‘In any event, I suppose this will be the last time we meet.’

  He raised the knife. Sunlight bowed off the blade – then suddenly vanished. The sun had disappeared, blocked out by the almighty cloud of smoke and dust that had shot into the air where the blockhouse had been. At the same time, a roar blasted Rob like a burning hurricane, hitting him with a hail of debris and throwing him onto the ground. He buried his head in his arms to protect himself as stones rained down.

  While they fought, the fires in the grass had ignited the powder trail. Peering back through the smoke, Rob saw the torture house had been levelled to its foundations. Near him, the man he had fought lay prone, the back of his head bleeding where a piece of rubble had struck it hard.

  Rob pushed himself up. The American’s knife lay on the ground. Perhaps it would have been wise to stick it in its owner, but Rob did not have time. The man was probably already dead.

  Rob ran to the mansion and crashed through a ground-floor window into what had once been a formal dining room.

  Scipio was waiting for him. He did not ask about the explosion, but beckoned him on.

  ‘Come.’

  He brought Rob through to the other side of the house and opened a side door. All their men had assembled. Rob counted them off. A few had been grazed by bullets, and one man’s arm hung limp, but otherwise they had come off lightly.

  ‘Are you hurt?’ said Angus.

  ‘I was lucky.’

  Angus returned the double-barrelled gun.

  ‘Here’s hoping we keep lucky.’

  No one saw them as they left the house to the north and raced across the lawn. Many of the rebels had been killed or stunned by the blast. The rest had rushed to help their comrades. The way was momentarily clear.

  The lawn ended at a rail fence. Beyond it, the land dipped into a soggy morass of mud and long grass, studded with small shrubs and gnarled trees. It looked impassable.

  Shots and shouts rang out behind them as the Americans realised what was happening. Scipio lifted a loose rail in the fence and stepped through. Rob followed. His foot sank into the mud up to his ankle.

  ‘Are you sure there is a path?’

  Scipio nodded impatiently. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Doesn’ae matter if there’s not,’ said Angus. ‘We’ll be dead either way.’

  C

  al opened his eyes. He didn’t know how long he’d been unconscious, but it couldn’t have been long. His ears were ringing, and dust was settling from the explosion behind him. A bruise the size of Bunker Hill had started to swell up on the back of his head where the stone had smashed it.

  He had been fortunate. The men who’d been coming to help him lay strewn across the grass like branches after a storm. Those closest to the blockhouse had been torn in two by the force of the explosion. Others looked as if they’d been crushed by a giant fist. None of them were moving.

  Cal pulled himself to his feet, gritting his teeth against the pain. He looked up, and promptly threw himself to the ground again as he remembered the British marksmen in the mansion. He crawled across the grass and took cover behind a rosewood chest of drawers that had been thrown into a flower bed. He peered over it.

  No one fired at him. Scanning the windows, he saw no movement behind the shattered panes. The house was empty.

  Running footsteps approached as his men came up.

  ‘Are you hurt, sir?’ said a young lieutenant.

  He mopped at the blood matted into the back of Cal’s head, but Cal shook him off. In that instant, he understood everything that had happened.

  ‘It was a ruse.’

  With the lieutenant and his men following, Cal ran around the house and found a trail of flattened grass across the lawn, ending in a broken fence at the edge of the property. He reached it in time to see the British disappearing into the low scrub of the swamp.

  He grabbed a rifle from one of his men and sighted it on the back of the last man fleeing. Before he could fire, the man ran behind a bald cypress. It was too far anyway. Cal threw the rifle aside.

  The lieutenant stared at the swamp. Whatever tracks the British had left, the wet ground had closed over them, leaving no hint of the path they had taken.

  ‘Do we follow them?’

  Cal rubbed the dust from his eyes. ‘Can they get to Seabrook Bay that way?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Then leave them.’ Heavy wheels rumbled on the carriage drive as the field guns rolled past. ‘We have bigger game to hunt.’

  S

  cipio led the way through the swamp, moving as nimbly as the insects that buzzed about their feet. Even when his foot splashed in water, he would unerringly find firm ground an inch below the surface. Rob wondered how he did it. To his eyes, the landscape was featureless.

