Each idea seemed more fantastic than the last, though the fact remained that Ashanti was not aboard the lugger.
Félicité had almost made up her mind to venture into the town on her own when she heard voices approaching and saw Captain Bonhomme nearing the gangplank with his boatswain. The second man had a crude jest for Félicité’s concern and Ashanti’s possible occupation at the moment, along with a warning that young François should have taken better care of her. The French captain questioned Félicité closely, however, then gathered up enough men for a search party and set out to look for the maid.
They combed the ship from stem to stern, from the masthead to the bilges. They fanned out along the beach in both directions, and made a sweep through the town, peering into alleyways, huts, and unlocked warehouses, and scanning the faces of the women in the taverns. They upturned barrels and flung beached boats over backward, and at the end of it, found nothing except indignant iguanas and disgruntled crabs.
Milk-white dawn was reaching into the sky when they turned back toward the Raven. As they climbed the wobbling plank, they heard a curse and a cry.
It seemed one of the crew, too rum-sodden the night before to join in the search, had crawled from his pallet to relieve himself over the railing. He had seen the body of a woman being towed by a great turtle. It was Ashanti, quite dead. She had been brutally raped and torn, and finally killed by a gaping wound in her throat that ran from earlobe to earlobe.
The tall ship hove into view with white-bellied sails set and pennants flying. It ran free toward the harbor with the wind only a few points off her stern. She was French-designed and Spanish-rigged; so said the salts who lined the water’s edge. A two-masted brigantine with fore and aft sails, she had black paint with a broad scarlet stripe bleeding backward from the bow, gilt-touched ornamentation, and a rearing horse as a figurehead. White sails shivered as she entered the lee of the harbor. Men like monkeys, dark with distance, swarmed into the sheets, slapping the sails, beating at them with their fists as they tugged, shortening sail. Onward she came, cleaving the water, the figurehead plunging over the waves, rising and falling, riding with a speed that made it seem impossible for her to stop without running aground. Nearer she drew, and nearer still. The forms of men grew clearer, could be plainly seen.
Abruptly the anchor chain ran down with oiled precision. The ship pulled to a halt, her bow swinging so that the name in gold lettering could be spelled out for the first time. It was the Black Stallion, making port with a skill and panache that the onlookers saluted with a lusty cheer. Two things only kept the crew of the Raven from running pell-mell to man their own ship’s guns to take the prize. The first was the Raven’s lack of readiness, and the second was the black flag, solid sable and without insignia, ancient symbol of piracy, that flew at the Black Stallion’s masthead.
They had buried Ashanti that morning, and Félicité was in no mood for empty, heroic gestures, but even she had to recognize the quality of daring and seamanship just displayed. She stood listening to the praises of the French captain while the Black Stallion’s crew lowered a boat to the water. Since the Raven was already lying alongside the wharf, there was no room for the larger ship to tie up. Every man jack of her crew would have to pull for the dubious delights of the shore.
Not so her captain. He was entitled to be carted about with all the care of a nursemaid for a mewling babe. Félicité followed with her eyes the progress of a tall, broad-shouldered man as he descended from the quarterdeck, stepped to the side, and climbed with swift agility down the rope ladder to the boat. An odd frisson ran over her nerves. The boat pushed away from the side of the ship and started toward them in great surging bounds as the men bent to the oars.
Captain Bonhomme lifted a hand to his eyes, scowling seaward. “Name of a name, it can’t be! I thought that man scuttled years ago, on the bottom with Davy Jones.”
Félicité strained her eyes. The captain of the Black Stallion stood with one foot on the crossbrace of the longboat’s prow. The ruffles at the open neck of his shirt and the gathered fullness of his sleeves fluttered in the wind. His breeches were black, tucked into the turned-down tops of jackboots, and banding his waist was a scarlet sash that held the wicked length of his sword. He was sun-bronzed and hard, this brigand, with a mane of mahogany-russet hair flowing backward in the wind, cropped short like that of a felon or a man ready for the executioner’s block and blade.
