Chapter 22

 

Reena stared at herself in the looking glass, the dark shadows under her eyes evidence of her restless night. A few years past, she could stay up all night and not appear worse for wear. But no longer. She was aging. She turned her head slightly and smiled. Tiny lines formed at the edge of her eyes and mouth. Bilge water! They seemed to have grown overnight. As did the slight droop of her right eyelid and the bland color of her skin. She pinched her cheeks, bringing forth a pinkish bloom that had always been present not long ago.

Leaning over, she splashed water on her face from the basin Michael had brought early that morning. She patted it with a towel then opened a jar and applied some lavender-scented cream she’d purchased from an apothecary on Barbados—a rather expensive cream that didn’t appear to be doing any good. How long would her youthful beauty last? With the wind, sun, and salt of the Caribbean, she'd seen women twice as beautiful as she crinkle up like used parchment by the time they were thirty.

Which was precisely why she needed to find the Fountain of Youth. She had no intention of growing old…losing her comely face and eventually dying. Not that her beauty was doing any good with Freddy. Stubborn fool! She saw the desire and affection in his eyes. Blast his religion!

A knock preceded Jo entering with a freshly-cleaned shirt and breeches for Reena. Being the only other woman aboard, Reena counted on her to assist in cleaning her clothing, particularly her underthings. While Jo closed the door and laid the garments on the bed, Reena took the opportunity to study the woman. “How old are you, Jo?” Though Reena knew she had to be in her thirties.

Jo looked up at her curiously. “Let me think. ’Tis been ten years since my husband died an’ two years since ye rescued me from that brothel. So my guess is three an’ thirty.”

Approaching the lady, Reena raised a hand to touch her cheek. “May I?”

Jo flinched at first, but then nodded, and Reena gently rubbed her thumb over the woman's soft skin. Wrinkles had formed around her eyes, and there was a slight indentation curving around the sides of her mouth, but otherwise, there was no indication of her age. With a round, but pleasant face and plain brown eyes, she was not uncomely, but no beauty either. In addition, she had neither name nor fortune, but ’twas obvious Brodie found her highly desirable.

“What is your opinion of this Fountain of Youth?” Reena made her way to her bed and took off her nightdress.

“I think it be a grand idea, Cap’n. After my husband were killed, the only way I could survive were by marrying agin, but I were not young or comely ’nough to git a man wit’ wealth.” She shrugged, but Reena heard the bitterness in her voice. “Ye knows the rest.”

Indeed, Reena did, and ’twas not a pretty story. She tossed her shirt over her head, then stepped into her breeches and tucked it in. She could have helped Jo if she’d found the Fount sooner. She still could help the woman—and many others as well.

Jo crossed arms over her chest and leaned back against Reena’s desk. “Men be sich brutes. Jist due to their physical strength, they think they can rule o’er us…tha’ our softness makes us weaker than them. The only weapon we possess be beauty or…or…” She shuddered.

“Or piracy,” Reena added with a smile as she put on her waistcoat and tied up the front.

Fred bobbed his head up and down. “A pirate’s life fer me!”

Jo chuckled. “I ’ave ye to thank fer that power. I will not be used agin by any man thanks t’ ye. And if ye allow it, I'd love to partake o’ this Fountain of Youth. I may not be as comely as ye, Cap’n, but wit’ youth an’ strength, I can be independent an’ make my own fortune.”

Reena had not realized until this moment how bitter and angry Jo was. Not that she could blame her. She’d suffered under male dominance her entire life. As the eldest of ten, her father had used her to care for the other children, to cook and clean and slave away at home. Then her husband had used her in the same way. Jo had revealed theirs was not a happy match. And then, of course, the men on the street had used her to satisfy their lust.

The brig pitched and plunged over a wave, complaining with grates and groans.

Lowering to sit on her bed, Reena slipped on her boots, then rose and grabbed her baldric. When she looked back up, Jo stared into the cabin, her face a contortion of angst. Sorrow for the lady tugged at Reena’s heart. What could living forever offer one so bitter? Wouldn’t this world make Jo more and more angry as the years passed? Did bitterness have an end, or would it eventually destroy her soul and leave her naught but an empty carcass—forever? Mayhap, in that case, death would be a welcome reprieve.

She didn't have time to think about it further when a knock on the door and her “enter” brought in Antoine, his two lackeys, along with Abraham, Sedley, and Brodie.

