The Pirate Devlin (32 page)

  'Right,' he said at last, and pointed a blade to Landri. 'How rich do you want to be, Fauche?'

  They were coming down the path now, the stockade silent before them, the surprising party of women they had met traipsing up to meet them still a leering subject of conversation amongst the chortling tars.

  With gentlemanly goodwill, Coxon had ordered the marines to stay with the women, find shade if possible, whilst he, Guinneys, Scott and the four hands ventured on, somewhat confused by the ladies' claims of compliance with the fort.

  Coxon had questioned three of them. The one called Annie had appeared to be their hostess and she assured him that they had arrived from the ship for one purpose, and now attended to and handsomely paid they were returning, for repose, naturally. Everything was fine in the fort. They knew nothing of pirates or of one called Devlin. Their ship was crewed by modest men who had sailed them from Hispaniola for an equal share. The two others had giggled the same story. They were alone, and only as innocent as they were yesterday, no less so.

  As they walked on, Guinneys could not help but cast aspersions. 'Surely they belong to the ship, Captain? They're with
them,
are they not? The pirates?'

  Coxon removed his tricorne, ran a sleeve across his forehead. 'I have no doubt. A whores' ship the same colour as the pirate brigantine? Unlikely.' A conflict he could not quite grasp kept surfacing within Coxon. Devlin, a pirate captain. Devlin, loyal servant. Devlin, lording over all with bloodied sword and smoking pistol. Devlin, biding his time to overthrow his pirate masters and show his true colours.

  'All that bunting, though. It's a possibility,' Guinneys theorised.

  'It's a deception. That's how he got in here. Using bloody whores like a Trojan horse. Now hold, William, look alive.' He waved them all down to crouch along the path and observe the fort.

  Nothing stirred. No sound from beyond the austere gate. No lookout in the tower.

  'Seems quiet, sir,' Guinneys pointed out needlessly.

  Coxon ignored him and pulled two of the sailors out to the front. 'You two,' he whispered. 'Go around the walls. See if it's clear. Look sharp now.'

  Without hesitation, the two men in slop-hose loped down to the gate. Finding themselves still alive, they sidled round the far wall and disappeared.

  Guinneys jostled Scott as he pulled one of his pistols clear of his belt.

  'What say you, Scott? Fool's errand? Pirates ahoy, ho-yo, ho-yo, eh?'

  'Quiet, old boy,' Scott hissed.

  Coxon looked back at his two officers harshly, then back to the fort, waiting for a shot or a yell to break the tension standing on his skin.

  Moments later the two sailors popped out from the opposite wall, indicated all was well and waited, stuck fast to the wall.

  Guinneys shuffled up to Coxon's side. 'What now, sir? All clear around, it seems?'

  'We need to know what goes on in there. Whose party this is.'

  'How do we do that, sir?'

  'Well, for one thing I've had enough of waiting for something to be done to me.' Coxon dragged Guinneys up and waved the others to follow. 'I'm going through that bloody door. I'm not about to be afraid of a man who used to wipe my shoes.'

  They were all against the wall now. The sailors were armed with musketoons, cutlasses and their own gullies, each gentleman with a brace of pistols, hanger or cutlass.

  'The door is barred,' Coxon reported from the front.

  Guinneys threw off his boatcloak, dashed up the path, then looked back to the fort. 'There is a bell,' he shouted. 'Want me to hit it, Captain?'

  'Your shot would draw more attention, William.'

  'Yes, of course. Silly of me. Damn nerves, I suspect!' He cocked his pistol.

  'No, William.' Coxon raised a palm to him. 'One of the musketoons will do better.' He gestured to Adam Cole, a burly soul striped in blue. Cole rose out of his crouch and away from the wall. Instinctively he looked upwards for a target; then, aware of all eyes upon him, he snapped back the dog-head and nestled the musketoon into his shoulder, firing, a breath later, over the stockade wall, the explosion reverberating off the walls. He looked to his captain like a child for praise, then lowered his mind to his cartouche, reloading as he walked back to the small group.

