by Wilbur Smith
‘Start the lead,’ he whispered, and heard the plop as it was thrown out ahead of the bows.
Seconds later came the soft call of the leadsman. ‘No bottom with this line.’
They were still beyond the drop-off. Suddenly there was a startled cry from the bows and Hal looked ahead. He saw a large dhow coming down the channel directly towards them, her triangular sail catching the moonlight, and her wake leaving a long glossy slick through the passage. She was on a collision course with the pinnace.
Hal had a moment’s temptation. She was a large vessel, and she was almost certainly stuffed with treasure she had traded from al-Auf. She was unsuspecting and vulnerable. It would take only minutes to board her and subdue her crew. Five of his men could sail her out to where the Seraph waited.
Hal hesitated. If they could take her cleanly it would be gold in the purse of every man-jack on the Seraph, but if they ran into resistance, and there was a fight on her deck, the sounds of the struggle would carry to the corsairs on the beach.
‘Take her or let her go!’ Hal had only seconds in which to decide. He glanced beyond the oncoming dhow, into the heart of the bay, and saw the bare masts of the Minotaur stand tall and proud against the stars. Then he looked back at the oncoming dhow. Let her go. He made the fateful decision, and aloud he whispered to his crew, ‘’Vast heaving.’
The rowers held their beat and the tips of the long oars dragged over the surface, taking the way off her, until she lay quiet and low in the dark waters. Behind her the other boats conformed to her example.
The big dhow made the final turn out through the passage. Unchecked and unmolested, she swept past where the pinnace lay. A lookout on her deck spotted them and hailed them in Arabic.
‘What boat are you?’
‘Fishing boats with the night’s catch.’ Hal pitched his voice so that it would not carry to the shore. ‘What boat are you?’
‘The ship of the Prince Abd Muhammad al-Malik.’
‘Go with Allah!’ Hal called after her as she bore away into the west and disappeared on the dark plains of the ocean. ‘Haul away!’ he ordered, and watched the long oars sweep forward and dip, swing and rise in unison, dripping liquid fire from their tips. He aimed the bows for the exact spot where the big dhow had come through.
‘By the mark ten.’ The lead had found bottom. Sir Francis’s chart was proved accurate once again, confirmed for Hal by the passage of the dhow. They rowed on into the gap. Suddenly water was breaking on either side of them.
‘By the mark five.’ They were entering the throat.
‘Drop the number-one buoy!’ Hal ordered. The leadsman in the bows let it go over the side, and the line attached to the small white-painted keg peeled out. Hal looked round and saw the keg bobbing in their wake. It would give him his marks when he brought out the captured Minotaur. He turned back and squinted at the walls of the fort, which showed pale in the moonlight, lining them up with the tip of the reef. ‘Now!’ he muttered, and made the first turn of the dog-leg. The other boats followed him round.
‘By the mark four, and a half four.’
‘Too close to the outer reef.’ Hal altered course slightly to keep down the centre of the channel.
Suddenly there was suppressed urgency in the voice of the man on the lead. ‘By the mark two!’
With that warning Hal picked up the shape of the coral, dark and menacing as some monster, dead ahead. He put the tiller hard over, bringing her round only just in time for they had almost overrun the channel.
‘By the mark seven!’ There was relief in the leadsman’s tone. They had passed through the coral jaws and were into the open harbour where the unsuspecting enemy ships lay.
‘Drop the number-two buoy!’ Hal whispered, and they left it standing in the middle of the pass to mark their way out. He glanced back over his shoulder. The other boats were fanning out.
He had given each of them their targets. Hal would take the Minotaur. In the second pinnace Big Daniel would take the Dutchman, and the longboats would attack and burn all the other craft in the anchorage. Hal steered for the big East Indiaman, where she lay in the deepest water directly opposite the fort. Let us find out how bright-eyed is her anchor watch, he thought, as he waited for the first alarm to be given. But the Minotaur stood tall, dark and silent as they came up under her quarter and hooked on to her chains.
Aboli went first, swinging up over the side. With the double-headed axe in one hand he landed on the deck, his bare feet making almost no sound, and ran forward lightly while a rush of men followed him up from the pinnace. Halfway down the deck a watchman struggled to his feet from where he had been lying asleep under the gunwale. He was unsteady on his feet and obviously only half awake. ‘Who are you?’ His voice was sharp with alarm. ‘I know you not!’ He grabbed for the musket that leaned against the gunwale beside him.
