Overboard! Read online

  ***

  Neep stood stooped inside the galley, carefully trying not to bang his head on the beams overhead. The galley was narrow but long, the cooking equipment being at the far end, a narrow long table with ten places being just inside the entrance. Neep thought that the meals must be done on rotation because of the lack of places and currently ten pirates sat around the table conversing, slowly picking at their bowls of food in front of them. As Mitch had carefully guided him past the table Neep had looked in the bowls and was slightly pleased to find that the food in them seemed to be of the same consistency and grey colour as to the food he had been fed whilst he had been locked in the flag store. The only difference appeared to be that as well as having a small bowl in front of them the men also had a small round biscuit as well.

  Mitch looked as if he was as impressed with suddenly having an assistant as Neep was with having been put to work in the galley. Nevertheless, he had put Neep to work straight away before disappearing through a small wooden door at the end of the kitchen which Neep could hear him locking behind himself after he went inside. Neep settled into stirring the contents of the large evil smelling pot as instructed whilst simultaneously trying to prevent himself from losing his balance as the galley swayed backwards and forwards as the ship rocked, as well as simultaneously trying not to bump his head on the ceiling. As the pirates continued eating their food Neep continued stirring. The men ignored him completely, their loud voices relating tales they had no doubt told many times before, but seemed to Neep to be mostly about stories of their escapades on one ship or another, and sometimes apparently two at the same time. One of the mean left after a while leaving an empty place and being unsure as whether to collect his plate or not Neep simply carried on stirring the pot.

  The galley was a masterpiece of design. All cooking utensils hung on hooks overhead, and the table itself had a recess for every plate and cup to prevent the movement of the ship setting the men’s food sliding across the table. The plate at the now empty seat sat perfectly still as the ship swayed backwards and forwards and Neep found himself swaying with the motion of the ship. He was beginning to feel a little peckish himself but the smell coming from the pot was sufficient to quell any pangs of hunger. He did notice however that the man who had departed had left his biscuit on his plate, and Neep fixed his gaze on it hungrily. The presence of the remaining nine pirates however deterred him from taking it and as he watched the biscuit slid across the plate and landed on the table.

  The strange thing was that the biscuit seemed to be moving in the opposite direction to the swaying of the ship and Neep felt a chill run up his spine as the biscuit began to make slow but steady progress across the galley table. All a sudden one of pirates at the table noticed its progress and he brought his hand down on it sharply. The biscuit spun on the table a little and then stopped moving.

  “I stunned me a biscuit!” shouted the sailor, and a loud roar rose around the table except for one small man who sat at the end of the table looking lost in thought. Deciding to join him, Neep tucked his mouth shut and continued stirring.

  Eventually Neep heard the bolts rattle on the other side of the door and Mitch appeared once more, his complexion red faced and anxious. Closing the door behind him again and locking it he made his way back into the galley and stared into the pot that Neep was stirring glumly.

  “Stir faster!” he growled and made his way to the table and clapping several of the pirates upon their backs he was soon lost in conversation. Neep felt miserable and continued to stir the pot, but he could not help but notice Mitch glancing back at him from time to time and then saying something that Neep couldn’t quite hear to the men at the table after which there were several gales of laughter. All except for the small man at the end of the table who just continued to stare at his plate glumly. Neep just kept on stirring. He tried to raise his spirits by playing with the thought that even notorious pirates had to start somewhere. Probably not a kitchen, but somewhere.

  Eventually Mitch returned to where Neep was standing and stood watching him stir for a while.

  “There are a couple of rules laddie if you want to make your time in my kitchen a pleasant one.” he said and Neep waited for him to explain. “First of all, you do exactly as I say. No slacking.” Neep nodded in agreement. “Secondly you do not enter the grog cupboard at all.” he paused slightly, a concerned look crossing his face. “That’s the cupboard here.” He said, indicating the door through which he had disappeared earlier on. “It’s not safe in there you see, laddie. No naked flames.” Neep gave a slight smile. “Lastly,” continued the cook, “No sausages!” he looked about him wildly as if trying to spot a sausage or two, and spit gathered at the corner of his mouth, a look of sheer horror gathering on his face. “The wee beasties will have you, lad. Mark my word.” with that he spat loudly. Neep however was slightly confused.

