The Bloody Black Flag

by Steve Goble

  “No,” Peg said. “I think Weatherall had one like it, maybe, but if it ain’t his, I would maybe buy it from you.”

  “He says it ain’t his,” Spider answered.

  “Then might I buy it? I got some tobacco, and an extra shirt, you can have in barter. I’ve never had so fine a flask as that one.”

  “Let me see,” Spider said, “if its owner comes forward. If not, I suppose we can trade.”

  “Very well.”

  They moved up in line. Doctor Boddings, huffing like a grave digger under a hot sun, tried to push a ladle down into a deep pan of extraordinarily thick duff. Cursing under his breath, he grabbed a knife and dug into the stuff. As Spider and Peg watched in a mix of amusement and horror, the surgeon used his knife to lift a thick brick of supposed pudding from the pan. Spider could see salt cubes in its surface, glinting with diamond brightness.

  Boddings dropped the duff into Spider’s bowl. Spider sniffed it. It smelled like a wet dog. “What is this?”

  “It is duff, damn you, and if you think you can do better, then the galley is yours!” Doctor Boddings set to digging out a portion for Peg and continued grumbling. “Men sit on their arses all day while I, a man with degrees from not one, but two, reputable institutions of higher learning, toil in a kitchen on behalf of a damned fool captain who despises men of more education than himself, which I deem includes almost everyone on this ship!”

  Peg looked at the duff Boddings dropped in his bowl and sighed with disappointment.

  Spider used his fingers to pinch a portion of duff from the bowl and put it in his mouth. He swirled the tasteless mass about on his tongue, chewed it with difficulty—he’d once eaten a raw slab of shark skin that was not nearly so difficult to chew—and reluctantly swallowed it. “Can we have some molasses for this, Doctor?”

  “Get thee away!” Boddings waved his ladle like a sword, pointing toward a tin cup of molasses swinging from a boom. “Fetch your own molasses. I am a surgeon, damn you, not a slop cook!”

  Spider nodded, poured some molasses on his duff, and walked toward the keg to fill his mug. Sunday meant wine, but it generally was watered down to the point of uselessness.

  Spider sat against the gunwale, near Weatherall, who stared at his duff as though it were a woman who had spurned him.

  “Peg says you had a pewter flask,” Spider said. “Are you sure you are not missing one?”

  Weatherall, his mouth filled with the doctor’s ridiculous duff, reached to his belt and pulled away a pewter flask. He held it up, shook it, and handed it to Spider. Then he swallowed and spoke. “Never lost mine. It has some whiskey in it still. Have a swig if you like.”

  Spider popped the cork and drank deep. “Thankee.” He handed the flask back to its owner and wondered if Peg had simply been mistaken, or if he had some other purpose. Spider’s questioning about the flask certainly could have alerted the killer that Spider was on the hunt. Could Peg have been trying to cast suspicion on Weatherall to divert it from himself, or from someone else? Was he that clever?

  A call coming down from the mainmast cut Spider’s line of thinking short. “Sail ho!”

  Men began scurrying up the lines, calling out lusty battle cries. The pirates had spotted potential prey, and there would be hunting. Odin, in charge of the crews handling sails aloft, began barking orders and reminding everyone he had sailed with Blackbeard. Barlow’s eyes gleamed, and he called for his spyglass. Weatherall tossed the remainder of his duff overboard and pointed across the rolling sea.

  The rising sun was still low on the horizon. Spider looked off the starboard bow, where Weatherall was pointing. A brig rode the easterly wind on a converging course with Plymouth Dream. The distance was too great to make out much, but she was flying England’s colors and had not, so far, altered course to make a run for it.

  Up top, Dream was mounting the king’s flag as well. Barlow had banners from France, Spain, and other nations in his stores, to be used as he saw fit. His own banner, a field of black sporting a bleeding white skull, was not waving above. The captain was not going to play fair and raise his battle flag.

  “Peg, take a glass up the mast with you and keep watch for that navy shadow of ours,” Barlow said. “This beauty on our horizon could well be bait.”

  Peg headed up the ladder with remarkable speed for a man with a wooden leg, Spider thought.

