Caribbee Part 71

Off the portside, bearing down on them, was the outline of a tallmasted English wars.h.i.+p with two gun decks.

Before she could move, there were shouts from the quarterdeck above, then the trampling of feet down the companionway leading to the waist of the s.h.i.+p. He'd seen it too, and ordered his gun crews to station.

She pulled back from the window as a wave splashed across her face, and a chill swept the room, numbing her fingers. She fumbled a moment trying to secure the latch, then gave up and turned to head for the door. If we're all to die, she told herself, I want to be up with Hugh, on the quarterdeck. Oh G.o.d, why now? After all we've been through?

As she pa.s.sed the lantern, she noticed Serina, still bent over the African, still mumbling the strange words. . . .

"Do you know what's about to happen to us all!" The frustration was more than she could contain. "Come back over here and take a look."

When the mulatto merely stared at her with a distant, glazed expression, she strode to where she knelt and took her arm, pulling her erect. While she was leading her toward the open window, she heard a deep groaning rise up through the timbers of the frigate and knew the cannon were being run out. Winston had ordered a desperate gamble; a possible ordnance duel with a wars.h.i.+p twice the burden of the _Defiance_. Moving the guns now, when the seas were high, only compounded their danger. If one broke loose from its tackles, it could hurtle through the side of the s.h.i.+p, opening a gash that would surely take enough water to sink them in minutes.

"Do you see, senhora?" She directed Serina's gaze out the open windows.

"If you want to pray, then pray that that man-of-war doesn't catch us.

Your African may soon be dead anyway, along with you and me too."

"What . . . will they do?" The mulatto studied the approaching wars.h.i.+p, her eyes only half seeing.

"I expect they'll pull alongside us if they can, then run out their guns and . . ." She felt her voice begin to quiver.

"Then I will pray."

"Please do that." She whirled in exasperation and quickly shoved her way out the door and into the companionway. As she mounted the slippery ladder to the quarterdeck, she felt John Mewes brush past in the rain, bellowing orders aloft. She looked up to see men perched along the yards, clinging to thin ropes in the blowing rain as they loosened the topgallants. The_ Defiance _was putting on every inch of canvas, in weather where any knowing seaman would strike sail and heave-to.

"Good G.o.d, Katy, I wish you'd go back below decks. The Gloucester must have spied our sail when we doubled the Point." Winston's voice sounded through the rain. He was steering the s.h.i.+p all alone now, his shoulder against the whipstaff. Off the portside the English wars.h.i.+p, a gray hulk with towering masts, was rapidly narrowing the distance between them.

"Hugh, I want to be up here, with you." She grabbed onto a shroud to keep her balance. "They're planning to try and sink us, aren't they?"

"Unless we heave-to. Which I have no intention of doing. So they'll have to do just that if they expect to stop us. And I'd say they have every intention of making the effort. Look." He pointed through the rain. Now the line of gunport covers along the upper gun deck were being raised. "They're making ready to start running out their eighteen-pounders."

"What can we do?"

"First put on all the canvas we've got. Then get our own guns in order.

If we can't outrun them, we'll have to fight."

"Do you think we have a chance?" She studied the s.h.i.+p more closely. It seemed to have twice the sail of the _Defiance_, but then it was heavier and bulkier. Except for the _Rainbowe_, Cromwell had not sent his best wars.h.i.+ps to the Americas. This one could be as old as Hugh's.

"I've outrun a few men-of-war before. But not in weather like this."

"Then I want to stay up here. And that mulatto woman you took on board frightens me, almost as much as this."

"Then stay. For now. But if they get us in range, I want you below." He glanced aloft, where men clinging to the swaying yards had just secured the main tops'ls. As the storm worsened, more lightning flashed in the west, bringing prayers and curses from the seamen. "The weather's about as bad as it could be. I've never had the _Defiance_ under full sail when it's been like this. I never want to again."

After the topgallants were unfurled and secured, they seemed to start picking up momentum. The _Gloucester_ was still off their portside, but far enough astern that she could not use her guns. And she was no longer gaining.

