The Sea Officer Bentley Thrillers

by Jan Needle

  But Deb could hear him speaking to her, the drumming silence filled with words. A jumble, she imagined: he might be threatening, cajoling, offering a bribe. “If you save me,” the silent man told her, “all will be forgiven. You need not go with these black savage wretches; you need not die. You are white. You are beautiful. You will be saved, forgiven, made much of. You will come home.”

  His eyes were bright with agony, and Deb thought, with a rush of pity, that his back was broken. All around her, slaves were pleading that she should come on. Mabel took her by the wrist, her eyes bright with different pain from the old English gentleman’s.

  “Deb,” she said. “Deb-bee come. Deb come. Deb-bee.”

  And Sir Nathaniel could speak again. So quietly, with so much agony, that she had to stoop to catch the words.

  “Please help,” he said. “Don’t go. I beg of you — please help me.”

  *

  The story of the murder of the Spaniards spread like lightning round the Biter, but the officers — Slack Dickie most of all — were not privy to it for some good long while. Slack Dickie got his facts from the Lamont brothers, whom he invited to his cabin when the ships were lashed together side by side. Before the lashing was complete he had gone aboard her formally, and had them show him round the treasure room, which he found a trifle disappointing. As he had feared, the men who had escaped by cutter had loaded the very richest stuff up to the gunwales, and it was regrettable their boat had been so well-found and excellently handled. If she and they had sunk, none of this current difficulty would have arose.

  But the Scotchmen showed him to the holds as well, and there he saw great stacks and chests of silver and worked plate and metal, which made his heart damn near implode upon itself with relief and wonder. She was not a bullion ship as such, but the quantity of precious stuff still made his eyes bulge with something like the dizziness of joy. He could not start to guess a value for it, but there was enough to please the King and all their lordships, enough to give him and his officers prize money to make their mouths water, enough even to make the people cheer his name instead of sneering as they generally did. Enough also, he considered privily, to secrete some bits away, to hide a little hoard. Christ, it looked like wealth beyond the common dream.

  In the great cabin the Scotchmen took a drink, served them by a Black Bob who was more creeping shadow than a boy by now, and glowed quietly in Kaye’s approbation. They told him of the sharp work when the Dons had set on them, and commended barrel-chested Morgan, and Miller, for their part in it. They said they’d set a course to northward from the point where they had lost the Biter, assuming that the captain would guess it was their safest way and sail to intercept them. They shook their heads about the lack of sightings after that, quite ruefully. But these things happened, did they not? At sea you never knew, not ever.

  It was an hour after this that Bentley and Lieutenant Holt heard the other story. They had assessed the damage to the Santa as too great for any hope of evading capture if it came to chase, and had assessed the quantity of treasure that could be shifted to the Biter’s hold. Hatch covers on the prize had been stripped with great brutality, in fact the decks had been axed and dismantled where possible for ease of getting tackles down below to lift the heavy stuff. The ’tween-decks in the Biter had been cleared as if for action to make cargo room, although Henderson had argued with great passion when it was proposed some of his guns should lose their recoil-space to cram more silver in. Spare gear and lumber was earmarked to go overboard if necessary, although most bulky items — food, mainly — had been consumed in the months at sea. Speed of shifting rather than space available was the likely problem, everyone agreed. The Dons were in the offing somewhere and, inevitably, the weather was clearly on the slide. No great wind as yet, but a greasy swell was rising, which made the vessels grind together most uncomfortable. If it worsened much more, damage would ensue.

  Ashdown approached them as they re-emerged on deck, and both knew from his face that the Irishman had need of telling something. He looked to check the coast was clear, then dared touch Bentley on the wrist, and slipped sideways behind a boat. Sam, quick as ever, took a position to shield Ashdown from the general view, and they asked him what the matter was. Ashdown, calm and frank, said quietly: “They killed the Spaniards. They slaughtered them.”

