The Silver Swan (2 page)

Fast as a snake striking, Papa ran into the hallway and whipped a sword from a scabbard hanging near the front door. I followed close behind.

‘Hide, all of you,' he said. ‘Run into the kitchen.'

I raced into the dining room instead and peered through the window into the night. There was another noise from outside, near the chicken shed. I grabbed the carving knife from the table and ran back into the hallway where Papa stood, sword drawn, facing the door. Mama was huddled in the corner with her arms around Lucas.

‘I think we're surrounded,' I warned. ‘We'll have to fight our way out.'

The pounding on the door started up again.

I stood beside my father. The knife in my hand looked pathetic. I longed for my silver sword, for a good solid stick, for anything.

‘You stand behind the door,' I whispered to him. ‘I'll pretend there's nobody here but women and children, then you can clobber them from behind.'

He nodded to me and moved noiselessly into the shadows.

I summoned up a scared little girl's voice. Actually, that's just how I felt. ‘Who's there?' I called. ‘What do you want?'

Several men's voices answered, all jumbled and rough, so that I couldn't understand what they said.

‘Who are you?' I asked again, my face closer to the door. I could hear Papa's steady breathing nearby.

‘Friends.'

Papa snorted softly, disbelieving. He tightened his grasp on the sword.

But there was something familiar about that muffled voice.

I pushed Papa aside and fumbled with the lock.

‘What do you think you're doing?' Papa tried to hold me back, but at last the bolt slid free and I threw open the door. The soft lamplight fell on a circle of unshaven faces.

‘Jem!'

Before he could say anything, I ran to throw my arms around his neck.

‘Well, I'll be dumblustered,' he spluttered.

Jem was so tall I'd had to jump right up, and now I hung there, my feet way off the ground. Then at last I felt his wiry arms fold right around me.

‘Cygno!' I heard Ricardo's voice. ‘You're alive.'

‘She's alive!' cried Francesco.

‘It's the pirates!' Lucas was shouting, but I buried my face in Jem's stinky shirt and held on tight. ‘They're real! Mama, it's the pirates.'

The next few moments were pandemonium. Everyone yelled at once, and Lucas jumped up
and down as if it was Christmas morning. Moggia grabbed me and swung me around in the air until I felt giddy. Miller and Jem slapped one another on the back and hooted. Mama ushered all the boys inside, and they exclaimed loudly at her and at the house, and grabbed Lucas's cheeks in great pinched handfuls. I pushed tears away from my face. We were a loud, clumsy knot of tangled, hugging, shouting people, spilling down the hallway and into the dining room, everyone talking at once.

‘You're all right! I can't believe it — but how, bella?'

‘How did you find me here?'

‘Where the hell have you been?'

‘Excuse me, sir, is that a blunderbuss?'

‘My, we had you buried at sea a thousand times, lass.'

‘Not me, I'm tough. Where's the
Mermaid
?'

‘Let me guess — you must be Brasher. Come in, come in.'

‘Don't mind if I do, ma'am.'

‘You tell us your story first, Cyg,' said Jem, when the clamour had died down.

‘Allow me.' Papa stood apart, in the hallway, with his sword still drawn. The boys all stared at him. I noticed Miller's right hand twitch closer to his cutlass.

But Jem took a step forward, peering at Papa, trying to see through the red beard and rough curly hair to recognise a man he had once known.

At last he pursed his lips. ‘I'll be blowed.'

‘Mamma mia,' said Moggia. ‘Look who it is.'

Papa's face was stern. ‘Tell me what you want with my family,' he said abruptly.

Jem crossed his arms and smiled ever so slightly. ‘We've come to pay our respects to the child's poor grieving mother.' He glanced at Mama. ‘I expect that'll be you, ma'am. How d'you do?'

Before she could answer, Papa brought the tip of his sword level with Jem's eyes. ‘What do you want?'

‘Calm down,' said Miller from behind me. ‘He's telling the truth.'

‘That'd be a first.'

Jem moved his hand, slowly and deliberately, so that Papa could watch the movement, and drew an old leather purse from his belt.

‘We came to bring you this, ma'am,' said Jem, holding out the purse to Mama. ‘We figured, since you'd lost your daughter, you deserved her share of the
Mermaid
's prize money.'

Mama put her hand out to touch Jem's.

‘Leave it!' snapped Papa.

‘Cygnet earned her share of the prize, fair and square,' said Jem. ‘We thought you should have it.'

‘Since she's not dead, perhaps you don't need it any more,' said Miller, trying to lighten the mood.

