Wake of the Bloody Angel

Chapter Four

The next morning, after a night in an inn better suited for livestock (yes, we shared a room, but I slept on the floor), we set out to find the bastard son of Black Edward Tew. Well, Jane had slept; I lay awake most of the night pondering the day’s events. Mostly I wondered why Angelina had not mentioned the fact that a child was involved in all this. I had no firsthand knowledge, of course, but it seemed to me that giving birth was the kind of event that would stick with you, whether or not you gave the kid away. So why didn’t she mention it? Did she think I wouldn’t find out about him?

I didn’t put any stock in the witchcraft talk. Sailors in general saw magic and omens in everything, and this was no different. Besides, in all the time I’d known her, Angie had never expressed any sympathy for either the belief in or practice of magic. She was a thoroughly down-to-earth woman.

But there was an inherent contradiction in the two stories, Angelina’s and Racko’s, that I couldn’t resolve. Angie claimed that her Edward became a pirate on his own; Racko said she pushed him into it. She also didn’t mention that he’d become famous-Black Edward was the kind of nickname you got only when a lot of people knew about you. The difference might not ultimately matter, but discrepancies always got my attention, and when added to Angelina’s serious omission of her son, it made me wonder what else she might have left out, or tweaked to her own benefit.

And unrelated to all this was something that nagged me, another discrepancy that I couldn’t coax to the front of my brain. I let it go for the moment; I had enough to worry about.

In the street outside, someone drunkenly began a song, and in moments an impromptu chorus had formed.

Ashore in Boscobel, a lady I did meet,

With her baby in her arms as she strolled down the street,

And I thought how when I sailed, the cradle stood all ready,

And how my lovely little son has never seen his daddy.

I rolled onto my side and closed my eyes.

“That’s him, huh?” I said.

“Must be,” Jane said. “This is where they said we’d find him. Duncan Tew, part-time farmer and full-time ne’er-do-well. Nobody expects much from him, him being the bastard son of a witch and a pirate, and by all accounts, he lives up to those expectations.”

We sat on our horses in the shade of a pine tree and watched a young man wrestle with an ox and plow. He was tall and narrow-shouldered, with black wavy hair tied at the nape of his neck. At this distance I couldn’t tell anything else about him, except that he wasn’t a very good farmer. The soil was little more than shallow half sand suited for growing only the tough grass that anchored the dunes near the water. You couldn’t see the ocean from here, but the farm was well within its reach for wind and storms. Trying to get crops to take hold here was a real exercise in futility, and from the looks of his pitiful results,

Duncan Tew was well aware of that.

“Not exactly the revelation I expected,” Jane said. “No, but we can at least talk to him. He might know something about his father. Orphans get curious. And persistent.

Maybe he’s already done a lot of our legwork.”

“You’re the boss, boss.” Then she added, “There he goes.” The boy walked away from ox and plow without bothering even to unhitch the animal. The ox bellowed its annoyance.

Tew kicked at the ground as he strode across the field toward a small cottage, where smoke trailed from a chimney. His bellowed curses were loud enough to reach us.

“That sounds like Angie, all right,” Jane said.

I said, “Let’s go.”

The cottage was as well put together as the field was plowed.

Beside it, a ramshackle stone ring and a bucket on a frayed rope indicated a well. The lower walls of what had once been a barn loomed jaggedly from a patch of high weeds. Chickens pecked at the grass and a skinny dog saw us, growled once, and skulked away. The lone flower pot beside the cottage steps, its blue blossoms waving in the wind, seemed both pitiful and somehow noble.

Then we heard the screaming inside.

A man said, “You call that breakfast? Starving pigs would run away from this!”

“Yeah, well, I can’t make a chef’s salad with nothing but the moss and rocks you manage to raise, you know!” replied a female voice.

“You couldn’t make a chef’s salad with the chef standing over you!”

Something breakable crashed inside. A baby began to cry. Jane laughed. “They sound like me and Miles, only in reverse. And without the baby.”

“Miles cooks?”

“He does if he knows what’s good for him. I can burn boiled water.”

“Is he any good?”

“Not a damn bit, but he does it on purpose, because he thinks it’ll make me stop asking him to do it.” She dismounted, strode up to the door, and pounded on it. “Hey! Duncan Tew!” There was silence; then the door opened and the young man peered out. He had a strong jaw, cleft chin, and striking blue eyes. His patchy immature stubble was the same color as his black hair. He looked no older than twenty, which made him the right age.

His glare was not encouraging. “Who the fuck are you? What do you want?”

“Is that one of your other girlfriends?” the woman’s voice taunted from inside. “She here to tell you she’s carrying another of your bastards?”

“Leave the kids out of it!” he yelled over his shoulder. Then to us he said, “And you two, whoever you are, get out of here.”

“Sorry for interrupting,” I said. “We’d like to talk about your parents.”

“I got no parents,” he snapped, and was about to close the door. Jane stepped forward and blocked it. “Get out of my face, bitch,” he warned.

Jane laughed. Then with one hand she grabbed a handful of his tunic and yanked him bodily out the door. She tossed him head over heels onto his back in the bare-dirt yard. The chickens scattered in clucking outrage. He rolled onto his stomach and tried to push himself up, but she put a boot on the back of his neck. She said, “You’ve got a lot to learn about talking to a lady.”

“Hey, you! Get off him!” A small, wiry girl stood in the doorway, a baby on one hip and a paring knife in her free hand. She was barely out of childhood herself, but life had already aged her.

Jane drew her sword and leveled it at the girl. It was almost as long as she was tall, and the blade did not waver. Sunlight reflected a vertical bar across the girl’s face.

