Knowing there would be little enough time when the moment came, he cast off the gig and let it drift slowly from the stern. At the very worst, it meant that Ransome and his bullies would now have no way of escaping from the ship if they attempted to sink it. He was satisfied to see that the tide carried it very slowly indeed.
The remainder of the deck seemed ominously silent. Then he heard Ransome's voice,
'Take him down and tie him fast.'
A body was pulled unceremoniously towards the companionway.
'Sergeant Verity! Come forward and give yourself up! Your friend will otherwise suffer greatly!'
Torn between loyalty to Samson and his wider duty, Verity looked about him. The lights of the Hero were clear now, the tall dark hull picked out by the row of lit portholes. Her engines beat strongly and the churning bow-wave as she cut the Channel tide was just visible in its white phosphorescence.
'Get clear, Verity! Get clear, for God's sake!'
Samson's words ended with the sound of a blow and a cry of pain. Verity could see that the others were coming towards him. They had searched the deck and they knew where he was. He backed against the rail, shivering in the tattered breeches which were all the clothes he wore apart from his boots. His plump flesh still shuddered with cold as he softly unlaced the boots and pulled them off.
'Take him!'
They must have seen his outline against the faint glow of the sea. Three of them came in a rush. But Verity was on the rail in an instant and, as their arms went for him, he jumped, feeling the rush of night air against his face, and then hit the water with a floundering splash.
He broke the surface, gasping. His first impression was that someone was, after all, trying to light a lamp on the deck of the Lady Flora. Then, as a single hailstone seemed to plop into the water a few yards from him, he recognized the flash of Ransome's revolver. They were on the side of the deck hidden from the Hero, which explained the apparent rashness. He knew that the chance of hitting a man at such range was remote enough, even for a man of Captain Ransome's proficiency. And, of course, if they were going to fire at him, they could hardly risk sending one of the bullies in after him. Verity swam slowly, paddling like a dog, to the place where he last saw the gig as it drifted from the stern of the little paddle-steamer.
It was not until he could almost put his hand on the gunwhale that he thought of the girl. Her cry of terror, half choked by the water in her throat, would hardly have reached the steamer. He knew that if he swam to her and attempted to rescue her in the water, she would cling to him frantically, and he was not a good enough swimmer to keep them both afloat in that manner. With the puffing and shuddering of a willingly stranded whale, Verity pulled himself carefully into the little gig, near the stern. At all costs it must not be overset. Then he peered forward and saw the disturbance of water where the girl was struggling to keep her head free of the waves. She was no more than ten yards away. Taking the oars, he sculled forwards and drew as close as he dared, turning the boat so that its stern was nearest to her. She clutched wildly, her fingers slipping against the white-painted planks of the gig's clinker-built hull.
The gown she had been wearing, plum-coloured merino, was gone. Either she had struggled out of it in the water, or more likely its buttoning had been ripped away by the force with which Verity had thrown her over his head. She was wearing a pale blue bodice and knickers which he saw, as he hauled her in over the stern, were so wet that they revealed her body in as much detail as if she had been naked, even the coppery flesh-tones appearing through the clinging semi-transparency of wet silk. She writhed in the bottom of the gig, drawing breath in a muted howl, retching sea water, and then choking for air again. Verity seized her by a cold, slippery arm.
'Right, miss! You got one last chance to decide whose party you'm to belong to! There's been murder done on that ship, and there's worse still planned for the souls on that other boat that's bearing down this way! You and all Ransome's crew shall wear a rope collar and dance a polka in the air outside Newgate. ..."
He saw the flash of the whites of her eyes as fear broke from her in a long wail.
'No-o-o!'
'Then you better join my crew sharply. Else it's over-the-water-to-Charley you dances, my girl. Eight o'clock sharp with the parson reading your burial service to you, and Jack Ketch pinching your bum most familiar as you goes through the trap.'
Her teeth were chattering, either from cold or fear, or both.
'I never knew they'd kill!' she shrieked. 'There was nothing said but brandy and perfume from France!'
'They'll hang you all the harder for lying,' said Verity, sitting on the little seat with his back to the bows and taking the two oars in his hands.
'I'll be the approver!' she cried. 'I'll give Queen's evidence, if I'm let! I'll say anything they want! Oh God, I will!'
'It'll go for nothing if I speak against you with the Crown lawyers,' said Verity gruffly. 'You'd best please me first, miss.'
Whimpering, she scrabbled at the waist of the clinging pants, about to wrench them down.
'No!' said Verity. 'Ain't you got a brain anywhere but between your legs? Hold that tiller and keep this boat straight till I tell you different!'
As he bent his back to the oars and pulled with all his strength, the gig drew slowly away from the lee of the Lady Flora. At this level, the prospect was less encouraging than it had seemed from the deck of the paddler. What had looked like a mere swell with occasional eddies of falling droplets was a different matter in the little gig, no more than eight feet long. On all sides they seemed menaced by steep seas, bitter wind, rain squalls and a surging tide. Verity knew that the lights of the Hero were at his back, the hammer-beat of her engines appallingly close. By his calculations she must be at least ten minutes from the Wolf Rock and the savage granite teeth now treacherously hidden beneath two feet of high water, yet the sound of her screws throbbing in the great ocean spaces seemed a good deal closer than that.
