Pirate Latitudes Read online

  “Not easy to outrun a ship,” Hunter said.

  “Or a storm,” Enders said. “You thinking of scuttling the sloop?”

  Hunter had considered it already. The ten men aboard the Cassandra would help on the larger ship, but not much; El Trinidad would still be sorely undermanned. Furthermore, the sloop was valuable in itself. If he kept his own boat, he could auction the Spanish galleon to the merchants and captains of Port Royal, where it would fetch a considerable sum. Or else it would be included in the king’s tenth, and greatly reduce the amount of bullion or other treasure that King Charles would take.

  “No,” he said finally. “I want to keep my ship.”

  “Well, we could lighten the sow,” Enders said. “There’s plenty of deadweight aboard. You’ve no use for the bronze, or the longboats.”

  “I know,” Hunter said. “But I hate to see us defenseless.”

  “But we are defenseless,” Enders said.

  “I know it,” Hunter said. “But for the moment we will take our risks, and trust to Providence that we will have a safe return. Chance is on our side, especially once we are in the southern seas.” It was Hunter’s plan to sail down the Lesser Antilles, and then west, into the vastness of the Caribbean between Venezuela and Santo Domingo. He would be unlikely to meet Spanish warships in so much open water.

  “I’m not one for trusting to Providence,” Enders said gloomily. “But so be it.”

  . . .

  LADY SARAH ALMONT was in an aft cabin. Hunter found her in the company of Lazue, who, with an air of elaborate innocence, was helping the girl comb her hair.

  Hunter asked Lazue to leave, and she did.

  “But we were having such a pleasant time!” Lady Sarah protested, as the door closed.

  “Madam, I fear that Lazue has designs upon you.”

  “He seemed such a gentle man,” she said. “He had a most delicate touch.”

  “Well,” Hunter said, taking a seat in the cabin, “things are not always as they seem.”

  “Indeed, I have long since discovered that,” she replied. “I was on board the merchantman Entrepid, commanded by Captain Timothy Warner, of whom His Majesty King Charles has a most high opinion, as a fighting man. Imagine my surprise to discover that Captain Warner’s knees shook more vigorously than my own, when confronted by the Spanish warship. He was, in brief, a coward.”

  “What happened to the ship?”

  “It was destroyed.”

  “Cazalla?”

  “Yes, the same. I was taken as prize. The crew and the ship were fired upon and sunk by Cazalla.”

  “All killed?” Hunter asked, raising his eyebrows. He was not really surprised, but this incident gave him the provocation that Sir James would sorely need to justify the attack on Matanceros.

  “I did not witness it,” said Lady Sarah. “But I presume so. I was locked in a cabin. Then Cazalla captured another ship of Englishmen. What befell them, I do not know.”

  “I believe,” Hunter said, with a slight bow, “that they made good their escape.”

  “Perhaps so,” she said, with no sign of understanding Hunter’s meaning. “And now? What will you vagabonds have with me? I presume I am in the clutches of pirates.”

  “Charles Hunter, freeborn privateer, at your service. We are making our way to Port Royal.”

  She sighed. “This New World is so tedious. I hardly know whom to believe. You will forgive me if I am suspicious of you.”

  “Indeed, madam,” said Hunter, feeling irritation at this prickly woman whose life he had saved. “I merely came below to inquire after your ankle—”

  “It is improved much, thank you.”

  “—and to ask if you are, ah, otherwise well.”

  “Ah yes?” Her eyes flashed. “Do you not rather mean, if the Spaniard had his way with me, so that you can freely follow?”

  “Madam, I did not—”

  “Well, I can assure you, the Spaniard took nothing from me that was not already missing.” She gave a bitter laugh. “But he did it in his fashion.”

  Abruptly, she turned in her chair. She wore a dress of Spanish cut — one she found in the ship — and it had a low back. Hunter saw a series of ugly welts across her shoulders.

