Hunt for White Gold

by Mark Keating

  Rogers ignored the remark, not even lifting a glance from the vellum page. ‘Then of course there is the theft of the French gold. Your most audacious crime. Fortunately we have a survivor with us in this very room who can enlighten us more as to the nature of that one.’

  Nobody needed Rogers to indicate Coxon. Devlin spoke before Coxon could open his mouth.

  ‘Am I on trial here, Governor?’ he asked. ‘I thought the Act of Pardon precluded such, Your Worship.’

  Rogers blinked at the chained pirate. His features remained unperturbed but a vein had begun to pulse against his cravat. ‘The pardon, pirate, is for those who give up their lawless ways voluntarily. Not for those that are captured and brought to justice.’

  Devlin leapt on Rogers’ words. ‘Ah, then we merely have a difference of opinion, for I was on my way back to Providence for that very reason when the Mumvil attacked my ship. In defending myself and my men I was brought here. The means may be different but the ending is the same. I have come to take the pardon offered by my King. An acre I believe? Something with a sea aspect will suit me fine, Your Worship.’

  Rogers looked at one of the soldiers shadowing Devlin and nodded curtly. The man stabbed his musket butt into the back of Devlin’s knee causing the rest of the room, except Rogers and Coxon, to wince in their seats.

  Devlin fell forward on his knee with a crack to the cap upon the stone floor. He twisted painfully against the soldier’s thigh as he sucked up the pain. He lifted his head, eyes now facing the corner of the room as Rogers continued, but he was no longer listening to him.

  His eye had fallen on the junk nestling in the corner and his pain had vanished when a red sparkling eye looked back at him enticingly. Rogers droned on but Devlin only noticed the Spanish guitar and the pirate songs lilting up from the town below as a contented expression flitted briefly across his face.

  He looked up at the man who had assaulted him, checking for any empathy due a decent soldier simply following harsh orders. Instead he found the grimace of a man who enjoys the kicking of his dog or beating a horse beyond its labours. That would do. He spoke softly enough just for the soldier to hear.

  ‘Touch me once more and I’ll kill you.’

  The soldier smiled at first, thinking of the manacles, his own weapon, his fellow beside him and the support of the room all around him against the man at his knees. His smile faded as Devlin rose slowly to his feet. He stood close to the soldier’s side so the man could feel the elbow against his forearm and a solid shoulder close to his cheek as the pirate racked up to his full height and even leant his boot against the soldier’s, touching it as if resting on a cobbler’s shelf. The closeness felt cold to the redcoat, as if the man beside him had already delegated him dead and gone. His eyes shifted to his feet and he inched away just enough to stop any part of the pirate touching him.

  ‘Captain Finch,’ Rogers addressed the ex-commander of the Mumvil Trader. ‘I must say I am a little confused.’

  ‘How so, sir?’ Finch asked.

  ‘You said that your ship was taken in the night by at least half your crew. You indicated that a man, Seth Toombs, was the chief conspirator and that Mister Davis here was most certainly involved.’

  ‘That he was, sir,’ Finch confirmed.

  Rogers lifted his head to Howell Davis. ‘So how is it, Mister Davis, that you came to the point of bringing Devlin in? Tell us what happened after the night where you appeared to be one of the ringleaders of this mutiny.’ He studied Howell carefully, watching his reactions. ‘Is there something else going on here that I should perhaps be aware of?’

  Howell, sitting beneath the window overlooking the square, looked nervously at Finch from across the room. He had been listening to the songs from the Porker’s End and wishing he had been part of that gathering and not this ill-matched game of cards.

  ‘Seth Toombs led the mutiny, sir. We were all pressed into it so to speak. Fear of our own throats, Governor. After a couple of days however, once we’d all sobered up that is, we saw the error of our ways and took back the ship from Toombs. He didn’t take kindly to that but bowed to our numbers like,’ he paused as Devlin threw a brief glance over his shoulder. All eyes were on Howell and only Coxon caught the look and felt his body tense.

  ‘Anyways,’ Howell carried on. ‘We were attacked by the pirate Devlin here on our way back, so. He showed his flag but we won the day. We brought his ship in, Governor. The Talefan. She be latched to mine in the harbour. All the men that live are with you now.’

