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Chapter Three - "A Pirate's Life"
As the girl looked on, she liked what she saw less and less. She had no way of ascertaining exactly what it was that the captain kept tucked away on the shelf that so interested the boy. Nevertheless, she could guess what his intentions were. Gathering her courage, she slid herself cautiously back towards the head of the bed with her eyes focused intently overhead. Following a brief moment of consternation in which the lady realized her propriety would be jeopardized should the coverlet decide to fall away, she rose to her knees. Inhaling deeply, she made a decisive lunge for her intruder's dangling ankles. She jerked with all the strength she could muster.
He hadn't realized his mistake until the fingers had clasped him firmly above the heel. In the split second it took for her to yank viciously backward, fate spared Jack Sparrow only the time required to curse his adolescent arrogance.
"Hey!"
The woman managed to narrowly escape burial beneath the heap of distressfully threadbare clothing, thrashing limbs, and incoherent curses plunging into the mattress. Immediately after his shoulders struck, he bounced up once before settling heavily into the discarded coverlet. Which was promptly torn from beneath him. She shrieked. He managed to mask his surprise(and struggling to keep a very real roar of frustration at bay) by forcing all the youthful deviltry he possessed into one lecherous grin,
"I appreciate the offer, lass," a knock sounded at the door; the girl hadn't heard the footsteps approach, "But I fancy that this is not the opportune moment." He sprung upright, the soles of his boots thudding dully as they met the floor. He lost no time in dashing for the latched porthole opposite the bed.
"Mary, why is the door locked?" a sharp voice demanded from the corridor. Her head snapped around to the door with a cry. Jack, having successfully secured his escape route, also turned,
"Your lover calls." The green eyes swung back at the sound, though Jack suspected she hadn't deigned to register the words; she gaped,
"You're not considering escaping.. Not.. Not through there, are you?" As if to emphasize her disapproval, she glared toward the tiny, circular opening.
"You've a better idea?" Silence.
"Alright, then. Good luck with the ol' captain, m'dear. Ta." He offered up a smart solute to the sealed door, heels clicking lightly together, before sweeping into a ceremonious bow for her benefit. Mary's jaw snapped shut, and whatever force had held her silent now fell away; she turned. She screamed,
"Captain! There's a man in here! Thief! Pirate!" But that worthy had already vanished.
The captain had forced the lock shortly thereafter. Once he gained entrance, he encountered no one but his concubine, said young lady doing her very best to disappear into the mattress. When he inquired as to what might have been stolen, she could only shake her head gloomily and point to the shelf. To her puzzlement, he had only laughed.
"Oh, yes; that was a completely necessary endeavor, mate," he chuckled, brandishing the bottle clutched loosely in one hand, "quite productive, as well." The young Jack Sparrow lay spread-eagled across the deck. This one-sided conversation continued with, "Have you quite satisfied your lawless impulses? No?" He grinned, "That's alright, mate. We-Auuggh." His eyes widened comically before a bolt of pain racked his skull. He grimaced, eyebrows drawn down into a "V." "Oy." The bottle rolled out of reach; his fingers immediately set about in a futile effort to retrieve it. Jack emitted an exasperated sigh before drifting into a restless sleep as the awakening sun mounted on that elusive horizon.
When he had opened the box in the captain's cabin Jack had discovered a single rumpled envelope. He'd given it only a cursory inspection, sliding it through his shirt collar before the girl had chosen her moment to interfere. Wasn't he surprised to reveal his treasure as no more than a slim packet of gushing love letters? You bet. It doesn't matter a bit. The entire point was to prove that it could be done, was it not? He'd reasoned halfheartedly; distrustfully. This did not dampen his disappointment, especially when a much more compelling voice kept insisting, You wanted treasure, mate. You wanted something that catches the sun when turned just the right way. Stop deceiving yourself. The last thing he'd heard that night was.. pirate. She was right, he'd mused, shuffling off to pinch a bottle of rum.
