An Introduction To The Eternal Collection Jubilee Edition

by Cartland, Barbara

  “Spaniards, sir, Spaniards!” Master Gadstone was saying at Rodney’s elbow, his eyes dancing with excitement, his feet hardly able to keep still.

  “Yes, I know, Master Gadstone. Clear for action!”

  There was hardly any need to give the word the men were already running out the guns, laughing and joking as they did so.

  The mist was moving low over the sea in clumps so that one moment the ships would be quite clear and the next moment they would be blotted out completely. In a moment of clearness Rodney saw that the nearest galleon was flying her ensign in friendly innocence, dipping it again and again. He was thankful then that he had placed no pennant upon the Santa Perpetua. She was flagless. They would wait until the last moment before running up the red cross of St. George and leaving the Spaniards in no doubt to what nation they belonged.

  “Keep her steady, Master Gadstone,” Rodney said sharply.

  “Aye, aye, sir!” Gadstone replied with a lilt in his voice as if Rodney had given him a bag of gold rather than an order.

  Rodney had taken Master Gadstone on board the Santa Perpetua purposely feeling that he was better able than Barlow to keep the young man’s exuberance in check. Now he was glad of his enthusiasm. In Gadstone’s opinion there was only one thing to be done with Spaniards – attack them whatever the risk, whatever the odds against success.

  Rodney knew without looking or asking the look-out that the Sea Hawk was not yet in sight. She had hove-to for some slight repairs and although with her superior speed she would catch up with them later in the day, it was no use waiting for her now. If they were going to grapple with the Spaniards, it was now or never. He set himself to plan the manoeuvres of the encounter which would be upon them all too shortly.

  The wind was with the Santa Perpetua, the galleons were having to tack into wind. He saw one of them broadside on now and realised that he had underestimated her size. She was much larger than the Santa Perpetua and her guns would be correspondingly more deadly. The other was about the same tonnage. They were lying as close to each other as was possible, as was the habit of the Spaniards. He would go between them he decided and he gave his orders accordingly.

  “Man the braces, Master Gadstone, and every man is to hold his fire.”

  The men at the guns could hear him and they knew what he intended. They knew as well as he did that a premature broadside would ruin the whole operation. Rodney called the men with the arquebuses and the archers on deck. They came running up just as the mist swept down again and he told them to crouch down behind the heavy bulwarks and not to be seen till the last moment.

  He had a good look at the galleons a few minutes later as the mist lifted. They carried four-storied deck-houses which gave them a unique and very impressive appearance. Like many of the Spanish ships they were almost as high as they were long. with netting over their half-decks to prevent boarding. This would have been a deterrent had Rodney intended to hoard them, but he knew there was no chance of capturing the galleons as there were two of them. There was only one thing he could do for the glory of England and that was either to sink them or make them so unseaworthy they would sink by themselves in the storm which lay ahead.

  Galleons were hard to manage in rough weather, slow of pace and almost helpless against a head wind, but that did not make Rodney underestimate the deadliness of their cannon at close quarters. They also carried an armoury of curious catapults and the Spanish men-at-arms were notoriously accurate with their arquebuses.

  The ships were growing nearer to each other and the mist was blowing away at the same moment. Rodney could see the glitter of the Spaniards” armour as they crowded towards the bow. They were getting curious, Rodney guessed, as to why the Santa Perpetua did not reply to their signals. She was approaching the two galleons unwaveringly.

  Rodney gave the order and the men sprang up the rigging. They were hauling up the cross of St. George and in a few seconds there would be no doubt to whom the Santa Perpetua belonged.

  “Hold your fire!” he shouted warningly to Master Gadstone.

  In the course of the next few seconds the Santa Perpetua’s bow-chasers would begin to bear. They were bow to bow now, and moving as brightly as a girl at her first dance, she slid between the two galleons.

  Rodney could see the Spanish officers pointing at the Santa Perpetua’s main mast. He heard orders being yelled, a note of panic in their voices. The men on the fo’c’sle cannon were stooping to look along the sights. Then Master Gadstone gave the order. The Santa Perpetua’s broadsides burst into thunder, flame and smoke.

