It took a little while for the Buzzard to adapt his tactics, but in the end he cornered the second man and left him lying with his stomach wide open and his guts strewn around him in a red, steaming stew of viscera, blood and sand.
By the time the third hapless wretch set foot in the yard, the Buzzard was into his rhythm and despatched him in a matter of seconds.
‘I’ve had enough,’ Aleena said with a tone of spoiled, pampered boredom.
‘Good,’ Jahan replied, ‘we have much better things to do than this.’
They departed without the slightest nod to the Buzzard, making it perfectly plain that he was of utter insignificance to their lives. He was shocked to find that he was hurt by Aleena’s indifference, like a schoolboy who has just seen the girl after whom he pines walk off to the woods with the village bully. But then he was snapped out of his reverie by a new, much harsher voice calling down from the gallery.
‘Hey, masked man!’ The Buzzard looked up to see a massive tree-trunk of a man. He was shaven-headed and bare-chested, with upper arms that were thicker than any normal man’s thighs. ‘My name is Ali! I am your trainer, and you have work to do. His Highness wants me to turn you into a fighter and so that is what I am going to do. So stay alert, keep moving. And do not stop until I tell you. This is both an order, and my sincere advice. Do you hear me?’
The Buzzard nodded.
‘Good,’ Ali continued. ‘For the men you will meet now are younger and stronger, and you must believe me, masked man. If you do not kill them, they will certainly kill you.’
The trainer was as good as his word. The next two condemned men stretched the Buzzard to the limit as he struggled to manoeuvre them into a spot where he could have them at his mercy. The sixth man carried a stave that the Buzzard had to fight past before he could kill him. The seventh landed several good blows on the Buzzard, who was now shattered and so short of speed and strength that it was only the very real fear of joining the other dead men scattered about the yard that gave him the energy to prevail in the end. One final, weak, exhausted stab finished off his final opponent and then the Buzzard slumped to his knees feeling gorged on death and sick of killing. He was so tired he hardly felt the fingers that prised the sword from his hands. So tired that the first time he knew that he was about to leave this hellish place was when he felt the tug of the chain and was almost dragged up onto his feet and out of the yard.
The Buzzard was shattered, starving and parched. When he got back to his quarters, an African house-slave lifted the spout of the watering can to the mouth hole of his mask and he gulped the cool water down with desperate, helpless eagerness. His djellaba was removed and he was led to a hot bath, filled with soothing oils that helped relax his tortured muscles. When he had been dried and given a clean garment to wear he was fed the large bowl of sloppy, mashed up chickpeas, vegetables and minced meat that was his meal for the day.
Later, after the Buzzard had slept for a while, Jahan came to him. ‘You did well today,’ he said. ‘Ali will train you every day from now on. Sometimes you and he will work alone. On other occasions you will be taken to the prison to test what you have learned. There are many men there who can be killed without anyone missing them.’
Jahan stepped up to the Buzzard, placed a hand on his shoulder and looked intently into his eye. ‘Aleena is an extraordinary woman, isn’t she?’ he said, almost as a friend, one man to another.
‘Yes,’ the Buzzard said, for he was allowed to speak to Jahan in private.
‘Sometimes I cannot decide if she is a witch, a whore, or a goddess … or maybe she is all three. It was astonishing to witness, the way that she could give pleasure, even to something like you.’ He paused and then added, ‘She aroused you, didn’t she? As much as you can be aroused.’
‘Yes,’ the Buzzard repeated, and there was a throaty huskiness to his voice now.
‘And you would like her to pleasure you properly, I am sure.’
‘Oh God yes … please … yes.’
Jahan gave the Buzzard a rueful smile. ‘I thought as much. But you will have to wait a while yet for that trip to paradise, for neither Aleena, nor any of my concubines, will so much as touch you until you have fulfilled the purpose of your existence and killed Captain Henry Courtney.’
‘But then …?’ the Buzzard asked.
