Pirates of the Caribbean: The Price of Freedom

by A. C. Crispin

  Ian Mercer’s eyes widened slightly. “Aye, Mr. Beckett,” he said, nodding for emphasis. “I wouldn’t dream of saying any such thing.”

  “I trust not.” Beckett folded his hands together on his deck. “Please, go on, Mr. Mercer.”

  “Yes, Mr. Beckett. I was about to say that the first thing I’ll need to do is have a talk with our man, Newton. Did you receive any letters from him?”

  “None yet, but you know it might take another two months or more. Yes, I believe you should indeed have a long talk with Mr. Newton. And then I’ll want to begin interviewing Captain Sparrow’s crew. I feel sure that he is lying about something, and, thus, there are bound to be discrepancies between what he’s told us and what his crewmen say. I’ll want to start as soon as possible.”

  “Where shall I send them for these interviews, Mr. Beckett?”

  Beckett considered for a moment. “Since some of the subjects we’ll need to cover might be…sensitive…in nature, I’ll use the library, Mercer. You can bring them up from the docks by twos and threes, and the ones not being interviewed can wait in the EITC office next door.”

  “Yes, Mr. Beckett. I’ll go down there immediately.”

  “I’m eager to get to the bottom of this, Mr. Mercer. I’ll start with Greene and Connery, the mates. After that, we’ll take the helmsmen, and then go on from there, working though a representative sample of the able seamen, then the ordinary seamen.”

  “Very good, Mr. Beckett. I shall arrange it.”

  * * *

  Cutler Beckett nodded pleasantly at Frank Connery, but did not smile. “Good afternoon, Mr. Connery. Please, take a seat.”

  “Yes sir, Mr. Beckett.” The big, grizzled second mate perched uneasily on the indicated chair.

  “Mr. Connery, I’d like you to tell me the story of your most recent voyage under Captain Sparrow, please.” Beckett dipped his quill in ink, and regarded the man expectantly.

  Connery eyed the pen and parchment uneasily. “Am I in some sort of trouble, Mr. Beckett?”

  “You? No, no. Nothing like that, Mr. Connery. I simply need to do a bit of fact-checking. There are some things about your most recent voyage that don’t seem to add up, so to speak.”

  Connery nodded, and began giving his account. He seemed to be articulate enough. He’d obviously had some education. Loquacious, however, he was not. He finished his account in less than five minutes.

  “I see, Mr. Connery,” Beckett said. “Tell me more about this attack by pirates. Did it seem in any manner atypical of pirate attacks you might have experienced or heard accounts of ?”

  Connery nodded. “Mr. Beckett, the pirate was one of those rogues. Flew a red flag with a horned demon on it. Didn’t seem to care about taking our cargo. Just seemed to want to sink us.”

  “I see. Did Captain Sparrow try to evade them? Did he fight back?”

  “He did, sir. Northwest Providence Channel can be treacherous. The Bahamas have a lot of shoal waters around those islands. The captain, he out-sailed ’em—ran ’em aground. But then we run aground, too.”

  “I see.” Beckett took notes.

  Connery shook his head. “Pure bad luck, it was, Mr. Beckett. Reckon it was the Good Lord saved us. Or maybe it was that Ayisha woman. Some said as how she put a curse on the pirate, and blew up his powder magazine.”

  Beckett scribbled. “I see, thank you. What did you think of Captain Sparrow’s judgment and seamanship in how he dealt with the pirate vessel?”

  “He did what I would have done, Mr. Beckett, ’cept he knew those waters better than I do. So he did it better. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be here talking to you today.”

  Beckett looked up. “Now…about the fact that apparently a different pirate vessel turned up and saved you. What can you tell me about that?”

  Connery shrugged. “The pirate captain was a woman, sir. Seemed she’d met Captain Sparrow before. She sent her men in, to help us with our repairs. And her surgeon to help with our wounded.”

  “What did she look like, this female captain?”

  Connery cleared his throat. “She was…pretty…sir.”

  “Regarding your vessel, Mr. Connery. Was it in serious danger of sinking?”

  “Yes, sir. As long as we worked the pumps, she was holding her own. But the men were weary, and almost everyone had gotten hurt a bit. Seven seriously wounded. Three dead. Doubt our remaining men would have been able to keep us afloat, Mr. Beckett. Boats were smashed. Bad situation.”