“I wish to see the map again, s'il vous plaît.” Antoine marched to her desk, halted, and rubbed his temples, where, no doubt, a headache brewed from his overindulgence in rum the night before. In truth, she was surprised he was awake this early. The reek of stale rum mixed with his lemon pomade in a rather putrid scent that wrinkled her nose.

“Death and damnation shall be yours!” Fred cackled.

“Hush your feathers, Fred.” Grabbing a slice of melon from her desk, she flung it at the bird. Then smiling sweetly at Antoine, she plucked both maps from her waistcoat pocket. “Of course.” Circling her desk, she spread them out in the sunlight spearing in through the windows.

Brodie moved to stand beside Jo while Abraham and Sedley inched closer.

She pointed to a land mass on the second map. “This is Montserrat. I’m sure of it.” She spread out her chart of the Caribbean and laid it side by side. “See? And here is Saint Lucia where we just were. So, this must be Martinique.”

Sedley scratched his head. “But that be French again.”

“Thank you, Sedley. I am aware.” She glared at the man, also aware he couldn’t be trusted.

Antoine nodded, releasing a sigh. “Oui, bien sûr. It does appear to be one and the same.” He dipped his head to the right and left as if trying to dislodge his headache. “Mais, this riddle. It makes no sense.” He waved at it, then groaned as if the effort pained him.

Reena hid her smile at his discomfort.

 

“Fallen fallen before his time

Ne’er remembered by his kind

What you seek is with the dead

If you dare to disturb the red.”

“No doubt it refers to someone who has died,” Antoine offered.

“Precisely.” Reena nodded. “I'm guessing we’ll find what we seek in a graveyard.”

A ray of sunlight oscillated over the map, spinning glittering dust in its path as if agreeing with her assessment.

Abraham humphed.

Reena looked up at him. “You wish to comment?”

“Der has t’ be dozens of graveyards on dat island.”

“Aye, but this small red X is on Fort Royal. How many graveyards could there be in one city?”

Fred bobbed his head up and down. “Dead men tell no tales.”

Brodie crossed his arms over his chest. “But e’en if we dae fin’ the right graveyard, who are we lookin’ fer?”

Michael scurried in, cup of hot chocolate in hand and a smile on his face.

Taking it, Reena thanked him and took a sip. Heaven. Now, maybe she could deal with these naysayers.

The young lad leaned over her map as the brig angled to port. Her quill pen rolled across the desk, and he picked it up and gestured toward the riddle. “Weren’t there a pirate who died long ago whose name was ‘Red’ something?”

“Wasn’t there a pirate,” Reena corrected him. But the lad had a point.

Brodie rubbed the back of his neck. “It haes to be Crimson Jack.”

“Crimson Jacque?” Antoine seemed to suddenly wake up. “Oui, Heard many tales about him. A good French pirate!”

“Aye, he captured more prizes and gathered more treasure in the Caribbean in his day than any other pirate since.” Reena had always been jealous of the man.

“Aye, ’eard ’e were a fearsome bloke,” Sedley commented, sharing an odd glance with Antoine.

“But him died o’er sixty years back,” Abraham said.

Jo shook her head. “The poor man ne’er reached ’is thirtieth year.”

“A true shame.” Reena sipped her chocolate, balancing on the shifting deck. “But ’tis his tomb we are seeking. Thank you, Michael.”

The lad smiled but then shook his head. “Not a good idea to dig up a grave, Captain. Danger awaits you, I’m sure of it.”

“Mere superstitions, lad.” Reena batted his words away, but in truth, they disturbed her. The boy was rarely wrong, if ever.

“I don’t understand,” Jo pursed her lips. “Word was ’e were hung for piracy then chained in the gibbet on Martinique. Pirates don’t get proper burials.”

“Nay. ’Tis true.” Reena let out a ragged sigh and placed one hand on her hip. “How are we to find him, then? And why would the man who hid these maps have visited a pirate’s grave with his lady love?”

Antoine raised a cultured brow. “Do you not know, mademoiselle? Ah, non, you couldn’t. He’s French and we French love to pass on tales of our own. His wife begged the governor for her husband’s bones. After the birds had pecked them clean, that is.” He fingered the beard on his chin. “The story goes that she gave him a proper burial under the name Jacque Bonhomme, which was his real name.”

Brodie lifted his flask in a mock toast. “Tha’ haes to be it, then.”

