Only Life That Mattered

by Nelson, James L.

  For all of Anne’s sharp tongue, the jailor and his assistants had treated them well. Mary had all but assumed they would be raped in prison, but in fact they had not been molested at all. It was one reason to be thankful they had been captured by the British, and not the Spaniards.

  The fact that they would be hung, and not burned alive, was another.

  The jailor opened Mary’s cell door first, with the guards arrayed in such a manner that she could not step out as the bailiff stepped in, manacles jangling in his hand.

  “This one becomes a sword,” Mary said, nodding toward the bailiff. “Do you reckon he knows the use of it?”

  “Shut it, you bitch, or by God I’ll see you gagged!” The bailiff was not the kind soul that the jailor was.

  “It won’t answer, Mary, dear, caressing that one,” Anne said. “I don’t think he likes women. Perhaps if you dressed as a boy again, he’d fancy you more.”

  The bailiff scowled, flushed red. Mary held out her hands, made no effort to resist. There might be the chance yet for an escape, or a clean death while making the attempt, but this was not it.

  The bailiff put the heavy iron shackles around her wrists, slid the bar through them, and fixed the pin in the end that would hold the manacles in place. She let her hands fall across her belly.

  “Now you look a right villain,” Anne called from behind the bars of her cell. “I should convict you sure, were I on the jury.”

  “Then I am pleased you will be on the same side of the bar as me,” Mary said. The bailiff took her by the arm, half guided and half pushed her out of the cell and up against the wall. Two of the soldiers who made up the guard stepped off, faced her, the stiletto points of their bayonets a foot from her chest.

  The other men turned to Anne’s cell, opened it, and secured her in the same fashion, and then she, too, was moved roughly into the alleyway. Two soldiers ahead of the women, two behind, with the jailor and the bailiff last of all, they marched down the narrow space between cells, like a tiny parade, toward the door at the far end.

  It was the first time the women had left their cages in a fortnight, the first time since the long sail around from Negril Point, locked down below aboard Barnet’s sloop. Mary could not resist glancing into the other cells as she passed by, but as she suspected, she and Anne were the only residents of that block.

  They stepped out the door at the far end and into the big room that Mary recalled from the one other time she had seen it, on the way into the prison block. The rough stones of the prison floor gave way to polished Spanish tile. The walls were a smooth stucco, white, of course, but without the streaks of mold that found their way into the humid cells.

  The bailiff and the jailor led them through the big door and into the courtyard around which were clustered the jail and His Majesty’s court and sundry government offices.

  It had been dark when last they had passed that way, the courtyard ringed with torches. But now it was lit brilliant by the morning sun and Mary had to turn her head from the brightest spots, blinking tears from her streaming eyes.

  Great irregular pieces of flagstone covered the open ground. The ubiquitous whitewashed buildings made up three sides of the courtyard, and the fourth was a row of columns, connected along their tops. Beyond the columns Mary could see the red roofs and the white homes of St Jago de la Vega, and a quarter mile beyond that, the sea. A fresh breeze blew unchecked across the open space.

  Mary breathed deep, glanced around, took it in the way a woman dying of thirst might gulp water. The sea. It glinted in the sunlight, sharp diamond slivers on the aqua-blue surface, right up to where it made a straight, sharp line on the horizon.

  Mary sucked the clean ocean air into her lungs. She lapped it up, swallowed it, devoured as much of the sensation as she could in the time it took their escort to hustle them across the courtyard and through the door at the far end.

  And then the ocean was lost from sight and they were in a small room with benches on either side, another door beyond, a soldier posted guard. The bailiff stopped.

  A few men lounged on the benches in the bored attitude of government officials, but they sat up, their interest piqued, at the sight of Mary Read and Anne Bonny.

  “Take a good look, boys, it’s the best you’ll get,” said Anne, her head up, her eyes fixed forward at some distant point.

  The bailiff nodded; the soldier at the door stepped aside, pulled the door open.

