The Mammoth Book of New Comic Fantasy

by Mike Ashley

  “– this causeless mutiny – plotted in secret – ringleaders did not escape my eye – some loyal hearts and true poisoned by men of evil – forgive you personally, but – sully the British Flag – cannot meet my eye – in the words of that great man –”

  “Oh, no!” said Alex involuntarily, but Billy was already giving the captain the pitch on his boatswain’s whistle.

  “Oh, my name it is Sam Hall, it is Sam Hall.

  Yes, my name it is Sam Hall, it is Sam Hall . . . .”

  Like most Hokas, the captain had a rather pleasant tenor, reflected Alex, but why did they all have to sing “Sam Hall” before being hanged?

  “Now up the rope I go, up I go . . . .”

  Alex winced. The song came to an end. Yardly wandered off on a sentimental side issue, informed the crew that he had had a good home and loving parents, who little suspected he would come to this, spoke a few touching words concerning his golden-furred little daughter ashore, wound up by damning them all for a pack of black-hearted scoundrels, and in a firm voice ordered the men on the end of the rope to do their duty.

  The Hokas struck up a lively chanty, and to the tune of “Haul Away, Joe” Yardly mounted into the air. The crew paled and fainted enthusiastically as for five minutes he put on a spirited performance of realistic twitches, groans, and death rattles – effective enough to make Alex turn slightly green behind his board. He was never sure whether or not something at this stage had gone wrong and the Hoka on the rope was actually being strangled. Finally, however, Yardly hung limp. Billy Bosun cut him down and brought him to the captain’s cabin, where Alex signed him up under the name of Black Tom Yardly and sent him forward of the mast.

  Thus left in charge of a ship which he had only the foggiest notion of how to run, and a crew gleefully looking forward to a piratical existence, Alex put his head in his hands and tried to sort matters out.

  He was regretting the mutiny already. Whatever had possessed him to throw the captain of a British frigate overboard? He might have known such a proceeding would lead to trouble. There was no doubt Yardly had been praying for an excuse to get out of his navigational duties. But what could Alex have done once his misguided impulse had sent Yardly into the ocean? If he had meekly surrendered, Yardly would probably have hanged him . . . and Alex did not have a Hoka’s neck muscles. He gulped at the thought. He could imagine the puzzlement of the crew once they had cut him down and he didn’t get up and walk away. But what good is a puzzled Hoka to a dead plenipotentiary? None whatsoever.

  Moreover, not only was he in this pickle, but five days had gone by. Tanni would be frantically flying around the world looking for him, but the chance of her passing over this speck in the ocean was infinitesimal. It would take at least another five days to get back to Plymouth, and hell might explode in Bermuda meanwhile. Or he might be seized in the harbor if someone blabbed and strung up as a mutineer before he could get this green horror off his chin.

  On the other hand –

  Slowly, Alex got up and went over to the map on the bulkhead. The Hokas had been quick to adopt terrestrial place names, but there had, of course, been nothing they could do about the geographical dissimilarity of Toka and Earth. The West Indies here were only some 500 nautical miles from England; HMS Incompatible was almost upon them now, and the pirate headquarters at Tortuga could hardly be more than a day’s sail away. It shouldn’t be too hard to find, and the buccaneer fleet would welcome a new recruit. Maybe he could find some ammonia there. Otherwise he could try to forestall the raid, or sabotage it, or something.

  He stood for several minutes considering this. It was dangerous, to be sure. Cannon, pistols, and cutlasses, mixed with Hoka physical energy and mental impulsiveness, were nothing a man wanted close to him. But every other possibility looked even more hopeless.

  He went to the door and called Olaf. “Tell me,” he said, “do you think you can steer this ship in the old-fashioned way?”

  “To be sure Ay can,” said the viking. “Ay’m old-fashion myself.”

  “True,” agreed Alex. “Well, then, I’m going to appoint you first mate.”

  “Ay don’t know about that, now,” interrupted Olaf doubtfully. “Ay don’t know if it ban right.”

  “Of course,” said Alex hastily, “you won’t be a regular first mate. You’ll be a Varangian first mate.”

  “Of course Ay vill!” exclaimed Olaf, brightening. “Ay hadn’t t’ought of that. Ay’ll steer for Constantinople.”

  “Well – er – remember we don’t know where Constantinople is,” said Alex. “I think we’d better put in at Tortuga first for information.”

