The Pyrates

by George MacDonald Fraser

  La, thought she, here's a turn-up. She and Calico Jack had voted the same ticket ever since she had placed her bloody, adolescent thumb-print timidly beside his on the New Providence manifesto telling Woodes Rogers what to do wi' his royal pardon. Against that, she burned wi' jilted fury against Avery, and he'd be safer silenced … on t'other hand, he'd kept quiet so far, and could any red-blooded man-eater worth the name put the bee on a creature so gorgeously edible? The Irishman wasn't bad, either, apart from being green in the face … oh, let Bilbo do it!

  “Dahlings,” she drawled, and smiled lazily on Blood, “you know one never could resist men with moustaches …” The disc fell from her plump fingers: two black, two white.

  Wi' Rathbonian snarl Bilbo raised his disc, and from the pirate assembly burst a chant of “Bilbo, Bilbo, rah-rah-rah!”. The ruffians gripping the prisoners prepared to heave, Goliath turned a cartwheel and snapped his fingers, Firebeard started striking matches in anticipation, Avery turned his best profile towards the audience, Blood wondered if chaps at Tyburn ever actually threw up -and Calico Jack Rackham, not leader o' men for nothing, look'ee, smiled grimly and … waited.

  For Bilbo's lean fingers were fretting wi' his disc, and Bilbo's lean face shone wi' sweat, and Bilbo's black eyes burned. Had Avery been ahead on points that night at Lardo's palace? Nay, never – and yet might not men say he had been? What o' the winks and nudges and snide questions on chat-shows hereafter … “'Twas pity, Cap'n Bilbo, thou never didst win decision o'er – plague take it, what was the rascal's name – Avery? Nor no return bout, neither … pray, sir, tell the viewers how that never came about…” Odd's pockets, he'd never live it down! Nay, more … if one aspired to gentle estate (as Bilbo did) and dreamed brave dreams of strolling arm-in-arm wi' the King's Grace at Newmarket, and chocolate wi' the Quality at Locket's, and spake, and dressed, and suffered excruciating shoon and bespoke head-doilies to that end … could one, wi' such genteel ambitions, damn wi' a spot a fellow swordmaster, rot him? Aye, and a gentleman born, too. What would Avery do in his place …? And yet… Bilbo gnawed his disc in hesitation, laughed sneering laugh, and bared savage teeth as he took his revenge.

  Never so tall and rakish he sauntered forward, took snutt, made play wi' lace kerchief, and grinned wickedly into Avery's calm grey eyes as he dropped his disc on the barrel-head.

  “Now, prithee, captain, tell me,” he lisped. “Who owes who?”

  It was white side up. Three-two for the visitors, and no double-header today. Black Bilbo tossed his snuff-box to Goliath, swung round on red-lacquered heel, saluted the company, swept a bow to Mistress Anne, and strolled away, his bunions singing in triumph.

  After that it ought to have been old pals' week, let bygones be bygones and be damned, wi' rum-sodden good fellowship among friendly enemies – but it wasn't. Once the verdict had sunk in, and the two captives had been released, as Brotherhood custom demanded, you might have expected back-slapping and congratulations, hearty jests, and much offering of pannikins and free advice about visas and galleon departures. Not a hope. The lower-deck pirates were thoroughly fed up at being cheated of their execution – it adds nothing to your enjoyment of buffet lunch to find that the man you'd hoped to see torn asunder by piranhas is standing next you wiring into salt-beef-i'-the-basket and rum Pimm's – and there were mutinous murmurs against the council, wi' dark hints that the old gang had been in long enough, it was time for new blood (preferably spilled), etc., etc., before the whole mob mooched off to the beach to get drunk and fall a-plotting.

  Which left only our principals to dispose of the al fresco buffet on Anne Bonney's croquet lawn, and the atmosphere was strained. There was none of that polite chit-chat of oaths and blasphemies, enlivened occasionally by sociable clash o' steel and witty pistol-shot, which you normally got at a Shark Island picnic. Firebeard, infuriated at the verdict, had torn up a couple of trees before going off to sulk in the barbecue pit, barely picking at his roasted ox; Happy Dan, equally miffed, had suffered an attack of Liverpool accent and was lying down in a dim room; Bilbo, cockahoop at handing Avery the perfect squelch, was ruffling it insufferably at the swimming pool, doing high dives in a fleering, provocative manner; Rackham brooded apart on the Brotherhood's woes and possible mutiny; Blood, still barely out of shock after his ordeal, flirted automatically with Mistress Bonney, who in turn smiled with mechanical languor while seething inwardly because Avery hadn't so much as glanced in her direction, damn him! And after she'd tipped him a white spot, too – the detestable, magnificent swine who'd spurned, robbed, and drugged her. Was she, she wondered, losing her marbles as well as her touch?