  Spider had also wondered if the interloper was a lure, designed to entice Dream into pouncing into a trap. It certainly was a possibility. She also could be a brig full of bandits not so different from Dream’s crew; perhaps her captain was moving in with thoughts of plundering Barlow’s ship. You often could not tell the nature of things on an outlaw sea until it was too late.

  The sea was rather calm, with Dream making about ten knots under a cloudless sky painted pink by the rising sun. They already had ranged far enough south to enjoy much warmer temperatures, and the sailors had left their coats lying below.

  Spider judged the other ship to be making about ten knots as well, cutting a nice wake. She was still too distant to make out many details. It would be a while before the ships met, assuming one or the other did not break away and attempt to run. Dream, with three masts of sail opposed to the brig’s two, would have the advantage of more canvas, but the brig likely had a narrower hull. A race could get interesting, Spider thought, even though neither captain, so far, had decided to run. The brig likely could sail much closer to the wind than Dream, so if maneuverability became a factor, Barlow’s ship could be in trouble.

  Barlow peered through his spyglass. “She’s got gun ports open,” he said. “I count six of them. We may be outgunned here, gents.”

  Spider, with his naked eyes, also saw gun ports on the brig’s hull, but they didn’t look quite right. He worked his way aft, where Barlow barked orders to the men in the rigging and assailed one man for lifting a rifle above his head.

  “Do you want them to see that, you fucking fuck?” Barlow punctuated his words by spitting overboard. “I swear to you by God or devil, if they show sign of expecting an attack, I will blow your fucking brains out of your fucking head.”

  “Cap’n,” Spider said quietly once Barlow had finished spewing venom. “Might I borrow your glass?”

  “Why?”

  “Something ain’t right about yonder vessel,” Spider answered.

  “Very well,” Barlow said, handing over his scope.

  Spider walked to the starboard rail and spied through the glass. Once he had the other ship in focus, he was certain. “Cap’n Barlow, those gun ports are naught but black paint.”

  Barlow smiled wide. “Are you certain, Spider?”

  “Aye,” Spider said. “She ain’t as deadly as she looks. Those ports are fake, painted on. But they ain’t been retouched in a while. Edges ain’t smooth. She hasn’t got any guns below, not on her port side, in any case.”

  “Well, I’ll be damned.” Barlow grinned. “We may not need to run today after all. She’s got real guns on her main deck, though. I saw a couple. I’ll lay odds those are full of nasty shit.”

  Spider handed him the glass and headed forward. He hoped the fakery meant Dream was rendezvousing with a merchant vessel, with a crew more disposed to surrender than fight. But the sneer on Barlow’s face, and the man’s deep inhalations and fierce exhalations through the nose, told him the captain was planning carnage whether the target vessel put up a real fight or not.

  “She ain’t making a move,” Barlow said to Addison. “Looks like we’ll have a nice slow dance. Maybe they think they’ll take us, or maybe they think we’ll have a nice little fucking church picnic and exchange news and such.” Barlow laughed. “All I know is it would be nice to take another vessel with us to add to our little fleet. Let us load up our guns, Addy, slow and quiet before she gets close enough to see what we are doing.”

  “Aye, sir,” Addison said, raising a telescope to his eye. “She seems a beauty. I am not seeing a lot of hands on deck, but that coul
d be a ruse.” Addison ordered gun crews to go to work. Men scurried toward the forecastle, where powder was stored. Others moved to the gun carriages and opened chests containing four-pound balls. The chests near the swivel guns held grapeshot, which would scatter like pellets from a shotgun and wreak holy hell upon the crew fired upon.

  Barlow screamed upward. “Peg! Any sign of our fucking Royal Navy friend?”

  “No, sir.”

  “His Majesty’s lazy crew of layabouts has not deigned to grace us with their presence, Cap’n,” Addison said. “It’s just us and that brig on the whole damned sea.”

  “Excellent,” Barlow replied, twirling his cane. “Addy, grab a couple of fellows and break out our weapons, if you please. I think we shall have work today. No damned hurrying or rushing about, though. Keep it all out of sight. We have time aplenty, and we’ll go on letting them think we’re just eager to have ourselves a little floating tea party.”

  “Aye, sir,” Addison said with a leer that indicated he looked forward to the action to come.

