Birds of Prey

"If we can make good ten miles a day, which I doubt, perhaps a little over a month."

"Will the Buzzard still be there when we arrive, or will he have given up his search and sailed away?"Aboli thought aloud.

"Aye!" Daniel muttered. "And if he has gone what will become of us then? We'd be marooned there for ever."

"Do you prefer to be marooned here, Master Daniel? Do you want to die of cold and starvation on this God-forsaken mountain when winter comes round again?"

They were quiet again. Then Aboli said, "I am ready to leave now.

There is no other path open to us."

"But what of Sir Henry's leg? Is it strong enough yet?"

"Give me another week, lads, and I'll walk the hind legs off all of you."

"What do we do if we find the Buzzard still roosting at Elephant Lagoon?" Daniel was not ready to agree so easily. "He has a crew of a hundred well-armed ruffians and, if all of us survive the journey, we will be a dozen armed with swords alone."

"That's fine odds!" Hal laughed at him. "I've seen you take on much worse. Powder or no powder, we're off to find the Buzzard. Are you with us or not, Master Daniel?"

"Of course, I'm with you, Captain." Big Daniel was affronted" "What made you think I was not?"

That night, around the council fire, Hal explained the plan to the others. When he had finished he looked at their sombre faces in the firelight. "I will prevail on no man to come with us. Aboli, Daniel and I are determined to go, but if any among you wishes to remain here in the mountains we will leave half the store of weapons with you, including half the remaining gunpowder, and we will think no ill of you. Are there any of you who wish to speak?"

"Yes, said Sukeena, without looking up from the food she was cooking. "I go wherever you go."

"Bravely spoken, Princess," grinned Ned Tyler. "And I go also."

"Aye!" said the other seamen in unison. "We are all with you."

Hal nodded his thanks to them, and then looked at Althuda. "You have a woman and your son to think of, Althuda. What say you?"

He could see the distress on the face of little Zwaantie as she suckled the baby at her breast. Her dark eyes were filled with doubts and misgivings. Althuda lifted her to her feet and led her away into the darkness.

When they were gone Sabah spoke for all his band. "Althuda is our leader. He brought us out of captivity, and we cannot leave him and Zwaantie alone in the wilderness to perish with the baby of cold and hunger. If Althuda goes we go, but if he stays we must stay with him."

"I admire your resolve and your loyalty, Sabah," said Hal.

They waited in silence, hearing Zwaantie weeping with fear and indecision in the darkness. Then, after a long while, Althuda led her back to the fire, his arm around her shoulders, and they took their places in the circle.

"Zwaantie fears not for herself but for the baby," he said. "But she knows that our best chance will be with you, Sir Hal. We will come with you."

"I would have mourned if your decision had been different, Althuda." Hal smiled with genuine pleasure. "Together our chances are much increased. Now we must make our preparations and agree on the time when we will set out."

Sukeena came from the fire to sit beside Hal, and spoke out firmly. "Your leg will not be healed for at least another five days. I will not allow you to march upon it before then."

"When the Princess speaks," Aboli declared, in his deep voice, "only a foolish man does not listen."

During those last days Hal and Sukeena foraged for the herbs and plants that she would use for medicine and food. The last of the infection in Hal's wounds yielded to her treatment, while climbing and descending the steep and rugged slopes of the mountains rapidly strengthened his injured limb.

On the day before the journey was due to commence, the two stopped at midday to bathe and rest and make love in the soft grass beside the stream. This was a branch of the river that they had not visited on their previous forays, and while Hal lay surfeited with passion in the warm sunlight, Sukeena stood up naked and moved away up the rarine a short distance to ease herself.

Hal watched her squat behind a patch of low bush, lay back and closed his eyes, drifting lazily to the edge of sleep. He was roused by the familiar sound of Sukeena's sharp pointed digging stick pounding into the earth. A few minutes later she returned, still naked, but with a crumbling lump of yellow earth in her hand.

"Flower crystals! The first I have found in these mountains." She looked delighted with her discovery, and emptied some of the less valuable herbs from her basket to make place for the lumps of friable earth. "Part of these mountains must once have been volcanoes for the flower crystals are spewed up from the earth in the lava."

Hal watched her work, more interested in the way her naked body gleamed in the sunlight, like molten gold, and the way her small breasts changed shape as she wielded the stick vigorously, than in the crystalline lumps of yellow earth she was pr ising from the bank of the ravine.

"What do you use this earth for?" he asked, without rising from his grassy nest.

"It has many uses. It is a sovereign cure for headaches and colic. If I mix it with the juice of the verbena berry it will soothe palpitations of the heart and ease a woman's monthly courses..." She reeled off a list of the ailments that she could treat with it, but to Hal it did not seem to have any special virtue, and looked like any other clod of dry earth. The basket was so heavy by now that, on their return to camp, Hal had to take it from her.

That night while the band sat around the fire and held their final council before beginning the long journey east, Sukeena pounded the clods of earth in the crude stone mortar she had made and mixed the powder into a pot of water. She heated this over the fire, then came to sit beside Hal as he went over the order of march for the following day. He was allocating weapons and loads to the men. The weight and bulk of each load would be dictated by the age and strength of the man carrying it.

Suddenly Hal broke off and sniffed the air. "Sweet heaven and all the apostles!" he cried. "What have you in this pot, Sukeena?"

"I told you, Gundwane. "Tis the yellow flowers." She looked alarmed as he rushed back to her, picked her up in his arms, tossed her high in the air and caught her as she came down, skirts fluttering around her.

"Tis not any type of flower at all! I would know that smell in hell itself where it truly belongs!" He kissed her until she pushed his face away.

"Are you mad?" She laughed and gasped for breath.

"Mad with love for you!" he said, and turned her to face the men who had watched this display in amazement. "Lads, the Princess has created the miracle which will save us all!"

"You speak in riddles!" said Aboli.

"Yes!" the others cried. "Speak plain, Captain."

"I'll speak plain enough so even the slowest-witted of you sea-rats will understand my words." Hal laughed at their confusion. "Her pot is filled with brimstone! Magical yellow brimstone!"

It was Ned Tyler who understood first, for he was the master gunner. He also leaped to his feet, rushed to kneel over the pot and inhaled the fumes as though they were the smoke of an opium pipe.

"The captain's right, lads," he howled with glee. "It's brimstone sulphur, sure enough."

Sukeena led a party, headed by Aboli and Big Daniel, back to the ravine in which she had discovered the sulphur deposit, and they returned to camp staggering under their loads of the yellow earth, packed into baskets or sewn into sacks made of animal skins.

While Sukeena supervised the boiling and leaching of the sulphur crystals from the ore, one-eyed Johannes and Zwaantie tended the slow fires, banked with earth, in which the baulks of cedar wood were being gradually reduced to pure black nuggets of charcoal.

Hal and Sabah's band climbed the steep mountainside above the camp to reach the cliffs in which the multitudes of rock rabbits had their colonies. Sabah's men clung to the precipice like flies to the wall as they scraped away the amber coloured crystals of dried urine. The little animals defecated in communal middens, and while the round pellets of dung rolled away, the urine dribbled down and soaked the rock face. They discovered that, in some places, this coating was several feet thick.

They lowered skin sacks of these odoriferous deposits to the foot of the cliff, then lugged them down to the camp. They worked in shifts to keep the fires burning all day and night under the clay pots, extracting the sulphur from the powdered earth and the saltpetre from the animal excreta.

Ned Tyler and Hal, the two gunners, hovered over these steaming pots like a pair of alchemists, straining the liquid and reducing it with heat. Finally they dried the thick residual pastes in the sun. From the first brewing of the stinking compounds they were left with a store of dried crystalline powders that filled three large pots.

When crushed the charcoal was a smooth black powder, while the saltpetre was pale brown and fine as sea salt. When Hal placed a small pinch of it on his tongue it was indeed as pungent and salty as the sea. The flowers of sulphur were daffodil yellow and almost odour less

The entire band of fugitives gathered round to watch when, at last, Hal started to mix the three constituents in Sukeena's stone mortar. He measured the proportions and first ground together the charcoal and the sulphur, for without the final vital ingredient these were inert and harmless. Then he added the saltpetre and gingerly combined it with the dark grey primary powder until he had a flask filled with what looked and smelt like veritable gunpowder.

Aboli handed him one of the muskets and he measured a charge, dribbled it down the barrel, stuffed a wad of fibrous dried bark on top of it and rodded home a round pebble he had selected from the sandbank of the stream. He would not waste a lead ball in this experiment.

Meanwhile, Big Daniel had set up a wooden target on the opposite bank. While Hal squatted and took his aim the rest spread out on either side of him and plugged their ears with their fingers. An expectant silence fell as he took aim and pressed the trigger.

There was a thunderous report and a blinding cloud of smoke. The wooden target shattered and toppled down the bank into the water. An exultant cheer went up from everyone, and they pounded each other upon the back and danced delirious jigs of triumph in the sunlight.

"It's as fine a grade of powder as any you can find in the naval stores in Greenwich," Ned Tyler opined, "but it will have to be properly caked afore we can bag it and carry it away."

To this end Hal ordered a large clay pot to be placed behind a grass screen at the edge of the camp, and all were strictly enjoined to make use of it on every possible occasion. Even the two women went behind the screen to make their demure contributions. Once the pot was filled, the gunpowder was moistened into paste with the urine, then formed into briquettes, which dried hard in the sun. These were packed into reed baskets for ease of transporting.

"We will grind the cakes as we need them," Hal explained to Sukeena "Now we do not have to carry such a weight of dried fish and meat for we will hunt as we travel. If there is such an abundance of game, as Sabah tells us there is, we will not go short of fresh meat."

Ten days later than they had first intended, the band was ready to set out into the east. Hal, as the navigator, and Sabah, who had travelled that route before, led the column, Althuda and the three musketeers were in the centre to guard the women and little Bobby, while Aboli and Big Daniel brought up the rear under their ponderous burdens.

They travelled with the grain and run of the range, not attempting to scale the high ground but following the valleys and crossing only through the passes between the high peaks. Hal estimated the distances travelled by eye and time, and the direction with the leather-cased compass. These he marked on his charts every evening before the light faded.

At night they camped in the open, for the weather was mild and they were too tired to build a shelter. When they woke each dawn, their skin blankets, that Sabah called karosses, were soaked with dew.

As Sabah had warned, it was six days of hard travel through the labyrinth of valleys before they reached the steep eastern escarpment and looked down from its crest on the lower ground..

Far out to their right they could make out the blue stain of the ocean merging with the paler heron's-egg blue of the sky, but below the land was not the true plains that Hal had expected but was broken up with hillocks, undulating grassy glades and streaks of dark green forest that seemed to follow the courses of the many small rivers that crisscrossed the littoral as they meandered down to the sea.

To their left, another range of jagged blue mountains marched parallel to the sea, forming a rampart that guarded the mysterious hinterland of the continent. Hal's sharp eyesight picked out the dark stains on the golden grassy plains, moving like cloud shadows when there were no clouds in the sky. He saw the haze of dust that followed the moving herds of wild game, and now and then he spotted the reflection of sunlight from tusks of ivory or from a polished horn.

"This land swarms with life he murmured to Sukeena, who stood at his shoulder. "There may be strange beasts down there that man has never before laid eyes upon. Perhaps even fire-breathing dragons and unicorns and griffons." Sukeena shivered and hugged her shoulders, even though the sun was high and warm.

"I saw such creatures drawn on the charts I brought for you," she agreed.

There was a path before them, beaten by the great round pads of elephant and signposted by piles of their fibrous yellow dung, that wound down the slope, picking the most favourable gradient, skirting the deep ravines and dangerous gorges, and Hal followed it.

As they descended, the features of the landscape below became more apparent. Hal could even recognize some of the creatures that -moved upon it. The black mass of bovine animals surmounted by a golden haze of dust and a cloud of hovering tick birds, sparkling white in the sunlight, must be the wild buffalo that Aboli had spoken of. Nyati, he had called them, when he had warned Hal of their ferocity. There must be several hundred of these beasts in each of the three separate herds that he had under his eye.

Beyond the nearest herd of buffalo was a small gathering of elephants. Hal remembered them well from his previous sightings long ago on the shores of the lagoon. But he had never before seen them in such numbers. At the very least there were twenty great grey cows each with a small calf, like a piglet, at her heels. Dotted upon the plain like hillocks of grey granite were three or four solitary bulls. he could barely credit the size of these patriarchs or the length and girth of their gleaming yellow ivory tusks.

There were other creatures, not as large as the elephant bulls, but massive and grey none the less, which at first he took for elephant also, but as they descended towards the low ground he was able to make out the black horns, some as long as a man is tall, that decorated their great creased grey snouts. He remembered then what Sabah had told him of these savage beasts, one of which had speared and killed Johannes" woman with its deadly horn. These "rhenosters" which was Sabah's name for them, seemed solitary in nature for they stood apart from others of the same kind, each in the shade of its own tree.

As Hal strode along at the head of the tiny column, he heard the light tread of feet coming up behind him, footsteps that he had come to know and love so well. Sukeena had left her place in the centre of the line, as she often did when she found some excuse to walk with him for a while.

She slipped her hand into his and kept pace with him. "I did not want to go alone into this new land. I wanted to walk beside you, she said softly, then looked up at the sky. "See the way the wind veers into the south and the clouds crouch on the mountain tops like a pack of wild beasts in ambush? There is a storm coming."

Her warning proved timely. Hal was able to lead them to a cave in the mountainside to shelter before the storm struck. They lay up there for three long days and nights while the storm raged without, but when they emerged at last, the land was washed clean and the sky was bright and burning blue.

Before the Golden Bough had made her offing from Good Hope and come onto her true course to round the Cape, Captain Christopher Llewellyn was already regretting having taken on board his paying passenger.

He had found out soon enough that Colonel Cornelius Schreuder was a difficult man to like, arrogant, outspoken and highly opinionated. He held firm and unwavering views on every subject that was raised, and was never diffident in giving expression to these. "He picks up enemies as a dog picks up fleas," Llewellyn told his mate.

The second day out from Table Bay, Llewellyn had invited Schreuder to dine with him and some of his officers in the stern cabin. He was a cultured man, and maintained a grand style even at sea. With the prize money that he had won in the recent Dutch war, he could afford to indulge his taste for fine things.

The GoLden Bough had cost almost two thousand pounds to build and launch, but she was probably the finest vessel of her class and burden afloat. Her culver ins were newly cast and her sails were of the finest canvas. The captain's quarters were fitted out with a taste and discrimination unparalleled in any navy, but her qualities as a fighting ship had not been sacrificed for luxury.

During the voyage down the Atlantic, Llewellyn had found, to his delight, that her sea-keeping qualities were all he had hoped. On a broad reach, with her sails full and the wind free, her hull sliced through the water like a blade, and she could point so high into the wind that it made his heart sing to feel her deck heel under his feet.

Most of his officers and petty-officers had served with him during the war and had proved their quality and courage, but he had on board one younger officer, the fourth son of George, Viscount Winterton.

Lord Winterton was the Master Navigator of the Order, one of the richest and most powerful men in England. He owned a fleet of privateers and trading ships. The Honourable Vincent Winterton was on his first privateering voyage, placed by his father under Llewellyn's tutelage. He was a comely youth, not yet twenty years of age but well educated, with a frank and winning manner that made him popular with both the seamen and his brother officers alike.

He was one of the other guests at Llewellyn's dinner table that second night out from Good Hope.

The dinner started out gay and lively, for all the Englishmen were merry, with a fine ship under them and the promise of glory and gold ahead. Schreuder, however, was aloof and gloomy. With the second glass of wine warming them all, Llewellyn called across the cabin, "Vincent, my lad, will you not give us a tune?"

"Could you bear to listen, yet again, to my caterwauling, sir?" The young man laughed modestly, but the rest of the company urged him on. "Come on, Vinny! Sing for us, man!

Vincent Winterton stood up and went to the small clavichord that was fastened with heavy brass screws to one of the main frames of the ship. He sat down, tossed back his long thick curling locks and struck a soft, silvery chord from the keyboard. "What would you have me sing?"

"Greensleeves!" suggested someone, but Vincent pulled a face. "You've heard that a hundred times and more since we sailed from home."

"Mother Mine'T." cried another. This time Vincent nodded, threw back his head and sang in a strong, true voice that transformed the mawkish lyrics and brought tears to the eyes of many of the company as they tapped their feet in time to the song.

Schreuder had taken an immediate and unreasoned dislike to the attractive youth, so comely and popular with his peers, so sure of himself and serene in his high rank and privileged birth. Schreuder, in comparison, felt himself ageing and overlooked. He had never attracted the natural admiration and affection of those about him, as this young man so obviously did.

He sat stiffly in a corner, ignored by these men who, not so long ago, had been his deadly enemies, and who, he knew, despised him as a dull foreigner and a foot soldier, not one of their brotherhood of the ocean. He found his dislike turning to active hatred of the young man, whose fine features were clear and unlined and whose voice had the timbre and tonal colour of a temple bell.

When the song ended, there was a moment of silence, attentive and awed. Then they all burst out clapping and applauding. "Oh, well done, lad!" and "Bravo, Vinny!" Schreuder felt his irritation become unbearable.

The applause went on too long for the liking of the singer, and Vincent rose from the clavichord with a deprecating wave of the hand that begged them to desist.

In the silence that followed, Schreuder said, softly but distinctly, "Caterwauling? No, sit, that was an insult to the feline species."

There was a shocked silence in the small cabin. The young man flushed and his hand dropped instinctively to the hilt of the short-bladed dirk that he wore at his jewelled belt, but Llewellyn said sharply, "Vincent!" and shook his head. Reluctantly he dropped his hand from the weapon and forced himself to smile and bow slightly. "You have a perceptive ear, sit. I commend your discerning taste."

He resumed his seat at the board and turned away from Schreuder to engage his neighbour in light-hearted repartee. The awkward moment passed, and the other guests relaxed, smiled and joined in the conversation, which pointedly excluded the Colonel.

Llewellyn's cook had come with him from home, and the ship had been provisioned at Good Hope with fresh meat and vegetables. The meat was as good as any that might be served in the coffee shops and ate-houses of Fleet Street, the conversation as pleasing and the banter nimble and amusing, larded with clever puns, double meanings and fashionable slang. Most of this was above Schreuder's grasp of the language and his resentment built up like the brewing of a tropical typhoon.

He made one contribution to the conversation, a stinging reference to the Dutch victory in the Thames River and the capture of the Royal Charles, the pride of the English navy and the namesake of their beloved sovereign. The conversation froze into silence once more, and the company fixed him with chilly scrutiny, before continuing their conversation as though he had not spoken.

Schreuder consoled himself with the claret, and when the bottle in front of him was exhausted, he reached down the table for a flagon of brandy. His head for liquor was -as adamantine as his pride, but today it seemed only to make him more truculent and angry. By the end of the meal he was spoiling for trouble, and prospecting for some way in which to ease the terrible sense of rejection and hopelessness that overpowered him.

