Ebb tide

The boat loomed again, then fell and was suddenly, obligingly close to them, offering them an instant of opportunity. They pitched the woman in with a huge, unceremonious heave as the oarsman trimmed the craft. The Baroness cried out with the impact and the hurt, while a moment later Drinkwater was flat on his back, fighting for breath as he dashed the water from his eyes. Ten yards away the transom of the boat flew up into the air with Jago clinging to it, kicking with his feet.

The oarsman was pointing and shouting, but Drinkwater, struggling to his feet, waved for them to get out, shrieking the order and then turning to make his sodden way back to the shore and the others. Wiping his eyes, he hoped that the ordeal of the Baroness had not completely unnerved her son.

As he waded through the shallows, he saw the young boy watching the departing boat as the line from Kestrel plucked it out into deeper water. Alongside him, his face obscured by his beard, Khudoznik stared expressionlessly. Drinkwater tried to smile reassuringly, but the smile froze on his lips, for beyond the boy, a line of horsemen spread out across the sand.

They were some way off and Drinkwater spun round to try and gauge how long it would be before the boat came in again. It would take some time to get the Baroness and her daughter aboard Kestrel and perhaps they had not yet seen the approaching cavalry in their preoccupation. Kestrel was, after all, only a yacht and had but a handful of men as her crew who would be occupied in dispositions they had made on the assumption that this evacuation would take place in the dark, uninterrupted by the intervention of any enemy.

He ran a little way up the beach in an attempt to gain some elevation to see what was happening, but Kestrel's waterline remained out of sight behind the cresting breakers, though a dark cluster of men amidships could be seen actively engrossed in some task. He looked over his shoulder. The cavalry were quite distinct now, advancing at a gallop, and he felt the knot of panic wring his guts. His pistols were soaked and empty, his sword his only defence. He hurried back to the boy who, in turning to follow him, had seen the cavalry. So had the Russian.

'M'sieur, regardez!'

Drinkwater nodded at the boy. 'Where in the name of Hades is that boat?' he muttered, hurrying back. Suddenly he saw the transom on top of a wave and Jago's face above it waving the oars as he back-watered furiously.

'Come on, son!' Drinkwater cried, holding out his fist and splashing forward, waving at Khudoznik to follow. He felt the boy's hand take his and the two of them splashed forward, first up to their knees in the water and then, suddenly, to their waists, then their breasts.

Faint cries came from behind. Drinkwater thanked heaven for fine soft sand — horses could get through the stuff no quicker than humans — but his moment of congratulation was short-lived. Out of the corner of his eye Drinkwater could see that off to the right, half a dozen horsemen had ridden directly down to the firm wet sand and were thundering towards them at full gallop. Jago drifted closer and Drinkwater thrust the boy forward.

'Tell him to hold on, Jago! Don't try and get us aboard!'

'Aye, aye, sir.'

The boy understood. The two of them splashed and kicked and grasped the gunwale of the boat and then they succumbed to the feeling of being drawn through the water as the line was hauled in. After what seemed an eternity Drinkwater felt them bump alongside Kestrel. He called for a rope with a bowline to be dropped down and, passing his arm round the boy's waist, got him to put his head and shoulders through the bight as he spat water and kicked with his feet.

'Courage, mon brave!' he shouted in his ear. The boy was shivering uncontrollably but above him he could see the white face of his mother. Blood ran down her cheek from a gash on her forehead but she had extended her hand in a gesture of supplication and she wore an expression of such eloquent encouragement and bravery that Drinkwater fought back his emotions. 'Haul away!' he bellowed harshly as he waited his own turn, watching the boy's spindle shanks lifted out of the sea above his own bobbing head.

'Welcome back, sir,' Frey called down to him. 'Where's the Colonel?'

'We lost contact,' Drinkwater said, but then Frey looked away as the first ball flew overhead.