“Mon Dieu! I knew I could not mistake. It’s the devil’s own, returned to haunt us. It’s that cursed Irish corsair, Morgan McCormack!”
Whooping and hollering, the gathered hawkers, prostitutes, pitchen, and beggars converged on the spot where the boat would land. The sailors were not far behind. Félicité, stunned into immobility, did not move. A hand fell on her arm, and Valcour was beside her, swinging her around, herding her in no gentle manner back toward the Raven.
She went without protest or backward glance. The last thing she wished at that moment was to face Morgan. The fact that he was here, in command of a pirate vessel, was more than she could grasp. How had it come about? How had he changed himself from a respected officer in the pay of Spain to a pirate captain overnight? And most important of all, why?
13
THE EVENING MELTED AWAY and became night. Félicité lay on her bunk with her arm across her eyes. She was locked in; she had discovered that hours ago. From the sound, she thought the ship’s officers and the majority of her crew had returned. Still, the Raven made no obvious preparations for departure with the morning tide. What was happening otherwise, she could not tell, though it seemed something was in the wind. From the quarters of the captain came the sound of raised voices with the timbre of disagreement. Footsteps came and went along the companionway to the cabin next door, from which she was certain she had heard Valcour’s voice in a cutting rebuke.
That it concerned Morgan’s arrival she had no doubt. Her adoptive brother would be ablaze with the need for revenge, and anxious to fall to it here, just beyond the reach of the lengthy arm of Spain. As for the others, hadn’t she seen the greed for the other ship shining in their eyes? They were fully alive to the advantage of taking the brigantine, a much larger vessel with heavier guns. The question of honor would not arise; the captain who could not hold his ship did not deserve to keep her. The single argument for prudence might be the presence of Morgan’s followers, and yet with such men, doubtless recruited in haste, how much would loyalty weigh?
Would Morgan recognize his danger? He must if he had followed on the heels of the Raven, if he knew Valcour’s connection with the ship, knew the big island of Las Tortugas was one of her favorite ports of call. But did he?
Was it accident or design that he had arrived so close behind her? Had he, in fact, come in pursuit of her? Was he on the track of Ashanti, Spanish property now, that she might have been considered to have stolen? Or was it, could it possibly be, that his reasons were more personal?
It made no difference. Her hate for the man was a living thing. It had tentacles like those of some sea creature that were wrapped around her heart, squeezing out all gentle emotion. She cared not a whit what Valcour might do to him. More, she cared even less what happened to anyone else, herself included. The buffeting of the last weeks, her father’s arrest, Valcour’s defection, her own ravishment and position of degradation, the ostracism by former friends, the trial and deaths of the conspirators, her father’s suicide, had left her drained. The murder of Ashanti in such a barbaric fashion, throwing her body to the fish and turtles like so much carrion, had been the final assault. Her feelings were too dulled with pain to accept anything more.
What was Morgan doing now? Was he cavorting with the island wenches, flinging his money away in the drinking houses? How long would it be before such amusement palled? Not soon, she suspected. The women would flock to him, such a change from the rough-and-tumble sailors. And for him, such enthusiasm would be vividly different. His last bed partner had not been so responsi
ve.
She slept finally, only to awaken within the hour to the racking shudder of sobs and the salty overflow of warm tears, tracking into her hair.
Day came. The ship was quiet, ominously quiet. A meal was brought to Félicité by the captain’s cabinboy at midmorning, and another in the afternoon. He professed ignorance of what was going on, though he did not quite meet Félicité’s eyes. In the morning hours, he agreed to deliver a message from her to Valcour, requesting him to come to her. Later he told her that he had spoken to Murat and got a cuff for his pains. From now on, anything she wanted said to the mean-tempered bastard she could jolly well say herself.
