Captain Adam (38 page)

Even if they had been willing to let both these suits go by default, they couldn't have sneaked away. Adam had not told her this, but Goodwill to Men, careened for a scraping over at Port Royal before Adam had learned how serious was his financial situation, was in no condition to sneak anywhere. What was worse, Adam's seven-sixteenths of the schooner, defenseless now, might at any hour be attached. Even to think of it was a poniard into his heart.

"We've got to take desperate measures, my dear," he said mildly. "I mentioned a plan I had, some time ago. We've got to get to Benbow."

"I've tried! I told you how I tried! He won't see anybody!"

"Desperate measures," he repeated thoughtfully. He finished his punch, put the mug on the floor, and rose. "Bring me my sword," he said.

|T O The frosty blue eyes swerved as though in slots, but no other

*-J O part of the old man moved, when Adam climbed through the window.

"What in Hell do you want?"

"Just to talk to you, sir."

"Going to kill me?"

"No, sir."

"Sure?"

But there was no glint of fear in the blue eyes.

"I'm sure," Adam replied.

"If you came from those captains, it won't do 'em any good. They're guilty. The sentence stands."

"I didn't come from the captains," Adam said. "And I wouldn't have climbed in this way except that I didn't know any other way to get here."

"You bribed one of the guards, I take it?"

"I did, yes, sir. But not the way you think. I took a look at the man who paces before the side door and underneath this window, and it struck me that he was likely to prove honest."

"Eh?"

"Some folks are, you know, sir."

"But you said you bribed him?"

"Yes, sir. I got up close to him this afternoon and whispered that I wanted very much to speak to the admiral for a few minutes and I'd be back tonight at nine. I whispered that here was a yellow boy for him, a gold guinea, provided he'd look the other way while I slipped in through the side door and upstairs."

"And he took it?"

"He wasn't going to. He was going to arrest me. But then he fell to figuring just the way I'd figured he would figure. He figured that as matters stood it would be his word against mine, and in that case, too— if he turned me in, that is—he'd have to give up the yellow boy. But if he could nap me when I tried to sneak up those stairs at nine o'clock, if he could catch me red-handed—d'ye see, sir?—"

"Isee. Goon."

"—then he'd not only be able to keep his coin but he'd get credit for being vigilant and so-forth."

"Yes."

"So he did this. And I guess right now he's down there watching that side door like a chicken hawk. I couldn't have climbed up here if he hadn't been."

Adam looked out of the window, smiling a little. The guard indeed was waiting behind a bush, watching the door, his back to the vine that climbed up past this window.

"And so what do you want?" rasped Vice Admiral Benbow.

Adam crossed quietly to him, and sat at the foot of the bed.

"To talk to you, sir. I have a proposition to make."

"If it's from those captains—"

"It's not from those captains," Adam cried.

Benbow blinked.

"You'll mind your manners, young man. Remember—I could just raise my voice and you'd be shot."

"You could. And I would be. Yes."

They looked at one another.

"Well, are you going to do it?" asked Adam.

The tiniest of all possible smiles touched the corners of the admiral's mouth. It was as though some movement of a glacier had opened a crack through which sunlight now peered hesitantly, half afraid.

"Well, I'll hear what you have to say for yourself first anyway."

"Thank you, sir. I'm sure you'll be interested. What I propose to do is clear out that whole colony of pirates on Providence."

"You—and how many thousand men and how many ships?"

"I'm going to do it alone, sir."

Benbow sighed. 236

"I might have known you was mad. This whole island's packed with madmen, but I don't know why they can't leave me alone."

He reached for a bellpull.

"Please don't do that, sir!"

Benbow paused. Adam swallowed. The scene was quiet enough—the tropic night, a high-ceiled room, the little old man in bed, a smell of medicine. From the harbor came the clean sweet sound of bells striking three times—half past nine. Oh, as peaceful as all-get-out! Yet if the little old man yanked that cord the motion would end Adam Long's life. Those around Admiral Benbow adored him. Adam knew this. Why, even that whining wizened little Willis Beach, who hated and feared everything else about the Royal Navy, never had anything but praise for John Benbow. The marines, upstairs and down, guarded their master jealously. If they found a stranger in this bedroom—well, it wouldn't need a command. Adam would be bayoneted instantly.

