Part 7

“Just sing. This was what he sung. He sung all the time. No. He didn’t laugh. He just whined a little and sang.”

The pirate dropped his voice to a whimper and sang:--

“Tom, Tom, the piper’s son, Learned to pipe when he was young, And all the tunes that he could play Was over the hills and far away.

There’s many like handsome Jim. I’ve knowed a many go that way. The Main’s a hard place, the same as the sea is, if you come to that.”

“Ah,” said Perrin. “How ghastly.”

Captain Margaret said nothing; for in his lively fancy he saw a half-naked man, lying on the deck, surrounded by pirates, who watched him with a sort of hard pity. The sun shone strongly upon the picture, so that the brass cannon gleamed. Out of the wrecked man’s body came a snatch of a nursery rhyme, with a pathetic tune. He felt the horror of it; he saw how the pirates shifted on their feet and looked at each other. He was tempted to ask, “Had one of your men a hare-lip?” for in the picture which his fancy formed a hare-lipped pirate stood out strangely, seemingly stirred by that horror on the deck. “Fancy,” he thought. “Pure fancy.”

“Let me fill your glass, Cammock,” he said. He poured another dose into the glass.

“Salue,” said the pirate.

A red log, burned through, fell with a crash inside the stove.

“Sparks,” said the pirate. “Sparks. We give the Dagoes sparks for that lot.” He paused a moment. “Yes, Captain Margaret,” he went on. “And that’s the way you’d best.”

“What way is that?” asked the captain.

“Well. It’s like this,” said the captain. “Your trading lay--I’m speaking as a sailor, you understand--is all Barney’s bull. It’s got more bugs than brains, as you might say. But you don’t want to go trading. What d’yer want to go trading for? You’d only get et by sand-flies, even if you did make a profit. What you want to do. You got a big ship. You’d easy get hands enough. Well, what I say is, why not go for one of the towns? Morgan done it. Sharp done it. Old John Coxon done it, for I was with him. And the French and Dutch done it, too; don’t I know it. If you come on ’em with a sort of a hawky pounce you get ’em every time. Profit, too. There’s twenty or thirty pound a man in it. Besides ransoms. There’s no work in it, like in trading. If you’re trading, you got to watch your stores, you got to watch the Indians, you got to kowtow to the chiefs. Pah. It’s a poor job, trade is. It’s not a seaman’s job. But you come down on the towns. Why. Half your life. I wish I’d been wise when I was a young man. That’s what I ought to a done, ’stead of logwood cutting.”

“What towns would you advise?” said Captain Margaret, smiling.

“Well. Here’s a map.” Cammock opened his book to show a map of the Terra Firme from La Vera Cruz to Trinidad. “It’s rough,” he explained. “But it’ll just show you. All them red dots is towns. And what I say is, take them. That’s the only way you’ll help the Indians, as you call it. Help them? You won’t help them much when you get among them, I’ll tell you that much. The Main alters people.”

“Oh,” said Margaret quietly. “So that’s what you think. Why do you think that? What reason can you give?”

“Well, take it on military grounds, sir,” said Cammock. “You’ll have to admit it on military grounds.”

Stukeley pretended to choke with laughter; it was an offensive act.

“Stukeley’s turning sick again,” said Perrin dryly.

“Well. On military grounds then,” said Margaret. “I want to hear your reason.”

“Look, sir. Look at my two fists. This right fist, here, is Carta-Yaina. This left fist is Portobel or La Vera Cruz. Now these here counters. You’ll excuse my taking your counters, Mrs. Stukeley. These here counters are the Samballoes islands in between. Now. On military grounds. Suppose I knock my fists together. The counters get a nasty jounce.”

“I see,” said Margaret. “We should be the nut between two crackers.”

