The cabin door opens and Blodgett comes out, wearing both his sword and his pistols, which he doesn't ordinarily do. He goes up to confront Carruthers.

"What the devil do you men want?" he demands.

Carruthers pulls off his cap and says, "We got some questions, Captain, and we wants 'em answered"

"So ask them," says the Captain.

"First, how come you and the Mate and the Bo'sun is the only ones aboard with weapons? There's some on board that says you plan to kill the lot of us when we get to Africa, 'cause of the nature of this cargo, which you think we might talk about sometime and get you and your bosses in trouble. What you got to say to that?"

The Captain breaks out in a big smile. "Now, boys, when have you ever been on a ship where the crew is armed, unless you've sailed on a pirate? Think back, now, have you?"

The crew thinks on this and mumbles things like, "Well, maybe not," and "Come to think of it..."

"And as for killing you? Why, you're the best crew I've ever had. I know you each for a good closemouthed lad who ain't never gonna peach on nobody. Besides, everyone back in the States thinks these girls are dead. Who's gonna be lookin' for 'em? Or news of 'em? Nay, these girls are a dead issue, count on it."

Carruthers thinks on this for a moment and then says, "There's been some strange things happenin' on this ship lately. Ghostly things, and we don't like it. There's talk of a Black Ghost what maybe slipped a noose over Henry Pritchett's head one night. There's seaweed poppin' up where it ain't supposed to be. There's big sharks followin' us. Strange noises..."

The Captain continues to smile. "Now, Carruthers, you know what a superstitious lot sailors are. It's in our very nature. There ain't no ghost, trust me, and sharks always follow a ship, surely you know that."

But Carruthers is not yet through. "Has this ship always been the Bloodhound? Or did it have another name in the past, like maybe the Marie Celestine?"

The Captain gives out a short bark of a laugh. "Boys, boys, boys! I saw this ship's keel laid in Charleston twelve years ago and I've sailed in her every year since! And so has Mate Dunphy and the Bo'sun. Ain't that right?" Dunphy nods and Chubbuck does, too, after the Mate gives him a jab.

"So you see, lads, there's nothing to worry about. We'll soon be at our destination and you'll all be rich," says the Captain with smug satisfaction writ all over his face. "But I'm glad we had this little talk, I am, to help clear the air, like. I'll even do this to set your minds at ease-Carruthers is your man, so let's fit him out with a fine sword, so he'll be armed, too. All right? Good. Carruthers, come with me into my cabin and we'll set you up."

Carruthers, a bit shocked by this turn, shrugs and follows Blodgett into his cabin.

He swaggers out a full minute later, his face flushed and smiling, and wearing a sabre in a scabbard around his waist.

"Let's have a cheer, lads," shouts the Captain, "and an extra tot for every man jack of you at dinner tonight!"

There is a cheer, but it ain't exactly a full-throated one. No, when the men break up and file past our bars, I see that Mick and Keefe are still looking grim.

I rush over to where they are passing, grab the bars, and hiss out at them, "He's been bought! You know that, boys! He's been bought!"

They look at me but say nothing. I snatch my hands back as Chubbuck's club hits the bars where my fingers have just been.

"Shaddap, you."

Flaps down, Hepzibah's Chorus, Connie's Scriptures, then I get up and finish my Cheapside tale.

Charlie's been real moody lately and I know it's 'cause the Polly thing has been weighing heavy on his mind.

Oh, I know he felt bad for Polly herself, like we all did, but it was his loss of face with the other gangs that galled him the most. He was usually full of fun and jokes, but he wasn't now. Now he had his shiv out a lot, sharpening it against the stones of Blackfriars Bridge. I know he's gonna try to kill Pigger-but that won't solve anything, I know it won't. I try to tell him, they'll just hang you is all and I don't want that, Charlie, I don't-but he don't listen. His pride is on the line, and I've come to know that with males, sometimes there just ain't no use in talkin' to 'em.

