‘I say we try our luck with that stranger,’ he said.
At a shout from Ma’pang, two of his crew began to ease out the mainsheet. Two others brought the forward corner of the sail aft until it was level with the mast, and a third eased on the halyard. The great sail ballooned out across the vessel, almost flying free. The sakman turned and began to sail downwind, the bow dipping and rising as the ocean swells overtook her.
‘WHAT SORT OF ship do you think she is?’ Hector asked Dan half an hour later. The two men, loaded muskets in hand, were in the bow of the sakman, trying to make sense of what they saw less than half a mile away.
The unknown vessel appeared to be a small merchantman of about a hundred tons. She had an unusual, very old-fashioned appearance. Two small aft decks rose one on the other to give a high, narrow stern, and there was a long run amidships to a low, shortened forecastle, so that she looked as though at any moment she would topple forward and bury her nose in the sea. She was rigged with three masts, but had only her foresail set, barely enough to propel her forward. She sat unnaturally low in the water, and was wallowing and pitching aimlessly. The sail flapped and slatted, and there were regular glimpses of a rich green coating of weed and growth clinging to her hull. Her rigging was slack and slovenly, and even at that distance an unhappy groaning could be heard as her masts worked in their steps. Most puzzling of all, she showed no signs of having seen the sakman bearing down on her.
‘There,’ exclaimed Dan. ‘Did you see it? Someone on her quarterdeck.’
Hector looked closely, but could see nothing. The vessel’s rudder was banging back and forth, swinging loosely from side to side. It appeared there was no one at the helm.
‘It could be a trap,’ said Stolck, who had come up behind them. He looked more animated now that there was something unusual happening, and he too carried a loaded musket.
‘Dan thought he saw a movement,’ said Hector.
Stolck gave a grunt and crouched down. He rested the barrel of his musket on the edge of the canoe’s hull and aimed at the merchantman. ‘If anything moves again, I’ll deal with it.’
The sakman was closing the gap very rapidly. Hector had advised Ma’pang to approach from directly astern, the point at which the strange vessel would be unable to use her broadside, if she had one. Now he worried that the sakman was moving so quickly she’d overshoot her victim.
‘Where is everyone on that ship?’ asked Jacques.
It was puzzling. Aboard the merchantman there was no one in the rigging or on deck. Several ropes trailed over her side, dragging through the water.
Stolck was muttering under his breath. He sounded irritable and impatient. ‘They’re waiting until we are alongside. Then they run out their guns and we’ll be blasted to pieces. I’ll give them something to think about.’
Without warning he pulled the trigger of his musket. The sound of the gunshot echoed across the water, and Hector saw splinters fly up from a stanchion under the poop rail. But once again there was no reaction.
Hector glanced back over his shoulder. Ma’pang was in the stern at the steering paddle, and three of his crew had made their way to the outrigger struts. They crouched behind the little cabin, hidden from anyone on the merchantman. With a knot in his stomach, Hector realized the cabin was the obvious target for any gunfire from the strange vessel. Maria had decided to stay out of sight inside, and its flimsy thatch would provide no shelter from a musket ball. She’d be far safer crouched in the bottom of the sakman’s main hull. But it was too late to do anything about that now.
The sakman was very close, less than a stone’s throw from the high stern of the vessel. Hector looked up, trying to distinguish the flag. But the cloth was tangled around its staff. He could only make out part of a white stripe on a blue background and a small red blotch.
The sakman suddenly swerved as Ma’pang twisted hard on the steering paddle, and the boat swept under the stranger’s overhanging stern. There was a brisk flurry of action as the palm-leaf sail was dropped, and at the same moment the three crouching crew members raced out along the struts and put their full weight on the outrigger. The float dipped into the water, caught and held, and the sakman slowed abruptly to a halt, almost as if she had dropped anchor in mid-ocean.
‘Ho there! Anyone aboard?’ Hector shouted up at the silent ship. There was no answer. He put down his musket and grabbed for one of the trailing ropes. He hauled himself upwards hand over hand, his feet scrabbling for purchase on the stained side of the ship. Beside him he was aware of Ma’pang armed with a spear and moving even faster, and of Jezreel with his backsword hanging from a lanyard around his wrist.
Hector reached the ship’s rail and clambered over. He found himself standing in the waist of the vessel, on the deserted main deck. To his right a short ladder led to the foredeck, and to his left a similar companionway gave access to the half-deck and the quarterdeck above it. All around him was the usual clutter of ship’s gear – blocks, ropes, a wooden bucket, several chests lashed to the rail, a small skiff lashed upside down over the central grating. He counted six cannon ranged along each side. None of them was prepared for action, their gun carriages were still lashed to ring bolts in the deck. He heard someone’s tread on the deck behind him and turned hastily, heart pounding. It was Stolck. The Hollander was breathing heavily, his shaven head shiny with sweat. He had his reloaded musket in his hand.
‘What’s going on?’ he asked.
‘There’s no one aboard,’ answered Hector.
Just then he caught a whiff of something burning. Stolck let out an oath, ran across the deck and began to stamp frantically on a thin rope. Hector saw a wisp of smoke beneath his feet.
At that moment a musket shot rang out, and a musket ball whirred past his head. Shocked, he spun round on his heel and was just in time to get a glimpse of a musket barrel being withdrawn through a small hatch in the bulkhead under the foredeck. A cloud of gun smoke hung in the air.
Hector dived for cover behind the skiff. Now he knew. The crew of the merchantman had retreated to close quarters. They had barricaded themselves into the forecastle, from where they would shoot down any boarders at point-blank range.
He lay flat on the deck, his eyes searching out the objects around him. A crew in close quarters usually left explosive devices on deck. They filled chests and glass bottles with gunpowder and scraps of metal and fitted fuses that could be lit from within their refuge. When the boarders arrived on deck, the home-made bombs and grenades were exploded, with devastating results. Stolck must have stamped on one such fuse. Perhaps there were others.
Ma’pang appeared from behind the mainmast, sprinting towards the forecastle. Another musket shot, and it must have missed, for the naked Chamorro vaulted up on to the foredeck in one huge leap. Now he was out of the line of fire.
Hector watched as Ma’pang poked and prised with his spear point, searching uselessly for a way to break into the stronghold from above.
Someone inside the forecastle began coughing loudly. The black powder must have blown back into the loophole. Then came a shout, and Hector caught words that sounded like ‘swart bastert’.
The accent sounded familiar, and Hector was trying to identify it when Stolck’s voice came from less than an arm’s length away, from the other side of the launch, where the Hollander had also taken cover. Stolck bellowed, ‘Halt ofsjitte, du idioat.’
There was a sudden silence.
‘Hwa bisto?’ called the voice from inside.
‘Stolck ut Friesland.’
Another long silence. Hector could hear the creaking of the ship. He wondered what was happening on the sakman, still lashed alongside the merchantman and out of sight.