Throughout the ship echoed a general bustle of expectant but orderly noise, the thudding of running feet, energetic hammering accompanied by mild cursing. Jesamiah’s great cabin had been altered in a matter of minutes; the bulkhead screens unbolted and removed, the stern windows folded up overhead, the glass panels of the skylight removed, to be stored in the hold along with the furniture, china plate and silverware.
Sea Witch
, transformed from the elegant and immaculate mistress of the seas to a professional fighting ship. Deadly and accurate. The lark become the hawk.
On deck, awaiting orders, the hands at their stations beside masts and guns looked towards the quarterdeck, to Jesamiah. This was always the worst part, the catching up. And the waiting.
Nine
Port Royal – 1683
Watching his son and waiting for the Witch Woman to come again; to come and help him put right that which he had done wrong, Charles St Croix remembered…
He closed his telescope with a sharp ‘clack’ and leant on the starboard rail staring at the several ships resting at anchor in Port Royal Harbour. He had expected a warm welcome, had received a notable rebuttal. ‘Come ashore and you will be arrested and hanged.’ A fine welcome indeed!
The place was so different now to what it had been ten years past. The fortress rebuilt, the town doubled in size. The narrow streets appeared to be as filthy and stinking as ever, but they were busy with trade. Much of it legal, for all that most were inclined towards the vices of gambling, drink and women. The harbour was full – but not one of the ships that Charles St Croix had studied through his telescope, the bring it close, was a pirate vessel.
The various wars and sparring matches with Spain and France and Holland had ended. There was no more privateering, and no more piracy, at least not here in Jamaica under Captain Henry Morgan’s administration.
St Croix spat disdainfully over the rail into the ebb tide gurgling past the hull of the ship. “Henry Morgan – beg pardon,
Sir
Henry Morgan, I forgot the King had knighted the rum-sodden old sot – was ever one to feather his own nest. He sits over there lording it as Lieutenant Governor, his fat rump planted on a gilded chair, while his drunken brain forgets the days when he sailed these waters as a pirate with his comrades.”
“Do not permit him to hear you say that, my friend. Morgan insists he was a legal privateer. He sailed with the King’s permission and did naught without it.” The speaker, Carlos Mereno, also spat over the side. He was shorter in stature than his good friend St Croix, broader around the waist and across the shoulders, but where Mereno was dark-eyed and dark-haired, St Croix had inherited his mother’s colouring. A tall, gaunt woman, long-nosed and olive-skinned, but her hair, the rich tone of spun honey and her eyes amber, like a cat’s, had for all her plainness drawn men to her.
“Despite my breeding,” Carlos Mereno smiled, “I have no love for Spain, yet the atrocities that man committed against my countrymen and women are beyond contempt.”
St Croix shook his head. “Privateer? Pah! He is a pirate to the core, always has been.” He had served with Morgan; had committed some of those atrocities. But then, the Spanish, or the French, or the Dutch, had been the cause of just as many.
Shrugging his shoulders Mereno sighed, a sound of resignation and regret. “Yet any man who steps ashore and makes mention of how he came about the gold in his pocket, or boasts of triumphs at sea, is named pirate and hanged.”
“Aye, even when he learned all he knew from Morgan’s own orders. It is a sad day when a great man, even if he be a fat-bellied, fart-arsed drunkard, forgets those of us who served with him for England’s sake.”
Mereno disagreed. “No
, mi amigo,
Morgan cared naught for England; he fought to gain for himself a fortune and to assure his name is remembered when he is nothing but worm fodder. He had not the same honour as do you and I.”
Footsteps on the planking of the deck. Slow and measured, for the man making them, though still a youth, was heavy in build. The kudos of becoming Second Lieutenant had added weight to his bearing. Lieutenant Teach was now an officer and a man of importance, and he ensured all knew it.
“Be we t’go ashore?” he asked gruffly, the burr of his accent making him seem slow and ponderous, though St Croix knew him to have a sharp, quick intelligence. “Cap’n Morgan be a man of m’own heart an’ thinkin’, or so I b’lieve tell.”
Charles St Croix did not look round. He regretted giving Teach the extra authority, for he was using it with malice and cruelty. The hope that perhaps a position of command would tame the fellow had been misplaced. He revelled in inflicting fear and pain on those who could not fight back.