It's been about a week since the Paternoster fight, but Pigger don't show himself, prolly figurin' what Charlie's got in mind. Pigger's big, but Charlie's a real hothead, and Pigger knows that and he ain't taking no chances. We ain't seen Polly that whole time, neither...

"No, Julia, we couldn't go to the police and complain. We wouldn't think of doing that, as the police were not our friends. Besides, it would break the Code of the Streets and we'd be seen as snitches and that would be the end of us. And no, Caroline, we couldn't just set fire to their filthy sty and flush 'em out-fire was much feared in London and anyone caught setting one was sure to end up dead very quickly. It's true they didn't hang nine-year-old kids-usually no one younger than fourteen got strung up-but a copper and his club could get the same job done. Once I got caught trying to pinch something or other and a cop grabbed me by the neck, took me into an alley, lifted me up, and started slamming me back against a stone wall, over and over again. My head went back on the first slam, hard against the stone, and my eyesight got a bit foggy around the edges. The second slam about broke my skull and things got real hazy, and by about the fifth one, everything went dark. I woke up back in the kip, sick with the worst headache I've ever had, before and since. Charlie and the bunch had found me crumpled up in that alley, out cold, and Hughie carried me back. I counted myself lucky to be alive, and lucky to have been found by my mates before Muck the Corpse Seller found me. No, Sisters, the police were not our friends."

But Polly or no Polly, we still had to eat, so we headed up to Fleet Street on this day, to try our luck with the reading-of-the-broadsides bit. When we got there, there was a pretty good crowd, it bein' the day the newspapers came out, and Nancy and Judy slipped right into the people standin' about to see what might present itself, like perhaps a gentleman's fancy handkerchief hanging carelessly out of his pocket, or somesuch. Charlie was about to take up his usual post close to Hughie and me, but I saw something that made me grab his arm and hiss, "Charlie! There's two Shanky Boys over there! Hold back and pretend you don't see them! Trust me!"

Charlie looks over to see Flick and Scut, the same two lowlifes we'd saved from the coppers before-plainly they was here to see if they could pick a few pockets. Charlie's hand goes for his shiv, but I plead, "Please, Charlie!" and he nods and fades back into an alley to watch and see what I'm up to.

"Hughie!" I say. "Up!" and good Hugh the Grand bends down and puts his two hands together, fingers entwined, for me to put my foot in, and then I am lifted up onto his broad shoulders. I feel the reassuring grip of his hands around my ankles as we make our way through the crowd and up to the newly printed broadsides tacked to the printer's wall. Then I go into my act.

"Ladies and Gents! This here is your own dear Mary Faber reading you the news of the day! Look ye here, we have an account of that nasty Bonaparte kickin' up sand in Egypt, chasin' the poor wogs from one end o' the place to the other and takin' all their stuff ... and 'ere's a notice that Miss Tessie Briggs and Mr. Asa Smoggs is gettin' wed and they're publishin' the banns right here before your very eyes, and I knows there's gonna be a big weddin' party 'cause I already got me invitation here tucked in me shift, and how about you?" As usual, my extra patter gets me a little laugh, and then I rock back like I seen somethin' that shakes me to my very core. "Coo! Look at this!" I say, pointing to a large bill. "It says here that a reward of five-hundred-pounds sterling is offered for the capture, dead or alive, of the no-tor-i-ous criminal Patrick O'Toole, alias Pigger O'Toole, on a charge of kidnappin' one Polly Von, long-lost granddaughter of Lord Peter Von, peer o' the realm and all that. It seems the little tyke was misplaced on a royal trip and snatched by the a-fore-men-tioned thug, who is known to inhabit various hells in Cheapside, the chief of which is on Paternoster Lane. Anyone wishin' to claim the reward must be careful in the app-re-hen-sion of the fiend, as he is known to be armed and dangerous, and must secure the safety of the child. App-li-ca-tion for the reward may be made at the Royal Huff-ing-ton Manor, London."

Out of the corner of my eye, I see the Shankies lookin' sharp at each other.

Several hard-lookin' types surge forward. "Are ye sure o' that, girl?" says one particularly vile-lookin' cove.

