Gene Wolfe - Pirate Freedom

"Naturally not, Hal. I'm saying only that if our Judas was there, he'd have spoken as the rest did-and might, perhaps, have suggested Portobello. The ideal result of our meetin'-from his perspective, mind-would be for me and some others to go off after Maracaibo, while he and the rest went elsewhere. He might've asked himself where Bram Burt wouldn't care to go, d'ye see? And been answered Portobello, for saucy Bram knows Portobello to be a hellhole.

"Of them that was at the meetin', who could Bram trust then, shipmates?"

I said, "Only Captain Harker here, I would think."

"Well said, Chris, but there's one other. Besides myself."

I probably looked as blank as my mind was at that moment.

"Hal? Care to have a go?"

He shook his head.

"Senora? You've a long head."

"Capitan Isham, I think. Because you have say nothing of him here."

"Clever." Capt. Burt smiled and leaned toward us, his elbows on the table. "Clever, but not right. No, I ask you, shipmates, if you had played Judas with Spain, and had afterward found letters saying the Spanish had been warned, would you tell Bram Burt?"

Novia shook her head.

I said, "I see."

"So you should, Chris. There's a good reason to trust Goslin', and here's another. When the rest went off to Panama and left me, who stayed by me? Why, it was Goslin' again. You with him, to be sure, and your man Rombeau. So there's four captains I can trust. I suppose everybody'd like a spot more wine?"

When it had been poured, Novia said, "Four to trust, but I do not count four here."

"Correct, Senora. Goslin' spoke against Maracaibo at the meetin'. If I was to say to him what I've said to you today, he'd always think he was not trusted. He is, but he'd think the contrary, d'ye see? I wouldn't want that. You can't trust a man who thinks he ain't trusted, Senora, and you can make book on that. As for Rombeau, I called him Chris's man, which he is. It's my wish he should make fast there, for the time bein'. If he were drinkin' with us now, he'd begin to think himself Chris's equal, and I don't want it. Do you, Senora?"

Captain Burt had told us we would be going to the Bay of Campeche. We did, but first we took a sort of working vacation in the Saint Blaise Islands. They are small and very lush-sort of jungle light-and there must be hundreds of them. Because the sea breezes tend to blow away flying bugs, they are nowhere near as bug-ridden as the lowlands of Darien or Hispaniola. You get beautiful beaches, big trees (mostly cedars), and parrots everywhere. Altogether, it is about as nice a place as I have ever seen.

The people are Kunas, like those we knew in Darien. Our Kunas there had been small, smaller than we were and smaller than the Moskitos. These Island Kunas were smaller yet, but they spoke the same language and seemed to have about the same customs. That was when I really wished Novia had let me bring Pinkie back with us when we left Santa Maria. I do not believe there would have been any trouble about getting her on board, and when we reached the islands she could have interpreted for us and I would have known a lot more Kuna than I did.

As it was, all of us did our best to make friends. The Kuna did not have anything we wanted, and it was pretty obvious that they would be good people to have on our side. We explained as well as we could that we were not Spanish and would not raid them for slaves the way the Spanish did. We were the enemies of the Spanish, who were their enemies, too. We proved it by giving them hatchets, axes, knives, and needles, the same kinds of gifts we had given the other Kuna. The Island Kuna liked them as much as the others had, and repaid us with meat, fish, and fruit.

We careened two ships there and scraped their bottoms, and made some other repairs. We also loafed a lot and ate a lot of fruit, and I taught Novia how to swim. At that time, I do not believe I had gone swimming since I had been on Hispaniola, and it was good to get back into the water. Once we were joined by two Kuna girls who could swim like seals, and anybody who saw the three of them playing would have found it easy to believe there were girls with fish tails right over the next wave. I have had some bad times in my life, but I have had a lot of wonderful times, too, times I would love to go back to. That was one of those.

Another one was just this morning. I bundled up in my sweater, my overcoat, and so on, and unlocked the church so I could go in to say my mass. (We have to say mass every day, whether anybody comes or not.) The furnace had been turned down the night before, and the church was so cold that there was a skin of ice on the fonts. But the warm presence of God was waiting, and He and I were alone in there together. After I had received, I was no longer aware of Him.

But I knew that He had not gone away. The logwood cutters lived in the swamps and cut a kind of wood used to make red dye. They said it pays better than anything else a man can do, but their living conditions are about as bad as living conditions can get. Imagine the march to Santa Maria-the part through the lowlands. Now imagine living like that all the time. Imagine sleeping in a swamp and eating in a swamp. Instead of marching with the hope of getting out, you go off each day to fell trees and haul logs. The Spanish try to drive the logwood cutters out from time to time, just like they did when we were buccaneers on Hispaniola. It comes, and it goes. That is what the cutters say. They fight if there are not too many Spanish, and hide in the swamps if there are.

They fight with Spanish logwood cutters, too.

We signed up a few men-three for my ship-but not what we had hoped.

The Cimaroons were something else. I have seen some tough men, but I never saw any tougher than they were. Most are black-escaped slaves, and men whose fathers were escaped slaves. Some are Zambo Moskitos, some white. (The whites are mostly runaway slaves, too.) We went ashore and talked with them, explaining what we wanted. They said they would talk it over that night and call us in the morning.

Right.

We were keeping a close watch, because we were almost within shouting distance of the Spanish Main, and there was no port. If the weather had looked like it was going to get rough, we would have to get out to sea in a hurry. Novia and I woke up in the middle of the night, and when we were both sweaty and out of breath we decided to go up on deck, look at the moon, and cool off.

Everything seemed to be in good shape. Boucher was officer of the watch, and he was awake and nearly sober. There was a man at the wheel and another at the masthead, both awake, and the moon-one of those thin crescent moons that always look prettier than anything has a right to-was setting behind the trees. Novia and I watched it go down, tangling itself in the branches and shining through the leaves.

Then she pointed, and I saw a piragua putting out, all dark and not making a sound that I could hear. To its left there was another, and another to its right.

I smacked Boucher a pretty good one, yelled, "Are you blind!," jerked the pistol out of his belt, and fired it in the air.

That woke the watch and we had the guns run out and firing before the piraguas had covered half the distance from shore. That woke men on the Magdelena, the Weald, and Gosling's Snow Lady. The piraguas scooted back, and when the sun came up there were twenty or thirty bodies floating in the water.

Pretty soon some Cimaroons hailed us just as nice as you please and said they wanted to join us, and would we kindly come ashore and pick them up?

We said no thanks, just swim on out and we will throw ropes to you so you can climb on board-no more than ten on each ship.

Eventually they paddled out in piraguas, carrying muskets, hatchets, cane knives, and so forth. Twenty-six came aboard Sabina. I do not remember how many went to the other ships. I looked them over and sent back all those who had any kind of wound. That left about twenty. After that, I let my officers pick out one man each, telling each officer that he was responsible for that man and was to kill him if he found him plotting with the rest. At that time, we had a quartermaster (Red Jack), a first mate (Bouton), a second mate (Boucher), a third mate (O'Leary), a bosun (Corson), a bosun's mate (Dell), a gunner (Hansen), and a gunner's mate (Maas). So that took care of eight.