Chapter Sixteen: Flower's Trial

Jack the bo’sun rowed them to the island. It was a fairly calm journey; with the burning away of the fog, the water had become less choppy, but the waves still crested and crashed against the rocky shore. There was a jagged arm of rock jutting in the crescent bay were they were going, sticking out dangerously and spraying surf everywhere as the sea thundered against the dark cliff that made up most of the arm.

“Reefs,” Flower whispered in Florencia’s ear, told, “Most of the island is ringed by them-”

Nonetheless, the water itself was quite clear, calm and turquoise coloured once they entered the shelter of the bay and ploughed into the white beach. A limestone pavement jutted up from the sand, just in front of the dead palm trees, which sat several feet back from the shoreline.

Storm jumped out and Flower followed. He took Florencia by the arm and helped her out as the rest seized the chest and the chest and the alcohol; they approached the trees. The sand was soft and warm as they tramped down the beach, following the curve of it as Storm led them on.

The rowboat was already at the bay’s mouth as they reached the limestone spit. Peter and Rufus were huffing and groaning under the chest’s weight as they staggered along behind their captain, who swerved left and vanished amongst the trees.

“Keep away from them,” Flower muttered to Florencia, nodding at the greenery, “they’re poisonwood trees. The sap gives you a rash and nasty boils-”

However, in spite of his advise, she found it hard to duck and dodge the overhanging branches, which choked the narrow track in places; they grew freely and disorderly, right up to the fence that sprouted out of the sand.

“This is it,” Flower added quietly, “the stockade.”

Florencia stared. There was a shallow ditch on either side of the doorless entrance, filled with dead leaves and other detritus left by pirates over the decades, including bottles and bones, at which she shuddered to see as her mind began to run away with her. Flower pushed her into the large, roughly circular enclosure itself, in which palm tress grew, dotted here and there, whilst in the centre, there was a two storey hut. It had a thatched roof and walls made from entire trees stripped of their bark; for the first time since the day before, Florencia felt that she could breathe freely with sucking in all the air.

“Don’t go near that bush either,” Flower warned her, pointing at the vivid green tree just inside the entrance, “it’s a small machineel tree-they’re poisonous too.”

Florencia, who had been standing feet from it, shuffled away quickly and approached a cracked ship’s bell that rested on the sandy floor. It had gone green with age and weathering. She made to sit down, but jumped and squealed as something brushed her leg.

“It’s a cat, don’t worry!” Flower called, as he helped with carrying the chest into the hut, “It won’t hurt you.”

She looked down and that it was a cat. It was brown and striped with a large splodge of white on its chest and chin. She automatically bent down and put her hand out.

“Here, puss,” she called softly, “Come here.”

The cat readily came over to her, purring. It sniffed her hand curiously and when it was done, began curling around her ankles.

“Looks like you’ve made a friend,” Flower commented when he came over.

Florencia had sat down by the bell and was scratching the content cat behind its ear.

“There was a woman in Havana,” Florencia explained, “Emiliana Velazquez, the Viceroy’s wife. She loved cats, and used to import them from Egypt, India, the East Indies, and the Philippines. She even had a cat from Japan with no tail-”

“You!”

The cat, who had been purring happily, started and ran off in fright. Florencia looked after it, sighing sadly. It was Storm who had shouted, and he came striding over, speaking rapidly in Patwa with his long-suffering cook.

“But if we steal from Salt Port,” Flower interjected, breaking into Spanish, “Then they’ll-”

“We’re on land so we’ll eat fresh food!” Storm stated angrily, “It’s a port; they’ll ‘ave spare food, so go find somethin’ an’ kill it!”

He abruptly returned to the hut, which had no door either.

“You’re not really going to go and steal, are you?” Florencia asked, sounding partly afraid and partly chastising as her morally upright upbringing came to the fore.

“I’m not,” he replied, “but somebody with a black record is.”

He looked around the stockade, appraising every man that had arrived thus far. The majority of them had already sat down with a bottle of drink and were gaming for guineas as Flower picked them out.

“Peter!” He called, “Simon, Hardy, Rufus-get ready! You’re going hunting-just wait for Newland-”

The cook saw to it that they had enough rope and powder amongst them before they set off, Newland following along grumpily as Jack, having returned, put Mr Thomas on the ground. The old mulatto groaned but did not move. He seemed to be very pale, and it was all Flower could do to move him the shelter of a cluster of palm trees.

“And make sure it’s fresh!” He shouted after the sweaty band as they slunk from view, guns in hand.

He sighed, looking at where they had been with a trepidatious expression.

“What?” Florencia asked, catching sight of his worry.

Flower shook his head.

“This is the Governor’s territory,” he said, “Pirates can use this place,” he nodded at the stockade, “so long as they don’t harass Salt Port, otherwise…”

“Otherwise what?” She said quietly.

“It depends on the severity; pretty theft might only be a fine, but stealing livestock? A flogging if you’re lucky.”

He shook his head again and glanced at the hut, where Storm was standing in the doorway, glaring at him. The latter was smoking his money bone pipe as Florencia swallowed nervously, sensing that something was direly wrong.

“Flower?”

The cook, who had been crouching beside her, straightened up slowly, his eyes fixed on his captain.