  She spun back to face him, “Now perhaps you understand,” she said. “Although probably you do not. I have other trophies of my encounter with the Court of Philip in the New World.” She lowered the neckline of her dress a trifle, to reveal a round red mark on one breast. She did it so quickly, so immodestly, that he was taken aback. Hunter could never accustom himself to well-born women from the court of the Merry Monarch who acted like their common counterparts. What must England be like, these days?

  She touched the spot. “That is a burn,” she said. “I have others. I fear they will scar. Any husband of mine will know the truth of my past soon enough.” She glared at him defiantly.

  “Madam,” he said, “I am pleased to have dispatched the villain on your behalf.”

  “That is just like a man!” she said, and began to cry. She sobbed for some moments while Hunter stood, not certain what to do.

  “Madam . . .” he said.

  “My breasts were my best feature,” she sniffled, through her tears. “I was the envy of every woman of breeding in London. Don’t you understand anything?”

  “Madam please . . .” Hunter fumbled for a handkerchief, but he had none. He was still wearing his ragged clothes from the attack. He looked around the cabin, found a table napkin, and handed it to her.

  She blew her nose loudly.

  “I am marked like a common criminal,” she said, still crying. “I shall never be able to wear the fashions of the town again. I am ruined.”

  Hunter found her inexplicable. She was alive, and safe, and returning to her uncle. Why was she crying? Her lot was better than it had been in many days. Thinking that she was an ungrateful and inexplicable woman, he merely poured her a glass of wine from a decanter. “Lady Sarah, please do not torment yourself thus.”

  She took the wine, and gulped the entire glass in a single long swallow. She sniffled, and sighed.

  “After all,” he added, “fashions change.”

  At this, she burst into fresh tears. “Men, men, men,” she moaned. “And all because I made a sojourn to visit my uncle. Oh, my poor fate!”

  There was a knock on the door, and a seaman stuck his head in. “Begging pardon, Captain, but Mr. Enders says we have landfall within a glass, and then the sea chests to open.”

  “I shall be on deck,” Hunter said, and he left the cabin. Lady Sarah burst into tears once more, and he heard her sobbing even as he closed the door behind him.

  Chapter 25

  THAT NIGHT, ANCHORED in Constantina Bay, in the shadow of a low and scrubby island, the crew voted six of their company to join Hunter and Sanson in the counting of the treasure. This was a serious and solemn business. Although the rest of the crew took the opportunity to become roaring drunk on Spanish rum, the eight men remained sober until accounting was completed.

  There were two treasure vaults on Hunter’s ship; the first was opened, and found to contain five chests. The first chest contained pearls, of uneven quality but still extremely valuable. The second chest was heaped with gold escudos, which gleamed dully in the lantern light. The escudos were painstakingly counted, and counted again, before being replaced in the chest. Gold in those days was extremely rare — only one Spanish ship in a hundred carried any — and the privateers were elated. The remaining three chests were filled with silver bars from Mexico. Hunter estimated that the total value of the five chests was more than ten thousand pounds sterling.

  In a state of great excitement, the accounting party broke open the second treasure vault. Here they found ten chests, and enthusiasm ran high until the first was op
ened, to reveal gleaming silver bars with the crown-and-anchor stamp of Peru. But the surface of the bars was multicolored and uneven.

  “I don’t like the look of this,” Sanson said.

  The other chests were hastily opened. They were all the same, all multicolored silver ingots.

  Hunter said, “Call for the Jew.”

  Don Diego, squinting in the dark light belowdecks, hiccoughing from Spanish kill-devil, frowned at the silver bars. “This is not good news,” he said slowly. He called for a set of scales, and a cask of water, and for a silver bar from the first treasure vault.

  When it was all assembled, the accounting group watched as the Jew placed the Mexican silver bar on one side of the scales and tested various bars of Peruvian silver on the other side until he found one that balanced exactly.

  “These will do,” he said, and set the bars of equal weight to one side. He drew the water cask in front of him and submerged the Mexican silver bar first. The water level inside the cask rose. The Jew marked the new level with his dagger blade, cutting a line in the wood.