At last Llewellyn stood up to propose the loyal toast. "Here's health and a long life to the Black Boy!" Everyone rose enthusiastically to their feet, stooping under the low deck timbers overhead, but Schreuder stayed seated.

Llewellyn knocked on the table. "If you please, Colonel, come to your feet. We are drinking the health of the King of England."

"I am no longer thirsty, thank you, Captain." Schreuder folded his arms.

The men growled, and one said loudly, "Let me at him, Captain."

"Colonel Schreuder is a guest aboard this ship," Llewellyn said ominously, "and none of you will offer him any discourtesy, no matter if he behaves like a pig himself and transgresses all the conventions of decent society." Then he turned back to Schreuder. "Colonel, I am asking you for the last time to join the loyal toast. If you do not, we are still within easy range of Good Hope. I will give the orders immediately for this ship to go about and sail back to Table Bay. There I will return your fare money to you, and have you deposited on the beach like a bucketful of kitchen slops."

Schreuder sobered instantly. This was a threat he had not anticipated. He had hoped to provoke one of these English oafs into a duel. He would then have given them a display of swordsmanship that would have opened their cold-fish eyes and wiped those superior smirks from their faces, but the thought of being taken back to the scene of his crime and delivered into the vengeful hands of Governor van de Velde made his lips go numb and his fingers tingle with dread. He rose slowly to his feet with his glass in his hand. Llewellyn relaxed slightly, they all drank the toast and sat down again in a hubbub of laughter and talk.

"Does anybody fancy a few throws of the dice?" Vincent Winterton suggested, and there was general agreement.

"But not if you wish to play for shilling stakes again," one of the older officers demurred. "Last time I lost almost twenty pounds, all the prize money I won when we captured the Buumwn."

"Farthing stakes and a shilling limit another suggested, and they nodded and felt for their purses.

"Mister Winterton, sir," Schreuder broke in, "I will oblige you with whatever stakes your stomach will hold and not puke up again." He was pale and sweat sheened his forehead, but that was the only visible effect the liquor had upon him.

Once again a silence fell on the table as Schreuder groped under his tunic and brought out a pigskin purse. He dropped it nonchalantly on the table and it clinked with the unmistakable music of gold. Every man at the table stiffened.

"We play in sport and in good fellowship here," Llewellyn growled.

But Vincent Winterton said lightly, "How much is in that purse, Colonel?"

Schreuder loosened the drawstring and, with a flourish, poured the coins into a heavy heap in the centre of the table where they sparkled in the lamplight. Triumphantly he looked around the circle of their faces.

They will not take me so lightly now! he thought, but aloud he said, "Twenty thousand Dutch guilders. That is over two hundred of your English pounds." It was his entire fortune, but there was a reckless, self-destructive pounding in his heart. He found himself driven on to folly as though he might wipe away the guilt of his terrible murder with gold.

The company was silenced by the size of his purse. It was an enormous sum, more than most of these officers might expect to accumulate in a lifetime of dangerous endeavour.

Vincent Winterton smiled graciously. "I see you are indeed a sportsman, sir."

"Ah! So!" Schreuder smiled coldly. "The stakes are too high, are they?" And he swept the golden coins back into his purse and made as if to rise from the table.

"Hold hard, Colonel." Vincent stopped him, and Schreuder sank back into his seat. "I came unprepared, but if you will afford me a few minutes of your time?" He rose, bowed and left the cabin. They all sat in silence until he returned and placed a small teak chest in front of him on the table.

"Three hundred, was it?" He began to count out the coins from the chest. They made a splendid profusion in the centre of the table.

"Will you be kind enough to hold the stakes, Captain?" Vincent asked politely. "That is, if the colonel agrees?"

"I have no objection." Schreuder nodded stiffly and passed his purse to Llewellyn. Inwardly the first regrets were assailing him. He had not expected any of them to take up his challenge. A loss of such magnitude must beggar most men, as indeed it would beggar him.

Llewellyn received both purses, and placed them before him. Then Vincent took up the leather dice cup and passed it across to Schreuder.

"We usually play with these, sir." Vincent said easily. "Would you care to examine them? If they are not to your liking, perhaps we may be able to find others that suit you better."

Schreuder shook the dice out of the cup and rolled them across the table. Then he picked up each ivory cube and held it to the lamplight.

"I can see no blemish," he said, and replaced them in the cup. "It remains only to agree on the game. Will it be Hazard?"

"English Hazard, "Vincent agreed. "What else?"

"What limit on each coup?" Schreuder wanted to know. "Will it be a pound or five?"

"A single coup only," said Vincent. "The shooter to be decided by high dice, and then two hundred pounds on his Hazard."

Schreuder was stunned by the proposal. He had expected to make his wagers in small increments, which would allow him the possibility of withdrawing with some semblance of grace if the run of the dice turned against him. He had never heard of such an immense sum staked on a single throw of the dice.

One of Vincent's friends chortled delightedly. "By God's truth, Vinny! That will show up the colour of the cheese head liver."

Schreuder glared at him, but he knew he was trapped. For a moment longer he sought some escape, but Vincent murmured, "I do hope I have not embarrassed you, Colonel. I mistook you for a sport. Would you rather call off the whole affair?"

"I assure you," he said coldly, "that it suits me very well. One hazard for two hundred pounds. I agree."

Llewellyn placed one of the dice in the cup and passed it to Schreuder. "One dice to decide the shooter. High shoots. Is that your agreement, gentlemen?" Both men nodded.

Schreuder rolled the single dice, "Three!" said Llewellyn, and replaced it in the leather cup.

"Your throw, Mister Winterton." He placed the cup in front of Vincent, who swept it up and threw in the same motion.

"Five!" said Llewellyn. "Mister Winterton is the shooter at one coup of English Hazard for a purse of two hundred pounds." This time he placed both dice in the cup. "The shooter will throw to decide the main point. If you please, Mister Winterton."

Vincent took up the cup and rolled it out. Llewellyn read the dice. "The Main is seven."

Schreuder's soul quailed. Seven was the easiest Main to duplicate. Many combinations of the dice would yield it. The odds had swung against him, and this realization was reflected on the gloating face of every one of the watchers. If Vincent threw another seven or an eleven he would win, which was likely. If he threw the "crabs" one and one or one and two, or if he threw twelve then he lost. Any other number would become his Chance, and he would have to keep throwing until he repeated it or threw one of the losing combinations.

Schreuder leaned back and folded his arms as though to defend himself from a brutal attack. Vincent threw.

"Four!" said Llewellyn. "The Chance is now four." There was a simultaneous release of breath from every person at the table except Vincent. He had given himself the most difficult Main to achieve. The odds had swung back overwhelmingly in Schreuder's favour. Vincent must now throw a Chance four to win, or a Main seven to lose. Only two combinations could total four, whereas there were many others that would yield a losing seven.

"You have my sympathy, sir." Schreuder smiled cruelly. "Four is the devil's own number to make."

"The angels favour the virtuous." Vincent waved his hand lightly, and smiled. "Would you care to increase your stake. I will give you even money for another hundred pounds?" It was a foolhardy offer, with the odds stacked heavily against him, but Schreuder had not another guilder to avail himself of it.

He shook his head curtly. "I would not take advantage of a man who is on his knees."

"How gallant you are, Colonel," Vincent said, and threw again.

"Ten!" said Llewellyn. It was a neutral number.

Vincent picked up the dice and rattled them in the cup and threw again.

"Six!" Another neutral number and, though Schreuder sat still as a corpse, his colour was waxen and he could feel droplets of sweat crawling through his chest hairs like slimy garden slugs.

"This one is for all the pretty girls we left behind US," said Vincent and the dice clattered on the walnut tabletop as he threw again. For a long terrible moment no man moved or spoke. Then a howl went up from every English throat that must have alarmed the watch on the deck above and reached to the lookout at the top of the mainmast.

"Mary and Joseph! Two pairs of titties! As sweet a little four as I have ever seen!"

"Mister Winterton has thrown his Chance," intoned Llewellyn, and placed both heavy purses in front of him. "Mister Winterton wins." But his voice was almost drowned by the uproar of laughter and congratulation. It went on for several minutes while Schreuder sat immobile as a fallen forest log, his face grey and sweating.

At last Winterton waved away any further chaff and congratulation.

He stood up, leaned over the table towards Schreuder, and said seriously, "I salute you, sir. You are a gentleman of iron nerve, and a sportsman of the first water. I offer you the hand of friendship." He stretched out his right hand with the palm open. Schreuder looked at it disdainfully, still not moving, and the smiles faded away. Another charged silence fell over the little cabin.

Schreuder spoke out clearly. "I should have examined those dice of yours more closely while I had the chance." He placed a heavy emphasis on the possessive pronoun. "I hope you will forgive me, sir, but I make it a rule never to shake hands with cheats." Vincent recoiled sharply and stared at Schreuder in. disbelief, while the others gasped and gaped.

It took Vincent a long moment to recover from the shock of the unexpected insult, and his handsome young face had paled under his sea and salt-tanned skin as he replied, "I would be deeply obliged if you could see fit to accord me satisfaction for that remark, Colonel Schreuder."

"With the greatest of pleasure." Schreuder rose to his feet, smiling with triumph. He had been challenged so the choice of weapons was his. There would be no aping about with pistols. It would be the steel and this English puppy would have the pleasure of a yard of the Neptune sword in his belly. Schreuder turned to Llewellyn. "Would you do me the honour of acting as my second in this matter?" he asked.

"No!" Llewellyn shook his head firmly. "I will not allow duelling on board any ship of mine. You will have to find yourself another person to act for you, and you will have to check your temper until we reach port. Then you can go ashore to settle this matter."

Schreuder looked back at Vincent. "I will inform you of the name of my second at the first opportunity," he said. "I promise you satisfaction as soon as we reach port." He stood up and marched out of the cabin. He could hear their voices behind him, raised in comment and conjecture, but the brandy fumes rose to mingle with his rage until he feared the veins beating in his temples might burst with the strength of it.

The folloing day Schreuder kept to his own cabin where a servant brought his meals to him. he lay on his bunk like a battle casualty, nursing the terrible wounds to his pride and the unbearable pain caused by the loss of his entire worldly wealth. On the second day he came on deck while the Golden Bough was on a larboard tack and making good her course of west-north-west along the bulging coastline of southern Africa.

As soon as his head appeared above the coaming of the companionway, the officer of the watch turned away and busied himself with the pegs on the traverse board, while Captain Llewellyn raised his telescope and studied the blue mountains that loomed on the horizon to the north. Schreuder paced along the lee rail of the ship while the officers studiously ignored his presence. The servant who had waited at the Captain's dinner party had spread the news of the impending duel through all the ship, and the crew eyed him curiously and kept well out of his path.

After half an hour Schreuder stopped abruptly in front of the officer of the watch and, without preamble, asked, "Mister Fowler, will you act as my second?"

"I beg your pardon, Colonel, Mister Winterton is a friend of mine. Will you excuse me, please?"

During the days that followed Schreuder approached every officer aboard to act for him, but in each case he was received with frigid refusals. Ostracized and humiliated, he prowled the open deck like a night-stalking leopard. His thoughts swung like a pendulum between remorse and agony over Katinka's death, and resentment of the treatment meted out to him by the captain and officers of the ship. His rage swelled until he could barely support it.

On the morning of the fifth day, as he paced the lee rail, a hail from the masthead aroused him from this black mist of suffering. When Captain Llewellyn strode to the windward rail and stared into the south-west, Schreuder followed him across the deck and stood at his shoulder.

For some moments he doubted his own eyesight as he stared at the mountainous range of menacing dark cloud that stretched from the horizon to the heavens and which bore down upon them with such speed that it made him think again of the avalanche sweeping down the dark gorge.

"You had best go below, Colonel," Llewellyn warned him. "We're in for a bit of a blow."

Schreuder ignored the warning and stood by the rail, filled with awe as he- watched the clouds roll down upon them. All around him the ship was in turmoil as the crew rushed to get the sails furled and to bring the bows around, so that the Golden Bough faced into the racing storm. The wind came on so swiftly that it caught her with her royals and jib still set and sheeted home.

The storm hurled itself upon the Golden Bough, howling with fury, and laid her over so that the lee rail went under and green water piled aboard to sweep the deck waist deep. Schreuder was borne away on this flood and might have been washed overboard had he not grabbed hold of the main shrouds.

The Golden Bough's jib and royals burst as though they were wet parchment and for a long minute she wallowed half under as the gale pinned her down. The sea poured into her open hatches, and from below there was the crash and thunder as some of her bulkheads burst and her cargo shifted. Men screamed as they were crushed by a culverin that had broken its breeching tackle and was running amok on the gundeck. Other sailors cried like lost souls falling into the pit as they were carried over the side by the racing green waters. The air turned white with spray so that Schreuder felt himself drowning, even though his face was clear of the water, and the white fog blinded him.

Slowly the Golden Bough righted herself as her lead weighted keel levered her upright, but her spars and rigging were in tatters, snapping and lashing in the gale. Some of her yards were broken away and they clattered, banged and battered the standing masts. Listing heavily with the seawater she had taken in the Golden Bough was driven out of control before the wind.

Gasping and choking, half-drowned and doused to the skin, Schreuder dragged himself across the deck to the shelter of the companionway. From there he watched in dread and fascination as the world around him dissolved in silver spray and maddened green waves streaked with long pathways of foam.

For two days the wind never ceased its assault upon them, and the seas grew taller and wilder with every hour until they seemed to tower higher than the mainmast as they rushed down upon them. Halfswamped, the Golden Bough was slow to lift to meet them, and as they struck her they burst into foam and tumbled green across her decks. Two helmsmen, lashed to the whipstall, battled to keep her pointing with the gale, but each wave that came aboard burst over their heads. By the second day all aboard were exhausted and nearing the limits of their endurance. There was no chance of sleep and only hard biscuit to eat.

Llewellyn had lashed himself to the mainmast and from there he directed the efforts of his officers and men to keep the ship alive. No man could stand unsupported upon the open deck, so Llewellyn could not order them to man the main pumps, but on the gundeck teams of seamen worked in a frenzy at the auxiliary pumps to try to clear the six feet of water in her bilges. As fast as they pumped it out the sea poured back through the shattered gun ports and the cracked hatch covers.

Always the land loomed closer in their lee as the storm drove them onwards under bare masts, and though the helmsmen strained muscle and heart to hold her off, the Golden Bough edged in towards the land. That night they heard the surf break and boom like a barrage of cannon out there in the darkness, growing every hour more tumultuous as they were driven towards the rocks.

When dawn broke on the third day they could see, through the fog and spume, the dark, threatening shape of the land, the cliffs and jagged headlands only a league away across the marching mountains of grey and furious waters.

Schreuder dragged himself across the deck, clinging to mast and shroud and backstay as each wave came aboard. Seawater streamed from his hair down his face, filling his mouth and nostrils, as he gasped at Llewellyn, "I know this coast. I recognize that headland coming up ahead of US."

"We'll need God's blessing to weather it on this course," Llewellyn shouted. "The wind has us in its teeth."

"Then pray to the Almighty with all your heart, Captain, for our salvation lies not five leagues beyond," Schreuder bellowed, blinking the salt water from his eyes.

"How can you be certain of that?"

"I have been ashore here and marched through the country. I know every wrinkle of the land. There is a bay beyond that cape, which we named Buffalo Bay. Once she is into it, the ship should be sheltered from the full force of the wind, and on the far side there stand a pair of rocky heads that guard the entrance to a wide and calm lagoon. In there we would be safe from even such a storm as this."

"There is no lagoon marked on my charts." Llewellyn's expression was riven with hope and doubt.

"Sweet Jesus, Captain, you must believe me!" Schreuder shouted. On the sea he was out of his natural element and for once even he was afraid.

"First we must weather those rocks, and after that we can prove the quality of your memory."

Schreuder was silenced and clung desperately to the mast beside Llewellyn. He stared ahead in horror as he watched the sea open her snarling lips of white foam and bare fangs of black rock. The Golden Bough drove on helplessly into her jaws.

One of the helmsmen screamed, "Oh, holy Mother of God, save our mortal souls! We're going to strike!"

"Hold your helm hard over!" Llewellyn roared at him. Close alongside, the sea opened viciously and the reef burst out like a blowing whale. Claws of stone seemed to reach out towards the frail planks of the little ship, and they were so near that Schreuder could see the masses of shellfish and weed that cloaked the rocks. Another wave, larger than the rest, lifted and flung them at the reef, but the rocks disappeared below the boiling surface and the Golden Bough rose up like a hunter at a fence and shot high over it.

Her keel touched the rock and she checked with such force that Schreuder's grip on the mast was broken and he was hurled to the deck, but the ship shook herself free, surged onwards, carried on the crest of that mighty wave, and slid off the reef into the deeper water beyond. She charged forward, the point of the headland dropping away behind her and the bay opening ahead. Schreuder dragged himself upright and felt at once that the dreadful might of the gale had been broken by the sprit of land. Though the ship still hurtled on wildly, she was coming back under control and Schreuder could feel her respond to the urging of her rudder.

"There!" he screamed in Llewellyn's ear. "There! Dead ahead!"

"Sweet heaven! You were right." Through the spume and seaftet Llewellyn picked out the shape of the twin heads over the ship's bows. He rounded on his helmsmen. "Let her fall off a point!" Though their terrified expressions showed how they hated to obey, they let her come down across the wind and point towards the next pier of black rock and surf.

"Hold her at that!" Llewellyn checked them, and the Golden Bough tore headlong across the bay.

"Mister Winterton!" he roared at Vincent, who crouched below the hatch-coaming close at hand with a halfdozen sailors sheltering on the companion behind him. "We must shake out a reef on the main topgallant sail to give her steerage. Can you do it?"

He made the order a request, for it was the next thing to murder to send a man to the top of the mainmast in this gale. An officer must lead the way, and Vincent was the strongest and boldest among them.

"Come on, lads!" Vincent shouted at his men without hesitation. "There's a golden guinea for any man who can beat me to the main topgallant yard." He leapt to his feet and darted across the deck to the mainmast shrouds and went flying up them hand over hand with his men in pursuit.

The Golden Bough "tore across Buffalo Bay like a runaway horse. Suddenly Schreuder shouted again, "Look there!" and pointed to where the entrance to the lagoon began to open to their view between the heads that towered on either hand.

Llewellyn threw back his head and gazed up the main, mast at the tiny figures that spread out along the high yard and wrestled with the reefed canvas. He recognized Vincent easily by his lean athletic form and his dark hair whipping in the wind.

"Bravely done thus far," Llewellyn whispered, "but hurry, lad. Give me a scrap of canvas to steer her by."

As he said it the studding-sail flew out and filled with a crack like a musket shot. For a dreadful moment Llewellyn thought the canvas might be shredded in the gale, but it filled and held and immediately he felt the ship's motion change.

"Sweet Mother Mary! We might make it yet!" he croaked, through a throat scoured and rough with salt. "Hard over!" he called to the helm, and the Golden Bough answered willingly and put her bows across the wind.

