Ransom (13 page)

“Would you like me to review the rules?”

“That’s not necessary.” Adrian had taken far too much pleasure in his first recitation of his ‘rules,’ and there was no hope of forgetting them. “I am to do exactly as you tell me, without resistance, or my shipmates will suffer, isn’t that correct?”

Adrian relaxed a trifle. “Essentially, yes.”

Archer bent his head over his plate and made his face a studied blank. Was this weird feeling the sort of thing that had compelled Marshall to defy Adrian at the gratings? It was not courage; he was sure of that, now. Perhaps it was some bastard offspring of fear. He felt as though he had been so frightened for so long that the emotion had burned out like a carbonized lampwick.

It left him feeling curiously free, and the sensation was most unsettling, since the situation really was dangerous. Even if he no longer cared what happened to himself, the others were depending on him. He had to tread carefully; Adrian seemed to sense that something in the balance of power between them had undergone a subtle shift.

“The question is,” Adrian said abruptly, “can I trust you?”

Trust?
Detachment deserted him as sudden rage fought to answer.
How dare you ask me that!
Archer was grateful for the past years’ practice in disciplining his emotions. If he showed anger, or even laughed, there would be hell to pay. But to play the craven...

He took a breath instead, and met the colorless eyes. “Not even for an instant,” he said levelly. “But my shipmates can.”

~

Supplemental Log, HMS Calypso, in for repair, Portsmouth. Lt. Anthony Drinkwater, in temporary command. 23-7-1799

No further news.

~

Night and day, and now night again. The North Star vanished into the same clouds that had swallowed the moon. Before long, there was nothing to be seen through the little port but darkness as deep as that inside the room. Marshall let his head droop against the louvers and wondered how much risk he would really be running if he let himself sleep for a few minutes.

Except it wouldn’t be a few minutes. If he fell asleep now, he would not wake before morning. Unless his four-legged messmates woke him. They were livelier at night, it seemed; from the sound of it, they were holding a party in the far corner.

They can’t keep me in here forever.

Oh, no? Why not?

I wonder if it’s true that talking to oneself is a sign of madness. Or is that only true when one starts to answer?

“I’m just tired, that’s all,” he said aloud. The party in the corner fell suddenly silent at the sound. “If you don’t take your festivities elsewhere,” he warned, “I’ll sing to you.” There, that ought to frighten them. He enjoyed singing, but his more musical shipmates had complained that he could never hit the same note twice, so he generally restrained himself.

I wonder if making idle threats to rodents is a sign of anything.
Frustration, for certain.

He wondered whether he would have any chance of getting to Davy or the Captain if he used the metal scrap he’d found to pry loose the door of this locker. If he could do it. Far more likely he’d just attract the attention of whoever was guarding the door; he had no doubt someone was out there. And they’d just take the tool away. Better to wait until he was back in the cell—unless, God forbid, it began to look like he’d be here indefinitely.

At least he had water, now. He celebrated the fact by raising a half-cup. He was trying to ration it out, not knowing how long it would have to last, and had only drunk about a third of the bucket’s contents. For the time being, his stomach had stopped expecting anything else; he didn’t feel hungry anymore, just listless. Not a serious problem. Yet. There had been days in the Horse Latitudes, when the ship was becalmed, when the whole crew had lasted five days with nothing but rainwater, and it had been hotter during the day there, and colder at night.
And I have no duties to keep me busy; I can rest.

He’d had his fill of resting.

He tried stretching, just to remind himself how it felt, and discovered his back really couldn’t move comfortably just yet. When it was light he might lie down on the floor full-length for a little while, rats be damned.

But the pain was worth it. For all he knew, Smith might already have an insurrection organized. Well, no, probably not; not this soon. At best, a crewman or two might be considering whether their luck was coming to an end, and weighing the Captain’s reputation against what they knew of their current commander. Most would probably stick with what they knew rather than take a chance; that was true of people in general.

He had exaggerated—though not by much—when he told Archer that Smith would take control of the ship. All they really needed was to get a boat over the side. They wouldn’t need many confederates. Someone to unlock the cell doors in the wee hours might be all that would be required—a handful of men on watch, who could escape with them and help row the boat.