'Them green lights!' shouted Verity at the girl. 'Hold a course for them! Slap between, if you can!'
'Cold!' she howled. 'So cold!'
'If I have to stop,' Verity swore, 'you'll get such a hiding as’ll make sure you never feel the cold again! 'old that bloody tiller straight!'
A smother of rain, spray and seas came drenching over the bows of the gig and fell with the pain of hail on his bare back. The ache in his arms and shoulders flamed as though the muscles and ligaments were being systematically torn apart by the strain of rowing into the squall. But the Lady Flora was dropping away astern, nothing visible of her at a distance but the three red lights at the masthead, treacherously simulating the warning buoy. Quarter of a mile, Verity thought. How far had they gone, and how fast? If they could only move at a slow walking speed, it would be enough, but with every surge of the dark water he felt the effort of his rowing countered. The gig seemed to be stock-still in the middle of a great ocean with the dark, curling seas racing past.
Then, to his dismay, he saw the Hero, her outline clear against the faint luminosity of the sky. The frigate and the gig were now on parallel courses, which would bring them broadside-on to the two green marker-buoys, though on different sides. There was no mistaking one of the newest and fastest of England's warships. Behind the curling bow-wave, the dark stalwart sides of the great ship rose menacingly from the water, the square gun-ports open and lit, the guns themselves rolled forward and ready for action. There were two rows of gun-ports on either side and tiny circles of light under each, indicating the portholes of the lower deck. The lights on the deck showed the three tall masts and the short, squat funnel amidships. Verity guessed that Lord William Jervis and his visitor would view the gunnery practice from the quarter-deck, which was on the high poop at the stern. There were two or three life-boats hanging from davits by the poop, but there would be no time to lower them once the bottom of the ship had been torn away by the granite teeth and by the force of her own speed.
Both
the warship and the gig were close to the green lights of the marker-buoys, the Hero about to overhaul the rowing-boat. Verity shipped the oars and seized the smooth brass cylinder which he had purloined from the paddle-box of the Lady Flora. He slid back the shutter, praying that it was already lit and would not need a flame kindled. To his relief it was. The gig would hardly remain steady if he stood upright, but on his knees he held aloft the red glow of the port riding-light from the Lady Flora. Surely they would see. Surely someone would see. He waved the light to and fro as hard as his aching arms could manage. The Hero was no more than two hundred yards off, the great ship thundering past in the darkness. But every eye on the quarter-deck was on the firing range marked out by the two green lights. The gig rocked in the swell of her passing, and soon she appeared only as a squat stern and a flurry of broken water above her twin screws.
Verity put the lantern down.
'Gotta tie it to that iron tower above the Wolf Rock buoy,' he said furiously, as though it mattered to the girl as much as it did to him. Seizing the oars he began to row strongly across the remaining hundred yards or so of water which separated them from the first buoy. In a matter of seconds, he knew his error. From behind him there came a whisper, which grew louder than any stage-whisper he had ever known. The sea ahead of them erupted with a crash into a great water-spout, sending a wave so powerful that it almost stood the little gig on its stern. The girl screamed and fell, but her hold on the tiller saved her from being thrown into the sea. In her terror she was beyond all reason and all control, beating at Verity with her little fists, her dark eyes flashing with panic, shrieking at him to save her.
Flame lapped the ports of the Hero again. There was a whisper, a roaring, and then a new thunder of spray was thrown skywards, drenching the occupants of the gig and almost swamping the fragile craft. But away from the flame and the storm of water, Verity was engaged in simple arithmetic once more. Ninety-one guns, say forty-five a side. Two rows on each side, say twenty-two each. They'd never fire off more than a single row at once, then reload that while the other was being fired on a second manoeuvre. Twenty-two. He counted the fourth and fifth. And the water-spouts would move further and further on as the Hero passed the target area. Now! It must be now!
Seizing the oars again, he pulled strongly for the first of the green marker-buoys. It would help to have extinguished it, but there was no time and, in any case, they would assume it had been accidentally hit by the guns. He rowed on towards the darkened warning buoy above the Wolf Rock with its black swaying tower of iron latticework. Just able to make it out in the gloom, he brought the gig alongside. The Hero was turning in a foaming sweep of water to race back between the green markers, loop round and discharge her other guns from the opposite side.
Clumsily, for the numbness of his hands, Verity made the gig fast to the buoy, threaded the handle of the riding-light on his right arm and tried to grab the iron latticework of the swaying twelve-foot tower. He was aware of the girl shrieking in terror behind him, but the time had come to put such things from his mind. He tried the buoy itself, but the slippery surface rolled away from under the pressure of his foot. Then the surge of the tide dipped the latticework tower far enough towards the gig. Verity seized it, felt at once that it would bear his weight, and rode with it forwards and upwards.
