Storm Tide Page 15

  But Theo Courtney had saved his life more than once, and never betrayed him. Moses trusted his son.

  ‘I will show you the path.’

  T

  he temperature dropped as they climbed into the mountains. The trees were bare and leafless. Cal was astonished to see how lightly the Abenaki moved through the forest. Growing up in Massachusetts, he had prided himself on his woodcraft. But compared to Moses, he was a bull ox blundering through the woods after a hummingbird.

  ‘When he was young, your father could move like a snake,’ Moses reminisced. ‘Now I am certain he must be old and fat.’

  ‘He is a different man,’ Cal agreed, tightly.

  Moses chuckled. ‘And your brother Aidan?’

  ‘He is dead.’

  Moses’ laughter died on his lips. ‘How?’

  ‘He joined a secret band of patriots.’ The truth made the best lie. ‘He died trying to steal powder from the British arsenal.’

  ‘It must have broken your father’s heart,’ said Moses gravely.

  Cal stared into the distance. In his mind, he was back at the farmyard gate, looking back at his father standing on the doorstep. You are no longer my son.

  ‘It was hard for all of us.’

  He lapsed into silence. Moses, seeing his sorrow, did not press him. They walked on together, climbing steadily, until they came up against a sheer rock face. The mountain loomed over them, the pines swaying softly in the winter breeze.

  ‘This is the path,’ said Moses.

  ‘Where?’ said Cal.

  Moses led him up to the cliff face. Cal could see there was a narrow gully behind it, leading up the mountainside. The cliff curtained it off almost completely.

  ‘This is the way your father and I went,’ said Moses. ‘From here, you go to the top of the mountain and then along the ridge to the fort.’

  Cal looked up. The gully was steep and rocky, so narrow you could barely imagine fitting a gun through it. It would take ropes, levers, and almost impossible determination to haul them over the mountain this way.

  But he was eighteen, and he had been polishing his boots in Washington’s army for months. Nothing was impossible.

  ‘Can you take me to the top?’ he asked Moses.

  It was a hard climb. Near the ridgeline, they came to a place where the gully forked. A distant look came into Moses’ face.

  ‘This is where we fought the French,’ he said. ‘Your father led sixteen men against a thousand and defeated them.’

  Cal knew the story. He did not want to hear it again.

  ‘How about you?’ he asked. ‘Were you never tempted to join the patriots?’

  Moses wrinkled his brow. ‘How is a man a patriot if he fights against his rightful king?’

  ‘I meant the rebels,’ Cal corrected himself.

  ‘I swore loyalty to King George eighteen winters ago. I will not break my oath.’

  ‘But the Abenaki fought against the British before they fought with them. Why not again?’

  ‘The British are our best hope,’ said Moses. ‘They honour their treaties with us. They leave us free to live and hunt in our own lands. But the colonists defy them. They come over the mountains and the rivers, they claim land and build farms and call it their own. And when we fight our claim, they kill us. Tell me, why is a white man who fights for his land a patriot, but an Abenaki who does the same a criminal?’

  Cal had no answer.

  The gully opened out as they gained the ridge at last. They followed it west for several hours, in a cold drizzling rain, until they came to an open knoll at the end of the mountain spur, overlooking the lake. From the cliff edge, Cal could see Fort Royal below.

  It was not the fort that Theo Courtney had taken some seventeen years earlier. That had been blown to pieces when the French general fired the gunpowder magazine, rather than surrender to the British. The rubble had been used in the foundations of the new structure, a five-pointed star with stone bastions and timber revetments on a promontory commanding the lake. Looking down into it, Cal could see the striped flag of the colonies hanging defiant from its flagpole.

  And there were the guns. Their mouths were plugged against the rain, their touch holes covered with canvas. But even muzzled, Cal could feel their power. They squatted low on the ramparts, like great cats poised to spring.

  ‘Wait until we get those to Boston,’ Cal said under his breath. ‘We will blast the British to pieces.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ said Moses.