Jahan smiled. ‘If you kill Courtney, and you make him pay for all the indignities he has forced upon both of us, and upon my people, and upon our cause, then you can have one of the jewels of my harem – perhaps even Aleena if I have tired of her by then – as my gift. You may keep her and do with her whatever you please. Think on that, why don’t you, tonight, as you try to bring yourself even some of the pleasure with your fingers that she would surely give you with hers.’
illiam Pett was a fastidious man: unusually so, some might say. Hal had lent him the use of his olive oil and barilla ashes soap and he had sluiced himself down with buckets of sea water, ridding his skin of the coating of filth, sweat and other excretions that had accumulated upon it during his time locked away in that fetid cockpit on the Delft. His concern for bodily hygiene was not, however, the only factor that made him more conspicuous than ever amongst the company that gathered every night at the captain’s table.
Unlike the other men around that table, whose faces were weathered by wind and salt water and brown as the Bough’s timbers from years beneath the African sun, Pett’s face was the ashen white of a high-born European. He had somehow travelled to Bombay and then spent a number of weeks on the Earl of Cumberland without acquiring so much as a faint glow of colour in his cheeks, and captivity had only made his pallor even more pronounced. This somewhat deathly aspect was emphasized by his gaunt face and thin, wiry-limbed physique. Hal and his crew were still consuming the last of the fresh food taken aboard before they left, and Judith had passed on tactful words of advice to the ship’s cook about the use of spices to add heat and flavoursome seasoning to food that was half rotten.
Two more nights had passed since Hal told his story. In the interim he had sent a skeleton crew of his own sailors to man the Delft, under the command of boatswain John Lovell, and the two ships were now sailing in line astern, though their progress was slow as the wind still refused to pick up. The captured Dutch sailors continued to be held in confinement while Hal decided what to do with them, but they were not shackled, they received the same food and drink as the rest of the ship’s company and they were given time on deck twice a day to stretch their legs, feel the sun on their backs and breathe some fresh free air. As for Tromp, Hal had thought back to the courtesies his father extended to those he defeated and decided that, even if the Dutch captain’s cargo of newly minted relics suggested he did not behave like a gentleman, he would still be treated like one and be invited to dine every night at the captain’s table.
Judith’s culinary advice had ensured that tonight’s main course, a mutton curry served with ship’s biscuit, had been tasty enough. The others had wolfed it down, but Pett did not so much eat his portion as move it around his plate. These eccentricities might easily have made him unpopular with his dining companions, but his profession demanded an ability to fit in with other people in almost any situation and he had taken trouble to make himself sufficiently agreeable that his presence at dinner was enjoyed, rather than endured, by those around him.
So Hal was smiling as he passed the wine decanter down the table and said, ‘Wet your whistle, Mr Pett. You made me tell you my story two nights ago. Now it is your turn. What twists and turns of fate led you to the particular patch of ocean from which Captain Tromp here …’ for the Dutchman had, at Hal’s suggestion, been invited to eat with them, ‘kindly rescued you. And I give you fair warning, Tromp, I will expect your story too, for I fancy your journey has not lacked incident.’
The Dutchman gave a self-deprecating shrug. ‘There have been … one or two interesting moments,’ he said, with a lazy grin.
Pett had by now poured himself ha
lf a glass and taken a sip that a sharp eye might observe had consumed almost none of the wine. He cleared his throat and began. ‘As you may recall, I sailed from Bombay aboard the Earl of Cumberland. I had been in the Indies conducting a number of negotiations with local grandees on behalf of the East India Company, setting up trade agreements and the like. Those discussions had concluded and when I met Captain Goddings at the governor’s residence he very kindly agreed to find room for me aboard his ship, the Earl of Cumberland, which was bound for London with a cargo of saltpetre aboard.’
There was a hissing sound as Will Stanley and Big Daniel both drew in their breath. ‘I don’t mind admitting that would scare me half to death, that would. Like turning the ship’s hold into one great big magazine, just waiting for a single spark to make it blow,’ Stanley said.
