Someone was knocking on the door of his cabin. “Captain Sparrow!” came the voice of Sam Hopkins.
Jack swung off the bunk, and opened the door. “Mr. Connery’s compliments, sir, and he said you ordered him to call you when the watch changed.”
“Very good, thank you,” Jack said. “I’ll be up directly.”
Still groggy with heat and sleep, he stumbled into the head and availed himself of the facility. Then he fetched a canteen filled with water. Bending over the hole, he sloshed the tepid liquid over the back of his neck, then splashed several handfuls onto his face, sputtering a bit. The water helped wake him up. He combed his hair, tied it back, then pulled his clothes and shoes back on. The couple of hours of sleep had refreshed him, and the effects of the rum were long gone.
Grabbing his tricorne and his spyglass, he headed out onto the weather deck. Almost immediately he spotted Robby, now officer of the watch, coming down the ladder from the quarterdeck. “How’re you doing?” Jack asked, knuckling something grainy from the corner of his right eye.
Robby smiled, taking in the gesture, as well as Jack’s freshly combed hair and still-damp face. “Better. I took a nap too,” he confessed, with a grin. “We’re getting too old for all this riotous living and late night high jinks, Jack.”
Jack grinned back. “Speak for yourself, lad. I’m always keen for a bit of a riot.”
Donning his tricorne, he straightened, his voice going more formal. “Report, Mr. Greene?”
“I just checked our heading, Captain, and we’re proceeding on course. We’ve maintained a steady six knots, and we’re currently between twelve and fourteen miles into the Northwest Providence Channel. My estimate, judging by the traverse log, says we’re about three leagues south of Sandy Point on Great Abaco.”
“Very good, Mr. Greene. Continue on present course,” Jack said.
He headed over to the starboard rail to peer through his spyglass, but all he could make out of Great Abaco was a smudge on the eastern horizon. Jack wondered where Ayisha was, and what she was doing. Probably talking with her brother, catching Shabako up on—
“Sail ho! Sloop three points off the lee bow!” rang the voice of the lookout from overhead.
Jack snapped to attention. A sloop? A sloop?
Striding fast up to the port bow, he scanned the area in question with his spyglass, but he couldn’t spot the vessel from the deck, not yet. It’s probably just an honest merchantman, he thought, trying to reassure himself. No point in getting the wind up yet.
Heading back down the ladder, Jack looked up at the main crosstrees, where the extra lookout, an experienced able seaman by the name of Dan O’Shaughnessy, was stationed. Should he go up himself to get a look? Or wait? Cupping his hands around his mouth, Jack yelled up to the Irishman, “How far off do you make her to be?”
“Seven, maybe eight miles, Cap’n!” the answer came back.
Jack frowned, calculating. By the time he climbed up to where the lookout was, it would only be a few more minutes before the sloop would be viewable by spyglass from the elevation of the quarterdeck. He decided to check their position instead, so he hastened across the deck, then took the ladder steps two at a time. Quickly he checked their compass heading, then the traverse board, and did a quick mental calculation. He nodded. Robby’s estimate as to their position had been right.
Robby joined him up on the quarterdeck, peering down into the binnacle, then turning to regard him. Jack tapped the traverse board, then nodded at the first mate, silently indicating his approval of Robby’s estimate.
Roger Prescott, the helmsman now on watch, eyed him. “Trouble, Cap’n?”
“Too soon to tell,” Jack said, absently, staring off to port. “It may be nothing. But…” He trailed off.
“This is the Caribbean, aye, sir,” Prescott finished for him. “The Spanish Main, they call it. Pirates on the prowl here.”
“Exactly,” Jack said. He and Robby exchanged a look. Then Robby headed back down the ladder to the weather deck.
Jack paced restlessly on the quarterdeck for the next fifteen minutes or so. Word of the sail being spotted must have been spreading because off-duty crewmen began gathering on the weather deck, gazing off to port.
Spotting the burly lee helmsman, William Banks, Jack called to him to come up the ladder to the quarterdeck. Spyglass in hand, Jack pointed to the high, solid railing at the rear of the quarterdeck. “I’m going to climb up to the edge of the taffrail for a better look,” he said. “A boost, if you please, Mr. Banks.”
