by Mark Keating
‘And then what, Sam?’ Devlin called back.
‘I scales the angle betwixt, Cap’n. And there I may be.’
‘And what do you make it now, Sam Fletcher?’
Sam’s lips counted visibly as he inclined his head to the gap between his arms. Albany watched, bemused.
‘Reckon it to be about just over ten, Cap’n?’
Devlin had already begun his own reading, his left hand moving the shadow vane slowly, ‘Back to your drink, Sam. Good man.’
Sam tapped his forehead with a thumb and skipped back to his mug. Devlin turned to Albany, slamming the backstaff to his chest.
‘I make it ten forty-two or thereabouts. What make you, Albany?’
Albany cradled the backstaff awkwardly as Devlin walked away, down to the deck. His final words to the gentleman were spat over his shoulder.
‘Just what are you worth to me? That man can’t even read and is worth more. You’re lucky I feed you, you dog!’
Albany heard Devlin’s boots stomping about the cabin beneath the deck. He listened to Watson’s mocking laugh, bit his lip and turned to the stair. Dandon saluted him from across the way with a leather mug and then their joint laughter followed him down the companionway to the gloom and George’s expectant face.
‘What did he say, Albany old boy?’ George looked up from his hammock just in time to catch the backstaff in his lap as Albany tossed it to him.
Chapter Twelve
Three weeks had passed. The bamboo scaffolding surrounding the ramshackle fort on the eastern cliffs rising above Nassau appeared like a skeleton re-growing its own skin. A yellowing British flag showing the Union colours, still new to some of the eyes that looked upward at it, flapped limply in the early summer breeze.
It was now mid August on New Providence. The two main taverns-cum-brothels, The Porkers End and The Cat and Fiddle, both owned by Mrs Haggins (Mr Haggins having long since whispered himself away), swelled with soldiers and ‘citizens’ now friends under the petticoat.
Then there was the old widow, who slept her nights under a blanket of brandy after sewing calico skulls and hour glasses onto black cloth. She had even made Devlin’s flag, the simple skull above crossed pistols set in a compass rose. She had died suddenly the day Woodes Rogers nailed the Proclamation to the walls of her shack.
As she died, in a foul sweat, others began to feel a bubbling within their chests, their eyes raw and weeping. They attributed the illness not to the saddles of horseflesh rotting on the beach or the effluence that failed to sluice down the dusty streets, now swelled by the immigration of hundreds of Europeans unused to the broiling dry heat. Instead they linked it to the redcoats and wigs that used Roman numerals to list the things they could not do and what they should be forced to pay if they dared do them.
The island stores now sold cloth, Protestant pamphlets and tilling tools instead of French powder, rum and Spanish grape wine.
Children appeared, like goblins, running amok. Scarred faces shook their heads above the rims of their cups at the proliferation of the tiny foreigners and whispered of the inlets of the Carolinas, of Ocracock and Bath Town, where Teach and Vane were holding mile-long gatherings on the beaches – whole parties of pirates carousing fearlessly and trading freely, for Lion Dollars and guineas not reales or maravedi – under more welcoming governors.
New Providence. And so it was. So Rogers claimed it to be. He sat sweating beneath his wig of Office copying his Latin from a Protestant-proffered tome. Boldly he raised his letter above Whitehall and Secretary Popple who received all governors’ addresses. He penned to King George himself and scratched his quill across the vellum with relish.
Expulsis Piratis. Restituta Commercia. Pirates expelled. Commerce restored.
Hornigold sat opposite, his nails bitten down to the nub. He wore a French suit, five years out of fashion, impregnated with a week’s worth of sleep-creases and sweat.
Rogers dusted the paper, brushed it with the feather of his quill for one stroke then slipped the pen back in its pewter well. Finally he raised his eyes to Hornigold.
‘Ben,’ he voiced gently. Hornigold straightened. ‘I have need of you.’
Hornigold sprang up from his ancient Spanish velvet chair and approached the governor’s broad desk, cut from a single oak.
The office stood in the old Spanish fort where the English governors had made their home before the Spanish returned to burn them out almost two decades before.
It was sparse and unrefined but some furniture from the ships had made it officious and comfortable enough.
