The Spanish longboat pulled up alongside.
The first officer stepped gingerly onto the deck. A man lay face down in the water. The first officer leaned down and turned him over.
He was small. This man was not David Cavendish, but it must be the renegade Juan who had escaped with the Englishman. The officer said, "Here is one of them. Dead."
One of the two men with him aboard the bark bent over to release the dead man's foot from the rope in which it was entangled.
"He would have been washed overboard, except his foot's caught, sir."
The first officer narrowed his eyes, looking down at the rope. Had the man been hitched? Dead? By his foot?
The two seamen with him had transferred the body to the longboat. He waited for them to join him. He walked to the small cabin; its hinged door swayed brokenly. It was dark, but it was not too dark to see that the tiny cabin was empty except for the rising water. The first officer sighed.
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"There is no one left alive aboard," he said. He thought to himself that had he been the Englishman, he would have much preferred to drown. That was the way the Englishman had taken, and he had taken his woman with him. The Spanish officer stepped into his longboat.
He reported to the Captain of the Eugenia. The Captain inspected his one prisoner, a dead man.
"But if I had not used the guns, she might have escaped us—" The Captain stared out at the dim shape of the sinking bark. He could barely make it out; it was drifting sluggishly toward shore.
"They did not attempt to use their boat, sir. It was hitched to the bark."
"Señor," the Captain said, "we shall tow the bark back to Acapulco. 'Tis the best we can do."
"Si, señor," the first officer said.
He relayed the Captain's order. After half an hour, night had fallen, and the Eugenia was under full sail again, towing behind her the small bark, and its small boat, empty.
Chapter XXX
Heat, it shimmered down upon the Desire, the men wore nothing but their breeches, and walked the hot decks in bare feet. The officers and Cavendish envied them; every day Cosmos washed out the thinest of Cavendish's lawn shirts and hung them in the bleaching sun to dry.
The Desire sailed on. At night the stars seemed to be lower in the sky and the ship's wake threw up great plumes of phosphorescent spray. Islands clustered close here; nameless islands, some of them sunk in the sea and nothing but sand any more. Gilolo was passed, its fingers of land thrust out green into the bluest of water, and at night the doubled lookouts aloft scanned the waters for the thin line of white that would herald the cry: "Breakers ahead!"
On the fourteenth of February, three degrees and ten minutes below the line, the Desire fell in with ten or twelve islands, rank and thick with vegetation. Low and flat, they lay drowning in heat. The Desire passed in the lee of them, close enough to hear the murmur of their jungle life. Havers was standing with Cavendish on the poopdeck. Suddenly he lifted his hand and struck at a fly that had settled on his neck. It left a bloodstain on his neck and hand.
"I like not the look of those islands," Cavendish said. "There is something rotten about them."
Havers knew what he meant. Fever and heat. Already twenty men were suffering with the fever.
"No man could exist long in those lagoons," Cavendish said. "We can get spice in Java. And we already carry a deal of it."
Java was to be the last port of call between the South Sea islands and the Cape of Good Hope, on the tip of Africa. Havers felt excitement when he thought of it. One more vast ocean to cross, and then their own Atlantic. What a joy it would be to see the gray Atlantic.
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"I'm tired of tropic nights, beautiful as they are," Havers said.
That night was a wonderful night. They had sighted the chain of islands that would end with Java. The moon was full; on deck the musicians played, and the men sang softly. Cavendish let himself drift into a dream of Catherine; he let himself long for her, the touch of her hand, the sound of her voice. He brought her image into his mind; he let himself remember how great was his longing for her. He looked down at his hands and thought only of touching her with them. She should already be on her way to England. If Fortune smiled only a little on them—the bark had only to cross the gulf to Mazatlan, and hug the coast until she fetched Acapulco. And there was a smaller port, Navidad.
"Havers," he said suddenly, "how far was it—do you remember— from Navidad to Acapulco?"
Havers said, "I do not know, Tom." He got to his feet. "I'll find out for you; I want—" He reached for the rail to steady himself; he lurched. His hand grasped the ropes, and over him at the same time came a terrible nausea and weakness. He thought the Desire pitched, he tried to get his balance, and then he fell.
Cavendish leaped to his feet. He bent over Havers; he and Tyler picked him up. They carried him into Cavendish's own cabin.
Havers was unconscious. He began to retch, first chokingly and then violently. Cosmos ran for cool water and towels, while Cavendish took Havers' boots off, and stripped from him the soiled shirt. On Havers' back and chest the familiar sweat was beginning to stand out in great drops.
Cavendish was not afraid that night. He had seen many men fall into a faint with these tropical fevers. He covered Havers with blankets when the chills began. Later, Havers seemed to sleep, and Cavendish ordered a hammock for himself slung out on deck. His cabin was the largest and most comfortable, and he could look after Havers himself.
In the morning Havers was delirious. The vomiting continued all morning, and the chills that gripped him now thrust fear into Cavendish's heart. He watched him all that day, waiting for the fever to abate a little, waiting for Havers to become conscious of him.
The next day was the sixteenth of February. That day, John Gameford, the cooper, who had been ill a long time, died. Cavendish mustered the crew on deck and led the prayer. Gameford's body slid over the slide, and the Desire sailed on.
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Heat. It dogged them. Among these teeming islands the Desire was lonely, a small ship against a heat-filled ocean. The men walked and talked in whispers. One man had died, even though it had not been from fever; the whole ship was afraid because Captain Havers was sick. He had lain unconscious for two days.
On the third day, at dawn, Havers recovered consciousness. Cosmos called Cavendish, who was on deck watching the sunrise. Immediately Cavendish went to Havers.
Havers was very flushed in the gray light. But his eyes were open and aware, and he tried to smile. "Tom," he murmured.
"Do not talk," Cavendish said. "Are you very hot, man?"
"Aye," was the answer. "My head."
Cavendish put his hand on Havers' forehead. To him it seemed less hot than it had been. "Cosmos and I will bathe you in cool water," he said.
He started to take off the blanket. When they had stripped Havers, they saw the rash. It covered his body, like a red network; then Cavendish knew Havers did not have ordinary tropical fever.
"Water," Havers whispered, with difficulty.
He drank thirstily, gulping. He lay back, exhausted with the effort. "Your cabin," he said, and closed his eyes.
"Aye, Havers," Cavendish said. "I thought you would rest better in here, alone."
They bathed him quickly, and wrapped him up again in the blankets. The chills came on again, the fever rose during the day and the sweating began, worse than before.
Havers was in terrible pain. Cavendish knew that by the way he tossed and cried out. When he was conscious he did not speak at all, but drank water. Nothing else would stay down, and even the water caused vomiting. But most of the time he lay gripped with pain and fever.