Master of Paradise (12 page)

There was a commotion in the doorway.
Gabrielle looked around to see officers dressed in magistrates’
uniforms asking questions of the whore as they shook their cloaks
free of rain, splashing the patrons, who let out a roar of protest.
She recognized them at once. Hastings’s men.

They moved through the hut, demanding to know
if a woman had been asking questions about leaving the island, and
warning against aiding her cause.

When Gabrielle turned back to Jonah Fitch, he
was eyeing her closely. “What would it take for you to skipper me
to the Amirarites?”

“It’d take a pretty bit of dosh to make me
navigate them reefs. A pretty bit, indeed.”

She reached into Hastings’s trousers pocket
and withdrew a silk pouch full of coins she’d pilfered, dropping it
to the table. “Is this pretty enough?”

Days later, a chilling sight abruptly loomed
on the horizon: four armed frigates anchored off the cove,
El
Paraiso
foremost among them. Beyond these lay an island heavily
fortified with castlelike walls. Unlike Mahé, with its high
mountains and huge granite outcroppings, D’Arros was a coral atoll,
relatively flat and covered with varieties of palms. Swarms of
large seabirds circled the sky above it.

It was the first sign of life they’d seen
since leaving Mahé. Jonah Fitch raised the spyglass. “Pirates!” he
croaked. “Hang on, matey. We’re putting our tails betwixt our legs
and running like dogs.”

“Not so fast.” Something in Gabrielle’s voice
stopped him. She was still disguised as a man, but her appearance
had altered. By now, she’d refashioned Hastings’s clothes so they
more closely resembled the ragtag attire of a man of the sea. She’d
slid her sword into the sash at her waist, which she’d made from a
torn bit of Hastings’s silk cloak.

It pricked her conscience that she had
tricked the skipper into this position. But she had no choice. No
man in his right mind would willingly sail into the midst of
Rodrigo’s fortifications. No amount of money could convince him.
Hopefully he wouldn't panic now and get them both killed.

“No time to waste, mate,” the skipper
protested.

“It’s not my intention to turn tail. This is
why I came.”

He turned and stared at her. “You came
looking for Soro?”

“I came to join him.”

“
Join
them?” He looked out at the
ominous ships riding the tide. “Well, too late to turn back now.”
With efficient motions, he raised a flag of truce.

When he was finished, Gabrielle gave his back
a manly slap. “That’s the spirit. Now let me do the talking. If we
don’t convince them we mean what we say, there could be
consequences.”

“To say the least.”

While waiting for the signal, Gabrielle
adjusted her appearance as she’d planned. To disguise her
distinctive cobalt eyes, she wore a patch over one and squinted the
other. If she was worried about what the skipper would say, she
needn’t have bothered. He eyed the black silk patch she’d also made
from Hastings’s cloak and said, “Have you got one for me?”

“Sorry.”

“I could pretend to have a wooden leg.”

“Just stay steady and calm,” she advised.

“Steady?” He squared his shoulders in a show
of bravado. “Mate, I’ve faced sea-beasts and tidal waves and King
Neptune himself more times than I can remember. You can always
count on Jonah Fitch to be steady in a storm.” Then he gave her a
keen look. “What about yourself?”

“A touch of stage fright, that’s all. It will
pass.”

“Odd choice of wording, that. Stage
fright.”

She reminded herself to watch what she said
in the future. If this uneducated skipper who hadn’t seen a theater
for twenty years had caught her slip of the tongue, Rodrigo was
sure to as well.

Once the white flag was spotted, they were
waved in toward the main ship, guns leveled at them from all around
the deck. Gabrielle’s pulse pounded as they drew close, looking up
at the vessel of terror, wondering if Rodrigo was striding the
deck.

“Permission to come aboard, sir,” called the
skipper, a formality that would never have occurred to
Gabrielle.

The red hair and bearded face of the
Scotsman, Wallace, came into view.

“What are you doing here, man?” he asked.
“Don’t you know these waters are filled with cutthroats?”

The pirates laughed.

“We hear you’re recruiting men for a big
battle,” Gabrielle called in her most masculine voice. “We’ve hopes
of joining your particular band of cutthroats.”

