Skull and Bones

“Mr Povey!”

“Aye-aye, sir?”

“I’d be obliged if you’d take the longboat and bring aboard the person who is calling from the shore.”

“Sir? What person, sir?”

The officer of the watch frowned. He was feeling unwell and in no mood for explanations. “Obey your bloody orders and be damned, Mr Povey – and don’t answer back!”

“Aye-aye, sir!”

Povey sank down into the longboat, almost in tears. He’d not realised how tired he was and how much he wanted to be out of the boat and into his bed. The crew obviously felt the same. They were moaning and snivelling.

“Oh, bloody-well-bugger the lot of you,” said Povey. “And pull for the bloody shore.”

Once they came round the ship, which happened to be between the longboat and the beach, Povey could make out the dark little dot of a figure outlined against the white sands of the beach, and he could hear a wailing cry coming over the still water. He’d not noticed it before, not with so many others shouting and the sick nausea rising in his belly again.

“Uuurgh!” Povey retched over the side, bringing up nothing and wrenching the muscles of his stomach. He dipped a hand in the water and splashed it over his face. The crew stared as they swayed to their oars. Some of them felt as bad as Povey.

“What are you bloody sods looking at?” he snarled. “Bend your bloody backs!”

The forlorn figure on the beach grew and took shape in the twilight. It was a man kneeling right on the water’s edge, with hands raised over his head. He moaned and wept and offered up prayers as, finally, the big boat ground ashore and Povey jumped out – and was astonished to be recognised.

“Mr Povey, sir! God bless and save you, sir, for it is Mr Povey, ain’t it now?”

“Damn my blasted eyes,” said Povey. “It’s Ben Gunn!”

Memories flooded in. Bad memories of HMS Elizabeth – the vessel which had first brought Povey to this poisonous island – and Flint’s mutiny, which had resulted in the death of her captain and loyal officers.

“Ben Gunn,” said Povey in amazement, peering at the bedraggled figure with its straw-like hair, deep-lined, deep-tanned face, barefoot raggedness – and the wide, staring eyes of a madman. A madman who grovelled and pleaded before Povey, crouching to kiss his feet, and grasping for his hands to kiss them too. Povey pulled away, embarrassed.

“Back oars, you swab!” he said, and frowned heavily. “You were one of the mutineers, you blasted lubber! One of those that followed Flint! You were aboard the ship Betsy that Flint made on the island. You were aboard her, with Flint, when I was cast adrift!”

“No! No!” groaned Benn Gunn, shaking his matted head in an agony of self-pity, betraying himself comprehensively by protesting too much. “Not poor Ben Gunn,” he moaned, “what-never-was-a-mutineer-nor-followed-Flint-on-the-island-nor-later-aboard-Betsy-nor-later-yet-aboard-Walrus-and-always-was-a-loyal-heart-and-true-God-bless-King-George-and-God-bless-England-and-bless-the-navy-too…”

It rattled out non-stop, ending only when Ben Gunn ran out of breath.

“Says you, Ben Gunn!” said Povey. “But you must come aboard and go before Captain Baggot to be examined.”

“Yes! Yes!” said Ben Gunn. “Aboard ship and not marooned. Not left lonely with only the goats for company. For there’s only them now…what with the others being gone.”

“What others?” said Povey.

But a cunning look came over Ben Gunn, and he fell silent, as if realising he’d said too much.

Within a sand-glass fifteen minutes, Ben Gunn found himself standing in the bright lights of Captain Baggot’s cabin with the blue coats and gold lace of officers seated in front of him, and red marines behind him, and Ben Gunn goggling at the astonishing fact that among the officers, though not in the king’s uniform, was Mr Billy Bones – Flint’s most loyal follower. Ben Gunn pondered over that, and perhaps he wasn’t so looney as he seemed, for he spotted two other things. First, most of those around the table looked like seasick landmen on their first cruise: pale and sweating heavily. And second, Ben Gunn could see that Mr Povey was as astonished as himself to find Billy Bones among the company. Alongside Bones was a clerical-looking gentleman who proved to be Dr Stanley, the chaplain, and he was treating Mr Bones with favour, almost apologetically.

Povey caught Lieutenant Hastings’s eye where he sat with the other officers, and looked questioningly at Billy Bones. Hastings nodded at Dr Stanley. He risked mouthing the words:

“It’s his doing!”

