It was the year 1600 and close to an end at that. The sails were full of the ocean breeze, and the Brigantine ship was underway in the warm salty waters. Sailing towards the sunset and into the great unknown. Seeking adventure and fortune, the crew of the large ship sang greedily about treasures and rum. Captain Mac was rude, mean, vulgar, and unkempt. His long greasy hair slapped around his head like a wet bonnet. He had one leg made of wood that he walked unevenly on. He had the nickname “Old Woody” by his mates and crew but, nobody would call him this to his face for fear that he would make them walk the plank in shark-invested waters. He was a stubborn old man. His years sailing the seas were not kind to him, and he had wrinkles in places you wouldn’t believe. Yet, Captain Mac was strong and feared.
His picture had been nailed to plenty of trees and docks throughout the Caribbean, with large rewards available for his capture. Yet because of his evilness, people would not seek him. There was once a young, arrogant man who attempted his capture but when Captain Mac came face to face with him, he took out his cutlass and lopped the man’s head clean off. He proceeded to grab the man’s head, hollowing it out like a Jack-O-Lantern, put a candle in it, and hung it from the bow of the ship as a light to continue with his adventure. The crew threw the body overboard and never spoke of the incident again. Supposedly the head hung on its hook for 3 months, long after the candle flame had gone out, and all that hung there now was the skull of a man that no longer was.
Captain Mac was as dirty on the inside as he was on the outside. His teeth were brown and black and always covered with dirt and grease. He seemed to enjoy the fact that he smelled ripe and appeared to wear his stink like a badge of honor. He dressed in his favorite red coat with golden trim, although one could hardly call it red anymore because of all the dirt and grime, it now appeared brown. The golden trim was almost no longer existent with the many years of scuffles and duals and mainly had worn away. But to Captain Mac, this was his dress of excellence. His hat was triangular in shape and made of beaver hair felt and fit him like a glove. Difficult as it is to believe, as he swindled this hat from a wealthy man at one of his porting stops to Tortuga. One would assume the hat was made for him.
It was during the night as Captain Mac couldn’t sleep, perhaps he had too much rum, or his leg was cinched on too tight. He was at the helm and gazing at the stars as most of his crew slept or were passed out from that evening’s festivities. It was then that he heard a rustling and almost paid no attention to it until he heard a sneeze come from a pile of nets on the starboard side of his ship. He gazed at the mess of nets and half expected to see one of his crew tangled in the mass but was surprised when all of a sudden, he saw a short small limb poking out through one of the holes. Captain Mac shook his head in confusion as he allowed no children on his ship. He left the helm and walked forward. He at once grabbed the small leg that was protruding from the mess of nets, grabbed, and pulled. To his surprise, he continued pulling until he had a small girl hanging from his hand and swinging in the air. Sneezes continued to come from the minor child, and for once in his life Captain Mac was speechless.
“Hey, put me down, you scallywag!” the small girl responded.
“Don’t think you realize who you are addressing, little Miss. If I were you, I wouldn’t speak until spoken to.” Captain Mac replied with a sinister grin.
As the little girl swung in the darkness, ankle hanging from her captor, she let out a yelp and started to grab at Captain Mac’s legs.
“Won’t do you any good to hit that one little Miss; it’s wood. Lost it to a shark over 50 years ago. And it would do you good to start worrying the same and worse will happen to you soon. Captain Mac doesn’t support any stowaways on his ship. Do you know what we do with stowaways, little Miss?” he said rhetorically. “They walk the plank.”
Just then, one of Captain Mac’s crew came walking aft towards them to see what the hullaballoo was about.
“Aye, Captain. What do we have here? A stowaway? It looks like a little girl, a filthy one at that. Scrappy one it seems. What ya gonna do with her?” His crew member asked.
“Aye, Climsy. It appears we have a stowaway on the ship. And aye, it appears to be a feisty little spat of a thing. Doesn’t seem to know whose ship she has gotten onto. She must have snuck on the last time we made port.”
“I said put me down, you smelly old man!” The small girl exclaimed in her most brutal voice.
“If ye want to be put down, why didn’t ye say so.” Captain Mac exclaimed as he rose his voice with a grin and opened his hand to let the girl drop roughly on the hard wooden floor.
“Ow, you pompous windbag, that hurt!” The little girl grabbed her ankle and patted her head at the same time, all the while glaring up into the ugly face that had just dropped her like a full keg onto the ship deck.
“Oy, you shouldn’t be talking to the Captain of the 7 seas like that, little dearie. Don’t ye know who’s ship you be on?” Climsy said with a wry smile.
