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coast.’
    ‘I don’t have to kill you.’
    Devlin’s gunshot sent a hundred birds screaming to the sky as the Diana monkeys crashed away and howled to everyone of what they had seen. Old Cracker fell with a squeal, slapping his hands to his shattered shin where the blood soaked and smoked.
    Devlin pulled his second pistol.
    ‘I just have to slow you down so you don’t bother me none.’
     
    As much as two thousand pounds, judging by the sacks hefted by Hugh Harris and John Lawson making their way back to the longboat. Devlin shouldered his own bag. The young negress was emptying John Leadstone’s green bottle down her throat at the counter. Devlin paused, shared one look with the girl, had nothing to say that she would understand, saw nothing in her eyes that he knew. The best he could do was leave the door open behind him.
    John Leadstone, ‘Jolly Old Cracker’, was on his knees. His sweat could have been tears now. He rocked, cursed and spat when the black coat came back to meet him.
    ‘No hard feelings to my coat, Cracker,’ Devlin dropped the sack. ‘I ain’t got time or men for dealing with slaves and I aims to stay around these climes for a while. You should be careful how you make your money when you meet the genuine.’
    Cracker heard the sway of leaf behind him, the boots of large men creeping through the grass. The pirate had not heard. Cracker shouted to cover the approach.
    ‘I been here years, pup ! I’ll tell every brother about you! And not for the good!’ He spat on Devlin’s boots. ‘The Pirate Devlin! Big in England is it? Big in America? Hah! I got Roberts and Davis as friends!’
    ‘Davis is dead.’ Devlin checked his favoured pistol’s fresh load and snap, the pyrite flint good for ten first shots so keep an eye on its edge. No-one would give you the time to cock again.
    ‘They’re all dying,’ he said. ‘We’re all dead men.’
    Cracker turned his head to the big leather-clad man with the Sibley blunderbuss emerging from the greensward at his side. A brother. A big, bald brother with red beard and steam rising off his shoulders. A straggler from the taverns who had heard the shot. God bless those who missed their ships for drink.
    ‘Friend! Ho!’ he yelled. ‘This man be robbing Old Cracker! Shoot him down for gold!’
    Peter Sam, Devlin’s quartermaster, thumbed back the doghead on the maple and brass gun.
    ‘This hogshit be dead, Cap’n?’
    Cracker felt the cold lip of the gun’s barrel at his cheek. The chill of it was oddly pleasant.
    Devlin had not looked up from checking his pistol.
    ‘Just slowing him down, Peter. Free those inside that hole. That’ll keep him busy.’
    Old Cracker found a protest. ‘Ah, come now, Cap’n. That’s a months work ! Leave a man a something!’
    Devlin aimed back to Cracker’s face.
    ‘I’m leaving you work ain’t I?’
    Peter Sam tried not to tread through the moat but his massive frame was not one for moving so delicately. Three paces in and the stench had him decided that the Sibley hand-cannon was the way to go. He pushed it into his shoulder and blasted the door’s lock, and Devlin ground his teeth at the gunshot that trembled the trees.
    If there were still slumbering heads about in the taverns and brothels that would bring them. He thought once about closing down his trigger into John Leadstone’s face, but other long-dead faces filled his eye. More every year. Every pull of his pistol they came back, but only until the shot blew them away again. He lowered the pistol.
    Peter Sam looked into the black hole as the door swung free then stepped back, pulling a fresh apostle from his bandoleer as things began to move forward from the dark within.
    ‘ Devlin ?’ He threw his voice behind, waiting for the word, right or wrong.
    Cracker shifted on his knees, his eyes turning to the mumblings behind him.
    ‘Ah, now . . . ah, now, Cap’n . . .’ Cracker found himself caught between judge and jury. He let his strap