"Give me a chance to say what I came for. After all, I do know something about Providence. I lived there for a month."

"Oho, you're a God-damn' pirate yourself, I take it?"

"I'm not a pirate, no, and I never was. I don't like pirates. They—they stink."

"Lots of men of the sea," pointed out John Benbow, "stink."

"Pirates stink in a peculiar way. Let me tell you about it, sir."

Benbow took his hand away from the bellpull.

"Oh, go ahead. Might as well listen. Can't sleep anyway."

Before Adam had a chance to start, however, there was a knock on the door. He sank to the floor on the far side of the bed.

"Come in," the admiral called.

It was the sergeant of the guard with the marine Adam had bribed. The marine told his story, though he made no mention of money. He'd got to thinking it over, he said, and he decided he ought to tell his sergeant.

"Should've done that in the first place."

"Yes, sir. But I thought I'd catch 'im in the act."

"He didn't give you any money?"

"Oh, no, sir!"

"And you say he was a very desperate-looking character?"

"Werry, sir! Scare you just to see 'im."

"Well, you did wrong. But no matter—now. So long as I've escaped. No punishment, sergeant."

"Very good, sir."

"That'll be all now. Thank you."

"Thank you, sir!"

A moment later Benbow said: "All right, come out again, desperate character. I want to learn how you propose to knock out a whole colony of cutthroats single-handed."

Adam nodded in a matter-of-fact way, and sat again on the foot of the bed, and told the admiral about Providence. He made no mention of Maisie, but he did describe the camp in details—its leaders, the pass, the bay, fort, beach, marketplace, warehouse.

"You really do know the place!"

"You couldn't get in there, sir. You could stand off and blast it to bits, yes, but you'd have to knock out that fort before you could put a landing party ashore anywhere near the bay, even in good weather. That would take time. And men. And gunpowder."

Benbow nodded.

"What's more," he said, "I can't spare even a fifth-rater. Need 'em for convoy duty. The merchants of this damn' place are yipping loud enough as it is—not to mention the Lords of Trade back home."

"And even if you did flatten the camp that way, and set fire to it, sir, the Providencers'd simply retreat to the other side of the island. And when you'd gone away they'd come back. They could build that camp up again inside of a week. It's nothing but old boards and tarpaulin. Loot their warehouse and that'd hurt 'em, but in the long haul it'd only make 'em all the more eager to go out and snatch cargoes."

"Aye, they'll pounce on anything that's not convoyed. And we can't keep far away from 'em on the run home, the way the winds are."

"This man van Bramm," Adam went on, "is no fool. But he's greedy. They put on a lot of talk about being brethren and all sharing alike and so-forth, but as a matter of truth it's every man for himself."

"I am not amazed to hear it."

"Van Bramm's ambitious. He wants more than his share. Naturally he's got enemies."

"Naturally."

"I reckon he's got more enemies than friends. It happens that I got acquainted with a good many of them, for the simple reason that they made me into a kind of hero there for a while, as I told you. What it came to, sir: they wanted me to lead a revolt against van Bramm."

"They ask you to do that?"

"Not in so many words. But they would have—if I'd given 'em half a chance. Thev're still sore, those same men. All they want is a shove, and in no time at all you'd have a civil war on Providence."

"Now see here, young man, it strikes me you're almighty glib about this. What if you do get 'em all shooting at one another—what then? Whichever side won, they'd still be on Providence. You couldn't expect 238

to divide those pirates so evenly that they'd all kill one another off down to the last man."

"I wasn't thinking of the pirates at all, sir."

"Eh? But you just said—"

"I said I had a plan for cleaning out the colony. And I have. But I don't mean by making it too hot for the pirates. Nothing's too hot for them. They're salamanders. They can stand anything. They have to— they don't dare go back to civilization. No, it's not them I mean. It's the traders that sponge off of them."

"ULGoon."

