by L. A. Meyer
She nods, putting another breaded shrimp in her mouth, grinding it up, and washing it down with a slug of lemonade.
"But not too much, Sister, or you'll get sick," I say, dispatching a last shrimp of my own. "I know I ain't your mother"—and here I give her a big wink—"but we do have to sing for our supper soon." We have been practicing a few numbers together, and tonight will be the first time she performs in public. I know she is a little nervous about it.
She nods again, and slacks off a bit.
I pat my lips with my napkin and rise. "Come, Joannie, time to continue your education," I say, and head for the gambling tables, with her following behind.
I lose a little money at the chuck-a-luck wheel, explain the bad odds to Joannie, and then sit at a table where a version of poker is being played. I quickly pick up the rules, and even though I'm playing it straight, I manage to end up winning some. Joannie stands behind me, taking it all in.
It is a pleasant interlude, and I know it keeps Joannie's mind off the coming show. Or, rather, it is pleasant until an empty chair is pulled back and a certain Spanish naval officer sits down in it and fixes his mocking gaze upon me.
"Ah. It is Lieutenant Juan Carlos Cisneros, the pride of the Spanish Navy," I say in my coldest voice. "How good to see you."
"So. The muchacha Bouvier, simple sponge diver, is now found to be an acclaimed café singer, as well," he says, signaling for the deck of cards to be given to him. "And now I find her simple self sitting at a table with the quality of Cuba. How interesting."
The other men at the table begin to look concerned when I rise, throw down my cards, take up my cash, and say, "I may not be of the quality, Señor, but all the same, I am not so low as to sit at the same table with a man who has abused me, who has put his unwanted hand upon me, and who has forced me to kneel to clean his boots!" At that they look downright shocked.
I spin around to head back into the main room, and to our table, with Joannie following. "It's time for me to get up on the stage. I'll take the guitar to start. Joannie, I'll call you up later." I put the guitar strap around my neck and lift my eyebrows to Señor Ric. He nods and mounts the stage, and the place falls silent.
"Señoritas y señores. Ladies and gentlemen," he calls out, acknowledging the international character of his clientele. "Fresh from the United States, England, and France, may I present Mademoiselle Jacqueline Bouvier!"
There is applause and I mount the platform, strum a chord, then go right into a Spanish love song "Sólo Tú," which means "Only You," which I guess sums up the sentiments of most love songs in only two words.
I always figure it's best to start out slow and then get wilder. That song gets a very good response, and I pick up the fiddle and rip into "Spanish Fandango," and that gets 'em where they live. Hispanics are a much less reserved people than us English. They hear a tune they like and they are up on their feet, clicking castanets and swirling skirts and shouting Ole!
I like this kind of audience—they certainly don't sit on their hands.
After that I do a few Anglo American fiddle tunes—"Billy in the Low Ground," then "Rabbit in the Pea Patch," and then I have a trembling Joannie come up and together we do a medley of "Sail Away Ladies" and "Old Molly Hare." She does well and gathers confidence with each sung note and, at the end, is glowing under the applause.
As she leaves the stage, I notice that Eduardo Santoro and his mates have come in and seated themselves near the front. I assume they came in with that damned Cisneros. I catch Eduardo's eye and nod, letting him know that I will be joining them at the break.
After that, I recite the poem "La Boca Dulce," "The Sweet Mouth," followed by some Galician tunes on the concertina. Then I end the set with "The Rocky Road to Dublin," a great Irish tune that seems to travel well across national borders.
I curtsy and leave the stage to resounding applause, which warms me to my soul, and I go over to the Spanish sailors' table and sit down next to Eduardo.
"So how are my fine and gallant Spanish sailors this lovely Caribbean evening?" I purr, settling in. I pat the hand of Mateo, the youngest of them, and he blushes quite pink. I don't think he has had his first shave yet, and I find him very ... well ... cute.
They inform me that they are in the finest of fettle, and I can tell that they are delighted to be seen having drinks with the star entertainer.
"Tell me, hermanos, what exactly is it that you do on the great and glorious San Cristobal," I ask by way of innocent conversation. "Are you cooks? Stewards? Carpenters?"
Jesus looks at me with great disdain. "No, mi corazón, we are gunners ... great and magnificent gunners!" Jesus has had a few, I can tell.
