CONCH STOOD STRADDLING the fallen, snoring Wentworth. He looked down at the young man, one cheek bunched up where it pressed against the gray paint of the wooden porch, mouth open and drooling. “Beggin’ yer pardon fer droppin’ by wif no notice. Jus’ got in from Nearin’ Vast, where I been dealin’ wif some scalawags…”
“Successfully, I hope?”
“Oh, we settled ’em down some. Caught all but the one I most wanted, is the pity. So I was up visitin’ the old man,” he nodded in the direction of the Ryland mansion, “and I saw the body lyin’ here. Feared foul play. But looks like young Wentworth jus’ took an odd spot fer his evenin’ nap.”
Shayla nodded her thanks. The pirate had a hat in his hands, but he hadn’t worn it anytime lately. His golden tresses were perfectly combed out, falling down to his shoulders in waves. He wasn’t wearing his usual yellow vest, but a gold-colored one, fine satin trimmed in maroon, with fine piping at the seams. He smelled of expensive cologne and the open sea. The contrast between the confident, courteous captain and the slobbering, whiskey-sodden Wentworth could not have been more pronounced. Shayla hoped her daughter would not see it.
“Why, Captain, do come in!” Jenta said from behind her. Shayla felt the voice like a cold knife between her shoulder blades.
“Ah, Miss Jenta!” The Conch’s smile was crooked, but no less sincere for that. He stepped forward, and Shayla had little choice but to back away and let him enter. He took Jenta’s hand in his and kissed it gently.
Shayla warned Jenta with her eyes.
“My health is fine, Captain,” she said. “I see you’re in better spirits than when we last met.” She had not forgotten his rudeness at her wedding, and she was not prepared to let him forget it, either. “Now, we’re quite busy with plans for the evening. Was there something else you wanted?”
He pulled his head back, and a grin spread across his wide face, causing the tips of his moustache to angle upward. “Might be indeed, miss. Or rather, I suppose it’s ma’am now. The three of us…” he glanced at the open door behind him, “…the four of us all know what’s what, don’t we?”
“We do. If there’s nothing else, then thank you for stopping by.” She said it with finality.
A shadow crossed his face. “Ah, yer a hard one since yer marriage, then. I remember ye a bit more lively.”
“And I remember you to be more of a gentleman than you showed last time we met.”
“Jenta!” But Shayla could say no more than that, nor did she have the desire to say more, for her daughter was quite correct.
Conch’s look grew hard, but it was not without interest. “If it’s a gentleman yer wantin’, then what’s that lyin’ at yer doorstep?”
“It is a gentleman, upon which I insist. Anyone else shall be locked out of my house and my heart, and may well die on my doorstep. That includes you, Captain.”
The silence was highly charged.
“Perhaps we should all take some tea,” Shayla said brightly, “before the conversation grows altogether honest.”
They both looked at her. Conch’s hard look softened. He chuckled.
“Tea?” Shayla offered again.
Conch looked like a man who suddenly remembered why he had come. “Thank ye, Mrs. Stillmithers. It’s right kind a’ ye to take pity on a poor pirate without much manners. I won’t be takin’ tea wif ye today, but I do have somefin’ to ask yer daughter.”
“Yes, and what is that?” Jenta answered, her voice again melodious.
“I made a wager wif yer…” he swung a thumb in Wentworth’s direction, “…laughable wedded husband. On yer weddin’ night. And I’m wonderin’ if he’s seen fit to mention it to ye.”
“There were many wagers made that night, I’m sure.”
“Oh you’d a’ remembered this one. It had somewhat to do wif you.”
She looked at him blankly. “What kind of wager?”
“Hmm. Thought he might a’ mentioned it. Thing is, it was done wif so many witnesses.”
“What kind of wager?”
“Not fer me to say, if he’s not seen fit to tell it. I jus’ come by to ask, is all. And so I’ll say my good days. Miss.” He touched his forehead. He turned to Shayla. “Ma’am.” He bowed. And he walked out the door, stepping over Wentworth, avoiding the cat now seated at the snoring man’s shoulder.
