The Pirates! in an Adventure with the Romantics (7 page)

‘He must have been washed aboard by a tidal wave.’

‘A tidal wave?’ said Shelley. ‘Again –
on Lake Geneva
?’

The pirate with a scarf pleadingly tried to pull a ‘just go with it’ sort of face. ‘Who might sort out this awful situation?’

At that point the doors to the downstairs of the boat crashed open and right on cue the Pirate Captain bounded out onto the deck, with nothing but a few beads of water to cover his modesty. The Romantics gasped, but none of the pirate crew so much as batted an eyelid, because they were hard-pressed to remember an adventure when the Pirate Captain
hadn’t
found an excuse to get unexpectedly naked.

‘Dear me!’ the Captain exclaimed. ‘I was caught unawares, just in the midst of a relaxing bath. And what’s this? A poor seal pup, cruelly harpooned by Eskimos.’

‘I already did that bit,’ said the pirate with a scarf.

The Captain rushed forward, punched the Eskimo, and cradled the misbegotten seal in his arms. The seal pup cursed a bit, and mumbled something about stupid plans always involving dressing up as creatures.

‘I’m going to have to heroically administer mouth to mouth,’ said the Captain gravely, leaning down to where the seal pup appeared to have a scowling second face poking out from the inside of its own mouth. Once the seal spluttered back into life, cursed and flopped around some more, the Captain hoisted it above his head and threw it over the side of the boat.

‘There you go! Back to the inky depths from whence you came! Tell your blubbery brethren that they have nothing to fear from those Swiss Eskimos so long as the Pirate Captain sails the waves.’

He saluted and then turned to his gob-smacked audience.

‘Tremendous! That’s one of the most noble things I’ve ever seen!’ roared Byron. Shelley groaned. Mary once again seemed to have got an oddly timed fit of the giggles. The Captain beamed at her. ‘I’m sorry, Mary,’ he said, subtly starting to flex various muscle groups. ‘I hope you’re not too overcome at the sight of me like this, but as I said, I was just having a bath, and didn’t have time to cover my strapping, manly form.’

Eventually Mary managed to forget whatever had been amusing her, and got her composure back.

‘Are you feeling okay, Pirate Captain?’ she asked.

‘Sorry?’

‘It’s just that you seem to be suffering from some sort of . . . terrible spasms.’

‘Devilishly attractive spasms?’

‘Not
exactly
.’

The Captain deflated a bit, stopped flexing,
¹⁵
and
sat
down
on
a
barrel
.

Shelley looked cross. ‘I hope that little episode wasn’t supposed to constitute our adventure? Because I have several doubts about the incident’s veracity.’

‘It wasn’t
just
an adventure, I was killing two birds with – oh, never mind,’ the Captain trailed off and decided to stare sulkily at the horizon. Everybody hovered awkwardly. A few of the crew did their best to melt into the background. Again, not literally, because that would be horrific.

‘Goodness me,’ said Mary, after a while, just to break the tension. ‘You certainly have a lot of tattoos, Pirate Captain.’
¹⁶

The Pirate Captain grunted.

‘Yes. What’s that one?’ asked Shelley, pointing at his chest. ‘Is it a sleepy caterpillar?’

‘No,’ said the Captain. ‘It’s a terrifying sea monster.’

‘How about this one? Is that a muscly horse?’

‘It’s a mermaid. Mermaids are unexpectedly hard to draw.’

‘And what on earth,’ said Mary, ‘is
that
meant to be?’ She pointed to a series of symbols stretching across the Captain’s belly:

‘Ah,’ said the Captain, following her gaze. ‘Actually that one IS a genuine mystery.’ He sighed a rueful nostalgic sigh. ‘You see, back when I was a lad in Pirating Academy, I had a mad old mentor, Calico Jack. Famed as the best pirate from Sussex to Shanghai, but almost preternaturally forgetful. Never remembered to carry any stationery supplies, so whenever anything important came up he tended to use his students as notepads.’ The Captain pointed to a line of text etched into the skin just above the symbols –

Here lies the key to every heart’s desire!

‘See? He was always writing things like that down on us. My left buttock has a note on it reminding him to pick up a prescription.’

‘The key to every heart’s desire! Why, but that sounds intriguing!’ boomed Byron. The pirate with a scarf was starting to wonder if he had any other way of saying words that wasn’t ‘booming’.

‘Yes, but as you can see, unfortunately it’s just those gibberish symbols after that,’ said the Captain with a shrug.

Mary stroked her chin thoughtfully. ‘You’ve never thought to discover what these symbols might mean?’

‘To be honest,’ said the Captain, ‘I suspect it means he was quite drunk when he tattooed it on me in the first place.’
¹⁷

‘You must have some inkling?’

‘Not really. I seem to remember a vague story about Calico’s grandfather.’ The Captain wrinkled his nose as he thought back. ‘Gave a lift to this inscrutable European gent, who, one ghostly night during their voyage, after rather too much grog, supposedly told old Calico Senior some profound sort of secret. But that was Calico for you, always arching an eyebrow and saying something enigmatic for no good reason. Probably imagined the whole thing.’

‘Well, don’t you see?’ laughed Byron heartily. ‘That’s it! That’s our adventure! It’s been under our noses all this time! Well, under your belly button, at any rate. A grand quest to uncover the mysterious meaning behind your tattoo!’