  Through the door, the courtroom. A big, airy space, the ceiling thirty feet overhead, rows of polished benches like pews in a church. It was crowded with spectators for this event, after a month of mounting anticipation. They filled the benches, stood at the back of the room and along the walls. The Members of the Council off to the one side, a long table with a row of clerks, already scribbling with their quills. And over it all the judge’s bench rose like a cliff.

  Their little parade stepped out, down between the row of benches, and Mary could not help but think how like a wedding it was. Past the gawking faces, she and Anne kept their heads back, eyes forward, looking at a spot just above the judge’s bench.

  They have taken everything, Mary thought. Everything but our lives, and soon they will have those too, but they cannot take our dignity if we do not yield it.

  To her left, standing in chains, were her former shipmates, the pirate band, the hapless sea robbers taken down at Negril Point. They were pushed off to one side, waiting for their chance to be set at the bar, to plead guilty or not, as if it would make a difference.

  The men were not center stage. Mary knew that that spot was reserved for her and Anne, because they were the chief attraction that morning. Mere pirates were commonplace, but female pirates were something else altogether. The prosecutor knew his business, knew how a spectacle should be staged.

  Anne was led to a place just left of center of the judge’s bench, Mary right beside her. Mary glanced to her left, quick, looking for Jacob, not letting her eyes linger. She did not want anyone to notice the particular interest she took in that one individual. But in any event he was not there.

  “All rise!” the bailiff’s voice rang out. The great mass of sound that rose from the muttered conversations of the hundreds of spectators dropped off, and in its place came the sound of the people getting to their feet.

  “This Wednesday, November the sixteenth, year of our Lord 1720, a Court of Admiralty to be held before His Excellency Sir Nicholas Lawes, His Majesty’s Captain General and Governor-in-Chief in and over His Majesty’s Island of Jamaica and other territories thereon depending in America, Chancellor and Vice Admiral of the same, President!”

  A soldier opened the door off to the side of the judge’s bench and Sir Nicholas, the bearer of those weighty titles, stepped out. His black robe hung down to his feet; his massive wig stood out against it in sharp relief. He did not look up, did not acknowledge the presence of the vast audience as he stepped up to his bench.

  He sat, arranged some papers before him, scowled down at them, left the rest of the courtroom standing. Finally he looked up, and still scowling, he said, “You may be seated.”

  Mary studied the judge’s face, trying to read in his visage what kind of man he was. Pink, jowly, heavyset, British to the core, he would not be seduced by the easy ways of the Caribbean. Neither did he look to be a man of great sympathy.

  The buzz of the spectators grew again, like an approaching swarm, and Sir Nicholas said, “Bailiff, you will order silence.”

  “The court will be silent!” the bailiff cried, and dutifully the noise fell away.

  “Let us proceed with the reading of the King’s Commission,” said Lawes. He nodded to the secretary, who stood, a great sheet of paper in his hand, cleared his throat, and began.

  “George, by the grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, defender of the faith, et cetera. To our truly and well-beloved Sir Nicholas Lawes, Knight, our Captain General and Governor-in-Chief in and over . . .” The secretary’s voice
settled into an easy monotone, no more intrusive or interesting than the hum of the spectators whom the bailiff had silenced, as steady and mesmerizing as the surf lapping the beach.

  The words moved in and out of Mary’s ears, swirled without meaning around her head. On and on the secretary droned, five minutes, ten minutes; she was ready to plead guilty just to shut him up.

  “Sweet Jesus!” Mary heard the voice of George Fetherston. She glanced sideways at the big man standing in irons with his fellows. “Hang us if you will, but don’t bloody bore us to death!”

  Sir Nicholas scowled, slammed his gavel down, demanding order. It was the only sound in the vast chamber. No one had dared laugh.

  Mary wanted to, she wanted to laugh out loud, but she did not even smile. She had learned long ago how to keep emotion from her face.

  “Silence!” Lawes ordered. “One more word from the prisoners and you all shall be gagged!”

