Caribbee

by Thomas Hoover

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  With every step Jeremy took, the wooded trail leading in­land from Oistins Bay felt more perilous, more alien. Why did the rows of stumps, once so familiar, no longer seem right? Why had he forgotten the spots in the path where the puddles never dried between rains, only congealed to turgid glue? He had ridden it horseback many a time, but now as he trudged up the slope, his boots still wet from the surf, he found he could remember almost nothing at all. This dark tangle of palms and bramble could scarcely be the direction home.

  But the way home it was. The upland plantation of Antho­ny Walrond was a wooded, hundred and eighty acre tract that lay one mile inland from the settlement around Oistins Bay— itself a haphazard collection of clapboard taverns and hewn-log tobacco sheds on the southern, windward side of the island. The small harbor at Oistins was host to an occasional Dutch frigate or a small merchant vessel from Virginia or New England, but there was not enough tobacco or cotton to justify a major landing. It was, however, the ideal place to run a small shallop ashore from a ship of the fleet.

  He reached a familiar arch of palms and turned right, start­ing the long climb along the weed-clogged path between the trees that led up to the house. As he gripped his flintlock and listened to the warbling of night birds and the menacing clat­ter of land crabs, he reflected sadly that he was the only man on Barbados who knew precisely what lay in store. He had received a full briefing from the admiral of the fleet aboard the Rainbowe. What would Anthony do when he heard?

  He tried to sort out once more what had happened, begin­ning with that evening, now only two days past, when Ad­miral Calvert had passed him the first tankard. . . .

  "If I may presume to say, it's a genuine honor to share a cup with you, Master Walrond." Calvert's dark eyes had seemed to burn with determination as he eased back into his sea chair and absently adjusted his long white cuffs. He'd been wearing a black doublet with wide white epaulettes and a pristine bib collar, all fairly crackling with starch. "And to finally have a word with a man of breeding from this infernal settlement."

  Jeremy remembered taking a gingerly sip of the brandy, hoping perhaps it might somehow ease the pain of his hu­miliation. Still ringing in his ears were the screams of dying men, the volleys of musket fire, the curses of the Roundhead infantry in the longboat. But the liquor only served to sharpen his horrifying memory of the man he had killed less than an hour before, his finger on the trigger of the ornate flintlock now resting so innocently on the oak table between them.

  "The question we all have to ask ourselves is how long this damnable state of affairs can be allowed to go on. Eng­lishmen killing their own kind." Calvert had posed the ques­tion more to the air than to the others in the room. Colonel Morris, his face still smeared with powder smoke, had shifted his glance back and forth between them and said nothing. He clearly was impatient at being summoned to the Great Cabin when there were wounded to attend. Why, Jeremy had found himself wondering, was Morris present at all? Where was the brash vice admiral, the man who had wanted him imprisoned below decks? What was the hidden threat behind Calvert's too-cordial smiles? But the admiral betrayed nothing as he continued. "The Civil War is over, may Almighty God for­give us for it, and I say it's past time we started healing the wounds."

  Jeremy had listened as the silence once more settled around them. For the first time he'd become aware of the creaking of the boards as the Rainbowe groaned at anchor. After so much death, he'd found himself thinking, you begin to notice the quietness more. Your senses are honed. Could it be even creatures of the field are the same; does the lowly hare feel life more exquisitely when, hounds baying on its scent, it hovers quivering in the grass?

  He wondered what he would do if the musket on the table were primed and in his hands. Would he raise it up and de­stroy this man who had come to conquer the last safe place on earth left for him? As he tried to still the painful throb in his temples, Calvert continued.

  "I'm a plain-speaking seaman, Master Walrond, nothing more. Though my father served in your late king's court, watching his Catholic queen prance amongst her half-dressed Jezebels, I never had any part of it. But I've seen dead men enough whose spilled blood is on that king's head, for all his curls and silks."

