by Jenny Barden
‘No.’ She leaned back on her heels. Will needed to know what Bastidas had told her. ‘He believes that the “English corsairs” have sailed away. He said you tried to ambush a mule train on the Royal Road. Then you attacked a town. You killed a friar . . .’
Will gave a nod.
‘So he hurts you. And that is just?’
She huddled against him, and he stroked her hair.
‘The friars were with soldiers who fired after we gave warning. We had no choice.’
Was that right? She no longer knew. She turned her head against his shirt.
‘Take me away from here.’
His reply was a kiss, on her head, then her brow, her temple and her cheek, one kiss after another, slow and then quick.
‘I will never leave you and never forsake you. I’ll never again let you go.’
He kissed her next as he had kissed her at first, when, over two years before, on an autumn night in Plymouth, she had leaned from a window to find him waiting in the cold, and slipped into his arms as she now fell into his embrace. The touch of his lips carried her with him without drawing away, taking her on and on, until at last she opened her eyes.
She saw the hollows that made his face look gaunt, scratches and bruises.
‘But what of you?’ she asked. ‘Where is Captain Drake?’
‘Gone west to find gold if he can. He wants a ship full of booty; more than that, he still wants a silver train. He’s determined on another raid.’ Will smiled and ran his fingers through his thick fair hair, and even that appeared changed to her, darker and rougher. ‘Ox has gone the other way to try and find provisions. Whatever happens we’ll be leaving soon. I had to get you back. There are a few of us left at Slaughter Island . . .’
‘Slaughter Island? What name is that?’
She watched a crease deepen between his brows, one that she had not noticed in his face before.
He looked aside.
‘Many have died. The Captain has lost his two brothers.’ His expression hardened as he went on. ‘We have gained few riches to draw the sting from that.’
She took hold of his bandaged hand, beginning to imagine what he must have been through.
‘You are hurt, too.’
‘A little cut that will soon heal.’ He spoke lightly and grinned when she pressed his hand to her face.
She kissed the bandage with care.
‘Let this help it.’
‘Now it is better.’
Delicately she probed the stiffened strips of frayed cloth, aware that whatever was beneath was almost black with dried blood. The wound must have been deep. It looked like the cut of a sword.
‘You will have a scar.’
He kissed her again.
‘And that will please me because it will remind me of this night.’
She met his gaze.
‘Then I hope it never fades.’
‘It will not.’ He smiled wryly, pressing his bandaged hand against her cheek. ‘It will be a lasting mark, like my brother’s.’
She frowned, wondering whether he expected her to know what he meant.
‘Kit has a scar on his palm like a sickle moon,’ he explained, ‘burned by a horseshoe in the smithy. A lucky mark, so our father said, though it did not protect him from the Spaniards.’
Turning her head, she let the bandage brush her lips. Will must have loved his brother deeply. He was talking about him again. Kit had a scar like a sickle moon. The words jarred in her thoughts. She looked up and away, staring at the little shell on a barrel top: the one in which Will’s message had been delivered, brought to her by the giant who had told her about the ‘Englishman of the Moon’. Who was he?
‘Kit . . .’ She breathed the name. Could the man be Kit? She clutched at Will’s arms, on the point of spilling out her suspicions. But what if she was wrong?
‘He might . . .’ she began.
What if she told him? Will would seek Kit out, of course, and Drake was preparing to leave having lost many of his men. What if Kit could not be found? It could finish far worse; Will might die in the attempt.
‘He could . . . still live,’ she said haltingly.
Will pressed her against him.
‘I cannot believe he does not.’
She hugged him, and shivered.
‘And I never believed you would not come back.’
For a moment they clung to one another, but then he released her.
‘We must finish here.’ He turned to the chest. ‘Shall I close this?’
In a daze she looked round. Heaps of possessions remained strewn about, and most were things she had once thought precious: bolts of kersey cloth and her pen and ink, a hat Marco had woven for her, but at a stroke they were all unimportant.
