She rose. Head averted, she stood right close to him. He could smell her hair.
"Reckon I'd better get back to the schooner," he muttered.
"You don't have to go, Adam."
"Reckon I'd better."
The air outside, unexpectedly cold, grabbed him like so many hands. He realized that he was all drenched w^ith sweat.
A shadow sprang from behind a maple. Arms went around Adam's neck. He forgot his sword, and brought up a knee, hopping back.
"Ow! Adam, you hurt me!"
"Thunderation! How'd I know it was you, out in the dark like this?"
"You take me for a footpad? We don't have 'em here."
"I've just come from England, and they sure have 'em there."
"Just come from England, yes, and where do you go?"
"Selden's the only other owner now. I had to make a report."
Elnathan came closer. She had a long woolen shawl over head and shoulders, a shawl the size of a comforter, and when she let this fall partly open, Adam saw that she wasn't wearing a great deal more. She must be cold, he thought.
"Forgive me, my chick." She slid an arm around his neck, pressing close to him. "It's been so long—"
"We're in a public street, woman!"
"Yes. Let's go inside. That's what I was waiting to ask you."
"Zeph—"
"He's asleep. Won't wake up for another hour, we can be quiet."
She laid her cheek on his chest, turning her lips up. Her eyes were closed. Her breath came fast.
"Come on, Adam. He won't hear anything. Come on."
He wrenched himself free, choky noises in his throat. He didn't say anything at all, just ran on down the hill.
It was as well for him that he did not see Elnathan Evans' face, the way she looked after him.
PART NINE
Said a Spider to a Fly
hr ^^ A sailor gets used to long separations, though it does not
«_/ / follow that he likes them. No matter what the poets may
sing about absence making the heart grow fonder, any man whose skin is more sensitive than pasteboard knows that it's better to have your darling lying alongside of you, preferably with all her clothes off, than to dream about her from a distance. Well, the waiting was over now. Adam had claimed a cavalier's reward—and would claim it again. He should have been happy. He wasn't.
He could no longer tell himself that this was a real home he had established in the house on the hill just outside of ICingston. He had been overeager, trying to delude himself. He knew this now. Jamaica was no place for an orphan like him to roost. He didn't belong here.
He resented Jamaica. He had never liked the place, now he hated it. From the veranda, while Maisie mixed him a drink, he looked over the garden wall, over the town of Kingston, to the harbor, which was crowded. The fleet was back—seven warships, fourth- and fifth-raters, together with their attendant vessels of supply. A great deal had happened in these parts since Adam's previous visit. Admiral Benbow had caught up with du Casse oJEf Santa Marta—ten vessels, only four of them warships, loaded to the gunwales with treasure. Benbow himself had sailed in with all guns blazing, but he'd not been followed by his captains, who despite orders had lingered in the background, making excuses. Eventually these captains had even presented the admiral with a round robin begging him to break off the chase. By that time Benbow, semi-conscious from wounds, was barely able to curse them. The English Navy was indelibly disgraced; while the luckiest man in the world, du Casse, escaped.
Benbow was still laid up—one of his legs had been smashed by chain shot—but he was going right ahead with his plans to bring charges of cowardice against the captains, two of whom had already been sentenced to death. Benbow's was not a forgiving nature. His rage made itself felt throughout the colony. There was no shore leave. He'd hear no com-
plaints from civilians. Bumboatmen were roughly handled. More marines than ever tramped the streets of Kingston and Port Royal. The press gang and the requisition squads had never been so busy.
Nearer, the prospect was more pleasant, consisting as it did of a garden all stippled with sunspots, of zigzagging flagstones set in the bright green grass, and gardenia and hibiscus, roses, jasmine, cereus, and, pert and pretty, and startlingly simple amid those lush tropical blooms, great masses of periwinkle.
Nearer still, in fact in his lap, lay the real causes of Adam's perturbation. For he wasn't just emotionally upset. There were touchable, material reasons why he was in the dumps.
