Sailing by Carina's Star, page 30
Robins studies Michel. Some of the anger fades. Curiosity takes its place.
“Commodore Michel Delacroix, I assume?” Robins asks.
“Correct.” Michel remains impassive and unimpressed. “Care to tell us what other pirates trade in this market? There might be something in it for you. A private execution rather than a public one, perhaps.”
Robins shakes his head, sending blood droplets splattering onto the deck. “Any goodwill we had for you is long gone now, Commodore. Pirates used to avoid you, given we’d heard you were kind to your men—uncommon, in the merchant ranks. Then you started hunting us. It’s too bad.”
“I’ve heard that before.” Michel puts his hands behind his back, standing up straighter. “I’m afraid I’m not looking for pirate approval, at the moment.”
“Though if the rumors are true, you're going a bit softer than your friend here,” Robins continues, paying the insult no mind. “There was word going around that you petitioned to have two pirates’ sentences commuted, recently. And it wasn’t the first time.”
“They were fifteen or sixteen at best,” Michel responds. “Boys that young could easily be coerced or conscripted with no escape.”
Jerome privately thought that Michel might have been thinking of René and Frantz when he petitioned for that commutation, because it was after he agreed to hear Jerome out. René and Frantz aren’t that age now, but they might have been when they joined a pirate crew.
“And was your petition accepted?”
“Their sentences were commuted to hard labor for ten years.”
“Well.” Sharp, sarcastic anger curls around Robins’ words, making his Irish accent thicker. “That’s certainly kind of you.”
Michel purses his lips. “It is better than being dead. I can assure you that no member of your crew will receive such leniency from me. Your choices were your own.”
Robins jerks his head toward his sloop. The black death’s head billows in the breeze even as the ship becomes a speck off in the distance. “You think we’re afraid of you? Think again.”
Jerome rolls his eyes. “Every man says they’re not afraid until that noose is around their neck.”
“I didn’t say I wasn’t afraid of anything, Captain Jerome, though I will go to my death with my head held high.” Robins smirks. “I said I wasn’t afraid of you.”
Jerome shoves Robins back to his knees with a growl. “That’s enough from you, thief.”
“You have no idea who you're dealing with,” Robins says, ignoring this. “The powers that be will need more than just the two of you if they want to keep piracy at bay. Now that the war’s ended there are more of us. But I’m just a common thief, as you say. Dare I mention some of my more famed comrades?” Robins looks Jerome dead in the face. “Teach. Hornigold. Bellamy. Rackham. Bonny. Danso.” He emphasizes the final name, awe rippling across the deck as everything goes quiet. “And that new young lad captaining his consort ship. Whoever he is, he's made a name for himself. There are plenty more the papers don’t talk about. You can’t defeat all of them.”
“Oh, can’t I?” Jerome’s words whip through the air, and he leans down closer to Robins. “Some of the colonial governors are corrupt, and some merchants can be bought, but I assure you that I cannot be intimidated or purchased. And there are enough like-minded men with the power to ensure your eventual destruction.” He moves yet closer, his words soft and sinister. Dangerous. “I’m a patient man.”
Robins doesn’t blink. “Maybe. But I don’t think you’re a good man, Captain. Call us devils all you like. The truth will win out. Men hide from your press gangs. Merchant sailors are beaten and starved and cheated of their wages.” Robins’ eyes shine with zeal, and Jerome catches Michel gazing at him as if he’s really, truly listening. “Men may murder their slaves at will. Maybe they’ll have to pay some money for the trouble. Convicts are leased out to ships, which is nothing more than a death delayed. How many men have died fighting for the British Navy, men who were forced into service? And you’re defending all of that, are you? If you’re framing it as an argument over monsters and men, well ....”
Jerome slaps Robins in the face, leaving the red mark of a handprint behind. He gestures at Anderson, who places the gag in Robin’s mouth.
“Do not try and turn this around,” Jerome says. “You’re the villain, Captain Robins. And history will remember you as such.”
