"Royal Charles, three hundred tons." "John Haislip, Master." "Taken and burned off Barbados by Captain Providence." "All hands believed lost." "Sea Lady, two hundred and fifty tons." "Edward Parrott, Master." "Taken of the Carolinas by Captain Providence." "Man the guns!" "Man the guns!" "Get them ready!" "It's the 'Sheba Queen'." "Prepare to repel an attack." "Load the guns!" "Fire!" "Quarter!" "Quarter!" "I've struck my flag!" "Did you care for all the wounded, Doctor?" "All but you, Captain." "Take off your coat." "A good purchase." "It'll keep these swine in rum and wenches for a year." "And for some sleeping room with the sharks." "We have twelve dead." "The greater the shares for the living." "We shall miss our sailing master." "Lucky the blood vessels are not touched." "It's a scratch, no more." "You will bear a scar." "I bear many scars from the English." "This one will mar your beauty." "Save that for the wenches." "Does it hurt?" "No." "To show pain is natural." "We're all born with a capacity for it." "I choose not to show it." "Nor pity." " You quite finished?" " Yes." "Come on deck." "Perhaps the sight will put some iron in your soul." "Only rum will do that now, my dear." "Is this the mercy of buccaneers?" "I learned my mercy from the English, Captain." "I struck my flag thinking to receive quarter." "So did my brother when he was overwhelmed." "And did you English show him quarter?" "No, you hanged him in chains on the wharf at Port Royal and spit in his face." "I know nothing about your brother." "You're not the first Englishmen who has learned of him." "If you have any last words, Captain, say them now." "If he was a pirate, he deserved the end he got as you will deserve yours." "God save the King." "By the veins of your nose, you have drunk your king often in wine." "Now drink him in salt water." "Come on, get him over!" "Why is this one in irons?" "We found him so in the fore peak of the merchantman." "A prisoner of the English?" "Then he's no friend of theirs." "Bring him here." " Your name?" " Pierre François." "You have the advantage of me." "I am Captain Providence." "You are?" "Charmed, Miss." "My title is Captain." "Charmed, Captain." "Why were you aboard the English ship?" "I was their guest, Captain." "I was being sent to England for trial." "What was your offence?" "I captured too many of their ships." "You dare to call yourself a buccaneer?" "Nothing so exalted, Captain." "Merely a privateers man." "Privateers man?" "A buccaneer who lacks the tripes to call himself by this true name." "What was your ship?" "The 'Molly O'Brien'." "That's an Irish name." "The Irish, like we French have little reasons to love the English." "Do you know of such a ship?" "Yes, Captain." "I know of one such, she's a privateer, Bordeaux registry with letter's of marque to prey upon English shipping." " Who named her that?" " I did." "Among the French, is it the cabin boys who name their ships?" "I was owner and master." "Big Belly." "Wait!" "I'm questioning him." "And he's right, you stuff yourself like a pig." "You say you were master." "Are you a sea artist?" "I can navigate." "I need a sailing master." "But, Captain..." "Have you the stomach to join us?" "It's not too great a step from privateers man to honest buccaneer." "We know nothing of this swab." "Stow your breeze, Big Belly." "Well, Mister?" "My choice is between joining your company and walking your plank." "It is." "Then it isn't too hard a choice to make." "I'm fond of life." "Have him sing the articles." "A mate's share for all future purchases." "Aye, Captain." "All hands stand to!" "I mind well the 'Molly O'Brien'." "The English took her more than a year since." "What for would they wait so long to send their captain back for trial?" "Let him go!" "Let him go!" "Mine!" "That's mine!" "Mine!" "Here, let me have it." "Two English dogs that'll bark at your command, Captain." "You, Doctor." "I doubt if there's anything here that will please me." "Yes." "A book." "Is that all?" "There's a magic in books." "There's more magic in a broadside of cannon." "Can a book sink a ship?" "Books have sunk the mightiest of ships destroyed armies, even brought down empires." "You, Frenchie." "What do you choose?" "I had no hand in taking the prize." "You're one of us now." "Come." "Listen to this." "'For what shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole word and lose his own soul?" "'" "Frenchie, choose from these gewgaws." "I choose this." "The dress?" "Are you going to wear it?" "Hardly, Mademoiselle." "Captain." "You have a wench somewhere?" "I'm a Frenchman." "Well, I'll take the sword." "Not for myself, but for Captain Teach." "Blackbeard." "You know him, Frenchie?" "Everyone has heard of Blackbeard." "No, I've never met him." "The greatest sea rover of us all." "Set a course for Nassau." "We need supplies and we'll find him there." "Aye, Captain." "I didn't take it!" "I didn't take it!" "Noble ladies and captains of the sea, the wrestlers." "There, you scurvy