"My grandfather is one of the wealthiest men in the New World." "If I plead our case and gain his support, that might be all we need to emerge from this intact." "I alone am to be left in charge of Nassau's security." "And I gave our lord governor my solemn oath that I would see it protected." "Israel Hands." "It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance." " You want to withdraw?" " If we don't, it will be the end of whatever trust exists between us and the slaves on the island." "I'm through following you down a path only you seem able to see." "Fire!" "The neighboring estates must've heard the guns and rallied." "We need to be gone before that militia arrives." "I board the sloop and I run." "The door will be open for you to reach your grandfather and gain his aid." " It's the governor's banner." " Do we pursue?" "Set a course to overtake her." "Captain?" "I would've thought you'd retired by now." "Bulletins... from my scouts in the field tonight." "I was contemplating my response after the sunrise." "Anything we should discuss?" "You have enough on your mind." "Let this be my concern." "Have you told her, my Lord?" "Your wife." "About what lies ahead?" "Good." "She doesn't need it on her mind, either... what lies ahead." "I have found that contemplating these things is the most difficult part." "That when the dread moment arrives, your true nature will assert itself." "The confusion will lift and all will appear as it should be." "You've given me good men to lead." "I'll do my best by them." "There isn't a good man among them." "Not anymore." "Some of them may have been, before all this." "Some of them may be again on the other side of it." "But right now, good men are not what the moment requires." "Right now, the time calls for dark men... to do dark things." "Do not be afraid to lead them to it." "Prepare for departure!" "Today is the 24th." "David is five today." "My son." "I didn't know that." "Mr. Grandal has not contacted me in weeks." "With the war apparently occupying Spain's attention elsewhere, there is a good chance the entire unfortunate affair surrounding the Spanish gold is behind us." "So, when we reach Philadelphia, once you are under the protection of your family..." "I was hoping you might see fit to release me from my service, that I might return to London... to my children." "Of course." "Ma'am..." "I've just been informed our permission to depart has been suspended." "Suspended?" "Why?" "I'm told the soldiers that were to comprise your escort are otherwise needed ashore." "What the fuck is this?" " Get out." " Get dressed." "Mr. Harrison, proceed." "Six men with you." "They never looked my way as I stayed a considerable distance." "Saw you meet two others late last night, one of them standing on just one leg." "Saw it all." "I had him follow you after you left town so abruptly last night." "I assume the one-legged man was Long John Silver." "Would you like to tell me what the meeting was about?" "I was summoned by him in a failed attempt to extort money from me." "I would hope that your spy also informed you that four of my six men attempted to arrest him and died in the effort." "I was barely able to escape myself." "Surely this should mitigate any doubt you may have about my loyalties." "If you were loyal to the governor, why did you not inform me of the meeting before the fact?" "If you are loyal to the governor, why attempt to arrest a man as dangerous as he rather than simply eliminating him?" "If you had informed me," "I'm sure I could have helped in that regard." "My questions about your loyalty, ma'am, are not mitigated by last night's events." "If anything, they are now aggravated to an intolerable degree." "Does the testimony presented satisfy a charge of treason?" " Wait." " It does." "This is outrageous." "When the governor returns, he will not stand for this." "The governor is not here." "I am here." "And you are now under an indictment that carries with it the penalty of death." "Mr. Harrison here trailed Long John Silver before losing him in the wrecks." "Men and horse await in the square, preparing to clear that area and apprehend him." "Today is the day the pirate resistance dies, its leader eliminated, its supporters in Nassau exposed and arrested." "If you cooperate with me to that end, perhaps your death might still be averted." "We have no choice but to leave the island." "No one is leaving anything." "We came here to take Nassau." "We leave once that is done or not at all." "Take Nassau?" "With what army?" "Whatever slaves are still alive on this island will never fight alongside a pirate again." " Not after last night." " Last night, there were also pirates who fought alongside us." "Against terrible odds and at great cost." "Billy and his men are our enemies now, but these men are not." "And as long as that is true, our alliance with them holds." "You know where you're going?" "I saw her last employed in the tavern." "I'll begin there." "We don't need to persuade her to do anything yet." "Eventually, we'll