Birds of Prey (75 page)

Vincent glanced down at them, and his expression mirrored the despair he felt as he faced the knowledge that he was no match for the Dutchman. He lifted his head and looked across to where
Schreuder waited for him, his stance classical and arrogant, his expression grave and intent as he studied his adversary over the weaving point of the Neptune sword.

Vincent straightened his spine and took his guard, trying to smile carelessly as he steeled himself to go forward to his certain death. The rough seamen who watched might have bayed and bellowed
at the spectacle of a bull-baiting or a cockfight, but even they had fallen silent, awed by the terrible tragedy they saw unfolding. Llewellyn could not let it happen.

‘Hold hard!’ he cried, and vaulted over the rope. He strode between the two men, his right hand raised. ‘Colonel Schreuder, sir. You have given us every reason to admire your
swordsmanship. You have drawn first blood. Will you not give us good reason to respect you by declaring that your honour is satisfied?’

‘Let the English coward apologize to me in front of all the present company, and then I will be satisfied,’ said Schreuder, and Llewellyn turned to appeal to Vincent. ‘Will you
do what the colonel asks? Please, Vincent, for my sake and the trust I pledged to your father.’

Vincent’s face was deathly pale but the blood that stained his shirt was bright crimson, as full blown June roses on the bush. ‘Colonel Schreuder has this moment called me a coward.
Forgive me, Captain, but you know I cannot accede to such conditions.’

Llewellyn looked sadly upon his young protégé.‘He intends to kill you, Vincent. It is such a shameful waste of a fine young life.’

‘And I intend to kill him.’ Vincent was able to smile now that it was decided. It was a gay, reckless smile. ‘Please stand aside, Captain.’ Hopelessly Llewellyn turned
back to the sidelines.

‘On guard, sir!’ Vincent called, and charged with the white sand spurting from under his boots, thrust and parry for very life. The Neptune sword was an impenetrable wall of steel
before him, meeting and turning his own blade with an ease that made all his bravest efforts seem those of a child. Schreuder’s grave expression never faltered, and when at last Vincent fell
back, panting and gasping, sweat diluting his streaming blood to pink, he was wounded twice more. There was black despair in his eyes.

Now, at last, the seamen from the
Golden Bough
had found their voices. ‘Quarter! You bloody murdering cheese-head!’ they howled, and ‘Fair shakes, man. Let the lad
live!’

‘They’ll get no mercy from Colonel Cornelius,’ Cumbrae smiled grimly, ‘but the din they’re making will help Sam to do his job.’ He glanced across the lagoon
to where the
Golden Bough
lay in the channel. Every man still aboard her was crowded along the near rail, straining his eyes for a glimpse of the duel. Even the lookout at her main top had
trained his telescope on the beach. Not one was aware of the boats that were speeding out from among the mangroves on the far shore. He recognized Sam Bowles in the leading boat, as it raced in
under the
Golden Bough
’s tumble home and was hidden from his view by the ship’s hull. Sweet Mary, Sam will take her without a shot fired! Cumbrae thought exultantly, and looked
back at the arena.

‘You have had your turn, sir,’ said Schreuder quietly. ‘Now it is mine. On guard, if you please.’ With three swift strides he had covered the gap that separated them. The
younger man met his first thrust, and then the second with a high parry and block, but the Neptune blade was swift and elusive as an enraged cobra. It seemed to mesmerize him with its deadly
shining dance and, darting and striking, slowly forced him to yield ground. Each time he parried and retreated, he lost position and balance.

Then suddenly Schreuder executed a coup that few swordsmen would dare attempt outside the practice field. He caught up both blades in the classical prolonged engagement, swirling the two swords together so that the steel edges shrilled with a sound that grated across the nerve endings of the
watchers. Once committed neither man dared break off the engagement, for to do so was to concede an opening. Around in a deadly glittering circle the two swords revolved. It became a trial of
strength and endurance. Vincent’s arm turned leaden and the sweat dripped from his chin. His eyes were desperate and his wrist began to tremble and bend under the strain.

Then Schreuder froze the fatal circle. He did not break away but simply clamped Vincent’s sword in a vice of steel. It was a display of such strength and control that even Cumbrae gaped
with amazement.

