"Hello," Rose cooed flirtatiously to the auctioneer, having stumbled her way down the cobblestone streets of Tortuga in her heeled shoes. Smile, be charming, smile, be charming… she repeated over and over in her head.
"Hello, lass," the auctioneer cried, dramatically sweeping into a large bow. "And what a lovely lady you are, indeed!"
Rose would have sneered at him were not her performance so vital to the success of Jack's mission. So instead, she just batted her eyelashes and hid her face bashfully with her hand. At least this is what Rose thought high society women did.
"And what might I assist you in, miss?" the auctioneer bellowed.
Her heart raced as she said, "I am here to sign up for the auction."
The auctioneer eyed her up and down, looking at her in bewilderment. "Why?" he asked.
Oomph. Rose felt like she had just been socked in the stomach. She hadn't anticipated that sort of reaction "Well…" she stuttered, "I need the money!" Bad choice. She quickly corrected herself. "I'm orphaned and…and I have nowhere to turn. And…oh! And I don't wish to become a woman of the night and I—"
But thankfully, the auctioneer wasn't concerned with an honest backstory. He was out to make a profit, and with Rose, he knew he could certainly expect a profit. He took her arm and wove it through the crook of his own as he gallantly announced, "My dear, of course not! And an honest bride you shall be after tonight! What beauty! Yer sure to win a well-oft beau!"
And by "well-oft" you surely mean the one who has swindled the most doubloons, Rose thought behind her forced smile.
"Tell me," he continued. "Is that your natural hair?"
She gulped as she lied, "Yes."
He grinned, thrusting his gold-capped grin into her visage. "Then we'll call you The Redhead, eh?"
Rose nodded timidly. Yes fine! As long as I am distracting enough for Jack to get what he needs…
He led her to the town square, bordering the river, where the auction was coming to fruition. Two rough looking men held a rope which tethered nine women together. They all appeared to be widows. There was no one there under the age of fifty. Most of them wore the remains of what looked like their former wedding gowns, and gazed sullenly at the ground. Rose suddenly realized why she would be such a commodity… She also began to panic when she realized that not only was she being tethered to the line around the waist, but she was being placed right in the middle of the women.
She tried to keep her voice calm as she asked the auctioneer, who had now begun to bark to passersby to advertise this evening's entertainment, "Won't I go last, as I just now joined?" She needed to go last, to ensure that Jack could return in an adequate amount of time to help free her. Also, she was trapped here. She couldn't escape anywhere at all like this if things went awry.!
The auctioneer called back to her, "No, dearie! ye cannot come too late! Elsewise how would we sell the others?"
Rose exhaled, trying to calm her nerves. The armed men had finished tying her waist to the line and had returned to their spots in the front and rear of the line. Rose looked over her shoulder at the woman behind her. She had to be over sixty, and grinned a drunken, toothless smile that made Rose recoil, so instead she tried communicated with the woman ahead of her.
"Psst!" she whispered. The woman leaned back to acknowledge her. Rose whispered again, "Why are you doing this?"
The woman snorted. "The bastard left me. What else am I gonna do?"
Rose narrowed her eyes. "Anything you wish! You're a pirate, aren't you?"
The woman smirked. "Me? Sail the seas? Too much effort, love. I don't want to work to earn my keep. Work just isn't my style."
Rose leaned away from her. These were the strangest women she had ever encountered. The woman ahead of her turned her body around more to give Rose a good looking over. "You're pretty, you'll go fast," she said in monotone. "This is my third time on the auction line, and things get quite awkward when nobody wants ye. You won't have to worry 'bout that."
Suddenly, Rose wished more than ever for this day to be over. Please, Jack, she prayed. Get here quickly. I can't afford to "go quick."
The auction began precisely at 6 o'clock. A few men were lingering around the auction block, mostly drunkards who had no clue where they were in relation to anything or anyone else on Earth. This is a joke, Rose thought.
Thankfully, the lack of attendance mixed with the sorry sights of the three women coming up to auction in front of Rose and her new friend took quite awhile to get through. By the time they got to the woman ahead of her, Rose could spot Cotton in the crowd. After some scanning, she spotted Marty posted by a crate. At least there were some Pearl crew members scattered in the crowd. It was also then that Rose noticed the severe increase in male attendance. And not just drunkards, several merchants and captains had also surfaced.
The woman in front of Rose leaned back to her once more. "Looks like you scared up quite the crowd, Redhead!"
Rose only nodded, unable to shake the fearful expression from her face. Her eyes met Marty's. He gave her an encouraging nod, and then her eyes began to scan the crowd again. She found Giselle and Scarlett standing by a lamppost. With a motion of her hand, Giselle reminded her to smile, and she instantly obeyed, silently reminding herself to breathe. Where was Jack?!
