HF - 03 - The Devil's Own (17 page)

'What a splendid sight,' Parke cried, pausing at the corner.

'The trees arc called poincianas,' Kit said. 'And are named after an erstwhile governor of French St Kitts, the Sieur de Poincy, who was something of a botanist.'

'By God, Kit, but you're a mine of information.'

Kit flushed. 'My grandmother was acquainted with the gentleman.'

'Was she now? But it was less the flowers I was admiring, magnificent as they are, than the evidence that even the humans in this delightful place are worthy of closer inspection.' He pointed with his cane, and the two white girls on the far side of the street giggled and darted away. Their faces were concealed by the shade of enormous straw hats, but their figures were indeed eye-catching, especially as they appeared to be wearing but a single petticoat beneath their muslin gowns. Parke glanced at his companion. 'But you, I observe, show no great interest in nubile females.'

'Perhaps I have seen sufficient such as they are reduced to the last extremity by lustful fingers,' Kit remarked. 'Amongst them my own.'

'By God, sir, but on occasion you are an uncommonly solemn fellow. So you once forced a Spanish hymen. You may be sure that in taking her own life, and that of her sister, she committed by far the more serious crime by the lights of her religion. This seems to be the right place.'

They had paused before a large doorway set into the highest building on the street, which appeared like a gigantic warehouse, for it stretched back a considerable distance as well. Parke rapped on the door with the head of his cane, and after a moment it was opened by a Negro wearing white breeches and stockings beneath a blue coat, with a white wig on his head and black leather shoes on his feet. 'Your pleasure, sir?' he inquired.

'By God,' Parke said. 'By God. You'd do well in Jamestown, by God. We seek your Governor, Colonel Philip Warner.'

'Colonel Warner is within, sir. Will you enter?' The doorman's gaze flickered to Kit, and he hesitated, and then bowed again.

'Thank you, fellow,' Parke said. 'Make way there. Make way.'

For the majordomo had straightened and was blocking Agrippa's way. 'No slaves are permitted, unless they are employed by the House.'

'Slaves?' Parke said. 'Who spoke of slaves? This man is my friend.'

'I should have said, sir, no man with a black skin is allowed within, unless he is employed by the House.'

'I'll have you whipped, you insolent dog,' Parke shouted. 'By God. Kit, cut me this fellow's ears.'

'In truth, Mr Parke, I'll not be the cause of a riot,' Agrippa said. 'I'd as soon explore this pretty little town.'

'By God,' Parke said. 'You'll go where I go, by God, if I so choose. Stand aside, fellow.'

Suddenly the street was crowded, with white people and black, issuing from stores and behind trees from whence they had been surreptitiously watching the strangers. It occurred to Kit that they might well have a riot after all. For the major-domo was showing no signs of yielding.

And Daniel Parke was going red in the face. 'By God,' he shouted. 'Kit, draw your sword. Draw it, by God, and clear me a path.'

Kit chewed his lip, uncertain what would be best, when a voice inquired, quietly enough, 'What seems to be the trouble, John?'

The majordomo sighed with relief. 'These gentlemen, Colonel Warner, sir, wish to bring a black man into the Ice House.'

As if Kit could ever really have forgotten that voice, that strut. And yet, to his surprise, Philip Warner this afternoon wore none of the finery he had sported in Tortuga, but preferred a plain coat and an unruffled shirt, with loose trousers
rather than breeches, hanging over riding boots. He did not carry a sword, and did not wear a wig, but instead a black tricorne. Nor were any of the men crowding behind him better dressed.

'Strangers,’
he observed, gazing at Parke with a frown. 'And you would begin by changing our laws? I'll have your name, sir.' But before Parke could reply, his gaze had flickered across to Kit. 'By God,' he said. ' 'Tis the buccaneer himself.'

'I sailed with Morgan, Colonel Warner, certainly,' Kit confessed. 'But that was in my heritage, would you not agree? Now I have given up the life in a search for something better.'

