If anything had been wanted to crystallise Rackham’s feelings towards the gentleman-adventurer it was supplied now. The misgivings which Kinsman’s mere presence had evoked had been enough to make him dislike the man; that Anne Bonney should flaunt herself at him turned those feelings into a simple detestation.
He stood looking down at them a moment longer and then turned his attention to the starboard side of the waist, where Kemp was setting the hands to the gun tackles. But even his stentorian blasphemies and the thunder of the carriages on the planking could not drown the laughter that every now and then would drift up from the port rail, Anne Bonney’s husky contralto blending with Penner’s deep-bellied guffaw. Captain Kinsman must be the most damnably amusing poker-backed bastard in the whole American sea, Rackham thought grimly. They would find how amusing he could be boarding the Star to-morrow perhaps, but speculation on that head only led to the conclusion that the captain would likely be most infernally able when it came to close-quarter brawling in the scuppers of locked ships.
There was too much to occupy Rackham’s attention for him to brood long, however. He was called forward by Kemp presently to assist in the instruction of the gun crews, and from that he was drawn away by Ben, who had suggestions to make for the improvement of certain running gear. Then came Penner for advice on the rehearsal of boarding parties, and so the afternoon passed, the hours almost unnoticed, such was the energy with which he applied himself to matters which he felt he really understood and in which he could engross himself.
Hard work gave him an appetite and restored his temper and when he went below to supper he was in an excellent humour. He shared the meal with Penner and Anne Bonney, the latter at her most enchanting in a gown of green and black silk which she had sent aboard the Major’s sloop days before the sailing.
Her mood was as gay as her appearance, and the meal might have passed pleasantly enough, for Penner was an amusing and stimulating companion. Unfortunately he required intervals to apply himself to his food and it was during one of these that Anne Bonney reawakened Rackham’s ill temper by suggesting that they should have Captain Kinsman to sit with them in the cabin.
He frowned, remembering how she had sought the gentleman-adventurer’s company, and asked himself was Kinsman the reason for the obvious care she had taken with her appearance. Jealousy prompted him to a hasty refusal of her request, and she looked at him in some surprise.
‘And why not?’
‘Because I don’t wish it.’
At this Mistress Bonney opened her eyes wide and her voice took on an icy edge. ‘And if I wish it?’
Rackham filled his glass before replying. ‘I still don’t want him here. I’d oblige you if I could, but not in that.’ Belatedly he made an excuse. ‘It might make bad feeling among the crew.’
‘As if you cared for bad feeling! Is that the best reason you can give?’
‘I need to give no reason,’ was his sharp rejoinder. ‘I don’t want him or any others of that mincing cattle that call themselves gentleman-adventurers, and there’s an end to it.’ Angrily he pushed his plate aside and thrust back his chair.
‘“An end to it”, you say?’ Her eyes shone with anger. ‘And who the devil may you be to tell me “there’s an end to it” as though I was some serving-wench?’
‘I’m captain of this brig,’ he retorted, ‘and that means captain over every man-jack – and woman – aboard. So you’ll do as I bid you.’
‘You dare – you dare to tell me that?’ She was on her feet, her eyes blazing.
‘You’ve ears, I think,’ snapped Rackham. ‘God knows you have a tongue.’ He got up and kicked his chair aside.
‘So.’ She considered him, standing with her hands on her hips, her mouth twisted into a spiteful smile. ‘I see. I noticed you seemed to like it mighty little when I spoke to him on deck. Well you’re not my husband, by God, and I’ll do as I please and be damned to your jealousy.’
‘Jealous!’ He turned on her. ‘Jealous? Of that mealy, spindle-shanked pimp?’
‘Aye, because he’s a gentleman—’
‘Gentleman! The nearest that ever came to being a gentleman was when he stole his master’s breeches to go whoring after the milkmaid.’
‘To be sure you’ll be a fine judge,’ she flung at him. ‘To the devil with you and your carping at a man that’s something you’ll never be. Aye, you can mouth and rant as much as you’ve a mind to, but your bellowings don’t matter that to me.’ She snapped her fingers under his nose and turned contemptuously away from the table.