"It is true," says Eduardo. "We can aim, fire, and reload our cannon in under ninety seconds. I should like to see the English match—"
All four of them suddenly shoot to their feet as I sense a presence behind me.
"So," says Lieutenant Juan Carlos Cisneros y Siquieros, in a low and sinister tone, "you are telling everything you know about the San Cristobal to this girl?"
"No, Teniente, your pardon," pleads a very white-faced Eduardo. "She is only a common cantante. What could be the harm?"
"She is not a common anything, fool. She has been pumping you idiots for information. Mondragon!"
There is another sailor behind Cisneros, probably a bosun's mate. He steps forward and says, "Sí, Teniente?"
"They are all under arrest. Take them back to the ship."
"Sí, Teniente," says Mondragon. "Vamos, hombres," and he leads the very chastened and unhappy four Spanish sailors out of the Café Americano. Poor lads, what started out as a fine evening for you turned into something very dif ferent. Looks like a long stretch of no shore leave for you fellows. Oh well, you're all good Catholic boys, so just offer it up—it will reduce your time in Purgatory, or so they say...
"As for you," says Cisneros, grasping me by the arm, "you will come with me. I have a room nearby and we will—"
I shake his hand off my arm. "We will do nothing, perro," I say. "Look around you." He does and sees my lads standing up and staring hard at him. He knows there are weapons under those suits. Señor Ric, also, has noticed and is headed this way. The Rules, Cisneros—surely you remember?
"You have sent away your men, Lieutenant, but mine are still here. Do you see? Good. Now get yourself gone, you."
His face turns a dangerous shade of red. Then he hits a brace, clicks his heels, bows slightly, and says, "I will take you. Count on that. I swear it."
He turns and leaves the place, his heels clicking on the hardwood floor.
I look over at my boys and see that they are sinking back into their chairs. I give them a nod and slight smile of thanks, and then remount the stage for the second set.
As I am putting my bow to the Lady Gay, a group of masked revelers, mostly men, but some women, too, enter and are seated. The one who sits at the head of the table wears a white half mask with red tassels to either side, and he seems to have taken a keen interest in me. But I am the leading entertainer, so why should he not? The masks are not unusual—it is Carnival, after all, and, besides, there are many times a gent likes to be anonymous, especially when he is out on the town and with a woman who is not his wife. They call for drinks and I welcome them, and then I lower the bow and take off into the opening number.
After all is said and sung, I bow and take the applause, then head for the hallway that leads to the back rooms, as if I were going to my dressing room. I do like to keep up the illusion that I am a class act. Actually, I'm going back to the privy.
On my way, I notice that the group of revelers who had come in during the break had left. Too bad. They seemed most appreciative of my performance and I expected some good tips from them. Oh, well, stiffed again, girl.
My violin case is left open on the stage, and people are tossing coins into it. From the corner of my greedy eye I can see that, while most of the coins are silver, some are gold. Ah yes, how I love it—lo
ud applause and gold to boot. Joannie has instructions to close the case and bring it back to our table after the last coin falls.
I nip into the hall and go past the closed doors to the private rooms, and into the privy. In there I find an old attendant, who hands me a damp cloth and opens the inner door for me. The latrine consists of a hole in the floor, at the bottom of a shallow masonry funnel. On either side are flat places to put your feet as you squat down over it to answer Nature's call. I drop drawers, hike skirts, and do it, put the damp cloth to good use, and then toss it in a nearby receptacle. Pretty neat, I'm thinking. Least I didn't have to sit down on something nasty. Up drawers, down skirts, and back out to the anteroom to check my face in the mirror while the attendant whisks any dust off my shoulders with her brush. Satisfied that all is as well as it could be with my appearance, I give her a good tip—Muchas gracias, Señora— and go back out to rejoin my mates.
I don't get there.
As I stride by the second door on the left, it opens and a hand snakes out to grab me by the neck and pull me in.
A strong hand is clapped over my mouth, and I am unable to cry out for help. My arms are pinned to my sides, preventing me from drawing my shiv. If this your work, Cisneros, you will pay for it! I squirm and kick, but it avails me nothing. As I am carried across the room, I can see that I have been taken by that bunch of masked revelers.
