‘I am going under the headland, Mr Deacon.’
Tobin tried not to think of what they might discover and concentrated instead on his ship’s safety.
‘Put the best leadsmen in the chains. I don’t trust the charts hereabouts. Sand-bars come and go like smoke in these rivers.’
‘Starboard two points.’
The slow-moving paddles threshed noisily as the first of the inshore current surged around the hull.
Tobin added, ‘Be ready to lower boats and take the landing party ashore.’
Deacon nodded, his eyes on the top of the headland searching for a possible lookout.
How trivial they had tried to make it sound in Freetown, Tobin thought savagely. They were all too busy with their trade and lofty ideas of expanding it along the African mainland to take Blackwood’s position seriously.
The senior naval officer, a commodore, had snapped testily, ‘It could happen to any of us. It’s what we’re here for, dammit!’ Perhaps he had just been told that Ashley-Chute would be relieving him of his command and could think of nothing else.
Even Slade, who had dashed ashore with his secretary within minutes of mooring, had said, ‘He’ll know what to do. He’d better.’
Very gingerly, the helm moving this way and that to compensate for the current,
Satyr
nosed her way into the shallows, the leadsman’s cry making the master and his assistants tense with apprehension.
Tobin levelled his glass as the fort’s low outline moved into view. He heard the clank of metal as the starboard ten-inch gun moved slightly on its slide, the black snout already trained on the fort.
It was still early morning, and a mist hovered along the shore to merge with the smoke from inland.
Lieutenant Deacon watched him curiously. If the captain ran this ship aground it would be the finish of his career. He
saw a muscle jerk at the side of Tobin’s jaw as a whistle shrilled and the signals midshipman called, ‘Chief engineer, sir!’
Tobin strode to the big bell-mouthed voice-pipe and barked, ‘Don’t bother me now, Chief! I don’t care if your dog-clutch
has
burst apart!’ He paused and then said, ‘My apologies, Chief,’ and replaced the whistle in the pipe.
Then he glanced at Deacon and grimaced. ‘Just wanted me to know I can have all the steam I want! And I almost tore his head off!’
They forgot Hamilton and his crashing, roaring world below decks as a lookout yelled, ‘The fort, sir!’
Tobin stared as something moved on the wall. It was occupied. By whom and with what intent he did not know.
‘Stand by, all guns!’ Tobin glared at the master. ‘Be ready to come about and keep an eye open for that bloody sand-spit!’
Deacon was so overwhelmed he touched his captain’s arm with excitement. ‘They’re running up the Colours, sir!’
Tobin trained his glass again and watched the familiar flag jerking up to a crude pole above the wall. He saw red coats too, and somebody waving his hat in the air, his shouts lost in distance but no less moving in the telescope’s lens.
‘Larboard helm!
Steady
, man! Stand by on the fo’c’sle, Mr Spalding! Look alive there!’
Men dashed forward with rope fenders while others climbed out on to the cathead in readiness to leap on to the rickety pier.
Tobin snapped, ‘Stop engine. Take over, Mr Deacon. I’m going ashore myself.’
Tobin knew now that his earlier fears had been false. He had expected them all to have been killed, wiped away like some of the other outposts he had heard about at Freetown. Normally he would have waited for the engine’s last dying quiver before he relaxed, and then only until the next demand of duty. He was like that, even though he believed he could hide it from his subordinates.
But the sight of that flag, the one which he knew M’Crystal had carried ashore with him, had driven all caution aside like steam in the wind.
Lines snaked across the pier, and as men leapt down to secure the bow and stern ropes,
Satyr
ground against the sagging piles and came to rest.
Tobin beckoned to his midshipman. ‘Come with me, Mr Allison!’ Ignoring the glances of the second lieutenant and his armed landing party who were already mustered amidships, Tobin clambered out and down by the great paddle-box, the midshipman hurrying behind him.
He was only halfway up the beach when he stopped and said quietly, ‘We’ll wait a while, Mr Allison. Just a moment longer.’
He watched the file of marines as they appeared around the side of the fort, their fixed bayonets shining brightly in the early sunlight.
‘Marines halt! R-i-g-h-t turn!’
Tobin said softly, ‘Watch this, Mr Allison, and mark it well.’
Colour-Sergeant M’Crystal marched down the slope and saluted stiffly. Only near to could you see the stains on his trousers and coatee, the stubble around his chin.