“I don’t think he can do anything,” he started, then stopped as Greer and Bandy, who was simple but as large as the former, began ambling closer at a mere jerk of Storm’s head.

Flower stepped in front of Florencia, protecting her with his body as the two huge men came up to them and each took one of his arms.

“What’s the meaning of this?” He asked, calling across the stockade to Storm.

Florencia had suddenly realised that there was no birdsong. She could not even hear a gull screaming from where she stood, cast in shadow by the two hulking men. The pirates had fallen silent too.

“Yer raised yer voice ter me,” Storm intoned, “Yer dared ter order me about. Yer went against my rules on my ship!”

He stepped forward, raising his arms and turning around so that all of his crew could see him.

“As cap’n, that entitles me trial yer-!”

“On your ship!” Flower pointed out quite angrily, “Not on land!”

Storm sneered.

“Yer precious Governor’s not ‘ere!” He jeered, “An’ we’re not inside a settlement either! We’re in the middle of nowhere, Fiore, and there’s no-one ter stop me-!”

“The whole crew is meant to present!” Flower reminded him, and although Florencia could not see his face, the first cracks were beginning to appear in his indignant, fearless show, “There’s men away! By pirate law-”

Storm let out a bark of laughter.

“What pirate law?” He demanded to know, “The rules were designed for pirates, an’ there aren’t any left-!”

“You!” Flower lurched forward, struggling a little against his human bonds, “You’re a pirate! We all are! The laws still exist-!”

“Ah!” Storm held up the forefinger of his damaged right hand, “But who’s gonna make me obey them rules? Who’s stupid enough to make me foller them? Huh?”

He looked around at the other pirates, whose faces were alight with a sort of feverish mirth.

“No-one!” He looked at Flower and threw up his arms, “No-one!”

Storm looked quite mad, Florencia saw, as she peered around Greer’s fat legs.

“I’ve broken ‘em before! I killed Donovan and Ricardo the Moor! Yer not supposed ter kill a fellow pirate, are yer, Flower? But I did. I got me revenge and now I’ll ‘ave me justice too, an’ nobody can stop me!”

Florencia gasped as Flower was jerked forward and dragged over the tree nearest the hut. He was tied to it amidst uproarious laughter and jeering from the rest of the crew, whilst one man grabbed an old barrel and pulled it across for Storm to sit on, which he did. The pirates circled around the two, shutting the brunette out.

“Yer are,” she heard Storm drawl maliciously, “Fiore, alias Flower, of Watling Island?”

She supposed that he had nodded, for she did not hear him speak.

“An’ yer are aware of the articles as set down by the pirate Black Bart in 1719?”

Again, silence from Flower, but she could hear the crew chortling.

“Me own articles too, set down in right of me cap’n-see?”

Florencia held her breath.

“So, yer knew both my articles and those of Black Bart’s, an’ yer swore on the Bible ter uphold them, an’ yet yer still dared ter give orders ter me, yer cap’n?”

“You were going to kill us all!” Flower shouted, sounding somewhat strangled as the crowd booed and hissed.

“Is that so?” Storm sneered, “Yer didn’t trust yer cap’n ter save yer-?”

“Flog ‘im!”

“Maroon ‘im!”

“Tie ‘im ter the mulatto’s corpse an’ push ‘em out ter sea!”

Florencia did not understand them, for they spoke in Patwa and English, but the force and vehemence of their words frightened her and chilled her to the bone.

“Silence!” Their captain screamed above the furore, bringing an unnatural hush back to the stockade. The sun was still out, and its brightness seemed obscene to Florencia, who clung to the cracked bell in fear.

“Do you, Fiore, alias Flower, of Watling Island, deny that yer gave me order?”

“Only to save our lives,” Flower muttered, audible in the silence.

“So yer don’t deny it!” Storm crowned, “Well then!”

The pirates began chuckling, growing louder and louder as the minutes slipped by.

“I find yer guilty in that case,” Storm announced, pleased with himself, “of darin’ ter order yer cap’n about!”

He banged something on the side of the barrel and the pirates laughed harder.

“Now all I ‘ave ter do is punish yer for it,” he added, far from unhappy, “if yer’d pleaded stupid about the articles, Fire, this wouldn’t be so bad-”

“Keelhaul ‘im!” Someone shouted gleefully.

“No!”

Florencia caught sight of Storm’s hat as he jumped down angrily and lunged at the man who had spoken.

“Yer dare order me about, Manne, an’ I’ll see ter it that it’s you I’m triallin’!”

The circle of men broke apart as a small, rather hunchbacked man was thrown backwards out of the circle to land on the sandy floor, whimpering as his captain stood over him and raged, “Yer dare tell me what to do-?”

Florencia spotted Flower through the gaps in the milling pirates. He was slumped in his ropes with his head bowed, looking exhausted and pale. He was ignored for a little while until Storm started coughing, at which point he stopped shouting and staggered back, hand clapped to his mouth. He ducked into the hut without another word, leaving his men up in the air, for which they began yelling at both Flower and their other foolish fellow, who remained snivelling in the dirt.

It took them a while to disband; they kept a wide berth between themselves and the hut when they did so, and hunkering down in twos and threes amongst the trees, slowly resuming their games and drinking. The sun began to sink after a while, casting long shadows like witches’ fingers across the floor as it sank behind the trees and stockade fence.