by Sally Watson
Then Anne gasped and clutched Jade’s arm, but Jade stood engulfed in stillness, for she had known since that laugh whom she would see.
“Barrister for the pirates,” said Michael Radcliffe, looking confident and professional. And behind him was a shock of black hair and two angry, slanted blue eyes.
The courtroom was a blurred roar in the background, and only one face was real and sharp; a fiercely inscrutable face, like a bad-tempered Indian tomahawk, or something carved with one. . . .
And all Jade’s cherished fatalism melted away, and she wanted to live!
Faint hope crowded into the prisoners’ dock, and died almost at once.
“Deuced decent of them to try it,” muttered Vane appreciatively.
Jade hardly heard. She and Anne stared with joy and despair while the court still buzzed, and the judge still banged, and Michael explained with respectful dignity that he and his friend had felt a moral compulsion to provide for the prisoners some sort of barrister (and he looked regretfully at the nondescript and hangdog creature who went under that label) even as belatedly as this.
“Too late!” rumbled Lawes angrily. “Trial’s all but over, damme! Out of the question to repeat it. Not worth it, anyway: cut and dried. The fellow can sit here for the rest of it if he likes, but the witnesses have been heard; I tell you, you’re too late!”
And Rory’s still face glared dauntingly at him, and Anne’s was a pale mask, and Jade could feel her own turn to smooth wood, with a crooked little smile fixed where she had carefully set it. But her eyes glared green at Rory, almost hating him for having returned to life at this impossible moment. Rory blazed back, forbidding her to weaken, and Jade stiffened. As if she would! She’d show him!
Interminably the summary dragged on, saying nothing that hadn’t already been said. And at the end of it, Judge Lawes turned to the dock with terrible triumph.
“You’ve heard the evidence against you. Have you any defense to make?”
“No!” Four voices spoke in defiant unison, a great disappointment to those who had hoped to see them grovel abjectly. Michael looked quietly desperate, but Rory looked dourly at Jade, as unyielding as she. He’d have done the same.
“Hang ’em!” chanted the crowd. “Hang ’em!” bawled the mob outside.
“Have any of you any pleas to make!” Lawes asked them, almost hopefully. Jade and Anne, hands gripping in misery, regarded him with stony scorn. Mary looked bored and Vane amused.
But Jack, losing his nerve, mumbled hopelessly that he was sorry, and he’d never do it again; and Bixby indicated sheepishly that if anyone were to offer him mercy, he’d accept it. The others just stood sullenly, knowing it was no use.
And then Jade, to her own astonishment, heard herself speak.
“I want to plead for two people who—who can’t plead for themselves.”
There was instant silence, all eyes on her, breathing suspended. Judge Lawes leaned forward avidly, the seedy barrister tried to look alert, Rory’s face was strained and challenging.
“It’s—” Jade hesitated, felt herself blushing, was furious at herself for it. “It isn’t for any of us—but—my Lord, if you hang Anne and Mary, you’ll be murdering their—their unborn babies. Surely they have a right to live, even if they can’t speak yet.”
Scarlet, she subsided in a stunned silence that turned at once to pandemonium. The town crier nearly fell out of the window. Lawes gobbled and goggled. Michael, mastering his emotion, spoke to the barrister with urgent intensity. Anne and Mary were whispering to Jade agitatedly, but she wasn’t listening, for Rory smiled at her suddenly, and quite lit up the room. The Crown Prosecutors were in a huddle that reluctantly took in the seedy barrister. The crowd was nearly out of hand. The trial, in short, was in as remarkable a state of chaos as had ever been produced by one sentence from a seventeen-year-old girl.
Lawes, his face quite unutterably annoyed, finally emerged from conference with the chief prosecutor and slammed his gavel down as if he wished Jade were under it.
“Court adjourned!” he squawked. “This trial will be continued later. Return the prisoners to their cells!”
Then he put the gavel down, turned, and glared at Jade.
