The Pirate and the Pagan (61 page)

“Because he’s got more brains than you,” growled Summer, “and he doesn’t want them spilled all over the road.”

“I’ll have you whipped for this!” he told his driver. “And as for you, I’ll see you hanged, drawn, and quartered.”

“Shut your cake hole and empty your pockets,” she said, waving the pistol in his face. She relieved him of his money, but to her great consternation the minute she let the carriage go on its way, the driver must have received orders to turn about and head back into Portsmouth. Summer had little stomach for this highway robbery; she would try to make the coins last.

When she rode into the inn yard at the Three Cranes and dismounted, she’d been so long in the saddle she thought she’d never be able to make her knees touch again. She paid for oats and
stabling the horse, paid for a bed and a bowl of hot stew, then walked out along the quay to see what ships lay at anchor. Wobbly on her legs from fatigue, she almost decided to turn back to the inn when a large ungainly vessel caught her eye. As she drew closer she saw it was unloading women in chains. “What in the name of God is going on?” she asked a seaman who was taking a keen interest in the unloading.

“Prisoners from London,” he told her. “Jails all burned … women from Bridewell and Fleet Debtors’ Prison to be housed here and Southampton.”

She stared up at the women in fascinated horror as their chains clanked together. Suddenly she got the weirdest feeling, as if someone were staring at her. She glanced about quickly, then froze. Looking straight down into her eyes was Sergeant Oswald.

“G
rab him!” he shouted to the men on the dock. Summer bolted immediately, but her legs betrayed her, turning to rubber as she tried to escape. Before she knew it, four burly seamen closed in on her to block her escape. She swept off her hat and shook her head. The black silken mass of hair tumbled to her shoulders and she begged them with her eyes. “Please, please, if any of you know Black Jack Flash of the
Phantom,
get a message to him. I’m his woman, I’m Cat.”

The men were startled by her beauty and touched by her low urgent plea. They looked at each other, ready to let her go, but before she could get to her feet, Oswald had his beefy hands on her. “Well, well, well, if it isn’t the notorious highwayman the Black Cat,” he ridiculed.

“Let me go, Sergeant Oswald, or I shall report you to the King himself,” she vowed.

He gave her arm a savage twist. “It’s Sergeant-Major now, Lady Bitch.” He quick-marched her to the end of the line of women who now stood on the dock and shackled her to the last one. A combination of hatred and pride kept her on her legs as Oswald and six militiamen under his command marched the women from the ship, through the port, and down to Portsmouth Prison. The forty women were made to stand in the prison yard until all the paperwork
was sorted out. The fact that it had begun to rain and the cold wind slanted icy raindrops against their faces made little difference to the harassed jailer.

“I’m overcrowded now,” argued Bludwart in the cluttered room he used for office cum living quarters. “The magistrate that looks after Hampshire and Dorset counties has been ailing for over a year. There’s been no hangings here in all that time. The prisoners just sit and eat their bloody heads off!”

A well-dressed man stood beside a cluttered desk with a look of disgusted outrage on his face. “Bludwart, I’m trying to report a criminal act. How dare you make me wait? If you ordered militiamen out now, you’d apprehend the fellow! I don’t know what the country’s coming to!”

“You’ll have to wait your turn, Mr. Blackthorn. I can’t be expected to do everything. I’m short of militiamen, short of guards, short of victuals, and what do they do? Send me forty bleeding drabs to feed and house—I tell you I’ve not room for four, let let alone forty!”

Oswald’s brain was working overtime to see how he could take advantage of this situation. His insides seethed with excitement at the prospect of having Helford’s whore in his power. Of the forty women who stood outside in the downpour only one obsessed him, the rest didn’t matter one iota. He rustled the official list of prisoners in his beefy hands and said low, “If I pull strings to get you out of this mess, Bludwart, I’ll expect something in return.”

The warden’s eyes narrowed and he stepped closer to Oswald. The sergeant-major almost recoiled at the reek of the man. He smelled of filth and sweat and gin. His eyes were bulging and bloodshot, the veins continually breaking down from his love affair with the bottle. “Most of these female felons are pickpockets, thieves, prostitutes, and I can take them over to Southampton. Half a dozen are murderers and I’ve orders to jail them here in Portsmouth because its security is stronger. You give me a private room for interrogation any time I want it and I’ll lumber you with only six of them. What do you say?”

