Louis L'Amour (13 page)

“They will receive me,” Henry said coolly. “I was a king among them.”

“But these are long from Africa, most of them,” John Tilly suggested. “Will they remember?”

“They will,” Henry replied, “and if not, I shall remind them.”

Fair blew the winds for Jamaica, and the good ship
Abigail
, named for my mother, proved a good sailer. Soon I was lending a hand at the sailing, learning the ropes, as the saying was, and taking a turn at the helm.

Each night we had a man or two back from the fo'c'sle to tell us what he knew of Joseph Pittingel, his ships, and of Max Bauer.

Soon a picture began to come forth, a picture of a man both shrewd and dangerous, a man who had many friends or at least associates throughout the islands and along the coast of the mainland. A man even more formidable than we had assumed and a situation that must be handled with extreme care, for he had friends in important positions who could cast a man into jail or have him hanged.

That he was a slaver came as a surprise to many of those to whom we talked. This he had apparently kept from anyone, yet here and there a seaman would drop a word to let us realize that there were those who did know. A picture of the man became clearer, a picture of an adroit, cunning man who presented one picture to
officials and to merchants and another entirely to those he considered menials.

John Tilly listened, asked a question or two, and when the last of the seamen had left the cabin, he said quietly, “This is no easy matter you have taken upon yourself, for if the man has the least suspicion of what you do, he will surely have you murdered or thrown into prison, and he will have the power, you can be sure.”

“I think of Noelle. What if it had been she?”

“Aye, and the poor lasses with no man to stand by them. It must be done, lad. It must be done.”

“First, to find that girl. Henry will help, for you know as well as I that there are no secrets from the slaves. He can go among them and among the maroons as I could not, for they would tell me nothing.”

Several times we passed ships at sea, but they were either too far off to be seen clearly or they made haste to seek distance. It was a time when piracy was rampant, and many a ship would not hesitate to seize another if opportunity allowed.

Wet blew the wind against our faces, leaving the taste of salt upon our lips. Much was the time I spent upon deck, my body growing accustomed to the dip and roll of the vessel and the sails overhead, all strong with wind. At times the rain beat against our faces like hailstones, but I could see how a man could grow to love such a life, and how easily he could come to live upon the sea.

There was a power there, a power in the roll and swell of the waves that told a man he was but tolerated here. This was a world of fish under the sea and gulls or frigate birds above it.

Captain Tilly was a cunning man with wind and sea, knowing very well how to get the most from his ship, and we went swiftly along the coast to the south, and I never knew when we passed our old shore along the Carolina coast.

The seas grew warmer. We worked often without shirts, and the whiteness disappeared from our bodies,
and they grew red, then brown, strongly tanned by tropical suns. Jamaica was a long green shore of a deeper green than found in our northern lands.

We sighted Great Plumb Point and the Pallisadoes, a long neck of land staggered here and there with trees that gave the neck of land its name, for they appeared a long broken wall to keep men out.

We held our course along shore to Little Plumb Point and passed between it and Gun Key, then rounding the point and coming at last to the well-sheltered bay.

Captain Tilly stopped beside me as I stared shoreward. Never had I seen so many houses or stores and drinking places along the waterfront. If there was one, there were at least twenty ships in the harbor, and more seemed to lie deeper witnin the bight of land.

No other place had I seen but Jamestown, and you could have tucked all of it into a corner of this.

“Be not trusting, lad,” Tilly warned. “They are knaves aboard there and proud of it. They'll have your money, and if you say the wrong word, you will be killed out of hand. Port Royal is said to be the wickedest city on earth, the Babylon of the west, they call it.

“They be pirates and those who prey upon them and more jewels and gold than you'll see ever in London town.”

We dropped our hook close in before the town, and a boat was got over the side. Tilly eyed me as I got into the boat. “To a tailor first, Kin Sackett, for in that outfit of buckskins you'll stand out like a lone tree on a headland, and every man in town will know where you go. And I've just the man for you.”

