by Dudley Pope
“You just told me,” Ned said calmly. “At Riohacha you told us the ships could be used for a plate convoy to Spain. Now you’ve made it clear that the Viceroy plans an attempt on the island.”
Sanchez swore violently and slammed his mug down on the table so hard that the rum left in the bottom jumped out and started spreading across the table.
Thomas asked: “What’s happening, Ned? I couldn’t follow all that.”
Secco, laughing delightedly, explained in English: “Oh, so neatly done! Mr Yorke trapped him! Now we know what the devils plan to do!”
Ned explained to Thomas and Diana what had been said – Aurelia had already followed the dialogue.
“So that’s what you meant about going for his pride!” Thomas exclaimed. “After you seemed to know all about it, he couldn’t claim to know nothing.”
“I don’t think it even occurred to him,” Ned admitted. “He just thought we knew – and I told him that as a hostage he’d probably get his throat cut. That’s an unsettling prospect, I imagine.”
“It could be,” Thomas agreed with a grin. “Was that why he slammed down his mug?”
“No, that was when I told him of my bluff. He has the Spanish fatalism about death.”
“What do we do?” Thomas asked. “Now we know they’re going to try to invade, we need to know when.”
“I don’t think they’ve decided on a date,” Ned said. “Don’t forget that the Dolphyn and Argonauta were taken to make sure they didn’t see any ships assembling. And this fellow–” Ned nodded towards Sanchez, “–gave no sign of knowing the date when I said that as a hostage he’d get his throat cut.”
Secco coughed and Ned glanced across at him. “I’ll find out,” the Spanish captain said. “There’ll be talk in Cartagena or Santa Marta, and the captain of some coasting vessel will have heard of it. I’ll take one or two and question the masters.”
Ned thought for a few moments. “I don’t like the idea of you going off alone.”
“There mustn’t be too many ships,” Secco said. “A single ship cruising along the coast – that’s one thing: no one gets frightened because he is probably smuggling. But two or three ships cruising together – why, everyone will stay in port, the buccaneers are out!”
This had already occurred to Ned, but the idea of Secco – a Spaniard who would die a horrible death if they ever caught him, because they would call him a traitor – alone on the coast seemed unfair on the man. But Secco wanted to sail alone; he could see that, ironically, there was danger in strength.
“Very well, but take no chances. No landing on the Main. Just question shipmasters. The date, within a week, that will be enough.”
Secco grinned cheerfully and stood up, bowing to Diana and Aurelia. He shook hands with Thomas and Ned and left the cabin with a light-hearted wave of his hand.
Chapter Sixteen
For the next two weeks the deck of the Griffin was a mess of cordage, with men hammering wooden fids as they spliced new rigging. New shrouds had to be eye-spliced and then the splice wormed, parcelled and served to protect it, so that the splice was covered as though by a glove to keep rain water out.
Halyards were unrove and stretched out on deck so that the new ones would be the same length, allowing for stretch. Every man on board, it seemed to Ned, was either tucking in a splice, or worming a rope by laying a thin line in the space between the strands to make the rope round, then parcelling it by passing a thin line round and round tightly, as though the rope was a cotton reel, finishing up serving it by stitching on the glove of canvas.
Before it was hoisted aloft the standing rigging was painted with Stockholm tar, and the servings covered with pitch. It was a tedious, messy job, and Ned was soon tired of the thud as a shroud or halyard was dropped to the deck, and the way that the smell of hot pitch bit the back of the nose, quite apart from the special precautions against fire that attended the heating of the pitch.
Over on board the Peleus Thomas was also using the time to change some of his ship’s rigging, and a few other of the buccaneer vessels, knowing that with the Griffin unrigged, nothing would be happening, used the time to replace rigging, coat their masts with linseed oil to preserve the wood, or put on a coat of paint.
“The ship smells like Mr O’Leary’s shop,” Aurelia commented wryly. “Linseed oil, new rope, pitch…all the things he has in his chandlery. And Stockholm tar: what a lovely clean smell!”
