The Princess and the Pirate, parts 5-6: A Rescue at Sea & The Strangest Pirate

A Rescue at Sea

As the ship pulled steadfastly away from the sinking ship, Laura boldly grabbed the captain’s tree-trunk-sized arm and cried, "There is someone else aboard. She is hiding in the same room where you found us."

The big man turned around to look at Laura, saw that she was in earnest, and began shouting orders for them to pull back alongside the other ship. By the time they pulled around, they had lost two more inches to the creeping waterline. The captain grabbed a rope and swung aboard the other ship without preamble. The other pirates seemed to know what to do. The girls watched, terror stricken.

On board the doomed vessel, Captain Matthew, flung open the door to the captain’s cabin once again. He boomed, "Lady, this ship is sinking, and you’d better come out right now or we will both lose our lives." The princess did not answer, for she was still deep in prayer.

The big man picked up the axe that had destroyed the princess’s trunk and began knocking into walls. There had to be a secret room—he just knew it. Then, a panel slid open and the most beautiful woman Matthew had ever seen stepped out with her valise. Matthew stood there with his mouth open, something he had never done before in his life.

"Where are you going to take me, Captain Matthew?" she asked.

"How did you know my name?" he asked without thinking. No one had called him anything but "Captain."

"God told me your name, and he told me I urgently needed to follow you. Here I am." She held out her arms in her genteel manner.
"Do you have a veil and walking shoes?"

"Yes," she answered definitively, and she put a veil on from her luggage. As she did so, she said, "I’m already wearing shoes comfortable for walking."

"Come with me," he said. He pulled her along behind him as she carried her valise and tried to keep up with his rapid pace. The water line was now just an inch or two below the deck line.

She thought about the things she was leaving behind on the sinking ship. Her bedding that had comforted her in the night all her life would soon disintegrate into nothing. Her many dresses and evening gowns that she and her mother had lovingly spent hours making for this trip would be forever left unworn. She thought of the day her dad had surprised them with yard upon yard of embroidery floss in the richest colors she had ever seen. She and her mother had spent many long hours decorating the clothes with beautiful designs. She remembered that laughter they had shared and the comfort of looking at her mother’s face. She longed to be back there with her now, safe and warm in front of a fire.

Captain Matthew stopped at a certain point along the railing of the ship. He grabbed hold of a rope and put his arm firmly about her waist. He was just as strong as he looked. She felt no fear whatsoever that he would drop her. He did not even tell her to put her arms around his neck, though she did instinctively. He climbed up on the ship's railing as the water began to seep onto the deck of what was once her magic carpet upon the seas, and he pulled her up with him.

Mirabelle could see several of his crewmen pulling on the rope and tensely ready to make adjustments as they were about to swing aboard. An enormous sea turtle lazily swam between the two ships, and it took Mirabelle’s attention for just a moment. Then they were soaring through the air. As they went, Mirabelle saw the massive shape that was almost as long as the boat come up behind the sea turtle with its obscene, large fin pointing out of the water. Though the shark could have swallowed them whole, Princess Fioretta did not fear it.

It seemed like they were swinging in slow motion as they came close to the ship. Captain Matthew expertly buffered the crash into the side of the ship with his tree-trunk-like legs as the great white shark opened its cavernous mouth and bit the sea turtle in half. Mirabelle gaped at its eyes of inky dark death, soulless eyes that marked this killer as the king of the seas. She held onto Captain Matthew a little tighter in her discomfort over the shark as they were pulled up to the deck level of the ship.

Once the woman was steady on her feet, Captain Matthew barked orders to sail as quickly as they could, leaving Mirabelle with her two frightened maids. The three women watched as their ship sank below the waters like a drowning man they could not save.

The Strangest Pirate

When Princess Fioretta could no longer see any part of the ship, she turned on her heel to observe her new surroundings through the mist of her veil. While aboard her "magic carpet upon the seas," she had been impressed by the efficiency of the sailors and how they had taken great pains to keep everything clean. She expected the men aboard a pirate ship to be more lazy, because she could only think of them as horrible thieves loose on the waves of the ocean. She expected fights or even brawls to break out occasionally. She certainly expected them to attack her and the pretty young maids with some sort of violence. Yet these pirates were, if it were possible, even more efficient than the sailors in her father’s navy. For the most part, they knew what their jobs were and they did them. Oftentimes, Captain Matthew merely had to look at a pirate in a certain way, and the man would not only know what to do, but would attack the task immediately. Not a single raised voice could be heard on the ship, though she had to admit, she had been on board only an hour.

Whenever she looked directly at any of the men, he would immediately avert his eyes, looking at the deck or the sky or across the waters. Fioretta wondered why these pirates were so different. Not one of them had laid a finger on her except for Captain Matthew, and that had been to save her life.

Her veil was cumbersome, and she longed to be rid of it. It was made for very formal occasions when either modesty or the seriousness of the occasion called for it—not for everyday wear. She wondered what would happen if she took it off. Laura was twisting one edge of her own veil, so Fioretta correctly guessed that she was thinking the same thing.