‘Go with God!’ said Aboli, and swung the axe in a wide, flashing arc. It took the man full in the side of his neck, severing it cleanly. His head toppled forward and rolled down his chest, while his trunk stood erect before it slumped to the deck. The air escaped from his lungs in a whistling blast of frothy blood from the open windpipe.
Aboli jumped over the corpse and, with a dozen long strides, reached the anchor cable stretched tautly through its hawsehole. He looked back over his shoulder and saw that Hal was already at the helm. The rest of the Minotaur’s skeleton crew had been subdued without any outcry, and their robed bodies were scattered along the open deck. Looking upwards he saw that most of the Seraph’s seamen were swarming up the rigging and swinging out along the yards. The Minotaur had been built in the same yard as the Seraph, and the rigging of her masts was almost identical. There was no hesitation in the way the topmastmen did their work.
As the main course spread, like the wings of a butterfly emerging from the chrysalis sheath, Aboli swung the axe high above his head and, with both hands, brought the blade flashing down again. The axe buried itself with a thump in the deck timber and the anchor cable parted with a twang.
The Minotaur paid away before the night breeze, until the rudder and push of the spreading sails checked her. Hal spun the wheel full to starboard and, lightly as a lover, the Minotaur came on the wind.
Only then could Hal spare a glance for the other boats of the flotilla. There was fighting on the deck of the Dutchman, and he heard the tinny clank of cutlass blade on scimitar, then the faint death-cry of a man hit through the heart. The sails spread on the yards and the big ship turned for the bay entrance.
At that moment there was a flicker of light, which grew swiftly in strength until it lit the deck of the Minotaur. Hal could make out Aboli’s features clearly as he strode down the deck towards him. He swung round and saw that the square-rigged ship closest to him was on fire. The men from the longboat commanded by Alf Wilson had climbed aboard her, killed her crew and tossed tar-soaked torches into her holds and rigging.
The flames caught in her hull and jumped up into the rigging. The fire raced up as though it were gun match, tracing fiery strings against the dark sky. It reached the furled canvas on her yards, and exploded in a tall writhing tower of light higher than the palm trees on the beach.
Alf’s men tumbled back into the longboat and rowed lustily across to the next ship in the anchorage, whose crew saw them coming and did not linger to greet them. They fired a few wild shots at them, then threw aside their weapons and jumped over the ship’s side, hitting the water in a series of white splashes and swimming frantically for the beach.
One after the other the anchored ships burst into flame, and lit the anchorage as though it were noon. The shadows and light played vividly over the walls of the fort, and the first cannon shot banged out from the battlements. Hal did not see where the ball struck for he was bringing the Minotaur around and lining her up for the entrance. The keg they had left floating to mark the passage stood out clearly in the firelight, and the flames were so bright that he could even make out the loom of the ree
f beneath the surface. ‘Ready about!’ Hal bellowed, and began the delicate manoeuvre of tacking ship with so few men in the confines of the bay. There was no latitude for error here. One false turn would put them up on the beach, or send the Minotaur crunching into the coral. He was towing the pinnace behind the ship and its weight and drag affected the Minotaur’s handling. He would have to allow for this when he made his turn.
The Minotaur was heading directly towards the fort, and in the dancing light of the flames Hal could see the gunners scurrying to their weapons. Before he had reached the keg that marked the entrance a cannon fired, then another. He saw a clean round hole appear miraculously in the mainsail as a ball flew through it, and realized that the gunners had made no effort to depress their aim: all their shots were flying high. He glanced back over the stern and saw that Big Daniel, in the Dutchman, was following only a cable’s length behind. He was towing his pinnace too: they would leave no consolation prize for the enemy.
Deeper in the bay the longboats had completed their work of destruction and every enemy ship was on fire. The anchor cable of one of the big square-rigged vessels burned through and she began to drift towards the beach, a moving bonfire. Suddenly the fire reached her powder magazine and she blew up with a thunderous roar. Her main mast was hurled aloft like a javelin, and as it fell back it skewered one of the small dhows, smashing clean through her decks so that the bottom was torn out of her and she sank stern first. The shockwave of the explosion capsized two of the dhows nearest her, and raised a tidal wave that swept through the anchorage.
