Blaggard's Moon (19 page)

Wentworth tried mightily to lose. Somehow, though, he managed to win
against the longest odds. Within an hour, he had amassed more than half the chips on the table. Conch's stack had dwindled while his irritation grew. The other players became visibly nervous for the young man, even edging their chairs away from his. None of this was lost on Wentworth, who appeared more terrified with every hand. It occurred to him, as it did to all the others, that he was being set up. A charge of cheating from Conch, and there would be a duel. Which would thinly disguise a murder.

Conch wants Jenta,
Wentworth concluded.
That's what all this is about.
His hands began to tremble uncontrollably. The pirate had made a deal with his father, but that deal wouldn't matter much if Wentworth was caught cheating—and killed for it.

And then, suddenly, Conch went all in. He bet the last of his chips on a hand with nothing showing: a deuce, a seven, and an eight. He turned to his dealer, also his banker, and said, “Give me twenty more in gold.”

Mart Mazeley opened the drawer at his lap and produced twenty gold coins. Conch tossed them into the pot.

Everyone around the table folded instantly, stepping on one another in their haste to throw in their cards. Then all looked at Wentworth.

The young man glanced again at his hand. Nothing had changed. He had three aces face up. He peeked at the hole cards. Two queens and a five down. A full house. He looked at Conch, saw the man's eyelids droop lazily, as though he were bored. But underneath his eyes were sharp as honed steel.

“That pot,” Wentworth tried, “is too rich for me. I don't suppose I could just fold?”

“Wif yer aces bared for all to see? No. No, I don't suppose ye could fold.”

“But I can't cover that bet,” he pointed out, a fact that precisely no one in the room had missed.

“How much do you have?”

Several moments passed as Wentworth counted his chips. “Fifteen in gold, twenty silver. I could cash out, pay my father's—”

“Ye need four more gold, and eighty. What's in yer pouch?”

Fingers fluttering like squabbling pigeons, Wentworth loosened his purse strings and emptied two gold coins onto the table.

“Still need two and eighty.” The pirate stared hard at the young man. Wentworth couldn't shake the sense that Conch had his pistol out again,
this time aimed at his heart. But he could see both of Conch's hands. “What's in yer pockets?” the pirate demanded.

“Nothing…” but then Wentworth remembered. He had the rings. Gold wedding bands, one for him, and one for Jenta. He had forgotten all about them in Conch's rush to conclude the ceremony. But Conch hadn't forgotten about them. He'd seen it all written out on the parchment. He'd skipped over a lot, including the part where he was supposed to ask if there were rings.

“What's in yer pockets?” Conch asked again.

“Nothing I'd want to bet,” Wentworth answered.

“Let's see.”

And Wentworth reached into his vest pocket and pulled out the rings. He held them out on his hand.

“What'd ye pay for 'em?”

“Two in gold. One for each.”

“Still short eighty in silver. Put 'em in.”

Wentworth closed his hand around them. He held them for a long time, glancing around the room. The others waited, withholding comment, withholding judgment, watching him work through the problem.

“Ye said vows over them pieces a' gold, or what?” Conch asked.

“No,” he answered, too quickly. He looked at his cards again. He still had a full house. A good hand. Nobody had had a better one all night. It was a winning hand. He set the rings on the table.

Conch exchanged glances with Mazeley, who reached out, swept them into the pile.

“What else ye got?” Conch asked.

“Just the clothes I'm wearing.”

“Are ye a man of yer word?” the pirate asked.

“Of course I am,” he answered.

“Then ye got more.”

“What do you have in mind?” Wentworth's heart raced.

“I fancy yer girl.”

Wentworth stood. The others held their breaths. Whether he meant to run or to fight, they couldn't tell. Either would be disastrous. “I knew it,” the young man whispered at last.

Wentworth glanced around the table, saw no help. But their wide eyes finally helped him find a place to dig in his heels. “I will not bet my…my girl at a card game.” The protest came out a bit more like a squawk than he would have preferred.

