Corsair hl-1

by Tim Severin

  ‘The Religion? Who are they?’ whispered Hector.

  ‘The Knights of the Order of St John of Jerusalem. A bunch of nobles who act like pirates when it suits them, and from the best families in Europe. Claim they are fighting for the Cross. Hate Barbary corsairs. They operate out of Malta. One of their petty officers was a slave shipwright alongside me in the Arsenal.’ Dunton stopped talking as the aga scowled at him, demanding silence as he also listened, trying to locate the direction of the approaching ship.

  Several minutes passed, and it became clear that the unknown vessel was moving at a leisurely pace. The splashes of the oars were slow and unhurried, the sound increasing only gradually. Izzet’s own rowers settled in their places and dipped the blades of their thirty-foot-long sweeps quietly into the sea, awaiting orders. Some were looking expectantly towards Turgut on the stern deck, others half-turned, trying to peer out into the mist. Abruptly, through the mist, came a cry, ‘Sieme! Sieme!’ Dunton mouthed, ‘Together! Together!’ and made a rowing gesture. Moments later, a dark patch in the mist became the unmistakable shape of an oared vessel, and there was a startled shout, ‘Aia! What ship?’ ‘Izzet Darya! In the Name of Allah,’ roared back Turgut. The advancing galley had stopped rowing, but her momentum carried her forward so that she could be clearly seen as a brigantine, an oared vessel about half the size of Izzet Darya. ‘Merhaba, welcome! From what port?’ called Turgut. ‘From Djidjelli. Corsan!’ The tension aboard Izzet Darya relaxed. ‘Fellow corsairs from Barbary,’ explained Dunton. ‘Hunting the same patch of sea.’

  Hector’s knowledge of Turkish was good enough to follow the shouted conversation between Turgut and the captain of the newcomer. The brigantine had been on the corso for less than a week, and had managed to intercept three infidel vessels, two Spanish and the third French. None of the prizes were very valuable, but the captain of the French ship had curried favour with his captors by telling the corsairs that he had sighted a large merchantman, of unknown nationality, hull down on the horizon and apparently heading towards Leghorn. In pursuit of this potential prize the brigantine had ventured north hoping to intercept the vessel which would now be delayed by the calm. ‘Have you seen any of those shaitans from Malta?’ called Turgut.

  ‘No, nothing. It’s too early in the season for them. They like to lie in bed with their harlots,’ came the reply.

  ‘Will we join forces then?’ enquired Turgut.

  ‘D’accordo!’ came back the reply. ‘One hand makes nothing, two hands make a sound.’

  Turgut smiled into his beard at the Turkish proverb as he called back, ‘We wait until the mist lifts, then spread out but stay in sight of one another, and cruise northward.’

  ‘Agreed! And may Allah go with us.’

  ‘Our luck has changed!’ said Turgut cheerfully, coming back across the deck. ‘Let the storemen issue a double ration so we may eat our fill, and be ready for what fortune brings.’ Dunton went forward to rejoin his shipmates and, as Dan took his meals with the odjaks, who had their own achtchi or camp cook, Hector found himself seated on the aft deck with the captain and his officers as they ate a simple meal of falafel and bread. From time to time the captain glanced across at the brigantine which lay hove-to half a musket shot away. He continued to be in a good mood.

  ‘Allah has been kind to us,’ he said to Hector. ‘Having a second ship means we can sweep a wider swathe of sea in search of prizes. And should we find only small coasters, the brigantine is fast enough to catch them easily. It will save us from having to lower our ship’s boats, and that means fewer visitas for you.’

  ‘The brigantine comes from Djidjelli,’ Hector observed. ‘Already you have a drawing of their harbour in your files, but if you wish I could go across and interview their captain and update the information.’

  ‘Maybe later,’ answered Turgut. ‘Less than four years ago I was in their port, not a good harbour, shallow and exposed but adequate if you want to take on supplies. The ruler of Djidjelli acknowledges the Dey as his overlord, and we leave him to his own devices. Just so that he does not interfere with our corsos. The same is true of Bougie a short distance down the coast. Let us hope that his information about the rich merchant ship turns out to be correct.’

  ‘Your excellency, if we do find and capture this ship how would we divide the spoils? The brigantine brought the news, so does her crew have first choice?’

