The Smuggler's Curse (6 page)

‘He'll be a brave man then, that junk captain,' says one of the crew.

‘Bloody idiot if you ask me,' says another. ‘He'll be seeing his own gizzards spread all over, before too long. Of that, I'm certain.'

‘Boy, to the masthead,' barks the Bosun. ‘Get closer to God. Younger eyes can see further. You as well, Teuku. Let me know the second you spot the scurvy, pox-ridden knaves. The very second, mind you.'

‘Did you get their language Bosun Stevenson, their dialect? Did you deduce where the maggots hail from?' asks the Captain.

‘The skipper at least. Malay, I'd guess. The others stayed pretty quiet,' the Bosun replies. ‘Nervous like.'

‘Guilty conscience I'd wager. Worried we'd smell them out sooner. Well, they'll be in a right hurry to get home, and away from us. West it is Bosun. All canvas if you please,' commands the Captain. ‘Every stitch you can get aloft until the sticks beg for mercy.'

‘You heard the Captain! All canvas! Step lively!' shouts the Bosun, without using his trumpet. The deck immediately transforms into a colony of rushing ants,
with each man knowing precisely what he has to do.

The Captain turns to me, ‘Boy, fetch me the open chart from my table. At the double!'

I hurry down the steps towards the Captain's cabin and return with the chart.

The Captain glances at the map. ‘The only way is up the Malacca Straits between Malaya and Sumatra. With this breeze, they'll have to head directly towards Sumatra then tack north from there. That's when we'll catch up with them. Those junks don't tack too well.' He smiles wickedly. ‘Whereas we do. And God help their wretched, miserable hides when we reach them.'

‘Red, Teuku,' calls out Bosun Stevenson. ‘Watch for a lighthouse on top of the cliffs. It should be off the port side as you go. A squat, square monstrosity it is too. Brown not white. Everyone in these parts uses that as a marker. That's what they'll aim for.'

I shoot up the ratlines like a rat across a hot tin roof and even beat Teuku to the crow's nest.

By midday, I am getting drowsy, with the mast swinging, the sun hot on my back, and not having had any breakfast. We have been sailing at full pace since daybreak.

A shout from Teuku startles me. ‘The lighthouse!' he yells, pointing left. ‘I see it.'

I peer towards the land in the distance and locate the brown brick lighthouse, jutting up into the sky. I do not know how I missed seeing it sooner. The thing stands out like a Christmas tree. Then something else catches my eye. Below the lighthouse and far to the left, silhouetted against the rugged face of the sea cliffs, a fishing junk with a dirty red sail beats hard against the wind. It dips in and out of sight with the swell, waves crashing over its bow. It is just as the Captain has predicted.

‘And there she is, Captain,' I, too, call. ‘The trading junk. Way back, just beyond where the cliff has collapsed. Running along the coast.'

‘Well done, lads,' calls up Bosun Stevenson, this time using his trumpet. ‘You can be relieved now. Get down here. Longest way if you like.'

Teuku slides down the shroud like a monkey, but I climb down carefully, reach the deck and grip the railing to keep myself steady. Up at the masthead, I had not noticed how quickly we were moving, but at deck level and looking over the railing, the speed is remarkable. The wind stretches the canvas sails to breaking point, and water swishes past the hull, leaving a long white wake trailing behind us.

‘You ever played chess, boy?'

I look over my shoulder, surprised the Captain is
actually talking to me and not just sending me to fetch and carry, as usual. ‘Chess? Not much, sir. Sometimes. Back at the Curse. Dominos, though, mostly.'

‘An interesting set of moves this could be. Black Knight to move. Do we get ahead of them and force them onto a port tack and straight into the cliffs? With these waves, they'll be smashed to pieces on the rocks in seconds. Or do we get in close and blow the blaggards out of the water? I suppose we could sit back here and use them as long-range target practice all afternoon. Long Tom would make merry Hell with a junk like that. Blast them into twigs. Checkmate.'

‘I don't know, sir,' I reply, pathetically. Well, I don't.

‘Remember, they've got a bagful of our gold on board, Captain,' interrupts Bosun Stevenson.