Like an arrow from a longbow, she drove straight at the western headland as though to hurl herself ashore, but her hull slid away through the water and the angle of her bows altered. The passage opened full before her, and as she passed into the lee of the land she steadied, darted between the heads, caught the tide, which was at full flow, and sped upon it through the channel into the quiet lagoon where she was protected from the full force of the storm.

Llewellyn gazed at the green forested shores in wonder and relief.

Then he started and pointed ahead. "There's another ship at anchor here already!"

Beside him Schreuder shaded his eyes from the slashing gusts of wind that eddied around the cliffs.

"I know that vessel!" he cried. "I know her well. "Tis Lord Cumbrae's ship. "Tis the Gull of Moray!"

"Eland!" whispered Althuda softly, and Hal recognized the Dutch name for elk, but these creatures were unlike any of the great red deer of the north that he had ever seen. They were enormous, larger even than the cattle that his uncle Thomas had raised on the High Weald estate.

The three Of them, Hal, Althuda and Aboli, lay belly down in a small hollow filled with rank grass. The herd was strung out among the open grove of sweet-thorn trees ahead. Hal counted fifty-two bulls, cows and calves together. The bulls were ponderous and fat so that, as they walked, their dewlaps swung from side to side and the flesh on their bellies and quarters quivered like that of a jellyfish. At each pace there came a strange clicking sound like breaking twigs.

"It is their knees that make that noise," Aboli explained in Hal's ear. "The Nkulu Kulu, the great god of all things, punished them when they boasted of being the greatest of all the antelope. He gave them this affliction so that the hunter would always hear them from afar."

Hal smiled at the quaint belief, but then Aboli told him something else that turned off that smile. "I know these creatures, they were highly prized by the hunters of my tribe, for a bull such as that one at the front of the herd carries a mass of white fat around his heart that two men cannot carry." For months now none of them had tasted fat, for all the game they had managed to kill was devoid of it. They all craved it, and Sukeena had warned Hal that for lack of it they must soon sicken and fall prey to disease.

Hal studied the herd bull as he browsed on one of the sweet-thorn trees, hooking down the higher branches with his massive spiralling. horns. Unlike his cows, who were a soft and velvet brown, striped with white across their shoulders, the bull had turned grey-blue with age and there was a tuft of darker hair on his forehead between the bases of his great horns.

"Leave the bull," Aboli told Hal. "His flesh will be coarse and tough. See that cow behind him? She will be sweet and tender as a virgin, and her fat will turn to honey in your mouth." Against Aboli's advice, which Hal knew was always the best available, he felt the urge of the hunter attract him to the great bull.

"If we are to cross the river safely, then we need as much meat as we can carry. Each of us will fire at his own animal." he decided. "I will take the bull, you and Althuda pick younger animals." He began to snake forward on his belly, and the other two followed him.

In these last days since they had descended the escarpment they had found that the game upon these plains had little fear of man. It seemed that the dreaded upright bipod silhouette he presented had no especial terrors for them, and they allowed the hunters to approach within certain musket shot before moving away.

Thus it must have been in Eden before the Fall, Hal thought, as he closed with the herd bull. The soft breeze favoured him, and the tendrils of blue smoke from their slow-match drifted away from the herd.

He was so close now that he could make out the individual eyelashes that framed the huge liquid dark eyes of the bull, and the red and gold legs of the ticks that clung in-bunches to the soft skin between his forelegs. The bull fed, delicately wiping the young green leaves from the twigs between the thorns with its blue tongue.

On each side of him two of his young cows fed from the same thorn tree. One had a calf at heel while the other was full-bellied and gravid. Hal turned his head slowly and looked at the men who lay beside him. He indicated the cows to them with a slow movement of his eyes, and Aboli nodded and raised his musket.

Once more Hal concentrated all his attention on the great bull, and traced the line of the scapula beneath the skin that covered the shoulder, fixing a spot in all that broad expanse of smooth blue-grey hide at which to aim. He raised the musket and held the butt into the notch of his shoulder-, sensing the men on either side of him do the same.

As the bull took another pace forward he held his fire. It stopped again and raised its head, on the thick dew lapped neck, to full stretch, laying the massive twisted horns across its back, reaching up over two fathoms high to the topmost sprigs of the thorn tree where the sweetest bunches of lacy green leaves grew.

Hal fired, and heard the detonation of the other muskets on either side of him blend with the concussion of his own weapon. A swirling screen of white gunsmoke blotted out his forward view. He let the musket drop, sprang to his feet and raced out to his side to get a clear view around the smoke bank. He saw that one of the cows was down, kicking and struggling as her lifeblood spurted from the wound in her throat, while the other was staggering away, her near front leg swinging loosely from the broken bone. Already Aboli was running after her, his drawn cutlass in his right hand.

The rest of the herd was rushing away in a tight brown mass down the valley, the calves falling behind their dams. However, the bull had left the herd, sure sign that the lead ball had struck him grievously. He was striding away up the gentle slope of the low, grass-covered hillock ahead. But his gait was short and hampered, and as he changed direction, exposing his great shoulder to Hal's view, the blood that poured down his flank was red as a banner in the sunlight and bubbling with the air from his punctured lungs.

Hal started to run, speeding away over the tussocked grass. The injury to his leg was by now only a perfectly healed scar, glossy blue and ridged. The long trek over the mountains and plains had strengthened that limb so that his stride was full and lithe. A cable's length or more ahead, the bull was drawing away from him, leaving a haze of fine red dust hanging in the air, but then its wound began to tell and the spilling blood painted a glistening trail on the silver grass to mark his passing.

Hal closed the gap until he was only a dozen strides behind the mountainous beast. It sensed his pursuit and turned at bay. Hal expected a furious charge, a lowering of the great tufted head and a levelling of those spiral horns. He came up short, facing the antelope, and whipped his cutlass from the scabbard, prepared to defend himself.

The bull looked at him with huge puzzled eyes, dark and swimming with the agony of its approaching death. Blood dripped from its nostrils and the soft blue tongue lolled from the side of its mouth. It made no move to attack him, or to defend itself, and Hal saw no malice or anger in its gaze.

"Forgive me," he whispered, as he circled the beast, waiting for an opening, and felt the slow, sad waves of remorse break over his heart to watch the agony he had inflicted upon this magnificent animal.

Suddenly he rushed forward and thrust with the steel. The stroke of the expert swordsman buried the blade full length in the bull's flesh, and it bucked and whirled away, snatching the hilt out of Hal's hand. But the steel had found the heart and, its legs folded gently under it, the bull sagged wearily onto its knees. With one low groan it toppled over onto its side and died.

Hal took hold of the cutlass hilt and withdrew the long, smeared blade, then chose a rock near the carcass and went to sit there. He felt sad yet strangely elated. He was puzzled and confused by these contrary emotions, and he dwelt on the beauty and majesty of the beast that he had reduced to this sad heap of dead flesh in the grass.

A hand was laid on his shoulder, and Aboli rumbled softly, "Only the true hunter knows this anguish of the kill, Gundwane. That is why my tribe, who are hunters, sing and dance to give thanks to propitiate the spirits of the game they have slain."

"Teach me to sing me this song and to dance this dance, Aboli," Hal said, and Aboli began to chant in his deep and beautiful voice. When he had picked up the rhythm Hal joined in the repetitive chorus, praising the beauty and the grace of the prey and thanking it for dying so that the hunter and his tribe might live.

Aboli began to dance, shuffling, stamping and singing in a circle about the great carcass, and Hal danced with him. His chest was choked and his eyes were blurred when, at last, the song ended and they sat together in the slanting yellow sunlight to watch the tiny column of fugitives, led by Sukeena, coming towards them from far across the plain.

Before darkness fell Hal set them to building the stockade, and he checked carefully to make certain that the gaps in the breastwork were closed with branches of sweet-thorn.

They carried the quarters and shoulders of eland meat and stacked them in the stockade where scavengers could not plunder them. They left only the scraps and the offal, the severed hoofs and heads, the mounds of guts and intestines stuffed with the pulp of half-digested leaves and grass. As they moved away the vultures hopped in or sailed down on great pinions, and the hyena and jackal rushed forward to gobble and howl and squabble over this charnel array.

After they had all eaten their fill of succulent eland steaks, Hal allocated to Sukeena and himself the middle watch that started at midnight. Though it was the most onerous, for it was the time when man's vitality was at its lowest ebb, they loved to have the night to themselves.

While the rest of their band slept, they huddled at the entrance to the stockade under a single fur kaross, with a musket laid close to Hal's right hand. After they had made soft and silent love so as not to disturb the others, they watched the sky and spoke in whispers as the stars made their remote and ancient circuits high above.

"Tell me true, my love, what have you read in those stars? What lies ahead for you and me? How many sons will you bear me?" Her hand, cupped in his, lay still, and he felt her whole body stiffen. She did not reply and he had to ask her again. "Why will you never tell me what you see in the future? I know you have drawn our horoscopes, for often when you thought I was sleeping I have seen you studying and writing in your little blue book."

She laid her fingers on his lips. "Be quiet, my lord. There are many things in this existence that are best hidden from us. For this night and tomorrow let us love each other with all our hearts and all our strength. Let us draw the most from every day that God grants us."

"You trouble me, my sweet. Will there be no sons, then?" She was silent again as they watched a shooting star leave its brief fiery trail though the heavens and at last perish before their eyes. Then she sighed, and whispered, "Yes, I will give you a son but-" She bit off the other words that rose to her tongue.

"There is great sadness in your voice." His tone was disquieted. "And, yet, the thought that you will bear my son gives me joy."

"The stars can be malevolent, she whispered. "Sometimes they fulfill their promises in a manner that we do not expect, or relish. Of one thing alone I am certain, that the fates have selected for you a labour of great consequence. It has been ordained thus from the day of your birth."

"My father spoke to me of this same task." Hal brooded on the old prophecy. "I am willing to face my destiny, but I need you to help and sustain me as you have done so often already."

She did not answer his plea, but said, "The task they have set for you involves a vow and a talisman of mystery and power."

"Will you be with me, you and our son?" he insisted.

"If I can guide you in the direction you must go, I will do so with all my heart and all my strength."

"But will you come with me?" he pleaded.

"I will come with you as far as the stars will permit it," she promised. "More than that I do not know and cannot say.

"But-" he started, but she reached up with her mouth and covered his lips with her own to stop him speaking.

"No more! You must ask no more," she warned him. "Now join your body with mine once again and leave the business of the stars to the stars alone."

Towards the end of their watch, when the Seven Sisters had sunk below the hills and the Bull stood high and proud, they lay in each other's arms, still talking softly to fight off the drowsiness that crept upon them. They had become accustomed to the night sounds of the wilderness, from the liquid warble of night birds and the yapping, yodelling chorus of the little red jackals to the hideous shrieking and cackling of the hyena packs at the remains of the carcasses, but suddenly there came a sound that chilled them to the depths of their souls.

It was the sound of all the devils of hell, a monstrous roaring and grunting that stilled all lesser creation, rolled against the hills and came back to them in a hundred echoes. Involuntarily Sukeena clung to him and cried aloud, "Oh, Gundwane, what terrible creature is that?"

She was not alone in her terror for all the camp was suddenly awake. Zwaantie screamed, and the baby echoed her terror. Even the men sprang to their feet and cried out to God.

Aboli appeared beside them like a dark * moon shadow and calmed Sukeena with a hand on her trembling shoulder. "It is no phantom, but a creature of this world," he told them. "They say that even the bravest hunter is frightened three times by the lion. Once when he sees its tracks, twice when he hears its voice, and the third time when he confronts the beast face to face."

Hal sprang up, and called to the others, "Throw fresh logs on the fire. Light the slow-match on all the muskets. Place the women and the child in the centre of the stockade."

They crouched in a tight circle behind its flimsy walls, and for a while all was quiet, quieter than it had been all that night for now even the scavengers has been silenced by the mighty voice that had spoken from out of the darkness.

They waited, their weapons held ready, and stared out into the night where the yellow light of the flames could not reach. It seemed to Hal that the flickering firelight played tricks with his eyes, for all at once he thought he saw a ghostly shape glide silently through the shadows. Then Sukeena gripped his arm, digging her fingernails into his flesh, and he knew that she had seen it also.

Abruptly that gale of terrifying noise broke over them again, raising the hair on their scalps. The women shrieked and the men quaked and tightened their grip on the weapons that now seemed so frail and inadequate in their hands.

"There!" whispered Zwaantie, and this time there could be no doubt that what they saw was real. It was a monstrous feline shape that seemed as tall as a man's shoulder, which passed before their gaze on noiseless pads. The flames lit upon its brazen glossy hide, turning its eyes to glaring emeralds like those in the crown of Satan himself. Another came and then another, passing in swift and menacing parade before them, then disappearing into the night once more.

"They gather their courage and resolve," Aboli said. "They smell the blood and the dead flesh and they are hunting us."

"Should we flee from the stockade, then?" Hal asked. "No!" Aboli shook his head. "The darkness is their domain. They are able to see when the night stops up our eyes. The darkness makes them bold. We must stay here where we can see them when they come."

Then, from out of the night, came such a creature as to dwarf the others they had seen. He strode towards them with a majestic swinging gait, and a mane of black and golden hair covered his head and shoulders and made him seem as huge as a haystack. "Shall I fire upon him?" Hal whispered to Aboli.

"A wound will madden him," Aboli replied. "Unless you can kill cleanly, do not fire."

The lion stopped in the full glare of the firelight. He placed his forepaws apart and lowered his head. The dark hair of his mane came erect, swelling before their horrified gaze, seeming to double his bulk. He opened his jaws, and they saw the ivory fangs gleam, the red tongue curl out between them, and he roared again.

The sound struck them with a physical force, like a storm-driven wave. It stunned their ear-drums and startled their senses. The beast was so close that Hal could feel the breath from its mighty lungs blow into his face. It smelt of corpses and carrion long dead.

"Quietly now!" Hal urged them. "Make no sound and do not move, lest you provoke him to attack." Even the women and the child obeyed. They stifled their cries and sat rigid with the terror of it. It seemed an eternity that they remained thus, the lion eyeing them, until little one-eyed Johannes could bear it no longer. He screamed, flung up his musket and fired wildly.

In the instant before the gunsmoke blinded them Hal saw that the ball had missed the beast and had struck the dirt between its forelegs.

Then the smoke billowed over them in a cloud, and from its depths came the grunts of the angry lion. Now both women screamed and the men barged into each other in their haste to run deeper into the stockade. Only Hal and Aboli stood their ground, muskets levelled, and aimed into the bank of smoke. Little Sukeena shrank against Hal's flank but did not run.

Then the lion burst in full charge out of the mist of gunsmoke. Hal pressed the trigger and his musket misfired. Aboli's weapon roared deafeningly, but the beast was a blur of movement so swift, in the smoke and the darkness, that it cheated the eye. Aboli's shot must have flown wide for it had no effect upon the lion, which swept into the stockade, roaring horribly. Hal flung himself down on Sukeena, covering her with his own body and the lion leapt over him.

It seemed to pick out Johannes from the huddle of terrified humanity. Its great jaws closed in the small of the man's back and it lifted him as a cat might carry a mouse. With one more bound it cleared the rear wall of the stockade and disappeared into the night.

They heard Johannes screaming in the darkness, but the lion did not carry him far. just beyond the firelight it began to devour him while he still lived. They heard his bones crack as the beast bit into them, then the rending of his flesh as it tore out a mouthful. There was more roaring and growling as the lionesses rushed in to share the prey, and while Johannes still shrieked and sobbed they tore him to pieces. Gradually his cries became weaker until they faded away entirely and from the darkness there were only the grisly sounds of the feast.

The women were hysterical and Bobby waited and beat his little fists in terror against Althuda's chest. Hal quieted Sukeena, who responded swiftly to the feel of his arm around her shoulder. "Do not run. Move quietly. Sit in a circle. The women in the centre. Reload the muskets, but do not fire until I give the word." Hal rallied them, then looked at Daniel and Aboli.

"It is our Store of meat that draws them. When they have finished with Johannes they will charge the stockade again for more."

"You are right, Gundwane."

"Then we will give them eland meat to distract them from us," Hal said. "Help me."

Between the three of them they seized one of the huge hindquarters of raw eland flesh and staggered with it to the edge of the firelight. They threw it down in the dust.

"Do not run," Hal cautioned them again, "for as the cat pursues the mouse, they will come after us if we do." They backed into the stockade. Almost immediately a lioness rushed out, seized the bloody hindquarter and dragged it away into the night. They could hear the commotion as the others fought her for the prize, and then the sounds as they all settled down to feed, snarling and growling and spitting at each other.

That hunk of raw meat was sufficient to keep even that voracious pride of the great cats feeding and squabbling for an hour, but when once more they began to prowl at the edge of the firelight and make short mock charges at the huddle of terrified humans Hal said, "We must feed them again." It soon became clear that the lions would accept these offerings in preference to rushing the camp, for when the three men dragged out another hindquarter from the stockade, the beasts waited for them to retire before a lioness slunk out of the night to haul it away.

"Always it is the female who is boldest," Hal said, to distract the others.

Aboli agreed with him. "And the greediest!"

"It is not our fault that you males lack courage and the sense to help yourselves," Sukeena told them tartly, and most of them laughed, but breathlessly and without conviction. Twice more during the night Hal had them carry out legs of eland meat to feed the pride. At last as the dawn started to define the tops of the thorn trees against the paling sky the lions seemed to have assuaged their appetites. They heard the roaring of the black-maned male fading with distance as he wandered away. He roared for the last time a league off, just as the sun pushed its flaming golden rim above the jagged tops of the mountain range that ran parallel with the route of their march.

Hal and Althuda went out to find what remained of poor Johannes. Strangely the lions had left his hands and his head untouched, but had consumed the rest of him. Hal closed the staring eyes and Sukeena wrapped these pathetic remnants in a scrap of cloth and prayed over the grave they dug. Hal placed slabs of rock over the fresh turned earth to deter the hyenas from digging it up.

"We can spend no more time here." He lifted Sukeena to her feet. "We must start out immediately if we are to reach the river today. Fortunately, there is still enough meat left for our purpose."

They slung the remaining legs of eland meat on carrying poles, and with a man at each end staggered with them over the rolling hills and grasslands. It was late afternoon when they reached the river and, from the high bluff, looked down onto its broad green expanse, which had already proved such a barrier to their march.

The Golden Bough dropped her anchor at the head of the channel in Elephant Lagoon, and at once Llewellyn set his crew to work, pumping out the bilges and repairing the storm damage to the hull and the rigging. A full gale still raged overhead, but though the surface of the lagoon was whipped into a froth of white wavelets the high ground of the heads broke its main force.

Cornelius Schreuder fretted to go ashore. He was desperate to get off the Golden Bough and rid himself of this company of Englishmen whom he had come to detest so bitterly. He looked upon Lord Cumbrae as a friend and an ally and was anxious to join him and ask him to act as his second in the affair of honour with Vincent Winterton. In his tiny cabin he packed his chests hurriedly and, when a man could not be spared to help him, lugged them up onto the deck himself. He stood with the pile of his possessions at the entry port staring out across the lagoon to Cumbrae's shore base.