Hal searched for sight of the longboats, worried that they had been overwhelmed by the force of the explosion, but then he saw them, bobbing and rolling in the disturbed waters, but making good speed to catch up with the Minotaur as their crews heaved frantically on the oars. Hal turned all his attention to taking the ship out through the channel.
He passed the marker keg by an oar’s length on the port side, and they entered the mouth of the pass at speed, passing close under the guns on the battlements of the fort. Hal had a few seconds before the next turn came upon them, and he looked up at the batteries above.
Some of the gunners seemed to have realized their error and were training their pieces down. Hal saw the angle of the protruding barrels depressing as they strained at the training tackles.
‘Stand by the main course,’ Hal told his tiny crew. Each man was forced to do the work of three, but when he put up the helm, and shouted, ‘Lee ho!’ they jumped to it with a shout and a will, the Minotaur came round handily and glided down the passage between the menacing arms of coral, disaster lurking close on either hand. Hal looked back and saw Big Daniel make the same turn in the slick path of the Minotaur’s wake. ‘Stout fellow!’ Hal applauded him, under his breath.
The battery on the walls behind him was firing furiously: the gunsmoke was a thick rolling bank through which the flashes of the bombardment cut long bright shafts. The gunners had managed to lower their barrage now, and a ball raised a gleaming fountain of spray close under the Minotaur’s counter.
Hal smiled wolfishly. The turn was taking the ship almost directly away from the fort and now the cannon shots were flying too low. It would take the gunners some time to realize this, and by then Hal hoped to be clear of the pass and bearing out into the open sea.
‘Ready about!’ he yelled, as he saw the number-one marker buoy dancing in the firelight directly ahead. One of his seamen ran to take his place at the main sheet. As he passed within arm’s length of where Hal stood, a chance shot from the battery hit them. There was a blast of disrupted air that almost threw Hal off his feet. He had to clutch with both hands at the spokes of the wheel for support. The stone ball, reeking of the powder fumes that had sent it on its way, struck the running seaman high in his back. It mangled his body and popped his skull so that half of his brains were flung into Hal’s face like a mugful of warm custard. Hal gagged and recoiled at the horror of it, so distracted as almost to misjudge the final turn. At the last moment he gathered himself, wiped the running yellow mess from his face, and shouted, with the sickening taste on his lips, ‘Let go your courses!’ and put the wheel hard over.
The Minotaur came round, skimming the edge of the coral, and lifted her bows to the first swell of the open sea. As the reef fell away behind him, Hal turned anxiously to watch Big Daniel negotiate the last turn. He made a neater job of it than Hal had. The Dutchman switched her fat bottom round, heeled slightly to the change in the angle of the wind and then, with all the aplomb and dignity of a dowager following her more agile and skittish daughter, came trundling after the Minotaur into the deep, open waters.
‘We’re through,’ Hal said softly, then raised his voice in a triumphant shout. ‘We’ve made it, lads! Give yourselves a cheer.’
They hooted and howled like mad dogs, and from the ship that followed Big Daniel’s men cheered as wildly. In the longboats they jumped on the thwarts, and danced and capered until they were in danger of capsizing. The guns of the battery banged away in frustration, a futile, fading accompaniment, and the flames of the burning fleet began to subside as they sailed out to meet the waiting Seraph.
As dawn broke next morning the squadron of Hal’s ships lay hove to ten miles south-west of Flor de la Mar. Hal came on deck, having changed only his shirt, and gobbled down an early breakfast, just as the sun pushed its upper rim above the horizon.
When Hal looked across at her from the quarterdeck of the Seraph, the Minotaur’s blemishes were apparent in the brilliant early sunlight. She was shot-ridden and neglected, her sails ragged and discoloured, her hull stained and battered. She rode high and light in the water. A cursory examination the previous night had disclosed that her hold was empty of all cargo, but her magazine was almost full of munitions, and the powder-kegs seemed in good condition. These stores would stand Hal in good stead when the time came to make his final assault on al-Auf’s beleaguered stronghold.