  Rob tried to step where Scipio did, but he always seemed to end up soaked. He moved a fraction to the right to avoid a thorn bush and sank waist deep in swamp water. Several times it was only a tug on his elbow from Scipio that stopped him falling deep into the mire.

  Scipio tapped his forehead, indicating that Rob should concentrate. It was hard. The tangled vegetation hid them from sight, and the wide, open landscape played tricks with sound. There could have been rebels ten feet behind them, or two miles away, and they couldn’t have known the difference.

  The dull boom of a cannon echoed over the marsh. A flock of ducks was startled into flight.

  ‘They cannot possibly see us,’ said Rob. ‘Are they shooting at shadows?’

  Angus shook his head. ‘That was not a field piece. It was a ship’s gun.’

  ‘Maybe the Perseus is signalling she is leaving.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  They hurried on. The ground became wetter, then firmer again. They came to a small island in the middle of the swamp. Rob saw lean-to shelters made of branches fixed to the trees, the remains of campfires. And tied to a stump, on a thin finger of clear water, was a pair of flat-bottomed canoes.

  ‘You came here before?’ Rob asked Scipio. The African nodded. ‘Why didn’t you run away? Surely they couldn’t have found you here?’

  Scipio frowned. ‘Phoebe,’ he said shortly. ‘I could not leave.’

  Rob wondered about the girl in the yellow headscarf. He pushed the thoughts aside as he scrambled into the low boat and cast off. With eight men in each canoe, the water almost came over the low sides. There were carved planks to use as makeshift paddles, while Scipio crouched in the stern on the balls of his feet, using a long sapling pole to steer them through narrow channels in the reeds and grass. The channels made a labyrinth of water, and the clouds hid the sun so it was impossible to find a bearing. Rob marvelled that anyone could navigate his way.

  Rob looked at Scipio. ‘Where does this come out? Seabrook Bay?’

  ‘Fremont Bay.’

  Rob had seen the name on the chart. It was north of where the Perseus had anchored, separated from it by a thick neck of land. They would have to paddle out into the open sea, and then south and back around, to arrive where they had started. The Perseus would not wait that long, even if the overloaded canoes could survive the ocean surf.

  But there was nothing else to do.

  The channel widened. They joined a river, the current tugging them on towards the bay. The tide was ebbing fast: Rob could see the water level dropping against the stalks of the reeds. He checked his watch and prayed Tew would hold station off the coast.

  They were so low in the water, and the reed banks so high, they didn’t see the bay until they came around a bend to the mouth of the river. Clear water stretched in front of them: a muddy bay fringed with palmettos and twisted mangroves. A small, thickly forested islet guarded the mouth of the bay.

  Rob looked at the low spit of land that separated them from the next bay. If he stood up, he should be able to see the Perseus’s topmasts.

  ‘Is there a channel between the bays?’ he asked Scipio hopefully.

  Scipio didn’t answer. He was staring in the opposite direction, over the larboard side. Rob followed his gaze. The shore had opened out further, so they could see deeper into the bay. A sloop sat at anchor, floating as innocently as a fishing boat. But her sides were pierced for gunports, and the red-and-white stripes of the American ensign flapped from her stern.

  There was nowhere to hide on the flat water of the bay. She would see them in an instant, if she had not already. And one shot from those cannons would sink them all.

  ‘Quick,’ Rob hissed to Scipio. ‘Swap places with me.’

  There was so little room, they almost capsized trying to manoeuvre around each other. Rob took the pole. It was hard to keep his balance, let alone steer the tiny craft, but he managed to bring her bow around so they were heading towards the sloop.

  ‘What are you doing?’ hissed Angus in front of him.

  ‘Ready your weapons,’ Rob answered. Angus handed him the double-barrelled gun Rob had taken from the plantation. ‘We are going to board her.’

  A man wearing a straw hat appeared at the sloop’s side. He looked surprised to see the two canoes approaching so boldly. He shouted something unintelligible. More men appeared alongside him.

  Lined up like ducks, thought Rob. It was the men he couldn’t see that worried him.

