It's not clear exactly when Penelope was born, for she liked gifts and claimed at least two birthdays a year. However, records show her father, a Cornish tin miner's son made good, changed his name to Cavendish on becoming Governor of Western Virginia in 1733. His wife and five children wanted for nothing; however, his youngest daughter was given to misbehaving dreadfully. Having spent her early childhood living all but feral on Bodmin Moor, the misfit did not take well to the sedate rules of Colonial society, so was packed off back to Cornwall for immersion in the extended family's Presbyterian ways. "Tis most galling," Penelope confessed in a letter. "Oh to be entrusted to you, my dear Cornish white-witch cousins instead. What larks we would have." Surprisingly, Penelope flourished; obeyed the rules and did as she was told. Indeed she was so remarkably well behaved that, through contacts among pre-Revolution bluebloods, she was eventually sent to France for presentation at court. Having bided her time well, she seized the moment when the ship docked on the Continent and, evading her escort, talked her way on to a vessel bound for the far East.
Using her wit and charm, Penelope - by this time, Penny - eventually found herself in the kitchens of the Maharajah of Cooch Behar's palace. His domestic staff delighted in her mimicry and stories of life in the West. By way of reward, she received a few silver trinkets, including a small vial to hang around her neck. That was her downfall.
For Penny had an eye for the bigger, shinier baubles she had seen, and used the vial to dispense an evil brew intended to cause illness in her main rival for the court's attentions. Not being too exact about quantities, she mistakenly caused the poor jester's demise in painful and gruesome circumstances. Oops.
There was no option but to scarper as fast as her bejewelled slippers could go, so she headed straight to the Bay of Bengal where she had arrived only months before. With a price on her head, the slippers and brightest gems were soon sacrificed for witnesses' silence. Penny was keen to get out to sea as soon as possible and in one of the vice-riddled haunts surrounding the harbour, got word of a pirate crew in town.
This was it. Having been surprised by her ambivalence regarding the jester's death, Penny gave her poison another go, putting an end this time to the pirates' chef. She brazened it out, bragged of the deed and let it be known she was replacing him. Thus Poison Penny Cook became a slightly mistrusted member of the crew.
Occasionally, Poison Penny and the rest of the gang struck lucky and had a high old time on the balmy Spanish Main, picking plunder from the cargoes travelling through the Caribbean. The pirates would cross the ocean to blow the lot in the notorious Mermaid Inn of Cornwall, near England. More often, though, they landed behind bars in the Colonies.
All, that is, except one. Poison Penny's bond and a hefty "donation" were consistently paid by an anonymous source, widely believed to be her family which was keen to ensure nobody learned the disgraceful truth behind the bodice. Thus, throughout her shenanigans, Penny never once faced trial.
Eventually, and much to the relief of successive crews, Poison Penny Cook lost her appetite for crusty sea biscuits, settling in a cottage - though how she afforded it led to much conjecture - near that which lay closest to her heart: the Mermaid Inn.
These days, she invites herself aboard various ships and takes to the waves when she pleases. Yet, having been adopted by the Mermaid's most infamous brigands, the Pirates of St Piran, Poison Penny is sure to be found in the notorious den of iniquity whenever the family's home.