Twenty minutes later the ship was turned and the white man had disappeared below and the black sailors had returned to their families and their dinners. The last vestiges of light disappeared in the west and along the deck drifted the soft singing of the women, each tribe to its different songs in its own language.
The embers burned low in the portable stove and the wind that blew along the deck and filled the canvas overhead was warm and steady and not a line needed tending. The clans sat together, the women wrapped in the bright-colored silks and dyed cottons they had found in the hold of their prize, the children wrapped in cloth or running around the deck naked or curling up with their mothers, their shattered worlds secure again.
It was a comforting scene, a happy ship. When the sun went down and the manly shouting was done, then the women worked their influence on the people and it was peaceful again.
Madshaka did not know how long he had been sitting there lost in his thoughts. Long enough for James to fall asleep, long enough for the few people on deck to forget his presence.
At last a familiar form appeared on the quarterdeck, a man stepping aft.
“Anaka,” Madshaka called, softly. Anaka was the headman of the Kru. Madshaka’s people. His word was law with them.
“Madshaka?”
“It’s me. Come over here, Anaka, and talk with me.” Madshaka spent so much time speaking in so many languages it was comforting to talk his native tongue. Language was the bond here, the basis of trust.
“How are you doing tonight, Anaka?”
“I am well, Madshaka. Things are better now. The people are hopeful that we will see our homes again.”
“Yes, we will. I can promise you that. And we will be wealthy men.”
“How is that?” Anaka asked.
“This ship, all that is in it. She is full of cargo, you know, worth a great deal. We will sell the cargo and the ship too when we get to Africa, divide the money.”
Anaka was silent for a moment, considering this. To the people on board, the ship meant food, water, a safe vessel, one that did not stink of death. The idea that it could mean wealth had not occurred to them.
“How can we sell the ship?” Anaka asked at length.
Madshaka dismissed the question with a wave of his hand. “I have spent many years as a grumete, you know that. I have learned the ways of these white men. I know how such things are done. That is why I tell King James we must take the ship, when he does not want to.” He paused for a moment and then said, “How many Kru are on the ship? Kru men?”
Anaka thought for a moment. “Twenty. About twenty.”
“Hmmm,” Madshaka said, but he did not continue.
“Why do you ask?”
“There is much more money to be made before we reach home, Anaka. Many ships on the ocean, and we have the warriors aboard that we could take them, take all of the valuable cargoes. Just think, after all the suffering we have been through at the hands of the white men, we could return rich, by taking back from them what they have stolen from us. It is a nice thought.”
A nice thought indeed, and in the dim light Madshaka could see that Anaka was thinking about it. “Has King James said anything about this?” the Kru headman asked.
Madshaka nodded. “We have talked of it. He is starting to think like me, that it is a good idea to enrich ourselves before we return. He knows a great deal about the ways of the pirates.”
“But he does not order it.”
“King James is a fair man. He does not want to impose his will alone. He and I have discussed this at length.” Madshaka had to force himself not to smile. Lord, this was so easy! The ship was his to control, standing as he did between King James and the others, the only one who knew what both were saying, the sole conduit for communication.
Anaka was quiet for a long time as he thought about that. Madshaka knew from experience that the thought of easy wealth was hard for any man to resist.
At last he said, “What should we do?”
Madshaka smiled. “We are pirates now, you know? We vote on what we should do. We see a ship, we vote on whether or not we attack. King James will not order it, he wants to be fair, but he thinks like I do that we should enrich ourselves.
“Twenty Kru men, that is a lot, if they all vote the same. And you have influence over the other tribes as well.”
“That’s true.”
“Will you talk to them? You speak other tongues, I know. Tell the others we can make the white men pay for what they have done to us. We can be free again, and we can be rich as well.”
“Yes, Madshaka, I will,” Anaka said, and there was determination in his voice. Anaka was now filled with thoughts of wealth. Anaka would talk to the others.
The headman hurried off and Madshaka remained on deck for a few minutes more, looking around, trying to see if there was anyone looking his way. The after end of the ship was lost in the darkness. No one around but the helmsman, and he was looking the other way.
He chuckled softly to himself. That had gone very well. These others might not think of wealth, but he himself was no stranger to the notion.
He was an ambitious man, had once already worked himself into a position of real power and wealth before his ostensible partners had hit him on the head and sold him to the blackbirder. But he had not forgotten them. Their turn would come.
But first, pirating. By pure chance he found himself aboard a fast ship with a gullible crew of strong young men he could use as warriors. It was not an opportunity to be wasted.
When he was at last certain that no one knew or cared what he was about, he stepped forward and down the aftermost scuttle.
He was prowling now, hunting. He was aware of the power in his arms, his legs, the silence of his step, the strength that was there to be summoned instantly. He had seen lions before and they were the same, soft-footed, powerful. Nothing ostentatious, they did not need to be. When you were truly powerful you did not need to show it.
Down the after scuttle and down again to the lower deck, moving aft, crouched under the low beams, awkward for a man so tall, but still his motion was fluid. He was invisible in the dull light of the lower deck, his dark skin lost in the shadow. He did not expect to find anyone down there. The people stayed on deck as much as they could. They had had enough of ships’ holds.
Aft, past the stacks of cargo, to the tiny cabins that lined either side of the stern section, one deck below where King James slept. It was all blackness there, save for the one feeble light that lit the white mate’s cabin from within.
Madshaka stopped a few feet from the cabin door and listened. He could hear the man, breathing, making tiny movements. He could smell his unwashed body, the sharp smell of sweat, not sweat from exertion but sweat from fear. He wondered how long a man could live with that terror before his mind snapped. Perhaps he would find out.
He took a step forward, grabbed the latch on the cabin door and swung it open, slowly, slowly, letting the hinges give their menacing creak. Inside the mate lay on his berth, pushing himself back, back against the bulkhead, away from whatever new horror was coming to him, his bloodshot eyes wide.
Madshaka smiled, a broad smile, a look that he knew was terrifying under those circumstances. Reached to the small of his back and drew out his dirk. He let the light play off the long, thin blade, held it casually at his side as he stepped into the small space.
The white man shook his head in mute protest. Madshaka raised the knife, held the needle point under the man’s chin.
“You don’t want to die, do you, pilot?” Madshaka asked, softly, and the man shook his head again.
“I didn’t think so.” He held the knife there for a moment more, letting the man consider the situation, then he withdrew the blade and sat back on his heels.
“Where you taking us, pilot?”
The man thought about it, as if the question were a trick. “Kala-,” he croaked, coughed, cleared his throat. “Niger River Delta, Kalabari, like you say.” His English was heavily accented with French, but good.