Two cathedral-like windows stretched and arched to the high ceiling, most of their lead work shot out and hanging grimly to the glass panes swinging loosely in the breeze.
The windows looked out over the whole winding slum that Nassau had become under the pirate regime and Rogers spent an hour every morning counting the bodies dragging their way to church at ten each day by order. He clenched his painful jaw at the volume of trade still disappearing within the doors of the taverns.
He looked up at Hornigold standing unsteadily before him. He spoke as he ever did, as if halfway through a speech.
‘We have the redoubt at the harbour built and work goes well on the new western fort. However, Ben, to date only six hundred of your fellows have taken the pardon,’ he adjusted his summer wig like tipping back a hat. ‘I need more.’
Hornigold pinched at his nose, muffling his mouth and apologetic words. ‘Ah well, Governor. It be early days yet. I think a lot of the English boys here be a bit at odds with the Dutch and German throats setting up here.’
‘They be the colonists, Ben. Like it or loathe it. There are few English hearts willing to come. We should all welcome good Protestant stock from wherever it comes.’
‘Aye, Governor,’ Hornigold sighed.
‘I also have become aware that some of the principals have slipped cable and have gone a-roving again.’ He observed Hornigold’s renewed perspiration.
‘None of my doing, Governor, I assures you. Burgess and I have taken up our privateering stations with honour.’
‘Oh yes,’ Rogers picked up one of his garrison’s reports. ‘Your militia company is often drunk on watch, if on watch at all. I fine more of them than any other soldier, and have more of them confined than I do prisoners.’
‘As I say, sir: early days.’ Hornigold lowered his head and fingered his sword hilt.
‘Indeed,’ Rogers placed the paper down again. ‘The matter, to be blunt, is that a good deal of the pirate captains have gone “off”. That leaves our province open to attack. Leaves the trade routes vulnerable again. I cannot allow that. I will not allow that.’ He checked Hornigold’s eyes. They were rheumy and wide, but faithful.
‘I will take my duties honourably, Governor. Even if I have to hunts them down myself.’
‘I am glad to hear you say it, Ben,’ Rogers’ eyes lightened. ‘It will come to that I am sure.’
A rap on the door startled Hornigold and set the collection of pistols and blades he wore clinking like a bridled horse.
Rogers waved him down, ‘Just in time. I wished Coxon to be present this morning.’ He called for Coxon to enter and they both looked to the door across the room, the path to it suddenly emblazoned in golden cobwebs of sunlight patterned through the windows.
The door swung open and in stepped Coxon, accompanied by an emaciated black tomcat weaving amid his ankles and looking hopefully at all the men one by one.
‘You sent for me, Governor?’ Coxon glanced at Hornigold whilst sweeping away the cat with a foot.
‘Indeed John, come hither,’ Rogers opened a hand to Hornigold. ‘You know Captain Benjamin Hornigold of course?’
Coxon bade good-day as he crossed the room. He removed his dusty hat, holding it behind his back. The cat trotted after, then became mesmerised by the warm shafts of sun and sat down in the glare, sniffing the light contently.
‘How can I be of service, Governor?’ Coxon aske
d.
Rogers pushed himself away from the desk, scraping the floor with his chair and affording himself a view of both captains at once.
‘Benjamin here offers himself and Burgess completely to our cause, John,’ Rogers wiped his shirt sleeve across his jaw as he spoke.
Coxon leant forward to listen more closely. ‘What cause is that, sir?’
Hornigold leant in also.
‘Let me tell you a little about Ben,’ he stifled a rise of bile in his throat and coughed. ‘Benjamin has been captain to no less esteemed patroons as Edward Teach and Samuel Bellamy. Teach of course has become the brigand known as Blackbeard. I feel Ben will be invaluable in netting such a rogue.’
‘He left some time ago, Governor,’ Hornigold interjected. ‘We went our separate ways a long summer since. And Bellamy of course, God forgive his young soul, went down with his ship last year.’
Hornigold crossed himself in a clumsy twitch at the memory of the young pirate. Rogers carried on undeterred.
