Louisiana History Collection - Part 1 (157 page)

“Curse you, Morgan,” Captain Bonhomme growled. “Have you a previous acquaintance with every beautiful woman we are like to meet?”

“Not all,” he said with a laugh, his gaze flicking to Félicité.

She gave him a cold stare.

Isabella was speaking again, suggesting a meal for the ladies with whom she was traveling, a collation of food and wine served alfresco. Regardless of the fact that the men had been dining in no other fashion for some days, this was greeted as a novel idea. Afterward there would be entertainment, the best rough seamen could provide, and then might the ladies not feel that much more amorous, especially since the moon was full?

They might. They would need time to prepare, however. Isabella would return, and her ladies with her, at sunset.

It was as well the men had been given extra hours. As it was, the afternoon scarcely sufficed to accommodate all their speculation as to the quality, expected to be high, of the goods being offered, or to spread out the meat for the feast — the roast piglets, boiled crab and conch, baked snapper and grouper, and as an afterthought, a plate of salt cod. To go with it there would be stewed palm cabbage, manioc cakes, roasted plantains, and a great salmagundi of palm hearts, boiled turtle eggs, chopped pork, and wild garlic and onion, all stirred together with herbs and oil. For dessert there was fruit, the ever-present bananas and oranges. To wash all this down was palm wine aged the entire week, a watered-down ale the pirates called “belly vengeance,” the great delicacy known as “bumboo” consisting of rum, water, and sugar flavored with nutmeg, and finally, the crowning achievement, a punch. This last concoction, made with rum, palm wine, brandy, herb tea, and lime juice, sweetened with sugar and flavored with spice, was guaranteed to put any man in a concupiscent mood. If he wasn’t careful, it would also put consummation quite beyond him.

They piled driftwood high for a pair of enormous fires, one at either end of the long bolt of sailcloth laid on the sand for a table. Plates and knives and antimony mugs were scoured with sand, rinsed, and piled artistically in an empty water butt.

When all was in readiness, and for some long before, there was a great trimming of beards and slicking of hair. The best shirts and waistcoats were brought out. One man doused himself with a most vile perfume, and before the scent had polluted the air for more than a yard, his bottle had been pounced on and passed around, down to the last drop.

There came then the time for parceling out to the men a fair division of the spoils of the Black Stallion. The assembled crew watched with anxious, avid eyes as Valcour directed the barrels and chests and bales to be brought forth. On this dealing out their night’s pleasure depended. How else were they to afford the favors of such high-class beauties?

Félicité retreated to the hut. She had no interest in the spoils, but the advent of the women was just as disturbing to her. She was not immune to the prospect of competition, or the general air of refurbishing. She took out her bundle and unwrapped her feminine attire. The gowns were hopelessly crushed after all this time, and there was no chance of pressing them. They were, in any case, serviceable day gowns such as she had thought she might need for wearing on the streets of Paris. Compared to La Paloma and the other women, in them she would be quite extinguished. Not a man on the island would be aware she was even present, so dowdy and rumpled would she appear.

Morgan, finding her with her gowns spread over the coverlets, was unsympathetic. She would be beautiful in anything, he said. There was no need to upset herself.

She was in the process of telling him, most vehemently, that she was not upset when a man stepped into the open doorway, blocking the light.

“Forgive me if I intrude,” Valcour said, his smile belying the politeness of his words.

“What do you want?” Morgan turned to face the other man squarely, his features hard.

Valcour still was forced to stand slightly bent at the waist in spite of the healing of his wound. He turned to indicate the man carrying a chest who trailed him. “I regret to disturb your quarreling, but since neither you, Sailing Master McCormack, nor Félicité was present just now, I thought it best to deliver your three shares to you before they were lost in the confusion.”

“Our shares?” Félicité inquired, a frown drawing her brows together.