‘And we have a hold full of expensive sea water for our trouble,' replies the Captain, thoughtfully. ‘But you are right, Bosun. There's no point in sending hard-earned gold to the bottom if we can recover it from those …' He hesitates then spits it out venomously, ‘… those cockroaches.'

‘I can put a shot across her bow, get 'em to surrender,' offers Mr Smith.

‘They'll not surrender,' replies the Captain grimly. ‘Not in a million years. They know full well we'll gut
their gizzards like so many barracudas the minute we get our hands on them. They know who I am. They would have heard the stories.'

‘Double charge Long Tom, Mr Smith,' he continues. ‘As soon as we're in range, drop a shot in behind them. We'll see if we can drive them towards the open sea. They'll try to out run us and reach the island's coves facing the north coast but they have no chance of that, especially in this breeze.'

The gun crew are ready in minutes. Mr Smith peers along the barrel and using a wheel on a long screw, adjusts the gun carriage to its maximum height for the longest shot. Eventually, he seems satisfied and looks up, ready to pull the cord on the trigger.

‘Whenever youse is ready, Cap'n,' he says.

When the double charge from Long Tom fires, it fairly rips the air apart, and the shock wave of the massive charge goes straight through me, shaking me from my ears right down to my toes. A ten-foot column of flame bursts from the cannon's mouth. Moments later, part of the distant cliff, above and behind the fishing junk, explodes in a puff of red dust as the cannonball strikes. I stand there with my mouth open in shock as the acrid stink of the gunpowder fills the air for a brief second, then immediately blows away in the wind.

‘Holy Moses!' exclaims someone close by.

The Bosun lifts his telescope to his eye. ‘It worked. They're going about. Changing tack to seaward.'

‘Bosun, do you think you can get us in close to that point?' says the Captain, pointing to where the green jungle meets the sea.

‘Not too close, Captain. Submerged rocks. I've been here before. But I'll do my best, sir.'

Bosun Stevenson looks towards the helmsman and nods. The helmsman immediately spins the wheel to the right, and the motion of the boat changes a shade.

‘'scuse me, Cap'n!'

‘What is it, Mr Smith?' replies the Captain, turning slightly to face him.

Mr Smith's face has turned pale. He seems suddenly very alarmed, as he points to starboard, amidships. He does not need to say anything.

Clearing the headland and bearing down on us rapidly thunders an enormous frigate. The canvas on all three masts full, with the decks cleared for action and her gun ports open. Moreover, flying from her backstay, three flags whip colourfully in the wind; the white and blue flag of the Netherlands, the pennant of a Captain, and the Dutch battle ensign.

‘Where did that come from?' exclaims the Bosun, genuinely surprised. ‘God preserve us.'

The massive old frigate, its timbers painted blue and bright yellow, is racing straight at us.

‘The Willem that'll be, Captain,' says Bosun Stevenson recovering his composure. ‘Thirty-six guns, if I remember correctly. Always on patrol in these parts, looking for smugglers and pirates. She is old and slow but mighty powerful. Nothing can stand up to those guns. Nothing. Last of the line she is.' In spite of the certain danger, he sounds almost proud to be seeing such a magnificent old ship.

‘Still think the East Indies is theirs, them Dutch do,' adds Mr Smith.

‘They are still mostly theirs,' replies the Captain.

The deadly cliffs and hidden rocks of the point lie directly ahead, while, to the left, the coast and the shallows of a wide sandy bay block our way. To the right, directly into the wind, looms a warship armed with three dozen thirty-two pounder guns that can turn a whole town into rubble in an hour. They can also turn the bravest man's bowels to liquid in an instant, or a boy's even quicker. I look about the deck. The men are silent, some visibly frightened, and most wait for the Captain's reaction.

You do not need to be an experienced sailor to know this is not good.

‘Bosun Stevenson,' the Captain calls calmly, loud enough for us all to hear. ‘Remember our scrap with that scurvy pirate south of Hong Kong a couple of years ago? How we got out of it?' Several men smile. ‘It worked then, God rot him. I don't see why it shouldn't work now.'

‘Except that pirate wasn't a thirty-six-gun frigate bearing down on our heads,' says Bosun Stevenson.

‘The principle's the same. We'll just have to be quicker by half,' he replies.

‘If you say so, sir.'