need to garner support to help incite Nassau to revolt against the governor, but what we need right now is information." "How many soldiers there are, what kind of sympathy exists for our cause." "I know." "Thank you." " What for?" " Last night." "You did not have to side with me." "It was costly for you to do so." "Well, it would have cost far more for me not to have done so." "We might be able to take Nassau alone, but there will be no greater victory, no widespread revolution unless we can somehow keep our alliance together." "You truly believe it is possible?" "That as disadvantaged and disabled as we are, that anything we do here is going to make the least bit of difference to the men in London?" "Well, that's the trick, isn't it?" "If no one remembers a time before there was an England, then no one can imagine a time after it." "The empire survives in part because we believe its survival to be inevitable." "But it isn't." "And they know that." "That's why they're so terrified of you and I." "If we were able to take Nassau, if we are able to expose the illusion that England is not inevitable, if we are able to incite a revolt that spreads across the New World... then, yeah..." "I imagine people are gonna notice." ""Too much sanity may be madness,"" ""and the maddest of all,"" ""to see life as it is and not as it should be."" "Get the main sail." "I'll say this for him, he's not shy." "If he misses this tack, we'll be on him in less than an hour." "He's completed his last three tacks." "Why stop now?" "Not that close to the wind." "Not nearly that close." "Don't you think?" "Any chance he could slip away from us?" " Not really, no." " No." "He's pointing higher, but we've got the speed." "He can't hold us off forever." "Once we've stopped him, you and I will take the vanguard aboard on longboats." "You can stay close, provide support until we're boarded." "Ever captained a ship of this size before?" "God, no." "Have you captained a ship this size before?" " Sure." " Good." "This ain't ever gonna end for us, is it?" "What?" "You always wanted to stand next to giants." "Now there you are." "And I'm wondering how it is you and I are ever gonna move on from this." "He's brilliant, you know?" "I've heard him underestimated on that score, perhaps owing to his physical strength." "People finding it hard to accept the idea that one man can be two things, but I've seen it." "He is brilliant." "And last night, all he wanted was revenge, and all that would satisfy it was Eleanor Guthrie's head on a plate." "And in a moment in which he had no appetite to be persuaded otherwise," "I persuaded him otherwise." "If the story of the pirate Jack Rackham is to end with him standing alongside Blackbeard as an equal, together defeating the governor who hanged Charles Vane and in so doing restoring pirate rule over Nassau... that is an ending I can live with." "Defeat Rogers... and we walk away." "They've missed stays!" "We've got him." "Ready the guns!" "The end is about to begin." "Our invasion failed." "But we are not through." "There is support for our cause inside Nassau." "There must be, however dormant." "But we need to find it." "Need your help to find it." "There was support once, but now Nassau is frightened." "What you would ask, openly defying those soldiers..." "I doubt you'd find that kind of support." "I have lost more than you can know to reach this moment." "Captain Flint has lost more than you can know." " But we are here." " Captain Flint?" "He awaits with a small force of men." "But if we can see those prisoners broken free..." "And you are with him as well?" "Yes?" "Him... who?" "Long John Silver." "He died in the bay during the invasion." "What?" "A posse just departed for the wrecks under instructions from Captain Berringer to locate and arrest Long John Silver." "Are you all right, ma'am?" "Ma'am?" "Fuck." " Fuck, fuck, fuck." " That's enough." "We should be running." "There's nowhere to run." "Then we have a serious problem, as Captain Berringer is going to demand she identify her connections to the resistance, which is us." "She won't." "How can you be so sure?" "Because she doesn't like her friends being threatened." "And she doesn't like to be pushed around." "I sincerely hope you're right, as I believe our lives depend upon it." "She won't tell on us in there." "What we should be worried about is how we're going to help her from out here." "Fuck." "The other day, you refused to name the source you used to undermine the pirate invasion of the bay... as a matter of principle." "Since that time, Long John Silver and his associates have murdered one of my men... murdered four of your men... murdered a family of three on the Underhill estate in cold blood last night, including an eight-year-old girl." "Knowing now how high the bodies are piling, how real the threat is," "I am giving you an opportunity to remedy your error and help me end this threat once and for all." "I want the names of your sources." "I am sorry, but I cannot do that." "Cannot or will not?" "These