“Captain Imbry!” Jenta called. She stepped over Wentworth as well, looking down to manage her skirts. But Conch turned back suddenly, and when she looked up she stopped short, but not short enough. She was standing too close to him.
“Miss?” he said softly.
“You are no gentleman,” she said. But there was too much breath in her voice now, and she knew it. She took a step back, careful not to step on Wentworth’s feet.
“How disappointin’ fer me. I would not like to be locked out here wif the likes a’ him.” Then Conch fished in his vest pocket. “Oh, I almost forgot.” He pulled out a delicate wedding band. “I thought you might like to have this. It’s yers. Won it off yer droolin’ gentleman.”
Her eyes went wide. Wentworth had said he was holding the bands until their public wedding day.
“Take it. Got the writin’ on the inside and all. Go ahead, take a look.” He held it out on his palm.
She reached for it carefully.
Wentworth groaned.
She turned back with a start, facing Wentworth. “No,” she said simply.
But Wentworth sat up.
Jenta looked past Wentworth at her mother, who met her eyes. “Come inside, Jenta. Come inside.”
Conch took Jenta’s hand from behind, put the ring into it, and closed it. She let him. She looked up at him, now standing to her left. He smiled down at her.
She thought he was going to kiss her. But he tapped his forehead again in a casual salute, and walked away. She swallowed hard, watching him. Her heart raced.
It took Wentworth a few seconds for it all to register, to remember where he was, what he was doing, what it meant to see Conch Imbry standing beside his wife, holding her hand. And then what her look meant, the shocked look, the warning, as though she didn’t want him to wake up, as though she didn’t want him to see.
“Conch Imbry!” he shouted, and staggered to his feet. He lurched forward. “Conch Imbry! I challenge you! I challenge your honor, though you have none! A duel! A duel!”
Jenta slapped him hard across the face. “He’s done nothing!”
Wentworth tottered for a moment, then collapsed, falling down onto his hindquarters with a thud.
Conch looked back and laughed.
Jenta ran into the house, where her mother slammed and locked the door behind her.
“I want a duel!” Wentworth screamed at the departing figure.
“You’ll have what you want, sonny!” he called cheerily with the wave of a hand. “And after ye don’t want it no more, it’s mine!” He turned again, and kept walking.
The gray tomcat escaped up a nearby tree.
Wentworth sobered up, eventually. He came around again the next day, meek and apologetic, asking for entry. Shayla invited him around to the back porch for lemonade with shaved ice.
“Might I see Jenta?” he asked, glancing through the back window. He looked pale. His hands shook. He eyed the cold drink in his hand, then set it on the glass tabletop beside him.
“Of course. But I thought you and I might have a little talk first.”
“Look, I know I made a fool of myself again. But ma’am, that was Conch Imbry I saw leaving your home. He held my wife’s hand. I didn’t dream that.” He looked unsure, however.
“No. You didn’t. You also challenged him to a duel.”
“I do recall that, yes.”
“My advice is, you should retract the challenge as soon as it is practical.”
“And I will, if Jenta can satisfy me that his intentions here were good.”
“What sort of proof would you need?” Her tone was cold.
“Not proof, I didn’t mean it that way.” He was very nervous now. “I’m curious what he wanted. What he may have…said.”
“I see.” She studied him. “How is your lemonade?”
“Excellent, thank you.” He wiped a water bead from the glass with his thumb. But he still didn’t drink.
“I cannot vouch for his intentions, though if he has any that are…poor…he did not make them known to us. But he did leave us with a question.”
He didn’t look her in the eye, but watched the water trickle down the outside of his glass. “And what sort of question was it?”
“He mentioned an unusual wager.”
Wentworth nodded. He picked up the glass now and drank it down. He closed his eyes, struggling, as though he feared it might come back up. Then he looked at her. “What sort of bargain?”
“I believe I said ‘wager.’ Was there a bargain, too, Mr. Ryland?”
He shook his head. “No. No bargain. I misspoke.”
“But there was a wager. One that involved my daughter.”
