Anthony raised an eyebrow at his remaining victims, and his sword point leaped forward jauntily. A second sword fell to the deck; a second man stood helplessly clutching his britches lest they fall to his ankles.
Olivia picked up the fallen sword and put it with the other. Laughter bubbled within her but she tried to emulate Anthony’s cool composure. He stood now leaning against the rail, his sword point resting between his feet as he regarded the two remaining Spaniards.
With an oath, one of them unbuckled his swordbelt, and his companion slowly did the same. Anthony leaned forward and took them. “My thanks, gentlemen. Now, if you would all be so good as to accompany my man to your cabins while we complete our business, we shall leave you in peace all the sooner.” He gestured to the stairs down to the companionway, and Olivia saw a grinning sailor waiting with sword and cutlass.
The man gave the Spaniards an elaborate mock bow. “Thisaway, gennelmen, if’n ye please.”
Olivia, her lip curled, watched them stumble away. Now the amusement was over, she was once more violently aware of the stench coming from the bowels of the galleon. It made her want to retch.
“What preposterous creatures,” she declared. “So pompous in their braid and finery, with their great fat bellies full of food, living off the slave labor of those poor starved, tortured wretches down there.”
Anthony sheathed his sword and came over to her. He had blood on his cheek, and he took from her his handkerchief that she still held, and dabbed at the cut.
“On that subject, should we hand the ship and her masters over to the slaves and let them do what they will with them? Or should we put the masters aboard one of their longboats to fend for themselves? Their fate is in your hands.”
Olivia considered. “Perhaps the slaves would murder them if they had the chance?” she muttered. “Do you think that’s likely?”
“Highly likely.”
“That seems like divine retribution,” she said savagely.
“You don’t think maybe that losing their cargo, their slaves, and their galleon would be punishment enough?” he suggested. “The freed slaves would have the galleon and we could leave them some doubloons so that they could go where they wished.” He raised an interrogative eyebrow.
“I don’t think you’re nearly bloodthirsty enough for a pirate,” Olivia observed. “But perhaps we should let them go their separate ways.”
“So be it.” He turned and leaned over the rail, calling down an order, and in minutes came the ring of steel on steel, a steady rhythmic hammering, as men set to work breaking the slaves’ manacles.
Olivia hung over the rail, watching the activity. Anthony’s men were bringing things up from the depths of the galleon, boxes and crates and bundles. They moved them across to Wind Dancer in a smooth operation that looked as if it had been performed many times. The galleon’s crew were assembled in the waist of the ship, and a few of the pirate’s crew were disarming them, moving cheerfully among them, chatting and whistling as if they were at a tea party.
“What about the holes in the ship’s side? Will it not sink?”
“Not if its new owners know anything about patching,” Anthony said carelessly. “They’re less than a day’s sail from Brest.”
“Brest?” Olivia tried to picture the French coast. How far from the Isle of Wight was Brest? She thought it was beyond the Gulf of Saint-Malo. How long would it take to sail back home?
Home. It was a concept so distant and so unreal, it seemed that it existed in another life. Suddenly she felt very tired as the surge of excitement ebbed. She glanced at the netting bridge with a tremor of apprehension. It looked very unstable now and very, very high above the churning blue-green water.
“Too tired to make it alone this time?” Anthony spoke at her side, and she looked up quickly to catch that little flicker of a smile in his eye.
“How do you know?”
“I make it my business to know what might be troubling the members of my crew,” he said. “Particularly my newest and most inexperienced member.”
“I thought I was very good at disarming villains,” Olivia protested, forgetting her fatigue for a minute.
“Oh, you were. A natural,” he assured her. “A pirate to the manner born. Only pirates, you see, think of their victims as the villains.”
“And I just fell into that way of thinking,” Olivia said in tones of wonderment. “Isn’t that amazing?”
“Oh, I knew it all along,” he replied airily. “Come, let me take you back. I can see that you’re thinking longingly of your bed.”
It was perfectly true, although Olivia still didn’t know how he could so accurately pinpoint her uppermost thought. He took her elbow and walked her down to the rail in the main body of the ship.
Olivia regarded the netting doubtfully, her heart beating uncomfortably fast. The distance seemed to expand and contract before her eyes, and it astonished her now that she had leaped across it as nimbly as a monkey a mere half hour earlier.
And then as she hesitated, despising herself for her apprehension, Anthony swung her into his arms, holding her securely against him. “This won’t take a second,” he said, and with that cheerful whistle between his teeth he leaped across the gap, his feet just once touching the netting bridge.
“There, now you may seek your bed, and when you awake, we will be on our way and we shall dine on… on… oh, whatever Adam has planned for us.” He held her against him for a moment, and she could feel the steady beat of his heart against her breast.
Then he set her on her feet and swiftly pulled away the blue scarf that had come loose around her hair and was threatening to blow off into the wind. He tied it around her neck. “I’d hate to lose it, it’s one of my favorites.” He put his hands at her waist and stepped back, surveying her crimson sash. “That one is growing on me.” He left her then and Olivia knew he would be smiling.
Thoughts of bed were now irresistible. She was too exhausted for hunger, too exhausted even to consider the unreality of her present circumstances. She left the quarterdeck and climbed down the companionway, her legs so heavy it was hard to lift them. The cabin was sun-splashed and peaceful, and without a second’s hesitation, Olivia fell onto the bed, dragging the quilted coverlet over her.
“‘Tis mad y’are. Mad as a March hare.” Adam glowered at his master. He had served this man since the man was a mere babe new delivered from his mother’s womb, and he knew when Wind Dancer’s master had mischief afoot. He could read it in the angle of his head, in the devilment in his eye.
Adam knew exactly where the devilment came from, and he didn’t hold with women on board ship. They were unlucky. He stood at his master’s side as the enriched Wind Dancer skipped true to her name on a freshening breeze.
“What’s troubling you, Adam?” Anthony didn’t take his eyes off the horizon, but he sounded amused, as always reading his friend and servant’s mind with uncanny accuracy. “She’ll not betray us,” he said.
“I don’t know as ‘ow you can know that,” Adam grumbled. “Look at who ’er father is.”
“The marquis of Granville. Parliament’s man.” Anthony shrugged. “But let us not visit the sins of the father onto the daughter, Adam. Not without cause.”
“Oh, y’are impossible. There’s no talkin‘ to you.” Adam glowered up at him. “An’ there she was, bold as brass, watchin‘ you take the Dona Elena-”
“She did her part, if you recall.” Anthony interrupted him before Adam could lose himself in his argument.
“ ‘Twas a disgrace,” Adam declared. “ ’Er bein‘ who she is.”
“This is no ordinary woman,” Anthony said with conviction. He looked down at Adam and the gray eyes now were serious, intent, his mouth set. “Trust me, Adam. Olivia Granville is no ordinary woman.”