and silently drew one of his long brown fingers down her cheek. Very
slowly. She stifled a shiver, reminding herself she'd had quite enough
of men in general, and Hugh Winston in particular, to do a lifetime.
But, still . . .
Before she realized it, he'd lifted back her yellow hair and kissed her
deeply on the mouth. Suddenly it was all she could manage, keeping her
hands on the mattress.
Then he faltered, mumbled something about the heat, and plopped back
onto the sweat-soaked sheet.
Well, God damn him too.
She studied his face again, wondering why he seemed so distracted this
trip. It wasn't like Hugh to let things get under his skin. Though
admittedly affairs were going poorly for him now, mainly because of the
damned Civil War in England. Since he didn't trouble about taxes, he'd
always undersold English shippers. But after the war had disrupted
things so much, the American settlements were wide open to the cut-rate
Hollanders, who could sell and ship cheaper than anybody alive. These
days the Butterboxes were everywhere; you could look out the window and
see a dozen Dutch merchantmen anchored right in Carlisle Bay. Ever
since that trip for the Council he'd been busy running whatever he
could get between Virginia and some other place he hadn't said--yet he
had scarcely a shilling to show for his time. Why else would he have
paid that flock of shiftless runaways he called a crew with the last of
his savings? She knew it was all he had, and he'd just handed it over
for them to drink and whore away. When would he learn?
And if you're thinking you'll collect on the Council's sight bills,
dear heart, you'd best think again. Master Benjamin Briggs and the rest
of that shifty lot could hold school for learned scholars on the topic
of stalling obligations.
He was doubtless too proud to own it straight out, but he needn't
trouble. She already knew. Hugh Winston, her lover in times past and
still the only friend she had worth the bother, was down to his last
farthing.
She sighed, telling herself she knew full well what it was like. God's
wounds, did she know what it was like. Back when Hugh Winston was still
in his first and only term at Oxford, the son of one Lord Harold
Winston, before he'd been apprenticed and then sent packing out to the
Caribbees, Joan Fuller was already an orphan. The hardest place you
could be one. On the cobblestone streets of Billingsgate, City of
London.
That's where you think you're in luck to hire out in some household for
a few pennies a week, with a hag of a mistress who despises you for no
more cause than you're young and pretty. Of course you steal a little
at first, not too much or she'd see, but then you remember the master,
who idles about the place in his greasy nightshirt half the day, and
who starts taking notice after you let the gouty old whoremaster know
you'd be willing to earn something extra. Finally the mistress starts
to suspect--the bloodhounds always do after a while--and soon enough
you're back on the cobblestones.
But you know a lot more now. So if you're half clever you'll take what
you've put by and have some proper dresses made up, bright colored with
ruffled petticoats, and a few hats with silk ribands. Then you pay down
on a furnished lodging in Covent Garden, the first floor even though
it's more than all the rest of the house. Soon you've got lots of
regulars, and then eventually you make acquaintance of a certain
gentleman of means who wants a pert young thing all to himself, on
alternate afternoons. It lasts for going on two years, till you decide
you're weary to death of the kept life. So you count up what's set by--
and realize it's enough to hire passage out to Barbados.
Which someone once told you was supposed to be paradise after London,
and you, like a fool, believed it. But which you discover quick enough
is just a damned sweltering version of hell. You're here now though, so
you take what little money's left and find yourself some girls, Irish
ones who've served out their time as indentures, despise having to
work, and can't wait to take up the old life, same as before they came
out.
And finally you can forget all about what it was like being a penniless
orphan. Trouble is, you also realize you're not so young anymore.
"Would you fancy some Hollander cheese, love? The purser from the
_Zeelander _lifted a tub for me and there's still a bit left. And I'll
warrant there's cassava bread in back, still warm from morning." She
knew Hugh always called for the local bread, the hard patties baked
from the powdered cassava root, rather than that from the stale,
weevily flour shipped out from London.
He ran a finger contemplatively across her breasts--now they at least
were still round and firm as any strutting Irish wench half her age
could boast--then dropped his legs off the side of the bed and began to
search for his boots.
"I could do with a tankard of sack."
The very brass of him! When he'd come back half drunk in the middle of
the night, ranting about floggings or some such and waving a bottle of
kill-devil. He'd climbed into bed, had his way, and promptly passed
out. So instead of acting like he owned the place, he could bloody well
supply an explanation.