“I've no great sum about me, captain,” I said doubtfully. “Yonder we lived off the country, and while we've gold at Shooting Creek, I'd naught with me when we came along to Cape Ann and Shawmut.”

He chuckled. “Ah, lad! Think nothing of it. I'll be your banker here. This ship was given me by your father, and all I have is by his favor. You'll be needing money, for nothing speaks but money. Money and a
man's cunning or strength, for they be fighting men here, and strength is respected.”

He glanced at me suddenly. “Can you handle a blade, Kin? You'll no be wearing more than a pistol in your sash. Here is the cutlass and the knife.”

“Aye,” I said doubtfully. “I've been well taught as a boy, for my father was a swordsman and Jeremy Ring as well and in another way Sakim, also. We fenced much as boys, but I've never fought for blood with a blade.”

I caught myself at that. “Except with a knife,” I said, “among the Indians. No year passed in those mountains without attacks by Indians, so we'd had our taste of that.”

“Aye. I've heard of those attacks on your forts.” He looked at me and shook his head. “Your father gone! 'Tis hard to believe. He was so strong, so fierce a fighting man, and he seemed like one to live forever.”

He had seemed so to me, as a child. He was a gentle but powerfully muscled man, trained in the arts of war by his father, who had been a professional soldier. He came from the fens, in the country of Hereward the Wake, and many a story did I hear of wars and struggle by land and sea.

“It is a jungle yon,” Tilly warned, “and the men and women are savages. Port Royal is no place for the good or the weak. Killings happen by day and night, fights are many, and rum is the greatest evil of all.”

Captain Tilly, I recalled, was not only a ship's captain but an ordained minister. It was he who had married my father and mother these many years agone. Yet minister of the gospel or not, I knew well what he spoke of Port Royal was the truth, for many a tale had I heard of the place whilst mingling with the seamen in Jamestown on our rare visits there.

With four stout seamen at the oars, we pulled for shore, Captain Tilly, Henry, and I, and soon were alongside the landing. I was first up the ladder. Beyond the rough planks of the landing was a stone-built dock and beyond that a line of dives, sailors' “rests,” and the
like. A drunken sailor, kerchief tied about his head and gold, diamond-studded rings in his ears, staggered past.

Tilly pointed with his thumb at a narrow street. “Up there,” he said, “there be a tavern that's clean. It be called the Bristol. Go there, and tell them I sent you, and have something to eat and wait. I shall send a tailor to you.”

Henry looked at me. “If it is well with you, I will be looking about for some of my people.”

The narrow streets were crowded with seamen from the ships, some of them obviously piratical craft, others merchantmen of one variety or another. Looking about, it became apparent that good business could be done here had one the mind for it, for many goods, looted undoubtedly from merchant ships, were going for less than the market price. If a man could buy here, then get away with his cargo without losing it again, he might quickly become a wealthy man.

We found the Bristol, and I entered and spoke for a room, using the name of Captain Tilly; once in the room, I had hot water brought to me and bathed there. Scarcely was I finished when there was a knock at the door. Knife in hand and pants hastily drawn on, I opened the door.

A short, fat florid man with a balding head stood there; behind him was a black slave. “Master Sackett? May I enter?”

Without awaiting my reply, he walked in, followed by the slave. “Measure him,” he said grandly, choosing the best chair in the room. “Measure him carefully!”

He glanced sharply at me, then at my buckskins. “We will have something for you. We work very quickly. I have,” he said proudly, “forty men employed and several women. All slaves, all my own.”

“I came aboard ship very quickly,” I said apologetically. “There was no time to secure proper clothing.”

He shrugged, waving a hand with a gesture of dismissal. “In Port Royal it is often the case. One moment a mere seaman and the next rolling in wealth. We get all kinds here and are surprised at nothing.

“You would be surprised,” he added, “at the number of the gentry we receive here, many in abject poverty. Some have been shipped out as slaves or prisoners to be sold as slaves. Imprisoned for debt, most of them.”

