The Pirate's Gospel: Chapter 2
Edward Lloyd’s Coffee House served only the finest coffees and, even though she preferred red wines and good brandies, Charlotte ordered a coffee for the sake of appearances. Eighteenth-century social norms excluded women from the business negotiations taking place in the coffee house much like any other venue where games of chance transpired, thus, like the gambling parlors she also frequented, Charlotte relied on her valet to transcend the bounds of propriety.
.
Pascal Saint-Rémy de Valois with his outrageous French fashions, powered wigs and make-up had been her constant companion for twelve years. Her professional relationship with the moody young man whose effeminate grandiosity veered toward the comedic coincided with the last time she saw her father. Few parents feel it necessary to leave their children under the watchful eye of an assassin, but her father was not the type of person to leave anything to chance. His word was absolute, no matter where he was, and Pascal’s first allegiance was to his order that his daughter not leave Great Britain. Even after Charlotte shot Pascal on two separate occasions related to the order, he still refused to disobey. Looking back, she doubted that she could have gone through with her fantastic escape to Barbados. It was just as well, since she lost the same sugar plantation within the month at different card game.
“Madame, your conquests.”
She snapped out of her thoughts as her smiling valet returned her carefully annotated copy of Lloyd’s List along with a small stack of folios containing the details of the ventures she’d agreed to underwrite. Pascal did not sit, but remained standing and his bright green frock coat captivated the curiosity of anyone who looked over in his direction. Few would forget the coat, most never noticed the woman with whom he spoke.
Charlotte’s dark eyes scanned the folios and a subtle smile surfaced on her lips. As she shuffled through the papers and calculated her returns, her haphazardly constructed façade grew more transparent. Her brazen personality craved outlets with higher stakes than the presumptuous parties of her Mayfair neighbors. While always well dressed, she was not exceptionally pretty or fashionable. Even though her freckled nose and small frame made her look much younger than her thirty-three years, it also made her look quite immature. She hated the corseted gowns popular with her social cohorts, so she dressed from her vast collection of riding and hunting outfits, which gave her a predatory look like a malevolent child that had sprung from the pen of William Hogarth. Unlike the great salonieres of the French Enlightenment and their counterparts in the British capital, Charlotte had few delusions about her lack of feminine wiles and did not feel the need to convince anyone of her intelligence. The venerable doyenne of London society, Elizabeth Montagu, had only spent a few minutes speaking with odd little woman and thereafter referred to her as the “exasperating-one.” In return, Charlotte referred to Elizabeth Montagu as “the bitch”. Despite her eagerness to turn down invitations, not surprisingly Charlotte received few.
“That’s the last of the Royal Africa Company for me-they’re veering toward insolvency and most likely will be reorganized under a new charter in the future.” She yawned and returned some of the documents to Pascal. “The African trade is lucrative, but I think the time has come to shift our investment habits further east-make sure you know where Bengal is on the map and don’t get it confused with Brussels or Bermuda.”
“Seriously?” Pascal sighed. “There should be rules about how many places can a have a name at any one point in time.” He was a crack shot and a superb swordsman, but Pascal’s sense of geography frightened Charlotte. He had only recently learned the difference between the East and West Indies.
A long moment passed before she decided not to reply. “The Atlantic is a fool’s game, too many variables and the odds are all on the house-the house that Morgan built. I only tolerate pirates who buy me presents and show up in my pedigree. Otherwise, we’re bound to take a beating in the next war with France and Spain. Unless,” she smiled devilishly, “I’ll get you a Letter of Marque and send you out to maraud in my good name.”
“C’est fou.” Pascal sneered, “I’d rather be a pickpocket than get lost in the ocean.”
“It’s not as though I would send you to sea in a dinghy by yourself.” She shrugged.
Standing, she smoothed her dark brocade skirts and set her jaw before walking through the crowd of bewildered men who had neither seen her enter Lloyd’s nor noticed her watching them from her vantage point in the corner. She reveled in their discomfort. Pascal hurried out ahead of her and opened the door of the waiting carriage.
