George Fraser - The Pyrates

“… all the way to England, camarado, dogging the King’s ship that brought you, till we sighted Portland, when we dropped ashore, while Bilbo lay off, d’ye see? When we had word o’ where ye was bound, we shipped aboard as focsle-jacks, and –” here he winked a shrewd Calico Jack wink “– with a score or so stout lads as we can count on, look’ee. Bilbo’s been tipped the word, and lays course south for a rendezvous agreed wi’ Akbar the Damned an’ Happy Dan Pew …”

“– an’ when the time comes, a right merry meeting we’ll ha’ on’t, rack, rat, an’ rend me for a sea-slug else!” chortled Firebeard. “Har-har! These misbegotten King’s pimps don’t dream what a flock o’ lovin’ lambs they’s got aboard – an’ when Bilbo and the lads lays alongside – why, good day an’ good-bye to ’em, honest men! Then, little Sheba darlin’,” gibbered the hairy scoundrel, “ye can pay ’em for this sal-oobrious accommodation, an’ this jewellery they’ve give ye!” And he jingled her fetters gleefully.

“Oh, friends!” Sheba, the proud, fearless sea-queen who gutted Spaniards before breakfast, and had been known to roast cathedralfuls of nuns just for laughs, choked back a sob of pure feminine emotion. A tear welled on her dusky cheek, and Firebeard wiped it tenderly away with the tail of his shirt, blushing coyly to the eyelids, the only part of him visible through his tangle of hair. “Dear comrades,” continued Sheba, “I know not what to say … shall we barbecue ’em first and keelhaul them after? Or flog and carbonado them, and then disembowel and flay them by inches? Could we, perchance, do all six, and woold and dismember them later on? Oh, I know these are mere womanly fancies,” she went on, with a catch in her voice, “but it’s been so long! And if it’s the last thing I do –” she clenched her fists till her chains rattled, and ground her pearly teeth “– I’m going to fix that stuck-up little blonde bitch in the St Laurent outfit with the puffed sleeves and those pleated seams going round above the hips and gathered in under the little bows along the back so that it fits snug at the waist and looks as though it’s creaseless material and probably costs a bloody fortune to have altered supposing you can get a woman to do it. She won’t,” Sheba added venomously, “have much use for it by the time I’m through with her –”

“There, there,” said Firebeard soothingly, patting her manacled ankle with his great paw, “she han’t got near such nice legs as you, I’ll lay, an’ I bet she sunburns somethin’ rotten – ha, Calico?”

“Patience, camarado,” said Rackham. “There’s long sea-miles to go afore we call our reckonin’ – so mum, an’ leave all to us.”

As they were going, Sheba suddenly checked them. “Calico, wait. When they were going to flog me today …” she looked askance, and her voice was over-casual “… who was yon that loosed me?”

“Which one?” asked Firebeard. “The cocky black Irisher or the mealy swab wi’ the long legs?”

“The Englishman,” said Sheba coldly, “thou untutored bladder.”

“Name o’ Avery,” said Rackham. “Captain in Charlie boy’s navy. Why?”

“Oh … nothing,” said Black Sheba, and stretched herself like some great black cat on her straw, her eyes stoking up ’neath lazily-lowered lids, a strange enigmatic quiver agitating her sensuously-parted toes …

A Canberra cruise this isn’t, but who can tell what lies ahead as the Twelve Apostles skids round the corner of the Kentish coast, her passengers all unaware of the mischief brewing below decks? What dark purpose does Sheba harbour Avery-wise? What will come of his infatuation with the lovely Lady Vanity? Is her dress of creaseless material, and could it conceivably be altered to fit a corsair virago six inches taller? What dark schemes revolve in the fertile mind of Colonel Blood? How would you like to be chained up in an orlop? Read on …

The Twelve Apostles followed the course charted by movie art directors since time immemorial, in which the image of a tiny galleon is seen gliding gently across an Olde Worlde map with whales spouting bottom right – down from the Channel, across Biscay (where everyone would be ghastly sick and heaving, but you don’t see that bit), round the top left-hand bump of Africa, and down into tropic waters, at which point the map dissolves into a long shot of the actual galleon cruising briskly across a sunlit sea. Then we get a quick shot of life on board – first the captain with a telescope on the quarter-deck, just to let you know that everything’s under control, possibly a long shot of filling sails in case you’ve forgotten how the ship is actually propelled, and lastly to the matter in hand, whatever it may be. Right.