  And Avery? He was sicker than mud. To be spared – discarded, almost – by a set of despised villains! To be patronised, dash it, by Bilbo, of all people, with his ghastly taste in steenkirks and cheap aftershave and phoney Vauxhall accent. He'd have challenged the brute straight away – but how in decency can you challenge a bounder who has just saved your life? Besides, he was by no means certain that he could take Bilbo, rapier to rapier, and absolute though our Ben's courage was, he had his duty to think of: the British settlements to warn, Vanity to rescue, Lardo to shove down the pipe, Vladimir to find – and what to do about the Brotherhood whom he'd vowed to destroy, and who'd now morally disarmed him by not cutting his throat? Gosh, how troubles piled up! So he idled pensively on the putting-green, abstractedly sinking thirty-footers left-handed with one eye closed, and trying to ignore Bilbo who was doing hand-stands on the top board in his Lurex trunks.

  Had the party lasted another twenty minutes in this atmosphere, it would have been the ultimate social disaster. For in that time Firebeard would have drunk enough to emerge from the barbecue pit, seeking sorrow, Happy Dan would have committed suicide at his inability to pronounce nasalised vowels, Avery's better self would have surfaced to the point where he offered to shake hands with Bilbo (which would certainly have led to bloodshed), Anne Bonney and Blood would have sought solace together in the rhododendrons, and Rackham would have caught them at it. Oh, and the pirate crews would have mutinied. And this story would have had a different ending, and ye may lay to that.

  Fortunately, before any of these things could happen, the Spaniards attacked.

  They always do – and it is arguable that they are acting not out of sheer badness, but from Castilian courtesy. Let the hero be facing sticky death, the heroine fleeing from a maddened ravisher, the cad on the point of telling all, the spy on the brink of discovery, the lovers about to quarrel, the mortgage to fall due, or the party to freeze over – and here they come, guns ablaze, banners streaming, trumpets blaring, and moustachios a-twirl, the dear old opportune Dons doing their stuff again, and everyone can forget their problems and pile in against the obliging common enemy.

  It happened now, just as Anne Bonney was moodily viewing the piles of untasted canapés on the buffet and wondering if she could unload them on her plantation slaves for supper. A thunderous boom o' broadsides shattered the sultry afternoon, Avery dropped his putter, Bilbo did a startled belly-flop from the top board, Happy Dan awoke with a shriek of: “Nous sommes betrayed! Les voleurs sont sur nous!”, Firebeard bit clean through his roasted ox, Rackham stroked shaven chin thoughtfully, Blood dived under the daybed, and Anne Bonney sighed contentedly – broadsides invariably meant visitors, so the canapés wouldn't be wasted after all.

  And who should the visitor be, by the powers, but Don Toro Molinos, whom we last saw knocking big holes in the Brotherhood stronghold of Tortuga. Flown with victory, he had been cruising down to join Don Lardo at Octopus Rock when he had learned that the fugitive Rackham and two other pirate ships were heading for Roatan. (Don Toro got this news, of course, from a half-caste fruit vendor in a bumboat; as all students of romance know, they were the only reliable sources of information on the Spanish Main, and fleets of bumboats were specially maintained, manned by trained fruit vendors who had passed stiff examinations, like London taxi-drivers.)

  So Don Toro ha
d turned aside for Roatan to wipe up this last remnant of the buccaneers, and here he was, strutting his gilded poop and quaffing Charneco, what time his squadron swooped in like gulls to pound Roatan's forts to rubble, and his troops piled into boats, all hot for the loot of waterfront boutiques and delicatessens. And on nearby Shark Island the buccaneer crews took swift action in the face of this sudden menace – one mad rush and they were aboard their three vessels parked in the strait, cutting cables, casting off, setting sails, towels, pillow-cases and anything that might catch the wind, and roaring for their captains to get moving, a God's name, afore the Spaniards noticed them.

  Their cries for leadership met with a mixed response. On the croquet lawn Bilbo was blasphemously trying to haul on his satin breeches without having dried his legs properly (yeegh!), Happy Dan was going glassy-eyed trying to say “ohn,” “ahn,” and “ehrn,” through his nose (those nasalised vowels were really getting to him), and Firebeard was held up because, intent on clamping a cutlass 'twixt his teeth, he couldn't remember whether the sharp side went outermost or not. Two cool heads there were, fortunately: Anne Bonney calmly bade the servants place clean damp cloths over the canapés and refill the ice-buckets, and Calico Jack, having calculated that it must take the Spaniards a good hour to force Shark Island strait from the north, saw that there was just time for his ships to slip out by the southern end – but only if Happy Dan Pew could be rendered fit for duty wi' out delay.

