Jack Iron (18 page)

A buzz of amusement swept over the men of Laffite’s crew who were standing within earshot and listening to the interchange between the Cajun cannoneer and McQueen. With a mischievous gleam in his eye, Francis Luc winked at the carronade’s gun crew, many of whom shared his private joke. “You will recognize ‘Captain Cayman,’” he said. “Of that, Lieutenant, I have no doubt.”

Morgan Town was a collection of buildings erected from the natural material to be found on the island: mud, wood, reeds, and stone. An irregular pattern of streets and roads consisting of hard-packed dirt became narrow streets paved with crushed shells. As a single johnny boat bearing Kit, Laffite, O’Keefe, and ten of the crew from the
Malice
nosed out of the shallows and up onto the beach, Orturo Navarre with NKenai at his side walked down a flight of wooden steps that led from the riverfront road and moved quickly across the beach to the water’s edge, a distance of less than twenty feet.

Francis Luc was right, thought Kit as he climbed out of the boat and slogged through the surf to the moist white sand mottled with patches of shade where the palm trees grew in clusters of threes and fours. The man coming to greet them was unmistakable. He was dressed as an aristocrat, but his seamed leathery features, shaved head, and crescent row of pointed teeth were the stuff of nightmares. This man could only be the infamous Orturo Navarre. Kit was grateful for Laffite’s presence, for the buccaneer apparently commanded respect even from the likes of the Carib.

“Captain Jean Laffite… I am honored.” Navarre spoke in a silken tone. He had no true affection for Jean Laffite, but the buccaneer’s exploits were legendary, and he was seldom without his brothers, so that an affront to one Laffite was an affront to all three. The Cayman suspected that Dominique You and Pierre Laffite were probably in the vicinity, perhaps lying offshore where the lookouts could not see them. “When I recognized your flag, I sent word to my men to prepare a celebration. Welcome to my island… Natividad.” Navarre bowed, and then turned and gestured toward Morgan Town with a wave of his hand. “All that I have is at your disposal.”

“All that you have?” Laffite replied.

“
Si.
I know you are Obregon’s good friend. Like a son is this young man to you. But he had abandoned these good people. They had not seen him in months. When I came ashore, the people of Morgan Town welcomed me with open arms.” Navarre glanced aside at Kit and O’Keefe. Both men wore buckskins and were armed with rifles, flintlock pistols, long knives, and tomahawks. “These two are not with the brotherhood.” His gaze narrowed, leaving Kit with the distinct impression he was being measured for a stewpot.

“We aren’t against it, either,” Kit replied. He introduced himself and O’Keefe. The Irishman had discarded his coonskin cap but taken the liberty of tying a couple of turkey feathers in his shaggy mane of gray. Kit made no overture, but instead allowed his eyes to wander to the collection of piled goods and tarpaulins along the waterfront. Was that the dull iron maw of a cannon beneath the oilskin? He estimated the number of Navarre’s crewmen in formation along the shore road and settled on about fifty or sixty men. As for the populace of Morgan Town, they seemed oblivious to Laffite’s arrival, which struck him as odd.

“If Captain Laffite has welcomed you aboard his ship, then you will be my guests tonight,” Navarre magnanimously proclaimed.

“We have come for Cesar Obregon,” Kit told the Carib.

“And you have not seen him?” Laffite asked.

“No,” Navarre said with a glance at NKenai, who also shook his head.

“He might be on the other side of the island, anchored in his cove.”

“I would know such a thing,” Navarre told them. “The Hawk of the Antilles has roosted elsewhere. But to put your mind at ease, I will have one of my men take a skiff around the island and see.” Navarre turned and took NKenai aside and spoke in a low voice, issuing instructions that only the African could hear. NKenai nodded and trotted off across the sand toward a skiff whose bow appeared to be wedged in the soft sand. The black man single-handedly extricated the craft from the beach and, wading into the surf, maneuvered the craft into the surf. He leapt aboard and untied the single, gaffe-rigged triangular sail, and tacking once in the westerly breeze blowing from inland, he caught the wind and headed out into the bay.

“Come with me. Rest. Bring your crew ashore,” said Navarre. “There are women. And plenty of rum. Are your brothers aboard the
Malice
?”

Laffite’s expression never wavered. “No, but they are around if I need them,” he lied with a poker face.

