Jim Morgan and the Pirates of the Black Skull (4 page)

“Jim, I know I be not much more than an old salt o’ the sea. And I know youth ne’er listens to age, nor never has. It was so even with me and me pappy when I was but a sea pup like yerself. But hear me this one time if ye’ve heard me at all. Storms come in this life, boy. Sure as the sun n’ the moon, n’ birth n’ death, storms’ll come. Not all of them be made o’ wind and rain. Me old sailin’ master used to say to me that ye don’t know if a swabby be a sailor or no till ye see him handle the wheel in a storm. He was right about that. But I say that ye don’t know if a boy be a man or no til ye see him handle hisself in the storms o’ this life. Do ye understand me, Jim?”

Jim stared at MacGuffy through the candle flame. “I think so, MacGuffy.”

“Good,” said the old pirate. “Then we’ll be seein’ ye in the mornin’ to take ye back home, and a joyous day I’m sure ‘twill be. Goodnight, young Morgan.”

“Goodnight, MacGuffy,” Jim replied. This time he heard the old man creak his way all the way up the steps to the lamp room above. Jim closed his eyes, but it was a long time before he fell asleep again.

THREE

he next morning, Jim woke before anyone else in the house, even old MacGuffy, who rarely rose after the sun. Jim leapt from the hammock, his nightmare forgotten for the moment and the joy of this long-awaited day bursting within his chest. Down the stairs he rushed to boil a few pots of water, enough for him and even the Ratts to have a bath in the tub behind the lighthouse.

After scrubbing himself cleaner than he had been in at least a year, Jim ran back to his room, dripping wet. He tugged on a pair of breeches and socks, and pulled on a bright white shirt with a cream-colored waistcoat. He also slid on a pair of new shoes and finished dressing with a blue riding coat and tricorn hat. These were nothing like the costly fashions from Austria and France that Aunt Margarita used to
have tailored for Jim, but they were the best clothes he had worn since running away from home that stormy night so long ago. They would more than do for this most marvelous of days.

The Brothers Ratt were waiting for Jim in the kitchen as he came down the stairs. They stood all in a row, hands on their lapels and looking every bit the dapper, noble-born boys they were absolutely not. The devilish smirks upon their faces told Jim at once how obscenely taken the three thieves were with their new look.

“Ah, Lord Morgan, you’ve arrived at last,” George said tiredly. He sauntered forward, arching one eyebrow and yawning into the back of his hand in a perfect imitation of the nobles whose pockets he’d once picked in London. “In honor of this glorious occasion, sire, we, the humble Clan of the Ratt, bid you good day.”

The three brothers turned as one on their heels, flipped up the tails of their coats, and bowed with their nobly dressed rears in a perfect row toward Jim. Together they shouted in unison: “We salute you, sire!”

“Knock that off, you blockheads!” Jim shouted. He laughed out loud and leapt from the stairs to deliver a swift punt to the seat of George’s upturned pants.

“Oy! That was a bit unlordly of you, don’t you think, Jim?” George said, gingerly rubbing one set of cheeks and the irrepressible Ratt smile still stretched across the others.

“And to have leapt down the stairs in such a manner?” Peter added, shaking his head and clucking his tongue in feigned shock and dismay. “You may have twisted your noble ankle, milord!”

“My lord!” Paul shouted, falling to his knees before Jim. “I postulate myself at your feet!”

“No you don’t!” Jim smushed Paul’s hat down over his head and slugged Peter in the shoulder. “And besides…” he was about to correct Paul, but Peter cut him off.

“The word is
prostrate
, Paul,” Peter said, shaking his head as though quite disappointed.

“Well done, Peter,” Jim said, impressed.

“Well, I have been doin’ a bit of readin’, haven’t I?”

“Yes, we know,” Paul and George replied together, giving Peter the snootiest of looks they could muster.

“It’s so BO-ring,” George added. “And keep gettin’ your nose stuck in all them books all day, you’ll forget your lock pickin’, Peter, which is the really the only thing you know of any use, innit?”

“Readin’ is useful, George,” Peter replied. “For civilized men like meself, that is. Readin’ is like pickin’ a lock in your mind.” Peter paused to sneak a self-impressed wink at Jim. “And besides, George, I could still out lockpick you in my sleep.”

“You’d be surprised what I can do in me sleep, Peter,” George said, emphasizing his brother’s name as nastily as possible.

“Too true, Georgie, too true,” Paul said seriously. “You’re an absolute master at peeing yourself in your sleep. A genius really, and I’m not just saying that, I swear.”

“THAT…WAS…NOT…ME!” George shrieked, snatching his new hat from his head and slamming it on the ground. “That was PETER!” Peter, of course, remembered events differently and the three of them were about to descend into a brotherly brawl when a stern shout came from the stairs behind them.

“Boys!” Lacey’s voice rang down into the kitchen. “You promised no fighting today. You’ll ruin your new clothes before we even step out the door!”

Jim turned to remind Lacey that the brothers were destined to ruin their clothes eventually, but the words caught in his throat. Instead, his mouth dropped open as though the hinge to his jaw had broken.

Lacey stood on the stairs looking down at the boys, a long yellow dress flowing in ruffles all the way down to her feet. White lace frosted her skirt like a dusting of snow on the first day of winter. A broadbrimmed hat framed her auburn curls and blue-eyed face like an angel from a painting. Somehow, Jim thought, Lacey suddenly seemed a great deal taller and older than she had ever seemed before. He had no idea why, but Jim felt irresistibly compelled to remove his hat. When
he looked over at the brothers Ratt, they had stopped wrestling each other and held their hats in their hands as well.