“I am uncomfortable speaking to you about it, if you’ll forgive me. It’s between the Captain and me.”
“And Jenta, it would seem.”
“Yes. It does have something to do with her.”
“The Captain’s words, almost exactly. Was this bargain known to all the men at that table?”
“Yes. It was a bet, and it was coerced. I felt in danger of my life.”
“Quite understandable. My advice to you, Wentworth, is this. Come clean with Jenta. Hold nothing back. Don’t expect it to go well. But come clean anyway. More lemonade?”
“No. Thank you.”
“I’ll go get Jenta.” She stood.
Suddenly, Wentworth was no longer anxious to see her.
“Why don’t the Conch just go fer the mother, that’s what I’m wonderin’,” a sailor offered. “She’s beautiful and strong and more closer to his age.” It was Lemmer Harps, who still had both of his hands at this time in his life. One was behind his head at the moment, the other gestured thoughtfully, palm open to the ceiling.
Delaney, usually silent during these stories, this time piped up. “She’s married, Lemmer.”
“No she ain’t!”
“I mean they think she is. She’s from a good family in Mann, remember?”
“No, she ain’t!”
“I don’t mean she is! I mean she wants it that way. To be thunk that.” Delaney wished he hadn’t said anything.
“The Conch don’t care what anyone thinks. He takes what he wants.”
“Well, then, I guess he wants the girl and not the mother,” Sleeve answered. “Let’s get on with the story.”
“I think he should like the mother, is all,” Lemmer said by way of defense. “That’d clear it all up easy.”
“I think it’s you likes the mother,” Sleeve scoffed. “Now shut up.”
“There’s no call fer sayin’ that!” Lemmer retorted. “What I want’s got nothin’ to say about it.”
“Well, I’ll be. Ye really are sweet on her!” Sleeve’s delight was cruel. “Next time we’re in Skaelington, why don’t ye get yerself all fussied up and pay her a visit? Maybe she’ll like ye back.”
The other men crowed, and Lemmer threw his hat at Sleeve. “You shut it now, Spinner! All of ye’s, just shut it right up!”
“You brought it on, fawnin’ over her. ‘She’s beautiful! She’s strong!’ ”
Lemmer rolled out of his hammock, pushed his way toward Sleeve. “I’ll take yer old bones apart fer ye, say one more word!” The other men, lying in their closely arranged hammocks about belt-high to Lemmer, smacked him on the head and the shoulders and pushed him as he bulled through, their hammocks rocking crazily. “I ain’t fawnin’, ye blowhard old coot!”
“All right, I’m shuttin’ up,” Sleeve offered, hands up, as Lemmer approached. “I know better than to get between a man and his one true love.”
Lemmer came at Sleeve now, fists flying. Sleeve just laughed as the other men grabbed, shoved, and pushed Lemmer so that he fell to the floor before he got there. The men hooted and clapped like it was midnight at a barn dance.
“Well, that’s all for tonight!” Ham shouted above the din. Then he added quickly, “More tomorrow if I’ve a mind and you’ve the time!”
“Men get real antsy about their women,” Delaney told the fish. He’d seen it too many times not to notice. It didn’t matter if they were good wives or bad mothers or even bad women. If there was a fight among the men, most likely there was some woman at the root of it. Or if it wasn’t a woman, it was a gold coin. Often it was both combined.
“Aye,” he instructed. “Women and money. That’s pretty much the full range of topics that’ll cause a fight between grown men.”
“Tell me what you bet,” Jenta demanded.
Wentworth’s eyes were all over the back porch and the backyard, from the hibiscus to the ferns, the stone birdbath to the lattice and climbing ivy. Then they went down to his hands. “I’d been drinking. And he had a threatening way.”
“Wentworth. Look at me.”
He did. She did not seem angry.
“Don’t hide,” she told him. “You always hide.”
“What do you mean? I don’t hide.” But he looked down. He couldn’t help it.
“You’re doing it now. You hide from me. You hide from yourself. If you want my help, you will need to quit hiding.”