The Buzzard had set up his camp on the same site as Sir Francis Courtney's, which Schreuder had attacked with his green-jackets. A great deal of activity was taking place among the trees. It seemed to Schreuder that Cumbrae must be digging trenches and other fortifications and he was puzzled by this. he saw no sense in throwing up earthworks against an enemy that did not exist.

Llewellyn would not leave his ship until he was certain that the repairs to her were well afoot and that, in all other respects, she was snugged down and secure. Eventually he placed his first mate, Arnold Fowler, in charge of the deck and ordered one of his longboats made ready.

"Captain Llewellyn!" Schreuder accosted him, as he came to the ship's side. "I have decided that, with Lord Cumbrae's agreement, I will leave your ship and transfer to the Gull of Moray."

Llewellyn nodded. "I understood that was your intention and, in all truth, Colonel, I doubt there will be many tears shed on board the Golden Bough when you depart. I am going ashore now to find where we can refill the water casks that have been contaminated with seawater during the gale. I will convey you and your possessions to Cumbrae's camp, and I have here the fare money which you paid to me for your passage. To save myself further unpleasantness and acrimonious argument, I am repaying this to you in full."

Schreuder would have dearly loved to give himself the pleasure of disdainfully refusing the offer, but those few guineas were all his wealth in the world and he took the thin purse that Llewellyn handed him, and muttered reluctantly, "In that, at least, you act like a gentleman, sir. I am indebted to you."

They went down into the longboat, and Llewellyn sat in the stern sheets while Schreuder found a seat in the bows and ignored the grinning faces of the crew and the ironical salutes from the ship's officers on the quarterdeck as they pulled away. They were only half-way to the beach when a familiar figure wearing a plaid and a beribboned bonnet sauntered out from amongst the trees, his red beard and tangled locks blazing in the sunlight, and watched them approach with both hands on his hips.

"Colonel Schreuder, by the devil's steaming turds!" Cumbrae roared as he recognized him. "It gladdens my heart to behold your smiling countenance." As soon as the bows touched the beach Schreuder leapt ashore and seized the Buzzard's out thrust hand.

"I am surprised but overjoyed to find you here, my lord." The Buzzard looked over Schreuder's shoulder, and grinned widely. "Och! And if it's not my beloved brother of the Temple, Christopher Llewellyn! Well met, cousin, and God's benevolence upon you."

Llewellyn did not smile, and showed little eagerness to take the hand that Cumbrae thrust at him as soon as his feet touched the sand. "How do ye do, Cumbrae? Our last discourse in the Bay of Trincomalee was interrupted at a crucial point when you left in some disarray."

"Ah, but that was in another land and long ago, cousin, and I'm sure we can both be magnanimous enough to forgive and forget such a trifling and silly matter."

"Five hundred pounds and the lives of twenty of my men is not a trifling and silly matter in my counting house. And I'll remind you that I'm no cousin nor any kin of yours," Llewellyn snapped, and his legs were stiff with the memory of his old outrage.

But Cumbrae placed one arm around his shoulder and said softly, "In Arcadia habito."

Llewellyn was obviously struggling with himself, but he could not deny his knightly oath, and at last he gritted the response, "Flumen sacrurn bene cognosco."

"There you are." The Buzzard boomed with laughter. "That was not so bad, was it? If not cousins, then we are still brothers in Christ, are we not?"

"I would feel more brotherly towards you, sir, if I had my five hundred pounds back in my purse."

"I could set off that debt against the grievous injury that you inflicted on my sweet Gull and my own person." The Buzzard pulled back his cloak to display the bright scar across his upper arm. "But I'm a forgiving man with a loving heart, Christopher, and so you shall have it. I give you my word on it. Every farthing of your five hundred pounds, and the interest to boot."

Llewellyn smiled at him coldly. "I will delay my thanks until I feel the weight of your purse in my hands." Cumbrae saw the purpose in his level gaze and, without another look at the Golden Bough's row of gun ports and the handy businesslike lines of her hull, he knew that they were evenly matched and it would be hard pounding if it came to a fight between the two ships, just as it had been four years previously in the Bay of Trincomalee.

"I don't blame you for trusting no man in this naughty world of ours, but dine with me today, here ashore, and I will place the purse in your hands, I swear it to you."

Llewellyn nodded grimly. "Thank you for that offer of hospitality, sir, but I well remember the last time I availed myself of one of your invitations. I have a fine cook on board my own ship who can provide me with a meal more to my taste. However, I will return at dusk to fetch the purse you have promised me." Llewellyn bowed and returned to his longboat.

The Buzzard watched him go, with a calculating look in his eyes. The longboat headed up the lagoon towards the stream of fresh water that flowed into its upper end. "That dandy bastard has a nasty temper," he growled and, beside him, Schreuder nodded.

"I have never been so pleased to be rid of somebody unpleasant and to be standing here on this beach and appealing to your friendship, as I am now."

Cumbrae looked at him shrewdly. "You have me at a disadvantage, sir," he said. "What indeed are you doing here, and what is it that I can do for you in good friendship?"

"Where can we talk?" Schreuder asked.

Cumbrae replied, "This way, my old friend and companion in arms," led Schreuder to his hut in the grove and poured him half a mug of whisky. "Now, tell me. Why are you no longer in command of the garrison at Good Hope?"

"To be frank with you, my lord, I am in the devil's own fix. I stand accused by Governor van de Velde of a crime that I did not commit. You know well how bitterly he was obsessed by envy and ill-will towards me," Schreuder explained, and Cumbrae nodded cautiously without committing himself.

"Please go on."

"Ten days ago the Governor's wife was murdered in a fit of lust and bestial passion by the gardener and executioner of the Company."

"Sweet heavens!" Cumbrae exclaimed. "Slow John! I knew he was a madman. I could see it in his eyes. A blethering maniac! I am sorry to hear about the woman, though. She was a delicious little muffin. put a bone in my breeches just to look at those titties of hers, she did."

"Van de Velde has falsely accused me of this foul murder. I was forced to flee on the first available ship before he had me imprisoned and placed on the rack. Llewellyn offered me passage to the Orient where I had determined to enlist in the war that is afoot in the Horn of Africa between the Prester and the Great Mogul."

Cumbrae's eyes lit up and he leaned forward on his stool at the mention of war, like a hyena scenting the blood of a battlefield. By this time he was heartily bored with digging for Franky Courtney's elusive treasure, and the promise of an easier way to fill his holds with riches had all of his attention. But he would not show this posturing braggart just how eager he was, so he left the subject for another time and said, with feeling and understanding, "You have my deepest sympathy and my assurances of any aid I am able to render." His mind was seething with ideas. He sensed that Schreuder was guilty of the murder he denied so vehemently but, guilty or not, he was now an outlaw and he was placing himself at Cumbrae's mercy.

The Buzzard had been given ample demonstration of Schreuder's qualities as a warrior. An excellent man to have serve under him, especially as he would be completely under Cumbrae's control by virtue of his guilt and the blood on his hands. As a fugitive and a murderer, the Dutchman could no longer afford to be too finicky in matters of morality.

Once a maid has lost her virginity she lifts her skirts and lies down in the hay with more alacrity the second time, the Buzzard told himself happily, but reached out and clasped Schreuder's arm with a firm and friendly grip. "You can rely on me, my friend," he said. "How may I help you?"

"I wish to throw in my lot with you. I will become your man."

"And heartily welcome you will be." Cumbrae grinned through his red whiskers with unfeigned delight. He had just found himself a hunting hound, one perhaps not carrying a great cargo of intelligence but, none the less, fierce and totally without fear.

"I ask only one favour in return," Schreuder said. The Buzzard let the friendly hand drop from his shoulder, and his eyes became guarded. He might have known that such a handsome gift would have a price written on the underside.

"A favour?" he asked.

"On board. the Golden Bough I was treated in the most shabby and scurvy fashion. I was cheated out of a great deal of money at Hazard by one of the ship's officers, and insulted and reviled by Captain Llewellyn and his men. To cap it all, the person who cheated me challenged me to a duel. I could find no person on board willing to act as my second, and Llewellyn forbade this matter of honour to be pursued until we reached port."

"Go on, please." Cumbrae's suspicions were beginning to evaporate as he realized where the conversation was heading.

"I would be most grateful and honoured if you could consent to act as my second in this affair, my lord."

"That is all you require of me?" He could hardly credit that it would be so easy. Already he could see the profits that might be reaped from this affair. He had promised Llewellyn his five hundred pounds, and he would give it to him, but only when he was certain that he would be able to get the money back from him, together with any other profit that he could lay hands upon.

He glanced out over the waters of the lagoon. There lay the Golden Bough, a powerful, warlike vessel. If he were able to add her to his flotilla, he would command a force in the oriental oceans that few could match. If he appeared off the Great Horn of Africa with these two vessels, in the midst of the war that Schreuder had assured him was raging, what spoils might there be for the picking?

"It will be my honour and my pleasure to act for you," he told Schreuder. "Give me the name of the Bastard who has challenged you, and I will see to it that you obtain immediate satisfaction from him."

When Llewellyn came ashore again for dinner, he was accompanied by two of his officers and a dozen of his seamen, carrying cutlass and pistols. Cumbrae was on the beach to welcome him. "I have the purse I promised you, my dear Christopher. Come with me to my poor lodgings and take a dram with me for loving friendship and for the memory of convivial days we passed in former times in each other's company. But first will ye no" introduce me to these two fine gentlemen of yours?"

"Mister Arnold Fowler, first mate of my ship. "The two men nodded at each other. "And this is my third officer, Vincent Winterton, son of my patron, Viscount Winterton."

"Also, so I am informed, a paragon at Hazard, and a mean hand with the dice." Cumbrae grinned at Vincent and the young man withdrew the hand he was on the point of proffering.

"I beg your pardon, sir, but what do you mean by that remark? "Vincent enquired stiffly.

"Only that Colonel Schreuder has asked me to act for him. Would you be good enough to inform me as to who is your own second?"

Llewellyn cut in quickly, "I have the honour to act for Mister Winterton."

"Indeed, then, we have much to discuss, my dear Christopher. Please follow me, but as it is Mister Winterton's affairs we will be discussing, it might be as well if he remained here on the beach."

Llewellyn followed the Buzzard to his hut, and took the stool that he was offered. "A dram of the water of life?" Llewellyn shook his head. "Thank you, no. Let us come to the matters at hand."

"You were always impatient and headstrong." The Buzzard filled his own mug and took a mouthful. He smacked his lips and wiped his whiskers on the back of his hand. "You'll never know what you're missing. "Tis the finest whisky in all the islands. But, here, this is for you." He slid the heavy purse across the keg that served him for a table. Llewellyn picked it up and weighed it thoughtfully in his hand.

"Count it if you will," the Buzzard invited him. "I'll take no offence." He sat back and watched with a grin on his face, sipping at his mug, while Llewellyn arranged the golden coins in neat stacks on the top of the keg.

"Five hundred it is, and fifty for the interest. I am obliged to you, sir." Llewellyn's expression had softened.

"It's a small price to pay for your love and friendship, Christopher," Cumbrae told him. "But now to this other matter. As I told you, I act for Colonel Schreuder."

"And I act for Mister Winterton." Llewellyn nodded. "My principal will be satisfied with an apology from Schreuder." "You know full well, Christopher, that my lad will no' give him one. I am afraid that the two young puppies will have to fight it out."

"The choice of weapons lies with your side," said Llewellyn. "Shall we say pistols at twenty paces?"

"We will say no such thing. My man wants swords." "Then we must agree. What time and place will suit you?"

"I leave that decision to you."

"I have repairs to make to my rigging and hull. Damage we sustained in the gale. I need Mister Winterton on board to help with these. May I suggest three days hence, on the beach at sunrise?"

The Buzzard tugged at his beard as he considered this proposal. He would need a few days to make the arrangements he had in mind. Three days" delay would suit him perfectly.

"Agreed!" he said, and Llewellyn rose to his feet immediately and placed the purse in the pocket of his tunic.

"Will you not take that dram I offered you now, Christopher?" Cumbrae suggested, but again Llewellyn declined.

"As I told you, sit, I have much to do on board my ship." The Buzzard watched him go down to the beach and step into his longboat. As they were rowed back to where the Golden Bough was anchored, Llewellyn and Winterton were in deep and earnest conversation.

"Young Winterton is in for a surprise. He can never have seen the Dutchman with a sword in his hand to have agreed so lightly to the choice of weapons." He swigged back the few drops of whisky that remained in his mug, and grinned again. "We shall see if we cannot arrange a little surprise for Christopher Llewellyn also." He banged the mug onto the keg top, and bellowed, "Send Mister Bowles to me, and be quick about it."

Sam Bowles came smarming in, wriggling his whole body like a whipped dog to ingratiate himself with his captain. But his eyes were cold and shrewd.

"Sammy, me boy." Cumbrae gave him a slap on the arm that stung like a wasp, but did not upset the smile on the man's lips. "I have something for you, that should be much to your taste. Listen well."

Sam Bowles sat opposite him and cocked his head so as not to miss a word of his instructions. Once or twice he asked a question or chortled with glee and admiration as Cumbrae unfolded his plans.

"You have always wanted the command of your own ship, Sammy me laddy. This is your chance. Serve me well, and you shall have it. Captain Samuel Bowles. How does that sound to you?"

"I like the sound of it powerful well, your grace!" Sam Bowles bobbed his head. "And I'll not let you down."

"That you won't!" Cumbrae agreed. "Or not more than once, you won't. For if you do, you'll dance me a merry hornpipe while you dangle from the main yard of my Gull."

The riverbanks were lined with wild willow and dark green acacia trees, which were covered with a mantle of yellow blossom. The river ran broad and deep, slow and green between its rocky piers. The sandbanks were exposed and, as they looked down upon them from the steep slopes of the valley, Sukeena shuddered and whispered, "Oh, what foul and ugly creatures! Surely these are the very dragons we spoke of?"

"They are dragons indeed," Hal agreed, as they gazed down on the crocodiles that lay sunning on the white beach. There were dozens of them, some not much larger than lizards and other brutes with the beam and length of a ship's boat, massive grey monsters, which surely could swallow a man whole. They had found out how ferocious these creatures were on their first attempt to ford the river, when Billy Rogers had been seized by one and dragged beneath the surface. They had not recovered any part of his body.

"I tremble at the thought of trying to cross again, with these creatures still guarding the river," Sukeena whispered tremulously.

"Aboli knows them from his own land to the north, and his tribe have a way of dealing with them."

On the -rocky bluff, high above the river where the crocodiles could not reach, they stacked the piles of eland meat, which were already beginning to stink, in the hot sunlight. Then Hal sent some of the men to search the forest floor for dried logs that would float high in the water. Under Ned Tyler's instruction they shaped them with the cutlasses, although Hal hated to see the fine steel edges dulled and chipped. While this was being done Althuda, with Sukeena helping him, carefully slit the wet eland hides into long tough ropes as thick as her little finger.

Aboli sought out the species of tree he needed, and then chopped short supple stakes from its branches and carried bundles of these back to where the others were working. Big Daniel helped him to sharpen both ends of these short, resilient pieces of green wood into spear points, and harden them in the fire. Then, using a log of the correct circumference as a template, the two powerful men bent each stake around the log until it formed a circle, the sharpened points overlapping. While they held them in place, Hal lashed the ends together with strips of the raw eland hide. When they gingerly released the tension the coiled stakes were like the loaded steel springs of a musket lock, ready to fly open if the retaining strip of hide was severed. By sundown they had finished work on a pile of these snares.

They had learned from their encounter with the lion pride, and on this night they hoisted the legs of eland meat high into the top branches of one of the tallest trees that grew along the banks of the broad river. They built their stockade well downstream from this cache of meat, and made certain that the walls were of sturdy logs, and that the entrance was blocked with freshly cut thorn branches.

Though they slept little that night, lying and listening to the hyena and the jackal howling and gibbering below the tree where the meat hung, the lions did not trouble them again. In the dawn they left the stockade to begin work once more on their preparations for the river crossing.

Ned Tyler finished the construction of the raft by lashing the poles together with rawhide rope.

"Tis a rickety vessel." Sukeena eyed it with obvious misgivings. "One of those great river dragons could overturn it with a flick of its tail."

"That is why Aboli has prepared his snares for them." They went back up the slope to where Althuda and Zwaantie were helping Aboli wrap the coiled green-wood circlets with a thick covering of half-putrid eland meat.

"The crocodile cannot chew his food," Aboli explained to them as he worked. "Each of these lumps of meat is the right size for one of the monsters to swallow whole."

When all the baits had been prepared, they carried them down to the water's edge. As they approached the sandbank where the great saurians lay like stranded logs, they shouted clapped their hands and fired off the muskets, creating a commotion that alarmed even these huge beasts.

They raised their massive bulks on short stubby legs and lumbered to the shelter of their natural element, sliding into the deep green pools with mighty splashes and setting up waves that broke upon the far bank. As soon as the sandbank was clear, the men rushed out and placed the lumps of stinking meat along the water's edge. Then they hurried back and climbed up to where the women waited on the safety of the high bluff above the river.

After a while, the eye knuckles of the crocodiles began to pop up everywhere over the surface of the pool, and then to move in slowly towards the sandbank.

"They are cowardly, sneaking beasts," Aboli said, with hatred in his tone and revulsion in his expression, "but soon, when they smell the meat, their greed will overcome their fear."

As he spoke one of the largest reptiles lifted itself out of the shallows at the edge and waddled cautiously out on to the sandbank, its massive crested tail ploughing a furrow behind it. Suddenly, with surprising speed and agility, it darted forward and seized one of the lumps of eland meat. It opened its jaws to their full stretch as it strained to swallow. From the bluff they watched in awe as the huge lump of meat slid down into its maw, bulging the soft white scales on the outside of its throat. It turned and rushed back into the pool, but immediately another of the scaly reptiles emerged and gobbled a bait. There followed a general melee of long slithering bodies, shining wet in the sunlight, that hissed and snapped and tumbled over each other as they fought for the meat.

Once every bait had been consumed, some crocodiles splashed back into the pool, but many settled down again in the sun-warmed sand from where they had been disturbed. Peace fell over the riverbank again, and the kingfishers darted and hovered over the green waters. A great grey hippopotamus thrust out his head on the far side of the pool and gave vent to a raucous grunt of laughter. His cows clustered around him, their backs like a pile of shiny black boulders.

"Your plan has not worked," said Sabah in Dutch. "The crocodiles are unharmed and still ready to fall upon any of us who goes near the water."

"Be patient, Sabah," Aboli told him. "It will take a while for the juices of their stomach to eat through the rawhide. But when they do the sticks will spring open and the sharpened ends will pierce their guts and stab through their vitals."

As he finished speaking, one of the largest reptiles, the first to take the bait, suddenly let out a thunderous roar and arched its back until the cox combed tail flapped over its head. It roared again, and spun round to snap with mighty jaws at its own flank, its spiked yellow fangs tearing through the armoured scales, ripping out lumps of its own flesh.