"Pish, my darling! Adam chick, you're not going to stew over tradesmen's bills at a time like this, sure?"
She gave him his punch and knelt by his chair, and put her hands over his left hand, her cheek against his left arm.
He smiled at her, but only from a distance. He shook his head. The husband who comes home to find himself inundated by evidences of his wife's extravagance was, he knew, a comic character. He didn't care. If, as some folks said, it showed a mean nature to worry about money matters, well then he had a mean nature. These papers in his lap were not funny, they were real. They might even prove tragic. Where was his Tillinghast blood? A true aristocrat would have swept them aside with a sneer. Adam couldn't. He was a mercantile man, a trader, and he took such things seriously.
He did not blame Maisie. In the circumstances she had behaved with a commendable moderation. It was his own fault, a result of his dereliction of duty, that they had been captured by the pirates and kept for a time on Providence, where of necessity all Maisie's clothes had been left. As she herself had pointed out, she had to have something to wear. And prices had gone 'way up, partly because the war had made for a shortage of fine clothes, partly because Maisie, already deeply in debt here, was a marked woman when she asked for more credit. Poor girl! Alone, with no one to guide her, spied on, tittered at, resented, she had consoled herself with change after change of costume here in their own house. She had pirouetted before a mirror, oh, yes! Adam was a lucky man that this was all she'd done. Kingston had not been kind to her. He didn't like the way she looked. When she smiled it was the same, warming his heart; but sometimes, when she didn't know that he was watching her, lines of worriment and of harshness crimped the corners of her mouth. She was paler than she'd been. Even the glory of her hair, it could be, was a touch dimmed.
More than ever it was advisable that she get away, that they both get out. But—how? Adam, who had maybe overstrained himself in order to
buy Zeph Evans' share of the schooner, had precious httle ready cash. Mr. Cartwright, "the jew who wasn't a Jew," was pressing for his money, with twelve per cent interest. Nothing had been done about the Tread-way plantation case. Nothing had been done about the Quatre Moulins.
Even if they had been willing to let both these suits go by default, they couldn't have sneaked away. Adam had not told her this, but Goodwill to Men, careened for a scraping over at Port Royal before Adam had learned how serious was his financial situation, was in no condition to sneak anywhere. What was worse, Adam's seven-sixteenths of the schooner, defenseless now, might at any hour be attached. Even to think of it was a poniard into his heart.
"We've got to take desperate measures, my dear," he said mildly. "I mentioned a plan I had, some time ago. We've got to get to Benbow."
"I've tried! I told you how I tried! He won't see anybody!"
"Desperate measures," he repeated thoughtfully. He finished his punch, put the mug on the floor, and rose. "Bring me my sword," he said.
|T O The frosty blue eyes swerved as though in slots, but no other
*-J O part of the old man moved, when Adam climbed through the window.
"What in Hell do you want?"
"Just to talk to you, sir."
"Going to kill me?"
"No, sir."
"Sure?"
But there was no glint of fear in the blue eyes.
"I'm sure," Adam replied.
"If you came from those captains, it won't do 'em any good. They're g
uilty. The sentence stands."
"I didn't come from the captains," Adam said. "And I wouldn't have climbed in this way except that I didn't know any other way to get here."
"You bribed one of the guards, I take it?"
"I did, yes, sir. But not the way you think. I took a look at the man who paces before the side door and underneath this window, and it struck me that he was likely to prove honest."
"Eh?"
"Some folks are, you know, sir."
"But you said you bribed him?"
"Yes, sir. I got up close to him this afternoon and whispered that I wanted very much to speak to the admiral for a few minutes and I'd be back tonight at nine. I whispered that here was a yellow boy for him, a gold guinea, provided he'd look the other way while I slipped in through the side door and upstairs."
"And he took it?"