“Aye, Cap’n!” Banks cupped his hands. Jack lifted his left foot, much as he would have to mount a horse, and stepped into the impromptu “stirrup.” He sprang upward, and Banks lifted. Moments later the captain was up another seven feet, bracing himself against the portside stern lantern, focusing his spyglass off to port.
The sloop was there, in the channel, and he could see her, now that she was closer, only five or six miles away. She was moving faster than the cargo-laden Wicked Wench, and if she held to her current course and speed, she would intersect the Wench in thirty or forty minutes.
Jack squinted, adjusting the focus of his spyglass to get the sharpest view. A Bermuda-rigged sloop…
He lowered his spyglass, gnawing at his lower lip. If only this wasn’t a bloody sloop, he thought, uneasily. Still, there were hundreds of sloops sailing around the Caribbean. Some undoubtedly were pirate ships, while others were merchantmen.
But there was only one rogue pirate who preferred sloops, and he flew a red flag, emblazoned with a horned demon’s skull.
Jack didn’t recognize this particular sloop, but that was no comfort. Vessels plying the waters of the Caribbean were at risk from shipworm, a type of worm that could literally eat holes in a ship’s hull. It had been five years since he’d seen Koldunya. Borya might well have replaced the sloop he’d had five years ago with a newer one.
Jack raised the spyglass again, but the ship was too far away to make out any details. He couldn’t see any spot of red that might be a flag.
“Bugger,” he muttered under his breath. “Bugger, bugger, bugger!”
Well, there was one way to find out whether the sloop was a pirate or a merchant ship. Jack went back to the edge of the high railing and sat down, legs dangling, then bent over to hand Banks his spyglass. When he slid down, Banks caught his arm, steadying him as he landed.
“Helm to port,” Jack ordered Prescott. “Heading due west. Let’s be very gentlemanly and pass astern of her. I want plenty of water between us, Roger.”
Prescott nodded. “Aye, Cap’n.” He turned the wheel, and the Wicked Wench’s bow swung to port.
Jack called down the course change to Robby and saw the crew beginning to make the necessary adjustments to the sails. Jack, Banks, and Prescott watched tensely for the next few minutes, waiting to see what the sloop would do.
Thinking he saw movement from the sloop, Jack trained his spyglass on her again. He was right. She was altering course. He watched her as she turned, until he could see her full starboard side. She was definitely “wearing,” changing course by turning her bow away from the wind. It was a useful way to turn a vessel without tacking. As the sloop continued to change course, her sails nearly disappeared—Jack knew he was seeing them edge on. Then the sails reappeared as the sloop completed its full turn. Once more, she was aimed to intersect the Wicked Wench.
“Bugger!” Jack whispered again, under his breath. The one word didn’t seem adequate to relieve his feelings, so he said a few others, in three or four different languages, but he kept his voice down. After seeing the way Bainbridge had yelled, cursed, and raved, Jack was determined to maintain proper decorum.
At this point, there could be no further doubt; the sloop was a pirate vessel, and the Wicked Wench was her intended prey. Jack thought for a minute, picturing their current location in his mind. He knew these waters.…
Jack beckoned to Robby to join him on the quarterdeck. “Mr. Greene, n
ew course, due north. Keep her hard on the wind, not an inch to leeward.”
Robby’s expression was grim. “Aye, Cap’n!” He hesitated for a moment, glancing back at Banks, but the lee helmsman was on the other side of the quarterdeck. “Jack,” he said, softly, “do you think it’s him?”
“I think we’ll find out before long, Robby,” Jack said. “But for what it’s worth…” He trailed off and nodded. “Yes, I do.”
“God help us,” Robby whispered. Beneath his tan, he was pale. “He was the only man Captain de Rapièr ever feared.”
“He’s human,” Jack said. “It’s not like he’s some kind of bloody demon. And we’re aboard the Wench, Robby. She’s a good ship. She’s quick to the hand, and she has teeth.”
Jack glanced to port, then back at his first mate—his friend. “Robby, we can fight, and we will. We may lose, we may go down, but if we do, by Neptune’s beard, that Russian son of a bitch will know he’s been in a scrap.”