“How about women?” I suggested. “Are any of them sold as indentured servants?”

“Many! Some likely lasses, too! Some of them use themselves wisely and end doing very well for themselves. Most—” He shrugged. “Most do not. Most are mere slatterns, passed on from one to another, ending doing the most menial tasks.”

He went on, chattering away, noting the measurements as the slave chanted them to him. He glanced at me several times, stripped to the waist as I was, and then said, “Have you ever engaged in pugilism? You are obviously an extraordinarily powerful man.”

Then, hastily, he lifted a hand. “I do not mean to offend! Fisticuffs are often staged here and much money wagered. One of the best we had was a gentleman down on his luck. He did very well, you know. Owns a plantation of his own now.”

“I am afraid I know nothing of such things,” I said, “but I am flattered to be considered a fighting man. I have come here”—the idea came to me suddenly—“looking for what may be the least marketable item Port Royal may have. I mean, with so many ships being taken … well, there must have been some books aboard some of them. Books of history, of knowledge.”

I glanced over my shoulder at him. “It was in my mind to open a school for young gentlemen in Virginia. There is nothing of the kind, and when the chance came to come here, where so many rich prizes are brought—”

He was astonished. “You come to Port Royal for
books?
” He got quickly to his feet. “I never heard of such a thing! To Port Royal, of all places! Men come here for strange reasons, but certainly none for anything … I am sorry, Master Sackett. It is not easy for me to grasp.”

“Do not worry yourself about it,” I said, “but if you hear of any such, please inform me.”

He looked at me closely. “Captain Tilly said you were a young gentleman.”

I waved a hand. “Of course! I came to Virginia expecting to find a plantation, but after living much in the forest and surveying much land, it seemed to me it would be better … better to
own
the land and let somebody else work it.

“Besides, she lives—”

“ ‘She'?” He smiled. “Ah, now I begin to understand.”

“You understand nothing!” I said. “She has a younger brother, and there are others about. If I started a school, I could then have access to her home.”

He chuckled. “Oh, well! I suppose it does make a kind of sense!” He got to his feet, looking over the measurements he had compiled. “Do you know? I might have clothes that would fit. I might have.”

“How could that be?”

“It often happens. Clothes are ordered, then for one reason or another he who ordered them does not appear. It seems I have clothing … Your shoulders are a little broader, your chest deeper, your waist … yes, your waist is smaller. With just a little work, a few minutes only, I could have an outfit that would suit admirably, something to make do with until your own are finished.” He glanced sharply at me. “That is, if you want them.”

“I shall want three complete outfits,” I said. “You choose the colors that will suit me. I haven't the time.”

“You trust my judgment?”

“I do. You appear to be a man of taste. Ordinarily I would not consider such a thing, but I have much to do and am but lately from the forest and am lacking in awareness of what is being worn.

“One thing only. A little on the conservative side? I am no fop.”

“Of course.” His vanity was pleased, I could see
that, and I felt he would do me well. Yet I had other thoughts. “In such a place as this,” I commented, “I expect most of the talk is of piratical ventures, looting, slaving, and the like. Do you hear anything at all of outlying plantations? I would assume life on some of them is very refined.”

I was choosing my words with some care. My world in growing up had been one where English of the Elizabethan sort was well spoken, but growing older and in wilder lands, both Yance and I had become careless. Yet here I had another sort of impression to make, and Captain John Tilly was obviously a man of repute.

“On the contrary! Little that happens in the Indies is not known in Port Royal. Information, you know, is the foundation of piracy. I do not approve, but one does not voice such opinions here. I do not approve, and yet the successful pirates do not rely upon chance. They learn to know which vessels carry treasure of easily sold goods, and they seek them out.”

“Are they slavers?”

He shrugged. “Very few. A slave ship can be smelled for miles, as a rule. Pirates avoid them. The cargo is difficult to handle, dangerous to carry, and offers far less profit than open piracy or privateering.”