swabs!" "Thousand pieces of silver of the bear." "Who'll cover it?" "Here's a hundred." "I'll cover." "Bring on the wrestlers!" "Now clear the decks." "Come on, come on." "Come, he's here." "Are you not coming, Frenchie?" "If you'll forgive me, I have some business here in Nassau." "No business can be more important than meeting Blackbeard." " Are you afraid?" " No." "Well, then, have no fear." "You're under my protection." "Belay there, you scum!" "The man would have won!" "Annie!" "Annie, lass!" "Annie, lass." "What fair wind blows you here?" "The hope of a sight of you, you old sea-eagle." "You find me among gulls and sparrows these lubbers who think themselves sea rovers." "You're like a northeaster after a calm." "Dougal, you Scottish swill bucket!" "Snug down an anchor." "Snug down an anchor yourself." "But you're the right kind of a girl for a Scotsman." "Who's that?" "My new sea artist, Pierre François." "A privateers man turned honest." "Welcome to our honourable company." "François?" "Haven't we met before?" "I've touched at many ports, sir, but it's unlikely that I would forget the great Captain Teach." "A chance resemblance, perhaps." "And I don't like flattery." "Well, Doctor, still drinking the ship's varnish?" "Way there, you bilge swine." "Way for a real hawk of the sea." "Well, lass, what have been your fortunes?" "Six English merchantmen in the past month." "Six more hostages in hell for my brother's soul." "You've scoured the sea like a broom." "I'm proud of you." "It was you who taught me my trade." "And in gratitude, I've brought you a souvenir of my last purchase." "There was no need, lass." "A sight of you is enough." "It's a fine blade." "Try it." "Balances well." "Who'll try it with me?" "Well, you swill tubs." "You see?" "Sparrows, all of them." " I'm here." " You, lass?" "Why should I carve you?" "Who says you can?" "Try and see." "Done, Captain." "Captain Rackham, give me your sword." "Captain, you put me aboard the 'Sheba Queen' to look after the girl." "Yes." "I do not trust the Frenchman." "Well, cut out his gizzard throw him overboard." "She has taken him under her protection." "Heated of a woman'?" "This woman, as you have made her, yes." " Are you ready?" " Ready, Captain." "Track him." "I cannot do it myself, for we sail in the morning." "Learn the yard where he was built, his registry and his sailing orders." "I'll see to it." "Done!" "Stuck!" "Stuck in the gizzard by a slip of a girl." "Blackbeard, you could have cut me down at your pleasure." "Annie, lass." "Rum for all hands." "We'll celebrate Blackbeard's downfall." "Did you see, Dougal, Frenchie?" "Where is he?" "He must have left during the fight." "Annie, come, lass!" "Not so fast, my hero." "Take your hands off me!" "Temper, temper." "But you'd best polish up that smile of yours." "What do you want?" "It's not me you have to reckon with." "The Captain wants you in her cabin." "Here he is, Captain." "Where've you been?" "Well, I told you." "I had business in Nassau." "What business?" "Mine." "A wench?" "Ls that why you chose the dress?" "No." "The dress is still in my sea chest." "Then maybe you're a spy." "You're at liberty to think so." "Be careful, it might go off." "Not by accident." "You're still alive only because I have no wish to spill blood in my cabin." "But I don't think you're a spy." "You know nothing about my plans." "As for my present whereabouts, all Nassau knows I'm in port." "So whoever you went to meet, it was not to report on me." "It was something else." "Well, Frenchie?" "Mr. Dougal!" "Put him in irons, as we found him." "Over the side would be better." "No." "If he has a secret, I intend to learn what it is." "Aye, Captain." "Here, son." "That was worth waiting for." "Have the watch loosen the tops'ls." "We get under way with the top of the flood." "Aye, Captain." "How does she run?" "Three knots, Captain." "Only three knots with this wind?" "She's loaded with barnacles." "Too loaded if we should meet a man-o-war." "We'd best careen her and scrape her before she drags like a scow." "Hold a course for Inagua Island." "Fair the weather." "Three to southwest by west to half west." "A few more strokes of the cat and he'll be a dead man." "Am I to weep like a woman?" "No, you're not to do anything like a woman." "But I believe I can show you good reason why he should live." "A buccaneer's reason, if you want." "Enough." "Cut him down and take him below." "To my cabin." "I searched his cabin as you ordered." "My first experience as a sneak-thief." "Now I've tasted every crime." "Stow it and come to the point." "I found this concealed in his mattress." "A map." "Half of a map." "It's been cut in two." "See, there's some writing on it." "The Wind's in my eyes." "I'm sorry, my dear." "I forgot you cannot read." "I can read a chart by the shape of the coast line." "That's all I need." "What does it say?" "This word is treasure." "This is a bearing south by east three quarters east from some point on the missing half." "There's a word here, faded