Missing Witness (13 page)

His host burst into a roaring belly laugh at that. He slapped the kitchen table with his hand. “Well said! Direct hit to the broad side,” Longfellow bellowed.

“I didn't mean any disrespect—”

“No, I know exactly what you're saying. Philosophy—literally—‘the love of wisdom.' Isn't that what everybody needs? An appropriation of a maximum amount of wisdom.”

“I certainly couldn't agree with you more,” Will said. “Not just in the mundane, daily things. But also in the big cosmic questions too.”

“Well, speaking of wisdom, perhaps I can shed some light on this Isaac Joppa business. Not exactly one of the mundane matters—and not belonging to the ‘cosmic matters' you alluded to. But something in-between. Certainly an intriguing historical question. I'm in the process of writing a book right now. I'm attempting to reconstruct the ideological constructs, the belief systems, in play during the eighteenth century along the Carolina coastal areas. That really was a seminal point in American history. The years preceding the Revolution. The influence of the Enlightenment. Expanding transportation. Cross-cultural exchange. A collision between religious fervor and scientific progress. So the point is—I've been studying the Outer Banks for many, many years.”

“Boggs Beckford told me you were fairly optimistic there was evidence indicating Isaac Joppa's innocence.”

“You mean the piracy charges? The indictment that was filed against him down in Bath by the grand jury?”

Will nodded.

“Well, I'm not quite sure that I'd use the word
optimistic,
” Longfellow said, hedging slightly.

“Well, what evidence do you have that he was innocent?” the lawyer said, probing.

“Let me see…I think I've got it around here somewhere…” Longfellow rose, put his bottle down, and began roaming around the house, looking through his bookshelves, muttering to himself.

After a few minutes, Will heard a victory cry from the other room.

“Here it is!” He had located a black book with the cover and spine crumbling from age.

“Very out-of-print book. I'm very proud of obtaining this.
The Shipping Trade, Piracy, and the Coastal Carolinas
. Nolan Kendricks. 1829. Way out of print. Very hard to find.”

Will waited for Longfellow's punch line. And waited. Hoping against hope that it would arrive eventually.

18

L
ONGFELLOW PAGED TO THE SPOT
he wanted.

“So. Here it is. Page one hundred forty-five. Kendricks makes reference to the Ocracoke battle with Edward Teach and his pirate band. He makes mention of Isaac Joppa. And then…look here…he talks about the fact that Isaac Joppa was apparently engaged to be married to Abigail Merriwether. He found that of interest because, as you see in the footnote, Peter Merriwether, Abigail's father, was a prominent shipping magnate in Bristol, England.”

Will was taking notes now, furiously.

“What else does the book mention about Isaac Joppa?”

“According to the footnote, Kendricks was citing a newspaper announcement in the
Bristol Recorder
. Now I checked into the
Bristol Recorder,
and it no longer exists. And it hasn't for more than a hundred years. So Kendricks, at the time he wrote his book, obviously had a hard copy of the actual newspaper article in his hands.

“In any event,” Longfellow continued, “the footnote here says that Peter Merriwether was contacted for his good wishes about the engagement, but refused comment. Now that's an odd thing for a newspaper report in the 1700s to have said. There was a strong implication that Peter Merriwether was strongly opposed to this engagement.”

“I'm not sure I understand,” Will said, thinking through the information that Longfellow had shared. “What's your theory on why that is evidence of Isaac Joppa's innocence?”

“Just this,” Longfellow explained. “Even if we assume that old papa wasn't crazy about his engagement to his daughter, nevertheless, it sounds like Isaac Joppa had a real leg up in terms of his future. All he had to do was please the father-in-law. That he had some ambition in life. Who knows? Isaac Joppa had every reason to believe that if he played his cards right, he might end up in his father-in-law's business. So the point is
this—none of that fits with the profile of the typical social outcast who populated Blackbeard's crew.”

Will jotted a few more notes down and then paused to reflect.

“What do we know about the period of time between Joppa's leaving Bath, North Carolina, and the point in time when he appears on one of Teach's pirate ships?”

“Some of that is fairly documented. There are admiralty records in England, quoted in a newspaper article in 1717, that indicate he was assigned, as an ensign, to the HMS
Intrepid.
That was a ship that had a captain by the name of Zebulun Boughton. Boughton was a real terror. He brutalized his sailors. That was widely known. Anyway, the
Intrepid
was part of the English Royal Navy. The admiralty records indicate that Joppa jumped ship in port at Ireland. It doesn't take too much imagination to figure out why he deserted, particularly with a violent, half-crazed captain like Boughton.”

“And then what happened?” Will asked, riveted to Longfellow's story.

“Joppa boarded a ship out of Dublin called
Good Intent
. It was a merchant ship. And off the coast of the United States, in October 1717, it was boarded by Blackbeard and his crew.”

“And Isaac Joppa?”

“Isaac Joppa, from the takeover of the
Good Intent
until the Battle of Ocracoke Inlet in 1718, made several appearances on board Blackbeard's pirate ship. He was spotted during at least one plundering of another ship.”

“Everything you've said so far,” Will said, ruminating on the information from Longfellow, “every bit of it could be consistent with the theory of his innocence. That he jumped ship from the Royal Navy because of a brutal, violent captain. He gets on the Irish ship, which is then taken over and plundered by Blackbeard. And then, if we assume he was kidnapped by Blackbeard and forced to remain on the pirate's ship during several other pirate attacks, that would certainly explain his presence there.”