‘Really? But where would we start? It’s just some funny marks,’ said the Captain, frowning. ‘Isn’t it?’

‘I don’t think it’s just some funny marks, Captain,’ said Mary, squinting closely at the tattoo. ‘I think it must be a
code
of some sort.’

‘Exactly!’ cried Byron. ‘A code! A code that will reveal the key to every heart’s desire! All the best adventures have codes in them.’

The Captain contemplated his belly anew. ‘A code, eh? Well, fancy that! All this time I thought it was nonsense, and it turns out to be a code. Mystery solved! Who’s for cocktails?’

‘No, Captain,’ said Mary. ‘Saying something “is a code” isn’t really the hard part. It’s the “working out what the code means” bit that’s tricky.’

‘Oh. Bother.’

Everybody scratched their heads and stared at the Pirate Captain’s belly for a while, apart from Shelley, who grimaced, and the pirate in red, who struggled to climb back aboard the boat whilst still stuck in a seal carcass.

‘I’m not normally one for body image issues,’ said the Captain, after a couple of wordless minutes had ticked by, ‘but I’m starting to feel a little self-conscious now. Could we stare at something else for a bit?’

‘It’s no use,’ said Mary, straightening up with a sigh. ‘Runes? Hieroglyphs? I can’t make head or tail of it.’

‘No,’ agreed Byron. ‘It’s a tricky one. Not really suited to our artistic skillset.’

‘Ah well,’ said the Captain. ‘How about an adventure sitting around in deckchairs instead?’

Byron shook his head. ‘We’re not defeated yet, Captain. Because I think I know just the fellow who could help us!’

‘Oh good grief,’ said Shelley, his face clouding over. ‘You don’t mean . . .’

‘I do!’ Byron leapt onto a barrel, and stared meaningfully at the horizon, like he was on a book jacket or something. ‘Pirate Captain, we must set sail for London!’

‘London?’ the Captain puffed out his cheeks. ‘You realise that sailing from Switzerland to London is more geographically challenging than it sounds? Might add to the expenses.’

‘Expenses be damned!’ roared Byron.

The Captain beamed again. ‘Of all the celebrated historical characters we have ever met, you are easily my favourites.’

Six

Two Tickets To The Corpse Factory

The pirates were glad to find that London hadn’t changed much since their last visit. They didn’t like change – partly because it reminded them of their own inescapable mortality, and partly because it meant having to buy new guidebooks, which were really expensive. The city was still stuffed full of flickering gas lamps and soot-covered fog machines and smiling commuters and little match girls setting fire to Beefeaters.

As Byron led them through the streets of Marylebone, the crew murmured excitedly to each other, because in all their years of creeping towards the lairs of mysterious figures, this was the first time they had ever crept towards the lair of a mathematician. But when they got there, instead of arriving at a mind-bending mathematical plane of reality, they found themselves faced with a perfectly plain terraced house, and, rather than an optical illusion of impossible stairs, there was a regular set of five whitewashed steps leading to the door. There weren’t even any henchmen dressed as numbers, just a grumpy butler who rolled his eyes when he saw Byron.

‘Are you sure he’s a mathematician?’ said the Pirate Captain, sensing his lads’ disappointment. ‘It’s not the kind of place I’d expect to find a man from such a glamorous and thrilling profession.’

‘No, it’s very strange,’ explained Byron, as the grumpy butler ushered them into the hallway. ‘He’s something of a maverick. Some while ago he turned his back on the heady, live-fast-die-young world of the maths establishment, and adopted an entirely different approach to the subject. It’s best if you let me do the talking, because he’s so staid and unadventurous that if he realises you’re a pirate I suspect his head might explode from the shock of it all.’

‘You don’t honestly think he could see through my disguise?’ asked the Pirate Captain, incredulous. In those days piracy was frowned on as a profession, and the beady-eyed London police force lurked on every street corner, so, as always when visiting the Big Smoke, the pirates were in disguise. The crew were all disguised as stern Victorian nannies, while the Pirate Captain was disguised as a sexy fireman. He was adamant that this was because there hadn’t been enough Victorian nanny costumes to go around.

‘He doesn’t get many callers,’ said Byron with a shrug, ‘and I’m fairly sure he never gets visits from sexy firemen. He may be boring, but he’s terribly smart.’

‘What is it
this
time, Byron?’ An irritable voice floated out from one of the rooms. ‘Do you require help counting your toes again? Dividing up a cake? Telling the time?’

When he stepped out into the hallway the owner of the voice appeared just as irritable as he sounded. He polished his glasses, and blinked at his visitors myopically, looking like a cross owl or, in nautical terms, a poorly tuna fish. He scowled so hard that for a moment the Pirate Captain was worried he would scowl his face into a little brown walnut. He’d seen it happen before. Or at least he thought he had. He didn’t remember everything perfectly.

Byron gave the man a cheerful punch on the shoulder. ‘Hello, Babs! Admit it. My visits are the only colour in your drab little life. Everybody, I’d like you to meet Charles Babbage. Babbage, I’d like you to meet my new friends. You already know Shelley here. And this is his fiancée, Miss Mary Godwin. These are some stern Victorian nannies, and this is my close friend, a sexy fireman. You may recognise him from the best-selling calendar last Christmas.’