Eleanor confronts Max, who still counts on her former allies to affirm her power over the street, and has not yet fully let the changed reality sink in. Max experiences how fickle the street can be. Meanwhile Eleanor comes to terms with the cards she's been dealt and witnesses a secret in the garden. Includes Max POV

Chapter 11 - The Chairwoman

"Move aside! Coming through!" the redcoats shouted as they were want to do. "Step aside."

Eyes ablaze, Eleanor stepped through the tavern's door, searching for Max, and down into the gallery. Pirates filed in line before a desk where two of the governor's officials prepared their pardon papers. The violin player stopped playing. Customers gaped at her, then ducked their heads. Everybody fell silent. Max rose from her chair in the back of the bar, mouth agape and blinking nervously. Eleanor stared at her with indignation, saying nothing, while Max turned a paler shade that not even her tawny bronze skin could hide. Slowly, Eleanor walked towards Max.

"Jesus Christ, how the hell is it possible that she's not dead?" mumbled one of the former pirates seated behind a mug of ale.

"Shut up!" another elbowed him. "If the king and governor can pardon the likes of us, then they sure can pardon the likes of her. See those redcoats? Don't want any trouble with them."

Max stammered a greeting and then recovered enough to say, "We will talk in my – the office."

Featherstone and Max's friend Idelle sat at the table where Max had been seated. Featherstone's cheeks colored red and he seemed to shrink under her eye, but Idelle? Well, Idelle was the sole person who met Eleanor's eyes fair and square - she lifted her chin at Eleanor with a dark, daring expression on her face. But neither were important to Eleanor, and she paid no further mind to them. Max attempted to regain her composure by adjusting her petticoat, and stiffly walked towards Eleanor's former office.

The dusty smell mixed with the wafts of foodstalls from the street brought back memories - not just short little flashes in her mind, but as if her skin, her body had its own recollections of senses. It is home, my home. But then Eleanor noticed the desk had been moved to another location, while a meeting table stood in what used to be her bedroom. Her favorite picture was taken down and replaced with something else. There lay another carpet. It all felt wrong all of sudden. It did not feel hers at all.

Still somewhat shaken, Max walked round the desk and seated herself in Eleanor's old chair in which Eleanor had lorded over Nassau. It was a beautifully decorated chair of ebony, its back decorated with inlaid lapis lazuli and ivory figures that always reminded Eleanor of Grecian characters - a man and a woman meeting one another. As beautiful as it looked, it also sat uncomfortable and was immensely lonely. She had sacrificed so many people and relations in order to keep that seat. Max attempted to appear anything but uncomfortable, but her hesitating voice, her need to stroke her own hands as if washing them informed Eleanor that Max was nervous, and not just because of the chair. While it gave Eleanor some measure of pleasure to see Max squirm under her silent, reproachful stare, it was just another reminder that she did not wish to trade with Max's place for all of the Urca gold.

Eleanor's continued silence forced the need in Max to explain herself, say something. "When weeks went by with no news of your sentence having been carried out, I assumed an arrangement had been reached to carry it out privately or a deal had been brokered to commute your execution to a long prison stay. I suppose I should have seen this, that somehow your grip on this place would be too strong to be denied by a king, his laws, or even your death."

Eleanor did not wish her chair back, not even within the confinement of legitimate commerce. That chair had been like a prison cell that had never allowed her to be anything but an austere woman of power. Max can have it, Eleanor thought - the street, the tavern, the chair, the desk, the business, the solitude, the betrayals, everything. Max wanted it, so now let Max be its prisoner.

While she strolled towards the desk, Eleanor gestured the windows with her eyes. "In the winter, the sun drives hard through those windows. You'll be blinded there lest you keep them shuttered all day long." Eleanor turned her head to indicate the old location of the desk. "I had the desk where it was for a reason, though I suppose you haven't been here long enough to know how to sit in that chair." She sat down gracefully, opposite of Max, in one of the chairs that used to be the seat of the men who wanted something of her. And yet, strangely enough, Eleanor felt that she had more power in the supplicant's seat than in the one Max sat.

Looking down at her hands, Max fidgeted with her fingers. "So here you are." Max looked up at her with a smile. "And I do not imagine you came to decorate."

