Overboard! Page 7

  “Now Mr Neep we need to advise you of some of the pitfalls that are liable to come your way during a lifetime of piracy.” Neep got the definite impression that Melvas was trying to put him off.

  “Ever been on a sinking ship?” he asked brightly.

  “Not up to this point.” he said. Melvas brightened visibly.

  “Oh.” he said. “Drowning can be a horrible way to go, you know.” He smiled broadly. Very nasty.”

  “Not a problem.” said Neep. “I can swim.” Melvas grimaced and placed another cross on the parchment.

  “What about buggery?” he asked.

  “Is it compulsory?” smiled Neep.

  “Of course not!” said Melvas irritably, shuffling in his seat.

  “Well no thanks then.” said Neep.

  “It could happen...” said Melvas attempting a look of concern.

  “Any statistics on the likelihood?” queried Neep. Melvas shuffled in his seat again.

  “Not to hand at the moment.” he said.

  “I’ll take the chance then.” said Neep as the representative from The Golden Octopus sighed to himself before crossing the paper once again.

  “Sudden death.” said Melvas.

  “I would prefer a little notice if at all possible really.”

  “Being stranded on a remote desert island with just a penknife and one pair of trousers and...” Neep noticed that Melvas seemed to be racking his brains to embellish his question if that was indeed what it was. “With a population of cannibals… and an… Erm… army of witch doctors.” he finished with a flourish.

  “Not very likely now, is it?” said Neep.

  “Why not?” said Melvas, peering at Neep intently.

  “Well I don’t have a pen knife.” said Neep with a smile. Melvas grimaced and rolled up the parchment.

  “Well that concludes our interview Mr Neep.” he growled darkly, “Though one piece of advice I will give you for free. If I were you then I would most definitely beware of treading on the toes of The Golden Octopus. They don’t take kindly to the world of consultancy I think you will find.”

  “Thank you for the advice.” said Neep, missing the veiled threat completely.

  “Good day Mr Neep.” said Melvas as he departed, nodding darkly to Mathias on the way out. Mathias took Neep’s hand and shook it, handing him back his papers and course book when he was done, not that Neep needed it. He had flicked through it once when he was given it and it was all in his head waiting for retrieval straight away. His lithographic memory was very much of an advantage not just for card schools.

  A noise from outside in the street brought him back to the present, and startled, he tripped over a number of papers on the floor. He thought he had a vague concept in his mind that bailiffs were as far as he knew not allowed to enter a building unless they were invited in. Just a bit like vampires. Like most people he had a vague notion of what a bailiff could, and could not, actually do in the execution of their duty. Applying this rule of logic to the current state of the front door and interior of his office seemed to be threatening to give him a headache. Noticing more papers scattered on the floor Neep bent down to pick these up too, noting as he did so that they all seemed to be demands of payment from the correspondence course.

  As he stood up to place the papers on the counter he was shocked to see two large, swarthy looking men stood inside his shop looking at him in what could only have been a predatory manner. Neep was equally startled to see that neither of them seemed to be the bailiffs that he had seen in the street just minutes before.

  “Mr Neep, is it not?” said the larger one of the men as he smiled in a causally evil manner. Neep noticed the man’s dark leather coat, long black boots, and dark floppy hat, topped with a long black feather. Of far more importance however was the long, carefully polished flintlock pistol pointed in his direction.

  “Yes?” asked Neep, and was not in the slightest bit surprised to find that his voice sounded as if he was singing from the treble section of the Hard Knocks choir. The man’s smile increased just a little more and the other man beside him gave a small chuckle in a low, deep voice. “Is it about the correspondence course?” Neep continued to squeak. The two men seemed to both smile a little wider.

  “In a way I suppose it is.” Said the man with the gun. Neep decided to try the outraged approach.

  “I didn’t think it was allowed for bailiffs to have guns!” yelled Neep. “I am calling a constable about this!” The two men stood perfectly still in front of Neep almost as if daring him to move. The only change in either of the two men’s stance was the slight rising of each of their left eyebrows.