  Spider did not look forward to it, and he muttered a very quiet prayer. “Let them choose surrender over fighting,” he whispered. “Let them give us no cause to slit throats and fire our guns. Let this end peaceful, if it can, Lord.”

  Spider had been through this drama more times than he could remember, and he did not want to go through it again. But if it came to a fight, he would swing his sword for all he was worth, because the last thing he wanted to do was die. If the world would not let him live in peace, he would try to live anyway, and hate himself afterward for whatever sins he had to commit to make that happen. He had heard Jesus forgives, and he fervently hoped it was true.

  He reminded himself he needed to live so he could avenge Ezra and so he could one day return home.

  He kissed the pendant he’d carved for Em.

  Weatherall appeared by Spider’s side, looking nervous. “This wretched sword is yours, I’m told.”

  Spider eyed the beaten scabbard, the frayed leather on the hilt, the ridiculous long thread of rope that served as a shoulder strap. He grasped the sword and took a deep breath, surprised at how good it felt to have a weapon again. He had been walking about unarmed in a nest of vipers.

  “It is,” he answered. “Many thanks. Not as fine as yours, it seems. Looks as though you got a proper naval officer’s sword there.”

  “Took it from a properly dead naval officer,” Weatherall answered, sneering.

  While the boarding party members armed themselves, others prepared ropes and grappling hooks. When the time came, they would crouch out of sight below the rail, awaiting word to snap the trap shut.

  Hob came running up to Spider. “Take a brace of these,” he said, proffering a wooden bucket filled with flintlock pistols. Spider took a couple.

  “Doctor Boddings has the powder and balls and flints and wadding, all by the mizzenmast,” Hob said before running off elsewhere.

  Spider strapped the cutlass over his shoulder, tucked the pistols into his belt, and prayed he would not have to use any of them. He headed toward the mizzenmast to get powder and ammunition, and doubted very much his prayer would come true.

  Barlow clapped an iron hand on Spider’s shoulder as Spider waited his turn in line.

  “I hope you fight like your friend,” Barlow said. “I was sad to lose him after seeing him in a scuffle. May you show a good account of yourself today.”

  “I fight damned hard when I must, Cap’n,” Spider assured him.

  “See that you do,” Barlow said, leering and swishing his cane violently through the air. “See that you do.”

  Neither Plymouth Dream nor the interloper had hoisted a black flag, which would have signaled piratical intent and an offer to spare survivors in case of surrender. Dream continued the charade of seeking a peaceful encounter. Spider suspected the other vessel was pretending, too.

  Spider got his gunpowder, wadding, and balls and moved to the rail to load his guns. He looked to starboard, where the target vessel was larger now. It still seemed bent on a simple rendezvous with Dream. “Just fucking surrender,” he whispered to himself. “Don’t let it become kill or be killed. Give Barlow what he wants. Don’t make him take it.”

  Then he tucked his loaded guns into his belt and tried to prepare himself for the probable carnage to come.

  The prey was closer now, and Spider could make out men moving on her deck. No one was brandishing weapons, of course, and neither ship was putting on sail. Everything pointed to a casual meeting at sea, an exchange of news, drinks all around, a welcome interruption of a dull routine.

  Spider was certain this would be anything but that.

  Crewmen looked at one another with rapacious smiles.

  Spider spotted Weatherall farther ahead, staring at the target. The man seemed lost in thought. “Be nice if they just handed over their ship and all joined our merry little band, I say,” Spider said.

  Weatherall grunted. “Aye.” Then he turned and walked away.

  “Still no sign of naval sail,” Peg hollered from above.

  “The sea is all ours today, by thunder!” Barlow clapped his hands. “And that bitch is headed right into our jaws, lads! Be she a merchant or a ship of wolves like us, we’re taking her today! You know your jobs, men! New lads, you are with the boarding party. Let’s make them bleed until they be empty!”

  Then he turned his attention to the rigging. “Odin! You lads reef sails, smartly now!”

  The oncoming vessel loomed ahead, and it, too, reduced sail to a minimum. Closer she drew, her fake gun ports now obvious to the naked, experienced eye, and her crew waving and calling across the waves. Dream’s murderous lot waved back and hailed the other vessel, but kept guns and blades hidden behind backs or behind the rail.