  “I see.” Beckett wrote another note. “So, under the circumstances, you agreed with Captain Sparrow’s decision to accept the assistance of a pirate vessel?”

  “Did what I would have done, Mr. Beckett. Captain Sparrow…he’d never have let the Wench go down, if he had to hold her up with his own hands.”

  “Very well. Thank you, Mr. Connery, I think that will be all.”

  “Good day to you, Mr. Beckett.”

  Cutler Beckett dipped his quill into the inkwell. “Thank you for your report, Mr. Prescott. I have just a few more questions for you.”

  Prescott looked apprehensive, but nodded.

  “Now, then…I’d like you to explain in more detail just what it was like when you went into this…fogbank, you called it.”

  Beckett watched the man’s face. Prescott shivered at the memory. “Mr. Beckett, when we all woke up from being asleep on the deck, we looked for that Obeah woman, and her brother, and the big fella. None of ’em was to be found. Our mate Chamba, he was gone, too. So was a longboat. The captain, he said that you had ordered him to go to this island and get a look at it with his own eyes, so we’d have to go into the fogbank. None of us liked that idea much, but orders is orders, sir. We sailed in.”

  “What was it like?”

  “Terrible, sir. It was like it was a cursed place, or something. You couldn’t scarcely tell up from down. Everything was gray. In the grayness, you could see things…out of the corner of your eye, you know? Misshapen things, monstrous…” Prescott swallowed, then shook his head. “And we all heard…things…”

  “What did you hear, Mr. Prescott?”

  The man looked down at his big, work-roughened hands, twisted together on the top of the table in the library. “Please don’t laugh, Mr. Beckett, but I could have swore I heard my sainted mother crying out to me, to go back. Like she was warning me. Been dead for twenty year, she’s been.”

  “You turned back quickly, after entering the fogbank?”

  “Yes, sir. And, begging your pardon, sir, thank God for it. Otherwise I don’t think we’d have gotten out.”

  “If you hadn’t turned back, what do you think would have happened to the ship?”

  Prescott shook his head. “I think we’d have been lost in there, past all getting out. We’d have all gone mad. And then we’d have died, Mr. Beckett.”

  Beckett’s quill scratched on the parchment. “I see. Thank you, Mr. Prescott. That will be all.”

  Cutler Beckett regarded Lucius Featherstone quizzically. “You say you saw Captain Sparrow fight a sword duel with a what?”

  “A ghost sir. A revenant, that’s what they calls ’em. Came out of that haunted fogbank. Must have, sir. That fogbank, it was haunted right enough. My friend, Etienne de Ver, he said that there’s an old fortress near where he grew up in France that was haunted. He said that he—”

  “Mr. Featherstone, I asked you about this apparition that came aboard that same night. Can you please describe it, and then tell me you why you believe it was not simply a man?”

  Featherstone rubbed his grizzled chin thoughtfully. “It looked like a man, sure enough. Tallish, wearin’ fancy clothes. One of them lace-trimmed shirts. Big hat, with a plume.”

  Beckett nodded. “Excuse me a moment.” He rose and went into his office, then returned with two items. “Do you recognize these, Mr. Featherstone?”

  “Yes I do, Mr. Beckett! That’s the coat and hat the revenant was wearing!”

  Beckett made a note. “So why are you
sure it was a…revenant?”

  “Well, hadn’t we been in a fogbank that was full of spirits just that day, sir? And how could any flesh and blood man get hundreds of miles off the coast of Africa in a dinghy? Doesn’t make sense, sir.”

  “There is that,” Beckett admitted. “You say you heard Captain Sparrow speak to the, um, revenant. What did they say?”

  “The cap’n, he told it to leave his ship or he’d be killing it. The ghost, he didn’t pay no mind. Next thing I know, the two of them are fighting, all over the weather deck. It was a scary sight, in the moonlight.” Featherstone shook his head, admiringly. “That revenant was a bloody good fencer, Mr. Beckett. For a while there, I thought the captain would lose.” Then the man realized what he’d said, and colored. “Oh, I’m sorry, sir! Pardon my language, sir. I shouldn’t have expressed myself so…vulgar.”

  Cutler Beckett waved his concern away. “Quite all right, Featherstone. I’ve been exposed to sailors for years. So afterward, Captain Sparrow ordered you and Mr. de Ver to clean up the blood from the, um…the loser, is that correct?”