  ‘A shrewd question, and the answer is that together we return to Algiers, with our prize. In Algiers the division is made by a court of arbitration composed of senior reis who decide on matters of precedence, acts of valour in the fight and so forth.’

  ‘And do they also decide who receives the prisoners as their reward?’

  ‘Of course. Often the value of the prisoners exceeds the value of the captured hull.’

  ‘And if we capture women, for example, where would they be held?’

  Turgut looked at Hector searchingly. ‘Do you have a special reason to ask that question, and is that why you volunteered to visit the brigantine?’

  ‘Forgive me for asking, effendi. When I was taken by the corsair Hakim Reis, my sister was also captured. She was placed on one ship, while I was kept on another. Since that time I have not seen her. I wish to learn what might have happened to her, and where she is now.’

  ‘Tell me the details, as best as you remember them.’

  Hector recounted the story of his capture and when he finished his account, Turgut paused to take a sip of coffee before replying, ‘I did not meet Hakim Reis after that venture when he raided Ireland. He was always lucky on the corso, quick to pick up prizes and welcome in any port to sell them. It would be normal for him to keep the women captives apart from their menfolk. I would do the same myself. The men are less likely to make trouble if they see their women could be punished. But I would have expected Hakim Reis and his escorting vessel to have entered their final harbour together and disposed of the booty in the same market place. That makes the final division of the profits easier as I have explained. I can only suppose that something happened to separate Hakim Reis from his raiding consort. You mentioned some sort of exchange of gunfire.’

  ‘And where might the other ship have gone?’ asked Hector. ‘Could it have gone to Djidjelli or to Bougie? Is that where I should look for my sister?’

  ‘If you volunteered to visit the brigantine in order to ask if anyone knew about her, then I’m afraid your enquiry would have been futile. Had the women captives been sold in Djidjelli, or Bougie for that matter, the news would have reached Algiers which is not so far away. No, I think your sister was taken farther afield.’ Seeing the disappointment in Hector’s face, he added, ‘You must not be too hard on yourself. Consider your own captivity. You must admit, it has not turned out to be so disastrous. Here you are aboard a fine ship and one of Muhammad’s people. Hakim Reis was right when he told you that, with luck, you could yourself rise to command. For all you know, your sister might be much happier than you fear.’

  ‘It is difficult to think with such optimism, effendi. I still feel responsible for her well-being.’

  ‘Hassan Irlanda,’ said Turgut kindly. ‘In Turkey we have a saying – “patience is the key to Paradise.” We must all accept the fate that Allah decrees. Keep up your search for your sister, but pursue it in the knowledge that it may never reach a conclusion. Rest assured that your sister will have been treated well. She would have been classified as murtafa’at; that is, first class. Wherever your sister was brought ashore for sale, everything about her would have been recorded by the amina, the woman inspector who examined her. Even as a conscientious jeweller notes the qualities of a special gem, her good points, the nu’ut, and her defects, the uyub, will have been written down. Somewhere that record and description of your sister still survives. Find it and you will be on the trail of your sister. Or find someone who sailed with Hakim Reis on that corso or, better still, find Hakim Reis himself. Then ask why the vessels were separated and where the m
issing ship would have gone.’

  Hector finished his meal in silence, turning over in his mind Turgut’s advice and, still troubled, was on the point of asking again whether he could visit the brigantine to enquire if anyone had heard of Elizabeth, when there was an order for the oarsmen to stand to their sweeps. Dunton reappeared on the aft deck. ‘The pilot must think the mist is due to lift soon,’ he said as he checked the preventer ropes which secured the great spar. ‘Or maybe he’s worried how far we’ve drifted in the mist. Strange currents around here, according to the store keeper’s assistant. He’s a local man from Sardinia and used to fish these waters before he was captured by the Turks, and became a rinigato like yourself. Tells me that the current can be strong enough to set a ship ten or fifteen miles in a day.’

  A series of calls and commands was heard along the catwalk as Izzet Darya slowly got under way, the same shouts repeated from the accompanying brigantine, whose sweeps also began to rise and fall ponderously as the two ships nosed their way forward. Occasionally Dunton looked up at the mast top where the captain’s insignia, a long red and gold pennant, dangled listlessly. ‘A sea fret like this normally lies close to the water, like a blanket,’ he said to Hector. ‘On a tall ship, you can send someone to the mast head as lookout, and often he’ll be sitting up there in the bright sunshine with a blue sky above his head. Yet when he looks down past his feet, he can scarcely see the deck for the vapour. Ahha! There’s a patch of blue now.’

