boar.
'On guard, Mij nheer!' Hal challenged him in Dutch, for he could not run him through the back. The lieutenant spun round to face him, lifting his blade into the guard.
His eyes were pale blue, and they flew wide with shock and fright as he found Hal so close behind him. He was not much older than Hal, and his face blanched with terror, emphasizing the rash of purple acne that covered his chin.
Hal thrust and their blades rasped as they crossed. He recovered swiftly, but with that first light touch he had assessed his adversary.
The Dutchman was slow and his wrist lacked the snap and power of a practised swordsman. His father's words rang in his ears. 'Fight from the first stroke. Do not wait until you are angry.' And he gave his heart over to a cold, murderous rage to kill. 'Ha!' he grunted, and feinted high, aiming the point at the Dutch, mans eyes but balanced for his parry. The lieutenant was slow to counter, and Hal knew he could risk the flying attack that Daniel had taught him against such a foe. He could go for the quick kill.
His wrist tempered to steel by hours with Aboli on the practice deck, he caught up the Dutchman's blade, and whirled it with a stirring motion that threw the point off the line of defence. He had created an opening, but to exploit it with the flying attack he must open his own guard and place himself in full jeopardy of the Dutchman's natural riposte suicide in the face of a skilled opponent.
He committed himself, throwing his weight forward over his left foot, and sped his point in through the other man's guard. The riposte came too late, and Hal's steel spiked through the sweat-stained serge cloth. It glanced off a rib and then found the gap between them. Despite the days he had spent with a sword in his hand this was Hal's first kill with the cold steel, and he was unprepared for the sensation of his blade running through human flesh.
It was a soggy, dead feeling, which smothered the speed of his thrust. Lieutenant Maatzuyker gasped and dropped his own sword as Hal's point stopped at last against his spine. He clutched at Hal's razor-sharp blade with bare hands. It slashed his palms to the bone, severing the sinews in a quick flush of bright blood. His fingers opened nervelessly, and he sank to his knees staring up into Hal's face with watery blue eyes, as though he were about to burst into tears.
Hal stood over him, and tugged at the sapphire pommel of the Neptune sword, but the Toledo blade clung fast in the wet flesh. Maatzuyker gasped in agony and held up his mutilated hands in appeal.
'I am sorry,' Hal whispered in horror, and heaved again on his sword hilt. This time Maatzuyker opened his mouth wide and whimpered. The blade had passed through his right lung, and a sudden gout of blood burst through his pale lips, poured down his coat front and splashed Hal's boots.
'Oh God!' Hal muttered, as Maatzuyker toppled backwards with the blade between his ribs. For a moment, he stood helplessly, watching the other man choke on and drown in his own blood. Then, close behind him, came a wild shout from the bushes.
A green-jacketed soldier had spotted him. A musket boomed, the pellets rattled into the foliage above Hal's head and -sang off the tree trunk beside him. He was galvanized. All along he had known what he must do but, until that moment, he had not been able to bring himself to do it. Now he placed his booted heel firmly on Maatzuyker's heaving chest and leaned back against the resistance of the trapped blade. He tugged once and then again with all his weight behind it. Reluctantly the blade slid out until suddenly it came free and Hal reeled backwards.
Instantly he recovered his balance and leapt over Maatzuyker's body just as another musket shot crashed out and the pellets hissed past his head. The soldier who had fired was fumbling with his powder flask as he tried to reload and Hal ran straight at him. The musketeer looked up in fright, then dropped his empty weapon and turned his back to run.
Hal would not use the point again but slashed at the man's neck, just below his ear. The razor edge cut to the bone, and the side of his neck opened like a grinning red mouth. The man dropped without a sound. But all around him the bushes were alive with green-jacketed figures. Hal realized there must be hundreds of them. This was not a raiding party but a small army attacking the encampment.
He heard shouts of alarm and anger, and now a constant barrage of musket fire, much of it wild and undirected, but some slashing into the undergrowth close on either side of him as he ran with all his speed and strength. In the midst of the uproar Hal recognized, by its power and authority, one stentorian voice.
