Pirates & Ghosts Short Stories, page 81
“Thirteen years, Captain, and I still ain’t forgotten what she said. Ya got the ship, and all the gold, but ya never got me!” He corked the bottle of rum, and then held the neck as he reared back to allow for the mightiest throw his aging frame could manage. The bottle spun through the air, and hit the water with a hollow sploosh, sinking at first and then remerging to bob with the waves.
His uncertain footing was challenged by a riptide, and he fell to one knee, spun, and was momentarily submerged before the wave receded and gave him the chance to breathe again. The taste of brine filled his mouth, and he wiped away the seawater from his grey goatee before laughing. He got to his feet and made his way up the beach again, safe from the darkening water that thirsted for his soul.
“Good try,” he said between restless laughs. “But ya still didn’t get me.” He made a rude gesture at the sea, just like he’d seen his captain do a hundred times before.
Salt stung his eyes, and tears clouded his vision. When he turned to look back at the spot where he’d been sitting earlier, he thought he saw a man. He wiped away the sea from the crags in his weathered cheeks, squinted, and saw that it hadn’t been an illusion. There was someone standing there, holding his flintlock pistol.
“Hey you there,” said Louis with a vicious, intimidating tone gleaned from years of practice. “Put that down.”
“Is it yours?” asked the stranger with a child’s voice.
Louis wiped his face again, hoping to ease the murkiness his old eyes afforded. He marched up the beach, his feet sinking deep into the sand as he went. As he neared, he saw that it was no man invading the secluded spot, but a boy. It’d been a long time since Louis had commiserated with a child, but he guessed this one to be no older than twelve or thirteen, with sun kissed skin and blonde hair.
“Put it down if ya know what’s good for ya.”
The boy dropped the weapon with little regard to its wellbeing, and stood his ground, unflinching. Louis knew how to deal with a cocksure whelp like this. He stormed up to him, placed his hand to the boy’s chest, and shoved him back. The child staggered and then fell, but didn’t show any sign of fear as the old stranger loomed above him.
“What’cha doin’ coming down here and takin’ things that don’t belong to ya? Planning for an early grave, are ya? Send your ma and pa weepin’ their way to the cemetery if ya keep actin’ like this.”
“My parents are dead.”
The child stayed on his butt, staring up at Louis as if he had nothing to fear, and less to lose.
“An orphan then? Even better,” said Louis as he picked up his pistol, dusted off the sand, and then plunged the barrel into its holster at his side. “No one to come lookin’ for revenge after I slit ya ear to ear.”
“Are you a pirate?”
Louis glared at the child in silence for a moment, and then let out a sharp laugh. “That’s the question of a boy who’s thirstin’ for a peek at the hereafter. What’s got ya askin’ somethin’ like that?”
“People around here say this is where a pirate used to anchor.”
“That what they say?” asked Louis with a curious glance in the direction of the only town around, far through the thick jungle that choked the interior of the island.
The boy nodded.
“And ya came here for what? To see a real, live pirate? Ya know what they say about curiosity, boy? They say it ain’t no good fer yer health. And I might be agreein’ with them.”
“I just wanted to know if it was true.” And then, emboldened by foolish courage, the boy followed by asking, “Is it?”
Louis was confounded into momentary silence by the boy’s eagerness to know something he had no business learning. There was something about the child’s courage that endeared him to Louis, and the old pirate snickered before saying, “Ya, it’s true.”
“And you’re really a pirate.”
“Was, a lifetime ago, but my ship sank, taking my crew and my gold with it.”
“Were you part of Captain Grey’s crew?” The boy asked with reverence.
“How ya know that name?”
“Everyone here knows it. Captain Grey and his ship, the Mary Anne…. They’re a legend around here.”
“Ain’t no legend, kid. Ain’t a legend when it’s true.”
“And were you really….” The boy showed his first sign of fear, with wide eyes staring up at the old pirate. “Were you really part of his crew?”
“Aye.”
“I’ve always wondered what it was like to be a pirate, back before the Royal Navy started their patrols – back when things were good.”
“Good?” asked Louis before letting out a hearty guffaw. “Good? Things weren’t never good, boy. Don’t go foolin’ yerself more than ya already have. It was never good.”
