Wilbur Smith - C11 Blue Horizon
The three stood at the very edge of the sea and watched the moon laying a pathway of shimmering iridescence across the dark waters.
'Full of the moon in two days,' Jim Courtney said confidently. 'The big reds will be hungry as lions.' A wave came sliding up the beach and foamed around his ankles.
'Let's get her launched, instead of standing here jabbering,' his cousin, Mansur Courtney, suggested. His hair shone like newly minted copper in the moonlight, his smile sparkling as brightly. Lightly he elbowed the black youth who stood beside him, wearing only a white loincloth. 'Come on, Zama.' They bent to it together. The small craft slid forward reluctantly, and they heaved again, but this time it stuck fast in the wet sand.
'Wait for the next big one,' Jim ordered, and they gathered themselves. 'Here it comes!' The swell humped up far out, then raced towards them, gathering height. It burst white on the break-line, then creamed in, throwing the bows of the skiff high and making them stagger with its power they had to cling to the gunwale with the water swirling waist high around them.
'Together now!' Jim yelled, and they threw their combined weight on the boat. 'Run with her!' She came unstuck and rode free, and they used the backwash of the wave to take her out until they were shoulder deep. 'Get on the oars!' Jim spluttered as the next wave broke over his head. They reached up, grabbed the side of the skiff and hauled themselves on board, the seawater running off them. Laughing with excitement, they seized the long oars that were lying ready and thrust them between the thole pins.
'Heave away!' The oars bit, swung and came clear, dripping with silver in the moonlight, leaving tiny luminous whirlpools on the surface. The skiff danced clear of the turbulent break-line, and they fell into the easy rhythm of long practice.
'Which way?' Mansur asked. Both he and Zama looked naturally to Jim for the decision: Jim was always the leader.
'The Cauldron!' Jim said, with finality.
'I thought so.' Mansur laughed. 'You still got a grudge against Big Julie.' Zama spat over the side without missing the stroke.
'Have a care, Somoya. Big Julie still has a grudge against you.' Zama spoke in Lozi, his native tongue. 'Somoya' meant 'wild wind'. It was the name that Jim had been given in childhood for his temper.
Jim scowled at the memory. None of them had ever laid eyes on the fish they had named Big Julie, but they knew it was a hen not a cock because only the female grew to such size and power. They had felt her power transferred from the depths through the straining cod line. The seawater squirted out of the weave, and smoked as it sped out over the gunwale, cutting a deep furrow in the hardwood as blood dripped from their torn hands.
'In 1715 my father was on the old Maid of Oman when she went aground at Danger Point,' Mansur said, in Arabic, his mother's language. 'The mate tried to swim ashore to carry a line through the surf and a big red steenbras came up under him when he was half-way across. The water was so clear they could see it coming up from three fathoms down. It bit off the mate's left leg above the knee and swallowed it in a gulp, like a dog with a chicken wing. The mate was screaming and beating the water, all frothed up with his own blood, trying to scare the fish off, but it circled under him and took the other leg. Then it pulled him under and took him deep. They never saw him again.'
'You tell that story every time I want to go to the Cauldron,' Jim grunted darkly.
'And every time it scares seven different colours of dung out of you,' said Zama, in English. The three had spent so much time together that they were fluent in each other's language English, Arabic and Lozi. They switched between them effortlessly.
Jim laughed, more to relieve his feelings than from amusement, 'Where, pray, did you learn that disgusting expression, you heathen?'
Zama grinned. 'From your exalted father,' he retorted, and for once Jim had no answer.
Instead he looked to the lightening horizon. 'Sunrise in two hours. I want to be over the Cauldron before then. That's the best time for another tilt at Julie.'