  “A sausage isn’t a creature, Mitch.” he said politely. It would do no harm to put the cook right, he thought. “It’s a tasty snack involving mustard and quite often bread.” Mitch squeaked loudly and grabbed Neep by the collars, which was quite impressive as he was a good foot shorter than Neep.

  “Are you a sausage sympathiser then are you, lad?” He growled. “If you are you had been better to be thrown over the side of the ship. Maybe I will help you do it instead of the captain?” he released Neep’s collars angrily and Neep backed up, almost standing on the feet of the glum looking pirate who had up to now been sitting sadly in the corner of the table not saying much at all.

  “Excuse me Mitch.” said the unhappy looking pirate with an air of sadness. “But my biscuit doesn’t seem to have any weevils in it.” Mitch looked at the plate in the man’s hand suspiciously, upon which lay one of the ships biscuits. With a snort Mitch took it off the plate and bit into it.

  “No weevils.” he sighed through a mouthful of biscuit shards. “Never heard the like.” Mitch chewed on the biscuit for a second or two and then held the biscuit up to his face and peered inside it.

  “Very odd.” he muttered, before opening up a small cupboard under the stove and opening a large metal canister that looked more like a cage than a biscuit barrel. As he removed the lid several of the biscuits made a break for freedom and began to scuttle across the deck. Mitch stuffed several of them back into the tin cage and hurriedly shut the lid, leaving one biscuit scampering across the deck.

  “That’s yours!” he said to the sailor who happily grabbed it and thanking the cook returned to the table, now looking much happier.

  “Weevils and sausages.” mumbled Mitch as he watched the man tuck into the biscuit. “Not like the good old days. That biscuit would have been halfway to the Old Coast by now when I was a lad.” Sighing loudly, he turned his attention back to Neep.

  “Keep stirring lad!” he shouted suddenly and Neep jumped back into action. “Don’t want the gruel getting restless too now, do we?”

  Neep was forced to concede that no, that did not appear to be a terribly good idea at all. As the ship sailed on into the night Neep continued to stir.

  Chapter 6

  ~ Key and Map~

  Mister Bones stood on the quarterdeck of The Magpie, watching Jenkins's ship, the Torta Di Frutta on the horizon. He noticed Daisy looked anxious, biting her lip as dusk began to fall, the horizon beginning to colour orange and red.

  “It is definitely Jenkins.” said Bones as he lowered the eyeglass, his voice deep and earthy, his black robe covering him, his hood up, obscuring his face. “His ship moves much quicker than we anticipated.”

  “Can we catch him?” asked Daisy without taking her eyes off the dot on the horizon. Bones sighed deeply. To Daisy it almost sounded like a growl.

  “Unlikely.” he said. “He is continuing on a south-westerly course and we have no reason to think he has spotted us, and so his course is almost certainly not about to change.”

  “But this is Jenkins we are talking about.” said Daisy.

  “Indeed. There is tha
t of course.”

  “He may very well just be fishing.” said Daisy and Bones chuckled.

  “He may well be indeed, though now he has the map I suspect he is running a direct course.”

  “If this gap between us continues to increase he will elude us when he changes course,” said Daisy, looking over the deck of the Magpie where all of her crew were making every attempt to increase The Magpie’s speed.

  “He may not change course.” said Bones.

  “He will have to old friend.” said Daisy, her attention still drawn to the horizon. “His present course will take him straight to the Seven Tines, which as we know is completely impassable. The map must surely head in another direction when he nears them. The archipelago to the south of the Tines is like a maze. If he is heading there then we would never find him.”

