The pirate Bartholomew Roberts is an enigma. As a Calvinist Christian, he refuses his crew both strong drink and women on his ship. Despite his high moral standards, however, the lovely and seductive Lady Mary Jane Llewellyn, with whom he has a love-hate relationship, is aboard. Roberts wears the scarlet cape of a cardinal of the Catholic Church, with a large diamond cross blessed by the pope around his neck-and yet he conducts Protestant services every Sabbath. He confounds all expectations when, after attacking the ships of the Royal African Company, he routinely sets their black gold slaves free.

Roberts flies not the black Jolly Roger flag with its skull and crossbones, but instead a red pennant upon which are stitched two forms: a skeleton and a rover, both reaching for a gold chalice. Some say it is life and death reaching for a tankard of ale, but they’re wrong. To Roberts, all of creation is a dance between life and death, and in the cup the answer awaits those brave enough to chase it.

For his actions and attitudes, both the king and the pope want him dead-but Roberts discovered that in death, he found the key to life.