Part 77 (1/2)
”Forget it. I have better things to do.” He smiled. ”But all the same, it's always good to see an old friend again. Stay a while. Anglais.
What if tomorrow night we feasted like the old days, _boucanier_ style?
Why not show your _femme_ how we used to live?”
”Jacques, we've got victuals on the _Defiance_.”
”Is that what you think of me?” He sighed. ”That I would forgo this chance to relive old times? Bring this _pet.i.te_ Anglaise of yours up and let her meet your old _ami_. I knew you before you were sure which end of a musket to prime. I watched you bring down your first wild boar. And now, when I welcome you and yours with open arms, you scorn my generosity.”
”We're not finished with this matter of the Spaniards, my friend.”
”_Certainement_. Perhaps I will give it some consideration. We can think about it tomorrow night, while we all share some brandy and dine on _barbacoa_, same as the old days. As long as I breathe, nothing else will ever taste quite so good.” He motioned for de Fontenay to lower the iron ladder. ”We will remember the way we used to live. In truth. I even think I miss it at times. Life was simpler then.”
”Things don't seem so simple around here any more, Jacques.”
”But we can remember, my friend. Humility. It nourishes the soul.”
”To old times then, Jacques.” He drained his tankard and signaled for Atiba. ”Tomorrow.”
”_Oui_, Anglais. _A demain_. And my regards to your friend here with the cutla.s.s.” He smiled as he watched them start down the ladder. ”But why don't you ask him to stay down there tomorrow? I must be getting old, because that sword of his is starting to make me nervous. And we wouldn't want anything to upset our little _fete_, now would we, _mon frere_?”
Katherine stood at the bannister amids.h.i.+ps. Serina by her side, and studied the glimmer of lights along the sh.o.r.e, swaying cl.u.s.ters of candle-lanterns as seamen pa.s.sed back and forth in longboats between the brothels of Tortuga and their s.h.i.+ps.
The buccaneers. They lived in a world like none she had ever seen. As the shouts, curses, songs, and s.n.a.t.c.hes of music drifted out over the gentle surf, she had to remind herself that this raffish settlement was the home of brigands unwelcome in any other place. Yet from her vantage now, they seemed like harmless, jovial children.
Still, anch.o.r.ed alongside the _Defiance_ were some of the most heavily armed brigantines in the New World--no bottom here carried fewer than thirty guns. The men, too, were murderers, who killed Spanish civilians as readily as infantry. Jacques le Basque presided over the most dreaded naval force in the New World. He had done more to endanger Spain's fragile economy than all the Protestant countries together. If they grew any stronger, the few hundred men on this tiny island might well so disrupt Spain's vital lifeline of silver from the Americas as to bankrupt what once had been Europe's mightiest empire. . . .
The report of a pistol sounded from somewhere along the sh.o.r.e, followed by yells of glee and more shots. Several men in Spanish finery had begun firing into the night to signal the commencement of an impromptu celebration. As they marched around a keg of liquor, a cl.u.s.ter of women, prost.i.tutes from the taverns, shrieked in drunken encouragement and joined in the melee.
”This place is very frightening, senhora.” Serina s.h.i.+vered and edged next to Katherine. Her hair was tied in a kerchief, African style, as it had been for all the voyage. ”I have never seen _branco_ like these.
They seem so crazy, so violent.”
”Just be thankful we're not Spaniards, or we'd find out just how violent they really are.”
”Remember I once lived in Brazil. We heard stories about this place.”
”'Tis quite a sight, Yor Ladys.h.i.+ps.” John Mewes had ambled over to the railing, beside them, to watch for Winston. ”The d.a.m.nedest crew of rogues and knaves you're ever like to make acquaintance with. Things've come to a sad pa.s.s that we've got to try recruitin' some of this lot to sail with us.”
”Do you think they're safe ash.o.r.e, John?”
”Aye, Yor Ladys.h.i.+p, on that matter I'd not trouble yourself unduly.”
Mewes fingered the musket he was holding. ”You should've seen him once down at Curasao, when a gang of Dutch s.h.i.+ppers didn't like the cheap price we was askin' for a load of kill-devil that'd fallen our way over at . . . I forget where. Threatened to board and scuttle us. So the Captain and me decided we'd hoist a couple of nine-pound demi's up on deck and stage a little gunnery exercise on a buoy floatin' there on the windward side o' the harbor. After we'd laid it with a couple of rounds, blew it to h.e.l.l, next thing you know the b.u.t.terboxes . . .”
”John, what's that light over there? Isn't that him?”
Mewes paused and stared. At the sh.o.r.eline opposite their anchorage a lantern was flas.h.i.+ng.
”Aye, m'lady. That's the signal, sure enough.” He smiled. ”Didn't I tell you there'd be nothing to worry over.” With an exhale of relief, he quickly turned and ordered the longboat lowered, a.s.signing four men to the oars and another four to bring flintlocks.