Captain in Calico

by George MacDonald Fraser

  Only she must weigh her words, and use every trick in her power to convince him.

  ‘Come back to the house,’ she said. ‘I think I know of a way.’

  They walked back to the house, and Rackham followed her through the cool, silent hall and down a passage to a small retiring room off her own bedchamber, richly furnished with a polished table, embroidered chairs and couch, and a carpet of heavy pile.

  Removing her headscarf before a small mirror in the panelling, Anne Bonney smoothed out her red hair and turned towards Rackham, who was visibly restraining his impatience.

  ‘Come, then, lass,’ he said, his dark face eager. ‘Let’s hear this way of yours.’

  ‘It would be a way,’ she began, ‘for both of us. It would pay your score with the Governor; it would free me from – from this. And it would mean that you and I could – could be together, Jack.’ She raised her eyes to his appealingly. For once she was not acting: she was hoping desperately for success. ‘Don’t laugh at me. Hear me out. And then tell me, not in a word “aye” or “no”, but just tell me … if it could be done.’

  Intrigued, he seated himself at the table. ‘Go on.’

  ‘Next week a ship sails from Providence for England. It will carry the treasure which was taken from your own ship, the Kingston, and other money as well, most of it in silver. The whole amounts to half a million pieces. I want to take it. By piracy, for there’s no other way.’ She stopped and faced him resolutely. ‘Can it be done?’

  He looked at her appalled. Then he shook his head in amazement. ‘You’re mad to think of it,’ was all he could say.

  ‘Can it be done? Could it be done?’ she insisted.

  ‘The thing’s an idiot’s dream,’ he protested. ‘Guarded as she would be …’

  ‘Not guarded,’ she contradicted. ‘One ship alone. Only Woodes Rogers and a few of his officers know what is intended. He is as short of shipping as every other Governor in the Caribbean, but he dare not keep such a huge sum here. It has been piling up at the Fort there this two years past: now it’s so great he can’t risk keeping it where the Spaniards might get wind of it and make a raid. It must go soon – surely you understand?’

  ‘Even so, if what you say is true—’ he was beginning, when she interrupted him with her question: ‘Could it be done?’

  He covered his face with one hand, kneading his brow between thumb and fingers. Her insistence demanded an answer, so he pondered it, and made a reply as to a hypothetical question.

  ‘Men said Morgan could never take Panama. They would have said he could never escape from Maracaibo. But he took Panama; he escaped from Maracaibo. So I say all things are possible, given the brain to plan and the courage to enact. And the skill, and the luck. Given all these, and a crew of lunatics led by another of the same: who knows?’ He shrugged. ‘Perhaps it could be done, but—’

  ‘Never heed the “buts”. Enough that you admit it’s possible. Now, listen to me. I can find out everything that is to be found – time of sailing, the crew, the captain, the armaments, even the course. Things you could never find, but simple to a woman. I can—’

  ‘Wait, wait, wait!’ he cried. ‘For God’s sake, this is folly. Believe me. I know something of these things. I know the difficulties, and the dangers. I know a thousand and one things to spike this madness dead.’ He slapped his palm on the table. Then he went on more quietly. ‘I’m a pardoned man, you’ll remember. This would be the kind of enterprise that would most likely end in speedy death or capture. And that would mean Ketch’s Hornpipe for me and every man aboard.’ He shook his head. ‘I’m not so out of love with life that I’ll throw it away for nothing.’

  She found her resolution wavering before that firm refusal, but she was not the woman to give in at a few words.

  ‘I said there were things I could find out,’ she reminded him. ‘But there are things I already know. Tell me, could you raise a crew for such an enterprise as this?’

  ‘I’ve no intent to try.’

  ‘But if you had. Oh, bear with me a little, Jack, please. You promised to hear me out. Could you raise a crew?’

  He shrugged impatiently. ‘Aye, I suppose so.’

  ‘Within a week?’

  ‘Yes, in two days. Perhaps one day. I flatter myself I know where to look. But I tell you I’m not looking.’

  In spite of this she took fresh heart. ‘How many?’ she asked.

