Devil's Ballast

by Meg Caddy

  That this couldn’t possibly last.

  I walked through the house one afternoon and stopped shy of the kitchen, hearing Walter and Calico in conversation. I lingered near the door. Eavesdropping came naturally to me. In my father’s household no one had told me anything, so I’d been forced to find things out on my own. It was a habit I had never bothered trying to break.

  ‘…fiery little thing. You should have seen her the first time we had the midwife over. Your Annie chased her out before she could even lift her skirt.’

  Soft laughter from Calico. ‘Sounds right.’

  ‘Poor woman was only trying to help. Will you stay? Might make things easier.’

  ‘I can’t. My ship.’

  ‘What does Isaac have to say about all of this?’ A long pause. ‘You haven’t told Isaac?’

  ‘Still thinks she’s a boy. Haven’t been able to tell him. He doesn’t like her much as it is.’

  ‘I don’t imagine he would. Sharp, ain’t she?’

  I leaned into the room. ‘Careful how you answer that, Calico.’

  Walter jumped, startled. ‘Christ’s blood!’

  Calico just laughed. ‘Aye,’ he said. ‘She’s sharp.’

  Rose jabbed me in the shoulder. ‘Stop chattering and come help me,’ she said. I sighed and went to her side, helping to serve out food and drinks. Calico’s eyes flashed in my direction. He looked uncomfortable as I handed him the plate, and well he might. He and I could never seem to find even ground. On the ship he was the captain and the keeper of my secrets. On land, I was a woman who waited on him. It all felt wrong: jumbled and awkward.

  ‘Sit down,’ he offered, kicking out a chair for me. He was trying to be a gentleman but he didn’t have the manners for it. His rough attempt made me smile, helped to ease some of the tension. Rose sat a moment later, comfortable and content beside Walter.

  ‘When are you going?’ I asked Calico. I tried to make the question casual but I could hear the edge in my own voice. Calico winced and spoke around the food in his mouth.

  ‘Three days.’

  Three days. He must have seen the expression on my face because he swallowed quickly, coughed, and added, ‘Will you be ready to join us by then?’

  ‘No,’ Rose said. I opened my mouth to protest and she spoke again, stronger this time. ‘No. She’s still recovering, and there’s no chance she can pass as a boy besides; not to mention the babe’s still feeding. I’m putting my foot down here, Calico. I know you want to go together but I won’t have it. You can come back for her in a month, when she’s had a chance to rest.’

  ‘I’ve already been resting a month,’ I said. ‘I’m well enough to go now.’

  ‘Everyone in this kitchen knows that is a lie.’ She folded her arms. ‘You’re well enough to get about but what sort of life would you lead? The work is too much for a woman not so long off the childbed. And there’s plenty of things you won’t be able to hide out there on the sea.’

  I hated it, but she was right. I still thought I’d manage well enough with the work. I was young and strong and the birth had been successful. Women everywhere went back to work in fields and streets without the luxury of a long recovery. But hiding all the other inconvenient after-effects of pregnancy, about which no one had ever warned me, was another thing.

  ‘We’ll be back in a month then,’ Calico said at length and I knew the matter was decided.

  ‘You’ll stay tonight though, won’t you?’ Another long pause. I felt my throat tighten. ‘You’re not staying tonight?’

  ‘I can’t, Annie. I have to go back to the ship.’

  ‘Why?’

  Walter cleared his throat, uncomfortable. Rose suddenly became very interested in her meal.

  ‘I told the crew I would. I can’t leave them too long, Annie, not right now. I’ve already spent too much time away.’

  ‘None of them just gave birth to your son.’ I hated that I had been backed into the role of the nag, the scold, but I felt sick with disappointment.

  ‘I’ll be back tomorrow.’

  I opened my mouth to argue, to say something bitter, to try to make him stay. But instead I sat back and let my shoulders slump. Calico reached under the table and caught my hand. I forced myself to breathe and smile. This was a passing thing. In just a month I’d be back at sea. Back to Calico. I had endured Nassau for two years, and I had suffered the stifling heat of Charles Town for almost four years before that. A month was nothing at all.