Tobin returned his salute and asked, ‘Was it bad?’
M’Crystal stared past him at the ship. ‘Seven dead all told, sir. Not too bad when you consider the odds. We’ve got fifteen wounded too.’ Only then did his eyes return to Tobin. ‘Including Captain Blackwood, sir.’
Tobin said, ‘Fetch the surgeon, Mr Allison, and tell Mr Oliver to take his landing party to the fort, at the double.’
Tobin walked up the slope with M’Crystal at his side. It was all so clear, as if he had taken part in it himself. The piled-up earth and stones where the corpses had been buried, the thousands of footmarks where a savage army had attacked this place again and again. As he got closer to the fort he saw the scars on the wall, the dark bloodstains both at the top and at the foot of the rough palisades where men had died.
‘Will they attack again?’
M’Crystal glanced at him, seemingly surprised at the question.
‘We fought ’em in the open, sir. Up there, by those rocks. Blade to blade.’
Feet pounded up the beach and seamen bustled past towards the fort, but Tobin did not see them. He saw only the small detachment of marines, fighting in the open, the only way they knew.
M’Crystal added firmly, ‘No, sir, them buggers won’t try it again.’
‘What is the smoke?’
‘Captain Blackwood insisted we pushed inland, in spite of his wound, sir. The day after the battle he took half of us and marched round that hill. We found several barracoons and burned them, big enough for two hundred slaves apiece they were. Empty when we got there, o’ course. Just a couple o’ dead ones and some shackles.’ He added bitterly, ‘For souvenirs.’
So that was it. The slavers had brought their live cargoes here to be collected by a ship of some kind. The fort, and then a handful of marines, had stopped them. They were probably fleeing through the bush right now with the slaves’ own people in hot pursuit.
‘I must see Captain Blackwood at once. How badly is he hurt?’
But M’Crystal stood his ground. ‘With respect, sir, we’ve been waiting here for two weeks. Captain Blackwood would not thank me if I did not have you inspect the guard.’
Tobin had seen many sights on his various commissions around the African shores, but to inspect a single squad of gaunt and shabby marines who stood like ramrods as he looked at each unshaven face was one he would put above most of them.
Godby, the frigate’s surgeon, met him inside the gates. ‘Bad gash in his left leg, sir. Poison of some kind. Maybe it was on the weapon which made the wound. Can’t do much
here.’ He darted a glance as the marine guard marched back into the fort. ‘He might lose the leg anyway.’
Tobin followed him to a screened-off corner of the fort. Blackwood lay propped on some rolled blankets, his eyes closed as Smithett lathered his face and prepared to shave him. He did not seem to notice as the surgeon lifted a blanket and the dressing he had just cut from the wound.
Godby said softly, ‘I can’t smell anything putrid in it. Not yet.’
Tobin saw Blackwood’s eyes staring at him. They were very bright and feverish.
Blackwood said, ‘Good to see you again, sir.’ He winced as Godby lifted his out-thrust leg to examine it again. ‘
Bloody
good. Things were a bit difficult here.’
‘I’ve heard. Don’t wear yourself out. You worked miracles.’
Blackwood murmured, ‘Lost some good men. A few others will never do a parade again either. And for what? Some greedy, murderous chief and a couple of dead slaves.’ He gave a crooked grin. ‘The rest of the slaves scattered, so we won’t even get the bounty money!’
He was delirious from the pain and the poison in his leg.
Tobin glanced at M’Crystal and asked, ‘Where is Lieutenant Lascelles? Is he . . . ?’
The colour-sergeant shook his head. ‘No, he’s alive, sir. Out at the village with a patrol and old Fenwick. Making certain those devils don’t have any more weapons hidden away. He’ll burn the place to the ground if he finds ’em.’
Tobin looked away. It did not sound like the amiable Lascelles he knew. Then he glanced down at Blackwood again and guessed what must have changed him.
‘Have the wounded carried to the ship right away. Mr Lascelles will take command here with one squad of marines.’ He looked meaningly at M’Crystal’s red face. ‘
Volunteers.
I shall leave a landing party and two six-pounders to give them some more authority –’ He broke off as Blackwood struggled up on his elbows.
‘They are
my
men, sir!’