For his part, Billy Bones stared fixedly at Ben Gunn, who had not featured in the instructions he’d received from Flint. Thus Billy Bones was forced to extemporise, which he did to such creditable effect as would have amazed the master down below, who believed him incapable of initiative. Though perhaps Billy Bones shone more lustrously by comparison with Captain Baggot, who was not himself, being now quite ill.

Baggot did little more than extract a repetition of Ben Gunn’s whining innocence, attempting only half-heartedly to examine such interesting matters as just what the Hell had been happening on the island while Flint was there? Especially to the north where John Silver had escaped aboard Walrus? All such matters Ben Gunn refused to discuss, fearing self-incrimination. Finally, bleary-eyed, swaying in his chair, and with red blotches now livid on his face, Baggot turned to Billy Bones.

“Will you have a word with him, Mr Bones? Were you not shipmates once?”

“Aye, Cap’n. Aboard Elizabeth, at the beginning of all these troubles.”

“What troubles, Mr Bones?”

“Cap’n Flint’s troubles, sir…and the wicked conspiracy against him.”

“Rubbish!” said Povey, who knew exactly what had gone on aboard Elizabeth.

“Poppycock!” said Lieutenant Hastings who’d served alongside him.

“Be silent, there!” cried Baggot irritably. “Do not interrupt your betters!”

“Indeed not!” said Dr Stanley, and the other officers nodded.

Hastings and Povey gaped. They couldn’t believe that they weren’t believed, for all England knew they’d been Flint’s shipmates. Had they been fit and well, they’d have fought for truth. But, like most others present, they were not fit and well. They were sick with headache and a nausea that was getting steadily worse as the day ended and the night came on. They hadn’t the strength for so fearful a task as opposing their superiors.

Billy Bones, however, being immune to the peril that was bearing down on his shipmates, pressed on clear-headed and determined.

“Now then, Mr Gunn!” he said, sending Ben Gunn quivering in fright.

“I don’t know nothing,” came the response.

“Yes, you do. For you was helmsman aboard of Elizabeth, wasn’t you?”

“Aye, but it weren’t my fault she run aground.”

“So whose fault was it?”

“Cap’n Springer’s!”

“That’s Springer as was cap’n of Elizabeth,” said Billy Bones for the benefit of his audience, before turning back to Ben Gunn. “So it were Springer as done it, not Flint?”

“Not him!” said Ben Gunn. “It were that swab Springer, damn him!”

“And who flogged you for it, Mr Gunn – you that was helmsman?”

“Springer! He flogged me, though I was steering to his own orders.”

“That he did, Mr Gunn. You that was innocent, as all hands knew!”

“Aye!”

“And when we was run aground, who was it as couldn’t get us off?”

“Springer!”

“And who was it got drunk day after day?”

“Springer!”

“But who was it built the Betsy out of Elizabeth’s timbers, to escape the island?”

“Flint!”

“So I akses you, Mr Gunn…who was the true seaman – Springer or Flint?”

“Cap’n Flint, God-bless-him-and-keep-him!”

And there Billy Bones stopped, being enormously wise to do so, for it was all truth thus far. It was plain truth, every word of it, and cast a most radiant light upon Joseph Flint, lately a lieutenant in His Majesty’s sea service, and now accused of mutiny and piracy. Billy Bones was doing wonderfully well.

“The rest is lies and spite,” he said, inspired with the genius of simplicity.

“Well?” said Baggot to Ben Gunn.

“Couldn’t say, Cap’n. For I weren’t there, and took no part.”

“Mr Hastings? Mr Povey?” said Baggot, turning at last to these vital witnesses.

But by this time Mr Povey’s bowels were squirting hot fluid down the leg of his breeches, and he was staggering, grey-faced, out of the cabin, trying not to foul the neat-patterned oilcloth floor, while Mr Hastings was slumped glassy-eyed in his chair, under the impression that the ship was rolling in a hurricane. Neither was in a position to contribute much to the discussion of Flint’s guilt or innocence.

Billy Bones smiled. He’d been lucky. He’d won a flying start to his campaign. One more heave and the irons would be struck off Flint’s legs as surely as they’d been struck off his own. It only awaited the next developments, as forecast by Flint.

And looking round the cabin, Billy Bones could see those developments already going forward very nicely.

