by Lance Morcan
On board Minstrel, Kemp directed musket-fire at the departing craft. He had the satisfaction of seeing two more pirates struck down before they were out of range. One was the fellow who had struck down Drake Senior and Svenson.
Throughout all this Drake Senior lay unmoving where he’d fallen.
Below deck, as the sounds of conflict faded, Susannah and the other women hurriedly removed the makeshift barricade they’d set up. Wives, partners and children were desperate to find our how their menfolk had fared. Through the port holes, they’d seen the pirates’ brigantine rowing away and heard the defenders cheering, so realized their menfolk had prevailed.
Not so sure of the outcome was Irishman John Donovan who had concealed himself in the hold at the first sign of trouble. Hidden amongst water barrels, he couldn’t be sure the defenders had prevailed so he chose to remain concealed for the moment.
Susannah led the women topside while two of the single women stayed below to look after the children. No-one wanted the young ones to be exposed to the aftermath of the violence that had occurred above deck.
As Susannah emerged into the sunlight, the first sight that greeted her was the still form of her father lying in a pool of blood on the deck. She cried, “Papa!”
24
Sydney Town, 1841
The initial excitement of escaping from Parramatta was starting to wear thin for Jack who was facing the prospect of having to overnight in Sydney Town. He’d been observing the docks since early afternoon, hoping an opportunity would present itself for him to stow away aboard one of several ships that were being provisioned alongside the main wharf. Alas, no such luck.
If anything, the number of Red Coats he’d seen earlier had increased. The soldiers were closely monitoring all comings and goings on the wharves, and checking the identities of anyone who looked out of place. They’re looking for me! He considered it a safe bet his escape from the penal settlement had been reported. That’d explain all those bloody Red Coats. Jack decided to give it another five minutes then he’d give up for the day and try again tomorrow.
Five minutes dragged out to ten and then fifteen until a disheartened Jack finally flagged it and wandered back up into Sydney Town. He was resigned to finding lodgings for the night and trying his luck down at the docks again tomorrow. His next problem was money: he didn’t have enough for both lodgings and a meal, and the fine breakfast he’d had that morning was already a distant memory. The hunger pangs were beginning to gnaw at him.
First some food then I’ll worry about a bed.
Jack entered the first eatery he came to and used the sixpence he’d earned earlier to buy a splendid cooked meal and a jug of stout to wash it down. Fellow patrons included an assortment of local residents, visiting seamen and, to Jack’s consternation, several off duty soldiers.
Before he’d finished his main course, Jack found himself in conversation with a group of rowdy laborers who occupied an adjoining table. They insisted he join them and, against his better judgment, he did. It turned out to be a fortuitous development as one of the laborers, a Cornishman, told him of a vacancy for a live-in handyman at a nearby boarding house.
Jack realized that could be the solution to his need for temporary lodgings until he managed to stow away on one of the ships. He bolted down the remainder of his meal, thanked his newfound friends for their company and excused himself. Before his friends allowed him to leave, they made him promise he’d return to the eatery the following evening. He agreed to that and hurried off.
It was dark by the time Jack found the boarding house his Cornish friend had told him about. A crude, hand-painted sign hanging from a first floor balcony read: Live-in handyman wanted - Pays 1 shilling a week & full board.
Jack rang the front door bell and was greeted a minute later by the establishment’s middle-aged proprietor, Jim Todd, a timid little Welshman who had just downed his third gin of the evening and looked decidedly unsteady on his feet.
“Can I help ye?” Todd asked.
“I’m here about the vacancy,” Jack said with a cheery grin.
“Ye’ll have to come back in the morn,” Todd said. He began to close the door.
Jack stuck his foot in the doorway, preventing the proprietor from closing it.
“Hey!” Todd objected.
“This is a one-day only offer,” Jack said cheekily.
“Who is it, Jim?” a woman’s voice enquired from inside.
“Just a chap here about the job, dear,” Jim replied.
