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“Of course”, he lied. He hadn’t touched any food since the previous evening. Still worse: the little food he had swallowed, had ended up in the lane after the rum the Portuguese had offered him.
He sometimes wiped the corners of her mouth by a cloth flap. Anne was smiling, trying hard to swallow her soup. When she had finished, he helped her to lie down.
“I don’t feel like sleeping”, the woman protested.
“You must rest.” Johnny addressed her a glance which brooked no argument.
She leant her head softly on the pillow. “That’s strange, isn’t it? I’ve always looked after you.”
“Don’t strain yourself by talking.”
“You know, I haven’t had a coughing fit since this morning.” It seemed as if Anne hadn’t heard him.
“You’ll get better and better, trust me.”
“I hope so.”
They kept silent for a while and Johnny started feeling guilty. As if he was held prisoner in a body which didn’t belong to him, he was forced to witness his mother’s illness helplessly. He watched her through a multicolour kaleidoscope, whose faces reflected pain and resignation. He understood at that moment that he wanted to get away, to run as far as possible, to avoid seeing her in that condition.
“You’d better rest”, he claimed. He took the bowl and the stirrer. “Bartolomeu might need me. Can I trust you and leave you alone?” Deep into his heart, he feared that she was going to ask him again to stay there.
Anne took him by surprise, saying innocently: “Just go and don’t worry. See you when you finish.”
“All right.”
“I love you, John.”
“Me too”, he answered. Then he bent down to kiss her on her forehead.
***
Johnny could see something hovering inside Bartolomeu’s brain all evening. He had said just a few words and Johnny had noticed it, in particular when he understood he was waiting for someone: he kept casting furtive glances at the door and every time someone opened it, he held his breath, almost worn out by that never ending wait. In spite of that, Johnny avoided investigating, being busy in serving the customers.
He was able to listen to some of their conversations, which drew his attention inevitably. And stirred his imagination once more. Some of them were commentating on Wynne’s horrible death, while others were saying that a certain captain Rogers was preparing a mysterious expedition.
After the last customer had left the inn, Bartolomeu ordered the boy to shut himself into the kitchen and do the washing up. He then started wandering about the inn, turning the candles out one by one. The large room plunged into a heavy gloom, made flickering by the few remaining flames.
Johnny spent an hour washing a never ending series of dishes and jugs. His eyes were swollen and his nose was closed, because of the unmistakable smell of spices. He feared he could faint. But after he had got used to it, he went on faster. He was washing an earthenware jug, when the door on the other side of the large room was flung open with a bump.
“You’ve come at last”, he heard Bartolomeu say.
“I’ve been busy.”
Johnny recognized Avery’s voice. He had told him he didn’t feel well after work and he preferred going to bed early. So, why was he there?
“Are we alone, Bart?”, the old man asked.
“Don’t worry”, the other answered. “I’ve sent the brat to the kitchen. He’ll be busy for a while. Now, sit down and tell me why you wanted to talk with me.”
There was a noise of chairs then. Johnny walked carefully to the door separating the kitchen from the main room. He pushed it slowly, letting it just half-open enough to eavesdrop.
“How is Anne?”, Avery began.
“Not well”, the Portuguese acknowledged. “She has felt better for a few days. That’s giving me some hope, but we can’t be sure without a doctor’s opinion.
“We didn’t need it.”
“That’s right.”
Johnny started. Listening to the two men talking so sadly about his mother’s condition comforted him. He pushed the door open and peeped out. From where he was standing, he could catch a glimpse of Avery’s back.
The old man said: “By the way, I didn’t want to talk about that, but about what happened to Wynne. I’ve been to his execution.”
“Did you know him?”, Bartolomeu asked.
“We used to be on the same ship.”
The boy could just avoid screaming in surprise. So, were the rumours going around about Avery true?
Had he really been a pirate? He had to find a way to get to know it.
