The Fiddler's Gun Page 17

  “That’s a big ship,” said Fin.

  Tan raised a worried eyebrow at her. “Sure you can manage that cutlass?” he asked. Fin said nothing.

  “All right boys, same drill, bigger fish. Play your cards, keep your face on, and she’ll fry up like all the others,” called Jack across the deck. Fin looked back at him. He didn’t look as sure of himself as he normally did. Things that scared Jack Wagon were certain to make other men faint cold. She prayed it wasn’t fear she saw.

  The captain exited his quarters and appraised the ship through his spyglass. Jack approached him, and they spoke in hushed words. Fin couldn’t hear what they said, but Creache didn’t look happy about it. When they finished, Jack looked more troubled than he had before.

  “Swing around and give us a shot,” called the captain to the helm. Art spun the wheel and the ship lurched to starboard.

  “Ready the guns!” Jack yelled down to Topper.

  The Rattlesnake tacked around until her gunwales were parallel to The Kingfish, offering a clear shot off the starboard.

  “Let fly, Topper!” yelled Jack, and seconds later the ship jerked and shuddered as Topper sent a ball across the deck of the other ship. The men on the deck of The Kingfish scurried about, some to the rigging, some heading below, but they didn’t take in sail, and the ship showed no signs of slowing.

  “Warn her a second time,” said the captain, and Jack relayed the order. Once again, a cannon boomed and the ship quivered. The shot sailed over The Kingfish and raised a plume of water on the far side.

  Fin looked around; the crew was tense—scared. They’d never had to fire twice before. If The Kingfish tacked around, they might fire back. Fin looked at Tan. He was grinning with anticipation. He noticed her and winked. Tan loved it. Fin looked away and wrung the railing. She wasn’t scared, but she certainly wasn’t enjoying it like Tan was.

  “Ready a volley,” ordered Creache.

  “Captain?” said Jack with a worried look.

  “You heard me, you blithering idiot. Ready a volley and prepare to fire!”

  “Aye sir,” said Jack. He turned to the hatch and relayed the order down to Topper. Jack was sweating. Topper called up that the guns were standing by.

  “Volley away!” snarled Creache. Jack hesitated. The captain’s face turned red with anger. “I said volley away!”

  Jack didn’t move. The captain drew his pistol and cocked back the hammer. “Mr. Wagon, I assure you, I will kill you if you do not obey.”

  Jack didn’t answer. He raised a swarthy arm and pointed behind the captain.

  The Kingfish was taking in sail.

  The captain’s eyes flashed at Jack, and he put his firearm away.

  “Prepare to board,” Creache whispered. Jack didn’t look at him or answer. He turned and prodded the crew into action. Along the rail, men readied their hooks and drew cutlasses. Fin pulled Betsy from her belt.

  On the deck of The Kingfish, its sailors stood ready with blades drawn. Murmurs of trepidation ran across the deck of the Rattlesnake. They’d never been opposed by armed men. These looked not only armed but ready to fight. The situation was far more dangerous than what they were accustomed to. Beside her, Tan was bouncing slightly on his toes. She looked around for Knut and found him against the far rail. He didn’t look scared, for which Fin was grateful. If the seizure turned to fighting, she hoped Knut would stay safe aboard the Rattlesnake.

  Jack called out the order, and hooks flew.

  Creache stood at the rail and shouted across to The Kingfish, “Call out your captain!”

  A large sailor on The Kingfish conversed briefly with two of his fellows, nodded, and disappeared into the cabin. Creache smiled with satisfaction and ordered a plank laid across the rail. The sailors aboard The Kingfish flourished their cutlasses and glared at their opposition. Tan was making eyes at one of them and twitching his head like a maniac. Dread ran through Fin’s veins. The crews of both ships stared at each other in nervous anticipation while waiting for the captain of The Kingfish to appear. It was odd that the ship’s captain wasn’t already on deck given the circumstance. Then the cabin door swung open. From the door came no captain. Out from the bowels of The Kingfish issued a red vomit of British soldiers. Fin snatched Betsy into the air and pointed her puckered barrel at the redcoats arraying themselves across the opposite deck. Muskets lifted in answer, and men began shouting. Sabers waved in the air and pistols dared the silence to break.