Robins glares at him.
“Take these scoundrels to the brig,” Jerome tells his men. “And put a full guard in front of the door in case they get any ideas. Rest assured, pirate, that I’ll be back to ask more questions about that black market.” He taps the fresh bruise on Robins’ cheek. “I have my ways of getting information.”
Jerome sees them off back toward the bay in Plymouth, bidding Anderson to take note of any of the men’s injuries so he can put it in his report. Michel’s already inside the captain’s cabin when Jerome makes his way there.
“That’s not too bad, I hope?” Jerome asks, gesturing to Michel’s injury. “Did you see the surgeon?”
“It’s just a flesh wound.” Michel waves off the concern, wrapping the bandage around his hand. “He just told me to wrap it.”
He puts his hand out, and Jerome ties the bandage off.
Jerome sits down at his desk, pulling his new reading spectacles out of a drawer with one hand. He wants to look at that file on Robins again.
“Hopefully Governor Daniel will have more to give us on the Charles Town black market by the time we go to South Carolina after the new year,” Michel says. “Though, the letters we’ve been getting from customs officers and others about pirate activity have proved useful. More than I thought they would. Getting them helped us break up that market in Barbados, and now here.”
“I thought we would only get nonsense when Admiral Adams suggested it,” Jerome admits. “But they have given us some good leads.” He leans back in his chair. “There’s no executions around Christmas and the New Year, so we’ll have extra time after Robins’ trial. I want to take some of it to question him about Danso. And the market, of course. See if I can get him to admit to the locations of others. They keep moving the damned Charles Town one around.”
Michel pauses before forging ahead. “Robins had an odd expression on his face when he looked at me. Why do you suppose that is?”
“Well, if these notes from intelligence are correct, Robins became a pirate because of Ebele. Just like Danso and Abeni.”
Understanding dawns in Michel’s eyes, his brows furrowed in thought. “And if Robins knows Danso and Abeni, you believe he knows—”
“René and Frantz. Yes.”
Jerome hates being responsible for Michel’s grief. But if he’s right, if he’s followed the correct trail, then he can finally bring those boys back. He has to bring those boys back, because Michel cannot go on as he has been. Jerome found him sobbing alone in René’s vacant room on the anniversary of Arthur’s death last month, holding an old book of Frantz’s in his hands. He’s been drinking more. He looks like he never sleeps. Finding those brats will make Michel happy. Jerome is determined. He will fix this. What the law—and Lord Travers—will have to say about it all remains a question, but they can sort that out.
“I still do not want to believe they’re pirates,” Michel says softly. “I also cannot banish the thought. We haven’t been able to lay our hands on Danso’s ships since I came around to your line of thinking. No surprise, I realize, he’s been impossible to catch for years. But still.”
“Danso is devious, and, unfortunately, clever.” Jerome sighs, drumming his fingers on top of the sketchpad resting upon his desk. “I think they take routes outside the norm, and they’ve clearly cultivated relationships that earn them intelligence about ours. We will catch them. I can assure you. Danso is a sentimental fool. He’ll act too boldly one day. And if I’m right about René, well ... the crew is rather loyal to one another. Something in their web will unravel. I’m hoping it’s this damned market in Charles Town.”
“I’m not even sure what I would say to them if you’re right,” Michel says. “A few years ago they would just have been crew members, but if René is a captain now? If that’s the case, I can only assume Frantz is the sailing master. Pulling them out of it will be difficult. I’ll have to call in every favor anyone owes me just to spare their lives.”
They grow silent, each lost in their thoughts. Michel taps the edge of the desk, chewing on his bottom lip. The puffy, purple bags beneath his eyes are more pronounced than usual. Jerome takes the opportunity to pour both of them water. The pirates put up a fight, for certain, and there’s not been time to rest.
“Oh!” Michel exclaims, taking the glass he’s offered. “I forgot to mention I wrote to Aldridge Carlisle at his new posting in St. Martin to tell him of our suspicions about the boys. I entreated for his discretion, of course.”