Rackham started after her, brushing aside Penner’s attempt to restrain him. ‘Wait!’ he began, and then, across his harsh command, there rang the cry of the look-out, carrying faintly down from the mainmast-head.
‘Sail ho! Ho, the deck! Sail ho!’
It froze them as though in a tableau: Rackham half-way across the cabin with Penner grasping his arm; Anne Bonney with one foot on the companion. She and Penner looked to Rackham with the same thought, and the Major gave it utterance.
‘The Star!’ He released Rackham’s arm and thumped the table with excitement. ‘Holy Saint Patrick! Johnny, d’ye suppose it is?’
There was a rush of feet on the deck overhead as the hands ran to the rails. Anne Bonney stood with parted lips and a flush of excitement on her cheeks, echoing Penner’s question.
‘Wait.’ Rackham frowned in concentration. He had not expected to sight the Star for several hours at least, but it was possible he had overestimated his quarry’s capabilities. ‘It’s only a sail, after all. There’s more than one in the Carribean.’
‘But on this course?’
‘Who said aught of the course? It’s a ship, but we don’t know where it’s sailing.’ He pushed past the Major. ‘The sure way is to go and see for myself. By your leave, mistress.’
Anne Bonney had moved forward as though to detain him, but he stepped aside. This unexpected turn had been sufficient to cool his temper, but not to quench his resentment. Nor was he impressed by her sudden change from icy rage to an attitude which, to judge from her expression, was designed to be conciliatory. He was beginning to distrust these changes.
He ran up the companion, and ignoring the noisy rabble crowded at the rail, swung himself into the mainmast shrouds. They fell silent as he began the hazardous ascent; for all his bulk he went up as nimbly as a monkey until he reached the main-top where he wriggled on to the narrow grating beside the look-out, breathless with the exertion of his climb.
Far below the Kingston was like a slim knife-blade, her decks white against the turquoise water around her. The wind sang in his ears, and as the vessel rolled the deck vanished from directly beneath him and he was hanging over the heaving trough of the sea fifty feet below. Slowly, like a great pendulum, the mast came up again with a thousand shrieks and groans from cord and timber as the vessel paused for a moment on even keel and rolled again.
‘Where away?’ he shouted. The look-out pointed almost dead ahead, and Rackham followed the line of the outstretched arm. The sun was setting, and its rays had turned the southwestern sky the colour of flame. Straining his eyes he made out a tiny smudge disturbing the perfection of the curve where dark blue and amber met on the horizon; a smudge, nothing more to the naked eye, but certainly a ship if that eye were a seaman’s.
Through the look-out’s glass the smudge leaped into clarity – two masts almost in line, with canvas spread. A prolonged observation told him what he wanted to know – the ship was sailing with the Kingston and apparently on the same course. It might be the Star – so much he admitted to the demand of the eager crowd who surrounded him when he regained the deck, and his words were greeted with a roar of acclamation which alarmed him because it was a measure of what the reaction would be if he was wrong.
‘Ye can hope and pray it is the Star,’ he told Penner when they had regained the privacy of the cabin away from the exultant tumult of the deck. ‘If it’s not, God help us. Listen to them! They’ll
be yelling for our blood – my blood – if that sail turns out to be some bum-boat making for Caicos Bank, as it well may be.’
‘Dear lad,’ the Major was effusive, ‘it has to be the Star. It must be. Aren’t ye convinced yourself, now? And by my soul it’s a credit to your captaincy, to your navigation. It’s nothing short of a miracle, so it is.’
‘Bah!’ said Rackham. ‘It’s luck and nothing else – if it is the Star.’
‘The crew won’t call it luck,’ said Penner complacently, eyeing his glass against the light. ‘And if they do, what then? It’s all a pirate skipper needs. Luck, my lad,’ and he drained off his wine.
‘Luck,’ said Rackham absently. He raised his glass but set it down again untasted. ‘Where is she?’
