Corsair (16 page)

Aurelia stood on deck with Ned, looking aft at the
Griffin
’s wake. “Although they never attack anything but fish, I think those frigate birds look evil. Much worse than sea eagles.”

“That’s because they’re black and so big. But what flyers! They have more grace than any other sea bird.”

“Look at them diving after those flying fish!” Aurelia exclaimed.

“Yes, they must have phenomenal eyesight. And they can turn so fast.”

At noon Ned took a sight and worked out the ship’s latitude and sighed contentedly: the
Griffin
was exactly in the latitude of Grand Cayman, and from his estimate of the distance they had run since leaving Jamaica they should just sight the island at dusk. So they would have to lie-to for the night: none of the coasts of Grand Cayman were clear of reefs, which seemed to stretch across every bay, like coral nets to catch the unwary seaman.

Ned looked again at the chart of Grand Cayman. It did not give much detail, but the first part they would sight, at the eastern end of the island, would be the cliffs at Gorling Bluff. There were trees drawn round the Bluff, and whoever drew the chart had sketched in a reef surrounding the whole eastern end of the island like a barrier. There were three breaks in the barrier, one of which went through to Gun Bluff, and its natural cistern of spring water.

The biggest village was at the other end of the island, and had about the only sheltered anchorage – sheltered, that is, from the prevailing east wind: it was open to the northers of the winter. So, Ned considered, the four pirates would be at Gun Bluff watering, or at the other end of the island at anchor, or they would have quit the island altogether, in which case the chances of them being at Little Cayman or Cayman Brac were slight: they were tiny islands, uninhabited except for turtles and goats, and wild birds. Unless someone had been marooned there, or a ship wrecked…

How long would it take four ships to get fresh water from the cistern? A couple of days, he estimated. So they would no longer be at Gun Bluff. He rolled up the chart: this was a hopeless business; the ships could be anywhere.

For hour after hour the
Griffin
, followed by the other two ships, plunged westwards into the sun, which gradually drew lower and lower in the sky. Finally, at six o’clock when Ned was searching the horizon just below the sunset, he grunted and said to Aurelia: “There we are – the island is dead ahead.”

“How far?”

“Ten or fifteen miles: just a smudge on the horizon.”

“So we’ll get there just as the moon appears.”

“Yes, and as the moon gets up we heave-to for the night.”

At dusk, the
Griffin
was about eight miles from the eastern end of the island and Ned turned her into the wind and dropped the sails. There was no point in heaving-to, he decided; easier to furl the sails and, with the sea not vicious, lie a’hull until daylight. The rolling would be uncomfortable, but they had pitched all the way from Jamaica, and the change of motion was not unpleasant.

It seemed everything in the ship creaked. The deck beams creaked, and in turn the deck planking creaked, and the cupboards and lockers creaked in sympathy. The great thick mast groaned aloft but creaked where it came through the deck. The rattle of blocks hitting the mast aloft was echoed by the mast and Ned cursed it.

The noises did not seem to bother Aurelia, but Ned had never been able to stand repetitive noises unless they were regular. The constant hiss of the ship running before the wind and surging forward over a wave did not bother him; but the occasional clatter of a block or the irregular banging of an unfastened door always roused him.

He had stood on deck and watched first the
Peleus
and then the
Phoenix
round up, drop their sails and lie a’hull. The dusk was reducing everything to a uniform greyness; it was the time of day he hated because quite innocent clouds turned dark and menacing; the seas seemed to grow bigger; it was easy, he admitted to himself, to imagine a storm was coming, or even a hurricane, although experience insisted that there was no swell, which was always the outrider of bad weather. No, it was just dusk; he hated it, and that was that.

Mind you, dawn could be just as bad: cold and hungry and sleepy, one could see dawn approach when the waves started taking shape: instead of a black mass surrounding the ship, one could begin to distinguish crests, and they soon became grey and menacing, and the clouds when they made an appearance were nearly always hard grey and menacing. Proper daylight took an age, and in the meantime the ship, as it became possible to see her, was not friendly: the line of bulwarks, seams of the deck planking, coamings – all seemed harsh and remote. But there was no colour: dawn was varying shades of grey.