  Cal froze. He had thought he was alone, but the Abenaki had stolen up behind him without a sound.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Cal shortly.

  ‘Why do you speak of turning the guns on your own people?’ Cal tried to ignore him, but Moses continued, ‘Why do you sneer every time you say “the British”, and call the rebels “patriots”? Why are you here?’

  Moses advanced. Cal took a step back – and stopped suddenly as he felt the cliff edge under his foot. He was caught between Moses and a thousand-foot drop. There was no escape. He had a pistol in his belt, but the powder would be wet from the rain.

  ‘Let me explain,’ said Cal.

  Moses lifted his head. ‘I am listening.’

  Cal opened his mouth – but no words came out. A thousand excuses ran through his head, but none of them seemed plausible. All he could feel was the great void behind him, sucking him back, and Moses’ eyes fixed on him.

  Cal was young, his emotions never far from the surface. The Abenaki chief had spent a lifetime getting the measure of men. He read the truth in Cal’s face.

  ‘These guns are for the rebels,’ he said.

  Cal said nothing. He felt a great pressure squeezing his chest, as if he was being crushed between two stones. Part of him wanted to run, and that made him flush with shame. If he failed in this mission, he would have failed the revolution. Aidan would have died for nothing.

  Moses put out his hand. ‘Whatever foolish thing you have done, it is not too late. You are still your father’s son.

  With a roar, Cal threw himself forwards, tackling Moses below his shoulders and driving him back. The Abenaki had not expected it. They staggered backwards together, then collapsed in a heap.

  Cal was bigger, but the Abenaki had a wiry strength. He rolled Cal over, twisting and writhing like a snake. Cal fumbled for the knife in his belt, but with Moses gripping his arms he could not get hold of it.

  There was a tomahawk in Moses’ belt. Cal felt it slapping against his leg as they wrestled. He tried to reach it, but Moses pushed him on his side, trapping Cal’s arm under his own body weight. With a howling war cry, Moses grabbed the tomahawk. He sat on Cal, pinning Cal’s free arm with his thigh, and raised the tomahawk.

  ‘If you were not your father’s son, I would split your skull.’

  ‘I am not my father’s son!’ Cal cried.

  Moses paused. The warrior-mist cleared from his eyes. He looked down at Cal and saw the spitting image of the young Theo Courtney he had befriended many years ago. The past seemed like a foreign country and the present was so difficult to navigate. It confused him with its changing alliances, vicious conflicts and how easily friend could become foe. He did not want to destroy what was important to him. He could not kill the boy.

  He lowered the tomahawk. ‘Let us be friends,’ he said. ‘Go home, and forget this quarrel.’

  It was a good offer – but for one thing.

  ‘I cannot go without the guns.’

  ‘Then how—?’

  Too late, Moses saw the knife in Cal’s hand. Cal had managed to pull it from his belt. He jerked his hand free, and held the knife at Moses’ chest.

  The Abenaki’s eyes went wide. ‘What have you become?’ he whispered.

  ‘I do not want to kill you.’ Cal’s hand was trembling, which made him ashamed. ‘You have shown me the path I needed. If you give me your word you will not reveal what we are doing, I will let you go.’

  Moses’ gaze was unyielding. ‘That would betray your father.’

  ‘And what about his son?’

  Rage rose in Cal’s heart. Could he really kill the man who had held him on his knee as a baby? If he did not, he could never return to the Continental Army.

  Moses could see his indecision.

  ‘For the love of your father—’

  He broke off as Cal’s left fist smashed in to the side of his face. He swayed sideways; Cal lunged up. He only wanted to get his enemy off him, to pin him down so he could force him to submit. But Moses had a warrior’s reflexes, and the tomahawk in his hand. Instinctively, he started to bring it down towards Cal’s head.

  He had forgotten Cal’s knife. Cal still held it; as Moses bent towards him, he instinctively lifted his hand to protect himself. Before either man knew what was happening, the blade plunged into Moses’ heart.

