Fifty Two
Friday 22nd November
As the last stars faded the two sloops weighed anchor and crept towards the channel that took them to the other side of the island. Jesamiah had made it his business to study the lie of shoals and deeper waters while he had been here with Teach, but all the same, they asked Frank Blake, one of the Navy crew who had known this area for most of his life, to pilot them in. There was very little wind, and the dawn sky promised a fine, sun-rich day. What wind there was came in little gusts that sent the spindrift skimming and waves bouncing like skittish horses, but the flurries were few and far between. It was frustrating, the
Adventure
was in sight but they were almost becalmed, they could not get at her! And any moment now someone from over there could awake and see them.
Maynard decided to send out the small boat to sound the depth, and to run out the sweeps. “We’ll row in.”
“They’ll hear us,” Jesamiah warned.
“Aye, but with our oars and the boat going ahead, we may be on them before they gather their wits.”
It was a risk. Jesamiah shrugged, but he did not countermand the order. He did not have a better one.
Sandy Banks and Crawford went in the boat with a few of the Navy men, everyone else in the
Jane
took the sloop’s oars, save for Nat and Maynard at the tiller and Blake forward in the bow. Even Jesamiah took hold of an oar and prepared to help pull. Maynard raised an eyebrow, said nothing. All the same, Jesamiah answered the thought.
“I ain’t afraid of hard work. That’s another thing we do different to the Navy. We all put our backs into it when we need to.”
With the
Ranger
following under oar behind, they made slow progress forward. The strategy did not last long.
Gibbens awoke, needing to urinate. He stood, streaming his water against a bush, his rum-sodden mind not taking in that there were two sloops pulling towards the
Adventure
. Two sloops? Was this Acorne? Had he got those boats then? Already? That was quick work. He stood there, frowning, the thoughts struggling through his inebriated brain. If it was Acorne, why would he be rowing in? Why not wait for the tide and the wind and sail in as any of them did?
Then he realised. This was not Acorne! Without bothering to button his breeches, but clasping the waistband in his hands, he ran, shouting and bellowing the alarm, waking everyone.
The way of pirates: they could be filled with more drink than a keg full of rum, but when action was needed they took no second thought. Those with muskets fired off shots, others ran through the shallows, swam the last few yards and clambered aboard their ship. Teach, Gunner Norton, Jimmy Baker and the Negro, Caesar, were already aboard with the captain. Edward Teach had opted to sleep in his own bed, in his own cabin, not on the sand that irritated and itched when it got inside clothing.
As men came aboard, Caesar handed out weapons and the pirates ran to the rail, took aim. The
Jane’s
small jolly boat received the force of two volleys. The third was from one of the cannons, which whistled its shot across the water and fell wide in a plume of spray. With more men wounded than were unscathed, Nat ordered the boat back to the sloop. He had a flesh wound, Crawford too. Another cannon shot would have them sunk.
Sam Odell had stayed ashore. He scurried with his crew into the dunes and they hunkered as low as they could get, hands over their ears and heads, wanting no part of this. The boy who had been with them yesterday was completely forgotten.
“Cut the anchor cable!” Teach yelled, “Get them sails up! Morton, why bain’t them cannons reloaded!”
The odds were in the attackers’ favour – sixty men, two sloops, against nineteen in one boat. But Teach knew these waters well and he was not incompetent. With the flurries of wind, and some of the men at the sweeps, he headed for the narrow channel between the sandbanks, knowing exactly where it lay. This was his hunting ground, this was where he lured ships by making the vulnerable and innocent think the water was deep.
Maynard ordered the King’s Colours to be hoisted, and set off after him, as before, the
Jane
going ahead, the
Ranger
following. The sails of all three were worse than useless; the creak and splash of oars and the grunt of men pulling the only sounds. Jesamiah was standing beside Maynard, anxiously watching the varying hues of the water ahead and gauging what was deep, what was shallow.
Jesamiah was not happy about sailing under the King’s flag, but he had made a bargain and he intended to stick with it. He wanted no mention of his or the crew’s names to be written in the logbook, which Rob Maynard kept with meticulous detail. As far as legal records went, Jesamiah Acorne did not exist. All he wanted was his rightful share of treasure and recompense for damage to his sloops. If he lived he would take the reward and go. If he died, the prize money was to be sent to la Sorenta. To where he had also ordered Tiola, should she be left on her own. Tiola had not acknowledged his order. If she were left on her own…she did not know what she would do, where she would go.
