Rapscallion (61 page)

"
You referring
to my business interests?"

Hawkwood
smiled.

Jago
shrugged. "Probably have, indirectly, given the control he's got. My line
of work, you don't always know the provenance of the goods. Mostly I try and
deal with the Sussex branch of the Trade."

"Don't
think I care to know too much," Hawkwood said.

"Just
as well."

"And
Garvey, does he work for Morgan?"

"No
flies on you, are there?" Jago said, taking a sip from his drink and
smacking his lips in appreciation.

"Local representative
?"
Hawkwood said. "Come on! He knows Pepper, he recognized the bodies in the
barn, and he obviously knows his way around that neck of the woods. It doesn't
take a genius."

Hawkwood
leant back against the bulkhead. His limbs, for some reason, had started to
feel as heavy as lead. Added to which, he had the sudden overwhelming desire to
close his eyes. He knew he mustn't fall asleep, for that would be fatal. If he
nodded off, there was a very good chance he'd never wake up. He tried to fight
the rising tide of weariness that was creeping over him.

"Aye,
well," Jago said. "Not that it matters. He's one of Morgan's errand
boys; delivers messages about upcoming runs and the like. Morgan also uses him
to pay people off, so he knows where some of the bones are buried. We go back a
ways; if ever I've a mind to visit my old hunting grounds, I get in touch. Just
as well, too." He paused and took a sip of coffee and glanced across the
table in time to see Hawkwood's eyes droop and the mug begin to slip from his
hand.

Jago
sighed. He put down his own drink and, reaching across swiftly, rescued the
falling mug. "'Bout bloody time," he murmured. He placed the mug on
the table, grabbed the blanket from his bunk and draped it across Hawkwood's
sleeping form. He stared down at the scarred and unshaven face, his brow
creasing as his eyes took in the new wounds and the state of Hawkwood's
clothes. He shook his head, returned to his seat and picked up his drink.
"No bloody stamina, some people," he muttered softly.

The
touch of a hand on Hawkwood's arm brought him jerking awake. For a moment he
wondered where he was. Then his ears picked up the creaks and groans and the
cry of a
crewman
from somewhere on the deck above and
his brain began to function. He looked up to find Jago's craggy countenance
looming over him. He sat up quickly, nearly crowning himself on the underside
of a deckhead beam in the process.

"Captain
wants us up on deck. There's a sail off the larboard bow, whatever the hell
that is."

Hawkwood
scrambled to his feet and almost lost his footing as the deck pitched
unexpectedly. He cursed, grabbed the edge of the table and felt his stomach
turn.

He
followed Jago up the canted stairway on to the schooner's deck and immediately
felt the bite of the wind and the lash of spindrift on his cheek. The hiss of
the waves against the ship's hull and the crack of canvas filled his ears. It
was not yet light, but beyond the bowsprit a band of sienna-coloured sky was
slowly widening across the horizon. Running along the lower edge of it was a
long uneven smear which Hawkwood knew was land. It was too far away to pick out
details.

Lasseur
was braced against the port rail, peering through a telescope, shoulders thrust
forward. A cheroot was clenched between his teeth. He looked like a wolf
scenting prey; a man in his element.

"Home,"
he said, following Hawkwood's gaze. "Mine," he added. "Not
yours." He gave a lupine grin.

"How
far?"

"Twenty
miles, maybe a little less."

Hawkwood
looked over his shoulder. Beyond the stern, the sky was much darker and it was
harder to differentiate between sea and land, if there was any land out there.

"There's
a sail?" Hawkwood said.

Lasseur
nodded. He handed Hawkwood the spyglass and pointed ahead, towards the distant
smudge of coast.

"Two
miles off the bow."

Hawkwood
wedged his hip against the rail, tried to ignore the water sluicing over his
boots, and jabbed the glass to his eye. At first, all he could see was a dark
swell of blue-black waves. He lowered the glass, took his bearings, aimed at
the band of light coming up over the bow and tried again. He bit back a curse
as the eyeglass slipped once more, but his perseverance was rewarded when
suddenly a dark, angular silhouette slid across his line of sight. The vessel
was low down, running close-hauled on a port tack, her fore- and aft-rigged
canvas braced tight.

"I
see it!" He felt a surge of excitement move through him.
"Morgan?" He passed the telescope to Jago.

"She's
a cutter," Lasseur announced confidently. "And Gravelines lies almost
dead ahead of us. It will be dawn in an hour. We'll know for certain
then."

"She's
not showing any colours," Jago muttered, peering through the glass. The
telescope looked very small in his hands.

"Neither
are we," Lasseur pointed out, taking the glass back and stealing another
look. "If they've seen us, which they may not have done, they'll be
wondering who we are, though they might guess from our rig that we're not a
British ship. The British don't have many schooners. Some of the ones they do
have were captured from us, but they're nothing like
Scorpion,
so he's probably
not too concerned at the moment. That gives us the edge."

Hawkwood
looked up. The schooner, like the cutter, seemed to be carrying a huge amount
of sail for her size; Lasseur's Barbary rig. He peered over the side at the
water rushing past the hull. The ship was slicing through the swells like a
knife. Spray burst over the bow. The sense of speed was exhilarating, and as
the eastern sky turned from reddish-brown to golden orange, and as the
coastline drew ever nearer,
Scorpion
continued
to overhaul her quarry.