  ‘Sloop ahoy?’ he called.

  ‘Who are y’all?’ came the challenge, from the man in the straw hat.

  ‘Robert Courtney.’ He didn’t bother to give a false name. He waved his pole at the freedmen in the boat. ‘We caught these slaves running away from Mr Bracewell’s plantation. Thought we’d bring them to you.’

  The men on the sloop conferred. Rob had come so close he could hear what they were saying. He heard his own name repeated several times, and he wondered why that should be.

  The men on the sloop reached a decision.

  ‘These slaves of yours,’ said the man in the straw hat. ‘We share the bounty. Fifty-fifty.’

  ‘Seventy-thirty,’ Rob countered. ‘We caught them.’

  ‘And we’ll bring ’em back to market. Sixty-forty.’

  ‘Done,’ said Rob, smiling to mask his disgust that men could barter so casually over human lives.

  The canoe bumped up against the sloop. The man in the straw hat tossed down a line and made them fast. Rob gestured Scipio to go first.

  ‘And don’t give no trouble,’ he added with a wink.

  Scipio climbed the ladder, followed by the other freed slaves. Rob watched them disappear over the side, one by one. Then it was his turn. Only six rungs, but it felt like the longest climb of his life with his men below and the American crew above.

  He came over the side and took in the scene at a glance. Scipio and the others had been herded against the mast. Four sailors guarded them with boarding axes. A dozen other men loitered around the deck, watching. On such a small vessel, Rob was counting on the fact there would be no one below.

  The man in the straw hat grinned at Rob.

  ‘Mr Courtney. A relative of Major Courtney’s, I presume?’

  Rob didn’t know what he meant. He gave a vague nod.

  ‘Fine work taking the fugitives. But you should have bound them. Slaves is like wild dogs. You can’t never let ’em off the leash or they’ll bite.’

  ‘Very true,’ said Rob.

  In one motion, he swung the double-barrelled gun off his shoulder and fired. The American’s head exploded like a melon under a hail of point-blank shot. Before the crew could react, Rob had flipped the barrels and fired again. One of the men guarding the slaves dropped to the deck. The other three had barely begun to move when Scipio and his men launched into them with the knives they had hidden in their trousers. They wrestled the axes from their captors’ hands and butchered them.

  A few of the remaining crew tried to fight. They had no chance. The rest jumped over the side. By that time, all of Rob’s men had gained the deck. They took potshots at the men in the water to hurry them along, while Rob and Angus made a search below decks.

  All the crew were accounted for. The ship was theirs.

  The men cheered – but there was little time for celebration. The tide was slipping out. They would have to be quick to rendezvous with the Perseus.

  While the men unbrailed the sails, Rob kicked off his muddy shoes and ran up the rigging to the masthead. It was not nearly as high as he was used to on the Perseus, but the land around was so flat he could see for miles: over the neck of land and into the next bay.

  His hopes soared. There was the Perseus, still in Seabrook Bay. But what was she doing? Her anchor was raised and her topsails set, but she was making little headway. Was Tew still waiting for him? Surely the tide was too far out for the captain to risk his ship like that?

  Rob noticed something moving at the mouth of the bay.

  Another ship.

  She had been hidden behind the wooded island, but now she sailed out from its lee like a wolf breaking cover. A frigate flying American colours, her gunports raised and her cannons run out. That gave Rob his second shock. He recognised her. She was the Rapace, the ship they had fought off Newport. How on earth could she have come to be here?

  Now he understood Tew’s manoeuvres. With the wind against him, Tew couldn’t leave the bay without sailing under the privateer’s guns and being blown to pieces. He was trapped.

  Rob slid down the backstay so fast he burned the skin off his palms. He told Angus and Scipio what he’d seen.

  ‘So there’s a stalemate,’ said Angus. ‘The Frenchie doesn’t dare sail into the bay to engage, and Tew can’t sail out.’

  ‘The French ship doesn’t have to come in,’ said Rob. ‘If the Perseus stays much longer she’ll be stranded by the tide. The Yankees can bring down their guns on shore, and they’ll blast her until she surrenders.’ He balled his fists so tight his nails bit into his palms. ‘We have to help Tew.’