'Here, sir!' The bowline dropped alongside Drinkwater. He let go of the boat and struggled into the loop. The next second the line was cutting excruciatingly into his back and under his armpits as he was drawn high out of the sea. For a moment he stared at the cutter's wildly pitching deck and the great quadrilateral of her slatting mainsail, then as he descended he span slowly round. The beach looked suddenly very close and there in the surf was the Cossack Khudoznik running alongside a single horseman and pursued by a semi-circle of hussars.

One hussar had lost his shako and another was already dead on the sand. A second fell as Khudoznik ran in among the horse's legs, grabbed a boot and swiftly detached it from the stirrup, pitching the trooper off his horse which he then mounted with consummate agility. Alongside him the single horseman tossed aside his pistols and drew a sword. It was Edward.

A moment later Drinkwater was lowered to the deck.

'That's the Colonel, sir!' shouted Frey, pointing.

'I know!' Drinkwater turned to find Jago alongside. 'Get the Baroness and her brats below, Jago. Mr Frey, clear the left flank with one of the swivels. But Frey was already pointing the after port swivel, and its sharp bark sprayed the beach with small shot.

Drinkwater threw his legs over the cutter's rail and dropped back into the boat. The swivel had struck one of the hussars from the saddle and hit a horse. Miraculously it had left both Edward and Khudoznik unscathed, but the following shot from the forward swivel was less partial. Edward's horse foundered beneath him and he threw himself clear as it staggered and sank to its knees with a piercing whinny. Khudoznik had whipped the pistols from the saddle holsters and was laying about him when a second shot from the after gun drove the hussars back. By now a frantic Drinkwater, his teeth chattering, was paddling backstroke towards the beach, shouting at Edward.

'Run into the sea, Ned! For God's sake don't stay there!'

A hussar bolder than the others, an officer by the look of his fur shabraque, spurred forward, intent on sabring the fugitive, but Edward still had his sword and cut wildly with it so that the officer's horse reared. At the same moment Khudoznik drove his own mount directly at the attacker. Just as Edward avoided the low thrust made by the hussar officer under his mount's neck, horse and rider crashed to the sand under the impact of the Cossack's terrified horse. With its bit sawing into its mouth, it reared above the dismounted hussar and its wildly pawing hooves struck the unfortunate man.

Edward staggered back and saw for the first time that it was Khudoznik looming above him. He shouted at him in Russian, but the next second the Cossack lurched sideways as a carbine ball struck him in the side of the skull. Khudoznik slipped from the saddle and landed heavily on the wet sand. Edward took a single glance at him, then turned and ran into the sea.

No more than ten yards separated them now, then Drinkwater felt the boat strike the bottom with a jarring thud that made his own teeth snap together. Edward seemed to tower over him before the next wave passed under the boat and then he had his arms over the transom and Drinkwater was jerking the painter and saw it rise dripping from the water as the hands aboard Kestrel lay back on it. As they began to draw out through the surf followed by a few balls from the hussars' carbines, Drinkwater met his brother's eyes as Edward gasped for breath.

'Where the hell did you get to?' Drinkwater asked.

'The devil...' Edward retorted, but his explanation was cut short. Drinkwater felt the ball strike the boat through the body of his brother. Over Edward's shoulder, he saw a hussar lower his carbine and reload.

Now that the boat was clear of their field of fire, the swivels aboard Kestrel opened up again behind them, the shot buzzing past overhead as Drinkwater lunged aft to grab Edward.

'Hold on, Ned! Hold on!' A thick red stream ran astern of the boat.

'Too late, Nat. My back's shot through.' He looked up and Drinkwater saw the last flicker of the departing soul. 'No trouble ... to you now ...' he gasped as he relinquished his grasp upon the boat and upon life itself. Drinkwater tenaciously clung on to his brother as he was once more pulled alongside Kestrel. Ned was dead before they reached the cutter's side, but they dragged his body aboard and laid him in