Matelots

by W. A. Hoffman

  “Here? In the church? Someone used her?” I asked.

  “No, no, senor, before, when they found us. They pulled her…” She shook her head and chewed her lip to stop her words. “She was to marry. But even he is dead this day. He was wounded and he died, and now…”

  “She has taken her own life,” the young priest said sadly.

  “She had a blade?” I asked, and knelt beside her.

  “A little knife,” the matron wailed. “She asked someone here for it, to defend herself if it should happen again. That is what she told us, and then she went to lie down. I came to look at her, and ask her how she was, and I found her…” She trailed off in sobs. “Help her, senor. You must help her.”

  I touched her chest and felt the weak beat of her heart.

  “She still lives,” I said.

  I looked up at Gaston, wondering why he was not beside me. I found him staring at her in horror and surprise. The same emotion gripped me with icy claws as I realized what he must see.

  I stood and took his face between my palms, willing his eyes to mine. He met my gaze distantly.

  “Does she look like Gabriella?” I breathed.

  He gave a short little bark, as if he were caught between tears and remembering to breathe.

  “She does not,” he said at last. “I know it is not… but the white and the blood and…It is difficult.”

  He pointed, and I looked down at the girl again and saw the little blade clutched in her bloody hand.

  “And she wished to die,” I whispered softly.

  He nodded. “I cannot… She will die. She… The wound is… She sliced… I can see it from here. She did not stab. She sliced. The blade is long enough. Her intestines are ruined.”

  I pulled his eyes back to mine. “We need to get you out of here.”

  He shook his head. “I am not… running… I am…”

  “Senor!” the matron called. “Help her!”

  I kept a firm grip on Gaston’s wrist and looked down at her. “I am sorry. He says she will die. Her intestines are badly damaged.”

  The woman wailed and turned on the priest. “Give her the Rites before she passes. She is not dead yet.”

  The young priest stood and shook his head sadly. “She has taken her own life.”

  “No, no!” her mother wailed. “She is sick with grief. It is as if those animals did it to her. They took her life.”

  “By your own words, Senora,” the priest said. “I am sorry.”

  I swore. Gaston growled. I turned back to him.

  “Send her to Heaven,” Gaston rumbled. “Do not let her die by her own hand.”

  I knew what he meant. “Not in front of you,” I whispered.

  He closed his eyes. “Do it.”

  “You will not move from this spot?” I asked.

  “I will not move,” he hissed.

  I thought it unwise; but the thing had already been seen, the damage already done.

  I released him, and knelt beside the girl again. I met her mother’s eyes and whispered, “Do not watch.”

  Her face froze into an ageless mask, and her gaze drifted from my face to the dagger in my hand. She held her hand up. “One moment.” She leaned down and gently kissed her daughter’s forehead. Then she sat up straight and met my gaze again. She nodded and closed her eyes.

  I stabbed the girl through the heart, coming up through her ribs, the way Gaston must have done when he took his sister’s life at her behest.

  I wiped the blade on her gown and looked to the priest. He was regarding me with wonder.

  “She was murdered,” I said calmly. “I suggest you bury her as you would any other here killed by heathen dogs. Tell her mother she will go to Heaven.”

  He nodded soberly and looked to the matron. “She will go to Heaven.”

  His gaze returned to me. “May God have mercy on your soul.” He crossed himself.

  I wished to tell him a number of things, but I knew it would not matter. I wished to tell him I did not believe in his Heaven or Hell; but I could not do that with any honesty, and that scared me.

  I collected Gaston, who still stood with his eyes closed. Pete and Cudro raced with us to the door.

  “What is wrong?” the big Dutchman asked.

  “I hate religion,” I growled.

  He shrugged, but his curious gaze was upon Gaston. Behind him, Pete was poised to strike, yet he looked to me for some cue.

