Читать книгу The Lost Gentleman - Margaret McPhee - Страница 10

Chapter Two

‘I put her in my cabin. I’ll sleep on the deck with the men—naturally.’ Within Kit’s day cabin Gunner was lounging in a small wooden chair. The priest pulled a silver hip flask of brandy from his pocket, unstopped it and offered it to Kit as a formality. They both knew that Kit would refuse.

‘There’s a cot in the corner—you are welcome to sleep there.’ Kit was seated in his own chair behind the plain mahogany desk.

‘Are you suggesting I could not manage a hammock?’ Gunner downed a swig of brandy.

‘A man does not forget such things,’ said Kit and thought of the past years and all it had entailed for them both.

‘He certainly does not.’ Gunner grinned. ‘They will bury us in those damned hammocks.’

Kit smiled. ‘No doubt.’ He moved to the large rectangular window, looking out over the sea. ‘How is our guest?’

‘Resting. She has a remarkable resilience. Most women would be suffering the vapours at the mere suggestion of the ordeal she has endured. But maybe the shock of it has not hit home yet. Delayed emotional response following trauma—we have both seen it.’ Gunner came to stand by his side and met his gaze meaningfully. They both remembered the horrors of the year in that Eastern hellhole.

‘Has she any signs of physical hurt?’

‘None that I could see. I did explain I was a physician and enquired whether she had need of any assistance, but she declined, saying she was well enough.’

‘A lone woman amongst a crew of pirates... How well can she be?’ said Kit.

Gunner’s mouth twisted with distaste. ‘I am rather glad that you killed La Voile.’

‘I am not. They would have taken his life just the same in London.’ And Kit would have welcomed the extra money that would have paid.

‘Always the money,’ said Gunner with a smile.

‘Always the money,’ agreed Kit, and thought of what this one final job would allow him to do. All the waiting and planning and working, and counting every coin until the target was in sight, and the time was almost nigh. He pushed the thought away, for now. ‘I will have the day cot set up for you and space cleared for your possessions and clothes. If you will excuse me, I have got work to do.’

‘And always work,’ said Gunner.

‘No rest for the wicked.’ There was a truth in that glib phrase that few realised, Kit thought wryly. No rest indeed. Not ever. ‘La Voile is dead, the job is done. We go back to England and claim our bounty.’

‘And Mrs Medhurst? We cannot touch port in America. We’d be running the gauntlet with the flotilla of French privateers and pirates patrolling their coast. Even with all Raven’s advantages, she cannot match such numbers.’

Kit smiled. ‘We will drop the woman at Antigua when we victual. Fort Berkeley there will organise her return home.’

‘A good plan. But it has been so long since we were in the presence of a respectable woman, one cannot help speculate how her presence would have lifted the journey home. It would certainly have kept the men on their best behaviour.’

‘You are too long from home, my friend,’ said Kit drily.

Gunner gave a smile. ‘Perhaps.’ He was still smiling as he left the cabin, closing the door behind him.

Kit returned to his desk and the navigational charts that lay there. But before he focused his attention on studying their detail he thought once more of Kate Medhurst with her cool grey eyes: proud, appraising, wary and with that slight prickly hostility beneath the surface.

Disharmony between our two countries. He smiled at that line and wondered how a woman like her had come to be abducted by a shipload of pirates. And even more, how she had fared amongst them. For all the strength of character that emanated from her, she was not a big woman. Physically she would not have stood a chance.

Maybe Gunner had a point when it came to La Voile. Kit thought of his blade slicing through the villain’s heart. Maybe it was worth the gold guineas that it had cost him, after all.

He gave a grim smile and finally turned his attention to the charts that waited on the desk.

* * *

Kate forced herself to stop pacing within the tiny cabin in which they had housed her. She stopped, sat down at the little desk and stilled the panic roiling in her mind and firing through her body. Stop. Be still. And think.

Her eyes ranged over the assortment of medical books, prayer books and the large bible on the shelf fixed to the wall above the desk. On the desk itself were paper, pen and ink and a small penknife. She lifted the knife and very gently touched a thumb to test the sharpness of the blade. The priest kept the little knife razor sharp, potentially a useful weapon, but it was nothing in comparison to her own. The feel of the leather holster and scabbard, and their precious contents, strapped to her legs gave her a measure of confidence.