The opportunity to do so did not come until near evening. Valcour unlocked the door, swung it wide, and stepped inside without so much as a pause for a knock. Pushing the panel to behind him, he sauntered toward her with a sardonic smile lighting his yellow brown eyes. From his right hand hung what appeared to be a woman’s velvet gown. “Good evening, ma chère.”
“Good evening,” Félicité returned, her tone even. She swung her feet off the mattress and came slowly upright. She would have stood, but Valcour put a hand on her shoulder, forcing her back down before he moved to take a seat opposite her on the bound chest fastened to the floor. He draped the gown he carried to one side.
“I trust you have had everything you need? Meals? A relaxing rest?”
“Those two things, yes. Otherwise, my amusements have been somewhat — confined.”
“Too bad. And you look as if you could use a hot perfumed bath, too.”
She flung him a glance of acute dislike. “Could not everyone on this ship?”
“One of the drawbacks of going a-pirating. The lack of bathing facilities, I fear, accounts as much as the tropical sun for the teak-colored swarthiness attributed to most of our calling. What say you to bathing in the ocean? So refreshing, this time of day.”
“I wouldn’t know. I haven’t had the privacy to partake of such delights.”
“We must remedy that.”
“How — kind of you,” she said, her voice taut, expressionless.
Reaching into his clothing, he withdrew his snuffbox with its cross-and-skull bones enameling. Flipping it open, he took a pinch, holding it ready between thumb and forefinger with a delicate gesture. “You mistrust me, I see. I wonder why?”
“Experience is a formidable teacher.”
“You are right,” he said, and snapped the snuffbox closed, inhaled, then tended his nose. “There is an unfinished reckoning between us, one that I shall enjoy pursuing. But for the moment, there are more important matters at hand.”
Félicité came to her feet, shifting to rest her shoulder against the wall end of the bunk. “Of what nature?”
“I thought I told you,” he said, his face bland. “You are going swimming — in this.”
She caught the gown of rich golden velvet as he flung it at her. The folds hung in her hands, dragging, weighing her down with their great width even dry. “You must be mad. It’s impossible.”
“Nothing is impossible if you want it badly enough, and I want Morgan McCormack dead badly indeed.”
Félicité looked up at him. “If I go into the water in this, it will be my death you will achieve, instead of his.”
“I think not,” he said, and slowly, carefully, began to explain what he meant for her to do.
When he had finished, she stared at him. She shook her head. “No.”
“Yes.”
“What if he knows I can swim?”
“You mentioned it to him?”
“I may have.”
“In that case we must make the picture even more distressing.”
“You presume too much, Valcour. He — may care not at all what happens to me. What then?”
“Think you I would allow you to perish?” he inquired with a narrow smile.
“Without a qualm.”
“You underestimate your attractions — or my attachment.”
“But I would be a party to murder!” she cried. She felt as if there were a noose being slowly tightened around her neck.
“You would also be very rich. I have been authorized to offer you a seaman’s share of the Black Stallion. It seems Morgan and his men overtook an English vessel heading for Jamaica and captured for themselves a right valuable cargo of silks and satins, spices, jade, and ivory, plus a chest of bullion meant for the governor’s pay chest.”
“Blood money.”
He lifted a brow in provocative misunderstanding of her scorn. “So far as I know, the English merchantman struck her colors after the first shot. Quarter was given upon request of the captain. Not a man was killed.”
“You know very well what I mean!”
“Yes,” he agreed, his voice taking on an edge, “and I warn you, I have listened to your parading of objections and scruples as long as I intend. Time grows short. You will take off your breeches and garb yourself in this gown, or I will be forced to perform that service for you. You will not enjoy it, I’m sure. But suffer though you may, my darling sister, you shall do as I say.”
“Valcour, for the love of God—”
“God,” he said, coming to his feet, stepping to where the sword she had removed, his own, leaned against the washstand and picking it up, “has nothing to do with my actions, nor ever has had.”
“But I can’t do this, I tell you. I can’t!”