As she looked around, Fioretta saw a shocking sight: it was a man hanging high up in a cage! His arms hung out of the cage, and she was not sure if he were alive or dead. She screamed involuntarily, and all the nearby pirates looked at her. The man standing closest to her said, "I’d appreciate it, ma’am if you would not scream like that. It could mean my neck."

"What do you mean?" asked Fioretta.

"Why, the captain has strict, standing orders. Just looking at you wrong could mean a week up in the swinging cage. Now, if he thought I made you scream, just imagine what he’d do to me." This pirate was young, not much more than a boy, really. He was not very tall, nor was he very strong, and he had a kind of innocence about him that was disarming.

"And just who are you?" asked Fioretta.

"My name is Jeff. I just came aboard a year ago, and the Captain assigned me to be near you at all times while you are walking the decks. When you are ready, I will take you to your cabin."

"Our cabin? Just who is this Captain Matthew anyway? I thought pirates were vile and vicious."

"Who is Captain Matthew, ma’am?"

"The one you keep calling `The Captain.’"

The boy thought for a moment or two, and then he said, "I’m begging your pardon, ma’am, but we don’t have a Captain Matthew. Our captain is Captain Brady Thomas O’Malley, but he just wants us to call him `Captain.’ He doesn’t like the name."

The man himself had walked up behind Jeff during this last discourse. He gruffly dismissed the boy and offered his arm to Fioretta. She took it after a moment's hesitation, and they began to walk. The maids followed as if it were the most normal thing in the world for a pirate to be courting a princess. The boy watched for a few minutes then busied himself carrying the ladies’ meager luggage to the Captain’s cabin.

They walked the length of the ship together, and as they reached the very front of the ship, Fioretta noticed the incredible beauty of the sunset. The colors seemed to pour from the sky into a magnificent painting. The reds, yellows, purples, and blues perfectly complemented each other in some mystical way. Fioretta and the Captain stood captivated by it while the other pirates went about the business of sailing the ship.

Finally, Fioretta, still watching the beauty, said, "Why did you tell me I was right about your name, when the young pirate you had watching us tells me that’s not your name at all?"

The Captain was silent for a good five minutes, but Fioretta had the patience of Job.

He took in a deep breath, and rigidly said, "The other pirates do not know about my confirmed name. Matthew is the name I took when I fully took on the adult responsibility of a Christian."

"It’s the name you chose at your Confirmation? I didn’t know people could be Christians and pirates at the same time." She stated this in an innocent, matter-of-fact sort of way. She could very easily have been very sarcastic and accusing, as she was first inclined to be, but something stilled her tongue. It was obviously the right move, because the captain relaxed somewhat.

"Listen, I have a private dining room on the upper deck. Will you join me there at seven for dinner? We can talk all you want then. Your maids can eat just outside and still see you through the windows or they can take their dinner in my cabin where the three of you will be sleeping.

"Before I answer, tell me how many men from my ship died today and please allow me to see those who survived."

He turned to look her full in the veiled face and said, "Not a single man on either side was lost today."

"None?"

"None, according to your captain himself. One man will never walk on one of his legs again because of a cannonball wound, but all the rest are still able-bodied men."

She could tell he was serious, but she just could not believe it.
"Our goal was booty, not bodies." He pointed up to the man in the cage at the back of the ship. "I run a tightly ordered ship. Do you see that man up there?"

Fioretta nodded.

"Do you know why he’s there?"

"No. I was just about to ask the young pirate that very question when you showed up. That’s why I screamed. I thought he was dead."
"He isn’t dead. Someone brings him food and water three times a day and carries down his waste bucket. He’s not very happy, but he’ll learn his lesson."

"Well, why is he there then?"

"I have the following standing orders for our raids on land or sea: No man is to be killed, and no woman or child is to be killed or injured in any way. If one of the pirates finds a woman or child, he is to bring me to that person immediately, so I can get her or him to safety. That pirate up there decided not to follow my rule. He wanted to force himself on a woman he had found during a land raid, so he planned to steal her away during the thick of the battle. In the struggle, he broke her arm and someone heard her scream—me. I called two men to hold him while I got her to safety. I carried her to the local doctor’s home at great risk of being caught, and I left her there in his care with money to cover his charge. When I got back, all the pirates and I boarded the ship and set sail. I put that pirate in the cage for two months to punish him and to serve as a warning to the others."

"What would you have done if he had finished what he started?"

"I would have put him in the cage for two years. And if he would have seriously hurt her or killed her, I would have thrown him to the sharks in the middle of the sea."

"What if your pirates kill a man?"

"I would put them in the cage for two years. And if they harm a child at all, I will throw them to the sharks. They all know these things. They know the rules. Almost all of them follow the rules."

"What if they mutiny against you?"

"They haven’t."

"But . . ."

"Listen—meet me in the dining room at seven if you care to talk more. I leave you in Jeff’s charge. He will take you anywhere on the ship you would like to go." He motioned the boy over and walked away, leaving Fioretta more confused than ever.