“You little devil!” he said, not without admiration.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“I Don’t Envy You”
Anne paced the cell like a tigress, Mary chewed her knuckles, and Jade stood kicking the hapless wooden bench as if she could punish it for everything. For they had done a terrible thing between them, she and Rory and Michael. They had unleashed first the wish and then a tiny hope to go on living—with perfectly disastrous results. Calm acceptance had collapsed, and now the cell was filled with raging uncertainty, rampant longing, regret, fear, protest—all the emotions so long and carefully blocked out.
“I wish you hadn’t!” said Mary wildly. “I don’t want to live any longer; not without Tom!”
Jade looked at her bitterly. “Well, I do—and I can’t!” she spat, and then her anger fell apart. “I’m sorry,” she muttered, forlorn. “I was only trying to help.”
“Shame, Mary!” snapped Anne, and Mary turned, remorseful.
“Forgive me, Jade! I didn’t mean that; you know I didn’t. You’ve given our babies a chance to live—and nothing for yourself. There aren’t any words.” She came over to Jade and gave her a quick affectionate hug, and said no more. There was no more to be said. It hung in the air.
“I wish it had been Tom who came back instead of Rory,” said Jade desolately.
There was no answer to that, either—unless one counted the faint clang of the door above, and then familiar footsteps and two familiar faces at the bars.
“Michael!” Anne flew to him, laughing and sobbing and reaching her fingers through to meet his. Mary came smiling to greet them. But Jade stood still. She and Rory searched each other’s faces with fierce wonder. No word of love had ever passed between them, nor had they ever intended such a thing.
They looked at Anne and Michael, still babbling endearments. They looked at each other again, consciously superior.
“Hullo,” said Rory gruffly. Their fingers touched through the bars. They glowered.
“I must say,” Jade observed waspily, “you’ve picked a fine time to rise from the dead! Now you’ve got me right back in the mood for living again.”
“And you would have to try to defend that silly sloop single-handed!” he retorted with acrimony. “How can we convince anyone that you’re a poor delicate little victim of circumstances who wouldn’t hurt a fly?”
Jade managed a small chuckle. “What happened to you?” she demanded, moving over to make more room for Mary between herself and Anne. (Poor Mary, left out of the reunion, looked as if she more pitied than envied the rest of them—and perhaps she was right.) “We hunted and hunted, and there was nothing but bits of ship and a few bodies! Are Joshua and Domino—”
“Safe, too,” he growled, and Jade found herself smiling happily. “They’re here in Port Royal, too, posing as our slaves and staying right in our rooms in case anyone should recognize them.”
Jade frowned. “Are you sure it’s safe?”
“Safer than you are,” he retorted curtly.
This was unanswerable. “Well, what did happen to you?” she asked again, and Mary, coughing, nodded.
“When Queen Royal broke up, about a dozen of us managed to get in one of the longboats and more or less stay afloat,” he said simply. “The hurricane tossed us ashore in the wildest bit of jungle I’ve ever seen, and it’s taken ever since to patch ourselves up and get back to St. Catherine’s and then here. No trouble finding out where you were, anyway.” He regarded her sourly. “Everyone’s talking about the female pirates. Especially about Anne, of course.”
Anne had stopped babbling and was looking scared. “Michael! What if they should suspect you?”
“Now calm down,” he said gently. “No one will. And if they did, there’s no evidence.”
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“And pirates don’t inform on each other,” Mary reminded her. Anne relaxed. This was perhaps the first rule of the Brotherhood of Pirates; not even Jack and his cronies would break it . . . particularly when it could gain them nothing.
“We only arrived last night,” said Michael. “Had a terrible time getting even that wretched cur of a barrister, Thrumpton; the others won’t touch your case. But we’ll turn Jamaica upside down to get you three reprieved.”
There was a moment’s silence. They all looked at Jade. She shook her head. “Not me,” and she managed to sound unconcerned, through the lump in her chest, and even to shrug and smile. “It’s all right; I—”
“Shut up,” said Rory crossly, and he and Michael began to explain their plans for arousing public sympathy (Jade snorted at that), get up petitions, and generally bring pressure on the governor.
It was a feeble enough hope, and they all knew it, but nobody said so. Easier not to—although Rory’s eyes were hagged with the knowledge and raging at the prudent part he must play. Better even her shoes than his, Jade realized with a stab of compassion.
