Chapter 42
Anne held her chin high, higher than a solstice sun. But under her skirt, her knees shook. “Everyone is looking at me,” she whispered to Mary as they walked toward the main square.
To the place where she would face James Bonny again, along with the rest of New Providence if this crowd was any indication.
“Ignore them,” Mary said. “This ritual thrives on humiliation. They expect you to break. Don’t give them what they want.”
Anne swallowed. At least Jack would be there.
Then again, maybe she didn’t want him there.
He might mistake her cuts and bruises from the woodland as a beating.
She dreaded him seeing her like this—trembling, pathetic, still smelling like a fishmonger’s bin.
But damn, she also needed him to “buy” her.
“This way,” Mary said, lending Anne her arm as the press of bodies thickened.
Anne quickened her steps, going over what Mary had explained.
Though Anne—a lawyer’s daughter—had never seen or heard of such an abominable practice, Mary had.
Among the poor folk in England, anyone could procure a permanent, socially accepted separation from a wife by putting her on the market and auctioning her off to the highest bidder.
There was, Mary said, almost always only one bidder—the wife’s lover.
Sometimes all parties involved laughed the whole way to and from the wife sale, a happy parting of ways that circumvented the fees and hassle of divorce—the sum already decided ahead of the sale, and the possibility of being sued by a former husband closed for good.
A joke of a ritual that got everyone what they wanted. But not always.
Anne’s situation was, of course, a case of revenge.
When they reached the noisy square, Anne lit up with emotion when she saw Jack. He caught her eye and relief flooded his features. She moved toward him.
“Wait,” Mary said, throwing out an arm to stop her. “I’m sorry, Anne. You really won’t like this part.”
Anne whipped her head around just in time to see Bonny. He wore a fine waistcoat and his greasy hair was tied back in a ribbon. And in his hand, he held a rope.
“A wife sale models a cattle auction,” Mary said, turning Anne around and bracing her by the shoulders. “Sometimes exactly.”
Anne felt her cheeks glow scarlet with rage. “I will not bloody—”
“Oh yes, you will,” Bonny said, stepping toward her. “My dear, darling wife.” He brushed the slash on her cheek. “Did you have a nice time in the woods?”
She snarled.
He held out the halter rope and Anne cursed.
Mary pulled her aside and said in a cutting whisper, “Do not give them what they want, Anne. Remember?”
Anne seethed, chest heaving. For a moment, she felt like that powerless little girl frozen in front of her grandparents’ estate.
She reached into her bones and tried to summon the strength of Queen Maeve, Grace O’Malley, Joan of Arc, Mam, Ellen—anyone.
But she struggled to imagine any of them stooping so low as to be sold like a common heifer.
Anne twisted her sneer into a smile as Bonny tied a rope around her waist. With a yank, he tugged her to the middle of the square.
Her steps trailed through sand, dirt, and clumps of cattle manure.
People cheered or booed. Anne craned to find Jack in the crowd.
He gave her a sympathetic nod. His gaze shifted to Bonny, and it seethed pure murder.
Lord how she loved him for it—that reckless, wonderful, beautiful man.
When they reached the middle of the market, Anne turned to face the crowd. Sweet Jesus, there had to be a hundred people watching this spectacle.
“I hereby place my wife, Anne Bonny—formerly Anne Cormac—for sale.” Bonny circled her, as if scrutinizing Anne from every angle.
“She weighs about ten stone,” he said. “Some slight damage to her skin, but that will heal. A fine color of hair, as you can plainly see. Anne, my dear, please uncover your lovely tresses and show your beauty.”
Anne scowled. He tore the cloak from off her head and the onlookers whooped with false delight.
“But,” Bonny crowed, “I would be remiss if I didn’t name some of Anne’s less desirable qualities.
” He shot her a smug look, then continued to pace.
“Anne is a born serpent, and frolicsome and tempestuous as a mad dog, a roaring lion, a loaded pistol, and cholera combined.” People laughed.
“Oh. And she is also a filthy, wanton slut.”
To this, the laughing turned deafening. Her ears rang with the sound. Pressure formed behind her eyes but she would not, could not, let her emotion come to the surface.
Act, her whole body screamed. Move. Run. Fight.
Instead, she dug her fingernails into her palms.
“However, Anne has reasonable market value. I should also note that my wife can cook a half-decent stew, milk a goat”—he squeezed her arm—“sing well enough, and serve as an adequate drinking companion. I, therefore, offer here all her perfections and imperfections, for the sum of no less than a thousand pounds.”
Anne whirled on him. “A thousand pounds? Have you lost your mind?”
The sound of hooves thundered down the street. Everyone turned to stare, a few darting out of the way of the horses.
Anne watched Bonny’s smirk fade, then turned to face the commotion.