“Only think of what this man has done to you. Or did you, perhaps, come to like it after a time?”
“No, no, but—”
He unsheathed the sword and turned toward her, stretching out his arm until the point of the blade glittered before her eyes. “Or perhaps it is as I said once before. You are in love with him.”
“No!”
“Prove it. Join with me in destroying him. Together we will wipe out the shame. Together, you and I, Félicité.”
She watched him in fascinated horror as the tip of the sword dropped lower, coming to rest gently against her abdomen. He leaned slightly, increasing the pressure, the look on his face one of maniacal enjoyment. Félicité held her breath.
He tightened the muscles of his arm, twitching his wrist, and the blade sliced upward, cutting through the linen of her shirt until it met the ruffle-edged placket of the head opening. The material fell away, exposing the proud curves of her breasts. On her upper abdomen a small scratch oozed a drop of crimson against the whiteness of her skin. He studied the effect for a long moment, his head on one side.
“Valcour,” she breathed.
His eyes glazed, he flashed her a smile. “You must permit me to congratulate you on your nerve, ma chère. Most men would have flinched, and quite spoiled the picture.”
He dropped the sword edge to the buttons of her breeches, flicking away first one and then the other, so that the front flap fell open. Félicité grabbed for it with both hands, but he reached out left-handed to snatch one wrist. The length of a thigh was exposed from hip bone to knee. The sword point wavered, coming to rest on the back of her other clutching hand.
“The gown, Félicité,” he suggested, his tone silken.
Refusal might gain a point of honor, but what use was it if she lost dignity and more in the process? This contest was unequal, weighted heavily in Valcour’s favor. Later there might be a chance to even the odds.
She nodded. “All right, the gown.”
Muscles stiff with reluctance, Valcour drew back the sword, and gave her a mocking salute with it before he rammed it into its scabbard. “Wise, as well as steady of nerve. What a pair we shall make, ma chère, as soon as you learn to obey the instant I command. That is something it will please me to teach you. I will return on the quarter hour. Do not fail me.”
She was ready, wearing the gown of golden velvet, captured no doubt from some Spanish ship’s cabin. She had made no attempt to put up her hair without the help of Ashanti, but she had brushed it, pushing it behind her shoulders, where it hung like a honey-gold cape, blending with the shi
mmering velvet.
They left the cabin and climbed upward through the quiet ship. It appeared deserted of men except for the cabinboy kicking his feet on the edge of the wharf. He stared open-mouthed at Félicité as she came down the gangplank, his face in the light of the stern lantern both amazed and slightly knowing.
There was no moon. The night, wine-dark and impenetrable, lay on the gently heaving water, shot by shifting beams from the Black Stallion’s lanterns as it rose and fell on the swells. That light was the beacon toward which Valcour, in the stern of an island pirogue, directed his unwieldy craft, made of a hollowed-out log. At the snub-nosed bow, the waves that slapped beneath the hull threw spray upward. The droplets clung to Félicité’s face and shoulders, jeweling her brows and lashes, as she sat forward. She blinked against their salt sting again and again, but could not wipe them away, for her hands were tied behind her back. Valcour had added that refinement to the plan he had outlined just before they had stepped into the boat.
Félicité scarcely thought of what she was doing. She should be happy, she told herself. In a way Valcour was right; retribution for what she had suffered at Morgan’s hand should be a great satisfaction. The method of gaining it mattered little.
Or did it? Against her will, she thought of how Morgan had come to tell her of her father’s death, of his attempts to prevent her from learning her father’s motive for suicide. She thought back over her days with the former lieutenant colonel and of the nights, and the searching light of the lantern was reflected with a golden glow in the depths of her wide eyes.
The side of the ship rose above them. They could hear the creaking of the anchor cable as the ship swung against it, and soaring above that the long-drawn notes of a jew’s harp. As a counterpoint to both came the drone of the voices of the watch. Valcour stopped paddling.
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