  “Hold your peace!” cried Jack, though which crew he ordered, none could say. Tan glanced from Jack to The Kingfish and back, trying to anticipate the next move. Knut cowered behind the mast. Fin was lost in a sea of red. She smelled the burning flesh of a British soldier from a world away, felt a cold knife on her back. She felt a one-eyed man breathing into her face as she thrust a knife. Murder. She saw dead men lying across the dining table, blood spreading across its waxy grain. Ruin. Fear and anger welled within her. She squeezed the trigger and Betsy roared. A cloud of smoke erupted from the barrel and men screamed. The smoke cleared and a man lay dead across the rail of The Kingfish. Then musket fire exploded toward the Rattlesnake.

  Tan leapt the rail, rapier drawn, and began his ruinous work with unsettling grace. The crew fired their muskets and followed Tan. Fin cast Betsy down as if the weapon had burned her. She drew her cutlass and ran after them. A soldier charged with his bayonet, and Fin clubbed it aside. She swung the blade and he fell cloven as she moved to the next soldier in her path.

  Aboard the Rattlesnake, Jack stood stone-like, firing pistol shot as fast as he could load it while he called up curses and hurled them at the British as if they might flee by the foulness of his insults alone. Creache retreated into his cabin.

  Fin’s blood was on fire. She lavished vengeance on her attackers like kisses upon a long-missed lover. Jack shouted in the distance, but Fin paid no heed. She cut down a soldier and licked sweat from her lips. She looked around for Tan but he was gone. The deck of The Kingfish was choked with bodies, most British, but some she recognized as her shipmates. Jack shouted again from somewhere behind her, but she couldn’t make out his words.

  A hand grabbed her and spun her around. It was Tan.

  “Come on!” he shouted at her and pointed back to the Rattlesnake.

  “Bloody hell, Button! Get over here or you can join the limey’s in Davey Jones’ locker!” Jack yelled.

  She cast another glance back at The Kingfish and saw that Tan and the crew had barricaded the hatches and trapped the British below before reinforcements could make it topside. The soldiers below decks shouted and beat at the hatches. Fin turned and bounded across the plank.

  “Now, Topper!” shouted Jack, and the cannons fired into the belly of The Kingfish. The Rattlesnake rocked hard to port, and Fin grabbed the rail to avoid falling. Sounds of splintering wood and breaking glass echoed through The Kingfish as the cannonshot tore through her amidships and left holes the size of barrels down her sheerline. Seawater rushed into her, and the angry shouts of the trapped British turned to screams and cries for help. The Rattlesnake righted itself and Jack shouted, “Reload!”

  Creache emerged from hiding, livid with anger. “What are you doing?”

  “Sending these bastards to the dark below as soon as Topper loads a volley,” growled Jack.

  “We’ll do no such thing until we’ve plundered her hold.”

  “Not this time, captain. We was lucky enough we got them by surprise a’fore the entire company made it topside. There’s more soldiers below decks. I ain’t waiting around for them to bang their way up and bleed us.”

  Topper called up that the guns were ready.

  “Stand down, Mr. Wagon!”

  Jack looked at the captain with a stern eye and shook his head.

  “Fire!” yelled Jack, and the guns blew. The Kingfish shuddered and began to crumple. As it slipped into the sea Tan ran down the starboard rail cutting away the hooks before they could drag the Rattlesnake down as well.
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br />   The captain and Jack faced each other in cold silence as the remaining soldiers and crew aboard The Kingfish sunk to an icy grave. No one spoke a word; all eyes were on the captain. Jack had disobeyed a direct order.

  “See Mr. Wagon to the brig. Put him in irons,” said Creache to no one in particular. In all likelihood he hadn’t any idea who to order. It was Jack who ran his ship, and it was Jack who commanded the men. The crew looked around at each other, each hoping another would be the one to step forward and fulfill the order. Bill stood in the background smiling. No one moved. The captain bristled with anger.

  “You, Mr. Bough, is it not?” he asked, pointing his chin at Tan. “Have this mutineer locked away.”

  Tan looked to Jack, who nodded, before answering. “Aye, sir.” He sounded uncertain for the first time since Fin had known him. He motioned for Jack to come with him and proceeded below decks to the brig.

  “As for the rest of you cowards, an example will be made.”

  “Sir, it was an ambush,” protested Art. “We wasn’t prepared for no fight with British regulars. A trap it was, what with them waiting below.”

