Diablero

by Toby Tate

  Suddenly a boom like a thunderclap echoed from the Adventure, followed by a splash only yards from the tiny vessel.

  They were being fired upon.

  “Turn this bloody thing around, and be quick about it!” shouted the bosun. “May the Lord help us!”

  The oars hit the water. Both seamen pulled frantically in opposite directions. The boat turned slowly, as if the water had suddenly turned to molasses.

  Another boom. Splash! A couple of yards closer.

  The men glanced nervously behind them, wondering if the next cannonball would hit its mark. The bosun looked ahead at the British Navy vessel as they started moving forward, willing the boat to go faster. The two men pulled on the oars, their muscles burning with the effort.

  Boom. Splash! Closer.

  Boom. Splash! Closer still.

  More frantic rowing as the skiff picked up speed.

  Finally, they reached the great warship and were hauled aboard.

  The two British ships—the Ranger and the Jane—drew closer together, preparing for battle. Aboard the Ranger, Captain Maynard gritted his teeth, watching as the Adventure’s first mate ran forward and cut the anchor line with a huge sword.

  “Look alive, men! They’ve cut the line and will try to outrun us!”

  The captain, standing on the forward deck, turned and ran aft toward the ship’s wheel. “Run up the Union Jack!” he ordered as he took the wheel from the quartermaster. The men below decks rowed as the ship picked up speed. “I need flank speed! Raise the sails!”

  The men standing on the yardarms high above decks pulled with all their weight on the ropes, raising the huge sails, which immediately caught the wind and began moving the Ranger. The men tied the ropes fast, and scrambled down the ladders to the main deck. They were closing in on their quarry.

  Twenty-two

  Caesar stood with alacrity at his post next to one of the large cannons on deck. Neither he nor anyone else had expected to be challenged in home waters. Two ships, one large and one small, both flying the Union Jack, now chased them. The Adventure had raised anchor and was heading north, closer to shore.

  Caesar had faith in the captain and knew there was a plan, even if he could not see it. The quartermaster, Thomas Miller, looked toward the shore line, and his expression said he was not as sure as Caesar. Mr. Miller left his post at one of the cannons, and Caesar watched as he ran to the helm and grabbed the captain by the shoulder, pointing to the approaching shoreline. Blackbeard backhanded the quartermaster, knocking him to the deck. Caesar thought to himself, That’s a thing you don’t want to do, no sir, you don’t want to chide a man such as Edward Teach.

  Their crew was down in number, barely enough to man the sails of this pirate sloop. The two English ships were gaining quickly.

  Then, just as Teach had planned, the navy ships ran into the hidden sandbar, an invisible barrier beneath the murky green water.

  “Mr. Miller,” the pirate captain hissed as he turned to look down on the sprawled figure of the quartermaster, “I trust in the future you will learn patience for that which you do not understand. Now return to your post.”

  The quartermaster stood and staggered back to the unmanned cannon, rubbing his jaw and clearly grateful that Teach had not ordered him flogged.

  “Ready men!” Caesar heard Teach say. “When I signal, fire into the broadside of them, four of you trained on each vessel.”

  The men, with gunner Phillip Morton in command, readied themselves, every man lining up his sights on the appropriate ship, turning the powerful cannons, loading the heavy cannonballs and the powder, setting the fuse and lighting the torches.

  “On my word, men. Steady, steady…”

  The tension was exhilarating to the captain, and Caesar knew it. Edward Teach was made for battle. He donned his black hat and jet-black hair spilled out over his broad shoulders like a dark waterfall. His beard was braided in five ropes and adorned with red ribbons the color of blood. He was a large man, as tall as Caesar, and wore six pistols in six holsters up and down his massive chest. Blackbeard also carried a great cutlass, a formidable weapon Caesar had seen in action, its long, curved blade gleaming in the sunlight. The figure stood against the blue sky, the wind whipping through his hair, a smile on his face, looking to Caesar like the Angel of Death.

  “Fire!”