“Yes, sir. You would. And take it as a matter of business. You’d be on the trade route, or jolly near it, between the crackers; besides being able to flank the overland route from Panama to Portobel. They’d never set still to let you establish yourself among them. Why, you’d as well ask them to cut their own throats. You’d have to destroy their towns first. Portobel’s nothing very much. It’s been took twice within the last few years; but you can never really settle Portobel till you settle Panama; and to do that you’d want a fleet in the South Sea to settle Lima. To make yourself secure. Quite secure. Secure enough for the King of England to back you up. You know what that means. The enemy beat, and the spoils your own, that’s what makes King James your friend. God save him, I say, and bring him glory. To put yourself in that position, you’d have to take the two big naval ports on the North Sea, both of them. Carta-Yaina and La Vera Cruz. For jabbing an enemy’s no use at all. A prick here and there’s nothing. Nothing at all. Smash the naval ports first, and then the place is your own. Go for the main stem and you’ll get the whole tree. Upset Carta-Yaina alone, and La Vera Cruz wouldn’t bother you very bad; but till Carta-Yaina’s yours---- Well, honestly, Captain Margaret, you’ll never be let settle down, not on the Isthmus. But. I don’t know so much. It might. I’ll think it over.”

During Cammock’s speech, Stukeley had made occasional offensive interruptions; but he said nothing when Cammock ended. Olivia, being ignorant of the exact nature of the question discussed, through her ignorance of geography, waited for her husband to speak. Perrin, who had gone into the matter thus far with Margaret, to his own boredom, now waited, half asleep, for his friend to say something more. He hoped that no one would ask him for an opinion that evening. He knew nothing much about it, one way or the other, and cared little; believing only that his friend, who could do no wrong, would be the man to uphold against all comers. As the active part of him, never very violent now, was idle to-night, he gave himself up to torpor, keeping his mind a blank, paying little attention to the words of any one. To Cammock, whom he liked, he was polite. Indeed, Cammock’s glass was seldom less than half-full all through the evening. Now and then he wished that the meeting would end, so that he could turn in. He lay back in his chair, looking at the faces of the company, wishing that he had his friend’s charm, and Cammock’s bodily strength, and Stukeley’s insolent carriage. It must be good, he thought, to be indifferent, like that, to people’s feelings. And if he had all three gifts, what would he do with it? He looked at Olivia, as she sat there, upright in her chair, listening carefully to all that he said. “Yes,” he thought, “you’re taking it all in, all that you understand, and thinking what you’ll make your husband do. And you’re beautiful,” he added to himself. “In that black silk, with the green about your hair, you’re---- Yes, Charles was right. I never saw it before. You’re beautiful.”

“Olivia,” he said aloud, “will you let me get you a little wine and some fruit? This must be so awfully dull for you.”

“Oh, I like it,” she answered quickly. “I like it.”

“Do you, really?” said Margaret. “Well. We’ll go on. Let me see your map, Captain Cammock.”

He took the dirty piece of vellum from Captain Cammock, and examined the coast-line. There were manuscript notes written here and there across the Isthmus. Captain Margaret read: “Don Andrea’s Cuntrey.” “K Golden Cap went with Capt S from here.” “The Indians washes for Gold on this Side.” Mountains and forests had been added to the map in water-colours. A ship or two, under all plain sail, showed upon the seas. In among the islands a hand had added soundings and anchorages in red ink. He looked among the network of islands, remembering the many stories he had read of them, fascinated by the thought that here, before him, was one who could make that marked piece of vellum significant.

“Tell me,” he said. “These keys here. La Sound’s Key and Springer’s Key. Are they well known to your people?”

“Yes,” said the pirate.

“Do the Spaniards ever search among these islands? Do they send guarda-costas?”

“Not them. Not to hurt. They’ve no really organized force on the Main. Nor’ve they got any charts to go by. They aren’t hard any longer. Only soft, the Spaniards. Why, there’s often a matter of a dozen sail of privateers come to them keys, at the one time.”

“Why do they come there?”

“Water, sir. Then the Indians bring gold dust. Sometimes they land and go for a cruise ashore. Lots of ’em make money that way, where the Spaniards don’t expect them.”

“Have they buildings there?”

“No. When they careen their ships, the Indians build huts for them. Very nice, too, the huts are. Palmeto and that.”

“Then the Indians are friendly?”

“Yes. Sometimes there’s a row, of course.”

“Why don’t the privateers combine, to found a kingdom there? They could so easily.”

“They never agree among ’emselves,” said the pirate. “Quarrelsome ducks. That’s what they are.”

“And if a strong man got hold of them and made them agree?”

“Then. Yes. Perhaps. They might be a thundering great nation. But then there’s the Main. It changes people. It’s hard to say. It’s different from talking by the fire.”