He forced himself to look her in the eye. “Your help?” The idea that she could help, that she would want to help, had never occurred to him. “Why…would you want to help me?”
She gave him a puzzled look. “We’re married. You’re in trouble. Why wouldn’t I want to help?”
He could think of a thousand reasons. He was the man—he was supposed to be the strong one. But he wasn’t strong. He was pathetic. He’d blackmailed her, he and his father. She married him against her will. He’d bet her in a card game with a pirate. He’d hidden that from her. She’d found out about it from the same pirate. What had he ever done to earn her help? Nothing. But she offered it anyway.
And suddenly, he was overcome by a great rush of strong affection, devotion toward her. “I will duel Conch Imbry,” he declared. “I will prove my love to you.”
She sighed. “You’re hiding again.”
He was crushed. “What? I’m doing nothing of the sort. I’m…taking my obligations seriously.”
She just shook her head. “Tell me the wager.”
This deflated him further. He looked at his hands. “I’m ashamed of it.”
“Well, that’s a start.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You weren’t hiding when you said that.” She marveled. “Have you never been schooled in anything that matters? Every child in Mann knows that confessing and admitting the source of your shame is far more honorable than taking some sort of revenge because of it. It takes courage to face your own weakness. Any idiot with a pistol can die charging into a den of pirates vowing vengeance.”
He wanted to ask her where on earth such things were common knowledge. And then, how could this horrible feeling of exposure ever, by any stretch of the imagination, be called courage? But he said nothing. He just watched her eyes. They were sincere.
“Wentworth.” When she was sure he was there, listening, she said, “I know all about shame.”
He saw a genuine, earnest, gentle person, who cared for him and was willing to share something deep and painful. She didn’t want to be his wife, or desire him in any romantic way. He was sure of that—it was what tormented him. But despite those hard facts, he couldn’t shake the idea that somehow, right now, she truly cared. And this in turn created in him a feeling quite new to him. But he recognized it for what it was.
It was hope.
“Now wait!” Sleeve complained. “Yer not goin’ to make this Wentworth slug into some sort of a hero, are ye? Just when ye got us ready for the Conch to knock the stuffin’s out of him fer a dandy, droolin’ scum?”
“You know the story already?” Ham asked easily. “Why don’t you tell it?”
“Jus’ save us all the weepin’ and repentin’, will ye? Get on with it. Get to the fights!”
“Aye, the fights!” others agreed, though not quite wholeheartedly.
“Well, I suppose some of this may be a bit over some of your heads. But there’s a story to tell here. Truth is, gents, Damrick needs time to rebuild the Gatemen. It’ll be months before we see the battle that settles for all time the row between Conch and his pirates and Damrick and his Gatemen.”
Moaning and other sounds of distress rose from around the room. “Months?” and “You gotta be kiddin’!” and “Just forget the whole fire-blasted story, then, and tell us somethin’ else.”
“Whoa, now. I’m not saying it’ll take that long to tell it. Why, all I have to say is, ‘It was nearly a year later, when…’ and then we’re there. What I’m saying is there’s some story left between here and there. If I just jumped forward to the fight, how could others know the roles some of you men played there on the island of Cabeeb when it all happened? Delaney. Mutter. Spinner. Even Mr. Trum, and the younger Mr. Trum. You all played your parts.”
“I’ll tell that!” Dallis Trum suggested.
“Tell a word and I’ll pickle yer hind end and leave ye to rot in the larder!” Sleeve roared.
“Okay then, I won’t,” Dallis Trum pouted.
“Now gents.” Smoke mingled with Ham’s words, and both drifted lazily through the forecastle. “You can’t dock a ship afore arriving to harbor, can you? No, you can’t,” he answered himself. His voice kept rhythm with the creaking of the timber, the rocking of the ship. “For you need to sail the whole journey, one league after the next, and arrive to port at the end.”
A confused silence followed. Then Sleeve said, “Aye, but we want to hear the fight.”
