Pirate Latitudes

Chapter 9

THE JEW WAS ensconced in Sutter’s Bay, to the east of the port. Even from a distance, Hunter could determine his location by the acrid smoke rising above the green trees, and the occasional report of explosive charges.

He rode into a small clearing and found the Jew in the midst of a bizarre scene: dead animals of all sorts lay everywhere, stinking in the hot midday sun. Three wooden casks, containing saltpeter, charcoal, and sulfur, stood to one side. Fragments of broken glass lay glinting in the tall grass. The Jew himself was working feverishly, his clothing and face smeared with blood and the dust of exploded powder.

Hunter dismounted and looked around him. “What in God’s name have you been doing?”

“What you asked,” Black Eye said. He smiled. “You will not be disappointed. Here, I will show you. First, you gave me the task of a long and slow-burning fuse. Yes?”

Hunter nodded.

“The usual fuses are of no use,” the Jew said judiciously. “One could employ a powder trail, but it burns with great swiftness. Or contrariwise, one could employ a slow match.” A slow match was a piece of cord or twine soaked in saltpeter. “But that is very slow indeed, and the flame is often too weak to ignite the final materials. You take my meaning?”

“I do.”

“Well then. An intermediate flame and speed of burning is provided by increasing the proportion of sulfur in the powder. But such a mixture is notorious for its unreliability. One does not wish the flame to sputter and die.”

“No.”

“I tried many soaked strings and wicks and cloths, to no avail. None can be counted on. Therefore I searched for a container to hold the charge. I have found this.” He held up a thin, white, stringy substance. “The entrails of a rat,” he said, smiling happily. “Lightly dried over warm coals, to remove humors and juices yet retaining flexibility. So, now when a quantity of powder is introduced to the intestine, a serviceable fuse results. Let me show you.”

He took one length of intestine, perhaps ten feet long, whitish, with the faint dark appearance of the powder inside. He set it down on the ground and lit one end.

The fuse burned quietly, with little sputtering, and it was slow — consuming no more than an inch or two in the space of a minute.

The Jew smiled broadly. “You see?”

“You have reason to be proud,” Hunter said. “Can you transport this fuse?”

“With safety,” the Jew said. “The only problem is time. If the intestine becomes too dry, it is brittle and may crack. This will happen after a day or so.”

“Then we must carry a quantity of rats with us.”

“I believe as much,” the Jew said. “Now I have a further surprise, something you did not request. Perhaps you cannot find a use for it, though it seems to me a most admirable device.” He paused. “You have heard of the French weapon which is called the grenadoe?”

“No,” Hunter shook his head. “A poisoned fruit?” Grenadoe was the French word for pomegranate, and poisoning was lately very popular in the Court of Louis.

“In a sense,” the Jew said, with a slight smile. “It is so called because of the seeds within the pomegranate fruit. I have heard this device exists, but was dangerous to manufacture. Yet I have done so. The trick is the proportion of saltpeter. Let me show you.”

The Jew held up an empty, small-necked glass bottle. As Hunter watched, the Jew poured in a handful of birdshot and a few fragments of metal. While he worked, the Jew said, “I do not wish you to think ill of me. Do you know of the Complicidad Grande?”

“Only a little.”

“It began with my son,” the Jew said, grimacing as he prepared the grenadoe. “In August of the year 1639, my son had long renounced the faith of a Jew. He lived in Lima, in Peru, in New Spain. His family prospered. He had enemies.

“He was arrested on the eleventh of August” — the Jew poured more shot into the glass — “and charged with being a secret Jew. It was said he would not make a sale on a Saturday, and also that he would not eat bacon for his breakfast. He was branded a Judaiser. He was tortured. His bare feet were locked into red-hot iron shoes and his flesh sizzled. He confessed.” The Jew packed the glass with powder, and sealed it with dripping wax.

“He was imprisoned for six months,” he continued. “In 1640, in January, eleven men were burned at the stake. Seven were alive. One of them was my son. Cazalla was the garrison commander who supervised the execution of the auto. My son’s property was seized. His wife and children . . . disappeared.”

The Jew glanced briefly at Hunter and wiped away the tears in his eyes. “I do not grieve,” he said. “But perhaps you will understand this.” He raised the grenadoe, and inserted a short fuse.

“You had best take cover behind those bushes,” the Jew said. Hunter hid, and watched as the Jew set the bottle on a rock, lit the fuse, and ran madly to join him. Both men watched the bottle.

“What is to happen?” Hunter said.

“Watch,” the Jew said, smiling for the first time.

A moment later, the bottle exploded. Flying glass and metal blasted out in all directions. Hunter and the Jew ducked to the ground, hearing the fragments tear through the foliage above them.

When Hunter raised his head again, he was pale. “Good God,” he said.

“Not a gentleman’s apparatus,” the Jew said. “It causes little damage to anything more solid than flesh.”

Hunter looked at the Jew curiously.

“The Don has earned such attentions,” the Jew said. “What is your opinion of the grenadoe?”

Hunter paused. His every instinct rebelled against a weapon so inhumane. Yet he was taking sixty men to capture a treasure galleon in an enemy stronghold: sixty men against a fortress with three hundred soldiers and the crew ashore, making another two or three hundred.

“Build me a dozen,” he said. “Box them for the voyage, and tell no one. They shall be our secret.”

The Jew smiled.

“You shall have your revenge, Don Diego,” Hunter said. Then he mounted his horse and rode off.