"He wasn't going to. He was going to arrest me. But then he fell to figuring just the way I'd figured he would figure. He figured that as matters stood it would be his word against mine, and in that case, too— if he turned me in, that is—he'd have to give up the yellow boy. But if he could nap me when I tried to sneak up those stairs at nine o'clock, if he could catch me red-handed—d'ye see, sir?—"
"Isee. Goon."
"—then he'd not only be able to keep his coin but he'd get credit for being vigilant and so-forth."
"Yes."
"So he did this. And I guess right now he's down there watching that side door like a chicken hawk. I couldn't have climbed up here if he hadn't been."
Adam looked out of the window, smiling a little. The guard indeed was waiting behind a bush, watching the door, his back to the vine that climbed up past this window.
"And so what do you want?" rasped Vice Admiral Benbow.
Adam crossed quietly to him, and sat at the foot of the bed.
"To talk to you, sir. I have a proposition to make."
"If it's from those captains—"
"It's not from those captains," Adam cried.
Benbow blinked.
"You'll mind your manners, young man. Remember—I could just raise my voice and you'd be shot."
"You could. And I would be. Yes."
They looked at one another.
"Well, are you going to do it?" asked Adam.
The tiniest of all possible smiles touched the corners of the admiral's mouth. It was as though some movement of a glacier had opened a crack through which sunlight now peered hesitantly, half afraid.
"Well, I'll hear what you have to say for yourself first anyway."
"Thank you, sir. I'm sure you'll be interested. What I propose to do is clear out that whole colony of pirates on Providence."
"You—and how many thousand men and how many ships?"
"I'm going to do it alone, sir."
Benbow sighed. 236
"I might have known you was mad. This whole island's packed with madmen, but I don't know why they can't leave me alone."
He reached for a bellpull.
"Please don't do that, sir!"
Benbow paused. Adam swallowed. The scene was quiet enough—the tropic night, a high-ceiled room, the little old man in bed, a smell of medicine. From the harbor came the clean sweet sound of bells striking three times—half past nine. Oh, as peaceful as all-get-out! Yet if the little old man yanked that cord the motion would end Adam Long's life. Those around Admiral Benbow adored him. Adam knew this. Why, even that whining wizened little Willis Beach, who hated and feared everything else about the Royal Navy, never had anything but praise for John Benbow. The marines, upstairs and down, guarded their master jealously. If they found a stranger in this bedroom—well, it wouldn't need a command. Adam would be bayoneted instantly.
"Give me a chance to say what I came for. After all, I do know something about Providence. I lived there for a month."
"Oho, you're a God-damn' pirate yourself, I take it?"
"I'm not a pirate, no, and I never was. I don't like pirates. They—they stink."
"Lots of men of the sea," pointed out John Benbow, "stink."
"Pirates stink in a peculiar way. Let me tell you about it, sir."
Benbow took his hand away from the bellpull.
"Oh, go ahead. Might as well listen. Can't sleep anyway."
Before Adam had a chance to start, however, there was a knock on the door. He sank to the floor on the far side of the bed.
"Come in," the admiral called.
It was the sergeant of the guard with the marine Adam had bribed. The marine told his story, though he made no mention of money. He'd got to thinking it over, he said, and he decided he ought to tell his sergeant.
"Should've done that in the first place."
"Yes, sir. But I thought I'd catch 'im in the act."
"He didn't give you any money?"
"Oh, no, sir!"
"And you say he was a very desperate-looking character?"
"Werry, sir! Scare you just to see 'im."
"Well, you did wrong. But no matter—now. So long as I've escaped. No punishment, sergeant."
"Very good, sir."
"That'll be all now. Thank you."
"Thank you, sir!"
A moment later Benbow said: "All right, come out again, desperate character. I want to learn how you propose to knock out a whole colony of cutthroats single-handed."
Adam nodded in a matter-of-fact way, and sat again on the foot of the bed, and told the admiral about Providence. He made no mention of Maisie, but he did describe the camp in details—its leaders, the pass, the bay, fort, beach, marketplace, warehouse.