  My matelot was withdrawn: lost in thought. I could well imagine what he saw within the halls of his memory: the great house of his birth; his sister’s chamber; her great bed with its folds of linen, and her, a paler thing upon a field of paleness; her hair spread all about, the color of his, the color of blood, like that which must have marked her lips from all of her attempts to expel the death eating her lungs and sapping her life; him kneeling above her, drugged by her insistence, having just succumbed to her seduction and his own desire: not for lust of the body, but for some comfort of the soul. And then the knife in her ribs, the spreading stain of blood upon the bedclothes, the light fading from her eyes, and then the darkness overtaking his as the enormity of what he had done at last pulled him under to wait for his father’s wrath like a lamb left for slaughter. The pounding in my ears was the drum of the hooves of his madness coming to run us down and drag us away. I ran outside, towing him with me.

  Darkness had fallen, but there was a moon. Men were filling the square once again, and filling themselves with wine. I wondered that they could find so much to drink and so little to eat. We could not stay among them. I did not wish to return to the vacant house or even the bakery.

  Striker saw us on the steps and left the captains. He was not regarding Gaston askance as he approached, but me.

  “Will?” he queried.

  “We need to be away for a time, into the woods,” I said quickly.

  He thankfully did not argue. “Liam and Otter are going to hunt cattle. Go with them.”

  I took up our weapons and bags, and handed Gaston his. I was relieved when he accepted them. Then I took his hand, and we hurried across the square to the place where Liam and Otter were standing with a small band of men. They were pleased to see us, until they truly saw us in the torchlight.

  “Ya be well?” Liam asked me

  “Do not mind us. We will be fine. We need to be away from here, though,” I said.

  They nodded, and exchanged looks with one another, and the Frenchmen with them, and led us out of town.

  “We be campin’ in the woods tonight, so that we be huntin’ at dawn,” Liam explained.

  As I followed, I was forced to remain intent upon my footing in the poor light and not upon my matelot. All the while, I heard the thundering hooves. I felt great relief when our friends at last found a place to camp and I was able to tow Gaston away from them and further into the trees before collapsing and pulling him down with me. He embraced me tightly.

  “How are we?” I breathed.

  “I am well enough, but you are quite distraught,” he murmured.

  I pulled from his embrace and regarded what I could see of his face in the dappled moonlight. He appeared as calm as his words.

  I took a long and shaky breath. “I thought…”

  “As did I,” he said grimly. “But I have not fallen to the madness or even felt its call. I thought on it as you brought us here. I believe it is because I saw her through the eyes of a physician. I had been in the presence of blood and the wounded all day, aiding them, not hurting them, and I feel it steadied me so that I saw her, Will, not Gabriella.”

  I felt the fool. “I am sorry I thought…”

  He shook his head and kissed me lightly. “If I had seen her through the battle lust that grips me the result would have been… difficult. And if I had seen her before you made me remember the events of that night, then… it would have destroyed me. But you made me remember, and now, in seeing that girl, I knew she was not my sister, and though there are similarities, it is not the same
.”

  He brushed another kiss on my cheek. “I am sorry I scared you so.”

  I shook my head. “I feel such the fool. I saw… I imagined what I feel you saw that night. It is odd. I have felt its like before. When I am told a tale I often try to envision what the other saw, and sometimes these fantasies are of such a poignant vividness that it is as if I were there with them. This is how I see many of the events you have imparted to me, especially of that night. I see you… It is as if I stand beside her bed and watch the entirety of it unfold. I felt you would surely be overcome with guilt and shame, as you were when first you told me the tale.”

  He nodded and then his head cocked with thought. “Do you feel guilt and shame over taking her life?” he asked.

  “Non,” I said quickly, too quickly. Then, “Oui, but non, not shame or guilt, but… wrong. I feel it should not have been necessary. I feel God will take who He will and no man may decide that. It is not for man to judge who will enter Heaven. And then I feel that perhaps I still believe in Heaven, and… I am afraid I will never see it. I am afraid God may yet be as the priests describe, full of vengeance and reproof for those who do not follow his dictates... much like my father. And, for all of my brave words about not caring for… their love, or holding it in reproach if it is so meanly ladled out, I… do care.”