“As Captain of this ship, I demand to know who you are and why you have found yourself hidden in my nets. What business do you have with me, little Miss?”
The little girl sat on the deck for a short while, and then almost as if not knowing how to answer, she behaved like any small child her age would behave. She pulled her knees to her chest, wrapped her arms around them, and sat silently with a scowl in her eyes.
“Not talking aye, little Miss? Well, I have something that might make ye change yer mind. Climsy, get me the blunderbuss.”
Climsy was short, very fat, and wore pants that were too long and a linen blouse that was obviously too small. He saluted the Captain and said, “Aye, aye.” Running to the Captain’s quarters and tripping along the way, he still made good time. The girl continued to sit there, hands crossed and lips shut, but, Captain Mac saw a change in her eyes. He saw terror amid her dust-smudged face. He was never a sensitive man, but he almost felt a slight sadness deep within his dark heart when he looked at her. She couldn’t be more than 6 years old, petite, dirty, and skinny. Judging by her appearance, she hadn’t eaten in a while. Who knew how long it had been since she had a bath. Her hair was dark and matted and matched her overall appearance. She was dressed in a grey dress full of tatters and tears and worn black boots. This was not what he had expected this night when he took the helm. Climsy arrived a short while later and handed the blunderbuss with an eager smile.
“Yer blunderbuss Captain.” Climsy handed over the gun, and Captain Mac looked down at it and paused for a moment. Then he took it into his wrinkled palm and pointed it directly at the little girl.
“Now, tell me yer name, child, or I will fill you with as many holes as was in those nets you hid in.”
The little girl glared, and before she could come up with another snarky comment, she burst into tears. She started to say something, but it was all muffled between her wails and sobs.
“Gits ’em every time,” Climsy said with a wink, and he patted his ample belly with his hand.
“Mmmmmmm, ffffff, grrr, cry, cry, tttttttt, hhhhhhh, cry, cry, sob sob.” The girl tried to spit out.
“If ye don’t start talking some sense, little Miss, you will be off this ship faster than a sloop in a jewel raid!” Captain Mac was losing patience, and any slight sadness that he once may have had was long gone. Tired and frustrated, he did the only thing he could think of to do to stop the girls from blubbering. He started to sing.
“Bring the keg, tap out the rum, sing one, sing all for the galleon has come
Buccaneers and brutes gather at the helm, look starboard, look port, for the treasure is near
Grab yer best cutlass and grab the blunderbuss too, point the cannons at the Blue, shoot shoot shoot!”
Climsy gawked at his Captain with his mouth hanging agape, but the little girl had stopped her crying and looked at him with awe. As soon as he stopped his singing, the little girl looked up at him as she sat and opened her mouth.
“My name is Grace.” She said in her tiny voice, which sounded less sad at the moment. “What is your name?”
“Grace, is it? Okay then. My name is Captain Mac Delroy, and ye be on me ship without permission, see? So I ask of ye again, how did you board my ship and why ye be here?”
“Well, it’s a long story, I guess, but I was being chased by a mean man, and I ran looking for a place to hide, and your ship was at the docks. I looked around and didn’t see anyone, so I headed aboard and hid under those there nets. I guess I got tired of waiting for him to leave, and I fell asleep.”
“She must have snuck aboard when we were at Tortuga, Captain Sir. All the mates were busy trading in their gold and silvers fer some nice ale and kinships.”
“Aye, ye must have been there for hours Little Miss Grace. All stowaways walk the plank, and that is just what I intend to do to ya, but we will wait til the morning hours of dawn so that the crew can witness such an event or, I would never hear the end of it.”
Captain Mac winced in pain as he twirled to head back to the helm.
“Climsy, take the helm, will ya? I’ve got to get this darn leg off before it takes off even more. I’ll take the Little Miss with me fer the night.”
“Aye aye, Captain. Good night then.” Climsy strode away as his heavy belly jiggled with each step, and off he went.
Captain Mac took Grace by the back of the hair and stood her upon her feet. Let’s go, little Miss, yer with me tonight.” He pulled her along as she looked up at his face and back down at his leg, but she didn’t say anything. She didn’t even cry and walked along with her captor.
Captain Mac opened the door to the Captain’s quarters and lit another candle, and hung the lantern on the wall. He painfully walked to his chair and table and reached for a stale piece of bread, and dispensed himself a glass of rum. He looked at Grace and motioned for her to sit at the table with him. She looked at the bread, and her stomach made a loud growl. Grace sat at the table, looking at the Captain. He looked at her, looked at the bread, and without a word, he tossed it to her. She caught it and gobbled it up in an instant.
