Silver (11 page)

‘Let me see it,’ he whispered, rolling his eyes feverishly to and fro in their sockets. ‘Let me hold it in my hands again.’

I glanced at Natty, searching her face for a sign of what I should do, and again she acted for me, indicating that I should take the map from its hiding-place. It occurred to me as I did so that this would be the first time she had seen it herself. Whatever excitement she felt was well concealed, which I thought was proof of her trust in me.

While I began to undo my shirt, Mr Silver clawed the air as he
had done during our previous visit. ‘And what of yourself, Father,’ Natty said gently, ignoring this. ‘What of yourself?’

The old man did not reply. He merely clenched up his face like a fist so that all his wrinkles were emphasised, and looked at her with disdain. Natty affected not to notice, and ran her hand over his forehead. There was nothing more than goodness in the gesture, which was a relief to see, but Spot evidently suspected otherwise. As her hand pulled back again, the bird hopped from the floor of his cage onto his perch and clung there with his bright yellow feet, rocking backwards and forwards. ‘Leave me alone! Leave me alone!’ he shouted, with enough defiance to keep us all still for a moment.

‘I have it here, Mr Silver.’

It was my voice that spoke now, and my hands that were holding out the map. I had already unfolded it, which meant I was seeing it in daylight for the first time. The underlinings appeared even more childish than when I had glanced at them in my father’s room. Yet the
names –
the names and the rusty cross-marks – held such extraordinary power, the air seemed to shiver around me.

Mr Silver did nothing for a moment except stare, his milky eyes narrowing with an effort of concentration, his brow tightening, and his head lifting an inch or two from the pillow.

‘Give it to me,’ he said. ‘I need to be sure.’ His voice was very thin and scratchy, but had a note of command that Captain Flint himself would have obeyed. When I did as he ordered, he laid hold of the paper with great delicacy, as if he feared that it might melt between his fingers. When he had stroked it a few times, and reassured himself of its robustness, he raised it close to his face and breathed in two or three times very deeply.

‘Do you smell it, boy?’ he asked in a much quieter voice, when he had allowed his head to sink back onto the pillow again. ‘And you, my girl, do you smell it? The sea and the earth and all that in them is!’

Neither of us answered, but watched in amazement as he returned to touching all over the map with his finger-ends. To and fro they wandered, to and fro, as though he had transported himself from his bed and was in fact strolling around the coves of the island, exploring its valleys and forests, drinking from its streams and hauling himself up its hillsides. Eventually he settled on the words ‘bar silver’ and seemed to pluck at them, teasing them upright. When he had satisfied himself in this way, he caressed the whole surface of the map with a most lingering fondness, which made the snake tattoo writhe along his arm. Next he performed the same action with his face, sliding the paper backwards and forwards across his white bristles, over his nose and forehead. Finally he held it to his lips, and puckered them into a tender kiss.

It was a revolting performance, as well as a spellbinding one, and by the end of it Mr Silver’s mouth had filled with saliva, so that he had to swallow not once but twice. Natty took this to be a sign that she should bring things to a close, perhaps fearing for his health. She therefore leaned forward and prised the map from between his fingers, all the time murmuring, ‘There, there, Father; we will take it back now. There, there.’

When she had returned the paper to my safe keeping, Natty sat down on the chaise longue beside her father and took both his hands in her own. ‘Listen to me,’ she said, in the voice of sweet reason. ‘We have come to show you the map, and now you have seen it. We have also come to say goodbye to you. You know what we must do. We must begin our journey. Will you give us your blessing; and say you look forward to our safe return?’

‘My blessing? Why of course you have my blessing,’ said Mr Silver; his voice was very quiet, as if he were speaking in a church. ‘You have my blessing and my prayers – my prayers for your safe return, and your
success
.’ He drew out the last word so that it sounded
like a serpent’s hiss, then collected himself, which showed he was about to say something he wanted us to remember. It was this: ‘Your success will be the end of everything. It will set me free. It will set all of us free. Bring me the silver and I will be able to die.’

‘Hush, hush, you must not say that,’ Natty told him quickly, but her father would not respond, except by tightening his jaw.

