“How did you come to be in the garden?” he asked.
“We was waiting for you to go home, but you came out first.”
If they had been intending –
“Stand back!” yelled Johnson.
He leaped backwards with astonishing agility for his bulk, bracing himself, knees bent, body tense, on guard with the sword. Hornblower looked round in astonishment, in time to see Spendlove relax; he had been poising himself for a spring. With that sword in his hand and its point against Johnson’s throat, the position would have been reversed. Some of the others came running up at the cry; one of them had a staff in his hand – a headless pike stave apparently – and thrust it cruelly into Spendlove’s face. Spendlove staggered back, and the staff was whirled up to strike him down. Hornblower leaped in front of him.
“No!” he yelled, and they all stood looking at each other, the drama of the situation ebbing away. Then one of the men came sidling towards Hornblower, cutlass in hand.
“Cut off his ear?” he asked over his shoulder to Johnson.
“No. Not yet. Sit down, you two.” When they hesitated Johnson’s voice rose to a roar. “Sit down!”
Under the menace of the cutlass there was nothing to do but sit down, and they were helpless.
“You write that letter?” asked Johnson.
“Wait a little,” said Hornblower wearily; he could think of nothing else to say in that situation. He was playing for time, hopelessly, like a child at bedtime confronted by stern guardians.
“Let’s have some breakfast,” said Spendlove.
At the far end of the shelf a small fire had been lighted, its smoke clinging in the still dawn in a thin thread to the sloping overhang of the cliff. An iron pot hung from a chain attached to a tripod over the fire, and two women were crouching over it attending to it. Packed against the back wall of the shelf were chests and kegs and barrels. Muskets were ranged in a rack. It occurred to Hornblower that he was in the situation common in popular romances; he was in the pirates’ lair. Perhaps those chests contained untold treasures of pearls and gold. Pirates, like any other seafarers, needed a land base, and these pirates had established one here instead of on some lonely cay. His brig Clement had cleaned out one of those last year.
“You write that letter, Lord,” said Johnson. He poked at Hornblower’s breast with the sword, and the point pierced the thin shirtfront to prick him over the breastbone.
“What is it you want?” asked Hornblower.
“A pardon. With a seal.”
Hornblower studied the swarthy features in front of him. The jig was up for piracy in the Caribbean, he knew. American ships-of-war in the north, French ships-of-war working from the Lesser Antilles, and his own busy squadron based on Jamaica had made the business both unprofitable and dangerous. And this particular band of pirates, the remains of the Harkness gang, were in a more precarious position than any, with the loss of their ship, and with their escape to sea cut off by his precautions. It had been a bold plan, and well executed, to save their necks by kidnapping him. Presumably the plan had been made and executed by this rather stupid-seeming fellow, almost bewildered in appearance, before him. Appearances might be deceitful, or else the desperate need of the situation had stimulated that dull mind into unusual activity.
“You hear me?” said Johnson, offering another prick with the sword, and breaking in upon Hornblower’s train of thought.
“Say you will, My Lord,” muttered Spendlove close to Hornblower’s ear. “Gain time.”
Johnson turned on him, sword pointed at his face.
“Shut that mouth,” he said. Another idea occurred to him, and he glanced round at Hornblower. “You write. Or I prick his eye.”
“I’ll write,” said Hornblower.
Now he sat with the volume of Waverley open at the flyleaf, and the stub of pencil in his hand, while Johnson withdrew for a couple of paces, presumably to allow free play for inspiration. What was he to write? ‘Dear Sir Augustus’? ‘Your Excellency’? That was better. ‘I am held to ransom here along with Spendlove by the survivors of the Harkness gang. Perhaps the bearer of this will explain the conditions. They demand a free pardon in exchange for -‘ Hornblower held the pencil poised over the paper debating the next words ‘Our lives’? He shook his head to himself and wrote ‘our freedom.’ He wanted no melodrama. ‘Your Excellency will, of course, be a better judge of the situation than I am. Your ob’d’t servant.’ Hornblower hesitated again, and then he dashed off the ‘Hornblower’ of his signature.
Page: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131