Come Looking For Me (30 page)

“Yer alive, sir!” he shrieked.

Gus's eyes flickered, then opened. “I'm cold.”

“Oh, Mr. Walby …” Magpie's voice broke. He tugged at his arms again.

“No! Leave me. I'm broken – most everywhere, I think. Leave me here.”

“I won't, sir,” shouted Magpie. “I've brung a blanket and some water.” With his chest bursting now with happiness, he chattered on, his words tripping over one another, informing Gus of how he would make him better by feeding him freshly baked biscuits and fixing up his broken bones “just like I seen Dr. Braden do it” and how he would carefully haul him into the cutter where he could get dry.

“And then I'll play ‘Heart of Oak' on me flute!” Magpie broke into sudden, shrill song.
“Come cheer up my Lads, 'tis to glory we steer …”

Gus closed his eyes again. “Save yourself and go back.”

Magpie, his back to the dying ship, knew there was no sense in telling Gus of the terror on the
Isabelle.
“I won't, sir.” He glanced to the north again and his heart quickened, for he was now certain that it was two sails he could see on the skyline. “But if ya can see fit to look through the glass with yer good eyes and all, ya might tell us what ya see.” He waited anxiously for the waves to swing the mizzenmast in a north-facing direction, and then held the glass before Gus's right eye. “There now, Mr. Walby, give us a squint.”

Gus stared at the horizon for what seemed to Magpie an eternity.

“What d'ya see, sir?”

Finally, Gus raised his head a bit and began to laugh – his laughter weak at first, then an outpouring of explosive sobs. “I'm certain of it, Magpie! Two ships – one of them – why, I know her colours!” he gasped, tears streaming down his whitened cheeks. “It's our good friend, the
Amethyst!
”

“Fire the starboard guns.”

“Lower the larboard boats.”

“Mr. Evans! To the stern at once!”

“The fire – it'll soon reach the magazine!”

Though she could not see Fly Austen, Emily could hear his voice, hoarse and spent, above the shouting and raging roar of the inferno. His sharp orders were everywhere – now fore, now aft, now amidships – and she called out to him, but he did not reply. Headlong, she ploughed into the crush of frantic bodies and battled her way towards the ship's foredeck, desperate to find the hatchway that would take her down to the hospital.

Perhaps there she would find Leander.

From the bowels of the ship, a shot of flame whooshed before her like a fiery giant, blocking her way, knocking her backwards upon the scorching planks. Fleeing feet trampled and stumbled over her. She gasped as the severe knocks to her body tore open the skin on her forehead and ruptured anew the bullet wound in her shoulder. Blood poured down her face, filling her eyes and her mouth.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

The starboard guns were fired off in rapid succession, ferociously shaking the
Isabelle
and everything that still clung to her decks. The larboard boats began their precarious descent into the darkened water, while bits of burning spars and shroud rained down upon the desperate men who lowered them, setting several afire. The men shrieked and darted about in a ghastly dance before hurling themselves overboard. Emily, unable to breathe, unable to scream, lay paralyzed and helpless near the mainmast, holding her ears in a vain attempt to shut out the appalling bedlam.

After long, terrifying moments, someone stopped to help her. She felt a small, warm hand slip into hers, pull her to her feet, and guide her to the starboard rail.

“Gus? Magpie?” she cried, addressing her shadowy saviour. But, before her eyes, the small hand and its owner slowly shrank away, then disintegrated, as if never really existing in the first place.

Desperate to escape the severe heat, Emily hung her head over the rail and contemplated a plunge into the heaving blackness below. The deck beneath her feet groaned and began to buckle. No one fled past her now; Fly Austen's shouting had long since ceased. The roar and snap of the fire as it ravaged the
Isabelle
was the only sound that struck her ears. Now all was ablaze, the flames leaping around her like a swarm of striking snakes.