  This was vital, d'ye see, for while the buccaneers were never short of leaders of the Firebeard school, able to shout “Up and under!” and charge head-first through brick walls, they were always short of skilled seamen, and apart from Rackham and Bilbo, Happy Dan was the only captain present who could really handle a ship. When he was half-sane, that is; out to lunch, as he now plainly was, he wasn't fit to pole a punt, and with three ships (one of them jury-rigged) to manoeuvre out of that narrow channel, Rackham foresaw catastrophe. He ordered immediate emergency treatment for the wandered Frog, and while Goliath plied smelling-salts and the little Welshman sang “The Ash Grove” in a vain attempt to charm the bugs out of Pew's steeple, Rackham, Firebeard, and Bilbo held urgent conclave – closely watched by Avery, his brain zipping like a computer in overdrive. Presently he sauntered up casually, lip a-curl and eyes glowing wi' contemptuous voltage.

  “So, ye'll run, Master Rackham?” quo' he lightly. “British seamen will abandon their friends to hell o' Spanish sack, ha?” And he gestured airily towards Roatan, inadvertently burying his finger in the earhole of Colonel Blood, an anxious bystander.

  Rackham eyed him full grim. “They ain't our friends – Roatan's a free port, payin' 48 percent to shareholders who make their profit floggin' our stolen goods and chargin' harbour dues that'd fright the Grand Cham. That,” he jerked a thumb towards the gunfire, “is the risk they run.”

  “But ye ha' our good leave to die in its defence, bully,” mocked Bilbo, and Firebeard raised two fingers and rasp-berried resoundingly.

  “Unless …” Rackham's eyes glinted wi' sudden thought, “ye prefer to sail along o' us – as signed member o' the Brotherhood—”

  “I'd sooner join the Maltese police force!” Avery freed his finger with a glugging noise. “But since ye won't fight, I've no choice but to sail with you – on a fare-paying basis, understand? For yon Spanish onslaught is but foretaste o' Don Lardo's design to sweep all non-Dagoes from the Caribbean, and I must bear speedy warning to Port Royal—”

  “Sa-ha!” Rackham's shaven chin took another thoughtful fingering. “So that's why he drove us from Tortuga! Aye … but why should we risk our necks seein' you to Port Royal? The King's colonies is no pals of ours.”

  “Indeed, bully,” Bilbo snuffed jauntily, trying not to wriggle in his wet pants, “shall we mourn if Lardo doth plunder fat Bristol planters and set merry torch to their sugar-cane? We owe naught to them – or to thee,” he added, meaning it to sting, the cad.

  “Aye, burn 'em all! They'm honest men!” bawled Firebeard. “Good luck to lousy Lardo, sez I, wi' a wannion, an' belike, an' nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah to thee, dandy-prat!”

  Avery quivered wi' disgust. “You … cads! Nay, can rotters be so utter? Faugh! And tchah! I mean, I know you're bally pirates, but these are English settlements! Is that naught to thee? England? The old flag, free speech, honey still for tea, carol-singing i' the snow, little girls gathering primroses—”

  “Guinness,” put in Blood helpfully. “Meat pies. Brothels.”

  “Exac – Will you shut up, Blood? Look here, Rackham – can you stand idly by while Lardo wreaks red ruin on all decent chaps?”

  “Decent chaps as builds gallows for us,” said Calico Jack. “But belay that, King's man – for if ye did get warning to Port Royal 'twould do not a pinch o' good. There's but two leaky men-o'-war in Kingston Bay, a half-regiment o' invalids at Spanish Town, mebbe a frigate at St Kitts – an' no other help nearer than Port o' Spain or Providence. They'll not save the settlements, if Lardo sails, an' ye may lay to that.”

  “What?” Avery increddled. “I'll not believe it! No cover? Nay, 'tis not possible!”

  “Ask the fruit vendors,” jeered Bilbo. “They'll tell thee. Why d'ye gape, man? Wherefore should the King keep costly ships to guard his western outposts, when we o' the Brotherhood ha' ever been stout bulwark 'gainst the greed o' Spain? 'Tis not fear o' the Navy has kept Lardo and like wolves from the throats o' your Jamaicas and Carolinas – 'tis that we, the buccaneers, ha' kept the Spaniard his hands full this many a year—”

  “Say it again, wi' three times three an' a curse!” bellowed Firebeard. “Aye, we'm the boys, by thunder!”

