“Aye, but that ally is an advantage only if he shares what he’s seen from the peak of his lofty foresight, m’lord. And Don Michael, whatever his reasons might be, did not do so.”
“So what are you saying? That he’s not to be trusted?”
O’Rourke rubbed his thick nose with a flat, meaty thumb. “I wouldn’t be saying so black a thing as that, m’lord. But if Don McCarthy is clever enough to keep important secrets from someone like General Turenne, then isn’t it a possibility that he could be keeping important secrets from us, too?”
Hugh nodded and turned his gaze slowly to where Michael McCarthy was tutoring Mulryan, back at the taffrail. “Yes, O’Rourke, there is that possibility. There is definitely that possibility.”
San Juan, Puerto Rico
Barto—the only name he ever gave out because it was the only one he had ever had—ate the third slice of papaya greedily and washed it down with a mix of rum and soursop. The musky taste of the latter mixed well with the local spirit’s strong cane flavor. Speaking around the mixture in his mouth, he addressed his host. “So you’ve business with me, eh? Can’t remember when a man in silk trousers had business with me. Now, silk-trousered ladies, on the other hand—” Had Barto’s senior “officers” been present, they would have no doubt laughed on cue.
But tonight, Barto had no audience. He was alone with his host, Don Eugenio de Covilla, who now seemed to be attempting to suppress a disgusted sneer, as he had throughout much of the meal. But Barto suspected that his host’s duty to Spain and Philip came before indulging in displays of repugnance. “Se&nTilde;or Barto, I most certainly do have business to conduct with a man of your—experience.”
Barto leaned back, belched, studied the Spaniard. A minor functionary recently dispatched from Santo Domingo. A dandy who had probably been in fewer fights than Barto had warts (well, a lot fewer fights, by that count). But the Spaniard reeked of oils and silver, and while Barto had no need of the former, he had both a powerful need and lust for the latter.
Ironically, Barto’s increased need of silver was a direct consequence of his corresponding increase in good fortune. His “free company” had grown prodigiously in just the past month. Three weeks ago, while drawing near shore at Neckere Island to take on water and any fruits they could find (scurvy having made yet another general appearance), Barto had come upon a sloop-rigged English packet in the throes of repressing a mutiny. Drawn by gunfire as a shark is drawn by blood, Barto quieted his men and commenced to run close against the far side of the headland at which the packet was moored. After putting his best boarders into his smaller boat—a shallow-hulled pinnace—he swept around the headland, the wind full at his back. He was on them in three minutes; the fight lasted less than half that time. He put the lawful owner, stalwart captain, and loyal crew to the sword—the whole lot weren’t worth twenty reales in ransom—and put the mutineers to work cleaning the deck and transferring stores and cargoes between this new hull and Barto’s two others. With the mutineers added to his ranks, he finally had enough men to consider plundering a larger town, maybe one of the small English settlements just recently established in the Bahamas, or the Dutch enclave that was rumored to have returned to Saba. Such a raid would only swell his coffers slightly, but would at least quiet his crews. They were already restless and would soon make their displeasure known to him—in a most pointed fashion, if need be. So, since a full-scale raid would take more time to plan, a smaller intermediary action was required to tide them over and sate their appetites for both rum and blood. A nuisance, reflected Barto, but it was all part of a freebooter’s life.
He belched again. “You invited me to dinner that we might talk. So now I’ve eaten your dinner. What have we to talk about?”
De Covilla smoothed his moustache. “The matter is somewhat delicate, Se&nTilde;or Barto. Do I have your word . . . hmmm, allow me to rephrase: is it understood between us that sharing this information would attract the special disfavor of His Imperial Majesty Philip of Spain?”
Barto smiled. He had thought that, having seized four of Philip’s ships, he had already attracted quite as much of that imperial displeasure as anyone could hope for. But apparently he had been mistaken. “I understand. And I hope that His Majesty’s representatives will realize that any past, er, indiscretions on my part regarding his shipping were matters of mistaken identity. Night actions, you see.”
“Of course.” De Covilla’s smug smile indicated that he knew Barto never attacked ships after sundown. “Indeed, the representatives of my liege are not only willing to pay handsomely in silver, but to provide you with something else you might find of even more durable value.”