Listening to Laffite and watching the way he handled himself, it was obvious to Kit that they were not among friends. Since we’re still alive, I guess we aren’t among enemies either, he told himself.

Navarre clapped Laffite on the shoulder and then extended his invitation to the crew of the johnny boat. “I welcome all of you. Fire some jack iron, my brothers. But beware: the oildown is hot, but the women, hotter.” Laffite’s crew cheered to a man and followed the two captains across the beach to the wooden stairs leading up to the waterfront.

“He does ugly proud,” O’Keefe said to McQueen. “But he seems like a hospitable rascal.” The Irishman, despite the grave reason he had come to Natividad, was anxious to have his feet on dry land for a spell. And a tankard of rum wouldn’t hurt, either. “The way I see things, maybe we passed Obregon at sea and he’ll be along if we wait for him.” O’Keefe wiped the perspiration from his forehead on the sleeve of his buckskin shirt. The feathers in his hair fluttered in the breeze. He noticed that two of Laffite’s crewmen were starting back toward the
Malice.
Out in the bay, about seventy yards from shore, another boat had been lowered into the water from Laffite’s schooner and several men were climbing over the side. Others simply dove over the side and swam toward shore, unwilling to wait their turn and be ferried to Morgan Town.

“Come on, there is nothing we can do for now,” O’Keefe said. “We’ll make our war plans in town over a jug or two of white rum. I reckon it’s safe enough.”

Kit studied the waterfront tarpaulins. Yes, that was a cannon. His gaze swept up the hills above the town to the governor’s palace nestled against the limestone bluffs. His heart began to pound; his breath came in shallow gasps, the pressure building in his chest. He stared at those sun-bleached, solid walls with the redoubt at their base and shook his head and ran a hand over his face to clear his blurring vision.

“What is it, Lieutenant?” asked the Irishman.

“I don’t know,” Kit said. The sensation had passed and left him cold and shivering in the Caribbean sun. He steadied himself on his rifle as his windburned features hardened, betraying the iron-hard resolve that was his heritage. His hand inadvertently closed around the medal lying against his chest. “But I intend to find out.”

B
Y LATE AFTERNOON, LAFFITE’S
crew had come ashore and gathered in the town square along with the men from Callaghan’s ship and many of Navarre’s swaggering ruffians. Pity those crewmen stationed on the walls of the governor’s palace. From a distance, the guards enviously watched as banquet tables made of palm wood were carried out and placed around the square. Casks of rum and sorrel were loaded on carts and placed in each corner of the square, while the tables themselves were laden to the breaking point with platters of roasted pig, boiled shellfish, codfish fritters, and molasses cakes. As the sun dipped toward the western horizon, torches were set ablaze to illuminate the periphery of the town square, while in the center, timbers were stacked head high and set ablaze.

Throughout the day, Kit McQueen had wandered among the narrow streets and alleys, up to the walls of the governor’s palace, where Navarre’s guards turned him back. As he meandered among the houses and shops where a turner might ply his trade with wood and lathe or a gunsmith or crockmaker labor at his craft, Kit could not help but notice that the townspeople appeared far less enthusiastic about Navarre’s presence than the Cayman had led them to believe. Indeed, they tended to speak of him more out of dread than affection—that is, when they would speak at all. Still, what happened on Natividad was none of his concern. Let Obregon and Navarre fight for control of the island, let them hack each other to pieces. Kit was only interested in one person. Nothing else mattered. At least, that was what he tried to tell himself.

But there was something about the way Navarre lorded over Morgan Town’s populace that made Kit uneasy and riled his innate sense of justice. Even as the Cabilde came forward to welcome Laffite’s Baratarians to the port, their eyes constantly shifted to Navarre as if each man feared for his life and looked to the Cayman for approval.

Kit’s mother and father had fought and sacrificed during the Revolution. The conflict had left an indelible brand, one that would become a legacy to their children like the medal itself, handed down from generation to generation. A McQueen wasn’t partial to oppression.

Kit felt someone staring at him and he glanced up to see a hollow-cheeked priest in black robes and a broad-brimmed black hat watching him from across the square. The padre seemed oblivious to the revelry surrounding him: a drunken freebooter staggered up to the priest and shouted something in his face. When the man of God failed to react, the drunkard continued on his way. Kit sensed immediately that the priest wanted to speak with him. McQueen had heard of Father Bernal from Laffite’s crew; indeed his first stop had been the church, only to find the doors bolted from within. No one had answered his knock. Perhaps the padre wished to reveal a different version of Navarre’s arrival on the shores of Natividad.