an M, and 0 and this could be a B or an R." "Mob or Mor." "Could it be Morgan?" "Morgan." "Yes, Morgan and treasure." "Captain Henry Morgan." "When he took to Panama City, he took a king's ransom not all of it's been accounted for." "I could tell you tales of..." "What's this coast shown here?" "The name is missing." "Come with me." "Forgive me for not rising for a lady." "Where's Morgan's treasure buried?" "How do you know about it?" "Talk, Frenchie, if you still love life." "I bought that five years ago from an innkeeper on the Bordeaux water front who found it on the body of a lodger of his..." "Give me that." "Here." "Go on." "I came to the Indies with one thought in mind to find the rest of that map." "I had no luck." "Go on." "Why should I trust you?" "Because you have no other course." "What you have learned, I can learn." "But I will save time if we become partners." "Otherwise, I'll cut your throat and go for the treasure on my own." "Equal partners, you will swear to it?" "For me and me crew, yes." "By the beard of Captain Teach." "Amen." "Go on." "A man in Porto Bello told me of a Portuguese in Nassau trusted by Henry Morgan." "I was in my way to see him when I was taken by the English." "And he had the other half?" "No, but he told me who has it." "Well who, Pierre?" "Who?" "A certain Carib named Pedro Mendoza, living in Port Royal in Jamaica." "Port Royal." "The lion's den." "Headquarters of England's Caribbean Squadron." "Could he be lying?" "I'd swear it's authentic." "The parchment's old enough and it's difficult to counterfeit this faded ink." "And the treasure a king's ransom." "No wonder he wasn't anxious to share it." "Care for him, Doctor." "Bring him back to health." "Do we sail for Port Royal?" "After we've careened." "I've run the 'Sheba Queen' under the muzzles of the English guns she'll need a clean hull." " Captain." " Well?" "You have the map." "You know all he knows." "Why don't you cut his throat?" "I gave him my word." "While the ship is lying helpless, if any come by sea our cannon here command the passage through the reef." "That's a nice trick to know." "Blackbeard taught me." "There's little chance we'll be surprised." "Only he and I know of this cove." "Seems Blackbeard taught you everything." "How long have you know him?" "Since I was still unable to wipe my own nose." "He was father, mother, school master to us my brother and I." "The brother that the English..." "I had no other or sister." "He was my half brother, really." "Of Spanish blood on both sides." "And you?" "My father was an Englishman, so they say." "Named Providence?" "His name never passed my mother's lips." "She died when I was young." "I was called Anne Providence because I was born in New Providence Isle nigh to Nassau Town." "I have no other name." "Yet you've made a name for yourself, feared throughout the Indies." "Some day it will make them shake in London itself." " It already has." " What?" "What do you know of it?" "Talk." "Talk I heard in Port Royal Charlestown, New York." "You've seen much of the world." "What there is of it." "Where were you born?" "In Paris." "I have often thought of it." "Paris." "They say the houses are like the sea." "Wherever you look, nothing but houses." "Not as clean as the sea, tough." "But beautiful." "Any Parisian will tell you so." "Then tell me." "Better, take me there." "Now?" "When we've lifted the treasure." "We'll go together as partners." "But they'd laugh at me, the grand people." "Not at Captain Providence." "A fish on land." "Who did you choose the dress for?" " No one." " No one?" "Perhaps for a woman I hope some day to meet." "See to your scraping and caulking, Mister and keep a watch working tonight." "Aye, Captain." "Well, good afternoon." "Why aren't you at work?" "Dougal's there." "May I help, Captain?" "Bear a hand with these lines astern." "They won't pull up properly." "Aye, Captain." "Avast hauling, there." "Do you think I'm made of iron?" "A wench who would be fashionable endures this every day of her life." "Let me see." "There, that's the proper hour-glass figure." "Wenches are mad." "How can they move clewed up like this?" "They don't." "They wait for the men to make the moves." "That's much better." "Do men like this?" "Any man would be a fool who didn't." "Why?" "Well, it's the nature of men." "You mean a man sees a woman like this and he wants to make love to her?" "Yes." "How?" "Well, surely you've seen them in Nassau." "Those sea-lice." "They take their women as they take their rum, by the barrel." "How does a Frenchman make love, a gentleman?" "Captain!" "Captain!" "Captain, I..." "Well?" "What is it, Mr. Dougal?" "There's a sail bearing down up on the island." "A sail!" "Give me the glass." "It's the 'Revenge'." "Blackbeard ship." "I'd know the cut of his tops'ls anywhere." "Now what could he want here?" "Make ready." "Broach a barrel of prime Jamaica rum." "Aye, Captain." "Here, help me out of this." "What's the jest?" "Blackbeard." "He'd tear the hide off me if he