The woman before Rose came up to the front. The auctioneer cried out, "Weigh anchor now, ye swabbies! What be I offered for this winsome wench? Stout-hearted, and corn-fed she be!"
A pirate heckled from the crowd, "Hey! Be ya sellin' her by the pound?"
The auctioneer seem unfazed, however, instructing the woman, "Shift yet cargo, dearie. Show 'em yer larboard side."
"We wants the redhead!" a drunken pirate slurred from somewhere on the bridge. Rose's blood ran cold once she realized that he was talking about her.
"Allay there, you fo'c's'le swab!" warned the auctioneer.
This call crew into a chant amongst the bidding men. "We wants the redhead!" they cried. "We wants the redhead!"
"Avast there!" a balding man sitting by the bridge yelled, firing off his weapon. This quelled the crowd for a moment, until…
"Harold?" the increasingly frustrated "bride" ahead of Rose screeched, peering into the crowd. Everyone, including Rose, followed her gaze to a small, skinny, unshaven man wearing an oversized hat standing in the rear of the group. The man quickly leapt to cover his face with the hat.
"Harold! Don't try to hide from me!" she shouted again. "I know it's you, you bastard!"
The man known as Harold gave up his attempts to hide. "Aww Marguerite! I'm sorry, but I moved on!"
"Like hell you did!" Marguerite called back. "You married me!"
"A lot of people married you!"
"Yeah, but none o' them had the gall to come back here and bid on other women!"
"I came for the redhead, Marguerite!"
Rose felt her jaw go limp. Was…everyone here for her? as Marguerite pointed at Rose. "HER?!" she cried. "You honestly think you could afford HER?! Harold, I know how dirt poor you are!"
"Aww Marguerite!" he moaned. "That's what all these blokes is doin' here! She's what's the biggest news this town has had in years! I thought I'd throw my hat in for consideration!"
But sadly, Harold's competitors did not want to hear this. A chorus of hisses and boos, along with the occasional "Go home!" or "You already have a wife! Take 'er!" resounded from the crowd of men. Rose looked at the auctioneer and his wife, who looked like happy children at a marionette show. This was madness!
Marguerite demanded one of the guards to cut her free, and she marched up to where her husband stood, grabbing him by the ear and dragging his yelping figure stumbling down the street and around a corner into the great unknown.
This can't have gone worse, Rose thought in a panic. Now Marguerite was gone in a flash, leaving Rose standing there, the next woman to be auctioned off. Please, Jack! Please… She prayed that these men, who were supposedly all here to fight over her, would haggle and fight over a price long enough for Jack to resurface.
Her wish came true in the form of Giselle and Scarlett again, who wildly waved their arms to get her attention. When she finally saw them, Scarlett took a seductive pose, putting one arm up behind her ear and another slightly revealing her ankle. Of course! Rose leaned down elegantly and picked up the end of her skirt, lifting the material and exposing her bare calf. The whistles and hoots increased to deafening proportions.
"Alright! Alright quiet down," the auctioneer cried out over the men's hollering. "Strike yer colours, ye brazen wench," he called to Rose. "No need to expose your superstructure!" Rose gave a winning smile and turned for the men to see her, posing like some of the painted ladies she had seen on posters around Tortuga during her youth. "And now, ye bilge rats," he continued, "Do I hear six? Who makes it six?"
Rose stopped listening when she looked over the crowd and saw powdered wigs staring back at her from the rear of the square. The Navy! Rose felt panic start to rise in her chest. This meant that Norrington had caught up with the Pearl! Where was Jack? Had they already captured him and the Pearl?
Chanting stirred her from her trance. "We wants the Redhead! We wants the Redhead!" they called out.
"QUIET YOU SCUM!" the man by the bridge shouted once more, firing off his weapon. The noise subsided, and the bidding continued. Rose feared the worst, but had to continue with her charade, all the while keeping one eye on the Navy officers, who ogled her from their position across the bay. One man pushed his way in front of them and ordered the men to continue onwards. They all rushed down an alley leading to another part of town, but the man who gave the orders remained. He scanned the crowd. He was looking for someone!
So they haven't found Jack after all!
This man was shouldering his way through the crowd, but barely anyone acknowledged him because they were still so fixated on the rapidly increasing bidding. As the officer grew nearer and nearer to the block, his eyes met Rose's and lingered there. Rose's expression grew earnest and she let her smile fade. He looked her up and down and sneered at her, stalking back where he came from. Instead of following the other men, Rose watched him stand posted with his hands behind his back, looking over the scene in front of him placidly. Another officer joined him. Rose gulped.