For a moment the duellists remained unmoving, then slowly Schreuder began to force both points upward, until they were aimed skywards at full stretch of their arms. Vincent was helpless. He
tried to hold the other blade but his arm began to shudder and his muscles quivered. He bit down on his own tongue with the effort until a spot of blood appeared at the corner of his mouth.

It could not last longer, and Llewellyn cried out in despair as he saw that the young man had reached the furthest limits of his strength and endurance. ‘Hold hard, Vincent!’ It was
in vain. Vincent broke. He disengaged with his right arm at full reach above his head, and his chest wide open.

‘Ha!’ shouted Schreuder, and his thrust was a blur, fast as the release of a bolt from a crossbow. He drove in his point an inch below Vincent’s sternum, clear through his body
and a foot out of his back. For a long moment Vincent froze like a figure carved from a block of marble. Then his legs melted under him and he toppled into the sand.

‘Murder!’ cried Llewellyn. He sprang into the square and knelt beside the dying youth. He took him in his arms, and looked up again at Schreuder. ‘Bloody murder!’ he
cried again.

‘I must take that as a request.’ Cumbrae smiled and came up behind the kneeling man. ‘And I am happy to oblige you, cousin!’ he said, and brought the wheel-lock pistol
out from behind his back. He thrust the muzzle into the back of Llewellyn’s head and pulled the trigger. There was a bright flare of sparks and then the pistol roared and leaped in the
Buzzard’s fist. At such close range the load of lead pellets drove clean through Llewellyn’s skull and blew half of his face away in red tatters. He flopped forwards with
Vincent’s body still in his arms.

The Buzzard looked around quickly, and saw that from the dark grove the red rocket was already soaring upwards, leaving a parabola of silver smoke arched against the fragile blue of the
early-morning sky, the signal to Sam Bowles and his boarding party to storm the decks of the
Golden Bough
.

Meanwhile, above the beach, the gunners hidden among the trees were dragging away the branches that covered their culverins. The Buzzard had sited the battery himself and laid them to cover all
the far side of the square where the seamen from the
Golden Bough
stood in a row four deep. The culverins enfiladed the group, and each was loaded with a full charge of grape shot.

Even though they were unaware of the hidden battery, the seamen from the
Golden Bough
were swiftly recovering from the shock of seeing their officers slaughtered before their horrified
gaze. A hum of fury and wild cries of outrage went up from their midst, but there was no officer to give the order, and though they drew their cutlasses, yet instinctively they hesitated and hung
back.

The Buzzard seized Colonel Schreuder’s free arm and grated in his ear. ‘Come on! Hurry! Clear the range.’ He dragged him from the roped ring.

‘By God, sir, you have murdered Llewellyn!’ Schreuder protested. He was stunned by the act. ‘He was unarmed! Defenceless!’

‘We will debate the niceties of it later,’ Cumbrae promised, and stuck out one booted foot, hooking Schreuder’s ankle at the same time shoving him forward. The two men sprawled
headlong into the shallow trench in the sand that Cumbrae had dug specially for this purpose, just as the seamen from the
Golden Bough
burst through the ropes of the ring behind them.

‘What are you doing?’ Schreuder bellowed. ‘Release me at once.’

‘I am saving your life, you blethering idiot,’ Cumbrae shouted in his ear, and held his head down below the lip of the trench as the first salvo of grape shot thundered from out of
the grove and swept the beach.

The Buzzard had calculated the range with care so that the pattern of shot spread to its most deadly arc. It caught the phalanx of sailors squarely, raked the sand of the beach into a blinding
white storm, and went on to tear across the surface of the quiet lagoon waters like a gale. Most of the
Golden Bough
’s men were struck down instantly, but a few stayed on their feet,
bewildered and stunned, staggering like drunkards from their wounds and from the turmoil of grape shot and the blast of disrupted air.

Cumbrae seized his claymore from the bottom of the pit, where he had buried it under a light coating of sand, and leaped to his feet. He rushed on these few survivors, the great sword gripped in
both hands. He struck the head clean from the torso of the first man in his path, just as his own sailors came charging out of the gunsmoke, yelling like demons and brandishing their cutlasses.

They fell upon the decimated shore party and hacked them down, even when Cumbrae bellowed, ‘Enough! Give quarter to those who yield!’ They took no heed of his order, and swung the
cutlasses until the thrown blood drops wet them to the elbows and speckled their grinning faces. Cumbrae had to lay about him with his fists and the flat of his sword.

