Two weeks later, Gabrielle Belain was gone. She slipped out to sea on the back of a porpoise, and she did not return to the island, except at last in chains in the belly of a prison ship.
From the window in the library, I saw the ship with black sails unfurl itself, draw its anchors, and sail away. From the forest surrounding the Pleasure House, a sound erupted, echoing across the shore, down the road, and deep into the wild lands of the island’s interior. A deep, mournful, sorrowing cry. A dark cloud emerged over the forest and grew quickly across the island, heavy with rain and lightning. It rained for eighteen days. The road washed away, as did the foundations of houses, as well as gardens and huts that had not been securely fastened to the ground.
The Abbot went alone to the place where Marguerite wept. He brought no one with him, but when he returned, the sun reappeared, and Marguerite returned to her work healing sickness and coaxing abundance from the ground.
Every day, she made boats out of leaf and flower and moss, and every day she set them in the waves and watched them disappear across the sea.
Some years later, shortly after Gabrielle reached her fifteenth year, the captain called Gabrielle to his quarters when the pain in his chest grew intolerable.
“The weight of the world, my girl, rests upon my chest, and even your mother wouldn’t be able to fix it this time. That’s saying something, isn’t it?” He laughed, which became a cough, which became a cry of pain.
Gabrielle said nothing, but took his hand between her own and held it as though praying. There was no use arguing. She could see the life paths in other people, and was able to find detours and shortcuts when available to avoid illness or pain or even death. There was no alternate route for her beloved captain. His path would end here.
The red bird whined in its cage, flapping its wings piteously.
“I thought that bird would die with me, but he looks like he’s in the prime of his life. Don’t lose him, girl.” He did not explain, and she did not ask.
The captain died, naming Gabrielle his successor, which the crew accepted as both wise and inevitable. As captain, Gabrielle Belain emptied many of the ships heading toward the holdings of the Governor, as well as redirected ships with human cargo, placing maps, compasses, swords, and ship wheels in the palms of hands that once bore chains, and setting the would-be slavers adrift with only a day’s worth of food and water and a book of prayers to help them to repent. The freed ships followed flocks of birds toward home, and Gabrielle prayed that they made it safely. The Governor lost thousands, and thousands more, until he was at the brink of ruination, though he attempted to hide it. This caused the pirates no end of delight.
The red bird remained in his cage for two years next to the portal in the captain’s quarters, though it hurt Gabrielle to see it so imprisoned and alone. Finally, after tiring of his constant complaining, she brought the cage on deck to give the poor thing a chance to see the sun. The mongrel dog growled, then whined for days, but Gabrielle did not notice. There the bird remained on days when it was fine, for another year, until finally, Gabrielle whispered to the bird that if he promised to return, she would let him out for an hour at sundown. The bird promised, and obeyed every day for ten days. But on the eleventh day, the red bird did not return to its cage.
The next morning, a mercenary’s ship approached from the north, and fired a shot into the starboard hull. It was their first hit since the crew’s meeting with Marguerite Belain eighteen years and nine months earlier. The ship listed, fought back, and barely escaped intact. Gabrielle stood on the mast step and peered through her spyglass to Martinique. A storm cloud churned and spread, widening over the thrashing sea.
Down in the ship’s hold, Gabrielle rummaged and searched until she found the empty rum barrel where she had placed the boats made of leaf and flower and moss, which she had fished out of the water when no one was looking. She took one, then thought better of it and took ten and threw them into the water. In the waning light she watched them move swiftly on the calm sea, sailing as one toward Martinique.
Gabrielle Belain (the witch, the revolutionary, the pirate) became the obsession of the Governor, who enlisted the assistance of every military officer loyal to him, every mercenary he could afford, and every captain in possession of a supply of cannons and a crew unconcerned about raising a sword to the child of a Saint Among Men. The third, of course, was most difficult to come by. A soldier will do as he is told, but a seaman is beholden to his conscience and his soul.
For many years, it did not matter. Ships sent out to overtake the ship with black sails, navigated and subsequently commanded by the girl with red hair, flanked as always by a mongrel dog, found themselves floundering and lost. Their compasses suddenly became inoperable, their maps wiped themselves clean, birds landed in massive clouds and ripped their sails to shreds.
In the beauty and comfort of the Governor’s mansion, I took the dictation of a man sick with rage and frustration. His hair thinned and grew gray and yellow by degrees. His flesh sagged about the neck