‘Your fear would be entirely justified, as I shall recount,’ Pett said. ‘But all was good humour as we set sail. Captain Goddings seemed a cheerful, hearty sort of fellow. He was greatly amused, I recall, by the nickname given to their ship by his crew, the Sausage.’
There was a very faint smattering of polite laughter before Judith said, ‘Forgive me, Mr Pett, but I don’t understand the joke in that name.’
‘Please do not be in the slightest bit discomfited, madam, for I confess I had not the faintest notion where any humour might lie either. Captain Goddings suggested it pertained to matters of meat and butchery. It seems the people of Cumberland are noted for preparing sausages to a particular recipe. Beyond that, I am at a loss.’
‘So tell us about this Sausage, or whatever she was,’ Ned Tyler asked, impatience getting the better of him. ‘Decent enough ship, then, was she?’
Pett nodded. ‘I would say so. Mr Goddings took great pleasure in regaling me with the particulars of her construction. I dare say he was keen to impress upon me what a privilege it was to be aboard such a vessel. In any case, he informed me that more than two hundred trees had gone into her. The pines for her mast and spars came all the way from the colonies but her heart was good English oak from the Forest of Dean. Or was it the New Forest? I confess I do not recall. But I can assure you, Mr Tyler, that all of her, from her masts and rigging to her sails and her great guns, were of the very best quality. For as a plain matter of business, the Company commissions merchant vessels of the very highest calibre, for its profits depend upon the arrival of its cargoes safe and sound.’
‘Captain Goddings’s name sounds familiar to me,’ Hal said. ‘I believe that my father knew him. Yes, now I remember. They fought together at the battle of Scheveningen in fifty-three. Father said he was a good man to have on your side in a ship fight.’
‘Ah, Scheveningen, that was some hot service,’ Ned Tyler said, shaking his grey head. ‘Too many good men sank to the sea bed that day. Good ships went down with ’em. We should have paid attention to the omens.’ He scratched the silver bristles on his cheek as he cast his mind back across the years. ‘The wind the night before was fierce as God’s wrath. Should have known the Lord was trying to tell us something.’
‘Enough of your old tales, Mr Tyler,’ Hal said, ‘or we shall never get to the end of Mr Pett’s story.’ He hoisted an eyebrow at Pett. ‘You must excuse Mr Tyler. As I am sure you know, we seafaring men are a superstitious lot.’
‘And with good cause,’ Tyler said. ‘Why, I was once coming out of a hostelry in Plymouth when a red-haired beauty came up offering her services to our boatswain before the lad had a chance to get a word in.’
‘Or anything else in, hey?’ Aboli said with a grin. Then he looked at Judith. ‘My apologies.’
‘There is no need, Aboli,’ Judith smiled. ‘I have spent the past year as the lone woman in an army of men. Rest assured, I have heard far, far worse.’
‘Now it is I who am at a loss. Forgive, me, Mr Tyler, but what was the significance of the boatswain’s encounter with the lady of ill-repute?’
‘Ned believes encountering a red-head before coming aboard ship brings bad luck,’ Hal explained to him. ‘Unless, that is, you speak to the fiery-haired harbinger of doom before she, or he – for the superstition pertains to males too – speaks to you.’
‘Ah, I see,’ Pett said. ‘And what happened to the young man after this encounter?’
‘Why he fell off the gangplank and sank like a stone.’ Ned shook his head again and clicked his fingers. ‘Gone just like that. Poor sod signed up to sail to the Cape and ended up drowning in Plymouth dock.’
‘Well I don’t put much store in superstitions, Mr Tyler,’ Pett said. ‘I put my faith in God first, and myself second. And recent events have convinced me that my trust in both is well placed. After all, I am here with you now enjoying this excellent food. Captain Goddings, his ship and all his crew, on the other hand, are merely bones and ashes on the sea bed.’
There was a muttering around the table at those bleak words that conjured up images that were rather too close to home for men who lived with the continual risk of death at the hands of the elements, their enemies and plain bad luck. Ned Tyler was about to say something, but Hal flashed him a warning look that told him to hold his tongue.