‘Yes . . . no.’ She picked up the shell. ‘Put this inside.’
The rest could be left. Then her eyes alighted on her old worn shoes: the pair that had been Thom’s, that she had worn when she had played the boy – though playing was all it ever could have been. She had kept them for use like clogs in the fields. She picked them up as Marco came back. She held the shoes out.
‘Here, Marco. I want you to have these.’
His face brightened, and his gratitude showed in the flash of his smile, but that soon faded as he turned his head, first to the chest and Will standing beside it, then towards all that was left in disarray about the house. When he looked at her again his brown eyes widened.
‘You are going without me.’
She went up to him and held him.
‘I have to. Stay here and go back with Friar Luis. When the soldiers come tomorrow, tell them—’ She felt his slight frame stiffen and sought the words to prepare him best ‘—that I have left with some cimarrones,’ she said, struggling to keep her voice steady. ‘You do not know where.’
Sounds of banging and shuffling made them both glance round, to see two Cimaroons in the process of lugging out her chest. They were the same men whom Marco had threatened earlier.
‘You must say I have left with the cimarrones,’ she repeated.
Marco hung his head.
‘This will be true.’
She bent and put her love into a kiss, whispering intently, making an earnest request, one only he could hear, knowing that this would be the last thing she ever asked him to do.
‘Wait for the fishermen, the ones who brought me the shell. When they come, tell them this . . .’ She gave him her message: news for the ‘Englishman of the Moon’, and if that man was Kit, then she prayed he would heed it.
Marco nodded and she held him, unable to bring herself to let him go until Will gripped her shoulder and the boy’s as well.
‘Come now.’
Will led her away towards the sea, past a group of goats, just visible in the moonlight, busily feasting on bananas by the beach.
19
Alliance
‘. . . As the pack-trains engaged in the overland traffic of this realm were proceeding under guard . . . from this city to that of Nombre de Dios, with gold and silver belonging to Your Majesty and to private persons, to be laden on board ships of the fleet, when they had arrived about a league and a half from that city, there came forth . . . a certain number of English, French and cimarrones, who are negroes who have run away from their masters, and advertise that they have allied and confederated themselves with the English and French to destroy this realm, a thing not until this year ever seen or imagined . . .’
—From the report of the Royal Officials of Panamá to King Philip II of Spain dated 9th May 1573
WILL CLASPED THE little bells in his fist. He did not want them jingling as he brushed by to enter the hut. He could see Ellyn was asleep. So he edged inside; then he settled on a chest from where he could watch her quietly. She sat with her head down, neck arched and turned to one side, eyes closed, lips parted. He took off his cap. He would share a moment with her, and the Cimaroon outside would make sure they were not disturbed. The fort was noisy but, in the plac
e that gave her some privacy, a sense of calm made the hubbub seem less. She had only been on Slaughter Island a few days, and in that time she had hardly relaxed. He was glad to see her resting. Whatever trauma she had been through, rest would help in healing. He was content just to be near her; he would never tire of that.
The pleasure he took in being with her was like waking up in summertime in England, beneath a bright, cloudless sky. She was a landscape entire. Her body was curved like the coombes and there was promise in her folds. He thought of soft paths through meadow grass leading to field-strips of barley. He looked at her lips, red as poppy petals: lips he had kissed and would kiss again. Merely the imagining was enough to stir him. She was the heartache of home – yearning and joy all rolled into one.
He gazed at her face. No other woman could be as lovely. His blessing was to be with her as she was at that moment, in a time that was his, without sense of its passing. Asleep, her face moved. Her eyelids quivered and her lips curled slightly. She gave a little shudder and took a quick breath. He wondered where she was in her dreams; whatever the place, he would have liked to have joined her. She frowned, rolling her head, and he reached out to calm her. Suddenly she was awake, eyes open and fixed on him.
‘Will! What are you doing here?’
‘Considering you.’ He smiled. ‘Thinking how fair you are.’