  ‘And what of the Shadow?’ Coxon asked Howell. ‘Where was she?’ He kept his eyes on Devlin’s.

  Howell leant forward to hear again. ‘What Shadow, sir?’

  ‘The frigate. His warship.’ Coxon moved in front of Devlin, blocking Rogers’ sight. ‘Where did this Talefan spring from, Patrick?’

  ‘I took her in Madagascar. Left the Shadow with the bulk of my men. My quartermaster with her. I came here with but a handful.’

  ‘And why did you come here, Patrick?’ pressed his former master. ‘Why Providence? If it was to take the pardon you could have done that at any colony. Why here at all?’

  ‘Enough, John!’ Rogers declared, his voice pulling Coxon back away from Devlin. ‘I take it, pirate, that your ship still has some of this stolen French gold upon it?’

  ‘It has some of it, Your Worship, enough to show my allegiance to yourself and my King,’ Devlin gave a side look to Coxon. ‘The bulk of it is in other hands now.’

  ‘Wasted on women and drink I shouldn’t wonder,’ Rogers snorted.

  ‘Hardly wasted, Your Worship,’ Devlin grinned.

  ‘Well, never mind,’ Rogers sat back. ‘John, you will escort Mister Davis back to the Mumvil and this Talefan and retrieve the gold,’ he raised his voice to catch Howell’s attention. ‘Mister Davis, you are to be rewarded for your loyalty.’

  Howell stood, hat in hand.

  ‘You are to be given command of the Buck. A fairer sloop, that sailed with me from England and isn’t so sullied with this pirate mess. It sailed back the first time at least. You have done well, sir. I should like you to continue the original mission and fetch supplies from Hispaniola and then onto Martinique to do the same for we are now in desperate need.’ He had already begun to scratch the order into his log.

  Coxon stepped forward and spoke as peacefully as he could. ‘With respect, Governor, perhaps Howell is not quite the man to take such a voyage. Given his recent experiences.’

  Rogers did not look up from his penmanship. ‘He has captured a pirate, overturned a mutiny and returned with a hold of gold. Should I throw him in a cell perhaps, John?’

  Coxon started a little and stabbed a finger at Devlin, his voice rising, ‘I know this man, sir, and I would ask you not to measure him by the state of his clothes or the accent of his voice or the company he keeps but more …’ he began to flush, feeling the focus of the whole room upon him. Rogers looked up.

  ‘How should I estimate him, John?’

  Coxon leant on the desk over Rogers’ writing hand. ‘By the moment when you first saw him and the hair stood up on the back of your neck.’ He straightened. ‘I would appreciate it, Governor, if you would register for the record that I recommended the hanging of this man.’

  ‘I will note it, John,’ Rogers continued to write. ‘However, it is my duty here to reinforce the King’s Act and in my considered opinion it would benefit that act if a man like Devlin were to bow to it. It may encourage others equally notable to do the same. To see value in its peace. I wouldn’t be surprised to see even Blackbeard follow him to these shores after such an announcement.’

  Devlin bowed, ‘We can only hope, Your Worship.’

  ‘In the meantime, take him to a cell below. Increase your patrols of the shores if you wish. Mount yourself upon my battlements with spyglass all day and keep an eye out for his ship. Do whatever you feel is appropriate, with my full warrant.’ He put back his pen and stood. ‘Gentlemen, that is all. I a
m retiring for dinner. The pirate Devlin will sign the proclamation in the morning. I will have my clerk convene the town for the occasion.’ He moved away from his desk and tipped a hand to Howell. ‘Congratulations, Captain Davis, I will have your papers drawn up also. That is all gentlemen, that is all.’

  Howell bowed until Rogers left the room then ducked his way out, avoiding everyone’s looks, Captain Finch’s most of all, and made for the stairs and the relief of the outside.

  Finch followed, watching Howell’s heels kicking down the stone spiral steps. Coxon, Devlin and the two soldiers were alone.

  Coxon wiped his brow of sweat, and replaced his hat. ‘Bring him to the cells,’ he ordered. ‘And watch him.’ He swept out of the room.

  Devlin resumed his close position to the soldier at his right. Elbow, shoulder and foot touching to an uncomfortable closeness. The soldier stepped back.