Tobin smiled sadly. ‘You rest and finish your shave. I’m taking you to Freetown. No arguments. Have no fear about this bloody fort. I’ve seen what you did. A steam gunboat will be here tonight. She couldn’t keep up with
Satyr
!’
The surgeon was signalling to some men with a stretcher but made himself wait until Smithett had completed the shave to his own satisfaction. Then Smithett eased Blackwood’s arms into his coatee and made an attempt to adjust his shirt for him.
It was then that Blackwood realized how weak he had become, that Lascelles and the others had somehow managed to hide it from him.
Feet pounded across the compound and Lascelles appeared, gasping for breath.
‘Don’t worry, sir. Everything will be all right.’ Their eyes met and he added quietly, ‘Now.’
Blackwood was lifted on to the stretcher and faces swam around him like balloons.
Here and there a hand reached out to touch his shoulder or just the stretcher as he was carried from the fort. Beneath the gate he saw the marks of battle, the stains where one marine had been hacked down. Now it was his turn. He felt his eyes smarting as he tried to hide his despair. He would lose a leg. It was better to die like Simcoe, Oldcastle and the others.
At the pier he was able to open his eyes as a shadow spread over him. It was M’Crystal, as he knew it would be.
‘I shall stay with Mr Lascelles, sir. But he’s thriving on it now.’ He was too used to duty and the stern demands of discipline and was unable to say what he really felt. Instead he said, ‘I’ll see you again soon, sir. When they come back for us.’ He managed a grin. ‘Last to leave, that’s us.’
Blackwood twisted his head to answer him but he had already gone.
‘Worth fifty men, is M’Crystal.’ He even sounded as if he was dying, and his voice lacked any message of hope.
Tobin watched him being carried carefully up the frigate’s
side and said to himself, ‘You’re worth a few yourself, my friend.’
Later, as he lay in the same cabin he had used after joining the ship at Gibraltar, Blackwood felt the hull begin to shake and quiver to the power of her engine. He peered up desperately at the scuttle and tried to picture the scene as
Satyr
cast off and thrashed violently clear of the piles. The surgeon must have given him something because he could feel no pain, and for a terrifying instant he imagined his leg had already been taken off.
The door opened and Smithett padded to the scuttle and opened it slightly. He did not speak but turned to watch his officer’s reaction as the sound of distant cheering penetrated the cabin.
Blackwood tried to move higher but his strength failed him.
‘What are they cheering? Tell me,
please
!’
Smithett winced as the ship’s siren blasted raucously along the shore and to the hidden village whose king was now a prisoner on the orlop deck.
He closed the scuttle tightly and replied, ‘Cheerin’, sir? It’s fer you, that’s wot.’
Smithett picked up Blackwood’s coatee and curled his lip. Take a week to get it back into shape. Work, work, bloody work, there’s no end to it.
He glanced at Blackwood and waited until he was back in a drugged sleep then left the cabin.
A petty officer was coming along the passageway and paused to say, ‘Glad you got out of it in one piece! You deserve a bloody medal, to all accounts!’ He hurried away to his allotted station.
Smithett stood quite still, the coatee dangling from his hand, as the ship began to surge ahead.
It was then, and only then, that he understood the true significance of the petty officer’s words.
He had survived.
Tobin entered the cabin and studied Blackwood thoughtfully. He was required everywhere. Move to another anchorage. Take on more coal. Report to the senior officer at Freetown for orders. But this moment was important too.
‘How are you feeling?’
Blackwood raised himself on his elbows and winced as the pain came back. As if it had been lurking there. Lulling his defences.
‘What’s going to happen now?’
He felt rotten and knew that Tobin had already read the surgeon’s report so knew better than he did about his condition. The wound had been deep and badly infected. But for his stubborn insistence on following up their victory with a march on Mdlaka’s village, he might be on his feet right now.
Tobin shrugged. ‘You are being taken ashore. A surgeon there will be better placed to help you. After that . . .’ He shrugged again. ‘Back to England probably.’ He attempted to smile. ‘I did hear a rumour that you wanted to resign from the Corps anyway?’ But he regretted it instantly as Blackwood’s expression changed to one of dismay and loss.
Two seamen were in the passageway with a stretcher, and Smithett had already packed up their gear. The cabin looked empty and alien. Waiting for Lascelles to reclaim it.