“But of course. As odd as it may seem, as an officer of the pirate crew of Captain Bonhomme, Morgan is due two shares of the Black Stallion’s captured English prize — taken before she reached Las Tortugas.”

“And the third share?” Morgan asked.

“Belongs to Félicité, hers by right for her indispensable aid in the taking of your brigantine,” came Valcour’s answer.

She had forgotten. She might have known Valcour would not, especially if there was the least chance of causing trouble. She ran her tongue over her lips, sending a quick glance to Morgan’s unyielding face, before she turned back to her brother. “I told you then, and I tell you again; I don’t want it.”

“Want it or not, it’s yours, ma chère. You earned it.” Valcour made an imperative gesture, and the man behind him stepped forward to up-end the chest in the middle of the sand floor. An ivory chess set spilled out, the pieces tumbling from a box of inlaid teak and gold. There was a shower of gold coins, a cascade of cloth, a gleam of green jade. And there was also the slither and slide of a gown of cream satin brocade. It lay shining in the slanting rays of the dying sun, a glistening pool of decadent, beckoning luxury.

Félicité stabbed a look of hate at Valcour. He had always been too clever in matters of women’s dress, and also women’s weaknesses, much too spitefully clever.

He bowed, his smile baleful. “I trust I will see you both later.”

His footsteps retreated with those of the seaman, crunching in the sand. Félicité clasped her fingers together as Morgan moved slowly to take up the shimmering satin gown. His fingers crushed the fabric as they closed on it.

“You have something new to wear now,” he said, his voice quiet.

“I — I swear by the virgin, I did not help take your ship for gain, or willingly.”

“Don’t repine. There is a certain justice in it. I was well served.” His face was averted, without expression.

“But I tell you—”

“Don’t! Don’t tell me.” He cut across her words with the command, dropping the gown as if it were hot.

“I would have died if you had not saved me. Don’t you remember?”

He turned his head to stare at her, dark-jade grief mirrored in his eyes. “It might have been best if I had not.”

Her mind closed tight against the pain, leaving her nothing to say. She watched him swing from her and stride from the hut. When he was gone, she sat down on the coverlets, stacked together, doubled now. Stretching full-length, she buried her face in her arms. A shiver ran over her, and then another. Despair, black and blighting, crept in upon her.

Here she and Morgan had lain and loved in the week past. Here she had found deep pleasure. Held through the night in Morgan’s arms, she had felt safe, content, secure. Gradually she had allowed herself to hope, to dream, to trust.

It had been a mistake. The certainty of it was like a swordthrust to the heart, one from which she could not flinch, had no protection. In this contest she had been for some time disarmed.

Was that true?

She sat up, resting her back against a pole support. With narrowed eyes, she considered Morgan’s undeniable passion for her, the way he turned to her in the darkness with soft words and gentle caresses, seeking the solace of her body again and again as if his thirst for her could not be slaked. Was it possible, could it be that this aspect of their alliance could be forged into a weapon?

Her brown eyes intent, Félicité uncoiled from the coverlet and gently picked up the satin gown, shaking it out, holding it against her.

* * *

La Paloma’s tactics were admirable. After a day of careful preparation the pirate crew and common seamen alike were as diffident as schoolboys promised a treat. Men who would have bedded a trollop with gusto and scant notice, or tossed any unsuspecting, chance-met maid and gone on without a backward glance, were after a day of waiting nigh sick with expectation. They crowded the shore peering toward the new brigantine long before there was any sign of departure from her.

The women came at last, boatload after boatload, to the number of near a hundred, few enough in all events for the combined crews of the Raven, the Black Stallion, and the Prudence. Except for Isabella in her usual black, they were dressed in bright-colored gowns of fine floating silk, and with silken flowers in their hair. They laughed, they chattered, fluttering here and there, exclaiming over everything in clear voices to rival the calls of the birds in the trees. Not the usual waterfront trulls, they were still females without the impediment of virtue, and so there were roguish glances, sly innuendos, and the air of availability even as pinches and clutching hands were avoided.

