A Perilous Alliance

by FIONA BUCKLEY

  Then someone screamed.

  It wasn’t one of us. It came from somewhere else, further aft, I thought. It was a shrill sound and could have been either male or female. It was followed by a chorus of masculine laughter and when that died away we heard a voice we recognized, raised in a cry of No, no, no! And then another scream, which gradually subsided into gulping sobs. Again, there was laughter. ‘That was Jacky!’ I said. ‘I’m sure it was! What’s happening to him?’

  It was a good hour later, and one of the lanterns was guttering, when the bolts were drawn back and Bones came silently in. In the bad light we could not see his face well, but it was plain that he was in a rage. It came off him like a rank smell.

  ‘Did you hear?’ he asked abruptly.

  ‘We did,’ said Brockley shortly and without troubling to say, Hear what? ‘Was it your nephew? What happened?’

  ‘That bugger of a captain,’ said Bones, with an emphasis that made the epithet unmistakably literal, ‘has branded Jacky. He has burned JB, for Jacky Bones, on to my poor lad’s left wrist. He’s always careful to make it the left unless his victim’s left-handed. I’ve treated the burn and got the boy to his hammock, with a good tot of liquor inside him to get him to sleep, at least I hope so. I didn’t tell you, or him, that we once lost a man through a branding. The burn went bad.’

  ‘But – has Jacky committed any crime?’ Sybil asked.

  ‘No. But Garnett knows plenty about crimes and wanted men. Finds out all he can when he can. He can send word to any constable, naming Jacky as such and such a miscreant, some lad or other he’s heard of, around Jacky’s age, wanted for such and such a crime. Who’s to prove Jacky’s not him? Of course, the real criminal might have been caught already, but on the other hand, he might not. Jacky could well find himself a prisoner and in danger of his life. He’s terrified now as well as in agony. Garnett finds the lad useful – “lovable” is the word he used while the brands were heating, said it as if he were trying to comfort the boy, and all the time Jacky was white as a ghost and pleading, and Garnett was almost licking his lips with anticipation of the pretty scene ahead. I wanted to vomit.’

  Sybil drew Kate to her and put an arm round her. Dale pressed close to me and I took her hand. Bones had paused, his eyes darkening as he remembered what he had just witnessed.

  Brockley said: ‘Go on.’

  ‘He called the rest of the crew to watch, of course. He always does. Garnett means to keep hold of my nephew in his usual vicious way and as far as I’m concerned he’s done for himself,’ said Bones furiously. ‘He’s gone too far. I have an affection for that boy, for my dead brother’s sake as well as Jacky’s. I’ll take any risk, any risk, to deal with that swine of a man. If you mean what you say about picking locks, Mistress Stannard, when we get to the Isle of Wight I’ll be asking you to demonstrate. Where did you get those lanterns, by the way? Oh, I suppose they’re yours. Well, they could be useful.’

  We sailed all through the night, and it was indeed a rough journey that let few of us sleep very much. The motion was easier in the morning, however, which was a relief. By dusk, we were anchoring in a sheltered position alongside the Isle of Wight. We heard someone ordering a boat to be lowered for the captain. Not long after that, Bones appeared with a meal. Jacky was not with him, but instead he came accompanied by another sailor, a small, wiry fellow with dark hair to his shoulders and a square, pugnacious face in which innocent, almost childlike blue eyes looked out of place.

  They had brought trays of food and drink. They set these down and then Bones said: ‘This is Magnus Clay. He’s a friend of mine and no friend to the captain or to any man in the slave trade.’

  ‘Aye, that be right enough.’ Clay spoke with the accent of western England. ‘And not just that. I got scars on my back as shouldn’t be there. All I did was protest when Cap’n reported one of the fellows as jumped ship. I b’ain’t the forgiving sort. I been awaiting my chance, like. Reckon this could be it.’

  ‘Let us hope so,’ said Bones. He turned to us. ‘Eat quickly, if you will. We’ll wait. Cap’n’s gone ashore and taken Myers and Leo with him.’

