THE GUN KETCH

Alacrity roared out her defiance, thrashing along with wind singing in her rigging, foam flying about her hull, spray leaping high as the clews of her jibs. The guns crashed and bellowed, and a wall of smoke gushed from her to be ragged away astern. 'Fire!' And another broadside howled from her artillery. A single-masted lugger was torn to splinters, leaping stern-high and pitch-poling, tumbling as if she'd tripped over her own bows! She crashed upside down into the sea in a welter of white water and began to sink at once. 'Reefs ahead to larboard!' a lookout shrilled. 'Helm up, quartermaster! Bear away starboard!' Lewrie shouted.

'Deep water to starboard, sir!' Gatacre counseled from a perch on the starboard bulwark where he could see ahead and below.

'Ten fathom t'this line!' a leadsman shouted back from the foredeck, pointing to his right to indicate blue water and safety.

'The clever bastard!' Lewrie sighed with relief. 'He knew what he was about, turning to windward so early.'

'To wipe us off him in passing, so to speak, sir,' Lieutenant Ballard commented. 'The guns cannot bear, sir, unless we turn up to windward again.'

'Eight fathom t'larboard! Eight fathom t'this line, sir!' the other leadsman sang out. 'Clear water ahead.'

'Mister Fellows, Mister Gatacre, do you think there is depth enough for us to continue the chase, sirs?' Lewrie inquired. 'For a space, sir,' Fellows allowed.

'Another mile or two, sir, if we're quick about it,' Gatacre recommended.

'Quartermaster, put your helm down. Lay us close-hauled'

'Aye, aye, sir! Close-hauled t'weather!' Neill parroted. The luggers had gained at least half a mile on Alacrity after she was forced off course, and now lay more ahead than abeam of her after she began to beat to windward once more. The gun crews had to pry the guns about to angle them within the ports to point at the foe, grunting and sweating as they put their backs and arms against the metal crow-levers and handspikes.

'Quartermaster, pinch us up and let her luff,' Lewrie snapped. 'Gun captains, as you bear… fire!'

One at a time the guns belched and leapt, rolling back from the gun ports and snubbing on the breeching ropes, slewing a bit due to the acute angle and making the tackle men, swabbers and loaders jump back.

'Tacking!' the foremast lookout wailed.

Lewrie stepped to the left side of his small quarter-deck for a view. The luggers had tacked across the eye of the Trades and were now heading west-nor'west, back the way they had come all during the long morning chase. But this time, they were inside the Caicos Bank, sheltered from pursuit beyond the reefs and breakers, skimming along over pale aquamarine waters far too shallow for Alacrity.

' 'Vast, there!' Lewrie roared. 'Mister Buckinger, ready the larboard battery. Quartermaster, ease your helm two points aweather. Mister Ballard?'

'Aye, sir?'

'We'll not have much time, I'm thinking, so be ready to haul our wind and come about to loo'rd.'

'Six fathom!' the leadsman warned.

'Guns ready, sir!' Buckinger called out.

'Open fire, Mister Buckinger.'

Alacrity rocked with recoil, and spent powder smoke rolled over the decks like a thick fog, only slowly wafting away. Shot moaned in the air, across the shoaling waters, across the sand and coral reefs which separated them from the foe. A second broadside; a third, and one of the two-masted luggers was at last hit. Two shots slammed home, rocking her at the extreme limit of Alacrity's range. Powder charges or a cask of powder aboard the lugger must have taken light, for there was a sudden ruddy mushroom cap of flame, followed by a squat, bulging hump of gray-black smoke shot through with whirling wreckage, then a hailstorm of splashing debris and she was gone! The sound of her ruin came to them as a twofold Crump-Fhwumph as the smoke-cloud turned to a sooty mist chased low across the shallow sea, and the white-roiled waters became a series of ripples.

'Out of range, sir,' Buckinger informed them from the foot of the ladder to the waist.'Three fathom!' a leadsman called mournfully. 'Three fathom to this line, and shoal-waters ahead! Two cable, no more, sir!'

'Mister Ballard, haul our wind. Mister Buckinger, secure your guns for a gybe,' Lewrie commanded.

'Run out unloaded! Bowse up to the bulwarks and belay!' the quarter-gunner told his hands. 'Put those slow match out.'

'Sheetmen, brace-tenders, stations for wearing ship! Off yer belays and haul taut!' Ballard instructed. 'Ready about? Helm hard up to weather, quartermaster. Wear-ho!'

Once settled on her new course out toward safer, deeper water, and the guns secured with charges and shot drawn, vents covered and striker pans emptied, ports closed and the guns lashed securely hard up against the hull, Lewrie had all hands summoned. They thundered aft to mill about at the foot of the quarter-deck, grinning with delight and chattering their excitement.

'Lads, we did damned well!' he told them, putting a brave face on his embarrassment. 'From powder monkeys to waisters to the guns. We shot like a crew three years in commission, and I'm well pleased with you this day! Mister Keyhoe? We will splice the main-brace!'

They cheered the announcement of a double rum ration, one free of accumulated debts among themselves of 'sippers' and 'gulpers.'

'Then!' he continued, raising his hand to silence them, 'then, lads, we pick up survivors and clap 'em in irons. We go back to get our boats and other mates in Clear Sand Road. And hunt the rest of this pack of murderers and cut-throats down and bring 'em to court to hang! Mister Harkin? Pipe 'Clear Decks And Up Spirits'!'

After the clamor died down, Lewrie paced aft to the taffrail on the windward side. He raised his telescope and glared at the surviving luggers as they receded from view two miles or more away now', hull-down, with their sails mirrored on the glassy waters inside the Caicos Bank.

He had hurt them. He'd sunk three out of five of them, saved a merchant ship… come to think on it, he gloomed, where had that bugger gone so quickly, without a word of thanks… he'd put the fear of King's Justice in the rest of them. But it wasn't enough. The fact remained that he had been outmaneuvered… fooled! He'd almost lost his ship on those razor-sharp reefs!

Somewhere out there was a very clever criminal, laughing fit to bust he was certain, at how he'd bested him! A criminal who had outsmarted him!

Chapter 3

'A 'Brother Johnathon' ship,' Lewrie chuckled wryly. 'I saved a Yankee's ship. And now here he is, selling bold as brass!'

'That you did,' the local magistrate Mr. Lightbourne said as they strolled past the open-air market of sheds just above the high-tide line. 'I've no way of stopping him. No reliable bailiff, no real power to regulate for the Governor-General.'

'But this is a violation of the Navigation Acts, sir,' Lewrie insisted. 'Is there no King's ship in these waters?'

'Nothing against your fellow officer, Captain Lewrie, but there is but the one tiny single-masted cutter, and she's off at the moment,' the gloomy magistrate said, halting their stroll to make a point. 'Sir, were it not for Yankee ships coming to the Salt Isles, we would have no imported food or goods! Not in the winter months after salt-raking season, to tide us over, certainly. When British ships put into port, their prices are dear. Dear, sir! With a half-battalion of troops, a fleet of revenue cutters, the full force of the King's Customs, even then I would have no hopes of enforcing steep prices, just to benefit fat London merchants, who got this Order In Council passed.'

'So you have to tolerate this?' Alan said, trying not to sound too accusatory. To Mr. Lightbourne's reluctant nod, he went on. 'May I take it, sir, that some revenue is gathered? Some import duty?'

'Uhm,' Lightbourne shrugged eloquently, but meaning 'no.'