'Tow her back outta Barataria Bay, den sink her in deep water,' Balfa cagily suggested, 'so nobody ever see her again, by damn.'
'Sink her?' Helio gawped, louder than he'd meant to. 'Why can't she be sold… to some stupid Yankees, perhaps?' he plaintively posed as if ruing the loss of a single ecu of her worth.
'Sink her?' his sister Charite demanded, stalking up from astern to join them, her dainty left hand fisted about the hilt of her smallsword in sudden dismay, and her knee-high boots drumming on the decks. 'Sink her, will you, messieurs!' She's the equal of Le Revenant, with better guns aboard her. We need her to begin building our own fleet! Helio, tell them! Carriages could be built, the artillery could then be used ashore… for our Creole army, for our coming revolution!'
'We were just discussing that, Charite, ma soeur, uh… ' he lamely stammered, blushing under his sister's indignant glare.
'Capitaine Balfa has been promised a ship of his own,' Charite continued, her colour high over any less-than-zealous enthusiasm for their cherished cause. 'Et voila, here she is. When word gets out, hundreds of men will come forward to crew her. Capitaine Balfa then can choose only the best. The others can enlist in your regiment, mon frere. They will come like… that!' she exulted with a boyish snap of the fingers of her free right hand.
'Tiens, there is a difficulty, Charite,' Helio muttered, gazing away, unable to meet her eyes. 'We will speak of it later, if… '
'Let us speak of it now, Helio,' she countered. 'Or is it too complicated a matter for a mere woman to understand, hein?'
' Quel dommage. We're out of targets, alas,' Don Rubio Monaster pretended to mourn as he and her cousin Jean-Marie casually sauntered up to join the leaders of the expedition, which was to their minds a natural right. They were still smirking over the 'hunter's bag' they had shot or skewered while there yet had been survivors from the Spanish vessel's crew or armed guard. 'Eh, something is amiss? Why all the long faces? We did just win a great victory, did we not?'
'They insist that we must sink this ship after looting her,' Charite informed him with the slightest plaintive sound, as if looking for a supportive voice to champion her argument.
'Well, I suppose we should,' Rubio said with a simper. 'When a blind Spaniard could recognise her a mile off, ha ha! A pity surely. But, we can salvage her artillery and such.'
'Hidden far up Barataria Bay, she'd be safe enough, as safe as Le Revenant has been,' Charite hotly pointed out. 'Cher Capitaine Balfa to command her, with two ships to prey on the Spanish cochons.'
'I quittin', me,' Balfa baldly told her.
'What?' Charite spat, aghast at that news. 'But, you cannot!'
'Losin' dis ship, de Spaniards git too stirred up,' Balfa laid out in a calm voice. 'My share be more'n enough t'get by a long time. Got a bad feelin', mademoiselle. A longtime sailor's 'sight,' ' he added with a shiver.
'But!' Charite spluttered for a moment, then turned icy cold. 'Tres bien, m'sieur, ' she said, distancing her demeanour. 'If you have a… foreboding, then… we could promote a promising mate for command of this schooner. And honour you for your contributions.'
'We cannot keep her, cherie, ' Helio gravely told her. 'It is a risk we cannot take.'
'But we do need a second ship, yes?' Charite snapped, rounding on him as if he'd let her down, too. 'If not at once, we could make a third cruise with Le Revenant and take a suitable merchant ship, then add to her armament with this ship's guns, yes? With news of this success, recruit more eager volunteers to man her, yes?'
'Well, of course, but…' Helio quickly agreed with a shrug of his shoulders, mostly to cool her ardour.
'Then I have a promising man in mind who seems more than eager for adventure,' Charite schemed. 'That mercenary former Anglais Navy man, Willoughby.' She blushed as she raised that possibility to them, the mention of his name and nation. 'He is nearly penniless, dismissed his service, and will do anything for riches. A very useful man who can be… lured.' She blushed, too, to describe her lover in such a harsh fashion when the thrilling memory of his hands, his lips, his thrusting body was still fresh in her mind. 'He would do anything for me, n'est-ce pas?' she intimated with a cruel grin forced to her lips.
'Not if he's run off in terror!' cousin Jean-Marie Rancour hooted with dismissive scorn and glee.
'Jean!' Rubio cautioned, but it was too late, and Jean-Marie waded in deeper despite the elbow aimed at his mid-ribs.
'We did for both of those uppity poseurs, didn't we, Rubio? The Anglais and that nosey Americain Ellison who followed you, Charite… that night you bearded the Anglais?'
'What… did… you… do?' she angrily demanded, breathing slowly but hard enough to flare and collapse her delicate nostrils.
'Shot both of them,' Rubio gruffly confessed, nose-high for his motives, his actions, to be questioned. 'Just before we gathered at your house to leave. They were not gentlemen!' he haughtily declared.
'Oh, you arrogant… stupid…' Charite raged, surprising all of them by leaping at Rubio to hammer her fists on his chest, driving him towards the starboard bulwarks; surprising them, too, by loosing a sudden flood of tears amid her ire.
'Rubio didn't kill him, the Anglais I mean, Charite!' Jean- Marie cried, trying to seize one of her arms as Helio went for another. 'He put a scare on him, was all. He ducked too quick for a clean shot, he got off three shots at us, and got away! Helio and Hippolyte did for that El-isson. He and his men were dirty Americain spies, and I wager your Anglais pig is one, too, so…'
'Pompous, idiot. Vain and jealous!' Charite shrieked just as they peeled her off the startled Don Rubio, squirming and kicking at his shins in vain. Don Rubio Monaster went as pale as a winding-sheet, slack-jawed in astonishment at her reaction. In that instant, he realized he'd never possess her, that all that had passed between them had been 'kissing cousin' teasing. Another, a despicable other, held her heart, and Rubio suddenly despised her, hating that Anglais with an equal revulsion-could have shot her as gladly as he'd shot at the Englishman. A new weapon, the man's agility and return shots; to get that close yet fail because he didn't use his old Jaeger rifle, hadn't been familiar with the Girandoni! His own righteous action had slain his hopes and dreams… and someone would have to pay!
Charite calmed, much too suddenly for any of them to credit, as if the eye of a Gulf storm claimed her rage. Her arms went out at her sides to fend off those who held her, nodding in grim understanding… brought her hands prayerfully together under the tip of her nose, to think… to bide.
'Tres bien,' she finally muttered. 'Very well. You enrage the Americains to find who shot their leader. You enrage the British merchant company, and they will try to avenge Alain,' she bleakly sketched for them, clearing her too-tight throat several times.
'We can deal with any-' her brother Hippolyte disparaged.
'No! Mon Dieu, you have even wakened the Spanish!' she retorted. 'Better you had… but it is much too late for second thoughts or sense, is it, messieurs?' she accused. And, like the gust-front of an ouragan, her icily controlled rage