  Mary’s eyes wandered to the seven Members of the Council who sat as jury in the Court of Admiralty—some tanned, some pink-faced—wealthy Englishmen all, with their long white wigs draped over rich silk coats, ample midriffs.

  She heard the secretary read, “. . . to call and assemble any other persons on shipboard or upon the land, to make up the number seven. And it is thereby also provided that no persons, but such are known as merchants, factors, or planters, or such as were captains, lieutenants, or warrant officers in any of His said late Majesty’s ships of war, or captains, masters, or mates of some English ship, should be capable of being so called . . .”

  Bloody marvelous. None could be called to sit in judgment save for merchants, planters, naval officers, officers of merchant vessels—just the men to have no compassion for the men (or women) of the sweet trade, just the ones who would have suffered the most by the depredations of the pirates.

  No, she thought, “suffer” is not the word.

  They might lose ships to the pirates, they might be plundered of a cargo or two, lose some slaves, and come out the poorer for their investment, but they did not suffer. She did not think these men sitting as Members of the Council knew what it was to suffer, and she wished she could teach them, as she herself had been taught.

  At last the secretary stopped and set the King’s prolix Commission down on the table. Sir Nicholas publicly opened the court, took the oath that the act had directed him to take, then administered it to the Commissioners.

  It was all so formal, all so silly. Just bloody hang us, you’ll do it in the end in any event.

  When the oaths were done the prisoners were ordered set at the bar. Rough hands grabbed Mary’s arm, pushed her forward, right up against the low wooden rail, Anne at her side. Off to their left, the men were brought forward as well.

  The Register now stood, ready to read the articles brought against the prisoners, but President of the Court Sir Nicholas held up his hand.

  “Hold a moment, Mr Norris,” he growled. “Mr Nedham.” He turned to the Chief Justice, who looked up in a great wave of white wig. “It is your intention to try for any piracies, felonies, or robberies committed upon the sea,” he looked at one of the papers, as if he could not recall the name, “one John Rackam, et al., late of New Providence?”

  “Yes, Sir Nicholas,” said William Nedham.

  Sir Nicholas looked up from his papers, still scowling, swept the court with his eyes, as if just now noticing it.

  “Do you intend to try these,” he nodded toward Anne and Mary but did not look at them, “these women along with the others?”

  “Yes, Your Excellency.”

  “No, no, this won’t answer. These women stand accused of adultery and fornication along with piracy. Do you mean to charge the men with adultery and fornication?”

  That brought a laugh to the courtroom, and when it died the prosecutor said, “No, Your Excellency.”

  “Very well, then, we shall proceed with the charges against Rackam and the others, and them we shall try separate. Bailiff, you may return them to their cell.”

  So that is it, Mary thought, so ends our day in court, after waiting for better than a month.

  She could hear the guards assembling to march them back and she took that last chance to glance around once more. She cocked her head, looked to her left, where the others were standing in their chains.

  In the center of the group, and two steps in front, Captain John Rackam. Calico Jack.

  God, but he looks a pathetic sight.

  His coat and breeches were filthy and torn, and his stockings hung baggy around his shins. His enviable hair—long, brown, and curly—was matted and tangled. His face was dirty, his long mustache twisted, a week’s growth of beard on his cheeks. He seemed physically smaller, as if he had collapsed into himself.

  His fine bright clothing, once the mark of the flamboyant buccaneer—the calico of Calico Jack—now seemed to mock him.

  He glanced over, as if sensing that he was being watched. Anne kept her eyes straight ahead, would not look at him. But Mary caught his eye and they looked at one another for a second—less than a second—and then Jack quickly looked away.

  Mary Read, Anne Bonny, and Calico Jack Rackam.

  How many coincidences and accidents needed occur, that we three should find ourselves in this place? Mary wondered. How very odd that our three lives should this way intersect.

  She heard the bailiff step up behind them and mutter a gruff order for them to follow.

  But it was not an accident at all, that their three lives should come together as they had. Mary understood that. There was no other way that it could have turned out.

