'Then put me a ball across her bows, Mr Borrell. But not too close, hey? Hey? Don't you touch her, whatever you do; those flimsy one-and-a-half inch plank affairs sink for a nothing. And all our eggs are in one basket.'
Mr Borrell had no intention of sinking five thousand purses, and his shockingly successful shot brought his heart into his mouth. The ball pitched six feet ahead of the galley, sending a great fountain of water over her deck. It did not induce her to bring to, but it did give her something else to think about. She instantly backed water with a great flurry of oars, jigged, and then made for Hatiba again, while the opening in the reef slid fast astern.
They raced on, now the one gaining, now the other; but the general advantage lay with the Niobe. The distance between them dwindled to point-blank range and less, and if the galley had not obviously been convinced that no one would fire into her she must have struck her colours long since to avoid destruction: but a vessel with a cargo too precious to sink could run all risks except that of being boarded.
There was nothing Jack Aubrey loved more than a chase at sea; yet for some little time now his blazing delight had dwindled - the old story of the shrinking horse again. A carping voice in the back of his mind asked why all this alarm at the sight of a Company's ship on her lawful occasions? Why was the inlet passed so easily? And although Crimson Breeches was perpetually running up and down the gangway between the rowers, thumping his staff and haranguing them, surely the galley's real speed did not correspond to the threshing labour of the oars? Something was not quite right. He had deceived too many enemies at sea to be easily misled himself; and when they were within musket-shot and a subdued cheering had already started on the forecastle his uneasiness was confirmed and wholly justified by the sight of an inconspicuous line running from the galley's stern into her strangely troubled wake. 'Mr Williamson, Mr Calamy,' he called, and the midshipmen came running, their faces all aglow. 'Do you know what a lame duck does?'
'No, sir,' they said, beaming.
'It attempts to pull wool over your eyes. Lapwings do much the same when you are near their nest. Do you see that line from the galley's stern?'
'Yes, sir,' they said, having stared awhile.
'It is fast to a drag-sail under water, so that they can seem to be pulling like fury and yet let us catch up. There, you can see the grommet in her wake. They mean to lead us into a knacker's yard. That is why I am going to sink her. Mr Mowett: starboard guns.'
The moment the gunports opened Crimson Breeches ran aft and cut the line: the galley leapt forward with a bow-wave that reached half way down her side. Hassan came hurrying across the deck, his white robes flying and a look of extreme urgency and concern on his usually impassive face. Stephen said 'He urges you not to fire on the galley. It has treasure aboard.'
Jack said 'Tell him we are here to take Mubara, not to make money. We are not privateers. We cannot catch the galley this side of the island - look at her speed now -and once she gets round she gives the alarm. Mr Mowett, Turkish colours. Mr Borrell, a ball low under her counter, if you please.'
The galley turned ninety degrees to starboard in her own length: she now presented nothing but her stern and her flashing banks of oars as she pulled away at racing speed for the reef, and it was at this stern that the gunner presented his piece. He was firing from a steady platform at a steady mark: in professional conscience he could not miss, and if he did the whole starboard broadside would do his work for him. With death in his heart he pulled the laniard, arched his body over the violently recoiling gun and stared through the smoke as the gun-crew clapped on to the train-tackle and swabbed the hissing barrel.
'Well done, Mr Borrell,' called Jack. From the quarterdeck he had seen the ball go home, sending the frail wood flying at the waterline; so had most of the ship's company, and they uttered a low grunting sound, not of triumph nor of joy, but of sober appreciation. For a single stroke of her oars, still perfectly timed, the galley carried on: then the rhythm broke; the oars were all ahoo, abandoned, criss-crossed, entangled, and in his glass Jack could see all hands busy at their boats. They had barely cut the last gripes and lashings before the galley slid away from under them, leaving them and the boats afloat on the smooth sea. At the same moment an unsuspected battery on the island over against Hatiba, on the far side of the entrance to Mubara bay, opened fire on the Niobe', but it was more an expression of anger than anything else, since the ship was a quarter of a mile beyond the extreme range of its guns.
'Bring her to. Reduce sail,' said Jack, automatically careful of his spars; and as the way came off the ship he stood there with his hands behind his back, considering the trap he had escaped and the fortune he had lost, while at the same time he watched the crowded boats paddle away across the reef and into the shallow water of the lagoon. Was he more glad or more sorry? Did he rejoice or did he grieve? In this hurry of spirits he could hardly tell: he only observed 'And yet to the very end I never saw the Frenchmen. No doubt they were dressed as Arabs.'
'Sir,' said Mowett, 'the galley's pennant can still be seen. Should you wish us to take it?'
'Certainly,' said Jack. 'Lower away a boat.' His eye followed the galley's path, and there, well this side of the reef, he saw the truck and the last two feet of her mainmast with the green swallowtail rippling out on the surface. 'No, stay,' he said, 'let us bear up and run over to it. And let us, for God's sake, get some awnings over our heads. Our brains will boil, else.'
The water was extraordinarily clear. When they had dropped the small bower they could see not only the galley lying on an even keel down there upon a coral plateau fifty vards wide but the encrusted anchor of some ancient wreck far deeper and their own cable running away and away. The hands hung over the rail, gazing down with dumb longing.
At dinner Jack said 'While Hassan and the Turks argue about whether to land in some other part of the island or not, I have decided to lie here: it would be foolish to stand off and on all day, wearing ship in this hellfire heat. But I rather wish I had chosen somewhere else. The sight of five thousand purses no more than ten fathom under our keel makes me almost regret my virtue.'
'To what particular virtue do you refer, brother?' asked Stephen, his only guest, since Mr Martin had begged to be excused- could not swallow a morsel in this heat, but should be very happy to join them for tea or coffee.
'God help us,' cried Jack. 'Did you really not appreciate the heroism of my conduct?'
'I did not.'
'I deliberately threw away a fortune, sinking that galley.'
'But you could not catch it, my dear; you said so yourself.'
'Not on this leg, no. But with a quick tack to round the island I could have chased her right down the bay, and it would have been strange if they could have kept us from the treasure, sooner or later, whether we took Mubara or not.'