“Well,” said Captain Margaret. “I shall try it. I believe it could be done. And it’s worth trying.”

“I believe you’d do it, if any one. Morgan’d ’ave done it perhaps. But Sir Henry was weak you know. Rum. Well, sir. If you can do it. You’ll be in the story-books.”

“What is this place here? This Boca del Toro? Away to the west here? You sometimes meet here, don’t you, in order to plan a raid?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Is it a good anchorage? It doesn’t seem to be much of a harbour.”

“No, sir; Toro’s just an anchorage, out of the way, like. We goes to Toro for turtle. Very good turtle on Toro. Them Mosquito boys gets ’em with spears. You see ’em paddle out, Mrs. Stukeley, two of these red Indians in a boat, and they just paddle soft, paddle soft, as still as still, and they come up to the turtles as they lie asleep in the sea, and then. Whang. They dart their fizgigs. They never miss.”

Olivia looked at Cammock with quickened interest; but she did not speak. She was now leaning forward, over the table, resting her chin upon her hands, probably with some vague belief that her throat was beautiful and that these stupid men would never notice it. She may have been conscious of her power. Yet perhaps she was not. She may have given too much of herself to Stukeley; she may have tuned too many of her emotional strings to that one note, to feel how other men regarded her.

“Look, Olivia,” said Margaret. He placed the map before her.

Perrin and Cammock put out each a hand, to hold the curling vellum flat for her. She looked at the map as a sibyl would have looked at the golden scroll; she looked rapt; her great eyes shone so. She put out one hand to flatten the vellum, and to Margaret, watching her, it seemed that her whole nature was expressed in that one act, and that her nature was beautiful, too beautiful for this world. Her finger-tip touched Perrin’s finger-tip, for one instant, as she smoothed the map’s edge; and to Perrin it seemed that his life would be well passed in the service of this lady. She was, oh, wonderfully beautiful, he thought; but not like other women. She was so strange, so mysterious, and her voice thrilled so. In dreams, in those dreams of beauty which move us for days together, he had seen that beauty before; she had come to him, she had saved him; her healing hands had raised him, bringing him peace. “She says nothing,” he said to himself; “but life is often like that. I have talked with people sometimes whose bodies seemed to be corpses. And all the time they were wonderful, possessed of devils and angels.”

As for Cammock, her beauty moved him, too; her voice moved him. In his thoughts he called her “my handsome.” He was moved by her as an old gardener is touched by the beauty of his master’s child. His emotion was partly awe, partly pity. Pity for himself, partly; because he could never now be worthy of moving in her company, although he felt that he would be a better mate for her than the brandy-sipper on the locker-top. She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen; she was like a spirit; like a holy thing. Looking at her, as she studied the map, he thought of an image in the cathedral of Panama. He had been with Morgan in the awful march from Chagres. He had fought in the morning, outside Panama, till his face, all bloody and powder-burnt, was black like a devil’s. Then, he remembered, they had stormed old Panama, fighting in the streets, across barricades, over tables, over broken chairs, while the women fired from the roofs. Then they had rushed the Plaza, to see the flames licking at all the glorious city. They had stormed a last barricade to reach the Plaza. There had been twenty starving pirates with him, all blind with drink and rage. They had made a last rush, clubbing and spearing and shooting, killing man, woman, and child. They swore and shrieked as they stamped them under. And then he, with two mates, had opened a postern in the cathedral, and had passed in, from all those shrieks, from all that fire and blood, to an altar, where an image knelt, full of peace, beautiful beyond words, in the quiet of the holy place. He remembered the faint smell of incense, the memory of a scent, which hung about that holy place. The vague scent which Olivia used reminded him of it. “_She_ is like that,” he thought, “and I am _that_. That still.”

Margaret glanced at Stukeley, who seemed to be asleep. “I suppose, captain,” he said, “I suppose, then, that you would recommend one of these keys in the Samballoes, as you call them?”

“Yes, sir,” said Cammock. “I’ll tell you why. You’re handy for the Indians, that’s one great point. You’re hidden from to seaward, in case the Spanish fleet should come near, going to Portobello fair. You’re within a week’s march of all the big gold mines. You’ve good wood and water handy. And you could careen a treat, if your ship got foul. Beside being nice and central.”