She would not hesitate to use either the knife or pistol on North if she needed to. Not that she thought it would come to that.

Coyote would come for her. It is what she would have done had one of her crew been taken. Regroup, rearm, follow at an unseen distance, then come in fast for the attack. Sunny Jim would do the same. She knew her men—they would not abandon her.

They would come for her and it was vital that Kate be ready. All she had to do was watch, wait and keep her head down. Not today, perhaps not even tomorrow, but soon. It was just a matter of time before she was back once more on her own ship, maybe even with Captain Kit North as her prisoner. She smiled at that thought. The Lafitte brothers, the men who oversaw most of the mercantile, smuggling, privateering and pirate ventures around Louisiana, would pay her well for him. With North off the scene it would be a great deal safer for them all. She smiled again, buoyed by the prospect.

She pleaded fatigue that night so as not to have to join them for dinner, eating instead from the tray he sent to her cabin. Coyote would not come tonight, and as for North... An image of him swam in her head and she felt nervousness flutter in her stomach...she would defer facing him until tomorrow.

* * *

But of North the next morning there was no sign. It was the priest, Reverend Dr Gunner, who sat with Kate at breakfast and the priest who offered her a tour of Raven. She accepted, knowing the information could be useful both to Coyote and to all her fellow pirate and privateer brethren.

‘I could not help noticing that Captain North was not at breakfast.’

‘North does not eat breakfast. He is a man of few needs. He takes but one meal a day.’

‘A man of few needs... What else can you tell me of the famous Captain North?’

‘What else would you like to know?’ He slid her a speculative look that made her realise just how her question had sounded.

‘All about this ship,’ she said.

Reverend Dr Gunner smiled, only too happy to oblige.

Raven was bigger than Coyote, but the lower deck was much the same. There were more cabins and the deck contained not cargo, but long guns. Better gunnery than Coyote carried. So much better that it made her blood run cold. Two rows of guns, some carronades, others long nine pounders, and a few bigger, longer eighteen pounders, including two as bow chasers, lined up, all neat on their British grey-painted, rather than the American red-painted, wheeled truck carriages and secured in place by ropes and blocks. There were also sets of long oars neatly stored and ready for use, something that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up.

‘You are oared,’ she said weakly.

‘They do come in handy at certain times when the wind does not blow. And we are sufficiently crewed to man them easily enough.’ The priest smiled. ‘We are also carrying extra ballast to make us lie low in the water,’ he explained. ‘To give the illusion we are heavily laden with cargo.’

‘You were deliberately posing as a merchantman.’

‘Captain North’s idea. He said that when you have a whole ocean to search for La Voile the easiest thing would be to have him come to us. He said it would work.’

‘And it did.’ A shiver ran through her at North’s cold, clever calculation and how easily and naïvely she had stepped into his trap.

‘It did, indeed, Mrs Medhurst,’ Gunner agreed with an open easy smile as he led her into a room that was lined with wooden and metal hospital instruments.

Her eyes ranged around the room as he spoke, taking it all in, and stopping when they reached the huge sealed butt in the corner. The sudden compassion on Reverend Dr Gunner’s face and his abrupt suggestion that they progress to the upper deck confirmed the butt’s macabre contents: Tobias. She was relieved to follow the priest up the ladder out into the fresh air and bright sunshine. But the relief was short lived.

North was already out on deck, taking the morning navigational reading, chronometer, sextant and compass clearly visible; a man absorbed in his task. The blue-sheened raven sat hunched on his shoulder, as if it were party to the readings.

His shirt was white this morning, not black, and he was clean shaven and hatless, so that she could see where the sun had lifted something of the darkness from his hair to a burnished mahogany. It rippled like short-cut grass in the wind. In the clarity of the early morning light his golden tanned features had a harsh handsomeness that was hard to deny. But even a rattlesnake could look handsome; it did not mean that she liked it any the more.

North saw her then, cutting those too-perceptive eyes to her in a way that brought a flutter of nerves to her stomach and prickle of clamminess to her palms.

He gave her a small nod of acknowledgement, but he did not smile. Indeed, his expression was serious, stern almost. Nor, to her relief, did he make any movement towards her. Instead he turned his attention back to his measurements and calculations.

