Kitabı oku: «Pieces of Eight», sayfa 2
“And Flint,” said Silver, “Never mind, Billy-boy, for it comes to this: You know the lie of this island: latitude, longitude and all. I want you to tell me how soon Flint’ll be back, so’s I can be warned.”
“And why should I help you?” said Bones.
“First, ’cos I saved your neck from a stretching–which it still might get, if you ain’t careful–and second because we’ve found your old sea-chest, with all your goods aboard, and none shall touch it but you.”
“Oh…” said Billy Bones, for a seaman’s chest held all that was dear to him. “Thank you,” he mumbled, and thought vastly better of Long John. But Silver’s next words stung him.
“Good! Now listen while I tell you how that swab Flint has betrayed you.”
“Never!” said Bones fiercely, making as if to stand.
“Billy!” said Silver. “Don’t!” And he laid a hand on his pistol butt.
“You daresn’t!” said Bones, but he sat down again.
“Billy,” said Silver, gently, “Flint left you, and ain’t never coming back except to kill you, along of all the rest of us.”
“Huh!” sneered Bones. “You just want that black tart–Selena. You can’t stand that Flint’s aboard of her, fuckin’ her cross-eyed!”
“Ugh!” this time the pistol was out and cocked and deep denting Billy Bones’s cheek. Silver was white and he leaned over Bones like a vampire over its prey.
“Don’t you ever say that again, you lard-arsed, shit-head, land-lubber! Just listen to me, Billy, for there’s things about this island that ain’t right and I need you to explain ’em, and I need you to make ready for Flint–’cos if you won’t help, then we’re all dead men…but you the first of all of us! So what course shall you steer, Billy-boy?”
Chapter 3
15th August 1752 The Bishop’s House Williamstown, Upper Barbados
The Bishop of Barbados refused.
“There can be no wedding!” he said. “I am well aware that Mr Bentham–who is a damned pirate–enters into so-called marriages every time he visits this island, choosing as his bride any trollop that takes his fancy, and whom he might have had for sixpence, and whom afterwards he abandons!”
“Quite so!” said his chaplain, standing beside him in nervous defiance of the crowd of garishly dressed, heavily armed men who were crammed into the bishop’s study.
“I’m sorry, Your Grace,” declared Brendan O’Byrne, who commanded the intruders. He was frighteningly ugly and the gallows were groaning for him, but he’d been raised to give respect to a bishop. “I’m afraid you mayn’t say no, for I’m first mate to Captain Bentham, and Captain Bentham is resolved upon marriage. So, will you look at this now?”
He produced a little pocket-pistol, all blued and gleaming. Then, showing its slim barrel to His Grace, he explained what he was going to do with it, and had his men remove the chaplain’s drawers and breeches, and bend the chaplain over a table, to demonstrate precisely how it would be done.
Five minutes later, His Grace was stepping out under a burning sun, sweating in mitre and chasuble, with crosier in hand. His chaplain followed bearing a King James Bible and a Book of Common Prayer while attempting to keep the hem of the bishop’s robes clear of the mud and dog-shite of Queen Mary Street, main thoroughfare of Williamstown.
Beside the bishop marched O’Byrne, arms crossed and a pistol in each fist, while two dozen of his men capered on every side, taking refreshment from bottles. No matter how the bishop looked with his quick, clever eyes, there was no way out but forward, and he made the best of it by smiling to the cheering populace who’d turned out for Danny Bentham’s latest wedding.
“Bah!” said the bishop in exasperation as O’Byrne turned him left into Harbour Street, in sight of the dockyard and the Custom House with its Union Flag, and a small group of the island’s foremost citizens: those who by blind-eye and bribery allowed outright piracy to flourish when it was stamped out in every other place but this.
“Cap’n!” roared O’Byrne, seeing Danny Bentham among them. He waved his hat in the air. “Give a cheer, you men!”
“Huzzah!” they cried.
