She pouted. “You promised me a string of pearls,” she reminded him.
“And when you arrive, you shall collect it. Arne has instructions to pay for them.” And as her face cleared, “You have gained something else, Georgette—a story to tell your grandchildren.”
A cloud of smoke had hung over the battle and was duly noted on nearby Tortuga, where a number of ships had hastily put out to see what was afoot.
They came upon the scene when the battle was already over, the flaming Maravilloso burned to the waterline and sinking, the mighty Alforza riding low in the water. She was taking water steadily into her hold as van Ryker towed her ruthlessly toward Tortuga.
When he sighted the line of approaching buccaneer ships, van Ryker stopped towing the Alforza forward and let her drift aimlessly. Well he knew those hastily launched ships out there would be shorthanded, low on shot, unprovisioned—but they were a pack and packs are always dangerous.
He watched as a longboat put out from the Alforza with Georgette preening in the prow and a full complement of Spanish officers, watched it as it went through the first of that line of ships. She was safe now, he thought, heading toward Cayona and that strident mother of hers.
Now he stood upon the rail, holding on to a ratline, and hailed the nearest ship. His whole ship’s company were in fullest agreement with what he was about to say, for he had discussed it with them and they were, to a man, eager to get on.
“Brethren of the Coast!” His voice drifted out to the nearest ring of buccaneer vessels—some of whose captains itched to attack van Ryker and take his gold from him. “We of the Sea Rover have taken this fine Spanish vessel and need it not. We know not what stores are aboard her, but rest assured they will be plentiful for this is the flagship of the duke of Sedalia-Catalonia. We are of one mind—to give this prize to a friendly captain of the brotherhood—that he may ransom her crew and spend her gold and have money to dice with! That he may refit her and careen and tallow her and let her carry him to harry the might of Spain wherever it may lie! And that he may take the rivers of wine that lie in her hold and drink the health of the men of the Sea Rover! So sail in with your grappling hooks at the ready and board her—she is yours. We give her to you freely.”
“To whom do you make this gift?” came a foghorn of a voice.
“To the strongest!” replied van Ryker instantly. “Decide among yourselves who that is. And drain a glass to us for the gift!”
As van Ryker stopped speaking, for a moment there was a dead silence. Then a mighty roar of approbation went up from the buccaneer ships. Hearing it, Flogg and the others who had hoped to bring this pack to harass van Ryker, to surround and capture him, looked at each other in balked impotent fury. And then abruptly they reconsidered, every man for himself, for here before them was treasure too— treasure in the great hold and in the cabins of the Alforza —the great ship herself was a treasure!
Pandemonium broke out among the ships of the buccaneer fleet. The great prize riding majestically before them belonged to the captain who could take it! Van Ryker had correctly judged his men.
Fear was struck into the hearts of the Spaniards on board the Alforza as the buccaneer fleet of Tortuga streamed out to board her. Iron grappling hooks were tossed and scraped against wood. Barefoot and cutlassed buccaneers stormed over the side to take possession.
But victory was short.
Van Ryker in the distance saw it happen. He watched, grim-faced, that first puff of smoke. They were fighting over possession of the Alforza now, that wild convoy that was escorting her into Cayona Bay. Soon there was a steady rattle of gunfire as the fleet broke up into groups, having at each other in fury over who should have the lion’s share of the loot. “Share and share alike” did not count that day.
And the Sea Rover sailed away from it. It was probably the first battle van Ryker had ever sailed away from, and he left it with a grim smile on his face.
He wondered how the little governor of Tortuga was going to handle his unruly daughter—and now his unruly buccaneers.
But in Tortuga, when the battle was over—and by then but half the ships were in condition to sail, and none of a mood to pursue the Sea Rover—they patched up their wounds and drank van Ryker’s health in the taverns. For he’d done handsomely by them, hadn’t he? Even if the Alforza, victim of furious if uncertain gunnery, did sink even as they fought to possess her in the middle of Cayona Bay, what did that matter? When buccaneers sailed over that spot where she lay like a jewel at the bottom of the brilliant blue bay, she would be called forever after “van Ryker’s gift to the Brethren of the Coast.”