The boy looked crestfallen by the rebuke, and muttered, “It sounded good to me.”
“Did it? And what sounded good about it to ya?”
“The life. The danger. The money, and going port to port, living free. I know it was dangerous, but Captain Grey made it out all right. They say he’s living back in Spain, fat and happy and rich.”
“That what they say?”
The boy nodded.
“Then they’re fools. Captain Grey’s not in Spain, he ain’t rich, and he sure as hell ain’t happy.”
“Then where is he?”
Louis regarded the boy suspiciously, as if sizing him up. The rum burned in the pirate’s belly, and allowed for a willingness to tell the truth that Louis might not have had otherwise. “Ya want to know the whole truth, lad? All right, I’ll tell ya.” He pointed to the cove, where the setting sun had given up on brightening the dark, calamitous water that churned there. The shadows of the nearby landscape shadowed the scene. “That’s ole Captain Grey’s grave right there, ’neath them waves, past the shallows. That’s where we left him, chained up with the rest of his loyals. Chained up and pushed off, left to drown there.”
The boy just stared, wide-eyed and eager to listen.
“That’s right, kid. Your fabled pirate captain ain’t nothing but bone by now. Him and the crew that wouldn’t join my mutiny are down there somewhere. And ya know why I did it? Ya wanna know why? Because he came here to kick up his boots and quit the life we built together. I spent twenty some years with that man, out there fightin’ and killin’, stealin’ and whatnot. Ya see, kid, I wasn’t just some buccaneer who joined up to see what the pirate’s life was like. No, I was Grey’s First Mate. Louis the Liar they used to call me. Well, old Louis the Liar earned his name when he promised his captain he’d help with one last haul. Grey wanted to come here ’cause some witchy woman snatched his heart – had him tied ’round her finger like she cast a spell on him. He wanted to gather up his gold, and make a life with her here. He was going to give me his ship, and I was going to take his crew and the Mary Anne back out to sea to live the only life I ever knew. Only, what sort of pirate would I be if I let a man carry two trunks full of gold off my ship? Huh? What sort of pirate would let that happen? No sort of pirate who’s worth a damn, that’s for sure.”
Louis regarded the sea, bitter and hateful. The lonely gull circled, cawing as the two strangers met below.
“Then it really is you. You’re really Louis the Liar,” said the boy. “But you left a part out of the story.”
Louis looked down at him, intrigued.
“You hunted down and killed the woman Grey loved. And before you killed her, she put a curse on you. She said that you and the Mary Anne would both sink to the bottom of the ocean.”
“How’d you know that?” asked Louis, spooked by the boy’s knowledge.
“But I know something you don’t. The woman Grey loved was pregnant when you killed her. And you’re right, she was witchy.” The child had a hateful smirk.
“Who are you?” asked Louis as he drew his pistol.
“Aldous Grey, the unborn son of Captain William Grey and Rebecca White, and I’ve come for what’s mine.”
Louis pointed the pistol at the boy and pulled the trigger, but the hammer broke the brittle frizzen when it struck, and the spark the flint inspired was barely enough to cause a flash and a puff of smoke. The boy was undaunted by the threat, and advanced.
“Stay back,” said Louis as he staggered away.
“I’ve come for my father’s revenge.”
Louis heard the rattle of chains, and turned to see the dead rising from the dark water of the cove, chained by the wrists to one another, and dragging an anchor behind them, just like they’d been the day Louis ordered they be pushed from the side of the Mary Anne to drown.
Suddenly the boy was upon him, icy fingers gripping his throat. The child was imbued with otherworldly strength that brought Louis to his knees. Aldous Grey’s eyes faded to white, and the rest of his form followed suit, revealing the ghostly apparition for what it truly was.
“Let the sea claim its prize,” said the boy, his voice echoing as if screamed from a mountaintop.
Chains wrapped around Louis’s throat, and he was dragged back kicking and screaming through the sand. The foamy swash flooded over him, and he choked as the salt water filled his throat. The dead dragged their fellow pirate back to the sea, past the shallows, to the grave that’d always been open for him.