“Huzzah!” cried the mob, and everyone dashed forward, the bishop and his chaplain bundling up robes, dropping and retrieving sacred books, and managing by sweat-soaked miracles of footwork to avoid falling over completely, Finally, bedraggled and gasping, they arrived at the Custom House, where a wizened man in a red coat stepped forward to greet them.
“My lord!” said Sir Wyndham Godfrey, the governor, doffing his hat and bowing in his ceremonial uniform as colonel of the island’s militia. The bishop caught his breath, took the thin hand, and nodded curtly. The governor had once been an honest man who fought corruption, but now he was a figure of pathos: disease and the tropical climate having taken their toll.
Standing next to him was Captain Danny Bentham, with his bride-to-be. He was a huge man, six foot five inches tall, muscular and upright, with blue eyes, a heavy chin and a thick neck. He wore a gold-laced blue coat, a feathered hat, gleaming top-boots, and a Spanish rapier hung at his side. Sir Wyndham introduced this thieving, murdering rapist as if he were a nobleman.
“It is my pleasure, Your Grace, to present Captain Daniel Bentham, a worthy master mariner and owner of two fine vessels.”
“Milord,” said Bentham, taking the bishop’s hand. “Gaw’ bless you for agreein’ so kindly to do the honours!” The voice was soft but the handshake crunched like pincers. The bishop winced as he looked up into the tall man’s eyes, and was surprised at Bentham’s youth, for the big chin was as smooth as a boy’s.
“And this is my little Catalina, milord.” A small, plump tart was pushed forward in a cheap dress, a lace cap, and half-naked breasts. She was a mulatta: dark-skinned, pretty and with big eyes, the sort that Danny Bentham liked. He gazed upon her with urgent lust, hoisted her off her feet, and kissed her deep and hungry, with loud groans of pleasure.
His men cheered uproariously and fired pistols in the air, while Sir Wyndham and his followers simpered, and the bishop wished his post abolished and himself back in England, albeit as the lowest curate in the land.
“My little Catalina,” said Bentham, putting her down and wiping the slobber from his lips. “Fresh from the Brazils, milord, and speaks only Portugee, of which I has a few words meself. So she don’t know all our ways.” For some reason this provoked laughter from Bentham’s men, but he swiftly went among them and restored order with his fists and shining boots.
The rest of it passed in horror for the bishop, as a procession set out from the Custom House, led by the garrison band and a company of grenadiers. Next came the bishop and the Happy Couple, followed by the governor and prominent citizens, then the populace in general, with slaves, dogs and hogs to the rear.
The destination was Miss Cooper’s whorehouse, a large, stone-built mansion to the windward side of Williamstown, all laid out for a huge banquet.
But first there was the wedding ceremony, which took place in Miss Cooper’s salon: a splendid chamber, but it was Sodom and Gomorrah combined, so far as the bishop was concerned. He looked despairingly at Captain Bentham standing before him doting over his Catalina, while behind them the room was packed stinking full and sweltering hot with coarse and leering persons, mostly drunk and none of them quiet, with the governor and his entourage long gone.
“Ahem!” said the bishop. “Dearly beloved, we are gathered here this day in the sight of God and this congregation…”
Eventually they let the bishop go, shoving him out the front door, his chaplain close behind. There, Mr O’Byrne capped insult upon injury by presenting each clergyman with a gratuity of fifty Spanish dollars in a purse tied up with ribbon.
Bang went the door, and they were free. For an instant the bishop stood trembling and close to tears. Then he snarled, “Give me that!” And, snatching the chaplain’s purse, he hurled it, together with his own, straight back into the house through one of Miss Cooper’s windows. If he’d hoped the gesture to be accompanied by the smashing of glass, he was disappointed; all was thrown open for the cool night air. “Bah!” he cried. “A lost labour and an affront to God!”
“What is, Your Grace?” said the chaplain.
