Invasion

and named, among others, Stirk, Poulden and Mr. Midshipman Calloway.

The mystified men padded aft. Kydd waited until they were mustered, a wisp of a smile playing on his face. Then he stiffened and snapped, 'Barkers and slashers!'

Answering grins surfaced—pistols and cutlasses could only mean Kydd expected to close with the French in the very near future.

As Teazer slewed to the wind and stopped, the men tumbled into the launch—but before Kydd could be the last to board Renzi pushed past and clambered in. 'Nicholas, this is not your fight, m' friend,' he said, in a low voice. In the past Renzi had been insistent on detaching himself from the naval hierarchy, reserving the right only to take up arms if the very ship was threatened.

'You've a fine idea as I'm sanguine will prove diverting, old fellow. You wouldn't begrudge me the entertainment?'

The boat shoved off and Poulden took the tiller. 'After him, sir?' he said, watching the lugger with a frown. Although the light breeze was only sending the vessel along at walking pace it was beyond even the stoutest hearts to come up to it under oars.

'No, take us in,' Kydd ordered, ignoring the puzzled looks.

The boat grounded lightly in the shingle and Kydd was away up the beach immediately. He knew where to go and quickly told the man what he wanted. 'Now or sooner, Mr. Cribben, and it'll be three guineas the man.'

The lazy afternoon on the Deal foreshore turned suddenly into a scene of activity: urgent shouts broke the stillness as small boys raced away, hovellers stumbled blinking from their huts, others from the grog-shops, all converging on one long shed amid the sprawl of shanties further along the beach.

Cribben muttered angrily to the knot of locals who stood glaring at the King's men suspiciously, eventually thrusting past them and throwing open the shed doors A surge followed, then from inside came the lusty call: 'Alaw boat, haaauuul!' and out from the gloom, under the urging of a score of men, appeared the dark-varnished sharp prow of a long, low, oared craft.

This was quite a different matter from the iron sturdiness of the hovelling lugger. There, in unaccustomed daylight for all to see, was the notorious Deal galley-punt. Low and mean in build, it could make the French coast in two hours with twenty men at the oars, in good weather, and was known to be much favoured by smugglers and others of like need.

When the vessel was afloat in the gently lapping sea, the Navy men were sent forward while the oarsmen scrambled in, and then they were off, with low, feathering strokes that were quick and efficient; at night these would leave no telltale white splashes. They skimmed across the balmy seas and Kydd dared hope.

The rowers had quickly fallen into a rhythm and the strokes lengthened to produce a breathtaking dash across the waters. But several miles ahead the fishing-boat had won the open sea and now nothing was between it and Calais, already in plain sight.

'Stretch out for your lives! ' Kydd roared at the men of Deal, who made a show of increasing speed. Then, wise in the ways of sailors, he added, 'You catch 'em and it's a cask o' beer and another guinea each.'

Leaving England to sink into anonymity astern, the rowers laboured on and on in a uniform dip and pull that was regular to the point of hypnotic, studied blankness on their faces as they concentrated on the effort. There was no doubt that they were catching the fishing-boat but would they be in time?

When the rolling dunes and cliffs of Calais were in stark clarity it was nevertheless clear that the race would be won. Pale faces appeared at the stern and Kydd's men prepared themselves. Stirk had a wicked grin as he tightened his red bandanna around his head and eased the pistols in his belt.

Kydd waited for the right moment and bawled across the last dozen yards, 'In the King's name, come to or we fire into you!'

Faces showed again and raised voices were heard, but the lugger did not vary its course. 'Lay us alongside aft,' Kydd hissed.

The rowers panted and sweated but the freshening breeze now cooling them was at the same time their enemy. Under its gathering strength the lugger dipped and swayed daintily, then began slowly to pull ahead—it was agonising.

'Stirk! The grapnel!' Kydd barked.

It was a last chance—but at thirty feet? Stirk stood braced in the fore-sheets, coiling the line deliberately, the main turns in his left hand, the grapnel and flying turns in his right, and began his swing, casting wider and faster and then, at precisely the right moment, he flung out.

The grapnel sailed across—and clunked firmly on the lugger's plain transom.

'Well done, Toby!' Kydd gasped, watching Stirk complete his feat by deftly taking turns around the little samson post and belay, letting the rope take up to allow them to be towed by the fishing- boat.

'Haul in!' Willing hands leaned out and heaved, but as they neared the vessel a face appeared above the transom with a heavy pistol. It fired—and Renzi was flung backwards into the bottom of the boat. An instant later three pistols returned the shot, the man threw up his hands and slumped over the stern.

Kydd dropped to his friend—but Renzi was already pulling himself up, his lower thigh wet with blood from an ugly scoring along his side. 'Damn the fellow,' he said faintly. 'Ruined a good pair of breeches.'

Reassured, Kydd looked up to where the transom was being rapidly hauled in. Poulden was first over in a lightning heave and leap. Kydd and Stirk followed, landing on the cluttered after deck and scuttling over to the side to take in the situation.

It was deserted, except for right forward where Fulton was kneeling, bound and gagged. Over him a man stood with a cocked pistol at his head. 'Get back! ' he barked harshly, jabbing Fulton with the muzzle. 'Get back in the boat—now!'

Kydd froze. To be so near to success! A dead Fulton would be a disaster—but perhaps that would be preferable to allowing Bonaparte to take possession of the inventor.

He hesitated but the decision was taken out of his hands. Behind him Renzi had hauled himself painfully on