She chuckled, more to herself than Max. She looked sideways at the carpet. "The governor is going to announce today the formation of a governing council." Eleanor stared at Max. "Twelve seats. Six filled from his ranks, six filled from merchants native to the island. It will signal the governor's clear intent to give the people of New Providence Island a meaningful say in their own futures, and we would like you to bless it."

"I'm sorry. Are you offering me a seat?"

"No," Eleanor replied coldly. "The six names have already been chosen, and yours is not among them."

Max smiled in that typical way when she was offended. She rose from her chair. "I own title to more of the street than you ever did." She came to stand beside Eleanor. "I earn as much legitimate income as you ever did." She walked through the office, the salon, as if fully claiming it as her own, until she stood behind Eleanor. "I have no enemies and strong friends. I'm the one they all come to here to make peace between them when no one else can."

Foolish woman, thought Eleanor. Which strong friends? Pirates who either took the pardon and are now England's subjects, or sailed off to miserable Ocracoke. Even Rackham and Anne had left her. "You are a pirate."

"Excuse me?"

Eleanor sniggered in disbelief at Max's incredulity. She turned on the seat to look at Max standing behind her. "The first thing he asked me to do was to identify pirate ringleaders on the island - organizers."

"And you named me?" whispered Max, leaning on the back of a salon chair. "Undermined my reputation with him before he –"

Max's accusing tone, made Eleanor rise. "You abetted the practice," Eleanor interrupted Max. "You signed articles, for Christ's sakes! You held a share in an active crew." What had Max believed would happen? Was Max so blind by the lies she told herself to sleep at night?

"What I have done so thoroughly pales in comparison to what you did before me?" Max asked angrily.

"I lost everything for it," whispered Eleanor. How Max could even compare herself to her was beyond Eleanor. Max had not been dragged to England. Max had not been convicted to a noose. And Max had never repented. "I lost everything! Remember that when you sit in that chair."

But Max was still Max, haughty and defensive. "You were wise to come to me. If I remain silent about this council or, worse yet, oppose its formation, it will sow all manner of mistrust and apprehension amongst my colleagues. For if I can be so easily discarded, who next?"

Max's self-delusions of grandeur when there was an English governor with the royal navy and redcoats behind him living at the other side of town, only saddened Eleanor. It saddened her that Max could not see beyond the petty, still. I am not here to make war with her, Eleanor reminded herself. Nor to take back what was once mine, or make her pay for what she took. I am here to ensure peace. Hand her the olive! Softly, she said, "Which is why you won't remain silent."

Max lifted her chin at Eleanor. "Really? Why?"

"Because this is important to him, that the street understands that his intentions are genuine and he means to be a friend. If you undermine that, he can make life very difficult for you."

Max blinked, as if she had been given a blow, but clung to her pride still. "You should know people do not speak to me that way anymore."

It was not truly the threat that struck Max so. It had been the way Eleanor talked of the governor. Max had never seen this man. He had actually only stepped foot on the island just a few hours ago. He was a stranger to Max. But when Eleanor talked about the governor it was evident he was no stranger to her. Governor Rogers was not the 'governor' to Eleanor. Governor Rogers was him and he in Eleanor's speech. It was this implied familiarity that hurt Max more than she had expected it could. More, Eleanor's way and responses intuitively told Max that she was insignificant in Eleanor's eyes and perhaps always had been. There was nothing more mortifying than the realization that the one Max never stopped desiring barely thought of her, not even after Max took everything from her.

"Be smart," said Eleanor as if to a child. She turned and walked towards the door.

"Was I on that list?" Max called out to her. Eleanor halted mid-step, frowned and turned to meet Max's eye. "That night before you were taken, when you made the first of your lists of those you wanted to see dead Mr. Stayton, Mr. Atz, Mr. Featherstone, Jack, Anne. Was I on that list?"

"No," Eleanor said in a low voice. Eleanor had not named Max herself as a target. Without a crew, Max would have been insignificant. "The night I was taken, did you inform Hornigold where he could find me?"

Max shook her head, lowered her eyes. "No," she said with a tremor in her voice.

Eleanor was unconvinced by Max's reply, but she guessed she would never know, and if she could work with Captain Hornigold after he captured her, she could also work with Max for dooming herself to that unforgiving chair.

As Eleanor walked back to the governor's mansion with her escort, she thought perhaps for the first time of the Max she once knew, the new whore who had been so eager to have her love. It had been Mrs. Mapleton who urged Eleanor to pay for the unique service of one of the newer girls in the brothel to satisfy her sexually after she ceased her relationship with Vane.