  ‘Enough to sail the Kingston. Perhaps more. Say a hundred and twenty. But if you’re thinking that would suffice to tackle a treasure-ship carrying half a million pieces – Jesus! what a pile – you can forget it.’

  She leaned forward over the table, her voice eager. ‘Now I’ll tell you something, Captain Rackham. It’s one of the few things I know already about this tressure-ship. She carries eighty seamen; eighty, I tell you. No more.’ She was rewarded by the sight of his incredulously dropping jaw.

  ‘Eighty! Never in this world!’

  ‘Then ask yourself,’ she continued, ‘where can Woodes Rogers come by any more? Those eighty are half the crew of the Unicorn, the only naval ship he has – and they’re as many as he can take from her. Could he trust men from the privateers? Aye, you can smile. Don’t you see he has no more men in the Bahamas than those he can get from that one King’s ship? He daren’t risk the honesty of a single man who isn’t in the royal service.’

  He scratched his chin reflectively. ‘You’re well informed, I’ll say that. But there’s a snag in it. There must be. Why, the man is begging and praying for trouble if he lets all that money loose in one bottom with only eighty men to sail and fight his ship.’

  ‘There will be soldiers, too,’ she added. ‘Perhaps fifty.’ She watched him uneasily, and he shook his head.

  ‘That’s still too few for him. Far too few. But too many for me,’ he added warningly. ‘There’s something rotten about it somewhere, which would make me extra cautious even if I was considering it, which I’m not.’

  ‘But he depends on secrecy,’ explained Anne Bonney. ‘He intends that the ship shall sail without a soul knowing what she carries or where.’

  ‘Secrecy? And what’s his secrecy worth?’ He leaned back in his chair and eyed her sardonically. ‘When you know of it, and I, and my Lord Jack Dandy and Tim the bumboatman and God knows who else beside. Why, half the Fort must know it now, and half Providence to-morrow. The thing’s unchancy; I can smell it already.’

  His scorn, so confidently expressed, did more to quench her hopes even than his earlier refusals. But seeing that he had wavered, too, and that she had only to convince him that the Governor’s plan was not a trap, she persisted.

  ‘I tell you it is secret. Only a chance remark from that ogling booby Harkness, who thinks that no woman has a mind that can hold a fact longer than she can hold a breath, gave me first wind of it. Then I set to work to find out all. Surely you can understand that I can question where others dare not; that I have weapons will open any door and loose any tongue?’

  ‘Aye, aye, I don’t doubt it.’ He smiled wryly. ‘Ye’ve a powerful way with the men, I grant you. I’ve noticed myself.’

  ‘But it can be done.’ Her voice was vibrant. ‘You know it can be done. Yourself admitted it, given luck and planning, and the courage. And we shall have those. You can find a crew, I can get the information we still need. There is a ship, too, that we must have, and you must see to it. It would have to be stolen.’

  ‘Stolen?’ Rackham tried to stifle his irritation. ‘D’ye think it’s like plucking an apple, then, to steal a ship?’

  ‘Has it never been done?’

  ‘Aye, but—’

  ‘Aye, but, be damned to you! Do I have to teach a pirate that piracy isn’t easy? D’ye think half a million pieces will fall into your lap for nothing?’ She stood with her booted feet planted apart, hands on hips, like a swashing captain, a militant Hebe. ‘Of course there is a risk, and there will be danger—’

  ‘I need no woman to teach me my trade,
’ he began angrily.

  ‘It’s not your trade,’ she taunted. ‘Your trade is lying in bed and bumbling and mumbling about risks you’re afraid to take.’

  ‘Afraid?’ He stared at her incredulously. ‘Afraid? I’ll take that from no one—’

  ‘Aye, will you not?’ She curled a lip. ‘What holds you, then? Is a fortune not lure enough for you? A fortune – and me?’

  It checked his angry outburst for the few seconds she needed. Then her scorn vanished as suddenly as it had come. Her tone became pleading again. ‘Oh, Jack, it is the only way. It would mean so much for us both – release from this, happiness, as much money as we’d need to live a thousand lives. And it can be done – you know it can.’