‘Avast! We need men to sail the
Golden Bough
. Spare me a dozen, you bloody ruffians.’ They gave him less than he demanded. When the carnage was over there were only nine,
trussed ankle and wrist and lying belly down in the sand like porkers in the marketplace.

‘This way!’ the Buzzard bellowed again, and led his crew sprinting down the beach to where the longboats from the
Golden Bough
were drawn up. They piled into them and seized
the oars. With Cumbrae roaring in the bows like a wounded animal they pulled for the
Golden Bough
, hooked onto her sides and went swarming up onto her deck with cutlass bared and pistols
cocked.

There, help was not needed. Sam Bowles’s men had taken the
Golden Bough
by surprise and storm. The deck was slippery with blood and corpses were strewn across it and huddled in the
scuppers. Under the forecastle a small band of Llewellyn’s men were hanging on desperately, surrounded by Sam’s gang of boarders, but when they saw the Buzzard and his gang storm up
onto the deck they threw down their cutlasses. Those few who could swim raced to the ship’s side and dived into the lagoon while the others fell to their knees and pleaded for quarter.

‘Spare them, Mr Bowles,’ Cumbrae shouted. ‘I need sailors!’ He did not wait to see the order obeyed but snatched a musket from the hands of the man beside him and ran to
the rail. The escaping sailors were splashing their way towards the mangrove trees. He took careful aim at the head of one, whose pink scalp showed through his wet grey hair. It was a lucky shot,
and the man threw up both hands and sank, leaving a pink stain on the surface. The men around Cumbrae hooted with glee and joined in the sport, calling their targets and laying wagers on their
marksmanship. ‘Who’ll give me fives in shillings on that rogue with the blond pigtail?’ They shot the swimming men like wounded ducks.

Sam Bowles came grinning and bobbing to meet Cumbrae. ‘The ship is yours, your grace.’

‘Well done, Mr Bowles.’ Cumbrae gave him such a hearty blow of commendation as to knock him almost off his feet. ‘There will be some hiding below decks. Winkle them out! Try to
take them alive. Put a boat in the water and drag those out also!’ He pointed at the few survivors still splashing and swimming towards the mangroves. ‘I am going down to
Llewellyn’s cabin to find the ship’s papers. Call me when you have all the prisoners trussed up in the waist of the ship.’

He kicked open the locked door to Llewellyn’s cabin, and paused to survey the interior. It was beautifully appointed, the furniture carved and polished and the drapery of fine velvet.

In the writing desk he found the keys to the iron strong-box that was bolted to the deck below the comfortable bunk. As soon as he opened it he recognized the purse he had given Llewellyn.
‘I am much obliged to you, Christopher. You’ll not be needing this where you’re going,’ he murmured as he slipped it into his pocket. Under it was a second purse, which he
carried to the desk. He spilled the golden coins out onto the tabletop. ‘Two hundred and sixteen pounds five shillings and twopence,’ he counted. ‘This will be the money for the
running of the ship. Very parsimonious, but I am grateful for any contribution.’

Then his eyes lit on a small wooden chest in the bottom of the box. He lifted it out and inspected the name carved into the lid. ‘The Hon. Vincent Winterton’. The chest was locked
but it yielded readily to the blade of his dirk. He smiled as he saw what it contained, and let a handful of coins run through his fingers. ‘No doubt the gambling losses of the good Colonel
Schreuder are in here but he need never be tempted to wager them again. I will take care of them for him.’

He poured a mug of French brandy from the captain’s stores and seated himself at the desk while he ran through the ship’s books and documents. The log-book would make interesting
reading at a later date. He set it aside. He glanced through a letter of partnership agreement with Lord Winterton who, it seemed, owned the
Golden Bough
. ‘No longer, your
lordship.’ He grinned. ‘I regret to inform you that she is all mine now.’

The cargo manifest was disappointing. The
Golden Bough
was carrying mostly cheap trade goods, knives and axes, cloth, beads and copper rings. However, there were also five hundred muskets
and a goodly store of black-powder in her holds.

‘Och! So you were going to do a spot of gun smuggling. Shame on you, my dear Christopher.’ He tutted disapprovingly. ‘I’ll have to find something better to fill her holds
on the return voyage,’ he promised himself, and took a pull at the brandy.