She pointed to a couple of dozen blocks hanging up on a line, where the wooden cheeks had been coated with linseed oil. “Those pulleys – like starlings on a clothes line.”
“Blocks, not pulleys,” Ned corrected her for what seemed the thousandth time.
“Blocks!” grumbled Aurelia. “Why a pulley on land becomes a block in a ship I don’t understand. And sheets! You sleep in them and use the same word for the rope that trims the sails. You English. No logic. Mouse, mice, but not house, hice.”
Ned grinned in agreement. “It is all part of a mystery made up by sailors to confuse land people,” he said. He pointed to one of the ropes lying on the deck. “Why would that be an eye splice in the end: why not a round splice? And why is the wooden piece inserted in it called a thimble, which is the name of the thing with which you protect your fingertips when sewing?”
Aurelia smiled ruefully. “All right, I’ll learn in time, but it’s very muddling.”
She pointed and exclaimed delightedly: “Ah, here come Diana and Thomas.”
As soon as Diana had come on board she confessed: “We are refugees. Thomas just gets bad-tempered with the ship in such a mess, and there is so much rope all over the deck I feel we’re trapped in a net.”
“Some fish!” Thomas commented. “An eel, maybe.” He turned to Ned, tugging at his beard and turning up the end. “We’re taking a chance changing our rigging around now.”
“I know, I feel completely unsettled with the ship helpless. But if we have to fight the Dons, I want to be sure of my shrouds and halyards! Anyway, we should get a day or two’s warning from Secco.”
“That’s another thing,” Thomas said miserably. “It’s a bit late to say it now, but it’s risky relying entirely on Secco. Supposing he’s captured, or loses his mast in a squall…”
“He wanted to go alone,” Ned pointed out, “and for a very good reason.”
“I know, but I keep looking over the Palisadoes and seeing a Spanish fleet approaching, and the Peleus with half her rigging down on deck.”
Ned laughed in what he hoped was a reassuring manner. “There are enough of our ships with their rigging still standing to drive off the Dons!”
“You hope so. But we don’t know how big those ships are that came from Spain. Supposing they’re frigates, or even larger.”
“Trouble,” Ned said succinctly. “We’d be in trouble. But do you think Spain has a dozen frigates to spare? If she has, she’d have sent them long before now, because you can be sure the King of Spain wants silver and gold. He’s always short of money, and he’s unlucky that he’s on one side of the Atlantic and his riches are on the other.”
“Yes, you may be right, he’d have sent them sooner,” Thomas admitted. “In fact,” he said brightening up, “he may have sent over a few merchant ships with a frigate or two to escort them. Frigates can’t carry much plate.”
“Nor troops, guns and horses,” Ned added.
He moved out of the way as some seamen began coiling up a rope. “Phew, it’s so hot here on deck. Let’s go below and have some limejuice.” He pointed at Thomas’ stomach. “That’s getting enormous. No rumbullion for you.”
“You sound like Diana,” Thomas grumbled. “She swears rumbullion is fattening; now she rations me to a glass of wine at a meal. I tell you, Ned, it’s no fun getting fat…”
They had been sitting in the saloon sipping juice
and gossiping for more than an hour when there was a banging on the door, and at a word from Ned, Lobb came into the cabin, looking excited.
“One of the men up the mast says he’s sighted Secco coming back. He’s certain it’s him.”
“How long before we’re rigged again?” Ned asked immediately.
“If we put some of the old rigging back, four hours,” Lobb said. “We’ve almost finished anyway.”
“Very well, just carry on; we’ll wait and see what news Secco has for us.”
It took half an hour for the Spaniard’s ship to get in and anchor, and another fifteen minutes before Secco himself arrived alongside the Griffin in his boat.
Before that, Ned and Thomas had stood on deck, inspecting the Spanish ship with the perspective glass.