  I felt subdued as we finished the meal, but when it was cleared away, Walter joined Rose in the kitchen to ask her something about food for the crew. I grabbed Calico’s hand and pulled him out into the cool air.

  ‘Promise me one thing.’

  He held my gaze. ‘What is it?’

  ‘This is the last time you leave me behind.’

  He pressed his lips against mine. ‘I promise,’ he said. He hesitated. ‘Annie. Sorry this is how things happened.’

  I shrugged and patted the side of his face. ‘For your information, Isaac adores me. He just hasn’t realised yet.’

  ‘I’m sure he’ll be thrilled to see you again.’

  We traded faltering smiles, both feeling the impending distance.

  Calico and I walked along darkened streets, hand-in-hand: strolling like new lovers towards the docks. It was strange for us to be able to walk together in the open, without having to dodge around corners or tuck ourselves into shadows. In Nassau we had stolen moments around James Bonny’s absence and every second had been steeped in fear. Onboard, I had visited Calico in the small hours of the night, heart pounding and nerves buzzing from ducking crewmen. Now, though, we took our time. For a whisper of a second I thought I could get used to this. Being…undisguised.

  ‘You should tell Isaac,’ I said at last, dropping my head against Calico’s shoulder.

  ‘Tell him what?’

  ‘About me.’

  Calico stopped walking. ‘What?’ he asked, a laugh shaking the word. ‘Annie.’

  ‘You should tell him.’

  ‘You only say that because you know he’ll berate me.’

  ‘I say it because he’s your friend.’ I shrugged. ‘Maybe he’ll even like me more for it.’

  ‘He won’t.’

  ‘At least it’ll be one less person we have to lie to. The secrecy was exhausting, Calico.’ I squeezed his hand. ‘You trust him, don’t you?’

  ‘Of course.’ He didn’t hesitate, not even for a breath. I wondered what it was like to be so sure of someone.

  ‘Well then. He won’t give you away, will he? Just consider it.’ I caught his questing look and tipped a shoulder. ‘I don’t know, Calico. These past few months have been hard but at least I don’t have to bind myself down or hide my bleeding or worry about where to take a piss. I don’t mind dressing as a man, living a man’s life, but I hate constantly being afraid of the lads finding out. It would be easier for us if Isaac knew. He’s discreet enough. I don’t think he’d make it a problem.’

  ‘I’ll think about it. Maybe…’ He stopped, trailing off with a frown.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Shh.’ His hand tightened on mine. In a moment he snapped back into the role of the captain, the commander, his muscles tense and his hand on his flintlock. ‘We’re being followed.’

  I looked down the street behind us, saw a flicker of movement some yards away.

  ‘Do you have a spare flintlock?’ I whispered.

  ‘You can’t fight—’

  ‘I’m out of condition but I can still damn well shoot. Do you have a spare flintlock?’

  He handed one to me. I loved the familiar weight, the cool press of the gun in my hand. I tugged Calico along, trying to act natural. Either someone was hoping to rob us or we were being hunted. We reached the end of the street and I pulled Calico around the corner. The sea was in front of us. Clouds were thick overhead, smothering the moon and the stars and whatever lights may have been flickering from the ships. Soon the rain would
drive in from the water, washing across the city.

  Calico would have continued down along the docks but I pulled my arm free from his and planted my feet, waiting. I readied my flintlock, ramming and wadding the weapon. It calmed me.

  ‘Annie!’

  I hissed at Calico and waited, hitch-breathed. Footsteps sounded by the corner. I didn’t ask questions, I fired. There was a bang, a grunt, and someone sprawled onto the ground. I waited until he stopped moving, then stepped out and rolled him over.

  I didn’t recognise the man.

  ‘Just a pickpocket,’ I said. Relief made me lightheaded. ‘It’s fine, Calico. Just a thief.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘I don’t recognise him.’ I straightened and leaned against the wall. ‘Thank God. I thought we were in real trouble for a moment there.’

  ‘Put down the gun.’

  I froze. Breath snagged in my throat, I turned. Calico stood with his hands raised, his own gun on the ground in front of us.