ever caught me in such a rig." "Toss!" "Toss!" "Little sea-hawk." "Welcome ashore, you old sea-eagle." "Dougal." "Mister François." "Doctor." "Well, must an old friend stand dry in the hot sun?" "I looked for you in Tortuga and through the Windward Passage." "Then I guessed you were here to careen." "You came fast." "The 'Revenge' sails sweet when she must." "Not as sweet as the 'Sheba Queen', but then she carries more guns." "Drink hearty, mates." " Barbados." " Jamaica." "I saw your guns on the headland." "You remember everything I taught you, lass." "Everything except one thing." "Yes?" "I thought I learned you never to put your trust in any son of Adam unless I signed his papers first." "Traitor scum!" "Traitor?" "What're you saying?" "Let him tell you." "Tell her it isn't true, Mister Pierre François." "Lieutenant Pierre François La Rochelle of the French Navy!" "I should have known him that night at Nassau." "Remember, Lieutenant?" "Remember Martinique?" "Where you Frenchies hanged Sam Austin from a yardarm?" "You didn't know I was there, did you?" "But I saw you." "You were lined up along the wharf with the other officers in you golden epaulettes while poor Sam kicked from the end of a rope over your stinking perfumed heads." "You heard what I swore I'd give the lot of you." "Here, wait." "Pierre, is this true?" "It's true that once I held a commission in the French Navy." "You lied to me." "No, Captain." "Everything I've told you has been the truth." "I merely neglected to mention my commission because the memory of that chapter in my life is painful to me." "I was cashiered from the Navy in disgrace." "Talk." "Nothing but talk." "I didn't hang Sam Austin." "I wasn't on the ship that took him nor the court that tried him." "I was on the wharf because all the officers in port were ordered to be there." "Talk." "And bilge at that." "I've a stopper here for your lying mouth." "Captain, you're in command here." "We're not on his quarter-deck now." "I appeal to you." "I've signed your articles." "He's right." "He did sign the articles." "And I am Captain here." " You're..." " Wait!" "You learned me that a captain's bound by the articles like this men." "You've heard the charges, Mister." "Have you anything further to say?" "Only this." "Since we sailed from Nassau I have served you loyally and well as I will serve you well in the ventures we have planned for the future together." "I ask only to be judge by what I have done not by what he says I've done." "You're my Captain, I put my fate in your hands, without fear with confidence in your justice." "Put away your blade." "I believe him innocent." "Annie, lass, he's turned your head with his smooth tongue." "Put it away, I say!" "I'm Captain here!" "You're Captain because I made you Captain." "I was a fool to think that a wench could be other than a wench." "But what I've made I can blast." "You've given your judgement." "Now witness mine." "Annie, lass." "I did it for your own good." "You murdering brute." "You'll pay for that." "Mr. Dougal, disarm his men and put them in their long boat." "Jump!" "Doctor, see to Mr. François." "If he's dead, you die here on the sand beside him." "No, he's not dead, yet." "I give you your life for past favours." "Get back to the 'Revenge'." "If I see your tops'ls..." "I'll blast you out of the water." "The sea is wide, lass." "Keep the width of it between us for unless you've forgotten everything I ever learned you you'll remember that Blackbeard never forgives an insult." "Will he live?" "Yes." "Doctor, you believe him?" "Long ago, my dear, I gave up all beliefs." "Pierre." "Land ho!" "Land ho!" "Right on the starboard." "It's Jamaica." "Keep her up to windward, Mr. Dougal." "Stand well off shore till it's dark." "Aye, Captain." "Hands to the bracers." "Brace up sharp." "Ahoy there, Blackbeard." "Do I look as bad as that, Doctor?" " No." " No." " We've raised Jamaica." " Good." "How do you find him, Doctor?" "Sound as a gold doubloon if you ask of his health." "I wish you'd shave it off." "It tickles." "I'll need it ashore." "Instead of a shaven French gentleman of fortune escaped from the English I'll be a bearded buccaneer,.." "...I might even braid it and beribboned it like Blackbeard." "Don't you mention his name." "If he ever finds you..." "Or you." "Pierre, I'm frightened." "Captain Providence frightened?" "There's danger for you in Port Royal." "Let me go ashore." "I can find Morgan's man as well as you." "There is no danger." "The English think I walked your plank long since." "Yes, I know, but I have a sense of misfortune if I let you go." " Let me." " You?" "With every Englishmen in the Indies on the lookout for Captain Providence?" "No, for me it'll be easy." "And I found this." "Let me have the satisfaction of laying the other half of it in your hands." "Take care, my love." "If you're careful, nothing will go wrong." "Dougal will take you ashore in the longboat." "He'll wait for you on the beach." "Dougal?" "Why Dougal?" "He roared and bellowed