by Wilbur Smith
and came sailing over the hedge, flying free. He struck the ground in a tangle of limbs and equipment and lay like a sack of beans.
Colonel Keyset saw his man unhorsed, waved his sword over his head and shouted, "Follow me! Through the gate!"
His squadron bunched up close behind him and he charged into the gateway. With a metallic clash the chain sprang tight as the combined weight of animals and men crashed into it. In an instant the entire column was cut down, horses piling into each other as they fell. The bones of their legs snapped like dry firewood as they hit the chain. Their bodies filled the gateway in a struggling, kicking, screaming mass. Men were caught under the animals and their cries swelled the tumult.
Even Tom, who had engineered it, was appalled by the shambles. Instinctively he turned back his horse, tempted for a fleeting moment to try to render assistance to his victims. Dorian rode out from behind the wall of the kraal where he had been concealed and stopped beside Tom. The two stared in horror. Then Keyser struggled to his feet almost under the noses of their horses.
As the first into the trap, Keyser's mount had struck the chain cleanly, and as they went down Keyser was hurled from the saddle like a stone from a sling. He struck and rolled across the earth, but somehow retained his grip on his sabre. Now he stood up unsteadily and gazed back in disbelief at the pile of struggling men and horses. Then he let out a cry of rage and despair mingled. He raised his sword and rushed at Tom.
"For this I shall have your hide and heart!" he bellowed. With a flick of his sword Tom sent the sabre spinning from his grip to peg into the earth ten paces away. "Don't be an idiot, man. There has been enough damage done for one day. See to your men." Tom glanced at Dorian. "Come, Dorry, let's go on."
They turned their horses. Still half stunned Keyser staggered to retrieve his sword and as they rode away he shouted after them, "This is not the end of the business, Tom Courtney. I shall come after you with all the might and authority of the VOC. You shall not escape my wrath." Neither Tom nor Dorian looked back and he ran after them shouting threats, until they had pulled away and he had run out of breath. He stopped, panting, and hurled his sabre after them. "I shall hunt you down and root you out, you and all your seed."
Just as they were disappearing into the night, Keyser bellowed his last taunt: "Koots has already captured your bitch-born bastard. He is bringing back Jim Courtney's head, and the head of his convict whore, P'ckled in a keg of brandy."
Tom stopped and stared back at him.
"Yes, Koots has caught him," Keyser shouted, with wild laughter.
"He is lying, brother. He says it to wound you." Dorian laid a hand on Tom's arm. "How could he know what has happened out there?"
"You are right, of course," Tom whispered. "Jim has got clean away."
"We must get back to the women, and see them safely aboard," Dorian insisted. They rode on and Keyser's shouts receded behind them.
Struggling for breath, Keyser tottered back to the tangle of men and horses. A few of his troopers were crawling to their feet, or sitting holding their heads or nursing other injuries. "Find me a horse," Keyser yelled.
His own horse, like most of the others, had broken its legs when it struck the chain, but a few animals, who had been in the rear rank of the charge, had been able to heave themselves upright and were standing, shivering and shaken. Keyser ran from one to another, checking their legs. He selected the one that seemed strongest, hoisted himself into the saddle and shouted to his men who could still walk, "Come on! Find yourselves a mount and follow me. We can still catch them on the beach."
Tom and Dorian found the last wagon descending the final slope of the dunes. The women were walking beside it. Sarah had relit the lantern and held it high when she heard the horses galloping up.
"Will you not hurry, woman?" Tom was so agitated that he shouted at her from a distance.
"We are hurrying," she replied, 'and your rough seaman's language will make us go no faster."
"We have delayed Keyser for the moment, but he will be after us again soon enough." Tom realized his mistake in adopting that brusque approach to his wife and, despite his agitation, tried to ameliorate his tone. "We are in sight of the beach, and all your possessions are safe." He pointed ahead. "Will you now let me take you to the boat, my sweeting."
She looked up at him and, even in the poor light of her lantern, could see the strain on his face. She relented. "Lift me up, then, Tom." She raised her arms to him like a small girl to her father. When he swung her up and placed her behind him she hugged him close, and
whispered into the thick curls that bushed down the back of his neck, "You are the finest husband God ever placed upon this earth, and I am the most fortunate of wives."
Dorian gathered up Yasmini and they followed Tom down to where Mansur waited with the lighter at the water's edge. They placed the two women firmly on board. The wagon came trundling down, and as it reached the lighter it sank axle deep into the wet sand. But this made it easier to transfer the last of their possessions into the boat. Once the wagon was empty the oxen were able to haul it away.
While this was going on, Tom and Dorian kept glancing back into the darkness of the dunes, expecting the worst of Keyset's threats to materialize, but the harpsichord was at last lashed down and covered with a tarpaulin to protect it from the spray.