"So how did it go yesterday?" She held her voice even, a purr. "With
that business on the _Zeelander_?"
That wasn't the point she actually had in mind. If it hadn't been so
damned hot, she'd have nailed him straight out. Something along the
lines of "And where in bloody hell were you till all hours?" Or maybe
"Why is't you think you can have whatever you want, the minute you want
it?" That was the enquiry the situation called for.
"You missed a fine entertainment." His tone of voice told her he
probably meant just the opposite.
"You're sayin' the sale went well for the Dutchmen?" She
watched him shrug, then readied herself to monitor him sharply. "And
after that I expect you were off drinking with the Council." She
flashed a look of mock disapproval. "Doubtless passing yourself for a
fine gentleman, as always?"
"I am a gentleman." He laughed and swung at her with a muddy boot, just
missing as she sprang from the bed. "I just rarely trouble to own it."
"Aye, you're a gentleman, to be sure. And by that thinking I'm a virgin
still, since I was doubtless that once too."
"So I've heard you claim. But that was back well before my time."
"You had rare fortune, darlin'. You got the rewards of years of
expertise." She reached to pull on her brown linen shift. "And I
suppose you'll be telling me next that Master Briggs and the Council
can scarcely wait to settle your sight bills."
"They'll settle them in a fortnight, one way or another, or damned to
them." He reached for his breeches, not the fancy ones he wore once in
a while around the Council, but the canvas ones he used aboard ship,
and the tone of his voice changed. "I just hope things stay on an even
keel till then."
"I don't catch your meaning." She studied him openly, wondering if that
meant he was already planning to leave.
"The planters' new purchase." He'd finished with the trousers and was
busy with his belt. "Half of them are Yoruba."
"And, pray, what's that?" She'd thought he was going to explain more on
the bit about leaving.
"I think they're a people from somewhere down around the Niger River
delta."
"The Africans, you mean?" She examined him, still puzzled. "The
slaves?"
"You've hit on it. The slaves. Like a fool, I didn't see it coming, but
it's here, all right. May God curse Ruyters. Now I realize this is what
he planned all along, the bastard, when he started telling everybody
how they could get rich with cane. Save none of these Puritans knows
the first thing about working Africans. He's sold them a powder keg
with these Yoruba." He rose and started for the door leading into the
front room of the tavern. "And they're doing all they can to spark the
fuse."
"What're you tryin' to say?" She was watching him walk, something that
still pleased her after all the years. But she kept on seeming to
listen. When Hugh took something in his head, you'd best let him carry
on about it for a time.
"They're proud and I've got a feeling they're not going to take this
treatment." He turned back to look at her, finally reading her
confusion. "I've seen plenty of Yoruba over the years in Brazil, and I
can tell you the Papists have learned to handle them differently.
They're fast and they're smart. Some of them even come off the boat
already knowing Portugee. I also found out that at least one of those
Ruyters sold to Briggs can speak it."
"Is that such a bad thing? It'd seem to me . . ."
"What I'm saying is, now that they're here, they've got to be treated
like men. You can't starve them and horsewhip them the way you can
Irish indentures. I've got a strong feeling they'll not abide it for
long." He moved restlessly into the front room, a wood-floored space of
rickety pine tables and wobbly straight chairs, plopping down by the
front doorway, his gaze fixed on the misty outline of the river bridge.
"I went on out to Briggs' plantation last night, thinking to talk over
a certain little matter, but instead I got treated to a show of how he
plans to break in his slaves. The first thing he did was flog one of
his new Yoruba when he balked at eating loblolly corn mush. That's
going to make for big trouble, mark it."
She studied him now and finally realized how worked up he was. Hugh
usually noticed everything, yet he'd walked straight through the room
without returning the groggy nods of his men, two French mates and his
quartermaster John Mewes--the latter now gaming at three-handed whist
with Salt-Beef Peg and Buttock-de-Clink Jenny, her two newest Irish
girls.
She knew for sure Peg had noticed him, and that little sixpenny tart
bloody well knew better than to breathe a word in front of her
mistress.
"Well, settle down a bit." She opened the cabinet and took out an
onion-flask of sack, together with two tankards. "Tell me where you're
thinking you'll be going next." She dropped into the chair opposite and
began uncorking the bottle. "Or am I to expect you and the lads'll be
staying a while in Barbados this time?"
