"The famous 'Captain' Jackson, you mean?"
"Captain William Jackson."
"Sure, I recall that lying knave well enough." She snorted. "Who could forget him. He was here for two months once, while you were out, and turned Barbados upside down, recruiting men to sail against the Spaniards' settlements on the Main. Claiming he was financed by the Earl of Warwick. He sat drinking every night at this very table, then left me a stack of worthless sight drafts, saying he'd be back in no time to settle them in Spanish gold." She studied him for a moment. "That was four years past. The best I know he was never heard from since. For sure / never heard from him." Suddenly she leaned forward. "Don't tell me you know where he might be?"
"Not any more. But I learned last year what happened back then. It turns out he got nothing on the Main. The Spaniards would empty any settlement—Maracaibo, Puerto Cabello—he tried to take. They'd just strip their houses and disappear into the jungle."
"So he went back empty-handed?"
"Wrong. That's what he wanted everybody to think happened. Especially the Earl of Warwick. He kept on going." Winston lowered his voice again, beyond reach of the men across the room. "I wouldn't believe what he did next if I didn't have these pistols." He picked up one of the guns and yelled toward the whist table. "John."
"Aye." Mewes was on his feet in an instant, wiping his hand across his mouth.
"Remember where I got these flintlocks?"
"I seem to recall it was Virginia. Jamestown." He reached down and lifted his tankard for a sip. Then he wiped his mouth a second time. "An' if you want my thinkin', they was sold to you by the scurviest-lookin' whoreson that ever claim'd he was English, that I'd not trust with tuppence. An' that's the truth."
"Well . . ." She leaned back in her chair.