Chesapeake by James A. Michener
“What is thee saying?”
“That before sunset we must divest ourselves of all slaves. It is the will of God.”
He tried to quieten her, intending to reason with her later, but she would not be consoled. “We shall set our slaves free,” was all she would say.
Realizing that from this night there would be no retreat, he attempted several evasions. “Let me draft a will which manumits them on my death.” No, such delay would be mere avoidance of the basic problem. “Then let me hire them out to others—men of good deportment who will treat them well.” No, such hiring would not remove the blemish from us. “Then let me sell them. I’ll see Steed before noon. He needs help.” No, because that would be thrusting on others the sin resulting from one’s own action.
But when he explained in the careful terms of husbandry that there was no conceivable way in which he could operate his business if he simply gave the slaves away, she stopped arguing and listened, and she saw that her imperative demands were placing on him a burden of moral and economic action for which he was simply unprepared. Tenderly she kissed him and said, “Edward, I have forever known that thee will do right. By sunset this night there will be no slaves at Peace Cliff, nor ever again.”
“What I’ll do—”
“Don’t tell me. I can bear no more knowledge.” And she fell asleep.
Early next morning he set in motion his practical solution: he herded the slaves and their children onto a small boat and ferried them to Devon, where the Steeds said they would be delighted to purchase them. “We daren’t call it a purchase,” Paxmore warned, “or Ruth Brinton would terminate the agreement.”
“There’s other ways,” Steed said, and what he arranged was this: from London, Fithians would send Edward a crate of shipbuilding tools and Ruth Brinton a crate of theological works. “And to make the sale more attractive, Edward, I’ll cede you that good land east of Patamoke for a permanent boatyard.” Paul Steed promised to find such white servants and hired-out slaves as might be required in building the additional ships, and in this manner the Quaker Edward Paxmore divested himself of his slaves, turning a nice profit and acquiring a boatyard. On the morrow, when the Martha Keene was handed over to the Steeds, Paxmore would move his business to Patamoke.
There was an interruption, and surprisingly, it did not come from Ruth Brinton; she was satisfied that with the banishment of slaves from Peace Cliff she had accomplished as much as she could reasonably hope for in 1670. Later on, she assured herself, all people will awaken to the problem, and then perhaps even Edward will quit side-stepping moral issues.
The interruption involved violence. Men came running to the Steed warehouse, crying, “Pirates have stolen the Martha Keene!” And others shouted, “They’ve slain our sailors!”
When men from the warehouse ran to the shore they saw their ship, sails high, heading down the Choptank toward the bay, while on the wharf lay the bodies of three dead sailors.
In the next frenzied hours the people of Patamoke made a series of shocking discoveries. Jack Griscom and Henri Bonfleur had for some years been pirates; operating under various names, they had swept the Caribbean, chasing down Spanish vessels heading home from Panama, but accepting any accidental English traders who sailed into their path.
That much was learned from Stooby Turlock, who had watched and listened. When the citizens demanded angrily, “Why didn’t you warn us?” he replied, “Nobody asked.” The day was spent piecing together information about the pirates: they had no crew working ashore in Virginia; they had probably escaped into the Choptank at the end of some long and bloody chase; from the moment they saw the Martha Keene they had intended stealing her; and they were doubtless headed back to the Spanish Main for further depredations. Other shocks came as individuals catalogued their losses.
Edward Paxmore’s ship had been stolen. On the eve of turning it over to the Steeds it had disappeared; two years of toil had come to naught.
Henry Steed came, distraught, to report that as the pirates were leaving the Choptank they stopped off at Devon and persuaded all slaves working on the island to join them in a break for freedom. “When Abijah and Amos tried to persuade our slaves to stay with us, Griscom killed them both. All of yours fled, Paxmore.”
