“But when to cut it, eh?” Fairley asked.
“Wait for daylight?’ Dalton suggested.
“It’ll take some cutting,” Sharpe said, for the rope was near three inches thick. It ran in a space between the main and lower decks and Fairley put the canvas carpet back into place, not only to disguise the hole, but to keep the rats from coming up into his cabin.
“How long will it take to replace that rope?” the merchant asked Tufnell.
“A good crew could do it in an hour.”
“They’ll have some good seamen,” the merchant said, “so we’d best not waste their efforts now. We’ll see what morning brings.”
That night brought no Lady Grace. Perhaps, Sharpe thought, she had already looked into Pohlmann’s cabin and found Sharpe absent. Or perhaps Lord William was awake and watchful, wondering if a rescue was closing on the night-shrouded Calliope, so Sharpe wrapped himself in a blanket and slept until a fist knocked on his door to announce the breakfast burgoo. “There’s a ship on the starboard bow, sir,” the seaman who had brought the cauldron said softly. “You can’t see it from here, but she’s there all right. One of ours, too.”
“Navy?”
“We reckons she is, sir. So it’s a race to Mauritius now.”
“How close is she?”
“Seven, eight miles? Fair ways, sir, and she has to tack to cut us off so it’ll be precious close, sir.” He lowered his voice even more. “The Froggies have taken down their ensign, so we’re flying our old colors, but that won’t help ‘em if it’s a warship. She’ll come and look at us anyway. Ensigns don’t mean nothing when there’s prize money to be gained.”
The news had spread through the ship, elating the passengers and alarming the French crew who tried to coax their prize into showing her best speed, but to the passengers in the stern, who could neither see the other ship nor determine what happened on the Calliope’s deck, it was a slow and agonizing morning. Lieutenant Tufnell suggested that the two ships must be on converging courses and that the Calliope had the advantage of the wind, but it was bitterly frustrating not knowing for sure. They all wanted to cut the tiller rope, but knew that if they severed it too soon the French might have time to make a repair.
No dinner was served at midday and perhaps it was that small hardship which persuaded Sharpe that the rope was best cut. “We can’t tell when the best moment is,” he argued, “so let’s give the buggers a headache now.”
No one demurred. Fairley pulled back the carpet and Sharpe thrust his saber into the hole and sawed the blade back and forth on the rope. The rope kept moving, not by much, but enough to ensure that it was difficult keeping the saber on the same spot, but Sharpe grunted and sweated as he tried to find the leverage to bring all his strength onto the blade.
“Shall I try?” Tufnell asked.
“I’m managing,” Sharpe said. He could not see the rope, but he knew he had the blade deep in its fibers now, for the blade was being tugged back and forth with the rudder’s small movements. His right arm was on fire from the wrist to the shoulder, but he kept the blade sawing and suddenly felt the tension vanish as the ravaged hemp unraveled. The rudder squealed on its pintles as Sharpe drew the saber back through the hole and collapsed in exhaustion against the foot of Fairley’s bed.
The Calliope, with no pressure on the rudder to resist her weather-helm, swung ponderously into the wind. There were frantic shouts on deck, the sound of bare feet going to the sheets and then the blessed noise of the sails slatting and banging as they flapped uselessly in the wind.
“Cover the hole,” Fairley ordered, “quick! Before the buggers see it.”
Sharpe moved his feet so they could drop the carpet into place. The ship jerked as the French used the headsails to bring her around, but without the rudder’s pressure she stubbornly went back into irons, and the sails again hammered at the masts. The helmsman would be spinning the wheel that suddenly had no load, and then there was a rush of feet going down the companionways and Sharpe knew the French were at last exploring the tiller lines.
There was a knock on Fairley’s door and, without waiting to be bidden, Lord William entered the cabin. “Does anyone know,” he asked, “what precisely is happening?”
“We cut the tiller ropes,” Fairley said, “and I’ll thank your lordship to keep quiet about it.” Lord William blinked at that brusque request, but before he could say anything there was the sound of a distant gun. “I reckon that’s the end of it,” Fairley said happily. “Come on, Sharpe, let’s go and see what you wrought.” He held out a big hand and hauled Sharpe to his feet.
None of the prize crew tried to stop them going on deck, indeed the Frenchmen were already hauling down the Calliope’s original ensign which they had hoped would fool their pursuer into thinking that the Indiaman was still under British command.
And now they really were under British command for, coming slowly toward the Calliope and furling her sails as she glided ever nearer, was another great bluff-sided warship painted yellow and black. Her beakhead was a riot of gilded wood supporting a figurehead that showed an ecstatic-faced lady graced with a halo, carrying a sword and dressed in silver-painted armor, though her breastplate was curiously truncated to reveal a pinkly naked bosom. “The Pucelle,” Sharpe said in delight. Joan of Arc had come to the rescue of the British.
And the Calliope, for the second time in five days, was taken.
CHAPTER 6
The first Pucelle crewman to board the Calliope was Captain Joel Chase himself who scrambled nimbly up the merchantman’s side to the cheers of the liberated passengers. The officier marinier, having no sword to surrender, stoically offered Chase a marlin spike instead. Chase grinned, took the spike, then gallantly returned it to the officier marinier who resignedly led his men into imprisonment below decks while Chase doffed his hat, shook hands with the passengers on the main deck and tried to answer a dozen questions all at once. Malachi Braithwaite stood apart from the happy passengers, staring morosely at Sharpe on the quarterdeck. The secretary had been sequestered in steerage ever since the French took the ship and he must have been suffering pangs of jealousy at the thought of Sharpe being in the stern with Lady Grace.
“There’s a happy naval captain,” Ebenezer Fairley said. He had come to stand beside Sharpe on the quarterdeck and was staring down at the throng of steerage passengers surrounding Chase. “He’s just made a fortune in prize money, but mind you he’ll have to fight for it proper now.”
“What do you mean?”
“You think the lawyers won’t want their share?” Fairley asked sourly. “The East India Company will have lawyers saying that the Frogs never took the ship properly so it can’t be a prize, and Chase’s prize agent will have another set of lawyers arguing the opposite and between them they’ll keep the court busy for years and make themselves rich and everyone else poor.” He sniffed. “I suppose I could hire a lawyer or two myself, seeing as how a deal of the cargo is mine, but I won’t bother. Yon captain’s welcome to the prize so far as I’m concerned. I’d rather he got the cash than some blood-sucking lawyer.” Fairley grimaced. “I once had a good idea on how we could mightily improve the prosperity of Britain, Sharpe. My notion was that every man of property could kill one lawyer a year without fear of penalty. Parliament wasn’t interested, but then, Parliament’s full of blood-suckers.”