Gene Wolfe - Pirate Freedom

"Si, Captain. If there is no carpenter aboard."

"Make sails?"

"If you have no sailmaker, Captain."

Jarden asked, "What of treating wounded men?"

Antonio shook his head. "No better than you, Captain."

"You cannot do everything in such a case."

Antonio shrugged. "I have done it, but I have seen other men do it better."

I asked, "Can you navigate?"

He smiled. "Si, Captain. I am a skilled navigator."

"Can you teach others to navigate?"

He rubbed his beard again. "It is long since I have done that, Captain. But yes. Where there are instruments, I can."

Jarden told me, "You can navigate already."

"I know," I told him, "but Rombeau can't, and neither can you. I could teach you as much as I know, but Antonio here may know more than I do. For sure, he'll have more time to do it than I will."

"I ought to be on deck," Jarden said. "Are you about finished?"

"Almost." I motioned toward the door. "Go ahead if you want to." Actually I wanted him out. With him gone I could have spoken straight Spanish. I knew that better, and it would have saved a lot of time.

"I shall wait until you finish in that case."

"Swell. Antonio, did you offer to join the pirates who took the San Mateo?"

He shook his head.

"Why not? You were willing to join Captain Jarden here."

"Captain Burt wanted only young men, Captain, and wanted no married men. I am married and no longer young."

I had hardly gotten past the second word. "Wait up! Captain Burt was the one who took your ship?"

"Yes, Captain. He was."

Jarden said, "Do you know him?"

I nodded. "He's an old friend. I'd like to hook up with him, if-"

Right then is when they started shouting out on deck.

Do you know the joke about the turtle getting mugged by two snails? When the police ask what the snails looked like, the turtle says, "I… don't… know… It… all… happened… so… fast…"

That was what it was like. It probably took fifteen or twenty minutes really. But Jarden, Antonio, and I were running around like crazy, yelling at people and trying to get things done, and it seemed like the whole thing was over before it started.

When we got out on deck, there was a Spanish galleon making for us, all plain sail set and heeling to a quartering wind. Jarden's crew was loosing the sails as fast as they could, which was not very fast, and trying to get Rosa under way. Azuka was screaming at nobody, and the first thing I did was to make her shut up.

The second was not much different. The lookout who had not spotted the Spaniard until she was on top of us was still yelling from the masthead. I laid aloft and told him to shut the hell up and get down and do some work. After that I helped with the mainsail.

Magdelena had more sail set than we did-Rombeau had a heck of a lot more men-and was firing her stern chaser. The Spaniard's bow chasers started answering as I watched, and the men at those guns were faster than ours. I would have tried to get Rosa's stern chasers into action if she had any. She did not.

I wish I could say now that we went flying down the wind. Magdelena did, and was out of range before long. If God had blessed us with a handy crew and a whole lot more luck, we might have gotten away, too. As it was, we did not have either of those things. There at the end, I was just hoping that the Spaniard would chase Magdelena and let us alone.

It did not happen like that. I was on the quarterdeck trying to surrender when the Spaniard fired her broadside into us. It killed two or three men and knocked down the mainmast. After that, the Spanish captain accepted my surrender. I could have kissed him. You can laugh at that all you want, but a second before he did it I was certain we were all going to die in the next five minutes.

It would have been nice if I had been brought before him for some witty conversation. That was how it happened in one pirate movie I watched on TV. It was not like that for us, and I never even learned his name. We were boarded by what seemed like a hundred Spaniards and roughed up quite a bit. Then the Spanish officer, a young guy who was probably some kind of junior officer, had our hands tied behind us.

That was when Antonio yelled that he was no pirate, he had been captured on the San Mateo and so forth. I got close enough to tell the Spanish officer it was the truth. I told him I was the pirate captain, these were my men, and Antonio was our prisoner. I was hoping, of course, that Antonio would help us if he were free. I got smacked hard enough to knock me off my feet for my trouble, and Antonio was thrown into the hold with the rest of us.

I have had worse moments in my life, but that was a bad one. They put the hatch cover on when we were all inside and battened it down. Once it was closed, that hold was as dark as the inside of a cow. Somebody began cursing in French. He was pretty good at it and kept it up for a while before he started repeating himself. Finally I told him to shut up. My jaw still hurt, and I was not real nice about it.

"You are no longer captain! You are food for the gallows bird. We are all food for the gallows bird!"

"That's right," I said. "That's what I'm hoping to fix. If you want to hang, keep on cussing and I'll see to it as soon as possible."

He started calling me names, but he had not gotten very far with it when a woman's voice whispered, "Would you like me to put your knife in him, Chris? I have it."

"Azuka?"

"Who else?" She kissed me. "Am I still so black? Down here?"

"I never saw anything wrong with black. Cut my hands loose, will you?"

She tickled my chin. "Let me stab him for you first. It will teach him a lesson."

Jarden must have overheard us. He yelled, "Be silent, Michet!"

"Who cares what you say, gallows-food?"

I told Azuka, "I want you to kiss him on the cheek for me, and make two cuts there afterward. Deep scratches is all, because we're going to need him. A cross, okay? It doesn't have to be perfect. Can you do that? His feet are loose, and he may try to kick you."

Her voice got louder. "If he kicks I will stab him no matter what you say."

After that it was as still in that hold as I have ever heard it. Sure, there was a little chop to the sea. Maybe the timbers creaked, and you could probably hear the slap of waves on the hull sometimes if you listened for it. But everybody seemed to be holding his breath, and the silence was so thick you could feel it pressing on your face.

"I have done as you told me." Azuka was back. It seemed like an hour later. "The right cheek."

"He didn't kick you?"

"I would have killed him. He knows that."

"Or make a noise when you nicked him? I was listening for some and didn't hear any. He's got balls, that Michet. A real soldier. Now cut me loose."

My hands were numb by then, but I felt my arms move as Azuka started working on the ropes. She said, "I could cut off les couilles, if that would make you feel better."

"Nope. We're going to need them."

She stopped sawing my ropes. "Azuka saves you, Chris. Are you going to marry me?"

"Cut rope. I marry." (That was Willy.)

"I have a good offer. You must say at once. Will you marry me, Chris?"

"What about Estrellita?" The ropes seemed looser. I was trying to work my hands out.

"Marry her, too. Such men as you have many. I will not object."

Jarden said, "Free me, Azuka, and I will marry you and shoot that sponge Michet."

Azuka said, "We will be most happy together, Chris darling." She sort of moaned it, rubbing her hip against me and having the time of her life.

By that time I knew I was going to get my hands loose. I could feel the life rushing back into them. It hurt, but that was fine with me. I said, "I wish you two well, and I'm going to give you a swell present as soon as we have the ceremony. Only we need Michet. We need every man."