For good measure, the devil take landfalls made at dusk: the chart noted that there were currents off this end of the island, and he had been careful to have the three ships lying in a position where if the wind freshened from the east during the night, it would not carry them on to the reef.

All this because of old Loosely, Ned thought to himself. If the damned man had not called him a pirate, he would still be in Port Royal harbour, comfortably at anchor…

All through the night, Lobb, Ned and the boatswain took it in turn to stand a watch, keeping an eye on the end of the island and the other two ships. There was a current but the wind died down, so the ships hardly changed their position.

At dawn next day it was possible to see the whole coast, and Ned could be fairly certain which was the gap in the reef that led to Gun Bluff. There was no ship anchored there; as he searched along the coast with his perspective glass he could not even see an open boat belonging to a fisherman or turtler. The waves thundered monotonously on the reef. “If they break with this sea, imagine what they do when it’s rough,” he commented to Lobb.

“Think of a hurricane,” Lobb said lugubriously.

Ned shuddered. “I don’t want to think of anywhere in a hurricane. Port Royal, maybe. Or English Harbour, in Antigua. Maybe the anchorage in Grenada…”

Lobb tugged at his beard. “Glad they don’t have hurricanes in Kent,” he said in his broad Kentish accent.

Ned grunted. “All that rain, though, and the cold. I think I’d prefer one brisk hurricane to a winter of Kentish drizzle and chills.”

“Me, too,” Lobb agreed. “Kent seems a long way from here…”

Once it was completely daylight, Ned told Lobb to get the mainsail hoisted and the ship sailing along the south coast of the island to the village at the western end. He then went below for a wash.

Without waking Aurelia he poured some water into a basin and found some soapberries. He sliced a few into the basin and then rubbed his hands with them, to make suds, and then he washed his face. It was remarkable how a wash put new life into a man, though it was a pity that no one got any fresh soapberries: these were beginning to dry and were reluctant to lather.

And, he thought sourly, here is the second son of Henry Sydney Broughton Yorke, the sixth earl of Ilex, cursing soapberry… At least his brother George, who had succeeded to the title, had no such problems – or, to be exact, had no such problem when he woke up about four hours ago. Where would George be, he wondered: at the northern estate, between Godmersham and Molash? No, that was never George’s favourite; he would be at the southern, over at Saltwood, surrounding the castle. Or perhaps even at Ilex itself, the small Sussex estate house. Why the devil should he be thinking of George at this moment? Oh yes, he could trace the train of thought – he was annoyed that he had not sent a letter to George in the
Convertine
, telling him what a hopeless duffer was Luce. By now George should be getting into a position of influence – though it was doubtful that the seventh earl of Ilex would ever be in a position to influence the choice of the governor of Jamaica. It was more important, perhaps, that George kept his ears open for any hint that the King was thinking of honouring his agreement with Spain about the future of Jamaica…

He wiped his face vigorously, combed his hair, and was thankful that the ship had way on: it was easier to stand in the cabin when she was pitching than when she was rolling.

By the time he went back on deck the
Griffin
was still pitching her way along the south coast of the island, closely followed by the
Peleus
and the
Phoenix
. He could just see the headland ahead marking the south-western corner of the island, and round which they would turn to stretch up the west coast to the island’s largest – indeed only – village, apart from a few tiny settlements.

Fifteen minutes later Aurelia joined him, her face freshly washed, hair combed and wearing a yellow-coloured jerkin. Ned nodded to Lobb. “If you want to go below and get some sleep…”

Lobb shook his head. “No, I want to see what’s waiting for us round the corner. If anything, I think the birds have flown.”

Ned agreed with him. “It’s nearly a week since they attacked that ship. They’ll have watered and gone on to look elsewhere.”

“Where’s ‘elsewhere’?” Aurelia asked.

“If they expect to find some ships to capture, the Jamaica coast. If they stay at the western end they haven’t much to fear.”