This made an awkwardness in the room, which I felt I must end for Natty’s sake. ‘Before we set sail,’ I said, ‘I have a request. I was not able to say goodbye to my own father – for reasons you will understand. Can I ask you: will you give me a memory of him that I might have instead?’

I thought Mr Silver would ignore my request or brush it aside, so contemptuous was the expression on his face. But as the words sank into his brain they exerted a most curious influence. His eyes widened, his features relaxed, and a smile spread through him that was as warm as sunlight. It gave me a glimpse of the sweetness my father had witnessed many years earlier – the sweetness that was always false, and expedient.

‘Jim!’ he said, as though suddenly astonished. ‘Dear boy! You saved my life and you kept your word. We were two of a kind. We wanted to save our skins and get rich, didn’t we lad? Liberty and riches, they were the things.’

These were sentiments I had heard before, at our first meeting, but now they were uttered with a deeper sense of recognition. And my response to them was the more uncertain, because although I understood that Mr Silver was speaking of my father, I could not help gaining the impression that he thought of me as his own child.

This was not the memory I had requested, but it gave me a reassurance about the journey that was very welcome – at the same time as it troubled me.

So welcome, in fact, and so troubling, that for a moment I stood
quite still and felt nonplussed. When I was able to move again I surprised even myself. I stepped forward and kissed the crown of the old man’s head; it was a thing I had neglected to do when leaving my own father a few hours earlier, for fear of waking him. The threads of white hair felt ticklish against my lips and the skin very tight.

‘You are a good boy, Jim,’ he murmured as I straightened again. ‘You are a good boy and you must take care of Natty. You must …’

But the voice cracked as he spoke, so whatever he intended to say was lost. Instead, and with an awkward gulp, he lurched out to grasp his daughter’s left hand and my right, holding them together in the grip of his claws and shaking them slowly up and down.

With the light pouring over us, and the wind pressing against the window, and the immense silent pageant of London and its river spread out below, it was a moment of the most complex solemnity. A wedding and a farewell at once. And when it was finished, Mr Silver threw our hands into the air, making us understand that he was sending us on our way, and if we stayed any longer we would offend him.

It was a sudden conclusion, although no doubt for the best. It allowed Natty the dignity of seeming trustworthy to her father, and us both the privilege of feeling united in a common purpose. I waited a moment while Natty once more laid her hand on her father’s brow, closing her eyes as she did so – as if, by a great effort of concentration, she could absorb all the knowledge preserved inside his skull. Then she moved swiftly to collect Spot (who was now settled more calmly on his perch) before joining me again.

We walked slowly backwards out of the room as if departing from royalty, and kept our eyes fixed on Mr Silver for as long as possible. He never stirred – except, as the door closed, to lift one long hand and so repeat the blessing we had asked for.

As I look back today from the vantage point of my later age, I am astonished that so much remained unsaid during our final interview with Mr Silver. Very little about my father. Next to nothing about the adventure they had shared. Nothing whatsoever about their later lives. Our haste in setting sail was partly to blame for this – and also my reluctance to ask questions, having already heard so many answers at home. The main reason, however, was my youth. I showed insufficient curiosity about the means of arriving in a particular situation, and excessive concentration on the situation itself, and my importance in it.

I was equally complacent about the preparations for our journey. In fact, as I followed Natty downstairs from her father, I had the same expectations of removing immediately to our ship that a
gentleman might feel on leaving his house for his carriage – except I did not have any of my own possessions for the voyage. When I asked Natty whether we should fill a trunk with things we might share, she brushed me aside: her father had sent ahead with everything we could possibly need. What about her mother then? Should we not say goodbye to her? Natty frowned as if dismissing the idea, then changed her mind and led us to the taproom of the Spyglass.