  “Do you presume to think,” spat Creache with disgust, “that I did not know there were soldiers aboard?” Creache lifted a dangerous eyebrow at Art. He couldn’t have known; he simply didn’t care. “Sacking a ship of the British Navy and selling off her arms and hold would have turned us more profit than any three pitiful merchant ships. But now, thanks to you lot, our wages are locked safely away at the bottom of the Atlantic.” Creache glared around at the crew. He stuck out a crooked bony finger and pointed at a man hiding around the corner of the cabin.

  “Bring him!” Creache ordered. No one moved. Creache glared around the deck waiting for his order to be followed. He marked carefully each sailor that defied him, including Fin. Then he spat on the deck and rushed to the man hiding behind the cabin bulkhead. Creache disappeared around the corner as the man shrank away, then reappeared dragging the man, kicking and fighting, across the deck by his arm. It was Knut. The captain threw him against the mainmast, and Knut crumpled into a pile at its foot, quivering and crying. Fin hadn’t believed Creache was strong enough to drag and throw a man like that, but she’d just seen it with her own eyes. He tied Knut’s hands fast to the mast.

  Before she knew what she was doing Fin stepped forward and shouted, “Stop it! What are you doing to him?” Creache’s head snapped toward her and he pulled his pistol out.

  “I’ve had enough mutineering for today and will not hesitate to shoot dead the next man that questions me!” He cocked back the hammer.

  Fin was horrified. Surely he wouldn’t punish Knut for the offense Jack had done him. Creache was not bluffing though. He would shoot her. She was certain of it. She shook her head and stepped back.

  Creache stuck his gun back into his belt and turned to the stowage locker behind the mast. He reached inside and brought out a long, stiff cane. Knut pulled and twisted at his bonds in a hopeless attempt at flight. The captain walked slowly around Knut, smiling gently as at an animal caught in a trap. Then he raised his arm and brought the cane down on Knut’s back. It made a sharp smacking noise, like the slap of a wave against the ship. Knut cried out. Again and again, Creache let fall the cane, and each time Knut’s screams pierced the air.

  Fin flung herself to the rail and dared not turn to watch. She couldn’t bear it. She convinced herself many times over that she had to run to his aid and cowered as many times from the threat of Creache’s pistol. She wailed inside for Knut and fanned into flames a hate for the Rattlesnake’s tyrant.

  At last, the blows and screams ended. Creache raised the cane like a sword and pinwheeled slowly around the deck, making sure to point it at each sailor.

  “Such is the price of mutiny,” he said with a nod toward Knut’s unconscious and bloody body. “I’ve no interest in damaging good deck hands, but this worthless half-wit will pay dearly for any breach of my command. His blood is on your heads.” Then Creache cast the cane down upon Knut’s still body and stalked back through the cabin door.

  Fin ran to Knut. His back was striped and split open, cut to the bone. She rolled him over and attempted to rouse him but could not.

  “Take him,” she whispered. She stood and took hold of him as the men around lifted his body and slowly marched below decks to tend him what care they could.

  CHAPTER XVI

  In the days following Jack’s insubordination, the atmosphere of the ship thickened. The crew’s thoughts grew heavy and filled the ship like a vapor. They could feel Jack’s presence below, locked away in the dark stink of the ship’s brig, and although none spoke of it, the shadow of the captain’s accusation was present in everyone’s mind. Mutiny, however small or justified, was no light matter. Even the hint of it was enough to win a man a flogging; Jack had done more than hint.

  The captain made no mention of appointing a new first mate, so others stepped in to fill the void. Tan gave orders and tried to cover Jack’s duties, but he had to contend with Bill. Bill coveted the job and turned his dislike on Tan when Tan stepped in to try to fill it. The reality was that neither of them could. Jack’s boots were bigger than his feet suggested, and over the past months the divisions on the ship had become sharper and more defined. No man in Bill’s camp would take orders from Tan, and likewise, none of those sympathetic to Jack’s defiance would hearken to Bill. Combined with worries over Jack, the splintering of the crew turned the atmosphere of the Rattlesnake into an oppressive murk of whispers, suspicion, and distrust.

  In the past, the captain was seldom seen about the ship. It was rare for him to leave his cabin unless business demanded it. But after The Kingfish, he took to making regular tours. On more than one occasion, Fin felt eyes upon her and turned to find Creache glaring at her in silence. He sent shivers down her spine. Though he never said a word, Creache’s eyes told her all she needed to know; he was looking for mutiny, as if Jack’s insubordination had spawned a festering mold somewhere in the ship, and he aimed to ferret it out and stamp it dead.