“That useless privateer?” Jerome grumbles. “I thought we bid him good riddance when he left Jamaica.”
“Come now, Nicholas,” Michel chides. “The man was a talented sailor and businessman, even if I didn’t care for how he treated his sailors.”
“You are more generous than me,” Jerome mutters. “He tried to tell us what to do constantly right after the boys went missing, and then once six months had gone by he left us out to dry. That and his ridiculous wardrobe were enough to remove him from my esteem.”
Michel laughs. “I do not claim to understand why he would give up so easily on his son. I suppose he had his new child to consider then, although ....” Michel trails off, shaking his head. “But that is not the point. I received an answer from his wife, you see. It turns out Aldridge passed away.”
Jerome pulls back in his chair. “Really? How?”
“Accident on the ship, apparently. She didn’t give me the details, but the surgeon had to remove part of his arm. The stub got infected. He was able to die at home, at least. A shame for her and their son.”
“I can’t say I would wish that upon him.” Jerome recalls how similar Auden looked to his father even if they were very different in temperament. That Auden grated on his nerves to no end was a fact, but at least the boy had some sense of loyalty, though now ill-used. Jerome never sensed that in Aldridge, who’d been the worst sort of opportunist. “What of Mrs. Carlisle and the child?”
“They’re returning to England, to her family.” Michel crosses his ankle over his thigh, examining a stain on his boot. “Though with a great deal more money than they arrived with. Being able to live in comfort should be some solace.”
“They’re leaving the Indies without Auden?” Jerome asks.
“She believes him lost to the sea.” Michel’s voice wavers. “Given how long it’s been.”
“She doesn’t know her son very well. He was a stubborn brat. He wouldn’t give up so easily, on life or anything else. He’d fight the sea before he was lost to it.”
“Nicholas,” Michel chides again. “Come now. He was a boy.”
“You did not particularly care for him either.”
“He was overly rambunctious,” Michel admits, “and could be a bad influence, but he did have his charms. It’s odd,” he muses. “We talk so much of Danso, and yet I know so little of him. I suppose I didn’t think I needed to know much about him. But if he has my son and Arthur’s, as well as Auden, then I ... well I would like to know more.”
“There is not a great deal to know.”
Jerome pauses, thinking. Michel knows everything about his past with Danso. They’ve even discussed how maddening it is that Danso has chosen to spare him twice. What Jerome hasn’t mentioned is how uncertain Danso makes him feel. The kindness in his eyes Jerome can’t forget but wishes he could banish. He’s certain Danso has René and Frantz and Auden on his crew, and yet Danso behaves not just as a captain, but as a father for all his refusal to give them up. Jerome cannot force any of these words past his lips. He cannot say them aloud to Michel. They are foolish, soft, ridiculous thoughts about a convict, about a pirate, and he will not entertain them.
“I’ve told you everything I know about his past. He was a farmer and a dock worker in Barbados. Carib mother, African father. Said he stole to feed his sister and her family. I don’t know what happened to them after, though there has been word of a young man who sails with Danso that might be related to him.”
“I know how much he frustrates you,” Michel says. “But I suppose I ought to thank him, somewhat. If he hadn’t escaped that night, you may not have ended up on my crew.”
“Yes, that is true.”
Though Michel has been his mentor for a long time now, his friend and second father, sometimes Jerome still doesn’t know how to accept the love the other man bears him, even if he reciprocates the sentiment. He did fine on his own after he lost his mother. But then there was Michel, then there was René and Arthur and Frantz, and they became his family before he could say no.
“The fact remains,” Jerome continues, “that I am responsible for their escape, and had Danso and Abeni not become what they have, perhaps I could more easily let it go.”
Michel raises his eyebrows, a smirk playing at his lips.
“I said more easily,” Jerome insists, biting back an embarrassed chuckle. “But they have become these famous pirates, and with an astonishingly long career. It is an aberration of justice I must correct. And if they have René and Frantz? It makes me want to find them even more.”
