Heart of Steele

by Brad Strickland

  Then the birds began swarming up in thousands, for an instant blotting out the little town in a fluttering wall of screaming white. Gulls, so many gulls, and my mind immediately cast back to the last time I had seen so many.

  That was when they had risen like an evil white cloud over the horror that had been the derelict bark Elizabeth Bingham.

  Their screaming cast a spell of silence over the decks of the Aurora. The closer we glided, the more apparent the destruction that was San Angel became. The harbor was empty and there was no giant bloodred pirate ship waiting for us with open gunports. In truth, there were no ships waiting at all. It was deserted, save for us. The little dock was cluttered with broken barrels and cases, fishing nets festooning the piers like seaweed. And the neat little houses gaped roofless at the cloudless sky.

  And still the gulls rose.

  “It’s a fishing village,” whispered Mr. Adams, coming up behind us. “Where are all the fishing boats?”

  At that moment there was a sharp scraping sound from underneath us. Something was dragging against the Aurora’s cooper-sheathed bottom. Uncle Patch looked over the side and all the color drained from his ruddy face.

  “Faith, Mr. Adams, they’re all right here,” he breathed in a dead voice. “You just have to know where to look.”

  I joined him at the railing and stared down into the azure water. I could just barely make it out, but I could see the faint outline of a fishing boat resting on the bottom of the harbor. It was the very tip of her single mast that was scraping against our hull. Other shadows loomed up out of the deeps.

  “Sharks!” Mr. Alonzo cried from where he stood clinging to the shrouds. “There’s another! And another! Blessed Mary, the bay’s alive with ’em!”

  And by then even I could guess what the sharks were feeding on.

  “Drop anchors, Mr. Adams,” came Captain Hunter’s unnaturally calm voice from where he stood high on the poop deck, “before we drive something through our hull. The bottom’s too crowded around here for the Aurora to rest comfortably.”

  Our anchors splashing down into that polluted water was the loudest sound I had ever heard.

  Once again I sat next to Uncle Patch and his medical kit, being rowed to another scene of death. The wind had shifted as soon as we had lowered the boats, and the reek that came boiling across the harbor to us from San Angel spoke volumes of burned buildings and ruin. Everything was quiet, as still as a tomb. Even Morgan’s men, men who had seen slaughter and bodies piled atop bodies, sat silent and nervously fingered their cutlasses as the oars rose and fell. The gulls wheeled indignantly above us, and no one would look into the bright blue water, fearing the dark, soulless eyes of the sharks that might stare back.

  Then we were standing on the little harbor street and that same water seemed pure as any angel’s tears. “’S blood,” Mr. Jeffers growled. “I was at Panama I was, in the thick o’ it with Morgan himself. We did dark things that day, Lord forgive me. But this …” He just stood there, shaking his head.

  The docks were thick with corruption and decay. Burros, cattle, and sheep had been slaughtered and left for the ravenous seagulls. We found no human bodies there or anywhere. That was almost worse than what we found aboard the Elizabeth Bingham. The crew had divided up into teams and began searching the town, desperately hoping to find someone, anyone, alive who could tell us what had caused this monstrous evil. As fast as they fanned out, they were back.

  “Town’s stripped bare, Cap’n,” reported Mr. Alonzo, his suntanned face as pale as everyone else’s. “Not a candle or a coil o’ rope anywhere! Whoever did it looted and then burned everything, so they did!”

  Captain Hunter nodded, not really listening. Like the rest of us, he was staring at the front of the Catholic church that stood in San Angel’s tiny town square. It had been a pretty little structure once, white and simple and holy. Now it stood desecrated, burned, and profaned. And all you had to do was glance at it to know who was responsible.

  Across the entire front of that small, inoffensive building, someone had written a gigantic H in bright red paint.

  “It’s a trap,” the captain said in that strange calm voice. “Baited in blood and betrayal. God’s truth, what kind of brain has the man who can come up with this?”