"Because the camp couldn't be run without those traders, sir. You think of it like a saihng man, just as I did—at first. But if you'll think of it the way a merchant would—"

"I'll never think of anything the way a merchant does," coldly.

"Well then, think of it the way a pirate would. A pirate can't eat the stuff he steals. He's got to sell it. You can't make a supper out of silks from Samarkand. You can't slaughter a sapphire necklace and cut it up like as if it was a cow, and roast it."

"I begin to see your point. Captain."

"Take away a pirate's receivers, and what is he? And those merchants ain't going to stand around and get sabered. They don't like fighting. They'll scamper right back here."

"Where you wouldn't know 'em from any other bloody merchants!"

"That could be true, sir. But they don't have a price on their heads. They'd get out of Providence as fast as they could—and what's more, they'd stay out. And the pirates'd have to find some new source of supplies. And that wouldn't be easy to do, these days."

There was a considerable silence in the room. Poked by a vagrant breeze the curtains at the window lifted a little, then fell back, limp. A sentry could be heard pacing below.

"Let's get this matter straight, young Yankee. You say you're going to do this whole thing yourself." He leaned forward. "How?"

Unabashed, Adam crossed his legs; he took a knee in his hands.

"There's an ordinary called Walter's, on the waterfront over in Kingston. It's their headquarters." He looked at the admiral. "I don't know whether you knew that, sir?"

Benbow grunted.

"I didn't. Go on."

"It's a respectable place, to look at. But you can always get messages through to Providence from there. No, don't raid it! You wouldn't learn anything, and they'd only shift to another place."

"And you think you can kick up a revolt from there?"

"I can try, sir. I've got friends on Providence."

"You've got enemies there, too, from what you say. What about this man van Bramm? Wouldn't he be sure to hear of anything hke that and nip it short before it got going good?"

Adam paused.

"Well, wouldn't he?"

"I reckon he would," Adam admitted. He cleared his throat, uncrossed his legs. "All right, then. What if I didn't even look in at Walter's? What if I went straight to Providence myself?"

"Alone?"

"Alone."

"I could let you have some men. Not many, but they'd be good men."

"No. That would only bring 'em together. They'd all turn and fight outsiders. But maybe alone I could work with my friends."

"Still sounds mad. You'd go in disguise?"

"Something like that. You could arrange to have me dropped from some vessel in convoy that's passing there at night. All I'd need is a small sloop. I could find my way in. And I know just where I'd land, without being seen."

Benbow put one hand over the other, on the coverlet. They were large coarse hands, though they were clean. He regarded Adam for a long time.

"Captain, I think you're a lunatic," he said at last.

"No, sir, I'm not."

"But I'm beginning to wish I'd had a few lunatics like you off Santa Marta."

Adam flushed.

"Why, thank you, sir!"

"And now let's get down to cases. Of course you're not offering to do all this for nothing?"

"Of course not."

"Good. And what is it you want in return?"

"Only two things. Both of them easy, for you."

"Yes?"

"First, a derelict I took last summer and brought in here. French. A brig. I'm entitled to her and I have my claim in, but the way things are done in the admiralty courts here sometimes—well—"

"Captain, when you have eliminated that pesthole on Providence by whatever means at all, the brig's yours with ribbons on it. And the other thing?"

"A word from you would straighten that all up, too. I want to see Horace Treadway's will probated and his estate settled, so that his cousin can get her just share of it and settle her debts here." 240

"Oho!" Now the eyes were opened very wide, and the hands on the coverlet moved a bit, and the admiral stirred under the sheets. "So now I know who you are, Captain! You're this young Yankee who set Maisie up in that house back on the Constant Spring road. Now don't stiffen! You can't even dream of calling me out. I'd only laugh at you. And I knew Maisie Treadway long before you ever met her. Tell me one thing, Captain. And stop being so uppish. After all, I've insulted better men than you—and will again, sir. Tell me: If you do your part of this bargain and I do mine, will Maisie Treadway use the money to take herself somewhere else? Could that be one of the terms?"

"Mistress Treadway," Adam said, "would be right happy to leave the colony."

"And the colony would sure be right happy to see her go. Very well. That's an agreement then, eh? Here's my hand on it."