Ham was patient. “A story is a journey, Spinner. That’s what I’m saying. You can look at the chart of the seas and plot a course, but that ain’t the same as actually sailing, is it? Just so, saying there’s a fight coming is like looking at the charts and planning the voyage all the way to the destined harbor. Don’t mean you’re there yet.”
“But there ain’t no charts and no seas,” Sleeve complained. “There’s jus’ you tellin’ us a story. And we want to hear the fight.”
The others now agreed.
“Think about it. In sailing, you have a big sheet of canvas, thick and heavy, and you catch something invisible, naught but air, and it moves your ship. In storytelling, it’s memories and fantasies you catch in an invisible sail, and they push your imaginary ship right along. Too much canvas in a stiff wind, and you’ll lay her on her beam-ends, and there goes the ship. Too much canvas in a light wind and your sails luff and flap, and you go nowhere. Same with a story. And gents, you’re simply asking me for too much sail.”
“That’s ’cause yer givin’ us nothin’ but wind!”
Laughter.
“All right then. I can’t tell the fight just yet, but I can tell you how it smoldered, and what all was at stake, which will make for a bigger, better fight when it comes. For this was a fight started long before Jenta could be persuaded to say ‘I do’ for a second time.” Ham watched the smoke from his pipe rise as the questions came fast and furious.
“Wait! Jenta gets married again?”
“To who?”
“She marries Damrick, ye oaf! Right, Ham?”
“Damrick? Yer crazy. It’s the Conch gets her!”
“Aye, Conch gets her next, ain’t that right?”
“Hold on, what happens to Wentworth?”
“Wentworth’s a wetmop! Conch’s got her in his aim, Wentworth’s good as gone!”
When they finally calmed, Ham said, “Well, if you’ll all see fit to let me tell it, we’ll all find out together, now, won’t we?”
“And so I went all in,” Wentworth concluded. “Both our wedding rings on the table. And this absurd proposition, that he could have you whenever I no longer wanted you, that was there in the bargain as well.” As he unburdened the truth, amazingly, he began to feel somehow stronger. Not in a proud way, not at all. He knew the damage being done even as he spoke, and every word hurt him as it hurt her. But he felt like he was facing something that had cowed him and strangled him, but that was losing its power over him now.
“You told my mother that it wasn’t a bargain.”
“Were you listening?”
“Yes, from inside.” She didn’t seem the least bit embarrassed by it.
He nodded. He could not fault her for it. “It was a bargain as much as a bet. I lied to your mother about that.”
“You were hiding.”
He thought about that. “Jenta, I know I’m not the man you want me to be. I’m not even the man I want to be.”
“Then be that man. Become what you want to be.”
“It’s not that simple.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t know how!” he snapped.
She watched him, not backing off, waiting.
He sighed. He looked away, off into a distance only he could see. Then he looked down at his hands. “I tell myself I won’t, but I do it anyway.”
“Have you ever prayed?” she asked.
The forecastle filled with grumbling again.
“Now you lot,” Ham told them, “you don’t know much about this sort of thing, and I can tell you don’t want to hear about it from me. But such things happen in this world. People don’t only turn to doing bad, you know. They also turn to doing good. And here’s the part of our story where a man tries going the other way. My own daddy was a priest on the Nearing Plains, and so I’ve seen it happen more than once. I know how it goes.”
There was silence.
“All right, I won’t give you the particulars. You want to hear it, you come to me sometime and ask. But I’ll tell all you this much, there was prayers involved, and there was readings from the Holy Scriptures. For our girl Jenta had been raised right in that regard. Shayla, her mother, didn’t abide by such things, having been treated unkindly by church-people her whole life. Still, she sent Jenta off to Church School every Sunday. Because that’s what the fine people did. And there, Jenta learned a thing or two she never did forget.”
“Like what?” young Dallis asked.
Ham paused. “If I was to wager that the Trum brothers saw the inside of a church many a Sunday morning, would I win that bet?”
Dallis glanced over at Kreg. Kreg shrugged. “Sure. But we didn’t learn nothin’ we didn’t never did forget. Did we, Kreg?”
“Nothin’.”