‘There will be no further interruptions, I can assure you, Mr Pett,’ Hal said. ‘Now if you please, sir, finish your tale.’
‘Of course, Captain. As I was saying, Captain Goddings was sailing back to London with a cargo of saltpetre. As Mr Stanley has already observed, this was a perilous venture and I hope you will all not think me wanting in courage if I say that I would not have boarded the Earl of Cumberland had I not wished – as I still do wish, I might add – to return to England, there to report to my masters at the earliest possible opportunity. So there is nothing to be said beyond, “There was a fire aboard ship.”’
He cast his eyes over the sombre faces around the table. ‘Well may you shake your heads, gentlemen, for even a landlubber such as I knows that fire at sea is the greatest peril of all. Indeed, your story last night, Captain Courtney, ended with just such an event. You, however, knew the cause of the conflagration that killed the, ah, Buzzard, as you called him. I do not know what started the fire on the Earl of Cumberland. I can only say that I was enjoying a convivial conversation with Captain Goddings in his quarters, as was our custom after dinner, when sounds of alarm and panic came to our ears. A moment later, in burst a crewman, his eyes wide with fright, crying out in panic, “Fire! Fire!” and then, “Come quick, Captain! For the love of God come quick!”
‘Then the captain, courageous man that he was, thinking nothing of his own safety but only of his duty, left the room and marched towards the flames that were now sweeping through his ship, knowing as he did that he was going to his certain doom. At first, I followed him out onto the deck. Men were running hither and yon like flaming torches in the dark. Flames rose high into the night sky, higher than the mainmast itself, hurling innumerable sparks towards the stars and the sound of their crackling was like the rasping breath of Satan himself.’
‘So how did you escape, mijnheer?’ asked Tromp. ‘You who were, by your own words, wanting in courage.’
‘By God sir, I’ll ask you to withdraw that suggestion,’ Pett retorted.
‘Perhaps I misunderstood,’ Tromp said. ‘I thought I heard you say that you did not want to sail on this ship, filled with saltpetre, because you were wanting in courage.’ He looked around the table with an air of injured innocence. ‘Was I wrong?’
A sudden tension had descended on the cabin and Hal realized that it was up to him to intervene before things went too far. ‘You did indeed mistake Mr Pett’s meaning, sir. He was asking us not to think him wanting in courage, his point being that it was perfectly reasonable to be nervous about boarding a ship carrying a dangerous cargo. I am sure that, now that I have explained my meaning, you will agree that Mr Pett did not admit to any cowardice, nor can any reasonable man find fault with his sentiments.’
Tromp gave one of his lazy, beguiling smiles. ‘Ach! I have indeed failed to comprehend the m
eaning of your English language. Forgive me for being an ignorant, ah, cheese-head – that is the right word, no, for a Dutchman?’
‘Forgive you?’ said Mr Pett. ‘For a misunderstanding, yes, that I can forgive. But being locked in a stinking hole for no other crime than being a shipwrecked passenger … I’m a long way from forgiving that, Captain Tromp. A very long way indeed.’
‘As I have tried to say many times, that was simply for your own safety.’
‘Gentlemen! Enough! I will not have disputes of this kind at my table. Mr Pett, if you please, be so good as to finish your story, which lacks but one piece of information. How did you, alone of all the men aboard the Earl of Cumberland, manage to make your escape?’
Mr Pett said nothing for a moment. He was still fixing his cold, grey eyes on Captain Tromp. But then, as if waking from a dream, or even a trance, he snapped back to life and said, ‘Through the two forces in which, as I remarked earlier, I place my trust: the grace of God and my own initiative. I was blessed, as it transpired, by my own inadequacies. There was nothing whatever that I could usefully contribute to the crew’s efforts to contain the blaze. On the contrary, had I tried to assist them I should only have been in the way. That being the case, I was faced with a dilemma. Should I stay aboard the vessel, and risk going down with her if she sank? Or should I attempt to escape, knowing that I would be alone in the midst of the trackless wastes of the ocean?