The wildest complaint came from Timothy Turlock, who rushed up the river in a canoe, shouting monosyllables that could scarcely be deciphered. Stooby did the translating and informed the listeners that the pirates had persuaded Charley to go aboard to help with the sails and had taken Birgitta as well.
“Did they kidnap her?” a woman asked.
“No!” Timothy blurted. “She go!”
He wanted her back, and it was his noisy lamentation that goaded the others into action. Edward Paxmore said, “We must get that ship.”
“How?” someone asked.
“Sail after her. Take her.”
“In what?”
“In their ship. It’s smaller, but I fixed it well.”
Henry Steed was determined to recover his slaves, for they formed the backbone of his enterprise; indeed, they represented the profit of his plantation, and to lose them would be disastrous.
But the firm reasoning was done by young Earl Steed, intended captain of the ship that had been stolen: “If we can put together a crew of sixteen, and assemble enough muskets, we can handle their ship better than they can manage ours, and we’ll overtake them.”
“Where?”
This posed a problem. The pirates would have a day’s head start, and the faster ship, but they would have only themselves, Charley Turlock and the Steed slaves to handle it. A resolute crew might overtake them. However, the pirates had a hundred possible destinations and the likelihood of locating them was not great.
Now Stooby spoke. Pockmarked, emaciated, poorly clad, he was an unlikely young man to battle pirates, but he had often been insulted by them and they had stolen a woman who had been kind to him. “I listened. Often they said Marigot.”
“Marigot Bay!” Paxmore exclaimed.
“Where’s that?” Earl Steed asked.
“Of course!” Paxmore said. “That’s where pirates raided the barracoons. It must have been Griscom and the Frenchman who bore down on us when I was there.”
He told them where Marigot was and outlined a plan whereby the Choptank men might slip in and retake the Martha Keene. Earl Steed, listening intently, judged that retaliation might succeed. “Can we enlist sixteen?”
There was Steed himself, and Tim Turlock thirsting for revenge, and Edward Paxmore determined to recover his property. Henry Steed wanted to join them, but his son said, “You’re too old,” and Henry asked, “But what about Timothy Turlock?” and young Steed said, “That one has no age.”
Stooby insisted upon coming and produced three muskets for the arsenal. Twelve others volunteered, including a notable squirrel hunter with two muskets. Captain Steed told them, “We must collect all available powder.”
“Why?” Paxmore asked.
“If we cannot recover your ship, I do not propose leaving it for them to gloat over.”
On the long sail to Marigot Bay, Captain Steed, twenty-nine years old, displayed a resolution which those who had known his father and his two uncles would never have suspected he had. He was not gentle like Father Ralph, nor fastidious like Uncle Paul, nor slightly pompous like his father; he was a new breed. To him, England was a respected family memory; he had been educated there, but it was not the summum bonum. For Earl Steed, destiny resided in Maryland, and if the mother country was too pusillanimous to protect her colonies from pirates, he would undertake the job.
Over his crew of fifteen he exercised the most rigorous control, impressing upon them the fact that the pirates had already killed five people in this one escape. He appointed Stooby cook, Paxmore the permanent lookout. He put Tim Turlock in charge of the kegs of powder and the muskets, while he himself managed the tiller and the set of the sails and charted the course to be followed.
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When he was not on duty Paxmore studied the operation of the sails and confirmed the thesis of his Bristol instructor: the shrouds steadying the mast did not have to be pulled tight like the strings on a harp; they functioned best when slight strain or none was upon them. He also studied the action of the rudder and learned that it must not fight the sea but ride through it, giving direction, and at the conclusion of this inspection he marveled at how different a ship at sea was from one in a dock. All parts work together. You can hear them speaking.
Whenever he found a scrap of paper he sketched the manner in which a real ship was put together, and this information would become the foundation of his boatyard. He suspected that in the seventy years since this old wanderer was laid down, many improvements must have been devised in London or Boston, but these he would acquire later; what he had in this Dutch treasure was a bible of shipbuilding, and for an artist, which Paxmore was becoming, there could be no stronger foundation.