  I stood with my uncle, my heart in my mouth. Not a word had I spoken since we had landed, me who always has something to say. I was near thirteen and liked to think of myself as a man, with all the things I’d seen and done. Never had I felt more like a child since my mother had died. If seeing and hearing such things as this was what made a man, then it was a wonder anyone made it at all. I became aware of some kind of commotion behind us, but Captain Hunter was still speaking, and as far as I was concerned, his was the only voice in the world.

  “This was one of his safe harbors. He came here for food and supplies and to unload treasure and loot. On those days when the Red Queen hove to in the harbor, it must have been like carnival time to these poor wretched devils. There must have been dancing in the streets.”

  Somewhere someone began to yell, “Cap’n! Cap’n!”

  “William,” Uncle Patch began, sounding concerned.

  Captain Hunter’s flat, empty voice didn’t change a note. “They must have met her right at the dock, all of them singing and dancing. They had gathered flowers, flowers for the bloody Red Queen. Even their priest was there, come with his good book to bless their benefactor.” Now the words were grinding out of him, like wheat crushed to flour between great millstones. “Their bodies went to feed the sharks.”

  My uncle put a hand on his arm. “For the love of mercy, William.”

  “Did any of them get nervous when she sailed past the fishing boats riding at anchor? Did they have time to scream before that floating horror opened her bloodstained sides and vomited death and destruction on them? They trusted him! See what he did to the people who trusted him!”

  Now the commotion behind us was becoming too loud to ignore. I finally surfaced from the terrible reality around me long enough to recognize one of the voices. Mr. Tate was crowing his head off as he pounded his way through the packed pirates clustered around the captain.

  “They be comin’, sir! Can you not hear the drum? They be comin’!” he yelled, pushing men twice his size out of his way.

  “Who’s coming, Mr. Tate?” Captain Hunter said, never taking his eyes from the great dripping H on the side of the little church.

  “The Spanish, Cap’n, that’s who! The road east to Santiago is crawlin’ with Spanish steel! Soldiers and cavalry, comin’ at the double!”

  “Aye, it’s a trap!” snarled Uncle Patch. “A trap with jaws of steel closing on our necks!”

  “There’s a west road,” the captain said, finally tearing his gaze from the church. “How fares it?”

  “Another river of bloody Spaniard steel, Cap’n!” called Ezra Adain, one of the gunners’ mates, running with his men from the opposite direction. “They must have started marching days ago to be here now! Someone sent word of what was goin’ to happen. We’ve been betrayed!”

  “Back to the Aurora?” Captain Hunter thundered, brandishing his cutlass back toward the harbor. “It’s only a trap if we’re foolish enough to stay in it! Run, you sea dogs, run!”

  And run we did, pelting like madmen to the boats that rode on the polluted blue water. Fast we flew, oars stabbing into the very soul of the sea. Now we could all hear the drums, rumbling up from the converging roads. I imagined I even heard their boots, rising and falling, and my fevered mind swore I saw the sunlight flashing off silver breastplates and helmets, with the gold-and-crimson banner of Spain over all.

  “Row, curse ye, row!” Mr. Jeffers howled at his men. “The dons be indifferent sailors but the fiercest soldiers in the world! Remember Antwerp and row!”

  Antwerp. My old tutor, Mr. Home, had taught me the history of that sad city. Over one hundred years ago the soldiers of Philip II, he who had sent the Great Armada against Engl
and, had marched into the rebellious city of Antwerp. When they had marched out again, the city was destroyed and its people dead. Lord deliver us from the Spanish Fury.

  Up the sides of the Aurora we scrambled, leaving our boats to tow behind. Our sails were up and just catching the wind when the first of the Spaniards burst out through the gutted white buildings of San Angel. Even across the water, I could hear their shouts of outrage and despair. I felt my face grow red with shame. They thought we were the villains who had slaughtered the innocents, like King Herod in the Bible. Their muskets roared out at us, but we were already out of range and beating out to sea.

  We had cleared the long island that had failed to protect San Angel, and it looked as if we might be free. Then the second trap sprang.

  “Sails, Cap’n!” came a loud cry from our truncated mainmast, and I spied a spindly arm pointing beyond our stern.

  Captain Hunter turned and shaded his eyes with his hand. “Hardly seems fair, when you think about it.”

