by John Drake
Silver looked at the fierce little man, jabbering and stamping, and his men beside themselves with excitement, their eyes rolling and teeth gnashing. The warriors were groaning and swaying, and wildly dangerous: one false word would set them off, butchering every man that wasn't one of them. It was uncanny. It made Silver's flesh creep.
And it was too much, too fast, for Silver to make sense of. And in particular he was struggling to make sense of Dreamer, who clearly knew something - but for the life of him Silver couldn't get a grasp on it, for he'd never met such a creature before.
"What bloody demons?" said Silver. "What the blasted hell are you talking about?"
"John!" said Israel Hands. "For Christ's sake, look - it's the bloody navy!"
"Navy?" said Long John. "Where?"
"There!" said Israel Hands.
"Shiver me timbers!"
Just visible, out to sea, about a mile from the mouth of the inlet was a big sloop. It was flying British colours.
"ALLLLLLL HANDS!" roared Silver. He shouted to rattle the t'gallant masthead, and even the birds in the trees fell silent. "Now then," he said, "we've to get aboard and under way this instant - and God help him as dawdles!" He turned to Dreamer. "How many men have you got?"
"One hundred, and half a hundred, and a little more."
"Well and good - Mr Hands!"
"Aye-aye, sir?"
"Take command of the beach. Man every boat you can, and get these buggers aboard - all of 'em - and tell Mr Joe to see 'em stowed wheresoever makes best sense. At the double, mind!" Silver looked at those few of Flint's men now standing under guard. "We need seamen, so I'll take them too. And as for the rest -" he looked at the faces peering from Sweet Anne and Hercules "- them buggers must take their chance along of Billy Bones and Ben Gunn, for we ain't got time to take all."
The job was done quickly, with five boats passing to and fro, and Dreamer sending out his swiftest runners to call in Cut-Feather and his men. Finally there were just two boats ashore, one pulling away, loaded with Patanq and seamen, and one with Silver and Dreamer climbing aboard, and Selena and Israel Hands waiting with four men at the oars.
"Is that all your people, Dreamer?" said Silver.
"It is all of them."
"So let's be gone!"
"Wait!" cried Dreamer. "Look!"
Five Patanq warriors were sprinting along the beach towards the boat. Dreamer stared at them, and said something in his own tongue. He said it sharp and amazed.
"What's that?" said Silver. "Who's them?"
"My trackers!" said Dreamer. "Sent to find Flint -"
"Flint? Where is he? Where is the bastard?"
But the five men were gasping and panting and throwing themselves at Dreamer's feet and pointing back towards the woods, and Dreamer was listening and nodding… and then he threw back his head and let out a cry that chilled the bones.
"What is it?" said Silver. "Shiver me timbers, what is it?"
"In! In!" said Dreamer, and the five Patanq leapt into the boat. "One-Leg," he said, eyes round in horror, "he had a boat! He has escaped! My dreams were true! I thought I had won, but I have lost… he goes to the women and children!"
Silver said nothing but grabbed Dreamer where he stood shaking and spouting, and hauled him into the boat.
"Get us aboard ship, Mr Hands," said Silver. "Buggered if I knows what's up his Indian arse, but it ain't nothing good, now, is it?"
"Dunno, Cap'n," said Israel Hands, "but never mind him - lookee there!"
"Oh, shite and corruption!" said Silver. It wasn't just one navy sloop. There were three of them. "Give way!" he cried. "Break your backs and sod him as slacks!"
And the seamen heaved and the boat shot forward, even as the Patanq huddled round Dreamer, wailing and gabbling in their own language, and totally ignoring the white men. And so they continued, even as Walrus was got under way, and out to sea to face her enemies. It took all Long John's talents to bring them under orders for what he planned to do next.
