"Leave it, Long John!" said Israel Hands. "If there's one loose grain on them kegs, they'll blow!"
"No," gasped Silver. "Job's nearly done," and he rolled number eleven and reached for number twelve. This was far back and almost out of reach.
"For Christ's sake, John," said Israel Hands, "leave the bugger!"
"No!"
Silver went back for the last keg. Only he, of all aboard, could have reached it. For any smaller man it was out of reach, back against the ship's hull, and even he had to stretch. A hiss of steam rose as sweat dropped off his chin and on to the copper bands of the cask. He flinched as a tribe of rats scampered past, across the water-butts. The fur was burnt off their backs and their tails were blistered.
"John! Give it up!" said Israel Hands.
"Cap'n?" said George Merry. "Walrus is making sail!"
"Uh!" said Silver. The heat was burning his exposed skin, the nearby flames were roaring in his ears, and his coat and stockings were smouldering. The final keg was nearly too hot to touch. He turned, and stooped to roll it to Israel Hands… and dropped it… and fell flat as he reached for it. Then he grabbed it once more and embraced it and crawled forward with it.
"Walrus is bearing down on us, Cap'n," said George Merry.
"Here!" said Silver. "This is a hot 'un. Heave it straight over the side."
"Ouch!" said Israel Hands at the feel of the keg.
"George Merry? You hear that?" he said.
"Straight over the side!" said Merry. "Aye-aye, sir."
"Ahhhh!" cried Silver, as smoke poured from his coat. Any material other than wool would have burned. But wool saved him.
"Get him out!" cried Israel Hands. "George Merry, lend a hand!"
Silver was exhausted. His limbs ached. He was crawling and unable to stand. Israel Hands and George Merry cleared the last keg, and heaved Silver up and away, and got him back on deck and threw off his coat, and poured a bucket of water on him to cool him down.
"Thank you, lads," said Silver, and gasped and spluttered. "Another one," he said, "right over me head," and "Aaaah!" as the water cascaded over his shoulders. They gave him his crutch and stood him up, and he saw the awe-struck respect in their eyes. But the ship was well and truly lost. More than a third of Lion, from the taffrail to the mizzenmast, was blazing.
"Allllll hands!" cried Silver, and they turned to face him. The pump fell idle, the bucket-chain stopped, the unloading of stores came to an end. The busy teamwork ceased and the flames thundered unchecked.
"Lads," said Silver, "the game's up. But well done every man of you, for I'm proud of you!" They grinned and called back to him, but he raised a hand for silence. "In a trice we'll be over the side, but first — as jolly companions one and all — I calls upon you to give three cheers for the old ship. Three cheers for Lion," he cried. "Hip-hip…"
Lion had been Silver's first command, and he'd have loved her anyway, even if she hadn't been so beautiful. So he'd spoken from the heart when he called for three cheers, not knowing that he was following the lead of many captains before him, and many after, in honouring his ship as he lost her. Likewise, there was hard practical sense in lifting men's spirits at such a time. Any decent captain hopes to keep his men together as a crew, and not as a broken mob.
"Now, lads," said Silver, "steady as can be… them as can swim, shall go over the side, and them as can't shall man the boats, and shall do it like British tars: old 'uns last, and young 'uns first. And now…" he paused and forced himself to speak the dreadful words: "Abandon ship!"
Even then he wasn't done. He went among them with a cheerful word for all as they set to work heaving over the side anything that would float: gratings, hatch covers, spare masts, and all the rolled-up hammocks that could be found. Then, just twenty of the seventy-one aboard went over the rail and swam, or clung to whatever they could grasp, and struck out for the shore with the current behind them.
With over fifty-one men and three boys still aboard, it took two trips of the jolly-boat and three of the skiff to get everyone ashore, with Silver the last man over the side, and the fire now raging forrard of the mainmast.
As the skiff pulled away from Lion, Silver sat in the stern sheets and glanced at Walrus. She'd proved to be no threat at all. The wind had failed her. She had no steerage way and her sails hung like washing on a line. She was harmless, just a cable's length off, and gently wallowing in the water. He put his glass to his eye and looked her over, from stem to stern… and nearly leapt out of the boat at the sight of Selena struggling in Flint's arms.
Chapter 52
Flint studied Lion through his glass. She was well ablaze but bustling with activity. They'd got a pump rigged and buckets dipping over the side on lines, and they seemed to be discharging cargo into their boats. He didn't like that. Not at all.
Walrus was idle as a floating log. She couldn't move. The charges of canister he'd hoped to spray into Silver's men were sleeping in the iron cradle of their guns. What a pity. What a damned, bloody, infernal shame!
It got worse. Lion's crew went over the side and into the boats. Steadily and efficiently Silver got his whole crew ashore, right under Flint's nose and just out of cannon shot.
"So what are you going to do, Captain?" said Selena, standing beside him on the quarterdeck. "Looks to me like Long John's got the better of you."
"What?" he snapped. "How in the Devil's name do you calculate that?"
"He's given your ship a beating. He's killed half your men, and he's got the island and the treasure." She sneered, "And I thought you were the clever one." She was baiting him out of hatred, and the desire to hit back after being the victim for so long. More important, Walrus was much nearer the shore than she'd been when at anchor, and Selena was feeling ready for a swim again. She was feeling bold because she could hop over the rail in an instant and it was Long John ashore now, not Flint. The only problem was the ship's guns and their hundreds of musket balls.
Flint's eyes went round and white. The parrot or Billy Bones would have seen the danger signs. But they weren't there. She'd hit the mark. She'd hit it right in the centre.
When the sun rose that morning, there'd been a full crew aboard Walrus. There'd been seventy-three men. Now there were just thirty-one able-bodied men aboard, the rest were either enjoying Mr Cowdray's attentions or were dead. Flint had killed at least four of them himself, which he now rather regretted because he was left with nowhere near enough men to fight Silver's seventy-one for possession of the island.
"Bitch!" he said, and raised a hand to strike. But she jumped back, and turned and leapt up on one of the guns, and would have been over the side… if Flint hadn't caught her. She struggled fiercely and he — of necessity — held her close and dragged her away from the ship's side.
The struggle had a strange effect on him. An unexpected effect, since it was the first time he'd had close physical contact with a woman since certain highly unsatisfactory experiments with Portsmouth whores in his early youth.