till I gave him his way." "He's loyal, Pierre." "Yeah, to Blackbeard." "No, to me." "Well, you're Captain." "We're standing in to shore." "Yeah, I'll make ready." "Heave ho." "Heave ho." "Heave ho." "Heave ho." "Heave ho." "Heave ho." "Can you make out Portland Point?" "Not yet." "By the mark five and rocky." " It's shoaling fast." " There." "The point, just forward of the beam." "Drop the main yard." "Stand by to lower the boat." "Aye, Captain." "By a quarter less, five and sandy." "Here is the gold, in English guineas." "If the man wants more, otter him a share of the treasure." "If I'm not back by daylight, stand off and return tomorrow night." "Careful." "You're to wait here for me." "Mister François." "If you have any little games in mind I'll tear your guts with my own two hands." "And I can wait for that, too." "What games are you thinking of?" "Nothing, but I'm just warning you, take care." "What do you want?" "Don't you know me, Greenough?" "Captain La Rochelle." "Bring them here." "Better if I don't venture into the streets again." "Go on." "Greenough, is..." "Yes, I'll get you the key." "Never mind." "Yes?" "How dare you?" "Pierre, I thought you were dead." "My darling." "There, darling, it's over now." "Be careful, my love." "That's where your husband was honoured by a cut from the great Blackbeard himself." "Blackbeard." "You've seen him?" "I've seen them all." "I've seen ships burned, men butchered." "But it's a long story and will keep." "The important thing is it's all over." "Is it really over?" "The plan succeeded?" "Yes, it succeeded." "For three months I've been Captain Providence's sailing master." "Don't weep, darling." "We heard the last ship you were on was captured." "They say all hands were killed." "I didn't dare to hope." "And then I thought it might even be worse you alive in the power of that horrible man." "Captain Providence isn't a man." "He's a woman." "A woman?" "That's impossible." "She is incredible but she's real, alive waiting not ten miles from this room." "Yes?" "Captain La Rochelle, they're here." "I'll come down." "I'll be back soon, darling." " Gentlemen." " Well, Captain?" "As you instructed me I shipped aboard several merchantmen bound for waters Captain Providence is known to favor." "The first two voyages were uneventful." "The third time, I took passage on the 'Gemini' out of Trinidad and she was captured off Antigua." " By Captain Providence?" " Yes." "I was find in irons, as we planned." "Yes, man, yes." "The 'Sheba Queen' lies off Portland Point and will remain there till daybreak." "The Captain suspects nothing." "You've done well, Captain." "There's not a moment to lose." "We must rouse the Admiral." "No, wait." "I've kept my part of the bargain." "Now keep yours." "Release my ship to me." "We intend to honour our agreement, Captain." "Which, as you'll remember is that your crimes against us will be forgiven and your ship released to you once Captain Providence is safely in our hands." "Then and only then will the 'Molly O'Brien' be yours." "Goodnight, sir." "Listen." "Do you hear a boat?" "Too soon." "The French of Martinique call these Caribbean nights 'Nuits de Folie' because they drive the wenches mad." "Stow your drivel and listen." "Listen." "It's the boat." "He's back." "You're right, my dear." "I owe you an apology for doubting you." "Belay that, cut the boat adrift, we've no time." "All hands on deck." "Bosun, grab on all sails, jump to it." "Get them off." "What's the meaning of this?" "Where is Pierre?" "Drinking rum with the King's men." "He's led us into a trap." " Jump, you scum." " You're lying." "Avast hauling there." "This is mutiny, Mr. Dougal." "Call it what you like, but I never trusted that snake." "I followed him into Port Royal." "He's sold us clean to the King's officers." " A lie, he couldn't." " He did." "He loves me." "Even there he's played you for a fool." "Tell me." "Give me the full of it." "He's married." "He has a wife in Port Royal." " No." " Yes!" "You blithering fool, let us be off." "It's a lie." "I don't believe him." "Dougal always hated him." "Get forward, Mr. Dougal." "Carry every stitch that'll draw." "I'll take over here." "Aye, Captain." "Get those spritsails on out." "Man up aloft!" "Did you see any ships?" "Nothing in sight." "Well, we've showed them a clean pair of heels." "What are your orders, Captain?" "What course shall we set?" "Round Cape Negril to the north of the island." "Stand offshore." "But the King's ships are still close." "Those are my orders, Mr. Dougal." "Aye, Captain." "May I have your name, sir?" "Please, you may not come in here." "It's against the rules, sir." "Captain Harris." "This is a private club, Captain." "Since your office doors are closed to me I had no choice but to come here." "We have no business that I know of." "My ship, sir." "We made an agreement." "We shook hands." "And you failed to keep it." "The 'Sheba Queen' is still free to burn and pillage English ships while all we have from you is the unlikely