Pieces of Eight. John Drake

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      By day, Flint bore these burdens manfully: there was much to do in driving the ship hard, watching constantly for another prize on the horizon–not to mention avoiding the ships of the various navies that infested these waters. These activities kept Flint merry all day, and Walrus’s people enjoyed a pleasant voyage to Savannah. But by night Flint groaned for the loss of the freedom he’d enjoyed on his island. At night, in his dreams, that part of the human mind which is animal, primeval and beyond conscious control, punished Joe Flint with memories of the most dreadful time in his entire life. The time when he had enjoyed no freedom at all, only bitter constraint…His childhood.

       Chapter 8

       8 a.m., 15th November 1732 The Chapel, Salvation House St Pancras Court, Opposite the Smallpox Hospital London

      Twelve-year-old Joseph Flint stood trembling as his father got up from his prayers. The Reverend Mordecai Flint rose like a great, black snake, turning to face the wife and son who had so inexcusably interrupted his devotions. Although no speck of dust was suffered to exist within the chapel, he brushed his knees with a clean white handkerchief, which was then painstakingly folded before being returned to his pocket. When this was done he positioned himself, back to the altar, looming over them in his pious black coat, ominously stroking the clerical bands at his neck.

      The reverend was a man of tremendous intellect; dominant, charismatic and vastly learned in Holy Scripture. Years of profound study and introspection had resulted in an unshakeable conviction that he was damned for uncleanliness of spirit, and he had therefore made it his life’s work to save those less wicked than himself–in particular, those he loved–in the hope they might yet be shriven by repentance. It was his tragedy–and still more that of those around him–that not a drop of love did they see, only an ocean of chastisement and castigation. Thus Joseph Flint flinched as his father stared at him, and clutched at his mother’s hand for comfort.

      “Wretches!” said the reverend. “‘Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting.’” He cocked his head expectantly…

      “Daniel, five: twenty-seven,” said Joseph and his mother in unison. The reverend nodded and turned his eyes on his wife.

      “So,” he said, “you come again to me, even into God’s house, with the matter that I have declared closed. I see it in your eyes! ‘All is vanity and vexation of spirit!’”

      “Ecclesiastes, one: fourteen,” said Joseph’s mother. Then: “Mr Flint!” she cried, that being the constant manner of her address to him, for he was not ordained but self-appointed, and well he knew it. She took a step forward, shaking off Joseph’s hand. “Mr Flint,” she said, and the colour drained from her face and her eyes began to blink. She screamed in his face, her body shaking with rage, “You took our Joseph to the Turk!” She seized Joseph’s shoulder and thrust him forward. “See!” she cried. “Our boy stands before you even now, with the poison in his arm!”

      Joseph sobbed as the awful weight of their emotions fell upon him. He clutched his bandaged arm and bowed his head, and believed that he was to blame.

      “I’m sorry,” he said, “I’m so sorry.”

      But his guilt was nothing compared with his father’s. The reverend groaned as pain wrenched the depths of his belly. For he’d broken faith, even if in a noble cause. And worse than that…far, far worse…he’d been found out!

      “Ah!” said Joseph’s mother, seeing his reaction. “You hypocrite! You swore on the Bible! You said that you would not do it…and you did!”

      And so the parents screeched, and as the child looked on the hideous quarrel grew until words became blows and finally…Joseph Flint watched as his mother drew the hidden knife. He stood, eyes wide, as she fell upon his father and cut his throat. He looked on as she sat upon the reverend’s prostrate body and plunged the knife again and again into his face, paying back thirty years of mental cruelty with thirty seconds of demented revenge.

       Chapter 9

      One bell of the afternoon watch 2nd October 1752 Aboard Hercules off Cape Castillo, Niña de Cuba

      Since Captain Bentham liked music, the ship’s band of musicians was scraping and blowing fiercely even as the bosun’s pipes saluted the coming-aboard of Captain Parry of Sweet Anne, and Captain Nichols of Favourite: these gentlemen, and their first mates, being summoned aboard the flagship for a council of war. The noise was terrific, and powder smoke swirled as the guns of the three ships added their voices to the din.

      All was good fellowship and satisfaction, what with Captain Bentham having led his squadron safe and sound from Upper Barbados, making landfall exactly as he’d boasted and with fair winds and a swift passage besides.

      Of the greasy mob that filled Hercules’s maindeck, only Brendan O’Byrne was frowning. He frowned because he hadn’t the guile to hide his feelings, and he was scrutinising the new arrivals as they clambered over the rail, in their best clothes and their best hats, and into the arms of Cap’n Bentham and his crew, to be welcomed as jolly companions.

      Ugh! thought O’Byrne There it was: the look. He’d seen it on three faces. Not Cap’n Parry’s, God bless him! Not him, for he knew Danny Bentham of old. But his first mate didn’t, and Cap’n Nichols didn’t, and nor his first mate neither. So they were staring at Cap’n Bentham in the way men did who met him for the first time.

      So it was a puzzled, questioning look and one that tormented O’Byrne. Worse still, it filleted the backbone out of him, so instead of being fired with manly anger he was cast down and enfeebled.

      The fact was that O’Byrne couldn’t bear any insult to Cap’n Danny. Not when his feelings for the captain were so intense, and their precise nature–stemming as they did from his own nature–were a mystery even to himself. For while O’Byrne didn’t normally care for women, any feelings towards men were ruthlessly denied…such that Cap’n Danny was a unique door through which desires might emerge that otherwise must be contained.

      With a heavy sigh and a shrug, O’Byrne told himself that it was all part of the privilege of sailing under Cap’n Danny–like never mentioning the captain’s latest wife once Williamstown was under the horizon.

      Fortunately, Cap’n Danny himself was immune to such concerns. He was what he was, and he was used to it, though he swaggered a bit at first meetings, and took care to deepen his voice.

      “Rum!” cried Bentham now. “And lay out the chart!” The crew cheered, and with much good humour kegs of spirits were brought up from below decks. A big empty cask was then up-ended by the landward quarterdeck rail to serve as a table, and as the shipmasters and their leading men gathered around it, all hands pressed forward, as befitted their status as equals under the articles they’d signed.

      “So,” said Bentham, one finger on the chart and one pointing towards land, three miles to the north. “That there’s Isabel Bay, into which the River Ferdinand runs. The bay’s a thousand yards wide at the mouth, between Cape Castille and Cape Aragon, with a great anchorage within, and Isabel Island sits between the two capes, like a sausage in a dog’s jaws.”

      “So where’s the fort?” said Captain Parry.

      “And the dollars!” said Captain Nichols.

      “See here–” said Bentham, studying the chart “–to the east of Isabel Island is sandbanks and shoals. The safe channel lies to the west, between the island and Cape Aragon, past the fort, which is down here at the southernmost tip of the island.”

      Nichols took