Yet despite her appearance the Minotaur needed only small attention and work upon her to restore her to first-class condition. Hal had no reason to revise his opinion of her value. She was worth at least ten thousand pounds of prize money, of which his personal share would be close to three thousand. He smiled with satisfaction and turned the lens of his telescope on the other prize they had taken the previous night.
There was no doubt at all that she was a VOC ship, just as Hal had surmised. Through the glass he read her name in gold letters on her transom: Die Lam, which translated as the Lamb. Hal thought it described her well: she looked plump and docile, yet her lines were solid and workmanlike, appealing to his sailor’s eye. She was newly built and had not been long enough in the hands of the corsairs to suffer degradation. The hatches were still on her cargo hold but from her depth in the water it was clear that she was still fully laden: her cargo had not been taken ashore by al-Auf.
‘Call away the longboat, Mr Tyler.’ Hal snapped shut his telescope. ‘I am going across to visit Mr Fisher on the Lamb to see just what we have captured.’
Big Daniel met him at the entryport of the Dutch ship with a wide, toothless grin. ‘Congratulations, Captain. She’s a beauty.’
‘Well done yourself, Mr Fisher. I could have asked for no more from you and your rascals.’ He smiled around at the grinning seamen who pressed close behind Big Daniel. ‘All of you will have bulging purses when you step ashore on Plymouth Ho.’ They cheered him raucously.
‘How many of your brave lads were killed?’ Hal lowered his voice as he touched on such a morbid subject.
Daniel answered loudly, ‘Not a single one, praise God. Though young Peter here lost a finger, shot away. Show the captain, lad.’ The young sailor held up the stump of his forefinger, swathed in a grubby rag.
‘I will add an extra gold guinea to your prize money,’ Hal promised him, ‘to help soothe the pain.’
‘At that price you can have the other four fingers as well, Captain.’ The seaman grinned hugely, and his mates hooted
with laughter as they went back to their stations.
Big Daniel led Hal forward. ‘We found these still chained in her forecastle.’ He indicated the band of strangers in rags who huddled by the foremast. ‘They are the survivors of the Dutch crew. Twenty-three lovely little cheeseheads, all consigned by al-Auf to the slave markets.’ Hal looked them over quickly. They were thin but not emaciated, and though the galls left by their chains were obvious on ankles and wrists and there were weals on their backs and limbs, which had been laid upon them with the Arab kiboko, they seemed in reasonable health. Like the Lamb they had not been long enough in captivity to have suffered too severely.
‘It is your lucky day, Jongens,’ Hal greeted them in Dutch. ‘You are free men again.’ At that their faces brightened. Hal was delighted to have them. With two extra prize ships to handle, he would need every man he could find. ‘Will you sign up with me for the rest of the voyage, for a guinea a month and a share of the prize?’ he asked. Their smiles expanded, and their acceptance was wholehearted.
‘Are any of you officers?’ Hal asked.
‘No, mijn heer,’ their spokesman replied. ‘Our Captain van Orde and all his officers were murdered by that heathen scum. I was captain’s coxswain.’
‘You will retain your rank,’ Hal told him. ‘All these men are under your command.’ If he kept all the Dutchmen together the language problem would be solved. Then again Big Daniel had learned to speak Dutch well while they were in captivity at Good Hope . . .
‘They are your little lambs, Mr Fisher,’ Hal said. ‘Let them put their marks on the quarter-bill, and give them fresh clothing from the slop chest. And now let’s see what we have caught ourselves here.’ He led the way down to the captain’s quarters in the stern.
The main cabin had been looted by the corsairs. The captain’s desk and lockers had been broken open and ransacked. Every item of value had been stolen. The ship’s books and papers were littered over the deck, trampled and torn, although many were still legible. Hal retrieved the log and the cargo manifest from among the mess. One glance at the manifest made him whistle with surprise and delight. ‘By God, if all this is still in her holds, then the Lamb is a treasure indeed.’ He was about to show Big Daniel the stiff sheet of parchment but remembered that he could not read, was sensitive about this, and instead said, ‘Tea from China, Mr Fisher. She’s crammed with it – enough to swamp every coffee-house in London.’ He laughed and repeated the slogan he had seen above the front door of Garway’s coffee-house in Fleet Street: ‘“That Excellent and by all Physitians approved China Drink, Tea.”’