"In such an office," Mrs. Mapleton had said, "anyone who tends to your needs is going to ask for more in return than they give. But if you do not have these needs met, you will never survive the experience. Best to make sure that whomever you choose to have tend to you all you owe them is a fee. There's this new girl, exotic looking, from Haiti. She has no connections here and does not know Nassau really."

But as it turned out, even the woman of whom Eleanor believed she owed no more than a fee, wanted more of her than she could give. Eleanor had cared for Max, not wanting to see her harmed, not even when she learned of Max conspiring with Rackham to sabotage Eleanor by reaping the Spanish gold, but it had never been more than that. Eleanor had actually been taken by surprise when Max professed her love to her - surprised that Max believed Eleanor loved her back in the same way.

Max had pleaded with her to start a new life somewhere else with the pearls. That had never been an option for Eleanor. She had not loved Max in any way that she wanted to share the rest of her life with her, let alone leave Nassau. Max was novel and it was satisfying, because of Max's skills, but Eleanor desired only men really. Many a time, Eleanor could not even begin to enjoy Max's kisses, strokes and fingers without closing her eyes and imagining it was Charles fucking her instead. It was the idea of a man's body and what he would do with it to her that got her horny – his tongue in her mouth, his stubble charring her chin, the weight of his chest on top of her, and his proud cock thrusting into her. And at present, Eleanor was not thinking of Charles.

All flustered, Eleanor arrived back at the governor's mansion and realized she was not in any state to meet Rogers just now. So, she intended to check on the progress of furnishing the east wing, when Rogers saw her appear in the hallway from the assembly room and left Major Andrews standing by himself. He rushed to her and asked, "How did it go?"

Eleanor heaved a deep breath and looked away from him. "Beg your pardon, but I – I…"

"Are you well?" Rogers asked with great concern.

"I am," she said in a high-pitched voice. She told herself to get her act together. "I am. Really, I am," she reassured him. "It was just a very emotional confrontation. I would like a moment to come to myself again."

Puzzled, Rogers studied her. "Yes, absolutely," he said, doubtful. "I'll have Mrs. Hudson show you your apartments if you'd like."

"Thank you."

"But do not take too long, for we have a meeting about the bay's defense and repairing Fort Nassau. I would like to know your news from the street before that meeting." He smiled to her. "When you are ready, you can find me in the garden."

Upstairs, she discovered that Rogers had designated the second largest apartment to her, with a parlor and a bedroom. It was situated in the east wing, on the south-east side, with the windows overlooking the small bewildered garden. "This is much too rich," said Eleanor. Her office at the tavern had been grand enough, but her bedroom used to be a dark alcove with red drapings and barred gate. She would have chosen a less bigger apartment for herself. An apartment such as this one was intended for the governor's wife. If it were not clear before that his wife would never live in Nassau, it was now.

"Do not worry over the expense, Miss Guthrie," said Mrs. Hudson. "The Lord Governor had the surveyor search the rooms for any piece of furniture the pirates had left undamaged. He said that you were probably the only one who would not mind sleeping in a pirate's bed."

Eleanor gaped at Mrs. Hudson. "What about the governor's apartment? Does he not need salon chairs, a wardrobe and bedstead?"

"Oh, that is taken care of. Except for the bed there." Mrs. Hudson pointed at the wooden bedstead. "He does not mind leftover furniture either. He designated it to be yours, because his bed was the sole piece he brought with him from London. His house in London was a rented one, and he ended his lease with the owners." Eleanor went to the bed and sat down on the straw and feather mattress. If she forgot for a moment that Rackham had slept in it, it was a perfectly good bed. Mrs. Hudson indicated the empty top of the bedstead. "I'm afraid I could not salvage the draperies. They were severely dusted and torn." Mrs. Hudson walked to a cabinet. On its top stood a basin and large pitcher. The chambermaid poured water in the basin for Eleanor. "If you wish you can show me tomorrow where I can find fabrics in Nassau to make you new ones, and you might like to come to pick those you prefer." Then she walked to the large wardrobe, opened it and showed Eleanor how she had arranged Eleanor's clothes in it. "Well, I shall leave you now to yourself for a moment." Mrs. Hudson retreated towards the door. "If you require me, I am at the first servant room down the hall, south of this wing."