story that Captain Providence is a woman." "Another card, please." "We put our hands to a bargain, Captain Harris." "To make my end good I've worn irons I've been spread-eagled and flogged I've been under the cutlass of Blackbeard himself." "I've called red-handed cut-throats my friends." "I stood by and watched murders and worse, and that's not all." " No." " Another card, please." "With the daily and nightly prospect of the plank at my back I've flattered, and crawled and make myself agreeable in all ways to the vilest-hearted she-monster that ever came out of the sea." "And I think all the oceans will never wash me clean again." "It's you, gentlemen, who have bungled." "I still hold to my bargain." "In one way or another way, Captain Harris I'll have my ship." "Do you hear me?" "I'll have my ship." "Keep score of what I owe, gentlemen." "Captain La Rochelle." "Well?" "If you really want the 'Molly O'Brien', you can have her under certain conditions." "What conditions?" "You cannot have sailed with Captain Providence all these months without furthering your education." "You mean I can have my ship back if I agree to turn pirate?" "You put it crudely, Captain." "I can easily recruit a crew for you." "Real seadogs eager to do anything for gold." "And for you." "For me and my friends a captain's share." "Well, tell your friends I've had my bellyful of piracy." "I want my ship for honest trading." "She's not your ship, Captain." "She's a King's prize, and ours to dispose of on whatever terms we choose to make." "There are other captains in Port Royal, you know." "Bring her in." "Leave us alone." "So you're his notion of a mate for life." "If you intend to cut my throat, cut it now and be done with it." "Cut your throat?" "What do you take me for?" "A disgrace to our sex." " His words?" " No, mine." "He spoke no ill of you." "He pitied you." "Pity." "He dared to pity me?" "The treacherous scum!" "Before you blackguard him I ask you to remember that he is my husband." "The best you could get to yourself?" "You couldn't get him." "And you'll never have him again." "Then you do intend to kill me." "No, I'll not harm you." "My plan for you is quite different." "A life of travel new scenes, new faces." "Maybe an Arabian prince or a rich merchant from the Levant Sugar planter in Brazil whoever will pay the most for the privilege of your company." "You wouldn't." "In the meantime, you're my guest until we drop anchor at Maracaibo." "Mr. Dougal." "You can do as you wish with me." "I have no defence." "But there's one thing you can never change." "I am his wife." "Think about it." "Let in eat into your soul if you have one." "Take her below." "Begging your pardon, Captain but the company wonders what you intend." "We signed for gold or peg, but already you passed three fat merchant-men without as much as a shot across their bows." "We seek a richer prize." "What prize, Captain?" "The 'Sheba Queen'." "Well?" "Begging your pardon again, Captain." "We don't fear any ordinary purchase." "But the 'Sheba Queen' is..." "If I told you she carried a rich treasure." "Does she, in truth, Captain?" "I give you my oath." "She carries a treasure for which I would gladly lay down my life." "But if you gentlemen are afraid..." "Not me." "Very well." "Tonight we lie off Nassau where I hope to learn news of her I will ask for volunteers to go ashore with me I will need twenty men." "Gentlemen." "Keep your seats." "Put your hands on the table and don't move." "Take their weapons, Mr. Backett." "So you're alive." "I'll hang that surgeon from a yardarm." "He knows his trade too well." "I have no quarrel with you, Captain Teach nor with any gentlemen here." "I seek word for the 'Sheba Queen'." "I will give fifty English guineas to any man who has fresh news of her." "What'd he say?" "Fifty guineas for news of the 'Sheba Queen'." "What do you want with the 'Sheba Queen'?" "That's my affair, Captain." "Well?" "Surely someone here has word of her." "Fifty guineas." "You're wasting your time, Frenchie." "I'd gladly otter five hundred guineas for the same information five thousand and cheap at the price." "She must have touched here or somewhere for supplies." "No?" "No one knows." "Very well." "I apologize for interrupting your pleasure, gentlemen." "Pray proceed with your diversions." "It will be unhealthy for any man to put his head outside the door." "Wait." "We're followed." "Easy, Captain, easy." "I mean you no harm." "What do you want?" "Did I hear right?" "You'd give fifty guineas for word of the 'Sheba Queen'?" "Do you know where she is?" "Yes." "She..." "Blackbeard offered five hundred." "Why don't you tell him?" "They calls me cracked but I'm not as cracked as all that." "Blackbeard never pays his promises." "So I otters the information to you." "Where is she?" "I was on the Tortuga a week since when she touched in there for meat and water." "Yes?" "The crew said she was bound for Maracaibo to pick up what prizes they might on the way." "Maracaibo?" "Yes, for the