Chapter 80: And the Sharpest Tongues
The sun drifted westward toward the forest of masts while the interview book swelled thick enough that Whitlock would’ve mourned the cost of the ink alone if he’d still been there to see it. He and Crick had left as soon as their names dried on the page, one headed for the Fortune to wrestle her accounts into order, the other to argue with gulls over what the weather planned to do next.
The other recruits had been the expected lot.
One toothless old sailor swore he’d spent forty years before the mast, then admitted he couldn’t tell which side of a ship was port when asked outright. He earned a shilling for making the walk over and nothing more.
Another sailor arrived carrying a chicken under his arm and insisted the bird had survived three sinkings and therefore counted as an experienced seaman. Cudjoe had to inform him the chicken was welcome to apply separately once it learned to tie a bowline.
Some scarred giant claimed he could load a cannon faster than any men alive. To demonstrate, he seized an imaginary rammer, stumbled backward into a crate of oranges, and vanished beneath them in a avalanche of citrus. James signed him on the grounds that any man who survived that much embarrassment might survive a broadside.
The crowd had long since surrendered to outright mayhem.
Some rum sellers barged through the people sloshing liquor over anyone too slow to dodge, gamblers somehow found room for a game of dice in the middle of it all, and two whores had planted themselves near the front, laughing, showing enough bosom to distract a dozen sailors, and peeling recruits with promises whispered into ears and hands hooked through belts before disappearing with them between the warehouses.
"We still need a gunner for the Fortune." James looked out toward the harbor.
"Every drunken bastard out there’ll swear he’s fired a broadside."
Cudjoe snorted. "Doesn’t mean he’s done it twice. Doesn’t mean he was sober either."
Briggs grunted.
"Told ye. Bigger crowd."
James rose and cupped his hands around his mouth. "Right then, ye beautiful degenerates! Fortune’s still lookin’ for a gunner! Who here can put a shot where I tell him instead of where God decides it ought to land?"
The answers crashed together.
"I split a Spaniard’s anchor clean in two from half a mile!"
"Liar!"
"Aye, but it scared the bastard enough to surrender!"
"I once sank the wrong ship and still got prize money!"
"That’s because ye couldn’t tell Spain from Portugal!"
"Captain! I can hit anything afloat!"
Then another voice cut clean through the noise.
Confident and low.
That was why everyone heard it.
"Anyone still boastin’ this loud’s never held a linstock in a fight worth mentionin’."
The man who stepped forward didn’t look like someone chasing attention. Quite the opposite.
Lean across the shoulders, he wore a plain coat cut close to the body with the sleeves rolled to the elbows while old scars crossed his forearms over calluses earned through years of work. A broad hat shaded a face weathered more by salt and sunlight than by age, while short dark hair disappeared beneath it, tied back with a strip of leather.
"Mark Read. Gunner, if the berth’s still open."
"Aye, it is."
James gave him another look. "Ship’s rollin’ hard in a swell, and your gun’s risin’ on the wrong side of it. What do you do?"
"Wait."
Not a trace of hesitation. "Hold until she’s at the top of the roll, then fire as she starts down before she climbs again. If you fire too soon the shot climbs into the sky and if you fire too late it buries itself in the sea."
James nods, "The captain orders you to hold fire on a target ye’d swear’s already dead in the water. Then what?"
"I hold."
Again, the answer came without pause. "From where I stand, I can see me gun and whatever she’s pointin’ at. The captain’s seein’ every sail in the fight, so if he tells me to wait, there’s somethin’ I haven’t seen."
Bonnet leaned forward, his hands folded neatly atop the table.
"And why choose the Fortune, if I may ask?"
"Been hearin’ your names since I stepped onto the island."
A slight shrug. "Seems every bastard in Nassau wants aboard before you strike it rich. I’d rather be one of the crew than one more fool wishin’ he’d signed sooner."
James glanced at Cudjoe.
The quartermaster answered with a single nod.
MARK READ (?) - MASTER GUNNER, BLACK FORTUNE
Status : Fit for duty
Age : 25
Aboard : Less than an hour
Note : He is, for the record, a woman. I trust you recognized that already, unless you’ve somehow become both blinder and more foolish than your previous performance suggested.
James almost laughed.
Mark Read. Mary Read.
The name came back to him as easily as Blackbeard’s or Hornigold’s. One of the few women in history reckless enough to make a living as a pirate by pretending to be a man, and apparently she’d decided Mark would do for the time being.
Fair enough.
She’d answered every question straight, knew her trade, and hadn’t asked for special treatment. Whatever name she signed beneath the Articles was her business.
"Report aboard the Fortune."
James said, jerking a thumb toward the ship. "Quartermaster’ll see you settled."
Mark, or Mary tipped her hat in acknowledgment before weaving back into the crowd, disappearing among the recruits making for the gangplank.
James barely had time to think further before a familiar voice drifted across the dock.
He looked up, his lips rising into a grin.
"Look who finally decided the horizon was worth chasin’."
Anne stopped before the table, arms folded across her chest.
"Don’t flatter yourself, I’m here for the job."
Cudjoe facepalmed with a heavy thump. "I’ll give the pair o’ ye a moment, then. Wouldn’t want business gettin’ in the way o’ young romance."
Anne glared at him.
"Take one step away and I’ll throw you in the harbor."
She faced James again, chin lifting a fraction.
"Ask me the same questions you asked every other soul out there."
She jerked her head toward the shrinking crowd. "I didn’t come all this way to be waved aboard because of last night."
James bit back another grin.
"Can ye swim?"
"Better than the fools who signed today, and I’ve never needed a ship to prove it."
"Handled a blade?"
"I already split a man’s skull with a bottle. Figure a blade’s easier."
"Know rope work? Riggin’?"
"Never laid a hand on either."
She didn’t blink. "But I’ve hauled crates and kegs since I was tall enough. That’s more work than most of that lot’s ever done."
Another small shrug.
"I’ll learn quick. If I don’t, you’ll know before the week’s out."
Cudjoe muttered something that sounded suspiciously like God help the Rose, though the corner of his mouth had already given up trying to stay straight.
"Welcome aboard, lass."
For just a heartbeat, the fight went out of her.
The noise of the dock rolled on around them, but Anne seemed not to hear any of it. Her fingers curled, and for a single moment she looked afraid that if she blinked the offer might disappear. Then she drew a slow breath and found herself again.
"I’ll finish my shift at the Rat tonight."
She paused. "Meg deserves better than me vanishin’ without a word. I’ll come back tomorrow with whatever’s worth bringin’."
ANNE BONNY - CREW, BLOODY ROSE
Status : Fit for duty, pending actual duty
Age : 22
Aboard : Less than a day
Note : This is the first recruit to set her own terms before the interview started rather than after. I would call it a bad precedent if it weren’t clearly going to work.
Cudjoe watched Anne head back toward the Rat, "One more day like this and both crews’ll be full enough to sail proper."
James looked over at Bonnet, who still sat a little straighter than the moment required.
He laughed and clapped the man’s shoulder, "Best get over to the Fortune, Bonnet. Go win over your crew before they decide a rich man who can’t read the wind makes better bait than captain."
Bonnet gathered up his walking stick. "I shall endeavor to be remembered for something other than my incompetence, Captain."
James watched him leave, then rose and crossed the gangplank onto the Rose. With every step deeper into the ship, the clamor of the docks faded behind him.
Some time ago, an idea had taken root about where his next spend of Fate ought to go. Alone in the silence of his cabin, he turned it over one last time, liked it even better than before, and smiled to himself before he called for the voice.