“Captain Pascal of the mighty dinghy The Malcontent. Has a ring to it.” She giggled as she peered into her large leather envelope. “I might buy you a flotilla of dinghies and make you Admiral of the Thames, after today’s returns. Will you be happier as an Admiral? I’ll find you a fine hat.” She grew serious. “I’ll want these bonds put into Mr. Carvajal’s hands this afternoon and tell him I’ll be in Bristol later this week.” She handed Pascal a prepared document bearing the elaborate signatures and seal of her two imaginary uncles who served as Bristol and West Indies Ltd.’s only underwriters. From Carvajal’s talented hands the funds disappeared into a labyrinthine series of accounts, trusts and property investments. “What do you think, my dearest friend, shall I let you an office over at the Admiralty?”
“Tempting, but let’s first change our clothes and have something to drink. I think my shoe is ruined.” Pascal held out his foot and frowned at the soiled gray kid leather.
“You spilled the coffee yourself, so you can persevere or I’ll be happy to take a hatchet to your foot. Choppity-chop?”
“And back to square one, you’d have a find a new me.” He growled and folded his arms across his chest.
Charlotte was in too good of a mood to worry about Pascal’s shoe and decided to ignore him altogether as she fixed her attention out the window. The carriage continued up Lombard Street amid the flurry of new construction taking place around Cornhill. Happily, Charlotte had been in Bristol the weekend in March when much of the ward had been consumed by fire in March.[1] Lord Thomas had been in London, however, failed to notice a large portion of it burning. Lloyd’s Coffee House, the Royal Exchange and most of the financial offices along Lombard Street had escaped damage. To the north the scale of destruction was profound. The narrow streets and alleys of the Old City remained conducive to devastating fires even after the reconstruction of most of the area following the Great Fire of 1666. Charlotte despaired of the loss of no less than three of her favorite milliners. Over the past decade she had squandered a small fortune at Langley’s of Exchange Alley. The high-end specialty shop carried the most exquisite ostrich plumes.
The thought of ostrich feathers prompted her to open her leather envelope once more and make certain that she still had the letter from her father. Three weeks earlier a messenger had delivered the letter to Lord Thomas who used it to mark his place in a book and then lost it for a week. The moment Charlotte saw it, she recognized the handwriting and was furious that her husband had neglected to give it to her. She said nothing to the absent-minded mathematician, but fired the servant who had permitted the messenger to deliver a letter to Lord Thomas addressed to her.
Charlotte unfolded the letter and traced her fingers over the words. The handwriting was unmistakable and betrayed much about its originator. Each letter and every word had been crafted with a deliberate elegance. Her name was written with an exaggerated flourish and the salutation was “My Charlotte” not the commonplace “dear”. There were no mistakes, no stray drops of ink and no hint of hesitation. Predictably, her father’s letters opened with a perfunctory inquiry about her health and well being followed by a cryptic or oddly verbose explanation of his purpose for writing and the conclusion always contained an odd piece of advice or a directive he felt compelled to add. Charlotte could remember him straying from his template only once.
In the late autumn of 1740 a packet arrived in Bristol containing a collection of unsent letters, an old logbook, his will and an unsigned note from the sender that stated simply, “Left on the Black Pearl. Apologies.” The seven unsent letters represented a five-year period from 1734-1739 and were individually dated and sealed with black wax. The contents amounted to the rambling confessions of a cursed man. She stopped reading after the second letter’s disturbing account of a man sent to the bottom of sea chained to a canon and unable to die. She did not break the seals on the other five. The will included a request that she visit her mother’s grave on Curacao at least once the future and among other more impressive pieces of property, bequeathed her a monkey named Jack. Charlotte spent a year trying to discretely locate a reliable source to confirm Hector Barbossa’s death and placed a large private bounty on the on the head of Jack Sparrow after she heard he had stolen the Black Pearl. She hoped Jack Sparrow was not the monkey.