"That I am, Sir, it says so right here, and if it's in print, it's got to be so," I says, eyes round in wonder. "Coo, five hundred pounds ... Wouldn't that buy ye a right big slice o' kidney pie?" I see Flick and Scut turn and run down the street toward Paternoster. Ah, yes, two fleet Shanky messengers bearin' the news.

The man who spoke and two other very tough-looking gents gather, then take off toward Saint Paul's. I chuckle to myself: You're real good, Pigger, at kickin' kids around-let's see how you handle those three. All have swords and I think I see pistol bulges under their long black coats.

They ain't the only ones interested, neither. Other groups of men confer and then take themselves off, intent on some mission.

Now there are also folks standing about who look at me in a curious way-thems must be the ones what can read and are wonderin' why I'm sayin' the words I am whilst pointing at a poster advertising an auction of yearling horses. But I put my finger to my lips like it's all a big joke, and they don't say nothing, as it ain't their business, anyway.

Well, the upshot of it was that Pigger had to light out of town, fast. In fact, we never seen him ever again. It's said that he got nabbed for stealin' a hog up north and got himself hanged for it. Though how the constables up there could tell him and the pig apart, I don't know. Maybe they hanged the hog and roasted Pigger ... There's others who say he got a job in a circus as a geek, sittin' in a cage, bitin' the heads off live chickens, which seemed to me to be much more likely, that bein' the vocation I always felt he was born for. I don't know. All I know is we was deprived of his company from then on and we rejoiced in it. A cove named Natty B. Matt took over the Shanky Boys, and though he wasn't exactly a stand-up citizen of the streets, he was a practical fellow and we got along with him. Peace returned to the streets of Cheapside.

I, too, had to lay low for a while, 'cause of bein' guilty of spreadin' false rumors and other falsehoods, but it was worth it-Charlie didn't get hanged for murderin' Pigger, and Polly come walkin' back into our kip, thumb in mouth, the next day, as if nothin' had ever happened.

I lay low by going up to the rooftops again. Some of those blokes who went after Pigger to get the reward was now lookin' for me, for sendin' them on a wild-pig chase, so I figured high up was the place for Little Mary Faber to be till they cooled off a bit. I had a special place that I liked, a roof where the tiles came together twixt two gables and made a rain gutter. I could sleep there without worryin' about fallin' off, and I could watch the goings-on of the city from that perch high above. Judy or Nancy would come up each night to stay with me and bring me news of the gang's activities, and maybe a bit of food.

It warn't so bad, and after a while, when the heat was off, I went back down to join my friends in our kip.

"And that's the end of that story," I say, taking another invisible bow.

"Jacky, weren't you just the cleverest thang," I hear Clarissa say by way of snide comment on my little tale.

My face burns at that, but I say, "How 'bout a round of applause for our Hughie here for bein' the real hero of the piece?

"Hear, hear!" and hands are clapped together and I'm surprised to find that some of the girls know how to whistle.

When the cheering subsides, Hughie, who I know is blushing mightily back there in the hatchway, says, "That was real nice, Mary. Now tell us about when you had the baby."

Well, that gets a rustle out of the girls, for sure.

"Yes, Ma-ry," comes Clarissa's slow drawl out of the gloom. "Please do tell us about when you had the bay-bee."

I heave a sad sigh. I hadn't told anybody about Jesse, not even Amy. He was just the best little boy, and it was true that, for a short while, he was mine.

"Well, of course, I didn't have a baby-I was only about eleven at the time. I found him in a garbage can."

I get up and start the story.

I was out on my own that day and I thought I'd check out a rubbish bin where I'd found some pretty decent apple cores the week before. I slipped up the alley and was on the pile in a minute, tearing away at the useless stuff, when I pulled away a bundle of dirty rags, and there he was. I don't know how he got there-prolly left by Muck to die after he'd taken the poor dead mother off to the anatomist's to sell. I know his mother wouldn'a left him in a garbage can if she could help it.

