The Monsoon (46 page)

“Ready aboud” he yelled, as he saw the number-one marker buoy dancing in the firelight directly ahead. One of his seamen ran to take his place at the main sheet. As he passed within arm’s length of where Hal stood, a chance shot from the battery hit them. There was a blast of disrupted air that almost threw Hal off his feet. He had to clutch with both hands at the spokes of the wheel for support. The stone ball, reeking of the powder fumes that had sent it on its way, struck the running seaman high in his back. It mangled his body and popped his skull so that half of his brains were flung into Hal’s face like a mugful of warm custard. Hal gagged and recoiled at the horror of it, so distracted as almost to misjudge the final turn. At the last moment he gathered himself, wiped the running yellow mess from his face, and shouted, with the sickening taste on his lips, “Let go your coursesP and put the wheel hard over.

The Minotaur came round, skimming the edge of the coral, and lifted her bows to the first swell of the open sea.

As the reef fell away behind him, Hal turned anxiously to watch Big Daniel negotiate the last turn. He made a neater job of it than Hal had. The Dutchman switched her fat bottom round, heeled slightly to the change in the angle of the wind and then, with all the aplomb and dignity of a dowager following her more agile and skittish daughter, came trundling after the Minotaur into the deep, open waters.

“We’re through,” Hal said softly then raised his voice in a triumphant shout.

“We’ve made it, lads! Give yourselves a cheer.”

They hooted and howled like mad dogs, and from the ship that followed Big Daniel’s men cheered as wildly. In the longboats they jumped on the thwarts, and danced and capered until they were in danger of capsizing. The guns of the battery banged away in frustration, a futile, fading accompaniment, and the flames of the burning fleet began to subside as they sailed out to meet the waiting Seraph.

As dawn broke next morning the squadron of Hal’s ships lay hove to ten miles south-west of Flor de Lla Mar. Hal came on deck, having changed only his shirt, and gobbled down an early breakfast, just as the sun pushed its upper rim above the horizon.

When Hal looked across at her from the quarterdeck of the Seraph, the Minotaur’s blemishes were apparent in the brilliant early sunlight.

She was shot-ridden and neglected, her sails ragged and discoloured, her hull stained and battered. She rode high and light in the water.

A cursory examination the previous night had disclosed that her hold was empty of all cargo, but her magazine was almost full of munitions, and the powder-kegs seemed in good condition. These stores would stand Hal in good stead when the time came to make his final assault on alAuf’s beleaguered stronghold.

Yet despite her appearance the Minotaur needed only small attention and work upon her to restore her to firstclass condition.

Hal had no reason to revise his opinion of her value. She was worth at least ten thousand pounds of prize money, of which his personal share would be close to three thousand. He smiled with satisfaction and turned the lens of his telescope on the other prize they had taken the previous night.

There was no doubt at all that she was a
VCC
ship, just as Hal had surmised. Through the glass he read her name in gold letters on her transom: Die Lam, which translated as the Lamb. Hal thought it described her well: she looked plump and docile, yet her lines were solid and workmanlike, appealing to his sailor’s eye. She was newly built and had not been long enough in the hands of the corsairs to suffer degradation. The hatches were still on her cargo hold but from her depth in the water it was clear that she was still fully laden: her cargo had not been taken ashore by al-Auf.

“Call away the longboat, Mr. Tyler.” Hal snapped shut his telescope.

“I am going across to visit Mr. Fisher on the Lamb to see just what we have captured.” Big Daniel met him at the entry port of the Dutch ship with a wide toothless grin.

“Congratulations, Captain.

She’s a beauty.”

“Well done yourself, Mr. Fisher. I could have asked for no more from you and your rascals.” He smiled around at the grinning seamen who pressed close behind Big Daniel.

“All of you will have bulging purses when you step ashore on Plymouth Ho.” They cheered him raucously.

“How many of your brave lads were killed?” Hal lowered his voice as he touched on such a morbid subject.

Daniel answered loudly, “Not a single one, praise God.

Though young Peter here lost a finger, shot away. Show the captain, lad.” The young sailor held up the stump of his forefinger, swathed in a grubby rag.