  ‘I loathe those two,’ said Kate suddenly and violently. ‘I hate those yellow eyes; they make Leo as you call him look like a hunting cat. And I’ve got bruises where that horrible Myers got hold of me …’

  ‘I hate the captain most,’ said Sybil. ‘You may have fallen in love with him, Kate, but how you could, I can’t imagine. How could you fall for a man with all those self-satisfied teeth …’

  Joseph laughed.

  Dale said: ‘Self-satisfied teeth. That was clever!’

  ‘Yes, a marvellous description!’ I agreed.

  ‘I admired them,’ Kate said dismally. ‘Then. Not now. I’ve changed my mind. Now I think he’s just wicked!’

  ‘Well, all three of them have gone off for a bit of a pleasure trip and likely won’t be back till morning,’ Bones declared. ‘Two others have gone, as well, and the rest are at supper or on watch. That’s five ashore out of the way. Jacky’s in his hammock and me and Magnus here, we’re against the captain. That just leaves six men to convince. If only we can find proof enough to swing them to our way of thinking! If we can, then with Joseph and Brockley we’ll have ten men all told. That should be enough. No one’s going to be about near the captain’s cabin for a while and if you can get us into it, Mistress Stannard, we can work safe enough behind a closed door. I’m bringing Magnus because I want a second witness from among the crew. If we find what I hope we do, there ought to be at least two of us reporting the same thing to the final six. Two’s more convincing than just one.’

  The moment had come.

  I didn’t eat much. I was too nervous, though Bones and Clay were probably taking the greater risk. The rest of us were captives already and merchandise as well, and therefore worth preserving.

  Bones said we couldn’t all come crowding to the captain’s quarters but Brockley insisted on coming and Dale came as well, as my attendant. Sybil and Kate stayed behind, sitting on Kate’s pallet with their arms round each other, while Joseph declared himself to be their guardian. Brockley brought one of his lanterns, although Bones insisted that it must be put out while we made our way to the captain’s quarters. In fact, he didn’t want us to have a lantern at all but Brockley said we’d need it. ‘Mistress Stannard can’t pick a lock without seeing what she’s doing. I’ll bring my tinderbox.’

  I checked that my picklocks were safely in my hidden pouch, then Bones and Clay led the way out. The Brockleys and I followed; Bones slid the bolts home after us, and then we followed their two bobbing lanterns to a flight of stairs leading upwards.

  After that, I lost my bearings, but we were back on deck for a while, under a star-powdered sky. There was no moon. It would be waning by now and presumably it had not yet risen. We moved stealthily from shadow to shadow. No one was about. I remember a second set of stairs and then Bones was whispering: ‘Here we are,’ and we came to a halt in front of a door.

  I was very nervous indeed, and so was Brockley. I heard him muttering under his breath as he struggled with his tinderbox. He got the lantern lit eventually and with shaking hands I got my picklocks out. Safety lay in speed, but with such delicate tasks the less you hurry the better, only I wanted to hurry. The picklocks rattled in my frightened grasp and Brockley noticed.

  ‘Steady, madam. All’s quiet,’ he said, and held the lantern in position to help me.

  I tried to breathe deeply and slowly, tried to steady my hands. The picklock I was using felt right. I had fortunately had a good deal of experience and my ingrained knowledge took over. At last came the soft, satisfying click as the lock surrendered and the door swung open. We were all inside in a trice and Brockley, the last to slip through, shut it firmly behind him. It had an inside bolt and he shot it.

  One lantern wasn’t enough to reveal the cabin in detail but there was an impression of luxury: a big bed with a spotted fur cover – made of leopar
d skins, I thought, imported and a long way from cheap – a padded settle, a floor rug also made of spotted fur, a polished table.

  ‘There’s the strongbox,’ said Bones, now taking a turn at holding his lantern to show me what I needed to see. ‘At the end of the bed. Fixed to the deck but the padlock’s easy to get at.’

  This was so. The contents of the box might well be the captain’s secret, but clearly he considered that ordinary locks for door and strongbox were enough.

  ‘Well, if he ever had to abandon ship in an emergency, he’d likely want to get at his fortune in a hurry,’ said Magnus when I commented.

  He was also very confident of his control over his crew, I thought. Opening the padlock was almost ludicrously easy. I lifted it off and laid it down, and then threw back the box lid. Bones held his lantern closer. We all peered.

