It was a bitter cold winter. Long hard frosts, and heavy gales.
Taylor knew that her father was unlikely to see it through to the spring. He collapsed daily, and the inn fully occupied Taylor throughout it, to the point where she barely had time to consider their unpleasant guest.
The Captain had risen earlier than usual, that morning. Setting out down to the beach. Taking the time to strap a cutlass beneath the skirts of his blue coat, and his ridiculous hat to his head, before heading out the door with telescope in hand.
Taylor heard him make an irritated sound as he went, a quick glance seeing the man’s breath hanging like smoke around his head.
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She was just laying the breakfast table, for the Captain’s return, when the parlour door opened.
A man stepped in, whom she had never set eyes on before. He was a pale, tallowy sort of creature. Two fingers missing from the left hand, and a cutlass upon his hip.
Despite that he did not seem much like a fighter. Taylor was always on the lookout for seafaring types. Partly for the one-legged man, but mostly because they always brought the troubles of their day with them.
There was nothing attractive about a pirate.
Yet, to Taylor, this man didn’t strike the sailor. There was something puzzling about them, that she just couldn’t put her finger on.
“How may I be of service, sir?”
The man grunted, sitting down at a table. “Rum.”
As she turned to leave, however, he grabbed her firmly by the wrist. So tight that it felt like the bones were grinding together.
“Is this here table, for my mate, Bill?” He asked, with an uncomfortably close look. His eyes roamed all over her, with a spark in them that made her feel that her father’s fears about her gender might come to fruition.
Taylor found herself blurting out, “I am afraid we know of no Bill. However, the Captain stays here, and enjoys that table.”
“Well, my mate Bill would be callin’ himself Captain.” The man nodded, “He has a cut on one cheek, and is mighty pleasant, ’specially when he got the drink in him. The right cheek. Would that be sounding like your Captain?”
She grimaced as his grip tightened on her wrist, “It may be that your Bill, is staying here.”
“Now, is my mate in this here house?”
She shook her head, “I’m afraid you have missed him, sir. He is out walking this morning.”
“Which way, sonny? Which way has he gone?” The man asked urgently.
Taylor almost didn’t feel the tightening on her wrist, as the relief at being called sonny washed over her. She pointed out the rock, through the window, and gave an estimate for when the Captain was likely to return.
The man relaxed, releasing her wrist. “Well, then I suppose I’ll drink to my good mate, Bill.”
Taylor fled behind the bar, to fetch the rum, and to rub at her wrist. The expression the man had given with his last words, was anything but pleasant.
She doubted that he would be cheering the good health of the Captain, but at least he had both his legs. That was about the only thing she could be grateful for, in this.
Taylor considered the encounter to be none of her business.
She was paid to look for a one-legged man, and not this man. The two unpleasant fools could strike each other down, and make her life easier.
After she gave him the rum, the stranger continued to hang about the inn. Staying close to the door, and looking over towards it, like a cat might to a mouse.
Not just hanging about, close to the entrance, either.
Taylor found that when she tried to go outside, to deal with the garden, the man’s vicious grip reappeared on her wrist, and his sneer breathed down and into her ear.
“I have a son of my own.” The stranger said, “Likening to you, and the pride of my heart. But the great thing for boys, to turn ’em into men, would being discipline.”
She heard the threat, even as he released her and sat back down. Continuing to speak as he looked at her coldly, “Now, if you had sailed with Bill, you wouldnae have to be told twice. That were never Bill’s way, nor those that came ashore after he had his way.”
Taylor considered fleeing upstairs to her room, but as she did, motion caught the edge of her eye. Looking over, she could see out the cold window, through the frost on the glass, to a blurred figure approaching with a slow and familiar halting pace.
The stranger grabbed her, and pulled the both of them around a corner, so that they were hidden when the door would pull open. She was beyond alarmed, so she wasn’t exactly reassured as the stranger himself seemed to go on edge.
The man didn’t just fondle the handle of his cutlass, but actually loosened the blade in the sheath. She could hear him swallowing and beginning to tremble.
The door slammed open, and then shut again.
The Captain strode into the parlour, without looking either to the right or to the left, but over towards the table where Taylor had prepared his breakfast.
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“Old Bill.” The stranger said, forcing their voice to be loud and strong.
The Captain wheeled on one heel, his face white and not just from the cold outside. His nose might be blue, but his eyes were that of a ghost, or someone who had quarrelled with a demon. He looked no healthier than Taylor’s own father.
“Oh, come now.” The stranger walked by Taylor, spreading out his hands, “Bill, you know me. You knowin’ a shipmate, when you see them, surely.”
The Captain gasped, “Black Dog!”
“Who else?” Returned the man, relaxing visibly, “Black Dog, as ever, come to see his old shipmate Billy Boy, at the Nightingale Inn. Ah, Billy, Bill, Billy Boy! We’ve seen a sight o’ six, us two, since I lost me talons.”
Taylor’s eyes darted to the missing fingers, before looking towards the Captain.
“You’ve run me down. Here I am. What the devil do ya want?”
“Ah, me old Bill, you are.” Black Dog chuckled, and then waved at Taylor, “I’ll have a glass of rum, boy. I’ve taken quite a liking to this one, Bill. Let’s drink and sit. Talk, like old shipmates.”
Taylor took the opportunity, darting behind the bar. She sat down behind the wood and just tried to breathe. Her heart thudding violently in her ears. She didn’t believe for a moment that these two were old friends.
When she returned, hands no longer trembling, she found the two seated at the breakfast table. Black Dog nearer to the door, and sitting sideways on the chair - she thought to watch for a possible retreat.
“Back to the bar.” Black Dog instructed, “And none of that listening.”