  “And now we're broke – first at Tortuga, now at Roatan.” Rackham shaded his eyes and looked north where the Roatan forts were burning. “So farewell an' adieu to the Americas for us – an' God help your honest folk, Ben Avery.”

  It shook even Blood, callous ruffian though he was -perhaps he remembered Cohaclgzln, and tales of other Spanish deviltry. But it acted on Avery like shot o' benzedrine; it was just what he had been needing for weeks – a hopeless cause, insurmountable odds, a sudden blazing inspiration, and a heaven-sent chance to start ordering everyone about. This, he realised, was hero time; his shirt-ruffles blossomed at the prospect.

  “Farewell and adieu, ha? Don't make me laugh! Why, as ye stand, ye're in no case even to clear this island! Aye, scowl, villains – ye've a French skipper yonder who's in the Land of Nod and like to stay there – so ye need a commander o' proven sailorly skill, address, and character, able to hand, reef, steer, lay a course, fight a ship, quell a mutiny, keep a log in legible hand-writing, and see that the sharp end's pointing the right way at night. I even speak their beastly language”, he admitted frankly. “In fine – you need me if you want to get the Frantic Frog out of that channel before the Dons are in among you.”

  Rackham, who had already reached this conclusion, took another scratch at his chin, glanced towards burning Roatan, watched as Goliath helped Happy Dan into a canvas jacket, considered the plight of the Frantic Frog with her alien crew wrangling hysterically about whose turn it was to go aloft, and didn't even bother to argue.

  “We could abandon her,” he said slowly. “But suppose ye conned her out for us … what's your price?”

  “Bilbo,” said Avery coolly, “you seem to be well in with the fruit vendors – what ships doth Lardo dispose at Octopus Rock?”

  Startled, Bilbo went all slit-eyed. “Say … fifteen, ha? Tall ships o' war. A round score, when Don Toro joins him …”

  “But if, before then,” cried Avery, his profile a-quiver wi' derring-do, “three stout ships, well handled and packed wi' reckless fighting men, were to fall all unsuspected on Lardo, they could so maul his fleet it would be in no case to harry the settlements for ages—”

  “An' where d'ye get three stout ships, well handled and packed wi' reckless fighting loonies – as if I can't guess!” Rackham gestured angrily at the strait, where the pirate crews were beating
the sides with pannikins and singing “Why are we waiting?” with mounting urgency. “That's your price, ha? We'm to fight for you at Octopus Rock?” he rasped, and Avery nodded serenely.

  Bilbo gaped, and smote his forehead in scornful amaze; Firebeard, when Avery's proposal had percolated, collapsed in helpless mirth, waving his hairy legs in the air and hooting. Rackham eyed our hero with grim amusement.

  “Either ye're moonstruck,” he growled, “or ye've a rum idea o' a bargain. For your mere two hours' pilotage, ye expect us to hazard our ships an' necks 'gainst odds o' five to one an' worse? Now, tell me, quiet-like, Long Ben – why should we, ha?”

  “Fair question,” approved Avery, “and I'll deal with it in a moment. But first, ask yourselves: why shouldn't you? I mean, what else have you got on offer? You admit your Brotherhood's kaput, you're out of a job, you're on your uppers, you can wander like Van der Decken till someone hunts you down and strings you up—”

  “The world's wide, bully!” snarled Bilbo. “We're gentlemen o' fortune, and take our chance, damme! There's other oceans!”

  “And better places for a funeral than Octopus Rock,” said Rackham (but his glance at Avery was speculative and wary).

  “Funeral?” Avery was amused. “With me in charge? What funerals should there be but Spanish ones?”

  “Oh, get knotted!” cried Bilbo, out of all patience. “To hear such braggart clack from you that but two hours ago stood mewling wi' a noose about your neck—”

  “I'm still waitin' to hear,” said Rackham quietly. “What's in it for us, Long Ben?”

  “Well, it would be a jolly good thing to have done, for a start,” said Avery warmly, “but if it's rewards you're after …” he paused impressively, “I can promise you the tops. The Big One. Wait for it… Free Royal Pardon, for all—”

  Their hoots and oaths drowned him out; Firebeard begged him to stop before he, Firebeard, did himself a mischief. Even Rackham waxed derisive (but still with a thoughtful glint in his eye).