Wearing the gown of satin brocade, Félicité left the hut to join the others. It felt strange to be trussed up in stays and panniers again, and to have the swirl of skirts at her feet. She looked well enough, as far as she could tell in the steel shaving mirror Morgan had tacked to a tree outside their cramped quarters. The gown was a trifle large in the waist, but was a fair fit otherwise. The cream color was a perfect foil for the golden tint of her skin and the sun-bleached fairness of her hair. Without pins, it was difficult to do anything with her long tresses, but she had drawn them back from the temples on either side of her face, and tied the mass with the ribbon from her chemise so that it cascaded in waves and curls down the back of her head.

She came to a halt near the fire at the upper end of the spread sailcloth. Its flickering orange glow, edged with the blue-green of salt-soaked driftwood, played over her, reflecting on the shining fabric of her gown with a strange, unearthly light. Morgan was standing with Captain Bonhomme and Isabella. He turned, then went still, as if transfixed. The seconds passed. His face masklike, he did not move, gave no indication that she was welcome to join their group.

Unhurriedly, Félicité looked away. Juan Sebastian lounged against an oaken barrel of pitch. Forcing a smile to her lips, she strolled toward him.

He came to his feet as she drew near. Inclining his head in a bow, he sent Morgan a quick glance before he spoke. “Good evening, Mademoiselle Félicité.”

She returned his greeting, asking, “Why are you here alone when there is other company to be enjoyed?”

“The other company is not to my taste.” His dark, admiring gaze brushed over her, implying the direction his taste might run. “May I ask why you are not in the company of my friend Morgan?”

“A difference of opinion,” she said, looking away toward the other fire at the opposite end of the sailcloth before she gave him a brilliant smile.

“I trust it is not — serious.”

She moved one shoulder in a weary gesture. “I fear so.”

“One man’s misfortune can be another’s happiness. If you are truly at odds, perhaps you will sit beside me at supper.” The expression in his eyes grew warmer.

“I would be delighted,” Félicité answered without hesitation.

Captain Bonhomme, a short distance away, stepped forth then. “What are we waiting for, men?” he shouted. “To the table!”

The glassy-eyed seamen were no less anxious to get the preliminaries out of the way. They urged the women toward the spread cloth, plying them with food, then falling to themselves. The wine and punch and ubiquitous bumboo were passed up and down the table. Faces grew flushed in the firelight. Voices trilled or guffawed in an ever-rising crescendo. More frequent slaps and laughing protests rang out, as hands groped in the semidarkness.

The French captain sat at the head of the cloth, with Isabella at his right as guest of honor, and Morgan beside her. Félicité and Bast were seated halfway down on the opposite side. It was a trial to watch Morgan and Captain Bonhomme vying with one other for the woman’s attention. Though Bast piled her plate with food, Félicité had little appetite. She sipped from her cup of punch, and promptly choked on the breath-snatching mixture. Bast pounded her on the back then until, laughing, with tears streaming from her eyes, she begged him to stop.

The sense of constraint between them was eased after that. Bast felt it too, for he caught her hand, gazing at her with something near adoration in his eyes. “Mademoiselle — Félicité, you are beyond compare in loveliness tonight.”

“Thank you, Bast. It is kind of you to say so.” Her smile was perhaps more confiding than it might have been under other circumstances.

“You grow more beautiful every day. I have watched you and marveled, when you did not know I was there.”

“Bast—” she began uneasily.

“Does it trouble you to know that I keep you in my sight? It has become a habit with me, watching you from a distance, when you are with Morgan. It gives me pleasure only to be able to see the place where I know you rest, though it also brings pain to think of you with another.”

How could she be unaffected by such a declaration? “Oh, Bast, I didn’t know.”

“How should you, if in my pride and despair I hide it, at times even from myself. Ah, Félicité. I must speak to you, later, when we may be private.”