Chapter 5

Four bells of the afternoon watch

18th March 1753

Aboard Walrus

Off Upper Barbados

With Walrus’s keel sprouting too much weed for swift sailing, she was brought alongside of Venture’s Fortune only by cunning: Walrus having hoisted British colours upside-down – a sign of distress – and left her sails hanging in a slovenly manner as if some disaster had befallen her people.

“Steady, boys,” said John Silver to the armed men hiding behind the bulwarks, and anywhere else where they couldn’t be seen from the approaching ship.

“Steady boys,” croaked the parrot on his shoulder and the hands laughed.

“Stow that!” hissed Silver, and clappEd a hand on the bird’s beak.

It would be a tragic waste to spoil things now. The sun was high in the blue heavens, the sea was calm with a fresh wind, and there were even gulls above, ventured out from the land just under the horizon, while a fine, fat three-masted ship came offering itself up, all bright and spanking new, with fresh white sails and bright-coloured flags that hadn’t seen a drop of weathering, and jolly tars aboard who couldn’t imagine what a mistake they were making in coming to give aid.

“John,” said Selena, standing next to him by the tiller, “I give you one last chance not to do this. It’s shameful deceit. How can you do this to others who use the sea?”

“Belay that!” he said. “We can’t take a prize no other way – we’re too slow. It’s this or nothing! D’you think I’d not rather bear down with colours flying?” He cursed and beat the deck with his crutch, and he looked at her and sneered: “An’ if you’re so moral and mighty, what’re you doing on deck in your gown so they sees a woman and ain’t afraid?”

“Huh!” she said. “You know why! If they’re taken by surprise there’ll be less fighting, that’s why!” But she blinked and looked away, for that wasn’t entirely the truth. She wasn’t so sure of anything now, having considered what Dr Cowdray had said…and…and…a soft word now, from John Silver, a friendly smiling word, might have closed the gulf between them. But Silver was too angry. Too many harsh words had been spoken.

“Well, there you are then!” he said with extreme bad grace. “So stand fast, and clap a hitch on your jawing tackle – or go below with them two swabs of navigators as I’ve locked in my cabin to save their precious innocence!” And there followed even more temper and more shouting, which ended in her being ordered below – at which she screamed defiance – and then being dragged below…causing consternation aboard Venture’s Fortune, the big West Indiaman, coming on under close-reefed topsails, for her quarterdeck people were studying the wallowing, helpless Walrus through telescopes.

“There, sir!” cried Mr Philip Norton, a big, young, muscular man, well dressed and handsome, with the confidence that comes with power. “Did I not say it was madness to approach her? Look at the number of gun-ports! And now there’s fighting aboard her.”

“Bollocks!” cried Captain Fitch, a veteran seaman and a master of his craft, but cursed with the short stature which turns a man to bloody-mindedness when the tall look down on him and tell him what to do. And that went double when the tall one represented something that all decent men despise: the government. He glared defiance at Norton. “I shall render assistance to a mariner in distress, according to the ancient traditions of the sea,” he said. “And as for the risk that terrifies you, Mr Norton, you well know that I have a Protection in case of that!” And clapping his eye to his glass again, Fitch told himself there was nothing to worry about in the sight of two men manhandling a shrieking woman down a hatchway while a one-legged man with a green bird on his shoulder looked on, shouting and pointing, and apart from which there wasn’t another soul visible on deck other than the helmsman…

“Jesus wept!” said Norton. “D’you think a piece of paper will save you from pirates? Do you not understand what I have under hatches?” And then, as Fitch steadily ignored him, Norton suddenly displayed a remarkable degree of seamanship: “Mr Mate,” he cried to the first officer, “shake out the topsails! Put up the helm and bring this ship about!” He pointed at Walrus: “And steer me clear o’ that ‘un!”

His voice rang with command. It was the dominant bark of a man used to being obeyed, and the mate instinctively touched his hat in salute and started to bellow at the hands. But Fitch spat fire.

“Avast!” he cried, and stamped a foot at Norton and glared up into his eyes. “Slam your trap, you bloody bugger! I don’t care what you was before, but don’t you by-God-and-all-his-bloody-angels give commands aboard my ship, for I’m cap’n here, and there ain’t none other!”

Thus Fitch and Norton were still arguing when Walrus came within spitting distance and her crew leapt up at Long John’s command, gave a cheer, and commenced hurling grapnels to bind the two ships together. Led by Long John himself, they came roaring over the side, taking command of Venture’s Fortune in a matter of seconds.