Suddenly Leander was there. He was untouched by the fire, except for its reflection that glowed in the depths of his eyes. His gaze was steady, reassuring, as he extended his hand towards her. Intense happiness flowed through Emily's veins as she loosened her grip on the rail and turned to meet him. Her fingertips were almost touching his when he moved away, as if an invisible hand were dragging him backwards into the fire. It was then that a tremendous explosion ripped through the
Isabelle,
thrusting the ship's pathetic remains upwards, above the sea's surface for a moment, before slamming her down, down upon the eternal waves …

Emily's eyes flew open. She was drenched – drenched with sweat and tears. Her heart was beating with the speed of a hummingbird's wings and her chest hurt. She sat up in her cot and struggled to slow her laboured breathing. For the fourth time that long night, she had dreamt about the
Isabelle
. It was in flames and Fly Austen had tried with steadfast determination to organize the men and maintain some semblance of order as it burned around him. Someone … perhaps Gus or Magpie … had helped her up when she had fallen on the quarterdeck, and Leander – Leander had been there, smiling, holding out his hand to her. But the fire was everywhere and there had been a thunderous noise that caused the decks to collapse down upon one another and he had been wrenched away from her, cast into an abyss.

Leander.

In painful recollection, Emily squeezed her eyes shut and began to tremble violently in the dimness of her tiny cabin. If only he would come to her now, pass through the canvas curtain and soothe away her nightmares with his tonics and his dear company. But the door to her quarters – her new quarters on Thomas Trevelyan's ship – was locked, and the
Isabelle
was gone, burned to the waterline, her crew presumably dead or scattered.

It was more than Emily could bear, this incessant, frenzied speculating about who might have survived and who had not. Briefly, before being taken from the
Isabelle
by Trevelyan and his marines, she had seen Fly Austen and Morgan Evans, and therefore knew they had escaped harm during the confrontation with the American frigates – but had they survived their ship's final destruction? And what about the others? Of them, she had no real news at all. Those on Trevelyan's
Serendipity
were forbidden to speak to her. She knew there was someone on duty outside her locked door. She could see the heels of a pair of boots in the space between the door and wooden planks of the floor – the same space through which they had passed a tray of stale biscuits hours before – but no one had answered her calls or cared about her grief.

In need of fresh air, Emily crawled out of her cot, mindful of her swollen ankle and aching shoulder. She clambered over the still-warm cannon that sat silent below the cot, negotiated her way round the network of thick ropes that held it in place, and finally pushed open the heavy gunport. A cold sea-spray met her face with a sharp slap, but despite its sting, she filled her lungs with the early morning air and gazed out over the grey swells towards the faint glimmer of light between the dark horizon and the black wall of clouds hovering above it. She stuck her head out the gunport, welcoming the freshness from the surging sea and the wind that tossed the straight strands of her hair about her shoulders. She forced herself to breathe deeply until her pounding heart slowed. But nature could not diminish her sorrow, and desiring only to sleep, she closed up the heavy port, jumping back with a start as it fell into place with a thud and plunged her cabin once more into semi-darkness.

Using the gun's ropes for assistance, Emily groped her way back towards her cot and was almost at her destination when her bare feet tripped over objects that had been relegated to the wet floor ten hours ago when she had first been thrust into this unfamiliar cabin. Kneeling down, her shaking hands felt about for the pair of leather shoes with the gleaming silver buckles, and the precious volumes of Jane Austen's
Sense and Sensibility
. In her crouched position, she pressed them to her breast until she heard the ship's bell clang four times – 6:00 a.m. Listless, she scrabbled to find her footing on the cannon, and tumbled into her cot. There she set the shoes and volumes down beside her pillow, wrapped herself into her blanket – a frock coat that held a faint musky scent within its voluminous folds – and let her tears come again.

There would be no sunrise this day.