But the battle had taken a toll on them too. The captain of the Maravilloso had got in a lucky shot before the Sea Rover's deadly accurate guns had struck his powder magazine and near blown him out of the water. The Sea Rover was taking on water; she had taken a pounding and needed repairs to her sheets and rigging, as well as repairs to a gaping hole in her hull.
Van Ryker knew he could not cross the Atlantic with his ship in this condition. With reluctance, he put ashore on an unnamed island, a mere group of rocks and beach with a fringe of palm trees, and made his repairs.
And then he set sail again. He knew there was no hope of overtaking the Goodspeed, even with the reckless amount of canvas he piled on in the effort, but he had no doubt her captain had observed through a glass how van Ryker had drawn off the Spaniards. Captain Bagtry, he told himself, would linger off Plymouth—and there the Sea Rover would rendezvous with the Goodspeed as planned.
It was with confidence that van Ryker headed his prow into the broad wastes of the Atlantic.
With misplaced confidence for he had no knowledge of the despairing thoughts that now consumed his young wife.
CHAPTER 20
Imogene never knew van Ryker had sailed the Sea Rover away to divert the Spanish. Indeed, none on the Goodspeed, including her captain, saw the Sea Rover come about and lure away the Spanish vessels—for the little Miller lad, with his mother in full pursuit, had collided with one of the cookpots and scattered fire all across the deck. Captain and crew and passengers had come running, for fire was the dreaded enemy of all voyagers.
By the time the fire was got under control, and the Miller lad soundly spanked, there was not a sail to be seen in any direction. So what reached Imogene was a somewhat different version of the truth.
“I thought Captain Bagtry said that damned buccaneer was protecting us,” grumbled a man in a high unfashionable sugarloaf hat to another who was crouched over the rail studying the sea through a spyglass. “And now you say there’s no sight of him?’’
“Right you are.” The linsey-woolsey-clad fellow with the spyglass turned his glass to give the empty sea another sweep. “Dumped us, he did. Unless he’s dropped back over the horizon.”
“Sailed back to Tortuga, more likely! And yon’s the reason for it, I’ve no doubt.” Sugarloaf gave Imogene an unfriendly glance, letting his voice rise so she would be sure to hear. “They’ll have had a fight and she ran off—and he don’t want her back! So he followed us until he made sure the wench hadn’t persuaded the captain to turn back and leave her in Tortuga where she’d be a trouble to him. Now he’s seen us plowing straight ahead, he knows he can rest easy and forget her. So we won’t see his sails no more!”
Imogene pretended not to hear but pain knifed through her heart. She wanted to scream at them, but she held her anger in check. For it was even possible.... Van Ryker could have sailed back to Tortuga, where he could exact an even more galling revenge on Don Luis by letting all the world know Veronique reigned there as his mistress.
She felt cut to the quick and turned a stony face toward the stares of the curious—and that brought out baleful looks from some of the women. And relief on the faces of some, for by now everyone knew that she was the wife of the notorious buccaneer and there had been rumors flying about that she had escaped him and that he was sailing fast to retrieve her—and who knew what he would do
in anger to those on board the ship that had carried her away?
Now word spread rapidly that she was the discarded mistress of a buccaneer—a woman to be despised and laughed at discreetly behind one’s hand. As the day sped by and no sails were sighted, that was regarded as clear proof that the buccaneer van Ryker had cast off this resplendent creature who had come running aboard in a ball gown and still wore it, like someone demented.
There she was, alone and silent as a ghost by the rail, still ablaze with topazes and diamonds, flaunting her illicit wealth in their disapproving faces. Did she think they were going to hold a ball in her honor? some tittered. Or was she going to wait there forever for van Ryker to catch up? Certainly she looked calm enough now.
It was a façade that had cost Imogene much, but at least it kept her pride from cracking. She stood silently at the rail because she did not want to go back to her cabin and face the specters of memory that would rise up to confront her—memories of another ship and a great cabin that had burned with love.
