Chapter 4
Chapter Four
My topsails they did shake
And the merchants they did quake,
So many I did take
As I sail’d….
— ANONYMOUS, “BALLAD FOR CAPTAIN KIDD”
Until today Sara had found the voyage uneventful.
True, she’d had trouble squelching the gambling of the more hardened women who liked to fleece the country maids of their rations.
And she’d given many a lecture on the inappropriateness of swearing.
Still, her classes had gone well, and she and Petey had succeeded in keeping the women separate from the men.
Now, however, confusion reigned. The women had been sent below, and they gathered around Sara, panic-stricken and babbling.
It took some minutes before she could make sense of what they were saying.
A pirate ship approaching? Surely not. Pirates grew scarcer with every year as the British and Americans sought to clear the waters of the pests.
And what would they want with a convict ship carrying nothing of value?
Of course, they didn’t know that the Chastity carried only women. She froze, a sick fear settling into the pit of her stomach. Women. Everyone knew what pirates did to women. And if these men found no gold to sate their savage appetites, they would surely turn to other terrible pleasures.
“They’ll rape and kill us!” Ann Morris cried above the clamor of voices, speaking aloud Sara’s worst thoughts. “Oh, Miss Willis, what are we to do?”
Sara wanted to scream that she didn’t know, that she’d never faced pirates before. But she couldn’t. The others relied on her. They watched her expectantly, as if she could conjure up an army of protectors to save them. Oh, if only she could.
She forced a calmness into her voice that she didn’t feel. “There’s no need to panic. The sailors will fight them off. The ship is armed—”
“Not well enough to frighten pirates,” Queenie grumbled.
“That puling bunch of sailors won’t fight,” came Louisa’s cynical voice. “They’ll jump ship before they lose a finger for a shipload of convict women.”
Unfortunately, Louisa was right. The milling voices in the hold became oppressive, and Sara had to struggle to keep from panicking as the other women were.
Suddenly Louisa cried in a loud voice, “Listen, everybody!”
One by one the women heeded her words until only the sounds of babies crying and the children’s plaintive voices broke the silence. They could hear nothing at first, except a faint muffle of voices. The ship seemed to have stopped, although it was hard to tell in the hold.
Suddenly there was a rumble as of several men jumping on the decks. Then the ship swayed to one side, causing the women to grasp at the bars for balance, before it righted itself.
“They’ve come aboard,” Queenie pronounced.
“Perhaps if we stay still, they won’t know we’re here,” Ann Morris whispered. “Perhaps Captain Rogers will tell them the hold is empty, and they’ll leave.”
Louisa’s pretty features were ashen in the lantern light. “With just a word from our good captain? I think not. Besides, he won’t tell lies on our behalf. We’re the only thing of value he can throw as a sop to the pirates.”
The chilling words made all the women shudder, even Sara. Never had she dreamed when jesting with Jordan that this could occur. There shouldn’t be pirates in these waters, and they shouldn’t have stopped the Chastity.
If only she and the others could fight. But they had naught with which to defend themselves. Nor could they prevent the pirates from entering the hold.
Every creak of the ship added to the tension in the hot, stifling air. Even the children seemed to be holding their breaths, waiting for what would become of them.
“Oh, how I wish Petey … I-I mean, Mr. Hargraves … was down here to protect us,” Ann burst out into the ominous silence.
“Even your Mr. Hargraves cannot stop a band of pirates, Annie,” Louisa retorted. “He’s not God, you know. This time all the Miss Willises and Mr. Hargraves’s of the world cannot stop us from being forced into unspeakable—”
“That’s enough, Louisa,” Sara said sharply. “You’re scaring the children.”
They heard the telltale sound of the hatch door opening. The women all turned as one toward the stairs, their eyes gleaming with fear.
It wasn’t a pirate, however, who descended the steps, but Captain Rogers’s nimble-footed cabin boy. As soon as the women saw him, they let out a collective sigh and surged toward the stairs.
Cries of “What’s going on?” and “Is it truly pirates?” filled the air as he stopped halfway down the steps.
“I been sent to tell you to gather your things and come on deck.” His skin was pale, and his skinny legs shook.
“Sent by whom?” Sara asked.