‘Do not mind North,’ said Gunner with good humour. ‘It is his manner with everyone. He is a man who takes life too seriously and works too hard.’

As she followed the priest over to the stern of the ship, her eyes scanned the ocean behind them and saw the distant familiar shapes of islands across the water, but nothing else.

She leaned against the rail, feel the cooling kiss of the sea breeze, noticing both its strength and direction as she watched the frothy white wake Raven left behind her. Just looking at the ocean, just being on it, never failed to comfort her. Her gaze dropped to the tall lettering that named North’s ship, tall and clear and stark white against the rich black paint of the stern. Raven.

‘There was no name upon this ship when the pirates approached.’ She looked at the priest with a question in her eyes. ‘I am sure of it, sir.’ But was she? Had such a basic mistake brought her to this situation? ‘At least, I thought I saw nothing and I sure was looking to see who you were.’

‘Do not doubt yourself, madam. There was no name for the pirates to see. Look more closely.’

She walked toward the stern and leaned over it to examine the painted name, and saw exactly the device North had used. ‘There is a long black plank, like a frame fixed above the lettering.’

‘Largely invisible from elsewhere. It can be flipped down to cover the name.’

‘How clever.’ So clever that it frightened her.

‘It is, is it not? North is clever.’

‘How clever?’ she asked, needing to know the full measure of the man who was her enemy.

‘Do you know anything of ships Mrs Medhurst?’

‘I do,’ she admitted with a nod. ‘Both my father and grandfather were shipwrights and sailors. There have been sailors in my family for as far back as can be remembered.’

He smiled. ‘Then look up at Raven’s sails and rigging.’

She did as he bid and what she saw stole the words from her tongue. Gone was the tatty patched ordinary canvas found on many merchant schooners, and in their place was a large spread of pristine-looking sails. She felt the prickle of cold sweat at the sight.

‘And our hull is longer and sleeker than most ships of this size. North’s own design. The combination of the hull design and the sail spread allow us uncommon speed and manoeuvrability, making us faster than most pirate ships.’

‘I did not see any gun ports either for the guns below.’

‘Optical illusion.’ Reverend Dr Gunner smiled again. ‘We are carrying eighteen big guns, as well as several small swivel guns.’

Compared to Coyote’s arsenal of eight guns.

‘Our men are drilled to fire one-minute rounds. And—’ he could barely contain his excitement ‘—we have a special powder mix that extends the range of our shot.’

‘Oh, my!’ she said softly.

‘Not to mention our personal weaponry.’ He pulled part of the enormous cutlass from the scabbard that hung from his left hip, to expose a small section of the silver shining blade. ‘It is a special high-tensile steel from Madagascar. There is nothing to match its combined hardness and flexibility. And we carry an armament that would kit out an army. We are the very best, or, depending on whose point of view one takes, the very worst of what sails upon these seas. We can best any pirate.’ He smiled again.

Kate thought of Coyote out there somewhere behind, following Raven. ‘I see.’ She forced the curve to her lips, but inside her stomach was clenched with worry and there was a cold realisation spreading through her blood.

‘Wonderful, is it not?’

Wonderful was not the word Kate was thinking to describe it. The priest was awaiting her reply, but she was saved from having to make one by the arrival of a call that rang out from the crewman in the rigging.

‘Ship ahoy!’

It was the words that until only a few minutes ago Kate had been praying to hear. Now, in view of what Reverend Dr Gunner had just told her, they left her with mixed emotions.

* * *

‘South-south-west.’

Kit scanned the horizon in that direction and saw the tiny spot. Raising his spyglass to his eyes, he trained it hard upon the ship and focused.

He heard the familiar tread of Gunner’s boots strolling over towards him. He heard nothing of the woman, but knew she was there from the reassurances Gunner was speaking to her.

They stood there quietly by his side, the woman between him and his shipmate. Gunner, not wanting to interrupt Kit’s concentration, stood content and quiet in his own meditations.

The silence stretched.

It was the woman who broke it.

‘What do you see, sir?’ she asked.

‘A schooner.’

‘Is it the pirates? The same pirates...?’