But now the island of St. Lucia loomed, and the time for study was past. It was Captain Steed’s plan to lie leeward of the French island of Martinique to assure himself that no other piratical ships were moving in the Caribbean, and then to sail as swiftly and boldly as possible to Marigot, hoping to find the Martha Keene riding there, but when this plan was put into effect it yielded nothing, for Steed had sailed his craft too well: it had arrived two weeks before the pirates. The bay was empty.
He spent the time devising tactics that would give him an advantage when the pirates did arrive. He had to assume they would approach from the direction of Jamaica and Haiti, so he stationed his ship in a small bay which allowed it to be hidden while observing the entrance to Marigot. He then sent Stooby and Paxmore overland to scout the terrain at Marigot, and from the low mountains that rim that splendid harbor Paxmore looked down on the barracoon he had rebuilt, and the wattled homes where the pirates lived when ashore, and the desultory guards they mounted. He was pleased to see that the routine was careless, but it was Stooby who noticed the protected cove where small pursuit boats were tied. Without uttering a word, he indicated how someone must cut those boats adrift, and he spent a long time plotting paths to that spot.
When Paxmore returned with news that Marigot was sleeping peacefully in the sun and that the barracoons were empty, indicating that no trading ships were scheduled, Captain Steed said, “All is in readiness for Griscom. He must come soon.” And on the morning at about the ninth hour, the Martha Keene hove into view, rolling easily on broad swells as it moved toward anchorage. Deftly it negotiated the entrance to Marigot, disappearing behind the headlands like a beautiful woman entering a night room. Stooby, watching from his mountain, waited until the pirates had rowed themselves ashore. He noted every man that went: Griscom loud and licentious, Bonfleur grabbing the waist of a woman not seen before, six white sailors, but no sign of Charley, nor of Birgitta, nor of any blacks. He carried this perplexing news to his captain.
It was Steed’s firm decision that they must strike that night—“The pirates will be ashore, and if I know Griscom he’ll be drunk.” He appealed to Stooby for guidance, and that cadaverous, pockmarked waterman said, “Maybe Charley. Maybe two more.”
“Why won’t the others come back?”
“Drunk.” Earl Steed, like the older men in his family, had considered Stooby Turlock an imbecile, and yet he was now prepared to rely on him, for the strange fellow had an animal cunning that produced startling results. Stooby looked at the world, digested what he saw, and reached conclusions. Now he told Steed of the cover where the pursuit boats lay—“I cut loose.”
Then Steed explained his tactics: “At dusk we’ll row this big ship down to Marigot. Stooby, you and Tom go overland to cut the boats adrift, then swim out and we’ll pick you up in the rowboat. Squirrel Hunter, you’re in charge of the rowboat. Paxmore and I will lead the boarding party. And when we get aboard, raise the anchor. Or cut the chain if necessary, and if this wind holds, we’ll maneuver the Martha Keene out of the harbor, slap some sailors on her, and be off with both ships to Maryland.”
“And if there is a numerous guard aboard?” Paxmore asked.
“We cut their throats,” Steed said matter-of-factly, and when he saw Paxmore wince, he added, “Remember, they’ve killed five of ours already. They’ll kill all of us if we give them a chance.”
“And if they resist?” Paxmore asked.
“Stooby and I will fire on deck. Squirrel Shooter from the rowboat.”
“The shore will hear.”
“They’ll find no boats. Stooby takes care of that.”
“And if the wind fails? And we can’t move the ship?”
Captain Steed pointed to the barrel of powder resting in the rowboat. “We burn her to the water’s edge.”
“Agreed,” Paxmore said. Then, quietly, he said, “I would not like to carry a knife or a musket.” When Steed assented, Paxmore said, “But if we must burn the ship, let me light the fires.”
Steed nodded and said, “Stooby, off to get those boats,” and the waterman was gone.