The Major hesitated. ‘In her cabin. And if you take my advice you’ll let her stop there. Quarrels aren’t breeches – they don’t have to be patched. You’ll do more good by letting well alone, and by morning it’ll all be forgotten. Besides,’ – his face broke into a jovial smile again – ‘there’s the Star to be thought of, and half a million tinkling, lovely dollars that we’ll be wading ankle-deep in this day night.’ He laughed for delight and applied himself again to the bottle. ‘The wealth of the Indies! Silver from the mines of Peru, gold from the deserts of Mexico, pearls from the Rio Hacha big as your fist, dollars and crowns and pieces of eight from God knows where! And what does it matter? We know where they’re going!’ He chuckled and shook his head. ‘And to think – to think if I hadn’t clapped eyes on you that morning at the Fort it might never have happened.’
‘It hasn’t happened yet,’ Rackham reminded him. He found the Major’s optimism annoying, but the other waved him aside with airy assurance.
‘Have we come this far to be bilked by fortune? I tell you I feel it in my bones, and my instinct was never wrong yet.’
But in spite of this carefree confidence in his partner Rackham was too well aware of the difficulties yet remaining to be able to abandon himself to an anticipatory carouse. He sat while the Major babbled on about the treasure they were to reap on the morrow and proposed numerous toasts which he honoured himself, but as the light began to fade Rackham’s nervous irritation increased and at last he rose and went on deck, leaving Penner to drink himself to sleep.
In the quickly gathering dark the Kingston must follow as best she could the quarry they had sighted; they must hold the course that they believed she would take during the night. Rackham issued his orders, and in renewing contact with these practical if trivial details which were no more than formalities to the experienced steersmen, shed a little of his anxiety. There was an air of excitement about the Kingston’s decks which could not help but communicate itself to him; they were active and eager for the chase and the capture, and it seemed that the first reckless enthusiasm had been replaced by a steady purpose which heartened him more than all Penner’s flights of fancy could have done.
It was dark when he went below. Penner was snoring gently in the main cabin, and Rackham stood hesitant for a moment at the foot of the ladder. To his right was the cabin where he had spent last night with Anne; she would be asleep in it herself by now. The other was the one he had occupied in the old days; it would be empty.
He turned to it and opened the door, closing it again behind him in the darkness. He took the two steps he knew were necessary to reach the bunk, and the hairs on the nape of his neck rose as something moved in the blackness before him. He stopped, tense and ready, but before he could move or strike a hand touched his own and held it. Fingers caressed it lightly, and then drew him downwards. He felt for the arm in the darkness, and followed it to a smooth, naked shoulder. He could hear her breathing, swift and urgent, and then the other hand was touching his face and he was drawn to her without resistance.
13. THE ACTION
Captain Bankier of the Star watched through his glass the brig that had been following in his wake and steadily drawing closer since dawn, and asked himself for the twentieth time what the devil she could be about. That his pursuer was the Kingston he knew, and since she had been snug at anchor in Providence two days ago he could not doubt that her presence was legitimate, but he knew also that she had been due to careen, and that only an emergency could have brought her out after the Star.
He was reassuring himself that it would be best to continue on his course until signalled to do otherwise, when a thin jet of smoke shot out from the Kingston’s side, followed by the dull thump of an explosion. The signal to heave-to was unmistakable; the question was whether to obey or not. Common sense told Bankier that the Kingston had been dispatched after him on some lawful errand; no other logical explanation offered. In which case his duty was clear.
He snapped his glass shut and addressed an order to his first lieutenant, and a few minutes later Rackham, on the Kingston’s poop, saw the Star behaving precisely as he had calculated she must, swinging round to heave to.
He drew a deep breath. For the next hour a hundred pairs of eyes would be watching them from the Star’s decks; for an hour there must be no sign that the Kingston was anything but what she pretended to be. The least slip to arouse suspicion and the Star would be away like a bird, her well-greased keel covering four miles to the Kingston’s three. Surprise was their only hope.
Himself he relieved the steersman, and the Kingston ploughed on before the light breeze over a brilliant cobalt sea. Slowly she narrowed the distance as the long minutes passed, and the tension mounted among the silent men in the waist and those aft. Penner, his crimson coat providing the only patch of colour on the poop, paced up and down behind Rackham, pausing every now and then to gaze ahead at the Star before resuming his interminable walk. Once he stopped and said, ‘D’ye suppose …?’ and left the question unfinished. His nerves were beginning to wear at the silent waiting broken only by the creak and moan of timber and cordage as they ran swiftly down towards their quarry.