“This!” said the bishop, spreading his arms to encompass the entire island.
Inside, roaring and swaying in unison, the men of the company were helping Cap’n Bentham upstairs for his wedding night, bellowing obscene advice. The women, meanwhile, were assisting the new Mrs Bentham out of her clothes, before tucking her into the house’s best bed.
“Ah!” said Bentham at last, leaning his back against the locked door, and “Huh!” as from outside there came the rumble and thunder of Mr O’Byrne removing all those who would have pressed their ears to the wood for further entertainment.
“Now, my little Catalina!” said Bentham.
“Oh, senhor!” she said, and the blood pumped into his loins at the sight of her, sat small and helpless against the pillows, with a linen sheet pulled protectively under her chin. Miss Cooper’s girls had expertly combed out her hair and spread it around her shoulders, while Catalina herself had been a virgin recently enough to remember a maiden’s modesty, and to deliver a representation of it sufficiently convincing for Danny Bentham.
“Senhor,” she pleaded, “seja delicado…”
“Be gentle?” said Bentham. “I’ll show you gentle, my girl!” and he swept off clothes, boots, belt and sword, to stand magnificently naked before his bride, legs spread wide and hands on hips.
“Oh!” said Catalina, sitting up straighter and staring in wonderment, for Danny Bentham’s body was something to see: slim-waisted, smooth and muscular, with long legs, strong arms, and gleaming skin. Catalina thought it a sight to please any bride–apart from the undoubted presence of a fine pair of breasts and the undoubted absence of anything between the legs that stood to attention, or even dangled at ease. In fact there was simply nothing. (Indeed there was doubly nothing, since to explain his smooth chin, Cap’n Bentham called daily for razor, soap and water, and having nothing else to shave, shaved what he had.)
“Hmm…” said Catalina, who understood a lot more than these stupid English thought, and who’d never for a moment believed she’d got a permanent husband: one that would last longer than the dollars she’d been paid. But she had thought she’d got a handsome husband and had been looking forward to the wedding night.
Que piedade, she thought; what a pity. But Captain Bentham thought otherwise. There was not the slightest equivocation in “his” mind as he leapt on to the bed, throwing sheets aside and seizing his wriggling, naked bride with absolute conviction, abandoned passion, and remarkable technique, for Danny Bentham liked women, and only women, and had learned how to please them.
Outside, Mr O’Byrne was at his station, lounging in a chair backed against the door with a bottle of rum for company, still keeping dirty-minded eavesdroppers from their sport.
“Uh! Uh! Uh!” came Bentham’s voice, muffled through the door.
“Go to it, me hearty!” said O’Byrne, and drank a toast.
“Oh! Oh! Oh!” came the other voice.
“Give her one for me, by Christ, Cap’n!”
“Oh! Oh! Oh!”
“Go on, my galloping boy!”
“Ohhhhhhhhhhhh!”
Chapter 4
Two bells of the forenoon watch (c. 9 a.m. shore time) 7th October 1752 Aboard Walrus The southern Caribbean.
“No!” said Selena, “I won’t go below. I want to see.”
“Damn it, girl, do as you’re bid,” said Flint, while beside them at the tiller, Tom Allardyce the bosun worked hard not to notice the argument, focusing instead on the ship they were chasing.
“She’s Dutch, Cap’n!” he said. “Round stern and bilanderrigged, and she’s hard up in a clinch with no knife to cut the seizing!”
Flint snapped out his glass and looked. Allardyce was right–he must have marvellous eyes: it was a Dutchman, heavily storm-damaged, and plodding along helpless. So much the better! He turned to Selena. “Go below, girl!” he muttered. “Don’t play the little madam with me!” Then he raised his voice cheerfully to the men standing to the guns and ready at the sails: “There’s our dockyard, lads!” he cried. “Our planking and rum, and our pickles and pork!”
