The yawl is waiting to cast off and take you back to harbour.' Bolitho lifted his arms and saw Masters' eyes shift to the curved fighting hanger which Allday deftly clipped to his belt. 'I am afraid it will be carrying a different crew this time, but you will take us past the boom.'
He watched his words touch a cord in Masters' mind.
'But, but ..."
"The governor has acted unlawfully. I intend to take control of the island, and to do that with a minimum loss of life you will steer us through the entrance.' He counted seconds before adding quietly, 'What happens to Rivers will depend on others. But if you attempt to raise an alarm you will be killed. If you betray us in any other way I will treat such action as treason against the Crown. You know what that will mean.'
He adjusted the hanger on his belt, sickened by the man's stunned features, by his own brutal remedy.
Then he thought of Duncan and the others and said, 'Put him aboard the yawl. I shall follow.'
He looked at Keen. 'This is the only way. You must command the ship.'
They both glanced up as the wind moaned through the shrouds and ratlines like a taunt.
'Your first lieutenant is an excellent seaman, but ashore with men he sometimes abuses too much, who can tell? And we have no margin at all for error.'
He looked from Keen to Allday. Friends. Comrades. So few of us left.
'You, Allday, have the most dangerous part. You will lower the barge at the seaward side. It cannot be seen now from the fortress.'
Allday eyed him stubbornly. 'I know what to do, sir. Take the boat past them moorings and light a beacon.'
'It is a hard thing to ask. If we fail you will be cut off.'
Allday grunted. 'I'd rather stay with you, sir. It's my right, my place.'
Bolitho gripped his arm and tried to hide his emotion.
'Without that beacon Achates has no chance of entering harbour. No chance to avoid running aground in this wind.
And yonshall be with me, old friend. Make no mistake about it.'
Keen said, 'I still believe ..." Then he shut his mouth and gave a rueful grin. 'But it's done.' He loosened his shirt and touched his sword. 'Rivers may be surprised, but that compares little with my own feelings!'
He nodded to Allday and strode from the cabin, his voice going ahead as he rapped out his orders.
Bolitho took a pistol and thrust it into his belt. Did it really matter if Quantock led the attack? In his heart he knew it did. Men being asked to face death while fighting for a cause they did not understand, or if they did probably had a greater sympathy for the foe, needed to see him there too. To watch him die or share whatever fate he had flung them into.
Allday followed him from the cabin, breathing hard as he ducked beneath the deckhead beams. Around them in the gloom half-naked seamen were already standing to the guns, while on the deck below the hands had cleared for action with barely a sound or an order being shouted by the lieutenants and warrant officers.
On the quarterdeck more figures stood in dark clusters or tottered about in the hot wind. It felt like burning sand, the spray hard enough to blind a man.
Bolitho tilted his head to peer at the thrashing canvas as it rippled and boomed against the spars. Once set free the ship would be like a wild thing. A good sailer, they said. She would need to be all that and more.
Tackles squeaked and he heard the barge being lowered down the side. Even though he was hidden in the menacing gloom he could almost feel Allday's resentment, his anxiety, as once more he was parted from him, from his special place in things.
Keen shouted, 'Good luck, sir!'
They made a quick handclasp, their fingers running with warm spray. Then Bolitho was out and swinging down to the pitching yawl, where hands reached out to help him aboard.
A voice growled, 'Who's this, Ted? Gawd, let's get on with it!'
Another gave a hoarse cheer. "Tis th' admiral, lads!'
They pushed round him as if they did not believe he was joining them. In his sodden, grubby shirt he could have been anyone, but they knew, and from the darkness a voice called, 'Welcome, Equality Dick!'
Bolitho groped his way aft, moved and, as usual, ashamed that he had not even considered that these unknown seamen might trust him.
He heard Mountsteven, the second lieutenant, say cheerfully, 'Smells like a Portland whore-house, sir.' His total lack of respect showed that he too was caught in the madness like the rest.
'It's powerful."
