A Shot of Oakies

Alex Bennett

Description

A tale of bourbon and pirates with a little Shakespearean flair!

Kingston, Jamaica 1785. Despite a tropical storm hitting the island, Sarah, the bartender at Henry’s, opens the pub for the night. When an old sea captain takes a seat and she offers him a drink, his reply is cryptic and, he warns, it leads to a story. Insisting he continue, a regular patron buys his first round and thus the adventure begins . . .
It’s 1742, Europe is a battlefield and a rebellion brews in Scotland. In the Americas, Mairi, a young Scotswoman, stumbles upon an innovative method for distilling whiskey. The spirit attracts the attention of Clarkeson, a beautiful Irish pirate, and she seizes a British ship rumored to have several barrels aboard. Declaring a personal war on the English, she executes the captain and claims the Caribbean Sea.
As her notoriety crosses the Atlantic, it reaches an English pirate-hunter fighting the Spanish in the Mediterranean. Intrigued by the stories, he and his crew of whisky drinkers are faced with a conundrum—are the reports of this pirate, and her ‘Oakies’, credible enough to make it worth taking the journey to the New World?

Sujets

• Álex
• Alex
• Bennett
• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Xlibris US
• Date de parution: 02 mars 2023
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781669862642
• Langue: English

Extrait

THE OLDE ROSIE CHRONI CLES
A SHOT OF OA KIES
VOLU ME I
 
 
 
 
 
 
ALEX BEN NETT
 
 
Copyright © 2023 by Alex Bennett.

Library of Congress Control Number:
           2023900640
ISBN:
Hardcover
978-1-6698-6265-9

Softcover
978-1-6698-6263-5

eBook
978-1-6698-6264-2
 
 
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.
 
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
 
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.
 
 
 
 
Rev. date: 03/02/2023
 
 
 
Xlibris
844-714-8691
www.Xlibris.com
849456
CONTENTS
Acknowlegements
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Epilogue
Coming Soon: Book 2 of the Olde Rosie Chronicles “The King’s Firkin”
Chapter 1
Appendix A
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
To Mom for dealing with my artistic side,
the ladies who taught me the lessons I needed to learn,
and all my regulars for making this possible…
Thank you!
ACKNOWLEGEMENTS
Trisha Charlotte Albano—Star of the cover
Instagram: @trishaalbano
Stephen Gardner—Cover art
Website: www.gardnerillustration .com
Instagram: @gardnerillustration
Melissa LoBianco—Proofreading
Website: wanderingpathremedies.godaddysites.com
Aine McGillycuddy—Translations.
Facebook page: The Irish Skinny
Gregg Obodzinski—Map compasses
Website: www.GreggsDeepColors.com
Facebook page: Gregg’s Deep Colors—Paintings and Artwork of Gregg Obodzinski
And last but not least—All the people who read my work and gave me feedback. Your input was invaluable!
 