  He removed the Mexican bar and dropped in the Peruvian silver. The water level went higher than his cut mark.

  “What does this mean, Don Diego? Is it silver?”

  “In part,” the Jew said. “But not entirely. There is some impurity, some other metal, heavier than silver, but of the same color.”

  “Is it plumbum?”

  “Perhaps. But lead is dull on the surface, and this is not. I warrant that this silver is mixed with platina.”

  This news was greeted with groans. Platinum was a worthless metal.

  “How much of it is platina, Don Diego?”

  “I cannot say. To know exactly I need better measures. I guess as much as half.”

  “The damned Dons,” Sanson said. “Not only do they steal from the Indians, they steal from each other. Philip is a poor king to be so openly cheated.”

  “All kings are cheated,” Hunter said. “It is in the nature of being a king. But these bars are still worth something — at least ten thousand pounds. We have still captured a great treasure.”

  “Aye,” Sanson said. “But think what it might have been.”

  There was other treasure to be accounted. The holds of the ships contained household articles, fabrics, logwood, tobacco, and spices such as chili and cloves. All these could be auctioned on the docks of Port Royal, and they would amount, in total, to a substantial sum — perhaps two thousand pounds.

  The accounting ran long into the night, and then the counting team joined the others in drunken songs and revelry. Neither Hunter nor Sanson participated; instead, they met in Hunter’s cabin.

  Sanson came directly to the point. “How is the woman?”

  “Prickly,” Hunter said. “And she cries a good deal.”

  “But she is unscathed?”

  “She is alive.”

  “She must be accounted a part of the king’s tenth,” Sanson said. “Or the governor’s.”

  “Sir James will not allow it.”

  “Surely you can persuade him.”

  “I doubt it.”

  “You have rescued his only niece . . .”

  “Sir James has a keen business sense. His fingers cling to gold.”

  “I think you must try, on the part of all the crew,” Sanson said, “to show him the correct way of thinking.”

  Hunter shrugged. He had, in fact, already thought of this, and was planning to argue the case before the governor.

  But he did not wish to make any promises to Sanson.

  The Frenchman poured wine. “Well,” he said heartily. “We have done great things, my friend. What is your plan for the return?”

  Hunter sketched his intention to travel south, then to stay in open water until they could reach northward for Port Royal.

  “Do you not think,” Sanson said, “that we will be safer if we divide the treasure between the two ships, and separate now, returning by different routes?”

  “I think it is better we remain together. Two ships present a formidable obstacle, seen from a distance. Singly, we might be attacked.”

  “Aye,” Sanson said. “But there are a dozen Spanish ships of the line patrolling these waters. If we separate, it is most unlikely we would both encounter warships.”

  “We need not fear Spanish warriors. We are legitimate Spanish merchantmen. Only the French or the English might attack us.”

  Sanson smiled. “You do not trust me.”

  “Of course not,” Hunter said, smiling back. “I want you in my sight, and I want the treasure beneath my feet.”

  “So be it,” Sanson said, but there was a dark look in his eyes, and Hunter promised himself he would remember it.

  Chapter 26

  FOUR DAYS LATER, they sighted the monster.

  It had been an uneventful sail, down the chain of the Lesser Antilles. The wind was fair and the sea calm; Hunter knew he was now nearly a hundred miles south of Matanceros, and with each passing hour he breathed more easily.

  His crew was busy making the galleon as seaworthy as possible. The Spanish crew had kept El Trinidad in a lamentable state of repair. Rigging was frayed; sails were thin in places, torn in others; decks were filthy and the holds stank with refuse. There was much to do as they sailed southward, past Guadeloupe and San Marino.

  At noon of the fourth day, Enders, ever watchful, noticed the change in the water. He pointed off to starboard. “Look there,” he said to Hunter.