  “Indeed.” said Bones, and silence fell across the quarterdeck. “Just like old times.” he chuckled, and he half turned his face to see Daisy smiling. “Where you and I were first acquainted.” Daisy strode impatiently a pace or two, regarding the man at the helm who was doing his very best to ensure their passage through the waves was as rapid as he could possibly make it. It did not do to make The Scarlet Daisy angry.

  Mister Bones stayed where he was.

  “We could jettison any unnecessary ballast.” he said. “Making the ship lighter may assist in our pursuit.”

  “Damn it Bones, I should have anticipated that he would make full sail, and that The Golden Octopus would give him their fastest ship, The Torta Di Frutta.”

  “I think they must really have wanted to make sure they got rid of him as quick as they could.” he laughed. “Do not be harsh on yourself, Daisy. We could not anticipate them being so keen to see him on his way.”

  “I should have anticipated it.” She said angrily.

  “How?” sighed Bones. “They do not expect him to return. It seems somewhat extravagant of them to give him so fine a ship.”

  “Well it is Jenkins we are talking about.” she said and they both laughed.

  “What ballast could we dispose of?” asked Daisy returning to his suggestion. I cannot think of anything surplus to our requirements. Certainly Mister Boom would object to any cannons going over the side I suspect.”

  “He seems to be settling in rather well I think.” said Bones, and Daisy nodded, before continuing.

  “Maybe some of the supplies and general fixtures and fittings may be surplus to requirement. Perhaps some supplies too. This may not be such a long voyage. I could set up a detail to investigate.” Bones agreed and Daisy departed to set in motion the task of making the ship lighter.

  Bones stood motionless on the quarterdeck with the Helmsman heaving quietly at the ships wheel as the wind blew about his black cloak. Darkness was falling rapidly now and slowly the dot on the horizon was starting to disappear. He hoped that Daisy could make some progress with her detail. They would certainly need it. Compared to The Torta Di Frutta they were hardly moving at all. By morning it may be too late to catch them, and the map would be lost once again. He sighed as he thought of the lost treasure of Capability Jones, and the fact that he had spent most of his life chasing after it; a desperate search for the lost island of El Bongo. Many a time he had been laughed at; mocked for his belief that the island and the treasure actually existed at all. Yet he knew it did. He touched the large round medallion around his neck as the wind picked up, sending his cloak billowing around him. Yet he did not feel the air on him. Not at all. It simply was not possible. He touched his left hand with his right, feeling the bones nestled just inside the sleeve of the robe. He would have shivered if he could, but he could not. Not anymore. Yet it had not always been the case. Oh no. Once it had been very different. That had been long ago. Just after he and Daisy had first met. So long ago, he thought and the waves crashed against the side of the ship as he remembered.

  ***

  Even when he was just a child, Seaman Bob Owens had an air of neatness about him; an edge of practicality. He liked things to be in order, and mess was a demon that set him tidying whenever he encountered it. To his mind order was necessary in all things and he pursued it with a passion that was almost fanatical. He labelled all his clothes with his name, polished his boots endlessly and his sword was so finely sharpened that it seemed that even sunlight split and glittered about its gleaming edge. He had found himself a life as a sailor initially, running on merchant ships and cargo hauls along The Old Coast, but eventually a life of piracy had drawn him in. He was a solitary man, not handsome but plain; unremarkable. He knew these things about himself too and was not in the slightest perturbed by them. It was just how he was. It was the same in love really, women did not interest him at all, and most of the men he met would have been at best surprised at his desires, if not downright hostile. Yet Bob was at ease with himself. He was seldom lonely, and the life of piracy though at sometimes harsh and dangerous, was one that sat well with him.

  He could not remember where he had first heard the legend of the lost island of El Bongo from, and though the tale was fascinating he had placed it at the back of his mind for many years until he had signed up with a buccaneer running out of the town of Hard Knocks and they had found themselves sailing in the area of the Seven Tines. Though he had seen drawings of the spectacular rock formation that edged the seas of the Seven Tines he had not expected them to be as majestic as they actually were when they had sailed up close.

