The Sea Officer Bentley Thrillers

by Jan Needle

  They reached her as she turned in another gentle puff, the unsecured mainsail blocking Will’s anxious view as they came alongside. Oars were unshipped, hands gripped the canoe’s gunwale, and he jumped across, and pulled the sail, and saw the body.

  But it was not Deb, it was the Worm. His throat had been cut savagely, and he was alone. The boat held no other human being.

  The old man’s eyes opened, and caught his. As he spoke, he bubbled blood.

  “She might’ve got away,” he said. His voice was thick and curdled. “I think she might’ve done. God bless her.”

  *

  When Dod and Rab had struck there had been chaos, and terrified confusion. Marlowe’s men had fought like tigers, far more of them than Deborah had expected, many with guns. As she fell to her knees – pulled there by Mildred after Marlowe had let go his grip and shouted something she did not understand – smoke and flames had gushed all round her in a cacophony of yells and musketry. Their attackers seemed to be white, the lot of them, and charged out of the wood in what looked like massive numbers. Her impression was that they were sailors, but in her terror they were more like fiends. They had pistols, dirks and swords, they whooped and bellowed like men gone mad. Marlowe’s men, the blacks, met them head-on in a mirror show of bestial exuberance. It was a Roman Coliseum, a killing ground.

  Had they intended to, they could have murdered Deb Tomelty on the spot. Once on her knees she stayed there for long moments, her face held in her hands, her throat contracted on a scream, her body clenched and rigid, at some sort of breaking point. Mildred was beside her for a second, then was whisked away. Deb gasped, threw out her arms, but did no more, she could not. She saw Marlowe running towards her with a pistol in his hand, pointing at her head. Before she could react the pistol jumped, gushed black smoke and fire, and she had the sensation of a ball flying past her face, which was instantly bespattered with fiery black specks that burned and stank. Marlowe’s hip crashed into her as he ran past, whirling her sideways to see him leap upon a white man and drive a knife into his neck. Another white man clubbed at Marlowe with a gun, but he too was overwhelmed and stabbed. Then the white men she had noticed first, the skinny, bearded ones, set themselves at her, and Marlowe was obscured from her sight.

  At this instant she caught a roar from the ancient Worm, who was beckoning furiously from a gap in the undergrowth that might have been a path. She was on her feet and running, and burst out of the clearing into the darkness. Suddenly the light was gone, it was blackness cut with vicious shafts of sun, among which she glimpsed men, armed and shouting, rushing at her and away in a turmoil of violence. Ahead she saw the Worm once more, beckoning like a demon in a nightmare, and blindly followed him, brushing against running fighters, black and white, as if she were invisible indeed. When she reached the pathway it was not a path, and the Worm had gone. It was a gap, a rift between two dense bunches of undergrowth, into which Deb threw herself. For a moment she saw Worm again, and beat and burst against the fronds and creepers she seemed buried in. No one behind her, nothing in front but a matted wall of greens and stalks and branches. She noticed that her heart was hammering, that her muslin dress was torn almost off her breast, that her legs were running blood. She could hear noise and shouting, but had a roaring in her head that was drowning most things out. And she forced herself forward, she tore and struggled through the undergrowth, she prayed that she might get away.

  The clearing came again as suddenly as it had before, and Deb blundered helpless into open view. She was on the edge of a wider open pathway where it became a beach, and on the beach were several struggling men. There was a boat half in the water, its sail halfway set, with some men in it and others reaching across the gunwales with clubs and swords. Deb’s eyes met the Worm’s, an instant of shock and recognition, then she pulled herself back inside the friendly darkness, aching with what might have been.

  What was, perhaps. In front of her, not fifteen feet away, a shaft of sunlight blazing on his face, stood another of the tall, thin, bearded men, and he was blinking. Deb stood still as stone, and cold as ice. He was blinded. Perhaps he would not ever see her.

  And then Big Angus smiled.