The following morning, a pair of boots stood alone in the sand, as if a ghost stood staring out at the cove as an empty rum bottle came in to settle on the litter strewn beach. And above, the lonely gull cawed.
Echo the Damned
Nemma Wollenfang
The Year of our Lord 1726, off the coast of New England.
“Great Saints preserve ’em!” the bosun muttered, mouth agape.
Not half a league ahead, a hulking warship cleaved the fog like some great beast, bearing down on a struggling sloop which was already aflame, floundering under the assault of a dozen canon-blasts. The ships came abreast with an almighty crash that echoed over the water, thick with the screech of splintering wood. And like angry ants the boarders swarmed over the gunwale, waving cutlass and dagger in a macabre dance of lethal metal. Pistols blasted, curses arose, ’til the deck of the beleaguered vessel became a red chaos of men hacking other men down, and the crackle of flames was smothered beneath a roar of screams.
Young Gideon had never seen anything like it. The merchant was overrun. Clutching the cross at his neck on its thin leather cord, he mouthed a silent prayer. Poor devils. No one said it aloud, no one spoke at all. Not even the bosun. They all just stared, mute with horror.
“What if they turn their sights to us next?” a deckhand finally muttered; a burly mulatto by the name of McRoy with scarifications on his cheeks. “We’re the only other ship in the water.”
That shook the bosun from his daze. “S-step to, lads! Canons at the ready! All hands!”
“We’re…we’re to fight ’em?” Gideon asked.
That feral monstrosity against their two-masted schooner? Mother have mercy….
The bosun’s meaty palm clamped on his shoulder. “Best prepare ourselves, lad. Don’t want to face that beast unguarded.” Raising his head, he called, “Someone fetch the cap’n!”
The quartermaster relayed the command while the deck churned with crewmen hurrying about their tasks, shouldering kegs of powder, rolling canon-shot, silent, save for the patter of feet fore and aft. Gideon had duties to attend to as well, he knew he must, yet for the life of him, in that moment, he could not recall what they were. Never before had he faced battle.
A simple boy, of simple means, Gideon was used to the calmness of ships at anchor, the bustling of trim wharves. Merchants’ tales and mariners’ yarns. Life at sea had been but a vague notion until, one eve, he’d met some of the Harridan’s crew while keeping bar for his uncle and been enamoured by the privateers turned pirate. Join the account, they’d coaxed, earn better coin. So he had, thinking ’twould be an easy way to earn great fortune. They’d set out from New Providence with a complement of thirty men. Yet not two leagues out the sickness had taken him. Green, they’d called him, slapping his back. Green of age and face. For every rock and sway, every slight keen of the ship, had him hurling his guts up, ’til the bosun took pity and handed over a tonic. “Tansy, to settle yer belly, boy.” Nothing would settle it now though. Not with the foul noises that carried their way with every gust.
They were pirates themselves, to be sure. They’d been lurking the northern sea-lanes for nigh on a month looking for decent prizes, richer pickings than the overly raided latitudes to the South, when they’d come across this sorry sight. Captain Beaumont was a fair fellow though; a good, God-fearing man, who loathed violence and not once had put a crew to the sword. Most surrendered the moment they saw the black flag fly. Hence the reason Gideon’s blade was yet to taste a man’s blood. Quick, painless, almost civil robbery. But this, what they were witnessing…was pure savagery. Gold lettering on the assailant’s stern named her the Merry Christmas. Such a queer, cheery title for so formidable a vessel. Seemed wrong.
“Master ya courage, ya cack-handed miscreants,” the bosun hollered as he strode passed. “Gunners to yer posts! Powder every canon, open them gun-ports!”
“Belay that! Close the gun-ports!”
All swivelled to face the captain, who stood up on the quarterdeck, resplendent in his rich leather greatcoat with its polished buckles and many accoutrements. A man of fashion – one could tell by the froths of lace at his throat and cuffs – yet also one of practicality; hence the fearsome bandoliers full of pistols cast over either shoulder, and the twin cutlasses sheathed at either hip. Fair and noble, yet not so weak as to be crossed without consequence.
“Cap’n?” The bosun hurried forward.
