"Why d'you did that?" she asked crossly.

"Show thy jack, lady. Handful of jack buys a handful of good victuals. No jack. No eat. Thy credit runs only with Master Jedediah Rodriguez and the Rising Flukes. And no place else."

"Then stuff it up your fat arsehole, you sad fat bastard," she said, knocking the false smile clean off the plump lips.

The quayside of Claggartville was bustling with action, men heaving casks and bales, pushing small carts with iron wheels over the clattering cobbles. Mongrels slunk around, snapping at one another, cowering from the blows and kicks aimed at them. As they moved through, Ryan and the others could catch the scent of tobacco and liquor.

"Git out th'way, outlanders," bellowed an enormous man in a stained white shirt, who carried a pile of baskets filled with fish on his head.

The ships loomed over it all, masts rocking in unison on the gently rolling waters of the harbor.

"She's a whaler," Doc said, pointing to one called Rights of Man. "There's the ovens on decks there."

"The one painted dark brown?" Donfil asked interestedly.

"Not paint. Blood," J.B. said.

The last ship along the line was another whaler, painted in somber black, with a narrow white stripe running all the way around her, just beneath the rails. False gun ports were etched in white along her sides, and a white flag hung limply from the masthead.

The men working on the dock seemed to be avoiding this ship. It was almost as though there were an invisible barrier erected on the quay. Nothing was being loaded or unloaded at that end of the harbor, and there was nobody to be seen on the deck of the dark vessel.

"Called the Salvation," Ryan said. "Fine name for a sailer."

The seven stood and watched the ship, admiring the elegant lines of her yards and the four slim twenty-eight-foot whaleboats that hung from the davits on either side.

"Everyone stopped," Jak whispered.

It was true.

Behind them, all along the dock, work had ceased as though a switch had been thrown. Every bearded face was turned toward them, staring in a fascinated stillness. The only sound was the sighing of the wind through the rigging and the scream of gulls, circling around a small shoal of herring a quarter mile out into the bay.

"Someone farted?" Jak asked, giggling nervously. "What d'they want?"

"Something about the ship?" Krysty suggested.

"She looks normal enough. Like the others. Sight cleaner than most."

"True, Ryan," Donfil agreed. "But there is something I like not about it."

Krysty nodded slowly. "Know what you mean. Feeling gets me across the back of my head and clear down my spine. Something about the Salvationjust doesn't set right. Can't say what."

"Guess we can go," Ryan said. "Find out later. Mebbe."

As they neared the turning into Try-pot Alley they came across a ragged urchin bowling a metal hoop, striking sparks from the stones. Ryan reached out a hand and took the hoop from the boy.

"What art thou?.." the guttersnipe began.

"One question. Who owns the Salvationl"

The boy spit against the wall. "Everyone knows that, 'cept outlanders. Captain Quadde, of course."

Ryan gave him back the hoop, and they continued on to the Rising Flukes.

Chapter Fourteen

"No work?"

"No work."

"All day in Claggartville... seven healthy outlanders and no work?"

The incredulity of the landlord was going on and on, and Ryan Cawdor was already beginning to find it exceedingly tedious. Ever since they'd returned after exploring the ville he'd been on about work, counting off on his fingers the people that he knew personally who were almost begging in the streets and alleys to find men and women to fill vacancies for all manner of work.

"Rory Starbuck the chandler. Also runs the rope-making works. He could take on a couple of fresh hands with no trouble. The women would be welcome with their looks at Eleanor Goodman's gaudy..." He caught the eye of Doc Tanner and hastily changed his mind. "No, I didn't... There's many taverns'd take them as pot girls or cooks if they had the skill. The Indian could ship as harpooner on any vessel leaving harbor. There's jobs in some shops for... Oh, so many that it makes my head spin."

"Why don't you just spin off and bring us some food?" J.B. suggested, as calm as ever. As menacing as ever.

The supper was baked fish, what Rodriguez called "star-gazers' pie." It had a thick golden crust with the heads of a dozen mackerels protruding through the top, eyes open, staring ceilingward. With it came some fried greens and large potatoes roasted in their skins, with butter oozing over the platters.

They washed it down with bumpers of ale, perhaps the very same they'd seen being rolled in iron-hooped kegs along the quayside.

The piano was being played by a blind man whose forehead was furrowed by a huge scar. He picked at the keys with a soft touch, singing slow ballads of lost love and vanquished honor.

As Rodriguez came across at the end of the meal to oversee the removal of the greasy dishes and dirty glasses, Ryan caught him by the sleeve of his linen smock.

"What is it, Mr. Cawdor? The meal not to thy liking?"

"Tell us about Captain Quadde and the Salvation. What's so terrible?"

The innkeeper tried for a laugh that got lost somewhere between his throat and his mouth, coming out like a strangled yelp. "Terrible?" he squawked. "Why rock the boat asking that sort of question? Won't do thee good, outlander."

"Quadde and the Salvation," Ryan repeated, tightening his grip.

"Not good to blab 'bout it. Don't want to finish keelhauled or having my backbone laid bare by the cat. Let thee find someone else to tell thee about Quadde. Not me."

Ryan looked around the Rising Flukes, seeing that his conversation with Rodriguez had hushed every voice in the place. Every face was turned to him.

"Well!" he shouted. "Any of you chicken-shit bastards tell an outlander about the fireblasted mystery of the Salvationand her captain?"

Faces were averted, eyes downcast.

"Let it lie, mister," the landlord whispered. "There's a couple of men of her crew here."

Ryan stood up, feeling the familiar rise of anger, the crimson mist that flowed down over his brain when the rage took him. For most of his adult years he'd been able to control it. Most of the time. But now it was swelling again.

"Rodriguez says some of you are off the Salvation. So, what's so fucking frightening about her?"

"Outlander?"

"At last." Ryan turned to face the man who'd spoken. He was sitting in front of a half-finished plate of mutton stew at the long table nearest to the silent piano. "I'm second mate on the Salvation. Been that for five years now."

He was a little taller than average height, with a smaller beard than was usual about the ville. Several scars lined his weather-beaten face, one of them pulling down the corner of his left eye. The middle finger was missing from his left hand. He wore the jumper and breeches that most of the sailors favored. There was a dirk in his belt with a hilt that looked as if it had been carved from a piece of bone or ivory.

"Then you can tell me why everyone shits themselves at the mention of your ship and your captain."

"Best keep thy prow out of waters that don't concern thee."

Ryan spit on the floor, shrugging off Krysty's warning hand, knowing with a surge of strange excitement that he wasn't going to be cautious. Not this time. This time he was going to see the quarrel through. Even if it meant pushing it all the way himself.

"You scared to tell?"

The man stood at that, pushing away the table, hands resting on his hips in a gesture that was provocative and also kept his right hand near the knife hilt.