“I will add an extra gold guinea to your prize money,” Hal promised him, “to help soothe the pain.”

“At that price you can have the other four fingers as well, Captain.” The seaman grinned hugely, and his mates hooted with laughter as they went back to their stations.

Big Daniel led Hal forward.

“We found these still chained in her forecastle.” He indicated the band of strangers in rags who huddled by the foremast.

“They are the survivors of the Dutch crew. Twenty-three lovely little cheese heads all consigned by al-Auf to the slave markets.” Hal looked them over quickly. They were thin but n of emaciated, and though the galls left by their chains were obvious on ankles and wrists and there were weals on their backs and limbs, which had been laid upon them with the Arab kiboko, they seemed in reasonable health. Like the Lamb they had not been long enough in captivity to have suffered too severely.

“It is your lucky day, Jongens,” Hal greeted them in Dutch.

“You are free men again.” At that their faces brightened. Hal was delighted to have them. With two extra prize ships to handle, he would need every man he could find.

“Will you sign up with me for the rest of the voyage, for a guinea a month and a share of the prize?” he asked.

Their smiles expanded, and their acceptance was wholehearted.

“Are any of you officers?” Hal asked.

“No, mijn heer,” their spokesman replied.

“Our Captain van Orde and all his officers were murdered by that heathen scum. I was captain’s coxswain.”

“You will retain your rank,” Hal told him.

“All these men are under your command.” If he kept all the Dutchmen together the language problem would be solved. Then again Big Daniel had learned to speak Dutch well while they were in captivity at Good Hope “They are your little lambs, Mr. Fisher,” Hal said.

“Let them put their marks on the quarter-bill, and give them fresh clothing from the slop chest. And now let’s see what we have caught ourselves here.”

He led the way down to the captain’s quarters in the stern.

The main cabin had been looted by the corsairs. The captain’s desk and lockers had been broken open and ransacked. Every item of value had been stolen. The ship’s books and papers were littered over the deck, trampled and torn, although many were still legible. Hal retrieved the log and the cargo manifest from among the mess. One glance at the manifest made him whistle with surprise and delight.

“By God, if all this is still in her holds, then the Lamb is a treasure indeed.” He was about to show Big Daniel the stiff sheet of parchment but remembered that he could not read, was sensitive about this, and instead said, “Tea from China, Mr. Fisher. She’s crammed with it enough to swamp every coffeehouse in London.” He laughed and repeated the slogan he had seen above the front door of Garway’s coffeehouse in Fleet Street That Excellent and by all Physitians approved China Drink, Tea.””

“Is it worth anything, Captain?” Big Daniel asked lugubriously.

“Worth anything?” Hal laughed at him.

“Probably more than its own weight in silver bars, Danny.” He flipped through the ledger to the final tally of the manifest.

“To be precise, it was worth one hundred and twenty-three thousand six hundred and ninety-two guilders on the quay at Jakarta, twice as much in London. Say thirty thousand guineas as a rough estimate. More than the Lamb, herself.” At noon that same day Hal called all his officers on board the Seraph to receive their orders.

“We are going to be stretched to the limit for men to work all three ships,” he told them, as they assembled in the stern cabin.

“I’m sending the Minotaur and the Lamb with skeleton crews south to the Glorietta Islands to make the rendezvous with Captain Anderson in the Yeoman. Mr. Fisher will have the Lamb and overall command.” He glanced at Big Daniel, and thought, By God, I shall miss him.

“Mr. Wilson will have command of the Minotaur.” All Wilson bowed his gypsy-dark head in acknowledgement.

“Grand Glorietta is two hundred and thirty sea miles from here.

Not too far. There is a safe anchorage at the south end of the island, and fresh water in the creek there.

I will give you four of the carpenters to undertake the repairs to the Minotaur and to get her back into fighting trim. That will be your first concern.”

“Aye, Captain.” Big Daniel nodded.

“By my calculations, the Yeoman should arrive at the rendezvous within the next three weeks. As soon as she does, you are to leave the Lamb anchored at Grand Glorietta with a skeleton crew aboard, and if the Minotaur is repaired by then you will bring her and Captain Anderson back here to take part in the assault on Flor de la Mar.”

“I

understand, Captain,” Big Daniel answered.