  The vessels were now within hailing distance of each other.

  “Plymouth Dream, bound for Africa,” Barlow bellowed, waving his tricorn. He spaced out his words to make them understandable. “We’ve a fair fiddler aboard, if you’d like to celebrate this chance encounter!”

  “Loon, our ship is, bound for Boston,” replied a cadaverously thin man with long blond hair falling in sloppy curls on his shoulders beneath a ridiculous black hat. “Captain Joshua Horncastle, at your service. We can spare some excellent French wine to share with our new friends.”

  “Come alongside, then, if you please!”

  The voice of Loon’s captain sounded strained, and Spider suspected Horncastle and crew had plundering thoughts in mind. He tugged Em’s pendant from beneath his shirt and gave it a another quick kiss.

  “Tie these on your arms, sir,” Hob said, tugging on Spider’s sleeve and proffering a wooden bucket filled with scraps of deep-blue cloth.

  “What the devil is this?” Spider lifted one of the lengthy scraps from the bucket.

  “Cap’n says it’ll make it easier to tell who is who once the balls and blood fly,” Hob said. The eagerness in the boy’s voice told Spider that Hob wanted very much to tie blue ribbons around his own biceps and lurch into battle. Spider grabbed two ribbons from the bucket and said, “Hob, you pass these out and then you get the hell belowdecks and stay there.”

  “I ain’t no coward,” Hob said, turning to hand a pair of ribbons to Weatherall, who had circled back and resumed his spot near Spider. Then the boy ran off as Spider yelled, “You do as I say, Hob!”

  Disgusted, Spider spat overboard for luck and felt his stomach tighten. He tied the damned blue ribbons around his arms. It would not be long now before Barlow tipped his hand. Dream would come alongside the brig, and Barlow would give the call to action. And if the Lord heeded Spider’s prayers, the fellows on the other ship would drop their guns and beg for mercy rather than show fight.

  But the expressions staring back at him across the water told him the Lord was not heeding prayers on this Sabbath.

  The ships slowly drew closer and closer on their convergent paths. The dance proceeded at an agonizingly slow pace as Spider
and the rest of Dream’s crew waved and whistled in a friendly manner while keeping careful eye for any sign of treachery. The men on Loon waved back and yelled greetings—and Spider noted numerous hands hidden below the rail, or behind backs, in postures no different from those aboard Dream. Spider wondered how many men over there were crouching behind the rail, or waiting below with guns and steel.

  Weatherall, looking grim and holding a knife behind his own back, whispered, “Mother of God.”

  “It’s looking less and less like a pack of vestal virgins over there,” Addison replied quietly.

  “Aye,” Weatherall said. “It is my hope we vastly outnumber them, and they will see that and just surrender.”

  Any hope of that was lost in the next breath as a rifle shot from the approaching vessel sent a ball across the waters to thunk into the mainmast.

  “Fuck them, lads! It’s a fight!” Barlow lifted his cane high and pointed at the brig. “Fire!”

  The gun crews struck matches and lit fuses. Aiming was not necessary at this close range. The four-pounders roared thunder and belched their black clouds of smoke, and the swivel guns unleashed their devastating grapeshot across Loon’s deck. The small pellets ripped sails and sent blood flying.

  Grapples flew, muskets fired, and blasphemous curses lifted from both vessels.

  A swivel gun on the target ship replied, and the rail near Spider splintered. Flying wood and gun smoke streaked across his face, and he recoiled in pain and uttered a new silent prayer.

  A handful of Loon’s guns—Spider had not counted them—flashed fire in the smoky haze. Dream’s rail exploded in places, and a man standing next to Spider flew backward and vanished beyond the mizzenmast. A trail of blood marked the path of his flight.

  “Hard over!” Barlow fired a pistol, and Dream’s grapplers heaved on their lines. Loon’s grapplers did the same, and the hulls of the two vessels thunked together in a jarring collision. “Free-for-all, lads! Cut them down, one and all!”

  Horrifying screams lifted from both ships as brigands raised their voices in hopes of creating fear and panic in their enemies.