The Pirate Ship

If you just visited the island once, you would believe it.

Islands in the Caribbean come alive with a flicker of sunshine. The ocean lights up from the center and rain mists form over the deep blue of the relentless sea.

The island was St. Kitts, named after its discoverer, Christopher Columbus. It was the first island in the Caribbean where I lived and it left its greatest impression on me.

I discovered the pirate ship or rather the plans for the pirate ship by accident. The previous week I had driven to Keys Village, a small bump in the road about six miles from Basseterre. A villager named Lynnette whom I had met at the Newfoundland Bar on the edge of Keys Village had invited me to spend the day with her family.

Lynnette was strikingly attractive. She did the hair of tourists she met on the beach, using cactus plants and other natural ingredients to bring out the beauty in their hair. She had built a tree house behind the road leading into Key's Village and I often spent nights there with her looking at the blinking lights of the ships at sea.

'My brother is a pirate,' she said one evening. We were drinking rum and Coke that I had purchased at a convenience store in town.

'You have four brothers,' I reminded her. 'Which one is the pirate?'

'Steve,' she said. 'The 15-year-old.'

When Steve got home that day from soccer practice, I asked him about being a pirate. Steve smiled shyly.

'Has my sister been telling you things about me?'

'Perhaps. What are you going to do to make yourself into a pirate?'

Steve smiled. 'Build a pirate ship, of course. That is the way we will start.'

His house was about 300 yards from the beach. He took me down to the beach that afternoon, along with three of his friends. They were muscular island boys who had never left the island.

'Are you the reporter who plays poker?,' one of the kids wanted to know. I said I was and he said he had heard of me.

'They say you are a good poker player,' he continued. 'Maybe you can invest in our pirate ship. The tourists come here and they ask us about pirates. Some of our ancestors were pirates, but we don't know what to tell them. Steve came up with the idea of building a pirate ship and taking the tourists on cruises.'

'For a price,' said one of the other kids. All the boys nodded solemnly.

'So what will you serve them on the ship?' I said.

'Drinks. food. We'll have a reggae band. Maybe they can fish from the back of the boat. There will be things to do,' said Steve.

'And how will you build your pirate ship.'

'From the natural materials we find on the island,' said Steve. 'We will make it very authentic. You'll see.'

That conversation with Steve and his friends took place about 10 years ago. I lost track of Steve. Lynnette told me he joined a gang. I hope he didn't run into problems with the police. That would have been bad. Steve was a good kid who had dreams. He dreamed big and he wanted to build a pirate ship.

His sister, Natasha, was an island beauty who had chosen an island where she wanted to live. I have never been on that island. Natasha once had me pull the car to the side of the road and she pointed it out -- a bare smudge off in the tropical sea.

'That is my island, Geno, I am going to live there one day. Will you come visit me? She laughed and ran into the ocean.

Steve said all the boys in his village had promised to work on the pirate ship.

'That way we will all be owners,' he said. 'We will share the income with our families.'

''Like capitalists?'

'Like capitalists. Except pirates will own it.' We both laughed.