“Aye, you are much like Morgan,” Charles observed. “You care not who stumbles into your path. If someone – male, female, adult or child – stands in your way you crush them beneath your boot with no thought or compassion. Morgan would break a man’s back to ensure a fast passage, and break a ship too, if it suited him. As will you.”
Teach folded his arms, squinted into the evening sun, its blood-red reflection blazing upon the water. “There be always more crew, always another ship; bain’t often a chance at treasure. Tha’ way worked fer Morgan, it’d work fer me an’ all.”
Not looking at his second officer, St Croix remained staring across the harbour at Port Royal, said, “Morgan took what he wanted with pistol and blade. He thought nothing of starving a man to death or slicing open the belly of a woman, though she be great with child. ‘Spanish turds,’ he would say, ‘they deserve to die.’” He looked at the darkening hills of Jamaica, the lights beginning to glimmer along the shore, in the town and from the ships. “I was a boy when first I sailed with Morgan. I once thought him a fine man.”
“He still be a gurt man,” Teach protested, “Looken where he be now! Knighted by tha King. No un’ll forget his name I’d wager; ‘til Trumpets sound he’ll be ‘membered. As’ll I if’n it please God or tha Devil. As’ll I.”
The sun sank into the sea and the sky darkened.
“Who’ll ‘member thee, Cap’n St Croix?” Teach asked quietly into the night. “Who’ll be carin’ t’ r‘member thee?”
Aye, Morgan had been remembered. He had died with his body diseased with dropsy and his great belly bulging so far that his coat would not fasten around it. The rum he insisted on continuing to drink had drowned his innards and his sense. So desperate had he been for his name to pass forward, his will had made clear that his sole male kin, his nephew on his wife’s side, could inherit only if he took the name of Morgan.
And where was he now, the legendary Captain Henry Morgan? He was beneath the sea, his grave gone, lost, and forgotten. There had come a great quake in Port Royal, the earth had split and crumbled, and the sea had swallowed much of the town whole. The destruction so complete they had rebuilt as Kingston, Jamaica, on the far side of the bay. Port Royal had become nothing more than a naval base. The sea goddess, Tethys, had claimed her own and Morgan was nothing more than a name from the past.
Charles St Croix sat alone beside the River, remembering.
What of Teach? Ah, even then, Teach had spoken as one who had traded his soul with the Devil.
Ten
Jesamiah’s plan was to give chase, get in as close as he could, then send the two pirate ships scurrying for their lives. Simple. Except nothing concerning Edward Teach was ever simple.
Every pirate traded on a formidable conduct. To be feared was to be successful, it made sense to cultivate a strong reputation. Why fight if you could convince your victim to surrender with a minimum of resistance? Teach had adopted a fearsome identity, even down to his terrifying appearance and usage of the name Blackbeard. Despite his far from young age, in a fight he remained an awesome sight; tall, with a physique of limitless strength and endurance. He had no fear of death and thought himself invincible. There were few who doubted he had made a pact with the Devil.
Sea Witch
had to tack twice, but she was a fast ship and whenever the variable wind shifted in her favour she ate up the sea miles as if she were a dolphin leaping through the white-capped surf.
“We’ll tack again, Rue,” Jesamiah said, “then one more should bring us in on a suitable course to intercept them.”
Rue nodded, peering at the expanse of sail. He was not particularly happy with this venture. Blackbeard’s reputation was feared by every man who sailed the Caribbean and American coast. A few minutes later, when the yards had been trundled round, the braces hauled and
Sea Witch
had settled comfortably on her new tack, he said, “You once told me you ‘ad fought alongside Blackbeard. I did not know whether to believe you.”
“Am I so poor to convince then?” Jesamiah chuckled, watching Nathan Crocker’s final round of gun inspection; frowned as his first mate reprimanded the number four gun captain for not having his slow match made ready. There was a brief exchange of harsh words, Jesamiah waited, would intervene if necessary, but Nat had been a lieutenant aboard a Navy frigate. He knew his job, and was good at it. The gunner backed down, ambling away to fetch a match from the below deck store. It would be a while yet before the fight, but once engaged on a Chase Jesamiah never took chances.
“If you’d rather be demoted to deckhand, Crawford, I’m sure it can be arranged!” Nat shouted at the man. Crawford scowled, picked up his pace to a jogtrot. Jesamiah made a mental note to keep a weather eye on him. This was not the first time he had shown a lack of enthusiasm.
