“Not now. I’ve suffered worse in a nasty badminton match. Ambrose, please ask Mr. Golgolkin if his comrade down there can swim.”
Ambrose and Golgolkin had their backs to Hawke, both peering down over the side of the yacht. Someone flipped on a spotlight and trained it on the Russian. They could see him thrashing about in the water and the disturbance was attracting the attention of the sharks congregated at the bow.
“I say, did he survive the fall?” Hawke asked.
At the sight of the fins slicing through the water in his direction, the floundering Russian started screaming.
“Apparently, he did,” Hawke said, answering his own question. He stepped to the rail and glanced down. He was pleased to see all the dorsal fins, circling, closing.
“Brian, let the sharks get a little closer and then have someone open the closest starboard hatch and pull the little bugger in.”
“They’re pretty close right now, Skipper,” Drummond said. “Especially that big white-tip.”
“Not close enough,” Hawke replied. He turned to Congreve.
“Ambrose, perhaps someone could give Comrade Golgolkin here a towel or something to press against his wound. It’s nothing serious, unfortunately, just a scratch. And I suppose we can return this to him now.”
Hawke pulled the confiscated automatic pistol from his pocket, released the cartridge magazine, and tossed the clip overboard before handing the empty gun to Golgolkin.
“You’re quite welcome, I’m sure,” Hawke said, having heard no expression of thanks for his kindness.
The bearded Russian was speechless. Goggle-eyed, he was leaning over the varnished teak rail, watching the sharks circling ever closer around his hapless colleague.
“Will that be all, Skipper?” Brian asked.
“I think that’s quite enough excitement for one evening, don’t you? If our chief bosun is still sober when he returns to the boat, you might ask him to have my seaplane fueled and ready for me first thing. File a flight plan to Nassau, I want to be airborne by dawn’s early light.”
“Aye, sir.”
“After you’ve seen our guests safely ashore, you might call my pilots in Miami and tell them I want the Gulfstream to meet me in Nassau, tanks topped off and ready for wheels-up at noon. I’m taking her into Reagan Washington.”
“Aye, aye.”
“Aye, aye!” squawked Sniper.
“Ah, Sniper, my brave fellow. You deserve a treat. Brian, a lid of our best Beluga for old Sniper?”
“Done,” Brian said, smiling.
“Oh. And tell Miss Perkins down in the ship’s office to have Stokely pick me up in D.C., and book me a quiet table for two at the Georgetown Club at eight.”
“Done,” Brian said. “And your usual suite at the Hay-Adams overlooking the White House?”
“Not necessary, thanks. I spoke with Pelham. Apparently the new house is ready for occupants.”
Brian saluted and headed aft to make the arrangements.
Hawke noticed that the fat Russian, still looking down over the rail, appeared to have been eavesdropping on his conversation with young Drummond. Nosy, he decided, very nosy.
“Ambrose, do you have a second?” Hawke asked, and he and Congreve walked to the top of the steps leading down from the bridge deck, moving out of earshot of the Russian.
“Well done,” Congreve said softly. “He wants his money.”
“He’s bloody lucky he’s got his life,” Hawke said. “Tell that socialist disease that anyone who lines his pockets putting nuclear weapons in the hands of terrorists takes his chances with me. He’s already used up one. And one is about all he gets. Bagged his bloody limit.”
“We’ll get them off the boat, Alex. But I would definitely increase the security on and around the yacht, starting tonight. Round the clock. These chaps are beyond unsavory.”
“I agree. I’ll have a word with Tommy Quick. Double the watch. This Telaraсa. I seem to have heard the name. Spanish, isn’t it? Something to do with spiders?”
“The spider’s web, actually.”
“I’ve always been petrified of spiders,” Hawke said, shuddering. “Strange, isn’t it? Ever since I was a boy. No idea why, of course. Spiders. Horrid little buggers.”
“Let’s have a nightcap up on deck, shall we?” Ambrose said. “And you can finish the gripping saga of that scourge of the Spanish Main, the blackguard Blackhawke.”
“Pirates’ lore. Most appropriate after a splendid evening of saber-rattling and plank-walking,” Hawke said. Motioning his friend up the stairs, he said, “After you, Constable.”
17
Once Hawke and Ambrose had made themselves comfortable up on deck, Hawke continued the story of his illustrious ancestor.
The old pirate, upon hearing that the king’s men were in the courtyard, now knew he was not to be spared the hangman’s noose. Collapsing back upon his tattered cot, he uttered one word, “Lost.”
The parson knelt on the cold stone beside him and put his hand out to the man. “Repent with me now, and make your final journey with peace in your soul. I beg of you to—”
“Innocent!” Blackhawke bellowed. “How does an innocent man repent? The king himself long encouraged piracy to fill his coffers. Now that damnable East India Company decides pirates are discouraging the mercantile trades, and suddenly our heads are on the block!”
“Alas, ’tis true.”
“My friends at court, my crew, one and all betray me to save their own skins! It’s these foul traitors must repent their treachery, not Captain Blackhawke!”
“Alas, ’tis true twice over,” the parson said. “Let us go now, and speak with the Lord.”
On their way to the courtyard, the parson took the hapless pirate into the prison chapel for one last chance at redemption. They sat for a moment in the gloom on a long hard pew facing a single coffin draped in black. As was tradition, the doomed prisoners had been forced to sit before the symbolic coffin, quite empty, for hours each day, supposedly doing their penance.
Thick incense floated to the high, vaulted ceilings, but it couldn’t mask the pervasive stench of urine rising in every dark corner; nor could the chants and mournful prayers of the condemned hide the sounds of those wretched souls fornicating on the back benches.
Blackhawke stared silently at the draped coffin, quietly sipping his grog.
“It’s no use, Parson,” he said finally. “It ain’t in me, repentance. Nary a bit of it. I’ll step off into the next world and take me chances as I am.” He pulled the spyglass in which he’d hidden the map from his cloak and slipped it into the parson’s hands.
“This glass is all that’s left to me in this world,” Blackhawke rasped. “ ’Twas a gift from my wife when first I went to sea. Now I want her to have it as a poor remembrance of her husband. I beg you to see that it makes it safely into her hands. I’ve four gold doubloons sewn into me coat here that are yours, if you’ll give me no more than your sacred word. It’s my last wish.”
“Consider it done, Captain,” the parson said. And Blackhawke ripped open the seam in his coat, withdrew the doubloons, and slipped them to the fellow.
The parson and the pirate emerged into the courtyard.
“I warn you, Parson,” Blackhawke said, angrily eyeing the crewmen who’d betrayed him, some of whom were already in the cart. “I warn you this. An unarmed man full of vengeance is the most dangerous of men. I warrant I’ll rip their treacherous hearts out!”
But in the event, riding in the king’s cart, Blackhawke merely drank grog all the way to the dock. He was simply too tired and too weak and too full of rum to wreak his vengeance. He was thus oblivious to the merry shouts and taunts of the crowds lining the streets leading to the River Thames. By the time he and the other condemned arrived at the place of execution, the parson had to help the old man stagger up the steps to where the hangman waited. The notorious pirate captain would be the first to go.