Robby nodded. Jack could see that he was trying to stay impassive, but he knew him too well to miss the fear in his eyes.
“Don’t forget, I know these waters, Robby. I’m wagering I know them better than Borya does. I’ve got an idea how to get him. You’re a praying man. Pray it works. Pray hard.”
“I will, Jack.”
Jack smiled and clapped Robby on the shoulder. “I believe I gave you an order, Mr. Greene?”
“Aye, Cap’n,” Robby said. He tried to smile, then turned away.
Jack heard him giving orders, and felt the Wench turn again, swinging back to starboard, heading due north. He headed down the ladder, then turned and went into his cabin. All his charts had been put away to make room for the little gathering earlier, but a quick search produced the right one. Jack lifted it, and with an expert snap of his wrist, sent it unrolling across his table. He bent over it, studying it. He’d ordered the course change based on memory; now it was time to check and double-check what lay to the north.
After looking again at the chart, Jack went back to the quarterdeck, moving fast, to examine the traverse board, where all the Wench’s positions, as determined by the chip log, were recorded, using pegs to mark their progress. Quickly he checked them, then, holding the figures in his mind, he ran back down the ladder, back to the chart. Muttering the numbers, he hastily grabbed a quill and some ink, then scratched them onto a scrap of parchment. Then he went back over the chart again.
Finally Jack sagged into his chair, and absently capped his bottle of ink. He was sure of their position now. The Wicked Wench was not quite twenty miles from an uncharted deepwater inlet, a trough in the coral reef about one mile wide and three miles long. The inlet dead-ended just east of the northernmost tip of a little island called Gorda Cay. If the Wicked Wench continued due north on her current course, all Jack had to do was turn just little bit to the northeast, and his ship would sail right into the inlet—and Borya would follow him.
Jack knew where the trough began. He also knew where it abruptly dead-ended. He was betting Borya didn’t.
He knew his plan was risky. If he didn’t time this maneuver just right, he and his crew would wind up trapped, sitting ducks. On the other hand, if he were successful, the pirate sloop would run aground, and the Wench would be free to come about and blast her to flinders with her twelve-pounders. A ship that couldn’t move couldn’t aim her cannons properly.
Jack took a deep breath and crossed his fingers. All I need is good timing and a bit of luck.
Time passed, seeming to crawl, as the two ships continued on their respective courses. As the afternoon lengthened, the pirate sloop gradually closed the distance between it and the Wicked Wench. Jack watched the gap between them narrow, checking the sloop through his spyglass as it drew closer and closer. When the sloop was barely two miles away, the pirate hoisted his colors.
It was almost anticlimactic for Jack to recognize the flag the sloop ran up as a rogue pirate’s distinctive red ensign. On some level he’d known the pirate ship pursuing him was Borya Palachnik ever since the lookout had shouted his alert.
Jack handed Robby the spyglass. When Robby lowered the glass, he was pale, but resolute. Jack kept his voice flat. “Mr. Greene, call all hands.”
Cupping his hands around his mouth, Robby shouted, “All hands on deck!” The ship’s bell rang stridently.
By this time many of the crew had already gathered, nervously watching as the sloop paced them, drawing ever closer. The remaining hands arrived quickly.
Jack turned and climbed a few steps up from the weather deck, waiting for his men to gather. As soon as he was sure they were all there, watching him silently, he spoke, raising his voice so all could hear. “Lads, you’re a good crew, none better. We’re shipmates, so I’m going to be honest with you. Lads, we’re in a tight spot. That sloop over there”—he pointed—“is a rogue pirate, flying the red flag. She’s after us, and we’re going to have to fight.”
Jack paused, hearing the mutter of anxious voices. He cleared his throat. Silence fell again. “I believe most of you have heard stories about how these rogue pirates treat the crews of vessels they capture. They slaughter them. No quarter, no mercy. Being captured is a death sentence. So, lads, we have no choice but to fight, and each of you must give his all. The Wench must not be captured. Savvy?”
Jack waited.
Robby, recognizing his cue, shouted, “No surrender! We fight!”
Slowly, a few voices at a time, the assembled crew picked up his words. “We fight! We fight! We fight!”