“No sign of damage,” Ned said. “No scorching at the gunports. I don’t think he’s been in action.”
Nor had he: the Spaniard climbed on board laughing and joking and with a deep bow for Aurelia and Diana.
“What would you do if the Spanish fleet had been chasing me?” he teased Ned. “All your rigging down on deck! Would you attack with rowing boats?”
“We had faith that you’d give us plenty of warning.”
“Yes, I can do that. All the ships – nine merchant ships and a frigate – are waiting in Santa Marta.”
“Santa Marta?” Ned repeated, startled. “Not Cartagena?”
“No. From what I heard they will be embarking horses and troops at Santa Marta. The delay is because although the troops are coming from Panama, the guns and horses are coming from Caracas, so Santa Marta is more or less halfway.”
“From whom did you get this information – a ship?”
“I stopped three and had the same story. Then I went up to Santa Marta and had a look for myself. And then I came here.”
“What did you see in Santa Marta?”
“The nine merchant ships. Five of them are quite big – bigger than anything we have. And the frigate is about the same size as the Convertine.”
“The merchant ships – they are well armed?”
Secco nodded. “Unfortunately, yes. I think they had extra guns fitted for this voyage: I counted more gunports than I would have expected.”
“And there is no question but they are coming to Jamaica?”
“None,” Secco said firmly. “All three captains were sure of that: they knew the ships are just waiting for the troops, guns and horses. Some soldiers have already arrived in Santa Marta from Cartagena and Barranquilla. In fact one of the captains said there is trouble with the local people because the soldiers are behaving badly, drinking too much and insulting the women.”
“How many troops do you reckon these merchant ships can carry – allowing for horses and guns?”
“The five big ships – say six hundred men each, a score of horses, their guns and powder and shot. The four smaller ones – well, three hundred men and fifteen or so horses and guns.”
“Just over four thousand men,” Ned said. “We needn’t worry too much about the horses and guns; they’d have to be unloaded into boats, and that would take time. But four thousand men – say five thousand, just in case you’ve underestimated and the frigate carries some. Five thousand Spanish troops against a hundred or so of old Loosely’s militia, if he could ever get them together.”
“It sounds as though the Dons mean business,” Thomas said. “I was thinking – those merchant ships probably have more guns than any of our ships, and each one will have five or ten times as many soldiers as we have seamen…”
“Makes boarding us easy, doesn’t it?” Ned said. “One thing’s obvious…”
“It may be to you but it’s not to me,” Thomas grumbled.
“Well, we’d be silly to wait for the troops to embark, wouldn’t we?”
Ned sat for a while thinking while Secco poured himself rumbullion into a silver mug, one of a dozen Ned had taken on some earlier raid. Bigger ships, four or five thousand men, horses and guns…
Well, if the ships are bigger than those owned by the buccaneers, it will be silly to try and fight them at sea. If each carries a number of troops, the Spanish will try to close and board, and the buccaneers will be heavily outnumbered.
Probably the most important thing at the moment, Ned thought sourly, was to keep the information from Sir Harold: the last thing they needed was the governor interfering with ideas or wasting their time cavilling about commissions. If it was a question of saving Jamaica, Ned decided, the devil take commissions and, for that matter, Sir Harold Luce as well. If Luce knew the size of the threat to the island, he would probably panic. That was if he believed it. More than likely he would cast doubt on Secco’s news. Not just cast doubt but flatly contradict it.
Ned turned to the others. “First, we must keep all this from old Loosely.”
“By God, yes!” Thomas exclaimed. “Can you imagine, the place would be awash with cancelled commissions, demands that we don’t upset the Dons, and he’d want the Spanish governor and the bishop brought ashore to have their wigs powdered.”
Ned held up another finger. “Second, there’s no point in waiting to meet the Dons off Port Royal: if they’ve any sense they’ll try to board us and they have plenty of men.
“Third, and most important, if we destroy the ships they can’t sail anyway.