He seemed suddenly high above the water, in a world where the cold was more bitter and the air was full of screaming, whether of the wind, or the girl's terror, or sea birds in the dark, he could not tell. His feet were as numb as his hands, but they were securely lodged in toe-holds on the iron framework. His left arm was threaded into the latticework to hold him to it. Gripping the handle of the red port-hand riding-light in his right fist, he held it outwards and upwards as far as he could.
The Hero had turned completely, her broad blunt bows head-on to the dark tower. The water rose in two cresting plumes on either side as the powerful ship gathered full speed from her massive engines and bore down on the black and treacherous rock. Almost sobbing from the ache and the chill, Verity waved his tiny lamp and prayed.
On the quarter-deck of the Hero the thunder of the ship's engines was discreetly muted. Lord William Jervis, in the splendour of cocked hat and gold braid, stood close to General Lord Bruce, surveying the froth which now marked the surges after the firing of the first salvo. Lord William spoke to the elderly General Bruce, who wore the plumed hat of a British staff officer, but the other officers on the quarter-deck had not the least doubt that his lordship's aim was to engage in conversation the young man who stood at the General's side. He was a dark-haired adolescent, rather too weighty, with a round face and a heavy mouth. The mouth gave him an appearance of perpetual sullenness, which was unfortunate since he had made every effort to be as agreeable in his behaviour as he might be, ever since boarding the Hero at Plymouth several days before.
As the green lights seemed to rush upon them, General Bruce inquired,
'You find markers of great use, my Lord William, on such occasions as this?'
'Use, sir?' said Lord William, smiling confidentially at the General's young companion, who seemed a little embarrassed by such public intimacy. 'Never try a ship without 'em! Why, sir, only think of the scandal when they steamed battleships over the measured mile at Maplin Sands. Damme, there were posts stuck in the sand for the ships to steam past, out to sea. By altering his angle, a commander could steam a measured mile that was a hundred and fifty yards short! And he might set a course for another ship that was a hundred and fifty yards long. Why, there were ships that did the same speed but one was noted as two knots faster than the other! Now, sir, when the course is from buoy to buoy. . . .'
'Red warning light dead ahead, sir! Range two hundred yards!'
Lord William clapped a spyglass to his eye, dropped it on the deck, and turned to his subordinate, crouching as though he might actually spring at the man.
'Hard a-starboard!'
The urgent shout echoed across the quarter-deck. Lord Bruce stood rigid and deathly pale, the young man beside him seemed tense but nonplussed by it all. The deck beneath their feet slewed and canted as the ship swung in a churning suction of water. The men on the quarter-deck braced their feet against the angle of the ship as she turned, and then there was a mighty thump which suggested the meeting of two blunt surfaces.
'What in God's name . . . ' said General Bruce, but Lord William ignored him.
'Stop engines!' he shouted down the voice-pipe. 'Go astern!'
A breathless lieutenant appeared from below.
'Struck an unknown obstruction in turning, sir. No major damage apparent. Passing blow, sir.'
Lord William Jervis shook his head, as though to clear it. He went to the rails of the quarter-deck as the Hero's searchlight sprang across the water in a blinding shaft of magnesium brilliance. The beam probed the dark water.
'What the devil's that?' said Lord William suddenly.
'It's the Wolf Rock warning buoy, sir.'
'Dammit, can't I read for myself?' said his lordship ungratefully. 'But what's the bloody thing doing across the bows of my ship?'
Verity almost wept with relief as the great dark shape of the Hero, looming the height of a house over the warning buoy and its tower, turned in a surging thunder of foam, shearing away at the last moment from the savage sharpness of the long rock. But the relief was soon overwhelmed by other considerations as the wash from the mighty hull and the powerful screws struck the buoy with the force of a sea driven by a gale. The riding light was spun from his hand, hitting the water and sinking at once. He lost his footing, his right hand brushed uselessly against the cold wet metal and, as he fell, his weight tore his left arm from its grip on the iron struts. In the second between falling and hitting the water he thought, for the first time since leaving Plymouth, of Bella and Paddington Green.
Carried down into the trough of the waves and then up on the next crest, he had hardly the breath to cry for help. As the water bore him up, he
saw the iron latticework now brilliantly lit, but there was no sign of the gig or the girl. He had not the strength left even to cry for rescue. The sea had taken him at last, an unresisting victim to be borne to his death wherever the tides drew him.
And then there was a terrible pain in his eyes as a white radiance seemed to hit him with the force of a blow. He longed only for the ease of darkness, and darkness came. It was followed abruptly by the same cruel brilliance, the sound of voices, and something falling. The voices were closer, the words quite clear.
'Back starboard! Down port! Give way together!'
For a long moment he was alone in the painful white light. Then a voice, almost at his shoulder, said,
'In bows!'
Though his body was numb, he could just feel the hands which took him under the arms and pulled with such strength that Verity's portly body seemed to flip effortlessly into chill air and then to fall on to the boards of the ship's cutter.
'Girl,' he said drowsily, 'Jolly, girl in the water.'
SV - 03 - Sergeant Verity Presents His Compliments Page 26