Galbraith gasped as a blow flung him hard against the tiller bar. As if a white-hot bar of iron had been dragged across his back; he could even smell the cloth of his coat burning, then Jago's hard hands as he tore it away and slapped a wad of rags across the wound. But no pain. Just breathlessness, as though he had been kicked.
Jago said sharply, 'Easy, Mr Galbraith. We'll get you fixed up, good as new!' He turned as the jollyboat passed abeam, oars rising and falling without cease, as if they had only now cast off from the ship's side. 'Frank Rist can manage.' He felt Galbraith turn to listen, to understand, and added, 'He always wanted a bloody command of 'is own, anyway!'
Then the pain did come, and Galbraith found himself lying by the first stretcher, his head propped on somebody's hat. He was alive. But all he could think of was that he had failed.
Jago held out a hand. 'Oars.' He gauged the overhanging stern. Young Deighton would have enjoyed this, he thought vaguely. But his mind was still like ice. 'Ready in the bows.' He heard the hiss of steel being drawn, and knew a couple of them were armed with hoarding-axes. He trusted that the grapnel had been thrown, and lurched to his feet as the gig came under the counter with a violent jerk. A swivel gun exploded, it seemed only a few feet away, and for an instant he imagined that the schooner's crew had been ready and waiting for them. Instead he heard a wild whoop and knew it was Williams, the mad Welshman. At 'em, lads.' Then he was clawing his way up and over the stern with all the others.
He paused only to peer down at the gig, where Galbraith lay where he had been dragged into a safer position. He even grinned. Bloody officers!
Frank Rist, master's mate, had heard the burst of firing and the swivel gun's murderous response. As ordered, he had brought the jollyboat alongside. He knew he would have done it in any case. Even if a friend is cut down in battle, don't offer your hand. Or it's your turn next.
He rubbed his stinging eyes; the smoke was everywhere. Miles and miles of it. He swore silently as his boots skidded on blood and fragments of flesh. There had only been one man to challenge them, and he had taken the full blast of canister, all on his own. Some other whimpering shapes had been seized without even a struggle. The anchor watch were alone on board, eight men in all. One had tried to escape, but a boarding-axe had stopped him in his tracks. A splash alongside told the rest.
He found that he could relax, albeit holding his nerves on a leash. He heard the battle roaring in the background, men being killed and maimed, ships disabled or sunk. It was all meaningless in the distance and the smoke.
And Unrivalled's guns had stopped firing. With her two consorts, she would be waiting. He stared around the unfamiliar deck, scarcely able to believe it. Because of us.
He heard Williams calling to one of his mates, pictured his nimble fingers twisting and fixing fuses, like that other time with the chebecks. Galbraith had been there then.
He thought Williams was humming to himself, unconcerned about everything beyond his immediate reach. Rist felt himself smile. The madness of a fight. Williams would probably lay a bet on the outcome of this raid, down to the last minute. Although he was a powerful man, he made his strength seem effortless; Rist had seen him pick up a handspike and use it to train an eighteenpounder gun to explain something to a green landman at Plymouth. He had used no more effort than somebody moving a chair up to a table. But a gentle man in many ways, despite his trade of gunner's mate. Like the time he had carried the young black girl in his arms, on board that damned slaver when her master had recognised him, or thought he had, from the past. The girl had been abused so badly that it was unlikely she would recover. It was common enough. But she had not said a word or protested once when Williams had carried her to her own people, when by rights she should have seen him as just another white devil.
Williams could have been promoted long ago, but for his love of gambling. With hirn it was like lust, and, discipline or not, nothing would change him. Dice, or simply laying odds on the most common daily occurrence: how many knots sailed in a single watch, or how much rum would be consumed in one mess in the course of a week. He had a loyal group of fellow gamblers, his clutch, as he called them, and as he was able to read and write he was the one who kept a tally of the wins and, more likely, the losses. Rist had heard some of them say they had already laid down their slave-and prize-bounty in Williams' care, and they had not even received it yet!
Williams was his own man. If he liked you, it was enough. If you pushed him too far, then beware.
It had all been so quick. If Mister bloody Sandell had not been nosing around between decks when he should have been standing watch, it would not have happened. Maybe the midshipman had heard something and was out to prove himself. But he was there that morning, when Williams had been returning to his mess after yet another secret session with the clutch.
Sandell had probably attempted to seize the list of bets, or even some of the money, as evidence. It was all so fast, you would never know for sure. One moment there had been the two of them, Williams towering over the irate, gesticulating midshipman, then there was only Williams. Sandell had fallen back against one of the carronades, his head striking the iron 'smasher.' Dead or unconscious, the sea had received him. And bloody good riddance.
He swung round guiltily as Williams shouted, 'Done, Frank! Cut the cable, and we'll be going!'
Rist hurried forward and called, 'Cut it, lads!' He stared ahead at the overlapping shapes of anchored vessels. They would soon do the same when they saw a fireship drifting down on them.
A seaman shouted, 'Look out!' It was almost a scream.
One of the anchor watch must have hidden below, undiscovered, when the boarding party had swarmed up from the boats. He just seemed to rise out of the deck, from a small hatch which nobody had cared to investigate.
Fist aimed his pistol; he did not even recall having drawn it. The two shots sounded as one. He ran to help Williams, who had fallen to his knees; the other man had no time even to cry out as a cutlass smashed into his skull.
'Where is it, Owen?' Other hands were helping, but Rist and Williams were completely alone.
Williams said thickly, 'It's a bad one, Frank. This time, I think…' His head lolled, and he groaned, as if to bite back the agony. Rist could feel the blood on his hand, running over his wrist. A bad one. He had seen enough of them.
'We'll get you to the boat.'
Williams tried to protest but the pain held it back. Then he said in an almost normal tone, 'You too busy to see the wind, man? It's shifted. Not much. But a bit. Enough, see?'
Rist stared around. 'I don't give a damn!'
With sudden strength Williams pulled himself up to the schooner's wheel. Gasping with pain, he slowly wrapped and fastened the old-style crossbelt he always wore around and through the spokes, so that it took his weight.
'Get to the boats, Frank. Time to move, see? Nothing more you can do. The ship'll need you now!'
Somebody asked, 'What d' you say, Mr Rist?'
For a moment longer he stared up at the masts, and the loosely flapping jib. A command of his own. What he had always wanted. He shrugged, as if to the world. What Galbraith wanted too, although he would never admit it.
He looked down as a hand gripped his.
Rist lowered his head until their faces almost touched. Feeling the agony, the sudden determination.
'What is it, Owen?'
Williams gripped his hand harder. 'You saw me, Frank, that morning. I knew you did.' lie fought a bout of coughing. There was blood on his shirt. Rist heard the distant guns. It could not last. He had others to think of
'Yes, I saw it.'
'And you never said?' He tried to smile, but it only made it worse. 'Save yourself, see? Time to go, cut the cable. Now.' He reached out suddenly and Rist heard the sharp click of his flintlock. The realisation seemed to freeze him, but he could see it stark and clear in his mind. Williams had fired the fuse.
'Cut the cable, Billy! Into the boats, the rest of you!'
The deck was deserted, the only sound the regular thud of a heavy axe. He heard Williams mutter, 'A life for a life, see, Frank? So I was taught!'
'Cut.' The seaman was already running aft to the waiting boats.
Rist stood motionless, seeing the wheel respond to the hands, the jib hardening enough to swing the hull very slightly. Adrift, and at any second the fuses would blow.