  Calvert had suddenly seemed to remember himself and rose to pour a tankard for Morris. He took another sip from his own, then turned back. "And there's apt to be more killing now, here in the Americas, before this affair's finished. But to what purpose, sirrah? I ask you. We both know the island can't hold out forever. We've got her bottled now with this blockade, and the bottle's corked. What's more, I know for a fact you're all but out of meat and bread, whilst we've made free with all the victuals these interloping Hollanders in Car­lisle Bay kindly had waiting to supply us. So my men'll be feasting on capon and port whilst your planters are starving, with nothing in the larder save tobacco and cane. You've never troubled to grow enough edibles here, since you could always buy from these Hollanders, and now it's going to be your downfall." Calvert's eyes had flashed grimly in the lantern light. When Morris had stirred, as though to speak, he'd si­lenced the commander with a brisk wave of his hand, then continued.

  "But we're not planning just to wait and watch, that I can promise you. Colonel Morris here will tell you he's not going to sleep easy till this island is his. At the break of day he'll commence his first shelling, right here at Jamestown where he's spiked the ordnance. You'll see that spot, breastwork and the rest, turned to rubble by nightfall tomorrow. No, Colonel Morris is not of my mind; he's not a country angler who'd sit and wait for his line to bob. He's a man who'll wade in and take his perch with both hands." Calvert had sighed and risen to open the windows at the stern. Cool air washed over them, bringing with it the moans of wounded men from the deck above. Jeremy noted the windows had been severely damaged by cannon fire and temporarily repaired with wood rather than leaded glass. Calvert listened glumly for a mo­ment, then shoved the windows closed and turned back. "But what's the point of it, Master Walrond, by all that's holy?"

  "You'll never take Barbados, blockade or no." Jeremy had tried to meet the glare in Calvert's eyes. "We'll never sur­render to Cromwell and this rabble army."

  "Ah, but take you we will, sir, or I'm not a Christian. The only question is when." He had paused to frown. "And how? Am I to be forced to humble this place till there's nothing left, to shell her ports, burn her crops? I daresay you're not fully aware what's in store for this island. But it's time some­body heard, and listened. I came here with peace in mind, praying your governor and Assembly would have the sense to recognize the Commonwealth. If I was met with Defiance, my orders were to bring Barbados to its knees, man and boy. To see every pocket of resistance ferreted out. More than that, you'd best know I'll not be staying here forever. There'll be others to follow, and that young stalwart you met out on decks, my vice admiral, may well claim the only way to keep the island cooperative is to install a permanent garrison. Believe me when I tell you he'd as soon hang a royalist as bag a partridge. Think on that, what it's apt to be like here if you force me to give him free rein."

  Jeremy had felt Calvert's eyes bore into him. "But, Master Walrond, I think Barbados, the Americas, deserve better." He glanced toward Morris. "And I'll warrant our com­mander here feels much the same. Neither of us wants fire and sword for this place. Nor, I feel safe in thinking, does anyone on this island. But someone here has got to under­stand our purpose and harken to reason, or it's going to be damnation for your settlement and for the rest of the Amer­icas."

  "Then that's what it'll be, if you think you've got the means to attempt it." Jeremy had pulled himself upright in the chair. "But you try landing on this island again and we'll meet you on the beaches with twice the men you've got, just like to­night."

  "But why be so foolhardy, lad? I'll grant there're those on this island who have no brief for the Commonwealth, well and good, but know this—all we need from the Americas is cooperation, plain as that; we don't ask s
ervitude." He low­ered his voice. "In God's name, sir, this island need merely put an end to its rebellious talk, agree to recognize Parlia­ment, and we can dispense with any more bloodletting."

  Then Calvert had proceeded to outline a new offer. Its terms were more generous—he'd hammered home time and again—than anyone on the island had any cause to expect. The point he had emphasized most strongly was that Jeremy Walrond stood at the watershed of history. On one side was war, starvation, ignominy; on the other, moderation. And a new future. . . .