“Best thing for you and your snot factory there is to go back inside and shut the door,” Jane said coolly. “The light of your life won’t get hurt if he starts behaving.” She twisted her foot for emphasis. “And you’re going to behave, right?”

“Yeah!” he snarled through the dirt.

Jane stepped back and, still holding her sword ready, said, “Get up.”

He did so slowly, head down, spitting dirt from his lips. He brushed the front of his tunic. He glared at me and said, “Your wife’s a bitch.”

“Why does everyone think we’re married?” Jane asked, and winked at me.

Tew stumbled to the well, drew up the bucket, and poured it over his head. He sputtered as it washed away the dirt. Without looking at us, he said, “Just so you know, my real mother died when I was born, and I never knew my real father. So you got me muddy for nothing, and you wasted your own time.”

“Who told you your mother died?” I asked as I climbed down from my horse.

“What the fuck difference does it make?”

“Manners, hot stuff,” Jane said warningly.

He sighed and nodded. “The dog under the porch, who do you think? The folks who raised me.”

“What did they tell you about your father?”

He turned the bucket over, sat on it, and glared up at us from under wet strands of hair. “Why do you care?”

“We’re looking for someone.”

“My dad?”

“Maybe.”

“He was a pirate who fucked my mom and left her to deal with the consequences. Or, if you take the other side, she was a witch who made a nice young sailor turn to piracy to keep her in gold and jewels. It’s for damn sure everyone in Watchorn believes one story or the other. Doesn’t make a difference to me.”

“Yeah, you’re a no-good bastard either way,” the girl said, and slammed the door.

Tew laughed harshly. “Guess that makes it unanimous.” I held out a coin. “If you know anything else, I’m willing to pay for it.”

Jane shook her head at me. “Where do you keep getting those? Do you pull them out of your ass?”

I ignored her and waited for Tew’s reaction. He stared at the coin like a bird hypnotized by a snake, seeing the possibilities in it. He said, “They tell me my father was Black Edward Tew. People who knew him say I look just like him. It doesn’t make it easy around here.”

Jane asked, “Why do you stay?”

“I got my reasons,” he muttered.

“Do you have any idea,” I asked, “where your father is?” Before he could answer, a small boy emerged from the back of the house, brandishing a sharpened stick. He was barefoot, dressed in tattered clothes, and looked maybe five years old.

“Twouble, Dad?” he said, staring fearlessly at us.

Immediately Tew’s whole demeanor changed. He sat up straight and said calmly, “No, son, just visitors. C’mere.” The boy eased over, keeping the sharp end of his stick pointed our way. “This is my son, Sido. Say hello, son.”

“Hi,” the boy said flatly.

Tew kissed the boy’s dirty cheek. “I’ll be done here in a minute. Go back inside and finish your lunch, okay?”

“You sure you don’t need me?” Sido asked seriously. Tew smiled. “I probably do, but you need your lunch more so you can be big and strong. I’ll be along, don’t worry.” The boy went back inside through the front door, giving us his best tough-guy look the whole way. When he was gone, Tew said, “No need for him to see you kill me, is there?”

“We’re not here to kill you,” Jane said.

“Then what do you want?”

“Anything you know about your father,” I said, and waved the coin for emphasis. “Like we keep saying.”

“And his treasure,” Jane added. I stared javelins at her. “I don’t suppose he ever stops by for a father-son chat when he’s in port?” I asked.

Tew laughed. “Yeah, sure. He brings me presents from all over the world. One day I’ll sail as his first mate.”

I fought not to smile. His sarcasm sounded just like his mother. “What about the Dirnay family? Do you know them?”

“Is this a trick question?” he snapped. When I didn’t answer, he said, “They’re the jerks who raised me. Look, I got nothing to add. Neither one of my parents stuck around to change my diapers or watch my first steps or teach me a goddamn thing.” He stood, adjusted his clothes, and with as much dignity as he could muster, said, “And you can shove that money back where she said you found it.”

With that, he went inside and slammed the door. The bar slid into its slot across it.

Jane chuckled. “That was pointless.”

“No, it wasn’t.” I put the coin on the middle of the top step, careful to avoid the smeared manure. “We know what Edward Tew looks like now.”

“We do?”

“Junior in there didn’t get that cleft chin and blue eyes from Angelina.”

“Wonder what he did get?”

“Definitely the warmth,” I said as I got back on my horse. Jane laughed as she did the same. “So now what, boss?”

“Your friend Racko sounded pretty sure Black Edward was dead. He implied it was a well-known story.”

“Some of the other guys disagreed.”

“Yeah. I think we need to find a more reliable source.” She chuckled. “A more reliable source for pirate gossip?”

“Pirate history. I want to know what happened to Black Edward and why some people think he’s dead. There must be a better authority than some drunks in a tavern. Maybe the Society of Scribes, or some royal archivist somewhere.”

Jane looked down thoughtfully. “There is. It’s a bit of a ride, but we don’t seem to be in a hurry.”

“Who?”

She said in a whisper, “The Sea Hawk.”

I repeated, “Who?”

She snorted at my lack of knowledge. “You land crabs. I mean Rody Hawk. Captain Hawk of the Poison. ”

I knew that name, all right, and it sent a rush of apprehension up my spine. I’d heard all the stories about this particular scourge of the seas, and if only a fraction of them were true, Hawk was the worst of the worst. “I thought he was dead, too.”

“See? You can’t trust any stories about a pirate’s death. Rody Hawk has enough treasure hidden to buy Langlade and most of Algoma for dessert. He’s in prison in Shawano until he tells where it is, or dies, whichever comes first.”

“How do you know so much about him?”

She grinned triumphantly. “Because I’m the one who caught him.”