It was incredibly easy. Not a blow was struck or a grain of powder burned other than that which went into the air to terrify the West Indiaman’s crew, of which there were only twenty foremast hands, who’d not been stood to arms and were thus empty-handed in the face of John Silver’s thirty-two, who between them bore enough pistols, cutlasses, muskets and pikes to equip a small army, and who moved with practised speed: some to guard the prisoners while others – led by Allardyce and Israel Hands – went below to search the ship.

It was a sweet, clean capture, and the only injury to any man on either side – to the hilarity of Silver’s men – was a broken leg suffered by one Dusty Miller, a notoriously clumsy seaman who’d fallen badly as he swung aboard the prize on a line from the mainyard.

“Who’s cap’n?” cried Silver, stumping across the quarterdeck to where his men had herded the ship’s officers. He reached up to his shoulder to pet the big parrot that had fluttered back with wide-beating wings, after flying aloft as she always did when there was fighting. Silver was grinning in triumph, which turned to instant amazement as a small, thick-bodied man among the prisoners started yelling and waving his hands in fury.

“I, sir!” he cried, trying to push aside the firelocks aimed at him by Silver’s men.

“Huh!” said Silver. “Let the bugger through” and Captain Fitch stamped forward to stand looking up at Long John Silver, who towered over most men let alone one only five feet tall. The sight was greeted with laughter from the crew, which was deeply unfair to Fitch, who despite being unarmed, and facing death for all he knew, was fearlessly brave, and told Silver off something ferocious.

“I’m Fitch,” he cried. “Cap’n of Venture’s Fortune with cargo and supercargo bound for London. And I may not be touched, God damn-your-eyes, sir! You may not lay a finger on me! For I sail with protection, sir! Protection from Sir Wyndham Godfrey, Governor of Upper Barbados, and which Protection…”

“Clap a hitch, you bloody dwarf!” cried Long John, but Fitch persisted, stabbing a finger up at him and shouting until finally Silver drew a pistol, cocked it, and shoved it into Fitch’s belly.

“See here, mister,” he said, “either you pipe down or I give fire. I don’t mind which, so please your soddin’ self!”

“Bah!” said Fitch, but he shut up.

“Good,” said Silver. “Now what’s this about blasted protection? What’re you talking about?”

“A Certificate of Protection of Free Passage from Sir Wyndham Godfrey!” said Fitch. Then he lowered his voice: “Protection from gentlemen such as yourself, sir!”

“What gentlemen?” said Silver.

“Gentlemen o’ fortune, sir.”

“Oh?” Silver’s eyebrows raised.

Fitch nodded knowingly. “Aye, sir! For isn’t Upper Barbados the only port where you may safely call?”

Silver frowned. The old days were gone when there were a dozen safe havens for pirates on the Spanish Main. There was still Savannah, of course, and maybe one or two others, but none that boasted a dockyard like those of Williamstown, Upper Barbados, where gold talked all languages and the law looked the other way. Fitch read Silver’s face.

“So,” he said, “spurn Sir Wyndham’s Protection, and he’ll turn the guns of his fort on you.”

“Where is it? This ‘Protection’?”

“Below, in my cabin. I’ll show you…”

“Back your topsail,” said Long John. “Time for that later.” And he looked around.

For the moment, all was well. The weather was fine, the prize taken, the prisoners under guard. And that included five passengers – now trembling in each other’s arms on the maindeck, wealth written all over them – who had cabins for the passage to England. These were Fitch’s “supercargo”. Two were women: one middle-aged but handsome, and clearly a lady of fashion, wearing a Leghorn straw hat to save her complexion from the sun and a fine linen gown, cut practical for the ocean journey but underpinned with a full rig of hooped panniers. The other was her elderly maid. No blushing virgin, either of ‘em, but they’d need watching for fear the hands – bless their hearts – forgot what they’d signed under articles, concerning the punishment for rape.

But greater matters presented themselves…

“Long John! Long John!” cried Allardyce, coming up from the maindeck hatchway and leading a tall man with chains dangling from his wrists and ankles. “Look!” said Allardyce, with reverence. “It’s Himself! It’s the McLonarch! Him that led the charge of Clan McLonarch, between Clan Chester and Clan Atholl, and me behind him – my mother being a McLonarch – right to the British bayonets where he killed five with his own hand!”

