Pirate In My Arms Read online

  Table of Contents

  PIRATE IN MY ARMS

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Dear Reader

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  More Books by Danelle Harmon!

  Excerpt from THE WILD ONE

  PIRATE IN MY ARMS

  Danelle Harmon

  Pirate in My Arms

  Copyright © 2017 by Danelle Harmon

  originally published 1991 by Avon Books, New York, NY

  re-released as an e-book January 2018, copyright Danelle Harmon

  PUBLISHED BY:

  Danelle Harmon

  License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people or uploaded to ANY websites! If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or you downloaded it from an unapproved and illegal pirate site, then please purchase your own copy, because literary piracy hurts us all. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Discover other titles by Danelle Harmon at Amazon.com!

  Table of Contents

  PIRATE IN MY ARMS

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Dear Reader

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  More Books by Danelle Harmon!

  Excerpt from THE WILD ONE

  Dedication

  The original version of this book, first published in 1991, was lovingly dedicated to my dear friend Kenneth J. Kinkor of Barry Clifford’s Maritime Explorations. Ken, a pirate historian, was instrumental in firing my imagination, helping me with the finer details of 18th century pirate life and culture, creating a space and role for me at Maritime Explorations, and fostering a love for all things nautical. A gentle, soft-spoken and kind soul, he departed this life in 2013, leaving behind a legacy that few dream about and even fewer obtain. I hope he’s now sailing with Sam and Paul, and that he knows how grateful I remain to him all these years later.

  As that long-ago first version of Pirate In My Arms was dedicated to Ken, so is this second one. God bless you, my friend.

  You are missed.

  Dear Reader…

  The book you are about to read was my debut novel, first published by Avon Books back in 1991 when I was a young and fledgling writer. It was a Waldenbooks mass market bestseller, went into a second printing, and launched a career that has spanned nearly three decades. I have updated it for today’s market, but the story itself remains largely as I wrote it. I hope you enjoy this book about the real-life captain of the pirate ship Whydah and the innocent young woman who captured his heart. Their legend lives on in the timeless waves and shifting sands of Cape Cod.

  — Danelle Harmon,

  September, 2017

  The natural medicines referred to in this book are included to enhance the authenticity of the story. Readers are advised not to use them without securing the prior consent of a medical doctor.

  Chapter 1

  Was he devil or man?

  He was devil for aught they knew.

  — Tennyson

  There wasn’t a lot of activity in Eastham’s Billingsgate Harbor that spring of 1716: a few scarred fishing vessels, a dory tied at the pier, and a half-dozen gulls that were too lazy to chase the incoming boats for scraps of cod. When a threatening storm forced a battered old sloop flying the colors of England at her masthead into that harbor, tongues were wagging.

  “A tight little ship,” mused Joseph Doane, the Justice of the Peace, as he stood on the wharf with his sea-grizzled neighbors and watched the sun sink down through the clouds and into the gold, then crimson, waters of Massachusetts Bay. The vessel’s sails turned to fire before darkening in silhouette against the painted sky. Through the smoke that crawled about his craggy features Doane stared hard at them, then pulled his pipe from his mouth with methodical slowness. “Who’d ye say her master is? Some fellow named Bellamy?”

  William Smith, just arriving after a long—but bountiful—day of net-casting in the shoal waters, tossed a line to one of Doane’s cronies and hauled himself up onto the pier to join them. “Aye, Bellamy,” he grunted, deftly tying his boat to a cleat. “From Devon, or so John Knowles tells me.”

  “A West Countryman, eh? Can’t be all bad, then. Wonder what he’s doing in these parts….”

  “Heard he’s come to try to stir up interest in some treasure hunting scheme of his.”

  “Treasure hunting? Be serious, man!”

  “Aye, ’tis true. That’s what Knowles told me.”

  “Knowles? What’s he know, anyhow? Always starting rumors and getting folk all riled up about nothing.” Doane shoved the pipe back between his teeth. “I’d no sooner believe him than I would those two scatterbrained daughters of his!”

  But such puzzled speculations were not shared by the pious, white-haired Reverend Treat, who had his own firm beliefs as to why such a bold, adventurous sort as Samuel Bellamy had chosen to drop anchor in Billingsgate Harbor. “The devil’s own!” he expostulated to his faithful flock that Sunday morning. “Come to stir up trouble, no doubt!”

  And judging by the way some of the twittering, mob-capped female members of his congregation were ignoring his sermon and whispering about the Devonian sea captain instead, it would seem his prediction was beginning to ring true. The devil was already at work….