Eleanor went to the washing stand and splashed the water in her face and her neck. Attached to the cabinet was a large oval, cracked mirror framed in wood. Eleanor adjusted it to such an angle that the crack did not interfere with her reflection. It was the first time she could actually see herself clearly in contrast to how she must have looked when she first emerged from her prison cell in London. Clearly the many hours on the Delicia's deck, had given her a healthy tan. Her blonde hair had lightened and softened. Her mother's green blue eyes looked back at her, soft and glistening. And her breasts truly filled her bodice.

She noticed a little jewelry box with inlaid mother-of-pearl on the cabinet. She opened it, and found it empty. A few glass bottles could serve as perfume holders, but except for one with leftover rosewater, they too were empty. She turned around to survey the bedroom. It had a genuine bathtub and an exotic dressing screen. Eleanor felt positively sensual.

She walked over to the window to look at the garden. It was not a large one in comparison to what she knew to be the typical parks of England that went with a mansion the size of the governor's. It used to be larger, but now at least half had been built on. Still, it was a small oasis in the heart of Nassau, with full grown fruit trees such as mango, papaya, lime and bananas, an imported avocado tree, but also palms, ferns, birds of paradise flowers and orchids and when Eleanor opened the window she could smell a sweet, heady fragrance of ripe fruit.

She noticed Rogers standing under the mango tree, pointing with a cane where the servant on the ladder could pick a mango for him. He sat down on the garden bench nearby, peeled and cut the sticky fruit with a knife. Fearful that he would notice her, she moved slightly away from the window, behind the curtain and watched him as he tried a piece. His face lit up with delight. When he finished it, he felt his pocket for a handkerchief, seemed to have found none, looked about, shrugged his shoulder and licked the juice from his fingers. He seemed completely oblivious that someone had seen it all.

Eventually, Eleanor went downstairs and joined him. She was not entirely unable to suppress her smile, recalling the fruit scene. As soon as he saw her, Rogers stood and beamed at her. "My goodness, I just had a taste of heaven, I think. Let me live here forever. But if ever I am forced to choose another career, I will grow mango trees to make it paradise." He chuckled. "What am I saying. With such a temperate, tender climate, the air breathing so sweetly on us, fruit to live on, lusciously green, it is paradise." He gestured with his knife to the mango tree. "If you want one, I will have the servant pick one for you."

"Thank you, but no. Maybe later, when I have a napkin," Eleanor smirked. "They are sweet and juicy, but sticky." Rogers squinted at her and she pointed at her window. "My apartments look out onto the garden. I could not help but notice your predicament."

Rogers grimaced embarrassed. "Hmm, well." He coughed. "If you wish furniture moved or rearranged you can just tell the surveyor."

"No," she blurted, and then stared at her hands, glowing. "It's perfect." Eleanor had never felt like she needed all the frills of a lady's parlor, but now that she had one, she wanted nothing changed. "And you were correct – I don't mind sleeping in a pirate's bed."

Rogers coughed again. "Um, shall we walk?" He already took several strides, his hands behind his back, and when Eleanor joined his side, he was all business again. "So, what news from the street? "

"Max expects a seat on the council."

Rogers chuckled at that. "A brothel madam having a seat on the council? I might just as well put a quartermaster and former pirate captain on my council."

"She is more than a brothel madam now though," urged Eleanor. "Max bought the shares of my former partners and took possession of the tavern. She has acquired considerable influence."

Rogers stopped walking. "Max took your business?" There was an edge in his voice that she had not expected to hear. "I understand now why you needed some moment alone. That must not have been an easy confrontation."

Eleanor furrowed her brow and looked at her feet. "It was painful," she muttered. "To learn of this." Learning about the mock trial trial gutted her the most. But Eleanor refrained from mentioning that detail to him. It would do him no good if he would get angry with Max over this. "But I think that it went better than expected, considering the circumstances."

"It had a positive conclusion then?" Rogers turned and strolled the other way again in the garden. He stopped at a shrub of yellow and orange flowers of birds of paradise. "Are these poisonous?" Eleanor shook her head, and he tapped his finger against the flower.

"I would not exactly say positive." Eleanor weighed her words. "Max has gone through great lengths to be where she is now, and she is very reluctant to recognize that the Nassau of yesterday is not the Nassau of today. She is not as dangerous as she believes herself to be, but she can make your governance difficult, delay the progress."

