Birds of Prey - Smith Wilbur - Страница 50

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Hal rolled gently off the bed, careful not to disturb the woman beside him, and found his breeches where she had thrown them.

Neither spoke again until they had crept out through the gap in the stockade. There, they paused as Hal glanced up at the sky and saw, by the angle of the great Southern Cross to the horizon, that it lacked only an hour or so till dawn. This was the witching hour when all human resources were at their lowest ebb. Hal peered back at Aboli's dark shape. "What is it, Aboli?" Hal demanded. "Why did you call me?"

"Listen!" Aboli laid a hand on his shoulder and Hal cocked his head.

"I hear nothing. "Wait!" Aboli squeezed his shoulder for silence.

Then Hal heard it, far off and faint, blanketed by the trees, a shout of uncontrolled laughter.

"Where?"... Hal was puzzled. "At the beach."

"God's wounds!" Hal blurted. "What devilry is this now?" He began to run, Aboli at his side, heading for the lagoon, stumbling in the darkness on the uneven forest floor with low branches whipping into their faces.

As they reached the first huts of the encampment, they heard more noise ahead, a snatch of slurred song and a hoot of crazed laughter.

"The gun pits Hal panted, and at that moment saw, in the last glimmer from the dying watch fire a pale human shape ahead.

Then his father's voice challenged him. "Who is that?" "Tis Hal, Father."

"What is happening?" It was clear that Sir Francis had only just awakened for he was in his shirt sleeves and his voice was groggy with sleep, but his sword was in his hand.

"I don't know," Hal said. There was another roar of stupid laughter. "It comes from the beach. The gun pits Without another word, all three ran on, and came together to the first culverin. Here, at the edge of the lagoon, the canopy of leaves overhead was thinner, allowing the last rays of the moon to shine through, giving them enough light to see one of the gun crew draped over the long bronze barrel. When Sir Francis aimed an angry kick at him he collapsed in the sand.

It was then that Hal spotted the small keg standing on the lip of the pit. Oblivious to their arrival, one of the other gunners was on his hands and knees in front of it, like a dog, lapping up the liquid that dribbled from the spigot. Hal smelt the sugary aroma, heavy on the night air like the emanation of some poisonous flower. He jumped down into the pit and seized the gunner by his hair.

"Where did you get the rum?" he snarled. The man peered back at him blearily. Hal drew back his fist and struck him a blow that made his teeth clash together in his jaw. "Damn you for a sot! Where did you get it?" Hal pricked him with the point of his dirk. "Answer me or I'll split your windpipe."

The pain and the threat rallied his victim. "A parting gift from his lordship," he gasped. "He sent a keg across from the Gull for us to drink his health and wish him God speed."

Hal flung the drunken creature from him and leapt onto the parapet. "The other gun crews Has the Buzzard sent gifts to all of them?"

They ran down the line of emplacements, and in each found sweetly reeking oaken kegs and inert bodies. Few of rthe crews were still on their feet, but even those who were, were staggering and slobbering in intoxication, Few English seamen could resist the ardent essence of the sugar cane.

Even Timothy Reilly, one of Sir Francis's trusted coxswains, had succumbed, and although he tried to answer Sir Francis's accusation, he reeled on his feet. Sir Francis struck him a blow with the hilt of his sword across the side of his head and the fellow collapsed in the sand.

At that moment, Big Daniel came running from the encampment. "I heard the uproar, Captain. What has happened?"

"The Buzzard has plied the gun crews with liquor. They are all of them witless." His voice shook with fury. "it can only mean one thing- There is not a moment to lose. Rouse the camp. Stand the men to arms but softly, mind!"

As Daniel raced away, Hal heard a faint sound from the dark ship across the still lagoon waters, a distant clank of ratchet and pawl, that sent tingling shocks up his spine.

"The cap scan he exclaimed. "The Gull is tightening up on her anchor spring. They stared a cross the channel, and in the moonlight saw the silhouette of the Gull begin to alter, as the hawser running from the anchor to her capstan Pulliede her stern round, and her full broadside was presented. "the "guns are run out!" Sir Francis exclaimed, moonlight glinted on the barrels. Behind each they could now make out the faint glow of the burning slow-match in the hands of the Gulls gunners.

"Satan's breath, they're going to fire on us! Down!" shouted Sir Francis. "Get down!" Hal leapt over the parapet of the gun pit and flung himself flat on the sandy floor.

Suddenly the night was lit brightly, as if by a flash of lightning. An instant later the thunder smote their eardrums and the tornado of shot swept across the beach and thrashed into the forest around them. The Gull had fired all her cannon into the encampment in a single devastating broadside.

The grape shot tore through the foliage above and branches, clusters of leaves and slabs of wet bark rained down upon them. The air was filled with a lethal swarm of splinters blasted from the tree-trunks.

The frail huts gave no protection to the men within. The broadside slashed through, sending poles flying and flattening the flimsy structures as though they had been hit by a tidal wave. They heard the terrified yells of men awakening into a nightmare, and the sobs, screams and groans of those cut down by the hail of shot or skewered by the sharp, ragged splinters.

The Gull had disappeared behind the pall of her own gunsmoke, but Sir Francis leapt to his feet and snatched the slow-match from the senseless hand of the gunner and glanced over the sights of the culverin and saw that it was still aimed into the swirling smoke behind which the Gull lay. He pressed the match to the hole. The culverin bellowed out a long silver gush of touc smoke and bounded back against its tackle. He could not see the strike of his shot, but he roared an order to those gunners down the line still sober enough to obey. "Fire! Open fire! Keep firing as fast as you can!"

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