  Seven giant fingers of granite stood up from the ocean at a range of more than fifty miles, the stone needles raised against the sky like enormous granite fists. The waters running around them were shallow and harsh needles of rock covered the approach to the Tines, making it completely impassable. Strong currents and almost constant storms made the entire area treacherous. Any who attempted to pass never returned. Yet through the clouds of fog, alternating with driving rain and almost constant bursts of lightning, the sea could be heading away from The Tines on the far side on the horizon. Yet none who tried to find a way across ever returned. Nor could it be circumnavigated. The coastline of Iruvia lay to the south, and the land there was a huge jungle, through which none had ever passed. Off the coastline there, the archipelago of the hanged man was a maze of hundreds of islands, most small and unchartered. It was there that Bob found himself after a storm blew the ship he was serving on off course after a particularly bad storm had hit them off the Seven Tines, and they had drifted into the archipelago, the ship badly damaged and half of the crew drowned.

  Before setting off on their voyage the ship had docked at Meesha to take on supplies and several new crew members had come on board. One of them, Scarlet Daisy as she called herself, had latched onto Bob as a companion almost straight away. Bob thought she had a good eye for people, and was aware of his preferences almost instinctively. She had confided in him once that she felt safe from molestation or of being leered at with him.

  “Why?” he had asked, genuinely puzzled. He was a workmanlike pirate at best, and his skill with a sword compared to her was at best lacking.

  “You know.” she had said, and they had never mentioned it again. It was just to be.

  On the second day lost in the archipelago the ship had come across an island larger than some of the others, dense jungle obscuring what seemed to be a large butte of stone in the centre of the island. Most of the pirates on the ship had made signs against demons as they sailed close to the island and muttered charms to ward off evil for on the shore of the island sat what was definitely a small wooden hut. Through the eyeglass it appeared that the hut was ramshackle, but a hut it definitely was. Keen to impress, Daisy had volunteered to investigate and Bob would not let her go ashore herself. The captain had insisted that another member of the crew went along with them; a native man called Hindriah, who was to accompany them in the case of them coming across any inhabitants of the island. The captain reckoned Hindriah would be able to translate, but the pirate himself did not look so sure. Still, it was not good to lose
face in front of a crew of cut throat pirates, and so soon all of them stood on the beach of the island, several men waiting in the rowing boat for them to return from their investigations.

  Approaching the hut, they could see now that it had not been in use for what appeared to be many years. The wood was bleached white by the proximity of the sea’s salt and the constant sun, and the door hung off at angle. All was dark inside, though a number of strange symbols were painted on the front of the hut itself. Daisy pushed the door open carefully, her sword held out before her, but the inside of the hut was completely empty apart from a small sack in the shadows of the room. Bob stepped inside and made for the sack. Hindriah stayed steadfastly on the beach, examining the markings on the front of the hut just below the top of the roof. He muttered to himself as he ran his fingers across the symbols.

  “Careful Bob.” said Daisy, moving inside the hut herself and prodding the bag with her sword. A slight clinking like that of crockery or glass tinkled about the hut as she did so, but apart from that nothing. “Take the bag outside. We will open it there.” she said, and Bob gingerly picked the sack up and threw it onto the sand on the beach where it made a sharp clinking sound. Daisy crept forward as Bob took the bottom of the sack and upended its contents onto the ground.

  “What in the name of the …” began Daisy as Bob and Hindriah gathered around to see about a dozen small glass bottles on the sand. Inside each one was a small ship, the sails completely raised.

  “It’s a tiny ship inside a bottle…” gasped Hindriah as Daisy took one and held it up to her face.

  “How on Earth do you get a ship inside a bottle?” asked Daisy.

  “No idea.” said Bob. “But more importantly why would you put a ship inside a bottle?”

  “No idea about that either.” said Daisy, beginning to place the bottles back into the sack. We will take them back to the ship to see what the captain says.” Bob nodded as Hindriah turned his attention to the symbols on the front of the hut again.