To her astonishment, on the first day of December 1742, she received a letter from her father assuring her that he was quite well and his death something of a misunderstanding. By way of offering an additional assurance that he was neither dead or nor an imposter, he concluded his letter with the proverb inscribed on her grandfather’s tombstone in Bristol: “Unos tienen las hechas, otras la fama” or “Some are known by deeds and others by reputation. He had also written her to let her know he travelling to Singapore and needed her to have a good copy made of an obscure chart from the family’s collection. Mr. Carvajal’s son, a representative of the Dutch East India Company, delivered the copy to a William Turner in Singapore. Later that year, her father sent her an unusual crab shaped pendant made of tarnished silver and promised her that story outshone the spoils. Life seemed back to normal and their correspondence returned to its regular frequency of three or four letters throughout the year. Thus, she had not been surprised by the most recent letter’s appearance in London; however, its content had caught her off guard completely.
My Charlotte,
I trust that this correspondence finds you in good health and enjoying the prosperity befitting my only daughter. I beg your forgiveness for not writing sooner, but under the circumstances that have arisen I am confident that you will award me clemency for this oversight. As I have written in the past, London lacks the salubrity of most coastal towns and it attracts a foulness that must be mitigated by frequent ventures elsewhere. Furthermore, complacency is a formidable adversity and one should take pains to avoid falling victim of the status quo in the pursuit of a life unfettered by want. Subsequently, I pray that you are free of the entanglements that might inhibit your ability to travel to Bristol before the end of this month. Perchance you will be surprised to learn that I have quietly returned to England.
My unplanned relocation is the direct consequence of a lamentable personal tragedy endured at the hands of a dishonorable cur whose name does not warrant the ink spent to reveal it. As it stands, I have lost my ship and crew as a result of a cowardly unprovoked assault by a vessel whose captain’s ignorance of the Code and lack of decency outshines that of any other man I have had the misfortune to encounter. My survival hinged doubly upon the sharp blade within my reach and willingness to value life over limb. It is not my intention to alarm you or provoke undue worry, but I have lost my right leg below my knee. Do not fear for my health. Other than the mild fever and delirium I suffered for about a week following my extraordinary surgical efforts, which, mind you, were executed in the dark whilst suspended from the yardarm of a rapidly sinking ship, I survived the harrowing ordeal with considerable ease. A homeward bound Dutch frigate rescued me, but I remember little of the crossing given my fever. I stayed for a few weeks in Amsterdam with a kinsman who possesses a good reputation as a physician. Following my convalesce, I travelled with a former business associate to Bristol where I have taken up residence and attempted to restore a degree of discipline to the servants connected the house.
Despite being encumbered by a slower gait, I plan to rectify the injustice that I have suffered at the hands of that soulless devil who cowers behind the hubris that none live who fear him not. As a matter of course, I am in need of a new ship and the service of a seasoned sober crew under the command of a complement of well-schooled and obedient officers. Given the enormity of this venture and my desire to see it executed without flaw, I require some assistance from you and I feel that it is best to discuss those details further in person.
I would also like to meet your husband and I must express my concern regarding your last letter when you wrote that he was a “magician”? I sincerely hope that the error was in the penmanship and not in your better judgment. Nonetheless, I expect to see the two of you very soon. Prior to my introduction to your husband, I need not remind you to exercise the discretion you feel necessary regarding the particulars of my professional exploits. Additionally, would you be kind enough to order me a new hat from Langley’s. My measurements are in their book as should be the specifics from my previous orders. And if you are travelling to Bristol by coach, which is terribly unsafe, make certain that you have an adequate amount powder as I worry that a member of the peerage is an easy mark for a highwayman and a “magician” probably not the type of man capable of defending his wife.
Godspeed,
HB
Charlotte refolded the letter and hoped that her father’s relief that she had married a mathematician would offset his reaction to finding out that Langley’s burned to the ground two months earlier.