Reena stared at the map. “But it still doesn’t explain why the pirate would visit such a place with his lady.”

“Looks like we’s come t’ the end of yuh’s quest.” Abraham crossed his meaty arms over his chest and smiled.

Reena snorted. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

Jo leaned on the desk. “I say we should seek ’is grave. There may be another clue there.”

“Agreed.” Reena straightened and raised her shoulders.

Sedley grinned his approval.

Abraham frowned.

Michael’s brow wrinkled. “I still don’t think it’s a good idea, Captain.”

Antoine squeezed the bridge of his nose, sunlight glittering off the jewels on his fingers. “Shall we be about it, then? I'm anxious to find the next map, ma chérie.”

“Never fear, Antoine. I have already set our course to Martinique. We shall be there by nightfall.”

Fred let out a shrill twitter. “Cursed be them who disturb the dead.”

 

♥♥♥

 

Frederick turned the page in the Bible to Romans 8, one of his favorite chapters. Thus far, only Michael sat at his feet listening to the holy words, but it did not escape Frederick’s notice that several of the sailors leaned their ear toward him on occasion.

The Reckless leapt over a wave, showering him with salty spray. Fitting, since the word of God was described as living water and its people as salt.

Frederick had spent a difficult night filled with nightmarish visions, most of which had been swept away by dawn's light. But one in particular would not leave him be. ’Twas a vision of Reena walking through a thick jungle along with several of her crew. She crept forward, shoving aside foliage, and stepped into a small clearing. Instantly she sank, the soft sand folding around her feet, then her legs, and finally her torso. A look of horror etched across her face as she yelled for help and reached for her crew standing around her. But they merely stared at her as if some natural thing were occurring and she wasn't about to be swallowed whole. In the vision, Frederick knew he was the only one who could help her, the only one who could grab ahold of her—that, somehow, he had been chosen for the task.

Gripping the thick branch of a nearby tree with one hand, he reached out for her with the other.

“Grab hold, Reena! Grab hold and let me draw you into the light.” The “drawing into the light” made no sense, but she reached for him anyway. Her hand floated midair toward his, fingertip to fingertip…when he suddenly woke, heart spinning in his chest.

His first thought was that Reena was in immediate danger. But after he found Michael below deck and inquired about her, the lad said she was perfectly well. Abraham had left the cabin early so Frederick returned to pray. He prayed for the enemy to release this woman, for her safety and protection, prayed that if the dream had continued, and she had grabbed hold of him, that she wouldn’t have dragged him beneath the sand along with her.

“I'm not strong enough, Lord. She has too tight a grasp on my heart. Please free me from her. Find someone else to rescue her. I am too much like my father.”

After his prayer, several minutes passed in silence, save for the purl of water against the hull. No word from above, no inner voice, not even a sense of God’s presence. But then, a beam of light struck his face from the porthole, shifting over it with the movement of the ship, and he heard in his spirit, Indeed, you are just like your father…your heavenly Father!

That one sentence had spurred him to grab his Bible and head on deck, where he now sat reading his Bible to a very excited Michael. He began reading Romans 8. “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.”

One of the sailors—was his name Mack?—stopped reeling in the line he held and turned to face him. “Did ye say no condemnation? Like it don't matter that I killed people an’ stole their goods?”

Sunlight tossed the man’s dark hair around him as sails above thundered to catch the wind.

“That's exactly what it says.” Frederick nodded, excitement stirring within him. “But only if you put your faith in Jesus and follow Him the rest of your days. He forgives every wrong thing you've ever done. God’s Spirit comes to live inside of you, and you become a new person. And then when you die you are escorted into heaven.”

The sailor chuckled and rubbed his sleeve over his mouth. “Me? Escorted into heaven? Now that's something I ne’er thought to see.”

Another sailor beside him elbowed him “Ye ain’t goin’ t’ no heaven, Mack. Ye'd ruin it fer all them saints up there.” He laughed and others joined him.

But Michael was beaming. And Frederick felt as light as the foam atop the waves.

“Keep reading.” Michael gestured toward the holy book.

Happy to oblige, Frederick raised his voice a little higher this time, hoping more sailors would hear. But by the time he finished reading the chapter, no one else had said a thing. No matter. Seeds were planted. He closed the Bible and looked up to find Abraham standing a short distance away, smiling at him.

