Suddenly we emerged into the cove, and wonder of wonders, a ship lay there at anchor.
It was the Good Catherine!
I stood up and whooped loud, waving my hat vigorously. But although somebody seemed to be watching us through a glass, I doubted they could see much. Spyglasses were found on some ships now, but few were of much value.
Turley shook loose the sail and we made for the Good Catherine. Heavy-laden as we were, we made but slow time and the boat from the pinnace closed in swiftly.
It was Guadalupe who got off the next shot, and it struck matchwood from the gunwale. Turley rested his musket on the tarp-covered cases and fired. His shot also scored. We saw one man drop his oar and rise up, and my ball took another.
The boat swung off and we saw the big man rise up, sword in hand, gesturing at the others. More afraid of him than of us, they set to work, but we had gained a little as we had our sail and they had none.
Suddenly there was a shout from Felipe. He was pointing, for the pinnace had cleared the inlet and was coming straight for us.
“Can you swim?” I asked Guadalupe. “If you can, you and Conchita head for the Good Catherine. Tell the captain you’re friends of mine and he will stand by you.”
She looked at me for a long moment. “And you?”
“We will keep them busy,” I said. “I got these lads into this and I’ll not see them suffer alone.”
By then I’d recharged my musket. Armand and Felipe had taken up theirs. “Take turns,” I advised. “Don’t let them catch us with an empty gun.”
We were still moving, and now there seemed to be action aboard the Good Catherine. Armand fired toward the boat and missed; Felipe did not. His shot was well aimed but the boat was drawing closer. His ball hit the man at the tiller, for he had gotten a good shot. The man leaped to his feet, clawing at his chest, then tumbled into the water. The boat swung wide and lost distance.
The Good Catherine was moving now, moving to cut off the pinnace. Suddenly a gun boomed and we saw a round-shot skip the waves across the bow of the pinnace. The pinnace promptly replied, and the master of the Good Catherine proved himself. He let go a broadside of four well-aimed guns. The first holed the pinnace a point abaft the beam, and just above the waterline. Another shot smashed the bowsprit and brought down the forestay.
What happened to the other two shots I never knew for at that moment their boat came alongside ours. Turley fired into the boat, as I did. Then, grasping my two pistols, I fired again, once with each.
“Tosti!” I yelled. “You’re on the wrong side!”
He leaped to his feet, staring at me, and then the big man lunged from the stern of the boat and I was staring into the eyes of Rafe Leckenbie!
A shout from the pinnace tore his eyes from me. She was bearing down upon us, not answering to her whipstaff, for he who manned it must have been killed.
The Catherine was also coming up fast. Sheathing my blade, I ran forward to throw her a line. The pinnace, running blind, sheared into Leckenbie’s boat and ran it down just as my line was taken by the Catherine.
For a time all was confusion. Leckenbie’s men were swarming aboard the damaged pinnace as his longboat sank. Not sixty feet away Guadalupe and Conchita were being helped aboard the Catherine.
Armand and Felipe came to help me lash lines around the boxes. One after another they were hoisted aboard, and at last I stood on the deck.
Gesturing to the boxes, I said, “Take them below. To my cabin.”
A glance toward the pinnace showed the two vessels were drifting apart. The pinnace was damaged, but nothing beyond repair.
Leckenbie was aboard there. Rafe Leckenbie, of all people! I stared after his boat with almost a hunger in my heart. Never had I wanted so much to fight a man, to meet him face to face. Had he been the man who led the attack on my father’s house, I could have been no more eager.
Would this be our last meeting? Knowing the man, I knew it would not. He was never one to give up. I knew that from our first meeting he had meant to kill me, and not for an instant had the thought left his mind.
Nor mine…
Was it that I doubted myself? Was it because he had made me feel fear, knowing the closeness of death? There was a savage hunger in me, a hot desire to cross blades with him, to end once and for all what lay between us.
For with him alive, I would never know peace. Always I must be on guard, certain that he would strike at me in the way I could be most hurt. For Leckenbie, to kill was never enough. He enjoyed making other men suffer.
And now I was vulnerable, for now I loved…
Yes … in that moment I admitted it. For the first time I confessed it to myself. For better or worse I loved Guadalupe Romana.
Not the Irish girl of my dreams, but a lass from the high Andes, a girl of another blood, another way of life. She I loved. And neither of us could ever know safety as long as Rafe Leckenbie lived.
Now was the time…
Captain Dabney was on his poop deck and I went to him. “Pursue them,” I said. “We carmot let them escape. There is a man aboard there, whom I—”
He interrupted. “Captain Chantry, you are now aboard my ship. Yours is most of the cargo aboard, but the vessel is mine. I shall not risk it in needless pursuit of some reprobate you wish to fight.”
He brushed lint from his sleeve. “You were in grave danger, so I came to your help. Now you are safe and I see no reason to risk either the vessel or a single man of my crew in order to follow up a fight that is yours alone.”
“Do you think he will lie quietly by, knowing I am aboard and have what he wants? He will not. He will attack at first chance.”
“Very well, then. If he attacks, we will defend ourselves. But if we can avoid his attack we will do so. I do not command a ship of war, Captain, nor a privateer. I am a simple merchant seaman and I shall do my best to return the investment of those who ventured with me, of whom you are one.”
He turned and looked me up and down. “I would suggest, Captain Chantry, a bath, a change of linen, and a good night’s sleep. In the morning you will think better of your insistence.”
Ashamed, I shrugged. “You may be right, Captain. I am a fool.”
“Not a fool, Captain. No man is a fool who can survive ashore there and come back aboard with a lovely lass and whatever is in those chests. I imagine you have done well.”
He gestured toward the pinnace, limping away toward the inlet. “If you are wise in your judgment of that man, whomever he may be, he will come upon us when he can. Better get some sleep.”
“The man aboard there,” I said, “is Rafe Leckenbie!”
“Ah? The man who was driven from London. So this is what he came to! Well, well! Yes, I think we shall see more of him.”
He bowed. “Captain Chantry, a good night to you.”
A good night? With Rafe Leckenbie alive? Would there ever be a good night until I had faced him again?
32
Surprisingly, I slept. Not the night through, but for several hours. The bath I had, and the change of linen lay hard by my bunk and ready for use. Yet when I awakened it was not the clash of arms that brought me from a sound sleep, nor a woman’s scream, but the sound of the wind.
Our harbor back of Cape Lookout was a snug one—if any harbor is snug when a hurricane blows. The main force of the wind came, at first, from the southeast and that was the point of our best protection, but even there the land was not high. The waves broke on the outer shore, but the wind swept, almost unimpeded, across the low dunes that made up the point.
The Good Catherine was a snug vessel, her crew well chosen and tautly disciplined, the ship herself well kept and secure. Knowing the sort of man Dabney was, I felt secure despite the wind, and so did we all. I heard it from the crew when we went on deck.