“Sir Harold will have a fit!” Aurelia commented.

“Well, he can’t expect the former buccaneers to go out and chase them. He’s going to find out just how helpless he is without ships.”

“Without you and your ships,
chéri
.”

“Yes, there’ll be no more Santo Domingos; that was a mistake; I think it was one of those generous impulses on my part that will eventually prove costly.”

“At least you have Heffer on your side.”

“Heffer has as much influence on old Loosely as a puff of wind. Loosely listens to no one. He’s too stupid to realize how little he knows.”

Ned was bored with talking about Luce, and he looked back at the other two ships. “They look a fine sight,” he said. “I can almost see Diana sitting on the bowsprit, instead of the ship having a figurehead.”

Aurelia laughed. “What about Martha Judd for the
Phoenix
? What a sight that would be!”

“The sight would strike terror into the hearts of any Dons!”

Ned watched the coast and said to Lobb: “We can turn close under the headland. There’s the usual reef but you’ll see the sea breaking on it.”

A few minutes later the yard was braced up as the
Griffin
turned to head northward, and as the ship swung Ned was ready with the perspective glass.

“By God, they’re there!” he exclaimed. “Four of them, anchored off the village. Quick, Lobb, get those guns loaded. Have the men prepare muskets and pistols, as well; we may have to board ’em.”

The four ships, almost certainly Spanish (since they were not from Jamaica), were not large: Ned estimated that each was half the size of the
Griffin
. Each would have a crew of thirty to forty men, and perhaps four guns. They were, he thought, just the right size for the job they had apparently set themselves: capturing small coasters and raiding small towns.

As Lobb gave orders to prepare the guns, Ned had men trimming the sails – the pirates were not expecting him, and the quicker he was alongside them the less time they had to get ready.

With the wind now broad on the beam, the
Griffin
sliced through the water, spray flinging up in sheets over the weather bow and the water trickling back along the deck in snaking lines.

The
Griffin
’s seamen were hurriedly ramming powder and shot into the muzzles of the guns, and other men were going round with their arms full of muskets and pistols, powder horns and bags of bullets. Ned pictured the same happening on board the
Peleus
and
Phoenix
; there would be the same level of excitement in all three ships.

With the sails trimmed he took up the perspective glass again. There was a row of black ships on the beach that puzzled him, and after a few moments he was able to distinguish what they were: boats from the four ships.

He blinked as he counted them. The last few blurred and he started counting again. Six, seven, eight… Two boats to each ship: he realized that all the boats were up on the beach. He swung the glass to the ships. No, none had boats riding astern.

Then he could make out curious domed shapes beside the boats and, many hundred yards along the beach, some men, who seemed to be dragging some of the same curiously shaped objects.

Turtles! The crews of the four pirate ships – they were definitely Spanish from their sheers – were all on shore catching turtles: several of the turtles were turned over, lying upside-down and helpless beside the boats; the men were dragging more along the beach up to the boats, leaving tracks in the sand.

Two miles – the ships were no more than a couple of miles away, and the
Griffin
was making six knots, probably more. Ned estimated the distance of the men from their boats and their boats from the ships. It would be a close-run affair, but in any case the men would be returning to ships with guns unloaded and, most likely, muskets, pistols and cutlasses still stowed in arms chests.

As soon as Lobb rejoined him, Ned explained to him and Aurelia. “The biggest ship happens to be the nearest, so we’ll tackle her. It’s a race – can we get alongside before the crew get their boats launched and row back to their ships?”

“Burn or capture?” Lobb asked laconically.

“Capture to start with. If they’re sound ships we’ll take ’em back to Jamaica. We’ll offer them cheap to Sir Harold, to start his own navy!”

Ned gave more orders for trimming sails: a few inches in on the jib and flying jib sheets seemed to bring an increase in speed; an easing of sheets and braces, letting the mainsail fill a little better, was a distinct help. Looking astern, Ned was sure they were gaining on both the
Peleus
and the
Phoenix
, but he knew excitement might be affecting his judgement.