'Morgan? Morgan, did you say?' The other planters pushed forward. 'Were you at Panama?'

'I had that misfortune, sir,' Kit replied to the man who had asked the question.

'Fear not, gentlemen,' Colonel Warner said. 'The lad is an old acquaintance of mine. Kit Hilton. You'll have heard the name. His people were in the employ of my family when first we came to these islands.'

'Why, sir, I ...' Kit bit off the words. He had no wish to brawl with the Deputy Governor, at this moment.

Warner smiled at him. 'And faith, lad, you look the part. What of your friend?'

'By God, sir,' Parke declared. 'I had supposed you had forgotten my existence. Daniel Parke, of Virginia, at your service.'

'Parke?' Warner extended his hand. 'Why, sir, a thousand apologies. I received a letter but a fortnight gone, from your father, informing me of your impending visit. Why, sir, I but wish you had established yourself sooner. Now my manners stand shot to pieces, with only patchwork left to be accomplished. But I had not expected to find you in such company.'

'Kit is my good friend, Colonel Warner.'

Warner continued to smile. 'And mine. Why, when last was it we had the pleasure of meeting, Kit? Two, three years?'

'More than four, Colonel,' Kit said.

'And since then much has happened. Yes, indeed. You'll take a drink of rum punch with me, gentlemen. Not your servant, Ki
t. Our laws are meant to be obey
ed.'

'My ...'

But Agrippa interrupted him. 'I will look at the town, sir,' he said, gravely.

'A likely fellow,' Warner said. 'You must tell me how you came by him. But first of all, the punch. Back, gentlemen, let us show our visitors true Antiguan hospitality."

'Punch?' Parke demanded, as he was escorted from the lobby into a large room, distinctly cool as opposed to the heat of the street, but remarkably lacking in furniture; the bare wooden floor was scattered with sawdust, and there were only some tables against the far wall, behind which Negro servants, as liveried as the doorman, were handling mugs while others came through from the back door with enormous blocks of ice set in wooden tubs, which they proceeded to assault with hammer and spike rather in the fashion of marauding artillerymen.

'The sweetest drink in all the world.' Warner assured him. 'And made from our own good sugar. The liquid molasses, you understand, suitably thinned and fermented. There you have the rum. Add some lime juice, to keep out the scurvy, and some sugar, to sweeten it up again, and a good deal of ice, for fear the strong liquor lays you flat in a single blow, and you have nectar, Mr Parke. Sheer nectar.'

'Knock me flat?' Parke grumbled, raising his mug. He drank, with a lusty sigh, and stepped back. 'By God.' He blinked. ' 'Tis certainly stronger than wine.'

Kit, who had made the acquaintance of rumbullion on board Morgan's ship, sipped his punch more cautiously, very aware that he was being scrutinized by every man in the room. Perhaps he was the first real-life buccaneer any of them had ever seen. It certainly behoved him to tread warily in this society. But already questions were bubbling into his brain, if he dared ask them.

'Aye,' Philip Warner said. 'We had heard of the fate of Tortuga in the recent war. But you cannot say I did not warn you, Master Hilton. I trust your grandmother made her escape in time?'

'My grandmother was hanged by the Dons,' Kit said.

'The devil,' Philip muttered, and a murmur of outrage went round the room. 'And so you sailed with Morgan. By God, I cannot altogether blame you. And as you pointed out, it is in your blood. And so what brings you to Antigua? You're no
cane-planter, I'll be bound.'

Kit glanced at Parke, who promptly came to his rescue.

'No, sir, he is not. But he has sworn to turn his back upon villainy and bloodshed, having had a bellyful in Panama. Kit seeks employment, Colonel Warner. And be sure you will find no stouter seafarer in all these islands. I give you my word on that.'

'Employment?' Philip Warner stared at Kit. 'You came to Antigua for employment?'