NOTES:
1 Cornhill Fire occurred on Friday, 25 March 1748.
2 Sephardi proverb. Trans. from Ladino, “Some have their deeds, others their reputations.”
.
Pascal Saint-Rémy de Valois with his outrageous French fashions, powered wigs and make-up had been her constant companion for twelve years. Her professional relationship with the moody young man whose effeminate grandiosity veered toward the comedic coincided with the last time she saw her father. Few parents feel it necessary to leave their children under the watchful eye of an assassin, but her father was not the type of person to leave anything to chance. His word was absolute, no matter where he was, and Pascal’s first allegiance was to his order that his daughter not leave Great Britain. Even after Charlotte shot Pascal on two separate occasions related to the order, he still refused to disobey. Looking back, she doubted that she could have gone through with her fantastic escape to Barbados. It was just as well, since she lost the same sugar plantation within the month at different card game.
“Madame, your conquests.”
She snapped out of her thoughts as her smiling valet returned her carefully annotated copy of Lloyd’s List along with a small stack of folios containing the details of the ventures she’d agreed to underwrite. Pascal did not sit, but remained standing and his bright green frock coat captivated the curiosity of anyone who looked over in his direction. Few would forget the coat, most never noticed the woman with whom he spoke.
Charlotte’s dark eyes scanned the folios and a subtle smile surfaced on her lips. As she shuffled through the papers and calculated her returns, her haphazardly constructed façade grew more transparent. Her brazen personality craved outlets with higher stakes than the presumptuous parties of her Mayfair neighbors. While always well dressed, she was not exceptionally pretty or fashionable. Even though her freckled nose and small frame made her look much younger than her thirty-three years, it also made her look quite immature. She hated the corseted gowns popular with her social cohorts, so she dressed from her vast collection of riding and hunting outfits, which gave her a predatory look like a malevolent child that had sprung from the pen of William Hogarth. Unlike the great salonieres of the French Enlightenment and their counterparts in the British capital, Charlotte had few delusions about her lack of feminine wiles and did not feel the need to convince anyone of her intelligence. The venerable doyenne of London society, Elizabeth Montagu, had only spent a few minutes speaking with odd little woman and thereafter referred to her as the “exasperating-one.” In return, Charlotte referred to Elizabeth Montagu as “the bitch”. Despite her eagerness to turn down invitations, not surprisingly Charlotte received few.
“That’s the last of the Royal Africa Company for me-they’re veering toward insolvency and most likely will be reorganized under a new charter in the future.” She yawned and returned some of the documents to Pascal. “The African trade is lucrative, but I think the time has come to shift our investment habits further east-make sure you know where Bengal is on the map and don’t get it confused with Brussels or Bermuda.”
“Seriously?” Pascal sighed. “There should be rules about how many places can a have a name at any one point in time.” He was a crack shot and a superb swordsman, but Pascal’s sense of geography frightened Charlotte. He had only recently learned the difference between the East and West Indies.
A long moment passed before she decided not to reply. “The Atlantic is a fool’s game, too many variables and the odds are all on the house-the house that Morgan built. I only tolerate pirates who buy me presents and show up in my pedigree. Otherwise, we’re bound to take a beating in the next war with France and Spain. Unless,” she smiled devilishly, “I’ll get you a Letter of Marque and send you out to maraud in my good name.”
“C’est fou.” Pascal sneered, “I’d rather be a pickpocket than get lost in the ocean.”
“It’s not as though I would send you to sea in a dinghy by yourself.” She shrugged.
Standing, she smoothed her dark brocade skirts and set her jaw before walking through the crowd of bewildered men who had neither seen her enter Lloyd’s nor noticed her watching them from her vantage point in the corner. She reveled in their discomfort. Pascal hurried out ahead of her and opened the door of the waiting carriage.