The others waited aboard ship till the agreed-upon hour, then launched the rowboat and held it close astern while Steed, Paxmore and Squirrel Hunter climbed down. Using small paddles instead of oars, they penetrated Marigot Bay, listened to the revelry ashore, and waited apprehensively until they saw, in the gloom, Stooby and his mate swimming toward them like a pair of beavers.
Steed was alarmed by what Stooby reported: “Quiet, so we swim to ship. Almost empty.” One accidental glance by a watchman would have spotted the swimmers and ruined the expedition; what Steed did not consider was that no watchman would have spotted Stooby Turlock, who could slip through water without leaving wakes or splashes.
The five rowed silently to the offshore side of the Martha Keene, and when Paxmore held his hand out to prevent them from bumping, he could almost identify which plank he was touching and when it had been attached to the ribs. He patted the dark ship as if it were a pet.
It had been planned that at this point Captain Steed would take over, making crucial decisions as to whether a boarding should be attempted, but to his astonishment Stooby Turlock started talking in a loud voice, using a mixture of Choptank Indian and broken English that no one could have understood but his twin brother Charley, who ran to the side of the pirate ship, peered down into the darkness, and began calling back. The brothers spoke freely for half a minute, during which Paxmore was paralyzed with fright, after which Stooby cried almost loud enough to be heard onshore, “Nobody here but Charley!” And he was up the side of the ship.
He was followed by Steed and Paxmore, and after a moment by the swimmer who had helped Stooby. Each was greeted by Charley’s bear hugs and indecipherable gruntings, and after a delay the invaders attacked the problem of getting the ship under way and out of the harbor.
It proved impossible. The anchor could not be sprung loose. The sails were down and stowed. The invaders had not enough power to row the lumbering craft. And lights were beginning to show onshore.
“Ho, Charley!” came Griscom’s deep voice. No response from the huddled raiders. “Charley, you idiot! Who’s there?”
Squirrel Hunter, who had been left guarding the rowboat on the offshore side, had pulled himself around the stern end of the Martha Keene, and now with the most careful and deliberate movements took aim at the pirate holding the lantern. With one shot he killed Griscom, and hell erupted. There were shouts and screams and running, and little Bonfleur had the good sense to stay hidden behind a
“We’ve got to burn the ship!” Steed cried, and Paxmore hauled up the keg of powder, but Stooby was already working with his brother, and deep in the bowels of the oaken ship—so strong, so ugly—they had spread powder from the pirate’s store and without instruction had touched it off. A powerful flame surged out of the hatchways, with the twins appearing in its midst, slapping at their burning hair and chortling gleefully.
“Set fire!” Steed shouted to Paxmore, but there was no need. Stooby’s blaze swept across the deck, reached Paxmore’s keg and ignited an enormous fire.
“Out of the lights!” Steed shouted as gunfire started from the shore. Running to where he had left the rowboat, he started to climb down, but the boat was not there.
“Where in hell is the boat?” he bellowed.
“Here!” Stooby cried from the flaming darkness, and there it was, on the wrong side, in full target, with Squirrel Hunter and the two Turlocks gunning down pirates as if they were Choptank ducks.
“God damn it, bring that boat over here,” Steed roared, but Edward Paxmore warned him, “No need to swear. This ship will sail no more.”
Captain Steed would never forget the return voyage from Marigot Bay. As he explained later to his father:
“The Turlocks stayed together like the witches in Macbeth, stirring an evil brew, and every six or seven minutes all three would roar with laughter and punch one another and roll about the deck and giggle with delight. And what, pray tell me, was the cause of their glee?
“Griscom and Bonfleur had proved to be monsters.
They beat Charley and put burning tapers in his ears and made him dance while they drank, but every so often as we sailed Charley would remember how the squirrel hunter had shot Griscom dead and he would fall backward like Griscom and the three would roar with satisfaction.