  They had been born to it. It was their fate.

  BOOK ONE

  FATE INEXORABLE

  CHAPTER ONE

  FATE HAD INTERCEDED two years before, in Charles Town, in the colony of South Carolina.

  Then, a young couple stood before a minister. They held hands. The church was cool and dark in the autumn evening, lit with a half dozen candles that illuminated only the altar area, leaving the rest in deep shadow.

  The girl was jubilant, charged, her heart pumping with the recklessness of their act. The young man was sullen, bitter, silently cursing the unfairness of it all.

  “If there be any here know why this couple should not be joined in Holy Matrimony, let them speak now or forever hold their peace . . .”

  There were only three people in the church, besides the couple. Just the minister and his wife and a servant to act as witness.

  God, but she wished her father was there! How he would have been provoked by this. Big Bill Cormac, trying to bend his daughter to his will. Her life had been filled with petty defiances, minor assertions of independence. Each time her father pushed her down, she came back, stronger, more eager to be free.

  And now this.

  William Cormac, Esquire, would have come up with some reasons why they should not be joined, all right, couched in his lawyer’s language, edged with a father’s anger. But he was not there, and no one else spoke.

  “Do you, Anne Cormac, take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, for richer, for poorer . . .”

  Poorer, indeed, she thought.

  Anne Cormac had known only wealth, at least from the time she was old enough to recall. Now she was eighteen years old, beautiful, her body taut and voluptuous, her hair thick, cascading down her back, reddish in winter, yellow in the summer. Her face might have been that of an angel, but for the look in her blue eyes, that flash of something deeper than mere mischief.

  Anne Cormac could have married any of the bright and wealthy young men in the colony, fellows who had £1000 a year and kept coaches and had been sent to England for their schooling. They came around like dogs to a bitch in heat. Over them all she chose this penniless sailor and her father was not well pleased.

  “. . . in sickness and in health . . .”

  It had been no small task, convincing the minister to perform the ceremony.

  The minister
knew her, knew Billy Cormac. He did not wish to get in the middle, to stand at the point where the irresistible force meets the immovable object. He had only agreed when Anne told him that she was with child, that she wished for the baby to be legitimate, not a bastard like herself, the result of her father’s liaison with the lovely and willing young Peg Brennan.

  Fiery, lusty Peg had been the family’s maid in Cork. The scandal had ruined William’s law practice. He had fled to the New World with his illegitimate family. Passed Peg off as his wife, mistress of their home. He loved Anne and spoiled her as much as any father ever had a daughter.

  “. . . until death do you part?”

  So the minister had agreed to marry them, for the sake of the unborn child, who did not exist. The sailor had not enjoyed Anne’s favors, not to that degree.

  Not because of Anne’s sense of chastity—she had her mother’s inclinations in that regard, and they were none too strict—but because she knew men and she knew that there was little chance she would get what she wanted if he got what he wanted first.

  At fifteen years of age she had come to understand the powerful force of lust, predictable as the tide and just as unstoppable. Hard lessons, but others paid for them more dearly than she.

  The lessons began when she took her first suitor, a brash young buck from the outlying plantations. Evenings they would walk together in her father’s well-tended garden. She yielded to his tight embrace, let him kiss her deep, standing in the orchard under a full moon. Her thigh pressed against his cock, throbbing under his breeches. She allowed his hand to grope her breast for a few beats before she pushed it away. She loved the wickedness of it all.

  Then one night, panting and groping, hot breath on cool skin, sighs deep in their throats, she said, “No . . .” but he was far beyond listening to “no.” Hands on her breasts, pulling her bodice down, hands under her shift, reaching up, fingers looking to violate her.

  Anne Cormac was not afraid. She was not sorry or repentant or guilt-ridden. Her mind was wiped clean by a red-hot rage. She had been angry before, but now as the boy’s big hands tugged at her petticoats, his tongue forced its way down her throat, she was swept up in a violent passion she had not even known was in her.