She turned back to Hal, her eyes bright with excitement. "You were right. They have been following the Gull since dawn. Until only a few hours ago they had her top sails in sight but then the wind strengthened and she pulled away from them."
"What course was she on when last they saw her?"
"The same course she has held all this day," Judith told him. "Due south, heading straight for the narrows of the Bah."
Though he entreated her to go down to his cabin and rest, Judith insisted on staying beside him on the quarterdeck. They spoke little, for both were too tense and fearful, but slowly there came over them a feeling of companionship. They took comfort from each other, and drew on a mutual reserve of strength and determination.
Every few minutes Hal looked up at his funereal black sails, then crossed to the binnacle. There was no order he could give the helm, for Ned Tyler was steering her fine as she could sail.
A charged and poignant silence lay heavy on the ship. No man shouted or laughed. The off-duty watch did not doze in the shade of the main sail as was their usual practice but huddled in small silent groups, alert to every move he made and to every word he uttered.
The sun made its majestic circle of the sky and drooped down to touch the far western hills. Night came upon them as stealthily as an assassin, and the horizon blurred and melded with the darkening sky, then was gone.
In the darkness he felt Judith's hand on his arm. It was smooth and warm, yet strong. "We have lost them, but it is not your fault," she said softly. "No man could have done more."
"I have not yet failed," he said. "Have faith in God and trust in me."
"But in darkness? Surely the Buzzard would not show a light, and by dawn tomorrow he will be through the Bah and into the open sea."
He wanted to tell her that all of this had been ordained long ago, that he was sailing south to meet a special destiny. Even though this might seem fanciful to her, he had to tell her. "Judith," he said, then paused as he sought the right words.
"Deck!" Aboli's voice boomed out of the darkness high above. It had a timbre and resonance to it that made Hal's skin prickle and the hairs at the back of his neck stand.
"Masthead!"he bellowed back. "A light dead ahead!"
He placed one arm. around Judith's shoulders and she made no move to pull away from him. Instead, she leaned closer.
"There is the answer to your question," he whispered. "God has provided for us," she replied.
"I must go aloft." Hal dropped his arm from around her shoulders.
"Perhaps we are too hasty, and the devil is playing us tricks." He strode across to Ned. "Dark ship, Mister Tyler. I'll keel haul the man who shows a light. Silent ship, no sound or voice." He went to the mainmast shrouds.
Hal climbed swiftly until he had joined Aboli. "Where is this light?" He scanned the darkness ahead. "I see nothing."
"It has gone, but it was almost dead ahead." "A star in your eye, Aboli?"
"Wait, Gundwane. It was a small light and far away."
The minutes passed slowly, and then suddenly Hal saw it. Not even a glimmer, but a soft luminescence, so nebulous that he doubted his eyes, especially as Aboli beside him had shown no sign of seeing it. Hal looked away to rest his eyes then turned back and saw in the darkness that it was still there, too low for a star, a weird unnatural glow.
"Yes, Aboli. I see it now." As he spoke it became brighter, and Aboli exclaimed also. Then it died away again. "it could be a strange vessel, not the Gull."
"Surely the Buzzard would not be so careless as to show a running light."
"A lantern in the stern cabin? The reflection from his binnacle?"
"Or one of his sailors enjoying a quiet pipe?
"Let us pray that it is one of those. It is where we could expect the Buzzard to be," said Hal. "We will keep after it until moonrise."
They stayed together, peering ahead into the night. Sometimes the strange light showed as a distinct point, at others it was a faint amorphous glow, and often it disappeared. Once it was gone completely for a terrifying half hour, before it shone again perceptibly stronger.
"We are gaining," Hal dared whisper. "How far off now, do you reckon?"
"A league, said Aboli, "maybe less."
"Where is the moon?" Hal looked into the east, "Will it never rise?"
He saw the first iridescence beyond the dark mountains of Arabia and, shyly as a bride, the moon unveiled her face. She laid down a silver path upon the waters, and Hal felt his breath lock in his chest and every sinew of his body drawn tight as a bowstring.
Out of the darkness ahead appeared a lovely apparition, soft as a cloud of op aline mist.
"There she is!" he whispered. He had to draw a deep breath to steady his voice. "The Gull of Moray dead ahead."
He grasped Aboli's arm. "Do you go down and warn Ned Tyler and Big Daniel. Stay there until you can see the Gull from the deck, then come back."
When Aboli was gone he watched the shape of the Gull's sails firm and harden in the moonlight, and he felt fear as he had seldom known it in his life, fear not only for himself but for the men who trusted him and the woman on the deck below and the child aboard the other ship. How could he hope to lay the Golden Bough alongside the Gull while she fired her broadsides into them, and they could make no reply? How many must die in the next hour and who would be among them? He thought of Judith Nazet's proud slim body torn by flying grape. "Do not let it happen, Lord God. You have taken from me already more than I can bear.
How much more? How much more will you ask of me?"
He saw the light again on board the other ship. It glowed from the tall windows in her stern. Were there candles burning in there? He stared until his eyes ached, but there was no single source to the emanation of light.
There was a light touch on his arm. He had not heard Aboli climb back to him. "The Gull is in sight from the deck, "he told Hal softly.
Hal could not leave the masthead yet, for he felt a sense of religious dread as he stared at the strange light in the Gull's stern.
"Tis no lamp or lantern or candle, Aboli," he said. "Tis the Tabernacle of Mary that glows in the darkness. A beacon to guide me to my destiny."
Aboli shivered beside him. "Tis true that it is a light not of this world, a fairy light, such as I have never seen before." His voice shook. "But how do you know, Gundwane? How can you be so sure that it is the talisman that burns so?"
"Because I know," said Hal simply, and as he said it the light died away before their eyes, and the Gull was dark. Only her moonlit sails towered before them.
"It was a sign,"Aboli murmured.
"Yes, it was a sign," said Hal, and his voice was strong and serene once again. "God has given me a sign."
They climbed down to the deck, and Hal went directly to the helm. "There she is, Mister Tyler." They both looked ahead to where the Gull's canvas shone in the moonlight.