As the two men trudged back toward the fires, Davies pulled a pistol out of his belt. "If Venner plays me square I can handle him," he said quietly. "But if he doesn't, I want you to hang back with this and make sure no - " He stopped talking suddenly and gave a weary laugh. "Never mind. I forgot I was talking to the little wooden choirboy." He put the pistol away and lengthened his stride.

Shandy followed, angry with himself - partly for feeling bad at staying out of a squabble between pirates - like a child feeling bad about refusing a foolish dare! - but partly, too, at the same time, for staying out of it.

His petticoat breeches whirling out around his knees at each ponderous step, Leo Friend reached the bottom of the sandstone track that led down from the ruined fort, and, sweating profusely in the confinement of his fantastically ribboned doublet, struck out across the sand toward the fires where Davies' crew was. Beth Hurwood strode along next to him, sobbing with fury and trying to disentangle the mummified dog paw that Friend had shoved into her hair - "This'll protect you in case we get separated!" he'd snarled impatiently - -just before dragging her out of her windowless room and unceremoniously propelling her ahead of him down the track.

Though she was having no difficulty in keeping up with the laboring young man, he turned around to face her every few steps, both to wheeze, "Hurry, can't you?" and to peer furtively down the neckline of her dress.

Damn all these delays, Friend thought, and damn the sort of fools we have to consort with in order to get to the focus in Florida! Why did it have to be ignorant, bickering brigands that found it? Though of course if a more savvy sort had found it, Hurwood and I wouldn't be able to manipulate them this way ... and I gather this Blackbeard fellow is very nearly too clever for us anyway. He's hanging back now, letting us commit ourselves to this Florida trip before joining us; he could have got those protective Indian medicinal herbs just by purchasing them, for God's sake, but instead he has to blockade the entire city of Charles Town, capture nine ships and a whole crowd of hostages including a member of the Governor's Council, and then ask for the crate of medicinal herbs as ransom. I wish I knew, thought Friend, whether the man is just showing off, just keeping his crew in battle trim, or whether he's using all that spectacle to conceal some furtive other purpose. But what plans could the man have that would involve the all-too-civilized and law-and-orderly Carolina coast?

He glanced again at Beth Hurwood, who had finally pulled the dog paw free of her hair, and as she flung it away he whispered a quick phrase and caressed the air, and her dress flew up - but she forced it back down before he'd seen anything more than her knees. Oh, just wait, girl, he thought, his mouth going dry and his heart thumping even faster - soon enough you'll be so hungry for me you won't be able to take a deep breath.

Friend came blundering into the fireside crowd just as Davies entered it from the beach side. The pirate chief was grinning confidently, and Friend rolled his eyes in exasperation. Oh, spare us the brave show, captain, thought the fat physician; you're in no danger from anyone here ... unless you really annoy me with your gallant posturing.

"Ah, here's our captain!" cried one of the pirates, a stocky red-haired man with a broad, freckled, smiling face; and though some of the men in the crowd were frowning angrily, Friend watched this smiling man, for he sensed that it was he who posed the threat. "Phil," the man said earnestly, "some of the lads here were wonderin' exactly what action we've worked so hard outfitting the Carmichael for, and how much profit we stand to take from it compared to what sorts of perils there be waitin'. I tried to answer 'em in general, but they want specific answers."

Davies laughed. "I'd have thought they'd all know better than to go to you for specifics, Venner," he said easily - though to Friend the apprehension behind the unconcerned pose was obvious.

Friend saw the new recruit - Elizabeth's friend, what was his name? Shandy, that was it - scuffling his way through the crowd behind Davies, and for a moment the physician considered engineering things so that the interfering puppeteer would be killed ... or, better, maimed, rendered simple-minded by a blow to the head ... but he regretfully decided that it would be difficult enough to restrain a crowd this big and wild from mutiny, without trying to get them to swat his personal fly at the same time.

He returned his attention to Venner, whose face, despite the smile, shone with sweat in the firelight. "That's what I told 'em, cap'n," he said, and for a moment the falsity of his smile must have been obvious to everyone present, "but several have said they plain won't sail if we be goin' to that damned place on the Florida coast where Thatch got infested by ghosts."

Davies shrugged. "Any of 'em who be not satisfied with my promise to make 'em rich, or who doubt my word on that, can see me privately to settle it. And any that want to desert in mid-endeavor know the prescribed penalties. Do you fit into any of those groups, Venner?"

Friend, peering in from the periphery, whispered and held up his hand.

Venner tried to reply, but produced only a choked grunt.

Should I have him provoke his own death, Friend wondered, or save him? Better let him live - there is real fear and anger in this crowd, and I don't want it stirred to a blaze. He whispered and gestured again, and Venner suddenly hunched forward and vomited onto the sand. The people near him drew away, and coarse laughter broke the tension.

Playing to the audience, Davies said, "I don't call that a responsive answer."

Friend's fat fingers danced in the air, and Venner straightened and said, loudly but haltingly, "No ... Phil. I ... trust you. I ... what's happening here? These aren't my ... I was just drunk, and wanted to ... stir up a bit of trouble. All these lads ... know you've got their best ... damn me! ... interests at heart."

Davies raised his eyebrows in surprise, then frowned suspiciously and peered around among the crowd; but Venner's words had been convincing enough for one pirate, who clumped up and punched the would-be mutineer in the face.

"Treacherous pig," the pirate muttered as Venner sat down in the sand, blood spilling from his nose. The man turned to Davies. "Your word sooner'n his, anytime, cap'n."

Davies smiled. "Try not to forget, Tom," he said mildly.

Out at the edge of the crowd, Friend smiled too - all this was so much easier here than it had been back in the eastern hemisphere - and then he turned to Elizabeth Hurwood. "We can return to the fort now," he told her.

She stared at him. "That's all? You ran down here, so fast I thought your heart was going to burst, just to see that man throw up and get hit?"

"I wanted to make sure that was all that did happen," said Friend impatiently. "Now come on."

"No," she said. "As long as we're here, I'll say hello to John."

Friend turned on her furiously, then caught himself. He smirked and raised his eyebrows. "The keel-scraper and brigand chef? I believe he's here," he said, simpering, "unless what I smell is a wet dog."

"Go back to the fort," she said wearily.

"So you c-can ... have c-c-congress with him, I suppose?" sputtered Friend, his voice shrill with scorn. He wished he could refer to sexual matters without stuttering. "B-banish that thought, my d-d-d - Elizabeth. Your father commanded me not to let you out of my sight." He nodded virtuously.

"Do as you please then, you damned wretch," she said softly, and with a flash of uncharacteristic and unwelcome insight Friend realized she wasn't using damned as a mere adjective of emphasis. "I'm going to go and speak to him. Follow or not."

"I'll watch you from here," said Friend, and he raised his voice as she walked away from him: "Fear not I'd follow! I'd not subject my nostrils to proximity to the fellow!"

The confrontation by the fire being over and more or less settled, some of the pirates and prostitutes nearby looked toward Friend for further amusement - and evidently found some, for there were whisperings and guffaws and giggling behind jewel-studded hands.

Tags: Tim Powers Fantasy
Source: readsnovelonline.net