Chapter 40
“Listen well,” Thomas said after Anne climbed into his cart. She lay flat, covering herself with the pungent fishnets. “You must tell no one of Mary’s true identity. You hear?”
Anne could see a snatch of blue sky through the heap of nets. Did he honestly think she’d do such a disservice to the person who’d helped her—baffling as this new revelation was? “Understood.” She wasn’t nearly as sensitive to smell as Mary, but still, she breathed through her mouth.
“Good,” he said. Anne detected a shake in his voice. She heard him heave the cart up and begin to pull.
“No donkey?” Anne whispered.
“No money. You can thank your Captain Rackham for that.”
What the Devil did that mean? Anne glowered, even though he could not see her face.
“When I say ‘lovely morning,’ that means someone is on the road. It’s your cue to shut it. Understood?”
“You seem to think there is a great deal I don’t understand!” Anne shot. She regretted her biting words immediately. He and Mary—for apparently that was Read’s real name—were risking everything.
“Well, pardon me! I’m not the one covered in fishnets wreaking havoc on all the inhabitants of New Providence.”
Anne shifted. “I’m thankful,” she said. “And sorry,” she added. She felt like a louse for endangering them in this way.
The wheels creaked, and for a moment, Anne wondered if Thomas heard her.
“My apologies,” he said in a tone Anne had not heard from him yet—all the bravado gone. “I know it’s not your fault. There is a lot on my mind. A lot that could go wrong.”
“And you’re troubled by Mary’s condition?”
“Aye,” he grunted. “But what you said isn’t possible. I fear you’ve upset her. Mary is barren—a point that has been most distressing in her past. It’s best not to give her false hope.”
The cart moved over a bump and Thomas yelled out, “Lovely morning!”
Anne kept still until his whistling—beautiful whistling, she noted—returned to speech.
“Another five minutes and we’ll be to the boat. It’s all I have in the world. Can we trust you with the plan?”
“Yes,” Anne said, revisiting it in her head. Anne would spend the day in hiding, waiting for Mary to come for her that night. Mary would welcome Bonny when he came to the house—learn what she could, see if she might negotiate an agreement. Thomas had the job of notifying Rackham.
Anne wished she had Thomas’s task instead of hiding under this pile of slimy mesh. But she knew this was the only viable plan. “You know Jack?” she asked.
“Aye,” Thomas said, puffing. “I was part of his original crew when he took over command from Charles Vane.”
“You were a pirate?”
“You’d be hard-pressed to find someone in these parts who wasn’t part of ‘The Flying Gang.’ Most still are.”
Jack had told her about his time sailing under Captain Vane.
The day he’d called Vane out for his cowardice.
How the crew rallied and ousted Vane, capturing a French man-of-war, calling for Rackham to serve as captain—a position he held with distinction and benevolence until taking the king’s pardon.
“You resent him, for putting an end to the pirating?”
Thomas chuckled. “I took up King Georgie’s amnesty like the rest of ’em. But Rackham kicked me out of his crew before that.”
“What for?”
“Idleness. Gambling. Excessive drinking.”
“And?” Anne said. Jack kept a tight ship, but he was no stranger to fun. Especially if it involved rum.
“Stealing a few pieces of silver from the hold.”
This Anne was not expecting. According to the Articles that governed pirates—strict rules that afforded every crew member an equal vote, compensation for any injury, a fair share of the treasure, and more—she knew any man caught stealing should be shot or marooned.
“He was good to let me go rather than make me governor of my own island. Charles Vane, that sick bastard, would never have done the same,” Thomas said, following her line of thinking.
“Though punishment found me anyway. That onetime mistake has its hooks in my reputation. It’s hard to find work.
” The cart picked up speed as they descended a hill.
“Maybe this makes me even with Rackham, my helping you. All the same, I’m not looking forward to facing him aboard the Ranger again. ”
Thomas stopped and lowered the cart. The sea flooded Anne’s nostrils and she heard water lap the white shore.
The crunch of boots announced that Thomas had returned with the rowboat.
She saw him look in all directions through the mesh.
Then he scooped her and the nets up like a sack of flour and placed her in the bottom of the vessel. The rowboat wobbled under her weight.
“I’ll tie it off so you don’t drift,” Thomas said. He hesitated, then cleared his throat. “Please don’t stray from the plan. I really can’t afford to lose the boat.”
Anne had no intention of betraying his trust. However uncomfortable a day of waiting idly in this condition sounded, it was nothing compared to a day with Bonny. “Find Jack,” she said. “I’ll be here, waiting for Mary.”
