Excerpts

from

Alfred and the Pirates

THE BOY STARED at him and then gestured upwards, urgently.  A huge blackened bird with outstretched wings was hovering over the masthead above his head, casting a great shadow over the whole ship.  The men on deck, caught in the sudden gloom, fell silent and looked up too.  Alfred saw the head of the climbing pirate draw level with the top of the crow’s nest.  The man’s eyes were bloodshot, and his lips cracked.  After a pause he lunged towards Alfred. 

The dreams begin:
‘Come here you vermin.  Why didn’t you send the messages?  The captain wants your hide.’
Alfred turned frantically to escape, and caught one of his feet in the rigging.  Tugging and twisting, he broke suddenly free, but fell, bracing himself for the impact, to crash headlong onto the deck far below…

The dreams continue:
…the minute he was drawn back on board, he knew that something was badly amiss.  What could have happened while he was away?  Sprat shot off the bowsprit as he stood nervously near the front of the ship, out of sight, gazing the horizon that lay stretched infinitely before him.  Something had gone terribly wrong.

Alfred despairs:
Maybe he was going really mad.  He tried to imagine himself in a small room with bars, and padding, and white-coated doctors pointing at him to one another and talking about ‘delusions,’ and ‘fixations.’  He would have to get somebody’s attention and talk about it.  It was flatly impossible that dead pirates could walk up their staircase, wasn’t it?