  * * *

  “I don’t see why you’re getting your hopes up, Jane. ’Tis said he’s only staying here ’til the weather clears,” whispered young Thankful Knowles, pretending to be engrossed in her hymnbook.

  “Hopes? You watch, Sis. I’ll catch his eye before week’s end, I promise you. And I don’t care a whit about the weather. If that’s what’s keeping him here then Lord, I hope it rains all summer!”

  Heads were turning. Old matrons glared disapprovingly, and the younger ones wondered what the loud whispering and hushed giggles were all about. A deacon scowled at them from beneath beetled brows, and the pastor shot them a warning glance.

  The whispers lowered. “But Jane, the Reverend Treat says he has
the devil in him.”

  “I know, ninny. ’Tis what makes him so…appealing. Think I’d waste my time if he was as tame as everyone else around here?”

  “Really, Jane, you go too far! Besides, you are promised to another!”

  But the glance that Jane tossed her sister was arched and dismissing.

  “Maybe he brings news from England,” speculated young Maria Hallett in the pew directly behind them. “You can’t say he has the devil in him just because he didn’t come to the service. Perhaps he has good reasons for not attending.”

  “Maria, hold your tongue! You heard the reverend!” snapped the dour-faced woman who sat stiffly beside her. She shot a withering glance at the Knowles sisters before glaring at her niece’s bent, golden head. “He brings naught but trouble, and if you girls shared a brain between you, you’d stay away from him!” She lowered her voice for Maria’s ears alone. “Shameless hussies! Such talk, and on the Lord’s day besides!”

  But her words, meant to dissuade her niece from any thoughts she might entertain about the reputedly handsome English captain, were unnecessary. Maria Hallett, sitting quietly with her gaze on her hymnbook—and her thoughts on Jonathan Dratham, her hoped-for suitor—had not the slightest bit of interest in either the bold adventurer from the West Country or Reverend Treat’s lengthy sermon. And given the fact that the town had such a handsome visitor, it was purely coincidental, of course, that today’s sermon warned of the just rewards of those who partook of the sins of the flesh.

  But young Maria was ignorant of the sins of the flesh, had not made the Englishman’s acquaintance, and had no desire to. Besides, her aunt’s eagle-eyed countenance would quickly smother any romantic notions on her part such as those the Knowles sisters were entertaining.

  It certainly wasn’t that she hadn’t reached marriageable age. Maria was fifteen years old; a young fifteen in that her aunt allowed her to lead nothing but the most sheltered, protected life: an old fifteen in that her winsome, head-turning beauty—piles of thick, gilded hair now pinned up off a graceful neck and modestly covered by her cap, eyes of sea-green, and a face so delicate, so perfectly formed, that its flawlessly creamy skin only emphasized the faint hollows beneath her high cheekbones and the soft shades of rosy apricot that were apt to bloom there whenever Maria was thinking, as she was now, about Jonathan Dratham—gave her two or three extra years that she really hadn’t earned. But if one looked closely there were indications, despite the high, budding breasts, the blossoming curves, that marked Maria Hallett as the young girl she actually was.

  Namely, the purity in her eyes.

  For if Maria Hallett was not paying attention to the reverend’s ardent sermon, it was because she was too innocent to understand it.

  So instead she sat in the hard pew, the unforgiving wooden seat beginning to make her squirm and earning her another sharp glare from her aunt. It was still pouring outside; the Cape Cod wind splattered the windows with rain and whistled around the eaves outside. The room smelled like wet wool and leather, tallow and wood, and although it was a futile attempt, candles tried desperately to inject some cheer into the gloominess that the gray day spawned.

  The sermon seemed destined to last forever. Sighing, Maria glanced down at the leather book in her lap. The Knowles sisters were whispering quite loudly now and beside her, Auntie’s face was tight with disapproval. If the girls weren’t careful, they were going to earn the chastisement of a deacon—or worse, Reverend Treat. Dutifully, Maria lowered her gaze once more, trying her best to understand the sermon, indeed, just to hear it.

  “Seriously, Jane, how long do you think he’ll be here?” Thankful was asking.

  “I told you, ninny, ’til the storm blows out to sea!”

  “Well, can you find out for certain? After all, your friend Prudence does work at the tavern. That’s where he’s staying, isn’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  “I wonder why he didn’t come to church—”

  Reverend Treat looked up sharply. “Girls!”

  Surprised, the Knowles sisters hushed in mid-whisper.

  “Thank you,” he said with affronted dignity. Raising his old white head, he cleared his throat and continued in a thunderous voice. “Yes, my good children, the torments of Satan’s Hell await those who succumb to the wicked call of the flesh! Eternal damnation is reserved for those who partake of and savor the Devil’s own pleasures! Repent, my faithful flock! For impenitent sinners will writhe in hell, with a thousand devils rending and tearing and ripping them throughout all Eternity!”

