Under the Jolly Roger

by L. A. Meyer

  Higgins had returned from Colchester and I had a bank draft in the amount of four thousand pounds sterling in my strongbox. I didn't bank all I had—we do have to re-victual in Waterford and the bowsprit repairs ain't gonna be cheap—and I still have my money belt with its stock of gold coins that encircles my waist every moment that I'm not in bed. That, and my emerald, of course.

  Higgins's aged father was well and was even better after his son had laid some coin of the realm on him. His visit with the Hollingsworths was joyous, with all the girls tugging at his sleeve and begging him to come back to them and stay, but Higgins said he told them that now that he was a bold sea rover, it would be quite impossible, however charming were their entreaties.

  "Quite a tale, Miss, and I enjoyed it hugely, for you are, without a doubt, without equal as a storyteller. And rest assured that I shan't abuse your trust in a literary way," says Higgins, dabbing his mouth with his napkin. "I suppose Boston and its inhabitants have by now recovered from your visit?"

  "I guess so, but Boston was burning right cheerfully as I left."

  Higgins laughs. "You, Miss, are nothing less than a modern Visigoth, lacking only a two-handed broadsword. Perhaps the next item we should purchase for you is a Viking helmet, shiny gold, for sure, and complete with fur-trimmed horns."

  "Well, I hope I'm not as bad as all that. I try to be good, but sometimes things don't seem to work in that direction."

  "One mystery, though, if you don't mind?"

  "Shoot."

  "How did you learn to speak French so well in only three-quarters of a year? I know you received some instruction when you were on the Dolphin but that could not have been much. And I know you are a quick study, but..."

  I consider this. "Well, the Boston winter was long and my friend Amy and I would have contests, dares if you like, wherein we would speak only French to each other for a certain period of time. Sometimes for hours, then for days, and once for a whole week. You learn a language fast that way."

  "Ah," says Higgins, "I see. I also see you miss your friend Amy from the way your eyes mist up when you talk of her."

  "Aye, but that's over. Like a lot of things," I say. "But now, let us be merry." I lift my glass. "Thank you for coming back to me, Higgins, and I really mean that."

  As I get undressed for bed, I wonder how they are on the Wolverine tonight—my friends, I mean, Robin and Tom and Ned and Jared and the rest of the Werewolves. I hope they are well. Yes, and Amy, too.

  When all of my clothes are over a chair, I take my emerald out of the money belt where I have made space for it. I hold it up and watch the facets glimmer in the lamplight. Beautiful ... I try to get the emerald into my belly button and, by stretching the skin around a bit, I do force it in so that it stays. I look at myself in the mirror. Well, my girl, if you ever fall out of favor with Dame Fortune again, and I'm sure you will, you can become a hoochie-coochie dancer. I mean, I do all those other dances—Irish jig, Scottish sword dance, English hornpipe—why not hoochie-coochie as well?

  I go over to the wardrobe and take my white shawl and I tie it low down on my hips like a Hindoo belly dancer might wear it and go back to the mirror. I put my palms together over my head and try out a few wiggling moves, and as I do it, I hum the tune to the song that those rascally boys back on the Dolphin used to sing when they wanted to get themselves worked up over the thought of women with no pants, and further thought that they were sounding like Indian snake charmers when they were singing it. There's a place in France where the women wear no pants. And the dance they do, it is called the hoochie-coo ... Hmmm. I puff out my belly, but that still doesn't seem to do it. Well, better stick to buccaneering, Jacky. I don't think Hindoos prize scrawniness highly in their nautch dancers.

  I read once in a newspaper that Lady Hamilton, love of the great Lord Nelson's life, started out as a hooch dancer, dancing naked behind sheer curtains, on the other side of which old men would lie in beds hoping to be cured of the ailments of old age by the dancing of young girls amid braziers smoking with aromatic herbs. Men sure are strange, no matter what the age.