"See there!" Aboli sprang to his feet and pointed. "The sharp end of the stake has cut right through his belly." Then they saw the fire-blackened point of sharpened green wood protruding a hand's breadth through the scaly hide. As the bull crocodile writhed and hissed in his hideous death throes, a second reptile began to thrash about in gargantuan convulsions, and then another and another, until the pool was turned to white foam, and their terrible stricken cries and roars echoed along the bluffs of the river, startling the eagles and vultures from their nesting platforms high on the cliffs.

"Bravely done, Aboli! You have cleared the way for us." Hal leaped to his feet.

"Yes! We can cross now,"Aboli agreed. "But be swift and do not linger in the water or near the edge for there may still be some of the ngovenya who have not felt the spikes in their bellies."

They heeded his advice. Lifting the clumsy raft between them they rushed it down the bank, and as soon as it was afloat they flung aboard the baskets of provisions, the saddle-bags and the bags of gunpowder, then urged the two women and little Bobby onto the frail craft. The men were stripped to their petticoats, and swam the craft across the sluggish current. As soon as they reached the opposite bank they seized their possessions and scampered in haste up the rocky slope until they were well clear of the riverbank.

High above the water they could at last fall upon each other with laughter and congratulation. They camped there that night, and in the dawn Aboli asked Hal quietly, "How far now to Elephant Lagoon?"

Hal unrolled his chart and pointed out his estimate of their position. "Here, we are five leagues inland from the seashore and not more than fifty leagues from the lagoon. Unless there is another river as wide as this to bar our way, we should be there in five more days of hard marching."

"Then let us march hard," said Aboli, and roused the rest of the depleted band. At his urging, they took up their loads and, with the rays of the rising sun beating full into their faces, fell once more into the order of march that they had maintained through all the long journey.

The four longboats from the Golden Bough were crowded with seamen as they rowed ashore in that dark hour before the dawn. A sailor in the bow of each boat held high a lantern to light their way, and the reflections danced like fireflies on the calm black surface of the lagoon.

"Llewellyn is bringing half his crew ashore with him!" the Buzzard gloated, as he watched the little fleet head in towards the beach.

"He suspects treachery," Sam Bowles laughed delightedly, "so he comes in force."

"What a churlish guest, to suspect us of villainy." The Buzzard shook his head sadly. "He deserves whatever Fate has in store for him."

"He has split his force. There are at least fifty men in those boats, Sam estimated. "He makes it easier for us. From here it should all be plane sailing and a following wind."

"Let us hope so, Mister Bowles," the Buzzard grunted. "I go now to meet our guests. Remember, the signal is a red Chinese rocket. Wait until you see it burn."

"Aye, Captain!" Sam knuckled his forehead and slipped away into the shadows. Cumbrae strode down the sand to meet the leading boat. As it came in to the beach he could see in the lamplight that Llewellyn and Vincent Winterton were sitting together in the stern sheets. Vincent wore a dark woollen cloak against the dawn chill, but his head was bare. He had braided his hair into a thick pigtail down his back. He followed his captain ashore.

"Good morrow, gentlemen," Cumbrae greeted them. "I commend you for your punctuality."

Llewellyn nodded a greeting. "Mister Winterton is ready to begin."

The Buzzard waggled his beard. "Colonel Schreuder is waiting. This way, if you please." They strode abreast along the beach, the seamen from the boats following in an orderly column. "It is unusual to have such a crowd of ruffians to witness an affair of honour," he remarked.

"There are but a few conventions out here beyond the Line," Llewellyn retorted, "but one is to keep your back well covered."

"I take your point." Cumbrae chuckled. "But to demonstrate my good faith, I will not invite any of my own lads to join us. I am unarmed." He showed his hands, then opened the front of his tunic to demonstrate the fact. Making a comforting lump in the small of his back, where it was tucked into his belt, was one of the newfangled wheel-lock pistols, made by Fallon of Glasgow. It was a marvelous invention but prohibitively expensive, which was the main reason why it was not more widely employed. On pressing the trigger the spring-loaded wheel of the lock spun and the iron pyrites striker sent a shower of sparks into the pan to detonate the charge. The weapon had cost him well over twenty pounds but was worth the price for there was no burning match to betray its presence.

"To demonstrate your own good faith, my dear Christopher, will you kindly keep your men together at your side of the square and under your direct control?"

A short way down the beach, they came to the area where the sand had been levelled and a square roped off. A water cask had been set up at each of the four corners. "Twenty paces each side," Cumbrae told Llewellyn. "Will that give your man enough sea room in which to work?"

Winterton surveyed the square then nodded briefly. "It will suit us well enough." Llewellyn spoke for him.

"We will have some time to wait for the light to strengthen" Cumbrae said. "My cook has prepared a breakfast of hot biscuit and spiced wine. Will you partake?"

"Thank you, my lord. A cup of wine would be welcome." A steward brought the steaming cups to them, and Cumbrae said, "If you will excuse me, I will attend my principal." He bowed and went up the path into the trees, to return minutes later leading Colonel Schreuder.

They stood together at the far side of the roped square, talking quietly. At last Cumbrae looked up at the sky, said something to Schreuder, then nodded and came to where Llewellyn and Vincent waited. "I think the light is good enough now. Do you gentlemen agree?"

"We can begin." Llewellyn nodded stiffly.

"My principal offers his weapon for your examination," Cumbrae said, and proffered the Neptune sword hilt first. Llewellyn took it and held the gold-inlaid blade up to the morning light.

"A fancy piece of work," he murmured disparagingly. "These naked females would not be out of place in a whorehouse." He touched the gold engravings of sea nymphs. "But at least the point is not poisoned and the length matches that of my principal's blade." He held the two swords side by side to compare them, and then passed Vincent's sword to Cumbrae for inspection.

"A fair match," he agreed, and passed it back. "Five-minute rounds and first blood?" Llewellyn asked, drawing his gold timepiece from the pocket of his waistcoat.

"I am afraid we cannot agree to that." Cumbrae shook his head. "My man wishes to fight without pause until one of them cries for quarter or is dead."

"By God, sir!" Llewellyn burst out. "Those rules are murderous."

"If your man pisses like a puppy, then he should not aspire to howl with the wolves." Cumbrae shrugged.

"I agree!" Vincent interjected. "We will fight to the death, if that's the way the Dutchman wants it."

"That, sir, is exactly how he wants it," Cumbrae assured him. "We are ready to begin when you are. Will you give the signal, Captain Llewellyn?"

The Buzzard went back and, in a few terse sentences, explained the rules to Schreuder, who nodded and ducked under the rope of the barrier. He wore a thin shirt open at the throat so that it was clear that he wore no body armour beneath it. Traditionally, the brilliant white cotton would give his opponent a fair aiming mark, and show up the blood from a hit.

On the opposite side of the square Vincent loosened the clasp of his cloak and let it drop into the sand. He was dressed in a similar white shirt. With his sword in his hand, he vaulted lightly over the rope barrier and faced Schreuder across the swept beach sand. Both men began to limber up with a series of practice cuts and thrusts that made their blades sing and glitter in the early light.

"Are you ready, Colonel Schreuder?" After a few minutes, Llewellyn called from the side-line as he held on high a red silk scarf.

"Ready!"

"Are you ready, Mister Winterton?" "Ready!"

Llewellyn let the scarf drop, and a growl went up from the Gull's seamen at the far side of the square. The two swordsmen circled each other, closing in cautiously with their blades extended and their points circling and dipping. Suddenly Vincent, sprang forward, and feinted for Schreuder's throat, but Schreuder met him easily and locked his blade. For a long moment they strained silently, staring into each other's eyes. Perhaps Vincent saw death in the other man's implacable gaze, and felt the steel in his wrist, for he broke first. As he recoiled Schreuder came after him with a series of lightning ripostes that made his blade glint and glitter like a sunbeam.

It was a dazzling display that drove Vincent, desperately parrying and retreating, against one of the water kegs that marked a corner of the square. Pinned there, he was at Schreuder's mercy. Abruptly Schreuder broke off the assault, turned his back contemptuously on the younger man and strode back into the centre. There, he took up his guard again and, blade poised, waited for Vincent to engage him once more.

All the watchers, except Cumbrae, were stunned by the Dutchman's virtuosity. Clearly Vincent Winterton was a swordsman of superior ability but he had been forced to call upon all his skill to survive that first blazing attack. In his heart Llewellyn knew that Vincent had survived not because of his skill but because Schreuder had wanted it that way. Already the young Englishman had been touched three times, two light cuts on the chest and another deeper wound on the upper left arm. His shirt was slashed in three irregular tears and was turning red and sodden as the wounds began to weep profusely.

Vincent glanced down at them, and his expression mirrored the despair he felt as he faced the knowledge that he was no match for the Dutchman. He lifted his head and looked across to where Schreuder waited for him, his stance classical and arrogant, his expression grave and intent as he studied his adversary over the weaving point of the Neptune sword.

Vincent straightened his spine and took his guard, trying to smile carelessly as he steeled himself to go forward to his certain death. The rough seamen who watched might have bayed and bellowed at the spectacle of a bull-baiting or a cockfight, but even they had fallen silent, awed by the terrible tragedy they saw unfolding. Llewellyn could not let it happen.

"Hold hard!" he cried, and vaulted over the rope. He strode between the two men, his right hand raised. "Colonel Schreuder, sir. You have given us every reason to admire your swordsmanship. You have drawn first blood. Will you not give us good reason to respect you by declaring that your honour is satisfied?"

"Let the English coward apologize to me in front of all the present company, and then I will be satisfied," said Schreuder, and Llewellyn turned to appeal to Vincent. "Will you do what the colonel asks? Please, Vincent, for my sake and the trust I pledged to your father."

Vincent's face was deathly pale but the blood that stained his shirt was bright crimson, as full blown June roses on the bush. "Colonel Schreuder has this moment called me a coward. Forgive me, Captain, but you know I cannot accede to such conditions."

Llewellyn looked sadly upon his young protege. "He intends to kill you, Vincent. It is such a shameful waste of a fine young life."

"And I intend to kill him." Vincent was able to smile now that it was decided. It was a gay, reckless smile. "Please stand aside, Captain." Hopelessly Llewellyn turned back to the sidelines.

"On guard, sir!" Vincent called, and charged with the white sand spurting from under his boots, thrust and parry for his very life. The Neptune sword was an impenetrable wall of steel before him, meeting and turning his own blade with an ease that made all his bravest efforts seem like those of a child. Schreuder's grave expression never faltered, and when at last Vincent fell back, panting and gasping, sweat diluting his streaming blood to pink, he was wounded twice more. There was black despair in his eyes.

Now, at last, the seamen from the Golden Bough had found their voices. "Quarter! You bloody murdering cheese head they howled, and "Fair shakes, man. Let the lad live!"

"They'll get no mercy from Colonel Cornelius," Cumbrae smiled grimly, "but the din they're making will help Sam to do his job." He glanced across the lagoon to where the Golden Bough lay in the channel.

Every man still aboard her was crowded along the near rail, straining his eyes for a glimpse of the duel. Even the lookout at her main top had trained his telescope on the beach. Not one was aware of the boats that were speeding out from among the mangroves on the far shore. He recognized Sam Bowles in the leading boat, as it raced in under the Golden Bough's tumble home and was hidden from his view by the ship's hull. Sweet Mary, Sam will take her without a shot fired! Cumbrae thought exultantly, and looked back at the arena.

"You have had your turn, sir," said Schreuder quietly. "Now it is mine. On guard, if you please. "With three swift strides he had covered the gap that separated them. The younger man met his first thrust, and then the second with a high parry and block, but the Neptune blade was swift and elusive as an enraged cobra. It seemed to mesmerize him with its deadly shining dance and, darting and striking, slowly forced him to yield ground. Each time he parried and retreated, he lost position and balance.

Then suddenly Schreuder executed a coup that few swordsmen would dare attempt outside the practice field.

He caught up both blades in the classical prolonged engagement, swirling the two swords together so that the steel edges shrilled with a sound that grated across the nerve endings of the watchers. Once committed neither man dared break off the engagement, for to do so was to concede an opening. Around in a deadly glittering circle the two swords revolved. It became a trial of strength and endurance. Vincent's arm turned leaden and the sweat dripped from his chin. His eyes were desperate and his wrist began to tremble and bend under the strain.

Then Schreuder froze the fatal circle. He did not break away but simply clamped Vincent's sword in a vice of steel. It was a display of such strength and control that even Cumbrae gaped with amazement.

For a moment the duel lists remained unmoving, then slowly Schreuder began to force both points upward, until they were aimed skywards at full stretch of their arms. Vincent was helpless. He tried to hold the other blade but his arm began to shudder and his muscles quivered. He bit down on his own tongue with the effort until a spot of blood appeared at the -corner of his mouth.

It could not last longer, and Llewellyn cried out in despair as he saw that the young man had reached the furthest limits of his strength and endurance. "Hold hard, Vincent!"" It was in vain. Vincent broke. He disengaged with his right arm at full reach above his head, and his chest wide open.

"Ha!" shouted Schreuder, and his thrust was a blur, fast as the release of a bolt from a crossbow. He drove in his point an inch below Vincent's sternum, clear through his body and a foot out of his back. For a long moment Vincent froze like a figure carved from a block of marble. Then his legs melted under him and he toppled into the sand.

"Murder!" cried Llewellyn. He sprang into the square and knelt beside the dying youth. He took him in his arms, and looked up again at Schreuder. "Bloody murder!" he cried again.

"I must take that as a request." Cumbrae smiled and came up behind the kneeling man. "And I am happy to oblige you, cousin!" he said, and brought the wheel-lock pistol out from behind his back. He thrust the muzzle into the back of Llewellyn's head and pulled the trigger. There was a bright flare of sparks and then the pistol roared and leaped in the Buzzard's fist. At such close range the load of lead pellets drove clean through Llewellyn's skull and blew half of his face away in red tatters. He flopped forwards with Vincent's body still in his arms.

The Buzzard looked around quickly, and saw that from the dark grove the red rocket was already soaring upwards, leaving a parabola of silver smoke arched against the fragile blue of the early-morning sky, the signal to Sam Bowles and his boarding party to storm the decks of the Golden Bough.

Meanwhile, above the beach, the gunners hidden among the trees were dragging away the branches that covered their culver ins The Buzzard had sited the battery himself and laid them to cover all the far side of the square where the seamen from the Golden Bough stood in a row four deep. The culver ins enfiladed the group, and each was loaded with a full charge of grape shot.

Even though they were unaware of the hidden battery, the seamen "from the Golden Bough were swiftly recovering from the shock of seeing their officers slaughtered before their horrified gaze. A hum of fury and wild cries of outrage went up from their midst, but there was no officer to give the order, and though they drew their cutlasses, yet instinctively they hesitated and hung back.

The Buzzard seized Colonel Schreuder's free arm and grated in his ear. "Come on! Hurry! Clear the range." He dragged him from the roped ring. ""By God, sir, you have murdered Llewellyn!" Schreuder protested. He was stunned by the act. "He was unarmed! Defenceless!"

"We will debate the niceties of it later," Cumbrae promised, and stuck out one booted foot, hooking Schreuder's ankle at the same time shoving him forward. The two men sprawled headlong into the shallow trench in the sand that Cumbrae had dug specially for this purpose, just as the seamen from the Golden Bough burst through the ropes of the ring behind them.

"What are you doing?" Schreuder bellowed. "Release me at once."

"I am saving your life, you blethering idiot," Cumbrae shouted in his ear, and held his head down below the lip of the trench as the first salvo of grape shot thundered from out of the grove and swept the beach.

The Buzzard had calculated the range with care so that the pattern of shot spread to its most deadly arc. It caught the phalanx of sailors squarely, raked the sand of the beach into a blinding white storm, and went on to tear across the surface of the quiet lagoon waters like a gate. Most of the Golden Bough's men were struck down instantly, but a few stayed on their feet, bewildered and stunned, staggering like drunkards from their wounds and from the turmoil of grape shot and the blast of disrupted air.

Cumbrae seized his claymore from the bottom of the pit, where he had buried it under a light coating of sand, and leaped to his feet. He rushed on these few survivors, the great sword gripped in both hands. He struck the head clean from the torso of the first man in his path, just as his own sailors came charging out of the gunsmoke, yelling like demons and brandishing their cutlasses.

They fell upon the decimated shore party and hacked them down, even when Cumbrae bellowed, "Enough! Give quarter to those who yield!"

They took no heed of his order, and swung the cutlasses until the brown blood drops wet them to the elbows and speckled their grinning faces. Cumbrae had to lay about him with his fists and the flat of his sword.

"Avast! We need men to sail the Golden Bough. Spare me a dozen, you bloody ruffians." They gave him less than he demanded. When the carnage was over there were only nine, trussed ankle and wrist and lying belly down in the sand like porkers in the marketplace.

"This way!" the Buzzard bellowed again, and led his crew sprinting down the beach to where the longboats from the Golden Bough were drawn up. They piled into them and seized the oars. With Cumbrae roaring in the bows like a wounded animal they pulled for the Golden Bough, hooked onto her sides and went swarming up onto her deck with cutlass bared and pistols cocked.

There, help was not needed. Sam Bowles's men had taken the Golden Bough by surprise and storm. The deck was slippery with blood and corpses were strewn across it and huddled in the scuppers. Under the forecastle a small band of Llewellyn's men were hanging on desperately, surrounded by Sam's gang of boarders, but when they saw the Buzzard and his gang storm up onto the deck they threw down their cutlasses. Those few who could swim raced to the ship's side and dived into the lagoon while the others fell to their knees and pleaded for quarter.

"Spare them, Mister Bowles," Cumbrae shouted. "I need sailors!" He did not wait to see the order obeyed but snatched a musket from the hands of the man beside him and ran to the rail. The escaping sailors were splashing their way towards the mangrove trees. He took careful aim at the head of one, whose pink scalp showed through his wet grey hair. It was a lucky shot, and the man threw up both hands and sank, leaving a pink stain on the surface. The men around Cumbrae hooted with glee and joined in the sport, calling their targets and laying wagers on their marksmanship. "Who'll give me fives in shillings on that rogue with the blond pigtail?" They shot the swimming men like wounded ducks.

Sam Bowles came grinning and bobbing to meet Cumbrae. "The ship is yours, your grace."

"Well done, Mister Bowles." Cumbrae gave him such a hearty blow of commendation as to knock him almost off his feet. "There will be some hiding below decks. Winkle them out! Try to take them alive. Put a boat in the water and drag those out also!" He pointed at the few survivors still splashing and swimming towards the mangroves. "I am going down to Llewellyn's cabin to find the ship's papers. Call me when you have all the prisoners trussed up in the waist of the ship."

He kicked open the locked door to Llewellyn's cabin, and paused to survey the interior. It was beautifully appointed, the furniture carved and polished and the drapery of fine velvet.

In the writing desk he found the keys to the iron strongbox that was bolted to the deck below the comfortable bunk. As soon as he opened it he recognized the purse he had given Llewellyn. "I am much obliged to you, Christopher. You'll not be needing this where you're going," he murmured as he slipped it into his pocket. Under it was a second purse, which he carried to the desk. He spilled the golden coins out onto the tabletop. "Two hundred and sixteen pounds five shillings and twopence," he counted. "This will be the money for the running of the ship. Very parsimonious, but I am grateful for any contribution."