  As he had heard it, it was a simple tale that rang completely true. Morgan and Miller, sober while in the Scotchmen’s thrall, had smuggled brandy from the Santa back on board, made free with it, and then begun to brag among their fellows. First of much small treasure that the five of them had hidden, which they intended they would make away with, then of the Spanish deaths, not in honourable combat but through the Lamonts’ treachery. When pressed for details, Ashdown said, they had spoken freely of the murders, but said almost nothing of the secret spoils. They had laughed, but made it clear they could not tell, on pain of instant death.

  “Myself, I fear discretion came too late to save them, sirs,” he added, with a sort of smile. “Loose tongues have signed their death warrants, I would say. Indeed, I fear for all our lives if those Scotchmen should live, the miserable bastards.”

  Work still had to be done, so Sam left Bentley to confront Kaye with the revelation, while he went off with Ashdown to direct men to gather gear to keep the treasure-transfer moving. Bentley found Kaye at his cabin table, on his own, not even a glass of wine left from his victory celebration with the Scots. He was sitting with a page of paper in front of him, playing with a pen as if to write things down. His face was dreamy. He was calculating endless wealth. Why else, thought Bentley, was he not on deck, as a captain ought to be at times like this?

  His irritation with this charming madman (as Sam had called him while they drank one night) robbed the careful phrases from his lips. Instead of circumspection he said baldly, “Sir, we must arrest the Scotchmen. They are murderers.” He thought he should go on, but could not. He had left himself with little else to say.

  Kaye looked him up and down, with nothing on his face but curiosity. He looked as if he thought Will mad.

  “Those Scotchmen, sir,” he said, in measured tones, “have saved your life and mine, and brought us riches to the bargain. Those Scotchmen, sir, are worth your weight in gold. What is this nonsense now? What mean you by this idiocy?”

  “Sir,” said Bentley, “they have killed the Spaniards that they saved from drowning. Five of them. It was cold-blooded villainy, and they should hang for it. I have it on best information.”

  “What information, Mr Bentley? Tittle-tattle, I’ll be bound. Jealousy and tittle-tattle from the meanest of the crew. The Lamonts told me how the Spanish died, sir, and I believe them, utterly. They rose against our prize-men as they were bounden by their country’s oath no doubt, and they were beaten. Fairly, Mr Bentley, very fairly; the odds were even, five ’gainst five.” He paused. “You know the Lamonts, sir, and Morgan is the strongest man I’ve ever seen. Do you think, fairly, that the Dons would stay alive in mixing with those men? They were bound to die soon as they rose, sir, and contra talk is filthy slander. It is unworthy, and must cease. Do you hear me?”

  Will felt a touch of sweat break out beneath his arms. The sky outside the large windows was metallic, coppery. The breeze had come erratic, the swell was rolling in. He licked his lips once more, harder. His mouth was drying in the growing heat. How could he warn Kaye of the danger that he faced from these cold and desperate men? How would he make him see?

  “Sir,” he said, “I think I must arrest them. I have been told — ” He was cut off by a roar of rage from Kaye, whose hand shot out, knocking his pen and inkhorn to the deck. Oddly, there was a sudden wail from behind the bed curtain, a wail of fright from little Bob. Then Kaye was on his feet.

  “Mr Bentley, sir, if you do not cease this folly, it is you will end in irons, not the Lamonts! They have done great service, sir, and you know it! I will not hear another word against them, not one word!”

 
Silence, at sea, is relative. All the ports and windows to Kaye’s cabin were open, all the doors to quarter galleries and the stern. Undoubtedly his shouting was audible on deck, and when it stopped, a different sort of silence drifted in from there. Noises of blocks and gear, and two hulls grinding as they rubbed, but not a human voice; a void.

  Until, thin and shocking, came a lookout’s cry, “A sail! A sail!” and in a moment the silence in the cabin changed. Kaye and Bentley stared into each other’s faces, mesmerised. Then they bounded for the door, Slack Dickie grabbing up a sword and spyglass as he ran. When they emerged, the decks and rigging of both ships were alive with men.

  “Where away?” Gunning was bellowing. “Damn you, where away?”

  Bentley sprang into the lower rigging and raced towards the main top like a squirrel. He had no glass but his eyes were good, and his luck was in. As he steadied himself to stare in the direction every man was indicating, he caught a flash of white that would be canvas, for a pound. He shouted down to Kaye, “I see him, sir, I see him! He’s coming square this way!”