  ‘You take him down, Jim,’ the soldier’s voice a tremor to his mate. ‘I’ll watch his back.’ He snapped up his musket at half-cock taking care not to touch any part of the pirate with his weapon, then followed carefully, his musket at the pirate’s spine, and listened to Devlin talking about ghosts and dead men all the way down the stairs to the gaol.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  ‘I’ve known worse,’ Dandon remarked, wiping the mould from his coat after he had foolishly leant against the cool walls of his cell. He removed the garment and folded it carefully on the bench that would also be his bed. He tended to his wrists where the chains had chafed and listened to the collection of footsteps echoing from the stairs without.

  There were six cells in the base of the tower, below the level of the town yet still high above the harbour, but with no grill to enjoy the view. The cells circled the walls.

  In an alcove at what should have been one corner spiralled the stone steps to the upper storeys, and through Dandon’s wrought-iron door he observed them for any descending sound or flickering lantern.

  The soldier who had shoved him into his new home informed him that he should be honoured to be gaoled so. Most other drunken locals were interred in the wooden barracks. The cells were for the condemned of old, and that odour was the last reminder of the fort’s Spanish past. Dandon was alone in his; Hugh Harris and John Lawson shared a cell; and the other two, Ben Rice and Adam Cowrie, younger hands no more than forty years between them, shared another.

  They had scraped their way through the battle on the Talefan and now sobriety exhibited to them the clarity of their fate. The scratchings on the walls from men long dead prophesied too late to mend their ways and left them sitting silent and still, not caring for the yells of the others, as their captain entered the dark confinement with his armed company.

  ‘Ho! Patrick!’ Dandon yelled through the iron weave of his door. ‘Could they not find a rope big enough for your head there, Captain?’

  Hugh Harris chimed in. ‘I’ve saved you a room next to mine, Cap’n. Hoping you didn’t tell them you could walk through walls!’

  In the centre of the stone quarters a square table and chair formed the station of the guard, who could see all the cells from his chair, and likewise the prisoners could watch him like an actor upon a stage. He was a skinny man, like every lobster Devlin had ever seen, not like the puffed up swollen marines who could blow you over. These were slivers of men, chipped off London’s walls.

  ‘Take out your pockets,’ the wretch rasped as Devlin’s escort brought him to the edge of the table. Awkwardly, with the chains, the waistcoat was emptied: a meerschaum pipe, hinged brass tobacco box, tinder box with lens. No coin, patches or cartridges. No knife, either. Devlin had not been without a knife since he was nine. Now he had not even a gully blade to eat with. He was less than a boy now. They ran hands over his belt and sash for the bulge of something, anything.

  ‘Take off your boots,’ the voice rasped again and Devlin did so, shaking them upside down to reveal no hidden weapons. With a nod to the right, leaving him nothing but his boots in his hands, he was walked to his cell.

  Dandon and Hugh could not see each other, their cells sharing a wall, only the fists of the other as they hung onto their cell doors and waited. Their captain would do something. Any moment now.

  The cell was unlocked. The soldiers tightened their grip on their muskets as the guard took Devlin’s chains and slowly removed the makeshift manacles.

  ‘Thanks,’ Devlin said, his arms lighter with freedom, and he stepped in under the stone lintel.

  Confidence and cruelty flooded back to the one who had struck Devlin before. He raised his musket again and rammed Devlin’s shoulder, tripping him into his cell as the door slammed with a throw and the three padlocks were clicked shut in seconds by a well-practised hand.

  The lobster stood in front of the door, judging the distance for a hand grab from the man within. ‘I thought you were going to kill me if I touched you again, dog?’ he sneered and spat at Devlin’s feet.

  Devlin rubbed his wrists and rolled his shoulder through the pain. He looked past the soldier, as if he could see to the ocean beyond the walls.

  ‘I have killed you,’ he said flatly. ‘Spend all your coin tonight. Find a woman.’

  There came the click of the musket’s dog-head pulled back and Dandon and Hugh shook at their iron doors with cries for quarter.

  ‘Enough!’ The bellow from John Coxon at the steps made the soldiers jump away from the cell. Dandon and Hugh held their breath as they watched him approach. ‘Get away from him!’ Coxon scowled. ‘Back to your posts!’ He strode forward and was on them in three steps. ‘Away with you. Wherever you should be. This man will be under my command.’ The two lobsters beat away, back up the stairs; the guard saluted and returned to his table. Coxon looked briefly into the cell and called back the guard, his voice too low for Dandon and the others to hear. ‘Get some supper.’ He pressed a reale into the man’s clammy hand. ‘I’ll watch them.’