  All eight cannons erupted at once. The deafening boom reverberated off the distant sand dunes. Gulls and egrets took to the skies. The massive recoil pushed the ship closer to the shoreline. The cannonballs broadsided both of the Royal Navy ships, splintering wood and bone alike. Screams of surprise and aguish carried across the water to the Adventure.

  “Good job, men!” cried the pirate captain. “We’ll not turn and run from a fight, though they hound us to Hell!”

  Just as Teach spoke, the ship jerked violently and most of the crew found themselves sprawled on the deck. The Adventure slowly began listing to port.

  Blackbeard turned and looked to the port side as the men on deck ran to the railing and stared down at the sandbar they now found themselves wedged upon.

  Twenty-three

  Miller, standing by the port railing, looked back at the captain, his eyes wide with fear. “Captain!” he said. “We have run aground. We’re stuck fast.”

  Teach turned and squinted toward the pursuing sloop. “Damn!”

  He slid his curved cutlass from its metal sheath, the steel blade ringing like a small cymbal. The blade hung loosely by his side as he gazed furtively at each of his crewmen. None of them dared flinch.

  “Men, we’ve come to a crossroad and we’re damned if we do or damned if we don’t. We’ll have to stand fast and fight, or run like cowards to the nearest sand dune. I have never run from a fight, nor will I do so now, but I won’t ask any of you to fight that haven’t the backbone. It would be better to have one willing man than a hundred cowards on my side.”

  Deadly silence ensued aboard the ship, the only sounds that of Maynard’s beleaguered crew throwing ballast over the side of their own vessel.

  Finally, Caesar looked from one side to the other at the men surrounding him. Their faces were worn and haggard, hardened like stone from the cruelty of a life at sea, yet their eyes were full of fire.

  Then Caesar turned and faced the captain.

  “Just give the word, captain.”

  Teach grinned from ear to ear, then gave the command to go below and bring up on deck his own special secret weapon—hand grenades. The men began parading up and down the ladder from the hold below, carrying armloads of glass bottles filled with gunpowder, small shot, iron pieces, and lead. Each bottle had a fuse worked into the center that was short enough to give no more than five seconds of burn time. And then, devastation.

  * * *

  Aboard the pursuing sloop, Captain Maynard and the survivors of the cannon attack regrouped and set about carrying their dead and wounded below decks. As they were doing this, Maynard had an idea, a ploy that he had seen used in another battle long ago. He turned to his first mate.

  “Mr. Pennington, leave the dead crewmen where they are and order the men to have pistols and swords at the ready, then place two ladders into the hold. Have the crew climb into the hold, save yourself and the bosun. When we are alongside the pirate vessel, I will give the word and the crew will come to the main deck and take their revenge on the pirates. But no one is to touch the captain, Blackbeard. Leave him for me. Is that understood?”

  The first mate smiled knowingly. “Aye, sir, it is.”

  As the ship slowly began moving again, Maynard turned back to watch their forward progress as Pennington barked his orders to the crew. Maynard prayed to God that he and his men would survive just long enough to send Blackbeard and his pirates where they belonged.

  To Hell.

  Twenty-four

  Teach and his crew waited, watching anxiously as one of the English ships approached the Adventure in the shallow water of the sound. Blackbeard noticed that th
e crew on board the ship had diminished from its earlier number.

  He turned to his first mate. “Get the crew to stand by with the bottles, and throw them on my command at the main deck of that ship.”

  “Aye, captain. All right, men. On the captain’s order, light your fuses and aim at the main deck. And don‘t drop the bloody things, damn you.”

  The ship drew closer, and the sound of the hull cutting through the waves reached the ears of Blackbeard and his men. The captain raised his cutlass above his head, as if readying to cut a mooring line. Breathless seconds passed and he could feel his heart beating against the wall of his chest, like a drummer pounding out a driving rhythm.