Blake called out a warning – they were too far to starboard. And a bullet tore through his throat. The blood from the severed artery sprayed in an arc behind him as his body toppled from the bow into the sea. Almost at the same instant, the
Jane
and the
Ranger
ran aground.
Teach guffawed loudly then hurled a torrent of abuse, the still, almost windless air carrying his gruff voice clearly. “Damn thee for villains! Who bist thee? From where’d thee come? Blast thy eyes!”
“You can see very well from our Colours you knave! We are the King’s men!”
Teach ignored Maynard’s bold words. “I can see thee, Acorne! Damn thee and may the Devil take thee for a cursed traitor!” He had a bottle in his hand. He raised it in the air, crowed, “I give thee no quarter, Jesamiah Acorne! D’thee hear? No quarter t’none o’ thee or I’ll see thee in Hell!” He drank from the bottle and then hurled it at them to seal his macabre promise.
Jesamiah raised a pistol and fired at Teach, a wild shot, for the distance was too great. “I expect no quarter from you, Teach!” he shouted, “and you shall expect none in return!”
Finch was raging at the men to lighten the load – they had to get afloat. The drinking water went overboard, then he sent men down to haul up the ballast, send that over, his blustering and swearing motivating them to shift their arses. What little was left of the food – the stove, the wood to burn in it, the coffee, even the cups and drinking tankards went. About to start on hammering at the bricks of the stove’s chimney, the rising tide rocked them loose, and encouraged by Isiah Roberts, with some more heaving and pulling, the
Jane
floated free. A moment later, the
Ranger
too was afloat. The men cheered. The fight was on again!
They put their backs to it and rowed. The
Ranger
was a little way behind. Teach had brought the
Adventure
around slightly. Her guns had been loaded with swan shot, nails, and pieces of old iron. He fired a broadside. The resulting damage to the
Ranger
was catastrophic. Midshipman Hyde was killed instantly, his head half severed. Five of his men died outright also. Ten more wounded. With more than half her crew dead or injured, the
Ranger
ran aground again and stuck fast. There was no one to pull her off this time.
For a moment Maynard did not know what to do. With one broadside half his attacking force had gone. Jesamiah yelled for his best shots to come forward – Sandy Banks, Joe Meadows, Crawford, Nat Crocker..
“Shoot at his jib,” Jesamiah ordered, “concentrate your fire on those fore halyards. If we cripple her we can force her aground.”
They rested their muskets on the rail, took careful aim – nothing haphazard, nothing left to chance – and fired, reloaded, fired. Teach was returning fire with pistols and muskets. His guns were at last reloaded, were being run out – another broadside, but he was not so lucky this time. Some tore holes in the sails, some gouged great splinters from the rails, but most of the shot fell short. Crawford fell back, a bullet through his shoulder; Sandy Banks screamed, dropped his musket. Blood burst from his eye as a bullet tore into his face. Other men fell writhing on the deck. Jesamiah, Nat and Skylark took no notice. They fired again and by sheer luck, the
Adventure
’s halyards snapped, the jib tore free and she slewed into a sandbank. Teach was stuck fast.
With no wind to clear it, smoke hung in a great pall between the two sloops. Those men who were not dead were coughing, their eyes watering from the stink and sting of gunpowder. Jesamiah’s ears were ringing from the gunshots; his hearing impaired, sounds were suddenly muffled, distant.
In the lull of firing, he hurried aft ordering the more seriously wounded to be taken below. On strict command he had told Tiola to stay down there. Strict orders. Bad enough having her aboard, but he would not allow her on deck. Would not. With wounded to care for, not really knowing where to start with their terrible injuries, Tiola had no opportunity to disobey.
Maynard found Jesamiah for’ard. “We’re drifting towards the
Adventure
, with one man on the tiller we’ll come straight up against her. Get your men ready to board.”
“No!” Vehemently, Jesamiah disagreed. “If we’re drifting let’s make Teach think we’re done for. Let him come to us. Get everyone below. Just you and me up here. When we are alongside, we can give Teach a warm welcome.”
Fifty Three
Jesamiah had not noticed that a bullet had nicked his arm. He felt the first twinge of pain as he grasped the tiller and encouraged the
Jane
to keep drifting in the right direction. Maynard, next to him, was half slumped over the binnacle box. He had enough blood on him from helping the wounded below to look convincingly dead.