The men cheered. Walrus had taken a battering in the fight against Lion; heavy shot into her hull had spoiled stores, sprung leaks, wrecked her windlass, and blown away her binnacle and compasses. Desperately short of provisions and fit only for a short voyage, Walrus remained sound aloft. Now, charging onward under foresails and gaffs, mainsail and topsails, she was going like a mail-coach on a turnpike.
“Go below!” said Flint. “There’s danger…and things unfit for you to see.”
“No!” she said. “Not this time. I won’t be shut up below!”
Flint’s eyes showed white all round. Nobody said no when Flint said yes. In agitation he reached up to his shoulder to pet the parrot that was his friend and darling…and which was no longer there because he’d lost it to Silver. Just as he’d got Selena, Silver had got the parrot.
“Huh!” he said, snatching down his hand before anyone should see. “You shall do as you are bid!” And he grabbed Selena, pulling her close and breathing the scent of her. He breathed it deep and felt her warmth and looked into her eyes. This was a new game. He knew it. She knew it. He’d been playing it ever since the island: finding excuses to brush past her, to touch her, and even–on one occasion–attempting to slide a hand inside her shirt to touch her naked skin.
Yes. A shining dawn was breaking for Joe Flint. Thanks to Selena, his lifelong, shameful incapacity seemed to be on the mend, and the dormant contents of his breeches were stirring. Conversely, Selena felt that for her the sun was going down. Flint was master aboard Walrus and would take whatever he wanted the instant he became capable of taking it.
“Flint!” she said sharply. “Look!” Flint turned and saw every eye was on himself and the lovely black girl in her boots, shirt and breeches, with two pistols stuffed in her belt. It’d been Flint’s joke to rig her out like this, but by God Almighty didn’t it just suit her! And now the swine were ogling and nudging one another for the fun of seeing a shapely seventeen-year-old defying him on his own quarterdeck.
Flint measured choices: he could wrestle her bodily through a hatchway–proving to all hands that she was beyond his command; he could order someone else to do it–allowing another man to handle her…or…
He came to a swift decision. “So be it, my chick!” he cried, slapping her backside merrily, as if it were the biggest joke in the world to have a woman on deck as the ship went into action. Turning to his men, he smiled his glittering smile…and it worked! For Flint was a man to admire: handsome, charismatic and splendid.
“A-hah!” roared the crew, united in shared pride of their magnificent captain…even if he was a mad bastard that popped out men’s eyes like pickled onions when the mood was upon him.
“So, my dear,” Flint said to Selena, smiling and smiling, “do try to keep your limbs clear of flying shot, and let’s see how much you relish what you now shall see!” He dropped his voice: “Because you won’t like it, not one little bit, that I do most solemnly promise you!”
The chase was short, for the wretched bilander was as slow as Walrus was fast. As soon as he came within cannon shot, Flint broke out the skull and swords–his personal variation of the black flag–and on the upward roll discharged a thundering load of chain-shot into the Dutchman’s rigging: some ten pounds of iron apiece from each of Walrus’s seven broadside guns. It was more to terrorise than to disable, for the bilander was already in ruins aloft: jury-rigged on the stump of her foremast, most of her bowsprit gone and the big crossjack yard on her mainmast fished with a spar where it had sprung.
The Dutchman shuddered under Walrus’s fire and those aboard were blinded in the smoke. She was a little ship, no more than sixty feet in the hull and a hundred tons burden, with an old-fashioned rig and shallow draught to suit the Netherlands’ waters. Against the heavily armed, sharp-keeled Walrus she was already lost. But she raised the red, white and blue of her native land and fought like a tiger.
One after another, the four one-pounder swivels that were all she had for a broadside blasted their charges, hurling dozens of pistol-balls across Walrus’s decks, prompting roars of rage as men were struck down or staggered back under the impact of shot, even as they stood ready to hurl grappling lines.
“Bastards!” cried Walrus’s men.
