Chapter 9

What we needed was to get a foothold on the enemy’s deck. There were a few of the pirates down in depressions in the deck and the superstructure that we could not easily reach with our shotgun fire. It looked to me like we needed to put out a lot of suppressive fire so that one or two men at a time could climb to the enemy’s deck. There were enough projections and crevices that could be used in the climbing so long as the man would not be shot while he was exposed as he climbed; thus, no ladders were needed.

Our shotguns had slings so that a man could carry one on his back and have both hands free to climb. I went to each man and explained what I wanted him to do. I figured that if everyone but the single man doing the climbing was firing his shotgun at the enemy, they all would keep their heads down and not realize that there was a reduction in the shots coming from us.

Once enough men were on the pirate deck, their shooting would let the last of the men from our boat climb to the that deck. I realized that this was not the time for me to pull one of my macho stunts and be the first man on the other deck. I needed to stay back and make sure that everything was done according to plan. It was not easy to hold back like that, but it was what was necessary to make the plan work.

Okay, time to start. I had six men under my direct command, so I sent the one on the extreme right to make the climb while the other five pumped out shots. They were not to wait to aim at a pirate, but just to pour out buckshot so fast that the pirates were not given the chance to shoot back. This worked like a charm: all of the still living pirates kept their heads down and the first man made his climb to the other deck without a single shot being fired at him.

Once he was safely in place, I sent the next man. At this point, a couple of the pirates might of realized that something was different, but they were not stupid enough to stick their heads up to examine the situation. The difference in four instead of five shotguns being fired was noticeable if you knew that it had happened, but I doubt that a man being shot at would have paid that kind of attention.

By the time there were only two shooters left on our deck, it was too late for the pirates to counter. I had the two shooters stop firing and yelled for the men on the other deck to do their best. The explosion of shotgun fire was devastating to the few pirates holed up on deck. One of my men on the other deck waved to me, and we remaining three climbed up to the pirates’ deck. By this time, Nina had realized what I was doing and had stopped her men from shooting so that they would not hit one of my people by mistake.

We had conquered the main defense; now it was time to clean up the stragglers, if there were any. Nina and her men joined me, and we partitioned out the jobs. Two-man groups went below deck to check on what was down there and in the hold. Meanwhile, Nina and I went forward to make sure that no pirate was hiding up there. Also, I was anxious to locate the pirate captain. Hopefully, he could tell me why there were suddenly so many pirates operating in Gulf waters.

Nobody was at the helm, and we did not see any live men there. There were a number of storage closets on the deck, and all of the doors were locked except for one. That was too strong a clue for us to ignore it, so I held my shotgun ready while Nina jerked the door open.

Ah-ha, one man was hiding in there behind several coils of rope. Nina pulled him out, and he turned out to be the pirate captain, judging by the clothes he was wearing. She threw him to the deck and rolled him over to tie his hands behind him. She then cut away his clothes and pushed him to sit on the deck with his back against one of the locked doors.

I said, “We know that you are the captain. What is your name?”

The Spanish equivalent of “fuck you” was spat at us. Well, this was no problem. Both Nina and I knew enough Spanish that we could still talk to this piece of filth. I was about to question the captain when one of our men ran up. “Mr. Terhune, Sir, we found four women locked in a cell down in the hold. What should we do?”

“Nina, go with this man to investigate. I will leave it to you to handle the situation.”

A few minutes later, Nina returned with four women wearing ponchos made from blankets with holes cut for their heads to pass through. “We found these four women locked in a kind of cell down in the hold. They were all naked, so I had the men collect blankets for them and cut the blankets so that they would have some covering. The women said that they had originally been a larger group, but the others died from rough treatment, mostly during rapes.”

Suddenly, one of the women shouted in Spanish, “There is the bastard who raped my sister to death!” She ran up to him and began kicking him with her bare foot in his crotch.

I shouted, “STOP, WOMAN! STOP! WE NEED TO ASK HIM SOME QUESTIONS!” She kicked him one more time before she quit and backed off, but all of the women looked like they wanted a chance at the man. I said to the man, “Now you know what you have to face before you hang. Answer my questions or I will turn these women loose on you.”

Again, all I got was a “fuck you.”

“Nina, please go through his clothes to see what you can find. Especially look for keys.

“Women, would any of you like to express your feelings upon our captive?” The shouts of “SI” were all I needed to hear. All four of the women would like to relieve some of their feelings by hitting back at this man. I counted off on the women and said for them to be sure to remember their number. “Remember, Ladies, you may do whatever you like to this man as long as you do nothing that keeps him from answering questions.” I stared at the women until they all agreed to follow my guideline.

The first question was a simple one to the captive: “What is your name?” I got the standard answer from the man, so I pointed to the woman designated as No. 1. “You may do what you like to this creature. Continue until he answers the question, but be sure you give him a chance to do so.”

No. 1 nodded her head and hit him on his right elbow with a belaying pin. That produced the expected yelp of pain, but nothing else. The woman had to hit him four more times on that elbow before the man said, “My name is Edwardo Juarez.”

I pointed to No. 2 and said, “It is now your turn.” She grinned most maliciously and picked up the belaying pin. My next question was, “Where is the loot stored?” There was no answer, so I nodded to woman No. 2. Very sensibly, she hit the man as hard as she could on that same elbow. There was a scream of pain, but nothing else from the man. We heard a bone crack with the next blow to the elbow. The scream of pain this time was more from the heart, and we got an answer this time. The loot was in the locker next to the one he was leaning against.

Nina had found a bunch of keys, and one of them unlocked the door. Inside, there were six bags of coins: gold in two and silver in four of them. Ah, this was more like it. I sent a man to fetch Scruggs and Abernathy to count the money and arrange the shares. It seemed only fair that the four women get a share each to help relieve some of their pain and anguish.

Nina and I continued with the questioning with the “help” of the women until we had learned all that we wanted to know. Nina and I then walked away after I said to the women, “You may now do whatever you like to this bastard. We will toss him overboard when you finish.”

The screams of pain continued from the forward deck for another 20 minutes or so, and that was followed by a splash as the body was dumped over the side. That was fine with us because Nina and I were not interested in the details of what the women had done to the former pirate captain.

The rubbish and detritus left by the pirates, and that included their bodies, were dumped over the side to feed the fish. Once the former pirate ship was cleaned and we had looked through the loot that the pirates had kept, mostly jewelry, we distributed the shares of gold and silver. As usual, Nina and I took the pirate ship as our share of the loot, along with the jewelry. These pirates must of been very successful, judging from the large size of the shares that were distributed.