Three bells of the forenoon watch
(had bells been struck, which they were not: the ship
having beat to quarters)
26th February 1753
Aboard HMS Leaper
Northeast of the island
Lieutenant Heffer's head pounded as if it would burst. Here it was! This was it! Exactly what they'd been looking for! A big New England topsail schooner, just like Flint's. And it weren't showing no courtesy to a man-o'-war. Leaper, Bounder and Jumper were all flying King George's colours, and any honest merchantman coming upon them sudden, like this, would dip her colours and let fly her topsails. But this schooner flew no flags. She was pierced for fourteen guns, and she was coming on furiously, without the least intention of giving honours or heaving to.
"Flint!" cried Heffer. "We got the bastard, lads! Give a cheer and stand by to go alongside. We'll have his tripes for tow-ropes, lads!"
"Huzzah!" cried the Leaper's crew, all seventy-five of them, and the master at arms ran round issuing pistols and cutlasses to all those who hadn't already got them.
They were crackling with excitement. They'd got Flint! Three ships to his one! They'd board him, baste him and boil him! And he wasn't even trying to avoid them. He was coming on, bold as brass, and there wasn't a gob's chance on a griddle of him getting away.
Heffer leapt up into the main shrouds for a better look. With skill born of practice, he hooked a leg into the ratlines to cling on and leave his hands free for the glass.
Ah, he thought, as he scanned the decks of the schooner, there's hardly a bugger aboard! Instinctively he felt the pistols in his belt and the blade at his side. I'll do it! he thought. I'll board the sod, and clap Flint in irons. And all this, God willing, before Bounder and Jumper could join in and spoil the splendid completeness of his victory. And if that didn't end up with himself promoted, then God rot his soul!
The two vessels closed at speed, both on a good wind, on converging courses, and they slid diagonalwise, slanting together, with all hands cheering aboard Leaper and not a soul in sight aboard the schooner, other than a tall man with one leg standing beside his helmsman, and a few others in the rigging.
Leaper's maindeck fired, guns trained hard round on the bow, set to bear as soon as they might, and her shot howled and zoomed and some struck crunching into the schooner.
"Huzzah! Huzzah!" cried Leaper's people.
"Damnation and buggery!" cried Lieutenant Clark of Bounder and Lieutenant Comstock of Jumper, and they screamed at their bosuns to make better speed. Neither wanted to miss out. All that remained to be decided was the matter of who got most credit. Flint was done for. The noose was as good as encircling his neck.
Then the schooner's topmen spilled wind from her sails. She slowed.
"Uh?" thought Heffer.
She slowed, at the precise moment necessary to line her up square alongside of Leaper, before Heffer could order grapnels away, at a range of twenty feet… and then she gave her entire broadside in a thundering cascade of flame and smoke, with guns aimed high to send a scything blast of chain shot into Leaper' s rigging: ripping spars, chopping lines and leaving the mainsail shredded and flapping like rags on a line.
In the same instant, shrieks and war-whoops rose from Walrus's decks as over a hundred and fifty half-naked savages leapt up from where they'd been hiding, and gave such a volley of musketry as put the maindeck guns to shame, dropping men dead, ruined and wounded all over Leaper's decks, and her helm unmanned, and her sail trimmers fallen, and herself falling off the wind, and left trailing and tattered in the wake of the speeding schooner.
Lieutenant Heffer had made a serious error. Something a more experienced man wouldn't have done. He should have waited until his full force of three ships could act together. As it was, his ship was thrashed, while the enemy, unharmed, was proceeding northward at great speed.
Heffer however was past caring, having been hit by a three- foot length of chain that flew somewhat low. As Leaper d
rifted in disarray, he lay like a fish on a slab: stone dead and gutted, with his entrails around him.
26th February 1753
Aboard Walrus as she fired into Leaper
Israel Hands's gun-captains fired as the sloop came under their guns. They all knew their master gunner. They knew his ways and they knew not to waste shot - even those who, until half an hour ago, had thought themselves Flint's men. But Israel Hands couldn't help bellowing out the words of command:
"Let 'em come, boys! Wait your target! Fire as the guns bear!"
Walrus shuddered as the guns bounded back, jerked to a stop by their tackles, and Silver, standing by the helmsman, jabbed the end of his crutch against a brown figure laid flat on the deck.