Mansur and the crewmen who were shoving out the boat were still waist deep, when there was an angry shout from the dunes and the flash and clap of a carbine shot. The ball slammed into the transom of the boat, and Mansur leaped in.
There was another shot and again the ball struck the hull. Tom pushed the women down until they were sitting on the deck, in an inch or more of bilge water, protected by the pile of hastily loaded cargo.
"I entreat you now to keep your heads well down. We can argue the merits of this suggestion later. However, I assure you those are real musket balls."
He looked back and could just make out Keyser's distinctive outline against the pale sand, but his stentorian bellows carried clearly: "You will not escape me, Tom Courtney. I shall see you hanged, drawn and quartered on the same scaffold as that bloody pirate, your grandfather. Every Dutch port in this world will be closed to you."
"Take no notice of what he says," Tom told Sarah, dreading that Keyser would repeat his gruesome description of Jim's fate and torment her beyond bearing. "In his pique he utters only monstrous lies. Come, let us give him a farewell tune."
To drown Keyser's threats, he launched into a hearty but off-key rendition of "Spanish Ladies', and the others all joined in. Dorian's voice was as magnificent as ever and Mansur had inherited his ringing tenor. Yasmini's soprano lisped sweetly. Sarah leaned against Tom's reassuring bulk and sang with him.
"Farewell and adieu to you, fair Spanish ladies, Farewell and adieu to you," ladies of Spain For we've received orders to sail for old England, But we hope in a short time to see you again...
Then let every man here toss off a full bumper,
Then let every man here toss off his full bowl,
For we will be jolly and drown melancholy,
With a health to each jovial and true-hearted soul..."
Yasmini laughed and clapped her hands. That's the first naughty song Dorry ever taught me. Do you remember when first I sang it to you, Tom?"
"My oath on it, I will never forget it." Tom chuckled as he steered for the Maid of York. Twas the day you brought Dorrie back to me after I had lost him for all those years."
As Tom clambered aboard the Maid of York he gave orders to his captain: "Captain Kumrah, in God's name, get this last load on board as quick as you like." He went back to the rail and looked down at Dorian, who was still in the lighter. He called to him, "As soon as you're on board the Gift of Allah douse all lights and hoist anchor, we must be clear of the land before first light. I don't want Keyset and the Dutch lookouts in the castle to spy out in which direction we are headed. Let them guess whether it be east or west, or even south t
o the Pole."
The last of the baggage to come on board from the lighter was Sarah's harpsichord. As it dangled over the side, Tom called to the men on the fall of the tackle, "A guinea for the man who lets that damn thing drop down to Davy Jones."
Sarah prodded him sharply in the ribs, and the crewmen paused and looked at each other. They were never sure what to make of Tom's sense of humour. Tom put his arm around Sarah and went on, "Of course, once you have your guinea, out of deference to the feeling of my wife, I shall be obliged to throw you in after it."
They laughed uncertainly and swung the harpsichord in board. Tom strode back to the side. "Be away with you then, brother," he called to Dorian.
The crew of the lighter shoved off and Dorian hailed back, "If we become separated in the dark, then the rendezvous will be off Cape Hangklip, as always?" '
"As always, Dorry."
The two ships sailed within minutes of each other, and for the first ] hour they were able to keep station. Then the wind increased to near j gale force and the last sliver of moon went behind the clouds. In the ; darkness they lost contact with each other. i
When dawn broke the Maid* found herself alone, with the south' ,: easter howling through her rigging. The land was a blue smear, low on ; the northern horizon, almost obscured by the breaking waves and the ' swirling sea fret. ;
298 }
"Fat chance that the Dutch will make us out in this weather," Tom shouted at Kumrah, as the tails of his tarpaulin coat flapped around his legs, and the ship heeled over to the push of the storm. "Make this your offing, and come about for Cape Hangklip."
Close-hauled against the storm they raised the Cape the next morning, and found the Gift there before them, beating back and forth on the rendezvous. Once more in convoy they set out eastwards to round Cape Agulhas, the southernmost tip of Africa. The wind held steadily out of the east. They spent many weary days tacking back and forth, steering clear of the treacherous shoals that guarded Agulhas and clawing their way into their eas tings At last they were able to double the Cape and turn northwards along that rugged and inhospitable coast.
Three weeks after leaving High Weald they finally passed through the heads of grey rock that guarded the great Lagoon of the Elephants. They dropped anchor in the blessedly calm waters, clear as good Hollands gin and learning with shoals of fish.
"This is where my grandfather Frankie Courtney fought his last battle with the Dutch. Here, they made him prisoner and took him down to Good Hope to perish on the gallows," he told Sarah. "My sacred oath, they were tough old devils those ancestors of mine," he said with pride.