  Fin tended to Knut every chance she had, changing his bandages, bringing him water and food, sitting with him when she was able. He would heal up fine, but it would take time. Knut remembered nothing of that day or his beating, and he often asked after Jack and the captain as if they might pop in to see him at their earliest opportunity. Fin would tell him they were busy about the business of the ship, and he’d frown. Fin questioned him gently at times to see if his memory of the event was returning, but he never answered and he never asked what caused his injuries.

  Of the rest of the crew, only Tan ever asked after him with anything that seemed more than common courtesy. The other men had always been distant from Knut—he had no real friends except for Fin—but she’d never taken much notice of just how much they avoided him until now. They weren’t merely indifferent, though; it was something else. Shame maybe, the same shame she felt that she hadn’t stopped his wounding. The shame that kept her cowered on the rail while Knut was beaten and bled for no crime at all.

  Fin sat next to his hammock, changing his bandages. She asked him questions to ply his mind for memories of how he’d been hurt, but as ever, he remembered nothing. When at last he fell asleep, she shook her head and continued washing his cuts and wrapping them fresh.

  “He never remembers,” said Tan from behind her. She hadn’t heard him come in.

  “He doesn’t seem to remember any of it,” said Fin with a wrinkled brow.

  “This isn’t the first time you know. Remember I told you Knut used to be a right good boxer?”

  “Yes,” said Fin, her curiosity aroused.

  “He was more than that. He was first mate before Jack.”

  “Knut was first mate?” Fin was sure he was joking.

  “Aye, and a good one.” Tan’s eyes glazed into memory as he talked. “Ran a tight ship, took lip from no man and gave boot to many a lazy sailor. Most figured he’d be his own captain one day.”
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  Fin’s mind boggled. “What happened?”

  “Same thing what’s happening to Jack in a way,” Tan said with a grim look. “We was crossing from West Africa, late summer, must have been two . . . three years back. Captain had us running slaves. None of us liked it, but the captain ain’t one for listening to no one but himself. Bad luck running slaves—terrible stink, and diseases, and it hangs darkness on a man’s soul. Half the . . . cargo . . . was dead before we was halfway to Charleston, and most of the other half was sick. You can’t imagine the smell, can’t breathe, can’t sleep at night listening to the sickness coming up from down below. If death got a sound, I heard it. Every morning we’d throw a net down and the negroes would laden their dead on it. We’d haul ’em up and throw ’em overboard. One time some live ones got in the net with the dead, maybe hoping we’d throw them to the water as well. That got the captain furious mad. He beat a couple of ’em to death to teach the others a lesson. That was the last time talk on the ’Snake started whispering mutiny. The sickness didn’t stay below, see? The crew started to wasting away. Saw twenty mates flush their bloody innards out their bums before they died screaming and bleeding out every hole God give ’em. It was Captain Creache they blamed. Bad luck, hauling the devil’s cargo. And hell was the next berth many of ’em seen.

  “About two days east of Charleston, the wind and sky turned hellish as well. Knut told the captain we best swing north a ways, ’round the storm, and come in to Charleston on the third day, but the captain wouldn’t turn aside. The sooner to port, the more live cargo he’d have to sell off. Captain was more than willing to risk sinking us all to Davey Jones’ locker rather than spend an extra day and see his profits sink instead.”

  Tan paused and considered Knut lying on the hammock in the dark. “That’s where Knut and the captain finally parted ways. Knut told him the storm was the death of us all, said it was a great swell of God’s vengeance come rolling right at us, said it come to exact payment for the evil Creache had led us into by trading negroes. Knut had the mind of the crew, and the captain nearly did to Knut what he done to those negroes what tried to have themselves drowned. He beat Knut like an animal, and I swear he enjoyed it. Then he hauled Knut below and sailed us through the storm. In all my years of sailoring, I’ve yet to see a worse one. The ocean jumped up so big it blocked out the sky. Couldn’t tell what way was up. The wind grabbed anything on deck—wood, rope, cannon, or crew—and flung it away into the black heart of the storm. The crew wailed and prayed and knew they was sailing straight to hell to drown and burn for Creache’s madness.