Buccaneer by Tim Severin Read Free Book Online

notice his listener’s preoccupation and prattled on until, from behind, Susanna called out.
    ‘Robert, do stop talking about money and point out that bird to Mr Lynch. There, over to your left beside the bush with orange flowers. He will not have seen anything like it before.’
    Indeed, at first sight, Hector thought that Susanna was mistaken. A large brown and grey butterfly was feeding on the blossoms, moving from one flower to the next. Then Hector saw that it was not a butterfly but a tiny bird, just over an inch long, which was hovering in position, its wings a blur. Turning aside he rode closer, and the bird suddenly rose from the bush and came towards him. For several seconds the tiny creature hovered close beside his head, and he distinctly heard the sound of its wings, a delicate hur! hur! hur!
    ‘Your first hummingbird, Mr Lynch!’ called out Susanna.
    ‘It is indeed a remarkable creature. It makes a sound like a miniature spinning wheel,’ Hector agreed, able at last to turn and look directly at her.
    ‘You have the soul of an artist, Mr Lynch,’ she said, with a smile of delight which made him dizzy. ‘Wait until you’ve seen its cousin. The one they call a streamer. It flies in the same way and has two long velvet black tail feathers which dangle in the air, and you can hear them fluttering. When the sunlight strikes its breast, the feathers flash emerald, then olive or deepest black as the creature turns.’
    Hector was tongue-tied. He wanted desperately to say something gallant to this divine creature, to continue the conversation, but he could find no words. The way he looked at her, though, could have left no doubt about the way he felt.
    It was some hours later, as the sun was nearing the horizon, that he heard a sound he recognised. It was a long-drawn-out call like a distant trumpet and he had heard it before, on the coast of Africa, and knew it to be someone blowing a call on a conch shell. ‘Are we so close to the sea?’ he asked Robert.
    ‘No,’ the young man replied. ‘It’s one of our farm workers calling in the hogs. They feed by day in the savannah, but come back to the sty at night when they hear that call. They are unexpectedly intelligent animals. That sound also means that this is where we turn off for Spanish Town.’
    He reached out to offer Hector a handshake of farewell.
    ‘The road to Port Royal is straight ahead. It’s no more than a couple of hours’ walk to the ferry. If you hurry, you should be able to get there while it is still daylight. I wish you well.’
    With sudden dismay, Hector realised that his journey beside Susanna was at an end. Crestfallen, he swung himself out of the saddle of his borrowed horse, and handed the reins to Robert. ‘Thank you for allowing me to accompany you this far,’ he said.
    ‘No, it is I who have to thank you,’ Robert replied. ‘Your presence helped deter the maroons from attacking us. If we had been fewer, we might have become their prey.’
    Walking stiffly across to the carriage, Hector stood beside its door and looked up into Susanna’s blue eyes. Once again, he did not know what to say. He did not dare to take her hand, and she did not offer it. Instead she gave him a demure smile, less coquettish now, more serious. ‘Goodbye, Hector,’ she said. ‘I hope you find your friends and, after that, perhaps your path will lead you back to Jamaica so we will meet again. I feel there is more that we have in common than just our names.’ With that the carriage moved away, leaving Hector standing in the red dirt road, and hoping fervently he had been more than a day’s amusement for the first girl he had ever fallen in love with.

FOUR

    P ORT R OYAL had more taverns than Hector imagined possible in such a small area. He counted eighteen of them in the ten minutes it took him to walk from one end of the town to the other. They ranged from The Feathers, a grimy-looking alehouse close by the fish market, to the new-built Three