In the days that followed she was made aware, by many slights and drawn-away skirts, that the women passengers disliked her. The men, sober merchants for the most part, watched her covertly, yearning secretly for her delicious body but prudently keeping it to themselves. For there was a brooding emptiness in those beautiful delft blue eyes that told them they would get nowhere with her. That lovely expressive face had assumed a masklike quality that told the beholder nothing of what she was thinking or feeling.
Only one passenger, a small wrenlike woman named Gert, made any overtures of friendliness toward Imogene. At her vigil by the rail one day, Imogene heard a voice behind her say, “Would you not like to share a bit of my porridge, Madame van Ryker? For I’ve gone again and made too much and ’twill only be wasted?”
Imogene turned gravely to look down into that small pert face. “I’d like that,” she said gently. “And indeed I’ve some leaves of the new China drink, which would go well with it. If you’ve some hot water to brew it?”
The expensive new China drink! Gert was delighted. Imogene fetched the metal tin of black tea leaves and a pillow and sat and watched her newfound friend brew tea on the open deck. Around them other passengers, as was the custom, had built small careful fires on the deck and were making porridge. They watched curiously as Imogene and Gert shared the tea.
“You know why nobody talks to you?” Gert asked conspiratorially.
“No. Why?” asked Imogene indifferently.
“They be eaten up with envy,” pronounced Gert. “Especially them. The Osgoods.” She bobbed her head meaningfully at a large family of sallow-faced Puritans. “They’s going back to England for good. Said the Colonies was a Godless place. Full of your kind.”
Imogene turned to look at the nearby family clad in sober black. The woman’s back was ramrod straight and she returned Imogene’s inspection truculently. To gaze into their sallow faces, Imogene could not help remarking, one would have supposed their disapproval extended to sunlight itself, for all were notably pale.
Gert choked on her tea at that remark. The hot drink had warmed her bones and loosened her tongue. “Their children have names like ‘Sorry for Sin,’ ‘Penitence’ and ‘Lament Thy Thoughts,’ ” she told Imogene, giggling. “Their father calls himself ‘Bare Bones’. Imagine!”
Imogene shuddered. She turned to watch the children scurrying around with hunted pointy faces, trying to escape the notice of their dour, black-hatted father.
As if incensed at this obvious attention from a sinful buccaneer’s woman, Osgood’s wife leaped up, overturning a pewter bowl with a clatter. She had sharp features and an even sharper tongue, had Bare Bones’s wife—indeed she had narrowly escaped the pillory for some of her remarks made in the New World. She could not forgive this “pirate’s wench,” as she dubbed Imogene, for combing her hair at the rail day after day with a silver comb, whilst she, Godfearing woman that she was, was forced to comb her own dull locks with a wooden one.
“Gert Tyler, you are accepting tea from this pirate’s woman!” she shrilled. “I would think it would stick in your throat! And,” she added balefully, “there are those of us who’ll remember it of ye back in England!”.
Gert dropped her cup at this outburst. Imogene would have risen to confront her detractor, but Gert, busying herself cleaning up the spilled tea, tugged at her skirt to pull her back.
“They’s vengeful, these Puritans,” she muttered. “You’d best look to yourself. That pack there”—she nodded her head without looking up—“are going to Plymouth same as me.”
Imogene settled back with a sigh. She understood Gert’s fear of reprisal later. It did not surprise her that from then on Gert ducked her head and scuttled away when she passed. There were no more tea parties.
After that Imogene proffered nothing to the other passengers—not her friendship nor the fine claret and Canary that van Ryker had had put aboard for her use—although she did covertly pass out oranges among the children. She sat on deck alone, nibbling the excellent Cheshire cheese and the puddings and other dishes that were prepared for her by the ship’s cook and served by an eager cabin boy—both of whom had been overjoyed to receive as payment for their services golden links from the heavy money chain that lay in the bottom of her trunk. Around her on deck the other passengers gathered in little groups, cooking their oatmeal and dried pork and pease and munching dry ship’s biscuit. They washed down their food with beer and muttered as Imogene drank fine wine from a silver goblet that had, along with table cutlery and plates, been packed in the trunk that had been put aboard for her.
