Sea Fire (10 page)

Cathy started when the door swung open.

“Out you get, my dear,” said Harold with a smirk, holding up his hand for her to grasp and smiling evilly into her bewildered face. Cathy didn’t move.

“Don’t you want to bid your pirate a fond farewell? I assure you, you won’t be seeing him after today. You really can’t expect me to permit my wife to visit an incarcerated prisoner.”

“Why are you doing this?” Cathy’s voice was faint. More than anything in the world she wanted to see Jon, wanted to tell him she loved him and explain why she had acted as she had. But she knew Harold too well to suppose that he had her wishes in mind. No, his purpose had to be something nefarious.

“Quick, aren’t you, my dove?” Harold said with every evidence of approval. “I have a little score to settle with your pirate. He hit me quite hard, you know. For several days I actually feared that he might have ruptured my spleen. Now I plan to inflict a little pain of my own.”

“I refuse to be a party to such a thing,” Cathy replied slowly, impotently clenching her
hands that had been resting lightly on her lap.

“You’ll do just as I tell you, Cathy my dear. Remember, one word from you, even a gesture that I mislike, and he hangs. Besides, there is really no need for you to get into such a fret.” Here Harold cast a glance at her clenched fists. “Having the pirate physically abused is the very furthest thing from my mind, I assure you. After all, one is, however much one regrets the fact, a gentleman. No, I merely intend to present him with the spectacle of our newly wedded bliss—and what I require from you, my dove, is the portrayal of my loving wife. For the sake of the pirate, I hope you are convincing. I am sure that hanging is a most unpleasant way to die.”

Cathy stared at him, biting back with difficulty the words she longed to utter. Jon would be stabbed to the heart, she knew, when he learned that she had married Harold. But better by far to let him suffer a little emotional bloodletting than death. Besides, he would surely understand that what she had done, she had done out of love for him.

Harold was watching her gloatingly. Cathy’s chin snapped up, and her eyes hardened. She would play Harold’s little game, because he left her no choice. But one day there would be a reckoning! With icy dignity she permitted Harold to help her from the carriage.

Inside, the prison stank. As they were escorted by an obsequious guard along dark, clammy corridors, Cathy wrinkled her nose at the horrible smell, and was finally forced to extract a perfumed handkerchief from her pocket and hold it pressed to her nose. Harold did likewise; Cathy watched him sniffing fastidiously into his lace-edged handkerchief with loathing.

Almost worse than the smell were the sounds. Low moans of pain joined sobbing cries of despair to form a hellish chorus. Listening, Cathy shivered convulsively, sickened to think of Jon imprisoned in such a place. Surely Hell itself couldn’t be worse than this!

By the light of
the lantern held aloft by their escort, Cathy could just make out dozens of half-naked, filthy men and women jammed into tiny cells, forced to endure conditions far worse than even those afforded the wild beasts at the Exchange. Sunken eyes glowed at them darkly from the depths of cavernous faces; voices implored them to have pity. Poor souls, Cathy thought, tears rising to her eyes as Harold hurried her past. At their passage some of the prisoners leapt toward them, wailing inhumanly as they begged for help, clinging to the bars like apes. Cathy cringed instinctively. Harold shrieked, then immediately sought to disguise his display of cowardice by screaming to the guards that came running to their aid, “Whip them! Whip them!”

“No!” Cathy cried, aghast, but it was too late. The guards were inside the cells, laying about them with huge whips, yelling obscenities at the cowering, scuttling prisoners. Harold’s arm curled roughly around Cathy’s waist when she would have stopped, forcing her on.

It was still around her waist moments later when the guard abruptly stopped, raising the lantern high above his head to illuminate the interior of a small cell. Cathy barely had time to register the green slime on the walls, the moisture standing in pools on the stone floor, and, of course, the terrible stink, when her eyes fastened on the gaunt and filthy man slowly unwinding from a sitting position on the floor. He was blinking, as though the dim light had momentarily blinded him, and he leaned one hand heavily against that revolting wall for support. His black hair was overlong, matted and unkept, while the beginnings of a rough black beard covered the lower half of his face. Only the gray eyes, at first incredulous and then slowly filling with pleasure at the sight of her, were unchanged.