Slowly I stepped into the pool of light between my father and Jem. I turned around, away from Papa, and faced my friends. Papa's sword was now only inches from the back of my neck.

‘It's a strange world, isn't it?' I said. ‘Last time we saw each other, we all thought for sure I'd be dead within days. I nearly was.'

‘We couldn't stop them,' said Moggia.

‘I know,' I reassured him. ‘I've always known that.'

‘Diablo would have killed us all.' Francesco pushed his way to the front.

‘Jem and Miller got a bloody good clobbering as it was,' said Brasher. ‘Pardon the language, ma'am.'

‘Is that what this is all about?' asked Papa, harshly. ‘You thought you could absolve your guilt with a few gold pieces?'

‘Perhaps,' said Jem, quietly but firmly. ‘It was the only thing we could think of to do. We didn't expect to find Cyg — or you — here.'

‘You can go now.' Papa motioned with his sword. I watched its glittering tip flick past my ear. ‘Go on, and don't come back.'

‘No.' I faced my father. ‘These are my friends. If you don't want to talk to them, that's your loss, but they didn't come to visit you.'

Mama stood beside me and put one hand on my shoulder. ‘There's plenty of pudding,' she said.

‘Pudding!' cried Ricardo. ‘Let's eat.'

I held my father's gaze. ‘These boys would never hurt me.'

His eyes flickered. Slowly, he lowered the sword.

‘See, Papa,' said Lucas. ‘All Lily's tales are true.' He ran across the floor and grabbed Papa's hand. ‘Come and meet the pirates.'

At last Papa smiled. He looked over Lucas's head, straight at Jem.

‘I believe we've already met.'

By the time the boys had demolished our pudding and downed a few glasses of wine, Lucas was sitting on Moggia's knee, and Mama and Brasher were chatting like old friends. He'd served with her father, he said, on the frigate
Amelia
, many years before Mama was born — too many to remember, and yet he managed to describe every stitch in every one of
Amelia
's dozens of sails. A kind of soft contentment buzzed in my chest as I watched them all talking together.

The boys filled our white dining room with colour and random noise. They all looked just the same to me. Jem sat precariously on a carved oak chair as if it was a hedgehog, too scared to move in case he broke something. His sword kept getting stuck in the chair legs. Ricardo and Francesco sprawled on the rug near the fireplace, where they argued and joked and threw splinters of kindling at each other. They weren't used to furniture, either. Miller seemed comfortable enough, but then he'd had three glasses of wine and was pouring another glass for Max. Lucas flicked Moggia's gold earring
and made him laugh aloud.

But there was a shadow — there was always the same dreadful shadow.

‘Jem,' I asked at last, ‘where's Captain Diablo?'

‘Who knows? Nowhere close by, anyhow.'

‘We lost him.' Miller chuckled. ‘He stuck a couple of his cut-throats on the
Mermaid
to keep an eye on us, but we threw them overboard in Naples.'

‘You never did!' I gasped.

‘Aye,' said Jem. ‘They were getting on my nerves.'

‘You killed them?'

‘Nah, more's the pity,' Miller said. ‘Just bonked them on the head and put them ashore.'

Jem kept sneaking suspicious glances across the room at Papa, sizing him up — trying to figure out whether he was a pirate captain or an Ottoman renegade or a navy deserter. Or a spy. We'd never really known, in our days together on the
Mermaid
, yet the truth was even stranger than we'd imagined.

‘You guessed he was my father, didn't you?' I asked Jem.

He scratched his straggly beard. ‘I didn't know what to think, really. It didn't seem possible, but somehow I just felt it.'

He slapped Miller on the chest. ‘Hey. Where's that letter?'

Miller scrabbled inside his vest and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper. ‘Damn me, I forgot all about it.'

He passed it over to Papa. ‘I expect this is for you.'

Papa looked as if he didn't want to touch it. ‘Where did you get that?'

‘Strange thing,' said Jem. ‘We was hauled up by the Navy. Thought they'd give a bit of trouble, on account of some stuff we had aboard. But they let us off scot-free when they heard we was bound for Santa Lucia.'

Papa kept staring at the paper.

‘Is it from the Admiralty?' I asked Jem.

‘Couldn't say,' he replied. ‘Didn't see any admirals. All I know is we was told to bring it here. The Navy fellow said we'd know what to do when we got here. I thought he was mad, but it looks like he knew better than me.'

Papa slowly put his hand out to take the letter, and unfolded it. I watched his face as he read. I knew what it was: the call to arms. The Navy needed us. The Swanns were going into action.

Papa handed me the letter, instinctively, just as he would have in our pirate life, then jumped from his chair and began that familiar pacing I hadn't seen for so long. He stared into the night outside the windows as if he could see something there, and then turned towards me.