Escape.

For some reason, he kept thinking of Archer, remembering the stricken look on Davy’s face as the guards had taken him away. What was worrying him so? Yes, being separated was unpleasant, but hardly the end of the world. Of course, Davy didn’t know that all they’d done was lock him up here; he might be imagining the worst. For all Marshall knew, Adrian might have said he was going to put him on the rack, or some other outlandish threat.

Or was it that outlandish? Yes, of course; he was tired, he was not thinking clearly. If anything really hideous had been done to the other folk who’d been abducted, Captain Smith would surely have said something, or at least would have seemed more concerned. He had sounded more angry than worried.

But that was before they were brought aboard, before Adrian started his power games. The whole situation had changed very suddenly, from nearly unbelievable to painfully grim. This business of the “escape attempt” that apparently never happened—was it because they were Royal Navy? Had Adrian realized the stakes had been raised, and responded with a preemptive attack? Too many questions, and no answers, and Marshall knew his mind was too foggy to make sense of any of them. There were only two questions that mattered, really: what was happening to David and Captain Smith...
and when in God’s name are they going to let me out of here?

Return to TOC

Smith opened his eyes in the darkness. Had there been a sound? The lantern outside the door was so dim it barely gave any light, but he saw a faint silhouette at the bars. “Cap’n?”

“Yes.” Not one of his own men; pity. But not that snake of a pirate, either. Smith climbed out of the cot and approached the door warily. “What is it? And where’s your watchdog?”

“Gone to the ‘ead with a bellyache. ‘E’ll be awhile. I wanted to ask you about what you said the other night.”

Smith recognized the man; it was the one who had reported his initial offer to Adrian. Bert, the other guard had called him. Bert, who apparently was Adrian’s right-hand man. Or was he? “What of it? I do not propose to see my men mistreated again because your captain is bored.”

“At’s what I wanted to talk to you about, sir. The Cap’n’s got us all in deeper’n I ever signed on for.”

“What did you sign on for?” Adrian could hardly punish Marshall or Archer if one of his own men were loquacious. No, belay that; he could and would do anything he thought he could get away with, regardless of what any of them said or did. “Abduction seems a risky line of work.”

“I signed on because nobody else’d take on a man on the run from a charge o’ thievery. We had a hangin’ captain, an’ I’ve got a wife an’ two kids.”

“What did you steal?”

“Not a damn thing, Cap’n. But the goddamn crooked purser said different, an’ him bein’ a warrant officer an’ me a gunner’s mate, who’d you think they listened to? Cap’n Adrian, ‘e’s got a whole crew o’ men with black marks on ‘em, and most earned ‘em fair.”

“Why?”

“This damn’ ransom business. ‘E wanted men as wouldn’t care about stickin’ it to the nobs. It was funny, at first—’e kidnapped ‘imself to make sure it’d work.”

“He what?” Smith could hardly believe his ears. “Are you telling me that the first abduction was a test?”

“Yessir. An’ it worked. But the cargo’s honest, mostly.”

“What is it?”

“Gunpowder. The pay’s good.”

“Because it’s a risky cargo.” And vital to the war, so his crew would have protection from impressment. Shrewd. And it spoke of influence, that he could get a contract for shipping powder. Everything he’d just heard confirmed Smith’s original estimate of Adrian. “And you want out. Why now?”

The man chewed his lip. “Cap’n, I’ve wanted out since the first time somebody got killed. A coachman, ‘e was, tryin’ to protect ‘is lady. Takin’ money from them’s got more’n they need, that’s one thing. Like Robin Hood, and the crew gets shares, same as with a prize ship. But this...” He shook his head. “Even Cap’n Adrian’s partner left a couple months back. Least, Cap’n said ‘e left. Disappeared one night when we were in port. ‘E might’ve left on ‘is own.”

But, his expression said, he might have gone over the side in the dead of night, with a weight at his feet. “So the situation is deteriorating—I mean, it’s getting worse,” he explained, when the man frowned.

“A lot worse. And I think you’ve got ‘im worried, too.”