'Get that man!' it bellowed in Dutch. 'Don't let him get away! I want that one.' Hal glanced in the direction from which it was coming, and almost tripped with the shock of seeing Cornelius Schreuder racing through the trees to head him off. His Hat and wig flew from his head, but the ribbons and sash of his rank were gold. His shaven head gleamed like an eggshell. His moustaches were scored heavily across his face. For such a big man, he was fast on his feet, but fear made Hal faster.
'I want you!' Schreuder yelled. 'This time you will not get away.'
Hal put on a burst of speed and, within thirty flying paces, had forged ahead to see the stockade of the encampment through the trees. It was deserted and he realized that his father and every other man would have been decoyed away to the lagoon's edge by the heavy fire of the two warships, and that they must be manning the culver ins in the emplacements.
'To arms!' he screamed as he ran, with Schreuder pounding along only ten paces behind him. 'Rally to me, the Resolution, In your rear!' As he burst into camp he saw, with huge relief, Big Daniel and a dozen seamen responding to his call, rushing back from the beach to support him. Immediately Hal rounded on the Dutchman.
'Come, then,' he said, and went on guard. But Schreuder came up short as he saw the Resolution's men bearing down on him and realized that he had outrun his own troops, had left them without a leader, and was now outnumbered twelve to one.
'Again you are lucky, puppy,' he snarled at Hal. 'But before this day ends, you and I will speak again.'
Thirty paces behind Hal, Big Daniel pulled up short and lifted the musket he carried. He aimed at Schreuder but, as the lock snapped, the Colonel ducked and spun on his heels, the shot went wide and he bounded back into the forest, shouting to rally his attacking musketeers as they came swarming forward through the trees.
'Master Daniel,' Hal panted, 'the Dutchman leads a strong force. The forest is full of men.'
'How many?'
'A hundred or more. There!' He pointed as the first of the attackers came running and dodging towards them, stopping to fire and reload their muskets, then running forward again.
'What's worse, there are two warships in the bay,' Daniel told him. 'One is the Gull but the other is a Dutch frigate.' 'I saw them from the hill.' Hal had recovered his breath.
'We are outgunned in front and outnumbered in the rear. We cannot stand here. They will be on us in a minute. Back to the beach.'
The coloured troops behind them clamoured like a pack of hounds as Hal turned and led his men back at a run. Ball and shot thrummed and whistled around them, kicking up spurts of damp earth at their heels, speeding them on their way.
Through the trees he could see the piled earth of the gun emplacements and the drifting bank of gunsmoke. He could make out the heads of his own gunners as they reloaded the culver ins Out in the lagoon the stately Dutch frigate bore down on the shore, wreathed in her own powder smoke. As Hal watched, she put her helm over, bringing her broadside to bear, and again her gun ports bloomed with great flashes of flame. Seconds later the thunder of the cannonade and the blast of howling grape shot swept over them.
Hal flinched in the turmoil of disrupted air, his eardrums singing. Whole trees crashed down, and branches and leaves rained upon them. Directly in front of him he saw one of the culver ins hit squarely, and hurled off its train. The bodies of two of the Resolution's sailors were sent spinning high into the air.
'Father, where are you?' Hal tried to make himself heard in the pandemonium but then, through it all, he heard Sir Francis's voice.
'Stand to your guns, lads. Aim at the Dutchmen's ports. Give those cheese-heads out there some of our good English cheer.'
Hal leapt down into the gun pit beside his father, seized his arm and shook it urgently.
'Where have you been, boy?' Sir Francis glanced at him, but when he saw the blood on his clothing he did not wait for an answer. Instead he grunted, 'Take command of the guns on the left flank. Direct your fire, -' Hal interrupted, in a breathless rush, 'The enemy ships are only creating a diversion, Father. The real danger is in our rear. The forest is full of Dutch soldiers, hundreds of them.' He pointed back with his blood-stained blade. 'They'll be on us in a minute.'
Sir Francis did not hesitate. 'Go down the line of guns. Order every second culverin to be swung round and loaded with grape. The front guns continue to engage the ships, but hold your fire with the back guns until the attack in our rear is point-blank. I will give the order to fire. Now, go!' As Hal scrambled out of the pit, Sir Francis turned to Big Daniel. 'Take these men of yours, and any other loafers you can find, go back and slow the enemy advance in our rear. Hal raced down the line, pausing beside each gun pit to shout his orders and then running on. The sound of the barrage and the answering fire from the beach was deafening and confusing. He