‘The Maltese have the French army besieged in the fortresses on the Grand Harbour, trying to starve them out,' he said. ‘But they refuse to surrender.'

‘I coulda told you that,' said Brasher. ‘That's no secret.'

‘Bonaparte has made himself First Consul of France,' Papa went on. ‘The man thinks he's Julius Caesar. He'll be more dangerous than ever.'

‘So the French Revolution's over, is it?' asked Miller.

‘Looks like it.'

‘What a tempest in a teacup that turned out to be,' muttered Brasher.

‘I had great hopes of it once,' Miller admitted. Everyone stared at him. ‘Before they started chopping off one another's heads, that is. Seems plenty strange that you could go through all that to get rid of a king, and then let some upstart appoint himself Caesar.'

‘What's the world coming to, eh?' said Brasher, sympathetically.

I scanned the letter quickly. It was from Admiral Kent, giving Papa an order to land on Malta to support the work of Nelson's squadron and the local patriots fighting against the French. Tucked inside was a bank draft for one hundred pounds for supplies and men.

‘It says the British have landed with arms and food,' I said.

‘Aye, we saw 'em coming in, didn't we, Max?' Brasher elbowed his old mate. ‘Just when you think it's safe to go a-pirating again, another navy turns up.'

The letter said nothing of what we should do, but that Papa would find another message waiting for him at the White Swan tavern, in a fishing village on the east coast. It would explain what was expected of him.

At the bottom, in Admiral Kent's own hand, was scrawled a note: ‘And for God's sake, keep your scallywag daughter out of mischief.'

I snorted. ‘Chance'd be a fine thing.'

‘The White Swan …' Papa murmured to himself. ‘Any of you boys heard of the place?'

They all laughed at once.

‘Aye,' said Miller, ‘we know it well.'

‘You'll never guess who runs it, Cygno,' said Moggia.

‘No,' I admitted, ‘I can't guess.'

‘Cookie!' The Vella boys shouted it together.

‘You should see him,' Max said, laughing. ‘He stands behind the bar like the king of the world. You hardly dare to ask for a drink.'

‘But the food!' sighed Ricardo. ‘Fried rabbit just like our Mama makes.'

‘Aye, and a mean Irish stew,' said Miller.

‘How wonderful.' I could just picture him. ‘Is he happy?'

‘He was happy enough,' said Brasher, ‘until we told him you were dead — you never heard a grown man sob so.'

Poor Cookie, I thought. But, by the sounds of it, we'd see each other soon enough.

‘What's in the letter?' asked Lucas. ‘Papa, do you have to go away again?'

There was no answer. I glanced at Mama, but her gaze was fixed on my father, who now stood staring into the fireplace.

‘I may have some work for you,' Papa told Jem.

Jem smiled. ‘Somehow I thought you might.'

‘Where are you anchored?' Papa asked.

‘Down in the harbour, like the respectable traders we are,' said Miller with a grin. ‘We even had to bribe the harbour master, like normal people do.'

‘If you're all here, who's looking after the ship?' I asked.

‘Got a couple of new crew mates now, Cyg,' Jem explained. He looked at Papa. ‘Slaves, they were, until Bonaparte released them from the Maltese galleys. Both good men. You can trust 'em.'

Papa nodded. ‘Bring the ship around into this cove, if you like,' he said. ‘Then we can go back and forward without those busybodies in the garrison being any the wiser.'

‘Fair enough,' said Jem. ‘We'll load the provisions in the morning, and sail around by noon, wind permitting.'

‘When do we leave for Malta?' I asked.

‘You're not going anywhere,' Papa said.

‘That's what you think,' I muttered under my breath.

But he didn't hear me. He was already deep in a conversation with Miller about provisions and scribbling a list for the storekeeper. ‘Tell them I'll be down to settle the bill before sunset,' Papa said. ‘Don't let them charge you extra for the gun powder casks.'

Miller nodded. ‘Aye. No fear.'

Jem stood up and stretched. ‘We'd best be off then, lads. Sounds like we've got a big day tomorrow.'

He bent over and shook Mama's hand. ‘Lovely to meet you, ma'am. Sorry for the intrusion.'

I must have stared at him as if he'd flown in from the moon.

‘What's up with you?' he asked. ‘Ain't you ever heard a person converse before?'

‘Never heard you talking like a pageboy, that's for sure,' I said.

Mama laughed and held his hand tight. ‘I'm so happy to meet you at last,' she said. ‘Thank you for looking after my girl.'