  'Good, Cole.' Coxon nodded. As if to reinforce the gunfire, he kicked out at the door again and again with his buckled shoes, simulating the impatient knocking of a giant.

  Coxon stepped away, perspiring coldly from the heat and the effort of his rapping at the gate.

  Guinneys' voice wafted up to his ear. 'Someone locked those ladies out, Captain, not ten minutes ago.'

  In response to Guinneys' words, barely uttered, the solid sound of a wooden bar drawing back scraped through them.

  The gate dragged slowly inwards, revealing a bright world beyond the shade of the stockade wall, the small, grief- stricken form of Landri Fauche stepping into the gap, musket in hand.

'Bonjour, mes amis.'
He smiled weakly. 'You are English, no? You have come to my aid, monsieur?'

  Devlin checked his bonds. His arms were tied behind his back as he sat at the feet of the dead Bessette, the tablecloth again concealing the hiding place of the black chest. Dandon stood at the intersecting door to the corridor, Bessette's pistol in one hand covering Devlin, the other nervously sleeking through his hair beneath his wide yellow hat.

  'Did I tell you how I became the captain of these men, Dandon?' Devlin almost sang.

  'You did not, sir.' Dandon smiled back.

  'It was a day out of the Verdes,' Devlin began. 'We had taken the
Shadow
from the Portuguese. Like an apple from a tree. All hands were to the punch, mourning the loss of Seth Toombs.'

  'This Seth Toombs was the previous commander. I have gathered this of late,' Dandon stated.

  'Aye. Fellow not much missed, save by Peter Sam I reckon.' He shuffled to have his back to the table and the chest. 'The call went round for a vote, you see. And I was just as drunk as anyone else and on the
Shadow
meself. They launched one of the gigs on a cable from
Lucy.
Then a round robin came aboard. You know what that is?' Dandon shook his head. 'It's a message, a decision of the crew, with all names signed in a circle round the plan. In a circle, so you can't tell who started it. Anyways, Hugh brings the round robin aboard with my name in the centre and all the principal officers signed round it. Then Hugh was staggering in front of me, telling me I was captain.
Told
me I was captain.' He arched his head round to Dandon and grinned as rakishly as he could given he was half beneath a table, his wrists tied. 'Seemed like a fine notion on the day.'

  The deafening sound of Guinneys' leather sole stoving in the door made even Bessette's corpse jump. The room filled with sunlight, the dust swirling in it as thick as ash.

  Guinneys, pistols drawn, sidestepped into the room and backed to the left wall, darting his eyes between Dandon and Devlin. A weapon on each. Lieutenant Scott followed and took a cautious pose to the right of the door, making way for John Coxon to enter with Landri Fauche at his shoulder.

  Coxon's feet echoed twice on the rough wooden floor as he stepped towards the man looking up at him. Coxon's face was impassive, unmoved, as he took in the sight of Devlin at his feet.

  'Hello, Patrick.' Coxon heard his voice crack with drought, and he swallowed hard. 'Tell me all about this pirate business now then, eh?'

Chapter Fifteen

  'I believed you dead, Captain,' was all Devlin could say. He sighed a laugh of genuine irony.

  'I was having doubts myself, Patrick.' Coxon chose to avoid looking at his man, now tanned and bedraggled and far from the shining pale valet he had cultivated. He surveyed the room. The dead Bessette dominated, his head lolled back, dry blood smeared over his face, a peppering of red on the wall some feet behind him.

  'Your handiwork, Patrick?' he asked, his head darting around the room like a bird of prey's.

  'An accident, Captain Coxon. Not of my doing.' Devlin smiled, his eyes taking in Guinneys and Scott in turn. Landri Fauche had crept into the suddenly crowded room to stand between the open door and the group of sailors inching their heads into the room.

  'Cole!' Coxon turned to the door. 'Secure the gate. Get one man into that tower.'

  'Aye, Captain!' Cole knuckled his forehead and vanished.

  Coxon spoke to Landri as he walked round Bessette, casually examining the black gap in the back of his skull. 'This man' - he flapped a hand to Dandon - 'he is the doctor you spoke of, monsieur?'