Unaware of the ruse, unaware that he was not about to be boarded, Blackbeard retaliated as the
Jane
bumped alongside. Most of his crew were alive and relatively unscathed, for the
Jane
’s small arms had not been as effective as his cannon. His men tossed grenados made of bottles filled with gunpowder and scrap iron to the
Jane
’s deck, a quick-fuse in the bottle’s neck to ignite it. They exploded on the
Jane
with loud bangs and more smoke, but aside from those already dead her decks were empty, and little damage done. The noise abated. There had been no retaliatory fire. The smoke began to clear.
Teach waited a moment. There was a man slumped over the tiller, another, blood covered, draped over the binnacle box. Bodies were scattered around, two had been decapitated, severed limbs had streamed blood everywhere. It was a charnel house. He grinned.
“We’ve knocked ‘em on the ‘ead, m’dears!” he cried, and stepped across into the
Jane
with most of his men: his boatswain Garratt Gibbens, Phillip Morton, Thomas Gates and Red Rufus, among them.
Save for the flurries of wind and the cry of gulls overhead, it was eerily quiet. Teach walked towards the nearest scuttle, poking at bodies with his foot as he passed. He had found time during that first flight after cutting his anchor cable to dress in his usual imposing manner: two pistols hung from his baldric tied on by ribbons – there had been others, but fired, they had been discarded. Twined into his beard and hair, slow match fuses were burning and smoking. With his grimed face, tall stature and bulging eyes, he looked a fearsome sight as he strode across the
Jane
’s bloodied deck, although it was only his own men who saw him. And Maynard; peeping through the crook of his arm covering his face. Another yard…One more…And Maynard sprang upward. Yelling like a wild man, his pistol raised, he aimed, fired, point blank at Teach.
Teach already had a pistol in his hand – loosed a shot as Maynard’s bullet thudded into his shoulder. It was enough to knock his aim askew and his bullet flew wide, but not enough to kill him. He barely felt its impact. At the same instant, Jesamiah moved, fast, away from where he had been slumped over the tiller, and adding his roar to Maynard’s frantic yelling, urged the men of the
Jane
to come up from below, to attack.
The men, many already bloodied and wounded, appeared from the scuttles, weapons raised, screaming and chanting a war cry of “Death to the bastards!” All was noise and chaos; pistols popping, blade ringing against blade, shouts, grunts, cries.
Jesamiah met with Gibbens. Both of them had pistols that had been fired in the frenzied rush – Jesamiah’s had taken down one of Teach’s men; Gibbens’ shot had gone wide of the mark – they had their cutlasses out, met, parried, broke apart, met again. Jesamiah’s foot slipped on blood on the deck, he went down on his backside. Gibbens moved in for the kill but Nat Crocker was there, behind them. He was using his pistol as a club; brought the butt down on Gibbens’ head. There was an audible crack, the pirate fell, unconscious. Another man – Nat turned, used his feet, his elbows, anything, to fight, to defend himself. Jesamiah came upon Red Rufus, someone else with whom he had a score to settle. Jesamiah’s cutlass swung upward; Rufus tried to parry with his own, but he was not as fast, not as agile. The cutlass – a killing weapon, heavy, lethal. His belly slit open, Red Rufus lay dead.
Skylark ducked under an axe that was scything downward, brought his dagger up and plunged it into his opponent’s groin – but Skylark fell also, his face contorted in a grimace of agony, a bullet lodged in his thigh.
Maynard could not believe his bad luck. He had shot Teach at close range but the man stood there and fought on like a fury! In disbelief he saw another bullet slam into Teach, going clean through his side. The big man stumbled, but that was all. It was as if he could feel nothing, as if he had no blood inside him to shed. No earthly life to lose. Was he truly protected by the Devil?
Enraged, more than a little afraid, Maynard raised his cutlass and attacked. Teach merely laughed and stepped aside. The blade came down and shattered in half, broken on impact with his cartridge box, the edge tearing across Maynard’s hand, cutting the knuckles open to the bone. With the back of his hand Edward Teach delivered a blow to Maynard’s face and contemptuously swept him aside. He turned with a leer of triumph to face Jesamiah. He had another loaded pistol raised, was aiming straight at Jesamiah’s heart.
And Time stopped.
This was the place. The place where the land became the sea and sea became the land. Where one was not the other and all was not as it seemed.
Charles Mereno stood between Blackbeard and Jesamiah, he too had a pistol raised, was pointing it at Edward Teach. The bigger man with the black hair and the bushed beard slowly lowered his weapon, the hint of a questioning frown wrinkling his forehead. After all these years of taunting, was Charles St Croix Mereno to finally find his balls and turn against him?