I don't know how he got there. I only know he was there and reaching up at me and sayin', "Ma-Ma..."

Chapter 44.

I'm down at the Rat Hole again that night, having been awakened at one fifteen and ready in my black rig to go out at one thirty. We've found this is the best time for me to be out 'cause the watches have changed and everybody's back to sleep-including most of them that's on watch.

I gave Clarissa a good shake on my way down, and I soon find her here by my side in the candlelight as I make ready. Beatrice, who had been on watch on the Stage, had lit the candle and taken down the Rat Hole boards before I got there. Then she had gone back up on watch. Good girl.

"What are you plannin' to do out there tonight?" Clarissa demands.

"I've got to start disabling the other lifeboat so's the crew won't be able to chase us when we make our break. That ship we saw yesterday showed us that we've got to get moving on this or things will get out of our control and we can't have that. The fuse is five links from being done. We could go the day after tomorrow if the weather holds."

"I'm going out with you," she states firmly.

"No, you are not. You don't have a black rig and there's no time to make you one. Besides the Bloodhound only needs one Black Ghost"

"It's not fair that you should have all the glory."

Glory?

"Look, Clarissa, I know you are brave and bold, but this is not the time for it. Too much is at stake to pander to your sense of adventure. Your time will come, believe me, when we break out. Haven't we talked about your role in that enough?"

"Humph," she says. "A little bit of playactin'...hardly seems heroic enough."

"The success of the whole venture depends on that bit of playactin', Clarissa, and don't you forget it. You've got the starring role and, if you must know, I'm a bit jealous."

She smirks at this. "Yes, you would be, wouldn't you, bein' the shameless show-off hussy that you most plainly are."

"Come on, Clarissa, we're all in this together, and when this is over and done with, we can go back to being the best of enemies."

"Well, still, I'm going with you to the top of the first ladder, anyway. I will act as sentry. No one will see me there," she says, and I have to agree to that. "What do you plan to do in the boat?"

"I plan to drop the oars over the side and slit the sails so they cannot follow us by either rowing or sailing. I would get rid of their rudder, too, but as that hangs outside the canvas covering, the fact that it's missing might be spotted, and so we can't chance it. No, the rudder will have to be the last thing to go, on the night before we escape."

"Suppose they discover the slit sails and the missing oars?" she asks. "Won't they blame it on us? Won't they conduct a thorough search?"

"No, they will blame it on the Black Ghost. He's gonna leave footprints there tonight. I'll explain later. Come on, let's go."

I get into the lifeboat without incident. Leaving Clarissa on the lower level with a warning not to do anything daring or stupid or both, I gained the deck, looked, and saw that the entire watch was huddled on the quarterdeck, no doubt a bit fearful of going off alone to possibly encounter either a ghost or a once-human heap of seaweed, neither of which would be much to their liking. As before, I loosen the line holding down the canvas cover and crawl in.

From the inside, I slacken the canvas on the outboard side and carefully put five of the six oars over the side-they are long enough so that I can just about touch the water with them, such that when I let them go, they slip into the water with nary a sound.

Having done that, I pull out my shiv and silently but thoroughly slice up the mainsail and the jib. That job finished, I put my shiv back in my waistband and pull out the oilskin wad I had also tucked in there before leaving the Hold, then open it up. I'm glad enough moonlight is shining in so I can see to do this work.

Earlier in the day I had taken a rag, soaked it down good, and on it I sprinkled the powder I'd made by crushing the red cake of dry watercolor from my miniature-portrait-painting kit. I added a touch of brown pigment to bring the color to reddish-brown, the same shade as dried blood. Then I folded the rag and mashed it and kneaded it till the color started to seep through. Opening it back up, I saw that I had a nice, blood red printing pad. I wrapped it in the piece of oilcloth where I stored my brushes and put it away for later.

Now I lay the open ink pad on the lifeboat's rear seat and ball up my fists and start making baby footprints-I take my clenched right fist and press its right, or pinkie, side onto the pad and then push it down on the deck. Then I put the tips of my right-hand fingers on the pad and then push them all down, in a slightly curved way, on the top of the print I had just made, and behold, a perfect little child's footprint ... or a perfect little ghost's...