Unusually for such an establishment, this was on the first floor of the building, as though to escape any floods that might occur – as well as other kinds of unwelcome visitation. When I opened the door, I found a low-ceilinged, smoke-filled den where everything was brown as a kipper: chairs, tables, floorboards, hands and faces. The ebb and flow of talk, which broke occasionally into arguments or laughter, filled my head with memories of home. But to say this was my chief impression would be to underestimate Mrs Silver. While we made our way among the customers (who were a very rough crew bundled up in old sailors’ coats, with pipes fuming in their mouths and neckerchiefs pulled round their ears), she rose from behind a trestle table that filled one end of the room. Her face flushed a deeper mahogany with the effort of standing, and she spread her arms wide.

‘My children!’ she exclaimed, so loudly that everyone around her fell silent; I noticed especially one lanky fellow who seemed fiercer than the rest because a part of his right ear was missing – sliced off, I supposed, in a sword fight. He flicked a glance in my direction, then chewed his quid with an insulting slowness and spat on the floor before sinking back into his chair.

Natty and I stood as still as truants brought to book. This only encouraged Mrs Silver, who now shook her arms and fiddled her fingers in the air. ‘My children,’ she said again, ‘come to me’ – and
she folded us strongly to her bosom. A sigh rose from our audience, accompanied by the banging of tankards on tabletops.

‘My brave children,’ Mrs Silver continued in a quieter voice. ‘The Lord has told me what brings you here. You have come to bid farewell to your mother, and then to leave these shores in the pursuit of your fortune. “We must appear before the judgement seat of Christ; that everyone may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.” The Lord has told me this. And the Lord has told me that he is satisfied. I therefore give you my blessing and let you go. Be gone! Be gone! Find your happiness and, when you are ready, return with proof of it to your mother.’

Any objection that I might have made – to the effect, for instance, that she was
not
my mother – would have been futile. I was clasped too close to do more than nod my head, which was in effect to rub it against her skin.

Natty was making more vigorous attempts to escape, which I knew because I heard Spot’s cage clanking in her hand, and the bird himself give a raucous shout: ‘Hold steady, my hearties!’

‘Thank you, Mother,’ Natty said when she had regained her freedom, sounding very relieved. This was a cue for Mrs Silver to weaken her grip on me, at which I also sprang back, breathing much faster than usual. When I looked around to get my bearings, I saw our audience in the taproom had already begun talking among themselves again – all except for the lanky man I had noticed earlier, who was now slipping towards the stairs that led onto the street, taking his mangled ear with him.

‘We will be very glad of your prayers,’ Natty was saying. ‘We will remember you in our own, and often think of you.’

Few as they were, and softly spoken, I heard in these words what I supposed was the whole history of Natty’s feelings for her
mother. There was enough courtesy to show gratitude, but also a coldness, which reflected the lack of warmth she must have known all her life.

As if proving the point, Mrs Silver then closed the scene very abruptly. She waved her hands at us again – this time ushering us away – and busied herself with her customers, filling their tankards and laughing with them even before we had turned our backs. It made me impatient to be gone, but I was delayed another minute by noticing something I might have seen sooner, had I not been so distracted.

Set on a wide shelf above the lintel, and arranged in a large glass case with its wings outspread, was a magnificent parrot. The wings and body were brilliant green – green as spring grass – shading to soft yellow along the belly, from which protruded two extremely wrinkled black legs that ended in talons of a prodigious size. These grasped a fragment of mossy log, behind which rose a background of leaves to represent a portion of jungle.

The eyes of this marvellous creature were made of glass and seemed very malevolent – as did the beak, which was open to speak or bite, and was exceptionally thick, so that its layers of nail appeared separately towards the edge, like levels of rock along a coast. It was a weapon that could easily have taken a lump as large as a chicken’s egg from any man’s arm.

‘Captain Flint,’ whispered Natty.

‘
The
Captain Flint?’

‘The very same. Two hundred years old if a day, when your father met him. Parrots live for ever, mostly.’ Natty paused to let me admire this interesting fact, then continued. ‘The same Captain Flint who sailed with the great Captain England, the pirate. Captain Flint who was at Madagascar, and the Malabar, and Surinam, and Providence, and Portobello. Captain Flint who was at the fishing-up
of the wrecked plate ships – that’s where she learned “Pieces of eight!”: three hundred and fifty thousand of them!’