Shaka the Great (5 page)

Well, he knows now: thrashing about in a tempestuous sea.

As the boat turned, he'd been rising to throw out a scoop of water, but had instead been flung in Farewell's direction. The two men collided and somehow Jakot managed to grab the collar of the lieutenant's jacket. Farewell was tumbling overboard, but all was not lost. Jakot remembers reaching out to the nearest oarsman. If the big man had seized his hand, they could have both been pulled back on board. Instead—and now, riding the swells, Jakot remembers this clearly—the man had simply smiled.

In Jakot's mind the man's smile stretches time. With everyone else seemingly frozen in place—including Farewell, halfway out of
the surfboat, his eyes wide, his mouth wider as it forms a shocked cry—Jakot sees his own fingers close around the collar of Farewell's coat …

… and it's as if everything you touch starts moving, too, and Farewell's falling again, dropping fast, thrown into the maw of the emerald trough, and taking you with him …

… and somehow your fingers are trapped between Farewell's neck and the sodden collar of his coat, and you can't let go, so you reach out for the nearest oarsman, and your desperate fingers must have brushed his shoulder, because now
he
can move, but all he does is smile—a knowing smile; the smile of someone who knows what you have in mind, knows he can help but also knows he's going to do exactly nothing, just smile …

… and in the end it was the other sailor who came to Jakot's aid, the matelot who'd injured his head in a fall and who moved to his own time in his own world and didn't need a Xhosa prince to reanimate him, but it was to no avail …

The other crewmen have managed to drag the surfboat up the beach, away from the waves. Now collapsed on the wet sand in various states of fatigue, they can only watch and gape as Jakot staggers ashore, dragging Farewell behind him.

Edwards, the coxswain, is the first to react. He calls on the man nearest him for help, and they rush into the water. Together they get the lieutenant up onto his feet. Jakot stands still a moment, his chest heaving. Slipping one of Farewell's arms over his shoulder, the coxswain asks about … But Jakot shakes his head. The coxswain sighs. That's two they've lost today, the second sailor drowning as he got trapped under the boat.

Seeing that Farewell has survived his ducking gives the others a jolt of energy. They converge on the lieutenant, those passing close to Jakot gently clapping the Xhosa on the shoulder and telling him
Well done
. But no one notices how he has eyes for only one man.

First Mate Alex Thomson was thrown clear as the boat went over, only to find the backwash dragging him out toward the breakers. Gasping and gagging, he rolled on to his back in time to see he was about to be reunited with the surfboat, which an incoming wave was kindly carrying toward him. With the boat looming as large as a cannonball the instant before it takes off the fusilier's head, Thomson rolled on to his stomach again and dug in against the current … and found himself rising. With one more glance over his shoulder—churning foam the color of dirty soapsuds, curved planks with edges that suddenly seemed as sharp as the blade of a guillotine—he high-stepped it on a course that took him diagonally away from the surfboat, just as it gouged a gunwale into the sand and ceased to be a threat.

It was only after coughing up several mouthfuls of the salty stuff, and hearing the coxswain urge the other men to secure the boat, that he remembered his rank and levered himself up to take charge.

Now he hoists himself once again, a little more sharply this time, and Jakot's bearing down on him like a ship of the line with all masts square-rigged and staysails fluttering between. Because he doesn't believe in fighting fair, Thomson makes to throw the first punch, the fact that none of his fellow Salisburys seem aware that their first mate is about to be attacked by a black servant adding strength to the blow.

And that punch needs all the help it can get, for both men are so tired that the altercation seems to happen in slow motion.

Just as Thomson raises his fist, Jakot gives the first mate a push. It's a mighty heave as far as the Xhosa is concerned, enough to knock over a mountain, but in truth it's a clumsy child's shove, and Thomson merely takes a step back.

The two men stare at each other, Thomson stunned because Jakot has dared to lay a hand on him, and Jakot thinking,
Well, that could have gone better
. Then Thomson remembers his fist, the one up here by his right ear. But it's as if the air has turned into molasses, or they're still in the water—and both he and Jakot find themselves watching the passage of the first mate's knuckles as if they're merely interested bystanders.

Thomson recovers first, leaping back inside his battered body and reaching down deep into all that loathing and resentment, spite and sadism he's accumulated over the years, to give the punch the extra momentum it needs. Instead of bumping against Jakot's chest, the fist changes trajectory like one of Mr. Congreve's rockets, rises with a lurch and Jakot feels the first mate's knuckles bounce off the bridge of his nose. Then it's as if he's back on the launch, for the horizon drops away and he's staring up at the sky.

He should retaliate. He should leap up and defend his honor—and the honor of his people, of course. But these are distant voices of reproach, easily lost in the crash of the surf. Better to rest for a bit.

Then movement to his left causes him to turn his head to see the sack of pus himself, lying on his stomach next to him. Clearly that punch had overbalanced the weary, waterlogged first mate, and he'd dropped alongside the interpreter while Jakot was busy staring at the sky.