  *

  There are certain times, when in command of men, that options are unbearable, and desire, duty and humanity can only be at war. Will Bentley, alongside Marlowe’s canoe, was two hundred yards from the Jamaica beach, and every fibre screamed that he should go ashore and search for Deb, and save her. Before him lay the Worm, throat open, throbbing blood, doomed to die without a surgeon of the best. The surgeon on the Jacqueline was Grundy, drunk, vile, incompetent, but Will had no alternative. They went back to the ship.

  It was hours before they could reach the land again – Will, Sam and a stalwart party – leaving the Worm in Grundy’s hands, God save him, and the ship in London Jack’s. Gunning insisted on moving her offshore again to keep them safe from stranding, and swore to have her in a state of readiness if they should need her in a hurry.

  They picked through the forest with exceeding caution, expecting any minute that they might be attacked. The general direction they needed was not difficult to fathom, even without the Worm to be their guide. They passed two bodies and a lot of broken undergrowth, and a fair amount of blood spilled or smeared on leaf and bole. After some walking they heard sporadic guns as well, and shouting, and the sound of men and horses. Finally Alf Sutton almost rode them down, a rough-hewn colossus on his evil-looking mule. The day was won he said – grandiloquence a little spoiled by his raw West Riding accent – and the “top bastards all are took.”

  Will’s eyes were wide with fear and hope, and Sam spoke coldly for him: “Which ‘top bastards’ are you referring to, I pray? I will say nothing more, except that they are not our enemy.”

  Sutton was touched with genuine delight. His sneer became so wide it was an actual smile.

  “Tha mun suit thasen fer that,” he said. “Ah tell thee only that yon black savage Marlowe is in chains. And my Deborah? My lickle runaway, my maid for seven yur, paid up and signed for? My lickle Deb’s been took off by the Scotchmen, ’asn’t shoo? I used to know ’em when they lived ’ere, them Lamonts. Ee lads – there’ll be some fookin’ this neet, ah tells tha! She’ll wish she’d niver run away! Aye, champion. They’ll turn her privates inside aht!”

  He laughed, he wheeled his mount, he waved them on delightedly. Ah, simple pleasures, simple pleasures; was there anything to beat them?

  “This way, gentlemen,” he said. “Captain Daniel Swift has been expecting tha.”

  They walked.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  The “township,” when they got to it – huts, fire pits, a midden – was as unlike the scene of a military rout as could have been imagined. Alf Sutton rode on down the “main street” as he had called it, with every line of his body emanating contempt at the “mighty rebel chieftain’s way of life.” Sam and Will, uncomfortably, noted only signs of poverty and want, with no “citizens,” no “prisoners of war,” no living things at all save three chickens and a tethered goat. They could still hear noises from the woodland, but that was desultory, and of a triumphant army there was no hint at all.

  Alf Sutton stopped his mule and looked down on them.

  “Ah said we won, din’t ah?” he crowed. “They’re gone. They’re finished. Women and childer off into the hills like rats, Marlowe off in chains back Kingston way, nowt left to do but mop up scum, which is what we’re doing nah, out in the woods. It were easy, weren’t it lads? Like tekkin’ spice from off a lickle child. These niggers, eh? If I ’ad an ’eart it’d mek me want to weep, ’appen!”

  Both Sam and Will, in their own way, felt inclined to weep in any case, but they asked no more questions of this vile, triumphant man. They guessed that Swift would be full of himself also, would be vindicated and renewed in his convictions of superiority. Marlowe was gone, and Deborah, presumably. What would be his intentions now?

  Sutton showed
them the hut where Swift was sat, guarded by two men from Pourquoi Pas with muskets and bored faces, but he did not go in with them. He moved off further down the street to a bigger structure, a large palm-leaf roof held up by trunks, where men were massed and drinking, from the distant sound of it. Through Swift’s doorway, they saw him at a makeshift table, smoking a cigar. He too looked bored, but perked up when he noticed them.

  “Aha, my boys! At last! What luck? What news? Is your ship all right? Have you many prisoners? We have the bastard, and he would have hanged had it been up to me. Sadly, the acting governor put in his oar, the jumped-up popinjay. He said there had to be a trial, to protect Jamaica’s reputation! Have you ever heard the like of that? Jamaica’s reputation! Even the nigger smiled, I warrant you. As well he might, with the halter almost round his neck already, I suppose. Indeed, I’d had the gallows half-constructed when this reputation was invoked.”