“Thinks she’s too good for the likes of us,” she heard more than once, but any overture she made was turned down with a sniff and a toss of the head as the Goodspeed's passengers banded together against her.
Imogene was a woman who loved life and good times and their treatment of her was a further burden. She was bereft—and lonely.
In time she found a friend—the ship’s cat.
His name was Nicodemas and he had thick short black fur and four white paws and a purr loud enough to wake the dead. He leaned blissfully against the legs of the passengers, purring for all he was worth—but it was with Imogene that he found a home.
It happened on a particularly unhappy day when Imogene sat on deck waiting for Nat, the cabin boy, to finish preparing her dinner. She spent the time looking pensively at the pen of green turtles, waiting patiently above deck for the day when they would be cooked and eaten. As Nat brought her a platter, from a nearby group gathered around their little cookfire a head turned spitefully.
“Pirate’s woman!” spat a voice. “No wonder nobody will eat with her.”
At that moment Nicodemas loped up, stared intently up into Imogene’s face with enormous earnest green eyes, and tentatively extended one furry white paw. He was hopeful of receiving a bit of succulent meat from her plate but Imogene, driven to fury by the constant ill will of her fellow passengers, accepted it as the paw of friendship.
“Nat.” Her clear voice rang out, drawing everyone’s attention. “Prepare another plate, if you please. I am to be joined by a gentleman.”
Bewildered, Nat did as he was told, looking uneasily around him.
“Set the platter down there beside me,” directed Imogene. She pushed it under the nose of the now excited Nicodemas. “Nicodemas is better company than anyone here,” she remarked casually to nobody in particular and there was a general mutter around the deck.
Nicodemas did not care about murmurs. Enraptured, he demolished his chine of beef, purring away, and afterward followed Imogene to her cabin, where he jumped to the foot of her bunk and sat happily licking his paws.
After that the black and white cat and the buccaneer’s woman were inseparable. And if there were those on board who complained that the ship’s cat had lost interest in the ship’s rats now that he was dining elegantly on silver platters, the captain—who valued Nicodemas—ignored such grumblings.
&nb
sp; Day followed endless day on this voyage across the ocean. Isolated, cold-shouldered, Imogene felt she would have gone mad had it not been for the company of her staunch furry friend, Nicodemas. But in spite of that, her spirits sagged.
For Imogene the storm was, in some ways, a godsend.
She had been slipping down of late, down into despondency. Not even Nicodemas with his friendly purr and his habit of curling up and sleeping on the foot of her bunk with his furry chin propped trustingly on her ankles, and his way of strolling up the blankets and touching her cheek with his warm pink tongue when he felt she should wake up and feed him, could pull her out of it. It seemed to her that her life, so turbulent always, was finally shattered past all repair. If she could not count on van Ryker, who could she count on? Oh, why had he not let her slip over the side of the ship to oblivion on that long-ago night when he had pulled her back from self-destruction—if he was going to do this to her?
She began to pace the deck through the long days, brooding on that. She ignored the frowns of the women passengers and how they averted their faces and passed by her with a contemptuous flirt of their skirts. She saw instead the cool deep water in whose depths one could float endlessly, those depths that made all human problems irrelevant....
With every day those waters looked more inviting to her.
She began to spend more and more time at the rail, staring in fascination at the gray green sea. The passengers remarked it—and shrugged. Did this foolish woman expect her buccaneer to rise suddenly from the sea like Neptune from the waves? They tittered to themselves and nodded their heads wisely. Imogene was far past caring. She was teetering on the brink of self-destruction.
Live without van Ryker, without him.... It pounded in her head, sapping her will to live. Half crazed with grief, one gray day she leaned into the mist far over the rail. It would take only a moment to go over the side and it seemed to her that it would solve everything.
Wild Willful Love Page 27