  Hunter turned. The water was placid, with only a slight chop to mar the glassy surface. But barely a hundred yards away, there was a churning beneath the waves — some large object moving toward them, and at incredible speed.

  “What are we making?” he demanded.

  “Ten knots,” Enders said. “Mother of God . . .”

  “If we are making ten, that thing is making twenty,” Hunter said.

  “At least twenty,” Enders said. He glanced around at the crews. No one had noticed it.

  “Move to landward,” Hunter said. “Get us in shoal water.”

  “The kraken don’t like it shallow,” Enders said.

  “Let us hope not.”

  The submerged shape moved closer, and passed by the boat some fifty yards away. Hunter had a glimpse of dead gray-white, a suggestion of tentacles, and then the thing was gone. It moved off, and circled, then came back again.

  Enders slapped his cheek. “I’m dreaming,” he said. “I must be. Say it is not true.”

  “It’s true,” Hunter said.

  From the nest of the mainmast, Lazue, the lookout, whistled to Hunter. She had seen the thing. Hunter looked up at her and shook his head, to keep silent.

  “Thank God she didn’t give out the cry,” Enders said, “that’s all we’d be needing, isn’t it?”

  “Shoal water,” Hunter said grimly. “And quickly.” He watched the churning water approach once more.

  Up in the mainmast nest, Lazue was high above the clear blue water, and she could see the approach of the kraken plainly. Her heart was in her throat, for this was a legendary beast, the stuff of sailing songs and stories for the children of seafarers. But few had ever seen such a creature, and Lazue was not glad of the experience. It seemed to her that her heart stopped as she watched the thing approach again, with frightening speed, plowing up the surface as it came toward El Trinidad.

  When it was very close, she saw the entire animal clearly. Its skin was a dead gray. It had a pointed snout, a bulbous body at least twenty feet long, and trailing behind, a tangle of long tentacles, like a Medusa’s head. It passed beneath the ship, not touching the hull, but the waves from the creature’s movements rocked the galleon. Then she saw it emerge on the other side and plunge down into the blue depths of the ocean. She wiped her s
weating brow.

  Lady Sarah Almont came on deck to find Hunter peering over the side. “Good day, Captain,” she said. He turned and gave her a slight bow. “Madam.”

  “Captain, you are quite ashen. Is all well?”

  Without replying, Hunter rushed to the other side of the aft deck and peered over the side again.

  Enders at the tiller said, “You see it?”

  “See what?” asked Lady Sarah.

  “No,” Hunter said. “It dived.”

  “We should have thirty fathoms beneath us,” Enders said. “That’s shoal for the thing.”

  “What thing?” asked Lady Sarah, pouting prettily.

  Hunter came back to her.

  Enders said, “It may be back.”

  “Aye,” Hunter said.

  She looked from Hunter to Enders. Both men were drenched in cold sweat. Both were very pale.

  “Captain, I am no sailor. What is the meaning of this?”

  Enders, tense, exploded. “God’s blood, woman, we have just seen—”

  “—an omen,” said Hunter smoothly, with a sharp look to Enders. “An omen, my lady.”

  “An omen? Are you superstitious, Captain?”

  “Aye, he’s very superstitious, he is,” said Enders, glancing out toward the horizon.

  “It is plain,” said Lady Sarah, stamping her foot on the deck, “that you will not tell me what is amiss.”

  “That’s right,” Hunter said, smiling. He had a charming smile, even through his pallor. He could be most exasperating, she thought.

  “I know I am a woman,” she began, “but I really must insist—”

  And at that moment, Lazue shouted, “Sail ho!”

  Straining his eyes to the glass, Hunter saw square canvas directly astern, coming above the line of the horizon. He turned back to Enders, but the sea artist was already barking orders to run out all the canvas El Trinidad possessed. The topgallants were unreefed; the foresprit was run up, and the galleon gathered speed.

  A warning shot was fired to the Cassandra, a quarter of a mile ahead. Soon after, the little sloop also let out her full canvas.