“Which of these two keys do you recommend?”

“La Sound’s Key is the most frequented,” answered Cammock. “You often have a dozen sloops in at La Sound’s. They careen there a lot. You see there’s mud to lay your ship ashore on. And very good brushwood if you wish to give her a breaming.”

“I see. And the Indians come there, you say?”

“Oh yes, sir. There’s an Indian village on the Main just opposite. Full of Indians always. La Sound’s is an exchange, as you might say.”

“If I went there, in this big ship, should I be likely to get into touch with the privateer captains? I mean, to make friends with them.”

“You’d meet them all there, from time to time, sir--Coxon, Tristian, Yanky Dutch, Mackett; oh, all of them.”

“All friends of yours?”

“No, sir. Some of them is French and Dutch. They come from Tortuga and away east by Curaçoa. That’s a point I can tell you about. Don’t you make too free with the French and Dutch, sir. You stick by your own countrymen. I’ll tell you why, sir. If you let them ducks in to share, the first you’ll know is they’ve put in a claim for their own country. They’ll say that the settlement is theirs; that we’re intruding on them. Oh, they will. I know ’em. And they’ll trick you, too. They’ll get their own men-of-war to come and kick you out, like they done at St. Kitts, and at Tortuga.”

“That would hardly suit. But is La Sound’s more of a French and Dutch resort than Springer’s?”

“Yes, sir. Since Captain Sharp’s raid. Ever since that, we’ve been as it were more separated. And then there was trouble at the isle of Ash; they done us out of a sloop; so we done them in return. Springer’s is the place the Englishmen goes to, now. Oh, and Golden Island, this easterly island here. But Springer’s Key is the best of them. Though we goes to La Sound’s Key, mind you, whenever we’re planning a raid.”

“Then---- By the way. Who is Springer?”

“He was a privateer, sir. He got lost on the Main one time. He was in Alleston’s ship at that time. He got lost, out hunting for warree. He wandered around in the woods there, living on sapadilloes, till one day he come to a river, and floated down it on a log. He’d sense enough for that. Generally men go mad in the woods at the end of the first day.”

“Mad,” said Olivia. “But why do they do that?”

“It’s the loneliness, Mrs. Stukeley. You seem shut in, in those woods. Shut in. A great green wall. It seems to laugh at you. And you get afraid, and then you get thirsty. Oh, I’ve felt it. You go mad. Lucky for you, you do, Mrs. Stukeley.”

“How horrible. Isn’t that awful, Charles?”

“Yes. Awful. But Springer kept his head, you say?”

“No, sir. I’m inclined to think Springer got a turn. The sun’ll give it you. Or that green wall laughing; or just thirst. When I talked with Springer, he told me as he come to a little stone city on a hill, all grown over with green. An old ruined city. About a hundred houses. Quite small. And what d’you think was in it, Mrs. Stukeley?”

“I don’t know at all. Nothing very horrible, I hope. No. Not if it’s going to be horrible.”

“Well. It was horrible. But there was gold on every one of them. Gold plates. Gold masks. And gold all over the rooms. Now if that’s true, it’s mighty queer. But I think he’d got a turn, ma’am. I don’t think things was right with Springer. Living all alone in the woods, and then living all alone on the key. It very likely put him off. I was to have gone with him, searching for it, one time; but I never did.”

Stukeley seemed to wake up suddenly.

“You must have been a fool,” he said.

“Why? Acos I thought of going?” said Cammock.

“No. Because you didn’t go. I suppose you know which river he came down. And whereabouts he got on the log?”

“Oh yes,” said Cammock; “better than I know you, Mr. Stukeley.”

“What d’you mean?” said Stukeley.

“Nothing,” said Cammock. “The very last time I saw Ed Springer, we talked it all out. And he told me all he remembered, and we worked it out together, whereabouts he must have got to. You see, Mrs. Stukeley, Springer went a long way. He was lost---- And we were going to look for it together.”

“Why didn’t you?” said Stukeley. “Were you afraid?”

“Yes,” replied Cammock curtly; “I was.”

Thinking that there would be an open quarrel, Captain Margaret interrupted. “And you think Springer’s Key would be the best for us?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Here is Springer’s Key on the map. Come here, Stukeley, and just cast your eye over it.”