  Olaf’s face fell. “Oh,” he said sadly.

  “Later on we can look for Constantinople.”

  “Ay suppose so.”

  Seldom had Alex felt so much like a heel.

  They came slipping into the bay of Tortuga about sunset of the following day, flying the skull and-crossbones which was kept in the flag chest of every ship just in case. The island, fronded with tropical trees, rose steeply over an anchorage cluttered with a score of armed vessels; beyond, the beach was littered with thatch huts, roaring bonfires, and swaggering pirates. As their anchor rattled down, someone whooped from the crow’s nest of the nearest vessel: “Ahoy, mates! Ye’re just in time. We sail for Bermuda tomorry.”

  Alex shivered, the green beard and the thickening dusk concealing his unbuccaneerish activity. To the eagerly swarming crew, he said: “You’ll stay aboard till further orders.”

  “What?” cried Black Tom Yardly, outraged. “We’re not to broach a cask with our brethren of the coast? We’re not to fight bloody duels, if you’ll pardon the language, and wallow in pieces of eight and –”

  “Later,” said Alex, “Secret mission, you know. You can break out our own grog, bosun.” That satisfied them, and they lowered the captain’s gig for him and Olaf to go ashore in. As he was rowed away from the Incompatible, Alex heard someone start a song about a life on the ocean wave, in competition with someone else who, for lack of further knowledge, was endlessly repeating, “Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum.” They’re happy, he thought.

  “What yü ban going to do now?” inquired Olaf.

  “I wish I knew,” said Alex forlornly. The little Viking, with his skepticism about the whole pirate pattern, was the only one he could trust at all, and even to Olaf he dared not confide his real hopes. Such as they were.

  Landing, they walked through a roaring, drunken crowd of Hokas trying to look as villainous as possible with the help of pistols, knives cutlasses, daggers, sashes, earrings, and noserings. The Jolly Roger flew over a long hut within which the Captains of the Coast must be meeting; outside squatted a sentry who was trying to drink rum but not succeeding very well because he would not let go of the dagger in his teeth.

  “Avast and belay there!” shrilled this freebooter, lurching erect and drawing his cutlass as Alex’s bejungled face came out of the gloom. “Halt and be run through!”

  Alex hesitated. His sea-stained tunic and trousers didn’t look very piratical, he was forced to admit, and the cutlass and floppy boots he had added simply kept tripping him up. “I’m a captain too,” he said. “I want to confer with my . . . er . . . confreres.”

  The sentry staggered toward him, waving a menacing blade. Alex, who had not the faintest idea of how to use a sword, backed up. “So!” sneered the Hoka. “So ye’ll not stand up like a man, eh? I was tol’ t’ run anybody through what came near, and damme, I will!”

  “Oh, shut up,” said Olaf wearily. His own sword snaked out, knocking the pirate’s loose. That worthy tried to close in with his dagger, but Olaf pushed him over and sat on him. “Ay’ll hold him here, skipper,” said the Viking. Hopefully, to his squirming victim: “Do yü know the vay to Constantinople?”

  Alex opened the door and walked in, not without trepidation. The hut was lit by guttering candles stuck in empty bottles, to show a rowdy group of captains seated around a long table. One of
them, with a patch over his eye, glared up. “Who goes?” he challenged.

  “Captain Greenbeard of the Incompatible,” said Alex firmly. “I just got in.”

  “Oh, well, siddown, mate,” said the pirate. “I’m Cap’n One-Eye, and these here is Henry Morgan, and Flint, and Long John Silver, and Hook, and Anne Bonney, and our admiral La Fontaine, and –” Someone clapped a hand over his mouth.

  “Who’s this?” squeaked La Fontaine from under his cocked hat. Twenty pairs of Hoka eyes swiveled from him to Alex and back again.

  “Why, scupper and gut me!” growled another, who had a hook taped to the end of his hand. “Don’t ye know Cap’n Greenbeard?”

  “Of course not!” said La Fontaine. “How could I know a Cap’n Greenbeard when there ain’t any such man? Not in any of the books there ain’t. I’ll wager he’s John Paul Jones in disguise.”

  “I resent that!” boomed a short Hoka, bouncing to his feet. “Cap’n Greenbeard’s my cousin!” And he stroked the black, glossy, but obviously artificial beard on his chin.