  ‘We’re in the wrong place.’

  Angus pointed to the spit of land that divided the two bays, curving around far to the north. It would take hours to beat up to the mouth of the bay, and hours more to sail back down to where the privateer was stationed.

  ‘If only there were a way through,’ groaned Rob.

  Scipio had listened to everything they said. Rob was not sure how much he understood, but now he pointed towards the spit of land.

  ‘There,’ said Scipio.

  Rob looked. All he saw was a solid green wall of waving reeds and seagrass.

  ‘How can a boat get through there?’ he asked.

  ‘There is a way.’

  ‘Even with the tide so low?’

  Mudflats were already appearing around the edge of the bay. Soon there would be barely enough water to float a cork.

  Scipio nodded.

  ‘How can you be sure?’ asked Angus. ‘Were you not kept on the plantation?’

  ‘I was boatman.’

  ‘We must try it,’ said Rob urgently. ‘It is our only hope of getting there in time.’

  ‘And if we run aground?’ pressed Angus. ‘We’ll just be another target for the privateer to batter at her pleasure. We’ll lose the ship.’

  Rob grinned. ‘It was never ours to start with.’

  ‘Aye,’ said Angus. ‘But one day I’d like to collect a wee bit of prize money for all these ships we capture.’

  The crew ran to their stations. The freed slaves did not know how to work a ship, but they could haul a line as well as any man. Under Angus’s direction, they soon had the sail smartly set. Rob took the wheel, while Scipio stood in the shrouds calling out directions.

  Rob searched out Thomas on deck. Since his first run-in with Coyningham, the boy had become a capable seaman. He still did not like going aloft, but Rob made sure to give him deck work as often as he could. Thomas repaid him with staunch loyalty.

  ‘They must have a lead line aboard this ship,’ Rob told Thomas. ‘Find it and go to the bow. I want to know to the inch how much water we have beneath our hull.’

  Thomas ran to obey. From the rigging, Scipio gave Rob a bemused look.

  ‘You do not need it,’ he told Rob.

  Rob bridled at being told how to captain his ship.

  ‘If we are in dangerous shallows, I must know.’

  ‘Danger everywhere.’ Scipio shook his head impatiently. ‘Now you know.’

  Thomas’s voice rang out from the bows. ‘Two fathoms.’

  Rob flinched. The shore was barely two hundred yards ahead, and still he could not see the channel Scipio had promised. He was putting a lot of faith in the freed slave.

  ‘One fathom six,’ called Thomas.

  ‘For God’s sake,’ muttered Angus. ‘That’s not so much as a whore’s cunny-hair under our keel.’

  Rob hardly heard him. He was concentrating on Scipio, who pointed the way like a compass needle. Rob coaxed the wheel gently – infinitesimal movements, as if he were guiding a frightened horse.

  Something scraped the side of the ship.

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘Sunken tree,’ said Angus.

  From the corner of his eye, Rob saw reeds and trees sliding past. He had not realised they had entered the channel. It was so narrow, he could not see the water off their side. It looked as if the ship were gliding over the land.

  ‘Set topsails, and every scrap of canvas you can find,’ he said to Angus.

  ‘Sir?’

  They both knew that the faster the ship sailed, the harder the impact if they struck the bottom. They might split open the hull.

  ‘If we strike bottom, then we are lost. But if we run aground in the mud, an extra few knots of speed might carry us over the bar.’

  ‘One fathom,’ called Thomas.

  ‘Christ help us.’

  Rob glanced at Scipio. The former slave was rigid, eyes fixed ahead in an expression of implacable concentration. The only part of him that moved was his arm, directing the way forwards.

  A shudder went through the hull. Rob clutched the wheel for balance, and almost turned them into a thicket of trees. He straightened up in time. The ship was still moving, her keel slithering over the muddy bottom with a terrible rasping noise.

  Every man aboard held his breath, waiting for the sloop to grind to a halt. She kept going, slower and slower as the mud fought her momentum. Foot by foot, inch by inch.