“I’ll be right down.” The voice, which sounded assertive to Jack’s ears, belonged to the proprietor’s wife, Joan.
Todd stared at Jack glumly as his wife descended the stairs to talk to the visitor.
Before he’d even met her, Jack decided the proprietor’s wife wore the pants in this marriage. That was confirmed seconds later when Joan appeared in the open doorway and shooed her husband back inside as though he was a pet dog.
The not unattractive Welshwoman ran an appraising eye over Jack. She liked what she saw and she made no secret of that. “You’re here about the job, young man?”
“Ah…I’m Jack…ah…Billy Kennedy, ma’am,” he said, adopting the moniker he’d used earlier that day. “I’ve come about the job.”
“Are ye a handyman, Billy?” Joan asked with a twinkle in her eye.
“That I am, ma’am.” Jack wasn’t sure if there was a double meaning in Joan’s question, but he hoped there was. He found Joan Todd very fetching even if she was older than the women he was usually drawn to.
“Well ye best come in and tell me why I should give ye the job.” Joan stepped aside and motioned to the Cockney to enter.
Inside, Jack heard laughter and the hum of male conversation. Through an open doorway at the rear of the establishment he saw a dozen or so men eating dinner in the dining room. He guessed they were the boarders. More laughter. It was a happy establishment, Jack decided.
“Dinner’s served at six o’clock sharp,” Joan said. She spoke as though Jack already had the job. “Have ye eaten, Billy?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Then ye won’t mind talking to my husband and me while we finish our dinner.” She led Jack upstairs to the private quarters she shared with her husband. There was no sign of any children.
They entered a dining room where Todd was in the process of emptying the remains of a gin bottle while pecking at a hot cooked meal. Jack realized he’d interrupted the Todds’ dinner. He mumbled an apology, but Joan waved one hand dismissively and motioned to him to join her and her husband at the dining table while they finished eating.
Joan proceeded to demonstrate she had a hearty appetite as she attacked her meal, finishing it even before Jim finished his. She offered her husband no explanation why she’d invited Jack to their dining table, and Jim didn’t question her. He seemed content to leave his wife to attend to all business matters.
As soon as Joan finished eating, she began quizzing Jack on his background. Thankfully, he’d had time to concoct a convincing story, advising his prospective employers he’d been traveling around New South Wales hiring out his services as a handyman since arriving in the colony a year earlier.
Joan didn’t buy a word of what Jack was telling her, but the young man intrigued her and she decided to humor him for the moment.
What Jack didn’t know was the saucy Welshwoman had long since tired of her inadequate husband who was more interested in liquor than in her or anything she had to offer. She’d only tolerated his continued presence at the boarding house because it was his money that financed the business and the reasonably comfortable lifestyle it provided. Otherwise, he’d have been out on his ear long ago.
To compensate, Joan occasionally and discreetly took on a younger lover. Sometimes, the chosen one was a boarder she liked the look of.
Fortuitously for Jack, his arrival at the boarding house coincided with a long period of abstinence on Joan’s part. A long period by her standards at least: s
he hadn’t had a man in more than three months and she was like a dog in heat.
While Jack wasn’t good looking by any means, there was something about him that attracted her to him. For the life of her, she didn’t know what that something was, but she was determined to find out. “De ye still want the job Billy?”
“Yes ma’am,” Jack said without hesitation.
Joan quickly outlined the terms of employment, explaining that Jack would be expected to work from five o’clock in the morning to five at night Monday to Saturday. In return he’d receive one shilling a week and full board including meals. Jack had no objection to the terms. Besides, he didn’t imagine he’d be here more than a few days at most.
Jim Todd contributed nothing to the conversation and appeared to take no interest in it. He was content to drain the last of the gin from the bottle and was now glassy-eyed and inebriated. Without excusing himself, he stood up and lurched toward the door.
