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“Oh, hush,” says Jack.  “Don’t be so rude to our new friend.”  He smiles widely at Jamie, and Jamie smiles back.  “Tell me about your mates, then; where’d you lot spring from?”

“Our ship’s in the Pool.  We’re newly ’rrived from the Caribbean.”

“Ahh,” says Jack sagely, his restlessness further piqued by this revelation.  There may be more than one good reason to make... friends with this tempting little creature.  “That explains why you’re all so, er, exotic.”

Jamie splutters into his beer.  “Exotic?  Me?”

“O yes,” says Jack, trying on a suggestive leer for size.  “In’t many like you around these parts.”

“What d’you mean, like me?”

The boy gazes evenly at Jack, smirking a little, waiting for his reply.  Jack finds his leer’s now coming quite naturally.  With a disgusted snort, Tom jumps to his feet.  “Fuckin’ hell, Shaftoe,” he snaps, and stamps off.

“Oh dear,” says Jamie.  “I didn’t mean to offend him.  He was nice, your friend.”

“Not as nice as me.”

“No.  Not as nice as you.”  The comment’s accompanied by a frank appraisal of all the elements of Jack’s niceness, and the boy licks his lips.

The Imp of the Perverse clambers out from under the table, and climbs into Tom’s vacated seat.  Dammit.  No point fighting now.

“You’re nice too,” says Jack recklessly.  “In fact, I reckon you’d be quite astoundingly nice to me, if I asked sweetly.”

“Reckon I would, too.”  Jamie leans forward, and beckons Jack closer, till his ear’s only a scant inch from the boy’s mouth.  He can feel warm breath, and smell the sea.

“If you wanted,” whispers Jamie, “I c’d ask my captain to be nice to you an’ all.”

Jesus H. Christ!  Jack jerks backwards.  Even the Imp looks faintly shocked.  But the boy’s eyes, shiny with wickedness, say he means every word.

Does Jack think that’s a bit beyond the pale?
Or is it terrifyingly tempting?

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and the actors who portrayed them. Jack Shaftoe is the property of Neal Stephenson.
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