The
three men remained at the rail. Hawkwood was impressed at the speed with which
the schooner was bridging the gap. In no time at all, it seemed, the cutter was
barely three cables ahead of them. The sky had grown considerably lighter and
he could see figures moving about her deck.

"If
she didn't know we were interested in her before, I'd say she does now,"
Lasseur said. He raised the telescope.
"Batards!
'"
He swore suddenly and handed Hawkwood the glass.

Hawkwood's
first wild thought was that they had been following the wrong boat. Then a
black-painted hull swam into the foreground; increased in size now, but still
dwarfed by the spread of her canvas. Hawkwood remembered Gadd's description of
the
Sea Witch.
He searched for
a name on her counter, but the jolly boat suspended from the cutter's narrow
stern obscured his view. Three men stood by the rail at her starboard quarter,
close to the tiller man, staring back towards the
Scorpion.
Two of them
were wearing blue coats and white breeches. When Hawkwood saw the third man
standing between them, the boat's name became irrelevant. Tall and
grey-bearded, the man was holding a telescope to his face with one hand: his
right.

Pepper.

And
then as Hawkwood and Lasseur watched, the three men separated. Activity on the
cutter's deck suddenly took on a new urgency.

"Jesus,
they're running out bloody guns," Hawkwood cursed as the cutter's crew
began to remove canvas sheets from the cannons that lined the sides of the
cutter's hull. Six in all, from what he could see, three to each side. He
handed the telescope back to Lasseur, who took another look.

"Merde!"

"What
are they?" Hawkwood asked. He wasn't well versed in the bore sizes of
naval ordnance. As if it mattered. Cannon were still bloody cannon.

"What
you would call six-pounders, from their look. Your Revenue uses them. They're accurate
to about two hundred and fifty yards, with the right elevation. Fortunately, we
have the advantage. We've got more of them."

The
possibility that the
Sea Witch
would be carrying heavy armament had not occurred to Hawkwood. He'd assumed
that Morgan and his men would be equipped with small arms; swivel guns at a
pinch - indeed, he had seen one mounted on the cutter's bow - but not carriage
guns, though the carronade used in the storming of the residency should have
been warning enough. He wondered how well versed they were in combat at sea. It
wasn't that much of a leap to suppose that Morgan would have some gunners among
the ranks of the former seamen that he employed.

Lasseur
was clearly surprised, too. He spun away. "
Tous
les
marins
sur le pont!"

A
bell began to clang loudly. The deck echoed to the volley of pounding feet.

Scorpion
rose on the
swell and plunged forward.

"Preparez les canons!"

Within
seconds, sand had been laid down, guns run out, personal weapons distributed,
and neck cloths transferred to the men's right arms. As Lasseur explained, his
crew knew each other, but everyone, especially Hawkwood and Jago, had to be
able to identify friend from foe. A split second's hesitation could mean the
difference between life and death.

"You
definitely plannin' on boardin' her, then?"
Jago asked, running his thumb down a cutlass blade as Lasseur passed Hawkwood a
pistol and tomahawk.

"I
doubt Morgan will surrender to a hail," Lasseur said grimly.

Her
crew primed and at their stations,
Scorpion
swept on.

The
cutter, now less than a cable's length off the bow, started wearing to port.
Her sails flapped as her bow turned through the wind,
then
the canvas filled quickly as her sheets were pulled taut. She
looked,
Hawkwood thought, strikingly top heavy.

Lasseur
barked out orders. The nautical jargon meant nothing to Hawkwood. Lasseur might
just as well have been yelling in Chinese. But as men hauled eagerly on ropes,
reducing canvas, and as the helmsman swung the wheel hard over, it was clear
that the privateer was attempting to match the cutter's manoeuvre.
Scorpion
began to come
round.

There
was a distant bang and a puff of smoke appeared on the cutter's deck, then a
waterspout erupted five yards off the schooner's starboard quarter.

Someone
cheered derisively.

Lasseur
snorted contemptuously and yelled at his first officer to fire on the up roll.

Hawkwood
remembered being told that English gunners generally fired on the down roll so
that any delay would cause the ball to bounce off the water and ricochet into
the enemy's hull. French gun crews usually aimed for the rigging. As a
consequence, the French tended to suffer greater casualties. Hawkwood knew the
last thing Lasseur wanted was to sink the cutter, especially given the cargo
she was carrying, so in aiming at the cutter's rig the privateer was following
tradition. Hawkwood tried not to think about the rest of it.

As
Scorpion's
starboard rail
swept past the cutter's tapered stern, Delon dropped his arm.

The
gunner hauled back on the lanyard and the explosion took Hawkwood by surprise.
It was sharper and louder than he had expected, more an ear-splitting crack
than a roar. The sound pierced his brain like a skewer and he saw Jago flinch
beside him.

Hawkwood
looked for the fall of the shot and saw nothing.

They bloody missed!
he
thought angrily, and then he watched as the top quarter
of the cutter's mast began to topple sideways in a jumble of rigging.

A
loud whoop rang out from the gun crew, who were already sponging down the
barrel in preparation for the next firing. The cry was taken up by the rest of
the men on deck as the mast collapsed upon itself in a tangle of ropes and
spars.