Allison stopped and thought of all the smiling faces and good cheer he had seen at the reception the preceding evening.“To think, behind many of those pleasant smiles and polished good manners, some people were not only filled with fear and loathing over the events of the past weeks, but also with suspicion regarding their friends and peers!”“Do you really think it’s quite that bad?” Caldwell asked. “His Excellency could simply be acting on a personal feeling or information that only he was privy to.”“Making a statement like this, encoded or otherwise, is deadly serious. I don’t believe anyone would simply say something like this on intuition alone. Besides, from what we’ve learned of local politics during our short stay here, it’s very easy to envision corrupt officials and landowners secretly implicating or even falsely accusing others while nearly all of them are wallowing in some measure of illicit activity that they want or even need to protect. The mysterious disappearance o

A few last words out of context were all the sailor at the counter could hear as Scott’s voice was drowned out. The fiddler near the hearth had decided to strike up a rather loud and sprightly tune to which a couple of spirited locals decided to dance. A man was cutting a lively jig with his hands folded behind his back while a woman circled around with him, swirling her skirts as she spun. They were quickly joined by more people while other tavern patrons clapped and whooped in time with the fiddler’s music.Undaunted, the sailor slipped his pipe back into his pocket and slid deliberately off of his stool. He grabbed the rum bottle and slowly walked toward the blithesome commotion. Stopping at a small table, he took a generous swallow of rum from the bottle before setting it down. He then began clapping along with the others, stamping his foot in time with the rhythm of the buoyant strain. His attention, however, was still firmly fixed on the gentlemen in the corner who went on with

Later, after the sun had gone below the horizon, Allison sat in his cabin with his two naval lieutenants and Master Washburn going over the direction they had received from Semple as well as the signals he and Suggs had devised. Bosun Tallow already had men hard at work cutting, sewing and painting their new signal pennants which he had been assured would be ready for use by the time they weighed anchor. Allison was just going through the list of basic messages they would generate with those pennants when a hurried knock came at the door.“Come!”Midshipman Hardin walked in to deliver a message.“S-sir, Mr. Bannon sent me to let you know... there’s a dinghy approaching from Allison . There’s... there’s one man aboard. He said you wanted to know immediately, sir.”“Indeed I did. Tell Mr. Bannon to call the men to deck and prepare to receive one person onboard amidships and then recover the dinghy. I will be there presently.”“Yessir!” Hardin answered in the nervous, overly-quick fash

“As I’ve said before,” Weyland started, “it was the matter of underhanded profit-taking that formed the basis of the whole argument Thorpe had with these gentlemen that night. The proprietor of the establishment even went so far as to say that they were so jealous of the fact he was outstripping them in that way, the whole matter almost devolved into a fight. This, of course, is to say nothing of how he probably outshined them in legitimate ways.”Allison now knew what he was saying.“So Thorpe might have learned that they were planning to undermine him in some fashion and he decided to confront them all at the meeting in question,” he said, finishing the lieutenant’s thought. “Now, with him thought to be gone, they’re planning on seeking reparations for his crimes in the name of the government... from his wife and the estate he leaves behind?”Weyland nodded. “From the parts of their conversation I was able to hear, that’s what I gathered. No doubt each of them would find a way to p

A referral to the navigational plot showed them to be holding on their intended track, traveling the shortest possible distance to their destination which would split the twenty or so mile distance between Anguilla and St. Martin to the North and St. Christopher to the South. It was effective and efficient in terms of time spent, but Washburn and his mates continuously grumbled over the necessity to constantly change course.“It’s just the man’s nature,” said Caldwell, who had the watch, as he and Allison stood on the quarterdeck one evening. “Give him some of the best charts to be had by humankind, not to mention two wondrously accurate marine clocks, and it will still never quite do. In his estimation, things can always be done in a better fashion.”“I think he’s just asserting what authority he can,” said Allison , speaking his mind. “We all know he’s the bullish headstrong type, so he’ll always have his own opinion. However, sailing through the Virgin Islands was a prudent measur