They pulled out into the heart of the bay, riding the long Cape swells that came marching in unfettered ranks from their long journey across the southern Atlantic. With the wind full into the bows they could not hoist the single sail. Behind them rose the moonlit massif of Table Mountain, flat-topped and majestic. There was a dark agglomeration of shipping lying close in below the mountain, riding at anchor, most of the great ships with their yards down. This anchorage was the caravanserai of the southern seas. The trading vessels and warships of the Dutch East India Company, the VOC, and those of half a dozen other nations sed the Cape of Good Hope to victual and refit after their long ocean
At this early hour few lights showed on the shore, only dim lanterns on the walls of the castle and in the windows of the beachfront taverns where the crews off the ships in the bay were still revelling. Jim's eyes went naturally to a single prick of light separated by over a sea mile of darkness from the others. That was the go down and office of the Courtney Brothers Trading Company and he knew the light shone from the window of his father's office on the second floor of the sprawling warehouse.
'Papa is counting the shekels again.' He laughed to himself. Tom Courtney, Jim's father, was one of the most successful traders at Good
Hope.
'There's the island coming up,' Mansur said, and Jim's attention came back to the work ahead. He adjusted the tiller rope, which was wrapped around the big toe of his bare right foot. They altered course slightly to port, heading for the north point of Robben Island. 'Robben' was the Dutch word for the seals that swarmed over the rocky outcrop. Already they could smell the animals on the night air: the stench of their fish laden dung was chokingly powerful. Closer in, Jim stood up on the thwart to get his bearing from the shore, checking the landmarks that would enable him to place the skiff accurately over the deep hole they had named the Cauldron.
Suddenly he shouted with alarm and dropped back on to the thwart. 'Look at this great oaf! He's going to run us down. Pull, damn you, pull!' A tall ship flying a great mass of canvas, had come silently and swiftly around the north point of the island. Driven on the north-wester it was bearing down on them with terrifying speed.
'Bloody cheese-headed Dutchman!' Jim swore, as he heaved on the long oar. 'Murderous landlubbing son of a tavern whore! He's not even showing a light.'
And where, pray, did you learn such language?' Mansur panted, between desperate strokes.
'You're as big a clown as this stupid Dutchman,' Jim told him grimly. The ship loomed over them, her bow wave shining silver in the moonlight.
Hail her!' There was a sudden edge to Mansur's voice as the danger became even more apparent.
'Don't waste your breath,' Zama retorted. They're fast asleep. They won't hear you. Pull!' The three strained on the oars and the little vessel seemed to fly through the water, but the big ship came on even faster.
we will have to jump?' There was a question in Mansur's strained tone.
'Good!' Jim grunted. 'We're right over the Cauldron. Test your father's story. Which of your legs will Big Julie bite off first?'
They rowed in a silent frenzy, sweat bursting out and shining on their contorted faces in the cool night. They were heading for the safety of the rocks where the big ship could not touch them, but they were still a full cable's length out and now the high sails towered over them, blotting out the stars. They could hear the wind drumming in the canvas, the creaking of her timbers, and the musical burble of her bow wave. Not one of the boys spoke, but as they strained on the oars they stared up at her in dread.
'Sweet Jesus, spare us!' Jim whispered.
'In Allah's Name!' Mansur said softly.
'All the fathers of my tribe!'
Each called out to his own god or gods. Zama never missed the stroke but his eyes glared white in his dark face as he watched death bear down on them. The pressure wave ahead of the bows lifted them, and suddenly they were surfing on it, flung backwards, racing stern-first down the side of the wave. The transom went under and icy water poured in, flooding her. All three boys were hurled over the side, just as the massive hull hit them. As he went under Jim realized that it had been a glancing blow. The skiff was hurled aside, but there was no crack of rending timbers.
Jim was driven deep, but he tried to swim deeper still. He knew that contact with the bottom of the ship would be fatal. She would be heavily encrusted with barnacles after her ocean passage, and the razor sharp shells would strip the flesh from his bones. He tensed every muscle in his body in anticipation of the agony, but it did not come. His lungs were burning and his chest was pumping with the compelling urge to breathe. He fought it until he was sure that the ship was clear, then turned for the surface and drove upwards with arms and legs. He saw the golden outline of the moon through limpid water, wavering and insubstantial, and swam towards it with all his strength and will. Suddenly he burst out into the air and filled his lungs with it. He rolled on to his back, gasped, choked and sucked in the life-giving sweetness. 'Mansur! Zama!' he croaked, through the pain of his aching lungs. 'Where are you? Pipe