“Oh, Jon!” Cathy’s heart cried, but a large knot of tears in her throat prevented her from saying a word.

“Cathy!” he said hoarsely, taking
a faltering step toward her. “Oh, Cathy, sweetheart, I thought. . . .”

Here he broke off. His eyes hardened to fierce agates as they recognized Harold, took in the possessive arm around Cathy’s small waist and her acceptance of the other man’s touch.

“What did you think, Hale?” Harold asked with a gloating smile. “Pray go on. My
wife
and I would be most interested in whatever you have to say. Won’t we, my dear?”

Cathy, watching Jon with agony in her own heart, saw him flinch as if from a blow. Harold, watching as avidly as she but for different reasons, saw that involuntary movement too, and practically crowed with triumph.

“Won’t we,
wife
?” Harold asked again with a hard edge to his voice, his fingers digging warningly into her waist as Cathy didn’t answer. Blinded by tears she feared for Jon’s sake to shed, Cathy could do nothing else but agree.

“Yes, Harold,” she said, her voice muffled in a way that she prayed he would mistake for docility. Her eyes stayed fixed on Jon, willing him to understand the reason behind her action, to have faith in her love.

“You . . . married him?” Jon was speaking to her, his eyes as they tried to search her face through the shadows leaping with fierce emotion.

Harold’s fingers dug into her waist again, hurtfully, when it seemed she wasn’t going to answer. In truth, Cathy wasn’t sure she could; her throat seemed to have closed up. Closing her eyes, she licked her dry lips; then, hating Harold, hating herself for the pain she knew her answer would cause the man she loved, she said simply, “Yes.”

Even in the poor light she could see the muscles in Jon’s face clench.

“For God’s sake, why?” Jon demanded hoarsely, those leaping eyes never leaving her face.

Cathy trembled, and knew
she could find no answer to this. Harold, feeling the tremors that racked her, answered for her.

“She had the good sense to recognize a better bargain, Hale,” he taunted. “Surely you can see that for yourself. I am, after all, a peer of the realm; you are a condemned pirate. Besides, she only married you in the first place because of the brat, you know. Why else would a lady of her background marry a man of yours?”

Jon said nothing, but his eyes slashed back to Cathy. She stared at him mutely, willing him not to believe Harold’s farrago of lies.

“Cathy?” he rasped.

She felt Harold’s eyes on her face, his fingers digging menacingly into her waist. If she broke down now, he would carry out his threat to have Jon hanged. She knew it, knew Harold would even be glad of an excuse to have it so. To call Harold’s bluff would only result in Jon’s death.

“He’s telling the truth, Jon,” she said in a low voice, and felt Harold almost purring with satisfaction beside her.

“Well, we must be off,” Harold said with taunting gaiety. “We were just married this morning, you know. We’re anxious to be away on our honeymoon. Tonight we sail for La Coruña—that’s in Spain, you know—and after that we’re going to take a leisurely tour of the continent.”

He made a movement as though to turn away, then seemed to hesitate, and turned back.

“Oh, and one more thing, Hale. I must thank you for breaking my wife in to her marital duties so well. As I’m sure you remember, she’s quite delicious in bed.”

Jon’s eyes blazed murder as Harold turned on his heel, taking Cathy with him. He practically dragged her back down the passage, a malicious grin on his face. The bewildered jailer trailed them, holding the lantern high so that they could find their way.