It was early morning. He was in a small boat – a cutter – bobbing about on dull waves under a leaden sky that was spitting cold rain. With him, crowded into the boat, were eighteen indistinguishable men, all with soot-blackened faces. Some, with discernible wounds, slept, while others gazed at nothing, perhaps, like him, trying to reconcile the events of the last several hours. Every one of them was soaked to the skin and they huddled together to steal what warmth they could from their neighbouring comrades. Floating nearby were two more cutters and one larger pinnace, each carrying roughly the same number of exhausted, wet men, and each towing – by means of ropes and discarded shirts – bits and pieces of charred timber on which were sprawled another handful of survivors. One young lad had even lashed himself to an empty chicken coop to ride out the waves.

Fly rubbed his eyes as if trying to banish the dismal scene before him. Was this all that was left? In his fitful dreams, he had been able to save his men from the burning
Isabelle
, but this ragged bunch, drifting on the waves as helplessly as a bullet-ridden bird, spoke the true tale. As bitter awareness filled his dark eyes, he turned them towards Morgan Evans, who tried a second time to rouse him with his words.

“Captain Austen?”

Fly nodded wearily as his glance flickered over his meagre fleet. “Aye?”

“They've spotted us again, sir.”

“Who has?”

“The
Amethyst
and the
Expedition.
I beg you to look behind you, sir.”

Fly twisted his sore body in order to follow Morgan's finger and squinted at the two murky sails, running towards them from the north.

“They're still a few hours off, but – we're sure of it – they're on their way, sir.”

Fly recalled sighting the two British ships before Trevelyan had set the
Isabelle
afire, but as the flames' guiding glow had been extinguished and darkness had settled on the sea long before their arrival, they could be of no assistance to the poor souls, with nothing to cling to, who had cried out most piteously for help.

Fly winced. “How many of us are there, Mr. Evans?”

“Seventy-five in the boats, another twelve in the water, sir.”

“But there were so many on the
Isabelle.
”

“I was told there were four hundred of us in all, sir.” Morgan hesitated. “Four hundred and one if you include Miss Emily.”

Fly gave the carpenter's mate a grim smile as he made a tremendous effort to stand up. With his boots splashing in the several inches of seawater that had poured into the cutter, he examined the boats and floating timbers of the once-proud
Isabelle
, and the men who remained. Had they been able to lower the large launch and the second pinnace before the fire engulfed them, many more lives could have been saved. And the skiff, it could have carried a few more, but its fate was unknown long before Trevelyan's men and their torches had done their contemptible work. In the bow of the surviving pinnace, Fly noticed the unruly mop of hair that belonged to Biscuit.“You there, Biscuit! What the devil are you about?”

The old Scottish cook raised his woeful face from his hands, wiped at his whiskery cheeks, and reluctantly met Captain Austen's stare. “Canna help me sobbin', sir. Ya see, I lost me stove, me old reliable Brodie stove. She be keepin' comp'ny with a pod o' queer sea monsters by now, no doubt.”

“Brighten yourself up and tell me what provisions we have amongst us.”

“Why, none, sir, none at all. No food, no water. Ya see – there weren't no time, sir.”

Fly clenched his fists to fight the gnawing thirst and hunger that caused him more agony than his back. He didn't want to have to think, let alone lead men. He would gladly lie back down in the cold water that slithered up and down in the cutter's belly if only he could sleep and forget.

Morgan and a few of the others who were still alert looked up expectantly at Fly. They waited. At last Fly took a deep breath and stepped up onto the cutter's bench, balancing himself on his weary legs.

“Men! We must work together. We must stay occupied. These boats … each one of them should be fitted with sailing gear.” He forced an injection of fervour into his strained voice. “If there is mast and canvas to be found – raise them! If oars – lower them! And for goodness sakes, find something with which to bail this infernal seawater! If we can pull together, our reward just may be a hot breakfast.” He peered at the approaching ships through the rain that now fell harder, and to himself added, “so long as, this time, Providence is on our side.”