"Maybe we can still outrun them?" She moved alongside Winston.

"There's a fair chance." He was holding the whipstaff on a steady course. "But they've not got all their canvas on yet. They know it's risky." He turned to study the wars.h.i.+p and she saw the glimmer of hope in his eyes, but he quickly masked it. "In good weather, they could manage it. But with a storm like this, maybe not." He paused as the lightning flared again. "Still, if they decide to chance the rest of their sail . . ."

She settled herself against the binnacle to watch the _Gloucester_.

Then she noticed the wars.h.i.+p's tops'ls being unfurled. Winston saw it too. The next lightning flash revealed that the _Gloucester_ had now begun to run out her upper row of guns, as the distance between them slowly began to narrow once more.

"Looks as if they're going to gamble what's left of their running rigging, Katy. I think you'd best be below."

"No, I . . ."

Winston turned and yelled toward the main deck, "John, pa.s.s the order.

If they pull in range, tell Canninge to just fire at will whenever the portside guns bear. Same as when that revenue frigate _Royale_ once tried to board us. Maybe he can cripple their gun deck long enough to try and lose them in the dark."

"Aye." A muted cry drifted back through the howl of rain.

"Hugh, I love you." She touched the sleeve of his jerkin. "I think I even know what it means now."

He looked at her, her hair tangled in the rain. "Katy, I love you enough to want you below. Besides, it's not quite time to say our farewells yet."

"I know what's next. They'll pull to windward of us and just fire away.

They'll shoot away our rigging till we're helpless, and then they'll hole us till we take on enough water to go down."

"It's not going to be that easy. Don't forget we've got some ordnance of our own. Just pray they can't set theirs in this sea."

Lightning flashed once more, glistening off the row of cannon on the English wars.h.i.+p. They had range now, and Katherine could see the glimmer of lighted linstocks through the open gunports.

"Gracious Lord, for what we are about to receive, make us truly thankful." John Mewes was mounting the quarterdeck to watch. "This looks to be it, Cap'n."

"Just keep on praying, John. And get back down on deck. I want every inch of sail on those yards."

"Aye, I'd like the same, save I don't know where exactly we've got any more to put on, unless I next hoist my own linen." He crossed himself, then headed down the companion way.

Suddenly a gun on the _Gloucester_ flared, sending an eighteen-pound round shot through the upper sails of the _Defiance_, inches from the maintop. Then again, and this time the edge of the fo'c'sle ripped away, spraying splinters across the deck.

"John! Tell Canninge he'd better start firing the second his guns bear.

And he'd best be d.a.m.ned quick on it too." Even as he spoke, a roar sounded from below and the deck tilted momentarily sideways. Katherine watched as a line of shot splintered into the planking along the side of the _Gloucester_, between her gun decks.

"d.a.m.n, he came close." Winston studied the damage. "But not close enough."

Again the lightning flashed, nearer now, a wide network across the heavens, and she saw the _Gloucester's_ captain standing on his own quarterdeck, nervously staring aloft at the storm.

"Katy, please go below. This is going to get very bad. If they catch this deck, there'll be splinters everywhere. Not to mention ..."

The _Gloucester's _guns flamed again. She felt the deck tremble as an eighteen-pound shot slammed into the side of the _Defiance_, up near the bow.

"John, let's have some more of those prayers." Winston yelled down again. "And while you're at it, tell Canninge to give them another round the second he's swabbed out. He's got to hurt that upper gun deck soon or we're apt to be in for a long night."

"Hugh, can't we . . ." She stopped as she saw a figure in a bloodstained white s.h.i.+ft slowly moving up the companionway.

"Good Christ." He had seen it too. "Katy, try and keep her the h.e.l.l off the quarterdeck and out of the way."

While he threw his shoulder against the whipstaff and began shouting more orders to Mewes on the main deck, Serina mounted the last step.

She moved across the planking toward them, her eyes glazed, even more than before. "Come below, senhora." Katherine reached out for her. "You could be hurt."