  The tomahawk dropped to the ground, its handle striking Cal a glancing blow across his head. The Abenaki chieftain shuddered, then went still. Blood pumped out of the wound in his chest, covering Cal’s hands and running down his arms to soak his shirt. He let go of the knife, threw the body aside in horror, and scrambled away.

  He paused, panting, at the cliff edge. Part of him wanted to hurl himself over it, to obliterate what he had done. He could not look back. Even thinking of the trusting Abenaki made something grind in his heart, as if he had killed his own father.

  His father. Theo’s last words echoed in Cal’s mind: You are no longer my son. Flames of anger began to lick up inside him, cleansing the guilt. Moses’ death had been an accident; he was not to blame. Or perhaps it was inevitable. The Abenaki had allied themselves with the British, so killing them had been his duty, no less – another prick in the belly of King George’s military might. This was war, and Moses had
been the enemy.

  Cal looked out over cliffs. Far below, he could see the star-points of the fort, and the black guns sitting on her ramparts. The sight calmed him.

  He had done what he had to do.

  O

  ff the coast of Long Island, the Perseus rendezvoused with a cutter from New York. The boat brought news of the war’s progress. The rebellion had become more widespread; the Continental Army was besieging Boston. The colonists had no navy, but blockade runners and privateers were rife along the Atlantic seaboard.

  ‘They cannot engage us in battle,’ said the cutter’s commander, sitting in Tew’s cabin. ‘But they are damned hard to defeat, and they sting us where they can. General Howe’s troops in Boston are cut off by the siege. They receive their supplies by sea. If the American privateers take too many of our transport ships, Howe’s men will be starved into surrender.’

  The Perseus was ordered to patrol the coast of Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts, intercepting any ships who crossed her path.

  ‘Though what their Lordships in the Admiralty expect me to achieve by that, I cannot fathom,’ said Tew. ‘It is almost five hundred miles of coastline, and you can be sure that the Yankees will know every bay and inlet. They are past masters at smuggling contraband ashore. That is why they are so averse to paying the King’s taxes.’

  Rob thought about the challenge. At Portsmouth, the fleet of the Royal Navy had seemed so mighty it was impossible to imagine anyone standing against it. But on the far side of the Atlantic, the fleet did not seem so mighty against the vastness of the continent.

  For the first time, he began to wonder if the colonists might not be beaten as easily as everyone thought.

  This new country reminded him of Africa. It was not the climate, nor the smell coming off the land, but the untamed wildness of it. Along much of the coast, tangled forests came down to the shore. Long sand beaches stretched for miles. The villages and fishing towns that clung to the shore seemed no more significant than limpets crusted to a whale.

  But for such a sparsely inhabited place, it generated an astonishing amount of trade. Every day, the Perseus intercepted at least two dozen vessels plying the waters: fishing boats heading for the Grand Banks; Nantucket whalers bound for the Southern Ocean; merchantmen carrying timber to the West Indies and rum to England. It seemed they would not let war disrupt the way of commerce.

  Every ship the Perseus stopped flew a British ensign and swore allegiance to King George when challenged.

  ‘So much loyalty, you wonder there are enough men to make a rebellion,’ said Tew drily. ‘I cannot believe they all love their king so much as they protest.’

  ‘They love their profits,’ said Coyningham. ‘That is all these Yankees care for. When they see that war punches a hole in their purses, they will soon put a stop to it.’

  A shout from the masthead cut off their conversation.

  ‘Sail off the starboard bow!’

  All the officers grabbed their spyglasses and hurried to the rail.

  ‘A man-of-war,’ said Tew, taking in the row of gunports. ‘French, judging by her lines.’

  As if to confirm it, the white pennant of France billowed out from her masthead.

  ‘I count forty guns,’ said the second officer, Lieutenant Verrier, who’d been studying her.

  Every man in earshot looked at Tew. At that moment none of them, not even Coyningham, wanted to be in his shoes. If the French frigate had come from Europe, she would be carrying the latest news. If war had been declared between Britain and France since the Perseus left, the French captain could use that knowledge to devastating advantage.

