HF - 04 - Black Dawn (59 page)

The slave turned his head to look over his shoulder. His friends were coming closer, and more and more people were moving up the hill. The town burned merrily now; the crash of the factory roof as it fell in boomed across the morning.

'Aiiieeeee,' screamed the slave, and ran at the steps. It occurred to Dick that he must have sounded just like that, when leading his cavalry into the charge. But his thought, and the black man's scream, were already history. His arm was levelled, the pistol was kicking against his fingers, black smoke was eddying into his face. The man had reached the steps when the ball struck him square in the chest, at a range of eight feet. His head went back and both arms went up. The machete arced through the air behind him. His chest exploded into red, and he hit the earth with his shoulder blades.

The crowd moving up the hill checked. But it would only be for an instant. Dick stepped inside, and Boscawen slammed the door. Dick dropped the heavy bolts into place, looked back at the house, the tense faces; Cartarette, standing in the centre of the drawing room, a musket in each hand. Suzanne, looking through from the pantry, Barker and Harris, staring at him. Of them all, only he had ever killed in battle. Only he and Cartarette and Suzanne had ever been under fire.

'Hold,' he said. 'And wait.' He stood by the front door, watched the black army swarming up the hill, spreading out as they ran to cover the house from every angle, forming a gigantic enveloping movement.

'Present,' he shouted. 'But hold.'

There was an explosion from the drawing room.

'Hold, God damn you,' he yelled. 'Change your weapon. Reload, Cartarette, Reload. Hold.'

The black men reached the top, panting now, waving their cutlasses; they had all been at the rum. A man climbed over the verandah rail, screaming at the wooden shutters, for the first time noticing that every loophole contained a musket barrel. Now he was joined by his fellows. The verandah was full, and creaking. The first man banged at the front door. At this range a blind man could not miss.

'Fire,' Dick screamed. 'Change your weapons.'

The entire house shook. The crash of the explosions whanged around his ears, and he was surrounded in a seemingly solid cloud of powder smoke, turning his face and hands as black as his assailants. Yet even the noise of the explosions was drowned by the unearthly screams from outside.

'Present,' Dick bawled, the noise ringing in his ears. He left the door, and ran round the house. 'Present,' he bawled, slapping men on the shoulders to bring them back to their, senses. 'Present.'

The fresh muskets went back through the loopholes. Cartarette and her aides were already gathering the used weapons, cramming ball down the barrels, thudding away with their rods, while her titian hair tumbled about her ears; it too was streaked with black powder.

Dick stooped by a loophole, gazed at a scene of destruction not even his experienced eyes could remember. Men lay dead and dying all over the verandah; blood ran into hollows and dripped under the rail. Those left were still standing, dazed, one or two already edging back. 'Fire,' Dick shouted again.

This time he stayed, looking through the aperture. Noise eddied about his head, accompanied by the endless smoke. He watched men collapse, men fall to their knees, men jump from the verandah and stagger down the hill. There were still hundreds of them, perhaps thousands, gathered at a safe distance from the house. And now was the dangerous moment, when all muskets were emptied, save for the few Cartarette and Suzanne had managed to reload. But the slaves were retreating. They had lost perhaps forty men in those two deadly volleys. But far more than mere numbers, they knew that the next time they charged, the leading forty would die again.

He straightened, slowly. His men were withdrawing their muskets through the loopholes, staring at each other in delight. They had used the white man's weapons, and they had killed.

'Well done,' he said. 'Well done. Mr Boscawen, a
ration of rum for every man.' H
e crossed the room, stood beside Cartarette, watched her work, ramming home ball after ball, priming musket after musket, face and hair and dress blackened with smoke, sweat dribbling down her temples, mouth flat with concentration.

She saw his boots, raised her head. 'Will they come again?'

'Not for a while. They'll have to regain their courage.'

He walked into the hall, unbolted the front door, threw it open. Some of the smoke found its way out, the atmosphere became lighter. He wondered if he would ever get his ceilings clean again.

He stepped outside, looked at the dead men. Soon they would smell, whenever the sun rose. Josh had told him that, on his first night here. How many eternities ago.

Someone moved. A hand came up, holding a cutlass. Dick levelled his pistol, squeezed the trigger. The man gave a little leap, and lay still again.

The noise brought Cartaret
te running through the hall, to
check in the doorway in total horror. 'My God,' she said. 'My God.'

He put his arm round her shoulders, the pistol into his belt, took her back inside. Boscawen waited with a tray of rum. Dick took it from him, and the old man closed the door.

'Them boys done, Mr Richard,' he said.

'Aye.' Dick held a glass to Cartarette's lips, and she drank, and coughed, and drank some more.

Suzanne stood in the inner doorway. 'Are all battles like that?'

'All victories.'

'Listen.' Harris had been upstairs to oversee the blacks. 'They're leaving. Listen.'

They could hear the drumming of hooves. Boscawen was hastily withdrawing bolts again. Dick stepped outside, his arm still round Cartarette. Blood dribbled across the floor to wet their boots. 'Oh, God,' she said. 'I am going to vomit.'

He squeezed her against him, went down the steps. The black men were streaming into the fields, running as hard as they could. And galloping up the road was a company of horse, accompanied by a score of white men.

'Barraclough?' he said. 'Hardy? I've almost a mind to forgive your sins.'

'When I forgive yours, Hilton,' Hardy said.

The colonel dismounted, peered at the corpses. 'My God. What happened here?'

