Page 75 of Paid to the Pirate

Tar.

Whilst I slept, someone had covered my beautiful hair in tar. Hot tears sprang in my eyes.Covered it to the root.

Sobbing hysterically, I ran though the fields toward our home. By the time I threw open the door, I was inconsolable.

“Oh, my sweet girl,” my father sighed upon seeing me. “What trouble have you gotten yourself into now?”

“It wasn’t my fault!” I cried, running into his arms like a child.

“Careful, now,” he cautioned, retrieving his blade. “We don’t want to get that sticking anywhere.”

Over the next hour, my father hacked my hair. Tarred, matted chunks fell onto the floor. I sobbed all the while, feeling like I was six and not recently turned sixteen. It was gone. My mother’s pretty hair, gone.

“Shh, you’re still my beautiful girl,” my father said. “It will grow back in no time. You’ll see.”

“It will take years,” I wept. “I shall never marry. I have no dowry and now I have lost my best feature. I have nothing to offer a husband.”

“Hush,” my father chided. “You have everything to offer, my daughter, and I’m more concerned with what he be offering you.” Finishing up the area around the back of my neck, my father said, “I wanted it to be a surprise, but I’ve been saving up. We can go to the shop next week and pick out a bolt of cloth for a dress, anewdress. All your own, one that’s never been worn before.”

Who cares about a new gown, now?I thought,when I look like this?But I didn’t want to disappoint Father, who worked so hard to cheer me. Instead, I said nothing when we set the table for dinner and I ate nothing as we sat.

Finishing up our meal, the last rays of the dying sun still shone through our greasy windows when we heard a noise coming from outside our small house. It sounded like several loud men approached. My father immediately tensed, but I wasn’t alarmed. After all, anyone who’d meant harm would approach stealthily, I decided.

My father raced to the window and stumbled back, stricken.

“Quiet!” he whisper-shouted, making me jump. “Hide! There, behind the dresser!”

What was happening?

The color had drained from his face as Father looked me over. “If anyone finds you, you’re Charlie, you hear me? Charlie, my only son.”

Who was outside?

Father shook my shoulders. “What’s your name? Say it!”

“Ch – Charlie,” I repeated.

Shocked, I watched father retrieve a pistol from beneath the same mattress upon which the two of us had slept when I was a child. Now nearly grown, my father usually dozed in the armchair at night, giving me space.Had I slept above a weapon nightly, never knowing?

“Do what I say, no matter what!”

My father released me and I scurried behind the chest-of-drawers with my heart pounding so loudly it seemed to fill our home. Curling into a tight ball, I did as I was told. Seconds later, I heard the door creak open and the ominous, heavy fall of boots upon our wooden floor as three or four men entered our tiny dwelling. I knew I would never forget that sound as long as I lived. It was the sound of dire fate.

“Don’t do anything stupid and we won’t harm you,” announced a man’s gravelly voice.

In our small hovel, I could smell the men, wafting into the room with so much ale and rum in their bellies it leaked from their breath, their pores, and scented the already-stale air. Crouching, I peeked beneath the chest-of-drawers and could see three pairs of dirt-caked black boots, as well as the prints of fresh mud they trailed behind them.

I realized there was another reason men might not bother to hide their approach --confidence.They had nothing to fear from us and sauntered into our home with all the bravado afforded by their sense of security and superiority.

I hated them. I feared them.

“May I introduce Captain Colt,” one of the men said. “We’ve only come to get some information about your town. Give it to us and we’ll be on our way.”

“On your way to plunder it,” my father countered with anger. “On your way tokill.”

I heard Father move, feet sliding against the floor of our hovel, causing the pirates to quickly move in turn.

“Don’t fight, old man,” one of the men warned. “We promise you no harm if you do as we say. In fact, the more you help us the more lives will be spared. I give you my word.”

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