men would turn on you in a blink of an eye." "Why would you go to such lengths to protect them?" "I told you," "I have an understanding with the governor..." " in which he acknowledged..." " Give me the names." "The benefit of my being able to honor my word..." " to my sources..." " Give me the names." " Such that I might continue..." " Give me the names." " To serve his regime in the future..." " Give me the names." " As I have served it every day..." " Give me the names." " Until now." " Give me the names!" "You can't go in there, ma'am." "What is going on here?" "Go!" "I'm not shackled." "You plan to run?" "Do I need to run?" "That'd be fun for me to see." "How would you do it?" "With great difficulty, I imagine." "How would you take Nassau?" "When I did it... drove the governor away," "I had Teach and an army of my once-brothers at my back." "You want to play Teach?" "Who's to play the rest?" "Or do you believe we two could do it alone?" "Find him!" "Look over there!" "Find him!" "Right." "Over there!" "Behind them." "Check the brush!" "Find him!" "Search that wreck!" "Get in there!" "It's all right." "How are we going to take Nassau?" "That's how." "Cease fire!" "Cease firing!" "Shall we reload, Captain?" "There's nothing more we can do from here." "They're on their own now." "They've struck their colors!" "She is the most influential member of the Governor's Council." "Whatever tension there has been, he relies upon her to maintain control." "Ma'am." "If when the governor does return" "I have to explain to him that I discovered the most influential member of his council conspiring with our enemies and took action to stop her, that is an explanation I will offer happily." "Now, I apologize for the delay in your transport to Philadelphia." "The men were most needed to address today's crisis." "Please trust I will have you on your way by the time the sun rises tomorrow." "I explained the situation to him." "He's in no mood to be reasoned with on the issue." "You saw him, Silver?" "What happened?" "It was him and one other." "I had six men." "I thought it would be sufficient to apprehend him myself." "Apprehend him?" "No one asked you to apprehend him." "All you had to do was report the invitation to meet and let the captain handle it." "How in God's name did that not occur to you?" "I did not fail to do it." "I refused to do it and would again." "Why would you refuse to adhere to the law?" "Because the last time the law got its hands on a pirate of that stature, it yielded the following... anger, hostility, resentment, purges to combat it all that only resulted in amplifying it all, and a resistance movement that, since Captain Vane was hanged," "has done nothing but grow strong enough to control almost every part of this island outside of Nassau." "And you ask why I chose not to help start the cycle all over again?" "There is a ship in the bay that is supposed to be taking me to a place where I might actually solve our problems here." "But instead, I am stuck here for as long as it takes to fix this." "In order to do that, you are going to have to give me something to fix it with." "But you'd better come up with something of value I can use to get him to walk away from this." "You think you can control him." "And by the time you realize he has been controlling you, it is going to be too late." "Riders returning!" "Give me something I can use because otherwise I can't help you." "And I beg your pardon, but what the fuck have you got to lose?" " What happened?" " Fugitive escaped." "Though, not before killing three of my men and fixing that to one of the bodies." "What does it say?" ""To the men and women of Nassau,"" ""the strength of the governor's force is now reduced by three."" ""The time to lend us your efforts is now."" ""See my brothers held captive freed."" ""Join them." "Join me."" ""Signed, Long John Silver."" "You heard him." "The time is now." "Who among you would like to lend his efforts to Long John Silver and resist me?" "Here." "I am unarmed." "No one will stand in your way." "If the time isn't now, when the fuck is it going to be?" "!" "None of you?" "!" "No one at all?" "!" "You fucking cowards." "I don't understand." " Billy." " Yep." " Tried to kill you?" " Yep." " And Madi?" " Her, too." "Why are we not angry about this?" "Who says we're not?" "Well, I'm not sensing a whole lot of urgency to do anything about it." "There isn't anything we can do about it at the moment." "Isn't there?" "Look, Billy's not stupid." "He's almost certainly consolidated by now, intimidated or eliminated anyone who would challenge him or support me." "He has control of the Underhill estate, control of the army that calls it home." "There will be a time to deal with him, but not now." "This one, however." "He's fine." "If you'd asked me yesterday, when he was considering selling me to the governor for a profit," "I'd be in agreement we should be rid of him." "But now, I don't know." "I feel like we need as much help as we can... get." "Execution of the pirate prisoners