As soon as he’d gone, Joan turned to Jack as if her husband had never been in the room. “Now let me show you to your quarters and you can get settled in.” The accommodating Welshwoman stood and led Jack out of the dining room. She paused at the top of the stairs and turned back to her newest employee. “If we are going to be living in the same establishment, ye best tell me your real name, Billy.”
Jack realized he hadn’t fooled her at all. “Ah…Jack Marshall,” he lied. Can’t hurt letting her know me first name at least. He looked at her to see if she’d bought it.
Joan smiled knowingly. “Jack Marshall,” she whispered. “Don’t worry, your secret’s safe with me.” She reached out and squeezed his shoulder with all the familiarity of old friends.
Jack suddenly felt excited. Right now stowing away with rats and other creatures in the hold of some ship was the last thing on his mind.
25
Makah Nation, West Coast, North America, 1842
The spring thaw had arrived in the Northwest. Oregon Country’s rivers were swollen from the melting snows, and the hills were a blaze of color as flowers that had laid dormant over the winter burst into life.
Makah hunting parties took advantage of a rare fine day to venture deep into the interior in search of the elk and black bears that were plentiful at this time of year. Others scoured the coastline in search of the increasingly elusive sea otters. The Makah remained ever hopeful the traders’ ships would resume their visits to trade their muskets for the valuable sea otter fur.
Nathan and Tatoosh had gone their own way, hunting elk in the hills that overlooked Neah Bay. The blood brothers studied the ground for tracks and other spoor as they climbed one of the highest hills in the area.
Only days shy of his twentieth birthday, Nathan cut a fine figure in his traditional native garments. Tall and broad-shouldered with rugged good looks and startling blue eyes, the young white was considered a fine catch by the many maidens who desired to share his lodge. As a result, he seldom slept alone at night.
As he followed the young chief up the hill, his mind was on his latest dalliance – a pretty slave girl from a tribe to the south. While not as skillful in the love-arts as Tagaq had been, she’d proven an adventurous lover since Nathan had lured her to his lodge several weeks earlier, and he found he was looking forward to their next liaison.
There had been no shortage of women, whether they were from Neah Bay or from neighboring villages, for the young white. They’d been a pleasant diversion, but he longed to be able to pursue and bed eligible Philadelphian gals, and to converse with them in English.
Tagaq was now but a distant memory. Nathan had soon gotten over her violent death of almost a year earlier. While he’d been fond of her, he quickly realized after her passing that their relationship – for him at least – had been based on lust, not love. He’d replaced her with another willing maiden within a week of her death, and had shared his bed mat with more than a dozen others since then.
Even so, on the rare occasions he thought of Tagaq, he did experience a twinge of guilt. Nathan was aware her loss should have affected him more. If he was honest with himself, it was unlikely he was capable of ever truly loving a woman. Conditioning had taught him to view women as the Makah men viewed them – as companions to warm them at night and as workers to attend to chores by day.
As he reached the summit of the hill they were climbing, Nathan saw he’d fallen some distance behind Tatoosh. His hunting companion had picked up spoor and was now running down the other side of the hill, away from him.
Normally, Nathan would have been overtaken by the thrill of the chase and joined in the pursuit. On this occasion, he stopped to admire the three hundred and sixty-degree view. Behind him, to the south, clouds scudded across snow-capped peaks that stretched all the way to the horizon; ahead of him, to the north, shadows cast by other clouds moved like living beings across the waters of the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
Something caught Nathan’s eye. At first he thought it was a low cloud scudding across the strait. Then he realized it was the billowing sail of a ship. His heart jumped and the rare sight made him lose his breath momentarily. The ship, a two-masted schooner, sailed from west to east, or left to right, through the strait.
Tatoosh had seen it, too. He immediately forgot about the hunt and jogged back up the hill to his friend’s side. “They have come to trade muskets to our neighbors to the east,” he said matter-of-factly.
“How far to the east?” Nathan tried to sound casual.
