‘I couldn’t have expressed it better myself,’ observed Cook sardonically. He smoothed the lapels of his immaculate green coat before adjusting the lace at his throat.
Hector made one last attempt to regain the initiative. ‘I’d prefer if you gave us the cockboat so that we can head off on our own. Try to reach one of the English forts.’
Cook seemed amused. ‘Maybe you would make it, maybe not. I wouldn’t fancy falling into the hands of someone like that Akwamu chief we saw yesterday. You could be treated very nastily.’
Hector was conscious his three friends were looking at him, waiting for his lead.
‘Do we have another choice?’ he asked.
‘The offer I made yesterday still stands. I’ll recommend to my crew that all four of you join our company. They must vote on it, as you know. That’s the custom. But I’m sure they’ll vote in favour.’
‘My friends and I have had our fill of buccaneering,’ said Hector stubbornly.
‘Then, in view of our long-standing acquaintance and how helpful you’ve been in the capture of this fine ship, I’ll inform the crew that I’m willing to take you on, even if you haven’t signed articles. That way you’ll be free to leave the ship whenever you wish.’
Yet again Hector sensed that Cook was being dangerously subtle. ‘What would be our duties on board?’ he enquired cautiously.
‘Work the ship, stand watches, that sort of thing. Also I need a navigator who has already been around the Cape.’
‘But you’re heading through Magellan’s Strait.’
‘True. But I’m a cautious man, and if we have problems there, we’ll need to have an alternative route. When you left the South Sea last time, you came around the Cape, so I believe.’
Hector hesitated, still unwilling to commit himself when Jezreel intervened again. ‘Hector, I think we should accept Cook’s offer. At least until something better comes along.’
‘I don’t fancy taking my chances among the black men,’ agreed Jacques.
Hector looked across at Dan. He was always level-headed. Dan gave a rueful smile. ‘I’m with Jezreel and Jacques. We go to the South Sea aboard this ship. Besides, Hector, it will bring you closer to Maria, and we’d be happy to see that.’
Hector felt a surge of gratitude. He hadn’t realized his friends were aware of his longing to find Maria again. He’d no idea that his desire was so obvious.
‘All ready,’ called the sailing master from the poop deck.
‘So is it settled between us?’ asked Cook. There was a glint of triumph in his eyes.
Hector nodded his agreement.
Cook raised his voice so that he could be heard throughout the ship. ‘Time to move off. Remember, be slow and calm, as if the Carlsborg is simply heading down the coast to visit another trading post, and the Revenge is going with her.’
He grinned wolfishly as he turned back to face Hector. ‘We don’t want the fort mistaking us for pirates stealing Company property.’
‘I blame myself for telling you that her captain was away with half his crew,’ said Hector.
Cook shrugged. ‘I’d probably have found out for myself, from gossip among the canoe men. But I only decided finally to take the Carlsborg when you told me you and your friends would be on watch at dawn. The ideal time to capture a ship, and an opportunity I couldn’t ignore.’
‘And you counted on our loyalty to Jacques.’
‘Of course.’
‘What if the Governor raises the alarm when he sees the Carlsborg sail off before her captain has returned from the interior?’
‘Yesterday, after our little tour of the fort, I called in at the Governor’s office. I told him that my visit had made it clear there was a shortage of slave stock locally, so I would be taking the Revenge farther down the coast to trade.’
‘And he believed you?’
‘Naturally. He saw us as we left the slave pens. I took care to add that I would recommend to the Carlsborg’s first officer that he sail in company with me for a day or so, if he wished to pick up a few extra slaves. He would be able to return in time for her captain’s arrival.’ Cook gave a mirthless grin. ‘Before the Governor realizes the Carlsborg is overdue, I propose to make her vanish.’
With that, Cook walked away.
Hector slid a hand into his pocket and fingered Maria’s letter once again. His mind was in a tumult. Already he was calculating how many weeks it might be before he saw her again, and he felt a surge of happy anticipation at the thought that every mile the Carlsborg sailed would bring him closer to her. Yet he knew that he was also putting everything at risk by arriving on the coast of South America with a crew of ruffians whom the Spaniards considered barbaric pirates. He promised himself that at the very first opportunity he and his friends would abandon such unwelcome company.
THREE
THE LANDFALL off the broad entrance to Magellan’s Strait was both disheartening and confusing. The weather, hazy with frequent rain showers, made for poor visibility, and the tide, flowing out of the Strait, created an ugly current of at least six or seven knots, which was more than the ship could manage. The only land in sight was a low barren island, a dismal yellowish-brown, a cable’s length to starboard. A single black albatross, which had followed the vessel since early morning, was now gliding over the boulder-strewn beach, searching for food.
As he stood by the helm, Hector glumly set aside any hope that this was where he and his friends might be able to leave the ship.
‘Not much of a place, is it?’ observed William Dampier morosely. As navigator, he was responsible for the landfall. Hector had always liked him. Long-faced and lugubrious, Dampier had sailed on the previous South Sea raid. He’d admitted to Hector that his real reason for voyaging with the buccaneers was not to win plunder, but to have the chance to observe and record the natural world. He kept notes of whatever caught his interest, whether plants or animals or local people and their customs, tides and the weather, and wrote his observations on scraps of paper, which he kept dry in a stoppered bamboo tube. Now he had a chart in his hand and was trying to identify exactly where they were.
‘It would help if we knew our latitude more accurately,’ he muttered.
‘Little chance of that. This overcast looks set,’ Hector observed.
There was sharpness in the air, a chill that had been increasingly noticeable these past few days. Hector was wearing a thick jacket and a heavy scarf purchased from a shipmate. The sultry warmth of the Guinea coast was a distant memory. Behind them lay 4,000 sea miles from Africa, covered in little more than six weeks.
‘Our first snow,’ muttered Dampier, shaking the chart to dislodge a flake that had drifted down on it.
‘What do you think? Should we attempt the Strait?’ The question came from Cook, who had joined them by the helm.
‘We’ll be sailing into dirty weather,’ replied Dampier. Ahead of the ship, the sky was turning a menacing blue-black as if a great bruise was slowly spreading up from the horizon. Flickers of sheet lightning lit the underbelly of a cloud bank forming in the far distance. To emphasize Dampier’s warning, a sudden gust of wind made the vessel heel abruptly, causing all three men to stagger and lose their balance.
‘Are you confident this is the entrance to the Strait?’ Cook asked.
‘As sure as I can be, with such poor charts,’ answered Dampier.
Cook chewed his lip. Hector had noticed the same habit when the captain had been thinking about stealing the Carlsborg.