He snapped the spyglass shut and turned to look at her. ‘It is difficult to say at this distance.’

He felt that same slight prickle of tension and hostility that emanated from her.

‘Mrs Medhurst is understandably a little nervous,’ Gunner said. ‘I have tried to convince her of our superior strength, but...’ He smiled and gave a shrug of his shoulders.

‘Rest assured, ma’am, if Coyote is fool enough to come after us with vengeance in mind, then, as I am sure Reverend Dr Gunner has already pointed out, we will have disabled her before she is within range to fire her own guns. She has only eight small ones, mainly four and six pounders, nine if you include the swivel gun on the rail, to our eighteen larger.’

‘How can you know that?’ She looked pale in the bright morning sun.

‘I have a very good spyglass.’ He smiled. ‘And I counted.’

She swallowed and did not look reassured.

‘Calm your nerves, ma’am, if La Voile’s crew threaten violence they will go the same way as their captain.’

He saw the flicker of something in those eyes trained on the distant ship before she masked it, something that looked a lot like fear, there then gone.

‘Have I convinced you, Mrs Medhurst?’

‘Yes, Captain North, I do believe you have.’ Her eyes held his and she smiled, but it was not an easy smile. ‘May I?’ Her eyes flickered to the spyglass in his hand.

She could not have known what she was asking. A sea captain did not lend his spyglass lightly. But she stood there patiently waiting, with those Atlantic grey eyes fixed on his. There was no sign of any fear now. She seemed all still calmness, but he sensed that slight tension that underlay her. Her hands were steady as she accepted the spyglass and peered through it, adjusting its focus to suit her eyes. She looked and those tiny seconds stretched.

At last she closed the spyglass and returned it to him, their eyes meeting as she did so.

‘Thank you.’ Her American lilt was soft against his ears. ‘If you will excuse me, gentlemen. I think I will retire to my cabin for a little while, if you don’t mind.’

They made their devoirs.

His eyes followed her walking away across that deck to the hatch, the gentle sway of her hips, the proud high-held head. Despite the faded black muslin, chip-straw bonnet and bare feet, she had an air about her of poise and confidence.

‘She is afraid,’ said Gunner softly.

‘Yes,’ agreed Kit, his gaze still fixed on her retreating figure. She was afraid, but not in the way any other woman would have been afraid. There was a strength about her, an antipathy, and something else that he could not quite work out.

He glanced up to find Gunner watching him.

‘Is it Coyote?’ Gunner asked with just the tiniest raise of his brows.

‘Without a doubt,’ replied Kit smoothly.

* * *

Kate closed the door of the cabin behind her and leaned her spine against it, resting there as if she could block out North and the situation she found herself in.

If La Voile’s crew threaten violence, they will go the same way as their captain. North’s words sounded again in her mind, and she did not doubt them, not for an instant. Not because of rumours or reputations, but because she had seen the evidence with her own eyes.

Her men were coming for her. And they would most definitely threaten violence. Raven’s sails made her fast. But not faster than Coyote.

Sunny Jim was an experienced seaman. He would see the change in Raven’s sails, but he would not see anything that was designed to stay hidden. Not the long-range guns or their number, or the fact Coyote would be hit before she could fire a shot. Not the weaponry aboard, or, worse than any of that, the mind of the man who was a more formidable enemy than any fireside tale foretold.

He would not realise that Coyote did not stand a rat’s chance against Raven.

Have I convinced you, Mrs Medhurst?

He had more than convinced her. She had seen the cold promise in those eyes of his, the utter certainty.

Fear and dread squirmed in her stomach. She thought of Sunny Jim and of how much she respected the old man who had been her grandfather’s friend. She thought of young John Rishley and how he had his whole life to live in front of him. She thought of each and every man upon Coyote. She knew them all and their families, too.

‘Sweet Lord, help them,’ she whispered the prayer aloud. ‘Make them turn back.’

But they wouldn’t turn back. She was their captain. They were coming. She knew it and North knew it, too. If her men reached Raven, their fate was sealed and the knowledge chilled her to the bone.

She couldn’t just let it happen. She couldn’t just let them sail unwittingly to their deaths.