Kit was flushing with embarrassment and even anger at Parke's latest pronunciamento. 'No, sir, I did not. Having made Mr Parke's acquaintance, I agreed to accompany him on a tour of these islands.'

'Oh, come now, Kit,' Parke said. 'Do not dissemble before these gentlemen. Would you not make your future here amongst your own kind, rather than come with me to America, a nameless vagabond?'

'I do assure you, Daniel,' Kit began, but Parke was already bounding off on another, more vital subject.

'I wonder, Colonel Warner, if I might ask after your daughter, Marguerite? I have heard that she is the most beautiful charmer in all the world.'

Philip Warner's gaze was cold. 'In Virginia, sir? In any event, my daughter is lately widowed, of Harry Templeton, may God rest his soul in peace, and is not at this moment receiving.'

Marguerite, a widow? Now why, Kit wondered, did that set his heart pounding? They had met but once, and four years in the past, yet suddenly her memory came clouding back with a clarity he had thought to have lost forever. And if Modyford was to be believed, she might also remember him.

'Then I apologize,' Parke said, without a hint of embarrassment. 'Now, tell me, can the Deputy Governor of Antigua not find a suitable post for a man of Kit's talents? Especially as he is an old friend.'

Warner pinched his lip, and glanced at his companions.

'I seek no charity, sir,' Kit insisted. 'Nor will I accept any, even from you, Daniel. If my passage irks you, be sure that I am prepared to work it, from here to Barbados.'

'And what would you do there that you cannot do here?' Parke inquired. 'If only you would understand that I seek to
help you, dear Kit. The Leewards are the future of this hemisphere, sir, nay, of this entire empire. So it is loudly said, and what I have seen here today but convinces me of the truth of that statement. I have heard a respectable merchant, a man with much knowledge of trade and affairs, declare that within fifty years an ounce of good sugar will be worth more than an ounce of pure gold. I will not dispute that point, sir. I but suggest that you remain in close proximity to such a bottomless mine, for be sure that wealth will filter.'

'An admirable sentiment, and prognostication which agrees with my own,' Philip Warner said. 'But to find a suitable post for Hilton ...'

'The sloop,' said the man who had first addressed Kit, a heavy-set fellow with a shock of red hair, and not much older than himself, Kit estimated.

'Edward Chester,' Philip said offhandedly. 'One of my associates. You have a solution to this problem, Edward?'

'Indeed, sir. Do we not at this moment need a master for the
Bonaventure,
and is not Mr Hilton a seafaring man, who comes from a line of seafaring men? And a man of spirit, too. Why, he could be the answer to a prayer.'

Warner was frowning as he gazed at Kit, while Kit's heart was bounding with excitement. A ship, of his own? Even if it was only a trading sloop? And based on St John's. Where surely a chance meeting could be arranged.

'These are treacherous waters,' Warner said.

'None a seaman might not navigate,' Chester insisted.

'And treacherous times.'

'For a man who sailed with Morgan?'

'Tell us of this sloop,' Parke said. 'I do assure you that Kit will handle her as I might handle my horse, and there is no better horseman in all America.'

'Indeed?' Philip asked, somewhat drily. 'Perhaps I doubt that it will be sufficiently interesting for Mr Hilton. We speak of a sloop, you understand, which is jointly owned by a consortium of planters here and which trades with St Eustatius.'

Kit frowned. 'Is that not a Dutch colony?'

'Indeed, sir, so it is,' Ches
ter explained. 'And as the mein
heers, very generously, do not charge any duties upon their imports to that island, wc find it convenient to import most of
our European goods through their warehouses, and then bring them here privily.'

'Smuggling, by God,' Parke shouted, and burst into laughter. 'I like the sound of that.'

'We prefer to call it customs avoidance,' Philip Warner said.

'But ...' Kit stared at them in horror. 'Are we not at war with Holland? And what of the Navigation Acts? Are we not specifically forbidden to carry any goods to or from English soil except in English bottoms, and equally forbidden to trade with any country save England herself, or our sister colonies?'