“Captain Pascal of the mighty dinghy The Malcontent. Has a ring to it.” She giggled as she peered into her large leather envelope. “I might buy you a flotilla of dinghies and make you Admiral of the Thames, after today’s returns. Will you be happier as an Admiral? I’ll find you a fine hat.” She grew serious. “I’ll want these bonds put into Mr. Carvajal’s hands this afternoon and tell him I’ll be in Bristol later this week.” She handed Pascal a prepared document bearing the elaborate signatures and seal of her two imaginary uncles who served as Bristol and West Indies Ltd.’s only underwriters. From Carvajal’s talented hands the funds disappeared into a labyrinthine series of accounts, trusts and property investments. “What do you think, my dearest friend, shall I let you an office over at the Admiralty?”
“Tempting, but let’s first change our clothes and have something to drink. I think my shoe is ruined.” Pascal held out his foot and frowned at the soiled gray kid leather.
“You spilled the coffee yourself, so you can persevere or I’ll be happy to take a hatchet to your foot. Choppity-chop?”
“And back to square one, you’d have a find a new me.” He growled and folded his arms across his chest.
Charlotte was in too good of a mood to worry about Pascal’s shoe and decided to ignore him altogether as she fixed her attention out the window. The carriage continued up Lombard Street amid the flurry of new construction taking place around Cornhill. Happily, Charlotte had been in Bristol the weekend in March when much of the ward had been consumed by fire in March.[1] Lord Thomas had been in London, however, failed to notice a large portion of it burning. Lloyd’s Coffee House, the Royal Exchange and most of the financial offices along Lombard Street had escaped damage. To the north the scale of destruction was profound. The narrow streets and alleys of the Old City remained conducive to devastating fires even after the reconstruction of most of the area following the Great Fire of 1666. Charlotte despaired of the loss of no less than three of her favorite milliners. Over the past decade she had squandered a small fortune at Langley’s of Exchange Alley. The high-end specialty shop carried the most exquisite ostrich plumes.
The thought of ostrich feathers prompted her to open her leather envelope once more and make certain that she still had the letter from her father. Three weeks earlier a messenger had delivered the letter to Lord Thomas who used it to mark his place in a book and then lost it for a week. The moment Charlotte saw it, she recognized the handwriting and was furious that her husband had neglected to give it to her. She said nothing to the absent-minded mathematician, but fired the servant who had permitted the messenger to deliver a letter to Lord Thomas addressed to her.
Charlotte unfolded the letter and traced her fingers over the words. The handwriting was unmistakable and betrayed much about its originator. Each letter and every word had been crafted with a deliberate elegance. Her name was written with an exaggerated flourish and the salutation was “My Charlotte” not the commonplace “dear”. There were no mistakes, no stray drops of ink and no hint of hesitation. Predictably, her father’s letters opened with a perfunctory inquiry about her health and well being followed by a cryptic or oddly verbose explanation of his purpose for writing and the conclusion always contained an odd piece of advice or a directive he felt compelled to add. Charlotte could remember him straying from his template only once.
In the late autumn of 1740 a packet arrived in Bristol containing a collection of unsent letters, an old logbook, his will and an unsigned note from the sender that stated simply, “Left on the Black Pearl. Apologies.” The seven unsent letters represented a five-year period from 1734-1739 and were individually dated and sealed with black wax. The contents amounted to the rambling confessions of a cursed man. She stopped reading after the second letter’s disturbing account of a man sent to the bottom of sea chained to a canon and unable to die. She did not break the seals on the other five. The will included a request that she visit her mother’s grave on Curacao at least once the future and among other more impressive pieces of property, bequeathed her a monkey named Jack. Charlotte spent a year trying to discretely locate a reliable source to confirm Hector Barbossa’s death and placed a large private bounty on the on the head of Jack Sparrow after she heard he had stolen the Black Pearl. She hoped Jack Sparrow was not the monkey.