So Kate sat down at the priest’s little desk and she thought and she prayed, but no answer came. And then she remembered the distant islands and how all of the attention of North and his crew would be on Coyote growing steadily bigger. The first tiny hint of an idea whispered in her ear. She knew these waters, all of their layout and what was in them and on them. Any good Louisiana privateer or pirate did. And Sunny Jim was a good Louisiana pirate, too.

It was not the best of plans, she knew that. It was risky. It could go wrong in so many ways. But it was the only plan she could think of, and she would rather take a chance with it than sit here and let her men sail to their doom. Anything was better than allowing their confrontation with North.

Pulling up her skirts, Kate unbuckled the leather straps of her holsters and hid them with her weapons beneath the cot. Then she smoothed her skirts down in place, and, with a deep breath, made her way to the upper deck to wait for the right moment.

* * *

‘We need to veer to the north,’ said Kit. He stood on the quarterdeck with Gunner, the two of them pouring over the navigational chart that covered this area. With one of his men dedicated to watching Coyote full time, Kit could get on with navigating Raven through these waters. ‘Regardless of what the charts say, we do not want to be too close to that cluster of rocky outcrops, or what lies beneath.’

Gunner gave a nod. ‘One cannot always trust the charts and it is better to be safe than sorry.’

‘Bear to larboard, Mr Briggs,’ Kit gave the command to his helmsman. Raven began to alter course ever so slightly, taking her in a broader sweep clear of the rocks.

‘Clearly visible in daylight, but at night, in the dark... I bet there have been more than a few gone to meet their maker by that means.’

The two of them mulled that truth for a few minutes in silence as they watched those dark, jagged, rocky bases ahead. Kit would not mind meeting his maker. Indeed, over the years part of him had wished for death. But not quite yet.

His gaze wandered to Raven’s bow, to where Kate Medhurst had stood for so long, staring out at the ocean ahead of them. Now the spot was empty. He scanned the deck and saw no sign of her.

‘Where is Mrs Medhurst?’ His eyes narrowed with focus.

‘She was right there...’ Gunner stopped. ‘Maybe she wanted some shade from the fierceness of the sun.’

‘Some shade...’ Kit murmured the words to himself and in his mind’s eye saw the dark awning fixed across Coyote’s quarterdeck. Something about the scene niggled at him, but he could not put his finger on why.

‘Probably returned to her cabin.’

‘When the cabins are like sweat boxes and there is shade behind us?’ Kit raised an eyebrow and met Gunner’s gaze. ‘How long has she been gone?’

‘No idea. Could be two minutes, could be twenty. Some time while we were engaged with the charts.’ Gunner was looking at him. ‘Call of nature?’

‘Perhaps.’ But he had a bad feeling. ‘Better to take no chances.’ They both knew he was responsible for her safety while she was aboard Raven.

‘Has anyone seen Mrs Medhurst?’ Gunner asked of the crew.

‘Lady went below some time since,’ Smithy answered from where he was holystoning the deck.

Kit and Gunner exchanged a look and went below.

Kit gestured his head towards Gunner’s old cabin that, for now, belonged to Mrs Medhurst. Gunner nodded and went to knock on the door.

There was only silence in response. Gunner opened the door, then glanced round at Kit with a shake of the head.

‘The head?’ suggested Gunner. ‘I will let you check that one.’ He grinned.

‘You are too kind.’ But Kit didn’t balk from it. He headed to the bow and knocked on the door that led out onto the ship’s head. There was no one outside. But folded neatly and tucked in behind the ledge was black dyed muslin. Kit lifted it out and Kate Medhurst’s dress fluttered like the black flag of a pirate within his hand.

‘What in heavens...?’ Gunner shot him a worried glance.

The two men looked from the dress outside to the open platform of the head.

‘She cannot possibly have... Can she?’ Gunner whispered in horror.

Kit stepped out first on to the ledge of the head with Gunner following behind.

‘Hell!’ Kit had not cursed in eighteen months, but one escaped him now. For there in the clear green water a distance from Raven was Kate Medhurst, swimming smoothly and efficiently with purpose. Oblivious to the two men that stood watching her, and oblivious, too, to the sinister dark shape beneath the water out near the rocky outcrops.

Kit and Gunner’s gazes met and held for a tiny fraction of a second and then they were running full tilt for the upper deck.