  ‘Have the men beat to quarters,’ said Tew calmly. ‘We will be ready to give a good account of ourselves if we must. But do not fire unless I give the command.’

  The ship was cleared for action. Nets were strung above the deck to catch falling spars, while hammocks were stuffed in the side netting to provide shelter. On the gun-deck, partition screens were taken down and furniture stowed away. Boys sprinkled sawdust so the decks would not become slippery with blood. Powder was fetched from the magazine, the marine marksmen took their positions in the tops, and the gun crews loosed their tackles.

  Tew timed their progress on his pocket watch. The process took seven minutes.

  ‘What is the Frenchman doing?’ Tew asked.

  Midshipman Milnrow, stationed on the rail with a telescope, answered at once.

  ‘She is holding her course, sir. She does not seem to be preparing for battle.’

  The ships converged. Coming up from behind, the crew of the Perseus could now see the name written across the French ship’s stern in shining gold letters: Rapace.

  ‘It means “Predator” in French,’ Verrier translated.

  The Rapace shortened sail, letting the Perseus come up alongside her. There was no sign of unusual activity on her deck.

  ‘If she has not cleared for action,’ said Lieutenant Verrier, ‘she is taking an awful risk.’

  On the Rapace’s quarterdeck, a tall man in a cocked hat, wearing a commander’s epaulette, took a speaking trumpet and hailed them across the water.

  ‘Bonjour,’ he said. And then, in lightly accented English: ‘I hope you do not plan to start a war. When I left France, our countries were at peace.’

  Along the deck, the men at the guns relaxed.

  ‘Keep alert,’ Tew barked. He picked up his own speaking trumpet. ‘What is your business in these waters?’

  ‘We escort a convoy en route to Martinique,’ answered the Frenchman.

  Tew took a long slow look across the horizon.

  ‘I see no convoy.’

  ‘There was a storm. We are separated. That is why we have come so far north.’

  ‘If there had been a storm, we would have met it,’ muttered Coyningham. ‘We had the calmest crossing imaginable.’

  Tew ignored him. ‘Do you plan to enter port in America?’

  ‘Non,’ the French captain assured him. ‘We sail south and try to find our ships.’

  It was the first time Rob had seen Tew hesitate. He looked uncertainly at the circle of officers clustered around him.

  ‘He is lying,’ said Coyningham. ‘We have the weather gage and our guns are loaded. We can dismast him with a single broadside, then board him and strike his colours before he knows what has happened.’

  ‘That would be a black piece of infamy,’ countered Verrier. ‘To take advantage of a peaceable ship, when our nations are not at war. It would be little more than piracy.’

  Coyningham sneered at him. ‘Every man aboard would say that she fired first.’

  He was probably right. Along the deck, a row of expectant faces looked to the captain. The sulphurous smell of a burning slow match tinged the air. All it needed was for one spark to fall on the touch hole.

  Tew shook his head. ‘We cannot start a war. Stand down.’

  Steam hissed as the matches were doused in buckets of water. The helmsman turned the wheel, and the Perseus began to diverge from the Rapace’s course. The French captain raised an arm, half in salute and half in farewell. At that distance they were too far off to see his face, but it seemed to Rob that there was an arrogance in his stance, almost like a smirk.

  ‘I hope that is the last we see of them,’ he murmured to Angus.

  Angus nodded. ‘It doesn’ae sit right, having a Frenchman under our guns and letting him go. Like letting a wolf from a trap.’

  A brittle mood prevailed on the ship that night, and the following morning. Routine tasks went uncompleted, petty officers snapped at the men, and the officers could barely restrain their tempers. Coyningham was in an especially black humour, cursing and threatening the men fit to start a mutiny.

  ‘Is he so eager for battle?’ Rob wondered. ‘I took him for a coward.’

  ‘It wouldn’a have been much of a fight when we had the Frenchie under our guns. And if we took her, he’d have been given command of the prize,’ Angus explained. ‘He’d have sailed her back to England a hero. Promotion, medals, maybe an audience with the King.’