  “What ship?” Kaye shouted back. “Is it the Dons? How far away? What ship is it?”

  No answer to that, but they had to fear the worst. From his vantage point, Will assessed the possibilities as bad. Biter’s hatches were open, her yards were cock-billed for the lifting tackles, her decks were strewn with sacks and boxes. As the swell had grown, so the warps and hawsers holding the two hulls together had grown in thickness and complexity, with bolts of gash rope and canvas torn from off the Spanish ship lashed and jammed between them as fenders. Even if they got axes to bear and cut everything in sight immediately, they could not be under way in less than God alone knew how long.

  “Gunning!” Kaye was shouting. “For Christ’s sake, man, I need some sense in this! How long before she gets here? How far is she? What time falls darkness hereabout?”

  Below him, Will saw Lieutenant Holt organising the dropping and stowage of the treasure crates still in the air or on the decks, while sending boatswain’s mates off to unrig the lashings and get the vessel clear to sail. He assessed the readiness of yards all round him, and shouted hands to get the ribands off and free up clew and buntlines. Then he shot down to the deck as fast as he could slide, and skipped across the bulwarks to the galleon.

  “How much still below?” he shouted at Jem Taylor. “We’ll have to leave it, Jem; we’ll have to go like lightning. Haul the men out. Don’t let them stay there gawping. We’ve got to go!”

  “Aye aye,” said Taylor, and roared down the open hatchway “Stand clear below! I’m going to let this drop! Come out, come out, we’re getting under way!”

  As men began to scurry, the boatswain signalled to a group tailing a tackle, and they let the falls run out. The crate of loot emerging from the hold shot back down with a screech of blocks, and hit bottom with a muffled crash. One man emerging seconds afterwards had what looked like a candlestick in hand, which Taylor snatched from him and tossed back down the hatch.

  “Get overside!” he shouted. “Back on the Biter. Watch your heads! Look out there, Thompson! That fall’s parting! Watch your back!”

  Men were running here and there like animals in a forest fire, but patterns were emerging fast. As the Santa was cast free from Biter, each man on the brig raced for his station, while Gunning took control of making sail, and con. But as the two ships drew apart, as the last sailor leapt from one rail to the other, three men, then four, then five, burst out of the Santa’s aft companionway and headed for the far side of the deck. They had bags with them, long canvas sea bags, and bundles tied in cloth, like marauding gipsies from the plains of Germany. The bags were heavy, but the men were quick, and helped each other. When they reached the rail, two dropped over out of sight, while the others let the bags and bundles down. As the last gear went, a light mast-pole head appeared above the capping, with a single sheave and halyard. It waved about until it found its seating, then settled, shipped. Angus Lamont stood on the Santa’s bulwarks, laughing as he waved towards the Biter, and his friends clambered down into the dandy skiff and hoisted a sail. Sweetface Savary, quicker than the seamen, grabbed a long musket and discharged it across the wide deck at the parting Scot, but Lamont only laughed the louder — fond farewell.

  Slack Dickie stood gaping, thunderstruck. Bentley, gaping also, had a thought: Perhaps he will believe us now, about his precious Lamont brothers! Perhaps he will believe us now. He saw Jack Ashdown, standing by a pin-rail. Good God, the man was almost smiling…

  And at that moment, a cry went up from the mainmast head.

  “A sail! A sail! Two points to west’rd of the other one! A sail!”

  “God damn it!” shouted Sam Holt, springing into the lower rigging. “It will be another Guarda! God damn it all to hell, it has to be!”

  TWENTY-SIX

  If Dickie had a thought about the Scotsmen, he had neither time nor grace to share it with his officers. The skiff, indeed, had become visible beyond the Santa’s bulwarks, and she was going well. But Kaye’s mind, in money matters, was as sharp as razors and had moved on from mere betrayal and his own false judgement. He had on board the Biter about half the treasure from the galleon, which meant a further fortune left abandoned (beyond the unknown part the Lamonts and their friends had taken in the boat) which he now planned to sink beneath the waves. Neither Will nor Holt could see their way to arguing with this, although they guessed it as vindictive. The Spanish may not have seen them yet, said Kaye, and if they could sink the ship, then slide away, there would be no evidence at all “to hang them with.”

