The Blackbirder

Chapter 8

Twenty minutes after Dunmore and his men had disappeared behind the house they were back. Angry, scowling, driving their horses hard, taking their frustrations out on the animals.

Once again Dunmore reined up in front of Elizabeth, blocking her way with his horse, as if he were cornering a runaway slave.

“Where are they?” he demanded, his voice like a spade in gravel.

“Who?”

“Don’t come it the innocent with me! Your niggers! Where are your niggers?”

“Were they not all standing in a line, waiting for you to clap them in chains?”

Dunmore scowled at her. His eyes moved up to the house. “You have them in there? Hidden in there?”

Elizabeth stepped forward until she was just a few feet from Dun-more. The smell of the horse was strong in her nose, its breathing loud. “Do not think for one moment you will go uninvited into my house. You may come sneaking around here when Mr. Marlowe is gone, but he will not be gone forever, do you understand? He has been more than tolerant of your insults thus far, pray do not seek to find the limits of his patience.”

Dunmore had not yet arrived in the tidewater when Marlowe shot Matthew Wilkenson in a duel over Elizabeth ’s honor. He had not been there when Marlowe fought and killed the pirate LeRois. But he would have heard the stories, would understand the potential danger in pushing the man too far.

His horse spun around under him and he had to swivel his head to keep his eyes locked on Elizabeth ’s.

“You’ll not hide them forever, your bloody murdering niggers. You and your precious Mr. Marlowe will not put the entire colony in jeopardy with the notions you are putting in the Negroes’ heads, is that clear? I will be back! I will be back with dogs, with guns, with more men! I will be back!”

He spun around again, called to his band, and they rode off before Elizabeth was able to get in another word.

She watched them as they rode away. The overseers might agree with Dunmore, but ultimately they were just following orders. The other planters she knew socially. They did not support Marlowe in his decision to free his people, she understood that. But they had lived with it for three years now, had never before uttered more than the mildest of protests.

It was Dunmore. He was the one getting them worked up, had been for some time, quietly agitating. And now this thing with James and the slave ship. The spark in the powder magazine.

Why did Dunmore care so much?

“Bloody unpleasant man.”

Elizabeth turned. Billy Bird was standing on the porch, watching him ride away. “He does seem damned interested in your business.”

“You heard that?”

“Yes, yes.” Billy came down the stairs, hopping from one down to the next. “Watched the whole thing from the window, right up there.” He pointed with his thumb.

“That would be my bedchamber.” Elizabeth tried to make her voice icy.

“Ah, so it would. Recognized the ambience, got damned randy just stepping through the door. In any event, yes, a thoroughly unpleasant fellow. What is his name?”

“ Dunmore. Frederick Dunmore.”

“Hmm. I recognize him, know him from somewhere. Had a notion of that when I saw him leading that ugly business last night, but I am certain of it now.”

“What…ugly business?”

“Well, they pulled some poor Negro fellow out of the jail there in Williamsburg. A whole crowd of them, but that Dunmore was the one egging them on. Can’t miss him, in all his white kit. Looks like a bloody ghost. Pulled this poor bastard from the jail, beat him good and hanged him, right there on Duke of Gloucester Street. Sheriff tried to stop them, I’ll give the man credit, but he never could. Big mob, torches, the whole thing. Quite a show. If I’d known Williamsburg was so exciting a place I would have come sooner.”

Elizabeth closed her eyes, fought down the growing dread. “Do you know who it was, at all, that they hanged?” She knew the answer even before she asked the question.

“Someone said his name was William. Involved in some kind of murder aboard a slave ship.”

Elizabeth nodded, eyes shut tight. William, you poor, poor boy. Why didn’t you flee with the others?

“Does this have anything to do with your people?” Bird asked. “Your beloved Mr. Marlowe?”

Elizabeth opened her eyes, breathed deep. “It does indeed. Damn that man.”

“Damn who? Marlowe?” There was a hopeful note in Bird’s voice.

“No, Dunmore. Why the hell couldn’t he have stayed put, why did he have to come here?”

“He is not from this country?”

“No. He arrived a year ago. Less, I should think. Came from London, I understand, but he is from Boston originally.”

“ Boston…,” Billy said thoughtfully. He frowned, looked down at the ground. “ Boston…”

“Do you know something about this?”

“Well, now that you say he is from Boston, I do seem to recall something. Yes. Yes.”

“What? What of it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Billy, damn your eyes…”

“No, truly. I recall him now. Saw him around town on a few occasions. But mind, I was not in Boston long, dreadful place, all full of Puritans and their somber nonsense. Anyway, there was something about him…what was it?”

Elizabeth wanted to scream, wanted to slap Billy, to make him blurt it out before she could change her mind and tell him not to. She hated rumor, vicious stories, had been nearly brought to ruin herself by them. She didn’t want to hear any more.

But Dunmore, some vile thing about Dunmore, that was different, was it not?

“Never you mind, Billy Bird. I don’t want to hear any of your vicious gossip, even if it is about that bastard. I promised you some hot chocolate and you shall have it and then you shall be on your way because I have not a moment to lose.”