Taylor did gratefully retreat, but she also kept her ears open. If not out of pure curiosity, then out of a sense of self-preservation. However, she did not manage to hear much of anything - beyond the rattle of the wind against the windows.
She washed and cleaned glasses, working with a strange sense of boredom that was settling down, after all the build up. There was only one sort of man that Taylor could imagine being pleased to be called any kind of dog, and that was the pirating sort.
The Captain and the Black Dog.
The Nightingale Inn was not an unknown place, when it came to some of the rougher sorts of society. They were in a serviceable cove, and it was not well inhabited. Now and then, pirates were known to make their berth.
However, in all of her life, Taylor had never seen that rough kind for more than a night. They didn’t stay at the inn, and their ships never returned once they made back to the open sea.
Having the local magistrate be within a distance, certainly settled the voices of the worse kind. Taylor had never seen the army nor navy called for, of course. Redcoats were not something she had the pleasure of seeing march on by.
There was a single hanging that she could vaguely remember, from when she was a very young girl. Nothing since, because no one was fool enough to make things difficult enough to raise the ire of the military of the King.
“By Lord above!” An oath cut through the air, making all the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end.
“No, Lord, no!” The Captain cursed loudly, “If it comes to swinging, swing all, say I! That’s an end of it!”
There was an explosion of sounds all at once. A chair crashing to the ground, oaths from both men, and the shattering of a lamp against the wall. All of it followed by what sounded almost like a cat squealing.
Black Dog dashed by, limping and bleeding, as he made for the door.
As the man opened the heavy wooden thing, the Captain’s cutlass slammed down and into the wood, nearly ending the stranger on the spot, had it not been for the door. The man was gone before he could recover, pounding out and into the road.
The Captain stared after him, looking somewhere between bewildered and incensed, before his shoulders slacked. He yanked his blade from the door, and slid it noisily into its sheathe, before turning and walking slowly by.
As he passed, he grumbled quietly, “Taylor. Rum.”
She wished he’d told her to run. “Did he… Are you hurt?”
“Rum.” Was all he said, “Damned, I must get away from here. Rum!”
Taylor fumbled quickly, but too quickly. She dropped the first glass, causing her to have to clean up her mess before she could fill the request of the Captain.
As she was gathering up the glass, she heard a fall from next door, in the parlour.
She dashed in, and beheld the Captain lying full length upon the floor. At the same instant, her father came stumbling down the stairs. Weak and sick, with a look of concern etched into his face.
The two of them tried to help the Captain sit up. He was breathing hard and loud, but his eyes were closed, and he was even paler than her father.
With not a clue how to assist the man, nor any other thought than that he had some fatal injury from the scuffle with the stranger, Taylor returned to fetching rum. She tried to have the dying man sip at it, but his teeth were shut, and his jaws might have been welded shut.
It was relief when the front door opened to reveal Doctor Livesey, on his regular visit to her father.
“Doctor!” Taylor said, “What do we do? Where is he hurt?”
“Wounded?” Said the doctor in confusion, before crouching and giving a quick once over, before scoffing. “No more than you or I. Blasted drunk. The man has had a stroke, as I rightly warned him. Mr. Hawkins, to bed with you. This need be no concern of yours.”
Taylor’s father reluctantly, but readily agreed and began his weakened stumble back upstairs.
Doctor Livesey turned to Taylor, “Now, for our part. I must do my best to save this fellow’s trebly worthless life. You must get me a basin.”
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When Taylor got back to the doctor, dragging the basin, the doctor had already removed the Captain’s top half of clothing. Coat and shirt discarded, to reveal arms and chest that were sinewy enough to distract.
Tattoos dotted one of the man’s arms, things and symbols of luck, fair wind, surrounding a larger tattoo that spelled, ‘Billy Bones his fancy’. They were all neatly executed, leading the eye up the arm from wrist, to where a sketch of a skeleton upon the gallows sat on his shoulder.
The doctor snorted as he looked at it. “How prophetic. And now, Master Billy Bones, we’ll have a look at your blood. Taylor! Are you afraid of blood, boy?”
“No, sir.” She said firmly.
“Well, then.” Livesey nodded, and set to work. He began to drain the blood of the Captain into the basin, eyes fixed with knowledge and concern on the rough man who lay on the parlour floor.
A great deal of blood lapped within the basin before the Captain opened his eyes, and looked blearily around himself. He recognised the doctor after a moment, and gave him an angry frown, before turning towards Taylor.
As his eyes fell on her, he looked relieved, but only for a moment. He tried to sit up, crying out loudly, “Where’s Black Dog?”
“There is no dog about here.” Said the doctor, “Unless you have a tattoo of one, upon your back. You have been drinking, and you have had a stroke. Exactly as I did warn you. And now, that has led to this. Where I have needed to drag your stubborn ass headfirst out of the grave. Now, Mr. Bones -”
“That not my name.”
“I care less than God for your tainted soul.” Returned the doctor, “It is the name of a buccaneer, and one of my acquaintance. I call you by it for the sake of shortness. I have this to say to you - one glass of rum won’t kill you, but if you take more, as you would, then I stake my soul that you will die. Understand? You will die, and find hell less pleasant than our good shores.”
Before he could respond, the doctor signalled, and Taylor helped the men to their feet. The Captain strung between the two of them, as they walked him up the stairs and to his room.
As the Captain collapsed, eyes closing on his pillow, the doctor shook his head. “I clear my conscience. Rum for you, is death. Heed it or not.”
With that, the doctor pulled Taylor outside and closed the door. He looked at her grimly, “I have drawn blood enough to keep him quiet awhile. He should lie for a week, best for the both of you. Another stroke, and the pauper’s grave waits.”