“Done! Fetch ’em in,” said Bludwart. “I’ll get my records clerk.”

Mr. Blackthorn stepped forward. “It’s an outrage,” he thundered. “Bringing in more murderers to live off the fat of the land. When will they be executed, I ask you?”

“Mr. Blackthorn, half my prisoners haven’t even been tried and
sentenced since the magistrate took to his bed. Everything has to go by the book. I can’t hang ’em out of hand, you know. I’m here to uphold English justice, Mr. Blackthorn. Did ye never hear of the Magna Carta?”

Oswald walked out into the cold rain. The women set up a protest of catcalls. “You pisspot, get us inside. Whoreson … Bastard … Pricklouse.”

Summer shuddered as he walked a direct path to her. She knew the names they threw at Oswald were inadequate. She knew he was evil. He just looked at her. He walked down the line a short distance and began to unshackle women. He had selected five before he came back to unlock her chains.

Summer looked at the other women and was surprised to see they had not been chosen for their attractions. One was a short fat woman, as broad as she was long, another looked no more than a little girl. One of the women was great with child and Summer’s heart constricted for her. The fourth woman was old, she had scraggly gray hair and no teeth. The fifth woman was not ugly, she was rather comely in fact, but nothing could hide the fact that she was tough, like a hardened criminal. As Oswald returned for Summer he smiled. He couldn’t help it, he was so damned pleased with himself.

As the six drenched women filed into Bludwart’s office, Mr. Blackthorn’s mouth fell open. “That’s him … her! That’s the highwayman that robbed me! Do something, damn you!”

“Mr. Blackthorn, we’ve arrested your dangerous criminal, what more do you want?”

“I’ll tell you what I want, sirrah … I want him—her—it … I want it hanged!”

Oswald wanted no interference with his private brand of justice. He stepped up to the irate citizen and said, “These women are all murderers. Be assured every last one of the creatures will be hanged. This is maximum security. Everything must go by the letter of the law. All names strictly recorded in the journal. Not one will ever slip through the cracks. Please accept our deepest thanks for your positive identification.”

Bludwart scratched his lice-ridden head. “The only empty cell I ’ave is in the cellar and on nights like this the floor is ankle-deep in water.”

“Plenty good enough for these dregs of humanity, Bludwart. Lock ’em up. I’ll need two wagons to take the rest over to Southampton,
but I’ll be back tomorrow for that nice private room you promised me.”

Summer’s eyes never left Oswald. He was out for revenge. He relished the very idea of it. He would take his pound of flesh, of that she had no doubt whatsoever.

The women were taken down stone steps inside the fortresslike building to what could only be described as a dungeon. All six were locked in a cell which measured roughly four by ten feet.

“Well, at least we have running water,” quipped Sidney, the hard-faced one.

Summer had never seen anything like it. The stone walls dripped with water which formed a rivulet on the floor and emptied down a smelly drain. The cell was empty except for tallow candles in wall sconces, two heaps of moldy, damp straw, and a slop bucket in the corner. When the six women lay down, Summer knew their bodies would have to touch each other and she shuddered uncontrollably. She could smell their unwashed bodies, which surprised her, for the dungeon reeked heavily from rot, decay, moldering hay, and the open drain.

They were all drenched through to the skin and they took off their gray worsted smocks and tied them to the prison bars to dry. Underneath they wore black cotton stockings and knickers. Most of them pulled the knickers up to cover their breasts with the tops now sitting just underneath their armpits. The only one who couldn’t do this was the fat woman called “Lardy,” and her breasts hung down over her fat belly in an obscene overabundance of quivering flesh. Summer averted her eyes. She made no attempt to remove her shirt and breeches, though they were plastered to her body. If she got pneumonia, then so be it, she thought stubbornly. “What’s yer name?” demanded Sidney.

“Cat,” Summer said shortly.