‘La Boche has gone. Also Williams, Penner, Fife, Martel, Cocklyn and Sample. All slipped away in the last weeks with most of their crews. Jennings and Barrow have taken the pardon abroad and Charles Vane roams free from under our very bows.’ He looked at both men, his eyes swivelling between them. ‘We are close to failure, and now this!’ His fist suddenly slammed down on the oak, sending a stylus jumping from the desk. The cat started, flicked his tail twice, then nestled himself back in the sun.
Rogers wiped his mouth again. ‘Disease!’ he hissed the word sibilantly. ‘Thirteen cases this week alone. And it is only August! By September we shall all be dead if this continues unabated!’
‘I can report that the garrison is without blemish, sir,’ Coxon proffered. ‘It is the town that is infested.’ As he spoke he cast an eye to Hornigold who shifted uncomfortably.
‘I can only say, Governor, that it is due to the pirates and the townsfolk leaving their cattle heads where they fall, and their desire to gather together around the town rather than spread out amongst the hills.’ Hornigold stroked his hat-matted hair forward and distracted himself by watching the cat stretch and writhe in the sun.
‘Exactly. Ben, I want you to man two ships to the brim and go a-hunting. Take some of these idlers out of the town before we are all dead. We share too much foul air. It will help the newcomers to settle down with a couple a hundred of you gone.’
Hornigold’s ears burned as he looked back to Rogers. ‘A-hunting, Governor?’
‘Aye, lad,’ Rogers slapped the desk. ‘You are a Privateer to his Majesty. As you were in the war, again. It is your duty to bring these brigands to bear is it not? You spoke the same yourself did you not?’ He tested Hornigold’s mettle with his own.
‘And, naturally, any prize you find of yourself, you may keep two thirds.’ He pulled some parchment from a leather wallet, preparing to pen the thought. ‘The final third for your King, naturally.’
‘Oh, aye. Naturally,’ Hornigold agreed.
Coxon sniffed and plucked at his vest. So that was it then. The old game afoot to be sure. Rogers had played it well enough. Privateers – but pirates with a few extra strokes of ink. And it would not hurt if some Spanish ships sailed a few leagues too near. Maybe one on its way back from Potosi, lying low in the water with a ballast of silver.
Coxon cast a warm look at the cat that had sidled up and begun rubbing against his calves. Wild cats. The town was full of them. Thankfully rats could not be blamed for the fever.
‘John,’ Rogers addressed, ‘I wanted you to witness the order I am giving to Captain Hornigold. My sanction to go abroad from New Providence.’
Coxon bucked up. ‘Aye, Governor.’
‘And something for yourself, my good man.’
Coxon stepped forward, flicking the cat away again, watching Rogers inscribe the order on the vellum sheet.
‘We are short on supplies. I underestimated the provision of goat, cattle and crop required on this island. The colonists will farm, but we are in a desperate fix which I do not wish to be known. In another month it will be common knowledge.’
‘And I am to go north to Virginia for supplies I take it?’ Coxon surmised.
‘There is no time. And the price will not be as good.’
Coxon breathed in. Breathed in dread. As good as what?
‘I want you to tally what we can trade. Sailcloth and rope. Comandeer the salterns. Iron and weapons. That we have plenty of. Man the Buck and another sloop and sail to Hispaniola. Trade there for fresh victuals so we may stock ourselves without applying to England.’
Coxon looked to Hornigold as the only other compatriot in the room. Rogers’ head furrowed to his writing, paying as little mind to the words he had uttered as if he had merely asked Coxon to clean out a cupboard for him.
Trading with Hispaniola meant trading with the Spanish. An illegal act for a King’s ship.
Intolerable for an English captain to entertain the thought.
Coxon cleared his throat. ‘You want me to sail to Hispaniola, Governor Rogers?’
‘My God, man, no!’ Rogers glared up from blotting his ink. ‘I want you to send some pirates thus! Not a King’s man!’ He laughed at the possibility.
The cat, encouraged by the laugh, jumped up on the desk and nudged himself against Rogers’ sleeve.
‘Take some time to gather a couple of good crews, that’s all. I want you to find some good pirates to sally forth. There must not be a single Royal man aboard.’ He pushed the cat away, only succeeding in urging more ardour from the feline. ‘How goes the word for your former servant, John? This pirate, Devlin.’