“They already have prey in their grasp. If we show ’em we mean no harm, that we don’t mean to thieve their plunder, they may well leave us be. Shut the ports, men!”
Sailors complied while the captain descended the stairs to their level, where the bosun edged to his side. “That’s a risky gamble, cap’n.”
“Gamble’s even riskier should we engage. See there, she looks to have four-and-twenty guns. She’d lay waste to our miniscule skiff, shred our hull to splinters.” Aloud, he called, “Hoist the Jolly Roger, Mr. Connor, let ’em know their brethren vessel. An’ keep quiet about it. Mayhap they won’t spy us at all in this fog an’ we can slip by without harassment or pursuit.”
“No battle?” the mulatto perked up. “I likes the sound o’ that.”
“As do I, Mr. McRoy. Bring down the sails, lower mast. Let us slip by undetected.”
No one called the act craven, for indeed all could see the wisdom of it. Gideon certainly could. So they waited, crouched low, keeping quiet, as their ship cut the tide. Men occupied themselves loading pistols and honing blades. Raoul the Frenchman sharpened his rapier with a whetstone by the mizzenmast, every sweep as rhythmic as the waves. Grate…grate…grate…. ’Twas the only true sound on-deck, save for the snapping of canvas at each shift of wind and the creaking of the hull. And without the natural cacophony of the crew-at-work, those heinous sounds became that much louder. How close were they? Forty yards? Ten? Cotton-mouthed and shaking, Gideon clutched the hilt of his cutlass in a white-knuckle grip. He should be braver than this, he knew. He should be a born seaman, fearless of battle.
“Whose colours?” Captain Beaumont asked the bosun, who peered through a spyglass.
“Can’t rightly tell, cap’n. Smoke’s too thick. The other vessel though, it’s the Chance.”
“Hmm. Our presence don’t seem to vex ’em. ’Tis as if the pair don’t even see us.”
Gideon moved to the portside rail, away from the others. With the clamour of slaughter, with the reek of iron spicing the air, and the ship pitching and yawing, his stomach quivered something fierce, churning like a maelstrom. The sickness threatened once again, and he had no wish for his shipmates to bear witness to his weakness, lest they mistake it for cowardice.
There, back to the wood, the air smelt fresher. He focussed on the caw of gulls, on the slap of wood on water as Harridan ploughed through the surf. A rush of saliva filled his mouth. Focus harder. He did, on every intricate sound. ’Twas how he caught the splashing. And…could that be gasping? Twisting, he leaned over the rail, swallowing against the hint of bile in his throat and ignoring the chuckle at his back. “There goes Young Gideon again.”
Nothing visible. Except smoke and mist. All of it dense as molasses, thickest just above the water-line. And in the sparse pockets of clarity, the surface was choppy and rough. Whitecaps everywhere. Not a soul to be seen. Yet, he was sure he’d heard….
There! A cloudbank parted – a flash of white skin, a flailing arm.
“H-help me!” she sputtered weakly. “Please, help me!”
The girl was floundering already, the weight of her skirts pulling her under. Coughing, choking on saltwater, she struggled to remain afloat.
Gideon shot up. “Girl! There’s a girl in the water!”
Men came racing, Captain Beaumont at their front. “Ropes! Ropes, men! Cast a line, heave her up! She must’ve come from the besieged ship; a passenger who braved the sea!”
A wave crashed into the hull and the men hauling her up cringed at the spray of cold seafoam. Gideon expected her weight to strain, for the rope to chafe his palms as they heaved. Yet it almost felt as if there was nothing on the end of the line at all. ’Twas feather-light.
Soon the draggle-tailed wench was crawling over the gunwale and collapsing onto the planks of the deck, chest heaving beneath her bodice and ink-black hair tangled as seaweed. Upper class, to be sure. A gentleperson of good breeding…with rosebud lips and skin like milk, porcelain pale. Even in such a state of disarray, Gideon could not help but notice how comely she was, how fair. Lovely as a fresh-cut rose. Nor how her wet clothes clung to her, nigh diaphanous in parts. He tried not to look, it being ungentlemanly, and the lass having only just prevailed such hardship. But it did leave the curves of her figure so very well defined.