Then his eyes lit on a small wooden chest in the bottom of the box. He lifted it out and inspected the name carved into the lid. "The Hon. Vincent Winterton." The chest was locked but it yielded readily to the blade of his dirk. He smiled as he saw what it contained, and let a handful of coins run through his fingers. "No doubt the gambling losses of the good. Colonel Schreuder are in here but he need never be tempted to wager them again. I will take care of them for him."

He poured a mug of French brandy from the captain's stores and seated himself at the desk while he ran through the ship's books and documents. The log-book would make interesting reading at a later date. He set it aside. He glanced through a letter of partnership agreement with Lord Winterton who, it seemed, owned the Golden Bough. "No longer, your lordship." He grinned. "I regret to inform you that she is all mine now."

The cargo manifest was disappointing. The Golden Bough was carrying mostly cheap trade goods, knives and axes, cloth, beads and copper rings. However, there were also five hundred muskets and a goodly store of black, powder in her holds.

"Och! So you were going to do a spot of gun smuggling. Shame on you, my dear Christopher." He tutted disapprovingly. "I'll have to find something better to fill her holds on the return voyage," he promised himself, and took a pull at the brandy.

He went on sorting through the other documents. There was a second letter from Winterton, agreeing to the Golden Bough's commission as a warship in the service of the Prester John, and a flowery letter of introduction to him signed by the Chancellor of England, the Earl of Clarendon, under the Great Seal, commending Christopher Llewellyn to the ruler of Ethiopia in the highest terms.

"Ah! That is of more value. With some small alteration to the name, even I would fall for that!" He folded it carefully and replaced the chest, the purses, the books and documents in the strong-box, and hung the key on a ribbon around his neck. While he finished the rest of the brandy he considered the courses of action that were now open to him.

This war in the Great Horn intrigued him. Soon the south-east trade winds would begin to blow across the Ocean of the Indies. On their benevolent wings the Great Mogul would be sending his dhows laden with troops and treasure from his empire on the mainland of India and Further India to his entre pets on the African coast. There would also be the annual pilgrimage of the faithful of Islam taking advantage of the same fair wind to sail up the Arabian Sea on their journey to the birthplace of the Prophet of God. Potentates and princes, ministers of state and rich merchants from every corner of the Orient, they would carry with them such riches as he could only guess at, to lay as offerings in the holy mosques and temples of Mecca and Medina.

Cumbrae allowed himself a few minutes to dream of pigeon's-blood rubies and cornflower sapphires the size of his fist, and elephant-loads of silver and gold bullion. "With the Gull and the Golden Bough sailing together, there ain't no black heathen prince who will be able to deny me. I will fill my holds with the best of it. Franky Courtney's miserly little treasure pales beside such abundance," he consoled himself. It still rankled sorely that he had not been able to find Franky's hiding place, and he scowled. "When I sail from this lagoon, I will leave the bones of Jiri and those other lying blackamoors as signposts to mark my passing, "he promised himself.

Sam Bowles interrupted his thoughts by sticking his head into the cabin. "Begging your pardon, your grace, we've rounded up all the prisoners. It was a clean sweep. Not one of them got away."

The Buzzard heaved himself to his feet, glad to have a distraction from these niggling regrets. "Let's see what you've got for me, then."

The prisoners were bound and squatting in three files in the ship's waist. "Forty-two hardened salt-water men," said Sam proudly, "sound in wind and limb."

"None of them wounded?" the Buzzard asked incredulously.

Sam answered in a whisper, "I knew you wouldn't want to be bothered to play nursemaid to such. We held their heads under water to help them on their way into the bosom of Jesus. For most of them it was a mercy."

"I'm amazed at your compassion, Mister Bowles," Cumbrae grunted, "but in future spare me such details. You know I'm a man of gentle persuasion." He put that matter out of his mind and contemplated his prisoners. Despite Sam's assurance, many had been heavily beaten, their eyes were blackened and their lips cut and swollen. They hung their heads and none would look at him.

He walked slowly down the squatting ranks, now and then seizing a handful of hair and lifting the man's face to study it. When he reached the end of the line he came back and addressed them jovially. "Hear me, my bully lads, I have a berth for all of you. Sail with me and you shall have a shilling a month and a fair share of the prize money and, as sure as my name is Angus Cochran, there'll be sack loads of gold and silver to share."

None replied, and he frowned. "Are you deaf or has the devil got your tongues? Who will sail with Cochran of Cumbrae?" The silence hung heavily over the deck. He strode forward and picked out one of the most intelligent looking of his prisoners. "What's your name, lad?"

"Davey Morgan."

"Will you sail with me, Davey?"

Slowly the man lifted his head and stared at the Buzzard. "I saw young Mister Winterton slaughtered and the captain shot down in cold blood on the beach. I'll not sail with any murdering pirate."

"Pirate!" the Buzzard screamed. "You dare to call me pirate, you lump of stinking offal? You were born to feed the seagulls, and that's what you shall do!" The great claymore rasped from its scabbard, and he swung it down to cleave Davey Morgan's head, through the teeth as far as his shoulders. With the bloody sword in his hand he strode down the line of prisoners.

"Is there another among you who would dare to call me pirate to my face?" No man spoke out, and at last Cumbrae rounded on Sam Bowles. "Lock them all in the Golden Bough's hold. Feed them on half a pint of water and a biscuit a day. Let them think about my offer more seriously. In a few days" time I'll speak to these lovelies again, and we shall see if they have better manners then."

He took Sam aside and spoke in a quieter tone. "There is still some storm damage that needs repair." He pointed up at the rigging. "She's your ship now, to sail and command. Make all good at once. I want to leave this godforsaken anchorage as soon as I can. Do you hear me, Captain Bowles?"

Sam Bowles's face lit with pleasure at the title. "You can rely on me, your grace."

Cumbrae strode to the entry port and slid down into one of the longboats. "Take me back to the beach, varlets." He jumped over the side before they touched the sand and waded knee-deep to the shore where Colonel Schreuder was waiting for him.

"My lord, I must speak to you, he said, and the Buzzard smiled at him engagingly.

"Your discourse always gives me pleasure, sit. Come with me. We can talk while I go about my affairs." He led the way across the beach, and into the grove.

"Captain Llewellyn was-" Schreuder began, but the Buzzard cut him off.

"Llewellyn was a bloody pirate. I was defending myself from his treachery." He stopped abruptly and faced Schreuder, hauling up his sleeve to display the ridged purple scar that disfigured his shoulder. "Do you see that? That's what I got for trusting Llewellyn once before. If I had not forestalled him, his desperadoes would have fallen on us and slaughteied us where we stood. I am sure that you understand and that you are grateful for my intervention. It could have been you going that way."

He pointed at the group of his men who were staggering up from the beach, dragging the corpses of Llewellyn and Vincent Winterton by their legs. Llewellyn's shattered head left a red drag mark through the sand.

Schreuder stared aghast at the burial party. He recognized in Cumbrae's words both a warning and a threat. Beyond the first line of trees was a series of deep trenches that had been freshly dug all over the area where once Sir Francis Courtney's encampment had stood. His hut was gone but in its place was a pit twenty feet deep, its bottom filled with seepage of brackish lagoon water. There was another extensive excavation on the site of the old spice go down It looked as though an army of miners had been at work among the trees. The Buzzard's men dragged the corpses to the nearest of these pits and dumped them unceremoniously into it. The bodies slid down the steep side and splashed into the puddle at the bottom.

Schreuder looked troubled and uncertain. "I find it difficult to believe that Llewellyn was such a person." But Cumbrae would not let him finish.

"By God, Schreuder, do you doubt my word? What of your assurance that you wanted to throw in your lot with me? If my actions offend you then it's better that we part now. I will give you one of the pirmaces from the Golden Bough, and a crew of Llewellyn's pirates to help you make your own way back to Good Hope. You can explain your fine scruples to Governor van de Velde. Is that more to your liking?"

"No, sir, it is not," said Schreuder hurriedly. "You know I cannot return to Good Hope."

"Well, then, Colonel, are you still with me?"

Schreuder hesitated, watching the grisly labours of the burial teams. He knew that if he crossed Cumbrae he would probably end up in the pit with Llewellyn and the sailors from the Golden Bough. He was trapped.

"I am still with you," he said at last.

The Buzzard nodded. "Here's my hand on it, then." He thrust out his huge freckled fist covered with wiry ginger hair. Slowly Schreuder reached out and took it. Cumbrae could see in his eyes the realization dawning that from now onwards he would be beyond the pale and was content that he could trust Schreuder at last. By accepting and condoning the massacre of the officers and crew of the Golden Bough he had made himself a pirate and an outlaw. He was, in every sense, the Buzzard's man.

"Come along with me, sir. Let me show you what we have done here." Cumbrae changed the subject easily, and led Schreuder past the mass grave without another glance at the pile of corpses. "You see, I knew Francis Courtney well we were like brothers. I am still certain that his fortune is hidden hereabouts. He has what he took from the Standvastigheid and that from the Heerlycke Nacht. By the blood of all the saints, there must be twenty thousand pounds buried somewhere under these sands."

At that they came to the long, deep trench where forty of Cumbrae's men were already back at work with spades. Among them were the three black seamen he had bought on the slave block at Good Hope.

"Jiri!" the Buzzard bellowed. "Matesi! Kimatti!" The slaves jumped, threw down their spades and scrambled out of the ditch in trepidation to face their master.

"Look at these great beauties, sir. I paid five hundred florins for each. It was the worst bargain I ever struck. Here before your eyes you have living proof that there are only three things a blackamoor can do well. He can prevaricate, thieve and swive." The Buzzard let fly a guffaw. "Isn't that the truth, Jiri?"

"Yes, Lardy." Jiri grinned and agreed. "It's God's own truth."

The Buztard stopped laughing as suddenly as he had begun. "What do you know about God, you heathen?" he roared and, with a mighty swing of his fist, he knocked Jiri back into the ditch. "Get back to work all three of you!" They seized their spades and attacked the bottom of the ditch in a frenzy, sending earth flying over the parapet in a cloud. Cumbrae stood above them, his hands on his hips. "Listen to me, you sons of midnight. You tell me that the treasure I seek is buried here. Well, then, find it for me or you won't be coming with me when I sail away. I'll bury all three of you in this grave that you're digging with your own sooty paws. Do you hear me?"

"We hear you, Lardy," they answered in chorus.

He took Schreuder's arm in a companionable grip and led him away. "I have come to accept the sad fact that they never truly knew the whereabouts of Franky's hoard. They've been jollying me along all these months. My rascals and I have had just about a bellyful of playing at moles. Let me offer you the hospitality of my humble abode and a mug of whisky, and you can tell me all you know about this pretty little war that's a-going on between the great Mogul and the Prester. Methinks, you and I might well find better occupation and more profit elsewhere than here at Elephant Lagoon."

In the firelight Hal studied his band as they ate, with ravenous appetite, their dinner of smoked meat. The hunting had been poor in these last days and most of them were tired. His own seamen had never been slaves. Their labour on the walls of the castle of Good Hope had not broken or cowed them. Rather it had hardened them, and now the long march had put a temper on them. He could want no more from them. they were tough and tried warriors. Althuda he liked and trusted, but he had been a slave from childhood and some of his men would never be fighters. Sabah was a disappointment. He had not fulfilled Hal's expectation of him. He had become sullen and obstructive. He shirked his duties and protested at the orders Hal gave him. His favourite cry had become, "I am a slave no longer! No man has the right to command me!"

Sabah would not fare well if matched against the likes of the Buzzard's seamen, Hal thought, but he looked up and smiled as Sukeena came to sit beside him.

"Do not make an enemy of Sabah," she whispered quietly.

"I do not wish that," he replied, "but every man among us must do his part." He looked down at her tenderly. "You are the worth of ten men like Sabah, but today I saw you stumble more than once and when you thought I was not watching you there was pain in your eyes. Are you sickening, my sweetheart? Am I truly setting too hard a pace?"

"You are too fond, Gundwane." She smiled up at him. "I will walk with you to the very gates of hell and not complain."

"I know you would, and it worries me. If you do not complain, how will I ever know what ails you?"

"Nothing ails me," she assured him.

"Swear it to me," he insisted. "You are not hiding any illness from me."

"I swear it to you, with this kiss." She gave him her lips. "All is as well as God ever intended. And I will prove it to you." She took his hand and led him to the dark corner of the stockade where she had laid out their bed.

Though her body melted into his as sweetly as before, there was a softness and languor in her loving that was strange and, though it delighted him while his passion was in white heat, afterwards it left him with a sense of disquiet and puzzlement. He was aware that something had changed but he was at a loss as to exactly what was different.

The next day he watched her carefully during the long march, and it seemed to him that on the steeper ground her step was not as spry as it had been. Then, when the heat was fiercest, she lost her place in the column and began to fall back. Zwaantie went to help her over a rough place in the elephant path that they were following but Sukeena said something sharply to her and thrust away her hand. Hal slowed the pace, almost imperceptibly, to give her respite, and called the midday halt earlier than he had on the preceding days.

Sukeena slept beside him that night with a deathlike stillness while Hal lay awake. By now he was convinced that she was not well, and that she was trying to hide her weakness from him. As she slept her breathing was so light that he had to place his ear to her lips to reassure himself. He held her close and her body seemed heated. Once, just before dawn, she groaned so pitifully that he felt his heart swell with love and concern for her. At last he also fell into a deep dreamless sleep. When he woke with a start and reached out for her, he found her gone.

He lifted himself on one elbow and looked around the stockade. The fire had died down to a puddle of embers, but the full moon, even though it was low in the west, threw enough light for him to see that she was not there. He could make out the dark shape of Aboli. the morning star was almost washed out by the more brilliant light of the moon, but it burned just above his head as he sat his watch at the entrance. Aboli was awake, for Hal heard him cough softly and then saw him draw his fur blanket closer around his shoulders.

Hal threw back his own kaross, and went to squat beside him. "Where is Sukeena?" he whispered.

"She went out a short while ago." "Which way?"

"Down towards the stream." "You did not stop her?"

"She was going about her private business." Aboli turned to look at him curiously. "Why would I stop her?"

"I am sorry," Hal whispered back. "I meant no rebuke. She worries me. She is not well. Have you not noticed?" Aboli hesitated. "Perhaps." He nodded. "Women are children of the moon, which lacks but a few nights of full, so perhaps her courses are in flood."

"I am going after her." Hal stood up and went down the rough path towards the shallow pool where they had bathed the previous evening. He was about to call her name when he heard a sound that silenced and alarmed him. He stopped and listened anxiously. The sound came again, the sound of pain and distress. He started forward and saw her on the sandbank kneeling beside the pool. She had thrown aside her blanket, and the moonlight shone on her bare skin, imparting to it the patina of polished ivory. She was doubled up in a convulsion of pain and sickness. As he watched in distress, she retched and vomited into the sand.

He ran down to her and dropped on his knees beside her. She looked up at him in despair. "You should not see me thus, she whispered -hoarsely, then turned her head. away and vomited again. He put his arm around her bare shoulders. She was cold and shivering.

"You are sick," he breathed. "Oh, my love, why did you not answer me straight? Why did you try to hide it from me?

She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. "You should not have followed," she said. "I did not want you to know."

"If you are sick, then I must know. You should trust me enough to tell me."

"I did not want to be a burden to you. I did not want you to delay the march because of me."

He hugged her to him. "You will never be a burden to me. You are the breath in my lungs and the blood in my veins. Tell me now truthfully what ails you, my darling."

She sighed and shivered against him. "Oh, Hal, forgive me. I did not want this to happen yet. I have taken all the medicines that I know of to prevent it."

"What is it?" He was confused and dismayed. "Please tell me "I am carrying your child in my womb." He stared at her in astonishment and could neither move nor speak. "Why are you silent? Why do you look at me so? Please don't be angry with me."

Suddenly he clasped her to his chest with all his strength. "It is not anger that stops up my mouth. It is joy. Joy for our love. joy for the son you promised me."

That day Hal changed the order of march and took Sukeena to walk with him at the head of the column. Though she protested laughingly, he took her basket from her and added it to his own load. Thus relieved she was able to step out lightly and stay beside him without difficulty. Still he took her hand on the difficult places, and she did not demur when she saw what pleasure it gave him to protect and cherish her thus.

"You must not tell the others," she murmured, "else they will want to slow the march on my behalf."

"You are as strong as Aboli and Big Daniel," he assured her staunchly, "but I will not tell them."

So they kept their secret, walking hand in hand and smiling at each other in such obvious happiness that even if Zwaantie had not told Althuda and he had not told Aboli, they must have guessed. Aboli grinned as if he were the father and showed Sukeena such special favour and attention that even Sabah, in the end, fathomed the reason for this new mood that had come over the band.

The land through which they were passing now became more heavily wooded. Some of the trees were monstrous and seemed, like great arrows, to pierce the very heavens. "These must have been old when Christ the Saviour was born upon this earth!" Hal marvelled.

With Aboli's wise counsel and guidance they were coming to terms with this savage terrain, and the great animals that abounded in it. Fear was no longer their constant companion, and Hal and Sukeena had learned to take pleasure in the strangeness and beauty all around them.

They would pause on a hilltop to watch an eagle sail on the high wind with motionless wings, or to take pleasure in a tiny gleaming metallic bird, no bigger than Sukeena's thumb, as it hung suspended from a flower while it sipped the nectar with a curved beak that seemed as long as its body.

The grassland teemed with a plethora of strange beasts that challenged their imagination. There were herds of the same blue buck that they had first encountered below the mountains, and wild horses barred with stark stripes of cream, russet and black. Often they saw ahead of them among the trees the dark mountainous shapes of the double-horned rhinoceros, but they had learned that this fearsome beast was almost blind and that they could avoid its wild, snorting charge by making a short detour from the path.

On the open lands, beyond the forest, there were flocks of small cinnamon-coloured gazelles, so numerous that they moved like smoke across the hills. Their flanks were slashed with a horizontal chocolate stripe, and lyre-shaped horns crowned their dainty heads. When alarmed by the sight of the human figures, they pranced with astonishing lightness of hoof, leaping high in the air and flashing a snowy plume upon their backs. Each ewe was followed by a tiny lamb, and Sukeena clapped her hands with delight and exclaimed to see the young animals nudging the udder or cavorting with their peers. Hal watched her fondly, knowing now that she also carried a child within her, sharing her joy in the young of another species and revelling with her in the secret they thought they had kept from the others.

He read the angle of the noon sun, and everyone in the band gathered around him to watch him mark their position on the chart. The string of dots on the heavy parchment sheet crept slowly towards the indentation on the coastline, which was marked on the Dutch chart as Buffels Baal or the Bay of the Buffaloes.

"We are not more than five leagues from the lagoon now. "Hal looked up from the chart.

Aboli agreed. "While we were out hunting this morning I recognized the hills ahead. From the high ground I saw the line of low cloud that marks the coast. We are very close."