  Landri's understanding was poor but he gathered enough. '
Oui,
Capitaine.'

  'Sir' - he looked straight at the nervous Dandon - 'put your pistol away; this is a place for accidents. I am in charge here now.' Then, with more candour, 'Do you understand?'

'Oui.'
Dandon smiled and tucked away the pistol, his accent impeccable over his anxiety. 'My English is good, Capitaine. I will help as much as I can. Now you have rescued us.' He nodded nervously to Guinneys, whose pistol still stared at Dandon's chest. Guinneys scowled back, his second pistol barrel trembling slightly as it covered Devlin.

  Coxon put his hands behind him, revealing the brassed pommels of his pistols and the cutlass at his side. 'Good. Although you seem to have all in hand, Doctor. Reveal to me what has occurred here today.'

  'I should like, Capitaine, to be assured that your presence here is honourable. Under our circumstance, you understand?'

  Coxon's jaw tightened. 'I have orders, sir, to secure this post on behalf of the French court. There is the matter of a gold deposit that is my chief concern, but I will repeat that I wish to know what has occurred here this day.'

  Dandon did not flinch at the mention of the gold. He removed his hat, slowly, as if it might waken, then stepped out of his corner and to the back of the table. Guinneys' pistol followed his steps as Dandon laid his hat upon the green velvet tablecloth.

'Pirates,
Capitaine.' His voice wavered as if he might break into tears. 'We were beset by pirates. They duped the soldiers with whores. I was forced to drug them! Although they wished me to kill them, I succeeded in only dosing them gently. They will wake shortly.' He paused to wipe some linen across his forehead.

  'Capitaine Bessette was killed, truthfully in accident, when the soldiers discovered the pirates' true motives. A fight ensued.

  Deaths, as you see, have happened. Gunfire was everywhere. It was a miracle that myself and the brave Caporal-Chef Fauche endured. That was all this morning. Once they had the gold, their guard relaxed and-'

  Coxon interjected, 'They have the gold? Where? When?'

  'They took it from Capitaine Bessette's bedchamber.' He indicated the room behind Coxon. 'It took four of them to carry it, Capitaine.' He pointed to the back of Devlin's head. 'This one and two others remained. But his pirate fellows fled when we… Landri and myself… managed to overcome him. It has been that way for two hours now. We kept him alive for our own safe need, waiting for the rest of them to return. And then, mercy of Mary, you and your gallant officers appeared. Praise you, Capitaine! Praise be, your mercies!'

  Coxon had stopped listening as Dandon collapsed onto one of the green fauteuils, head in hands. He passed a casual hand and eye over the chest that held Dandon's plethora of bottles and curious paper parcels as he stepped within earshot of Guinneys, who had lowered his pistols. Scott still covered the room nervously.

  'The gold must be on that brigantine,' he whispered to Guinneys.

  'Then why do they wait?' Guinneys hissed.

  Devlin laughed.

  Coxon's head pivoted round to glare at the man on the floor. 'What is so amusing, Patrick?'

  'Ah, come now, Captain.' Devlin looked to the whitewashed ceiling. 'Do we not have more absorbing matters to talk on?'

  Captain Coxon bent on a knee to face Devlin, his sword scraping behind him and almost touching Lieutenant Scott's buckled shoe.

  'You and I will talk, Patrick. Of many things, be assured. I have come here a long way from where I left you and it is a compulsion within to shoot you where you sit. I am betrayed by you, Patrick Devlin. How little you realise the finality of your acts.'

  'Oh, spare me, Captain,' Devlin spat. 'All I have done is my own will. I'll listen to none of your damnings! My soul's my own!'

  Coxon lowered his eyes. 'You own nothing, Patrick. And soon you will own even less. Mark me now, lad.'

  Guinneys' voice barked, drawing all eyes to him. 'Enough, Captain! What of the gold? How many men aboard that slut,
peasant
? Tell us
now!'
His gun wavered at the end of his grip.