Jem looked abashed. ‘We did kidnap her in the first place.'

‘Hell, Jem,' I said. ‘There's no need to remind her.'

‘I've cursed you many times, it's true,' said Mama. ‘But now they've both come home to me, I can forgive a great many sins.'

‘Not Captain Diablo,' I said. ‘None of us will ever forgive him.'

‘Oh, you just wait until I get my hands around his fat neck,' Mama said, with a theatrical gesture.

‘I hope I'm there to see it, ma'am.'

As the boys crowded through the front door and out into the night, Jem took me to one side. ‘Here,' he said quietly. ‘These are yours. I was going to give them to your ma.'

He pressed a soft, clinking purse into my hand. The pearls.

‘These are for all of us,' I reminded him. Then the realisation hit me. ‘Jem! Let's go fetch the rest of them from the Grotto.'

‘Plenty of time for all that,' he said. ‘We've got enough to be going on with, by the sounds of things.'

He squeezed me in another embrace, as if he didn't expect to see me ever again, but the next day the
Mermaid
, with her golden pennant flying, sailed into our cove and dropped anchor.

Lucas was beside himself. ‘Is that your ship?' he asked me over and over. ‘Is it really yours?'

‘She belongs to all of us, all her crew,' I said, ignoring the fact that she actually belonged to some poor trader in Alexandria who was, by now, wondering where on earth she had gone.

‘She's beautiful,' he sighed.

She certainly was. We sat on the beach, just staring, waiting for the boys to row the boat in to shore. I pointed out to Lucas all the
Mermaid
's finest features: the sharp prow that cut so easily through the waves; the enormous sails, now furled, which grabbed far too much wind for her size, so you had to sail her like a thoroughbred; the gold-painted figurehead; the web of sheets and stays; and the windows in the stern that flooded light into the tiny cabin which had once been my home.

Mama called us inside for lunch, but Papa was nowhere to be seen, and Lucas could hardly sit still. The moment he finished eating, he leaped out of his seat and ran back down to the beach to watch the boys unload their boat.

Mama and I sat and stared at each other. At last, I took her hand.

‘Mama —'

‘I know,' she said softly.

‘I have to go with them.'

‘Of course you do,' she said.

‘You understand?' I had expected an argument, perhaps tears.

‘Perfectly,' she said. ‘Did you think I would forbid it?'

‘That's what I feared.'

‘Lily, I hardly think I can forbid you anything any more. Since you've come home, you are quite a different person to the child who vanished.'

‘I don't think Papa likes the new version of me very much,' I confessed.

‘Rubbish. He adores you. You're too similar, that's all.'

‘Really?' I asked. ‘I don't think so. I'm more like you. Admiral Kent said as much.'

‘Did he? The dear man.' The corners of her lips twitched in a smile. ‘Perhaps you are half like your father and half like me — and another half all your own person. What a formidable combination.'

‘Imagine if all three of us took on Diablo,' I said, laughing.

‘I was just picturing that myself, as it happens.'

She hesitated, suddenly serious. ‘Lily, I need your help with something …'

Papa caught us still whispering furtively an hour later, but he was too preoccupied to notice. Mama raised her head as if she'd been expecting him.

‘Sweetheart, have you got everything packed?'

‘Some of it,' he said, crossly. ‘Honestly, Frances, I simply can't take all that stuff. I need to travel light.'

‘Nonsense,' said Mama in her most matter-of-fact voice. ‘There's plenty of room aboard the
Mermaid
.'

‘But really — quilts? Bolsters? Candles? A whole crate of oranges? I hardly think I need those.'

‘You never know,' she said, catching my eye.

‘I do know,' said Papa. ‘Last time I was on Malta,
I had only the clothes on my back.'

‘And a sword,' I said, just to sound sympathetic.

‘Indeed, a sword, same as Lily.' He squeezed my shoulder in a comradely way. ‘We didn't need any of that fancy stuff then, did we?'

I was tempted to say there were a few times I'd have killed for a feather-down quilt and pillows, but instead I shook my head.

Mama got to her feet, and put her hands on her hips. ‘Don't you two start giving me that adventurer camaraderie business,' she said, in a half-serious, half-mocking tone. ‘I think I prefer it when you're arguing.'

We must have both opened our mouths to protest at the same time, because she held up one hand to stop us.

‘Rafe, please humour me by taking all that gear aboard ship. The boys can use it if you are too vain. Lily, it's time to round up the chickens, if you wouldn't mind, and ask Jem if they are all coming ashore for dinner.'

We were dismissed. Papa and I both crept away to finish our chores without further argument. Our family's true captain had spoken.