  He held me close. “Whatever the truth of death is, we will face it together, and we will go hand and hand into what comes after.”

  I nodded against his shoulder. “But, what if there is a Hell, and it is a place of endless torment? The Devil will surely separate us, as that is the worst that can be done to us.”

  “There is no Hell,” Gaston said.

  “Is that a prayer?” I tried to ask lightly, but the humor was not in my heart or voice.

  “To your Gods, oui.”

  “My Gods…” I muttered, feeling oddly blasphemous, and not sure if it was because I held to them in the face of the Christian God, or because in a moment of weakness I had given credence to the Christian God.

  “Gods are made in the image of man,” Gaston murmured and rubbed my shoulder. “Ours are made in the image of centaurs. And as we are centaurs, we are not like the sheep in the pastures. We know the Gods for what They are; we do not look to Them as shepherds, but rather as powerful Beings with Their own wishes and battles. And, Hell is a place without love, Will, and as long as we have one another, we can never be in Hell.”

  I understood; moreover, I believed. Once again, I felt sanity as a palpable presence, and it enfolded us, holding us safe against the world beyond. Another pocket of pestilence within my soul had been lanced and drained into the light, and now Gaston was the balm to heal it.

  The Gods were true, but we were truer still.

  Forty-Six

  Wherein We See Justice Served

  Liam found us in the glade in the morning. “There ye be!”

  We blinked at him like pitiful rabbits cornered in a hole; well, pitiful rabbits with pistols, anyway. The sun was well up, and I imagined they had been hunting already. I was surprised we had slept as deeply as we had.

  “Whatever do you want?” I asked pleasantly.

  He tossed me a finely-worked leather satchel. “We were huntin’ and came across this Negro sneakin’ about. He’s fine dressed; don’t appear to be a slave at all.”

  I opened the case and found several letters: two were addressed to names I recognized, and another was to the mayor. I cracked the seal on the one for Escoban the Magistrate. The contents drove me fully awake.

  “Come along, we must find Morgan,” I told them.

  I relayed the contents to Gaston as Liam led us to the Negro: it implored the fine citizens of Puerto del Principe to stand firm against the English barbarians and delay them as long as possible, as the mayor of Saint Jago and others were hurriedly marching an army toward us. My matelot did not seem surprised. I suppose I was not, either.

  The Negro was indeed finely dressed in the livery of some house, probably one of the officials responsible for the letters I held. He stared straight ahead with a great deal of dignity, and did not cringe about as slaves are often wont to do when surrounded by agitated, armed men. For the time being, I saw nothing to be gained in speaking to him on the matter. All I needed at the moment I held in my hand.

  The hunters put their catch, two cows, on poles; and Gaston and I helped carry them into town. I chafed at the delay, but thought we would be better received bearing food. I also wondered why they did not simply herd the damn animals into town and slaughter them there. Then I recalled that most of the men about us were not horsemen – they would just as soon shoot and eat a steed as ride one – and cattle-herding was done on horseback.

  We finally trooped into the square and located Morgan. With little ado, I told him of Liam’s capture of the Negro and translated the letter addressed to Escoban.

  There was a great deal of cursing, and Morgan asked me to read all the letters. They proved to be all of a type. Then he set me to questioning the Negro, who proved to be smart enough not to dissemble. He had been sent here with a small scouting party, and told to sneak into town and deliver the letters if he was able. They had thought a Negro might escape our detection, as he could blend in with the other slaves. Unfortunately, this being cattle country and not plantation lands, there were not a great number of slaves about; and those we had found were cached in a barn across town: they would leave with us as part of the booty. What amused me most was, judging from the Negro’s tone, he had thought the scouting party’s plan a piss-poor one.