  “Yes, Mr. Beckett.”

  “Did it seem like real blood?” Beckett couldn’t conceal the faint edge of sarcasm in his voice, but he needn’t have worried; Featherstone was oblivious.

  “Smelled like it, yes, sir. It was dark, though.”

  “So it is possible your night visitor was, in fact, a man, not a ghost?”

  Featherstone shook his head. “I don’t think so, Mr. Beckett. ’Tis well known that ghosts and spirits of the damned can menace honest mariners, trying to steal their souls. If Captain Sparrow hadn’t courageously fought that revenant, it would have taken over the ship, and we’d all have never been seen by mortal eyes no more. But Captain Sparrow, he’d do anything to save his ship from such a fate.”

  “Um…I see.” Beckett made a note. “Thank you, Featherstone. That will be all.”

  “Yes, Mr. Beckett.”

  Cutler Beckett regarded Jack Sparrow, who was once more standing before him. He didn’t offer him a seat this time, either. “Captain Sparrow, I’ve reviewed your logbook, and related paperwork. And I’ve spoken to some members of your crew.”

  “Yes, Mr. Beckett.”

  “I have a few questions for you.”

  “Yes, Mr. Beckett.”

  “How well did you get to know Ayisha before she…departed?”

  Sparrow looked startled. “I—what do you mean, Mr. Beckett?”

  “Did she learn enough English on the voyage that you could speak to her directly? Some of your men said she mended their clothes for them. They said when she saw them on deck, she would say good morning. And when they thanked her for mending their clothing, they believed she understood them.”

  “Oh, I see what you meant, sir. She did start speaking some English, yes, but mostly things like ‘good day’ and ‘thank you,’ and suchlike. When she wanted to tell me anything requiring real information, she spoke pidgin to my crewman, Chamba.”

  “The ex-slave that disappeared with her.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Beckett steepled his fingers. “Obviously she was not a half-wit,” he mused aloud.

  “No, Mr. Beckett,” Sparrow said. “Far from it. I believe, now, that she had the whole thing planned out from the beginning.” He sighed. “She fooled me, just as much as she fooled you and Mr. Mercer.”

  “By the way, Captain Sparrow, whatever happened to those earrings?”

  Sparrow shook his head, obviously chagrined. “I gave them to her, Mr. Beckett, shame on me for being fooled. That’s the first time I ever gave a woman jewelry, sir, and I assure you, it will be the last.”

  “I see.” Beckett looked back down at his notes. “Captain Sparrow, why didn’t you mention the incident that happened the night following the Zerzurans’ disappearance? Apparently you had a visitor, though the accounts differ regarding…him.”

  Sparrow cleared his throat. “Um…they do?”

  “Yes. Or perhaps I should say, concerning it. Not many of your crew were present that night, apparently, but those that were seemed to think that some kind of…” Beckett waved derisively, “…ghost…or something…came aboard, and that you fought a sword duel with it. Him. One man insisted it was a Frenchman. The others insisted it was a ghost who took on the guise of a Frenchman. And apparently the intruder wore these clothes.” Beckett reached into his drawer and removed a somewhat squashed hat with a plume, and an elegant satin gentleman’s coat. “Why didn’t you mention this encounter?”

  Sparrow sighed. “I’m sorry, Mr. Beckett. I didn’t say anything about it because I was…ashamed. Sir.”

  Beckett blinked. “Ashamed? Of what, pray tell?”

  “Well, Mr. Beckett, you’ve always been so square with me, treating me like a…professional, I suppose you’d say. Another man of business, not like an ignorant, superstitious sailor. It’s meant a lot to me this past year, Mr. Beckett, to have you treat me like I was…almost…sort of…equal to an educated gentleman like yourself, sir. So I didn’t want to admit that…” He shrugged, spreading his hands, palm up.

  “Admit what?”

  “It was a ghost, Mr. Beckett. A revenant, we call ’em. Ghostly visitations do happen, sir, on the sea. Strange things, things that can’t be explained.”

  Beckett folded his hands on the ebony deck. “Go on, Captain Sparrow, by all means. I want to hear the full story.”

  “Sir, ’twas the ghost of me old fencing master from Marseilles. He died angry at me, sir, some years ago, and he’s been haunting me.”