  You'd think the press'd be a little nicer to Lady Hamilton, she being the consort of the Great Lord Nelson, him who's the darling of the British Fleet and the one most likely to keep Napoléon's feet off of British soil, but they ain't. They're downright mean, showing her in cartoons as a strumpet and as fat and ugly, which she once wasn't. I've got some respect for her, though. She started out no better than me and now she's Lady Hamilton, can you imagine that? Married to a Lord ... Well, not exactly married, for she ain't Nelson's wife, but she might as well be—she's got a daughter by him. Go figure.

  Well, enough of this ... I tighten my belly and out pops the emerald and on goes the nightshirt and so to bed. Tomorrow we will weigh anchor and the Emerald will head back to our home port of Waterford, on the Emerald Isle, to refit and replenish.

  Chapter 33

  Waterford is a fine, bustling port city and it bustled even more when the Emerald came in on the morning tide with her loot and her boisterous crew. We warped her in next to the pier and soon the ship swarmed with workmen repairing the bowsprit damage and loading new stores aboard. The ship swarmed also with the wives, children, and sweethearts of the crew, and a proud lot they were, those boys and men of my crew proud to be able to put money in the hands of their wives and mothers, proud to know that their children would not starve through yet another cold, miserable winter but would instead have good food in their bellies and new clothes on their backs.

  The repairs are going slower than I hoped and, of course, are costing a lot more because of it. Liam has been overseeing the work while Higgins has been watching over the money end of it—to make sure we are not swindled by those cheatin' weasels.

  Those damned cheatin' weasels, damn ... No, wait. Calm down. Take a deep breath ... I've got to put that out of my mind and let others handle it. I've got enough other stuff to think about, like noticing that Higgins doesn't go ashore any more than he has to when he's here in Waterford. In Harwich he was all over the shops looking for neat new things for the Emerald's living spaces and such. I ask him right out about that, and he says the people here are very cold to him and so it is not pleasant to go out so he doesn't. Hmmm. That steams me a bit, but Higgins doesn't seem to want to talk anymore about it so I drop it.

  But I don't drop it for good.

  "Liam, Higgins tells me the people in this port have been mean to him—look at him with narrowed eyes and such. I won't have it. There're other places we could spend our money. Is it because he's ... the way he is?"

  Liam and I are at the rail looking out at all the activity on the wharf. There're barrels being rolled and hogsheads being hoisted and crates being stacked, and there's Arthur McBride strolling by in a new suit of clothes and a girl on each arm—'tis plain that lad will not have his money for very long, but he will have some tales to tell, I'm sure, and I'm sure his mates will listen to those tales and admire him for both the doing and the telling.

  Liam takes a long drag on his pipe and says, "No, lass, that ain't it. We've got as many like him as any other people. No, it's that he's British and he is so plainly British—the way he dresses, the way he speaks, the way he carries himself, even. To the people here he looks like the very picture of an English nob."

  "So?"

  "So, about six, seven years ago there was a big uprising—it was called the Rebellion of Ninety-Eight, when the Society of United Irishmen rose up to throw off the yoke of their British oppressors. A lot of the battles were fought hereabouts, especially up around Wexford, about twenty miles north of here, up near where I lived."

  His pipe makes burbling noises and works up a great head of smoke as Liam pauses, looking out over the rooftops of the town. I know he's thinking back to those troubled times. I don't say anything, not yet. I just wait.

  "Terrible, terrible things were done. The British put down the rebellion, and they put it down ruthlessly ... without any mercy.
Thousands were killed ... tens of thousands ... there was scarcely a pike or fence post hereabouts without a severed head stuck on it for the beaten Irish to look on and admire."

  His voice has taken on a real edge. His eyes narrow, but it is not against the smoke from his pipe. Geez ... I think, how did I get from Higgins being uncomfortable to this? Liam goes on.

  "Did you ever wonder, Jacky, just what I was doing on the Dolphin, in the British Navy, as I was?" He manages a rueful smile at this.

  I figured that he was there out of poverty as I was, or that he had been pressed, as so many others were, and I tell him this.

  "Nay, Missy, it was to keep my own head from resting on a spike. I had to hide out for a bit and it seemed to me that the best place to hide from the Beast was in his very belly. And so I joined as a man-of-war's man and met up with you and here we are. Ain't life strange?"