  ‘God Almighty!’ whispered Clay.

  TWENTY

  Other Men’s Gold

  The contents of the chest mainly consisted of little drawstring bags made of leather. They were all securely tied except one, whose drawstring had come loose so that some of the contents had spilled out. Clay was pointing at this.

  Justifiably, because what had slipped out were gold coins, which glowed in the light of his lantern as though they were themselves filled with sunshine.

  I picked one up and held it in the lantern-light. It was foreign currency of some kind. It had a wreath of what looked like laurel leaves round the edge while the centre was full of mysterious symbols which could have included writing in an unfamiliar alphabet. I couldn’t tell. Clay, meanwhile, had picked up another.

  ‘Ottoman,’ he said. ‘From Algiers, perhaps. We were based at Algiers when I were there. That day in Naples when I got away, I were crossin’ the deck when one of them swaggering pirates – one of their officers as they’d be called in a Godfearing country – dropped a purse by accident, almost at my feet. It spilt and I helped him pick up his coins. Some of them were like this.’

  He paused reminiscently and then spat on the captain’s floor. ‘It were a fat purse and I guess he didn’t himself know just how many coins were in it. I weren’t wearing much but I had a loincloth. Somehow or other, a couple of them coins found their way inside it. I wouldn’t quite know how.’

  ‘Really?’ said Brockley.

  ‘I took a hell of a risk,’ said Magnus. ‘It would have been all over with me if he’d realized. But I’d been scheming in my mind for months. I could go about that ship with some freedom, even though I were a pressed man and a slave. I were more or less trusted because I’d pretended to adopt their religion. I used to join them at their prayers and the like.’

  ‘You became a Mohammedan!’ said Bones, shocked. ‘You never told me that before!’

  ‘I said I pretended. I said the right things. Words come cheap,’ said Magnus dismissively. ‘But, meanwhile, I had an eye open for a chance to get away and, that day in Naples, I’d seen an English vessel – this vessel – anchored not far off. It was already giving me ideas. That dropped purse, those two snatched coins – they clinched it. I reckoned they were God’s own blessing on the attempt. I reckoned any English captain ’ud take me aboard if he knew I’d escaped from them but it’s useful, if you’re casting yourself out into the world, to have a penny or two with you. I had money for my passage, if the captain proved awkward. Half an hour later, I dived off the rigging. I can swim underwater and I did, and I got to the Lucille and they hauled me aboard. There were the pirates on their rotten ship, shouting and shaking their fists, but the Lucille, she were just about to set sail, and so we did. The ship I’d dived off, she weren’t ready to sail and maybe they wouldn’t have bothered, just for the one slave.’

  It occurred to me that though Magnus Clay didn’t look like a hero, he was one, in a way.

  ‘No decent English captain would ever have refused to take you,’ Bones was saying, but Magnus was shaking his head.

  ‘Garnett b’ain’t no decent captain. He took my gold coins – grabbed them, almost. He’ll do anything for money. He raids on the west coast and collects slaves for the gang on Lundy and he sells information to them, too – about other shipping, which vessels are where and carrying what. There’s allus gossip in the shore taverns and he picks it up. I’ve heard him talking to Leo about that.’

  ‘He does that?’ said Brockley, horrified.

  Magnus Clay shrugged. ‘Easier than robbing English ships himself. That way, he gets a share without runnin’ risks.’

  ‘Are the other bags the same?’ I enquired, and pulling one out at random, I undid it. This one contained English money, mostly in sovereigns. I tried another and poured a new stream of Ottoman gold into my palm. ‘But … but … the value of all this …!’

  ‘What’s this?’ Brockley had also pulled out a bag, a bulkier one, and was feeling it. ‘This can’t be coinage.’ He pulled its drawstring loose and emptied the bag into his hand. And then gasped, as its contents overflowed his palm and tumbled to the floor. He picked it up and put it on the bed, a tangle of jewellery, sparkling like coloured fire. There were half a dozen necklaces, a whole lot of rings and bracelets strung on a gold chain, and some elaborate drop earrings, tied in their pairs. All the settings were gold or silver, with gold predominating. The stones were mostly diamonds, rubies, pearls and a few sapphires. There was also a small inner bag and when Brockley got that open, it contained uncut stones which looked like emeralds.