  “Keep her at it, men!” Rodney shouted.

  And now those hours of drill under the gruelling sun in the Caribbean Sea were justified. The very second the sponges were withdrawn the powder, rammer and shot were ready for insertion down the muzzles of the guns. The crews flung themselves on the tackles and the guns roared out again.

  The men with the arquebuses and the archers had picked their men. The cannon, too, were sweeping the decks and thundering low against the galleons’ sides.

  As the smoke cleared, Rodney could see that the galleon on the starboard side had suffered the most. She had been nearer than the other. Her main mast was tipping forward like a broken wing, the deck was a swirling mass of spars and canvas, with dead men lying in heaps beneath them.

  The other galleon had lost her mizzen mast and there were several ugly, gaping holes in her hull; but her crew was the quicker of the two and now the Santa Perpetua was jarred by the impact of the shot from her cannon. The rigging parted in several places above Rodney’s head. There was a shower of splinters which were more deadly than the shot from the Spanish muskets, then they were out of reach.

  “Starboard!” Rodney roared to the helmsman. “Stand by your guns on the Starboard side!”

  It was a difficult manoeuvre to bring the Santa Perpetua round and to train her guns on the galleons great over ornamented sterns, but they managed it. A few seconds later, raked from astern, the second galleon was as helpless as her companion. Her mizzen mast was down, the sails trailed over her sides and down into the sea; and though her stern guns were still firing, the shots were wild and quite ineffectual. Rodney guessed that the crew was demoralised, as so often happened with the Spaniards when one came to grips with them.

  “Stand by to go about!” he commanded, and the crew cheered as they realised that the battle was over and the Santa Perpetua was homeward bound again.

  But the victory had not been achieved without casualties. The deck was splintered and the ornamental woodwork which must have been the pride of those who carved it was battered and slashed in a thousand places, the sails were split and holed and amongst the debris on deck lay the men who had fallen beneath the Spanish fire.

  There were a number of them. Rodney thought, and with an exclamation of horror he saw that Gadstone was amongst them. He was sitting propped against the taff’rail with his legs crumpled under him, and a great crimson stain spreading over his doublet above his heart told its own story.

  Lizbeth was kneeling beside him. It was only later that Rodney learned that she had been on deck during the whole action. She had gone to the side of the first man who fell, only to find, as she touched him, that he was dead.

  It was then above the roar of the guns that she realised that a seaman was speaking to her.

  “Master Gadstone, sir! He’s fallen.”

  She ran across the deck to Gadstone’s side. As she went, a splinter struck her shoulder, but was prevented from hurting her by the slashed puffing of her sleeve. She felt it prick her skin, but she paid no heed. It was Master Gadstone of whom she was thinking.

  She crouched down beside him, instinctively keeping her head below the bulwarks.

  “We’ve beaten them, haven’t we?” Gadstone asked weakly.

  “Yes, of course,” Lizbeth answered.

  “’Tis a victory!” He tried to cheer, but his voice croaked in his throat. “A victory against those damned Spaniards –
”

  His voice trailed away before the end of the words. As he slumped forward against her, Lizbeth knew that he was dead; but she held his head against her breast, not knowing what else she could do. She was deafened by the noise and din and dazed by the sight of death all around her.

  She found herself praying, praying out loud as she held Master Gadstone’s dead body to her. It was a long time after, when she opened her eyes to find Rodney standing beside her, that she realised it was for him and not for herself that she had been praying.

  The quiet now was almost painful after the roar of the guns. Her eyes were smarting from smoke; it caught in her throat and made her cough; and then despite her every resolution she knew she was crying. She felt Rodney pull her to her feet, heard him give the order for Gadstone’s body to be carried away, as he half-supported, half carried her into the after cabin.

  Everything was in confusion. Pictures had fallen, gold ornaments were scattered over the floor, chairs were overturned.

  “Drink this wine. Rodney said quietly, and there was something in the calmness of his voice which pulled Lizbeth together far more effectively than the wine he forced between her lips.

