The wind seemed to play against the doors of the tavern. Then they swung open and a sudden gust coursed through the room, spraying fine mist across the tables.

"Winston, damn me if I didn't figure I'd find you here." Benjamin Briggs pushed into the room, shook the rain from his wide hat, and reached for a chair. "I'm told you were the last to see that Yoruba of mine. That he tried to kill you this moming, much as he aimed to murder me."

"He was at Oistins, true enough." Winston glanced up.

"That's what I heard. They're claiming he and those savages of his brutally murdered some of Cromwell's infantry." He shook his hat one last time and tossed it onto the table. "We've got to locate him. Maybe you have some idea where he is now?"

"He didn't trouble advising me of his intended whereabouts."

"Well, he's a true savage, by my soul. A peril to every Christian on this island." He sighed and looked at Winston. "I don't know whether you've heard, but the Roundheads have already started disarming our militia. We'll soon have no way to defend ourselves. I think I winged him last night, but that heathen is apt to come and kill us both if we don't hunt him down and finish the job while we've still got the chance." He lowered his voice. "I heard about those flintlocks of yours. I was hoping maybe you'd take some of your boys and we could go after him whilst things are still in a tangle over at Oistins."

Winston sat unmoving. "Remember what I told you the other day, about freeing these Africans? Well, now I say damned to you. You can manage your slaves any way you like, but it'll be without my flintlocks."

"That's scarcely an attitude that'll profit the either of us at the moment." Briggs signaled to Joan for a tankard of kill-devil. "Peculiar company you keep these days, Mistress Fuller. 'Twould seem the Captain here cares not tuppence for his own life. Well, so be it. I'll locate that savage without him if I needs must." He took a deep breath and gazed around the empty room. "But lest my ride down here be for naught, I'd as soon take the time right now and settle that bargain we made."

Joan poured the tankard and shoved it across the table to him. "You mean that woman you own?"

"Aye, the mulatto wench. I'm thinking I might go ahead and take your offer of a hundred pounds, and damned to her."