  "It is that, Liam," I say, and I put my hand on his arm. "I am sorry for your poor friends and for your poor country."

  Liam puts his hand on mine and pats it, gently. "Now, girl, banish these thoughts from your mind. 'Twas none of it your fault. And tell Higgins it's nothing personal, just politics ... just bloody politics."

  I think on the things that Liam has told me. Many things are plain now—how the older men like John Reilly are uncomfortable in an English port like Harwich, and how the younger ones like Padraic and Ian and Arthur are always ready for a fight with the Brits. And 'tis plain now why Liam's wife, Moira, did not receive me with open arms when first I burst into their little farmhouse all those months ago. Why should she—to her I was English, and girl or not, kin to the murderers of her kin.

  Sad thoughts as these are dashed from my mind as I see a flash of red curls sticking out from under a bonnet down below on the pier.

  "Jacky!" she cries out, waving. "I've been let out!"

  "Mairead!" I call back and wave in turn. "Come on up!"

  In a moment she is dashing up the gangway and onto the deck. She sees her father and gives him a kiss on his grumpy cheek and then clasps my hand and we dive down to my cabin to plot out the afternoon. Away, dull care!

  Liam had moved his family from the farm and into the town as soon as we arrived back—and why not? He had the money and the potato crop, what there was of it, had already been brought in. Mairead and I lose no time in becoming fast friends in the short time we have been here together in Waterford—it is natural, after all, as we are of the same age and temperament, and sometimes I don't want to be the Owner of a Fine Ship or a Lieutenant in the Royal Navy or a Pirate Queen, La Belle Fille sans Merci. Sometimes I just want to be a kid, out on the town with a friend. Being out with Mairead reminds me of being out and being bad in Boston with Amy or Annie and Betsey and the other girls of the Sisterhood.

  Mairead is such a delight, too, in all her country-girl wonder at the sights of the big town, and it was great fun seeing her decked out in new clothes and eyeing the boys and seeing the boys eye her, with her sparkling green eyes and flaming red hair. And, because she is Liam's daughter, she is musical with a fine voice and can dance, if not rings about me, at least as well. She plays a mean pennywhistle, too, so we lose no time in getting an act together.

  Of course, I have Liam and his family to dinner in my cabin right off and Higgins serves up a fine feast and we have a grand time, but I don't think Moira will ever really love me—she sees me as too much of a threat to her family, and I have to admit she's right. Already I've taken off with her husband and her eldest son, and now I'm working on Mairead. Why wouldn't she view me with suspicion? When I'm thinking straight I have to admit I see her point—I am a bad influence on her Mairead. If I had my way, we'd be putting on our act in the local taverns at night, which is probably why Mairead is not allowed to stay the night with me in my cabin. Pity, I could have used the company. Liam knows me, too, and what I'm likely to do if I get my blood up, so, regrettably, I spend my nights alone.

  We have found a teahouse where we are allowed in, so we go in and are seated. Mairead sits stiffly, not knowing what to do right off, but I say just relax and they will bring us stuff to eat and drink. When they do, I say, "Put that napkin in your lap and then put your left hand in that same lap and leave it there. Pretend it doesn't work anymore, for all the good it's going to do you here. Reach for your teaspoon with your right hand and put some sugar in your cup. Stir it up. Put the teaspoon on your saucer, like this. Now take a sip. Put the cup back down and take a piece of cake. Bring it to your mouth and eat it—small bites, now. Now, another sip of tea, put the cup back down, and say, 'I say, Miss Faber, is it not the most deliiiiiiightful day?'"

  By this time we are both convulsed in giggles, but we soldier on and do not make complete fools of ourselves.

  "Jacky, I gotta say this's been the best part of my life so far and if anybody thinks I'm going back to that dirty little farm and marry that dirty little Loomis Malloy, they're sadly mistaken." She takes another cake and drops it down. She shakes her head and the red curls dance, her green eyes defiant. Mairead, like her brother Padraic, has red hair—not orange hair, not ginger hair, not carrottop hair, but red hair. I've never seen the like.

