'It's a poundin' match,' shouted the boatswain to Farrell.
'Better that than let those murdering knaves board us,' Farrell replied coolly, lifting his telescope once more.
Kydd could see little of Corbeau a few hundred yards to weather, but could feel the injury she was doing to Seaflower. He worried about Renzi, gun-captain of one of the forward six-pounders. If it came to repelling boarders he would be with the first of the defenders, probably going down under the weight of greater numbers. But if—
A sudden shudder and simultaneous twanging from close by made Kydd grip the tiller convulsively. The cause was ahead of him — there, the weather running backstay had taken a ball and was now unstranding in a frenzied whirl. Kydd instantly threw the helm hard over, sending Seaflower down before the wind.
Farrell saw what had happened and rapped out orders to ease away sheets to conform to the change in direction. The running backstays were vital sinews in taking the prodigious strain of Seaflower's oversize mainsail without which the mainmast would certainly carry away with the asymmetric forces playing on it. The stay now had some relief — but for how long? 'Mr Merrick—' But the boatswain was already calling for a rigging stopper, shading his eyes and gazing up to where the final strand was giving way. The lower part of the stay fell, its blocks clattering to the deck, leaving the upper length to stream freely to leeward.
Corbeau had been caught unawares, but now fell in astern in pursuit, the sudden silence of the guns from her bow-on angle allowing the victorious yelling of the enemy seamen to come clearly across the water.
The fighting stopper, a tackle with two tails, would be applied to each side of Seaflower wound, drawing the stay together again to be tautened by heaving on the tackle, but so high was the wound that someone would have to climb to the ratlines in the face of the storm of shot and musketry. Merrick took the hank of rope and blocks, the lengths of seizing, and without pausing draped them around his neck and swung up into the shrouds.
'Sir.' Jarman was pointing to the little islet not a quarter of a mile ahead: he seemed to be suggesting some sort of hide-and-seek around the island.
Farrell stroked his chin. 'One hand forward,' he said, common prudence with coral about, 'and we'll keep in with the island until we are to leeward, then . ..'
Kydd eased the tiller, snatching a glance astern. The schooner thankfully had no chase guns, but she was clapping on every stitch of sail and was gradually closing on Seaflower.
Jarman went forward with the lookout, staring intently into the water ahead, and indicated to Kydd with his arm where they should go. Musket balls occasionally hissed past, and one slapped into the transom, but the real danger would be when Corbeau reached and overhauled them. With the size of her crew, aroused to an ugly pitch, the privateer would be merciless.
Kydd clamped his eyes on Jarman. They were up to the island, and now began to round its undistinguished tip.
The schooner must have sensed their desperation, for she continued to crowd on sail, her crew clearly visible on her fo'c'sle, the glitter of edged weapons catching the sun as they waved them triumphantly.
'She's slowing!' Farrell's incredulous gasp came. 'She's - she's taken the ground! Corbeau's ashore!'
Kydd snatched a look over his shoulder. Corbeau was untouched, motionless on the course she had taken. She had misjudged the offshore reefs and her deeper keel had become firmly wedged among the coral heads.
Seaflower curved round, but Corbeau lay unmoving.
'God be praised — we get t' live another day!' muttered a voice.
An angry shout sounded from above. Merrick had passed the seizing on the upper length of the stay, and was demanding the rest to be hauled up to him. They had the luxury of dowsing sail while the operation was completed, Corbeau a diminishing image in the distance. The jury stay rigged, they could then beat a dignified retreat.
'Ready about,' ordered Farrell. 'We finish the job,' he said firmly. They carefully returned on a track that kept the bow of the schooner towards them. He hailed Stirk. 'Grape.'
Seaflower shortened sail to glide in within a hundred yards, then put up the helm and let go the stream anchor forward and kedge anchor aft. They came to a standstill, but were now in a position to adjust cables to aim her entire broadside to bear on the unprotected length of the big schooner.
With terrible deliberation Stirk went from one gun to the next, sighting carefully and touching off an unstoppable blast of man-killing grape-shot into the hapless vessel. It took until the third gun before activity was seen in the Corbeau — they were launching their longboat.
'That will do, Stirk,' Farrell called. Kydd was struck with Farrell's humanity in allowing the enemy to abandon ship without unnecessary killing, and felt ashamed of his own blood-lust.
'Give y' joy on y'r prize, sir!' Jarman said, with considerable respect.
'Renzi!' Seaflower's captain ordered. 'The longboat — do ye take possession of our prize.'
Grinning, Kydd watched Renzi climb into the longboat with his crew, but they were only half-way across when the first wisps of smoke arose. The boat's crew lay on their oars and watched blue smoke bursting into flame as tarry ropes caught, spreading the consuming blaze to the upper rigging. A crackling, bursting firestorm turned the schooner into an inferno, the shape of her hull only just perceptible in the flames. The climax came when first her foremast and then her main crashed down in a gout of sparks and the rapidly charring ruin forlornly settled to the reef. Corbeau's crew watched silently, lined along the shoreline. They were still there when Seaflower brought her longboat aboard and sailed away.
'Barbados?' asked Jarman. They had been cut about; it stood to reason they refit.
The beady eyes of Snead, the carpenter's mate, announced his presence on deck. 'Sir,' he said, touching his shapeless felt hat, 'we've taken a ball in midships, an' takin' in water.' The clinker build of Seaflower's hull was proving its worth - the strake where the ball had entered would need replacing but the rest were sound.
'How bad?' Farrell asked.
'Can swim a-whiles,' said Snead, *but she can't take a blow.'
'Dockyard,' said Merrick.
Snead looked at him and nodded.
Jarman turned to Farrell. 'Antego,' he said, without hesitation.
'Antigua — a couple of days only, thank the Lord,' said Farrell, but Kydd flinched. Of all places ...
Chapter 11
English Harbour shimmered under the noon-day heat it was quite the same as Kydd remembered — the beauty, the rank effluvia, the calm solidity of spacious stone buildings. Here it was that he had nearly ended his existence on earth, here it was ...