Rogers turned his head to look at her when she spoke. It was evident to him that Eleanor held back on much of the actual painful confrontation. But perhaps he did not need to know the details. He knew enough of his own feelings for her by now to admit that he was not entirely objective anymore regarding people who aimed to antagonize Eleanor. "Truthfully, I do not like the woman so far from the little I have heard." He sighed. "But I will take your opinion on the matter in consideration, and see whether I can show her some recognition, without giving her a seat on the council."

Eleanor's visit to Max had a far more productive result than Eleanor anticipated. She had left Max shaking with terror. Not only had Max not expected to see Eleanor ever again, least of all had she expected Eleanor to be as she was now. It scared her even more than the murder-plotting Eleanor she had last seen months ago. The moment that Eleanor stepped through the tavern's door, alive, Max expected Eleanor to rage, to threaten her, to promise her that she would reclaim her chair and business. But Max had seen pity in Eleanor's eyes, had heard it in her voice. It mortified Max.

Featherstone knocked on her door and entered her office together with Idelle. "Just checking whether Eleanor did not slit your throat or something."

Max shook her head. "No."

"It was surprisingly quiet in here," said Idelle. "There's a crowd outside, curious about you."

Max smiled, feeling strengthened at the idea of such support, but when she stepped outside to reassure the street that she was alive and well, she realized she just had made a mistake. They were not there in support of her, but for the spectacle they had expected. They all knew Eleanor was in some official position with the governor and had seen her come and go as such without drama. Many turned away without giving Max another look. Customers nodded shyly and left.

When Max's errand boy returned an hour later to report the word out on the street, reality finally hit Max. It was said that Eleanor had returned more powerful than ever, as the governor's senior advisor. And Max? Well that was the woman who had stolen Eleanor's business after her father's death, like a vulture, and even had some whores put on some macabre play. If a man wanted a job, like say repair Fort Nassau, it was probably best to stay away from her altogether. The governor seemed a reasonable man, if you did not cross him or his senior advisor. Vane had killed Eleanor's father, and see where that had gotten him - he fled with his tail between his legs like a thief in the night. Jack and Anne were gone as well. Without partners, without a crew and with Eleanor against her, it would only be a matter of time, before the governor would come down on Max. Within two hours of Eleanor's visit, Max was just a brothel madam and the owner of a tavern of little consequence. But Max had prepared herself for this. She simply had not factored Eleanor's existence into it. What had Eleanor said? That she lost everything because of her past, while Max tried to keep all her ill gotten gain as a pirate and expected to be rewarded for it with a council seat. I am smarter than you think, Eleanor, and I am willing to give up a lot, and make him an offer he cannot refuse.

(Eleanor-Max: S1 Eleanor's explanation on why she broke with Vane + S3 Mrs. Mapleton's "advice" gives a picture of "unrequieted love" for Max. I think Eleanor has a hetero preference, because she can jump Vane's bones lustfully and takes initiative towards him physically (as she does with Rogers) whereas Max must take initiave towards Eleanor, and even then it needs coaxing. Nor does Eleanor ever show an inclination to Max in a sexual manner again, as well as fails to comprehend how deep Max's feelings (and pain) went.

Tempest:
parallel - Eleanor chooses Rogers' service and let's go of her "office" and business once held by her father (her legacy). Prospero often calls his stolen dukedom of Milan and the island his legacy for his daughter Miranda. Initially, it seems that Miranda and Ferdinand will remain on the island, but Miranda ends up ruling Naples by Ferdinand's side, not her father's Milan, nor his refuge island.

reference - Rogers expresses his delight like Ferdinand who claims he wishes to live forever on Prospero's island and make it paradise (Act 4, scene 1). He describes the island like Alonso's companions (King of Naples, father of Ferdinand) describe Prospero's island (in Act 2, scene 1) when they do favoribly.

Paradise Lost: Rogers calls it paradise, talks of growing trees. There is a role reversal because Rogers eats the fruit in a manner he does not wish anyone else to have seen (inappropriate). He offers it to Eleanor who refuses the fruit and implies she knows what he did. Another reversal is that Rogers arrives in "paradise", not ousted from it. It becomes a Paradise Found, with the inherent risk of losing it.)