Stukeley advanced, and put his hand on Olivia’s shoulder, drawing her against him, as he leaned over to see the map. She stroked the caressing hand, only conscious of the pleasure of her husband’s caress. She had no thought of what the sight meant to Margaret.

Perrin felt for his friend. “Put it to the vote, Charles,” he said hastily.

“Very well then,” said Margaret. “Shall we decide then? To go to Springer’s Key?”

“Is it a pleasant place?” said Olivia. “Don’t, Tom.” She gave the hand a little slap.

“Very pleasant, Mrs. Stukeley. A island with huge big cedars on it--aromatic cedars--as red as blood; and all green parrots. Wells. Good drinking wells. Wonderful flowers. If you’re fond of flowers, ma’am.”

“What sorts are they?”

“Arnotto roses, and yellow violet trees. Oh, lots of them.”

“Oh, then, Springer’s Key, certainly.”

“Springer’s Key,” said Stukeley and Perrin.

“The ayes have it.”

“Very well, then,” said Margaret. “We’ll decide for Springer’s Key.”

“One other thing, sir,” said Cammock. “There’s the difficulty about men. We’ve forty-five men in the ship here, mustering boys and idlers. And that’s not enough. It’s not enough to attract allies. Of course, I quite see, if you’d shipped more in London, in a ship of this size, it would have looked odd. It might have attracted notice. The Spaniards watch the Pool a sight more’n you think. But you want more. And you want choice weapons for them.” He paused for a second to watch Captain Margaret’s face, then, seeing no change upon it, continued, “I know you got twenty long brass eighteens among the ballast.”

“How did you know that?” said Margaret.

“Well, you have, sir,” said Cammock, grinning, “and small-arms in proportion. You can fortify Springer’s with a third of that lot. Now you want another forty or fifty men, at least, and then you’ll be boss dog. Every privateer captain will come saying, ‘Oh, Massa’ to you.”

“Yes,” said Perrin. “It seems to me that there’ll be a difficulty in getting men. You see we want really a drill force.”

“No difficulty about men in Virginia, sir. Lots of good men, regular old standards, tough as hickory, at Accomac, and along the James River.”

“What do they do there?” said Perrin.

“Lots of ’em come there,” said Cammock evasively. “They tobacco plants, and they trap them things with fur on, and some on ’em fishes. Lots of ’em come there.”

“Where from?” asked Captain Margaret pointedly.

“Most everywhere,” said Cammock, looking on the deck.

“Campeachy?” said the captain.

“Most everywhere, sir,” repeated Cammock.

“Writs hard to serve there?”

“Every one has his misfortunes,” said Cammock hotly. “But they’re a better lot there than you’d get anywhere in the islands, let me tell you that. I’ve known a power of men among them, fine men. They might be a bit rough and that; but they do stand by a fellow.”

“Yes,” said Captain Margaret, “I dare say. But I don’t want them to stand by a fellow. I want them to stand by an idea.”

“They’ll stand by anything so long as you’ve a commission,” said Captain Cammock.

“And obey orders?”

“Now, sir. In England, everybody knuckles down to squires and lords. But among the privateers there aren’t any squires and lords. Nor in Virginia, where the old privateers tobacco plants. A man stands by what he is in himself. If you can persuade the privateers that you’re a better man than their captains; and some of them are clever generals, mind. They’ve been fighting Spaniards all their lives. Well. You persuade ’em that you’re a better man. You show ’em that. And they’ll be your partners. As for hands in the ship here, and ship’s discipline. They aren’t particularly good at being ordered about. They’re accustomed to being free, and having their share in the councils. But you give them some little success on the Main, and you’ll find they’ll follow you anywhere. You give out that you’re going against Tolu, say. You take Tolu, say, and give ’em ten pound a man.”

“Then they’ll want to go ashore to spend it.”

“Not if you give ’em a dice-box or two. You won’t be able to wage them, like you wage hands, at sixteen shillen a month.”

Olivia, who seemed disconcerted at the thought of sitting down at a council with a crowd of ragged sailors, now asked if it would not be possible to wage them, if they explained the circumstances.

“You say they are tobacco-planting in Virginia. Why should they not plant on the Main and supply all the ships which come to us, besides fighting the Spaniards when the crops are growing?”