  ‘So he takes payment in kind, so it seems,’ said Clay. ‘God knows what all this lot is worth, but it’s sure enough that we never had fair shares in it.’

  ‘He – we – have made some good hauls, raiding,’ said Bones. ‘There was one night we went round two hamlets on the Cornish coast, quick as lightning, gathered up every young or youngish woman we could find. We’d done some reconnoitring beforehand, naturally. Nineteen of them, we collected all told. We got into the houses, found the wenches in bed, gagged them and tied them before they could make much to-do, knocked a few husbands and so forth on the head who tried to stop us, or seized them too if they looked useful, marched the consignment to the beach and into our boats, took them out to the Lucille. We shoved them into the hold and then went back and did the other hamlet. It was late autumn, with pretty long nights, and it took nearly all the hours of darkness, believe me. But by dawn, we were on our way to Lundy, and when we got there, well, I fancy our hosts were mighty pleased with the merchandise we brought them and willing to pay well – though I daresay they made sure they’d still make a handsome profit back in Algiers.’

  ‘They pay taxes there, on whatever profits they make,’ Magnus put in. ‘But they still do well. Go in for piracy at sea, they do – ships comin’ from the new world often have gold and jewels aboard. Spanish ships, English – they corsairs as they call theirselves, they b’ain’t particular. Likely enough, the pack on Lundy keep back a good bit for themselves. I daresay they cheat their own masters.’

  ‘I’ve no doubt of it,’ said Bones drily. ‘There are luxury goods where the pirates live, on Lundy. Carpets, silver goblets, things like that. Must be loot from ships they’ve seized. I’ve been ashore there and seen for myself. There are women on the island too. I heard women’s voices.’ As he spoke, he was examining another little bag. ‘Ah. These are Spanish coins,’ he said as he tipped them into his palm. ‘More spoils of piracy, I fancy. Spain was the victim that time.’

  There was a silence and then he added: ‘When we raided the two villages – well, I’ve been on other raids too. So you can see that that knife-fight long ago ain’t the only reason why I wouldn’t care to set foot on English soil again. I’ve done worse things than quarrel over a girl. I’m an outcast for the rest of my life. Maybe if I manage to help you … if you do escape, you might put a word in someone’s ear for me. You know a few important ears, I’ll warrant, Mistress Stannard, being who you are.’

  ‘If we escape, I’ll do my best,’ I promised. This was no time to be shocked by any further detai
ls of Mr Bones’ past, or Magnus Clay’s, either. I took Brockley’s lantern from him, and shone it into the strongbox again because I thought I had seen something else in it besides the drawstring bags. A moment later, I was lifting a ledger from the bottom of the box. ‘I thought so. Now, what’s this?’

  It didn’t take long to find out. ‘Got a tidy mind, seemingly, our captain,’ remarked Clay.

  He certainly had. The ledger was a record of his transactions, legitimate and otherwise. It was odd to see, mingled with such items as so many casks of French wine brought from France to England, or such and such a weight of pine timber from Norway to Bristol, the proceeds of delivering fourteen young women, five comely matrons and five able-bodied men to Lundy. In those cases, the right-hand columns, which were usually empty, held details of how the proceeds were distributed between the men and their captain.

  ‘Here’s the raid I told you about. Nineteen women,’ said Bones, putting a forefinger on it. ‘And there are the details of the payment. And there’s something here about a payment for information supplied – yes, you were right about that, Magnus. We didn’t get any shares for that, seemingly.’

  Magnus was muttering and counting on his fingers. ‘These records look all right, except a lot are criminal. But they don’t match up with all this treasure, no they don’t!’

  ‘He always said the pirates paid him in English money,’ said Bones. ‘Stolen from English ships, no doubt. His share of that is here, right enough, and our shares were in English money too. But we never saw a piece of Algerine or Spanish money, let alone any jewellery. Not as much as a pearl brooch or a couple of doubloons! If he was being straight with us, where the hell did all this come from?’

  Clay, muttering again, was examining the jewellery. ‘This b’ain’t English work, not any of it. I were a goldsmith’s apprentice once and I can tell. He got all this from Lundy all right but he never declared it to us.’