“Good.” It was no more than a fair exchange. Smith was inclined to believe this man; his years of command had developed a certain intuition regarding crewmen, and this one felt more honest than his helpful, pigtailed shipmate. Besides, there was no need for such an elaborate story, and it made sense, which was a first on this mad ship. “What about my men?”

“Well, the tall one with the mouth on ‘im—” Smith had to suppress a smile at the description, “— Cap’n’s put ‘im in the sail locker night before last, no food or water, that’s for you talkin’ on deck. I dunno when ‘e’s gettin’ out, I think the Cap’n’s forgotten ‘e’s in there. But I took ‘im some water yesterday, an’ you wouldn’t believe it, ‘e’d cleaned the place up.”

That definitely had the ring of truth to it. Good to know that Marshall was fit enough to engage in such activity. “And Archer?”

“Cap’n’s ‘ad ‘im up for dinner, two, three times now. Supposed to make the other lad jealous...” He frowned, seeming about to say something more.

It was no news that Adrian was the sort to engage in stupid games. “I doubt it will matter to either of them.”

“No, sir. But it’s a bad business...” He looked down the companionway nervously. “I’ll hear ‘im comin’ but it won’t be long now. You meant what you said about amnesty?”

“I’ll sign you on my own ship, if you do your part, and no questions asked. But I need to know more. Where the devil are we? How far—”

Footsteps interrupted him. “Not now!” hissed Bert. He took two long steps away from the door and slouched against the bulkhead. By the time the door creaked open, he was deep in the process of stoking a stinking clay pipe—not a smart habit on a powder barge, but he didn’t seem to be having any luck in lighting it.

Smith heard the other guard enter with some comment about things being quiet, and made certain his return to the cot was noiseless.

~

“Hey! Wake up, in there! Time to go.”

Marshall shook his head, trying to loosen the fog. What time of day or night—? The moon was up outside, so high he could only see its reflection in the water. Late, then. Seven bells, maybe eight. Well, it didn’t matter what time it was, if they were ready to let him out. “Just a moment,” he called.

“Hurry it up.”

He checked to be sure the shard of broken adze was still rolled in an edge of his shirt, tucked tightly beneath waistcoat and breeches, and took a last drink from the nearly-empty water bucket before tipping it over behind a stack of sailcloth. Then, a bit wobbly, he made his way to the hatch.

Not knowing whether either of the masked guards was his unseen benefactor, he greeted them pleasantly, whereupon they went through the routine of tying and muffling him. They didn’t say where they were going; they didn’t say anything. But when the cloak came off, he was outside the familiar cell, and he was able to confirm Archer’s observation of the door latches. If he had not been at least half-awake for the past 60 hours or so, he might have felt more satisfaction in the fact; right now, he was so exhausted he could barely feel his fingers.

Archer was curled up in the corner, his back to the door. He looked to be sound asleep, and Marshall managed to arrange his own sleeping-mat without waking him. The straw smelled fresh; sometime in the last day or so, it must have been swept out and replaced. Top marks to the innkeeper. Marshall rolled his jacket into a pillow and had a long, luxurious stretch before sliding into blessed oblivion.

~

“No, laddie, that wasn’t what you were expecting, was it?” The weight rolled off his back, the hardness that had been pressing against him was gone. “We’ll get to that, no need to hurry. The Frenchie who showed me this called it frottage. Pleasant, don’t you think?” One hand gripped his shoulder as he buried his head between his arms, trying to disappear into the cushions piled on the floor; another rubbed oil between his thighs. “But I’m not finished yet. Roll over now, I want to watch your face...”

“No!” Archer rolled and pushed away in a panic, banging into a wall in the dark. His own shout woke him. He sat up, the wall at his back, and tried to slow his breath enough to stop his heart hammering. Not Adrian’s cabin, back in the cell, it was all right, just a dream, he was alone, safe for now...

Something stirred nearby. He was not alone.

“Davy? Are you—”

“Will?”
When did he come back? This isn’t real, is it? Oh, God, am I awake or dreaming?
He really couldn’t tell.

“Keep quiet in there, damn you.” Footsteps clumped up and somebody held a lantern up to the door’s window. “I got a starter out here, if we have to come in you’ll both feel it.”

“Bad dream,” Marshall said shortly, scowling in the dim light. “We’re awake now, thank you.”