"Now!" he said, and Cut-Feather jumped up, screamed a war-cry, and all around Patanq warriors came pouring out of the hatchways, and out from behind every scrap of cover where they could hide. Soon Patanq were blazing away with their muskets into the sloop that had been decoyed into trying to board, and was now falling astern in ruins.
The Patanq by this time were crowded into the gundeck, grinning and chattering and pointing at the sloop, and getting in the way of the gun-teams as these experts fell on their pieces with swabs and rammers and wads to re-load.
"Get 'em clear!" cried Silver from the quarter deck. "Cut- Feather - if you're a bloody officer, then act like one! Clear your men from the guns! Get them into the fo'c'sle and the rigging with their muskets!"'
Considering he'd never been aboard a ship in action, Cut- Feather learned most wonderfully fast. In a matter of moments he'd got his men where Silver wanted, leaving the gun crews to re-load and run out.
Meanwhile Silver found Van Oosterhout at his elbow, full of self-importance and tugging at his sleeve.
"What d'you want, damn you?" said Silver, who had two more ships to fight and wanted to be left alone to do it. They were trying to cut across his bow even this precious second, and would do it, too, if he didn't look sharp.
"You must take Flint's Passage!" said Van Oosterhout.
"What's that?"
"We go to the Patanq fleet, yes?"
"Yes. That's what he wants." Silver looked round for Dreamer, and saw him slumped with his back to the taffrail and his head in his hands. "Huh! What's wrong with him? Is he hit?"
"No," said Selena, "he's ill. He's ill all the time."
"What are you doing on deck? I told you to go below!"
"John," said Selena, "listen to him! To Van Oosterhout!"
"Why?"
"He's special. He's a better seaman than Flint."
"He's what?"
"He does a thing Flint can't do."
"What thing?"
But her answer was lost, for at that moment ship's guns roared, and shot screamed. Lieutenant Comstock of Jumper had calculated, correctly, that he couldn't get across Walrus's bows - she was just too fast. So he brought his ship around and gave his broadside, slow and steady, five guns, carefully aimed, in the hope of doing some damage that would slow her down.
ZOOOOOM! VOOOOOM! said the two closest misses, which were close enough to make Walrus's people duck, and the Patanq cry out in fright. But Jumper scored no hits.
"Hold your course!" cried Silver to the helmsman. "Steady as she goes!"
"Aye-aye, sir!"
"What thing?" cried Silver to Selena. Even in the heat of action he was intrigued, for Flint was a masterly seaman, and Long John knew of none better. "What can he do that Flint can't?"
"I find longitude. I find it at sea!" said Van Oosterhout.
"Bollocks!" said Silver. "Can't be done… can it?"
"Yes!" said Selena.
"Yes!" said Van Oosterhout.
"Well, stap my liver!"
"Cap'n!" said Israel Hands. "Belay this jawing - that bugger's got the wind of us!" He pointed at the third sloop, the one best placed to intercept Walrus.
"I know," said Silver, "and I'll do my best, Mr Gunner, if you do yours. Now then, madam -" he looked at Selena "- get below and out of the reach of shot. And you, Mijnbeer: get a pair of barkers and stand by to fight with all the rest. But first, tell me this: is our present course good enough for Flint's Passage?"
"Yes, Captain. But you will need my guidance to pass through. Without that, the ship will be lost."
"Well and good. Come to me later, then. For now I must hold this course and not delay, or we'll have the two of them to fight all at once."
So Silver pushed Walrus as hard as she'd go, trimming her sails to utmost advantage, even heaving her two foremost guns over the side and shifting stores below, so she'd sit more by the stern in the water, and which he felt would give her more speed… which didn't quite work.
Bounder was the furthest out to sea. She was best placed to cut across Walrus's bow - and cut across she did.
But she wasted her chance. With Long John steering as best he could to avoid her, she still managed to run slantwise across Walrus's bow, firing off her guns as she went. It would have been a classic piece of seamanship - had she not been so eager. She should have hung back a little, and waited until she was all but snapping Walrus's bowsprit… Instead, most of her shot went nowhere, just two thundering hits on Walrus's bow, with heavy crashes but negligible damage.