  “ Sit here,” he commanded. “I must go on deck. There is much for me to do.”

  He was gone almost before he finished speaking, and in a few minutes Lizbeth had followed him.

  “Fifteen men killed and thirty wounded, sir,” the Master Gunner told her.

  Here was her task and she set herself to do it, realising as she worked that the conditions on the Santa Perpetua were much better than those she had encountered on the Sea Hawk.

  She had inspected the surgeon’s cabin after they had captured the ship and had marvelled at what she found there. There was no need to ask Rodney this time for aqua vitae, for the Spaniards had a special vinegar which they used to clean and cool wounds and Lizbeth had already proved its efficacy on men who had cut or injured themselves while in the execution of their duties.

  There were rolls of fine linen to use as bandages, pots and bottles of healing lotions and pastes, some of which were too strange for her to risk employing them; others of whose qualities she had already formed a good opinion.

  It was several hours later before she had finished with the wounded or before Rodney remembered to ask where she was. He sent for her just as she had finished bandaging the last man. When she came on deck, she realised that the ship was rolling badly and that the waves were breaking over the decks, but even in that short time the remaining crew of the Santa Perpetua had worked miracles and the main deck was cleared of many of the traces of the fight.

  The boatswain and his mates were still splicing the rigging and the carpenter was at work, but the sail maker had already set new sails for those which were too tattered to be left aloft. It must have been hard work, against the heave and pitch of the ship, but they had managed it; and now with the swell leaping and rolling under them and the spray soaking all those who remained on deck, the only real danger lay from the fact that the crew was almost too small to bring the Santa Perpetua into port.

  As Lizbeth was helped across the deck and had reached the safety of the aft cabin, Rodney came running out, almost colliding with her in his speed.

  “ Silence!” he shouted at her, though she had not spoken. “Do you hear anything?”

  It was difficult to hear anything, Lizbeth thought, above the shriek of the wind, the splash of the waves and the creaking of the ship’s timbers. But a seaman who had heard Rodney’s question answered.

  “’Tis guns, sir, guns t’ the Sou’ of us!”

  11

  Lizbeth could hear them now and they seemed for a moment an echo of those which had rung in her ears a few hours ago.

  “It’s the Sea Hawk!” Rodney exclaimed. “I would know the sound of her thirty-pounders anywhere. ’Tis the Sea Hawk and she is finishing off the Spanish galleons.”

  It was a guess of course, but a guess that was proved right when just before dusk fell the Sea Hawk caught up with them. Rodney had heaved to and waited with an anxiety which he had managed to conceal from everyone but Lizbeth, who knew only too well the signs of strain around his eyes and mouth.

  The men were not so controlled, and despite the bad weather most of them were on deck when the Sea Hawk finally appeared.

  “Ship ho!” yelled the look-out, and a moment later came the cry that Rodney was waiting for – It’s the Sea Hawk, sir!”

  They cheered then, and below decks a minute or so later Lizbeth heard the wounded men cheering, for the word had been carried to them.

  “She is safe!” Lizbeth spoke the words in heartfelt tones of thankfulness.

  Rodney turned to look down at her. The wind was whipping her hair about her cheeks and it made her look so feminine that a few months ago he would have been filled with terror lest someone guess her identity.

  Now, the emotion which filled him was a different one. Her courage made him feel proud, her tired little face made him feel very protective.

  “And you, too, are safe!” He spoke softly, but she heard him above the roar of the wind.

  “Rodney, you have been wonderful!” She could not help telling him of the wonder and admiration within her heart. He put his arm within hers and with an expression of sheer jubilation cried,

  “Together, little Lizbeth, we have done it!”

  She felt as if he had placed a crown upon her head.

  “Together” – the word had a thrill of glory about it, and she loved him – loved him with every beat of her heart, with every breath she drew, with every drop of blood in her veins. Rodney, the conqueror, the victor – the man of her dreams!