A disbelieving snicker circled the deck. “And
why is that?” Wallace called down.

Without hesitation, she called back, “Because
we’ve as little pity for the masters of slaves as you.”

The laughter stopped. Suddenly the sea and
everything around them resonated a silence she could hear in her
soul. Wallace left his post at the rail, spoke to someone in low
tones, then returned.

“Permission granted. The captain’s onshore.
I’ll row you there meself. But I’d watch me step, lads. We tolerate
no tricks on D’Arros.”

Wallace settled himself into their skiff,
which bobbed about in the surf beneath his weight. As the man who’d
joined him rowed them in, Wallace disarmed the newcomers, tucking
Gabrielle’s sword under his arm. They said nothing. Gabrielle kept
her face turned toward shore, lest the Scotsman recognize her
beneath the disguise.

When they came at last to the reef that
surrounded the island, a group of barefooted sailors met them and
guided them over the treacherous coral. It was a fearsome struggle,
as the churning tide fought to free the boat from the sailors’
grip. The skiff beached at last on a white sandy surface and the
guests were helped ashore. As she descended, Gabrielle couldn’t
help noticing the thick calluses on the feet of the men who’d
helped them, as if years of traversing the coral had toughened
them.

Even from the water, Gabrielle had noted the
trappings of a community. The far beach was littered with a
congestion of huts made from tree trunks and palm fronds. The
island was flat with a natural harbor, but more barren than those
she’d passed to get here.

There was some activity here and there, but
most of the inhabitants of the island were gathered up the beach.
Wallace led them through the thick sand with sure, steady strides.
There, a collection of a hundred or more men, mostly freed slaves,
huddled in a mass—some looking determined, some casting glances
about the pirates as if unsure. Fires roared from an assortment of
tin barrels, while a number of the pirates held into the blaze long
metal spikes, as thin as needles, about eight inches in length.
Beside them, on tables fashioned from native trees, was a
collection of large wooden bowls.

“Wait here, out of the way,” Wallace told
them. “You’re just in time to witness the taking of the oath. If
you can stomach this, lads, we might well address your suit.”

Gabrielle didn’t like the sound of it. A
feeling of trepidation permeated the novices. From some she sensed
outright fear. What was going on? She glanced about the beach and
spotted Cullen, watching from the sidelines. She barely recognized
him. He looked different from the man Rodrigo had stolen from their
ship. Where once he’d been ill and pale, he now radiated a robust
well-being. His sandy hair, without its taming pomade, was long and
wild, but it shone with health, glinting with streaks the color of
pale wheat. His skin, once so pallid, now glowed red from the
sun.

“I’ll be back,” she told Jonah, then hastened
to her brother’s side before her companion could stop her.

“Cullen,” she whispered. When he gave her a
startled glance, she put her finger to her lips to signal
silence.

“Gabby!” He hushed his voice immediately,
looking around him. “How’d you get here?”

“With great difficulty. And now we’re getting
out.”

She caught the flash of fear in his eyes.

“Rodrigo will never let us off this island,
Gabby.”

“Why do you think I came in disguise?”

Abruptly, the air changed. An electricity
flicked through the assembly like a bolt of lightning. The men
straightened. The crowd cleared. And there stood Rodrigo, wearing
the fierce scowl of the pirate king.

He strode about the beach, inspecting the men
who congregated before him, some of them shaking visibly as he
caught their eye. They’d obviously heard ferocious tales about the
pirate, and at this moment of truth, didn’t know what to
expect.

When his back was turned, Gabrielle crept as
unobtrusively as possible back to Jonah’s side.

“You’ve briefed the new men?” Rodrigo asked
without preamble, looking at no one in particular.

“Aye, Captain,” someone answered. “They know
what to expect.”

Rodrigo paced before them with masculine
grace, his hands behind his back, his boots striking the dry sand
like cracks of a whip. He looked fearsome and proud. She suddenly
wondered what she was doing matching wits with him. But just the
thought of his power here, in his own domain, beyond the reaches of
the law, made her all the more determined to succeed in her quest:
to get her brother safely out of here.