  Will’s thoughts were locked on Deborah. He had no words to ask. Holt said: “How has he gone, sir? Who is escorting him?”

  Swift tossed the half-consumed cigar on to the floor and trod it out. He indicated stools brought from his vessel, part of his baggage-train, but neither of them sat.

  “Captain Kaye,” he answered. “He is there to make the villain walk; I fear that Mr Mather would have given him a horse. I wished to give a whipping at the very least, when my execution plan was vetoed, their softness amazes me, gentlemen. They tremble at the troubles that they have, they whine to London constantly that they are left bereft, then they put the kid gloves on and wonder why the niggers laugh at them.”

  Will still said nothing, and Sam remained bone dry, struggling with distaste.

  “I suppose they will hang him, though,” he said. “Due process does not seem too hard a thing, one may argue – except that he is innocent.”

  The grey eyes watched him.

  “You disappoint me, sir,” said Swift; but mildly. “If I did not know you for a doughty man, I might think… ah, never mind. It just seems such a waste, is all. My people would have loved a hanging. And they’ve done sterling work for it.”

  “Where are the Scotchmen, sir?” asked Bentley. The question jumped out hotly, try as he might. “Are they not hanged as well? Or going back to Kingston? And where is the young…”

  He bit it off at that, but he was nearly panting. If Swift knew what the question was – he surely must? – he did not show it. He turned pale eyes from Sam to Will and said, curiously: “Hanged? What, the Lamont men? But they it was caught Marlowe, and brought him in, they achieved when all men else had failed. Far from being ripe for execution, they appear to me – and to themselves, I must say – to have won the blessed day. In fact they feel hard done by; not to mince words they feel betrayed. Captain Kaye was not there to confirm it or deny it, but they insisted they had been promised a reward. Not just bright gold neither, but a pardon for their lives, which drove Mr Mather apoplectic on the spot. Another little row, more heated words – he said the King can offer pardons, not Kaye, not me, not even him despite his high opinion of himself. They wanted a reward; he offered them a flogging as criminals unhung, who had been deported off the island with no vestige of a right of coming back again. It was I bade them go, frankly just to spite him, and I offered them reward indeed. I thought he’d have a seizure on the spot!”

  That Captain Swift was revelling could no longer be in doubt. He was making points and scoring points, and included Andrew Mather in the rout. Bentley could no longer bear it. His gorge was rising as he tried to speak. It came out thick, congested; he was choking on his rage.

  “Reward?” he said. “Those men; reward? They should be hanged, sir! They are the most dangerous, they are more – Oh!”

  “Aye,” said his uncle, comfortably. “I am glad that you agree. Those three and their deserter rogues are more deadly than a thousand island men. We must thank our lucky stars that they have gone in peace, we are well rid of them. And when Andrew Mather comes to his wits again, I confide that he will thank me, as he should.”

  “This reward,” said Sam quietly, as Will was speechless still. “What did you give them, sir, to take?”

  “Nothing of importance, Lieutenant Holt. Nothing that should be greatly missed. They already have the little black boy as I think, and they took the English whore. They brought her in with Marlowe, so it seemed appropriate to take her out again. They took her for a bargaining, some sort of hostage, or perhaps a plaything. What’s it to me?”

  “But…” gasped Will. “But Miss Tomelty –”

  Swift shrieked suddenly, in violent anger.

  “Miss Tomelty!? Miss Tomelty? By God, sir, you make yourself ridiculous! It is a filthy little strumpet, a black man’s drab. Do you have thoughts of love still, in your addled brain? You are betrothed, sir, do you dare forget that fact? Tomelty is a common prostitute, and neither you nor she can overcome it. She is gone, sir, and so what? She is worthless; let her go!”

  Bentley was as pale as a blasted ash tree. His white lips moved, but he made no sound. Sam burst out, “But they are villains, sir. They are rapists who have abducted her. They are murderers.”

