The faintest hint of a smile touched Halt's pale face.
'That's why I didn't tell you,' he said. 'So what do you plan to do?'
The captain shrugged helplessly. 'What can I do? I can't outrun him. Can't outfight him. Can't even hand you over to him. He doesn't leave witnesses. We're just going to have to stand here and wait for him to sink us.'
Halt raised an eyebrow.
'I think we can do a little better than that,' he said. 'Just let him get a little closer.'
The captain shrugged. 'I can't stop him getting a little closer.' Then he added, 'What are you going to do with that?'
Halt was unslinging the longbow that was over his left shoulder. At the same time, he hitched the quiver on his right shoulder up a little and selected a shaft. Will, seeing the movement, unslung his own bow.
'One or two arrows won't stop that ship,' the captain told him.
Halt regarded him with some curiosity. 'I asked what you had in mind. Apparently you're content to stand here while O'Malley rams us, sinks us and leaves to drown.'
The captain shifted uncomfortably. 'We might make it to shore,' he said. 'I can throw over empty barrels and baulks of timber to hang onto. We might be able to make it to the beach.'
'More likely we'll be washed into the reef itself,' Halt said. But he wasn't looking at the captain. He'd stepped closer to the rail and had an arrow nocked to the string. His eyes were fixed on the figure at the Claw's tiller. O'Malley had his feet braced wide apart as he dragged on the wooden bar, heaving the ship's bow upwind against the thrust on the sail and the pull of the oars. The whole ship was in a delicate state of balance. Wind, oars and tiller created a triangle of conflicting forces that resulted in the ship holding its present headway. Disturb one of those elements, Halt knew, and the result would be some moments of chaos as the remaining forces took charge.
He gauged the distance and the movement of the ship under his feet. Strange, now that he was concentrating on the problem of making an accurate shot, the nausea caused by that movement had receded. He frowned. The Claw was lifting and falling too. He'd have to factor that in to the shot. He sensed Will beside him, his own bow ready.
'Good lad,' he said. 'When I give you the word, we'll both shoot.'
'I told you,' the captain exclaimed. 'A couple of arrows won't stop that ship. We've little enough chance as it is. If you antagonise O'Malley, he'll make sure we're all dead before he leaves.'
'The way I see it,' Halt said, 'he won't be leaving. All right, Will. Now!'
As if they were linked by some invisible force, the two Rangers raised their bows, drew, sighted and shot. The two arrows sailed away within half a second of each other. Seven The two arrows, with one a little in the lead, arced away into the grey sky. Horace, watching their flight, lost sight of them against the clouds. He was conscious of the fact that Halt and Will had already nocked fresh arrows, ready for the next shot.
Then, eyes intent on the burly figure at the Claw's tiller, he caught a flicker of movement as the two arrows flashed down. He couldn't tell which arrow struck O'Malley. Halt was the better shot, Horace knew, but Will was nearly as skilled.
One arrow thudded, quivering, into the bulwark less than a metre from the helm. The other buried itself painfully in the fleshy part of O'Malley's upper left arm – the side that was facing towards them.
With the noise of wind and sea, Horace couldn't hear the cry of pain from the smuggler. But he saw him stagger, releasing the tiller and clutching his injured left arm.
The effect on the Claw was almost instantaneous – and disastrous. Freed of the steadying pressure of the rudder, holding her across the wind, she suddenly flew up ahead of the wind, her square sail bulging and ropes snapping like overtuned harp strings with the increase in pressure as the force came from dead astern. The lurching of the ship threw O'Malley to the deck. At the same time, several oarsmen completely missed their stroke and tumbled backwards on the rowing benches. One oar came unshipped. Several others tangled with their neighbours. The result was chaos.
The precise balance of forces that Halt had observed was totally disrupted. The Claw swung wildly downwind, already passing astern of the Sparrow, rushing madly towards the boiling waters of Palisade Reef.
One of the crew was lurching across the plunging deck, heading for the tiller, which was smashing back and forth, out of control.
'Stop him, Will,' Halt said briefly. They crossed to the opposite side of the deck, where they had a clearer view of the out-of-control smuggler ship. Again they shot. This time, both arrows found their mark and the man pitched forward, rolling into the scuppers as the ship heeled.
The Sparrow's captain watched, open-mouthed.
'Nobody can shoot like that,' he said softly. Horace, beside him, allowed himself a humourless smile.
'These two can,' he said.
On board the Claw, the stricken crew realised that it was too late to save their ship from driving onto the reef. They began to scramble towards the raised stern, trying instinctively to avoid the point of first impact. Their ship, rolling wildly, struck the first of the rocks, hidden below the seething water. There was a grating crash and the ship shuddered, her movement checked for a moment. The mast bowed forward under the sudden impact, then snapped off clean, a metre above the deck. It came crashing down across the ship in a tangle of rope and canvas and splintered wood, crushing and trapping a few who had been caught beneath it. The extra weight to one side heeled the ship downwind and that seemed to release it momentarily from the grip of the first rock. It surged upwards, staggered further into the tangle of the reef and crashed hard against another black, jagged mass rising from the sea. A wave broke over the trapped hull and several of the men on board were swept away. Halt and Will had lowered their bows. The bearded Ranger turned now to the captain.
'We should do something to help them,' he said.
The captain shook his head fearfully. 'I can't take my ship down into that!' he protested.
'I'm not suggesting you do. But we could toss some barrels overboard to float down to them. It might give them a chance.' Halt glanced coldly back towards the wrecked ship. 'Which is more than they would have given us.'
Horace nodded, grim-faced. The sight of the Claw, so recently a fast, agile creature of the water, now turned into a splintered, helpless wreck, was a terrible one indeed. But he knew the men on board had been willing to consign him, his friends and the crew of the Sparrow to the exact same fate. At a word from the captain, some of the Sparrow's crewmen left the oars and began to heave empty casks over the rail and he moved to help them. Soon a line of bobbing, floating barrels was drifting down towards the sinking ship.
The captain turned to Halt, fear in his eyes.
'I need my men back on the oars now,' he said, 'or we'll join them on the reef.'
Halt nodded. 'We've done all we can for them. Let's get out of here.'
The sailors scrambled back to their benches and began to heave on the oars again. Slowly, the Sparrow began to drag herself away from the dreadful reef. But it was a close-run thing. One of the jagged rocks passed a few metres by their bow and was actually hidden by the port bulwark as they surged past it, emerging a few minutes later in their wake. Horace shuddered at the sight of it. He had no idea how they'd missed it and in his mind's eye he could see the Sparrow suddenly smashing into it, pinned to the rock by the wind, slewing round, her mast crashing down under the shock, men hurled in all directions as the grey waves broke over the deck. He shook the image away as they crept closer to safety. Then he felt a strange sensation as the wind on his right cheek faltered and died, to be replaced by a gust from the left, then another, then a steady breeze. They'd reached the backlift!