Richard Woodman - In Distant Waters

He did not escape unscathed. He was cut twice about the face and received a deep wound upon his extended forearm. A ball galled his left shoulder and a pike thrust from the rear took him ignominiously in the fleshy part of the right buttock. He began to feel his strength ebb, aware that one last rally from his opponents would result in his death-wound, for he could fight no more.

His vision was blurring, though his mind retained that coolness that had saved him before and fought off the weakness of his reactions for as long as possible. A man loomed in front of him, he swung the sabre… and missed. Tensing his exposed stomach he waited for the searing pain of the pike thrust.

'Fuck me! It's the Cap'n!'

The pike-head whistled past his face as the wielder put it up. Suddenly all opposition melted away, there were friendly faces round him, men he had known once, long ago, long ago when he had commanded the Patrician …

But it was not Valhalla he woke to, nor had it been the faces of the dead he had seen. Some intelligence beyond mere consciousness had allowed him to faint at last, recognising his part in the fight need no longer be sustained. His men had followed him, wiping out the stain of their desertion.

Somewhere far above him voices were discussing him. Impertinent voices that spoke as though he was nothing more than a blood-horse whose health was uncertain.

'Will he pull through, Mr Lallo?'

'Of course, Mr Q, 'tis only a drop of blood he's lost. He'll save me the trouble of prescribing a remedy. There's nothing serious, though that cut in his glutens maximus will embarrass him…'

'His what ?'

'Arse, Mr Q. He'll not sit for a week without it reminding him of its presence.'

Quilhampton laughed. 'I'll go and see about some food…'

'Go and find him a bottle of port. Nothing reconstitutes the blood better than a fortified wine.'

'There's some excellent oloroso aboard the Virgen …'

'What a damnably blasphemous name… go and get some then…'

'You're a pair of impertinent dogs,' Drinkwater muttered, fully conscious.

'There, Mr Q, I told you recovery would be complete… welcome aboard, sir.'

'Thank you, Mr Lallo, how many men do we muster?'

'I believe they call you "Captain Mack",' Drinkwater said. His wounded buttock still troubled him and he preferred to stand, his back to the stern-windows, a grim imperturbable silhouette regarding his prisoner. Mack's eyes were defiant, truculent. He nodded, but held his tongue.

'I understood you did your hunting further south, amid the barrens of California.'

'They ain't barrens,' said Mack shortly, with a half-smile that was at once menacing and secretive.

'Perhaps not,' replied Drinkwater dismissively; he had learned the term in the American War and its precise meaning was unimportant now.

'You are a citizen of the United States of America, are you not?'

'I suppose I am…'

'You suppose ?'

'In so far as I'm under any man's jurisdiction. I reckon to be born free, Mister, I respect it in others, I expect it from them.'

'Meaning you could have shot to kill me when we disturbed you at your office?'

'Sure. I can hit a running moose…'

'You didn't respect the freedom of my men, you turned them over to the Russians.'

'Hell, Cap'n, that's bullshit. You didn't respect their freedom either, an' that's supposing they was free in the first place, instead of run from this here ship.'

Drinkwater smiled. 'But you didn't turn 'em over to the Russkies for love of Old England…'

'Sure as hell I didn't.'

Then why?'

'They was trespassin', Cap'n.'

'So were you, on Spanish territory. Did you sell 'em?'

'What the hell would I want with roubles, Cap'n?' the mountain-man answered contemptuously.

'I presume you require powder and shot,' Drinkwater replied coolly, 'and gold is always gold…'

A spark of something flared in the mountain-man's eyes, hostility, malice perhaps, Drinkwater could not be sure beyond knowing he had touched a nerve.

'You are a solitary, Captain Mack. A man apart. I do not pretend to understand your motives and my men would have you hang for your treachery.'

'I promised them nothing!'

'Maybe not. Would you have me hand you over to the Spanish authorities at San Francisco… ?'

Patrician lifted to the swell and leaned gently over to the increasing breeze as, on deck, Lieutenant Fraser crowded on sail. Drinkwater smiled with grim satisfaction, for a wave of nausea passed visibly over Mack's features.

'You will do as you please, I reckon,' he said with some difficulty. Drinkwater jerked his head at Sergeant Blixoe.

'Take him below, Sergeant.'

He could afford clemency. It was good to have them all back together. Fraser, Lallo, Mount, Quilhampton, even the lugubrious chaplain, Jonathan Henderson. He looked astern through the cabin windows where, under Hill and Frey, the Virgen de la Bonanza danced in their wake. Perhaps best of all was to see little Mr Belchambers's cheerful smile, for Drinkwater did not think he could have brought himself to have written to explain the boy's loss to his trusting parents. It was true that there were still men missing, men who had been pressed by the Spaniards to labour on the wharves of San Francisco, but for the great majority the raid on the outpost on the Columbia River had reunited them in spirit, wiping out memories of discontent, disloyalty and desertion. It was less easy for Drinkwater to forget the depths to which he had sunk, of how near he had been to suicide; less easy to forget the risks he had run in his desperation, but the raid had had its effect, paltry enough though it had been in terms of military glory. They had landed by boat in the mist of early morning in a brief and bloody affair in which all the advantage had been with the assailants. They had carried off all that they had not destroyed, even Tregembo's swine, setting fire to the fort with the same enthusiasm they had burnt the first brig.

Drinkwater turned from the stern windows and glanced down at the chart on his table. They would do the same to the Russian outpost at Bodega Bay, where the mysterious mountain-man had first enslaved his own deserters. His men would enjoy that and he could set free Captain Mack, leave him to his damnable wilderness. Then he would return to San Francisco. His heartbeat quickened at the thought of confronting the Arguello brothers. How unexpected were the twists of fortune and how close he had come to ending his own life in the cell below the Commandante's residence. If it had not been for Doña Ana Maria…

He forced his mind into safer channels. His first consideration was the destruction of the second Russian post at Bodega Bay.

Lieutenant Quilhampton jumped into the water of Bodega Bay and led the men ashore. They splashed behind him, Mount leading the marines, Frey with his incendiary party. They met only token resistance. A couple of shots were fired at them out of bravado, but the two grubby wretches immediately flung down their muskets and surrendered. Surprise had been total and the British party entered the now familiar stockade with its stink of urine, grease and unwashed humanity, to set about its destruction.

Only when he saw the flicker of flames did Drinkwater leave the ship in the boat. In the stern-sheets, escorted by two of Mount's marines, sat Captain Mack. Wading ashore with the mountain-man's long rifle, Drinkwater indicated that the marines were to follow him with their prisoner. As they walked towards the blazing pine logs that exploded and split in great upwellings of sparks as the resin within them expanded and took fire, they met Quilhampton's party escorting a pathetic collection of bearded moujiks back to the boats.