Rackham called an order to Kemp, his voice sounding deep in that strange silence which was yet so full of noise. The red-haired gunner jerked upright from his seat on the ladder and padded gently to the rail, as though he were afraid the Star might hear his footsteps. For a moment he studied the Star and the swell of the sea, and then turned to summon his crews, without haste, to their guns.
Suddenly the Star seemed much closer; the men on her decks were recognisable as such and not as doll-figures. There was the little group on the poop; Rackham could see the coloured coats and the scarlet of the marine sentry. Soon they would be within hailing distance, and Penner would be called on to play the second act of the drama.
‘In good voice, Ned?’ asked Rackham softly, his eyes on the ship ahead, and the Major started.
‘What’s that?’
‘Be ready. We’ll hail them in a moment.’
The Major sighed nervously. ‘Aye.’ He moved over to the port rail and stood waiting, his hands clasped behind him.
Rackham put his weight on the wheel and the seaman beside him copied the action. Ben, in the waist, bawled an order that sent the hands to the braces and the Kingston swung over almost imperceptibly. Rackham judged the distance to the Star: three cables’ lengths, and as they shortened sail he spoke.
‘Now, Ned.’
Penner stooped and grasped the speaking trumpet at his feet, and his hail rang across the water.
‘Star ahoy!’
A figure detached itself from the knot on the Star’s poop and an answering hail demanded their business. Penner roared out his answer.
‘Major Penner, of the brig Kingston. We have dispatches from Governor Rogers for Jamaica. Urgent dispatches. A sloop brought news that Spanish ships are on their way from the Florida Channel.’
Rackham could guess the sensation this would cause aboard the Star. If only the fool who commanded her wasted no time with stupid questions. They were too near as it was; every minute was precious if Kemp was to be given the chance he needed – he was fidgeting among his guns, snapping his fingers wit
h excitement, casting appealing glances towards Rackham, and inaudibly cursing the delay.
The reply to come aboard came from the Star with tantalising deliberation, and Penner turned away from the rail, his face bathed in perspiration.
‘Ready, Andy!’ shouted Rackham, and Kemp waved in reply.
He barked an order, and the caps were whipped off the tubs containing the slow-matches. Beside each tub crouched a man, fanning vigorously to disperse the tiny drifts of smoke which might otherwise be seen from the Star’s look-out.
Rackham fixed his eyes on a point on the Star’s poop – a lantern that gleamed brassily in the sunlight. They were off her starboard quarter now, little more than a cable’s length away, and in bringing the Kingston down level with the other brig his judgement must be faultless. Two minutes and they would be broadside on, and Kemp’s guns would provide the answer to the question every man on board must be asking.
The lamp was moving nearer. In one minute the Kingston’s bow-sprit would be level with the Star’s after-rail, and still there was no sign that she had been discovered for what she was. Men were lining the Star’s side, watching as the Kingston crept up on their quarter. Rackham could see their faces plainly now; there was one man standing on the rail, a great bronzed fellow with a shock of yellow hair. He held with one hand to the shrouds and waved the other in greeting. Ben, on the poop ladder, waved in reply.
The scream of blocks overhead drew Rackham’s attention back to the Kingston as she trembled violently and the wheel kicked beneath his hands. Her head fell away a little; he brought her up, and they were gliding in level with the Star with a bare hundred yards of open water between them. There she lay, on a smooth sea, her side as broad as the proverbial barn door, as perfect a target as any gunner could have wished; if Kemp bungled he could not blame his quartermaster.
‘Ports!’ yelled Kemp, and the crash as the wooden flaps were flung back was followed immediately by the shrieking and rumbling of the guns as the crews ran them forward. The Kingston’s mask was off; the men of the Star, so indifferent a moment ago, were looking death in the face as they stared at the unwinking muzzles that had suddenly sprouted from the Kingston’s side.