“What is the meaning of this?” roared Governor Woodes Rogers from the back of his black horse. Behind him rode a dozen others in full uniform.
The spectators fled like scattered vultures scared off a carcass as the soldiers closed in. Jack fought through the chaos and found Anne. He stood between her and the governor.
“Mr. Bonny?” Rogers said, glaring down from his perch. “What evil is this?”
“Well, Governor,” Bonny said, pulling at his cravat, “seeing as my wife is a harlot, and I’m owed a debt—”
“I told you quite clearly that I do not grant divorce.”
A hush fell over the remaining parties, and Anne glanced around at the confusion.
Even Mary had a pinched look of concern.
Mary and Thomas had told her that this was a common practice.
They told her that if she endured this humiliation well, she would walk free.
Anne untied the rope around her waist and flung it to the ground.
“But a wife sale—”
“I know very well what a wife sale is!” Rogers barked. He dismounted, the ringlets of his powdered wig jostling. “A peasant practice that is not respected by honorable men or God Almighty.”
“I understand, Governor,” Bonny said with a deep bow. His groveling made Anne want to kick him in the bollocks.
“You,” Governor Rogers said, standing close enough that Anne could smell his foul breath and see the gnarled musket-ball scar and missing teeth on the left side of his once-shattered jaw. “Have you not caused enough commotion for one day? Had to do it again within the week?”
“This had nothing to do with her!” Jack said, stepping in. “Look at her welts. No doubt from that scoundrel.” His voice shook with fury.
The governor shifted his catlike interest from Anne to Jack. Her insides twisted. Jack had been so careful, so painstakingly careful, to avoid catching Rogers’s notice since taking the king’s pardon and forsaking piracy.
This was all her fault.
Bloody hell. This was not all her fault. Damn James Bonny for making her doubt herself.
“Lieutenant,” Governor Rogers called to a man behind him. “This woman has disturbed the public order. Would you be so kind as to retrieve the cat-o’-nine tails?” Anne watched as the soldier retrieved a whip. She felt the air abandon her lungs.
Governor Rogers gripped the flogger in his hand, studying it. Anne’s whole body crumpled inward.
“Governor, please,” Jack said, stepping forward. “I’ll take the lashes. She had nothing to do with this spectacle. This was all Bonny. This was all arranged.”
Anne trembled like a blade of seagrass. “No.” She wouldn’t let him do this. She wouldn’t let him take this blow for her. Not with a flogger like that—a weapon meant to tear flesh, to mangle skin, to end the lives of even the strongest men.
Then her mind tore from Jack to the unseen life stirring inside her.
A life that, this time, she would do anything to keep.
The corner of the governor’s thin lips curled. “Oh, I had something else in mind, Rackham.” He held up the leather whip, as if brandishing the coiled handle in the light. “As a captain and renowned, honest sailor,” he emphasized, “I imagine you are quite familiar with a cat-o’-nine tails.”
Jack paled. “I am.”
Bonny shifted his weight, clearly worried about what this meant for him. But the governor relieved any of the bilge rat’s fears by handing Bonny the whip. “Ten lashes, followed by a stint in jail, might help the message sink in.”
Jack lunged, knocking Bonny to the ground and wrestling the cat-o’-nine tails from his grip and flinging it to the ground. The remaining people watching—were there still people?—sucked in a collective breath.
Bonny found his footing and shook the sand off his waistcoat, revenge coiling like a viper in his pupils. But the governor held up a rapier to signal them to stop. “I’ve changed my mind.”
Anne caught herself from collapsing in terror, snagging on hope despite the sharp blade. She inhaled sharply, struggling for balance.
Then Rogers bent over, picking up the leather whip from the sandy street, and handed it to Jack. “Far better, and more effective, if you do it.”
The color drained from Jack’s face, and Bonny let out a hoarse, wicked cackle.
Act! Every nerve in her screamed again. Go boldly.
Jack. The baby.
Her life.
Her freedom to fight another way.
“I’ll reform!” Anne shouted, the words ripping from her like a tempest.
All parties turned to gawk. Anne threw herself at the boots of her miserable former husband.
She placed her knife down. “I will be a good wife!” she lied through real, terrible tears.
“I will be a good wife and repent of my wayward behaviors.” She pushed herself to her knees and shuffled to kneel in front of Rogers.
“Bon …” Jack said, barely louder than a whisper.
She caught his gaze and held it, then resumed her dramatics. “Please,” she begged, wiping at her eyes and prostrating before the governor. “You won’t have trouble with me again. I swear it. Send me home with my husband.” Not a jail cell. Anything but that.
“You swear it?” Rogers said, his rapier now lowered near her shoulder.
“On my life,” Anne pledged.