He slipped out of the kitchen, pushing the door so slowly that he took ages to do it. Crawling like a baby, he got to the long counter and stopped there, to make his heartbeat calm down. He could feel it pulsing in his temples. He was still holding the wine jug in his hands: he had forgotten he was keeping it. He was so excited that he didn’t even realize he was leaning against a rack full of bottles. When he moved, he made them clink. He opened his eyes wide with fear. Nothing happened for a short moment. Then he heard some footsteps coming closer. He lifted his eyes. Bartolomeu’s horny hand appeared just above his head. It was a few inches far from him. He could even smell the stink of his breath. He was going to grasp his hair soon, drag him out and… he leant over the rank instead and caught a bottle of rum, then he walked back.
“That doesn’t explain why you wanted to meet me”, he claimed while uncorking the bottle.
“It’s easily said”, Avery answered.
The noise of some more footsteps echoed there, followed by the one of the jugs which were being placed next to each other. Johnny leant over the edge if the counter. He saw the two men pouring the rum into their glasses.
“Wynne caused a lot of trouble”, the old man went on and gulped down his rum. “But he was just a poor wretch. He didn’t deserve to come to that bad end.”
“Better him than us”, Bartolomeu stated.
Avery’s expression showed a mix of incredulity and resignation.
“Are you afraid of being caught?”, the Portuguese asked him.
Avery didn’t answer. He started looking around distrustfully. After a while, he added, in a barely perceptible hiss: “The matter concerns what he said before being hanged.”
Johnny shivered, still hiding behind the counter. He could see again the pirate shaking in the slipknot’s grip, his legs kicking in the air and the gush of blood which had stained his face.
“Are you talking about the Devil’s Triangle?”
“Rumours travel fast, Bart.”
“That’s all nonsense”, the latter tried to belittle it.
“That place really exists!” Avery’s look exuded a palpable… and threatening certainty. “Even the most naïve freshwater sailor knows that legend. But I can assure you that it exists.”
“Stop it!”
“What if I told you a story?”
The Portuguese mumbled some words, without committing himself.
“Fine.” Avery poured some more liquor into his glass. His knotty fingers were shaking evidently and some trickles of rum finally slipped down the neck of the bottle. “It all started some years ago. I landed on an island near Antigua with the crew I had joined. We laid at anchor there for several days, trying to understand where we had got.”
“The Anthill’s archipelago is famous for having islands which don’t appear on nautical maps”, Bartolomeu explained.
“I know”, the other man replied, in a condescending voice. “What none of us could have imagined, was that the place was inhabited by some local tribes.”
“Which ones?”
“The Kalinagos.”
Bartolomeu felt puzzled for a few moments. He then shook his head slowly, as if that story wasn’t persuading him completely.
“The death eaters?”, he asked.
“Exactly”, Avery answered. His smile was askew. That memory was evidently amusing him. Or it made him nervous. Difficult to say. “Let me go on.” He swallowed the second glass of rum and filled a third one. “Our captain decided to send an expedition to explore the island. We waited for days, uselessly. So he decided to go himself, together with some other men. Wynne and myself included. The crew was nervous, even if nobody dared discuss his orders. We left the launches on the beach and walked through the forest.”
“You found the Kaliganos there”, Bartolomeu stated.
“They found us, actually”, the old man specified gloomily. “They caught us just like they had done with our mates. I could never forget what I saw. They are beasts, with no mercy at all.” He gulped down the rum again, letting it drop along his chin and neck. “They cut up their victims when they are still alive, with an incredible fierceness.”
Bartolomeu’s attitude was changing. Unlike his interlocutor, he had hardly sipped his rum. He was laying his arms on the table at the moment, his fingers crossed so tight as to let his white knuckles out.
“Anyway”, Avery went on, “our captain was able to be received by the shaman. We could avoid death, but at a very high price.”
Hidden behind the counter, Johnny started trembling. That matter was really turning interesting. Terribly interesting.
Avery on his side hesitated, pouring some more drink into his glass.
“The captain made an agreement with him”, he explained slowly. “So the man told him about the existence of a great treasure, hidden on an island lying north-east of the Bahamas. He even showed him an ancient drawing cut on a clay tablet. The location of the island seems to be the same area where the Devil’s Triangle is supposed to be.”
“What was the agreement about?”
“The captain had to commit himself to find the treasure. He could keep everything he wanted for himself. In return, he had to bring back an amulet to the shaman.”
“An amulet?”