His mind grappled with consciousness when the heat had reached the point of discomfort. The sunlight produced a gleaming aura across the surface of his olive skin, causing his eyes to water and squint in protest when the lids finally peeled open. He lifted his fist to scrub at them, only to nearly further blind himself with the corner of the envelope it still clutched. He ripped the pages from inside, tearing each leaf down the center before tossing them away in disgust. Massaging his temples, Jack watched as the sheets fluttered slowly back to the deck. He groaned. Best lay low for a bit, he began to rise, that harlot will have given the capta- he stopped; his eyes had caught on the corner of one of the letters. It had landed face-down, and the side now turned up boasted what he took to be a smudged diagram. Extending a leg, he pinned the fragment with his toe, sliding it within reaching distance. He scooped it up, fingering its edges gingerly as he bent to uncover its meaning. It depicted half of what appeared to be a grinning skull above and a portrait proclaiming itself to be Hernando Cortez below. In the scant column of text flanking these images:
curse was placed upon the treas
gold of Cortez. It is rumored to re
ose who already know where it is.
The aspiring pirate cursed inwardly, scuttling about on hands and knees to retrieve the shredded paper. By arranging them in some semblance of order, he learned that the treasure of Cortez had supposedly been cursed, that it now rusticated upon some godforsaken island by the name of Death, and that said island was mighty difficult to locate. Apparently, whoever decided to confess their eternal love to the good captain(probably his wife) was not wealthy enough to afford writing paper. Either that, or they had merely proven a more inventive way of disposing of an old storybook. He folded his discovery neatly, tucking it back into his shirt. Jack Sparrow didn't think that he could put a finger on why, but the tale had piqued his interest. That other internal voice, however, had no such difficulty: Aztec gold. An entire island of it. Aztec gold.. It would remain a persistent, driving impetus for many years to come.
Early that evening, the inevitable occurred; Jack Sparrow was forced into a confrontation. As he'd expected, from Captain to deck hand, the crew had appeared(materializing from the light veil of fog reigning the deck that night) as a whole. The expression exhibited by Captain Edward Strong was unreadable. It could have been equally one of anger, joy, or even boredom. No one present, however, could mistake the arrogance projected like a thick musk from his person.
He was certainly not a very tall man. While standing, Jack, an inch or two under six foot, came face-to-face with a perfectly smooth and gleaming forehead lest he lower his gaze to the Captain's unsettling blue one or lift it to risk a glance at the ridiculously gaudy hat perched atop an equally distressing wig. There was simply an appalling newness about him that, after a few moments, began to make the prospect of leaping overboard very appealing. It called for all the willpower that Jack could rally to keep from squinting.
"Jack. Your name's Jack. Jack what, may I ask?" The captain grinned brightly. At this point, something inexplicable took hold of the boy. He smiled, thrusting out his hand jauntily.
"Jack Sparrow, at your service," he replied, then(almost as an afterthought), "Cap'n." The dangerous flash in the Captain's eyes was unmistakable.
"Mr. Sparrow then," he purred icily, "we have witnesses who would accuse you of insubordination and pira-" A very convincing guffaw of laughter erupted at this. From the boy. The man's hand was halfway to the haft of his sword before the need to regain composure registered. Making a show of wiping his eyes, the cabin boy immediately slipped into the quintessence of solemnity.
"I don't doubt that you do, mate. But first, I'd advise you to look after your ship," he promptly spun on his heel, revealing the pistol tucked into the back of his trousers only momentarily before it was up and drawn into his palm. Before the softened crew could react, and in what may have been one fluid motion, Jack Sparrow thumbed back the flintlock and fired through the hull. The line of gunpowder, now painfully obvious and stretching the full length of the deck as it branched off into dozens of separate paths, blazed into life.
In the hysteria which followed, Jack nearly made a clean escape. It took a few ticks before the men could stop stomping about long enough to make any attempt at apprehending the culprit. He fled, and immediately a bullet struck the mast not a foot from him. Splintering and groaning, it suddenly did not have the capacity to support itself. The boy cursed mightily and dodged around it but did not stop. Shots echoed and buzzed around him.. To be continued..
I know exactly where this is going in the immediate future. Hopefully, I'll be able to get the fourth chapter going soon. I hope that you enjoyed the third.
~CS