  “Oh but we are not bailiffs” said the second man, producing an impressively long knife apparently from within his sleeve, and began paring his nails with it. The first man moved a step closer and waved the gun towards the shattered door of the shop.

  “No, Mr Neep. We are...” he paused, glancing to the ceiling as if trying to pluck a word from the air. “Messengers.” He finally settled on before casting his gaze in Neep’s direction again. “Yes. Messengers. We are from the Golden Octopus, Mr Neep.” He paused slightly watching the colour drain from Neep’s face. “And the Golden Octopus wants a word.” He waved the pistol at the open door. “Shall we go?”

  Chapter 4

  ~ The Sons of the Pinched Fuse ~

  The Patch and Parrot pub stands back from the main streets of Hard Knocks almost as if it is afraid of dipping its metaphorical toe in the water of the harbour. It is nevertheless still a very light stone’s throw away from the harbour that is also overlooked by the grand council building in which even now the mayor, Bradley Mackrell, sits carefully arranging what may very well be a set of miniature instruments of torture carefully on his desk. The pub itself has very much the image of faded glory; once it had been a public house but now it was just a pub. The front windows were yellowed, the paint on the walls outside vaguely peeling, giving a much lived-in appearance to the building if you were inclined to think of it favourably, if indeed you thought of it at all. To most inhabitants of Hard Knocks it was simply just there.

  Yet the clientele that frequented the pub were surprisingly well behaved, given that most of them were not total strangers to the concept of wielding a well-balanced knife in the dark or a little bit of recreational pick pocketing and general misbehaviour with high explosives. In fact, the Patch and Parrot had the best behavioural record with the local law enforcement agencies for many a year. This was down to one simple fact. The pub itself was only a single storey, but the building itself stood two storeys high, and the top floor was the headquarters for the pirate body known as The Golden Octopus. The landlord of the pub, one Thelonious Peck, was of course extremely grateful for the presence of the piratical cartel just above his head, and it was a well-known fact that any person who misbehaved whilst in the pub was rarely seen again. Well, with all limbs intact anyway.

  This strange co-existence of both businesses seemed to work well for all and sundry, and The Golden Octopus kept themselves pretty much to themselves, though they did tend to run up quite a significant food and ale bill, which of course the landlord never ever asked them for payment on. It was really an unspoken and most definitely unwritten agreement. The members of the Golden Octopus ate and drank as much as they could, and Mr Peck’s pub continued in a state of peaceful co-existence. The pub also of course had a large cellar, but only half of it was used by the pub itself, for The Golden Octopus had requested that the other half of the cellar be given over to The Sons of the Pinched Fuse to use for their weekly meetings. This was not so much an act of benevolence as such, it was just that The Golden Octopus wanted to keep a very close eye on the activities of those who wanted to give up the ways of gunpowder. This was not just because they found such a frame of mind highly suspicious, but also because they did tend to look upon the proximity of the club as a form of unofficial employment exchange.

  The Sons of the Pinched Fuse was run by Ensephilephto
r Boom, a tall gentleman whose main claim to fame was not the fact that he had formed an ever growing society of pirates who wanted to give up their use of gunpowder and large heavy weaponry, but that he was at one time also the most feared bombardier in the entire Seven Tines. His accuracy with a cannon was without match, and his reputation was feared amongst anyone who was unlucky enough to stare down the wrong end of a cannon barrel at him. It would be an understatement therefore to say that when he announced that not only was he giving up his piratical endeavours but that he was also actually forming a society to persuade others to do so too that his announcement was greeted with more than a fair amount of scepticism. This of course was yet another reason for The Golden Octopus to offer him the use of their cellar. Keeping an eye on a man who had years of extreme success with heavy munitions was certainly more than just at the back of their collective minds.

  Boom was of course no fool. Anyone that had spent years successfully lighting ever shortening fuses could be at least described as cautious. That he still had all ten fingers and both feet was in itself remarkable, but as well as that he had a very agile brain, but perhaps thankfully for The Golden Octopus, not much of an imagination.