“When do you want me to leave, sir?”

“As soon as you possibly can, Mr. Fisher. Captain Anderson may already be waiting at the rendezvous. With Dorian a prisoner on Flor de la Mar, every day is precious.

I shall remain here to keep al-Auf blockaded.” Standing alone on the quarterdeck of the Seraph, while the sunset incarnadined the western sky, Hal watched the Minotaur and the Lamb detach and head off into the south.

As the shapes of the two ships dwindled with distance and were at last engulfed by the gathering shades of dusk, Hal gave the order to take the Seraph back to her station off Flor de la Mar.

In the first rays of the next day’s sunrise Hal sailed his ship boldly across the entrance to the bay, just out of range of the guns on the walls of the fort. His purpose was to warn al-Auf that he was under blockade, and at the same time to survey the island thoroughly.

Through the lens of the telescope, the consternation in the Arab camp was clear to see. A throng of corsairs abandoned the huts and lean-to shelters among the palms and swarmed up to the shelter of the fort.

The great teak doors swung shut before all had passed through and those left outside clamoured and beat at the door with fists and muskets.

Hal was pleased to see how undisciplined they were; their lack of training and control had been just as apparent in their wild gunnery.

Hal could make out the turbaned heads of the gunners above the top of the wall as they rushed to man the cannon. The first shot boomed out, and the ball struck the surface of the sea halfway between the shore and the Seraph. It skipped along the surface, slowing with each bounce until it was quite clear to the eye. Half a cable’s length from the Seraph it plunged below the surface and Oisappeared.

Then the rest of the battery opened up. Soon the walls of the fort were hazed with a fog of gunsmoke, and plumes of seawater rose like a forest between the shore and the ship. The Seraph was still well out of range, Hal had overestimated the range of the Arab ordnance.

He switched his attention to the anchorage. No ships were left lying in the bay, not even the smallest fishing dhow. Their attack had swept it clean. Charred wreckage littered the surface and lay thickly along the high-water mark of the beach. The hurried-out hull of the three masted ship lay high and dry, canted over to expose her bottom, the masts burned out of her.

“She’ll never go to sea again,” Ned Tyler remarked with satisfaction.

“You’ve got the rat bottled up in his hole, Captain.”

“Our next trick is to winkle him out,” Hal declared.

“Send Master Tom to me.” Tom came, sliding down the backstay of the foremast and hobbled across on his injured foot. It seemed to be healing more speedily than Dr. Reynolds had predicted. Hal watched him come down the deck with a critical eye. Tom was taller now than most of the other men on board, with the wide shoulders and brawny arms of a swordsman. His hair had not felt the scissors since they had sailed from England and it hung down his back, thick and curling, dark like a horse’s tail.

Recently Hal had given him a straight razor, so his cheeks were clean but darkly tanned. He had the Courtney nose and piercing green eyes. A likely lad, Hal thought. It seemed that since he had lost Dorian, his paternal feelings had become sharper, more intense, and he had to darn back the flood of sentiment that threatened to overwhelm him. He handed the telescope to Tom, and said gruffly, “Point out to me the exact spot where you climbed the walls of the fort, and the opening of Dorian’s cell.” They gazed across the water at the island.

The barrage of cannon-fire still raged, and the thick bank of drifting gunsmoke resisted the efforts of the monsoon wind to sweep it aside.

“The northwestern corner.” Tom pointed.

“Do you see the clump of three taller palms? Directly above them there is a notch in the wall with the green bushes growing out of it, and it’s the first loophole to the left of that. I think that’s the one, though I cannot be absolutely certain.” Hal took back the telescope and gazed through it at the fortifications. With the early sunlight slanting across the walls, the slits formed by the loopholes were in shadowy contrast to the coral white blocks. He gazed at the one Tom had indicated, and felt that his loss was almost too painful to be endured.

“If you put me back on the island again, with Aboli and a small party of good men-” Tom began earnestly.

Hal cut him off with a curt shake of the head.

“No, Tom” He had lost one son, he would not chance losing another.

“I know exactly where to find Dorry,” Tom pleaded.

“There are any number of places where we would be able to climb the walls.”

“They would be expecting you.”