  Two heavily armed Spanish barks were standing in, racing toward the harbor passage on a quartering west wind. They flew huge red-and-gold banners and their sides were studded with too many guns.

  “Saints!” my uncle snarled. “They should not be floating under the weight of so many bloody cannons, let alone closing on us!”

  “The dons have always demanded good value for their gold, and they’ve always had a lot of gold,” Captain Hunter replied. “Mr. Tate! Run up a Spanish flag and let’s see if we can at least confuse our friends! Mr. Alonzo! On deck, sir, your services may soon be needed! Mr. Jeffers! Man your guns but keep the men below the bulkhead! Stand by, all! If you have any prayers, now would be a good time for them!”

  I watched the men come pouring up on the deck in threes and fours and heard Mr. Jeffers whispering harshly to them as they arrived. “Steady, lads, steady! Crouch down! We’re in for it now, we are!” Mr. Adams ran up our Spanish flag, but it looked a puny thing, not crackling and snapping with vengeance like the ones behind us. I didn’t see how it could fool anyone. It didn’t, of course, but it did buy us a few heartbeats of time, and that was what we most needed.

  The flag and our disguise made the pursuing barks hesitate, but only for a moment. Then they were coming on again, closing on us rapidly. We would pay dearly for the missing sections of our masts and the sails they had held. The Aurora was simply not as fast as she had been before her alterations.

  As we turned downwind, they were suddenly bracketing us, coming up one on each side, with ourselves trapped between them. And both of them but a few hundred yards off. Grim sailors stared at us. Not a word was spoken, not a curse hurled, just eyes that burned with cruel promises. They gave not a signal that I saw, but suddenly the bark on our left opened fire.

  It was no warning shot, but a great roaring broadside. The cannonballs either fell short, skipped, or bounced ineffectively off our sides. The other Spanish ship, a little farther off, held her fire.

  “The Spanish flag has failed, Mr. Adams!” Captain Hunter called out over the noise. “Run up the Union and see if that gets us anywhere!” As quickly as he spoke, the gaudy red-and-gold flag ran down and the solid old Union was hoisted up in its place. It made me feel good to see it fluttering where the Jolly Roger had flown so often. It did nothing for the dons, however. The two barks came angling in, ranging for better shots.

  “So much for flags!” Captain Hunter shouted. “Mr. Jeffers, I suggest you run out your guns, and be quick!”

  “Aye, aye, Cap’n! Stand to, lads! Get all that artwork off the sides! It’s ball and powder now and the devil take the hindmost!”

  With a deadly speed, men were ripping away the painted canvas gunports from the sides of the Aurora, exposing the real ones underneath. The second our gunports sprang open, both barks opened fire on us! They were now so close that they could not miss, and their shot pounded against the hull. The valiant Aurora shuddered as ball after ball struck home.

  “Why are we not returning fire?” I demanded of Uncle Patch. He stood there grim as death. There was nothing my uncle hated more than battle. He considered it a waste, and I had often wondered, if that was his opinion, why he had ever gone to sea for the navy.

  “Mr. Jeffers is getting a feel for them, Davy. It takes a cold, steady man to calculate cannons. If you do it right, it costs you. If you do it wrong, it costs you even more!”

  I watched Mr. Jeffers and realized that he was counting. I could see his lips move and his head nod. The Spanish barks fired again, the port one first, the starboard one mere seconds later. The first was firing solid shot, the second chain, meant to cut through our lines and men. Neither had any effect on Mr. Jeffers.

  “Brave they are, but slow, lads! Roll ’em out and we’ll touch ’em up good! Starboard fire!”

  Our starboard guns roared out and the crews immediately began to reload. As they feverishly worked, Mr. Jeffers literally skipped across the deck to where the other crews awaited his orders.

  “Larboard fire!”

  Now the port guns blazed away, and for the briefest moment their Spanish target disappeared in billowing white clouds, only to reappear as their own guns fired. Barely a minute and a half passed before Mr. Jeffers was back with his original guns.

  “Starboard fire!”

  From where Uncle Patch had stuffed me, I watched the starboard guns hammer their target. Then I turned, my eyes following the sprinting Mr. Jeffers.