He laughed. "Well now, am I supposed to think it's me you're thinking
about? Or is it you're just worried we might ship out while one of the
lads still has a shilling left somewhere or other?"
She briefly considered hoisting the bottle she'd just fetched and
cracking it over his skull, but instead she shot him a frown and turned
toward the bleary-eyed gathering at the whist table. "John, did you
ever hear the likes of this one, by my life? He'd have the lot of you
drink and play for free."
John Mewes, a Bristol seaman who had joined Hugh years ago after
jumping ship at Nevis Island, stared up groggily from his game, then
glanced back at his shrinking pile of coins--shrinking as Salt-Beef
Peg's had grown. His weathered cheeks were lined from drink, and, as
always, his ragged hair was matted against his scalp and the jerkin
covering his wide belly was stained brown with spilled grog.
Inexplicably, women doted on him in taverns the length of the
Caribbean.
"Aye, yor ladyship, it may soon have to be. This bawd of yours is near
to takin' my last shilling, before she's scarce troubled liftin' her
skirts to earn it." He took another swallow of kill-devil from his
tankard, then looked imploringly toward Winston. "On my honor, Cap'n,
by the look of it I'm apt to be poor as a country parson by noontide
tomorrow."
"But you're stayin' all this week with me, John." Peg was around the
table and on his lap in an instant, her soft brown eyes aglow. "A
promise to a lady always has to be kept. Else you'll lose your luck."
"Then shall I be havin' your full measure for the coin of love? It's
near to all that's left, I'll take an oath on it. My purse's shriveled
as the Pope's balls."
"For love?" Peg rose. "And I suppose I'm to be livin' on this
counterfeit you call love. Whilst you're off plyin' your sweet talk to
some stinkin' Dutch whore over on the Wild Coast."
"The damned Hollander wenches are all too sottish by half. They'd swill
a man's grog faster'n he can call for it." He took another pull from
his tankard and glanced admiringly at Peg's bulging, half-laced bodice.
"But I say deal the cards, m'lady. Where there's life, there's hope, as
I'm a Christian."
"And what was it you were saying, love?" Joan turned back to Winston
and poured another splash into his tankard. "I think it was something
to do with the new slaves?"
"I said I don't like it, and I just might try doing something about it.
I just hope there's no trouble here in the meantime." His voice slowly
trailed off into the din of the rain.
This bother about the slaves was not a bit like him, Joan thought.
Hugh'd never been out to right all the world's many ills. Besides, what
did he expect? God's wounds, the planters were going to squeeze every
shilling they could out of these new Africans. Everybody knew the
Caribbees and all the Americas were "beyond the line," outside the
demarcation on some map somewhere that separated Europe from the New
World. Out here the rules were different. Hugh had always understood
that better than anybody, so why was he so out of sorts now that the
planters had found a replacement for their lazy indentures? Heaven can
tell, he had wrongs enough of his own to brood about if he wanted to
trouble his mind over life's little misfortunes.
"What is it really that's occupying your mind so much this trip, love?
It can't just be these new slaves. I know you too well for that." She
studied him. "Is't the sight bills?"
"I've been thinking about an idea I've had for a long, long time.
Seeing what's happened now on Barbados, it all fits together somehow."
"What're you talking about?"
"I'm wondering if maybe it's not time I tried changing a few things."
This was definitely a new Hugh. He never talked like that in the old
days. Back then all he ever troubled about was how he was going to
manage making a living--a problem he still hadn't worked out, if you
want the honest truth.
She looked at him now, suddenly so changed, and recollected the first
time she ever saw him. It was a full seven years past, just after she'd
opened her tavern and while he was still a seaman on the _Zeelander_.
That Dutch ship had arrived with clapboards and staves from Portsmouth,
Rhode Island, needed on Barbados for houses and tobacco casks. While
the _Zeelander _was lading Barbados cotton for the mills in New
England, he'd come in one night with the other members of the Dutch
crew, and she'd introduced him to one of the girls. But, later on, it
was her he'd bought drinks for, not the plump Irish colleen he'd been
with. And then came the questions. How'd she get on, he wanted to know,
living by her wits out here in the New World? Where was the money?
She'd figured, rightly, that Hugh was looking for something, maybe
thinking to try and make his own way, as she had.
After a while he'd finally ordered a tankard for the pouting girl, then
disappeared. But there he was again the next evening, and the one after
that too. Each time he'd go off with one of the girls, then come back
and talk with her. Finally one night he did something unheard of. He
bought a full flask of kill-devil and proposed they take a walk down to
look at the ship.