In this case we see Captain Yardley and Admiral Rooke looking down indulgently on a specially-holystoned part of the main deck, where Lady Vanity, clad in biscuit-coloured muslin, is playing shuffleboard with Captain Avery, trilling merrily when she wins, and pouting prettily when she loses. She doesn’t often pout, because Avery is the shuffleboard champion of the Royal Navy, and his keen eye and sinewy wrist enable him to leave his rings just that bit short every time, or nudge Vanity’s shots into the centre of the target. (After all, he’s besotted with the girl, and knows that his wooing won’t prosper if he whitewashes her 12–0 every time.)

And as they play, the jovial Firebeard galumphs about retrieving the rings and crying “Rare shot, milady!” and “Bravely thrown, cap’n!” and “Bloody hard lines, ma’am!” and bobbing and grinning and knuckling his forehead and generally grovelling like anything. For he and Rackham have shipped aboard under the names of Knatchbull-Carshalton and Wentworth respectively (Bilbo’s suggestions, naturally), and have been at pains to impress their superiors with their trustworthy, seamanlike, forelock-tugging qualities. With the result that Captain Yardley has remarked to Admiral Rooke on the rare good fort’n, by cock, of getting two such prime hands, and Rackham has won such golden opinions by his resolution and intelligence that he has been appointed quartermaster, with responsibility for steering in the night watches. (Significant, eh?) Firebeard isn’t much good at navigation (let’s face it, when he watches the sunrise he has to spin a coin to decide whether he’s looking east or not), but he is something of a mascot because he organises dice-horse-racing and deck quoits and sweeps on the ship’s mileage for Vanity’s amusement, and is the caller for Bingo in the evenings, crying “Eyes down, look in, clickety-click, legs eleven, Kelly’s plonk, blind sixty” and the like, to the hilarity of all. Vanity thinks he is a perfect pet, and calls him (wait for it) Master Nittywhiskers, and generally treats him like a tame retriever, and no one ever notices the occasional mad piggy glint in the eyes of the grinning, fawning sycophant.

Not even Blood, with his villain’s nose for villainy. For he had other things to think about. To start with, he found himself sent to Coventry in the first week, after Avery suddenly remembered where he’d heard the Colonel’s name before, and the Admiral, Yardley, and Vanity were thunderstruck to discover that their fellow-passenger was the notorious ruffian who had recently scandalised London by his attempt to glom the Crown Jewels, for which daring exploit he had unaccountably been pardoned by King Charles and set at liberty. (Fact, and no one has solved the mystery to this day.) However, after that it was the cold shoulder all round for our Tom, the gentlemen turning sharply on their heels and Lady Vanity elevating her exquisite little retroussé nose and daintily fanning the air if he came within ten feet of her. The Colonel endured philosophically his exclusion from after-dinner whist and “I spy”, and having to eat in his cabin alone, and not having anyone tell him the right time. His isolation enabled him to ponder two matters which were intriguing him – one being the mysterious oak box which Avery kept hidden in his cabin (the Colonel having watched its bestowal from a convenient skylight on the first day of the voyage), and the other being how to arrange an undisturbed visit to the orlop to teach Sheba postman’s knock. Being a patient man, he set himself to wait, ignoring the slights of Cabin Society, and fingering his clarkie moustache with a slow smile as he leaned nonchalantly against the rail.