"Aquí, Capitán. Take her!" says the brute who has me by the neck and who flings me now into the lap of the man seated at the head of the table. "Mucho gusto!"
There is laughter all around. Well, let 'em laugh at this.
I whip out my shiv and put it to the throat of the whitemasked man.
He merely chuckles and reaches up to pull off his mask. "It is good to see you again, my sweet little English pirate. Let us have a kiss."
I sit astounded.
Flaco!
Chapter 27
"Flaco!" I cry, and fling my arms around his neck. "Flaco Jimenez! You devil! Well met, oh, so very well met!" Once again I gaze fondly upon my old comrade-in-piratical-arms. Same long black hair braided in thin strands that end in brightly colored beads and ribbons, same thin mustache and pointed chin beard, teeth gleaming white in his tanned face as he smiles upon me. The very picture of a dashing buccaneer.
"So good to see you again, Jacky Faber, my little English pirate. Let us have a kiss."
I look around the table at the various scarred and furrowed faces, some grinning, some not, and cry out, "Jorge! Moto! Not yet hanged, you jolly banditos! I am so very glad! And there's Serpiente and Coyote, and young Perrito, too! Lift your glasses!" A serving girl goes by with a tray of wine goblets and I snag one and hold it up. "To the waves and to the foam and to the Red Brotherhood. Let us always stand onboard as brothers! Salud, dinero, y amor!"
There is a roar of Salud! and the toast is drunk. Pirates will always drink to money and love. I notice that while many of the faces are familiar, many are not, and then I look for a face that is not there. I sit up straight.
"Where is Chucho? Oh my God, he wasn't ... ?" Chucho was Flaco's First Mate, and I liked him very much.
"No, my sweet, he was not killed or hanged," says Flaco, shaking his head, his braids flying about his face. "No, it was far worse than that."
I steel myself for the worst. Chucho was a good friend to me.
"No, the Grand Chucho, his sword feared from Martinique to Saint Martin, from Saint Thomas to Puerto Rico, has fallen ... and fallen to a woman, at that. A hostage we took in a raid on Puerto Gordo. While she was aboard and waiting to be ransomed, poor Chucho fell under her spell. He and the woman now have a farm and raise sugar cane and a horde of brats on Santo Domingo." Again Jimenez shakes his head at the ways of the world. "No proper end for a pirate, no." That sentiment is echoed around the table. "El Feo there has been elected First Mate." I look over to see a large, scowling, and very unpleasant-looking cove. El Feo means "the ugly one," and it seems to fit. I take an instant dislike to him, and I have a suspicion that he feels the same way about the bit of inglesa fluff that has just landed in his captain's lap.
"But enough of the henpecked and disgraced Chucho, chiquita, time now for that kiss."
I lift my face and give it to the rascal, and there are cheers all around—Olé, Capitán! Yes, I have always been free with my kisses, but then, I wasn't raised up proper. I say, what's the harm?
As I take my lips from his, he says, "That was lovely, mi corazón, and we must have another. But if you would put that blade away, I would be even more appreciative of your very obvious charms." He glances nervously at my shiv, which is still in my hand, the razor-sharp edge of which rests not very far from his right ear.
Leaving my left arm about his neck, I bring the knife around and put the point of it to his chin and gently tickle his beard with it. "No hay rosas sin espinas, eh, Flaco? You taught me that one—'No roses without thorns.' True, cómo no?"
" Es la verdad, mi querida, and especially in your case, my British rosa, but if you would just..."
I whip my knife back into my forearm sheath, and as soon as I do, he clasps me to him.
"You have become even more beautiful, my quivering little bowl of jalapeño jelly," he says, his nose a bare inch from the top of my bodice. The danger from my shiv now past, he leans in and plunges his face in the cleft between my breasts, then gives his chin a bit of a shake back and forth. I yelp and grasp his hair and jerk his head back up and out of there. I hear a faint tinkle, and see that at the ends of several of the braids now dangle tiny chimes.
"Bells, is it now? The beads and ribbons were not enough? Are you now a horse and carriage, Flaco?"
"Our captives and hostages seem to demand something colorful in the way of fierce pirate captains. I only seek to oblige them, my dear. And now for the second kiss, which I trust will be even sweeter than the first."
