Tales of Old Brigands Key (4 page)

"That
had not been my intention, Mr. Fawcett. Should it have been?" He turned
toward Fawcett, the pistol cradled in both hands, not exactly pointing it at
the man, and not exactly not. He returned the gun to his holster, and stooped
to find another bone. A femur, he believed. He looked at it closely, and wiped
grime from it. "God in Heaven," he murmured.

Fawcett
drew near. "Let's hear it, man. What has got you?"

Sanborn
held up the bone. "Look closely."

Fawcett
leaned closer, reached out tentatively, and withdrew his hand.

"It's
scratched," Sanborn said.

Fawcett
shrugged.

"Butchered,"
Sanborn added.

"Lord
a Mighty." Fawcett drew his gun and waved it loosely around in a
semicircle.

"Easy,
fellow."

"Easy?
This here's a ghost ship, all right, but ghosts don't butcher men."

More
men had clambered aboard. All told, there were now seven men aboard, with three
more staying behind with the small fleet.

Sanborn
showed them the bones. "You men despise
me, that
much is certain. So be it. However, it serves us best to work as one mind on
this ship. Something is horribly wrong. If the ship is indeed abandoned, you
have a legitimate lien on the vessel and all property, and
Blackwall
Rules govern your share. I shall take no share. A schooner this size was
probably crewed by not more than ten. If the vessel has crew yet alive, you
shall
respect their ownership, and claim only that just portion meted out by a court
of the United States. In fact, if we find men alive, they may well be
grievously ill and contagious, and you may wish to depart swiftly and
unladen
. Agreed?"

Fawcett
appraised him at length, scratching his whiskered neck. He glanced at the
femur, and let his eyes roam the ship. "I reckon you're right, Sanborn.
Don't expect this truce to continue onshore, though."

Sanborn
nodded. "I don't. As the only man with any legal authority in this group,
naturally I will command our endeavor."

Fawcett
glared, but slowly nodded. "You lead, until we determine she's abandoned.
At that very moment, you step down.
Us
boys will take
it from there."

"Very
well." Sanborn looked about. "We start at the bow, work our way on
deck to the stern. Then we'll go below deck. Check everything; if bones are
found, call out, but respect them. Do not mix them. We want to afford these
poor devils proper burials as best we can."

Sanborn
led the group to the bow. They fanned out and picked their way down the length
of the ship. Within moments, another skeleton had been discovered.

The
skeleton was not cohesive, its pieces scattered about and wedged into the
corners of the port bulwark. The larger bones—the femur, the tibia, the fibula,
the ribs—had all been broken in multiple places.

To
his horror, the truth of the ship dawned on Sanborn.

He
summoned the others and led toward the forward hatch. He paused at the hatch,
collected himself, and lifted the door. He expected the smell of death to
strike him full, but instead there was only an unpleasant miasma of mold, rot,
mustiness, and filth.

"Hello
in the hold," he called. "Is anyone there?"

There
was no response but the creaking of the ship.

"Well
then." He returned to the starboard bulwark and had Percy fetch him up two
oil lanterns, and a handful of candles. He handed one lantern to Fawcett, who
accepted it with a grunt of acknowledgment, if not gratitude. He kept one for
himself, and distributed the candles among the rest. He opened his tinder box
and struck a match to one candle, and passed it among the group until all were
lit.

Sanborn
raised his lantern and descended the stairs into the dark, dripping hold.

Within,
all was a confusion of debris. Immediately, Sanborn found the fourth and fifth
skeletons.

Amid
the clutter, an item of orderliness caught his eye. A stack of clothes, folded
neatly, sat underneath the stairs, and bound together with twine. Sanborn
stooped to inspect the clothes; despite the neat, almost fussy folds, the
clothes were grimy. Typical of a seaman's clothes, infrequently washed.

He
realized that none of the skeletons they'd found had even a
tatter
of clothing amid the bones. Each had been stripped.

He
led the group deeper into the hold, searching first the fore rooms, the sick
bay and crew's mess, and working their way slowly aft.

Two
more skeletons awaited in the midshipmen's berth, again with the cut marks of
butchery.

At
last, they reached the captain's cabin. Sanborn pushed open the door.

More
disarray. Another skeleton lay in a dark wet corner.

The
skeleton slowly turned to face him.

*
* *

Sanborn
realized with a shock that the man was not a skeleton, but a flesh and blood creature,
albeit more bone than flesh and blood, and more dead than alive. His eyes and
face were sunken, his skin drawn like parchment over his skull. His lips had
nearly vanished, shriveled into thin black crusts. His body was frightfully
emaciated, his bones showing pointedly through taut skin, devoid of fat and
muscle. Bones and skin.

In
its nightmarish extreme of starvation, the man's body had consumed itself in a
desperate struggle to stay alive.

Fawcett
crept into the room. "Lord a Mighty," he whispered. "Lord a
Mighty."

The
shrunken man's jaw moved weakly. No discernible words issued; rather, a release
of air.

Clutched
in the man's claw-like fingers was a rib. He pulled the rib closer to himself,
as if to jealously protect it from thievery.

"Captain?"
Sanborn said softly.

The
man's glazed eyes flickered.

"Captain,
do not be alarmed. We will help you." Sanborn took a step closer. The man
made a crackling sound, a hiss issued from paper lungs. Sanborn stopped, turned
to the men behind, and pointed at young William Beckett. "You. Fetch a jug
of water from my boat, and a bit of bread also."

Beckett
hesitated, his eyes fixed upon the living skeleton of a man.

"Now,
goddamn you!" Sanborn barked.

Beckett
glanced at him, nodded, and hurried away.