is scheduled for today." "Captain Berringer stood in the square and said if Long John Silver had a problem with this, he was welcome to show himself and voice it." "Even if we could get through their outer defenses, 10 of us walk into town against what could be 100 soldiers." "And then what?" "The threats have been made." "The story's been told." "Everyone in Nassau knows what Long John Silver's return means, what's expected of them when he does return." "All that remains to do... is for him to return." "It would help if Nassau knew I was coming." "Can you see to it?" "Of course." "Ooh, lovely." "I don't make this request lightly." "But after everything Max has done for the council, for you, it seems like a moment when she's owed something back." "The charges against her are of the utmost seriousness." "It sounds as if the law is being adhered to." "And what standing do we have to interfere?" "People are angry, Mr. Frasier." "At the soldiers, at Captain Berringer." "Some of them even at our lord governor." "You may not see it, but trust me, I do." "If the council won't resist the captain, then some of those people might find their own ways of resisting this." "Ways you might not like." "Don't send for me again." "Fuck." " What did he say?" " Nothing helpful." "What's going on?" "You're about to make a terrible mistake and I am asking you to reconsider." "I am entitled to exercise these sentences at my discretion." "But I'm not asking you to cancel the hangings." "I'm asking you to cancel the theater around them." "You intend to lure Silver in." "Force him to appear in the square to save his men so that you might defeat him in full view of all of Nassau." "Demonstrate your fearsomeness to them." "Don't." " Why not?" " Because you don't need to." "Because they know it already and because at a certain point, there is only so much fear a man can endure." "All you are doing is antagonizing them." "And who is that serving?" "Because there is a better way to solve this problem." "What is that?" "This is information about the preferred routes used by the resistance to enter into Nassau." " She gave it to you?" " She did." "Send men to lie in wait." "Set an ambush that can overwhelm Silver and his men when they attempt to pass." "End this quietly and easily and definitively." "What do you imagine happens next?" "If you are fortunate enough to capture Teach... what will you do with him?" "Years ago... as a privateer during the war," "I was in a running fight with a Spanish galleon." "Hounded her for days." "By all rights, she should've surrendered long before she did." "Just before her colors were struck, a shot was fired." "A cheap, cowardly shot... fired with the knowledge they were about to surrender anyway and the presumption that they be entitled to quarter." "This particular shot found its mark." "Took three of my men... one of them, my brother, Thomas." "He'd always been smarter than me." "Braver." "Better." "Protected me when we were young." "Taught me to sail when we were older." "He was my closest friend." "Lost to a cheap and cowardly shot." "So, after they surrendered, I went aboard the ship." "And I began with the captain." "I was more deliberate with him." "It took some time." "Then I moved to his first mate." "The gun captains." "Gun crews." "74 men aboard that ship when I boarded her." "But by the time we reached Acapulco, there was only one." "The one I delivered alive to recount the tale." "You asked what would happen next." "My instinct is the same now as it was then." "I will show them what the consequences are for threatening that which I hold most dear." "I will leave no doubt about it." "Do it." "Heave!" "Let's get the slack." "Now." "Pull!" "Pull it away!" "Hold him." "Again." "Again." "Heave!" " Heave!" " Get it out!" "Heave!" "Him next." "Again!" "Again!" "Heave!" "Heave!" "Let fall." "Can you see?" "Secure the rest of them." "Set a course for Nassau." "Raise sail!" "Keep moving." "Don't drag your feet!" "Go on." "Move it." "Go on through." "Sir..." "What did he say?" "Your men lying in wait for Silver and his men, were they successful?" "Do it." "There was no ambush set, was there?" " I reconsidered." " We had an agreement." "Nassau will never fully come to heel until we can demonstrate control." "And control that no one can see makes for no demonstration at all." "So, I will let them see it." "Remove them." "Ready the next three." "Take them down." "Next three prisoners." "You know Lieutenant Utley from the captain's staff?" " Yes." " Find him." "Tell him I ask that he gather as much food and supplies as he can move into the fort within the next hour." "The fort?" "And tell him to gather six men he trusts to escort it and us up there." "And tell him to get Max." "Why do we need an escort to the fort?" "Quickly, please." "We don't have much time." "They'll come." "Company, fall into two ranks!" "Make ready!" "Present!" "Ready!" " Fire!" " Fire!" "Charge!" "I need B Company!" "Fall back!" "B Company, make ready!" "Wait for my command!" "Mark your target!"