  He hesitated, and it is possible in that moment he took stock of past, present, and future, and weighed what was to lose against what was to gain, and resolved. He had never acquired the habit of lingering over decisions. On the one hand there was nothing to keep him in Providence; in fact there appeared to be every reason why he should place himself beyond the Governor’s reach as quickly as possible; on the other there was the chance of a fortune and Mistress Bonney besides. Both were tempting, but the risk was appalling. And yet, was it more desperate than enterprises to which he had set his hand in the past?

  ‘Give me a moment to think,’ he said slowly, and she knew that she had won.

  ‘As you please.’ She kept her voice level in spite of her exultation. ‘I’ll leave you a moment.’ And without another word she withdrew, closing the door of her bedroom softly behind her.

  For a moment she stood listening at the panels. Then she crossed swiftly to her dressing table and began to strip off her riding habit. Under her breath she hummed a jig tune, and in her light-heartedness she scattered the garments about the room. When she had undressed she stood in front of her long gilt-framed mirror and examined herself critically, turning this way and that, and smiling with some satisfaction at her reflection. She shook her long red mane of hair from side to side, gathered it up in her hands, considered the various ways in which she might arrange it, and eventually decided it looked best as it was.

  She slipped into a heavy green brocade gown before seating herself and beginning a close inspection of her complexion with a hand mirror. She had a few more minutes, she decided, before Rackham announced the acceptance which she now accounted foregone: she must spend them preparing to look her best.

  Presently she heard him call. She rose unhesitatingly, took one last quick look at herself in the long mirror, tapped her cheek-bone with her rabbit’s-foot, and walking across to the door, opened it. He was standing with his back to her, at the table, but he turned at the sound of the latch. She saw his brows contract and his eyes glint as he caught sight of her, and felt well pleased with herself.

  She smiled at him. ‘And has he held his council of war?’

  ‘He has,’ said Rackham, and smiled wryly in return.

  ‘And the answer, then?’

  ‘The answer,’ he said, pacing slowly up to her, ‘is “aye” – if you’ll find time, date, and course as you promised. But I warn you again, it’s a deadly risk, and only an even chance – if that – of success. I think myself I must be mad to listen to you.’

  She moved a little closer to him, and for all her height she had to look up into the lean dark face. She put up her hands to his cheeks and caressed them gently.

  ‘Not mad at all, captain. It’s the hot weather. It turns men’s heads.’ She ran the tip of one finger along his lips. ‘Even great hardy sea-faring men.’

  He caught her closer, and she shivered in his grip, writhing against his hard strong body. He stooped towards her face, but she turned it swiftly away with a gasping little laugh and made as though to try to break from his embrace.

  ‘Great hardy sea-faring men most of all,’ she whispered. His lips quested down her cheek and neck and on to her plump shoulder as he pushed away the loose gown that covered it. For a moment longer she resisted him, and then his lips met her mouth, sweet and loose and moist, her nails dug convulsively into his shoulders, and the robe fell with a soft rustle about their feet.

  9. THE PLOTTERS

  Next day Rackham left the Bonney plantation and went into Providence to lodge at the Cinque Ports. He was not a sensitive man, and was ready to cuckold Bonney whenever the opportunity arose, but he felt a reluctance to do it under the man’s own roof, or to meet Bonney’s shifty eye and guess that the planter knew what was happening and was content for some warped purpose of his own to smirk and say nothing.

  But this apart, having fallen in with Anne Bonney’s plan, Rackham was now faced with the enormous task of obtaining a crew and a ship, all in secrecy, and of plotting a course of action to ensure that when the argosy sailed for England he and his companions would be hard on her heels.

  As a first step he decided to enrol Ben, his former lieutenant, whom he found at breakfast in one of the wine-shops on Fish Street. Rackham had no hesitation in approaching one who, like himself, was a pardoned man, for he knew Ben and trusted him, although he told him no more than was necessary – that there was an opportunity of taking a treasure as valuable as any carried in a single bottom within living memory, that Rackham had weighed the risks and found the project dangerous but not impossible, and that a hundred and fifty men would be required.

  Ben picked his teeth with a fish-bone and knitted his brows.