“Ah. I see. Well, you might be surprised at the sort of things get tucked into the nooks and crannies of a young person’s mind at church. Big things, stuck in there good and tight, just waiting for a moment when they might work their way out again.”
The boys were silent, roaming their own nooks and crannies, wondering what might pop out.
“We get it.” Sleeve sighed. “She talked religion. Then what?”
“Well, what happened was, Wentworth began to change. He quit his drinking.”
“I knowed it! That’s always the first step on the road to righteous ruin!”
Laughter.
“Wentworth stayed home,” Ham continued, “since pubs and dance halls tend to appeal most to those who imbibe most, and tend to lose their appeal most for those who imbibe least. So he and Jenta had their quiet time of courtship after all, just as was planned.
“At first no one quite believed that Wentworth had changed for the better, and then that he’d changed for the better for good. But after a while, when he kept on staying sober, when a new thoughtfulness crept into his ways, when he not only went to church, but to Prayer Meeting of a Wednesday, and then to Men’s Breakfast of a Friday morning, and as weeks turned to months and a kind of gentleman began to emerge from the wreckage of a squandered youth, well, the whole city began to marvel. And they rightly gave full credit to Jenta Stillmithers. She had been the toast of the Summer’s Eve Ball, but now as autumn approached, she was the toast of the town. Even Shayla was amazed. But then again, so was Jenta, for while she had opened up the Scriptures for Wentworth because she knew them, and she knew he needed them, truly she had not expected anything like this result. So pretty much everyone was just pleased as punch. Everyone, that is, but the Conch.”
“Here we go,” Sleeve sniffed. “Finally!”
“Indeed. And the Conch had good reason to be displeased. Not only did Wentworth’s turnaround threaten what was a very good hand of pirate’s poker, it very quickly became a threat to his livelihood as well.”
“I don’t understand this column, Father,” Wentworth said, looking at the ledger open before him. “What are all these payments to an entity called ‘Protection Fund’?”
Runsford Ryland looked up from his papers, peered over his eyeglasses. His son stood at the other side of his huge desk, paging through a thick book of accounts. “It’s a hedge against trouble,” he told his son. “An account to defray the risks of business on the high seas, particularly in these perilous times.”
“It’s an extraordinary amount. Let’s see…ten percent. Ten percent…” He did the calculations in his head, his finger running down the numbers. “Almost fifteen percent on this one.” Then he looked up. “You’re setting aside over ten percent of your revenues from every cargo contract. Not profits, but revenues. This must be one of our largest categories of cost.”
“It is.”
“Who manages this fund? How is it drawn down?”
Runsford took off his glasses and leaned back. “You’re eager to learn all about the business. I’m glad to see it, finally.”
“You’ve given me a fleet to manage, and I intend to do it well.”
An accountant entered quietly, handing Runsford Ryland a sheaf of paper. “That pleases me greatly,” the father said to his son. “It’s only three ships, but I think it will give you every experience you’ll face managing all seventy-four of them one day.” He glanced at the paper. “Oops, I misspoke. It’s now seventy-five!”
“Congratulations.” Wentworth looked pleased, but then a sudden sadness crossed his face.
“What is it, son?”
“I’ve wasted so much time, and caused so much harm to so many. You the most. I want to make up for that now.”
Now the father rose and walked around the desk, put a hand on his son’s shoulder. “You’re a Ryland. I knew one day you’d come around. There’s no sense looking back.” He closed the ledger with his other hand. “All these details will be understood soon enough.” He tucked the book under his arm as he steered Wentworth toward the door. “To understand them aright, though, you must see them in the broadest possible context. How a business wins its permits from the government, and how the government keeps the peace. Only by understanding the large levers that are pulled by those with power can you begin to realize all that must be done to ensure that the stream of gold coins continues to find its way into these Ryland accounts.” He held up the ledger. “Let’s meet at lunch, and we’ll talk about these larger things.”
“I’d like that very much.”
Runsford patted his son’s shoulder.
“May I take that, please? I’d like to study it further.”
“Oh, yes.” He handed it to his son slowly. “We’ll talk at noon.”
