The Sea Wolves

Page 9

His mind went back to her unsettling words. They would come for him tonight. So be it. He would trust in her. And there had been her other comment, as well. We’ll be locked away together. That, at least, held promise.

Very little went to waste aboard a ship. Fruit and meat on the verge of rotting—but not quite rotten—would still make its way into the crew’s diet. Jack had managed to get Ghost’s permission to bring scraps from the galley to the handful of prisoners from the Umatilla who were locked in that room in the hold, but he had not been thinking properly about what the captain would define as “scraps.” In the end, the best he could do for those poor souls was a thin stew made from the snippings off the ends of carrots, a handful of moldy potatoes, two cans of beans he found in what he assumed was some private stock belonging to the former cook, and the bones of the pelican. Some meat remained on those bones, and it sloughed off as he boiled the stew, but it was barely enough to add a bit of texture to the meal. He spiced it as best he was able, giving it a bit of flavor. It wasn’t much, but it would have to do.

When the meager meal was ready, he tracked down Louis, who already had his orders from Ghost and the keys to the prisoners’ hold. Ogre came along, a knife in a scabbard at his hip.

Riding the swells of the sea, Jack followed Louis through that small door and down the few steps into the gangway belowdecks, carrying the steaming pot. Louis had been at sea much longer, and seemed almost unaffected by the rolling of the ship. Jack could not help reeling a bit, staggering right and left, but he managed not to spill more than a few ounces of stew. The ladle clacked against the rim with every sway of the vessel.

Ogre came behind Jack, perhaps to be sure he didn’t try anything rash. But the true purpose of his presence was to menace the prisoners once the door was open, in case they attempted to escape. Jack thought the precaution foolish. These people could not overpower the entire crew, and even if they did, where would they go? He doubted the people Ghost had imprisoned were sailors.

“Don’t talk to them,” Louis said, keys jangling as he led the way past the padlocked door, then the hold containing the food stores, and approached the prisoners’ hold.

“I’d like them to know they’re not alone,” Jack said.

Key in the first lock, Louis glanced at Ogre, and then at Jack. “You’ve got your orders from the captain. I am amazed he’s indulging you even this far. Don’t push him, Jack.”

Jack heard the voices beyond the door, sensed the fear and the hope in that room, and decided Louis was right. They would know just from seeing him that they had an ally outside their prison. He had wanted to apologize for not bringing them bowls, for them all having to share the ladle, but he told himself they would see such sympathies in his eyes.

Louis finished unlocking the door. He threw it open and stepped back, hand on the hilt of his knife. Ogre did the same but drew his blade, an eager glint in his eye. It seemed he hoped someone would try to escape, and he would get the chance to draw blood. Jack found his expression chilling.

The pleas began instantly. A thin, balding man wearing broken spectacles begged for his life, while a gray-haired matron demanded to know what the pirates intended to do with them. There were eight people in the hold, including a burly, bearded trapper, two young men, a pale and lovely woman in a torn but expensive dress, and a middle-aged black man who stood at the back of the room, studying the pirates with wary intelligence, obviously contemplating some plan of action. The eighth, and last, was a girl of perhaps fourteen. She still had a bow in her hair.

Jack searched their faces. They had all been on board the Umatilla with him, sailing from Alaska to San Francisco, but none of them looked familiar to him. They were strangers, but they were his fellow captives, and he racked his brain for some way he could help them. But on a ship of bloodthirsty pirates, in the middle of the sea—at least for the moment—the stew was the best he could do.

It seemed so little, but as he carried the pot into the room, they moved in eagerly. Some of them seemed to realize that he was not one of the pirates, for they began to question him. Jack felt ashamed that he could not respond.

“Hurry it up, Cooky,” Louis said, though not unkindly.

Regretfully, Jack left the pot and retreated to the door. As Louis began to haul it shut, the trapper gave a roar and lunged for him, but Louis was too quick. He clouted the big man across the temple with a small fist. Somehow, though the trapper was twice his size, Louis had knocked him down with a single blow. Disoriented, the trapper tried to scramble to his feet for another attempt, but Ogre stepped in and kicked him in the chest, sending the man crashing into the lady in the torn dress.

Jack found himself locking eyes with the bald man in the broken spectacles. “I’m sorry,” he said as the door slammed.

Some of them cried out, but moments later they fell silent, and he knew they must be gathered ravenously around the stewpot.

He felt sure he would see their faces in his dreams tonight.

As Louis fastened all the locks, Jack began to turn away, headed back along the gangway toward the galley, but Ogre blocked his path.

“What?” Jack demanded, his frustration overriding his fear of the quiet sailor.

It was Louis who answered. “You’re not done.” He gestured toward the middle door in the hold. “Go into the food stores. The captain’s got a private stock in there. You’ll find it easily enough. Make a plate of fruit and cheese, the best there is, and fetch a bottle of the finest wine.”

Louis and Ogre waited in the gangway while Jack did as he was told. Sabine had said the two of them would be locked away together tonight, so he presumed this small repast from Ghost’s private reserve must be some celebration for the captain, but he couldn’t imagine what the occasion might be. Along with the captain’s private stock, he found a stack of china plates and quickly arranged the requested food upon one of them.

A bottle of wine under one arm, he emerged from the stores, but once again Ogre blocked his attempt to leave the hold.

“Wait a moment,” Louis said, and he went to the triple-padlocked room that had so piqued Jack’s curiosity, unlocked it, and opened the door.

The first thing Jack noticed was that there were locks on the inside as well.

“Put them on the table,” Louis instructed him.

Confused, Jack nevertheless complied. He entered that room and was stunned by what he found. He could make no sense of the room. Here in the dingy hold was a chamber more richly appointed than any other on the ship, complete with a cot covered in a thick, woven spread, a love seat, oil lamps, and a shelf of leather-bound books. The wooden planks gleamed as though they had just been cleaned.

“What is this?” he asked, turning to Louis. “It’s a cabin? But for whom?”