Voyage of Plunder (3 page)

The rising sun shattered the cloud-studded sky with rays of yellow and orange. Halfway between the sun and the horizon, sails floated like the wings of a bird in flight. Below, a dark hull aimed toward us like a dagger.

“Look lively now, lads!” bellowed the captain through his speaking trumpet.

Sailors ran around me, their bare feet slapping the deck. One burly man knocked into me, scarcely apologizing as he ran by. I suddenly felt awkward. Stupid. Only fourteen years of age, average height, with soft muscles and pale skin, no doubt reeking like a rat in a cellar. I was in their way, knowing nothing of what they were doing. Hundreds of hempen ropes snaked this way and that.
How in the devil do they know which one to pull?

“Ready! Ready! Ease down the helm!”

I spied my father on the quarterdeck. I began to make my way toward him but then hesitated, remembering his expression of hurt the day before.
But,
I told myself,
it was my duty as a good and faithful son to tell him of his bewitching. Now, perhaps, he will see Faith for what she is. He will return to Boston and get rid of her.

With that thought, I squared my shoulders, climbed the com-panionway and joined my father at the rail. “What is it?” I hoped he would say we were turning around and going home.

“You must be feeling better.”

“I am,” I replied, realizing I
was
feeling better, even though the
Gray Pearl
now rolled heavily through the swells. “What is it?” I asked again.

He handed me his spyglass.

It took me a moment to find her. A solitary three-masted ship headed our way, yards straining to every stitch of canvas.

“Could be nothing,” my father was saying, “but she changed course to intercept once she spotted us. I told the captain to alter course and keep our distance.”

“Why?” I lowered the glass, noticing my father's hands as he gripped the rail. His knuckles were white, and it looked as if he might snap the rail in half.

Then he was staring at me oddly. Sweat dotted his upper lip. “If anything happens, Daniel, promise me you'll look after Faith.”

My knees felt weak. Something was not right, something my father was not telling me.

“Promise me, Daniel,” he said again.

How could I make such a promise? I despised Faith. But then again, how could I refuse? I loved my father. “I promise,” I said, pretending to mean it. I raised the glass and looked out to sea, feeling a sudden urge to apologize, to say I was sorry for calling Faith a witch. But I could not. I would not. Instead, I asked, “Are they pirates?”

“Pray they are not, Daniel. For the love of God, pray they are not.”

The other ship drew nearer throughout the day. My father told me that the wind favored her, and to go below and look after Faith, that they would soon be upon us, for better or for worse. I was angry to be sent below. I started to tell my father that I was a child no longer, but I remembered my promise and bit my tongue.

When we had first boarded the ship in Boston, the captain had given his cabin to my father and Faith. (It was only right, seeing as my father owned the ship and was very important, besides.) Now Faith lay on the bed in the captain's cabin, her pregnancy as yet scarcely noticeable. Her skin looked green.
While I stood in the doorway, she groaned, rolled over, and retched into a bucket.

I slumped into a chair with a sigh. All of the excitement would be happening on deck while I played nursemaid. And I was feeling sick again. My father was right. Being belowdecks was bad for the head. Even worse was listening to someone else be sick. I clenched my teeth.

Half an hour …

An hour …

Again the running of feet. Commands barked through the trumpet. A slight change in course.

A nearby
boom!

My heart lurched.
Cannon! So it
is
pirates! It has to be! Why else would someone fire upon a merchant ship?

Then it seemed everyone was running and yelling at once— a thunder of feet above my head. I could not tell what was happening. Were we preparing to fire our cannon? Were the pirates aboard and attacking us all? Meanwhile, Faith was sitting up, reaching for me. “What's happening? Daniel, oh dear God, what's happening? My husband—my dear husband—”

Another boom.

Whump!

A crunch of wood.

“Dear God! Daniel! Tell me what's—” But before Faith could finish her sentence, she was vomiting again.

And then I heard them. The pirates. A clash of screams pierced the air, mixed with a screeching wail of trumpets, violins, drums, flutes. Hair prickled on the back of my neck. Panicked, I glanced about the captain's quarters. I needed some sort of weapon to defend us.

The captain's desk. I opened it. Logbook, papers, quills, ink pots, maps …

The screams were beside us now. The ships collided with a crunch, throwing me to my knees. The
Gray Pearl
leaned slightly, her timbers groaning. I tasted fear, my heart wild as a galloping horse.

“Daniel!” Faith had crawled out of bed and now clutched my arm. “Pray tell me. I must know.”

“It's—it's pirates.” I continued rifling madly through the desk. There. A dagger of some kind, rusted and bent. It would have to do. I stuffed it in the waist of my breeches.

So there we stood, Faith and I, waiting. Listening to the shrieks and the thumps and the explosions. Watching the door. Dreading when it would smash open and a huge pirate would fill the gap. I glanced at her, wondering if I looked as scared as she did. Her hair was wild. The whites showed all around her pink-rimmed eyes. Tears hovered. Her chest heaved with panting.

Suddenly I felt sorry for her, witch or not. I would not want to be a woman when pirates attacked. For that matter, I would not want to be a boy either. Much as I hated to admit it, in that moment I was very much a boy—a frightened fourteen-year-old boy with a bent dagger in his waistband.

Suddenly everything turned quiet. Deathly quiet.

Then I smelled it. The stench of smoke. The nightmare of every sailor. My voice shook, “The ship is afire. We can't stay down here or we'll burn alive.”