James sat on one of the small cannons on the quarterdeck and looked down the length of the flush-decked ship. The people had worked hard and they were hungry.

They were gathered in their clans, little clusters of people dressed in whatever they had been able to find in the great cabin, in the crew’s dunnage. A woman had wrapped herself in one of the curtains pulled down from the great cabin windows, had managed to make the cloth look like a respectable garment.

The men, dressed out in the former crew’s clothes, the contents of the slop chest, were beginning to look like proper sailors. They were becoming acclimated to their surroundings and initiated into the mysteries of square rig.

Children, with the resilience of their age, were starting to wander away from their mothers, to play. Squeals and laughter cut across the deck, that former killing field.

They had worked hard for the past two days. The men at sailing, under James’s command, under the tutelage of Joshua and Cato, as translated by Madshaka and Kusi. They had organized by mast, and those with knowledge of such things had explained in rough terms how a big-wind ship was sailed.

Young, strong men. Those were the ones the slavers took, and those were the people who made up the crew now, to their great advantage.

James had led them aloft and out along the yards, had shown them as much as they needed to know to set and furl and reef sails.

They were agile, fearless aloft, natural sailor men. And Madshaka and Kusi, the grumete, were accustomed to the water, familiar with ships, having made careers bringing white men and cargo in their boats through the huge surf that pounded the African shore.

It had gone better than James would have dared hope. He had seen some of God’s greatest idiots become tolerable sailors, and these men were far above that class.

He had seen the pirates-filthy, depraved, subhuman-but sailors to the bone. These African men could learn.

The women had cleaned the decks, had set things to right, had seen to the family units. They cleaned in order to make the ship their own, to purge it of what it had been, for the same reason that James had lit brimstone in the hold.

They had to remake it in their way, otherwise they could not stand to remain aboard.

The sun was disappearing toward Virginia. They were on a broad reach, foresail, topsails, and topgallants, braced about just a bit. The leaking, weed-cover hull was able to make five knots, no more. But they were making progress, leaving the New World farther and farther below the horizon.

James had a vague idea that they should be making more northing, that the sailing route to Africa was that way, a great arc up through the north Atlantic and down, following the winds, but he knew little about offshore navigation.

He did understand leadership, however, and knew that they had to do something, had to make some progress, even in the wrong direction. Without progress there was no hope, and where hope was gone, terror and despair were sure to come.

And he had problems bigger than navigation. By now Marlowe would have passed through the capes, would be out there, somewhere, in their wake. Marlowe was a cunning bastard, and though it would seem an impossible task for one ship to find another on the great ocean, James did not think it unlikely that Marlowe would find them.

And he had problems bigger even than Marlowe.

Food: there was little of it. He and Madshaka and Cato had searched the ship, from great cabin down to the keelson, had taken note of everything that was aboard. Madshaka told them the people had been half starved, and now James saw that it was not merely capricious cruelty. There simply was not much food aboard.

On the deck was a portable stove; a fire sparked up with firewood from the galley and the doors of the binnacle box. Around it the women gathered, cooking the meager rations for their families, just as they had done thousands of times in their far-flung villages. The men sat on the deck, leaned on the rails, rested from the day’s exertions, talked about what they would do next.

Madshaka came ambling down the deck. There was the suggestion of power in his loose-limbed stride, the potential of power, like a man holding the bulk of his strength in reserve. He held two of the wooden plates they had found in the galley, carried them easily in his big hands.

“Captain, I bring you some food.” He held out the plate and James took it with a grateful nod. He was terribly hungry. A small piece of salt pork and a little clump of dried peas from the sailors’ stores, some of the thin porridge for the slaves. James ate it all greedily.

“Thank you, Madshaka.”

Madshaka nodded and was silent while he ate and James ate. Then he said, “We got food for two, three more days. We need more.”

James nodded. He had been thinking the same thing. But where to get it from?

There was only one reasonable answer, but James did not care to think of it.

“We got to take it.” Madshaka said it for him. “We got to stop another ship and take it. I know you don’t want to do it, I don’t neither, but these people will starve if we don’t.”

James was silent for a long moment. Madshaka always addressed him in English, never Malinke. Somehow it seemed the African tongue would have been more appropriate. Madshaka no doubt thought him more comfortable with English. “You’re right. You’re right. We got no choice.”

Pirates. They were running the ship with that rough pirate democracy. Now, raiding on the high seas. But there was no choice, the thing had to be done. “We’ll take food, just food. And not all that’s aboard.”

“Just food,” Madshaka agreed.

“There’s shipping here,” James explained, “this way, between the Caribbean and the American colonies. Good chance we see something tomorrow, the next day.”

“All these men we got, good, brave, strong men,” Madshaka added. “No problem. We go alongside, jump on other ship, take her, no problem.”

“No problem,” James agreed. No problem in terms of the tactical situation. The morality of the thing was another question.

But it was just food. His people had to eat. James was suddenly very tired.

“Madshaka, I must rest. I think the wind is steady, should stay like this through the night, I reckon. No need to trim the sails or change course. Things should be-”

“Captain, captain,” Madshaka interrupted. “You go sleep. I look after things here. The people need you, you no good to them if you too tired to think. You go down to the great cabin, you sleep.”

