The boucaniers who had been captured in battle were given their provisional release, on the condition that they repair the damage to the Citadel. Thus more than one hundred and fifty able-bodied men were working to rebuild the fortress they had helped destroy, and the recent rebellion was virtually forgotten in the press of emergency activities.
Twenty-four hours after the catastrophe a long line of men and women bearing fruits, vegetables, and meats had appeared at King's House, deposited the food silently on the lawns, and departed as quickly as they had come. Belatedly the governor general and his associates realized that the donors had been the Maroons, who had quietly and without drama laid aside their own grievances to aid fellow human beings in distress. And although Sir Arthur Bartlett was incredibly busy, he issued a proclamation making it unlawful for any resident of Jamaica—English, native, or foreign—to molest the Maroons.
Fortunately there had been no rain since the quake, and no further disturbance; the days had been hot and bright, the nights clear and balmy. So the refugees lived and slept in the open without undue discomfort, and when food supplies again dwindled, parties of official foragers crossed the bay and hunted intensively and systematically for bananas, breadfruit, and coconuts. They returned a few hours later, their fleet of small boats and dugout canoes piled high with fruits and root vegetables.
As the crisis abated, it was learned that Port Royal alone had been struck by the catastrophe; the rest of Jamaica had escaped unscathed, and the homes of a handful of respectable and prosperous citizens who lived on the outskirts of the town had not been touched. The plantations on the mainland of the island were intact, and the owners of these estates threw open their doors to all family groups.
The tarts and wastrels, shady merchants and scum who made up the greater portion of the population of the ill-starred "jewel of the Caribbean" were welcome nowhere; but, being a hardy lot, they moved to Kingston, set to work with a vengeance, and rapidly built new homes for themselves on ground they hastily staked out in the new settlement. Ships began to appear once more in the Port Royal roads, and when they saw no plague flag flying from the one tower of the Citadel that was still erect, they boldly dropped anchor.
It was a new arrival from one of these vessels who first noticed that the grave of Sir Henry Morgan had vanished. The few who took time to discuss the matter agreed that it had probably been swallowed up in one of the earth's convulsive openings and closings, and the disappearance of the tomb was regarded as an omen: under the greatest of the boucaniers Port Royal had seen her day of glory; it was unlikely that she would ever rise from her ruins to attain such glittering and evil prominence again.
The little house of Reverend Jonas Pennywell was still standing, and although it had been battered, it was in far better shape than most of the dwellings " in the community. The reverend worked incessantly through the first days of recovery, comforting the bereaved, holding funeral services for the dead, offering encouragement to the ailing. He was tireless, cheerful, and ever-buoyant, but whenever he encountered a healthy, able-bodied person his. attitude suffered a sharp change. Then his eyes burned with a holy zeal and his voice, hoarse with fatigue, thundered anew.
His text was invariably the same on these occasions. Port Royal had received her just deserts, and as always he quoted an appropriate passage from the Bible: " Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven; and he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground.' Genesis, 19."
The minister was too busy, too preoccupied to think of himself, so it came as something of a surprise when his niece, Esther Mary, approached him with the news that a grateful citizenry was already engaged in the project of building him a new church and a new house in the mushrooming town of Kingston. There were further surprises in store for Reverend Pennywell; Esther Mary, unusually diffident, had asked him to marry her to Dirk Friendly. The minister, alarmed, thought his niece was planning to go off to North America, but she quickly assured him to the contrary. She had decided, she said, that she and her bridegroom would move to the Land of the Maroons. The present amity between the authorities and the hill people would end someday, perhaps when a new governor general came to Jamaica and arbitrarily made up his mind to subdue the strong-willed little "nation" that refused to recognize the royal warrant.
When that time came, Esther Mary declared, the Maroons would be ready for any new military ventures that might threaten their security. Dirk was an accomplished gunsmith, and his bride-to-be was already making complete plans for the casting of cannon under his direction in the Land of the Maroons. Several spiked, unrepaired guns had disappeared at the time the Maroons brought their voluntary gifts of foodstuffs to King's House, and a number of twisted and broken iron fences had also vanished. Esther Mary was not allowing the Maroons to be caught napping, and Dirk was faced with the prospect of a very difficult task. He did not seem displeased at the future that had been plotted for him, however.
The wedding was to take place immediately, and Janine Groeliere hurried out of the Pennywell house to pick some flowers before the ceremony. Although little remained of the once lush garden, she had murmured something to the effect that it was unthinkable to have a wedding without at least a few flowers in a bowl. Watching her through the open window frame, Jeremy Stone was torn by a variety of conflicting emotions. Waves of heat seemed to dance above the girl's shining red hair, and he blinked at the vision, then passed a hand over his eyes. If he could rest for a little while, he told himself, he might be able to organize his thinking. But like everyone else who was uninjured, he had been working almost without pause in rescue and salvage operations, and he was unutterably weary.
He was sure that Janine knew he was looking at her, but she refused to glance in his direction. And he couldn't blame her. When he had first seen her after the tidal wave had come and gone, he had taken her into his arms and had kissed her hungrily. She had responded fervently and had clung to him, but they had said little to each other. There had been no need for words.
But that had been five days past, and since that time they had both been busy, too busy to settle any personal problems. At least that was what he had been telling himself, and the undeniable fact that Dirk and Esther Mary, who had been working just as hard, had found the opportunity to plan a joint future had pointed up his own indecision.
He stared hard at Janine, and even as he knew he wanted her, he felt the old fear that he could not ask her to share an uncertain future. She was bending over a bed of wild gardenias, carefully picking the few blossoms that remained on the bush, and as she straightened her eyes met Jeremy's. Suddenly his uncertainties, his sense of fatigue were gone.
Climbing rapidly through the window frame, he walked to her and put his hands on her shoulders. She was smiling, a trifle questioningly, tremulously, but Jeremy's eyes and face were grave. "Come into the house, Janine," he said gently. "We're going to ask Reverend Pennywell to make it a double wedding."
Janine drew back, and when she spoke she could not conceal a note of hurt from her voice. "You've waited a long time to propose to me, Jeremy."
"Too long," he conceded. "But I intend to spend the rest of my life making amends to you."
She was partly mollified, but the feminine perversity of her nature goaded her on. "You've given me every reason to believe that I'm your—your last choice."
Jeremy was so astonished he could not reply. Instead he reached for her, but the girl eluded his grasp.