“I spent a week aboard a ship with Teach,” Jesamiah confessed to Rue. “I was a few months off eighteen, m’head filled with pride at being made foretopman aboard the
Mermaid
under Captain Malachias Taylor. He was a good man, good sailor; what he didn’t know about ships and the sea was not worth knowing. England was at war – another bickering waste of time squabble that fat Queen Anne had initiated with the damned Frenchies. I’ve no idea what it was about. We never asked the whys and wherefores of things in those days.”
“As we still do not,
mon ami
,” Rue chortled. “I ‘eard it that
les anglais
put the fracas down to a disagreement about the Spanish line of succession,
non
? Though the Colonies see it different and call it ‘Queen Anne’s War’. They say it was fought over who governed which territory and ‘eld which fort. I ‘eard
les français
fought admirably against you English for what they considered their land.”
Realising that he had been derogatory about the French, Jesamiah waved his hand dismissively. “Pah, you’re Breton, Rue. I don’t count you as a Frog.”
“I am pleased to ‘ear it.”
“Since when have you been keen to hoist your colours for the French anyway?”
Rue adjusted the helm slightly, shifted his weight more squarely onto his widespread feet. Grinned. “I ‘oist them for myself,
mon ami
. For myself and my comrades.”
With his keen sight, Jesamiah measured the closing distance between the
Sea Witch
and the two rapidly nearing pirate vessels. “Talking of colours; Sandy, hoist mine if you will.”
From the rail the African second mate, Isiah Roberts, rubbed at his nose. “You think that wise Captain? The
Fortune
will be mighty worried at seeing three of us in her wake.”
“It’s Teach I want to fool, Isiah. We need to get in close to show him the error of his ways. Have you any other suggestions for trying to convince him we are on his side?”
Isiah said nothing more, Sandy sent the black flag with the white leering skull and crossed bones to the top of the mizzenmast where it streamed, whipping and cracking, in arrogant menace.
“You were saying about Teach?”
“What? Oh aye.” Jesamiah had been watching the bend of the sails and the distance the
Sea Witch
had travelled these last ten minutes, had forgotten Rue’s question. “We teamed up with Benjamin Hornigold to prey on the French. Technically, we were all privateers then of course, all legal with Letters of Marque and the Queen’s praises for her loyal subjects ringing in our ears. Changed her mind about us once we were of no more use. Teach was Hornigold’s quartermaster. They’d lost several men in a skirmish so Malachias sent me over to help out. Said I’d learn a lot being under the command of a different captain and with a different crew. Teach was Navy once, did you know that? First Lieutenant.”
Rue snorted disdain. “So, what did you learn?”
Jesamiah answered softly, confirming Rue’s suspicion that his captain was also none too keen on what they were about to attempt. “For one thing, I learnt that Teach is insane.”
“Even then?”
“Even then.” Jesamiah took a deep breath, chased away the feeling of dread that was hanging like an undigested lump of stale bread in his belly. “To tell the truth I don’t recall him having that great bush of a beard then. The notion of twining burning fuses into it came about after he captured that French slaver and renamed her
Queen Anne’s Revenge
. He was a bloody fool to wreck her.”
Rue and Isiah laughed outright. “If I recall,” Rue said through the burbling chuckles reverberating round the quarterdeck, “that misfortune was directly down to you!”
Jesamiah fashioned a look of innocence. “Me?”
“
Oui. Vous
.”
Indignant, Jesamiah snorted and elbowed Rue away from the helm, taking the spokes himself in his strong hands. He could make
Sea Witch
sing like a siren and turn within her own length; could make her run faster than the wind, swoop like a bird of prey. Eager, like a lover willing to please she instantly obeyed his every whim.
“I didn’t force him to chase us across those sandbars. Weren’t my fault he didn’t know the depth of the
Queen Anne’s
keel were it?”
“You snatched an entire cargo of tobacco from under ‘is nose then caused ‘im to wreck ‘is ship. ‘E will never forgive you. You made a public fool of ‘im.”
The freshening wind caught the forecourse and sent
Sea Witch
momentarily skittering. Jesamiah’s hands gentled her back to compliance and he rubbed surreptitiously at his sore ribs. Of the truth of Rue’s statement he was only too aware. Gibbens and Red Rufus had very effectively jolted his memory.
He grinned. “So let’s get on with this and convince him we are about to make amends for our misdemeanour, shall we?”
The waiting was over.
“Clew up! Clew up to fighting sail if you please gentlemen! Clew up!”