“I understand,” Michel replies. “I only ... you’ve spoken to me before about Danso’s fear that night on Nassau. And I wonder, given all the times he has so brazenly broken the law, why he would fear us finding out about René and Frantz if they are sailing under his colors? That he might be secretive about it makes a certain amount of sense. He knows we’ll come after him with even more determination, and I’m sure he’d rather avoid that battle, but fear is something different. It implies he cares about them.” Michel’s fingers curl against his palm as if he might be trying to catch his thoughts. “Like he’s trying to protect them from us. From me.”
“Michel,” Jerome says, slow. “Do you feel as though they require someone to protect them from you?”
Michel twists his fingers now. “No. But I cannot deny that I hurt them. The things I allowed to happen have haunted me for all these years. The way I let my father-in-law behave. I didn’t do enough. Not nearly.”
“They disobeyed you.” Jerome’s voice goes low, coming out harsher than he meant. “They were not grateful for everything you did for them. Whatever fault they may have found with you did not warrant their reaction.” He stops, realizing how angry he sounds. “I know things were difficult for all of you, but I hate to see you blame yourself.”
Michel smiles tightly. “I suppose thinking of Danso and who he might be reminds me of Arthur’s complaints about the treatment of convicts on East India ships. They are people, he would say, not just free labor. There were of course some hardened criminals, but he did question the circumstances that led them to crime in the first place. He even admired Danso and Ebele. I never knew how to feel about that. Did I ever tell you”—tears brim in his eyes and he clears his throat—“that he said he thought he met Danso and Abeni once? That they helped him? He told me during that awful storm.”
A wave of nausea crashes over Jerome. He does not like the desperate sound in Michel’s voice.
“Yes,” he replies, careful as he always is when Arthur is mentioned, because Michel has trouble talking about him without getting upset. “You did. But we’d had rather a lot of brandy that evening.”
Arthur Seymour and his legacy of defiance haunts them to this day. Jerome respected the departed sailing master, he cared about him, but they would not have gotten along now. He knows that for sure. What he’s less sure of is the influence Arthur might have had on Michel had he lived. The influence he has even in death. Still, it could not be enough to make Michel tolerate piracy, regardless of the sympathy he has for the younger lads they catch. No. It isn’t possible.
“Of course, no matter the circumstance there is no justification for Danso’s piracy.” Michel toys with the bandage around his hand. “That is nigh unforgivable. If he has René and Frantz, what has he turned them into? And what can we say to spare them the noose if Danso’s brought them up to be just like him? When we’ll want him sent to the noose but not the boys?”
Michel pales, meeting Jerome’s eye with ... well, it’s terror, and nothing less. For all these years Jerome has looked to Michel for steadiness, and now, Michel is looking to him. Michel leaned on him after the boys ran off, but regardless, Michel has always been the mentor in their relationship.
“We’ll sort it out,” Jerome says quickly, patting Michel’s hand. “Your influence should help prevent a capital sentence.”
Jerome refuses to think of what will happen if they can’t spare the boys the noose.
“Land ho!”
Michel stands up fast. “I’m sure John and Rollins will need our help rounding up any straggling rogues. Care to join me?”
Jerome assents, stacking his papers again before following Michel to the door. Michel turns again before they exit, his hand resting on the knob.
“You know how grateful I am for your discretion, about René and Frantz?” he asks. “I know you’re uncomfortable keeping the reasoning for our intensified search for Danso and his consort captain a secret from Admiral Adams. I know he doesn’t mind—he’s as eager to catch them as we are, so it doesn’t truly harm anything. Nevertheless, I know you only do it out of loyalty to me.”
“I understand the personal nature of the matter better than anyone else.” Jerome clasps Michel’s shoulder, and that puts color back in Michel’s cheeks, the earlier tears gone. “And it is what I owe you.”
René, Jerome thinks. Bide your time, boy. We’re coming for you.
Chapter 5
St. Michael’s Town, Barbados. January 1716.