  Hector followed his gaze, and indeed the mist was thinning. A glimpse of blue sky had appeared, and on the aft deck around him the daylight seemed to be growing brighter. ‘Shan’t be long now before we are clear of this,’ observed Dunton confidently. ‘Then it’ll be time for the brigantine to stand clear and take up her cruising station.’

  But that manoeuvre was not needed. Half an hour later the two corsair vessels rowed their way out of the mist. In a few oar strokes they passed from the close damp haze and emerged into a bright open world with a sparkling calm sea of intense blue. Looking astern, Hector saw that the edge of the mist was like a sheer grey wall, yet scarcely higher than a ship’s mast. A sudden exclamation from the galley’s pilot made him swing round again.

  ‘Alhamdullilah,’ the pilot burst out, pointing ahead. There, no more than five miles away, was a ship. She was utterly becalmed. Hector had never seen a craft as large or ponderous. Like Hakim Reis’s corsair ship which had raided Ireland, the vessel was an outright sailing vessel. Her three tall masts were rigged with great square sails which, at that moment, hung slack and empty and useless. Amidships her lowest point was twice the height of the low-slung galleys, and the stern of the vessel rose far above the sea in a series of decks that formed a wooden castle. Even at that distance it was possible to make out a massive ornamental lantern, twice the height of a man, which crowned the tall stern. The gilding on the lantern glinted in the sunlight.

  ‘God’s Blood!’ muttered Dunton beside him. ‘That’s a royal ship, I wouldn’t wonder. Can’t make out her flags, but she could be Spanish or Dutch maybe. She’ll be a tough nut to crack.’

  A hurried council was already forming up on the stern deck of Izzet Darya. The captain, his chief officer, the pilot and the aga of the janissaries clustered in a group, and Hector could overhear snatches of their conversation. The pilot was urging caution, warning that the strange ship was too powerful to attack. The aga of the janissaries, stroking his mustache and striking an attitude, retorted that if the pilot could bring the galley close enough for his soldiers to board, his janissaries would soon clear the foreigner’s decks. The galley’s chief officer, a grizzled Turk, said nothing but waited patiently for the captain to speak, and all the while the oarsmen kept up their steady beat, moving the great galley forward.

  Turgut Reis gazed thoughtfully at the sailing ship. This was not a vessel he had seen before, though it did have a certain similarity to the warship that had brought the English ransom agent to Algiers. He wished he had brought his sketch of that ship with him, even though this ship was much larger and, as yet, showed no flag. If only he had that sketch, it might help him decide whether the stranger was a warship or some rich merchant vessel. He looked again at the distant vessel. She was no more than four miles away now, and still helpless and becalmed. The captain thought about his ill luck on the corso so far, the debts that awaited him when he returned to Algiers, and that he had only a few days’ supplies left before he would have to return to base. He thought, too, about the damage to his reputation if it was said that he had shirked a fight with a large infidel ship. He knew his pilot was a cautious man who would always advise care, just as he knew that the aga was certain to demand a direct attack and boast of the courage and the fighting spirit of his odjaks. The captain did not doubt that at close quarters the weight of numbers and the terrifying charge of the janissaries would win the day. But first he had to get Izzet Darya close enough to board the stranger.

  ‘They’re lowering their boats!’ It was his chief officer who spoke, excitement in his voice. Turgut squinted into the distance. Yes, it was true. There was activity on the stranger’s deck. They must have been shocked by the menacing sight of two corsair galleys emerging as if by magic from the mist, and heading towards them. Figures on deck were hurriedly lowering boats into the water, and a large boat which had been towed astern was being hauled closer so that oarsmen could scramble aboard. ‘They’re abandoning ship!’ said a voice. Turgut wondered if this could be true. Often the crew of a vessel attacked by corsairs would leave their ship and flee for safety in their small boats. They would head for the nearest coast where they would run ashore and hide rather than be taken captive. But the Sardinian coast was too far for the small rowing boats to outrun the brigantine. ‘No,’ said another voice, ‘they’re trying to tow their ship out of trouble.’ That was more likely. The ship’s longboat and its tenders were moving to the bow of the becalmed stranger, and hawsers were being lowered to them. Maybe they were hoping to outpace their pursuit until darkness covered their escape.