‘Flattery will not excuse you. I prefer to invite people into my house.’ She frowned, plainly flustered, and brushed back her hair. ‘What did you see?’
‘You were asleep.’
‘I was pondering.’
‘You were pondering with your mouth open just so.’ He made a little ‘O’ with his lips as if he was blowing a bubble, but he had only mimicked her for an instant before she slapped her hand over his mouth.
‘Will Doonan, you are a heartless, mocking jackanapes. How could you think me fair if I was pouting like a fish?’
He pulled her hand away and kissed it.
‘As easily as I think you fair when in truth you are dark.’
‘So I am not fair?’
At that he reached for her and pulled her to him on his lap.
‘No, not fair at all; so unfair that I expect no justice. You wrong me, sweet maiden.’
‘I wrong you!’
‘Yes,’ he said, kissing her, ‘you do.’ He did not try to put his feelings into words; he doubted that he could, and he feared that if he did then she would only pick whatever he said to pieces. He simply kissed her again.
His reward was her laughter, and her arms around his.
Ellyn took up a shoe and traced the outline of a blood-smeared hole, imagining the agony of each step without protection where the skin was broken. ‘Your work could make the difference between life and death, Mistress Ellyn,’ so Drake had said. But why did the mariners need shoes now? She could guess the answer from what Will had told her. On the long march inland, the one that had led to the failed attack, the men had returned so footsore and weary that many had to be carried on the backs of the Cimaroons, so Will had told her. Handling their shoes gave her more understanding. She assumed Drake was planning another trek. Why else would he want shoes repairing? And in a way that pleased her, because of the message she had left with Marco; she had always supposed Drake would venture inland again – Will had said Drake still wanted a silver train. But she was also fearful.
On Slaughter Island there were few able men left. She looked up at empty shelters inside the walls of the fort, and then at her own tiny hut: the one that the Cimaroons had made for her in the week since her arrival. She scanned the trampled sand where hog bones and corn husks attracted flies in small clouds. She knew where the men would be: aboard the frigate that John Oxenham had seized, fitting her out as a man o’war, moving the ordnance from the rotting Pascoe where the Spaniards from the captured ships were now held as prisoners. With the bounty from Oxenham’s prize, she had seen how the mood had changed. Drake’s men had been restored, their bellies filled, fortified by wine and roused afresh by fighting talk. They were clamouring again for vengeance, and now Drake was plotting another strike. The sudden arrival of French corsairs had emboldened him even more; they had forged an alliance. But where did that leave her? She was labouring like a cobbler without really knowing what to do, cutting soles from a leather bucket since there was nothing else to use. She was trying her best, despite the pain in her hand from piercing holes with an awl, and the pricks of the curved needle, and the cuts of the waxed thread. But she would much rather have been helping to prepare for a voyage back to England.
The French alarmed her. They were Huguenot freebooters who outnumbered Drake’s men, with a much larger ship that was far better armed. Where would a pact with them lead? Drake had only thirty men left, and a good number of those were unfit to fight. She had seen men too weak to stand, wasted by fever and with terrible wounds. Men had died on every one of Drake’s raids, and no doubt more would die on the next. Where would it end? With her fingers inside a shoe she felt the mould of a man’s toes – someone who might be alive, or could be dead, and she had no idea who would wear the shoe next. The shoe could be for Will. She glanced up again and wondered where he was.
Only one man was near: a burly Cimaroon picking at fishing lines and hooks. It had not escaped her attention that while Will was hardly with her, the Cimaroons were never far from sight. At night at least one of them would be stationed somewhere outside her hut. She smiled at the man and looked back at her work. It was as if she had been assigned a constant guard. But did she need one? ‘I will never leave you,’ Will had said. But of course he would; he would be leaving on Drake’s trek. ‘I will never forsake you,’ he had promised. She wanted to believe him, but what did that mean? They were not betrothed. He had not asked her to marry him, or involved her in his plans, or even said that he loved her. She shook her head and jabbed with the awl.