God's life, as though she hadn't seen enough worn-out Dutch frigates. .
. .
Then she realized what was happening. This young English mate with a
scar on his cheek desired her, was paying court to her. He even seemed
to like her. Didn't he know she no longer entertained the trade
herself?
But Hugh was different. So, like a fool, she lost sight of her better
judgment. Later that night, she showed him how a woman differed from a
girl.
And she still found occasion to remind him from time to time, seven
years later. . . .
"I want to show you how I came by the idea I've been working on." He
abruptly rose and walked back to the bedroom. When he returned he was
carrying his two pistols, their long steel barrels damascened with gold
and the stocks fine walnut. He placed them carefully on the table, then
dropped back into his chair and reached for his tankard. "Take a look
at those."
"God's blood." She glanced at the guns and gave a tiny snort. "Every
time I see you, you've got another pair."
"I like to keep up with the latest designs."
"So tell me what's 'latest' about these."
"A lot of things. In the first place, the firing mechanism's a
flintlock. So when you pull the trigger, the piece of flint there in
the hammer strikes against the steel wing on the cap of the powder pan,
opening it and firing the powder in a single action. Also, the powder
pan loads automatically when the barrel's primed. It's faster and
better than a matchlock."
"That's lovely. But flintlocks have been around for some time, or
hadn't you heard?" She looked at the guns and took a sip of sack,
amused by his endless fascination with pistols. He'd always been that
way, but it was to a purpose. You'd be hard pressed to find a marksman
in the Caribbees better or faster than Hugh--a little talent left over
from his time with the Cow-Killers on Tortuga, though for some reason
he'd as soon not talk about those years. She glanced down again. "Is it
just my eyes, or do I see two barrels? Now I grant you this is the
first time I've come across anything like that. "
"Congratulations. That's what's new about this design. Watch." He
lifted up a gun and carefully touched a second trigger, a smaller one
in front of the first. The barrel assembly emitted a light click and
revolved a half turn, bringing up the second barrel, ready to fire.
"See, they're double-barreled. I hear it's called a 'turn-over'
mechanism--since when you pull that second trigger, a spring-loaded
assembly turns over a new barrel, complete with a primed powder pan."
He gripped the muzzle and revolved the barrels back to their initial
position. "This design's going to be the coming thing, mark it." He
laid the pistol back onto the table. "Oh, by the way, there's one other
curiosity. Have a look there on the breech. Can you make out the name?"
She lifted one of the flintlocks and squinted in the half-light. Just
in front of the ornate hammer there was a name etched in gold: "Don
Francisco de Castilla."
"That's more'n likely the gunsmith who made them. On a fine pistol
you'll usually see the maker's name there. You ought to know that." She
looked at him. "I didn't suppose you made them yourself, darlin'. I've
never seen that name before, but God knows there're lots of Spanish
pistols around the Caribbean. Everybody claims they're the best."
"That's what I thought the name was too. At first." He lifted his
tankard and examined the amber contents. "Tell me. How much do you know
about Jamaica?"
"What's that got to do with these pistols?"
"One thing at a time. I asked you what you know about Jamaica."
"No more'n everybody else does. It's a big island somewhere to the west
of here, that the Spaniards hold. There's supposed to be a harbor and a
fortress, and a little settlement they call Villa de la Vega, with
maybe a couple of thousand planters. But that's about all, from what I
hear, since the Spaniards've never yet found any gold or silver there."
She studied him, puzzling. "Why're you asking?"
"I've been thinking. Maybe I'll go over and poke around a bit." He
paused, then lowered his voice. "Maybe see if I can take the fortress."
" 'Maybe take the fortress,' you say?" She exploded with laughter and
reached for the sack. "I reckon I'd best put away this flask. Right
now."
"You don't think I can do it?"
"I hear the Spaniards've got heavy cannon in that fortress, and a big
militia. Even some cavalry. No Englishman's going to take it." She
looked at him. "Not wishing to offend, love, but wouldn't you say
that's just a trifle out of your depth?"
"I appreciate your expression of confidence." He settled his tankard on
the table. "Then tell me something else. Do you remember Jackson?"
"The famous 'Captain' Jackson, you mean?"
"Captain William Jackson."