Bolitho reached the tiller and peered at the men nearest him. He saw Christy, the boatswain's mate who had been in the Lysander, and the vague shape of Masters, who was easily recognizable in his militia uniform.
The boat certainly stank. It was crammed with inflammable materials. Old canvas, cordage soaked in grease and pitch, oil and various oddments from the gunner's store. One careless spark and the whole boat would ignite like a grenade.
Once they had seized the boom and cut its moorings, Allday's barge, followed by Achates' two cutters with the marines, would spread the attack. He had noticed that the yawl's original crew, like the guards he had seen around the fortress, were mostly of slave stock, left-overs and half-breeds from the island's various occupations.
It was unlikely that officers like Masters would live in quarters within the fortress. It would take time for them to be called from their comfortable homes. He shivered slightly. Unless of course Rivers had already seen through his scheme and every gun was loaded and ready for the first sign of an attack.
He said, 'Cast off, Mr Mountsteven. Show a lantern forrard as planned.' He glanced at Masters. 'You have your instructions. If you value your life and the chance to rejoin your family, I would advise you to be prudent.'
He heard Christy rattle his cutlass in its scabbard as an unspoken warning.
With the mooring lines released and the sails spreading over the deck like giant wings, the big yawl reeled away from Achates' protection.
Rivers' men on the boom would be wary, but they had no cause to expect such a rash course of action. He had a sudden stark picture of Achates in the first dawn light, wrecked across the entrance and a ready target for the great guns.
A voice whispered, 'Land ahead, sir!'
Bolitho felt a murmur run through the crowded space between decks where the mass of seamen crouched and waited for the onslaught. Blades scraped each other, and men groped for pistols and muskets in total darkness to make certain they were dry and ready. One foolhardy move, a musket being fired by accident, and all would be lost. Bolitho was grateful that Achates' people were mostly experienced hands. Well trained, part of a family.
He clung to a backstay and peered through the spray towards the darker wedge of land on the larboard bow. To starboard the fortress and the fifteen-hundred foot high volcano were a vague blur in this eerie light.
A lantern bobbed across the water, seemingly from the sea itself, and Bolitho thought he heard a shout.
Masters said harshly, 'Dip the forrard lantern!' He sounded as if he could barely breathe. 'Twice!'
The lantern dipped and rose twice as directed, and Bolitho found that he was holding his breath. It was Masters' chance to betray him, to prove his last loyalty to Rivers. But nothing happened, and the light on the boom remained steady and flickering above the tossing wavecrests.
The tiller-bar creaked as Masters guided the helmsman's hand. He had committed himself and had no intention of drowning because of faulty steering.
Bolitho saw the end of the boom and a few hunched figures around the guide light. Someone was shouting at the yawl, and Masters waved, his lordly gesture made pathetic by his treachery.
'Now! Helm hard to starboard! Take in the sails!'
The seamen, used to working in all weathers in daylight or darkness, brought the yawl hard against the moored craft and heavy timbers. As their grapnels soared across the startled guards the first concealed sailor leapt on to the boom, his cutlass silencing a challenge and changing it to a terrible cry.<
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The boom was suddenly swarming with men, and while some took care of the wretched guards, others dragged out the yawl's dangerous cargo and wedged it into position.
'Light the fuses! Slow-match there! Lively!' Mountsteven barked out his orders while the prisoners were flung unceremoniously into the yawl.
Bolitho peered up at the fortress's blurred shape. No sound or sign. Maybe Rivers had really expected him to ignore his honour and his future and sign some illegal document. It would not have been unique in naval history.
'Moorings cut, sir!'
One slow-match sparked briefly like a glow-worm and then another as the last sailor jumped into the tossing boat. 'Cast off!'
Barely glancing at the cowering survivors from their swift attack the seamen thrust with long sweeps, boat-hooks and anything else they could find to carry the yawl away from the boom.
Lieutenant Mountsteven in his excitement seized Bolitho's arm and pointed with his hanger. 'There goes your man, sir!'
With only the oar blades visible like trailing white snakes the barge swept through the gap and was into the harbour before the yawl had staggered clear.