“It would,” Longfellow said, finishing off his bottle of beer. “Except that there was testimony given to the magistrate in Bath, North Carolina, and to the grand jury, to the effect that passengers on that other ship plundered by Blackbeard swore that they saw Isaac Joppa partially in charge of the pirate attacks. He seemed to be free—roaming the deck and giving orders to assist Blackbeard.”

“And that's what they based the indictment on?”

“Exactly. And that's pretty compelling stuff,” Longfellow noted, scratching his beard.

Will glanced over his notes, which now filled several pages. He was missing something. But what?

“I can't believe I almost forgot to ask this one,” Will said. “According to Beckford, you knew of Isaac Joppa's relationship with two different women. One was this Abigail in England. Who was the other one?”

“Oh, yes…the Indian princess…”

“What!”

“Yes. You'll have to get this from a better source than me. Now I'm just talking from anecdotal information I've heard. You know, oral history stuff from the Indian folks here in North Carolina. But according to legend, a white English sailor who was once associated with Blackbeard's crew married an Indian princess. To be precise, the daughter of one of the Tuscarora tribal chiefs—by the name of King Jim Blount.”

“Now I'm confused. How does this work into the timeline of Isaac Joppa's life? Did he marry this Indian princess
before
going to England and becoming engaged to Abigail Merriwether? Or did this happen
after
his engagement in England? And did all of this happen
after
the battle at Okracoke Inlet? Which would mean that he survived the battle, right?”

“I'm not sure,” Longfellow said. “To get the real dope on this, you need to talk to a woman by the name of Susan Red Deer Williams. She teaches Native American history at Carolina College. She spends her time down at this Indian center along the coast on the way to Pamlico Inlet.”

“Why do they think that Isaac Joppa was the pirate that married this Indian princess?”

“Apparently, King Jim Blount and the Indian princess—a young woman later named Priceless Pearl—that was the Indian translation—were converted to Christianity shortly after meeting with this pirate. I suppose he proselytized them into the white man's religion. The only likely candidate for that would be Isaac Joppa, given the fact that his father was a well-known Calvinist preacher.”

“And yet,” Will said, thinking intensely on everything he had heard from Longfellow, “this marriage to the Indian princess undermines the theory of innocence I was suggesting before. If Isaac Joppa was truly in love with this Abigail Merriwether, then that would tend to indicate that he found himself on Blackbeard's pirate ship
not
of his own volition. On the other hand, if he ends up marrying this Indian woman—how much did he really love Abigail in the first place?”

“Ah, yes—the mystery of the ages…” Longfellow said, rising and stretching. “And therein I speak, of course, of
love
. Not that I'm an expert
on that subject…but on the other hand, though I've never been married—frankly, I don't believe in monogamy—I've loved many a woman—perhaps loved them too well!”

Will rose to extend his hand to say goodbye.

“Or,” he added in rebuttal, “perhaps it might be that you failed to love at least one of those women well enough to marry her.”

“You
are
a philosopher!” Longfellow said, chuckling.

“Just a philosophy minor in my undergraduate days—and presently a happily married man,” Will noted with a smile.

Longfellow escorted his guest to the front door.

“You know, Mr. Chambers, if you're not doing anything for dinner, I know a great crab house down the beach. We could carry on our conversation down there. I find you a stimulating conversationalist.”

“Thanks anyway,” Will said, “but I need to get back to my wife. But I do appreciate your help. Do you think you'll be able to continue working on this case with me as an expert witness for Reverend Joppa?”

“Most certainly,” Longfellow replied. “I hope I was helpful. This business of digging up the untold lives of dead people is always an exhilarating—and frustrating—enterprise. And a sobering one at that. It reminds you that the grim reaper awaits everyone of us.”

Despite his desire to extricate himself from Longfellow and get home to Fiona, Will felt he had to pursue that last comment. “It does bring into perspective your view of life, death, eternity, and an afterlife, doesn't it?”

“True. True,” Longfellow said with an air of superiority. “You want to hear my philosophy on death? Here it is: ‘No longer mourn for me when I am dead. Then you shall hear the surly, sullen bell give warning to the world that I am fled from this vile world, with vilest worms to dwell.' William Shakespeare. My sentiments exactly.”

“Interesting,” Will said. “But devoid of hope. You want to hear mine?”

Longfellow nodded eagerly.

“O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?”

Longfellow leaned against the doorway, smiled, and shook his head. “A true believer. One of God's elect. I should have known.”

“Actually, I prefer to think of myself as simply a sheep that was lost. And now I'm found.”

“Ah. Simplicity,” Longfellow remarked. “Some philosophers argue that such is the characteristic of the most likely metaphysical truth. The simpler the postulate, the more likely it is to be true.”

“That is the principle called Occam's razor, right?” Will asked with a smile.

“Exactly,” Longfellow replied. “If you were one of my students, I'd give you an
A
. But we'll have to continue this conversation at a more convenient time,” Longfellow gave a half wave to Will and closed the door.

The afternoon was waning and the tide was rolling in. The waves were crashing their way up the beach, toward the sand dunes that surrounded August Longfellow's beach house, which was perched on the sandy cliff. Will glanced at the darkening surface of the rolling ocean. Then he turned and walked to his car. The sound of the roaring surf was still ringing in his ears—just as it had three hundred years before, for another man—at another time. And at another place.