Avery nodded. “Yes. A jade amulet.”
“Why?”, Bartolomeu insisted.
“No idea. He just told him and the men he trusted the most. We were left outside the hut. I got to know later that, thanks to that amulet, he had promised the captain that he would have what he had lost in the past back.” He stopped to think about it. “I wonder what he was referring to.”
“And then?”
“As soon as the shaman told him, he accepted. He marked both of them with a tattoo, to seal the agreement. He then added that, if one of them didn’t keep to the agreement, that mark would bring him to death.”
“Superstitions”, the Portuguese got to the point.
“Think just as you wish, Bart”, Avery insisted. “I know what I witnessed! And that takes me back to Emmanuel Wynne. But I’m going to explain it later.” He gave out a hollow moan, as if that memories were still tormenting him. “I can swear on my own life that the captain went crazy after that experience. Some men decided to mutiny. They were thirty, included myself. The captain obviously didn’t take it well, so he left us on a deserted islet, east of Portorico, with just a bottle of rum for each of us and no food. After a few weeks, he came back to rescue us. Only fifteen men had survived.”
Bartolomeu gasped, with a grimace of amazement. He slapped his forehead, like someone who has just remembered something important. “You want me to believe that…”
“Exactly”, Avery said in advance, showing a very deep uneasiness. “I was on board the Queen Anne’s Revenge, at Blackbeard’s orders.”
Johnny jumped back in amazement: he instinctively laid both his hands on the floor, forgetting the fact that he was holding a jug in one. He lost his balance badly and bumped once more against the bottles rack. The impact was very strong that time. A fit of pain hit his shoulders. The bottles clinked. One even came out of its place, smashing to smithereens on the floor. Slivers of glass were shining everywhere.
The old man started on his chair. “What was that?”
“A mouse”, Bartolomeu replied, walking to the source of that noise. “A very big one.”
The boy was paralyzed, his eyes grew dull and his pupils dilated. He could hear his own heart hammering crazy. His heartbeats were resounding painfully in his ears, like a hammer’s clangour, so that the Portuguese’s footsteps seemed to come from a far-away, unknown world.
I must do something”, he thought. I must get away from here. Immediately!
Unfortunately, panic got the upper hand over him. It was like being stuck in quicksand: the more he struggled, the more he sank. Finally Bartolomeu’s threatening shade fell over him.
“What are you doing here, brat?”, he inquired.
Johnny smiled with a blank stare.
He understood he had got into trouble.
***
The two pirates made him sit down bodily between them. The candles flickered for a moment, moved by an invisible wind, and made the outlines of the big room slightly distorted.
“We have a stowaway here”, Avery giggled.
“How long have you been hiding there?” Bartolomeu sat down again. The fatherly feeling which he had shown at the beginning of their conversation had disappeared from his attitude. There was only resentment now.
“I swear I didn’t want to, Bart…”, the boy stammered. He was trembling all over.
The Portuguese hit the table with a punch. “I don’t give a damn to your excuses! I asked you how long have you been hiding there. Answer me!”
“Looking at him is enough to understand that he heard everything”, the old man stated. He crisped his lips, uncovering his gums. “But I know a way to make him speak.” After those words, he took a big knife from under his clothes and waved it in front of Johnny.
The boy stopped breathing in a moment. The blade was swinging strangely slowly, cold and merciless. He recalled the knife he had made, the one he had used to take his revenge on Alejandro. His knife couldn’t stand a comparison with the other one. Avery could butcher him.
“You are going too far, Bennet”, Bartolomeu warned him. However, he didn’t lift a finger to prevent him from doing what he had in his mind.
“Desperate situations require desperate remedies!”, Avery stated, catching Johnny’s hand. He pressed it on the table and lifted the knife.
The boy screamed with fear. The blade’s reflection pierced through him with its cruel glare. He knew he would soon feel it penetrating into his flesh. The thought that Avery could do something like that was frightening him more than the action itself. He didn’t think about it twice. He burst out crying. He told them what he had heard, in between sobs. When he had finished, the two pirates cast a furtive glance at each other. Then they started laughing their hearts out. Johnny was stunned and he couldn’t really understand what was going on.