To her astonishment, on the first day of December 1742, she received a letter from her father assuring her that he was quite well and his death something of a misunderstanding. By way of offering an additional assurance that he was neither dead or nor an imposter, he concluded his letter with the proverb inscribed on her grandfather’s tombstone in Bristol: “Unos tienen las hechas, otras la fama” or “Some are known by deeds and others by reputation. He had also written her to let her know he travelling to Singapore and needed her to have a good copy made of an obscure chart from the family’s collection. Mr. Carvajal’s son, a representative of the Dutch East India Company, delivered the copy to a William Turner in Singapore. Later that year, her father sent her an unusual crab shaped pendant made of tarnished silver and promised her that story outshone the spoils. Life seemed back to normal and their correspondence returned to its regular frequency of three or four letters throughout the year. Thus, she had not been surprised by the most recent letter’s appearance in London; however, its content had caught her off guard completely.
My Charlotte,
I trust that this correspondence finds you in good health and enjoying the prosperity befitting my only daughter. I beg your forgiveness for not writing sooner, but under the circumstances that have arisen I am confident that you will award me clemency for this oversight. As I have written in the past, London lacks the salubrity of most coastal towns and it attracts a foulness that must be mitigated by frequent ventures elsewhere. Furthermore, complacency is a formidable adversity and one should take pains to avoid falling victim of the status quo in the pursuit of a life unfettered by want. Subsequently, I pray that you are free of the entanglements that might inhibit your ability to travel to Bristol before the end of this month. Perchance you will be surprised to learn that I have quietly returned to England.
My unplanned relocation is the direct consequence of a lamentable personal tragedy endured at the hands of a dishonorable cur whose name does not warrant the ink spent to reveal it. As it stands, I have lost my ship and crew as a result of a cowardly unprovoked assault by a vessel whose captain’s ignorance of the Code and lack of decency outshines that of any other man I have had the misfortune to encounter. My survival hinged doubly upon the sharp blade within my reach and willingness to value life over limb. It is not my intention to alarm you or provoke undue worry, but I have lost my right leg below my knee. Do not fear for my health. Other than the mild fever and delirium I suffered for about a week following my extraordinary surgical efforts, which, mind you, were executed in the dark whilst suspended from the yardarm of a rapidly sinking ship, I survived the harrowing ordeal with considerable ease. A homeward bound Dutch frigate rescued me, but I remember little of the crossing given my fever. I stayed for a few weeks in Amsterdam with a kinsman who possesses a good reputation as a physician. Following my convalesce, I travelled with a former business associate to Bristol where I have taken up residence and attempted to restore a degree of discipline to the servants connected the house.
Despite being encumbered by a slower gait, I plan to rectify the injustice that I have suffered at the hands of that soulless devil who cowers behind the hubris that none live who fear him not. As a matter of course, I am in need of a new ship and the service of a seasoned sober crew under the command of a complement of well-schooled and obedient officers. Given the enormity of this venture and my desire to see it executed without flaw, I require some assistance from you and I feel that it is best to discuss those details further in person.
I would also like to meet your husband and I must express my concern regarding your last letter when you wrote that he was a “magician”? I sincerely hope that the error was in the penmanship and not in your better judgment. Nonetheless, I expect to see the two of you very soon. Prior to my introduction to your husband, I need not remind you to exercise the discretion you feel necessary regarding the particulars of my professional exploits. Additionally, would you be kind enough to order me a new hat from Langley’s. My measurements are in their book as should be the specifics from my previous orders. And if you are travelling to Bristol by coach, which is terribly unsafe, make certain that you have an adequate amount powder as I worry that a member of the peerage is an easy mark for a highwayman and a “magician” probably not the type of man capable of defending his wife.
Godspeed,
HB
Charlotte refolded the letter and hoped that her father’s relief that she had married a mathematician would offset his reaction to finding out that Langley’s burned to the ground two months earlier.
NOTES:
1 Cornhill Fire occurred on Friday, 25 March 1748.
2 Sephardi proverb. Trans. from Ladino, “Some have their deeds, others their reputations.”