“Fourth, if we are going to destroy the ships it has to be before the troops embark, and that means, ladies and gentlemen, attack them in Santa Marta, as soon as possible.”
“You’re right Ned!” Thomas exclaimed. “A sudden raid, sail in, sink or capture, sail out and home – and then tell old Loosely!”
Secco put down his mug with a bang. “And it can be done,” he exclaimed. “When I think of what I saw in Santa Marta, there is room for us to get in to attack. There’s only one fort and the gun platforms are probably rotten. A splendid plan,” he said appreciatively.
Ned looked at Thomas. “Can you get your rigging up and be ready to sail by nightfall?”
“Just give me a couple of hours,” Thomas said.
Aurelia stood up. “I’ll go and tell Lobb,” she said. “He said four hours for our rigging, but once he knows we’re all waiting to sail he’ll halve that.”
“Tell him to send both boats round to call a meeting of captains on board here as soon as possible. Inside the hour. And the boats had better warn the captains that while they’re over here their mates should be preparing for sea.”
Secco said: “If you will give me pen and paper, I’ll draw a rough chart of Santa Marta with the position of the ships. The captains can look at it.”
Ned went to a drawer and took out a quill, pen, knife, ink, sand box and paper, putting them down on the table in front of the Spaniard. “Amuse yourself by making some copies,” he said. “You’ve plenty of time before the captains arrive. Put in as many soundings as you can…remember what happened to me at Santa Lucia!”
Ned watched Secco as he frowned and slowly drew from memory the chart of Santa Marta, which was on a stretch of coast running south-west and about seventy-five miles westward of Riohacha, towards Cartagena. Inland of it were the peaks of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, with the Pico de Santa Marta only a dozen miles away to the south-east.
Secco drew with his tongue protruding from the effort of concentrating. He held the pen like a man more used to wielding a sword than a quill, but the final chart contained all the information that a sailor needed.
As soon as he had drawn the first chart he glanced at Ned, as if asking for approval. Ned nodded appreciatively and Secco took up another sheet of paper and once again dipped the quill in the ink.
By the time the first of the captains arrived, Secco had drawn enough charts for each of them to have a copy and he put the cork back in the inkpot with a sigh. “I’m
glad I do not have to use a quill very often,” he said. “Just look at my fingers – more ink on them than on the paper!”
As soon as the captains had all arrived and assembled on the afterdeck – excited because they had all seen Secco return, and they knew where he had been – Ned as usual stood on the breech of the aftermost gun on the starboard side. He greeted the captains and then told them of Secco’s voyage and what he had found.
He described his plans for the attack. Then he said: “You have all got some blocks of pitch on board, and one of my boats is already collecting all that O’Leary has in his shop. I want you to take it and put it on board the three prizes we brought back from Grand Cayman. That’s the first thing. Then will you put half a case of powder on board each of them. That along with a demijohn of spirits. Not your best; if you’ve some rough stuff your men don’t like, that will be fine. Make sure you spread these things among the three ships; we don’t want it all on board one of them.”
Several of the captains looked at each other and nodded knowingly: they could guess what Ned had in mind.
Ned then described Secco’s patient work with the charts and he paused while Aurelia gave a copy to each of the captains.
“Most of you know Santa Marta already. That’s how the Spanish ships are anchored – or were, when Secco saw them. Some may have moved, especially if they are getting ready to embark the guns and horses. No one likes embarking horses, so you can be sure they’ll try and arrange as little boatwork as possible. But the dock is too shallow for some of the big ships to get alongside, so some boatwork is inevitable.”
When Ned had finished explaining and asked if there were any questions, Leclerc and Brace asked about soundings close in to the shore, where the four smaller ships were anchored. Then Coles asked about the hostage he had on board.
“Getting very sad is Sanchez,” Coles said. “Ever since he came over here he doesn’t seem to think about much except getting his throat cut. Asked me if I had any orders about it.”