“Captain Horn, miss. Of the Satyr. ’Tis his ship that has taken us.”
The Satyr. She thought perhaps she’d heard of it, but she couldn’t remember what she’d read. “This Captain Horn is a pirate?”
The boy looked at her as if she were mad. “Aye, miss. Everybody knows that.”
It didn’t cheer her to have her fears confirmed.
“Come on, lad, that’s enough prittle-prattle,” shouted a coarse voice from above, cutting him off. “Tell them to be up here at once. Captain Horn wants the lot of them to present themselves on deck now or risk his wrath!”
The sound of that menacing voice sent the women into a frenzy. They dashed this way and that, gathering their meager possessions, cautioning the children, and drawing on their shoes, for many had begun going barefoot once they’d reached warmer waters.
Soon they were heading toward the stairs with rough canvas bags clutched in their hands.
Most even carried the makings for their quilts.
Before they could climb the steep ladder stairs, however, Sara moved in front of them.
She wouldn’t let them go into this alone.
Someone had to speak for the women, and it might as well be her.
“Listen to me, ladies. Remember all we’ve been talking about. No matter what they do to you, your soul is your own. They can’t touch it if you hold it safe within you.”
Her words seemed to give them courage, though it was a somber group who followed her up the stairs through the ’tween decks to the top deck.
The sight that met her eyes as she emerged into the brilliant sunlight was a sobering one.
The Chastity’s crew lined the sides of the ship, guarded by the most presentable bunch of pirates she’d ever expected to see.
How could these men be pirates? Why, there wasn’t an eye patch or a hook among them! They were clean and orderly, quite the opposite of Captain Rogers’ none too fastidious crew. And as the women massed on the deck, they didn’t hoot or grab at them or make any lewd remarks.
But their indecent attire certainly fit their profession. Leather vests predominated, often without so much as a scrap of a shirt. She’d never seen so many bare-chested men in her life nor so many heads of shoulder-length hair.
Then she caught sight of their weapons, and her blood froze. Knives with carved bone handles gleamed in their hands and a few had pistols tucked into their belts. They might be clean and orderly, but those weapons made it quite clear what they were here for.
Before she could brood further on it, however, a stocky, bearded man with a wooden leg ordered the women to proceed along the deck to the bow. There they found more pirates, a crowd far outnumbering the Chastity’s crew and perhaps even the women themselves.
Then the crowd parted, and she got her first glimpse of the man who could only be the Satyr’s captain.
He stood with legs splayed and arms crossed over his open-necked white shirt and leather vest, a serious expression hardening the already harsh angles of his face.
With narrowed eyes, he watched the women crowd onto the decks.
She didn’t know how she knew he was the captain.
She just did. He had a certain haughtiness lacking in the others.
There were other things, too, like his great height.
And his clothes, as fine as any she’d seen.
The dove-gray breeches hugging his muscled legs were of an excellent cut and quality, and his belt was crowned with a jeweled buckle.
His ship’s name suited him perfectly. Even though he wore weathered black boots where hooves should be and no horns peeked out above his unruly, shoulder-length black hair, his expression bore such mocking satisfaction that only a real satyr could have matched it.
His brutally thorough gaze assessed the women, as if to ferret out their weaknesses.
And his face! Though clean-shaven, it was also that of a satyr’s—blatantly masculine, coldly handsome despite its thick brows and crooked mouth … and frighteningly menacing.
What made him seem so fearsome? Perhaps it was his scars, the crescent-shaped one that bisected his wind-reddened cheek and the tiny slash along the outer edge of his eyebrow that seemed narrowly to miss his eye.
Most assuredly, the huge saber he wore tucked in his wide leather belt had something to do with it.
But it was more than that. She suspected this man would be alarming even if devoid of scars and saber and dressed in a frock coat and beaver hat.
“Good day, ladies,” he said with a distinctly American accent. With a grin that took the edge off his fierce looks, he added, “We’ve come to rescue you.”
His words were so unexpected, so completely self-assured that Sara bristled. After all his blatant methods of intimidation, after he’d stood here surveying the women like cattle before the slaughter, he had the audacity to say such a thing!
“Is that what they’re calling thievery, pillage, and rape these days?” she snapped without thinking.