  "Come, Mairead, he can't be as bad as all that," I say, munching my own bit of cake. It's good and I have another.

  "Well, if you, Miss, are partial to lads what ain't got no foreheads or necks and whose knuckles drag on the ground as they walks, then Loomis is just the man for you! I'll set up an intro-duck-shun, like," she says. I have to clap my hand over my mouth to keep from snorting tea and cake out my nose and onto the nice tablecloth.

  "Loomis, I'd like you to meet Miss Faber. She is a lady. Miss Faber, I'd like you to meet Loomis. He is an ape."

  I manage to swallow my cake without choking.

  "His talk is all about his hogs and how the sow is about to have piglets, and then he looks at me and my belly when he says that, and I about die of the pure mortification, I do."

  "Ah, but he has some land, I hear. That's got to count for something," say I, playing the devil's, or rather, father's advocate, just for fun.

  "Land!" she snorts. "Jacky, land is nothing but dirt, and all the dirt in Ireland grows nothing but sorrow. I notice you ain't had much use for it, dirt that is, always being out on the nice clean ocean and being Captain of your own fine ship and all."

  "You wouldn't use the word 'clean,' Mairead, if you ever smelled our bilges after we've been out for a month or so ... and besides, I ain't Captain, your father is."

  "Aye, but everyone knows who's really the boss."

  "Boss ain't the same as Captain, Mairead, and you should know that." To change the subject I ask, "Surely, Mairead, Liam would not marry his beloved daughter off to someone she did not love?"

  She sniffs and looks off out the window. "Dad didn't send Loomis away, like he did the others ... like he did Arthur McBride..."

  Jesus! I think. I sure don't blame Liam for that!

  "Or..." And here her voice softens, "like he did Ian McConnaughey."

  Ah. The things you learn when you just sit and listen.

  "I am sure the real reason he took Arthur and Ian on your Emerald as crew, them being farm boys who had never been to sea before, was to keep them away from me when he was gone out on the ocean."

  "Well, let's finish up here and head out into the town, and if we meet up with Arthur and Ian and I find myself on Arthur's arm and you on Ian's, then what's the harm?" I say, tidying myself up and getting ready to get to my feet. "We have two more days before we sail, so let's make the most of it."

  Two more days, which we fill with music and song and wild romps through the town. Yes, she does meet up with Ian, and I let myself be led around by Mr. McBride for a bit, rascal though he be. He spends most of his talk on telling me what a fine fellow he is, but he is fun and good company and so we get along.

  On our last afternoon in port, Mairead and I put on a performance on the main deck—all of the men are back on board and since she and I ain't allow
ed to put on our show in one of the pubs, 'cause Moira would crucify us both, her daughter in the regular way and me upside down like poor Saint Peter, it seems the only place we can do it.

  We do the usual sad Irish songs like "The Mountain of Mourn," some comic ones like "Galway Bay," and then rip into some fast reels like "The Green Groves of Erin" and "The Merry Blacksmith," with me on the fiddle and Mairead on the whistle, and then Liam can't stand it anymore and decides not to be the grumpy dad and pulls out his concertina and plays a hornpipe and Mairead and I link arms and dance to the delight of all. Then Dennis Muldoon, of all people, takes the Lady Lenore from me and he and Liam go into my favorite "The Rocky Road to Dublin," which I had sung all alone on the shores of South America and on the road from Boston and now sing here in Ireland, and when I finish the last verse, Mairead and I stand side by side, with Padraic by me and Ian by Mairead, and we all four pound the deck of the Emerald like it's never been pounded before. Glory!

  Mairead was good as any dutiful daughter at dinner that last evening. We all had a fine feast in my cabin and she left with her mother, without complaint, when night had fallen and it was time for them to go. I think my time with Mairead has settled her down a bit and she seems reasonably content. Easy in her own skin, like, and looking to the future with more assurance. She waved to me as she left and I waved back. It will be all right, Mairead, you'll see.

  Then we put away the charms of the shore and it's out to sea to raid once more.

  Chapter 34