  The captain made up his mind. ‘Allah concealed us from our enemy until the time was ripe! Now we attack!’ he called out. Turning, he gestured to the accompanying brigantine that both ships were to advance at full speed and close with their prey from directly astern. Seeing this, the oarsmen in the waist of Izzet Darya began to cheer a rippling ‘Ya Allah! Ya Allah! Ya Allah!’ as they laid on their oars and began to increase the tempo of their stroke.

  Hector felt the galley’s motion increase beneath his bare feet, and looked to the bow platform where Dan was checking the muskets of the janissaries. Dan glanced up and waved. Beside him Dunton said quietly, ‘Well here we go! The captain’s not the sort of person to run away from a battle. Let’s hope he’s not about to catch a Tartar.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ asked Hector.

  Dunton was staring intently at the sailing ship. ‘Seems to me,’ he said softly, ‘that she could be built for war. That big stern castle and the heavy bulwarks on the bow are the marks of a fighting ship. Still, if the calm stays with us, it shouldn’t matter too much. Right now, her main deck cannon – if she’s got them – are nigh-on useless. If we attack from directly astern, they can’t be brought to bear. She’ll have only one or two stern chasers, so she’s vulnerable.’

  The words were scarcely out of his mouth when there was the sound of a cannon shot, and a puff of smoke from the ship’s towering stern. A moment later, a cannonball skipped across the surface of the sea, sent up a trail of white splashes, then plunged into the sea, half a mile ahead of the approaching corsairs.

  ‘Levarim! Levarim! Lay on your oars! Lay on your oars!’ yelled the overseers on the catwalk. But there was little need for their exhortations. The oarsmen of Izzet Darya were already at full stretch, eager to close with their prey and earn the plunder they craved. Only in the bow, where there were three or four benches of slaves who had been placed aboard by their Algerine masters, was it necessary for the overseers to ply th
e courbash. ‘Strongly! Strongly! My children,’ Hector heard Turgut say under his breath, and he wondered if the captain had the same worry as Dunton that the aged galley was heading for a mistaken target.

  Again the thud of a cannon, and the splash of a cannonball, this time closer to the galley. ‘Good shooting,’ commented Dunton. ‘Those are not amateur gunners.’

  ‘Why don’t we fire back?’ enquired Hector.

  ‘No point,’ came the reply. ‘Our iron gun hasn’t the range, and besides it will hamper the oarsmen if we have to load and train the weapon. We’ll just have to take our medicine for the next few minutes. Run the gauntlet of those stern chasers until we are close enough to open fire ourselves. Better yet, get alongside and board her.’

  ‘FORTSA! FORTSA! Row Hard! Row Hard!’ the galley’s overseers were cheering on their men, and Izzet Darya surged forward, steadily closing the gap.

  A double thud as, one after the other, the two stern chasers of the sailing ship fired at the approaching corsairs. This time a cannonball threw up a burst of spray which drenched the port-side oarsmen.

  A closer explosion as Izzet Darya’s own gun answered. Hector felt the galley tremble beneath his feet. But the shot fell short.

  ‘Watch out! She’s coming round!’ cried Dunton. Hector looked forward over the heads of the straining oarsmen. Where before the sailing ship had presented her tall stern to the galleys, now he could begin to see along her quarter as slowly she began to turn. Out to one side he saw her boats. Their crews were rowing frantically, the towlines taut. ‘They’re pulling her to bring her into position so she can use her main armament,’ said Dunton. He sounded worried. Izzet Darya’s pilot had seen the danger, and called out to the helmsmen to try to stay directly astern of their prey.

  Another twenty oar strokes, as 160 men in teams of five strained at each huge oar handle, and then their opponent began to open fire with her main deck guns. There was no broadside, just an irregular series of loud reports as each gunner found he could bring the advancing corsair vessels into his sights. Dunton was counting, ‘five . . . six . . . seven.’ He paused as the cannon shots ceased. ‘Thank Christ for that!’ he muttered. ‘Seven, maybe eight cannon a side. She’s an armed merchantman. We should be able to cope with that.’ His sigh of relief was cut short as another cannon fired, then another, and another. Looking ahead, Hector saw that the sailing ship was almost entirely obscured in a great cloud of gun smoke billowing around her. ‘Oh shit!’ blurted Dunton. ‘Twenty guns a side, maybe more. She’s a ship of war, a fourth-rate at least.’