Chapter 125: The Grey Lady’s Say-So
The Fortune’s wound showed plainly, some long scar of fresh, pale timber ran low along her hull just aft of amidships, right where the Falmouth’s shot had punched through her as easily as water through a rotten plank.
James gripped the ladder and climbed aboard.
Her entire mizzen topmast was gone, struck away rather than risk losing more, leaving the mast itself standing a full length shorter than when she’d sailed out of Nassau. Her mainmast still stood, though the crew had caught a spreading crack in time, shoring it up with fresh timber and doubled cordage running up one side.
The deck had its own record of the fight.
New planks, still too pale to match the old ones, broke up the weathered wood and a section of railing near the waist had vanished completely, leaving nothing between a sailor and open sea. Some dark stains remained ground deep into the boards where no amount of holystoning had managed to scrub them away.
Even so, the ship was alive with work. Casks and chests came aboard from the rowboats alongside in a steady stream, since the Rose could never carry the whole prize home alone. Near the rail, the guns salvaged from the escort sloop swung aboard one by one before being lashed securely into place.
There was no rush. The killing was over, and the men had eased into the carefree rhythm that always followed a hard fight.
Mary, still dressed as Mark, spotted him across the deck.
"Well, now. Look what the tide’s washed back."
James raised an eyebrow.
"I weren’t aware I’d gone anywhere."
"Weren’t aware?"
She stopped with one hand on the rail, looked him up and down in a way that made no effort to hide what she thought of the sight, and then tipped her head toward the battered ship around them.
"The lass been limpin’ about with shot holes in her belly, prize crews cryin’ for orders, carpenters screamin’ for timber, Whitlock countin’ every bloody nail aboard, and all the while our illustrious captain’s vanished clean off the face o’ the sea."
James huffed a little laugh and leaned one shoulder against the ladder rail.
"I trusted ye’d muddle through somehow."
"Oh, we did."
Mary nodded gravely.
"Remarkable what a crew can accomplish once they’re forced to do the captain’s work for him."
"I knew there was a reason I kept ye all."
"There speaks a true gentleman. Shows up after every barrel’s rolled aboard, every gun’s struck below, every splinter’s patched over, then strolls the deck wonderin’ whether there’s any work left needs doin’."
James looked around the deck with theatrical care.
"So... is there?"
Mary barked a laugh. "Not unless ye fancy pickin’ oakum from between the seams. Though I’d not begrudge ye the sight, be good for morale, watchin’ the captain discover what honest labour looks like."
"Och, I’ve done honest labour."
"Aye?"
She cocked her head.
"Today?"
"Depends who you ask."
"Oh, I expect Anne’d swear you’ve earned a full day’s wage already."
James grinned.
"Then she’s a woman o’ uncommon judgement."
"A dangerous thing in a pirate."
She shook her head, still smiling. "Well, since ye’ve finally remembered where the Fortune’s berthed, I’ll give you the account. The lass is worse than she’d like to admit, better than she deserves. She’ll carry us where we mean to go, so long as nobody’s fool enough to hurry her."
James looked out over the deck, "Fair enough. And Bonnet?"
"Below."
She did not soften it, but there was no cruelty in it either. "Once the fightin’ was truly over, once there weren’t nowhere left for any of it to go, he just folded where he stood. Wasn’t weakness, mind. He held himself together through more than most men could’ve managed, right up until he didn’t have to anymore."
James nodded slowly. The news sat warmly in his chest. "Lad’s too well-mannered to faint in front of anybody while there’s still a fight on. Wouldn’t dream of it, far too rude."
"Aye, that’s about the size of it."
Whitlock crossed in front of them a moment later with a record book balanced against one forearm. His quill scratched steadily across the page before he had even stopped walking.
"Captain."
He did not look up. "Cargo’s tallied to the shilling, and every salvaged gun’s accounted for down to the barrel of powder left beside it. I’ll not have a man aboard either ship claimin’ a count I haven’t checked with my own hand."
James spread his hands, "Wouldn’t dream of arguin’ figures with ye, Whitlock. Never have. Tómas counted the prize on the Rose as well, so if there’s any error in it, the blame’s got company."
"...Has he, now."
The quill finally stopped. "Well. I daresay he’ll have managed. Even so, I’ll be wanting a look at his figures before I trust them over my own."
"Then yiy can fact-check ’em later. I’m sure Tómas’ll survive the scrutiny."
Not far away, Ezra and Silas Hollis dragged a stripped cannon across the deck between them. The effort seemed to matter less than the argument carrying on beneath it.
"Careful wi’ yer end, Silas. Ma always said ye’d be the death o’ me."
"I’m Ezra, ye blind old goat. Ma told ye so often enough."
"She told me no such thing. She always said I was Ezra."
"She said ye were dropped on yer head. That’s not the same."
"Fine. Soon as we’re done, we’ll ask Ma which one of us she meant to name Ezra, and that’ll settle it once and for all."
Neither of them slowed an instant.
Crick found him last, as if the old sailor had to be coaxed out of the charts by degrees. He wandered over while muttering beneath his breath, stopping just long enough to spit over the larboard rail before rapping his knuckles three times against the mainmast.
Only then did he seem satisfied enough to look up at the clearing sky. "Storm’s passed now, Captain, but that don’t mean she’s gone. The Grey Lady is a fickle one, she likes to trail behind weather like a widow after a wake, and she takes a special interest in ships that’s already been hurt. Best we don’t give her the courtesy o’ lingering."
James looked over amusedly.
Crick went on as if the sky itself had told him so. "She’s a greedy thing, the Grey Lady, that is. Smells fresh blood, cracked timber, and gold from a league off, and if a man lets her catch even the shadow of him, she’ll spend the night whisperin’ madness into his brains and leavin’ him to rot by mornin’."
Whatever odd precaution Crick believed he’d prepare with every spirit haunting the Caribbean, James had long since learned not to argue with it.
The old man had, however, reminded him of their situation.
The Fortune would make the voyage, but only if nobody demanded speed from her. Concordia could haul her ashore and scrape her clean, yet there was no yard there fit to replace a topmast, sister a cracked spar, or mend the sort of wounds she’d taken over the battle. Nor was there a market large enough to swallow entire prizes’ worth of sugar, rum, guns, and cargo without every merchant from Havana to Port Royal wondering where it had all come from.
Nassau, on the other hand, had shipwrights enough to make the Fortune and Rose whole again, chandlers to fit her out, and enough buyers that a fortune in prize cargo could disappear into the market without raising more than pirate gossip.
Concordia would manage well enough without him for a while longer. He had left it in hands he trusted.
"Nassau it is, then."