Marooned, 30

In Which Norrington Countenances Piracy

by

Gloria Mundi

Norrington thought of Jack stripped to the waist, hauling cordage, and chuckled.

"What's so funny?"

"The way you've infected my thoughts."

"Pirate," said Sparrow, raising his cup in a toast. "D'you see her?"

"Yes," said Norrington. "She's the one with the raked masts, at the end of the breakwater."

He raised a hand to point and Jack slapped it down. "We're not interested in any of that, remember?"

"I remember," said Norrington. "A fishing boat, if anyone asks."

He drank more ale, and watched as the daily business of the port ticked along, like the workings of some intricate device. Someone was yelling in Spanish at a foreman who'd sent away his team: someone else was arguing with a Frenchman who was pretending to speak no English.

"It doesn't make any difference to them, does it?" said Norrington, feeling a surge of bitterness that had nothing to do with the taste of the beer. "It doesn't matter whose flag's flying over the fort."

"Not in the slightest, Captain," said Sparrow, tipping out the thick dregs at the bottom of his cup. He examined the way they fell onto the cobbles, and grinned suddenly like a man who's seen good fortune. "Ready, then?"

"As ready as I'll ever be," said Norrington. "Are you sure—"

"Have you forgotten who I am, Captain?" demanded Sparrow, with a provocative leer.

"How could I forget?" said Norrington. "I simply find it difficult to believe that I've allowed myself to become a part of any plan devised by you."

That earned him a gilt-edged smile, all sincerity and wounded good nature. "It worked last time!"

"I remember it well," muttered Norrington.

They had been sauntering along the quay, towards those huge gates: well-guarded gates, as it turned out. Norrington suffered a brief moment of uncertainty as he drew close enough to see the foreign cut and colour of the guards' uniform jackets, and the ubiquitously deadly gleam of well-tended weaponry. But when he glanced at Jack, wanting reassurance, Jack wasn't even looking at him. He was gawping, from under his hat, like any landlubber exposed to the reek and noise of a working dockyard. He trusts me to do my part, thought Norrington. Perhaps this is normal: perhaps it's how actors feel, before they go on stage.

The guard waved them through so quickly—not a quarter of the way into Norrington's well-rehearsed speech, in halting German, about an appointment with a shipwright: Keppel, wasn't it?—that Norrington had to quell the urge to take the man's name and report him for slackness. Under the circumstances it would hardly have been wise. For here they were, inside a French Naval dockyard, with a plan that seemed likely to come off very well. Norrington revised his estimation of the French Navy downwards, by several notches.

It was possible that he'd simply been infected with Jack's ridiculous self-confidence.

Close to, he could see where fresh paint covered the scars of the Sorciére's encounter with Anamaria and her crew. There was a group of men watching as the last of the Sorciére's supplies were carried aboard. The brig's mainsail—new canvas, Norrington could see—had been reefed, and the crew were busying themselves with halyards and shrouds. He recognised one or two of the men.

Next to the Sorciére was the El Gammo, which Norrington thought might have been a frigate before the French had got at her masts and rigging. Now she resembled the bastard offspring of a xebec and a brigantine. There were a few sailors milling about on deck, not—he could see—doing very much, but looking busy enough to be safe from further orders.

"That one?" he muttered to Sparrow, not looking at his companion.

"That one," confirmed Sparrow. "After you, Captain."

In the end it was just as easy as Sparrow had made it look before. The idlers on board El Gammo were only too happy to abandon ship: some of them went over the bow rather than venture near the notorious Jack Sparrow, returned from the dead, and his villainous, pistol-wielding companion. Norrington found that he was enjoying himself: it was a different sort of battle, to be sure, but somehow a cleaner one. Between them, they made short work of the mooring-lines, and managed to haul the forecourse aloft before there was any fuss from the quay.

"They're coming," Norrington said urgently to Sparrow, who held a pistol in each hand.

Sparrow grinned, and in that moment he looked more dangerous than Norrington had ever seen him before. "Let them come," he said.

El Gammo was drifting away from the breakwater, just enough of a breeze to give her some forward motion. Some bright spark had thought of grapnels: one thudded to the deck behind them, and there was the whistle of shot.

Sparrow licked a finger and held it up, unnecessarily testing the wind. "Shall we go, Captain Norrington?"

This was the difficult part, and Norrington was sure that his weak leg would betray him at the critical moment. Sparrow heaved a grapnel of his own into the shrouds of the Sorciére—no great achievement, they'd passed close enough that Norrington could've reached out and scratched the fresh paint if he'd had a boathook to hand—and within a minute the two of them were on the deck of the Sorciére.

"Good day to you, sir," said one of the sailors: Woodhouse, who'd been with the Ariel since the battle off Port Royal. "Welcome aboard!"

"No trouble finding work, then?" said Sparrow, coming up beside them and leaning in so close that Norrington had to clench his fists against the urge to haul Jack up against himself.

"None at all, Captain Sparrow," said Woodhouse. "Told the Frogs we was deserters. Welcomed us with open arms, they did."

"Excellent!" said Sparrow. "Well, what are you all waiting for? Let's be on our way!"

Woodhouse was not the only man to turn to Norrington. Pirate, their horrified silence said.

"This ship is now under Captain Sparrow's command," said Norrington mildly, one eye on El Gammo as the frigate drifted sideways towards the beacon at the end of the breakwater. "Captain, if you'd be so good as to drop me at my ship?"

There was a beat of silence, amid the noise of reefing and hauling all around them, as Sparrow, unsmiling, looked straight at Norrington. Then the moment passed, and Sparrow nodded and turned to snap out pithy, precise orders to the men who'd stayed on board.

Today's instalment being posted early, and tomorrow's may be posted rather late, as I'm away / offline until tomorrow evening GMT. Don't worry, it'll be up before the end of the 31st!

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