  “Blast me, nobody can say that about a friend of Anne Bonney,” added the female pirate. She was brilliantly bedecked in jewels, horse pistols, and a long gown which she had valiantly tried to give a low-cut bodice. A quadrimammarian Hoka needed two bodices, one above the other, and she had them.

  “Oh, very well,” grumbled La Fontaine. “Have a drink, cap’n, and help us plan this raid.”

  Alex accepted a tumbler of the fiery native distillation. Hokas have a fantastic capacity, but he hoped to go slow and, in view of the long head start the others had, stay halfway sober. Maybe he could master the situation somehow. “Thanks,” he said. “Have one yourself.”

  “Don’t mind if I do, mate,” said La Fontaine amiably, tossing off another half liter. “Hic!”

  “Is there any spirits of ammonia here?” asked Alex.

  One-Eye shifted his patch around to the other orb and looked surprised. “Not that I know of, mate,” he said. “Should be some in Bermuda. Ye want it for polishing up treasure before burying it?”

  “Let’s come to order!” piped Long John Silver, pounding his crutch on the table. His left leg was strapped up against the thigh. “By the Great Horn Spoon, we have to make some plans if we’re going to sail tomorrow.”

  “I, er, don’t think we should start that soon,” said Alex.

  “So!” cried La Fontaine triumphantly. “A coward, is it? Rip my mainto’ gallantstuns’l if I think ye’re fit to be a Captain o’ the Coast. Hic!”

  Alex thought fast. “Shiver my timbers!” he roared back. “A coward, am I? I’ll have your liver for breakfast for that. La Fontaine! What d’ye take for me, a puling clerk? Stow me for a – a – sea-chest if I think a white-faced stick like yourself is fit to be admiral over the likes of us. Why,” he added cunningly, “you haven’t even got a beard.”

  “Whuzzat got to do with it?” asked La Fontaine muzzily, falling into the trap.

  “What kind of admiral is it that hasn’t got hair on his chin?” demanded Alex, and saw the point strike home to the Hokas about him.

  “Admirals don’t have to have beards,” protested La Fontaine.

  “Why, hang, draw, and quarter me!” interrupted Captain Flint. “Of course admirals have to have beards. I thought everybody knew that.” A murmur of assent went up around the table.

  “You’re right,” said Anne Bonney. “Everybody knows that. There’s only two here fit to command the fleet: Cap’n Blackbeard and Cap’n Greenbeard.”

  “Captain Blackbeard will do very well,” said Alex graciously.

  The little Hoka got to his feet. “Bilge me,” he quavered, “if I ever been so touched in m’ life before. Bung me through the middle with a boarding pike if it ain’t right noble of you, Cap’n Greenbeard. But amongst us all, I can’t take an unfair advantage. Much as I’d be proud to admiral the fleet, your beard is a good three inches longer’n mine. I therefore resigns in your favor.”

  “But –” stammered Alex, who had expected anything but this.

  “That’s fantastic!” objected La Fontaine tearfully. “You can’t pick a man by his beard – I mean – it isn’t – you just can’t!”

  “La Fontaine!” roared Hook, pounding the table. “This here council o’ pirate captains is following the time-honored procedure of the Brethren o’ the Coast. If you wanted to be elected admiral, you should ha’ put on a beard afore you come to meeting. I hereby declares the election over.”

  At this last and cruelest cut, La Fontaine fell speechless. “Drawer!” shouted Henry Morgan. “Flagons all around to drink to the success of our venture.”

  Alex accepted his warily. He was getting the germ of an idea. There was no chance of postponing the raid as he had hoped; he knew his Hokas too well. But perhaps he could blunt the attack by removing its leadership, both himself and La Fontaine . . . He reached over and clapped the ex-chief on the shoulder. “No hard feelings, mate,” he said. “Come, drink a bumper with me, and you can be admiral next time.”

  La Fontaine nodded, happy again, and threw another half liter down his gullet. “I like a man who drinks like that!” shouted Alex. “Drawer, fill his flagon again! Come on, mate, drink up. There’s more where that came from.”

  “Split my mizzenmast,” put in Hook, “but that’s a neat way o’ turning it, Admiral! ‘More where that came from.’ Neat as a furled sail. True, too.”

  “Oh, well,” said Alex bashfully.

  “Here, drawer, fill up for Admiral Greenbeard,” cried Hook “That’s right. Drink deep, me hearty. More where that came from. Haw!”