Jakot spends a few moments watching as Thomson endeavors to hoist himself on to all four paws, before realizing he's thereby missing a chance to strike. Taking a deep breath, he manages to send his right fist over his body in an arc that ends at Thomson's left ear. It's not the strongest punch Jakot's ever thrown, but it's enough to elicit a grunt from Thomson. Even more gratifying is the thump a second later, as the White Man's gut hits the sand.

Farewell dismisses the men after they have received their orders. Some will seek firewood, others will follow the strand in both directions, trying to retrieve what they can of their rations. Still more are to seek fresh water, but none is to wander too far (an injunction no one's likely to disobey).

He moves away from the overturned surfboat that will serve as their shelter tonight. The line of the horizon is interrupted by waves and there's no sign now of the
Salisbury
. King rightly won't risk a second boat. Instead he'll wait for clearer conditions before
rescuing them—and who knows how long that will be, Farewell wonders, gazing up at the leaden sky heavy with clouds. And behind him lies an even greater weight: terra incognita. Who knows how many eyes are watching them even now?

Damn Owen!

The thing is, on that first expedition, it was the
Barracouta
did most of the work. Owen had taken the
Leven
straight to Delagoa Bay, where he set about trying to fill his own coffers under the guise of exploring the surrounding countryside. But what little ivory and gold he could coax from the Maputos came at a terrible cost, as he would lose half his crew and two-thirds of his officers to malaria and dysentery. Finally forced to put to sea again, in November 1822, Owen set a course southward, needing to return to Simon's Bay. He resumed his survey of the coast, but it was lackadaisical at best, the voyage becoming more a series of burials at sea than a scientific expedition. And when he suggested Farewell attempt a landing at Santa Lucia, it had merely been because the place had seemed promising in passing.

At this time Farewell is unaware of the extent of Owen's dereliction of duty. All he knows is that the affable and cooperative captain who was willing to share his charts (as well as Farewell's private stock of port) has almost scuppered the whole bloody expedition.

Farewell scans the jagged waves, the seesawing horizon, then shivers and turns up the collar of his wet coat against the gusting wind that transforms every grain of sand into a thorn, as he tries not to think of what lies beyond the battered bush fringing the beach.

He can still see the captain's casual wave as they sat in the
Salisbury
's wardroom: one finger pressed against the chart, then the nothing-to-it gesture as Owen leaned back. “Santa Lucia, old chap.” A burp of Farewell's port. “That's the spot I'd try for, were I you, and don't I envy you!”

Clearly Owen hadn't even come within a nautical mile of this place, or else he would have realized that, even under the best of conditions, a landing would be difficult.

“Sir?”

Wrenched from his thoughts, Farewell turns to the coxswain, a wiry capable fellow he trusts more than King's first mate, who accompanies the fellow, his face as dark as the clouds above.

“Begging your pardon, Lieutenant, but we have a problem,” says the coxswain.

“Shut up,” growls Thomson, pushing the little man aside. “I can speak for myself.”

“Stand easy, Mr. Thomson.”

Thomson stiffens, his mouth working as he strives to remind himself that Farewell is the leader of this expedition.

After giving the first mate a chance to regain his composure, Farewell asks him what seems to be the matter.

There's no lack of choice in that department at the moment, but something in particular appears to have incensed him.

Thomson half turns; points: “It's him!”

Farewell's gaze follows the direction indicated by Thomson's trembling finger.

“Jakot?” he asks. “Blighter saved my life—must remember to thank him.”

“Be that …” Thomson gulps. “Be that as it may, sir, but that … that
blighter
has just attacked me!”

Farewell glances once more over to where a sodden Jakot sits, his chin resting on his knees, his eyes fixed on the breakers.

“Attacked you, Mr. Thomson?” Before Thomson can reply, Farewell turns to the coxswain: “Did anyone see this incident, Mr. Edwards?”

“Can't say as they did, Lieutenant, seeing as how we were all following your orders and foraging and what not.”

“Quite. And that reminds me: has the water party returned?”

“On their way back now, sir. They sent young Evans ahead to report they found us fresh water and fruit of some kind. Evans has gone back to collect some for us.”

“Good.”

“Begging your pardon, sir,” says the man who should be overseeing these operations, “but the black bastard
attacked
me!”

“Right, of course. So you say. Mr. Edwards?”

“Sir?”

“Be so kind as to fetch that black bastard, as Mr. Thomson here chooses to refer to him, although surely in no position to comment on the chap's antecedents.”

“Sir!”

“A heathen bastard he is,” mutters Thomson, as Edwards moves off. “A lazy, thieving one, too. Get him back on the
Salisbury
and I'll wield the cat myself.” Looking up at Farewell and finding evidence of distaste for his tirade, he adds a belated, “Sir.”