Sarah smiled at him. "Are you suggesting that you are a milk toast and a caitiff when compared with them?" Then she shaded her eyes and peered up at the hillside that rose above the lagoon. "Is that your famous post stone?"
Half-way up the hill a prominent lump of grey stone the size of a hayrick had been painted with a large, lop-sided letter P in scarlet paint, so that it was visible to any ship anchored in the lagoon.
"Oh, take me ashore immediately. I feel certain that there is a letter from Jim awaiting us."
Tom was certain that her hopes were doomed to disappointment, but they rowed to the beach in the longboat. Sarah was first over the side with the water reaching to her thighs and soaking her skirts. Tom had difficulty keeping up with her as she lifted the sodden cloth to her knees and scrambled up the hillside. "Look!" she cried. "Someone has placed a cairn of stones on the summit. That surely is a sign that a letter is waiting for us."
A hollow space had been burrowed out beneath the post stone, and he entrance to it was blocked with smaller ones. She pulled these apart and beyond them she found a bulky parcel. It was stitched up in a wrapper of heavy tarpaulin and sealed with tar.
*t i l knew it! Oh, yes, I knew it," Sarah sang, as she dragged the parcel otn its hiding-place. But when she read the inscription on it her face
fell. Without another word she handed the packet to Tom and started back down the hill.
Tom read the inscription. It was in an ill-formed hand, misspelled and crude: "Hail, you tru and worfy sole who doth this miss if find. Tak it with you to London Town and gif it over to Nicolas Whatt Esquire at 51 Wacker Street close by the East Hindia Dok. He shall gif you a giny for it. Opun not this pa ket Fayle me nefer! If you do so, then I do rot your balls and dam your eyes! May your mannikin never rise, you God forsaken boger!" The message was signed, "Cpt Noah Calder abord the Brig Larkspur out bound for Bombay, 21 May in the year of ow Lord Jassus 1731."
"Words well chosen, and sentiments sweetly expressed." Tom smiled as he replaced the packet in the recess and covered it with the stones. "I am not headed for old London Town, so I will not risk the dire consequences of failure. It must wait for a bolder soul heading in the right direction."
He went down the hill, and half-way to the beach he found Sarah sitting forlornly upon a rock. She turned away as he sat down beside her, and tried to stifle her sobs. He took her face between his big hands and turned it towards him. "No, no, my love. You must not take on so. Our Jim is safe."
"Oh, Tom, I was so sure it was his letter to us, and not that of some oaf of a sailor."
"It was most unlikely that he would come here. Surely he will be heading further north. I do believe he had set upon Nativity. We shall find him there, and little Louisa with him. Mark my words. Nothing can befall our Jim. He is a Courtney, ten feet tall and made from billets of cast iron covered with elephant hide."
She laughed through her tears. "Tom, you silly man, you should be upon the stage." "Even Master Garrick could not afford my fee." He laughed with her. "Come along now, my own sweet girl. There is no profit in pining, and there is work to do if we purpose to sleep ashore this night."
They went back down to the beach, and found that Dorian and his party from the Gift had already come ashore. Mansur was unloading the water casks into the longboat. He would refill them from the sweet water stream that flowed into the top end of the lagoon. Dorian and his men were building shelters on the edge of the forest, weaving frameworks of saplings. They were thatching these with new reeds, fresh cut from the edge of the water. The smell of sweet sap perfumed the air.
After the trying weeks at sea in rough weather the women needed comfortable quarters on dry land in which to recuperate. It was over a
year since the brothers had visited the lagoon on their last trading expedition along the coast. The huts they had built then they had burned to the ground when they sailed, for by now they would have been infested by scorpions, hornets and other unpleasant flying insects and crawling creatures.
There was a brief alarum when they heard a succession of musket shots banging out from the top end of the lagoon, but Dorian reassured them quickly: "I told Mansur to bring us in fresh meat. He must have found game."
When Mansur returned with the refilled water casks, he brought with him the carcass of a half-grown buffalo. Despite its tender age the beast was the size of an ox, enough to feed them all for weeks once it was salted and smoked. Then the other longboat returned from the edge of the channel where Tom had sent five of the crew to catch fish. The bins amidship were filled with sparkling silver mounds, still quivering and twitching.
Sarah and Yasmini set to work at once with their servants to prepare a suitable feast to celebrate their arrival. They ate under the stars, with sparks from the campfire rising into the dark sky in a torrent. After they had eaten their fill, Tom sent for Batula and Kumrah. They came ashore from the anchored ships and took their places, sitting cross-legged on their prayer mats in the circle around the fire.
"I ask your forgiveness for any disrespect," Tom greeted the two captains. "We should have heard the news you bring sooner than this. However, with the need to sail from Good Hope with such despatch, and the gale that assailed us since then, there has been no opportunity."