"Sure, I recall that lying knave well enough." She snorted. "Who could
forget him. He was here for two months once, while you were out, and
turned Barbados upside down, recruiting men to sail against the
Spaniards' settlements on the Main. Claiming he was financed by the
Earl of Warwick. He sat drinking every night at this very table, then
left me a stack of worthless sight drafts, saying he'd be back in no
time to settle them in Spanish gold." She studied him for a moment.
"That was four years past. The best I know he was never heard from
since. For sure _I_ never heard from him." Suddenly she leaned forward.
"Don't tell me you know where he might be?"
"Not any more. But I learned last year what happened back then. It
turns out he got nothing on the Main. The Spaniards would empty any
settlement--Maracaibo, Puerto Cabello--he tried to take. They'd just
strip their houses and disappear into the jungle."
"So he went back empty-handed?"
"Wrong. That's what he wanted everybody to think happened. Especially
the Earl of Warwick. He kept on going." Winston lowered his voice
again, beyond reach of the men across the room. "I wouldn't believe
what he did next if I didn't have these pistols." He picked up one of
the guns and yelled toward the whist table. "John."
"Aye." Mewes was on his feet in an instant, wiping his hand across his
mouth.
"Remember where I got these flintlocks?"
"I seem to recall it was Virginia. Jamestown." He reached down and
lifted his tankard for a sip. Then he wiped his mouth a second time.
"An' if you want my thinkin', they was sold to you by the scurviest-
lookin' whoreson that ever claim'd he was English, that I'd not trust
with tuppence. An' that's the truth."
"Well . . ." She leaned back in her chair.
"Along with the pistols I also got part of the story of Jackson's
expedition. It seems this man had been with them--claimed he was first
mate on the flagship--but he'd finally jumped ship when Jackson tried
to storm a fortress up on the coast of Spanish Florida, then made his
way north to Virginia. He stole these pistols from Jackson's cabin the
night he swam ashore."
"Then I've half a mind to confiscate them here and now as payment for
my sight drafts." She inspected the guns. "But I still don't follow
what that's got to do with Jamaica."
He picked up one of the pistols again and traced his finger along the
flintlock. "The name. Don Francisco de Castilla. I kept thinking and
thinking, and finally I remembered. That's not a pistol maker. That's
the name of the Spanish governor of Villa de la Vega. Jamaica. "
"But then how did Jackson get them? I never saw these pistols when he
was here, and I'd have remembered them, you can be sure." She was
staring skeptically at the guns.
"That's what I began to wonder. So I tracked down the seller and found
out what really happened." He lowered his voice again. "Jackson got
them from de Castilla's personal strongbox. In the fortress. William
Jackson took Jamaica. He got the idea the Spaniards'd never be
expecting an attack that far from the Main, and he was right. So after
Maracaibo, he made way straight for Jamaica. He raised the bay at dawn,
brought the fleet together and put in for the harbor. The fortress, the
town, all of it, was his in a morning."
"But how could he hold the place? As soon as the Spaniards over on the
Main got word, they'd be sure to send a . . ."
"He didn't bother. He delivered the town back in return for provisions
and a ransom of twenty thousand pieces of eight. Split the money with
his men and swore them to secrecy. But he kept these pistols." Winston
smiled. "Except now they're mine."
"Hold a minute. I'm afraid I'm beginning to see what you're thinking."
She leaned forward, alarm in her eyes. "So let me tell you a few
things. About that little expedition of Jackson's. That fast-talking
rogue put in here with three armed frigates. He raised over five
hundred men and God knows how many muskets. I saw them all off, holding
my valuable sight drafts, the day he set sail out of Carlisle Bay."
"But what if I got more men?"
"In God's name, who from?"
"Who do you think?" He ran his fingers through his hair and looked
away. "I've been thinking it over for months. Well, now I've made up my
mind. What the hell are the Americas for? Slavery?" He looked back.
"I'm going to take Jamaica, and keep it. It'll be the one place in the
New World where there'll be no indentures. No slaves. Just free men.
The way it was on Tortuga."
"Christ on a cross, you've totally taken leave of sense!" She looked at
him dumbfounded. "You'd best stop dreaming about Jamaica and put your
deep mind to work on how you're going to collect those sight bills from
the Council. You've got to make a living, love."
"The sight bills are part of my plan. As it happens, I expect to settle
that very item next Friday night."
"Best of luck." She paused, then pushed back from the table. "God's
blood, were you invited?"