opening of the slave markets there this month." "Now, I'll take this guineas if you don't mind." "Thank you very kindly, Captain." "You'd better get some sleep." "You were up all night." "Come in." "No, thank you." "In a few hours we drop anchor in Maracaibo Harbour the filthiest hole in the Caribbean." "I'll welcome it after your ship." "A poor piece of good, Doctor." "I'm almost ashamed to otter her for sale." "I've got my reputation to think of." "Doesn't it make you sick to think of it?" "Here put that on." "I'll cheat the Arabs and sell you for a lady." "In this harlot's trumpery?" "Don't turn up your nose at it." "Your husband chose it for you." "Then he changed his mind and gave it to me." "You mean you stole it." "He'd give you nothing of mine." "Put it on." "Put it on, or do I call my company to put it on for you?" "Charming." "The Arabs love such a display of white skin though it puts me in mind of the belly of a fish." "You'll fetch at least a hundred English pounds ninety-nine more than you're worth." "Were you born in the gutter, or did you choose it?" "Take her out before I forget myself and damage the merchandise." "You'd better take to your bunk." "Today?" "Never." "This is the day we market Captain La Rochelle's treasure." "Remember, Doctor?" "He promised us treasure." "Treasure." "Your attention, gentlemen." "What am I offered for this rare beauty?" "Now, this is not an ordinary savage but a proud daughter of the Aztecs a princess of the New World." "One thousand drachmas from Yussef Ibn Ibrahim." "Any other otters?" "Sold to the noble sheik for thirty pounds." "Move up." "Up with the others." "Wait till he learns of this." "Move up." "Gentlemen, and now I otter three sisters from Trinidad." "Born in the same hour and perfectly matched in beauty and..." "Do you consider yourself a woman?" "You plead with me now." "Only for your own sake." "Someday he'll find you." "Senor de Silva, right there." "I take the stand myself to make you a rare otter." "You all know me, Captain Providence of the 'Sheba Queen'." "I cheat no man and deal only in the finest of merchandise." "Here is one fit for the noblest among you." "A woman of breeding and temper spirited like the fine mares of Arabia smooth like the silks of Cathay." "You, sir?" "Two thousand drachmas?" "Surely you jest." "You, sir, do I hear three?" "Stop." "Stop it." "This is a decent woman, an honest woman stolen from her husband by a woman gone mad." "Captain, we are peaceful men of affair and if this woman was truly taken from her husband..." "Pierre." "Captain, you must take your ship and leave the harbour." "And take that woman with you." "We don't care to be entangled in this affair." "Leave at once." "Come here, you fool." "Go to your cabin." "I'll deal with you later." "We're caught fair with no sea room to maneuver." "He can rake us with his and never an answer from us." "Maybe we have an answer." "Take the woman forward." "Aye, Captain." "Stand by to fire, Mr. Hackett." "Aim high to dismast her." "Aye, sir." "Wait." "On the fore shrouds, see?" "Hold your fire." "What do you intend, Captain?" "Close her and take her with pike and cutlass." "She'll blow us out of the water first." "Do as I say!" "The woman is my wife." " Starboard a point." " Starboard." "Easy." "What does this mean, Mr. Hackett?" "Captain, we signed honest, for gold or peg." "We won't risk ourselves for the Captain's wench wife or no wife." "Get forward." "You've tricked us, Captain." "Now, you'll yield the ship to us." "I'll yield nothing." "Get forward." "Then let us fight." "The first man who fires I'll blow his head off." "Back on course." "Steer on." "Bring her to the wind." "Mr. Dougal, put a boat over the side." "I want him, and I want him alive." "Pierre!" "Take her below." "No." "No!" "Bring him to my cabin." "Leave us alone." "Well, Pierre?" "I don't ask mercy for myself." "I only beg you to spare my wife." "Why should I spare her?" "Why shouldn't I give myself the pleasure of watching you face while I let the men of my company throw dice for her?" "She's done you no harm." "Give me a better reason than that." "You're a woman." "You taught me to be a sort of woman." "I told you I'm sorry for that." "It was not part of the plan." "What are your present plans, Captain La Rochelle." "Well, I would say they're in your hands, Captain." "Then I must think of something diverting." "Would you crawl on your knees for her for instance?" "I would do anything." "Anything for her." "Nothing for me." "Nothing at all, Pierre?" "Is there no memory, nothing?" "I lied to you once." "I cannot lie again." "Then it was all lies, every word of it." "Mr. Dougal, take him forward and lock them up together." "Together?" "You are generous." "I wish to encourage so true love." "The only kind I've known was made of lies." "In the old days when the Spanish treasure fleets passed by here from the Isthmus this was where the buccaneer captains marooned their men." "There's plenty of water though it's salt... . "shade,"" "...though