Runsford Ryland went back to his work. Five minutes later he looked up and saw, through the glass window of his private office, his son deep in conversation with an accountant. The two of them were studying a column of figures. The accountant was jabbering on, looking somewhat frightened, somewhat apologetic. Wentworth’s brow was furrowed. Then the son raised his head, a faraway look in his eye. He turned as though drawn, and met the gaze of his father.
Wentworth’s look was blank. Runsford’s look was grim. Then Wentworth lowered his eyes back to the book. He thanked the chattering accountant, and walked out of the office building, carrying the book with him.
“He’s doing what?” Jenta asked him that evening, pouring warm tea over shaved ice.
Wentworth was downcast. The book of accounts was open on the side table next to the small sofa in the cottage. “Paying pirates. Father told me at lunch that all the shipping lines do it.”
“But I don’t understand. Paying them for what?”
“Protection, is what they call it.”
“Protection from what?”
“Pirates.”
“Paying pirates to protect them from pirates?”
“Yes.”
She finished pouring. “Then it’s blackmail.”
Wentworth felt a pang. He knew all about his father’s propensity for blackmail. “Technically, it’s extortion. But it’s even worse than that. We’re paying them so that they raid the other lines instead.”
“But you said all the lines do it.” She set the pitcher on the table beside the book.
“Yes, and whoever pays the most gets raided the least.”
“That’s…crazy.” She sat beside him. “Your father approves of this?”
“Not at the core of it—he hates it. But he does it. And the story gets worse. Conch Imbry has reinvested his share.”
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that the most famous pirate on the seas is a partner in the family business.”
“Then your father must want it this way.”
“Of course not. He says he doesn’t like it any more than anyone else. But what can be done? He has merchant ships, not a navy. And there’s no government force here that can or will stop Conch Imbry.”
“Why not appeal to the King of Nearing Vast? Don’t all these lines do business there?”
“I asked the same question. But the answer, apparently, is uglier still.”
She looked at him in silence. “The king already knows about it.”
He nodded. “And his ministers profit by it.”
She furrowed her brow. “You mean pirates pay taxes?”
“I mean those who should be stopping it take bribes. Conch Imbry is apparently not just the wealthiest pirate on the seas, but one of the wealthiest men on earth. He has a cache of hidden gold that would make the king’s exchequer look paltry.”
She just shook her head. “What will you do?”
He looked at her with astonished eyes. “Me? How am I to know what to do? In the last weeks I’ve found my feet, thanks to you. I’ve stood up, for the first time in my life. I’ve been able to feel what it might be like to be a good man, a good husband, a good businessman. I’ve left behind me all the shame of my own indiscretions. But now, with clear eyes and a clear mind, I find I am part of a vast, bloody enterprise that profits by terrorizing the innocent. Ryland Shipping & Freight is apparently one small arm of Piracy, Incorporated.”
She put a hand on his hand, and he immediately turned his palm up and grasped hers. He squeezed, looked into her eyes with a frightening urgency. “It’s nothing but deceit and conniving, with murder and robbery all mixed in, rising up to the highest levels.”
“And so,” she asked again, more firmly, “what will you do?”
He let go of her hand and looked out the window, down the length of the manicured, rolling lawn, seeing nothing. “I have no earthly idea. I was better off drunk.”
“Don’t ever say that.”
“But I feel it.” He looked back at her. “And I’m not hiding. What answers does your Scripture book have?” He said it in resignation, not expecting an answer.
“It’s not my book,” she answered darkly. “Though I’m pleased to lay some claim to it.”
“I’m sorry. I just doubt there’s a chapter in there headed, ‘When Daddy Is a Pirate.’ ”
“Maybe not. But we could go see someone who knows the book better than I do.”
“Who?”
“A priest, of course.”
“You know any?”
“Of course. And so do you.”
“Yes. But not any I’d trust with this bit of news.”
“You think that even the priests in this town—”
“Wait. There is one. One I’ve heard about, who has a history with pirates.”
“What sort of history?”
“Just the right sort, I think.”