“Lacey,” Jim said, scrunching up his face, which felt suddenly itchy. “You look like, like…well you look like, like a girl, don’t you?”

“Right,” George added, as though he’d just come to that brilliant epiphany at the same moment. “Like a girl, alright! Like a real girl!”

Lacey, who had been blushing fiercely while her four friends stared at her, suddenly mustered a familiar, fierce glare and her hands flew to her hips. “Well what do I normally look like then?”

“Well…you know, I…” Jim stammered. He looked to the Ratts for help – which even Jim knew in a situation like this would have been the last place to find any.

“Which is how you always look,” Peter managed first. “I think.”

“Right, always… you know, that’s what I meant: you always look like a girl, Lacey,” George said. “I mean, maybe not as much as right now…right?”

Paul was even less help than George and Peter. He simply stared at Lacey with a furrowed brow and an open mouth, as though still trying very hard to figure out whether or not she was even the same person. But it was MacGuffy, hobbling from down the hallway, who set Lacey’s concerns to rest.

“Ye look ever the graceful beauty, lass,” he said, limping gamely across the room and holding out his gnarled hand to guide Lacey down the stairs. The former pirate had done his best to tame his wild, white hair. His finest gold loops hung from his ears, and he wore his best and newest coat, which was probably only twenty years old and had been through merely a handful of storms and sea battles.

“You must forgive ‘em, ma’am. All boys be born fools, and only one man in ten ever manages to grow from his foolery a’tall. Ye look no lov’lier today than yesterday, lassie, but it is a fine dress, if ye let an old man say so.”

“Thank you, MacGuffy,” Lacey said. She leaned up and kissed the old man’s wrinkled face on the cheek, just beneath his eye patch. Then
she stormed out the front door, leaving the boys with only an irritated snort on her way.

“What was that for?” Jim said, slamming his hat back on his head.

“It be the charm ye lack, lads,” MacGuffy said, a smile as roguish as the Ratts’ stretched over his cracked lips. “And I could out charm the four of ye in
my
sleep, and that be a fact, young pups.” MacGuffy winked his one good eye at the Ratts and followed Lacey out the door.

“You know,” George said thoughtfully, adjusting his own hat on his head. “If it weren’t for all the preachy lessons about the ocean and gettin’ into trouble, and scrubbin’ the floors all the time, I might actually miss that old blighter.”

“Fortunately, George, I don’t think it’ll be so long before he comes to visit us at Morgan Manor,” said Peter.

“Why’s that?” Jim asked.

“Well, unless he can figure out where we hid all the underwear he made us wash yesterday, he’ll need to ask us where we put it, won’t he?” answered Paul. The three brothers sniggered naughtily, nodding to each and then to Jim before marching out the front door themselves.

Jim followed his friends, pausing at the threshold to take one last look around the old lighthouse. No more cellars or attics or closets for Jim Morgan and the Clan of the Ratt, he thought. Tonight they would sleep in the comfort of Morgan Manor – warm beds and hot dinners. Without doubt, this was going to be the first of many good days to come, Jim knew. He stepped out into the sunshine with a smile on his face, shutting the lighthouse door behind him for the last time.

For the better part of the day the carriage bounced down the road, winding along the southern coast of England toward the town of Rye. Jim and his friends pointed and stared at the cliffs and beaches they passed, and at the waves and the gulls floating on the winds above the waters. At one point Peter attempted to read a book he’d borrowed (most likely without permission) from MacGuffy’s library. The road
was so bumpy that Peter was forced to grip the book quite tightly and hold his face close to the pages in order to make out the words. It was too choice an opportunity for George and Paul to miss. George produced a good-sized rock from his pocket, the availability of which should come as no surprise to anyone who’s ever known a young boy or two, and hurled it with perfect timing from the window before one of the wheels. The carriage took such a start that the book snapped up and smacked Peter right in the face, sending George into the most impolite howling and cackling.

“George!” Peter yelped, holding his nose with one hand and slamming his book down with the other.

“It was just a bump in the road, Peter,” Paul said, without a trace of guilt in his face (he was a born con after all). George, of course, hollered like a monkey, pointing shamelessly in Peter’s face. This led to Peter falling on his brother with fists flailing and Jim and Lacey had to pull the three of them apart, as usual.

“Can the three of you not keep out of trouble for even one hour?” Lacey shouted, clearly agitated. “Not even on a day like today?”

“Have to stay on our toes, Lacey,” George replied matter-of-factly. “If you have a gift, not to use it is a crime. And that’s even in the Bible, in’t it? It just so happens that our gift is trouble!” At this, Lacey threw up her hands and refused even an attempt at arguing. But Peter, who was still rubbing his nose, nodded as if that made total sense.

“True, George, true,” Peter said in a quite nasally voice. “You caught me off guard on that one – but not the next time! I’ll be ready!”

“I’ll even sleep with one eye open,” Paul said, his arms folded over his chest. “Got used to doing it at St. Anne’s. Never knew when George was gonna wet the bed. One must stay on his toes indeed.”

“That wasn’t me!” George raged. “IT WAS PETER!”

The remainder of the journey passed without incident. As the afternoon stretched toward evening the Ratts and Lacey drifted off into naps and dreams of their own. Jim, however, stayed awake the entire time, wringing his hands and shifting back and forth in his seat.
The closer and closer the little carriage drew to Rye, the more and more anxious and restless he became. What would he say to the staff when he arrived? The house would surely be in an uproar over Aunt Margarita’s recent eviction, Jim imagined. It was also quite possible that many of them still had no idea Jim was even alive after that night Cromier’s soldiers had chased him into the dark forest.