‘Bosun Stevenson, take us about and set a course for that beach yonder, if you'd be so kind. And Mr Smith, I suggest you load and prime the three port guns. Load them with grapeshot, the biggest you have. Double
charge, I suggest. We want to do some grievous damage here today.'

Even before Mr Smith relays the order, the gun crew has started work, using block and tackle to pull the wooden gun carriages to the rail. Both the carriage wheels and pulley wheels squeal in protest as the men grunt with the effort.

I know my job. I scamper off down the ladder into the gun locker below the waterline, to bring up more sacks of gunpowder. In spite of the darkness, I am not allowed to use a lantern because of the explosive black powder. I feel about in the blackness, find the powder sacks stacked up and run back in minutes, breathing heavily from the weight of the measured sacks in which the gunpowder charges are packed.

‘Bosun, ease off the mainsail, let the Dutch think they can catch us. Not too much, though. We want to keep out of range of those damn thirty-two pounders,' orders the Captain, quietly. ‘We have a few minutes now. Everyone take a deep breath and be calm.'

Be calm? How? I look back at the massive ship and wonder if this is to be my last day on Earth. It certainly seems likely. My heart starts pounding so loudly I think everyone will be able to hear it.

‘Boy?' calls the Captain, snapping me out of my daze.

‘Captain?'

‘If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you. If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew to serve your turn long after they are gone, yours is the Earth and everything that's in it. And—which is more—you'll be a Man, my son,' he continues.

‘Captain?'

‘Not Mr Shakespeare this one time, boy, but a brand new poem by Mr Rudyard Kipling. Quite apt for this situation, don't you think?'

Quoting poetry as if he is in an English drawing room full of genteel ladies when we are facing certain death? Sometimes, I think the Captain is completely crazy.

‘Boy, stick close by me now,' he adds, breaking the calm. ‘I might need you when things start to get hot.' The Captain stands to the left of Bosun Stevenson at the helm, where he can keep an eye on the binnacle, a small cabinet where the ship's compass is mounted.

‘First off you can get rid of this.' He takes off his black peaked cap and hands it to me. ‘No need to make myself a target for all those Dutch sharpshooters they are sending aloft.'

Without his cap, the Captain looks more like one of us and less like an officer, but not quite.

‘Watch this next manoeuvre carefully, boy,' he commands. ‘We can outrun them easily, but we can't outrun a broadside of cannon balls. So we have to box clever. This next little trick has saved our lives before, and it may do the same for you one day. Pay close attention, and watch your head. When the boom whips across, this time, it will be vicious. Could take your head clean off at the shoulders.'

In spite of the increasing wind, we keep hearing snatches of kettledrums in the distance, beating the Dutch to their stations on the frigate.

Over the next half-hour, the frigate grows slowly but steadily closer to our stern until we can just hear the Dutch shouting at us. I cannot understand their words, but it is
easy to get their meaning, and they sound confident. They have two hundred or more men to our twelve, and we only have a handful of small guns, whereas their ship bristles with thirty-two-pound monsters that fire cannonballs as big as a man's head.

‘Listen to them. Pride comes before a fall, eh, Bosun?' laughs the Captain, quietly. I cannot understand how he can remain so calm.

Moments later, from behind me, I hear Bosun Stevenson begin humming the hymn, Abide With Me.

The Captain begins softly singing the words, almost to himself. ‘The darkness deepens; Lord with me abide.'

One by one, the rest of the crew join in, even Rowdy, who hardly ever says a word.

Abide with me; fast falls the eventide;

The darkness deepens; Lord with me abide.

When other helpers fail and comforts flee,

Help of the helpless, O abide with me.

Swift to its close ebbs out life's little day;

Earth's joys grow dim; its glories pass away;

Change and decay in all around I see;

O Thou who changest not, abide with me.

I am surprised and moved by the melancholic harmony all around me. I have no idea how we can possibly survive this. None at all. Even if we surrender, the Dutch will probably hang us as pirates, or worse, as spies. Either way, we'll be dancing the hempen jig from a yardarm before this day is out. I look about. The men know they are facing almost certain death, but none seems frightened anymore, just rather resigned to their fate. Other than the Bosun, the crew are not generally religious, but the gentle tune appears to comfort them.