James Forrester: The Roots of Betrayal

Ascension Day, Thursday, May 11, 1564

Everybody knew at least one story about Raw Carew. There was the matter of his birth: the illegitimate son of an English captain who abandoned his mistress to die in a Calais whorehouse. There was his refusal to surrender when Calais fell to the French in 1558. Although only seventeen, he had commandeered a ship and fought his way out of the harbor. Then there were the stories of his courage. Some of these were true, such as his boarding a Spanish vessel by jumping on to the rigging from the main mast of his ship in a heaving storm. Others were only loosely based on events or were fictitious. But even the tallest stories carried a modicum of truth. They were all wrought around an extraordinary man-brave as well as capable, regardless of whether the tale told was one of courage, seduction, loyalty, or revenge.

If William Gray, the captain of the Davy , had known that Raw Carew was at that moment in a skiff just two hundred feet away from his ship, he would have paid less attention to the young girl in his cabin and more to his crew, who were laughing, playing dice, and drinking by the dim light of the candles and lanterns on the main deck. Attack was the last thing on his mind. The ship was safe, anchored in Southampton Water, only four miles from the port itself. Gray knew that Sir Peter Carew was at that very moment patrolling the Channel with five ships and a royal warrant to hang pirates. The idea that Sir Peter’s own illegitimate nephew might take a vessel from its overnight mooring was unthinkable. Besides, Gray’s men had worked hard to sail so far that day. Leaving the Thames estuary five days earlier, they had been hit by a storm and had had to take shelter in Dover. It would not have been reasonable for Gray to insist that they stay on guard all night. The long hours in the rigging had been cold, and the wind coming up the Channel had delayed them. They deserved a rest.

***

Hugh Dean looked up at the black silhouette of the Davy . He had been the quartermaster on Raw Carew’s last ship, the ill-fated Nightingale , and retained his position as second-in-command. The smell of seaweed filled his nostrils as he crouched in the prow of the skiff. It was a new moon; the thinnest silver starlight touched the taut anchor chain and furled sails. He waited, listening to the lapping of the water and the slapping of the rigging in the brisk south-westerly wind. As the skiff came up to the Davy , he reached forward and placed his hands against the wet caulking of the hull, softening the impact. He whispered a single word-“Go!”-and the two men behind him hurled grappling irons over the starboard gunwales. They made sure they had caught, then started climbing the side of the boat. Two more men followed them. Three others could not wait and, having gained a handhold on an aperture or grabbed a piece of trailing rigging, they too pulled themselves up the wooden wall of the ship. Hugh Dean himself was one of these, determined to be at the front of any fray-the quartermaster’s proper station.

On the far side of the Davy , Raw Carew’s skiff also touched the ship. Up went the grappling irons and Carew began to climb, followed by his men.

The silence was broken by a shout. “Who’s there?”

Several men ran to the source of the noise, their feet thundering on the timber. A moment later, a throttled yell was heard as the sailor tried to call out again while a man cut his throat. A second guard, hearing the commotion, stamped hard, shouting, “Boarders! Boarders-on deck-” They were his last words. A sharp blade sliced through his gullet and sent a spurt of blood splashing onto the planking. A third guard did not even have the chance to cry out; a hand closed over his mouth and a dagger was forced through his back and into his lungs, once, twice, and then a third time. His killer felt the man’s weight crumple onto the deck. He threw the body against the gunwale and tipped it over the edge. It fell with a huge splash.

Only a handful of the fifty men below in the stinking dimness of the main deck heard the first shout. But all of them heard the stamping, the running, and the splash. Many hurried toward the ladder and climbed, only to find the hatch above them shut fast-locked from the outside.

They listened in fear. There was a second splash of a body into the sea, then a third. They could hear men striding across the deck above their heads. Hands fastened on the hilts of knives. Those with swords and daggers seized them and prepared for a fight. A ship’s lantern fastened to the base of the main mast flickered and went out, so that there was even less light. The boatswain of the Davy signaled for men to surround the ladder.

A full minute passed. Then they heard the creak as the heavy hatch was lifted.

Raw Carew stepped down slowly, into the candlelight. He was not tall. His only physically imposing feature was his upper body muscle, especially his powerful arms. He could climb a rope without having to touch it with his legs. His twenty-three years of hard living showed in his face, but they had not marred his good looks. His short blond hair stood on end, somewhat tousled. Smiling blue eyes darted between the men below deck, checking the shadows for possible lines of attack while preserving a confident expression. They were kind eyes: under their gaze each face unwittingly gave itself up for his examination. Four or five small golden earrings studded each ear. His velvet jerkin and linen shirt hung loose in an outlandish fashion. He wore a red scarf around his neck and several gold rings, including an enameled yellow one, with three black lions, on his middle finger.

The man nearest to the ladder challenged him with a blade, holding it up before his face. Carew raised an arm and gently pushed the blade to one side. The crew could see that he was carrying no weapon. His easy manner left them confused. A tall black man in his thirties, bald and bearded, with the furrowed brow of a general on the field of battle, followed him. His hand on a cutlass, with another blade in his belt, he looked around in the wick-lit darkness. The black-haired figure of the quartermaster Hugh Dean was next through the hatch, his leather jerkin and belt stuffed with three pistols. He also carried a pistol in each hand, and he pointed them at whatever caught his attention. His grinning eyes and the gun barrels flicked from man to man. His expression had all the relish of a huge bear that has just come across a pool of salmon.

The pirates came in a stream: the diminutive Stars Johnson, dreamy eyed, pale skinned, and armed with a dagger; the fat, bald figure of John Devenish, in a huge white shirt, flouncy blue breeches, carrying a curved Moorish blade. Then the next man and the next.

As Carew’s men assembled around him, he looked at the crew of the Davy . “Stay rested, all of you. We have no argument with you. But I will have words with-” There was a movement and a shout from a man nearby and a deafening explosion resounded through the vessel.

The noise subsided to a deep laugh. “Come on, more of you-come on!” Hugh Dean roared, shaking the still-smoking pistol in their faces. The smell of burnt gunpowder scorched the fug of the main deck. Only then did some of the crew see, in the dim light of the tallow candles, that the fallen sailor’s head had been blown clean away, leaving a raggedy stump, and blood splashed all over the beams.

“As I was saying, I wish to have words with the captain,” finished Carew, turning to the door beside him. More men came down through the hatch. He tried to unlatch the door; it was locked. “Hugh,” he said, placing a hand on the quartermaster’s shoulder. “If you please.”