Peril on the Sea by Michael Cadnum

particular,” said Captain Fletcher.
    â€œHow can it be you are such a relentless thief,” asked Katharine, “being, as you seem, a man of merit?”
    â€œYou pay me a compliment, Lady Katharine.”
    She was impressed by the captain’s appearance, and the way his offhand, easy manner barely disguised a cutting intensity. She could easily imagine a young woman being won over by his attentions.
    â€œBut I do not seek to flatter you, Captain,” she responded after a pause. “I want to know.”
    â€œTake our well-known hero Drake as an example,” saidthe captain. “He voyaged around the globe with over five score men in his crew, returned to Greenwich with scant two dozen remaining, and those living skeletons kept together by lice and scurvy scabs. I have seen brave men with their bellies shot out, and I have seen soldiers run through heart and lung, guttering for breath. I steal because I am crafty enough to avoid killing, and because I hate to see my men bleed.”
    â€œBut this does not answer the question, Captain, if you please,” Katharine persisted. “Why you do not ply a trade as a master of law or a scholar of the sea, or any other honorable profession?”
    â€œKatharine,” protested Sir Anthony, “you press our guest too hard.”
    But Sherwin leaned forward, very interested, she thought, in Fletcher’s possible response.
    â€œI am as honest with myself as I wish other men were,” said Fletcher with a laugh. “As a young clerk, through dint of hard work and talent, I rose up to the station of controller of the Queen’s Navy, if I may make a painful and lengthy story brief. I made sure that every purser was prudent, and that every strake and sheet were accounted for. I was good at what I did, but I was envied.”
    Katharine liked the captain’s manner. He had a way of looking at his audience, winning their attention, and then letting his gaze wander, firelight in his eyes.
    â€œWhy,” she asked, “were you envied?”
    â€œMen wished they could occupy my position, LadyKatharine,” the captain continued, “so that they could profit. They accused me of being a dishonest man, and while I was no thief, I was a man touched with the sin of pride. I resigned in a foul temper, and decided that if people thought me a thief, why, then, that’s what I would be.”
    â€œSurely, Captain,” said Katharine, with what she hoped was not ill-mannered directness, “you had a choice.”
    The captain lifted a hand from the table and quietly let it fall, as though to say such further examination of his own nature did not interest him.
    He reflected for a moment, however. “I was raised in Dover,” he explained. “My father was a purchaser for the Royal Navy, and I was well accustomed to tides and the compass rose, being a sailor since my youth. After my dishonor, I took to the sea. I suffered a thief’s reputation, and I decided that I would enjoy a robber’s swag. And so I do, and I regret nothing.”
    â€œYou might well say, sir, that you are a trustworthy man in a disguise,” said Sherwin hopefully.
    Perhaps, thought Katharine, he wanted to preserve a positive outlook on the moral fiber of the captain he served.
    â€œNo,” said the captain emphatically, drawing the word out and then laughing. “No, I was always going to be as you see me.”
    â€œBut you are careful with the health of your shipmates,” suggested Sherwin.
    â€œAh, and there you have me cornered, my wise younghistorian. Not a fortnight ago, I tried to steal a prize ship from some of Drake’s colleagues, and lost four of my soldiers in the fighting. I was badly upset by this failure on my part to protect their lives. This is why I am so reluctant to see my ship take part in any glorious battle to safeguard our kingdom. I detest bloodshed, and I am too softhearted, I think, to serve as