“I ain't askin' ye to lose yer girl at cards.”

“Then just what are you asking, sir?”

“The day ye don't want her no more, she's mine.”

“What? What are you saying? You agreed…” but he trailed off. He had too many things to hide.

Imbry spoke slowly, not with irritation, but as a man who wanted to be understood in every regard by a man who was slow to understand. “I ain't askin' ye to bet yer girl. I'm sayin' the bet is this: If ye lose this hand, then the day yer done with her, I'll come for her. And ye won't say a word about it. And neither will yer daddy. And neither will her mama. And neither will she.”

Wentworth's chin came up. “I'll never be done with her.”

“Then ye've got nothin' to lose. Pot's right. Let's play.”

Wentworth remained standing. “She's a free woman, and makes her own choices.”

Now Conch leaned in. “Is she, now? Well that's interestin'. A woman of fine means and her mother, come here by theirselves, no menfolk wif 'em. Brought here by yer daddy. And the two of you in that big house with no womenfolk around. And then, just when she's startin' to catch the fancy of many fine gentlemen, Jenta's suddenly yer…girl.” He lolled the final word out of his mouth like he was dropping a musket ball down a gun barrel. “But yet, ye say she's free to make her own choices. That's interestin'.”

“That is my own business, sir, and none of yours.”

“Yer business or mine, the point is, it's
business
. This little bet is just another transaction.”

“No, it's madness. You're mad.”

Conch spread his cards out on the table. He started turning the hole cards over, one by one.

“Wait, I didn't bet!”

“I didn't say ye did. I'm jus' showin' ye all my cards, all but the last one still sittin' there on the deck in Mr. Mazeley's hand. Just so's ye can make the appropriate choice.” He kept turning his cards over. In addition to the two, seven, and eight he turned over a four, another deuce, and a third deuce. “There. Yer aces showin' beats my deuces.”

For a moment Wentworth thought Conch was admitting defeat. But then the pirate said, “Well? Are ye bettin' or ain't ye?”

Wentworth pondered as the others waited. No one ever beat the Conch, and everyone knew it. And whatever a man bet here, he couldn't unbet.

“Do ye love her?” Conch asked. The question echoed within him, like the whisper he'd heard at the Summer's Eve Ball.

“Yes!” Wentworth answered fiercely.

“Then what are ye worried after? I'm just a pirate.” He seemed almost gentle. “I don't understand how a man binds hisself to a woman fer life. If ye'll always want her, she'll always be yers. And if ye find ye don't want her one day, then what's the harm? Ye won't want her no more, anyway.”

Maybe it was the rum. Maybe it was the way Conch's argument struck the other men as humorous, relaxing them. Maybe it was the argument itself. Maybe it was that Conch had left him only the one choice. Or maybe it was the full house he had on the table. “I'm all in,” he said.

“Ye heard that, didn't ye?” Conch asked the others, who nodded appropriately.

“Deal one more card down, Mr. Mazeley.”

Mazeley did. Still standing, Wentworth turned up his card immediately. It was a three. He quickly turned up his queens. “Aces over queens. Full house.”

“Aces over queens,” Conch repeated, as though lost in thought. “A good hand.” Then he reached out slowly, deliberately, and without taking his eyes off Wentworth, he turned up his last card. One more deuce.

He had four of a kind.

Mazeley rose and swept the winnings toward Conch.

The pirate stood. “And that's it, gentlemen. Cash in whatever little ye have left in front of ye, and Godspeed.” As Mazeley exchanged the men's chips for coin, Conch shook hands around the table, chatting briefly with each man. The players thanked the pirate warmly for his hospitality and for the highly amusing, highly memorable evening. A few of them patted Wentworth on the shoulder or said words like “Tough luck” or “I've seen worse” as they collected hats and canes and left the room. Soon it was Wentworth and the Conch alone, with Mazeley counting out the winnings behind them.

“Well, ye got somefin' to say?” Conch asked.

“You had a deal with my father, to stay away from her.”