  Caught up in his sermon once more, the reverend’s voice rose in passionate conviction, drowning out the occasional coughs and murmurs of his congregation, the sound of the rain beating against the thick glass windows, and the whisperings of the Knowles sisters, which had resumed once more.

  * * *

  Outside the meeting house Thankful and Maria stood waiting in the drizzle, for after the service it was Aunt Helen’s habit to speak with the reverend and Mrs. Knowles’s to gossip with her neighbors. The fact that it was still raining seemed to make no difference; if anything, the two were dallying longer than usual. Now even Jilly, Aunt Helen’s ornery mare, was growing restless and steam had begun to rise from her neck as she tossed her head and stamped her feet in impatience.

  “Really, Thankful, for your own sake I wish you’d be more careful,” Maria said, taking a firm grip on the mare’s wet bridle. “Did you see the looks you were getting from Reverend Treat? Next time he’ll make a spectacle out of you in front of everyone, mark my words!”

  “Good heavens, Maria! You’re starting to sound just like your aunt. Next you’ll be telling me the wrath of God will be ’pon my head for not listening to the sermon.”

  “Well?”

  “Well, what?”

  “Well, Sunday service is hardly the place to be discussing men.”

  Thankful rolled her eyes. “Oh, for goodness sake! Where else are we to discuss them? Doesn’t God want us to choose good, Christian men as our husbands?”

  “This Sam Bellamy does not sound like a good Christian man to me,” Maria declared importantly. “After all, he wasn’t at the service today, was he? And he doesn’t sound like he’d make a good husband, either.”

  “Oh what do you know. You haven’t even met the man!”

  “The way everyone’s talking about him, I don’t think I want to!”

  Thankful raised her chin, but it was impossible to look down her nose at Maria, who stood taller than she—and every other woman in Eastham—did. So instead she shrugged, huddled deeper into her woolen cloak, and watched Maria’s brown-and-white dog leap into the cart, where he tracked muddy paw-prints all over the wet seat. “And I suppose you have her own ideas of what constitutes a good husband?”

  “As a matter of fact, yes, I do.”

  “And?”

  Maria stroked Jilly’s warm, wet nose and blushed. “Well, for one thing, he’d never miss Sunday service. Second, he’d have to be someone who’s not a seafarer. Auntie says they’re the worst of sorts. And third, he’d have to be a man whose name wasn’t on the tongue of every woman in the parish.”

  “But aren’t you even curious about Bellamy?”

  “No. Should I be?”

  Again, Thankful rolled her eyes. “Heavens, Maria, you have such a lot to learn.”

  “Well, there are men right here in Eastham who’d make far better husbands than some foreigner who doesn’t even go to church.”

  “Still got your cap set for Jonathan, do you?”

  Maria’s eyes widened in alarm. “Yes, and don’t you dare go breathing a word of it to anyone!”

  “Oh, don’t be a goose. Of course I won’t. But why you don’t want anyone to know is simply beyond me. Are you going to keep it a secret when the two of you marry?”

  “Marry!” Maria gave a short, dismissing laugh. And then she sighed, and her shoulders drooped hopelessly. “He’s not going to marry me, Thankful. He doesn’t even
know I exist.”

  “Oh, come now—”

  “’Tis true. He says hello to me, but aside from that he treats me like a child, beneath his notice and nothing but a bother. I wear my prettiest gown when I come to town, I weave blankets and give them to his mother—she has so many little ones to worry about, you know—and still he doesn’t pay me one bit of attention. Even praying doesn’t seem to work.”

  Thankful raised her brows, for Maria’s beauty was, after all, the envy of every woman in Eastham. She should have no trouble netting Jonathan Dratham. “Oh, I’m certain he cares about you,” she said convincingly. “But I tell you, making blankets and praying are not going to be the things to actually make him notice you. Now listen to me. You’re a woman. The good Lord gave you beauty, but sometimes men need a little push. I’d suggest giving Jonathan some competition if you want to catch his eye.”

  Maria looked up, hopelessly. “Competition?”

  “Why, the Englishman, for one. Samuel Bellamy.”

  “Honestly, Thankful, now you’re really being ridiculous!”

  “Shh! Keep your voice down lest someone hears you!” She lowered her own to a conspiring whisper that, coupled with the brightening gleam in her eyes, made Maria even more apprehensive. After all, Thankful had a jealous streak that often culminated in practical jokes—jokes that could be downright mean at times.