Chapter 4
The dial slowly spun. Around... and around...and around. It wouldn't stop once. It twirled like a confused puppet. Frustrated, Captain Jack Sparrow snapped it shut.
"Bloody compass," he muttered, shoving it back into the pocket of his coat. Unsatisfied, he turned his attention to the large rum bottle next to him. Taking a long gulp, he refocused on the diagram spread out on the table in front of him. For the sixth time, he shifted the connecting pieces around to form words. And for the sixth time, the same sentence was spelled out. What you seek has not and will never be found.
"I swear to the sea, this bloody thing is broken," he muttered angrily. Leaning back in his rickety chair, he thought for a moment.
Thinking out loud, he said, "When I was a... miniature pirate, me dad told me about the great Jewel of Happiness," Mustache twitching, his eyes became sad. "I need that jewel. I WANT that jewel."
Suddenly, he had an idea. He shot out of his chair so fast, that one of the legs fell off. He started up the stairs to the main deck, but then turned back, remembering.
"Oh," he said, searching his pockets. "I don't have a heading." Chuckling at his stupidity, he pulled out his compass.
This compass he kept with him at all times. It was no ordinary compass, that was sure, for it did not point north. It had been called broken by a number of people, but Jack always insisted that this compass would point in the direction of the thing he wanted most. And it had done so, a number of times.
Holding this compass out in front of him, the Captain pictured a ship, encrusted in barnacles, with ripped and tattered sails. The compass spun, stopped, than spun again, finally coming to rest, the needle pointing south-east.
Jack smiled. "We have out heading!" he cried, racing out of his cabin. He made his way, slipping and sliding across the deck, to the sailors cabin. "Get up, get up!" He yelled, turning over hammocks, poking sailors, and banging walls. "Get up, you lazy sack of chickens! Man your stations! On deck, all hands! I want movement! MOVEMENT! We have our heading!"
Suddenly Jack's crew were wide awake, running this way and that, tumbling over each other in their hast to obey orders. Joshamee Gibbs, Jack's first mate, tumbled out of his hammock and landed at Jack's feet. "A heading, you say? Blessed mother of god, we have a heading! Which way, old Jackie?"
He was almost jumping for joy. Everyone on the Black Pearl had been waiting for a heading for days on end.
Jack told him witch way to start, and Gibbs started towards the main deck. Half way up the stairs, he paused and turned. "Jack," he said. "What are we headed for?" Jack smiled. "My friend," he said, "we are on our way to see our friend William Turner."
Gibbs thought about that for a minute, then said, "Will Turner, aye? What is he going to do for you? You two aren't exactly... fond of each other, are ye?
Jack laughed. "Yes, we did have a bit of a row, didn't we? But seeing as he is now...'ruler of the sea', and seeing as I need to... find something, I might need... a tiny bit of help."
Jack never liked admitting that he needed help, and he needed help very often.
Gibbs nodded. "Aye, Jack, we'll find him." He started up to the main deck, and Jack followed. As Gibbs yelled orders to the crew, the Captain made his way to the ship's wheel. He spun it expertly, his eyes darting from the wheel to his compass. Keeping his ship pointed exactly south-east, the Pearl plowed threw the ocean waves confidently.