“I suppose yer thirsty too, little Miss. Well, we mostly have rum and ale, but I’m sure there be some water around here. The cook needs it to make his soup. Drink this fer now, not that it will matter much anyway.” He poured her a small glass of rum and pushed it in front of her face. She looked at it, looked back up at him, and looked at it again. She then started to sip it, and to his surprise, she drank the whole glass up relatively quick and finished it off with an enormous belch.
“Bahahahaha! That was a good one coming from a small pipsqueak like you!” Captain Mac said as he smiled and laughed a loud, boisterous laugh. In fact, he couldn’t control himself, he was laughing so hard. Grace just looked at him with a neutral face. Then she started laughing too. They looked at each other in utter bemusement, the unlikeliest of acquaintances.
Captain Mac was astonished at his behavior and had not recalled the last time he laughed. There again was a slight feeling of sadness settling in in his dark heart. The laughter did not last long as the Captain reached for his leg and grimaced in pain.
“Ow, this dern leg pains me. I need to loosen it and rest. Now there, Little Miss, come here.”
Grace went to his side with curiosity and care. There she was, a stowaway on a ship, hungry, cold, and on the verge of fearful death. But she had a bright heart, a kind heart. Even if it was for a grumpy old terrifying man who would make her fish bait.
“Let me see,” Grace said as she stretched the elastic of his short pant leg and lifted it up. She saw the leather on top of his peg leg and the tight belt-like straps that attached it to his thigh.
“Too tight, too tight, you nincompoop! It needs to be loosened!” Grace unhitched the belt on each side, pulled the leather sheath down, and pulled the peg leg off. “There.”
Captain Mac breathed out a deep breath of relief and started to rub his thigh where the attachment was. It was red and bruised and smelled like rotten meat. Grace could see that Captain Mac was not able to reach around his whole thigh, and he was not able to stretch out his hand entirely. It seemed to her that he had hands similar to her grandmother’s as they appeared almost deformed. She could clearly see how difficult it must have been for him to put on his leg and wondered how long he had left it on to avoid asking for help to remove it. The Captain’s hands appeared to be arthritic. Of course, in 1600, Rheumatoid Arthritis was not yet known about, although many people suffered from the disease. Grace just knew that her grandmother’s hands caused her a great deal of pain, and she had to help with almost everything. See Grace’s parents died in an unexpected carriage accident, and her grandmother was tasked with raising her. It wasn’t but a couple weeks ago when Grace’s grandmother got really ill and passed away. Grace was left alone and had no other family to live with. So she became a beggar girl and roamed the streets asking for food and sleeping in the alleys. There was one man, the mean man that she was running and hiding from when she wandered onto Captain Mac’s ship, who wanted her to come to live with him. But Grace was far smarter than him and knew that he had other children that nobody wanted or that didn’t have family to care for them, and he worked them to death. She recalled one small boy that was no older than she and his parents died too. She recalls seeing him trailing behind the back of the mean man’s carriage carrying his trunks and cases, trying to keep up. The whole time the mean man laughed out his window and yelled, “Only to make you stronger Toby, only to make you stronger.” The thought sickened her. She then came back to the realization that she was in no better of a situation, in fact, she was worse off. She would be made to walk the plank in the morning, and no more would be of little Grace. But Grace was a smart little girl for her age, and she was filled with spirit and sass and had a strong will to live. She was scrappy and persistent and would think of a plan. And in fact, she did just that. She looked up at Captain Mac and started to rub his thigh wear the redness was, and with her knowledge of her grandmother’s hands, she began with her proposition.
“Captain Mac, I can see that your hands are hurt, and I am sorry to say that I’m sure it is rather difficult for you to put on your leg and take it off without help. I may be of use to you. See, my grandmother had hands like you have, and I was able to help her out doing various things. I think being such a fine man as yourself and being strong, you need to make sure your crew does not think you are weak because of your hands. I can help. See, if you allow me to stay alive, and I say that is, I mean you will not force me to walk the plank, I can be the one to attach and detach your leg and help with things you can no longer do.” Grace looked at him as she continued to rub his thigh and held her breath, awaiting his response.
“What makes you think I can’t do things on my own Little Miss? I have been doing things on my own for longer than you could know, and now some little pipsqueak comes along and thinks she can help me? Bah! I’m fine to do things on my own and my crew still fears me. “
Cryptic Corner 