  “Larboard fire!”

  This time our guns came home on the heavy Spanish ship. Our broadside blew gaping holes into the rails of the bark, and I saw at least two of their great guns upset and crashing back across their decks. More broadsides rang out. The dons were brave but slow, between them managing to get off but one broadside to our two. Cannons roared again, and I clapped my hands over my ears and thanked our stars that neither of our enemies was the Concepcíon, nor had any of their crews trained under her captain, Don Esteban de Reyes. He would have handed us our heads by now, even with two barks instead of his great war galleon. Just then, part of our starboard railing exploded into splinters, and I feared for our mainmast and the men crouched beneath it.

  Then we hulled the starboard bark, and her foremast came crashing down. She peeled away from us, her crew striving to clear her forecastle and keep her afloat. We pulled away from her but her sister kept coming, still firing away at us, cheered on by the sailors of the crippled bark.

  But even stripped of her topgallant masts, the Aurora was the superior ship, and with the wind full behind us the remaining bark didn’t stand a chance of catching us. Still, far into the night she pursued us, blazing away with her bow-chasers until she finally dropped below the horizon and out of range.

  Butcher’s Bill

  FROM ALL I could tell, the Aurora was sound in body, though the Spanish broadsides had shattered her limbs. The main topmast was gone at the partners, shot clean away, and the foremast had been so badly sprung, a strong wind would snap it in two like a dry stick. The whipstaff had been shot through, and the crew had rigged a makeshift, meanwhile steering the frigate by means of pulling on ropes belowdecks, directed by a crewman shouting orders down through the cockpit.

  But most of this I learned later, for busy were my uncle and I with the wounded. Three men had been killed outright: George Sawyer, Lloyd Jones, and Pondoo, who was one of the score or so of freed slaves who had willingly joined our crew. I had come to know these three men over our months at sea, and their deaths hit me hard. George Sawyer had been a navy man, mostly silent, but friendly and always willing to give a crewmate a rest by taking on part of his job. Jones had been a Welshman who loved a joke and a song, aimed his cannon as true as any could wish, and was our best fiddler. Pondoo, if that were even his real name, we had taken from our first prize. The poor man had been a slave, belonging to the Spanish captain of the very first privateer we had taken. When he heard our crew’s voices, he had pleaded, “I know English! Take me from this man, please. He beats me.
”

  Strong as any ox, many a time he had talked to me in his soft voice of his harsh life. He was taken from Africa, he had said, when he was but a child, and for a time was a slave on Tortuga, when that island was in English hands. Taken then by the French and sold to the Spanish captain, he lived a life of misery for many years. Once I had asked if he wished to go back to Africa.

  “Don’t know,” he had said quietly. “My whole family was taken. What is Africa without my family?” His hope was that somehow he could find his mother, father, brothers, and sister in the New World, but that was a dim enough wish. Come to that, he thought his family might have died on the slave ship coming over from Africa, for on it they were treated like animals, separated one from the other, and chained, and half or more of them had died.

  But though we had lost those three, the seventeen others who were wounded still had hopes of living, and my uncle worked like a dog over them, stitching and splinting, patching them up as best he could. It was remarkable to me always that the men seldom cried out or complained, even with the most terrible wounds. One old fellow, Davis by name, was placed on the operating table by some of his shipmates. The moment my uncle cut away Davis’s shirt, he shook his head. A horrible long spear of wood, probably part of a spar, had pierced him through the chest.

  Blood dripped from the corners of his mouth. He said in a wheeze, “It’s bad, ain’t it, Doctor?”

  “Bad enough,” Uncle Patch said shortly. “Your lung is pierced, Davis.”

  He nodded, his eyes dull. “Be I goin’?” he asked in that same rusty wheeze.

  “I’ll do what I can,” said my uncle.

  Old Davis raised a hand, flailed it, and caught my uncle’s wrist. “Be I dyin’?” he said with a grim insistence.

  My uncle gently released the clutching hand. “Davis, I think you are.”

  “Put me aside, then,” Davis answered at once. “Work on them as can be saved.”

  “One thing at a time,” insisted my uncle.