They chanted it, over and over, louder and louder, their voices rising and falling in unison, as their excitement grew. Soon the whole crew was pumping their fisted hands in the air, all of them shouting at the top of their lungs.
Jack nodded, then raised his own fist as they quieted, their faces turned up to hear him. “That’s my brave lads, my shipmates! Today we fight! We’ll fight like cornered bilge rats! We’ll fight, and we’ll win!”
His men cheered, and chanted again. “Fight! FIGHT! FIGHT! ”
“Victory!” yelled Jack. “VICTORY!”
The crew yelled with him, chanting for victory.
Jack looked over the assembled crew, and saw Ayisha, Tarek, and Shabako standing there, silent, beside Chamba, who was yelling and leaping up and down, as excited as his mates.
As the crew’s shouts died away, Jack nodded at their flushed faces. “I knew I could count on you! I’m proud to serve with you! Now, all hands, stand by for orders.”
He headed down the ladder, cleaving through the crowd of men, slapping backs, patting shoulders, flashing them a wide, confident smile. It had to be some of the best acting he’d ever done.
When Jack reached the three Zerzurans, he said, curtly, “If Chamba hasn’t explained, this is what’s happening. We’ve got a rogue pirate closing in on us, and he’s made his intention to attack us clear. The rogue pirates are the ones that give no quarter, savvy? That means they take no prisoners. If they capture us, we’re all dead.”
Ayisha gasped, and her brother put his arm around her. “The crew is going to be very busy,” Jack continued. “Too busy to deal with passengers. So I want you three to head below, all the way below to the cargo hold.”
Jack fixed Tarek with a stern glance. He’d been in the guards, surely he knew how to take orders. “Look over the cargo in the hold, and find someplace to hide there in the middle of the barrels. An empty spot, savvy? There’s a good chance we’ll take fire.” At their uncomprehending looks, he amended, “They will probably shoot cannonballs at us. Hide in one of the clear spaces. The ship may bounce around. Barrels may topple. Just find the best place, and stay there.”
He started to turn away, but Ayisha, her gray shawl held tightly around her, darted forward and grasped his arm. “Jack, isn’t there anything, any way that I can help? I want to help!”
Jack looked over at Tarek and a glance of understanding flashed between them. Shaking his head, he smiled faintly. “Sorry, love,
I’m afraid not. Unless you can arrange to blow up their powder magazine, the best thing you can do is to follow orders, go below, and stay there. Now go on, please.”
Without waiting for any more arguments from her, Jack headed back to give his orders. Behind him, he could hear Ayisha protesting, then she let out an indignant squawk. Jack suspected that the giant eunuch had picked her up bodily, to carry her below.
Jack spent the next few minutes ordering Robby and Frank Connery to “anchor by the stern” on the Wicked Wench’s starboard side—the side away from Borya. Jack didn’t want the rogue captain to see what they were doing.
Anchoring by the stern was a messy, arduous task, requiring the cooperation and strength of all available hands, but it would bring Jack the results he wanted—if all went according to plan.
Working together, under the supervision of the two mates, the crew would haul the thick, heavy anchor cable all the way from the bow on the main deck back to the stern, then pass it out of the aft-most gun port on the starboard side. Then, using ropes to keep the cable from falling into the sea, the crew would come up on the weather deck and haul the cable along the outside of the hull, all the way forward to the ship’s bow, where they’d secure it to the “small bower” anchor—basically, the Wench’s spare anchor.
When Jack gave the order to drop anchor, the small bower would plummet down into the water, catch on the bottom, and bring the ship up short, stopping her dead, before she could run aground at the end of the trough. While the anchor was dropping and catching, the sail handlers would spill all wind from the sails to stall the ship’s forward momentum.
Borya’s sloop was slowly closing on their port side, so the Russian wouldn’t be able to see what they were doing over on the starboard side.
Jack stood on the quarterdeck with his most experienced helmsman, Lemuel Matthews, on the wheel, and Chamba, who was on duty as the ordinary seaman, turning the hourglass and updating the traverse board. They were the only three who were exempt from the duty of hauling the anchor cable. Jack and Chamba stood side by side, watching as Connery and Robby gave the crew their instructions. The men went below to begin the operation.
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Price of Freedom Page 49