“Give ’em another!” cried Flint. “Grape and round-shot!” And it was a race between his gunners and the Dutchman’s as to who would fire next. The Dutchman won, and got off just one more volley of canister, killing a few more of Flint’s men before Walrus’s main battery, thundering fire and smoke, comprehensively smashed in the Dutchman’s bulwarks, blasting half her men into offal, and sending her swivel guns tumbling into the air as iron wreckage.
“Stand by, boarders!” cried Flint. “Put us alongside of her, Mr Allardyce!”
“Aye-aye, sir!”
The two vessels rose and fell, rubbing paint and splinters off one another as the grappling lines bound them together.
“Boarders away!” cried Flint, leading the scramble up on to Walrus’s bulwark. He leapt aboard the Dutchman followed by nearly sixty men, all of them armed to the teeth, fighting mad and seeking vengeance for their dead and wounded mates.
A mere handful of the Dutchman’s crew remained alive amongst the wreckage of broken timbers, shards of iron, smashed gratings and hanging sails that encumbered the narrow, smoke-clouded deck. It was hard enough to walk the deck, let alone fight on it. But fight they did, with pike, pistol and cutlass, led by a man in a grey coat boasting a big voice.
“Christiaan Hugens!” he cried, calling on the name of his ship.
“Christiaan Hugens!” cried the others, and then it was hand-to-hand.
Slick! And a man shoving a blade at Flint found the steel parried and himself spouting blood from a cut throat. Thump! And another man, pulling the trigger with his pistol aimed right at Flint’s chest, found Flint gone and a cutlass cleaving his own skull. But that was all the fighting Joe Flint had to do that day. Six men cannot fight sixty. Not for long, however brave they may be. Soon all was quiet except the sounds of the sea and the groaning, creaking of ships’ timbers.
A thick, squat man came lumbering through the wreckage. He was Alan Morton, Flint’s quartermaster, and he saluted Flint with his best man-o’-warsman salute: hand touching hat and foot stamping the deck.
“Cap’n,” he said, “there’s just three o’ the buggers left alive, and a dozen o’ dead-’uns, mostly killed by our gunfire afore ever we stepped aboard.” He pointed to the three prisoners, waiting by the mainmast. “There they are, Cap’n. Shall we slit ’em and gut ’em?”
“Good heavens, no!” said Flint, jolly as ever after a fight. “Not at all, Mr Morton–I have other plans for them.” He smiled and most cordially took a handful of Morton’s shirt front to wipe the blood off his cutlass. “Just make the gentlemen fast and we’ll see to them later. But now we have work to do.”
Flint sighed inwardly. It was on such occasions that he missed Billy Bones, who’d once been his first mate, and whose heavy fists had driven men to their duties without Flint having to do the tiresome work of punching heads and kicking behinds. Flint sighed wistfully. Bones did so wonderfully have the knack of terrifying the men, combined with just the perfect quantity of initiative: enough to fill in the outline of his orders without ever daring to question them.
“Huh!” Flint peered at Morton, now shuffling his feet and looking puzzled under his captain’s gaze. The low-browed, stupid clod was the best fist-fighter on the lower deck–which was why he held his rating–but like the rest he was infected with the equality of those blasted “articles” which were Silver’s legacy to Walrus; Silver who, believing himself a “gentleman of fortune” had drawn up a list of articles like those of Captain England, Captain Roberts and all the other pirates who wouldn’t admit what they were.
The thought that Morton believed Flint was captain by consent and could be deposed at will made Flint laugh out loud. Morton, basking in the sunshine of Flint’s merriment, grinned back at him.
“So,” said Flint, “here is what we must do, Mr Morton…”
“Aye-aye, sir!” said Morton, saluting and stamping again. At least he was keen.
The rest of the day passed in work: intense and heavy work, as everything useful was stripped out of Christiaan Hugens, which proved to be an expedition ship, fitted out by Utrecht University and sent to study celestial navigation in the West Indies, in the hope of advancing Dutch trade. Flint gleaned that from the papers in her master’s cabin. He had no Dutch, but many seafaring and astronomical words were similar to the English equivalents, and he filled in the rest by intelligent guesswork.