“What’s this, Tom Allardyce?” said Silver, stepping forward. He looked at the creature Allardyce was referring to and detected the authentic look of a holy lunatic. The man was as tall as Silver, round-eyed, gaunt and woolly-haired, with a straggling beard, a great beak of a nose and high, slender cheekbones. His clothes were unkempt but clean, for though he was in chains, he’d not been ill-treated and there was no stink of the dungeon about him. He had decent shoes and stockings besides, and silver buckles, so he’d not been pillaged neither.

“Who are you, my lad?” said Silver.

“My lord!” corrected Allardyce. “He is the McLonarch of McLonarch!”

“Very likely,” said Silver. “But I’ll hear it from him, not you!”

The tall man stirred, fastened his eyes on Silver, drew himself upright and spoke with the soft, Irish-sounding accent of the Scottish Highlands.

“I am Andrew Charles Louis Laurent McLonarch-Flaubert – ninth Earl of McLonarch, and First Minister of His Most Catholic Majesty King Charles III, who is known to men as Bonnie Prince Charlie.” He was bedraggled and in chains, and spouting utter nonsense. But nobody laughed. Nobody laughed at the McLonarch.

“Are you now?” said Silver. “And what does King George say to that?”

“George of Hanover is a pretender and a heretic,” said McLonarch calmly. “He faces the block in this world and damnation in the next.”

“I see,” said Silver. “So what’re you doing in chains? What with you being prime minister, an’ all?”

McLonarch looked around until he spotted the group huddled against the lee rail, menaced by pistols. He pointed at Norton.

“Ask him,” said McLonarch, and nodded grimly. “He is one whom I have marked for future attention, for he is deep in the service of the Hanoverians.”

Everyone looked at Norton, who shrugged his shoulders.

“I serve my king!” he said, afraid to say more.

“And what might that mean?” said Long John.

Norton thought before he spoke. He was a brave man but he was nervous, and with good reason. He couldn’t guess whose side these pirates might take, and he knew McLonarch’s power with words.

“McLonarch is a leader of Jacobites,” he said. “He would raise rebellion – civil war – to soak England in blood. He is under arrest by the Lord Chancellor’s warrant, and I am charged with escorting him home for trial.” Norton looked round to see how this was received.

“Bah!” sneered McLonarch. “The man is a catchpole, a thief-taker, an agent sent to return me to England for judicial murder. He used bribery and deceit to capture me, and to steal the treasure lawfully gathered by my master the king.”

“Treasure?” said Silver, just when the politics was getting dull.

“Treasure?” said a dozen voices.

“A war chest of three thousand pounds in Spanish gold, which –”

“THREE THOUSAND POUNDS?” they cried.

“Which I was delivering to my master’s loyal followers in London.”

“Where is it?” said Silver.

“WHERE IS IT?” roared his crew.

“In the hold, in strong boxes,” said McLonarch, and pointed again at Norton: “He has the keys. He stole them from me.”

There followed half an hour of the most delightful and congenial work. Having been told exactly what would happen to him if he didn’t co-operate, Norton swiftly produced a heavy ring of keys from his cabin. Meanwhile the main hatchway was broken open, a heavy block rigged to the mainstay, with lifting tackles, and the crew of Venture’s Fortune set to the heavy labour of burrowing through the cargo – rum, sugar and molasses – to get to the heavy strongboxes which were on the ground tier down below.

Then the captured crew were made to haul up the boxes, one at a time, for opening on the quarterdeck at Silver’s feet, to thundering cheers, the fiddler playing, hornpipes being danced, and joy unbounded as rivers of Spanish coin poured out all over the decks, such that it was a tribute to Long John’s leadership that all hands did not get roaring drunk and lose the ship.

The only thing that puzzled Silver in that merry moment was why McLonarch had given up his treasure so easily. Silver pondered on that. Of course, the gelt was lost to McLonarch as soon as his ship was taken…but why speak up quite so helpful: saying how much there was, and who’d got the keys, an’ all? It wasn’t right. No man behaved like that. So what was going on?

He got his answer later, when Tom Allardyce brought McLonarch down to the stern cabin, where Silver was sitting at Captain Fitch’s desk, going through the ship’s papers for anything that might be useful.

“Cap’n!” said Allardyce. Silver looked up. Allardyce stood with his hat in his hands, bent double in respect for the man beside him, and whom he kept glancing at, in awestruck respect. McLonarch, free of chains and even more imposing than he’d been before, stood beside Allardyce with his nose in the air, and gazing down upon Silver as if he were a lackey with a chamber pot. Silver frowned.