  Will blinked at this choice of words, but accepted there was sense in it, maybe. Gunning cursed the “capting” for making his decision only after they had cast adrift — a charge of powder in the Santa’s bottom would have been the quickest way — but he allowed at this range they could hole her pretty quick and fatally. The only problem being that the noise and smoke of cannonade must certainly alert the Spaniards, if they were not deaf and blind! But Kaye’s mind had switched on to devious, and he saw another big advantage to be had.

  “Mr Gunner!” he shouted to the waist. “I want incendiaries; I want flaming bombs! I want to send her like a torch into the sky; I want her burning bright. But Mr Gunner, first: can you sink that jolly boat for me?”

  From the quarterdeck the dandy skiff was an enticing target, about two cable’s lengths away. In this wind, light and fluky, she was the ideal boat, and all on board knew there was no point in chasing her. The sea was rolling quite wildly, driven by some wind across the far horizon maybe, and she was laden heavy with her booty, but going very well. As Gunning said, she was a sea-boat, and the Scotchmen, whatever else, were seamen born. Holt added that there was heavy ballast, too, to be chucked overboard if need arose. When queried with a look of disbelief, he laughed.

  “I don’t mean the treasure, John,” he said. “I mean their two companions with big mouths. I would not bet a groat on those men’s chances with the Lamont brothers. Would you?”

  But Mr Henderson, a sober man, told Kaye it would be a waste of time and shot to try and blast the cockleshell. He said that he could set the Spanish ship on fire, though, or sink her, or do both. Looking westward to the horizon, he expressed his feeling that there would be darkness before long, so surely a burning ship would act as beacon, would she not? Slack Dickie said “precisely,” and gave the orders to proceed.

  “Set her ablaze, sir, if you please. I want her burning like a bright volcano, attracting every ship for miles around like moths. But put some holes in too — not many, judge it right, so that she’ll float a good long while. Afloat and blazing suits me very well, that is my purpose. Mr Bentley, will you get aloft, sir, and assess those Guarda men, if that is what they are? Have they seen us yet, what sail they’re carrying, some idea of speed? Mr Gunning, when we have set that tub afire, I want this ship to run off like the wind. I want everything she’ll carry set and drawing, I want her to fly.”

/>   Gunning, impolite as ever, gave a loud guffaw, suggesting they should throw the treasure over if they wanted to go quick, then set off to confer with Taylor and his mates. While Kaye commanded Holt, “You, sir. Make certain there is nothing English in our look, see if the sailmaker can mock up some Donnish cut in any of the upper sails. I wish to get away unscathed, but if they come close enough to see us in daylight, I don’t want them to have an inkling of who or what we are. If we have to fight, so be it. Now you see what all that gunnery I insisted on was for.”

  The cheek of Captain Kaye was marvellous, but Holt was more amused than anything by it. While he sought out skills to change the Biter’s looks, Henderson got to work with his best crews, and the blacksmith flashed up a brazier of bright coals. Across the water both Spanish ships (there was no doubt once they were in proper sight) piled on everything, to move down sluggishly on them in the failing, fitful breeze. The light was failing also, going from day to dark without the slow degrees enjoyed by Englishmen at home, but before too long Henderson reported he was ready to set the sky alight. Gunning took over at the con, a good helmsman was picked, and all hands took stations at their sheets and braces to lay the broadside sweet and handsome on their lumpen target, rolling in the swell. Working with the roll, at point-blank range, the gunner poured pound after pound of iron into the Santa, below the waterline, then dropped in seven red-hot balls about amidships, three feet above it. Not too much shot, not too much smoke, not too much to indicate they were a ship of war to the distant viewers, but within ten minutes of the cannonade’s cessation, flames licked out of the cripple’s holds, climbed mast and rigging, and ignited the furled sails. When night fell, the Santa was like a giant bonfire, placed between the coastguard ships and the English brig. The moon rose, but it was bleached out, overwhelmed, by the blazing beacon. Despite themselves, both Holt and Bentley gave their captain best.