  Boom stood in the pitch dark of the patch and Parrot pub cellar, sitting at the front of the underground room on a small box as he heard members begin to arrive. From the very beginning it had been essential to Boom that The Sons of the Pinched Fuse met in total anonymity. After all, many of those who attended his meetings had yet to publicly renounce their use of explosives. To some who attended it may actually have shortened their retirement plans considerably were they to do so.

  So all meetings were held in complete darkness, though later on once the meeting had finished those who wished to remain and talk in the light did so, lanterns being lit around the large cellar. Boom despaired that surprisingly few did stay afterwards, and of those who did stay you could count the number of remaining fingers (or feet) on one slightly maimed hand. Yet he did see proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. Every week there seemed to be more members, and although it had been over twenty years since he had sharpened his senses for use in the darkness, (usually whilst sailing quietly into port with twenty cannons fully primed and ready to fire) he did have a fair idea of the voices of many of his regular attendees.

  Sitting in the total darkness he heard several more people enter, followed by the usual sporadic clatter of chairs and tables.

  “Oh I am sorry.”

  “Excuse me.”

  “Watch where you’re going sunshine”

  And so on.

  Voices in the dark.

  Some of the regular attendees he could identify by the sound of a peg leg bumping along the floor (there were a few of these), or a slightness of breath. Apart from the few who remained every week to chat though he had no idea who they actually were, just that some of them left a very definite… footprint, as it were.

  He waited just a little longer for a few more people to arrive, and was pleased to hear that there seemed to be more arrivals this week than usual. Perhaps word of mouth was spreading, and he sighed in the darkness, quietly hoping so. As he waited, his ears picking up the sounds of yet more arrivals he reflected on what had brought him here to this place in the world, and this cellar.

  When he was a boy it all seemed so far away, tales of pirates and gold and the high seas. His only ambition had been to take in the autumn harvest, and he smiled in the darkness as he remembered this. Had it ever really been so? Yet as he grew older and the back breaking constant toil on the farm became increasingly apparent he began to dream of a better life beyond a life of mucking out and milking. Piracy was his choice of daydream, and he found himself more and more imagining a life of adventure far away from the farm. He chuckled silently. It wasn’t a life of adventure that had called him away though. Oh no. From an early age he had found himself fascinated by fire. Flames danced in the hearth each evening and he watched them avidly, licking at the logs as plumes of smoke raced up the chimney. He had found himself striking flints out in the fields on hot summer’s day, watching small strands of hay catch and smoke in the summer sun. It wasn’t long before he discovered his father’s flintlock pistol locked in a cupboard in the hall, and emptying the gunpowder into a small bag one day he had walked a long mile before finally laying a trail of a big mound of the silvery black powder that seemed to almost glisten in anticipation of flame and fires. Lighting the makeshift fuse, he smiled inwardly as he realised now just how close he had been to the resulting small but highly combustible explosion. From that moment on he was hooked.

  His parents had been shocked when the eyebrow singed and soot covered face of their only son had arrived back at the farmhouse, and he was confined to his room for the best part of a week, as well as perhaps understandably having to do his own laundry for a while too. It was a turning point however, and from time to time he would find himself staring at the stacked bales of hay in the barn, stuffed with dry flammable hay for the winter. At this point his mouth would run dry, perspiration would form on his face and hands, and he could almost see the flames licking about the barn, about the roof, and then into the house itself.

  As he grew older he knew it would only be a matter of time before it was a reality, and so in what was to be a lifetime of satisfying and denying this impulse one Autumn night when the barn was filling up with baled hay yet again and the flames were flickering in his mind he packed a bag and left. As he crept along the hall he quietly opened his parent’s door and he could see both of their sleeping faces lit by moonlight streaming through the window, and he had smiled. He was sure, even to this day, that his father had winked at him, but he had never been completely sure. There was always a doubt. He left the farm and headed to the nearest port, bag on his shoulder and a life of piracy planned ahead of him in a vague yet enthusiastic way.

  He had never returned.

  “Ouch!” said a deep voice from the back of the room. “Will you please just sit down?”