“Jon, oh, Jon,
darling,” Cathy sobbed inwardly as she stumbled along at Harold’s side. Then she broke down completely as, just before they turned the corner that would take her from Jon forever, the blackness behind them was rent by the hoarse, tortured cry of a man in mortal agony.

four

J
on twisted miserably on the long wooden platform, running his swollen tongue around his dry, cracked lips. The hold of the
Cristobel
was like an oven; prisoners were crammed into it like sardines. There must have been more than two hundred of them, all male in this section at least, chained lying on their sides to the platforms that were arranged one above the other in layers so close that Jon’s broad shoulders barely cleared the one above him. Shackles with a short length of chain between them had rubbed away the skin on his ankles and wrists; for further security a chain had also been passed around his waist and that of the man who lay sweating not more than a hand’s width in front of him, linking them together. O’Reilly, he’d said his name was, when they’d first been locked into this hellhole. Lately, no one had bothered to talk; they hoarded all their energy just to survive.

The man directly behind Jon was dead. Jon had heard him choking on his own vomit several hours before, and as yet the guards had not discovered him. When they did, his body would be pitched overboard without ceremony. After all, why waste prayers on a
convict, whose crimes had robbed him of all humanity? Jon heard the clatter of the hatch cover being removed, then the thud of footsteps as the guards descended into the hold. Closing his eyes, he muttered a brief prayer for the soul of the dead man behind him, thinking, Christ, I don’t even know his name.

“All right, you bastards, on deck! Move!”

Jon heard a series of clanks as the long metal poles holding the prisoners in place were removed, felt the pole that had held his arms chained above his head slide free, and lowered his arms, groaning. Pain stabbed through cramped muscles as he rubbed them with both hands, trying to restore their circulation. O’Reilly, closer to the narrow aisle that ran between the layers of platforms set into either side of the hold, began to scramble for the open space after the man in front of him. Jon had, perforce, to follow. Behind him he could hear tired curses as men trapped by the dead man’s inert form struggled to get out, then a slow scraping noise as they pushed the body before them.

After ten days on board, this early morning ritual was expected. The prisoners were herded up on deck just after sunrise for exercise and their one scant meal of the day. Muskets were kept trained on them from all sides, but so far there had been no trouble. Despite their vigilance, the crew didn’t appear to expect any. As Jon shuffled after O’Reilly up the narrow stairs, he had to concede that they were probably right. After hour upon hour spent in that stifling hold, all any of the prisoners seemed to want was to breathe in the brisk sea air, drink their cup of water, and eat as much as they were allowed.

In response to a prod from one of the guards, Jon fell into line with the other prisoners along the rail for shackle inspection. The first mate, Hinton, a big, burly fellow almost as tall as Jon, inspected their chains link by link. He had been one of the contingent sent to fetch Jon and six others from Newgate, and while there had
apparently been treated to an account of Jon’s circumstances. Jon hated him with an intensity all the greater for being impotent. Every time that big, ugly face grinned knowingly at him, every time that slack mouth spat a stream of brown tobacco juice through the gap left by a missing front tooth, Jon had to fight an urge to smash him to bits. That he could have done it, he was sure. He was equally sure that such an action would cost him his life.

“Wonder what your lady-love is doing today, pirate?” Hinton grinned at him as he yanked on the chain that bound him to O’Reilly. “On her honeymoon with some fancy lord, ain’t she? Bet they’re in the sack right now, all warm and cozy. . . . Sailed on the
Tamarind
, didn’t they, on the very day we started on our little voyage? Maybe we’ll pass ’em, and you can give ’em a wave.”

He chortled. Jon’s muscles bunched in violent response, and O’Reilly gave him a warning look. If Jon caused any trouble, they wouldn’t hesitate for an instant to shoot him down like a dog.

“Lock ’em up!”

The order was bellowed down from the quarterdeck. Jon’s muscles slowly relaxed as Hinton became all business, sliding a long chain through his and O’Reilly’s shackles before throwing it to another guard, who did the same. In this way fifty or sixty men were fastened together, and the chain secured to a ring-bolt set into the deck. This was supposed to prevent a mutiny, or any of the men from leaping overboard. So far, it had succeeded admirably.