“We’ve talked to a Doctor Hughes,” said Michael, filling the pause. “He’s sympathetic to you, and very much annoyed about this dungeon you’re in. I see his point.” His face was taut. “It’s a foul place—and in your condition, too! A terrible health hazard! I’ll go tell the governor at once.”
“Dr. Hughes already did,” Jade broke in irrepressibly. “Only Governor Lawes said it wasn’t for long, and the noose would be an even worse health hazard.”
Michael looked outraged, but Rory chuckled reluctantly, and Jade twinkled back. A good quip was a good quip, even when it was on them. She wished she’d thought of it first, herself.
For a few days there was intolerable suspense. The doctors consulted the Chief Prosecutor, who sighed and advised the governor to reprieve Anne and Mary until after their babies were born.
Lawes, agreeing with great reluctance, saw no reason at all to include Jade in this—which didn’t surprise Jade in the least. Their encounters of late had been spiced with rather more malice than usual.
“They’re re-trying you and the men tomorrow,” Rory told her that evening, his voice expressionless.
Jade nodded, impassive. It was what she’d expected, wasn’t it? And if the sour taste of fear was suddenly in her mouth, making it hard to speak or swallow, the more reason not to show a trace of it. Not just for the sake of her pride and her code—but also for her friends, who felt bad enough as it was, and above all for Rory.
“Well, it’s one way of getting out of this cell.” Amazing that her voice could come out so nonchalant. Michael swore softly, and Rory’s fingers hurt her cold ones. “You’ll be there?” she went on deliberately casual. “I’m twice me when you’re around.”
His eyes burned; his voice was as matter-of-fact as hers. “Oh, aye; I’ll be there. If they sentence you, they’ll just have to hang me, too,” he added almost apologetically, as if the thing were far too obvious to need saying.
“Yes,” said Jade, and found she’d known it all along.
But Anne turned sharply. Anne was in love with life again, for everyone else as well as herself, and she’d have died ten times to keep her Michael alive once.
“What d’you mean to do?” she demanded of Rory.
He laughed. “Och, just stand up and demand my rights as a pirate.”
Anne raged at him. Rory showed her his most inscrutable face, and looked at Jade quizzically. Anne turned on Jade.
“Are you going to let him throw his life away?”
“Yes,” said Jade placidly. “And he’d let me. And neither of us could stop the other, anyhow.”
Michael—being a doctor—looked pained, but Mary smiled, understanding perfectly that neither Jade nor Rory feared to die, but only for either to leave the other alone in an alien and infuriating world.
“Well, we’re going to try to get you off,” said Michael. “Tell her our plan of argument, Rory; I’m going along to talk to Vane and Jack, and then see if I can batter some sort of intelligence into Thrumpton. He’s got to word things exactly right.”
“What things?” demanded Jade, beginning to bristle. “I won’t beg, you know. And I won’t lie the way Besneck and—”
“Of course not, daft loon,” said Rory tolerantly. “Now hold your tongue and listen.”
Again the courtroom was packed, but with a crowd of a slightly different mood, for the intensive propaganda of the past few days had not been altogether without effect. Besides, their pet hate Anne Bonney wasn’t here on trial today.
Heads craned as the file of shackled prisoners came in, and attention centered this time on the only female—the little French she-wolf who’d broken up the last trial so neatly and dramatically . . . and not even to her own benefit, either, as that hawk-faced young fellow had been pointing out.
There she was—looking very small and forlorn and valiant amid all those burly unshaved pirates. A few of the women began to develop distinct symptoms of maternal sympathy. Some of the eyes once so avid to see her broken and hanged now held traces of favor—even of pity (which would have wounded Jade’s pride severely had she known). They nudged each other, noting that she seemed even skinnier than before, and had a new shadow on her pointy face, but she could still trade quips with the hecklers and laugh about her own execution! A game ’un she was and all, keeping her head up that way. And so young: no older’n our Sukey.
Only sixteen or seventeen, ’twas said. Came from a fine aristocratic family, ’twas said. Kidnapped by the pirates, ’twas said.