  “Sorry.” Came a quiet, conciliatory voice and Boom made a mental count of who he estimated to be there in terms of numbers, reckoning around about thirty people. His best night yet! He decided to make a start.

  “Good evening.” he said, his voice carrying to the back of the room easily. A captain acquaintance of his had once remarked that he was not called “Boom” for nothing, which had, and did, make him smile every time he remembered it. “Welcome to the thirty third meeting of The Sons of the Pinched Fuse.” There followed a cacophony of returned hellos, yo’s and general greetings. He allowed these to settle into the darkness before continuing.

  “My name is Ensephilephtor Boom, and it has been one year, two weeks and three days since I last fired a cannon.” There was a general round of applause which Boom waited to die down before continuing. “As you know, we the gathered Sons of the Pinched Fuse have collectively forsworn the use of gunpowder in general, and cannons in particular, for by gathering together our strength and resolve to give up the evil chemicals of combustion we are stronger to resist its evil charms together than if we tried to do it alone. Now do we have any new members and is there anyone who wants to share their story?”

  Boom paused briefly. There was always a slow start in getting new members, or even old ones to start first, but with a little patience, and if required, a few encouraging words they were usually soon to have a speaker.

  “If I may…” said a slightly high pitched voice from the back of the room. Obviously a younger member of their brethren

  “Please.” said Boom in a soothing voice. “You are amongst brothers here.” There was another pause, and Boom was about to offer some encouragement when the voice decided to continue.

  “My name is …” There was a pause during which a mental dictionary of Christian names was fiercely scanned, “Er… Dave, and it has been three days and fourteen hours since I last fired a cannon.”

  There was a loud roar of approval from the gathered members and several sh
outs of “Well done Dave!” and “Keep it up!” amongst other things. Dave carried on as the congratulations fell back into silence. “I just don’t think it’s right Mr Boom.” he said, a quiver in his voice. “I mean. How was I to know the gunnery hatches were still closed? Could have lost a hand or worse.” he finished, and there were sighs of agreement all around the room. “Still.” finished Dave. “At least I know for sure I can swim now.”

  “Indeed.” said Boom, as the floor and the discussion opened up to tales of denial and disaster, all given freely by men keen to keep their wits and their full set of digits about them. Yet also Boom recognised that like him they were drawn to the flame with their every waking hour, every minute their thoughts full of fire and explosions. He let the meeting carry on in this vein for what he estimated as the best part of an hour (and there was one thing you could definitely agree about Ensephilephtor Boom, and that was that his sense of timing was very, very good), and from time to time he felt his mind drifting back to the beginning of his life as a pirate.

  Upon his arrival at the port of Hard Knocks he had wandered from ship to ship offering his services in any part of the ship that would have him. He had no problems with having to work his way up as it were. However, upon his potential employees discovering his surname there was only ever one part of the ship he could have ended up on. He had a talent for it too. His gun deck ran smoothly, accurately, and more importantly was completely deadly. He just seemed to have a knack for it, and so his fame spread as did his commissions. Of course this also meant he knew it was like to be on the receiving end of a cannons onslaught, and sometimes he wondered in his bunk at night if he was doing the right thing, but he had continued. A lifetime of denial and exquisite pleasure and yet also disdain for what he was doing. Eventually he snapped.

  It had been during a routine old coast sortie when they had destroyed a small merchant ship almost so efficiently as to be accidental. He had been under the command of captain “Mad Jack” Jenkins, who true to his name seemed to have lost touch with most of reality altogether. He had seen the ship sink and had ordered Boom to fire upon the wreckage, clinging to which he was sure were members of the merchant crew, almost certainly women and children amongst them. He had refused to do so, and he was lucky to have escaped with his life so incensed was Jenkins, but escape he did. He had never fired another cannon again. Yet he was not sure he never would. Each day was a battle with himself. In his mind he resolved it by rationalising that the only person he would ever aim a cannon at again was mad bloody Jenkins, and this seemed to work, for although Boom saw the old devil from time to time he so far had resisted the urge to break his vows and blow him to smithereens.