She nodded. A tear slid down her cheek.

I said a quick prayer as we left the cabin, her hand locked in mine.

aith and I stumbled onto the upper deck. The smoke was thick and black. I coughed and gagged, pulling Faith along. Behind us was the roar of fire.

I could not see where I was going; I knew only that we had to get off the ship. But the
Gray Pearl
appeared deserted.
Where is everybody?
“Father!” My voice choked.

Then I heard voices ahead. A grunt of pain. “This way” I said to Faith, hurrying in the direction of the voices. The smoke began to thin. I picked my way past the mainmast, then past the main hatch. We stepped out of the swirling smoke and into a nightmare.

A band of pirates surrounded my father. I could see him kneeling in the center. As I watched, frozen with horror, one of the pirates
placed his pistol to the back of my father's head and pulled the trigger.

My father jerked, then fell in a heap.

Faith screamed.

I realized that I too was screaming. “Father!” That I was running toward the pirates, dagger in my hand, screaming, screaming. They turned in surprise, as if not knowing anyone else was aboard. Hands grabbed me. I think I cut one of them; I'm not sure. I was flailing. Screaming and flailing.

“Father!”

He lay in a pool of blood, his wig blown away.

“Father!”

They pinned me down. I could no longer move. Still screaming …

Screaming…

One of them calling my name. Over and over again.

“Daniel…
Daniel, my boy …
”

And I knew no more.

I wanted to stay in the darkness forever. A numbing darkness that knew no pain. A darkness that remembered only sitting on my father's lap, listening to the whispers, treasures locked in my hand.

Whenever the light threatened, I fled to the comfort of darkness, pulling it over me like a blanket. For with the light came knowledge. And I did not want to know. Not now. Not ever.

I don't know how long I stayed in the darkness. A few hours. A day. A week. It seemed only a moment. It seemed forever.

Then it was gone, like the tide receding, leaving me stranded.

And I was back in the light…

I lay on a bed in a cabin. A single candle's flame shone from a hanging lantern. It swayed with the movement of the ship. I
knew immediately that I was not aboard the
Gray Pearl.
If I had been, I would have been dead, and I was not. Sadly, I was not. For wherever the
Gray Pearl
was, ashes scattered across the ocean, there also was my father. I longed to be with him. To have him back. To be anywhere except where I was now.

Beneath the lantern sat a man. He was the man who had pulled the trigger and killed my father. He was tall—even though he was sitting in the chair, I could tell that. He smoked a long pipe, and his hands were rough, callused, crisscrossed with scars. Grime edged his fingernails. His hair was plaited, bound with a strip of leather. He had a long, pale face, and as he smoked he watched me, his eyes pools of black in the candlelight. “You are awake,” he said softly.

I said nothing, remembering.

“Hungry?” He pointed to a platter heaped with food. Steam rose in wispy curls. I smelled meat and spices and saw biscuits piled on the side.

I would have liked to turn away from the food. But he was right. I was hungry. Since boarding the
Gray Pearl
in Boston, I had vomited almost everything I had eaten. My stomach now felt like a cave. My limbs shook and my mouth watered. Slowly, I rose from the bed and sat at the table as far away from him as I could. I pulled the platter toward me and ate with my fingers. It burned my fingers and mouth, but I did not care.

“Something to drink?” He must have taken my silence for a yes, because he filled a goblet with a golden liquid. “It will make you feel better.” He pushed it toward me across the table.

It was rum. Fumes swirled up my nose, and my eyes welled with tears. It burned my throat. I choked and gasped, and droplets flew. But I didn't care, and drank again.

He smiled. His teeth were straight, even, and white—a beautiful smile. It was unsettling, and so I looked away, swallowing.

“You always had a hearty appetite, Daniel, my boy.”

I chewed louder, wishing to drown out the sound of his voice, wishing he would go away. For a while I ate in silence, the rum's warmth spreading through my body like blood dropped in water.

“You've grown.” His voice was smooth, silklike. How I had always loved his voice.

I stuffed more food in my mouth and shut my eyes, stomach burning, wondering if I still had my dagger.

“I'm sorry. Really, I am. Forgive me, Daniel.”

I opened my eyes and stared at him, stupidly. My head spun just a little. My mouth was stuffed with food. And then I began to laugh. It was a hysterical laugh, shrill and crazy-sounding. It burst out of me like poison. Food spilled out of my mouth and plopped onto my chest. I bumped my goblet with my elbow. Rum spread over the table and onto my lap. The goblet rolled to the floor with a clatter.

He stood, looking exactly as I remembered him. He moved toward the door, and then paused before opening it. “I did not know you were aboard. Believe me. It was the last thing I wanted you to see.” Then he left, shutting the door behind him.

For a moment I just sat there, staring at the door, rum puddling on my lap. Suddenly I stood, roared, and hurled the platter at the door, laughing even harder when it splattered into a thousand million pieces of food. Ashes scattered across the ocean. I crawled among the bits of biscuits and beef, popping them into my mouth, laughing all the while.

Josiah Black is sorry. That's very funny.

My father had taught me to pray when I was very young. He'd showed me how to kneel beside my bed, how to fold my hands. Together we had prayed.

So I prayed now. I knelt beside the bed. I prayed for rescue, for death, for my father. I clasped my locket between my hands— my locket with my mother's likeness—and prayed she would beseech God on my behalf.