  ‘Time’s the thing,’ he observed. ‘I can find the men, but once found they want to be safe aboard before they can start blabbing. ‘Tisn’t as if we were in a free port any more. Afore the Government came ye could call for volunteers from the cross, but this bloody Rogers has an eye in every bottle and an ear in every jug. Soon as we start scoutin’ for men the buzz’ll go round, an’ they’ll know more about it at Governor’s House than we do ourselves.’

  Rackham soon dispelled his anxiety. ‘I’m not asking you to find the whole crew. Most of them you can leave to me. I want you to seek out thirty at most – men who sailed in the Kingston, or any others you can trust. But you must be able to trust them, mind that. Get Malloy and Bull, if you can. The others I’ll manage.’

  He had no clear idea how he would recruit them but Ben unconsciously pointed the way.

  ‘Bull’s signed wi’ Penner,’ he said, ‘but I can lay hold of Malloy. Kemp the gunner, too.’

  ‘Bull? With Penner, is he?’ Rackham was thoughtful. ‘By God, it would be a crew ready found if we could bring in Penner himself. And his men wouldn’t need to know it till we were at sea.’

  ‘Aye.’ Ben was dubious. ‘Mind that all his crew won’t be pardoned brothers like us. God knows what sort of hymn-singers and gentlemen-adventurers he’s got aboard. Whitehall pimps and youngest sons whose fathers left ’em nowt. They might not take kindly to sailing under the black.’

  ‘They’ll take kindly,’ said Rackham, ‘when there’s money in it.’ The more he thought of Penner the better he liked the notion. He got up from the table. ‘Find me those thirty men, Ben, and look for me at the Cinque Ports.’

  ‘Aye.’ Ben rose with him. ‘But Jacky,’ he added, frowning, ‘if as you go seeking Penner and his crew, mind what I said about the gentlemen-’venturers. There’s queer cattle on privateers these days, and honest men can work mischief among a crew of rogues.’

  It was advice that Rackham was one day to remember, but at present he was too preoccupied with the realisation of how much the Major’s participation would mean to their venture. Penner was a former pirate and seasoned sea-fighter. He had a crew, most of whom, in spite of Ben’s fears, would be unlikely to scruple at piracy. Furthermore, he was ready to sail – only the hope of signing Rackham as quartermaster detained him in Providence – and he could have his men aboard his sloop and ready when Rackham wanted them. Thus, the hazardous business of raising a crew would be safely accomplished, and Penner could lie offshore if need be while Rackham and the thirty rascals whom Ben would recruit could attend to the final detail
s. These would include gathering the last scraps of information about Rogers’ argosy – here Anne Bonney would prove invaluable – and, when the treasure-ship had sailed, the stealing of a brig for the enterprise.

  This last was the major problem, for Penner’s sloop would be a hopeless proposition against a ship of war, but it was by no means insurmountable. The Kingston lay in Providence harbour, with an anchor watch; it might not be easy to cut her out with thirty men and put to sea all in half an hour, but Rackham had known riskier ventures safely accomplished. Then, with Penner’s crew transferred to the Kingston they could be off on the heels of Rogers’ argosy.

  So he reasoned, recklessly perhaps, but aware that to be less than bold would be to invite failure. Thus, in a few minutes, his plan took general shape, and since Penner’s participation was vital Rackham straightway sought him out, sounded him carefully, and laid the proposal before him. In this, as in Ben’s case, he did not hesitate; he had to trust someone, and if piracy had taught him nothing else it had made him a tolerable judge of men.

  After the Major’s initial outburst of alarm and astonishment, their argument followed closely on the lines of that which had taken place between Anne Bonney and Rackham the previous day. But with this difference, that Rackham was a better advocate for the enterprise than she had been, since he understood better what it involved, and Penner, once his first fears had been overcome, proved a willing listener.

  At length he sat back, surveying Rackham with thoughtful eyes. ‘No question of its being a hanging job, is there? And saucy Anne thought it out for herself, ye say? A remarkable woman, that. Remarkable. Though I’d not trust her overfar. However, that’s by the way. I like it, John; I think I like it well. A captain’s share; let’s see, that could see a man rolling in the best of Paris or Rome for the rest of his days. Aye, or snug under a sandbank in the Windward Passage. You’re sure of your information?’