Hal nodded. "We must advance with caution. There is the danger that we might run into foraging parties from the Gull. This is a favourable place to set up a more permanent camp. There is an abundance of water and firewood and a good lookout from this hill. In the morning, Aboli and I will leave the rest of you here while we go on ahead to discover if the Gull is truly lying in Elephant Lagoon."

An hour before dawn, Hal took Big Daniel aside and committed Sukeena to his care. "Guard her well, Master Daniel. Never let her out of your sight."

"Have no fear, Captain. She'll be safe with me."

As soon as it was light enough to see the track that led eastwards Hal and Aboli left the camp, Sukeena walked a short distance with them.

"God speed, Aboli." Sukeena embraced him. "Watch over my man."

"I will watch over him, even as you watch over his son." "You monstrous rogue, Abold" She struck him a playful blow on his great broad chest. "How do you know everything? We were so sure we had kept it a secret even from you." She turned laughing to Hal. "He knows!"

"Then all is lost." Hal shook his head. "For on the day it is born this rascal will take it as his own, even as he did with me."

She watched them climb the hill and wave from the crest. But as they disappeared the smile shrivelled on her lips and a single tear traced its way down her cheek. On her way back, she stopped beside the stream and washed it away. When she entered the camp again, Althuda looked up at her from the sword blade he was burnishing and smiled at her, unsuspecting of her distress. He marvelled at how beautiful and fresh she looked, even after all these months of hard travel in the wilderness.

When last they had been here, Hal and Aboli had hunted and explored these *-hills above the lagoon. They knew the run of the river, and they entered the deep gorge a mile above the lagoon, following an elephant path down to a shallow ford that they knew. They did not approach the lagoon from this direction. "There may be watering parties from the Gull," Aboli cautioned. Hal nodded and led them up the far side of the gorge and in a wide circuit around the back of the hills, out of sight of the lagoon.

They climbed the back slope of the hills until they were a few paces below the skyline. Hal knew that the cave of the ancient rock paintings, where he and Katinka had dallied, lay just over the crest in front of them, and that from the ridge there would be a panoramic view across the lagoon to the rocky heads and the ocean beyond.

"Use those trees to break your shape on the skyline," Aboli told him quietly.

Hal smiled. "You taught me well. I have not forgotten." He inched his way up the last few yards, followed by Aboli, and, gradually, the view down the far side opened to his gaze. He had not had sight of the sea for weeks now, and he felt his heart leap and his spirits soar as he looked upon its serene blue expanse, flecked with the white horses that pranced before the south-easter. It was the element that ruled his life and he had missed it sorely.

"Oh, for a- ship!" he whispered. "Please, God, let there be a ship!"

As he moved up, there before his eyes appeared the great grey castles of the heads, the bastions that guarded the entrance to the lagoon. He paused before taking another step, steeling himself for the terrible disappointment of finding the anchorage deserted. Like a gambler at Hazard, he had staked his life on this coup of the dice of Fate. He forced himself to take another slow step up the slope, then gasped, seized Aboli's arm and dug his fingers into the knotted muscles.

"The Gull!" he muttered, as though it were a prayer-of thanks. "And not alone! There is another fine ship with her."

For a long while neither spoke again, until Aboli said softly, "You have found the ship you promised them. If you can seize it, you will be a captain at last, Gundwane."

They crept forward and, on the crest of the hill, sank on their bellies and gazed down upon the wide lagoon below. "What ship is that with the Gull?" Hal asked. "I cannot make out her name from here."

"She is an Englishman," said Aboli, with certainty. "No other would cross her mizzen topgallant yard in that fashion."

"A Welshman, perhaps? She has a rake to her bows and a racy style to her sheer. They build them that way on the west coast."

"It is possible, but whoever she is, she's a fighting ship. Look at those guns. There would be few to match her in her class," Aboli murmured thoughtfully.

"Better than the Gull, even?" Hal looked at her with longing eyes.

Aboli shook his head. "You dare not try to take her, Gundwane. Surely she belongs to an honest English sea captain. If you lay hands upon her you turn all of us into pirates. Better we try for the Gull."

For another hour they lay on the hilltop, talking and planning quietly while they studied the two ships and the encampment among the trees on the near shore of the lagoon.

"By heavens!" Hal exclaimed abruptly. "There is the Buzzard himself. I would know that bush of fiery hair anywhere. "His voice was sharp with hatred and anger. "He is going out to the other ship. See him climb the ladder without a by-your-leave, as if he owns it."

"Who is that greeting him at the companionway?" Aboli asked. "I swear I know that walk, and the bald scalp shining in the sunlight."

"It cannot be Sam Bowles aboard that frigate... but it is," Hal marvelled. "There is something very strange afoot here, Aboli. How may we find out what it is?"

While they watched the sun begin to slide down the western sky, Hal tried to keep his rage under control. Down there were the two men responsible for his father's terrible death. He relived every detail of his agony and he hated Sam Bowles and the Buzzard to the point where he knew that his emotions might override his reason. His strong instinct was to throw all else aside, go down to confront them and seek retribution for his father's agony and death.

I must not let it happen, he told himself. I must think first of Sukeena and the son that she carries for me.

Aboli touched his arm and pointed down the hill. The rays of the sinking sun had changed the angle of the shadows of the trees of the forest, so that they could see down more clearly through them into the encampment.

"The Buzzard is digging fortifications, down there." Aboli was puzzled. "But there is no plan to them. His trenches are all higgledy-piggledy."

"Yet all his men seem to be at work in the diggings. There must be some plan-" Hal broke off and laughed. "Of course! This is why he came back to the lagoon! He is still searching for my father's hoard."

"He is a long way off course." Aboli chuckled. "Perhaps Jiri and Matesi have deliberately misled him."

"Sweet Mary, of course those rascals have played the fool with him. Cumbrae bought more than he bargained for in the slave market. They will tweak his nose while they pretend to grovel and call him Lardy." He smiled at the thought, then became serious again. "Do you think they may still be down there, or has the Buzzard murdered them already?"

"No, he will keep them alive as long as he thinks they are of value to him. He is digging, so he is still hoping. My guess is that they are still alive."

"We must watch for them." For another hour they lay on the hilltop in silence, then Hal said, "The tide is turning. The strange frigate is swinging on her moorings." They watched her bow and curtsy to the ebb with a stately grace, and then Hal spoke again. "Now I can see the name on her transom, but it is difficult to read. Is it the Golden Swan? The Golden Hart? No, I think not. "Tis the Golden Bough!"

"A fine name for a fine ship," said Aboli, and then he started, and pointed excitedly down at the network of trenches and pits amongst the trees. "There are black men coming out of that ditch, three of them. Is that Jiri? Your eyes are sharper than mine."

"By heavens! So it is, and Matesi and Kimatti behind him."

"They are taking them to a hut near the water's edge. That must be where they lock them up at night."

"Aboli, we must speak to them. I will go down as soon as it's dark and try to reach their hut. What time will the moon rise?"

"An hour after midnight," Aboli answered him. "But I will not let you go. I made a promise to Sukeena Besides your white skin shines like a mirror. I will go."

Stripped naked, Aboli waded out from the far shore until the water reached his chin and struck out in a dog-paddle that made no splash and left only a silent oily wake behind his head. When he reached the far shore, he lay in the shallows until he was certain the beach was clear. Then he crawled swiftly across the open sand and huddled against the hole of the first tree.

One or two camp fires were burning in the grove, and from around them he heard the sound of men's voices and an occasional snatch of song or a shout of laughter. The flames gave him enough light to discern the hut where the slaves where imprisoned. Near the front of it he picked out the glow of a burning match on the lock of a musket, and from this he placed the single sentry, who sat with his back to a tree covering the door of the hut.

They are careless, he thought. Only one guard, and he seems to be asleep.

He crept forward on hands and knees, but before he reached the back wall of the hut he heard footsteps and moved quickly to the shelter of another tree-trunk and crouched there. Two of the Buzzard's sailors came sauntering through the grove towards him. They were arguing loudly.

"I'll not sail with that little weasel," one declared. "He would cut a throat for the fun of it."

"So would you, Willy MacGregor."

"Aye, but I'd no" be using a pizened blade, like Sam Bowles would."

"You'll sail with whoever the Buzzard says you will, and that's an end to your carping," his mate announced and paused beside the tree where Aboli crouched. He lifted his petticoats and urinated noisily against the trunk. "By the devil's nuggets, even with Sam Bowles as captain I'll be happy enough to get away from this place. I left bonnie Scotland to escape the coal pit, and here I am digging holes again." He shook the droplets vigorously from himself and the two walked on.

Aboli waited until they were well clear, and then crawled to the rear wall of the hut. He found that it was plastered with unburnt clay, but that chunks of this were falling from the framework of woven branches beneath. He crawled slowly along the wall, gently probing each crack with a stalk of grass until he found a chink that went right through. He placed his lips to the opening and whispered softly, "Jiri!"

He heard a startled movement on the far side of the wall, and a moment later a fearful whisper came back. "Is that the voice of Aboli, or is it his ghost?"

"I am alive. Here feel the warmth of my finger "tis not the hand of a dead man."

They whispered to each other for almost an hour before Aboli left the hut and crawled back down the beach. He slipped into the waters of the lagoon like an otter.

The dawn was painting the eastern sky the colours of lemons and ripe apricots when Aboli climbed the hill again to where he had left Hal. Hal was not in the cave, but when Aboli gave a soft warbling bird-call, he stepped out from behind the hanging vines that screened the entrance, his cutlass in his hand.

"I have news," said Aboli. "For once the gods have been kind."

"Tell me!" Hal commanded eagerly, as he sheathed the blade. They sat side by side in the entrance to the cave from where they could keep the full sweep of the lagoon under their eyes, while Aboli related in detail everything that Jiri had been able to tell him.

Hal exclaimed when Aboli described the massacre of the captain and men of the Golden Bough, and the way in which Sam Bowles had drowned the wounded like unwanted kittens in the shallows of the lagoon. "Even for the Buzzard that is a deed that reeks of hell itself."

"Not all were killed," Aboli told him. "Jiri says that a large number of the survivors are locked up in the main hold of the Golden Bough." Hal nodded thoughtfully. "He says too that the Buzzard has given the command of the Golden Bough to Sam Bowles."

"By heaven, that rogue has come up in the world," Hal exclaimed. "But all this could work to our advantage. The Golden Bough has become a pirate ship, and is now fair game for us. However, it will be a dangerous enterprise to hunt the Buzzard in his own nest." He lapsed into a long silence, and Aboli did not disturb him.

At last Hal looked up and it was clear he had reached some decision. "I swore an oath to my father never to reveal that which I am now to show you. But circumstances have changed. He would forgive me, I know. Come with me, Aboli Hal led him down the back slope of the hill, and then turned towards the gorge of the river. They found a trail made by the baboons and scrambled down the steep side to the bottom. There Hal turned upstream, and the cliffs became higher and steeper as they went. At places they were forced to enter the water and wade alongside the cliff. Every few hundred yards Hal paused to take his bearings, until at last he grunted with satisfaction as he marked the dead tree. He waded along the lip of the bank until he reached it, then scrambled ashore and began to climb.

"Where are you going, Gundwane?" Aboli called after him.

"Follow me," Hal answered, and Aboli shrugged and began to climb after him. He chuckled when Hal suddenly reached down and gave him a hand onto the narrow ledge that he had not been able to see from below.

"This has the smell of Captain Franky's lair to it," he said. "The Buzzard would have saved himself a lot of work by searching here instead of digging holes in the grove, am I right?"

"This way." Hal shuffled along the ledge with his back to the cliff, and- the hundred-foot drop that opened under his toes. When he reached the place where the ledge widened and the cleft split the face, he paused to examine the rocks that blocked the entrance.

"There have been no visitors, not even the apes," he said, with relief, and began to move the rocks out of the opening. When there was space to pass he crept through and groped in the darkness for the flint and steel box and the candle that his father had placed on the ledge above head level. The under flared at the third stroke of the steel on the flint, and he lit the candle stub and held it high.

Aboli laughed in the yellow light as he looked upon the array of canvas sacks and chests. "You are a rich man, Gundwane. But what use is all this gold and silver to you now? It will not buy you a mouthful of food or a ship to carry it all away."

Hal crossed to the nearest chest and opened the lid. The gold bars glinted in the candle-light. "My father died to leave me this legacy. I would rather have had him alive and me a beggar." He slammed the lid, and looked back at Aboli. "Despite what you may think, I did not come here for the gold," he said. "I came for this." He kicked the powder keg beside him. "And those!" He pointed to the piles of muskets and swords that were stacked against the far wall of the cave. "And these also!" He crossed to where the sheaves and gantry were piled in a heap and picked up one of the coils of manila rope that he and his father had used. He tried the strength of the line by stretching a length of it over his back and straining to break it with his arms and shoulders.

"It is still strong, and has not rotted," he dropped the coil, "so we have all we need here."

Aboli came to sit on the chest beside him. "So you have a plan. Then share it with me, Gundwane." He listened quietly as Hal laid it out for him, and once or twice he nodded or made a suggestion.

THat same morning they set off for the base camp and by travelling fast, trotting and running most of the way, they reached it shortly after noon. Sukeena saw them climbing the hill and came running down to meet them. Hal seized her and swung her high in the air, then checked himself and set her down with great care as though she were woven of gossamer and might easily tear. "Forgive me, I treat you roughly."

"I am yours to treat as you will, and I will be happier for it." She clung to him and kissed him. "Tell me what you have found. Is there a ship in the lagoon?"

"A ship. A fine ship. A beautiful ship, but not half as lovely as you."

With Hal urging them they broke the camp and moved out at once. He and Aboli scouted ahead to clear the path and to lead the band on towards the lagoon.

When they reached the river and climbed down the gorge Hal left Big Daniel there and all the other seamen but Ned Tyler. They were unaware that the treasure cave was only a cable's length upstream. "Wait for me here, Master Daniel. I must take the others to a safe place. Hide yourselves well. I will return after dark."

Aboli went with them, as Hal led the rest of the party up the far side of the gorge, then took them round the far side of the hills. They approached the sandbanks that separated the mainland from the island, on which they had built the fireships.

By this time it was late afternoon, and Hal allowed them to rest there until nightfall. As soon as it was dark they all waded across the shallows, Hal carrying Sukeena on his back. As soon as they reached the island they hurried deep into the thick bush, where they were safe from observation from the pirate encampment.

"No fires!" Hal cautioned them. "Speak only in whispers. Zwaantie, keep little Bobby from crying. No one to wander away. Keep close. Ned is in command when I am not here. Obey him."

Hal and Aboli went on across the island, through the bush to the beach facing the lagoon. In the area where they had built the fireships the undergrowth had sprung up again thickly. They groped and searched beneath it until they located the two abandoned double-hulled vessels that had not been used on the attack on the Gull, and dragged them closer to the beach.

"Will they still float?" Aboli asked dubiously.

"Ned made a good job of them, and they seem sturdy enough," Hal told him. "If we unload the combustibles, then they will float higher in the water."

They stripped the ships of their cargo of dry tar-soaked wooden faggots. "That's better," Hal said, with satisfaction. "They will be lighter and easier to handle now." They concealed them again, covering them with branches.

"There is still much to do before daylight." Hal led Aboli back to where most of Althuda's party were already asleep. "Do not wake Sukeena," he warned her brother. "She is exhausted and must rest."

"Where are you going?" Althuda asked.

"There is no time to explain. We will return before dawn."

Hal and Aboli crossed the channel to the mainland and then hurried back through the forest in the darkness, but when they reached the line of hills Hal stopped and said, "There is something I have to find."

He turned back towards the flickering lights of the pirate camp, moving slowly and pausing often to get his bearings, until at last he stopped at the base of a tall tree.

"This is the one." With the point of his cutlass he probed the soft loamy earth around the roots. He felt it strike metal, and fell to his knees. He dug with his bare hands, then lifted the golden chain and held it to catch the starlight.

"Tis your father's Nautonnier seal." Aboli recognized it at once.

"The ring also. And the locket with its portrait of my mother." Hal stood up and wiped the damp earth from the glass that had protected the miniature. "With these in my hands, I feel a whole man again." He dropped the treasures into his leather pouch.

"Let us go on, before we are discovered."

It was after midnight when, once again, they scrambled down the side of the gorge and Big Daniel challenged them softly as they reached the riverbank.

"Tis me," Hal reassured him, and the others emerged from where they were hidden.

"Stay here," Hal ordered. "Aboli and I will return shortly." The two set off upstream. Hal led the climb to the ledge and groped his way into the blackness of the cave. Working in the cahdle's feeble light, they tied the cutlasses into bundles of ten, then stacked them at the entrance. Hal emptied one of the chests of its precious contents, piling the gold bars disdainfully in a corner of the cave, and packed twenty pistols into the empty chest.

Then they rolled the kegs of gunpowder, with the slow match out onto the narrow ledge, and set up the gantry and sheave blocks with the rope rove through. Hal scrambled back down the cliff. When he reached the riverbank he whistled softly. Aboli lowered the bundles of weapons and the kegs down to him.

It was heavy work, but Aboli's great muscles made light of it. When they had finished Aboli climbed down to join Hal, and they began the weary porterage of the goods down to where Big Daniel and the other seamen waited.

"I recognize these," Big Daniel chuckled, as he ran his hands over a bundle of cutlasses then examined them in the moonlight.

"Here is something else you will recognize," Hal told him, and gave him two of the heavy powder kegs to carry.

All of them carrying as much as their backs would bear, they toiled up the side of the gorge, dumped their burdens and then scrambled down again to bring up the next load. At last fully laden they struck out through the forest. Hal made only one detour to cache the two kegs of powder, a bundle of slow-match, and three cutlasses in the cave of the rock paintings. Then they went on again.

It was almost morning when at last they joined Althuda and his band on the island. They ate the cold smoked venison that Sukeena and Zwaantie had ready for them. Then, when the others rolled in their karosses, Hal took Sukeena aside and showed her the great seal of the Nautonnier and the locket.

"Where did you find these, Gundwane?"

"I hid them in the forest on the day we were captured." "Who is the woman?" She studied the portrait. "Edwina Courtney, my mother."

"Oh, Hal, she is beautiful. You have her eyes." "Give my son those same eyes."

"I will try. With all my heart I will try."

In the late afternoon Hal roused the others and assigned their duties to them.

"Sabah, take the pistols out of the chest and draw the loads. Reload them, then pack them back into the chest to keep them dry." The other man set to work at once.

"Big Daniel will help me load the boats. Ned, you take the women down to the beach and explain to them how to help you launch the second boat when the time comes. They must leave everything else behind. There will be neither space nor time to care for extra baggage."

"Even my bags?" Sukeena asked.

Hal hesitated then nodded firmly. "Even your bags," he said, and she did not argue, merely gave him a demure look from under her lashes before she and Zwaantie, carrying Bobby strapped to her back, followed Ned away through the trees.

"Come with me, Aboli." Hal took his arm and they moved silently to the top end of the island. Then they crept forward on hands and knees until they could lie and look across the open stretch of water at the beach where the boats from the Gull and the Golden Bough were drawn up below the encampment.

