“There are lights everywhere. I trust that music I hear isn’t coming from my own head.”
“No, indeed, me hearty. It’s coming from one of those drinking establishments where there are beautiful, dark-eyed ladies who don’t even know the resurrected Paul Le Maire has arrived. Aye, arrived to rescue them from their otherwise dreary lives.”
Paul grinned. “It’s thoughts like that will make a person almost forget their troubles. When, think you, will the skipper let us ashore?”
“I believe there’s inspections and quarantines that have to take place. Might be a couple of days, then they’ll start lightering the passengers and cargo. Don’t know about human flotsam picked up along the way, though. Might be weeks before they let you on shore.”
For the first time Jack heard a chuckle from his new acquaintance. Paul was coming alive and there was something in the fellow that Jack liked. He had a seriousness and intensity in his manner, offset by a twinkle in his eye, an eye that seemed to see the world in different shades of irony.
For the next three days, anchored tantalizingly close to land, the young men passed the time together, watching self-important officials strut about their ship and accept bribes from the officers. This ritual was usually followed by the crew hauling batches of cargo topside for unloading. Hides, tallow, whale oil, and what appeared to Jack to be machined tools and hardwood lumber all made their way out of the hold. The trade goods seemed to be released in increments more in proportion to the silver flowing under the hastily erected documents table than over the top, for payment of duties and port taxes. The latter, formal transactions, were accompanied by duly witnessed scratching of quills and impressing of wax seals on stiff parchment, first by the ship’s captain, then the mustachioed Spanish port officials.
Standing at a respectful distance, Jack and Paul were unsure of the particulars of the transactions, but obviously the ship’s manifest and what it actually carried in cargo were two distinctly different things. As Paul opened up to Jack during these days of bureaucratic captivity, Jack felt he was watching a fine instrument being unpacked from a sawdust-filled crate. Paul carried a source of knowledge and information hard to credit in one of so few years.
The night before they were finally given leave to disembark, a simple remark by Jack regarding one of the patterns of stars that looked like a sort of wide W started Le Maire on a soliloquy regarding “a celestial seat for Cassiopeia’s shapely derriere,” and a flood of wisdom followed. Paul explained the planets, the constellations, the heavens as myth and physical reality. Jack had no reason to doubt his own intelligence but he was smart enough to know he was in the presence of a truly remarkable intellect. Jack resolved that he would spend as much time as possible with his new friend when they went ashore.
Early the next morning, as the O’Reillys were helped aboard the boat that would take them to shore, Jack looked back at his friend who stood forlornly at the rail. Paul, a rescued, penniless refugee, was low on the order for boat assignments. If he took a position on crew as an apprentice seaman, a possibility he had discussed with Quince, he would be even lower. Paul’s sad face and slight build provided a strong contrast to the robust first mate, who stood at the rail next to him, shouting orders for the men handling the boats.
Jack looked beseechingly to his parents. “Father, mother—may Paul come with us? I’d love for him to be with us when we set foot on Cuban soil.”
“No,” his father said. “You’ll see him soon enough, I warrant, when he reaches shore with the later boats. We have much to do!”
“But—”
“No, Jack!” His father’s clipped voice carried a mild warning. His mother, who had been about to speak, held her tongue.
At this point the first mate yelled down to the boat. “Mr. O’Reilly, sir, would you mind taking one more passenger in your skiff?” His hand was on Paul’s shoulder. “It would help us in scheduling the departures.”
“Certainly, Mr. Quince, we’d be glad to, if it helps,” Ethan replied. “Send the lad on down.” Jack tried not to smile for fear his father would reprimand him. His mother gave Jack a knowing wink and raised a finger to her lips for silence.
Paul climbed down the ladder, Ethan giving him a hand into the boat. Jack ventured a glance at Quince, who, without changing expression, winked as well.
The oars slapped the water with a vigor Jack had never seen from the sailors; even these worldly seamen couldn’t hide their excitement and the launch fairly leaped through the mild chop, approaching the wharf with its load of old salts and young men, all wide-eyed with anticipation.
Habana’s din met them as the boat’s bowline was handed to a waiting sailor on the dock. Whitewashed buildings looked like a backdrop for dingy streets that were hardly visible through the throngs of people, most wearing colorful sashes over white cotton, a brightness that Jack was sure could only be found under a tropical sun.
As soon as they were all gathered on the wharf, Paul tried to engage Jack’s parents in conversation. Though Jack had introduced his new friend to them on the ship, they had spoken only a few polite words to each other. The young man quickly charmed Pilar, and Ethan seemed to like him as well; but Jack could see his father was distracted by his desire to talk to the captain who was standing not far from them, engaged in business with dock officials. And Pilar was anxious to check on the whereabouts of Count de Silva. She hoped he had received her letter. She had bribed one of the port officials to deliver it to him the day before. She knew their arrival would be a great surprise to him. As the manager of her property and its closest neighbor, the count would be the best one to give her the news about the condition of her fields, and to verify the good news about the harvest which her friend Dolores had mentioned in her Easter letter.
Abruptly, Ethan and Pilar excused themselves, moving in opposite directions.
Jack signaled to Paul that he wanted to observe his father’s dealings with Deploy, so the two of them positioned themselves a few feet from the older men.
“Captain Deploy, a moment of your time, sir,” Jack’s father said.
The captain’s weathered face was expressionless as he listened to Ethan, who might have been a fly buzzing about the docks.
“As you know, the tools of my trade are not easily moved. Since I understand you don’t intend to load cargo for your next port right away, perhaps I may leave my smithing wares and gun parts in your care for a short time?”
“Impossible. We head for Boston with the morning tide.”
“Boston? Sir, I—well, I… was told you were carrying merchandise to the South Sea whaling fleets and wouldn’t leave for a fortnight.”
“What in blazes are you saying, smithy? Boston? I said we head for Papeete, probably two, three weeks hence.”
“Uh, well, very good then.” Ethan was clearly at a loss. What had the captain not understood? “So, Captain, may I leave my wares on board temporarily?”
“Makes no mind to me as long as they’re in the forward hold, out of the way when we first start loading.”
“Thanks so much, sir—”
“Aye, your thanks and five dollars for lease of space will be gladly accepted.”
“Five—” Ethan’s face sank. “I thought it would be a simple courtesy.”
“Matters not what you thought, smith. You’ve heard the terms. Take ’em or leave ’em.”
Jack felt that a sane man would have dealt with his father more fairly. Instead, he was being swindled by this drunken old despot. They both watched in silence as Ethan walked away, beaten. Jack’s body tensed, his entire being wanting to retaliate. Paul laid a hand on his arm. “Whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad,” he said.