His arm goes about my waist, and as he draws me even closer to him, I take a deep breath and muse about the past. I must admit, Jaimy, that I have sat in this very same lap before—yes, I have. It was during that summer on the Emerald when I thought you were out of my life for good and ever. I met Flaco Jimenez, Captain of El Diablo Rojo, in a smoke-filled tavern in Fort-de-France on Martinique, right after the lot of us, sailing in consort, had sacked and pillaged that very town. It was, after all, a French town, and being an English privateer, that's what I was supposed to do, wasn't it? Parts of the town were burning right merrily when my Irish crew and I piled into that tavern and, after many a drink, formed sort of an alliance with the crew of El Diablo Rojo, and I formed more than a bit of an alliance with her Captain, Flaco Maria Castro de Jimenez.
Anyway, I don't think very many people got hurt in that raid. Most of the smart ones, including the local police, headed for the hills as soon as they spotted our ships coming into their harbor, each bearing a version of the skull-and-crossed-bones flags flying at our mastheads as we charged in. I hope not, anyway.
It turned out that Flaco was a decent sort, for a Spanish pirate. He had a sense of honor in that he did not abuse his captives, and he did not push me any further than I wanted to go with him ... which was far enough, but never mind.
"Things have changed, my gallant buccaneer," I say, my mind and body back in Havana and still in Flaco's lap. "I am now promised in marriage to Lieutenant James Emerson Fletcher, an officer in His Majesty's Royal Navy."
Flaco affects shock. "What a silliness—pirata bonita muchacha is going to wed an inglés pig of a Royal Navy officer? No, it cannot be—it is a crime against nature."
I laugh. Flaco always did have a poetic way about him.
I decide to give him a bit of fun and squirm my bottom around and say, for the benefit of his mates, "Do you have a jackknife in your pocket, Flaco, or are you just glad to see me?"
Roars of laughter and poundings of the table.
"I am most glad to see you, Jacky," he says.
More hilarity all around, and Flaco presses his advantage, agai
n clutching me to him. "That next kiss, my little chili pepper, will you give it?"
Why not, think 1.1 could scream for help if I need it.
I wrap my arms about his neck and lift my face to his and our lips meet...uummmm ... and a part of my mind—the sane part, which is admittedly a very small part of that mind—says to me, Isn't this the part when James Emerson Fletcher comes bursting onto the scene?
Sure enough, there is a kick and the door flies open, and there, holding two pistols before him, is ... not Jaimy Fletcher ... but, rather, Higgins, with Davy and Tink to either side, knives drawn and about to do damage. Beside them I see, all big-eyed, Daniel and Joannie.
Taking my mouth off Flaco's I cry, "Higgins! It is our old friend Flaco!"
Higgins thumbs the pistols back on half cock and says to Davy and Tink, "It's all right, lads. Stand down." He puts the pistols into the vest holsters, where they habitually reside.
Davy's and Tink's knives were not the only ones drawn upon Higgins's entrance—pirates do not live to old age by allowing themselves to be caught unawares—but eventually all blades go back into their sheaths. I notice that El Feo's is the last one to disappear.
"The worthy Señor Higgins! Come in!" says Flaco. "Enrique, get up, and let the man sit down! We must talk business!"
The man next to Flaco vacates the chair and Higgins seats himself. Davy and Tink, and now Jim Tanner, stand around him, hard-eyed and very vigilant. Since there are no more open chairs, I figure I'll stay where I am.
"We are all friends here, mates," I say, and nod to the serving girl such that drinks are placed in my lads' hands. Everybody be calm, please.
"Buenas noches, Captain Jimenez," says Higgins, picking up his glass and taking a sip. "It is good to see you again."
When we had been sailing in company with Flaco and El Diablo Rojo, we had fallen upon a merchant ship that had a good, fat cargo, and several hostages as well—a Spanish girl, Rosalita, and her brother Alfonso, she being eighteen and bound for an arranged marriage in Puerto Rico, he being ten and going into apprenticeship with a distant uncle in cotton trading. He was told that he would not be forced to walk the plank if he succeeded in teaching me Spanish within two months. Although he realized very shortly that we had no intention of drowning him, he was relentless in his instruction, and soon I was quite good in conversational Spanish. Higgins, also, decided to avail himself of this chance to learn another language, and that is why he is able to converse so easily with Flaco.