Father's Day

     “‘Walk the plank’? Wherever did you get that idea, child?”
     "Mama told me stories of the buccaneers and the pirates who live in the islands. She said my Papa was the fiercest pirate of all!”
     He wasn’t about to deny such a sterling character reference.
     “Fiercest of all, am I? Hmmm…it occurs to me that if you are going to join the crew of my ship we need to give you a pirate name.”
      She stopped skipping and looked up at him, and one would think he’d just handed her the moon on a platter.
     “A pirate name! Oh yes, please, Papa!”
     They resumed walking and he thought about it, swinging her valise as he walked. She began skipping again.
     “Not that there is anything wrong with Mathilde,” he assured her. “It is a perfectly lovely name for a young lady. It strikes me though as not being piratical. Women who are pirates have names that are simple, but do not detract from their fierceness. Girls like Anne Bonny and Mary Read.”
     “There are girl pirates?” If she looked happy before, now he feared she would explode with excitement.
     “Yes, indeed there are. I will show you Captain Johnson’s book of pirates when we’re aboard the Prodigal. So. What shall your name be?”
     “What is your pirate name, Papa?”
     “I find being Captain St. Armand is sufficient in the course of a day’s work,” he said dryly. “For you…what about Tilly?”
     She thought about this, her steps slowing as she tried the name out.
     “No, Papa, not Tilly. If you give me that name, people might call me ‘Silly Tilly’ and that would not be a good pirate name.”
     “An excellent point,” he said. They were now in town and people called out greetings to them, some even fit for the ears of an impressionable child. He ignored most of it and concentrated on the task at hand.
     “I have it!” he snapped his fingers and looked at her. “Mattie! You will be Mattie! How does sound? Marauding Mattie, scourge of the West Indies!”


--WIP [working title] The Hot Pirate's Secret Baby, aka The Pirate's Governess

Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there, especially the ones who understand little girls who long to be pirates.