'Steer for the shore!'
Bolitho strode to the opposite side where Masters was leaning over the gunwale to peer towards the fortress.
It was like being in a mill-race, with the deck swaying from side to side, sometimes awash as the sweeps fought to hold steerage-way.
'That was well done, Masters.' Bolitho ignored the man's astonished glance and shouted, 'Stand by, lads!'
There was a muffled explosion and suddenly the yawl and their upturned faces were bathed in a vivid orange glare as the drifting boom burst into flames. In seconds it had moved well past the headland and was breaking up into smaller fiery shapes as the lashings parted.
Bolitho tightened the hanger's thong around his wrist and tested his wounded leg. If it failed him now . . .
The yawl hit the land, rebounded with the sea boiling over the gunwale and sweeping men aside like untidy sacks, and then drove ashore yet again. Bolitho heard wood splintering, the inrushing water surging and dragging at his legs as the boat continued to batter its way along a line of rocks.
But grapnels were already finding a grip, and as the first men clambered cursing and spluttering on to firm ground Bolitho heard the far-off blare of a trumpet.
He tried to fix the picture of the hillside in his mind, then turned to watch as another part of the drifting boom exploded in a great plume of sparks and flames.
The whole of Georgetown must surely be on the alert by now.
Crack . . . crack . . . crack . . . Musket shots whined impotently through the spray as some sentries fired from the fortress walls.
'Rally the men, Mr Mountsteven.'
The lieutenant was regarding the remains of the yawl. There was no way out by that method.
Someone gave a hoarse cheer which was instantly silenced by an unseen petty officer.
But Bolitho felt like cheering too. The Achates' cutters were pulling like demons as they swept through some last remnants of the boom, the marines' white cross-belts stark and clear despite the gloom.
From the bows of one came the sharp crack of a musket and a yell of command, magnified through a speaking-trumpet to add unreality to the moment.
A cutter was pulling directly for one of Rivers' own boats. Doubtless one which was bringing the unfortunate Lieutenant Trevenen to be exchanged. If they had harmed him . . .
He did not let his mind dwell on it as Mountsteven shouted, 'All accounted for, sir!'
'Carry on! Fast as you can! Across the track from the town. Scatter the men among the rocks, anywhere so that they can slow an attack until the marines support us!'
In spite of his racing thoughts he almost smiled at the absurdity of his orders. More like a general than a naval officer with a boatload of seamen and a company of marines, if they ever managed to reach here.
He ran with the seamen through dark rocks and great bushes which loomed and shook like monsters in the fierce wind as if to frighten them from their purpose.
'Here, sir!'
That was Christy, and Bolitho dropped beside him but gasped as the pain stabbed from his wounded thigh.
Christy was peering at his pistols and had a cutlass bared and lying beside him.
Bolitho saw others running and stooping as they sought out cover, while more musket shots whimpered overhead. Where was Rivers, he wondered? In his fine house, or up there on the fortress wondering if they were all going mad?
He pounded the wet ground with his fist. Everything depended on Allday. He might have run into a guard-boat like the one confronted by Achates' cutter. Even now Keen would be weighing anchor, watching the flames on the severed boom, all he had to divide sea from rock.
Soon those flames would have died too.
A voice yelled a command and a loose volley of shots cracked up the slope towards the fortress.
Scott, Achates' third lieutenant and Keen's next most experienced officer, yelled, 'Reload! Steady, lads!' He must have seen some movement at the fortress gates.
Bolitho tried not to think of Keen's helplessness as his ship tore free from the ground and began to claw her way round and into solid darkness. Short-handed because of the landing party, and with at least three of his officers out of the ship, it must be a living nightmare.
He saw Christy's eyes glow like twin matches and turned as a column of fire gushed from the end of the moorings.
Allday, in spite of all his doubts and arguments, had done it. The fire was burning brightly where the bargemen had lashed it to one of the buoys, and another would be ready when it died.