Reena leapt on deck, scanned the brig, her gaze briefly landing on Frederick before calling Abraham to the quarterdeck. As usual, she was a vision of feminine ferocity, and he couldn’t help but smile. Aye, he’d been angry at her last night. But ’twas hard to stay angry at someone when you prayed for them.

Michael scurried to his duties, leaving Frederick to put away the Bible, grip the railing, and stare across the wild turquoise sea. Antoine’s two ships kept pace with them just off their starboard quarter. But aside from them, morning sun glittered gold atop waves as far as his eye could see.

Did he truly believe what he had just told Mack—that God's Spirit lived inside of him and made him a new creature? Then why did Frederick struggle with so many wrong desires? Why wasn't he getting any better? Yet…wasn’t God giving him dreams and visions again? Would the Almighty do that for someone who wasn't His child, who hadn’t at least changed a bit?

He thought of the city of Castries and all the good his and Reena's parents had done there. Transforming the place from a cesspool into one where families felt safe to roam the streets at night. He knew his father had changed, but for some reason Frederick could not get over the violence of his conception…the horror his mother must've suffered, and how he'd been brought into the world—not by two people who loved each other, who were committed to each other by the sacred covenant of marriage. He was an accident, born out of lust and violence.

Reena suddenly appeared beside him. Her unbound hair fluttered in the wind behind her, the long ribbons of her head scarf trickled—along with her hair—over the hilt of the sword at her side. Several knives and a pistol peeked at him from her baldric. But it was the alluring smile she cast his way that heated his insides.

“Good day, Freddy. I see you've been instructing my pirates in the ways of God. Have a care or they might join you in your missionary work, and I’ll be left without a crew.”

“That would please me greatly, Reena.” He grinned at her, but all he longed to do was take her in his arms, embrace her, kiss her, shake some sense into her.

The Reckless crested a wave, white foam exploding over her bow. With every stitch of canvas spread, she flew through the sea on yet another grand adventure, without a care in the world. Or so it seemed from the excited look in Reena’s eyes as she scanned the horizon. Finally she faced him.

“I'm surprised you're not angry at me for not taking you to Kingston right away.” Wind snapped hair in her face, and she brushed it away. “I must say, in that regard, you're not like the old Freddy at all. That vicious temper of yours oft made an appearance, especially when you didn't get your way.”

Frederick couldn’t help but smile. Hadn’t he just been wondering if he had changed? And here the Lord was giving him confirmation—from the most unlikely of sources. “I apologize for those moments, Reena. ’Twas not fair to you. But you may thank God for the change in me.”

“Mayhap I will…when I get around to talking to Him again.” She smiled. “So, have you resigned yourself to join me in my quest?”

Frederick tore his gaze from hers, not wanting to crush her hopeful tone, not wanting to see her pain when he said what he needed to say. “Nay, since you will not take me to Kingston, I will disembark at Martinique and find my own passage there.” ’Twas the best solution he could come up with during the long night. Either that or take over the brig. And he couldn’t do that to Reena.

“Surely you can't mean that.” Her brow furrowed. “’Tis a French port and hence, dangerous.

“Then why are you going?” He raised a brow.

“You know why.” Her lips flattened as the deck canted, and she gripped the railing. “If I find this map and then the next, I will know the location of the Fount.”

“And what of Kingston?”

“I’ll have plenty of time to get to the Fount and then to Kingston.”

“’Tis a gamble, and you know it. How can you leave those people to suffer?”

She shrugged and stared across the sea. “I don't believe much of what Antoine says, and even if it were true, I have every intention of warning them. In truth”—her eyes met his again, and he balked at the pain he saw in them—“I simply don't wish to go there and have you leave me.”

“I am going to leave you, regardless, Reena, as I have said.”

Pain fizzled across her expression, and she lowered her gaze to the foamy water reaching for them up the hull. A single tear appeared beneath her long lashes, but the wind tore it away. Finally, she threw back her shoulders, and was about to say something when a shout came from the tops.

“A sail! A sail!”

“Where away?” Reena shouted, already heading toward the quarterdeck.

“One point off the larboard bow!”

“Two sets of sail!” Blared from above.

Plucking the scope from her belt, Reena held it to her eye and shifted it in that direction. A look of horror, followed by shock, turned her face white.

Frederick dashed up to her. “Who is it, Reena?”

“’Tis my father's ship, the Redemption.”

Grabbing the spyglass, he lifted it to his eye. “A brig follows her. My father’s. The Restitution.”