Excerpt from my novel FATE.
The Murder of Captain Eoin 'Bonny' Devlin
As he stepped onto the deck, he could feel the pulse of the schooner beneath his feet, a reminder of the bond they shared, ship and man. His reputation had been forged back when Eoin Devlin inherited The Lilly White from Captain O'Sullivan all those years ago ... the man who had given him, as a Wicklow boy, his start in whaling. The memory of O’Sullivan’s hand on his shoulder, and the old man’s quiet belief in him, gave Eoin Devlin the assurance he needed for this day.
Each sound aboard The Lilly White resonated within him, except for one sound … the silence amongst the crew. He took a long moment to survey his schooner, his sanctuary, his home on the seas, his Lilly White … and the crew.
The same crew who once rallied around him in good times knew this day would come ... when Captain Devlin would confront Little Joe Cox. A deafening silence shrouded The Lilly White, as if Death itself had stepped aboard and taken its place among them … and the dead with it, watching from whatever thin veil drifts over a ship at sea.
As Captain Devlin approached the helm where Little Joe Cox stood in defiance, the air thickened even more. Marcus Meagher fell in behind the captain, with the Irish cook and his son close after. All crew members ... those for and those against and those too frightened to choose ... they watched in that cramped, breath-held anticipation of what might unfold, aware in their bones that the dead often gather when a reckoning is near, and Lucifer was guaranteed not to be too far off when souls needed to be guided home.
Captain Devlin’s boots echoed off the wooden planks of The Lilly White, planks which needed a good scrubbing down. In a place where the usual rhythm of life on a whaling schooner came to a halt, it felt as though invisible forces were holding everything in place. The stillness was almost tangible, but you could feel a dryness in your mouth that created an atmosphere thick with anticipation ... as if the very soul of the vessel was holding its breath, waiting for something to happen. Each step of the captain resonated like a heartbeat, a reminder of life amid the eerie calm that had settled over the ship, hinting that the world outside had faded away, leaving only a deep, intimate connection between the individual and their fate.
Little Joe Cox stood facing him, the tired shadow of the man he once was, his knuckles pale against the dark helm as he gripped it far too tightly. Captain Devlin could see that Little Joe’s eyes were clouded with uncertainty … and he wondered, just for a moment, how he himself appeared to Little Joe under the gaze of the living and the dead alike. Who was watching who now?
The wind, picking up, carried the cold whisper of a foreboding chill ... one of those warnings that the dead hear first … and that only fate knows the outcome of. And maybe ... Captain O’Sullivan.
The two men, and if you were a stranger, looked as if they could be father and son who had once shared a bond of friendship that now felt like it belonged to another lifetime ... stood in opposition to one another. That friendship had long been substituted by the cold, hard reality of Whacky Cox’s misadventure ... the foolish step that cost him his life and brought every soul aboard to their knees. And now the death of Captain Devlin’s sister had been thrown into that boiling pot of fate, as if the old powers were stirring things none of them understood. They were just playing out their fate.
The anger in Little Joe, fed by misunderstandings and a supposed betrayal he felt deeply, had festered in him until it brought this moment to where it was now … the mutiny of The Lilly White. As they faced each other, the memory of his brother flashed behind Little Joe’s eyes ... a flicker of regret showing there like a candle guttering in the wind. He could hear Whacky calling out to him to stop. Little Joe's jaw clenched. His hands dropped by his sides, fists balled. He held his ground, refusing to back away … refusing to give the helm over to Captain Devlin, no matter who witnessed ... living or dead.
Little Joe was no longer Joseph Patrick 'Little Joe' Cox. He had become a manifestation of the grief and rage that had consumed him in the dark days following his brother's death, a man reduced to his most fundamental essence ... stripped back to the bone. Each moment since that tragic loss had carved deeper lines into his soul, into his heart, etching the pain of his experience into his very being.
The world he once knew now felt different, almost as if he had become an
outsider peering down from the top mast. In this deep state of grief, he was not just a man ... he was body and soul filled with pain, molded by the shadows of his sorrow and the
flames of his anger, trying to navigate a reality that felt both
familiar and strange. He was not backing down now.
The crew held their breath, some bunching up behind Little Joe, waiting for the first move or the first word that would shatter the silence … but nobody saw it coming. Captain Devlin fell back onto The Lilly White’s unscrubbed deck with Little Joe’s knife in his stomach. Blood oozed out onto The Lilly White’s deck.
Marcus Meagher dropped to his knees, lifting Captain Eoin Devlin’s head in his left hand, his right hand placed gently on his stomach. The crew backed away from Little Joe, who looked around him as if to justify support for a revenge killing in honor of his brother. But nobody wanted the good Captain Devlin dead. Not this.