‘I chanced on a man who had served with him.’ Coxon winced from a sharp pain that came on cue from the star shaped scar beneath his sleeve. ‘He led me to one of the whores that had served his purpose a year ago. She has the fever. She tells me the pirates sailed to the east. To leave the Antilles. He is gone, apparently.’
‘Ah, left for safer climes. If we could all do the same, eh?’
Coxon could still sniff an air of illegality about the room, mixed with the aroma of the streets wafting in through the broken windows.
It was at that moment that something red sparkled beyond Rogers’ shoulder and glinted to Coxon.
He noticed then the pile of chattels and goods piled in the dark corner of the room. His brow twitched curiously and Rogers followed his eye.
‘Oh, you note my waveson, John.’ He stroked the cat playfully then blew on the paper before him, causing the cat to flinch, and handed it to a bowing Hornigold. ‘Your orders, Ben.’
‘I thank you, sir.’ Hornigold took the parchment and squinted a watery eye to read it over, slavering at the prospect of adventure ahead.
Rogers shifted his chair to face the collection in the corner. The cat struck out a paw towards him as he moved.
‘I have tidied all the junk from the fort and kept it here. There may be some value in it. I should like it assessed. But I have more at hand for the moment.’
Coxon moved around the desk, his eye drawn to the red glare that had now vanished. Only a dull heap remained. A heap of black sacks and barrels. Clothes and broken weapons or weapons too old to care about.
He identified a few ornate harquebuses and matchlocks from Spanish ships and a small pile of astrolabes and cross-staffs. Iron ballast, in sheets and lumps, lay there crude and shiny. It was a collection with as much heart as a child’s broken toys from yesteryear. Partially forgotten, but potentially too precious to throw away.
Coxon found the source of the red spark: a small-bore cannon. It lay under a wealth of sacks, having been dropped at the earliest convenience for its weight and then everything piled atop it.
It was green and thick with age. Its barrel was sealed with some mixture of crustacean and barnacle. It had one redeeming if slightly gruesome feature, for gripping the barrel was a coiled dragon, its jaws panting and the tongue lolling over its teeth. The dragon was grey and green like the rest of the gun, sa
ve for its glowering red eye that appeared to be watching Coxon intently.
‘Oh that?’ Rogers anticipated the question. ‘Damn thing’s all sealed up. No use at all. I may put it in my garden. When I get one. Don’t get too excited, John. I am sure enough that its eyes are only glass.’
Coxon studied the dragon. He thought of Guinneys on The Island. A year ago, Coxon had come aboard Guinneys’ ship, Starling, on its way back from the Indian factories. He had been weak then. Weak from dysentery, the fate of many stationed in the castles along Africa’s slave-coast, but Coxon had not been stationed there. He had been struck down whilst his ship waited for resupply and favourable winds. It had been the wrong decision to send his ship home without him rather than escort a blackbirder, a slaver of the South Sea Company to the Americas.
His ship had been taken by pirates on her way home, burnt and sunk. His ship. The ship he had captained in the war, gone forever. His servant taken along with her.
But his man had not been so burnt.
He had gone with the pirates. He had become their leader somehow. Coxon’s ravening for revenge was matched only by his shame.
Before he stepped ashore in England he and Guinneys were sent to take the pirates who had destroyed his ship. He was to sail to The Island, to protect the French gold, but Guinneys had a different agenda. Blood had flowed following a fight on sand and in shallow waters. Hence a star-shaped scar on Coxon’s arm – and another ship almost lost by the man he had taught. And more shame to be paid.
There was something unsettling about the Chinese gun. Coxon thought of the dead Guinneys and his years spent voyaging from China. And then this dragon, staring at him this very morning, here on an island worthless to his mind, riddled with disease and pirates.
A Chinese gun. Here. Now. And himself sent to this island to sieve the seas of pirates. And a Chinese cannon winking from the corner of this very room. And Devlin not here.
A warmth spread over him that had nothing to do with the day’s heat, the same sort of warmth he used to feel just before a line of French frigates appeared on the horizon.
