Thomas Hoover - Caribbee

"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."