His last words were to Marcus Meagher, telling him that the paperwork had already been completed in case of his death, and that Marcus was now the captain of The Lilly White, should anything happen to him. Captain Devlin died on his beloved Lilly White, watching her sails billowing in the wind, knowing he had passed her on to a good man who would care for her as much as he did.
At that moment, the gravity of what Little Joe had done settled over Marcus Meagher like a heavy fog. Captain Devlin’s words were not just a transfer of ownership and captaincy, but a challenge now … to rise in the face of Captain Devlin’s murder in acting as the Devil's Advocate.
Little Joe was only then realizing what he had done, shouting out to the crew ... though it was really a declaration meant for God Himself, and for Whacky, wherever he might be listening from...
''I didn’t mean it to come to this … you’ve got to believe me … I didn’t.''
He stumbled back from Captain Devlin, repeating himself in that same panicked, cracking voice...
''I didn’t mean it to come to this … you’ve got to believe me … I didn’t mean it to … ask Whacky.''
He stumbled back from Captain Devlin, repeating himself in that same panicked, cracking voice...
''I didn’t mean it to come to this … you’ve got to believe me … I didn’t mean it to … ask Whacky.''
The weight of his words hung heavy in the wind that was blowing stronger now, as if it wanted The Lilly White to pull away from that place of death and regret. Little Joe Cox could feel the tension rising in the crew ... a mingling of confusion and anger pressing in on him like the waves now crashing against the hull, urging the schooner to move on from the calamity that had just unfolded.
The salty spray of the ocean mingled with the bitter aftertaste of regret on Little Joe’s lips. He knew he would have to confront the consequences of his shameful deed, a shadow that loomed over him like the dark clouds gathering on the horizon. There would be no escaping what he had done. He had nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. No friends left to justify the blood on his hands. But there were plenty of witnesses ... their eyes bearing witness to the grim reality of what had happened. Each onlooker held a piece of the narrative in a place where loyalty had evaporated, which would pass from mouth to mouth on land and sea of the killing of Captain Devlin.
It would take courage and humility to face the fallout of his disgraceful deed ... qualities he no longer possessed. Little Joe knew that. Humility, once a faint notion in him, was now a foreign thought ... almost unrecognizable, overshadowed by his inflated sense of self-worth. The values that once grounded him had gradually eroded, replaced by an overwhelming sense of pride and self-importance and vengeance that demanded retribution for Whacky's death.
And in his confused mind, he was beginning to understand that facing what came next meant confronting not just the crew, nor the law, but the rotting turmoil now deep inside him. The guilt that had been festering since Whacky’s drowning, now twisted further by Captain Devlin’s death under his knife.
As he wrestled with the fear of a trial ... his judgment, rejection, and the hanging rope he knew was waiting ... the thought of standing before those he had wronged filled Little Joe with a dread colder than the ocean wind that was now beginning to blow.
Marcus Meagher glanced around at the faces of the crew. He saw a mixture of grief and uncertainty, but also a slight flicker of hope in some. The Irish cook looked at Marcus, giving him a reassuring look that made him feel secure. Then something very strange happened to Marcus Meagher ... he thought of liver and Alexander Pearce and their time on the bolt.
He remembered that place inside a man ... the one you only find when survival, or justice, drives you to it. A place raw and primal, where a man is forced to face what he is capable of … and what he is willing to become. It is there that a man wrestles with the weight of his choices in life ... wrestling the internal beast that decides the measure of him ... like Jacob and the Angel. Marcus Meagher was standing in that place now. And so was Little Joe.
They were all in this together now. Little Joe, backing away from Marcus Meagher, took one last look at Captain Eoin ‘Bonny’ Devlin, the knife jutting from his stomach like the harpoon he would have heaved at the whale. Glancing around at the crew, now advancing on him, Little Joe’s eyes burned with fear. Then he bolted towards the railing and its carved notch. His boots hammered across the unscrubbed deck. He moved with the agility of a whippet chasing down a hare, every muscle coiling under the shock of panic and adrenaline.
Reaching the schooner’s rail, Little Joe hesitated for a heartbeat and looked back ... one final glance at Captain Devlin, the man who was friend to him, and at the chaos he was now leaving behind. Little Joe looked at Marcus Meagher and smiled, not a mischievous smile, but a smile of good fortune. The crew’s faces were twisted with anger and betrayal, their shouts urging him to come back … but he heeded none of it. He leapt into the vastness of the ocean, surrendering himself to the deep, to be reunited with his brother Whacky.
Captain Marcus Meagher stepped to the helm and called out…
''Ready full sail.''
At that moment, the howling wind seemed to pause, stalling as if the elements themselves were listening for his command. The crew exchanged looks, a silent understanding passing between them that they were in this together, that they would not falter … not again. Captain Marcus Meagher’s voice rose steady and sure above the wind and the waves, rising above fate itself.
And the crew sprang into action.