"I'm not scrounging for rum! It be gold I'm after!" she heard the auctioneer call to one of the highest bidders, who had apparently run out of money and had started instead to offer up any personal belonging he had to his name.
"Fifteen shillings!"
A horrible silence fell over the crowd. Rose realized in terror that this was the highest bid, and even worse, that no other man was willing to bid higher. She looked at her future husband, a man around the age of seventy, who, much like the woman behind Rose in line, also had little to no teeth left in his skull.
"Going once…" the auctioneer called out.
Rose looked desperately for Jack in the crowd. Please, Jack! Where are you?
"Going twice…"
"Oi!" a voice surfaced from the far right of the stage Rose stood upon. Rose watched triumphantly as her brother popped out from behind a cart, knocking loose several mannequins that were advertising a tailor shop. The crowd began to let loose several unsettled remarks about this new drama to the auction of "The Redhead." Rose looked up in a panic and saw the two Navy officers hastily conversing. The one who had glared at her sent the other in the same direction the other men had gone, most likely to retrieve them. She then saw him draw his pistol and quickly make his way through the crowd toward Jack.
"Oi!" Jack cried again. "Whatever that bloke offered, double it!" The unease in the audience only magnified.
Over the outrage, the auctioneer cried out, "Thirty shillings?"
Jack shrugged. "Sure! Why not?" he then leaned around several bodies and made eye contact with the former highest bidder. "Sorry mate. A man's got to do what a man's got to do!" The toothless wonder just grimaced.
Jack shot a triumphant grin Rose's direction, which was met only with a horrified expression from Rose as she quickly shook her head, trying to tell Jack to flee at once.
"Going once?" the auctioneer tried once more.
"Make that two pounds," a dark, deep voice boomed. Another bidder! The other men were close to rioting, the noise was so intense.
Rose's heart pounded in her chest, as she followed the men's gazes to where they were examining this newcomer to the bidding. The officer! He had worked his way so that he stood parallel to Jack, only a few paces away. The officer glared in amusement at Jack, and Rose saw his pistol pointed subtlety right at him, his arm aligned with his Navy jacket.
The officer grinned like a cat who had just caught a mouse by the tail and was gleefully watching it try to escape his claws. "Care to outbid me?"
Jack squinched up his nose. "Meh. Not particularly." Rose raised her eyebrows, but from a quick flick of his wrist waving her off, Rose realized that Jack was trying to divert attention off of her, and was not feeding her to the hungry cat after all.
But this motion did not go unobserved by the officer, however. He began to laugh and he looked up where Rose stood. Rose was frozen, unsure of what move to make. Letting his gun go slack in his hand for a moment, the officer mounted the steps up to the auctioning stage.
"I do believe that that's a 'going once, going twice, and sold' to me, correct?"
The auctioneer smiled in confusion, still putting on the act. These pirates were not completely moronic. They knew the power a Navy official had over them. So graciously, he replied, "Of course, sir!"
He turned to Rose and stalked toward her. Rose never felt more exposed in her life. She wanted so desperately to run, but she was stuck there. His eyes still glinted in amusement as he growled, "It's Commodore."
Rose felt the air leave her lungs. Norrington! The was the man responsible for this ridiculous chase! Suddenly, she very much remembered him. Back on Port Royal, his cart had nearly run her over, and would have had Elizabeth Swann, the Governor of Port Royal's daughter not leapt out to help her. He had begrudgingly helped her up, though "helped" is still too kind a term. They had come as close to one another as they now were, reunited, though it Rose doubted that he recognized her in her current disguise.
He slowly walked up to her, letting the air grow stiff with tension. When he was mere inches from her, he caused Rose to start, for he pulled out his finely crafted sword, which glinted in the light of the square, chopping Rose free from the other women. He sheathed the sword calmly, and then he sprung, pinning Rose's arms against her with one arm and pressing his gun against her head with the other, spinning her toward Jack. As though it was expertly rehearsed, naval officers sprang out from every direction, causing onlookers to scatter. Jack motioned for Cotton and Marty to find the Pearl and alert them of danger, and they quickly scattered as well. Soon, it was just Rose and Jack amidst thirty armed officials, bayonets surrounding them on all sides.
Norrington had the side of his face pressed against Rose's. Her body was completely rigid, and she barely dared to take even the slightest of breaths, for fear that he would pull the trigger at the smallest movement.
"So tell me, Jack," Norrington said calmly. "What interest do you of all people have in marriage?"
Jack shrugged casually. "Boredom. They say it's always good to try new things."