you must dig for it and good company." "You see, my true love I have arranged for you and your wife a new honeymoon." "It will not last too long." "The best things in life are short and sweet like our few weeks together." "I ask a favour, now..." "No, Pierre." "Put my wife safe ashore in some civilized port and I'll go with you, on your terms, wherever you say." "No, I'd rather die." "She has more courage than you, Pierre." "But it's too late." "Much too late." "Then shoot us now." "Let us die clean." "And spoil your honeymoon?" "No, I want you to enjoy it." "To see your love scald and bloat in the sun her tongue turn black and shrivelled her eyes change till the only light in them is the light of madness till she cuts her wrists to drink her own blood." "No one but you would do such a thing as this." "The men you've known all your life, scum as they are Bonnet or Rackham, even Blackbeard not one of them would sink so low." "I am Captain Providence." "Give us no more than Blackbeard would a clean death." "You like to play the man then act like one." "But I'm a woman as you're so fond to reminding me." "You should have thought of that when you betrayed me." "Now I'm making sure that your last thoughts will be of me." "No!" "No!" "He promised!" "He promised!" "Promised!" "No!" "You'd best go down." "Three days and nights of this." "No." "What is it, Anne?" "Nothing, I was dreaming." "A light." "Strike a light!" "Better not." "Much more of that'll kill you." "Do you tell me that?" "You pay me to advise you." "Then tell me why I dream." "In an ordinary human being it would be called conscience." "Come about, Doctor." "You're driving on a lee shore." "It'd be the thought of those two on that lonely cay taking their time to die." "I hope they're weeks at it." "Let them learn." "I used to like you." "You asked and gave no quarter, but you were gallant and somehow, clean." "But now you've become a creature so foul that even your crew can no longer stomach you." "No more, bloodsucker." "Jealousy is a killer, true." "But usually it kills hot not viciously, in cold blood." "You'd betray me, too." "Though I dragged you from a gutter, made you a man again." "Get out." "You've betrayed yourself, my dear." "I've had provisions and water put in the longboat mast and sail, with a compass and chart." "That'll take them to any port." "Good." "Anne, I..." "My title is Captain." "You take the boat ashore." "They'll need a doctor." "Strike his irons." "How am I to return to the ship?" "You won't." "You will go with them." "I've struck your name from the articles." "No men sails with me who no longer respects me." "Perhaps I've changed my mind about that." "I haven't changed." "This one thing I will do for conscience but it's the last." "Aye, Captain." "Will you shake my hand?" "Bless you, my dear." " Bosun." " Aye, Captain." " Set a course for..." " Sail ho!" "What sail?" "Can you make her out?" "It's the 'Revenge'!" "Is the longboat ashore on the cay?" "Aye, Captain." "The doctor's beaching her now." "If Blackbeard comes closer, he'll see them." "And the Frenchie will walk his plank, after all." "Will I tell Mr. Dougal to get under way, Captain?" "Yes, tell him." "Stand by to weigh ship." "Sheets on main sail!" "Hold her to windward, close as you can." "Hands to the bases'." "Open your sheets'.!" "What are you doing?" "I mean to keep to weather of him." "Close-hauled, the 'Sheba Queen' can out-sail him." "Run to leeward." "That'll bring us under his guns." "The Frenchie was my prisoner, Mr. Dougal." "I'll decide whose plank he walks." " But..." " You've had your orders." "Aye, Captain." "Down the midships!" "Down the midships." "She's closing." "She means to fight." " What?" " She's closing us." "I can blow her out of the water." "She knows that." "The wench must have lost her mind." "I learned her better than that." "Want to stand away, Captain?" "No." "If she wants a fight, we'll give her one." " Man the bow chasers." " Aye, aye." "Look." "She's making for Blackbeard." "Yes, to cover our escape." "She's giving us our lives the only way she can." "We're no match for the 'Revenge', Anne." "My title is Captain." "The men are complaining." "They know the barracuda cannot fight the tiger shark." "You're Blackbeard's man." "If you wish, lower a boat and cast off." "No, Captain." "He put me on board to care for you." "I cannot leave without his orders." " His long twelves." " Answer him." "Make ready!" "Fire!" "The men are breaking." "Go forward, Mr. Dougal." "Use the lash if you must." "Strike the flag!" "Stop it!" "Strike the flag!" "Stop it!" "Raise that flag!" "Raise it!" "No, no, stand off from him!" "She's lost her mind." "The mizzen's gone, Anne, run for it!" "Will any gun still fire?" "I fired the last one myself." "Cutlasses, Mr. Dougal." "Blackbeard, you old fraud!" "Come aboard, if you dare!" "Hold your fire, you swabs!" "Hold you!" "She's home at last." "Let the sea keep her." "Pirate Ship, 'Sheba Queen' sunk off Barbados." "Anne Providence, Master."