Tatoosh shrugged. Thanks to the forest telegraph that was so efficient in these parts, he knew exactly where the ship was bound, but he had no intention of sharing that with his friend. Nathan had seemed withdrawn in recent times, and Tatoosh suspected he still harbored a desire to return to his former life.
The young chief was right. It had been nearly four years since Nathan had been captured by the Makah, and eight since he’d left his hometown of Philadelphia. Increasingly, his thoughts had been turning to the family and friends he’d left behind. He had long since given up any hope that anyone was looking for him and other survivors of the shipwreck. However, he hadn’t given up on escaping Neah Bay. Seeing the schooner got him thinking.
The blood brothers watched the vessel until she disappeared from sight then, without a word, began walking down the hill in the direction of the tracks Tatoosh had been following. As they walked, the young chief observed his companion out of the corner of his eye. He could see Nathan’s mind was far, far away.
#
That night, as the villagers slept, Nathan lay on his back staring at the wooden rafters of his lodge. For some time now, he’d had his own lodge – a gift from Tatoosh’s now deceased father Elswa. Next to him, fast asleep, lay the pretty slave girl whose company he’d been enjoying of late.
Nathan couldn’t get the sight of the schooner out of his mind’s eye. That’s my way outta here! A plan was beginning to take shape.
Although Tatoosh hadn’t specified where the schooner was bound, Nathan thought it likely she was heading for a sheltered bay that marked the eastern boundary of the Makah nation. Known as Whale Bay, it was home to a Makah sub-tribe. It also had a large colony of sea otters, and traders were well aware of that.
The young white had visited Whale Bay several times on trading ventures with the Makah. They’d traveled by canoe. From memory, the fifty-mile sea journey in canoes laden with trade items had taken almost a full day. Too long, he thought. He was under no illusions any attempt to escape from Neah Bay by canoe would be doomed to failure. They’d catch up with me within a few hours. One man in a canoe was no match for a canoe manned by seasoned paddlers.
Nathan thought he could reach the bay quicker and more safely on foot. Across country, the distance would be half that by sea. He estimated he could complete the journey in less than half a day. Nathan sat bolt upright, his mind racing. It’s now or never. If the schooner was even where he hoped it was, he couldn’t be sure she’d stay there for any length of time. Every minute was critical.
The young white strained his ears, listening for any foreign sound. Aside from the rhythmic breathing of his sleeping partner, the occasional hoot of a distant owl was the only sound to be heard. Nathan quietly pushed himself to his feet. He poked his head out of the door of his lodge and looked around. The village slept. There was no moon, which suited his purposes nicely. The only signs of life were two lookouts who could be seen conversing quietly on the far side of the village.
Climbing up into the rafters of his lodge, Nathan retrieved a survival kit he’d hidden there for just such an occasion. It contained smoked fish and various preserved foods, a water bottle and other essentials, and was wrapped in a blanket. He descended to the floor and stuffed the kit into his backpack, which he slipped over his shoulders. Taking care not to wake the slave girl, he tucked his hunting knife and a tomahawk into his belt then ventured outside. When he was satisfied no-one else was around, he moved silently between the lodges to the nearby beach. There, he placed his backpack in the bottom of a canoe. After pushing the craft into the water, he climbed aboard and quietly paddled into the darkness.
Freedom here I come!
Nathan still planned to flee across country, but before he did anything he wanted to throw any pursuers off his scent. The tracks he’d left on the beach, and the missing canoe, would serve that purpose nicely – he hoped.
26
Bata, Equatorial Guinea, 1848
One week after the pirate attack on Minstrel in the Bay of Guinea, the brigantine and her survivors finally reached the safety of the port city of Bata, in the African nation of Equatorial Guinea. There, Captain Mathers, who had mercifully remained sober since the violent incident, took stock of casualties.
Seven of Minstrel’s men had been killed, including three crew and four passengers, and a further eight wounded. All those involved in the violence had cuts and bruises at the very least.