James nodded, gratefully. Sleep. Nothing had ever sounded so good to him as sleep did at that moment. The physical activity alone would have been enough to exhaust him. The concerns over preserving the lives of the people aboard had pushed him well beyond his limit.

“I thank you, Madshaka. If anything happens, change in wind or weather, a light is seen, you get me.”

“Of course, of course. Never to worry.”

James made his way below and aft. The great cabin looked as if it had once been a fine affair. The smashed furniture was polished walnut, the cushions, now shredded and pulled apart, were a rich red damask. Among the many empty bottles scattered about and rattling across the deck with each roll of the ship James recognized labels he had seen in Marlowe’s well-stocked cellar.

The condition of the great cabin did not matter. The torn settee cushions looked as inviting as any feather bed. He sat heavily, felt the motion of the ship under him, the hypnotic rhythm of the vessel’s rise and fall, the gentle side-to-side motion that set everything swinging in little arcs.

He swung his legs up on the settee, letting the sleep come over him, warm and seductive. He felt his whole body pulled down into the torn cushion like it was wrapped around him and then he was asleep.

In his dreams James was floating above the ship, looking down on it, on the people on the deck, swooping ahead to make certain the way was clear, flying over the jungles that ran down to the pounding surf of the African coast, then back to the ship.

And then someone on the deck saw him and screamed, ran in panic, and then another and another and all of the people were terrified to see him flying over them.

His eyes fluttered and opened. The screaming was still there, the rushing of feet, but overhead now.

The screaming was real, not a dream. Something was happening on deck. James’s head felt thick, he had no notion of how long he had slept.

He launched off the settee, tripped on the broken carcass of a chair on the deck, kicked it aside and raced out the door, bouncing off the cabin doors along the alleyway as the roll of the ship tossed him side to side in his race for the quarterdeck.

Up and out the scuttle, the sliver of moon and the stars giving his eyes all the light they needed to see the chaos on deck, men running here and there, lines cast off, people tripping in their rush. His eyes moved automatically aloft but the sails were still set, still drawing perfectly, the wind still on the same quarter.

“Madshaka! Madshaka!” He grabbed the big man’s arm as he rushed past, turned him around. “What? What is it?”

“Man go overboard!” Madshaka shouted.

“Heave to!” James shouted. “We must heave to! Get the men to the foremast braces!” Shouts flying around the deck, orders in half a dozen languages. “Go! Get them ready on the foremast! Where the hell is Kusi?” They needed order. They needed to talk to one another, to all hear the same commands.

Madshaka ran forward, James aft. The helmsman, confused and terrified, was staring at the compass, keeping the ship exactly on its prescribed course, not knowing what else he might do. James wanted to tell him to round up when the fore braces were cast off, but he had no way of telling him that, so instead he took the tiller in his own hand and pushed the helmsman aside.

He eased the helm to weather, looked down the deck, waiting for the foreyards to brace around. He had no idea how long the poor bastard had been in the water, how much distance they had put between themselves and him. With the steady wind, they had to have traveled a good cable or two just since he had come on deck.

“Brace the foreyards! Come on, man!” James shouted down the deck. It was total confusion. All of their carefully practiced drills seemed to be coming apart. Madshaka, for all his calm efficiency during their earlier maneuvers, seemed to be in a frenzy, shouting this and that, waving his arms. Men ran in all directions, responding to his orders. Where in damnation was Kusi? He was half of the team, it was all going to hell without him.

“Brace the-,” James yelled again. It was pointless. Madshaka was the only one who could understand him and he was too busy bellowing orders to even hear.

He put the helm down, began to swing the ship up into the wind.

The weather leeches on the square sails curled and then collapsed and the sails began to flog as they turned edge to weather. The ship continued to turn, carried by her momentum, up, up into the wind. The sails came aback, fell silent, and then the ship stopped.

She was not hove to. Her sails were in disarray, her rig threatening to come down around their ears, but at least the ship was stopped. She was no longer moving away from the man in the water.

“Madshaka!” James shouted with all his considerable voice, and finally Madshaka looked aft. “Get the boat over! The boat!” He pointed to the jolly boat perched on the booms amidships. Madshaka followed his finger, nodded, and began to yell orders in one language, then another and another. Men left off what they were doing, cast off stay tackles and boat falls, hooked them to the jolly boat.

James handed the tiller back to the helmsman and raced forward. Madshaka was a grumete, a boat handler. He should go with the jolly boat.

James arrived in the waist just as the boat was lifting off under Madshaka’s directions. Up and over the side it sailed, and then down into the water and the boat crew scrambled down after it.

“Madshaka, you go!” James said.

“Yes, you stay with ship!”

“Where the hell is Kusi?”

“We find him, you don’t worry. He grumete, good swimmer.”

James felt his eyes go wide, his stomach convulse. He spun around, looked aft, realized how ridiculous that was.

“Kusi! It is Kusi gone over?”

“Don’t you worry,” Madshaka said, and there was genuine reassurance in his voice. He trotted to the rail, swung down onto the ladder. “I get Kusi, don’t worry.”