Tim Severin - Sea Robber

So too did the Carlsborg ’s first mate. He turned on his heel and bolted for his cabin, his nightshirt flying out behind him. A moment later he reappeared, a pistol in one hand and a bunch of keys in the other. He screamed at the Danish sailors to look out for their lives as he darted past them towards the arms chest placed beside the helm. It was there in case an uprising by the slave cargo had to be suppressed with weapons. Inside were loaded muskets and a pair of the newfangled blunderbusses.

The officer unlocked and flung back the lid, and began frenziedly pulling out the guns. He thrust them into the hands of his Danish compatriots. Then, looking around in desperation, he saw Hector and his two friends still standing by the cockboat. Gathering up three more guns, he darted across the deck and pushed the weapons into their grasp. ‘Skyde. Skyde,’ he commanded breathlessly and pointed towards the oncoming ship. ‘Shoot. Shoot.’

From his vantage point at the Carlsborg ’s rail, Hector looked down and saw armed sailors crouched on the Revenge ’s foredeck. They were waiting to leap on to the larger vessel. Flat explosions of musket shots told him the Danes had opened fire, but he couldn’t see where their bullets struck. He felt the weight of the musket in his hands, thumbed back the lock and brought the weapon up to his shoulder as if to use it. But he already knew he wouldn’t pull the trigger while Jacques was held hostage. Instead he swung the muzzle of the gun menacingly, pretending to seek a target, and found himself staring over the gun’s sight at Cook. The buccaneer captain had moved forward to stand next to Jacques. Cook glanced up and must have seen Hector, for the buccaneer gave a sly smile and raised a finger to his forehead in a sarcastic salute.

The Revenge ’s bowsprit was now so near that it was about to spear through the Carlsborg ’s stern windows. At the last moment the buccaneer helmsman gave a deft touch, which laid his vessel alongside the stern quarter of the bigger ship with a grinding crash. A pair of light grappling hooks flew through the air and caught on the Carlsborg ’s side rail. A moment later Cook’s men swarmed up.

There was the bang of a musket, then another. The Danish sailors had reloaded and were shooting downwards. Hector saw one of the buccaneers slip and fall back, tangling with one of his comrades. The two men tumbled back on to the Revenge ’s foredeck. But the assault did not waver. Several musket balls whizzed past Hector’s head, fired from below by the boarders, but he ignored them. Deliberately he lowered his weapon. He was aware that neither Jezreel nor Dan had fired, either. The three of them had left the defence of the Carlsborg entirely to the Danes.

On the poop deck the first mate was cursing, a steady stream of oaths. He had discharged his pistol and was scrabbling in the arms chest, trying to find a blunderbuss. A few paces away the two Danish sailors had dropped their guns and stood helplessly, looking on. Beside the helm Iversen clutched his side, blood oozing through his fingers.

The first mate found his weapon and turned, ready to use it, when a shot rang out. He grunted abruptly and a bright crimson stain appeared on the front of his nightshirt. For a moment he stood there, bewildered, took a half-step backwards until he came up against the open lid of the arms chest. As he toppled over, the lid slammed shut beneath him and his body lay across it for a moment, before sliding to the deck, dead.

There was a sudden, still silence and the overpowering acrid smell of gunpowder. Hector hadn’t seen who had fired the fatal shot, but already the first wave of the Revenge ’s boarding party – half a dozen men – were taking control of the poop deck. They relieved the two Danish sailors of their muskets and ordered them forward. A buccaneer put his arm around the shoulders of the wounded petty officer and helped him down to the main deck. The first mate’s body was pushed to one side, and a man whom Hector took to be the Revenge ’s sailing master stepped up to the helm and began tentatively working it from side to side, trying it out.

At least two dozen more men from the Revenge were clambering up to the deck of the slaver. In their sea-stained smocks and wide breeches and broad-brimmed hats, they could have passed for the crew of any honest vessel. There was nothing to mark them out as sea bandits. Hector looked into their faces closely, trying to identify anyone among them who had sailed with him in the South Sea. He thought he recognized one or two, but it was impossible to be sure, for they pushed past him without a word. Unlike the chaotic departure of the Revenge , which had been a sham to lull their Danish victims, Cook’s men went about their business briskly and with barely a command spoken. Some took up position by the companionways and hatches, and as the sleepy crew of the Danish slave ship appeared, they faced the muzzles of their captors’ guns and quietly surrendered. A larger group of the buccaneers dispersed about the ship, checking sheets and braces, looking up at the spars, climbing into the rigging, searching out capstan bars, and then stood ready, waiting for orders.

By Hector’s estimate only half an hour had passed from the time Dan had heard the first sounds from the Revenge as she began to get under way. In that interval Cook’s men had captured a ship almost half as big again as their own and with three times as many cannon, and had done so without loss to themselves. They were complete masters of the Carlsborg .

Finally Cook himself came aboard with Jacques. The Frenchman looked crestfallen. ‘There wasn’t much I could do,’ he muttered to Hector. ‘I was hustled under hatches the moment I came aboard the Revenge last night. Shut up all night in the cable locker, where I couldn’t be heard.’

Cook called down to the men still on the Revenge . They were to cast off and resume course. The buccaneer captain turned and glanced at the musket Hector still held, cocked but never fired. ‘That was sensible of you. I didn’t imagine you could bring yourself to shoot at your old comrades.’

‘Where are you taking this ship?’ Hector asked. He had an uncomfortable feeling that Cook’s plan was more devious than first appeared.

‘As I told you yesterday,’ said Cook casually, ‘we head for the South Sea by way of Magellan’s Strait. But aboard this fine vessel rather than our worn-out tub.’

‘And the Carlsborg ’s crew? What are you going to do with them?’

‘We’ll turn them loose in the Revenge ’s longboat as soon as we are safely clear.’

‘I trust you’ll allow me and my friends to go with them.’

Cook treated Hector to an oily smile. ‘If that’s what you want. But it’s not what I would advise. If I were a Dane who had witnessed the capture of my ship, I would think maybe you and your friends had a hand in it.’

‘Hector, we’ll not be welcome back at the fort,’ cut in Jezreel. ‘We did nothing to fight off the attack.’

‘I couldn’t have expressed it better myself,’ observed Cook sardonically. He smoothed the lapels of his immaculate green coat before adjusting the lace at his throat.

Hector made one last attempt to regain the initiative. ‘I’d prefer if you gave us the cockboat so that we can head off on our own. Try to reach one of the English forts.’

Cook seemed amused. ‘Maybe you would make it, maybe not. I wouldn’t fancy falling into the hands of someone like that Akwamu chief we saw yesterday. You could be treated very nastily.’

Hector was conscious his three friends were looking at him, waiting for his lead.