CHAPTER 1
October 1, 1785, Kingston, Jamaica
W ith a spark, the burning switch lit the fresh wick atop the beeswax candle on the mantel behind the bar, and though a dozen lanterns already illuminated the room, the sweet aroma immediately brightened the entire space. While a thin white melting rivulet began meandering through the ten metal pins inserted down the left side of the stick, Sarah blew out the switch and, continuing the tradition her grandfather had established forty-three years before, tugged on the knotted rope dangling from the bell tower over her head. Despite the tropical storm battering the island, she heard the familiar clear peal announcing Henry’s was open for the evening, took a deep breath, and turned to face the familiar coarse squeak of a stool being pulled out.
“Hello,” she said to an old sea captain taking the spot farthest on her left, where the hand-crafted mahogany top spanning the width of the room met the exposed white brick wall. The moment he sat down, lightning flashed through the gaps in the wooden shutters covering the arched windows flanking the front door, and as he scooched forward, it sporadically flickered to the ensuing rumble of thunder. Forced to wait out the clamor, Sarah smiled and held his bright blue eyes until she could follow up, “What can I get for you?”
Slowly stroking his long white bushy beard, he looked to the three different-sized casks in the cradle beneath the mantel and asked, “What do ye have?”
Hooking her right thumb toward the largest, a hogshead at the far end with a capital H branded above the tap, she began, “The big one is lager. I still brew it using the same recipe my grandfather developed back in 1742.” Nodding to the barrel in the middle, bearing a scripted vermillion CLT , she furthered, “The next in line is claret. The Dutch captain who ships it to Jamaica says it’s the finest wine produced at the finest estate in the entire Bordeaux region of France, and believe it or not, he swears it gets even better after a couple months at sea.”
“Oh, I believe ye,” the old sea captain attested, his voice booming in the confined place, “only I’m afraid I’m not much of a wine drinker.”
“That’s not a problem,” she went on, tapping her knuckles on the third, last, and smallest cask in the row. “This little firkin is the best spiced rum made in Barbados, and—” she added, with a wink, “they import it to Kingston specifically for me.”
Still stroking his beard, the old sea captain muttered, “Rum from Barbados. My good friend George favors rum from Barbados.”
“Would you like an ounce?”
Vigorously shaking his head, he held both palms forth and asserted, “No, I drank my fill of rum durin’ my time in the Royal Navy, and I’d be perfectly happy to never drink it again.” His gaze shiny and clear, he revealed, “To be sure, I was hopin’ fer a shot of Oakies.”
“A shot of Oakies?” Sarah repeated to another burst of lightning and another roll of thunder. “I’ve never heard of such a thing. What is it?”
Letting out a long happy sigh, he looked to the burning candle on the mantel and suggested, “Fer simplicity’s sake, we’ll call it an ounce and a half of the greatest whiskey the world has ever known.”
Frowning, she leaned forward and told him, “Then you must be new to the Caribbean. This is rum country. You’ll be hard-pressed to find any good whisky in these parts.”
Raising his big white bushy brows, the old sea captain countered, “Although I always hesitate to tell a bartender she’s wrong, I feel compelled to mention I’ve sailed the world round and I’ve tried every whiskey in every port of call to have it and I can promise ye, I’ve never had one better than the one I had the last time I sat on this very stool.” Digging his fingertips into the smooth timeworn wooden top, once a captain’s table salvaged out of a sunken Spanish galleon, he closed his eyes and murmured, “Bein’ here again, I can almost taste it—uisge beatha.”
Suddenly, a bolt of lightning crackled nearby, the thunder bellowed overhead, and a heavy downpour began echoing off the roof. The previous night, a hurricane had reached the southern Atlantic, and in unleashing a series of intermittent storms on Jamaica, it effectively closed the Port of Kingston. While Sarah had opened for lunch earlier in the day, Henry’s had remained empty, so she had taken advantage of the weather and gone home for the afternoon. In the evening, however, she had returned to Tony waiting with Rags at the door and Nancy, her serving maid, arriving a few minutes later.
Now, seven spots separated the old sea captain and Tony, who had pulled out his stool and stood with his left foot resting on the brass rail running six inches off the floor. Like always, he had used a red silk bow to tie his wavy graying black hair in a ponytail, waxed his dark mustache straight off the corners of his lips, and trimmed his dark goatee into a point on his well-defined chin. His white silk blouse and red leather vest were only buttoned halfway, exposing the sizable Spanish gold coin on the sizable braided gold chain in the midst of the curly hair blanketing his chest, and his black velvet pants were tucked into the tops of his muddy knee-high black leather boots. To his left, Rags sat on the second to last stool before the end. He wore a simple black blouse with tan pants and a small silver crucifix on a thin silver chain. His gray skin was wrinkly, his gray eyes were watery, and his few remaining strands of wispy gray hair were slicked back in an attempt to cover his bald head. Facing them both, Nancy, who was dressed in the same white shift, black waistcoat, and black bow tie as Sarah, stood in the gap leading behind the bar, and they all quietly chatted together.
The thunder faded in the background, and looking at the old sea captain, Sarah said, “I’m sorry, I couldn’t hear you. What was that?”
“Uisge beatha,” he repeated, smiling wide, “It’s Gaelic, and literally translated, it means ‘water of life.’” Covering his heart with his right hand and raising his left index finger, he declared, “And I’ve witnessed many a person who either couldn’t speak the language or, fer some reason wouldn’t speak it, utter the phrase upon takin’ their first sip of Oakies. It was like magic. Ye just couldn’t help yerself.”
“If it was that good,” she asserted, tilting her head to the left, “I’m surprised I never heard of it. Do ye know where my grandfather got it?”
Chuckling softly, the old sea captain replied, “If only there was an easy way to answer such a simple question.” Seeing her cross her arms, he opened his palms and quickly followed up, “To be sure, I’d be getting into a story.”
Uncrossing her arms and placing her hands on her waist, she repeated, “A story? What story is that?”
“Some call it the legend of Old One-Eyed Clarkeson,” he got out a moment prior to a particularly vicious clap of lightning and angry bout of thunder.
Without flinching, Sarah arched her brows and remarked, “Old One-Eyed Clarkeson? I’ve never heard of him. Who was he?”
Slowly stroking his beard, the old sea captain explained, “Well, he wasn’t a he, fer Clarkeson was a she, and fer those who didn’t know any better, they’d say she was the most beautiful pirate to ever sail these seas