Chapter 26: Three Days’ Grace
Night had fallen over the harbor by the time James reached the waterfront. Behind him, the town was drifting into the last hours of evening.
The Rose rested low against her moorings, dark against the harbor. Most of the crew had gone ashore to spend both their wages and their grief. Only a small watch remained aboard.
Briggs stood near the gangway holding a lantern. He seemed to rather be drinking with everyone else but had accepted that he wasn’t.
"Captain."
Nothing more.
"Briggs. Anythin’ burn down while I was out?"
Briggs grunted.
From him, that qualified as a detailed report.
"All as it should be."
James left him to his watch and headed below. The companionway creaked beneath his boots. Despite the pain in his side, he found himself half smiling.
He already knew Cudjoe’s reaction to what came next was going to be worth watching.
The cabin lamp swung gently with the motion of the ship. Light and shadow moved across the table where Cudjoe sat studying the ship’s accounts. A knife pinned one corner of a chart in place to keep it from curling.
He looked up as the door opened.
Whatever he intended to say vanished the moment James overturned a bag onto the table.
Coins spilled across the wood.
Silver rang against the surface, scattered, then into a shining heap beneath the lamp.
"Brought you a present."
Cudjoe didn’t move.
He didn’t speak either.
For a man who rarely showed much emotion, the silence said plenty.
After a long moment, his gaze lifted from the silver and stopped on James.
He spoke slowly, "Whose purse did ye empty tae get that? And how many men in this harbor are gonnae want it back?"
"Technically, it was already stolen before I took it."
"That’s nae an answer."
"Then call it a change of ownership."
Cudjoe’s eyes narrowed. Then they dropped to the blood dried across James’s sleeve, the tear in his coat, and the injuries underneath that clearly hadn’t been treated properly.
"Ye look like ye went on a trip tae a slaughterhouse."
James laughed.
Cudjoe pointed toward the chair opposite him.
"Tell it short. I dinnae have patience for the long version tonight."
James lowered himself into the chair.
He gave him the short version. A girl cornered outside the Rat. A swindler running a passage racket. A hideout, a stolen chest of silver, and five men who’d tried to stop him from taking it.
By the time he finished, Cudjoe was staring at him in weary disbelief. Five men dead over a debt that had never existed, and somehow James had returned with a fortune and a grin on his face.
"Christ preserve me."
He rubbed a hand across his face. "Ye’re gonnae get hanged in this town before the year’s out, and it’ll be over somethin’ this stupid."
"Maybe."
"Pull that chart over."
Cudjoe immediately set about murdering the newfound fortune.
The foremast claimed its share first. According to him, the Rose had been held together since the frigate engagement by rope, profanity, and habits too stubborn to die. Sawyer would need timber, tools, and enough silver to stop lamenting at the damage long enough to repair it.
Supplies came next. Salt pork, water, fresh food, and all the other necessities that somehow cost more than theft ever earned.
The rest vanished into the crew problem.
The convoy disaster had done more than cannons ever could. Men had seen two sloops lost and forty-one sailors buried beneath the sea. Stories had spread faster than truth, and now half of Nassau seemed convinced the Rose was unlucky. The other half thought she was cursed.
Neither opinion helped with recruiting.
Fortunately, silver had a long history of curing poor judgment.
By the time the piles were counted, Cudjoe meant to put coin into a man’s hand before he ever signed the Articles. Rumors were one thing, cold silver was another. A sailor might think twice about a cursed ship. He normally thought only once about money.
It would cost more than honest recruiting.
It would still be cheaper than sailing short-handed.
"Three days, by the way."
Cudjoe stopped.
He looked up.
"Three days for what?"
James leaned back carefully.
"There’s a job."
That got his full attention.
James explained, "One of Hornigold’s captains came to me at the Rat, Edward Thatch. Says a Spanish flotilla will move treasure from the Florida wrecks. Five Guarda Costa sloops escorting the cargo toward Havana, they sail in three days."
Cudjoe listened without interrupting.
"He wants the Rose alongside his sloop. Equal split of whatever we take."
Slowly, Cudjoe set his hand down.
The motion reminded James of a man putting aside one problem because a larger one had just arrived.
"Captain, ye’ve been ashore less than a day."
James waited.
Cudjoe sighed, "Yer reputation’s still bleedin’ from the convoy disaster. Yet somehow ye’ve acquired a fortune in stolen silver and a partnership wi’ one o’ Hornigold’s captains before ye’ve even slept."
He folded his arms.
"That’s nae luck."
"No?"
"No."
Cudjoe shook his head.
"That’s a man being handed somethin’ he hasnae earned."
The warning was clear.
"And every time I’ve seen that happen, the bill comes due later."
James drummed his fingers once against the arm of the chair.
The concern wasn’t unreasonable.
Why would Hornigold risk one of his captains on a disgraced brig?
Why offer the Rose a chance at such a profitable prize?
There had to be a reason.
"Hornigold sent Thatch to find me. Personally vouched for him."
That only deepened Cudjoe’s frown.
"And what does Hornigold gain?"
James turned the question over.
There was a simple reason why. Hornigold was under pressure from Jennings. If he didn’t had anything to show to Nassau, there was a fair chance the fickle population of the city would turn over their loyalty, if he could call that, to Jennings.
Cudjoe watched James ponder with suspicion.
He leaned back slightly, "My granddaddy used tae say that luck arriving too fast usually means a storm’s followin’ close behind."
The lamp swung overhead. Shadows drifted across the chart.
"I dinnae like it."
"Good point."
James spread his hands.
"We’re still going."
Cudjoe shook his head.
"A fortune if it works."
He let out a slow breath.
The conclusion hung between them. The opportunity was dangerous, but passing it up might be worse.
"I’ll spread the word at the docks tomorrow. Earnest silver in hand."
He pointed a finger across the table. "But I’m sayin’ this now. I dinnae trust how easily this landed in yer lap. And I’ll be watchin’ Thatch a great deal closer than ye seem inclined tae."
James smiled faintly.
"Wouldn’t expect anythin’ less."
He pushed himself away from the table.
"Right. Enough business."
He rubbed at his side.
"I’m done in."
Cudjoe stood and began gathering the coin back into the bag. His attention was already on tomorrow’s logistics, dividing payments and expenses.
"Get some sleep."
He tied the bag shut.
"And try nae tae bleed on the sheets. We still cannae afford a new captain."
James waved him away, amused.
"No promises there either."
Cudjoe left the cabin. His footsteps faded as he moved off to finish whatever work remained before he sought his own rest.
James dropped onto the bunk without removing his boots.
The mattress gave beneath him.
For the first time all day, he stopped moving.
That turned out to be a mistake.
Every injury he’d ignored immediately demanded attention. The cuts, the bruises, the ribs, the exhaustion. They’d been waiting for him to stop.
Now they had his full attention.
He stared at the ceiling.
In a single afternoon he’d killed five men he’d never met.
He’d accepted a partnership with a captain who, if history remembered correctly, would be setting fuses in his own beard within a few years.
He’d convinced his quartermaster to risk the Rose on a venture neither of them completely trusted.
And he’d promised silver to strangers, asking them to sail and possibly die beside him based on little more than his word and the hope of treasure.
By any honest word, he was past pretending.
He wasn’t playing pirate anymore.
He was a pirate.
The blood drying on his sleeve was proof enough.
Somewhere back in a life three centuries ahead of this one, in a country he’d left behind and never reached again, his mother had spent her final months worrying about him.
The thought sat heavily in his mind.
James closed his eyes.
A short laugh escaped him before exhaustion finally won.
Small mercies.
At least she never had to see what he’d become.