  The cutlass came down like the blade of a guillotine. The crew of the Adventure lit fuses and let loose a barrage of smoking glass bottles. The bombs hit the deck and the sides of the English ship, immediately ejecting their deadly contents of lead and shot in dozens of fiery explosions. The resulting smoke was so thick the damaged ship became nearly invisible, as if it had been enveloped by a fog bank.

  Blackbeard eyed the ship as the smoke cleared and saw there were only three living men on the deck and twenty or so corpses. His bombs had worked. The ship was now so close they could grab hold of it with grappling hooks.

  “All right, men. We’ve knocked them all out, save three or four. Pull it up alongside and board her, then cut them down like the English dogs they are!”

  At this, Blackbeard’s crew cheered boisterously, thinking they had won the battle. They tied off the lines, securing the larger ship to their own, and began climbing over the sides to board, yelling fiercely and firing their pistols.

  On board the ship, the stench of death and burnt gunpowder was overpowering. There were holes in every part of the ship, some nearly a foot wide, splintered at the edges like jagged, gaping wounds. The dead lay strewn about in pools of their own blood, some missing limbs or even heads that had rolled into corners of the main deck. The pirates simply stepped over them without a second glance, edging ever closer to the three who remained standing.

  As they advanced, the hold of the Ranger suddenly burst forth with dozens of men—most with their own swords and pistols at the ready—pouring out onto the deck like water from behind a broken dam.

  Teach and his crew were taken aback. This was not in the plan.

  Twenty-five

  The heavily armed English crewmen fell upon the pirates like a pack of wild dogs pouncing on wounded animals. The pirates, though surprised and outnumbered, fought furiously. Swords cut through the air, clanging on impact, steel blade upon steel blade, until the weaker man relented and paid with his life. Torturous screams of the wounded pierced the island air. Blood spilled like wine from a barrel across the already saturated deck. Combatants slipped on the blood, and fell to the deck, taking a pistol shot to the head or catching the razor-sharp edge of a cutlass on the way down.

  Blackbeard himself swung his great cutlass like a windmill, fending off anyone who dared come near, and disemboweling those who did. While swinging his sword with one hand, he pulled single-shot pistols from the bandolier on his chest and discarded them on the deck after firing off a shot.

  As the battle waged on, it became obvious the pirates were no match for the English. Many of them jumped overboard, begging for mercy. Those who remained fought on, but eventually joined the ranks of the dead now laying two-high in some places.

  The pirate captain seemed to be unstoppable, nearly supernatural, withstanding cut after cut and shot after shot. His own blood began to soak through his clothes and run down his legs onto the wooden deck, yet still he refused to quit.

  “Damn you! I’ll fight you all until the demons of Hell come and drag me away!”

  At last, there were none left to fight except for Maynard and Teach, and the two now stood facing each other. Maynard had received only superficial wounds, but Blackbeard had not fared as well. Even so, he was still an imposing figure. His eyes glowed red as burning embers and his mouth curled like a snarling, wild dog.

  And Maynard could have sworn he saw fangs.

  “So, you’ve come to kill me,” Teach said. His jet black hair and beard were matted with blood and his clothes were torn and ragged, a deep wound corresponding with each rip in the fabric. He swayed slightly as he spoke, but his gaze was steady and his voice tinged with venom.

  The crew stood enraptured by this meeting between the two captains, wondering just how it would play out.

  Then Maynard spoke.

  “I know what you are.”

  Teach grimaced “Do you?”

  “I‘ve heard the tales, met the witnesses. I didn’t believe it at first, but those I have spoken to are not taken to storytelling and fantasy. Then, there are your followers. Many of them know you as Blackbeard, but perhaps I should call you by your other names. Diablero, Obeah…the Death Defier.”

  Teach stood, cutlass in one hand and pistol in the other. The cold breeze blew across the faces of those on deck, but none of them felt it. They could only watch as the drama unfolded in front of them, not quite knowing what to make of the strange conversation.

  “I admire your diligence, captain, and your cleverness,” Blackbeard croaked. “And since you know what I am, you must also know that I cannot be killed.”