Will’s conduct could be explained; she tried to calm herself with reason. To preserve the general harmony it was better to behave as if nothing lay between them. If Will kept his distance, and she did not openly favour anyone, then no one could be put out: she would be no object of envy, and cause no resentment – there would be no rivalry when the men were preparing for another venture. Will would have other matters to think about and better things to do. Or was that just an excuse: an explanation she had devised to spare herself the truth? She struggled to push the spike deeper. Then the crunch of footsteps made her start. Her hand jerked back and the spike slipped out. She yelped with pain and sucked her thumb quickly; it was badly pricked, and she had seen Will approaching.
‘What have you done?’ Will stooped to her with knotted brows. His eyes flickered as he studied her face. ‘Let me see.’
‘Oh, nothing,’ she said, though her thumb was throbbing, and the slip had upset her. ‘I was careless.’
Will eyed the pile of roughly mended shoes.
‘You have been working hard. But come with me now. The French captain has asked for you.’
She stood, brushing down her skirts with her uninjured hand.
‘For what reason? Does he also have shoes in need of repair?’
Will took her arm and kissed her hurt thumb gently, smiling as he straightened.
‘Not Le Testu. I believe he has shoes fit for a royal audience. He is a distinguished navigator who has impressed our own Captain with his skill in drawing maps.’ Will told her more as he guided her through the gate. ‘He has made a fine cosmography of the world based on his voyages to Africa and the Americas.’
In brilliant sunshine Will led her to a little boat, and the effect of his company was like balm over everything; she felt instantly soothed.
‘Get in, and I will row you over,’ he said. ‘There is a meeting in Drake’s cabin.’
She smiled at him happily, unsure how she could be of any use though her uncertainties paled.
‘What is the meeting about?’ she asked, after settling herself in the stern and watching him take up th
e oars.
Will sculled the boat away, glancing over his shoulder at the two ships in the roadstead, before settling into a rhythm, pulling hard with each stroke. But while his body moved, he kept his eyes upon her.
‘Le Testu was a confidant of the Admiral of France,’ he said at last. ‘But the Admiral is dead. There was a massacre in France on St Bartholomew’s Day last year. Le Testu has told us. Most of the Huguenot leaders were murdered. Thousands of Protestants have been killed.’
‘But why?’ She blurted out the question, shocked by the news, and still none the wiser as to why Le Testu had asked to see her.
Will continued to row steadily, bringing his face closer, and then pulling back, so that she found herself fixing on each detail of his strong features: the line of his stubbled chin, and the pale creases by his deep-set eyes, with an intensity compounded by his constantly shifting. Coming towards her again, he spoke.
‘The Catholics feared them. Catherine de Medici turned her son, the king, against them.’ Will heaved on the oars. ‘The wars in France grow worse. And now you know why Le Testu is here.’ He leaned forward again. ‘He wants to join us in striking at Spain.’
‘For the Protestant cause?’
Will eyed her and grinned.
‘For freedom.’
Freedom. She thought of what that meant as she looked at the ships: the captured frigate and the French ship newly arrived. The activity all around gradually became clearer as they neared. Men were on the ratlines, and balanced on ropes under the spars, working on the rigging, winching up barrels and crates. They were scaling rope ladders, carrying up weapons and provisions. She noticed the gun ports cut in the sides of the smaller frigate, the little boats nearby and the pinnace roped alongside. She was free: free from Bastidas and the island and everything that had once constrained her. If she was asked to do anything for freedom, then she would.
‘How can I help?’ she asked.
‘Le Testu wants to know what you have seen of the silver trains.’ Apprehension unsettled her, and she wanted to prepare. Her recollection of the mule trains was hazy, and she supposed the questioning would be severe. If she could picture Le Testu, she might anticipate what she faced. She had already conjured up an image of him as a vigorous swashbuckler, dark and lithe.