He felt the deck shudder and for an instant thought they had run ashore. But the hull was steady, and somehow he knew it was moving, free from the ground.
A figure seemed to rise from the very deck, arms waving, mouth a black hole in his face. Yelling, screaming, unreal.
And then a familiar voice, harsh but steady. ‘Oh, no, you don’t, matey!’
And the sickening crack of a heavy blade into bone.
Bolitho gasped, ‘Fores’l!’ But he should have recognised the confusion of wet canvas, already breaking into life.
He staggered across the deck, toward a solitary figure grappling with the long tiller-bar. It was Drury, with a cutlass thrust through his belt.
‘Steady she is, sir!’ He laughed into the wind. ‘Almost!’
There was a small hatch, and Bolitho saw that he had nearly fallen into it. Two more figures were crouched on a ladder, shouting; perhaps they were pleading. Only then did he realise that the hanger was in his hand, and the blade was only a foot away from the nearest man.
He yelled, ‘You two, bear a hand! Now, damn you!’
His words might have been lost in the noise of wind and flapping canvas, but the naked blade was clear in any language.
Price was calling, ‘She’s answering, sir! We’ll tackle the mains’l now!’
Bolitho stared at the sky, and saw the big foresail swaying above him like a shadow.
‘Are we all here?’ He wanted to laugh or weep. Like madness.
Keveth shouted, ‘Large as life, sir!’
There was a muffled splash and he added. ‘That ’un won’t bother us no more!’
Bolitho tried to sheathe the hanger in its scabbard, but felt Keveth take it gently from his hand.
‘Don’t need this for a bit, sir.’ He was grinning. ‘We’ve taken th’ old girl!’
Bolitho moved to the side and stared at the choppy wavelets below him. He was shaking badly, and not because of the cold. Or the danger. And it was hard to think, and make sense of it. They would winch up the mainsail and steer a course clear of this rocky coastline.
At first light… But nothing would form clearly in his mind, except, we did it.
Below deck they might find more muskets, evidence which would justify Hotspur’s actions.
And ours.
Tomorrow… He looked at the stars. He was no longer shivering. And it was tomorrow now.
He heard someone else, ‘Too bloody late, you bastards!’ and the immediate crack of a musket. But even that was distorted by the wind and rigging.
Then Keveth, sharp, angry, ‘Get under cover an’ reload now, you mad bugger! You’ll ’ave a dead charge on your ’ands with the next shot!’
There were shouts and another shot and Bolitho remembered that the boats were out there, lost in the swell as they pulled toward the beach. Another few minutes and they would have foiled any attempt to board the lugger, and there would be corpses rolling in the tide to mark their folly. He ran to the side and peered past the tiller. It was not imagination. He could see the vague outline of the ridge, edged against the sky, where before there had been solid blackness. Clouds, too, but the stars had gone.
Keveth called, ‘That’ll show the bastards!’ But he was staring after the one who had fired his musket. ‘They’ll be comin’ for us – they’ve nowhere else to turn to!’ He waved his fist to drive the point home. ‘Listen!’
The rattle and creak of loose gear seemed to fade, and in a lull in the wind Bolitho could hear the slow, regular clink, clink, clink, like that last time, when they had left Plymouth. The pawls of a capstan, men straining every muscle against wind and tide to break out the anchor. The brig was making a run for it. Those in the boats, even their own hands, were being abandoned. There were no rules for the smuggling fraternity but save your own neck first. He banged his fist on the bulwark, the pain steadying him.
The brutal truth was that Hotspur might still be at anchor, unwilling to risk any dangerous manoeuvre on the mere chance of an encounter. He recalled Verling’s parting words. No heroics.
He joined Drury by the tiller-bar and leaned his weight against it. He could feel the heavy shudder, the power of the sea, and tried to guess at their progress. Without more sail and time to work clear of the bay… He shut his mind to the ifs and the maybes. They had done better than anyone could have expected. Hoped.
‘The brig’s weighed, sir!’ Another voice said, ‘Cut ’er cable, more like!’
Either way, the smuggler was making sail. If she worked around Hotspur or avoided her altogether, her master would have the open sea ahead, and every point of the compass from which to choose his escape.
And even if there was further evidence below deck, what would that prove? The two cowering wretches who had pleaded for mercy when Keveth and his mates had swarmed aboard would certainly go to the gallows, or hang in chains on the outskirts of some seaport or along a coastal road as a grisly warning to others. But the trade would never stop while men had gold to offer. Personal greed or to sustain a rebellion, the cause mattered little to those who were prepared to take the risk for profit.
He heard a cry from forward: Stiles, the prizefighter, poised high in the bows, one arm flung out.
Bolitho wiped his face. It was not a trick of light or imagination. He could see the young seaman outlined against the heaving water and occasional feather of spray, and then, reaching out on either side, an endless, pale backdrop of sea and sky.
Then he heard Stiles’ voice. Clear and sharp. ‘Breakers ahead!’
‘Helm a-lee!’ He saw the tiller going over, one of the captured smugglers running to throw his weight with Drury’s to bring it round.
Bolitho saw Keveth staring at him, as if telling him something, but all he could think was that he could see each feature, and that he still had his musket, ‘old Tom’, across one shoulder. As if all time had stopped, and only here and this moment counted for anything.
Stiles was stepping down from his perch in the bows, still watching the sea and the lazy turmoil of breakers. Not a reef, and at high water it would be little more than shallows. A sandbar. But enough.
And here too was the brig, her courses and foretopsail already set and filling to the wind, even a small, curling wave at her stem. Moving through the grey water, her hull still in darkness. Like an onlooker. Uninvolved.
‘Pass the word! Stand by to ram!’
It could have been someone else’s voice.
More of a sensation than a shock, the most noise coming from the flapping canvas as the handful of seamen ran to slacken off all lines and free the winch.
They had ground ashore, with hardly a shudder. When the tide turned again she would be high and dry.
Bolitho walked aft and watched the brig, heeling slightly as she altered course, her sails hardening, a masthead pendant whipping out like a spear.
The seaman named Perry shook his fist.
‘We did our best, damn their eyes!’
‘Not enough…’ Bolitho flinched as someone gripped his arm. ‘What?’ And saw Keveth’s expression. Not shock or surprise, but the face of a man who could no longer be caught aback by anything.
He said quietly, ‘An’ there’s a sight, sir. One you’ll long remember.’
It was Hotspur, lying over to the wind, casting her own shadow like a reflection across the whitecaps. She had skirted the headland, so closely that she appeared to be balanced across it.
Keveth swung round. ‘Wait, sir! What’re you about?’ He was staring up at him as Bolitho ran to the side and climbed into the shrouds.
‘So that he’ll know!’ He was unfolding the collar of his coat, until the white midshipman’s patches were clearly visible. ‘Give me my hat!’