  Maynard glanced at the bloody, bullet-ridden body of the big pirate and knew that what Blackbeard said was true.

  Or at least, partly true.

  “I know that what you say is misleading. You can, in fact, be killed. If one knows the proper method of doing so.”

  At this, Blackbeard’s eyes flashed with anger and he raised his cutlass to strike Maynard. But before his sword could find its mark, a crewman came from behind and cut Blackbeard across the neck. A spray of crimson bloomed against the cold blue sky. Blackbeard, still holding his cutlass aloft, toppled forward and fell face-first on the deck. One of his pistols fired upon impact and a lead pellet came through the pirate’s ribs and struck the starboard side, leaving a small hole.

  The men turned and looked at the crewman who had brought down Blackbeard, then began to advance upon the motionless figure sprawled on the deck.

  Twenty-six

  As the crew moved slowly toward the immobile body of Blackbeard, Maynard wiped the blood off his cutlass with a tattered shirt sleeve and slid the sword back into its sheath. He looked down at Teach, and with a booted foot, turned him over on his back. The limp body seemed to weigh a ton. The pirate’s face was covered with deep, ugly wounds. The jet-black hair and long, braided beard were matted with blood. His chest was peppered with stab wounds and bullet holes. His face looked as if it was still somewhat young, but a scowl had permanently furrowed the brow. Teach was an intelligent looking man, some might say handsome, even in death.

  While the crew stood wondering what to do next, Teach suddenly opened his eyes and looked directly at Maynard. The eyes were deep red, as if filled with blood and fire.

  “You can’t do away with me that easily,” Teach said. The voice wasn’t human, but sounded to Maynard like the deep-throated growl of some large animal.

  He knew it was the voice of a demon.

  Blackbeard lay motionless, as if waiting for Maynard to make his move.

  With a great battle cry, Maynard unsheathed his sword and raised it above his head, yet he hesitated.

  Blackbeard only continued to stare, grinning as if it was all a grand joke, arms lying limply by his side.

  “I’ll be back,” the pirate hissed, and raised a hand toward one of the pistols on his chest.

  Maynard brought the cutlass down in a flash and the razor-sharp blade carved a path through flesh and bone. “The hell you will!” He stepped aside as the demon pirate’s head rolled across the deck and came to rest against the body of one of Blackbeard’s unfortunate crewmen. Maynard grabbed the black hair and hoisted the head like a trophy of wild game. He handed it to his quartermaster and ordered it hung from the bow sprit.

  * * *

 
An informal autopsy by the ship’s surgeon showed that Teach had withstood some forty sword wounds and had been shot at least a dozen times, many of the wounds being potentially fatal.

  As the surgeon sewed the chest cavity back together, he shook his head in disbelief. “It’s unnatural,” he said.

  Maynard slid Blackbeard’s cutlass back into its sheath, then ordered four of his men to drag the pirate out and toss his lifeless body over the side.

  The men carried the dead weight, smearing thick blood and gore, across the wooden deck as they went, then heaved the body up over the railing and watched as gravity pulled it down into the frigid water.

  As the crew assembled by the railing, Maynard heard several of them cry out, some invoking the name of Christ, others simply cursing in dismay. Maynard quickly stepped up to the railing and looked down.

  The sight was one that would awaken him from sleep for many years to come.

  Blackbeard’s headless body swam along the ship’s keel, a damned soul defying death to the last, leaving behind a gruesome slick of blood on the water’s surface.

  As the horrified crew watched, moving from the port side to the starboard side and back, the living corpse swam hand over hand until it had circled the ship three times, then sank into the cold, indifferent Atlantic.

  Twenty-seven

  After Jason finished his abbreviated version of the life and death of Blackbeard, Hunter could only sit and shake his head. That a man could lead such a life and die such a gruesome death was unbelievable in itself, yet he knew from history that the story was true. At least, the parts leading up to the pirate captain swimming around the ship without a head. After all he had witnessed, however, even that didn’t sound as crazy as it should have.