The soldiers stared at the Negroes, who now came out of the house, muskets in their hands.

'Present,' Hardy screamed. 'Present.'

'Put them down,' Dick snapped. 'They fought for me.'

'You armed slaves?'

'I used what I had. And they fought well.'

'By God,' Hardy said. 'There's a confession, Colonel. A confession. Serve your warrant, man. Serve your warrant.'

'What madness is he spouting?' Dick demanded.

Barraclough shifted from foot to foot, gazed at Cartarette, then at Suzanne, standing on the verandah in the midst of the black men, then back at Dick again.

'Hardy's doing,' he muttered. 'He met me on the road. Brought me back here. But not to rescue you, Mr Hilton.' He unbuttoned his jacket, felt inside, pulled out the rolled parchment. 'There is a warrant for your arrest.'

18

The Day of Retribution

Dick could only gape at the officer, for the moment too taken back to speak.

'For his arrest?' Cartarette cried. 'You must be out of your mind.'

'Count yourself grateful you are not included,' Hardy said.

'Why, you . . .' Dick reached for his pistol, and was halted by the sight of a score of musket barrels levelled at his chest.

'They won't take you, Dick,' Suzanne called from the verandah. 'We have thirty men in here, Colonel. All armed, and all experienced; they have just repulsed the rebels. Look at the verandah.'

Barraclough licked his lips. He had already looked at the verandah.

'Mr Hilton, I beg of you,' he said. 'Humour me, for the moment. Things are not going well, sir. You may have saved Hilltop, but at least a dozen plantations are in the hands of the insurgents. White people have been killed. More have been insulted. Kingston is in a ferment, and the whole island has been placed under martial law. The militia has been called out. If we exchange shots here, I would not like to say what will happen.'

'Show me the warrant,' Dick said.

Barraclough gave him the parchment, and he looked at the signature.

'John Tresling?'

'Countersigned by the Governor, Mr Hilton. It is legal.' Dick glanced at the charge. It described him as an incendiary who had roused the blacks to revolt.

'You must know this is utter nonsense, Barraclough.'

'I know it, Mr Hilton, and so does the Governor.'

'Then why did he attest his signature?'

Barraclough sighed. 'Perhaps I would wish he could have shown more spirit, sir. The earl . . . well, his prime concern is the preservation of peace. All soldiers are needed on the plantations, Mr Hilton. Therefore Kingston must be defended by the militia. And the militia refused to mobilize unless all incendiaries are confined. Your name heads the list.'

Dick hesitated, still gazing at the paper.

'And who will guard my husband in the Kingston gaol?' Cartarette asked. 'This same militia?'

'He will be safe, Mrs Hilton. The Governor gives his word. But surrender, sir, and show that you have confidence at once in your own innocence and in our triumph. Those
are
the earl's own words, sir.'

Cartarette's fingers bit into his arm. 'Defy them, Dick. They'll not take you. They'll not move, if you say the word.'

'Aye,' he agreed. 'And then I would indeed be a revolutionary.'

'Dick, the mob will lynch you.' Her voice was urgent.

He smiled at her. 'I've survived worse than K
ingston mobs,' he said. 'Belmore
may not be the strongest of characters, but he is an
honest man. And there are more l
ives than just mine at stake. But I leave the children, and indeed my defence, if it comes to that, in your care.'

Her tear-filled eyes were only inches from his face. 'I'll get you back, Dick,' she promised. 'I have grown to love this new man.'

He kissed her forehead. 'Then make it soon.' He released her. 'I'll ride with you, captain. But provide me with a horse.'

'You'll hand over your weapons,' Hardy demanded.

'It would be best, sir,' Barraclough agreed.

Dick nodded, gave the colonel his pistols.

'And you'll command your people to throw down their muskets,' Hardy said.

'And leave my plantation undefended?' Dick inquired.

‘I
will leave ten of my men here, sir, to see to your plantation,' Barraclough promised. 'I beg of you, sir. I cannot leave any black people with weapons in their hands.'

Dick hesitated, for the last time; but he knew the blacks would not return, and ten soldiers should be sufficient to protect
his
blacks from white revenge. 'So be it, Cartarette, tell Absolom to surrender those muskets.' He swung into the saddle. 'Thank them for me. Tell them that when I return from Kingston, it will be as I promised them.'

He could not look at the house any longer, but turned his horse and led the cavalcade down the drive. He could hear Barraclough giving the necessary orders, the banging of the shutters as they were opened. Sunlight would flood the Great House, and the dead would be buried.

And the plantation? The road led by the white town, and the factory, and the slave village. Piles of smouldering ash, from which the smoke rose to tickle his nostrils. The factory had done best, the great machinery, used to overwhelming heat, merely protruded through the collapsed roof. But he had retained his slaves. They came out of the fields, men, and women, and children, to stare at the destruction, at the soldiers, at their master. And not even all of the cane had burned. There were sufficient green fields to salvage part of a crop, supposing he was there to do it.

But of course he would be there to do it. He was Richard Hilton. He had survived too much in the past to be depressed by mere legal formalities now.

Except that he was tired. Suddenly. And it was not merely exhaustion from a sleepless night.

Hardy rode alongside him. 'You'll hang, Hilton. Oh, aye. Not even the Governor's support will save you now.'

Dick glanced at him, looked ahead again. They were beyond the smoke now, and the morning air was cool.

'You'd best get back to Orange Lodge, Mr Hardy,' Barraclough said. 'Those devils may come again.'