"Stop the game, Sparrow!" yelled Norrington. Jack mumbled "Captain," under his breath, which was thankfully not overheard by Rose's captor. He continued, "How is she involved in your schemes?"
Jack shook his head. "Never met 'er. Seems nice enough though." His face lit up. "But, hey! I'm happy for you! Glad to see you got over that uh…ooh. Whatshername…" He tapped a finger against his chin pensively, then dropped his shoulders. "No really. What was her name?"
"Elizabeth. Swann," Norrington hissed.
"That's the one!" Jack cried happily. "Yeah that was just not meant to be, eh? But my most heartfelt congratulations for the two of you!" he said, motioning to Rose and Norrington. "You'll be perfect for each other!"
Norrington clicked the barrel of his gun, sending waves of panic through Rose's blood."That change your mind, Sparrow?" he said.
Jack let the facade fall, growing far more serious now. "Really, mate. I never met her. Seems innocent enough. Let her be."
Rose let out a yelp when Norrington took her by the shoulders and spun her around to face him. He pressed the end of his gun into the skin of her chest right where her heart was pounding ever quicker. "Your turn," he said threateningly. He glanced over her head and motioned toward where her sibling stood. "How are the two of you associated?"
Rose tried to turn the charm on for one final performance. She smiled. "I don't know him at all! That's the idea of being sold off at a place like this." She took a deep breath before she tried her next maneuver, leaning closer toward him and whispering, "So that any handsome stranger can whisk you away."
Just as she was about to lean completely in to him, he straightened his posture and looked over her head, pressing his gun into her chest, and therefore pushing her a safe distance away from him. "That'll be quite enough of that," he said nonchalantly.
He did look back down at her though, and when he did, he used his free hand to run his fingertips down the length of her cheek, catching red locks of hair as he moved. His hand travelled behind her neck and Rose suddenly felt a sharp pain in her scalp. Then her stomach dropped as she realized what he had discovered; a stray piece of her natural hair that had fallen from inside the wig.
"You know," he said, "Red really isn't your color." He yanked off the wig entirely and exposed her long dark hair. He tossed it aside and smiled his smug smile. "You're slightly less hideous without the wig."
Rose's stomach burned with fury. "I wonder if the same could be said for you!" With her final word, Rose wrenched the pistol from Norrington's hands and pointed it directly at him. Norrington retaliated by drawing his sword.
She laughed. "What will a sword do over a pistol?"
Norrington gave a wry grin. "I don't think you want to be threatening me, Miss." She followed his certain gaze to where her brother stood behind her. In horror, she saw that all thirty or so officers had stepped inward towards Jack when she stole their commander's pistol, completely boxing him in.
"Maybe...don't shoot Norrington," Jack nervously said.
In her distraction, Norrington had his blade pressed into her back. She ruefully held her hands up in surrender.
"I'll be taking that back," said he, retrieving his pistol once more. "Now, since you've proven with your hasty and clumsy attempts at retaliation that you two are in fact associated, I suppose I have no choice but to declare execution for the both of you."
He continued his lofty speech, but Rose had yet another plan that could distract the officers long enough for Jack to make a getaway. Feeling around her waist, she came upon the rope that had tethered her to the other brides. She swung the rope up and threw it over his neck, pulling it taught behind him and cutting off his speech.
Most of men's attention were drawn to their captured commander. Rose, upon seeing this, cried out, "Run, Jack!" Jack seized the opportunity, ducking beneath the bayonets and running for his life out of the square, dodging many bullets as he fled.
Rose grinned as she saw him flee, but did not anticipate Norrington freeing himself with his sword. Rose stumbled backwards with the sudden release of the rope's tension, but Norrington had caught the end of the rope which was still fastened around her waist, pulling her against him.
"Go! After him!" he shouted to his men, sending them rushing off in the direction Jack had fled. "Groves!" he called to one of his men.
"Aye sir?"
"Take this," he said, yanking Rose forward, "To the brig. She'll hang on the island where we first met."
Rose looked at him in alarm. He only laughed menacingly. "You really thought I didn't recognize you as that gutter rat I nearly ran over on Port Royal? Perhaps you and Jack will hang together this time instead of being separated by my carriage."
But Rose had already outsmarted them both, having located the knot which fastened the rope around her waist and quickly untying it. All she needed was a swift elbow to Groves's face and she was free, racing off at full speed in the opposite direction as her brother.
She heard Norrington order behind her, "She's not our priority! Sparrow is! After him!" She smiled in satisfaction, though she worried for Jack. Meet at the ship if we're separated, he had said. So Rose, despite her better judgement, obeyed and threw herself into the ocean, swimming frantically to reach the Pearl before sundown when her vision would dissipate.