  A group of men blocked the street. Maybe five of them. Too many to shoot. Too many to fight. There was no time. They crowded forward. Someone shoved me against the wall, pinning me by my shoulders. The gun flew from my hand and skittered across the ground. I could feel a blade through my blouse, through my skirts. Pressing just enough for me to feel, without so much as slicing a thread.

  ‘What’s this?’ asked the man holding the blade. He was heavy, with a beard that grew in patches and some missing teeth. ‘One of your whores, Rackham?’

  I met Calico’s gaze. He was frozen to the spot, pinned just as I was.

  ‘Yes,’ he said at last, hoarsely, murder in his eyes. ‘Just…just a whore.’

  ‘Or is it someone special?’ The man’s breath was hot on my cheek. ‘I hear you’ve been stealing women away. That you took a woman to your crew. Maybe this is her. Ugly enough to be a pirate wench.’

  ‘She’s no pirate,’ Jack said. His voice was weak.

  The man sneered and looked over his shoulder. ‘Bring the boy.’

  They hauled a child to the front, hands clamped on his arms. I recognised young Oliver right away.

  Barnet had found us. Relentless bastard.

  ‘Is that her?’ the man demanded. ‘Is that Bonny?’

  I looked at Calico. I could speak up now. Put myself by his side. He shook his head a fraction. Wanting to keep me safe. And I knew a braver woman—a better woman—would ignore that little shake of the head and fight for him.

  But if I fought for him, they would take me back to Nassau.

  They would take me to my husband.

  Read wouldn’t be able to save me; Calico wouldn’t be able to save me. I wouldn’t be able to save myself.

  But we’d be together.

  I said nothing. Frozen.

  ‘Nah,’ Oliver said. My head jolted up. Oliver stared at his shuffling feet.

  ‘Say again, boy?’

  ‘Ain’t her. Ain’t the Bonny woman.’

  I was shaking. Coward. Coward. Coward. But I was so afraid. My gun was on the ground and Calico was on his knees. The knife pressed a fraction closer and for a moment I thought it would cut right through, that the man was going to split me open there on the street. But he lowered the knife, thank God. He lowered the knife—

  Then he hit me.

  My head snapped back. I almost fell but I swung myself back up. Tiny lights flickered in front of my eyes, spinning and shining like stars off the waves. I tasted blood and spat. The men started to drag Calico away and my fear was gone like a freak wind. A flash of self-loathing hit me. Coward. Faithless, gutless. It was enough to strengthen me. I couldn’t let them take Calico.

  I ran at the man and he hit me again. My head smacked against the wall. I blinked. When I opened my eyes again I was on the ground and he was kicking me in the stomach. My body, still weak and raw from the childbed, cramped and seized. I grabbed his leg and curled around it, trying to drag him down. He bent, cracked his gun across my back, and my body spasmed. I tried to pull myself up again but he beat me down. I could hear Calico shouting, cursing. I tried to scramble to my feet. I saw him bucking and straining against the men who held him. And then he was gone around a corner, and there was a dull thud and I couldn’t see him, could only hear the ocean and the receding voices of Barnet’s men.

  I was undone by my fear for him. That moment of pause, seeing the last of him, distracted me. The heavy man hit me. And hit me. And hit me. The world was in the wind, scattered and tossed. It was the heavy man hitting me but it was also my husband. Sedlow and his boys. Barnet. And as I curled around myself and choking on the pain, I wondered if it had always been my fate to die beneath the fist of a man.

  ‘Virgil! Lay off, we gotta go!’

  He stopped.

  There was blood in my mouth. I opened my lips and let it splatter to the ground. I rolled against the wall. I tried to swim towards consciousness but all I had was James Bonny’s face and my own cowardice.

  Virgil spat at me. Then he laughed. His footsteps retreated.

  I tried to stand. Retched. Lowered myself back to the ground and lay there, my hands in the dirt, feeling the earth tip and lean like a ship in a storm.

  It was dawn before I could drag myself to my feet. By then Calico was long-gone and there was just nothing I could do except bleed and hurt and hobble back to the Cunninghams’.