  The men were still cheering, for it was the Sea Hawk right enough with nothing more dangerous to report than a split topmast and a dozen holes in her sails. The sea, which had been running high, abated enough for Master Barlow to come aboard and tell the whole story in detail.

  “They fired over the top of us, sir,” he said, which explained the lack of serious damage to the Sea Hawk.

  It was one of the faults of the high galleons that they invariably missed the hull of a smaller ship which lay close in beside them.

  “We heard your guns, sir, and guessed what was happening,” Barlow went on. “When we came upon the galleons ourselves, they were shipping water and drifting helplessly. We thought it was unlikely that either of them would make port, but thought it best to make sure of it”

  “Quite right, Master Barlow – well done!” Rodney approved.

  Extra hands from the Sea Hawk came to relieve the crew of the Santa Perpetua and, when dawn broke, both ships were on their way again. Carpenters were working on the damage done below decks until the day before they sighted Land’s End and after that there was nothing more to do but to dress the ship and bring her into Plymouth Harbour with all flags flying.

  For Lizbeth the last few days passed with an incredible swiftness. It seemed to her that she hardly had a moment to think, with thirty wounded men requiring so much attention that, when she went to bed, hardly an hour passed without someone rapping on her door. Five men died, but the rest, despite dangerous wounds, were, she believed, well on the road to recovery as they rounded Rame Head.

  Those who could walk or crawl dragged themselves on deck. No one wanted to miss that moment of satisfaction when the crews of other vessels entering or leaving the harbour would stare in stupefaction at the Santa Perpetua and know her for a prize.

  Rodney was as busy as Lizbeth was, but as they sat together on the last night in the big oak-panelled after cabin, Lizbeth felt a sudden constriction of her heart as she realised that the voyage was ended and this was perhaps the last time she would be alone with Rodney.

  Her love for him was as hard to bear, she had thought several times that week, as the wounds of the men she tended so carefully. They were now on the road to recovery, but she would never recover. Her love for Rodney went too deep, and she knew with that strange clairvoyance which had been her
s since childhood that, whatever the future might hold for either of them, she would love him until she died.

  She was not sure how she knew this; she was only aware that every nerve and vein in her body was a part of him. It did not matter whether he was angry or pleased with her, whether he was brutal or tender, she would still belong to him; and nothing but death, she thought, whimsically, would cure her of the hurt he had inflicted on her.

  They sat talking over supper the last night until the candles gutted low. They talked, not of the future, but of the past, of what had happened since they left England a hundred and sixty-six days before, of the amusing little incidents which had happened during the voyage, which made them laugh again as they had laughed at the time. There were memories of Master Gadstone, of his enthusiasm and of his hatred for the Spaniards, which brought tears springing to Lizbeth’s eyes and a grave note to Rodney’s voice.

  They remembered the blue skies and the clear sea of the Caribbean, the parrots and macaws with their brilliant plumage, many of which had also died on the voyage home, and the fish which swam amongst the coral reefs and could never be transferred from their natural haunts and kept alive, even for a few hours, however hard they tried.

  But somehow in the greyness of the English autumn it was hard to remember the dazzling beauty of the tropical seas, and Lizbeth sometimes wondered if the cargo, too, would lose its glitter and value when they unshipped it on the prosaic docks of Plymouth where it could no longer be seen against the luxuriant vegetation and the golden sands of the Caribbean shore.

  Even the bejewelled ornaments on the table, she thought, seemed duller and less sparkling; and then she realised that it was her own sadness at having to say good-bye that was colouring everything. For one wild moment she contemplated telling Rodney what she felt about him so that she could sail again with him on another voyage.

  It was but a passing madness and she smiled at the idea even as it came to her; and yet she dreaded the moment when she must leave him and return to her real life as a woman. In retrospect the voyage all became a wonderful dream; the heartache, the anxieties and even the miseries were forgotten or paled into insignificance beside the happiness and the laughter and the times when Rodney and she had shared a companionship such as she had never known in the whole of her life before. She would never know it again, she thought. She must go back to Camfield, to her father and stepmother, to Phillida and Francis and the safe security of her home.