Not taking his attention off Teach, Charles spoke to Jesamiah. “I wanted to make it up to you,” he said sorrowfully, “but you would not let me. You would not listen to what I wanted to tell you about Phillipe.”
“And I did not – do not – want to know about him now.”
Teach looked from the ghost of the father to the living son. Derision spread across his face. “’Ee weren’t thy brother, Acorne. Thy father ‘ere had no doin’ with plantin’ ‘is seed in the whore who birthed that boy. Any one of a dozen men could’ve sired ‘im. Did thee know that?”
“He knows,” Mereno said. “I told him on the night that poor young wretch you took as wife was used so ill.”
Teach cackled, a sound drenched in madness. “An’ did ‘ee tell ‘im I were one o’ them dozen men?”
“I did. I told him Phillipe was your son.”
Teach laughed again, a great cheer of mirth. “I ‘ave sons an’ brats all o’er tha place. In ev’ry port I doos reckon. Bain’t acknowledged a one of em, an’ I bain’t as startin’ t’do so now.” He hoiked spittle into his mouth and spat the saliva to the deck. “There again, fer many a reason I bain’t happy with thee, Acorne.” He raised his pistol, pointed it at Jesamiah’s head and cocked the hammer home. “Thee ‘as turned traitor t’me and my men. I casn’t be havin’ that, now cas’n I?”
He pressed the trigger. It clicked. Nothing happened.
Charles stared with hatred and loathing at Teach, a smile that was more of a sneer touching the corner of his lips. “You are losing your touch, Edward. That pistol is not loaded. You have already fired it.”
With a grunt of annoyance, Teach threw the weapon at him.
Jesamiah shivered, felt suddenly frightened. There had been no clatter as it had fallen, harmless, to the wooden deck. There was no sound at all, only their own three voices. Everything was still. It was like looking at a frozen tableau – the scene could have been a painting, one of the pictures Skylark created. Nothing moved. Not the clouds, the gulls, the sea, the tattered sails. The men, in various poses, stood like carved statues. Even the blood on the motionless deck was not running or dripping. This was unreal! A dream maybe? One of Tiola’s spells? He wondered if he had been wounded or killed and he was looking as a dead man on those who were alive. But if that was so, as Teach was moving then he was dead with him, and he did not want to be in the same place as that misbegotten whoreson. And Tiola was somewhere below with the wounded. Surely, she would not have let him die here, alone?
“Jesamiah?” Charles said, his anguish returning, so sad, into his voice, “why did you not let me explain?” He lowered his pistol, slowly twisted round to face Jesamiah.
“Evil is here, son; to counter it I have to do what I have to do. But I so want to say I am sorry. So want to say I love you and that I did what I did, will do what I do, out of love for you. I got things wrong, I made mistakes.” He faltered; steadied his nerve. “I would that you could forgive me, though I do not deserve it. Because of my stupidity I was not a good father, but never, never doubt that I loved you, Jesamiah. With all my heart, I have always loved you, my dearest son.”
What could Jesamiah say? What could he answer? His childhood had been a misery because his father had never protected him. But he had got through it, he had survived, and perversely it had made him a better person because he was determined not to be like Phillipe, or like his father.
“I wanted you to listen,” Charles repeated, a harder note coming in his words. “I wanted to tell you why, but the sand has run through the hour glass, and Time will wait no longer.” He raised the pistol, but not at Teach. He was aiming at Jesamiah.
Jesamiah stood very still; as immobile as the men frozen in Time. He did not look at the gun, only at his father’s saddened eyes. He was a dead shot, Charles Mereno. At this close range he would not miss once he pulled that trigger. It would be quick, instant: a better death than hanging.
“I no longer have questions about the past, Papa, nor care about the answers. You are dead, you are gone. Phillipe is dead. Neither of you can hurt me any more.” He half smiled; flicked a glance at the pistol. “At least, I thought you could not. Why kill me? What have I done? It’s him, Teach, who has evil in his heart. Not me.”
With infinite sadness Charles answered, “Please find it in your heart to forgive me. Edward Teach traded his soul with the Devil to become a midshipman aboard my ship. Unless the Dark is chased from him he cannot be killed. But you can, and for my peace, for yours, I have to do this. I am so sorry. So sorry.”
Charles cocked the hammer home, pulled the trigger, and fired at Jesamiah as the last grain of sand dripped through the hourglass, and Time became right and jolted back into its solemn, measured, tread.