  “Ulp!” said Alex. Somehow, he got it down past shriveling tonsils. “Hoo-oo-oo!”

  “Sore throat?” asked Anne Bonney solicitously.

  “More where that came from,” bellowed Hook, “Fill up.”

  Alex handed his goblet to La Fontaine. “Take it, mate,” he said generously. “Drink my health.”

  “Whoops!” said the ex-admiral, tossed it off, and passed out.

  “Yo, heave ho,” said Billy Bosun. “Up you come, mate.”

  They hoisted the limp figure of La Fontaine over the rail of the Incompatible. Alex, leaning heavily on Olaf, directed operations.

  “Lock ’im in m’ cabin,” he wheezed. “Hois’ anchor an’ set sail for Bermuda.” He stared toward the sinking moon. Toka seemed suddenly to have acquired an extra satellite. “Secret mission, y’ know. Fi-ifteen men on a dea-ead man’s chest –”

  “Sling a hammock on deck for the captain,” ordered Billy. “He don’t seem to be feeling so well.”

  “Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum,” warbled Alex.

  “Aye, aye, sir,” said Billy, and handed him one.

  “Woof!” groaned Alex and collapsed. The night sky began majestically revolving around him. Shadowy sails reached out to catch the offshore breeze. The Incompatible moved slowly from the harbor. Alex did not see this . . .

  Bright sunlight awakened him. He lay in his hammock till the worst was over, and then tried to sort things out. The ship was heeling to a steady wind and the sounds of sail-flap, rig-thrum, plank-creak, and crew-talk buzzed around him. Rising, he saw that they were alone in the great circle of the horizon. In the waist, the starboard watch were sitting about telling each other blood-curdling tales of their piratical exploits. Black Tom Yardly, as usual, was outdoing all the rest.

  Alex accepted breakfast from the cook, lit the captain’s pipe in lieu of a cigaret, and considered his situation. It could be worse. He’d gotten away with La Fontaine, and they should be in Bermuda shortly after sunset. There would be time to warn it and organize its defenses; and the pirates, lacking both their accustomed and their new admiral, would perhaps botch the attack completely. He beamed and called to his first mate. “Mr Buttonnose!”

  Olaf approached. “Ay give yü good morning,” he said gravely.

  “Oh? Well, the same to you, Olaf,” replied Alex. There was a certain air of old world courtesy about the small Vi
king which seemed infectious. “What kind of speed are we making?”

  “About ten dragons’ teeth,” said Olaf.

  “Dragons’ teeth?” repeated Alex, bewildered.

  “Knots, yü vould say. Ay don’t like to call them knots, myself. It don’t sound Varangian.”

  “Fine, fine,” smiled Alex. “We should be there in no time.”

  “Vell, yes,” said Olaf, “only Ay suppose ve must heave to now.”

  “Heave to?” cried Alex. “What for?”

  “So yü can have a conference vit’ the other captains,” said Olaf, pointing astern. Alex spun on his heel and stared along the creamy wake of the Indomitable. There were sails lifting over the horizon – the pirate fleet!

  “My God!” he exclaimed, turning white. “Pile on all sail!” Olaf looked at him, surprised. “Pile on all sail!”

  Olaf shook his round head. “Vell, Ay suppose yü know best,” he said tiredly, and went off to give the necessary orders.

  The Incompatible leaped forward, but the other ships still crept up on her. Alex swallowed. Olaf returned from heaving the log.

  “Tvelve dragons’ teeth,” he informed Alex reproachfully.

  It was not a pleasant day for Admiral Greenbeard. In spite of almost losing the masts, he could not distance the freebooters, and the gap continued to narrow. Toward sunset, the other ships had almost surrounded him. The islands of Bermuda were becoming visible, and as darkness began to fall the whole fleet rounded the headland north of Bermuda City Bay. Lights twinkled on the shore, and the Hokas crowding the shrouds set up a lusty cheer. Resignedly, Alex ordered his crew to heave to. The other craft did likewise, and they all lay still.

  Alex waited, chewing his fingernails. When an hour had passed and nothing happened except sailors hailing each other, he hunted up Olaf. “What do you think they’re waiting for?” he asked nervously.

  The bear-like face leaned forward out of shadow. “Ay don’t t’ink,” said Olaf. “Ay know. They’re vaiting for yü to signal the captains aboard your flagship. The qvestion is, what are yü vaiting for?”