“And now I got a deal wif you.”

“I will always want her.”

“Then what are we talkin' about?”

“She's my bride. You knew that.”

“Aye, and so did you.” Conch saw the bitterness of youthful rage. He put a hard, heavy hand on Wentworth's shoulder. He squeezed just
enough that Wentworth felt the power, and the control of that power. He stared deep into the young man's eyes. “Don't be gettin' all riled with
me
, son. Ye bet yer wife at a poker game.”

Wentworth looked at the hand on his shoulder, then looked sullenly back into the pirate's face. “You coerced me.”

“Did I? Don't recall. But even were that so, I'm not the one who bet my bride away like she was worth naught but eighty in silver. And her weddin' ring, to boot. Think on that when ye take yer honeymoon strolls down the beach.” He leaned in to give Wentworth the full force of his next statement, hard rum and stale tobacco with it. “Ye bet her away, Mr. Ryland. Ye bet yer new bride away on yer wedding night, not two hours after ye married her. That should tell ye all ye need to know about yerself. And it'll tell her all she needs to know about you as well.”

Wentworth recoiled. “Why should she ever know?”

“Ye want her comin' to ye one night all misty, askin' about the rumors she heard from some banker's wife, or the latest gossip at the market? Ye wanna lie right into that pretty face while she sees through ye to the truth of what ye are? If that's yer choice, that's yer choice. But ye'll make good on yer debt, son, when the time comes.”

“It won't come.”

Conch released his grip, stood toe to toe. “Oh, it'll come, lad. A man who'll make that bet, why, he'll throw a woman away when she displeases him. I oughta know.” He grinned. “I'm just that sort of man myself.”

Wentworth's mouth formed unspoken curses. Then he said, “You're no gentleman.” Then he turned and, buzzing with anger and shame, walked away.

Conch laughed and picked up the closest tumbler of rum. “The game's just begun, boy! Welcome to pirate's poker!” And he downed the drink.

Ham paused for effect. His audience was quiet.

Then one of the sailors exclaimed, “Conch'll get her within the month!”

“He's already got her!” another responded. “Did ye see how she looked at him?”

“No way she wants that wet noodle Wentworth now.”

“She's doin' jus' like 'er mama done!”

The forecastle buzzed, and Ham Drumbone listened. When the conversation died down, he spoke again.

“You gents got it all figured, do ye?”

“Well, what'd Conch do?” Ballast asked in the eagerness of his youth. “How'd he get her?” And for once, the experience of age did not descend on him like a ten-pound maul.

“Aye, tell us what he done!” and “Keep talkin', Ham!”

Ham nodded thoughtfully, but he tapped his pipe into his callused hand and mashed the embers out with hard fingers. “I will keep talking, for I'll tell you this. There's not a man alive who knows how to shut me up for long. But gents, we got business of our own tomorrow, and the Whale wants us in fine fettle. Any who lives another day gets another story. That's all for tonight—”

“No, don't say it!” several shouted at once, and a clamor arose.

But when it died down, Ham said it anyway. “That's all for tonight, lads. More tomorrow if I've a mind and you've the time.” And once he'd said those words, there was no getting him to unsay it. The rest would have to wait.

“All of 'em's wrong,” Delaney told his
Chompers
. “I know what sorta stock Jenta come from, I get that. She weren't high and fine born. But still, a person is what a person is. And Jenta, she was fine.” He stretched his toes out again, wriggled them, just to watch the fish roil the water in anticipation. “See, that's just it. Somethin' appeals to ye, and ye think ye gotta swallow it all up whole right now. Ye dumb fish ain't no better'n Wentworth, or Runsford, or the Conch. Women now, real ladies…” he trailed off as he thought of Maybelle, and her sweet brown eyes, how they seemed like liquid things looking up at him, and how she blinked. Just the way she blinked was like a song. Like a lullaby. There were words there, too, in that song in the blink of her eyes. And a melody too, somehow. If one just could hear it. And Delaney could hear it.