  “How long do we have, in your estimation?” I finally asked the man.

  He met my eyes squarely, “Do not quote me on this, sir, lest I be wrong and lose my life over it; but I feel you have a good sevenday.”

  “From what he heard and saw, it is unlikely they will arrive tonight or tomorrow,” I told the others in English.

  Morgan turned away and began to pace.

  Striker and Pierrot eyed me speculatively, and I waved them over.

  “He thinks it will be longer but he could not swear to it,” I told them quietly.

  “You believe him, obviously,” Pierrot said without rancor, but there was a tired edge to his voice.

  I shrugged and turned back to the Negro. “What is your name?”

  “I am called Pedro.”

  “What do you feel fate holds for you, Pedro?” I asked kindly.

  He frowned, and his eyes returned to the air above my head. “Sir, I think it is likely I will spend the remainder of my life in chains on an English plantation.”

  I looked to Pierrot. “Oui, I believe him.”

  Pierrot shrugged and joined the others.

  I turned back to Pedro. “I do not feel that will be your fate. It would be a waste of a lettered man. Do you speak any other languages?”

  “Latin, sir,” he said with relief.

  “Do you read and write Latin as well?” I asked in Latin.

  Gaston stepped in to join us with interest. Striker sighed and went to join the others.

  Pedro smiled. “Yes, sir. May I say you are well educated for an Englishman, sir.”

  We laughed.

  “You may even say he is over-educated for an Englishman,” Gaston said in Latin. “How and why were you educated?”

  “I was born into the house of a learned man in Saint Jago. He discovered I possessed an agile mind, and instructed me so that I could copy manuscripts for him and assist in the keeping of his books. When he passed away, he had me sold to his friend, the mayor, as a house servant.”

  Gaston and I looked to one another and smiled.

  “Now we must teach him English,” I said in French.

  “How many languages do you speak, sir?” Pedro asked.

  “Five, including German. My matelot here speaks five as well, but he speaks Dutch instead of Castilian.”

  “Now what is he saying?” Morgan asked from my elbow.

  I sighed, “We are discussing the l
anguages we speak.”

  He frowned. “Does he speak English?”

  “Nay,” I said with amusement.

  Morgan snorted and resumed pacing. “The men we sent out are due back tomorrow,” he said loudly enough for all. “What are your thoughts?”

  I looked to Pedro and asked, “How many men do you feel they can muster?”

  “At least two thousand,” he said.

  “They will likely arrive,” I said for all, “when they arrive, with three times our number.”

  Bradley and Striker were pawing through a satchel of Morgan’s. They produced a map and spread it out. It was obvious that if the Spanish came from Saint Jago, they would likely not get between our ships and us as they closed; however, they could if they chose.

  “I say we wait until the delegates return and see what they say,” Pierrot said.

  “Nay, it won’t matter,” Striker said. “The Negro said he was brought here by a scouting party; likely as not, they met up with the men we sent seeking ransom and apprised them of the plan. They’ll not return with money.”

  “We could take hostages and march tonight,” Bradley said.

  “It be late and we have men spread about all over,” another man said. “Best we sleep well and march in the morning.”

  “And send our own scouts out,” Striker said.

  Morgan was nodding almost continuously. “We may get something from this yet, gentlemen. Let us send out parties to watch, and the rest of us sleep well. We will march out tomorrow, with hostages. I will have it in mind to ask for something for their return. For now, let us collect our men and inform them of this change in plans. On the morrow, we will have a meeting after sunrise.”

  He happened to glance toward me. “Put that slave with the others.”

  I was not pleased with that order, but I shrugged and complied. Gaston and I escorted Pedro to where the other slaves, some fifty of them, were being held.

  “I swear you will not spend your days on a plantation,” I assured Pedro. “Please do not do anything to harm yourself before this can be sorted through.”

  Pedro studied me for a time and nodded. “I will put my faith in you, sir. I assume there is no way that I can return to the mayor.”