“It’s not that shallow here by the rock,” I said. “And those cannons will reach the shore for certain from here. We’ve got to get the boys back into the forest.”
Nod and Fog and Crow hadn’t noticed yet. They were all getting along, for a wonder, and had just hauled a net full of fish onto the rock. Kit and Ed had stopped swimming halfway out to us and were wrestling in the water, splashing and pushing each other under the waves.
“None of us have weapons,” I said to Peter, for he had that look in his eye, the one that said he’d like to swim out and board the ship, the one that said there was nothing better than killing pirates.
“You take the others back,” Peter said, almost dreamily.
“What will you do?” I asked.
Peter grinned at me and dove into the water. He had nothing but his skin and his brains with him, but I’d no doubt that if he managed to make it aboard that ship, he’d cause havoc.
The other three crouched over the net, arguing how best to bring the fish back to shore. Nod and Fog wanted to pull the net of live fish behind them. The thinking was that if the net broke or some other catastrophe occurred, the fish could swim free and this was fairer for the fish.
Crow didn’t care in the least about what was fair for the fish. He wanted to smash their heads with rocks and then drag them to shore.
“You can’t do that!” Nod said, smacking Crow in the head. “If you smash them they’ll get all bloody and then sharks come cruising.”
“The sharks don’t come just because there’s a little blood in the water,” Crow scoffed.
“Yes, they do. It happened to us once,” Nod said. “Fog scraped his leg out here on the rock and when we swam back to the shore this big old shark followed him the whole way. Jamie and Peter had to beat it away from Fog or else I’d have no brother to this day.”
They could have gone on like this, and I didn’t have time to break it up the usual way. I ran across the rock to where they were crouched and kicked the fish over the side and into the water, net and all.
“Jamie!” Fog shouted. “We worked for those! Peter wanted fish! And you’ve lost the net.”
“Pirates,” I said, and pointed to the ship that was getting closer unbelievably fast.
It seemed to cast a shadow on us, a shadow that stretched from the ship back to the shore of the island. They weren’t supposed to be there. They just weren’t.
Nod and Fog stared at the ship, as astounded as I’d been.
“Pirates . . .” Fog said.
“. . . don’t come to this side of the island,” Nod said.
“I know,” I said. “Look, everyone has to get back to the forest before the cannons start. You three grab Kit and Ed on the way in and go straight back through the dunes. Don’t wait for us, all right? I’ll collect the others.”
They nodded and dove into the water. Crow followed, always happy to do what the other two did, even if he didn’t understand why it was so astonishing to see the pirates there.
I glanced back at the ship again. There was no sign of Peter—not even the bobbing of his head above the water. I hesitated, wondering if I should go after him. I would have, if Charlie wasn’t on the beach. But Charlie was on the beach, and then the first cannon boomed.
The cannonball left the ship and arced up. For a moment I was mesmerized by the shape of it, by the way it looked small and then got bigger and bigger, and then I realized that it had been launched at me.
I leapt for the water, scraping the side of my ankle on the sharp side of the rock. The ball crashed into the rock behind me. I heard it bounce once and then it hit the water, just a finger’s length away.
I stopped when I felt it whoosh by me, peered into the clear blue water and watched it fall down, down, down. My ankle bled freely, making a little cloud of red in the water, and the salt stung the wound. I would have worried about sharks except that I thought any shark would be smart enough to stay away from that pirate ship and its noisy, smoking cannon.
Several brightly colored fish darted out of my way as I resumed swimming. The triplets were all enthusiastic swimmers, though not very good ones, and I caught up to and passed them easily.
When I stumbled onto the shore I saw that the rest of the boys had gathered down the beach, where the sand ended and became that wonderful jumble of rocks to climb on. That was exactly what they were doing, playing some kind of follow-the-leader game with one in front—I thought it might be Billy; his hair was yellow like Charlie’s—and the rest strung out behind him like a long snake. Charlie and Sal were still wading in the water, their backs to the sea. I was amazed that none of them had heard the cannon shot, but then, the crash of the surf was very loud by those rocks.
I yanked on my trousers and coat and buckled my knife belt around me. Nod and Fog and Crow and Ed and Kit made it to shore while I did this and they all scrambled into their own clothing.
“Back to the tree,” I told them.
“Wait—where’s Peter?” Ed said. “Wasn’t he on the rock?”
“He’s gone to cause trouble for the pirates,” I said.
Ed grinned. “Taking all the fun for himself.”
The pirates hadn’t fired again, and I’d expected them to do so right away. It was possible that Peter was causing enough trouble that the pirates were distracted.
I waved the others in the direction of the forest and ran barefoot down the beach, leaving my moccasins behind. The scrape on my ankle didn’t hurt but the blood splashed down my foot and onto the sand, making a trail behind me.
Sal and Charlie looked up when I was about twenty lengths away from them, the two of them smiling and slightly pink from the sun.
“Jamie, look—” Charlie called, holding up a large peach-and-white shell. “You can hear the ocean in it!”
“Get away from there!” I yelled. “There are pirates!”
Sal appeared bewildered, but one glance over his shoulder had him hustling Charlie out of the water at a run.
“Take him back to the dunes and then to the tree,” I said. “I have to get the rest.”
The others were at the very top of the rocks, strung in their long snake tail. Just then Billy stopped, and it seemed he had just noticed the pirate ship. He pointed at it, and the others peeked around him. There were six of them in that row—Slightly, Billy, Terry, Sam, Jack and Jonathan.
The cannon boomed again, and a second later they were all gone.
chapter 10
I’d never seen what a cannonball could do before. I’d seen a lot of blood in my time, though, and a lot of death. But I never saw death like that.
The ball tore through Billy first. The rest of them might have been all right except that they were directly behind him, and so that cannonball just ripped through all the boys like a finger flicking over a line of dominoes.
It hardly seemed to slow at all, just smashed in their ribs and pulled their hearts and guts out and then all that was left of them were heads on their bloodied bodies. The ball bounced off the rocks and tumbled in the direction of the marsh.
I cried out, and ran for them, unable to believe what my eyes told me. They couldn’t all be gone. But when I reached the top of the rocks, all six of them were nothing but mangled meat.
The pirate ship had anchored near Skull Rock, and I saw a rowboat with five or six of them lowering in the water. I didn’t see Peter, and the rest of the boys had disappeared into the forest.