Then a cannon roared out like a thunder-clap. Where the ball went nobody saw. It had probably ripped over the very buoy which Rivers had indicated when he had made his casual threat.
Masters was crawling on the ground and when he saw Bolitho flopped down beside him. Now that he had done it he was unable to stop shaking with fear.
Bolitho looked at him and asked, 'What is the date, Mr Masters?"
Masters gulped and managed to reply, 'J-July the ninth, I believe, sir!"
He would have jumped to his feet if Christy had not dragged him down for his own safety.
Masters' voice cracked as he asked, 'I heard something! What's happening?'
Bolitho had heard it too. The faint rattle of drums and the frail sound of fifes.
He could see it as if he were there with them. His marines, marching along a rough road in this howling wind, the little drummer boys keeping an even distance behind their officers as if they were on parade. A road none of them had even seen, and some would never see it when daylight came.
Bolitho managed to say, 'The date is important. One we shall remember."
He twisted his head to see another of Allday's blazing flares, but this time his eyes seemed blurred.
He drove the knuckle-bow of his hanger into the ground near his face and whispered, 'We shall win. We shall win'.' It sounded like a prayer.
Keen ran up the poop ladder and clung to a rail as the wind drove along the full length of his ship, the sound rising and strengthening like some obscene chorus.
His mind reeled as he tried to calculate the time and distance he had left to bring Achates about once the anchor broke free. He could dimly hear the creak of the capstan, the hoarse shouts of petty officers as they waited for the moment.
Keen returned to the quarterdeck, his face stinging as if the flesh were raw. He saw the dark outline of the wheel and a handful of helmsmen, the master with a midshipman standing nearby. Seamen of the after-guard at the braces, their half-naked bodies shining in the gloom like wet marble.
Soon . . . soon. Now or never. Keen had read it often enough in the Gazette or some Admiralty report. One of His Majesty's ships driven ashore and lost. A court martial later pronounced ... He stopped his racing thoughts and shouted above the din, 'Ready, Mr Quantock?'
The tall figure of the first lieutenant
, angled like a cripple's against the sloping deck, staggered towards him.
'It's no use, sir!"
Keen faced him angrily. Keep your voice down, man!"
Quantock leaned forward as if to see him better.
'The master agrees with me. It's madness. We'll never manage it.' He was encouraged by Keen's silence. 'There's no shame in standing away, sir. There may still be time.'
"Anchor's hove short, sir!' The cry came like a dirge.
'Time? What has that to do with it, damn your eyes!'
Keen strode to the nettings and saw some seamen watching him anxiously.
Quantock persisted, 'Captain Glazebrook would never - '
Keen retorted, 'He is dead. We are not. Do you suggest that we abandon our admiral and all his party because we are at some risk? Is that what you are advising, Mr Quantock?' The release of his bitterness and anger seemed to help him. 'I'll see you, the master and all else in hell before I turn and run!'
He walked to the quarterdeck rail and peered aloft at the wildly thrashing canvas. They might lose a sail or a spar, perhaps the whole lot. But Bolitho was out there beyond the swaying poop. Pictures flashed through his thoughts. The Great South Sea. The girl he had loved, who had died of the fever which had almost done for Bolitho. In spite of his own despair Bolitho had tried to comfort him. Leave him now after what they had endured together? Never in ten thousand bloody years.
'Pass the word to the topmen, Mr Fraser. It will be close. Clear lower deck and put every available man on braces and halliards.' He grappled for the name of the lieutenant nearby. 'Mr Foord, prepare to drop the larboard anchor if the worst should happen.' It might hold her long enough to get some of the hands ashore.
He heard himself say calmly, 'Well, Mr Quantock?'
Quantock was glaring through the drifting spray.
'Aye, aye, sir.'
He snatched up his speaking-trumpet and strode to the side.
Keen gripped the smooth rail. How many captains had stood here? In storm or becalmed, entering harbour after a long and successful passage, or concealing fear as the deck had quivered and rocked to the roar of cannon fire.
Success to the Brave - Bolitho 15 Page 11