And then Bounder was left behind, Walrus's guns firing long-range in an attempt to do some damage in return, while the sloop tacked frantically in an effort to get back into the fight.
As Walrus surged onward, heeled to the wind, foam under her bows and all aboard cheering - except the Patanq, who were whooping and dancing like madmen - Silver looked back at the sloop.
We done it! thought Silver. He could scarcely believe it, but it was true. They weren't maroons no more. They weren't meat for the savages to roast. They weren't pirates to be turned off and hanged. There was clear water ahead, and the navy astern, and Van Oosterhout the only one what knew the way through the archipelago, and all those as tried to follow liable to run on to the rocks! And Selena was beside him and throwing her arms around him, who'd not gone below, not for a second, and Long John Silver had a good ship, jolly companions and the woman he loved and all the world was his. He'd even got a quadrant-monger to replace Billy Bones!
There can't be nothing to spoil this, he thought.
* * *
Chapter 43
Nearly noon, 26th February 1753
Two miles southeast of Flint's Passage
The archipelago
It was getting cooler. The closer the launch got to the archipelago the cooler it got… cooler and safer, for as ever there was a mist over the archipelago. Once in Flint's Passage, the launch would be invisible and safe. Safe from pursuit, though not from the passage itself where the sea rolled and heaved and broke over some of the bigger rocks, leaving the rest hidden. They lay a fathom or two below the waves, waiting patiently, knowing that in time their patience would be rewarded.
In fact there was a great need for patience all around. Flint had to be patient, knowing that the only cure for his ills was a slow one; it might take months or even years to re-unite him with what was his. And the four hands whom Flint had brought along as crew must be patient too: they were anxious to get out of sight, but had to sail easy because of the rocks Flint had warned them of.
Then came the sound of gunfire from the sloops that were engaging Walrus. Poisonous rage boiled out of Flint's very liver at sight of his darling in another man's hands - and was promptly suppressed. Flint smiled to calm the hands, who were gaping at the distant ships and the rolling smoke. The Royal Navy was their bogey man, and they were unsettled.
"Never fear, lads," said Flint. "That'll be the saving of us. Let them fight. Let them smash one another. And whatever's left can beach and wreck itself trying to follow us through Flint's Passage, that only myself knows the running of!"
They nodded at that, the oafs. God's bowels, but they were stupid! To them, Flint's Passage was as insurmountable an obstacle as the walls of Troy. Well, maybe it was, to anyone w
ithout Flint's chart… or a copy of it. There was a thought! Could Van Oosterhout be aboard one of those ships? Flint thought not. He'd be no friend to the navy or to Silver. Or would he? Who could tell? Best assume that he was with them. Best make good time through the passage and get the Patanq fleet under way - after he'd attended to them, of course. That might prove difficult; he would have to be very careful how he went about it…
Thus thought Joe Flint as he ordered his men to strike the sail and take up their oars, and occupied himself with the little matter of getting through the archipelago without ripping the bottom out of the launch or running her aground. He'd done it before, of course, and had even added notes to his chart to make it easier. But still it would require all his attention, even with so small a boat as this.
Spreading the chart on a thwart, Flint took bearings of the island with quadrant and compass, noting the lie of the hills and the shape of its black profile rising out of the sea. Yes, they were on course for the archipelago and Flint's Passage.
"Give way!" said Flint, and took the tiller. He looked along the boat. He looked at the swaying oarsmen, the neat-furled sails and the masts laid along the thwarts, and he looked at the chests and the big tarpaulin.
Ahhhh, he thought, and nodded to himself.
Ten thousand dollars' worth of silver, gold and stones in the chests - enough to get him the men and ships he would need. He couldn't go back to Charlestown, but there were other ports. The colonies were full of them. He might even go to England. To Bristol perhaps, or Plymouth…?
But for now the gems and doubloons were as nothing compared with what he'd got under the tarpaulin. There, in the dark, was something even more vital to his plans. It was a pity it needed such constant attention.
"Stroke oar!" said Flint.
"Aye-aye, Cap'n."