Drinkwater had originally nursed some vague plan of coasting this wasteland in the hope of attracting attack, of appearing sufficiently like an Indiaman to mislead whatever lookout the putative pirates employed. But they were either nonexistent or knew full well that Patrician was no Indiaman, but a man-of-war. Not even the subterfuge of hoisting Dutch colours, resorted to two days ago, had made the slightest difference. Apart from the fisherfolk, the coast had remained obdurately uninhabited.
As Patrician stood inshore, coasting slowly to the east of Tanjong Sirik, Drinkwater allowed Morris on the quarterdeck. The sun was westering and the blessed cool of evening was upon them. Morris scanned the line of the shore through his glass, his silk robe fluttering about his obese form.
'Blow-pipe Creek lies to the southward,' Morris remarked.
Drinkwater raised his glass and stared at the impenetrable barrier of the mangroves. He would give the game one last throw of the dice; one last opportunity to see if providence would change his luck. He had nothing to lose by sending the boats away for a final search before he admitted himself beaten. His only satisfaction was the knowledge that Morris, too, had failed.
'You may bring the ship to an anchor here. It is good holding ground, if I recall correctly.'
Drinkwater grunted assent and gave the requisite orders.
Before the last of the daylight was leached out of the sky the launch and both cutters lay alongside, stores aboard and crews told off. The sentinels stood vigilant, their muskets loaded, primed and with fresh flints new-fitted, and the officers had been ordered to maintain a keen-eyed watch. Drinkwater was too old an officer, and too good a fencer, to sleep well with his guard down.
He was very tired, tired beyond what the exertions of the day justified. Perhaps it was age, or the strain of rubbing shoulders with Morris in this quotidian way. Morris had proved an expert pilot for the place and, Drinkwater was reluctantly compelled to admit, appeared to have justified all his claims made at Penang. If only this were the place ...
Drinkwater closed his eyes. The last thing he heard before sleep claimed him was the gentle knock of oars on thole pins as a guard boat rowed watch about the ship.
He slept as he rarely slept, deeply. The near-silence of the anchored ship released his nerves so that nature overcame his seaman's instincts. He did not hear the sudden roar of torrential rain that abruptly opened like the sluice gates of heaven. It drowned the watch, the heavy drops bouncing off the wooden decks so that a ghostly mist seemed to rise a foot from the planking. It pummelled the toiling oarsmen in the guard boat that laboured the small hours through under Midshipman Dutfield's command, beating them into inactivity and forcing them to crouch, dull-witted in the drifting boat.
It stopped almost as suddenly as it had begun. Those on duty gasped with the relief, blew the droplets off their noses and scraped back the hair from their foreheads, shivering in the chill. It was some time after the air cleared before anyone discovered what had happened under the cover of the downpour.
It took Frey a further five full minutes to coax Drinkwater into wakefulness.
'What is it?' Drinkwater was dazed by the depth of his sleep. 'Sir, the boats, the launch and cutters ...' 'What about them?' 'They are missing!'
CHAPTER 15
The Bronze-bound Chests
'What?'
Drinkwater was awake now, scrambling out of his cot and reaching for his breeches. 'Where's the guard boat? How the devil did the boats break adrift?'
'They didn't, sir,' said Frey unhappily, 'they were cut adrift.'
'Cut?' He paused, thinking furiously. There was little doubt but what that meant. 'Turn up the hands, muster the ship's company at once, and pass word for my coxswain!'
Drinkwater finished dressing as Patrician came alive to the shouts and pipings of the duty bosun's mate. Two hours before dawn her people were hustled unceremoniously out of their hammocks.
'Pass word for my coxswain!' Drinkwater roared the command at the bulkhead and heard it taken up by the sentry beyond. He cast angrily about for a lost shoe. Mullender answered the summons.
'I sent for Tregembo, man, not you!'
Mullender's face seemed to tremble in the lantern light. The cares of endless servitude had removed all traces of individuality from its customary mien so that Drinkwater took his distress for a trick of the guttering flame he held up.
'S ... sir ...' Mullender was stuttering, a blob of saliva gleaming wetly on his stubbled chin.
'What the hell is it?' Drinkwater spotted the lost shoe and bent to pull it on.
'Tregembo, sir ...'
Drinkwater stood. The ship was growing quiet again, evidence that her company were standing shivering on deck.
'Well?'
In a moment Frey or Dutfield would come down and report the lower deck cleared.
'He's missing, sir.'
'What d'you mean he's missing? How the devil d'you know?'
Cut boat-painters, deserters, Tregembo missing ... what the deuce did it mean? They were taking a damned long time to count heads. How many had run?
Suddenly he had no more patience to wait the conventional summons. Shoving poor Mullender aside he made for the ladder.
He met Fraser in the act of turning from the last divisional report.
'Ship's company all accounted for, sir, except Mullender and Tregembo.'
'Mullender's in my cabin ...'
The dark pits of Fraser's eyes stared from the pale oval of his face. Was Fraser implying Tregembo had absconded? Slashed the painters of the boats and disappeared? What was it the orientalists called it? Running amok ... had Tregembo run amok?
'Are you certain you have accounted for every man? In this darkness one could answer for another.'
'Certain, sir. I've had the divisional officers check each man individually.'
That accounted for the delay. But Drinkwater was too dumbfounded to accept Tregembo was responsible. He opened his mouth to inveigh against the inefficiency of the guard boat when Fraser pre-empted him.
'He must have gone in the rain, sir. Frey said you couldn't see the hand in front o' your face, and the noise and wind were terrific'
Drinkwater noticed the sodden decks and dripping ropes for the first time. But not Tregembo ...
And then a thought struck him.
'Morris! Has Morris been called?'
'Er ...'
No one had called the passenger, but he could not have failed to have heard the noise, nor have resisted the impulse to see what had provoked it. And even if he had not turned out himself, he would certainly have sent his catamite to spy.
'Mr Frey!'
'Sir?'
'Check the master's cabin. See if Mr Morris is there!'
'Yes, sir.'
Drinkwater paced across the quarterdeck. The entire ship's company waited, the men forward, heaped in a great wide-eyed pile across the booms, indistinguishable as individuals, but potent in their mass. Beside and behind him stood the rigid lines of marines and more casual grouping of the officers. Only Drinkwater moved, measuring his paces with the awful feeling that he was on the brink of something, without quite knowing what it was ...