“You look like a bleedin’ cat,” Sidney said.

“I know,” said Summer, turning the full impact of her green eyes upon her.

“We call the old hag Granny and the little one is Gert. The one ‘avin the kid is Nellie.”

Summer glanced at them one by one then murmured, “I’m pleased to meet you, ladies.”

“La-de-dah, ye talk like we was in a bleedin’ drawing room,” said Sidney.

“That’s ’cause she’s a lady,” said Lardy.

“Oh, really? And ‘ow the bleedin’ hell do ye know I’m not a lady?”

“Ye can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear,” said Lardy.

“You should know.” Sidney laughed. “If you lay on that bleedin’ straw, you’d just look like a sow ready to farrow.”

“Well, if I had a face as hard as yours, I’d give kids pennies to throw shit at me!”

Sidney’s eyes narrowed dangerously. She walked over to Cat and felt the silk material of her shirt. “I like that black shirt … how’d ye like to make me a present of it?” It was not a request, it was an order.

“In a pig’s arse,” said Cat, giving Sidney an aggressive shove against the wall. “The only present I’ll give you is a black eye; maybe two.”

Sidney grinned. “He was right when he called you Lady Bitch, wasn’t he?”

Cat smiled back, ready to call a truce. “I’m afraid he’s not finished with me yet. Look, we’re all in this together, so let’s not make it unbearable for each other. I think Nellie should sit down.”

Lardy helped Nellie to the straw and sat beside her. Both women began to crack things between their thumbnails and Summer realized with horror they were fleas which had immediately jumped on them from the straw. Nellie’s face was ashen, her eyes were circled by black rings. She was skeleton thin except for her great belly and her swollen ankles. “It’s an outrage for a pregnant woman to be imprisoned. What will happen when she goes into labor?” asked Cat.

They shrugged. The old woman said, “She’ll ’ave another unwanted kid, won’t she? An’ why am I in ’ere? I botched an abortion as kilt the slut, but she’s better off dead, don’t ye think?”

Cat was almost ready to agree with her. “I don’t think Charles has the vaguest notion how abominably women are treated in these places,”

“Charles who?” asked Sidney.

“The King,” explained Cat. “When I get out of here, I’ll go to him immediately. I won’t rest until something is done about it.”

“When you get out of here you’ll be on the end of a hempen rope,” said Sidney.

“Do you know the King?” asked Gert, wide-eyed.

“Yes, I was at Whitehall two days ago.” Granny and Lardy began to laugh.

“La-de-dah,” mocked Sidney. “What did you do for your bleedin’ hobby, m’lady, stitch embroidery?”

Cat looked off into the distance, remembering some of the unbelievable things that had happened to her. Then she smiled sadly at the women and said, “Actually I collected rubies.”

Gert’s mouth gaped open and Granny made a gesture to indicate that Cat had lost her wits.

“Do you think they’ll feed us?” asked Lardy wistfully.

“Not tonight,” said Sidney. “In London at least we were entitled to a penny loaf and pump water. Here, God only knows.”

Cat had bought stew at the inn so she wasn’t hungry, but how would she be able to face this misery when hunger was added to the other deprivations? One by one the women sat, crouched on the dank floor, their backs against the slimed walls. Cat was glad she was bone tired, for sleep would be a blessed relief from this living nightmare. She crossed her arms above her knees and laid her head down. The women quieted, the tallow candles guttered out, and she was about to drift off to a gentler place when she realized the cell had visitors. Rats! They climbed up the drain hole by the dozen. She screamed and they stood up on their hind legs in cheeky curiosity.

“Put the piss bucket over the hole and go to sleep,” grumbled Sidney.

Cat did the first thing Sidney advised, but she found it impossible to do the last. In the morning, when Cat tried to stand, every bone in her body ached. They were served wooden spoons and bowls containing thin gruel. When Granny found a cockroach in hers and ate it with relish, Cat could not bring herself to eat in spite of the fact that her common sense told her she would need food if she was to survive this ordeal. Cat gave her bowl to Nellie and Lardy looked deeply offended. “She’s eating for two,” Cat said lamely.