his new one.

“No wells, no springs… no privateerin’ lairs, then,” Lewrie speculated. “A decent-sized ship could lurk round here for a time, with full water casks, but they’d have to go somewhere else to replenish. The only thing they could find here would be firewood and a hog or two.”

“So searching the Keys would be a waste of time, sir?” Merriman asked, sounding a tad disappointed. Lt. Simcock looked downcast, too, as if the both of them had been having fun ashore and would hate to see their excursions end.

“From what I saw during the Revolution,” Lewrie told them, “and what I’ve read of Florida, the mainland is rich with lakes, rivers, and streams. Privateers could base themselves on the far side of Florida Bay, but that’s too far from the Straits for quick springs upon merchant ships.”

And, did French or Spanish privateers base themselves on the mainland side of Florida Bay, they would have a long passage out round Key West and the Marquesas Keys to get to their cruising grounds, and a long passage back with prizes, Lewrie realised.

Damme, I might’ve been right the first time, he congratulated himself; Florida Bay’s a sack, a place where a privateer’d be trapped, if a force like ours came along! They’re a greedy lot, but no one ever said privateers are stupid.

“No, we’ll be thorough,” Lewrie said at last to his officers. “A few days more, and we’ll reach the end of the Keys and strike the mainland. Damme, no springs or wells? Then, what does the wildlife do for water… the wild hogs, deer, birds, and such? Even sea -birds need to drink, now and again.”

“Wait for a downpour, sir?” Lt. Merriman posed. “So far, we’ve seen goodly showers each afternoon, and there would be shallow puddles left behind them, for a while. As for the wild people who dwell here, I suppose they can dance for rain, like the Indians, and catch them a barrel or two of run-off. There are clouds gathering on the horizon even as we speak, sir.”

“Seems a horrid waste, really,” Lt. Simcock commented. “These wee isles appear idyllic, but one would have to be pretty desperate to live here for long. Alluring and all, but not worth a tuppenny shit for white men.”

“Who knows, though, Arnold,” Merriman said. “Did one dig a deep well and strike fresh water, one could go as native as a Tahitian in the Great South Seas!”

“Though it don’t look promising for bare-breasted dancing girls in grass skirts,” Simcock quipped, fanning himself with his hat.

“Invite Mister Westcott to go native with you,” Merriman chirped, “and he’ll turn them up in a Dog Watch. It comes to women, he’s your boy!”

“Carry on, sirs,” Lewrie said, hiding a smirk, and returning to the quarterdeck to fetch his telescope. He peered at Lizard, Firefly, and Thorn which lay to anchor close by. Their boats were also coming offshore, empty-handed it appeared. Well, Lt. Bury was studying something that might have been a horseshoe crab with a large magnifying glass. No, he’d call it a trilobite, Lewrie thought.

Lewrie lowered his telescope and turned to gaze out to sea. A bank of darker clouds was gathering as the heat of the day grew, threatening yet another afternoon shower or two. Four or five miles out from their anchorage, a slim glass-white waterspout was slowly snaking down to thrash the bright green waters to a froth; yet another nigh-daily occurrence since they had entered the Florida Straits and had begun their slow inspection of the Keys.

“Mister Grainger?” Lewrie called, after turning to note which lad was the Midshipman of the Watch on the quarterdeck. “Hoist ‘Captains Repair On Board’.”

Grand places t’lurk, but not to base, Lewrie thought; unless ye fetch along all that’s needful. Might as well be at sea!

He went to the compass binnacle cabinet afore the helm to roll open one of the Sailing Master’s dubious charts of the area, to look closely at the great bay at the North end of the Keys. Yes, it was as he remembered it from a first perusal… there were rios feeding into the bay, and rivers meant fresh water in abundance.

Time for a conference, Lewrie determined; and time for a change of plans. Some midnight boat-work, to scout the bay out before we go barging’ in.

CHAPTER TWENTY

False dawn had broadened the circle of visibility from the decks and the mast-heads, revealing low shorelands and forests, and the broad bay into which the squadron crept under reduced sail. The winds were light but steady, bringing the scents of sand flats and marsh, of woods and growing things, and the faintest hint of flowers ready to open to the first rays of the sun when the actual dawn came. The waters of the great bay at the end of the Keys were very calm, with no chop or white-caps, and slack-water waves no more than one or two feet high, so the bow waves and wakes of the four warships barely whitened to foam, and they all rode upright, with only a slight angle of heel to the winds.

The smaller three preceded Reliant by only half a mile, spread in line-abreast, with Thorn and her short-ranged carronades closest to the larboard shore, weaker 8-gunned Firefly in the centre, and Lizard on the starboard corner.

“Trust to the leadsmen in the chains,” Reliant ’s Sailing Master, Mr. Caldwell, said in a low voice as those sailors called back a depth of six fathoms, “If not completely in these ancient Spanish charts. I doubt the Dons ever contemplated a proper settlement this far South of Saint Augustine, sir, so how meticulous the first, perhaps the only, surveyors were… in such a malarial place, right on the edge of a great swamp, well…”

“Neither did British surveyors in the twenty-odd years we held Florida, Mister Caldwell,” Lewrie pointed out.

The latest charts of the bay, and the shallow passage between a string of long barrier islands and the mainland, or the mouth of the river which fed into the bay, were an amalgam of old Spanish work and some sketchy surveys done between 1763 and 1783, though both doubted if much had been done to update them once the American Revolution had begun in 1775. Before, there had been no urgency, and once England was at war, there had been no need to correct maps done of such a minor, insignificant colony so far from the main scenes of action.

“Mayami… Tamiami?” Lt. Westcott posed with a brow up in puzzlement. “I suppose we should call it something, sir.”

“Mayami, perhaps… for the local tribe,” Lewrie speculated.

“Signal from Lizard, sir!” Midshipman Warburton called down to the deck from his perch at the top of the starboard main-mast shrouds, almost to the futtocks of the-main top. “Two vessels to starboard and ahead! Anchored!

“And, there’s the settlement, dead ahead, sir,” Lt. Westcott pointed out, “the cook-fires we saw last night are still burning.”

“Right where the river joins the bay, aye,” Lewrie said. “Just heave a net, dip a bucket, and there’s your breakfast and tea-water! Damme, do they look as asleep as I think they look? Two signals, Mister Eldridge!” he barked in rising excitement. “The first to Thorn. Make, her number, and engage shore. By the larboard halliards.”

“Aye, sir!” Eldridge replied, turning to the ratings of the Afterguard who stood by the transom flag lockers, and fumbling with his illustrated lists of signals to call out the right numerals.

“Might be hard to read in this light, sir,” Westcott warned.

“But streamin’ to loo’rd in plain sight,” Lewrie countered, “and if Darling kens the half of it, he may get my intent. For now, crack on a bit more sail, Mister Westcott, and let’s close up within hailing distance, just in case. Let fall the fore course, and hoist the foretopmast stays’1 and outer flying jib.”

Вы читаете Reefs and Shoals
Добавить отзыв
ВСЕ ОТЗЫВЫ О КНИГЕ В ИЗБРАННОЕ

0

Вы можете отметить интересные вам фрагменты текста, которые будут доступны по уникальной ссылке в адресной строке браузера.

Отметить Добавить цитату