He addressed the men. “Once you sign the
articles of faith, you will be officially inducted into the service
of
El Paraiso
. We fight for a noble cause, and we use
whatever methods that cause requires. No man is welcome who does
not hold these principles dear. I am master here, make no mistake.
But you are not slaves. You answer to me of your own free will. For
this reason, we ask of you this test of faith. If any of you are
squeamish, if you don’t love the cause we serve, we invite you to
leave. My men will escort you to safe waters once you’ve given your
oath not to reveal the whereabouts of this outpost. But be
forewarned, my hale and hardy men. We brook no deceit. If you break
your oath, we will know it. And on my honor”—he paused to look each
individual dramatically in the face—“we—will—hunt—you—down.”

A man behind her gulped.

“However,” Rodrigo continued, “if you decide
to join us, the wearing of our mark is the commitment we make to
each other and our cause. None of us does this lightly. The British
authorities know I will never force any man to wear this mark.
Therefore, they will automatically hang anyone who bears it. So be
forewarned. Once you’ve worn the bird of freedom, there is no
turning back.”

With a gesture of his hand, Rodrigo motioned
to one of the African members of his crew, who stepped forward and
repeated what he’d said in a language Gabrielle couldn’t place.
Some African dialect, she supposed, although she thought she caught
a few words of Portuguese thrown in.

When his interpreter was finished, Rodrigo
added, “Now, who among you wishes to part company with my men?”

He paused, waiting, but there wasn’t a
sound.

“Very well. We begin.”

A table was quickly brought up at the side of
the secluded beach. Behind that was placed a chair, and on the
table a heavy leather-bound book.

Rodrigo sat in the chair, opened the book,
then dipped a quill in the inkwell his men had provided. “Once
you’ve braved the brand, come to me and sign your name among those
of our men.”

Braved the brand? Gabrielle watched in
mounting horror as the long iron needles were removed from the fire
and dipped into the wooden bowls. All around them, the recruits
began to remove their shirts.

“If you want to join us, get in line,”
Wallace told her as she stared aghast. Numbly, she stepped into the
closest line of men. Staring at the naked, masculine back gleaming
with sweat before her, she fingered the buttons of her shirt and
wondered how in God’s name she could get out of this one.

The test of faith began. Ten men at a time
were brought to the tables, where they were folded over and given a
thick length of rope to place between their teeth. Then, with swift
efficiency, the needles were dipped in dark ink and inserted again
and again into the underlayer of the men’s flesh. The mark was
etched on their right shoulder blade with the same swift, efficient
pinpricks. Gabrielle heard the grunts of the men and saw the sweat
streaming down their faces before the tattoo was finished and a
special ointment smeared on top. When the first of the men stood,
wavering shakily, she could see the raw outline of a bird in
flight.

“What’s the mark?” someone asked in a weak
voice.

“A frigate bird,” said Jonah Fitch.

Gabrielle cast him a questioning glance.

“Frigate birds are the pirates of the air,”
her companion whispered. “They wait for some other bird to catch a
fish, then attack that bird and take the food. A pirate bird, you
see? Soro’s family used to own the island named for the birds, once
upon a time. Afore it was took from them.”

She could see some twisted sense in it, but
she had more pressing matters on her mind. Somehow or other, she
had to think of a distraction before her own shirt was ripped to
her waist, and her identity revealed.

Scores of men were tattooed, then made their
way to Rodrigo, where they signed the book and shook his offered
hand. She noted that he said a personal word to each, but too
softly for the rest of them to hear.

Just then, in the instant before the needle
scarred him, one of the few white men jerked away with a cry of
fear. He spit the rope from his mouth and turned on Rodrigo with
pleading eyes.

“On my honor, sir, I want to be one of your
men. I’m a fugitive from the penal colony in New South Wales—and an
Englishman who abhors seeing my countrymen pander in slaves. But I
have me doubts that I can do it.”

“Can’t you?” Rodrigo asked. He stood, then
put his hands to his shirt and ripped the buttons from it in a
single wrench, yanking it in the same fluid motion to his waist. “I
did.” Turning, he displayed a sun-browned back broad and taut with
muscles. And just at the right shoulder blade was the unmistakable
brand of a pirate bird in flight. Twice as big, it was beautiful,
etched into his skin like a lovingly fashioned work of art.