This was one of the rare occasions when Flint was happy to take a prize which carried no rich or valuable cargo: no silks or spices, no bullion nor pieces of eight–the fine Spanish dollars that the whole world used as currency. No, this time his most pressing need was ordinary ships’ stores. He especially valued the excellent compasses, charts and navigational instruments.
Flint’s men also took sheet lead, nails and carpenter’s tools to repair the shot-holes Lion had blown through Walrus’s hull, along with some spars and planking, a windlass and a fine new kedge anchor that was better than Walrus’s own.
They took particular delight in seizing Christiaan Hugens’s entire stock of foodstuffs: salt beef, salt pork and biscuit, together with more exotic victuals: ham, cheeses, tongue, tea, coffee, gin, brandy and wine, for the ship was only two weeks out of Port Royal, Jamaica, and was bursting with fresh provisions. There was even a coop full of chickens on the fo’c’sle; these hardy fowl survived the battle only to have their necks pulled by Flint’s cook, to provide fresh meat for the gluttony and drinking that always followed the taking of a prize.
Later, with a fiddler playing and all hands half drunk and full of good food, and the blazing hulk of the Dutch ship lost under the horizon, Flint stood before the tiller, with Selena, Allardyce and Morton beside him, to address the crew. Mr Cowdray, the ship’s surgeon, who had been busy with the wounded below, now joined them on deck. Like the rest, he was in his best clothes for the occasion. He nodded to Selena, who smiled.
For Selena, this was a cruel time. John Silver was stranded on Flint’s island where she might never see him again, while Flint’s stunted desires for women were changing and growing. She desperately needed a friend, and–aboard this ship–Mr Cowdray was the only honest man.
“Well,” he said, “have you seen a battle?”
“Yes.”
“And what did you think of it?”
“I’ve seen worse.” It was true. She had.
“Hmm.” Cowdray frowned. “Be careful. There might be more.”
“What?”
“Brothers and fellow gentlemen of fortune!” cried Flint, in a great and happy voice. Cheers followed, with raised bottles and hearty toasts. “Thank you, brothers!” said Flint. “Look at our ship! Go on, my lads, look at her!” That puzzled them. They stared around almost nervously. “Soon she’ll be good as new,” said Flint. “Re-fitted, re-provisioned, leaks plugged and rigging spliced. We’ve all the tackles and all the gear…and her luck shall be re-made!”
That was clever. They all knew Flint’s treasure had been left behind on the island and that, until she was stabbed in the back by Billy Bones, Lion had had the better of them. Nobody dared say it who sailed under Flint, but they all feared their luck was broken. Now they cheered and cheered and cheered.
“Brothers!” cried Flint, raising a silver tankard. “Here’s to old friends and new luck!”
“Old friends and new luck!” they roared.
“Fifteen men on the dead man’s chest…” began Flint, lifting up his fine, ringing voice and the fiddler following him.
“Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!” roared the crew.
“Drink and the devil had done for the rest!”
“Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!”
When he chose to be, Flint was irresistibly charming and now he worked his magic, with verse after verse of his favourite, hideous song, each more grim than the last, but always seeming funny when Flint sang it; he passed from man to man, pulling noses, clapping shoulders, poking ribs, and all the while dancing to the beat of his own song. Even Selena and Cowdray laughed, who both should have known better. As for the crew, they worshipped and adored their captain in that happy moment.
But Cowdray was right. There was worse to come.
“Now, shipmates!” cried Flint when the song was done, and he beamed at the close-packed ring of red faces, leering as the tropical sun went down. “Now, my jolly boys…” And Flint changed the entire mood with a solemn expression and hands raised to heaven. “Lads, let us remember those of our brothers foully slain in today’s action. Those slain against all the laws of war, when we had offered honourable surrender!”