  Beckett nodded slowly. “Angry, you say. Why?” I could sympathize with the poor specter, he thought, sardonically, if I believed any of this for one moment.

  “Well, Mr. Beckett, I didn’t pay his bill. I meant to, sir, honestly I did, but I was temporarily…embarrassed…as to funds, so to speak. And me ship was leaving with the tide. So I left him a note, all signed proper, sir, and sailed away, resolving to come back to Marseilles as soon as possible, to settle me debt.”

  “I’m sure you had the best of intentions,” Beckett murmured. “Do continue, Jack.”

  “I did have, Mr. Beckett! And I did go back, as soon as ever I could. But when I returned, I discovered that the poor chap had died. Terrible thing, it was.” Sparrow shuddered expressively. “Seems he was walking down by the docks one evening, and a doxy stabbed him and took his purse. Only he didn’t die immediately, you see. He went off his head, and died the next day, and somehow he’d gotten me and this…lady of the evening…mixed up in his head. So he thought I was the one what did him in. When I went back to settle me debt, they told me he died cursing me name.”

  “And he’s been haunting you?”

  “I’d see him in me dreams, Mr. Beckett, demanding his money, and holding out his bloody hands to me, saying, ‘Jack, why did you murder me?’ It was terrible, sir. I’d wake up in a cold sweat. So when we went into that fogbank, Mr. Beckett, that’s who I saw. Me old fencing master. I think he followed us out of that fogbank. And then attacked me that very night.”

  “I see. This is a truly…remarkable…account, Captain Sparrow. I didn’t know it was even possible to kill a ghost. Or a ‘revenant,’ as you term them. I mean, they’re already dead, aren’t they? Doesn’t dispatching one require a…what’s the word…an exorcism?” Cutler Beckett cocked his head at Jack, inquiringly. It was fascinating, watching that fertile brain come up with such utterly inspired codswallop.

  Sparrow didn’t even pause to think. “Oh, no, Mr. Beckett. Haven’t you ever heard of the power of cold iron over eldritch things?”

  “Of course,” Beckett said. “When you put it like that, it all makes sense.”

  Sparrow nodded earnestly.

  Cutler Beckett sat back in his seat, regarding the captain, thinking. So far his investigation had yielded exactly…nothing. Samuel Newton had confirmed to Mercer that although Sparrow’s behavior had at times been secretive, all the events he’d observed tallied with Sparrow’s
account of the voyage. All the crewmen Beckett had interviewed had given accounts that agreed with Sparrow’s report.

  But you’re lying to me, Jack. You know it. I know it. And I suspect you know that I know it—but that my hands are tied, because I can’t prove it. Beckett tapped his fingers thoughtfully on his desk, wondering whether Sparrow would start to fidget, or twitch. But as the moments stretched on, Sparrow just continued to stand there, as though he could do it all ruddy day. So all of that earlier fidgeting and hat twisting you did was just a performance, Jack, to prove how nervous you felt, and how sincere you were. Bravo, you smug, arrogant blighter.

  Beckett banked down his anger. Jack Sparrow would pay for whatever he’d done, yes he would. He picked up his notes and glanced through them, all the while mulling over the best way to make sure Sparrow learned his lesson. You forget whom you’re dealing with, Jack. I’m the Director for West African Affairs for the East India Trading Company. You think I have to swallow this folderol you’ve handed me, and that we’ll just go on from there? Think again, Jack. You’re due for a good humbling, you swaggering young cockerel. And I know just how to hand you one, starting now. As a matter of fact, I can think of several ways.…

  Beckett cleared his throat. “There’s just one more thing, Captain Sparrow.”

  Sparrow looked politely attentive. “Yes, Mr. Beckett?”

  “One of the men I spoke to said that you were wounded in the sword-fight. How serious was the wound? Where was it located?”

  “Two minor wounds,” Sparrow touched a spot on his neck, then another, high on his left arm, just below the shoulder. “I’m fine now.”

  “I suppose you wouldn’t mind proving that, Captain?”

  “Proving what?”

  “That both wounds are healed, and you’re fit for your next voyage. Take off your coat, please.”

  Sparrow obediently removed his coat, then walked over and hung it up on the hat and coat stand in the corner, his expression blank. “Now your waistcoat, please.” Again, the captain complied.