  “No!” responded Swift. “Those Scots are loyal Englishmen! They captured Marlowe and without them we could not have made it out to here, or found him. They have been robbed of their reward and if they want the girl, good luck to them, for she needs hanging too, remember? Have you forgot the Siddlehams? Have you forgotten why we’re here? The Scots are villains, maybe – but there are viler men by far on this vile island.”

  “But Marlowe’s not to blame,” breathed Will. “Neither Marlowe nor that poor young woman. We told you they are not to blame.”

  It cut no ice with Swift, and there was no more they could say to him. The Scots had gone, he said; good luck to them. The maid was gone, and who the hell should care? If that was everything the whole damn job had cost them – well, it was riches in the bank. And the death of Marlowe would be the candle on the cake. As to his innocence and the whore’s – good God, it was too laughable to contemplate.

  The three men in the little hut had brought themselves to silence, they were finished. They were face to face and failed to see each other’s eyes. When Swift tried to fire up his rage once more, that also failed. He merely sounded peevish.

  “Now, sirs,” he said. “What do you here, in any way? Who minds the ship? These renegades have hulls, as I believe. What precautions have you took to stop them sneaking out and taking Jacqueline? How sparky is your guard? There’s mopping to be done, there’s shore parties to get up, rebels to hunt down. Get back there now and prepare things for the morning; both of you must lead a troop of men. We meet again tomorrow evening, we meet here in this very place, and I expect your pickings to be substantial, am I clear? Or I have to say this – it will be the worse for you. Now, you may dismiss.”

  “Sir –”

  But Bentley’s uncle glared pure murder.

  “Sir, you will dismiss. You are dismissed.”

  They gathered their party and picked back through the dense country to the beach their gig lay on, under guard. All kept keen lookout in the forest, but no human form was seen. Not black, not Scots, certainly not Deborah. They had the whole west corner of Jamaica as their hiding ground. They could, perhaps, have broken further east.

  They could, in fact, be anywhere said Will, once in the boat. And Sam, beside him in the sternsheets, sadly agreed.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  No sane man, as Sam Holt once joked, would give a pet rat to Surgeon Grundy to look after, but it was Grundy, on the Jacqueline, who had worked a most unlikely miracle. Far from being dead, the old black Worm was in good humour, and almost in good health. When they saw him, lying on a pallet in the waist, both Will and Sam were delighted and astonished. Surgeon Grundy, his glory over, was by this time skulking down below once more, semi-conscious from a shocking head not caused, of course, by drink. He was too ill, indeed, to take congratulations.

  “Goo
d God, you Mr Worm!” said Sam to the beaming invalid. “Have you no self-respect, old man? To stay alive in Grundy’s tender care – it is outrageous!”

  Worm did not look too well, though, that was admitted. His neck was lost in folds of bandage, and his eyes stuck out like burnished sloes. One side of his head was nearly scalped, and three fingers on one hand were broken. He pulled the bandage down to show his neck (not at their request, far from it) and it was a wonderful dog’s breakfast. Grundy had gone at the ragged flesh with a curved sail-needle, inserted stitches individually, and tied off each one in clumsy knots. Luckily, Sam supposed, Worm could not see them, and his fingers were too hurt to feel.

  Even more lucky, no major blood vessels had been severed. Worm’s would-be murderers had muffed the job.

  Gunning, who had come along to watch the party, smiled with indulgence at these two young Navy officers communing with an “old emaciated corpse,” but he saved his broadest smiles for when they moved on from pleasure at the Worm’s survival to a hopeless, hopeful questioning. Had the young woman spoke to him? Had Marlowe, had the Scotch or any of their ruffians? In short, had he any clue, any theory, any hint, where the Scotchmen might have planned to go, where they might be found? Truth was, they told him, with affecting pathos – the maid had gone with them, been taken off. They feared for her. They knew she must need aid.

  Worm’s bright eyes flicked to Gunning’s, flicked away, and a sly smile crossed his face. He made to shake his head; thought better of it; grimaced.