"You really do know the place!"
"You couldn't get in there, sir. You could stand off and blast it to bits, yes, but you'd have to knock out that fort before you could put a landing party ashore anywhere near the bay, even in good weather. That would take time. And men. And gunpowder."
Benbow nodded.
"What's more," he said, "I can't spare even a fifth-rater. Need 'em for convoy duty. The merchants of this damn' place are yipping loud enough as it is—not to mention the Lords of Trade back home."
"And even if you did flatten the camp that way, and set fire to it, sir, the Providencers'd simply retreat to the other side of the island. And when you'd gone away they'd come back. They could build that camp up again inside of a week. It's nothing but old boards and tarpaulin. Loot their warehouse and that'd hurt 'em, but in the long haul it'd only make 'em all the more eager to go out and snatch cargoes."
"Aye, they'll pounce on anything that's not convoyed. And we can't keep far away from 'em on the run home, the way the winds are."
"This man van Bramm," Adam went on, "is no fool. But he's greedy. They put on a lot of talk about being brethren and all sharing alike and so-forth, but as a matter of truth it's every man for himself."
"I am not amazed to hear it."
"Van Bramm's ambitious. He wants more than his share. Naturally he's got enemies."
"Naturally."
"I reckon he's got more enemies than friends. It happens that I got acquainted with a good many of them, for the simple reason that they made me into a kind of hero there for a while, as I told you. What it came to, sir: they wanted me to lead a revolt against van Bramm."
"They ask you to do that?"
"Not in so many words. But they would have—if I'd given 'em half a chance. Thev're still sore, those same men. All they want is a shove, and in no time at all you'd have a civil war on Providence."
"Now see here, young man, it strikes me you're almighty glib about this. What if you do get 'em all shooting at one another—what then? Whichever side won, they'd still be on Providence. You couldn't expect 238
to divide those pirates so evenly that they'd all kill one another off down to the last man."
"I wasn't thinking of the pirates at all, sir."
"Eh? But you just said—"
"I said I had a plan for cleaning out the colony. And I have. But I don't mean by making it too hot for the pirates. Nothing's too
hot for them. They're salamanders. They can stand anything. They have to— they don't dare go back to civilization. No, it's not them I mean. It's the traders that sponge off of them."
"ULGoon."
"Because the camp couldn't be run without those traders, sir. You think of it like a saihng man, just as I did—at first. But if you'll think of it the way a merchant would—"
"I'll never think of anything the way a merchant does," coldly.
"Well then, think of it the way a pirate would. A pirate can't eat the stuff he steals. He's got to sell it. You can't make a supper out of silks from Samarkand. You can't slaughter a sapphire necklace and cut it up like as if it was a cow, and roast it."
"I begin to see your point. Captain."
"Take away a pirate's receivers, and what is he? And those merchants ain't going to stand around and get sabered. They don't like fighting. They'll scamper right back here."
"Where you wouldn't know 'em from any other bloody merchants!"
"That could be true, sir. But they don't have a price on their heads. They'd get out of Providence as fast as they could—and what's more, they'd stay out. And the pirates'd have to find some new source of supplies. And that wouldn't be easy to do, these days."
There was a considerable silence in the room. Poked by a vagrant breeze the curtains at the window lifted a little, then fell back, limp. A sentry could be heard pacing below.
"Let's get this matter straight, young Yankee. You say you're going to do this whole thing yourself." He leaned forward. "How?"
Unabashed, Adam crossed his legs; he took a knee in his hands.
"There's an ordinary called Walter's, on the waterfront over in Kingston. It's their headquarters." He looked at the admiral. "I don't know whether you knew that, sir?"
Benbow grunted.
"I didn't. Go on."
"It's a respectable place, to look at. But you can always get messages through to Providence from there. No, don't raid it! You wouldn't learn anything, and they'd only shift to another place."
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