  I was no stranger to beatings. The first time I was thirteen or fourteen. My mother had just died and we were new in Charles Town. Most of my days in Ireland had been spent running riot, dressed as a boy, but when we arrived in America I was confined to the sticky heat of the household, wearing corsets and laces. It made me wild, and when one of the maids muttered some insult about my mother I drove a knife into her hand. My father, tolerant and distant until that point, had me whipped. It put a rift between us that never healed. I continued to push him and he continued to punish me. And once I was out of my father’s household, Jim Bonny beat me at the end of his temper or at the beginning of a drinking night.

  But I had never given birth before. I took a fever the night Calico was captured and that fever held me for almost a week. I remember very little: Rose’s face in front of mine, Johnny’s thin wail from the next room, flies buzzing around my face, the sour smell of sickness, fever dreams…

  Calico was at my side, looking out at the bobbing ships. He levelled his finger towards an elderly, slim vessel to the west of the harbour.

  ‘See her?’ he asked. ‘She’s mine.’

  She was a patchwork of different woods, a rugged and weathered ship with keen lines. She leaned with a strong wave and then rocked back. She looked like she was beckoning.

  When the fever broke I woke to a clean room and the sound of the sea outside. For a few moments I was lost in the after-breath of the delirium. I thought I could hear Calico. Felt him, close and loving and willing.

  And I knew I had to go after him. To the worst place.

  I was sure Barnet would take him to Nassau.

  ‘Anne.’ Rose watched me as I hobbled across the room. My body felt slow, ungainly as it had when I was still pregnant. Sore. I scraped my hair back from my face and twisted it into a knot at the back of my head.

  ‘What?’

  ‘We can…’ She hesitated. ‘We can find work for you here in Havana. You can stay here until you find a place.’

  I glared at her. She winced and gentled her voice.

  ‘You know Calico wouldn’t want you to lose yourself. He’d want you to go on with things. Find a life for yourself. Survive.’ She reached over and touched my shoulder. ‘He wouldn’t want for you to put yourself in danger for him. Especially when there’s nothing that can be done.’

  ‘Have you heard any news from Nassau?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘From Jamaica?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘How long has it been?’

  ‘Over a week.’

  It would only take a week to sail from Cuba to Nassau. A week t
o get there, a week for the news to travel back. If Barnet had reached Nassau I was sure we’d find out soon. Wanting the message to reach me—as a lesson; to reach other pirates—as a warning. We’d know within the week, but I couldn’t wait that long.

  ‘How are the seas?’

  Rose paused. She held Johnny in her arms, one hand stroking absently over his tuft of orange hair. ‘Rough,’ she said at last. ‘I heard there’s storms through the north-east.’

  It was a bleak time of year. Hurricanes. Waterspouts. Wrecks along every coast. ‘So they might not even make it there.’

  ‘It’s possible, Anne. But there’s no telling for sure. You don’t even know where they went.’

  ‘They sailed for Nassau.’ When I said the words I became sure of them. Of course it was Nassau.

  It had always been Nassau.

  ‘You can’t be thinking of going after him.’ Her voice was sharp, eyes fixed on me.

  ‘Calico came back for me.’

  ‘You don’t have a ship to travel with, or a crew at your back.’

  ‘I’ve found both on shorter time.’ With Calico.

  ‘Anne.’ She caught my hands. I made to pull them away but she held tight. ‘Anne, stop. You are still weak. Tired. Even if you get there before he is executed, what will you do?’ She reached over and touched my cheek and I thought for a moment that this must be what it was to have a sister. ‘It’s not our world, Anne,’ she said. ‘Stay here. You can watch Johnny grow up. You don’t have to be his mother to see that. You can find a life here.’

  I took a breath and stepped away from her.

  ‘You’re a good woman, Rose,’ I said. ‘And that’s really the difference between the two of us.’

  ‘I don’t understand why you need to do this. Is it honour? Love?’

  Honour? Love?

  ‘No.’ I set my jaw. Buried my fear. Tried not to think of Nassau. ‘Neither of those things.’

  Revenge.

  22

  BARNET

  They crammed the pirates into the brig and Barnet took particular satisfaction in seeing them there, packed together, bleeding and bruised. His men, frustrated by the long hunt and their losses across the months, had beaten them savagely. Barnet had not curbed their efforts. The only one they had not been permitted to touch was the captain.