Proud little vixen! Never pleaded for herself, did she? No, nor wouldn’t neither. Bets were laid at once, and then more bets on whether she’d cry. Looking pretty worn, wa’n’t she? Pity, ’twas. Some folks were saying around town that ’twere only fair to reprieve her at least as long as them other females. . . .
Jade wasn’t aware of all this; only of the usual hecklers, which her tongue could handle almost without thought while her eyes searched for Rory. This second trial failed to arouse her love of battle; it was too much of an anticlimax. Instead she felt rather as Mary did these days: remote and detached and unreal. It was a state of mind that lacked zest.
There was Rory, carefully apart from Michael lest he incriminate him, as near as he could get to the dock, and smouldering at her in a manner altogether heartening—although some people might fail to find much comfort in thick scowling black brows and a ferocious mouth. Jade thought him beautiful.
She took her place in the dock again, this time between Vane and poor shaking Jack, who stared around with hunted eyes. Judge Lawes peered down at her with his old genial malignance. Triumph rode his smile. Jade returned it with a high chin and even a touch of mischief. For, one way or another, Lawes still had a surprise or two coming to him.
The resumé of the first trial was short and decisive. There seemed nothing left but to declare them guilty and pass sentence. And then the seedy barrister who rejoiced in the name of Thrumpton rose sheepishly to his feet.
“May it please Y’r Honor, before testimony is finished I’d—er—like to question the girl—er—Jade Loupin.”
He was certainly not much of a barrister, said Rory’s expression dourly. The crowd leaned forward expectantly, hoping for a new sensation. Lawes raised a thin eyebrow and nodded with an air of martyred patience. A waste of time, it was clear.
Thrumpton shuffled his feet nervously, and turned to Jade.
“Is it true, Mistress Loupin, that when you were—uh—aboard the pirate ship you—uh—refused to take part in piracy?” he asked with the air of someone grasping at straws.
Jade felt rather the same way herself. She regarded him with antagonism.
“Sometimes,” she admitted as grudgingly as if it were a crime to refuse to take part in piracy. “If they were just helpless merchant ships. Except, voyons, after the storm, when we were very much hungry,” she added, remembering her accent.
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Vane gleamed down at her, amused, and Lawes looked unimpressed.
“But before the storm—” Thrumpton managed to produce a note of dramatic passion that set Jade’s teeth on edge. “Before that, you refused! You were too noble, too honest, too gentle and ladylike to have anything to do with piracy!”
He had gone much too far, made it ludicrous! Jade hesitated—met Rory’s helpless eyes—was lost.
“Actually,” she said deflatingly, “it was merely that those were not the people whom I wished to kill.”
The crowd guffawed and the crier shouted. Michael—just visible behind the lawyer—looked furious, and Rory inscrutable, and Lawes spiderishly amused. Thrumpton lost his head and dropped his sheaf of notes in the same instant.
“But isn’t it true you were taken aboard against your will? No, I mean—” He’d worded it the wrong way. He pawed his notes, stammering. “I mean taken aboard without your consent?”
Judge Lawes looked deeply suspicious. “What do you mean?” He looked questioningly at Jade, who lapsed suddenly into mulish silence. It was Michael’s idea, this tack, and a blatant attempt to stir up maudlin sentiment for her. She couldn’t go through with it. Besides being shockingly undignified, she saw more clearly than ever that it was useless and irrelevant.
“Well, Mistress Loupin?”
She shook her head mutely, let her eyes pass over the despairing Michael, apologetically seeking Rory and his wry but unastonished grin.
The crowd buzzed, scenting mystery. Lawes rapped, scowled. “The prisoner is directed to answer.”
Jade grinned at him defiantly, having nothing to lose. The crowd booed her, but with a faint note of approval. And then Charles Vane cleared his throat.
“Mistress Loupin doubtless prefers not to speak of that day,” he said, so accurately that Jade tilted an indignant cropped head to stare at him reproachfully. “I understand that she was indeed taken aboard without her consent.” Jade found his toe and stamped on it vengefully but not very effectively. He smiled down at her. The judge demanded to know what he was talking about.