Whoever the hell Mary Read was.
After waiting in the rowboat until midnight, Anne startled awake when the rope jerked. Her eyes flung open in the darkness, the stars visible through the net. She felt around for her knife, then remembered the plan. “Read?”
“Shh,” came a familiar yet different voice. Mary, it seemed, used a different register for speaking as a woman.
Anne suppressed the urge to sit up, to stretch out her aching spine, to demand answers. The boat rocked, and Mary stepped inside. She picked up an oar, and Anne went to reach for the other.
“Not yet,” Mary said, clutching the second oar and using them both to row out. The minutes crawled by. Anne held her breath until, at last, Mary dropped the paddles. “That should be far enough.”
Anne flung off the nets and sat across from Mary. “Is the smell …?
Mary waved the concern away, halting that direction of conversation.
“I’m sorry,” Anne said. She’d had all day to think about the danger she’d put Mary and Thomas in. Mary was also missing the night shift at the Jubilee. “You shouldn’t be out here.”
“Nor should you. But here we are.”
Anne braced against the chill in the night breeze. “And where exactly is that?”
Mary took a moment before responding. “What motivates Bonny?”
“Spite,” Anne spat. A wave caused the boat to rise and fall.
“Think deeper, Anne. Resentment blinds you. You know him. You know him better than anyone.”
Anne bit the inside of her cheek. She did not, under any circumstances, want to admit that she knew—let alone understood—that man. But when Mary said nothing, Anne saw the question was in earnest. She exhaled. “Money.”
“Yes.”
Anne furrowed her brow and scoured her memories. “Recognition?”
Mary nodded.
Anne pressed her temple, remembering their days aboard the Swallow and how possessed he could be about the fortune he felt entitled to—an entitlement he applied to her. “And ownership,” Anne concluded.
Mary made a noise of acknowledgment. “That was my sense, too. Though to be frank, I think he does have some feelings for you.”
Anne’s gut twisted. “He came, then?”
“Indeed.”
She sat up straighter and cursed. “What happened?”
“We talked,” Mary said with a shrug. “That is, once he stopped his hollering. I asked him what he wanted. He said you. I asked why. He said it didn’t matter why. It went on like that for a while.”
Anne balled her fists and suppressed a scream. “I divorced him.”
“So I said. He remains unconvinced.”
“It doesn’t bloody well matter if he’s convinced.”
“While I tend to agree, that isn’t going to give you freedom in the eyes of English law.”
“To hell with the law.” Anne could have laughed. She was a papist in Ireland, the bastard daughter of a lawyer run out of town. All her life she’d seen how laws came and went, crushing people under their heels whenever convenient.
“I’ve been burned by that hellfire myself,” Mary said.
“My … discretion about my sex helps me avoid that particular purgatory again.” She paused.
“I lost everything when—” Her voice quieted.
“It doesn’t matter right now. What does matter is that you are a woman and you are considered Bonny’s rightful property.
You can’t argue against his ideals or scream your dissent against the law.
You have to find another way, another jab at his motivations. ”
Anne groaned and buried her face in her hands.
“Think, Anne. What does Bonny want that is stronger than his feeling of ownership? Perhaps even over his affection for you?”
Affection was laughable. But the answer rose quickly. “Wealth.” Yes, that was it. “If Bonny had enough money to stop scheming, the dog might drop the bone.”
“Let’s hope you’re right. I proposed another meeting with Bonny. Between him and Rackham. At the docks yesterday, Rackham all but offered up gold. I heard him. ‘Name your price’ was what he said.”
Anne squirmed with discomfort. Did Jack know, even before she did, what it would take to stop James Bonny’s pursuit?
She did not want to know how much her soul was worth, like appraising a milking cow or a horse.
Her gut clenched with disgust. She despised everything about this plan, but she was in little position to protest.
Mary moved to pick up the oars again, and Anne reached out to stop her. “Wait.”
The air stilled as waves nudged the boat.
“Who are you?” Anne asked.
Mary exhaled and looked up, as if studying the constellations. “You don’t want to know who I am.”
Anne felt anger scorch her cheeks. “Of course I do! You’re risking your neck to help me.
I’ve told you everything about my life—including the worst thing that has ever happened to me.
” Her voice caught. It was the high tide of emotion.
It was the idea of Rackham and Bonny haggling over her.
It was the whole of it. “I know you don’t owe me anything—especially after all of this. But I trust you. Can you trust me?”
Mary stared ahead, considering.