“Aye!” they roared.
“What’s he saying?” said Selena to Cowdray. “That’s nonsense.”
“I think you might wish to go below, my dear,” said Cowdray.
“Why?”
Cowdray looked away. “Experto credite!” he said. “Trust one who knows.”
Selena paused. She looked at Cowdray. He was a scholar who loved Latin, and had the habit of spouting it when swayed by strong emotion, be it happiness, fear…or shame.
“What do you mean?” she said.
“Just go below.”
“I see you recognise the villainy we endured today!” cried Flint. “And since we still have, under hatches, three of the guilty ones…” A deep and animal growl drowned out his words. “Silence between decks!” cried Flint, and instantly they obeyed.
“Since we have three of them, I have made preparations in the name of justice.” He grinned wickedly. “Justice–and your amusement. So, clear the decks, and hold your patience!” He nodded to Allardyce and Morton, who had their orders and immediately stepped up to the lee rail.
There was an intense buzz of conversation among the hands as Allardyce and Morton took a two-fathom plank (fresh from Christiaan Hugens) and shoved it over the lee rail so that half its length stuck out over the side, while the rest remained inboard, nailed firmly to the top of a heavy barrel. When this was done, they went below and brought up one of the prisoners. Barefoot, wearing only a pair of calico slops and with his hands tied behind him, the man was already shaking with fright, and he flinched pitifully as Walrus’s crew bayed like the mob at the Roman games. Finally, Allardyce and Morton heaved him bodily up on to the plank, where he stood swaying and shaking and gazing about in terror.
“What is this?” whispered Selena to Cowdray.
“I don’t know. This is new.” He turned to face her. “But I am going below now, and I think you should too.”
“No…”
“Selena, please follow me.”
“Can’t we stop him?”
“Flint? Never! But I beg you, on my knees, not to see this.”
Selena, horrified and fascinated, remained where she was.
Cowdray sighed and shook his head. “On your own head be it!” he said, and vanished down the quarterdeck hatchway.
“Brothers!” cried Flint. “Those who know me will recall some of my merry games–Flint’s games!”
“Aye!” they roared, nodding at one another in glee. There was one that they knew all too well, played atop an overturned tub with a belaying pin, where all the player had to do was move faster than Flint to avoid getting his fingers broken. They laughed and laughed, even those whose fingertips had been smashed. Indeed, some now displayed their scars with pride, and laughed louder than all the rest.
“But this is a new game,” said Flint, lowering his voice like a conspirator. “And this the first time it’s been tried. So watch me, shipmates. Watch and learn!”
With that, Flint picked up a boarding pike and began to sing his song again:
“Fifteen men on the dead man’s chest…” He cocked an ear to the audience.
“Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!” they cried, and burst into laughter as–on the word rum–Flint pricked the victim’s side with the sharp point of the pike.
“Aaah!” cried the man.
“Drink and the devil had done for the rest…”
“Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!”
Flint jabbed again, sharp on cue, and blood flowed. Selena, sobbing, finally took Cowdray’s advice and ran below.
“Aaah!” cried the victim.
And so it went on. Since the plank led out over the side, even the dullest spectator knew how the game must end, and any fool could simply have driven someone off its end with prods of a pike. But Flint was an artist. He worked to music and to rhythm, constantly leading his man to the end of the plank, then allowing him to stagger to safety, only to drive him back again or push him to one side, then to the other, with a dozen wounds oozing blood and the poor devil deranged with horror and begging in his own language for mercy.
The special horror of it was any man’s innate fear of falling, especially from a wobbling plank run out over the ocean, so the victim collaborated in the entertainment, even torturing himself by fighting to keep his footing, leaning against the sharp point that was driving him into the sea in a desperate attempt to resist the final plunge, hands-bound, into the hungry waters below. And Flint’s evil genius–his unique gift–was to make this funny.
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