I do the same with my other hand and place this print to the left and a bit ahead of the other one for the left footprint, and so on up the deck from the rear seat to the next, and then on top of that seat. Then I stop, as if the creature who made these tracks disappeared into thin air.

I learned this little number from Rooster Charlie back in the Blackfriars Bridge days. Oh, Charlie, I think fondly, always the trickster you were, always laughing and joking to give us cheer when we was all gathered together in the kip and maybe down a bit on account of bein cold and havin nothin to eat. You, Charlie, who said, "Now, ladies, you never can tell when these little tricks'll come in handy..." Right you were, Charlie, and right you are...

I refold my pad and stow it away. I retie the boat's outer canvas and peek out through the opening on the near side, the way I had come in. I see no movement. The coast being clear, I crawl out, tie down the canvas, and head back for the hatchway.

There, I say to myself, by leaving tracks I have covered my tracks.

I slink around the corner of the hatch and Damn! I am confronted by two men who have plainly gone up on some errand and were afraid to go alone.

"Good God!" gasps one. The other is scared speechless. I see only eyes wide with terror.

I am just as terrified as they, but I make myself think, You see them as men, but they see you as a black shadow, a black demon, and I reach up and pull myself to the ratlines, curling my arms about myself in imitation of a black spider. I twist those same arms in weird ways, and I reach deep down in my throat and rumble out, "Taboo ... taboooo ... taboooooooo..."

They cannot move.

I, however, can. After I have uttered the last taboooooo, I leap from the rigging to the rail, and then, seeing them transfixed, I drop over the side.

I do not, however, drop into the ocean. No, I drop onto the anchor, which I know is hanging there by the side. I quickly clamber up the anchor shaft and onto the chain and into the hawsehole, the opening in the bow where the anchor chain is drawn. It's a very tight squeeze and I leave a good bit of skin with the barnacles that cling thereto, but I make it in. Sitting on the pile of chain, I put my ear to the hawsehole.

"D-d-disappeared, it did, right into thin air. You saw it, don't say you didn't."

"Nay, I saw it go right down into the sea, and it grinned a hideous grin at me as it went under and ... Oh, my God! We is lost! We is lost! We seed it, we did! We seed the Black Ghost, we did!"

And chaos rules on the Bloodhound.

These two run back to the quarterdeck, shrieking out their story, and the ship's bell starts ringing and ringing, and I know a very unhappy Captain's gonna come roarin' out of his cabin, shoutin' out death and destruction to any who would disturb his sleep. I climb blindly over the piled-up chain in the anchor-chain locker to find my way to the door, where I can see light around the edges, and I wait there, crouched and fearful, 'cause I know the whole crew has been roused. A lamp has been lit in the kitchen and I hear shouts of "Muster on the quarterdeck!" and feet pounding out of the crew's berth. Then, when I don't hear nothin', I wait for another second, open the latch, which, thank God, opens from the inside, too. When I look out, there's no one around.

I bolt down the passageway and down the ladder. Clarissa is still there.

"Damn!" she says. "What happened?"

"I got spotted! We've got to hurry! They're mustering the crew, which means they'll muster us, too! Hurry!"

We go through the storeroom and worm our way through the Rat Hole and hear the other girls starting to wake up from the noise outside.

Beatrice is there with the candle.

"Get the boards up quick!" I say, and pull off my hood and black shirt. "They'll be down any minute!"

Clarissa and Bea get the boards up with one screw in the end of each, 'cause there's no time to do the others. We keep a little puddle of candle wax mixed with candle soot and brown color from my painting set next to the boards. Clarissa and Bea each take some up and thumb it into the screw holes to hide them.

Meanwhile, I'm strugglin' out of my black boots and stockings when I hear, "Lord, save us!" from above and I know that Sin-Kay and who-knows-who-else have entered our Hold.