Kit rose from the table to the right of Navarre and started to make his way through the crowd. The air was charged with the noise of the boisterous freebooters, the blaring music of fiddles and concertinas and hornpipes and drums. Men leaped and whirled and chanced injury as they flailed at one another with their cutlasses to see which man could make the other flinch.

Over by the fire and much to the delight of a group of onlookers, Iron Hand O’Keefe and Navarre’s own shipmate, Malachi Quince, a grizzled little throat-slitter who had escaped the clutches of the hangman on more than one occasion, were engaged in a fierce competition. O’Keefe and Quince each held a small cask of dark rum. At a signal from the Cajun Jean Baptiste, the two men began to gulp the contents of the kegs in a race to see who could be the first to drain them dry. O’Keefe towered over his opponent; however, size had nothing to do with a man’s ability to hold his jack iron. Malachi Quince, inspired by the cheers of his black-hearted brethren, was the first to empty his keg and toss it into the fire, besting O’Keefe by five seconds. Both of the rum-soaked casks exploded into flames on contact with the burning timbers.

Kit continued on across the square, working his way toward the priest. Quite unexpectedly, Father Albert Bernal spun on his heels and retreated from the square, moving quickly beyond the flickering reaches of the firelight. Quickening his pace, the priest darted up the steps and through the open doorway of his church. The darkened interior mirrored the gloom strangling his heart.

A hand caught McQueen by the arm, halted his progress, and turned him around. He started to pull free and found himself face to face with Navarre’s ebony-skinned henchman, NKenai. The African’s grip was like iron. His fingers dug into Kit’s shirt sleeve and found only corded muscle, the arm of a blacksmith, with about as much give as an anvil. NKenai arched his brows in surprise. He looked at the smaller man with renewed respect.

“
Ngoja kidogo.
Wait a little. Captain Navarre would speak with you. Laffite is with him.”

“Did you find anything at Obregon Cove?” Kit asked. The African must have navigated his return by moonlight, no mean feat.

“
Njoo.
Come.”

NKenai indicated the tables where the Cayman and Jean Laffite sat side by side. Several comely young women of African, South American, and Caribbean extraction had emerged from the Sea Spray Tavern to join the celebration. A hefty-set girl of no more than fifteen years immediately took up residence on Jean Laffite’s lap. The buccaneer laughed and sent the girl on her way with a swat to her ample derriere. Harry Tregoning managed to catch her on the rebound and pulled her into his embrace. He wrinkled his ugly features and made a silly face that the girl found amusing. As Kit drew nigh he heard the girl ask Harry if he was a captain and heard Tregoning reply, “Why, an admiral, my dear child. An admiral.”

Artemus Callaghan, a man of ample girth and prodigious appetites, commandeered a table all to himself and was enjoying his own private feast. He wolfed down pork and pastry. Grease smeared the slave trader’s wobbly jowls and spattered the broad bib tucked at his throat. He ate in a hurry. The Carolinian was anxious to return to bed with one of the Sea Spray’s harlots. Kit had nothing but contempt for the “peculiar institution” of slavery. No man had the right to own another. It was as plain and simple as the nose on his face, an incontrovertible truth and an issue he worried would one day divide the country if not dealt with by the government.

Navarre rose and welcomed Kit back to the table as if the lieutenant had been gone for days instead of a few minutes. He indicated a place on the bench to his left.

“As you can see, my dear Mr. McQueen, NKenai has returned.”

“With something of value to say, I trust.” Kit’s mood was souring. He was in no mood for carousing. The pursuit of Cesar Obregon was wearing thin, and he was no closer than when the
Malice
had set sail from New Orleans six weeks ago.

“He saw nothing but the slaves we are keeping there on Obregon’s plantation. But Artemus will take many of them with him when he leaves tomorrow.”

“Eh? Perhaps the day after,” Callaghan called out. He ran his tongue around the ear and along the neck of the girl on his lap. She laughed and pretended to enjoy his attentions. “Navarre tells me you are searching for a girl this Obregon has stolen.”