  The guard passed an eye over Coxon’s pistol in his belt and the hilt of his sword. The captain breathed over him. ‘Two minutes,’ he whispered.

  ‘Aye, sir,’ and the man ducked away to the mess upstairs, where a mug of small beer and a plate of cheese awaited him.

  Coxon looked at the pirates hanging off the doors opposite, pacing in front of them as he spoke. ‘Without your steel and pistols you seem much smaller, gentlemen. Almost like good citizens.’

  ‘Come closer and I’ll show you how good I am, Cap’n,’ Hugh Harris growled.

  Dandon raised a finger through a square of his door, ‘And I tend to carry neither, Captain Coxon, as is my wont. I prefer much subtler methods if you recall.’

  ‘Of course you do, surgeon.’ He whipped back to Devlin’s cell, close to the door where Devlin joined him, both leaning in to whisper as if merely partners at cards.

  ‘I promise you Sarah died of the fever, Patrick. And before she did, she entrusted me with your secret. I reckon two thousand pounds’ worth, what say you?’

  ‘About that I’d say, John.’ Devlin gripped the iron door, bringing his mouth closer. ‘And what are you to do with it?’

  ‘The rest of it is aboard the Talefan?’

  ‘Perhaps,’ Devlin cocked his head, judging Coxon’s voice, which held a different tone from that he recalled of his old master. It was the tone of gold rattling in a pocket.

  ‘Or perhaps a large portion with that Howell Davis? I have sent him and his men to bring your load in. But I might order the Mumvil to be searched also. Just in case. And whatever he might carry to the Buck.’

  ‘What are you after suggesting, John?’ Devlin leant back, his voice louder.

  ‘I suggest,’ Coxon moved closer in, almost biting the bars with his bitter words, ‘that Howell Davis is not the valiant hero that he is sketched to be. I suggest that you were coming back for your gold and that Davis did not capture you. He is with you. I know it. And a day will tell it I’m sure. But there is something I am missing. I have taken your gold, but I can feel my own skin craw
ling and telling me that there is something afoot here, Patrick.’

  Devlin let go the bars, falling back, cocksure as if the future were only his to know. ‘And what of you, John, this past year? I sent you back in shame to your masters yet you turn up here under Woodes Rogers, no less. And all the pirates pardoned, and Providence a colony as bright and English as Bermuda, although covered in shit and salt. And me but one of the flies upon it. Shall we not tell Rogers about the gold now? Together like the good friends that we are?’

  Devlin’s rising smile stopped as the walnut butt and brass cap of Coxon’s pistol rattled through the crossed bars of the cell. A small pistol, but its presence felt like a battering ram through the bars.

  ‘Take it,’ Coxon said coolly. ‘Take it now. I offer it. I’ll say you wrestled it from me. You’ve done that before, remember? The guard will be back soon and you can free yourself. And your men.’

  The others had seen the pistol lift and twist between the bars, but the words were dim and they strained against the iron to hear. Devlin looked down at the beckoning weapon – as sure a key to his cell as if he had forged it himself.

  ‘What goes on, John? Do you think I am hard enough to kill my own men and a dozen more just to get here under some ruse? Pretend to be brought to justice? Can you not imagine that I am simply caught by a crew that bested me? Or does it rile you that a fool like Davis bested me when you could not?’

  ‘Take the pistol. It’s a simple test. I give you the chance to escape. On my own head.’

  ‘But why, John? I am caught and barred. What harm am I to you, now?’

  ‘You won’t take it?’ Coxon edged the weapon further in, its steel scraping over the ironwork. Devlin backed away more, his face now in shadow, his palms up in retreat.

  ‘As I thought,’ Coxon dragged the weapon clear. ‘There is more to come.’ He brought the weapon up, twisted it in one casual movement, and aimed through the mesh of iron to the trapped man in the cell. ‘If I can’t hang you for the sake of others in their ignorance …’ He thumbed back the hammer suddenly, held his breath and fired before Devlin could move.