Bernard Cornwell - Wildtrack

“Yes, sir.” The “sir” was unconscious. He put the safety on, then thrust the pistol into a pocket of his oilskin jacket.

I used the monocular again, training it forward, and this time I clearly saw both Bannister and Mulder standing in the powerboat’s cockpit. They were staring at Sycorax , doubtless wondering just what we intended, then they must have decided that we meant no good, for I saw Bannister bend down to the throttles and the boat dipped its stern as she accelerated away.

“Tacking!” I shouted. We tacked. Terry sheeted the headsails across, we tightened up, and were clawing almost head into the wind. The breeze seemed stronger, slicing over the coachroof and bringing a sting of spray from the bows. “Watch the bugger for me, Terry!”

“He’s having a think, boss.”

Wildtrack II , having gone ahead of us, had now slowed again.

I felt the tremble of water under Sycorax ’s hull. We pitched once and the bows slammed down with a thump which banged back through the boat’s skeleton. The waves were building. The wind was noisy in the rigging and was slatting the leading edges of the sails. I was pointing her up as much as I could, still aiming her bowsprit like a spear at Wildtrack II ’s flank. “Where is he?”

“He’s putting his foot down.”

The powerboat, still puzzled by our behaviour, had accelerated again. She was going inshore of us now, perhaps planning to circle around to take position on our stern. I matched her move, spilling wind so that we were running north before the wind and banging into the cross seas. She was a hundred yards away, running across our bows, and I could see three faces staring from the cockpit.

“Turning to port,” I warned Terry. “Get ready to fire!” He brought out the gun and cradled it in two big and capable hands.

I turned back into the wind and hardened the sails. Now it looked as if we’d stopped playing games and resumed our westward progress. As I’d guessed and hoped, Wildtrack II also slowed. Her bows began to turn towards us. She was circling to follow us and, at its closest, her turn would bring her to within thirty paces. Long range for a Colt, but I wasn’t after pinpoint accuracy.

I watched the powerboat. I was falling off the wind a touch, slowing and widening our own turn to close the range. Wildtrack II was also slowing. The sea was bucking Sycorax , thumping her hull and shaking her sails. “You’re going to have ten seconds!” I shouted at Terry. “For Christ’s sake don’t hit anyone, but go for his hull! Aim as far for’rard as possible and as close to the waterline as you can.”

“Got it, boss.” He grinned, and I heard the snick of the safety going off, then the slam of the gun being cocked. He crouched on the starboard cockpit thwart, steadied by the coaming and the cabin bulkhead. The movement of our boat, and the heaving of the target, would make accuracy almost impossible and I prayed that Terry would not hit any of the three men. I almost told him to hold his fire, but then, when we were just thirty yards from the Wildtrack II , a wave heaved her up and I saw an expanse of her anti-fouling revealed in the moonlight. “Fire!”

Terry held the gun two-handed, braced himself, and opened fire at the speedboat’s belly.

The noise was just like a sail flogging in a gale. The old sailors used to say the wind was blowing great guns when their canvas banged aloft and made a noise like cannons, and now the Colt filled the sea with the same murderous sound. The muzzle flash leaped two feet clear of the boat and I saw a streak of foam reflect red, then I looked at the powerboat and I saw the three faces disappear beneath the coaming. There was no way of knowing where Terry’s bullets went, but water suddenly churned white at Wildtrack II ’s stern and she shot away from us.

“Hold your fire! We’re tacking!”

Terry changed magazines. I pulled the tiller gently towards me, wrenched in the mainsheet, and waited till Sycorax ’s head was round before releasing the headsail sheets. The effort tore at my back, and I wondered if I ever could sail this heavy boat alone.

We were running now, stern to wind. Wildtrack II , like a startled deer, was circling at full speed. Her bows thumped the waves as she spewed a high wake sixty yards long. Once I saw her leap clear off a wavecrest before slamming down into a trough. Then she headed straight towards us and I suspected Mulder must have his gun and that he planned to have his revenge on Sycorax . “Get ready!” The powerboat accelerated. I guessed they planned to swamp us with their wash as well as loose a broadside at our sails. They would have to be dissuaded, and I decided against waiting to make our own broadside shot at them. “Into the bows, Terry. Fire!” The powerboat’s bows were high and its anti-fouled belly, pale against the night, reared vulnerably above the water. Terry stood, legs spread, and fired. He emptied a magazine at the approaching boat and I swore I saw a scrap of darkness appear in the hull where a heavy bullet ripped the fibreglass ragged.

Terry changed magazines. Wildtrack II was slowing, her bows dropping. Terry braced himself again, fired again and this time the powerboat’s windscreen shattered in the night. The glass shards were snatched away like spindrift, and I saw the three heads twist away in panic. “Cease fire! Cease fire!” I was scared witless that the final shot might have hit one of the three men.

The powerboat veered off. I stared intently and thought I saw three figures still moving in the cockpit. That was a relief for me, but not for them, for they were in trouble. The powerboat would be taking water, needing to be pumped, and now their only safety lay in reaching harbour as soon as possible. They were forced to forget us, and Terry jeered as they fled. I sat down. “Make the gun safe, Terry.”

“Already done it, boss.”

We tacked again, sheeted home, and clawed into the south-west wind. The tide had long turned and the surging channel current was at last coming to our aid. I thanked Terry for his help.

“That’s what the working class are for, boss. To get you useless rich sods out of deep shit.”

“What the working class could usefully do now,” I said, “is get some bloody beer.”

I pegged the tiller. There was nothing to do now until we turned for Plymouth breakwater. We were a darkened ship sailing a black ocean. The wind was brisk, still chilled by the evening’s rain. There was something mesmerizing about Sycorax ’s motion; her plunging bow and rocking buoyancy.

Terry asked me about the filming and I told him how the television people kept asking me about the night I’d won the medal, and how I hadn’t really told them anything at all. “I can’t remember very much,” I confessed.

“You were a bloody wally, boss,” Terry said amicably.

“I remember going left round those rocks. The bastards were about ten yards behind, weren’t they?”

“Ten! Bloody fifty.”

“Truly?”

“I could hear you shouting,” he said. “You were like a calf in the slaughterhouse. God knows how those buggers missed you at first.

The Major had come up to tell us to keep our heads down and he was shouting at you to come back.”

“I didn’t hear him.”

“He gave up in the end. He reckoned you were a dead ’un. He said it was your own bloody fault ’cos you’d taken us to the wrong place anyway. We should have been a bloody half-mile away, and instead you was doing a Lone Ranger on their headquarters company.” He chuckled. “Then when you switched out their lights the Major told us to get the hell up after you.”

“It worked,” I said bleakly.