Sanborn
turned back to the man. "Are there any other survivors?"

The
man made no response.

Fawcett
edged closer. "Damn this man to hell. He's eaten them. He's eaten them
all."

"Don't
judge too
quick
. Cannibalism isn't unknown among
mariners adrift."

"Adrift!
Look about you, man! This ship's seaworthy." Fawcett withdrew his knife, a
great, wicked piece of glinting steel. He advanced. "This man's a
monster."

Sanborn
seized Fawcett's wrist and turned it hard, and slugged the man in the mouth. He
pried the knife free and kicked it skittering into a dark corner.

The
emaciated man's eyes followed the knife.

"You'll
do as I say, Fawcett," Sanborn said in a low dark voice. He seized Fawcett
by the lapels of his coat and shoved him against the bulkhead. "This man
has survived a great horror. We shall not judge him, not at this moment. There
is time aplenty for judgment later. Do you understand me?"

Fawcett
struggled. Blood dripped from his mouth.

"Do
you understand me?"

Fawcett
ceased his struggles. He did not acknowledge the question.

Sanborn
released him. "Good."

Beckett
noisily returned, holding up a jug and a small piece of bread.

Sanborn
took the water and bread, and approached the emaciated man slowly. He held up
the jug. "Drink, friend. You must."

The
man's eyes, glassy though they were, glinted with a wild light, and looked
away. He turned again to see.

Sanborn
reached him and laid a palm upon the top of his head, and brought the jug to
his lips. He tipped the jug and the man drank.

Sanborn
thought he heard a sound like a sob, but the man could make no tears.

*
* *

A
bit of wet bread, and more water.

The
men tore loose an old door and used it as a litter, and bore the wretch gently
up to the deck, and lowered him through the gangway to Percy's boat.

The
men searched the ship, fore and aft, above and below decks. There were no other
survivors. In all they had found the remains of seven men, so the vessel had
been undermanned with a crew of eight. A recipe for bad luck, if not disaster.

Sanborn
sat in the officers' mess. About him, men busied themselves removing things of
value. Sanborn had given them free rein to do so, with the only restriction
that they report each item removed to him, in case a court reached a decision
on the just awards due to each, and in particular to the starved captain. It
was most likely unnecessary. He doubted the man would survive much longer.

But
he did.

*
* *

The
captain teetered on the edge of death for seven days, slipping in and out of
consciousness, and began a slow climb up from the grave's depths. He spoke not
a word during those seven days, and indeed the only sounds he made were
guttural mumblings, incoherent and disjointed.

Doctor
Jameson tended to the man and fretted over him almost hourly.

On
the eighth day, Sanborn checked in on him as he always did. The man sat
upright, his eyes clear for the first time. His lips were still broken and
cracked, and he was gaunt as ever, but color had returned to his cheeks.

"Where
am I?" the man said, in a voice like dry wind.

"Brigands
Key, sir. On the Gulf Coast of Florida. We removed you from your vessel. You
were quite near to death."

The
man seemed to consider this. "I... thank you for your kindness, good
sir."

The
voice was ragged and weak, but the British accent was unmistakable. It was an
accent few if any of the townsfolk would have ever heard. Sanborn had heard it
many times in
Boston."You
are most welcome. I
had feared that we would never have the opportunity to speak."

"It
is indeed fortunate. I suppose that I have been more dead than alive these past
days. Are there... any others? Survivors?"

"None
but you."

A
great sadness seemed to enter the man's face. He sighed, and closed his eyes
and was quiet for a time.

Sanborn
waited, and asked, "What is your name, sir?"

After
a long moment, the man opened his eyes. "Captain Henry Dunham. Of
London."

"Mister
Dunham, I—"

"
Captain
Dunham, if you please."

Sanborn
held him in his glance. His forefinger tapped lightly on his knee. "
Mister
Dunham. You have been out of sorts for a spell. During that time, I've made
good use of telegraph. Your schooner, it seems, is indeed of British registry,
well-known in Boston, and captained by Henry Dunham. However, Dunham is
described to me as a small man. Not more than five and one half feet in height.
You however, are well over six feet in height. Privation tends to make one grow
thinner, not taller, in my experience."

The
man sighed. "Very well, you have found my lie. But you must understand the
reasoning behind it. In my sorry state, I felt it best to present myself as a
man of stature in order to better my chances of attaining aid. I apologize; it
was a grievous error in judgment."

"Perhaps
you should tell me who you really are."

A
pause. "Andrew Millstone. First mate."

"Ah.
That much is confirmed, at least in part, by the telegraph. Can you tell me why
your accent is British, from an educated background, yet ladled atop an obvious
American accent?"

"Ah,
a student of linguistics. I am indeed originally from Richmond. I served in
Lee's Army of Virginia during the war, as apprentice to a field surgeon. I
survived the war and fled to England."

"Why
did you, sir?"

"Put
yourself in my shoes, although by the fall of Richmond, I had none. I was a lad
of just nineteen years, yet already had witnessed the unholy carnage at
Antietam, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, and Spotsylvania, and had presided over
the deaths of however many hundreds I do not know. Can you imagine the parade
of death? Do you know how 'sawbones' came to be slang for a doctor?
Dismemberment was the prescribed treatment, without anesthetic unless whiskey
was at hand. Germ theory was unknown in that time. I spent the war steeped in
blood and death, more than a grown man should face, and far more than a
boy." Millstone paused, and his eyes focused on something faraway and
unknowable. "You can't go through that, and it not tear at your soul.
You
can't
. As soon as the war ended, I got as far from it as I could. I worked
my keep on an Atlantic steamer and ended up in London. And I made her my
home."