While they kept watch Hal explained the finer details and small modifications to his original plan. From time to time Aboli's tattooed head nodded. In the end he said, "It is a good and simple plan, and if the gods are kind, it will work."

In the sunset they studied the two ships anchored in the channel and watched the activity on the beach. As it grew darker, the teams of men who had worked all day, digging the Buzzard's trenches, were relieved. Some came down to bathe in the lagoon. Others rowed out to their berths on the Gull.

Smoke from their cooking fires spiralled up through the trees and spread in a pale blue haze across the waters. Hal and Aboli could smell grilling fish on the smoke. Sound carried clearly across the still water. They could hear men's voices and even make out something of what they were saying, a shouted oath or a boisterous argument. Twice Hal was sure that he recognized the Buzzard's voice but they had no further sight of him. just as darkness began to fall a longboat pulled away from the side of the Golden Bough and headed in towards the beach.

"That's Sam Bowles in the stern," Hal said, and his voice was filled with loathing.

"Captain Bowles now, if what "Jiri tells me is true," Aboli corrected him.

"It is almost time to move," Hal said, as the shapes of the anchored ships began to merge with the dark mass of the forest behind them. "You know what to do, and God go with you, Aboli." Hal gripped his arm briefly.

"And with you also, Gundwane." Aboli rose to his feet and went down into the water. He made no noise as he swam across the channel, but he left a faint phosphorescent trail on the dark surface.

Hal found his way back through the bush to where the others waited by the ungainly shapes of the two fireships. He made them sit in a tight circle around him while he spoke to them softly. At the end he made each repeat his instructions, and corrected them when they erred.

"Now nothing remains but to wait until Aboli has done his work."

Aboli reached the mainland and left the water quickly. He moved quietly through the &_)kforest, and the warm breeze had dried his body before he reached the cave of the paintings. He squatted beside the powder kegs and made his preparations as Hal had instructed him.

He cut two fuses from the slow-match. One was only a fathom in length, but the second was a coil thirty feet long. The time delay was an imprecise calculation and the first might burn for ten minutes, but the second for almost thrice as long.

He worked swiftly, and when both kegs were ready he tied the bundle of three cutlasses on his back, swung a powder keg up onto each shoulder and crept out of the cave. He remembered that the previous night when he had visited the hut in which Jiri and the other slaves were being held, he had observed that the Buzzard's men had become careless. The uneventful months they had been camped here had lulled them into a complacent mood.

The sentries were no longer vigilant. Still he was not relying on their sloth.

Stealthily he moved closer to the camp, until he could clearly make out the features of the men sitting around the cooking fires. He recognized many, but there was no sign of either Cumbrae or Sam Bowles.

He set up the first keg in a patch of scrub on the perimeter of the camp, as close as he dared approach, and then, without lighting the fuse, moved away until he reached one of the trenches where the Buzzard's men had been digging for treasure.

He placed the keg with the longest fuse on the lip of the trench and covered it with sand and debris from the excavation. Then he paid out the coiled fuse and took the end of it down into the trench. He crouched there and shielded the flint and steel with his body so the flare of sparks would not alert the men in the camp as he lit the slow-match. When it was glowing evenly he lit the fuse from it and watched it for a minute to make certain that it was also burning well. Then he climbed out of the trench and moved swiftly and silently back to the first keg. From the slow match in his hand he lit the shorter fuse.

"The first explosion will bring them running," Hal had explained. "Then the second keg will go off in their faces." Still carrying the bundle of cutlasses, Aboli moved away swiftly. There was always the danger that the flame of one of the fuses might jump ahead and set off the keg prematurely. Once he was clear, and moving with more caution, he found the path that ran down towards the beach. Twice he was forced to leave the path as other figures came towards him out of the darkness. Once he was not quick enough but he brazened it out, exchanging a gruff "Good night!" with the pirate who brushed past him.

He picked out the mud hut against the glow of the campfires and crept up to the back wall. Jiri responded immediately to his whisper. "We are ready, brother." His tone was crisp and fierce, no longer the cringing whine of the slave.

Aboli laid down the bundle of weapons and, with his own cutlass, severed the twine that held them. "Here!" he whispered, and Jiri's hand came out through the crack in the mud wall. Aboli passed the cutlasses through to him.

"Wait until the first keg blows," he told him, through the hole in the wall.

"I hear you, Aboli."

Aboli crept to the corner of the hut and glanced round it. The guard sat in his usual position in front of the door. Tonight he was awake, smoking a long-stemmed clay pipe. Aboli saw the burning tobacco glow in the bowl as he drew upon it. He squatted behind the corner of the wall and waited.

The time passed so slowly that he began to fear that the fuse on the first keg had been faulty and had burned out before reaching it. He decided that he would have to go back to check it, but as he began to rise to his feet the blast swept through the camp.

It tore branches from the trees and sent clouds of burning ash and sparks swirling from campfires. It struck the mud hut, knocking down half the front wall and ripping the thatch from the roof. It hit the guard by the front door and hurled him over backwards. He floundered about on his back, trying to sit up, but his big belly made him ungainly. While he struggled Aboli stood over him, placed one foot on his chest, pinning him to the earth, swung the cutlass and felt the hilt jar in his hand as the edge hacked into the man's neck. His whole body spasmed and then lay still. Aboli leaped away from him and grabbed the rope handle of the rough-hewn door to the hut. As he heaved at it the three men inside hurled their combined weight upon it from the far side, and it burst open.

"This way, brethren." Aboli led them down towards the beach.

The camp was in uproar. The darkness was full of men blundering about, swearing, shouting orders and alarms.

"To arms! We are attacked."

"Stand to here, they heard the Buzzard roar. "Have at them, lads!"

"Petey! Where are you, me darling boy?" a wounded man screamed for his ship wife "I am killed. Come to me, Petey." Burning brands from the campfires had been carried into the scrub and the flames were taking hold in the forest. They gave the scene a hellish illumination, and men's shadows made monsters of them as they rushed about, startling each other. Someone fired a musket, and immediately there was a wild fusillade as panic-stricken sailors fired at shadows and at one another. More screams and cries as the flying musket balls took their toll among the scurrying figures.

"The bastards are in the forest behind us!" It was the Buzzard's voice again. "This way, my brave boys!" He was rallying them, and men came rushing up from the beach to join the defence. They ran full into the musket fire of their nervous fellows among the trees and fired back at them.

When Aboli reached the beach he found longboats drawn up, abandoned by their crews who had rushed away to answer the Buzzard's call to arms.

"Where do they keep their tools?" Aboli snapped at Jiri. "There is a store over there." Jiri led him to it at a run. The spades, axes and iron bars were stacked under an open lean-to shed. Aboli sheathed his cutlass and seized a heavy iron bar. The other three followed his example, then ran back to the beach, and fell upon the boats lying there.

With a few hefty blows they knocked in their bottom timbers, leaving only one unscathed.

"Come on! Waste no more time!" Aboli urged, and they threw down the tools and ran to the single undamaged boat. They thrust it out into the lagoon and tumbled aboard, grabbed an oar each and began to pull for the dark shape of the frigate, which was now emerging from the darkness as the flames of the burning forest lit her.

While they were still only a few oar strokes off the beach a mob of pirates poured out from the grove.

"Stop! Come back! "one shouted.

"It's those black apes. They're stealing one of the boats." "Don't let them get away!" A musket banged and a ball hummed over the heads of the men at the oars. They ducked and rowed the harder, putting all their weight into their strokes. Now all the pirates were firing and balls kicked spray off the water close at hand, or thumped into the timbers of the longboat.

Some of the pirates ran to the boats at the water's edge and swarmed into them. They pushed off in pursuit, but almost immediately there were howls of dismay as the water poured in through the shattered floorboards and the boats swamped and overturned. Few could swim, and the yells of rage turned to piteous cries for help as they splashed and floundered in the dark water.

At that moment the second explosion swept through the camp. It did even more damage than the first for, in response to his bellowed orders, the Buzzard's men were charging straight into the blast when it struck them.

"There's something to keep them busy for a while," Aboli grunted. "Pull for the frigate, lads, and leave the Buzzard to his kinsman the devil." al had not waited for the first explosion to shatter the night before he launched the &Hfireship. With all the men in the party helping, they dragged the hull down the beach. Relieved of her cargo, she was a great deal lighter to handle. They piled into her the bundles of cutlasses and the chest filled with loaded pistols.

They left Sabah to hold her and ran back to fetch the second vessel. The women ran beside them as they dragged it down to the water's edge and scrambled on board. Big Daniel carried little Bobby and handed him to Zwaantie when she was safely seated on the floorboards. Hal lifted Sukeena in and placed her gently in the stern sheets. He gave her one last kiss.

"Keep out of danger until we have secured the ship. Listen to Ned He knows what to do."

He left her and ran back to take command of the first boat. Big Daniel and the two birds, Sparrow and Finch, were with him, as were Althuda. and Sabah. They would need every fighting man on the deck of the frigate if they were to take her.

They pushed the boat out into the channel and as their feet lost the bottom they began to swim and steered her for the anchored frigate.

The tide was at high slack. soon it would turn and give them its help as they ran the frigate for the deep channel between the heads.

But first we have to make her ours! Hal told himself as he kicked out strongly, clinging to the gunwale.

A cable's length from the Golden Bough Hal whispered, "Avast, lads. We don't want to arrive before we're welcome. "They hung in the water as the boat drifted aimlessly in the slack of the tide.

The night was quiet, so quiet that they could hear the voices of the men on the beach and the tap and clatter of the frigate's rigging as she snubbed her anchor and her bare masts rolled, almost imperceptibly, against the blaze of the stars.

"Maybe Aboli has run into trouble, Big Daniel muttered at last. "We might have to board her without any diversion." "Wait!" Hal replied. "Aboli will never let us down."

They hung in the water, their nerves stretched to breaking point. Then came the sound of a soft splash behind them, and Hal turned his head. The shape of the second boat crept towards them from the island.

"Ned is overeager," Big Daniel said.

"He's only following my orders, but he must not get ahead of us."

"How can we stop him?"

"I will swim across to speak to him," Hal answered, and let go his hold on the gunwale. He struck out towards the other boat in a silent breaststroke that did not break the surface. Close alongside he trod water and called softly, "Ned!"

"Aye, Captain! "Ned answered as softly.

"There is some delay. Wait here and do not get ahead of us. Wait until you hear the first explosion. Then take her in and latch on to the frigate's anchor cable."

"Aye, Captain, "Ned replied, and looking up at the black hull Hal saw a head peering down at him over the side. The starlight glowed on Sukeena's honey-gold skin, and he knew he must not speak to her again or swim closer lest his concern for her affect his judgement lest his love for her quench the fighting fire in his blood, He turned and swam back towards the other boat.

As he reached its side and lifted his hand to grip the gunwale, the quiet night was shattered by thunder and the echoes that burst against the hills swept over the lagoon. From the dark grove, flames shot up into the night sky and, for a brief moment, lit the scene like dawn. In that illumination Hal saw every sheet and spar of the frigate's rigging, but there was no sign of an anchor watch or other human presence aboard her.

"All together now, lads," Hal said, and they struck out again with new heart. It took them only minutes to close the gap. But in that time the night was transformed. They could hear the shouting and musket fire from the beach and the flames of the burning forest danced and glimmered on the surface around them. Hal was afraid that they might be lit brightly enough to be spotted by a vigilant sentry on the frigate's deck.

With relief they swam the awkward craft into the shadow cast by the frigate's tall hull. He glanced back and saw Ned Tyler bringing the other boat close behind them. As Hal watched they reached the frigate's drooping anchor line and he saw Sukeena stand up in the bows and take hold of the cable. He felt a lift of relief. His orders to Ned were to keep the women safely out of the way until they had control of the frigate's deck.

He saw with satisfaction that a skiff was moored alongside the Golden Bough, a rope ladder dangling into her from the deck above. Even more fortunately, it was empty, and no heads showed above the frigate's rail. However, he could hear a babble of voices above. The crew must be lining the frigate's far rail facing the beach, staring across in alarm and consternation at the flames, watching the running figures and the flashes of musket fire in bewilderment.

They pushed the fire ship the last few feet and bumped softly against the side of the empty skiff. Immediately Hal hauled himself out of the water over her side, leaving the others to secure her, and swarmed up the rope ladder to the deck.

As he had hoped, the skeleton crew of the frigate were all watching the disturbance, but he was dismayed at their numbers. There must be fifty of them at least. However, they were absorbed in what was happening ashore, and as Hal gathered himself to climb out onto the deck there was another mighty detonation from out of the forest.

"By God, will you no" look at that?" one of Sam Bowles's pirates shouted.

"There's a bloody great battle going on out there." "Our shipmates are in trouble. They need our help."

"I owe no favours to any of them. They'll get no help from me."

"Shamus is right. Let the Buzzard fight his own battles." Hal swung himself onto the deck and, with half a dozen quick steps, he had reached the shelter of the break in the forecastle. He crouched there and surveyed the deck. Jiti had told Aboli they were holding the frigate's loyal crew in the main hold. But the hatch was in full view of Sam Bowles's men at the far rail.

He glanced back, and saw Big Daniel's head appear at the entry port He could not delay. He jumped up, ran out to the main hatch coaming and dropped on his knees behind it. There was a mallet lying beside the hatch, but he dared not use it to hammer out the wedges. The pirates would hear him and be upon him in an instant.

He knocked softly on the timbers with the hilt of his cutlass and spoke in a quiet voice. "Ahoy there, Golden Bough. Do you hear me?"

A muffled voice from beneath the hatch cover answered immediately, in a lilting Celtic accent. "We hear you. Who are you?"

"An honest Englishman, come to set you free. Will you fight with us against the Buzzard?"

"God love you, honest Englishman! We beg you for a taste of his mongrel blood."

Hal glanced round. Big Daniel had brought up a bundle of cutlasses, and both Wally Finch and Stan Sparrow carried others. Althuda had the chest of loaded pistols. He lowered it to the deck and opened the lid. At first glance the weapons within seemed dry and ready to fire.

"We have weapons for you," Hal whispered to the man under the hatch. "Lend a hand to throw back the hatch when I knock out the wedges, then come out fighting like terriers but call your ship's name, so we will know you and you us."

He nodded to Daniel and hefted the heavy mallet. Big Daniel seized the lip of the hatch and put all his weight under it. Hal swung the mallet, and with a resounding crack the first wedge flew across the deck. He leaped across the hatch and with another two more full-blooded swings of the mallet sent the remaining wedges clattering to the deck. With Big Daniel straining above and the trapped crew of the Golden Bough heaving underneath the coaming cover flew back with a crash and the prisoners came boiling out like angry wasps.

At this sudden uproar behind them, Sam Bowles's men turned and gaped. It took them a long moment to realize that they had been boarded and that their prisoners were free. But by that time Hal and Daniel faced them across the fire lit deck, cutlass in hand.

Behind them Althuda was striking sparks from flint and steel as he hurried to light the slow-match on the locks of the pistols, and Wally and Stan were tossing cutlasses to the liberated seamen as they stormed out of the hold.

With a wild shout a pack of pirates led by Sam Bowles charged across the deck. They were twenty against two, and their first rush drove Daniel and Hal back, steel ringing and rasping against steel as they gave ground slowly. But the pair held them long enough for the seamen of the Golden Bough to dash into the fight.

Within minutes the deck was thronged with struggling men, and they were so mingled that only their shouted war-cries identified foe from new-made friend.

"Cochran of Cumbrae!" Sam Bowles howled, and Hal's men roared back, "Sir Hal and the Golden Bow." The frigate's freed sailors were mad for vengeance not merely for their own imprisonment but for the massacre of their officers and the drowning of their wounded mates. Hal and his men had a thousand better reasons for their rage, and they had waited infinitely longer to pay off this score.

Sam Bowles's crew were cornered animals. They knew they could expect no help from their fellows on the shore. Nor would they receive mercy or quarter from the avengers who confronted them.

The two sides were almost evenly matched in numbers, but perhaps the crew of the frigate had been weakened by their long confinement in the dark and airless hold. In the forefront of the fight Hal became aware that it was swinging against them. His men were being forced to yield more of the deck and retreat towards the bows.

From the corner of his eye he saw Sabah break and run, throwing aside his sword and scurrying for the hatch to hide below decks. Hal hated him for it. It takes but one coward to start a rout. But Sabah never reached the hatch. A tall black-bearded pirate sent a thrust through the small of his back that came out through his belly-button.

Another hour on the practice field might have saved him, Hal thought fleetingly, then concentrated all his mind and strength on the four men who crowded forward, yammering like hyenas around their bleeding prey, to engage him.

Hal killed one with a thrust under his raised arm into his heart and disarmed another with a neat slash across his wrist that severed his straining sinews. The sword dropped from the man's fingers and he ran screaming across the deck and threw himself, bleeding, overboard. Hal's other two attackers drew back in fear, and in the respite he looked around for Sam Bowles.

He saw him in the back of the horde, keeping carefully out of the worst of it, screaming orders and threats at his men, his ferrety features twisted with malice.

"Sam Bowles!" Hal shouted at him. "I have you in my eye." Over the heads of the men between them, Sam looked across at him and there was sudden terror in his pale, close set eyes.

"I am coming for you now!" Hal roared, and bounded forward, but three men were in his way. In the seconds it took him to beat them aside and clear a path for himself, Sam had darted away and hidden himself in the throng.

Now the pirates clamoured about Hal like jackals around a lion. For a moment he fought side by side with Daniel and saw with amazement that the big man was wounded in a dozen places. Then he felt the hilt of the cutlass sticky in his hand as though he had scooped honey from a jar with his fingers. He realized that it was not honey but his own blood. He, too, was wounded, but in the heat of it all he felt no pain and fought on.

"Beware, Sir Hal!" Big Daniel roared, close beside him in the confusion. "The stern!"

Hal jumped back, disengaging from the fight, and looked back. Daniel's warning had come just in time to save him. Sam Bowles was at the rail of the stern overlooking the lower deck. There was a heavy bronze murderer in the slot of the rail and Sam had a lighted match in his hand as he swivelled and aimed the small hand cannon. He had picked out Hal from the press of fighting men and the murderer was aimed at him. Sam touched the match to the pan of the cannon.

In the instant before it fired Hal leaped forward, seized the pirate in front of him around his waist and lifted him off his feet. The man yelled with surprise as Hal held him like a shield, just as the murderer fired and a gale of lead shot swept the deck. Hal felt the body of the man in his arms jump as half a dozen heavy pellets smashed into him. He was dead even before Hal dropped him to the deck.

But the shot had done fearful slaughter among the crew of the Golden Bough, who were grouped close around where Hal stood. Three were down and kicking in their own blood while another two or three had been struck and were struggling to stay on their feet.

The pirates saw that this sudden onslaught had tipped the balance in their favour and surged forward in a pack, Sam urging them on with excited cries. Like a cracked dam Hal's men started to give way. They were seconds from total rout when from over the rail behind the raging rabble of pirates rose a great black tattooed face.

Aboli let out a bellow that froze them all where they stood, and ashe sprang over the rail he was followed closely by three other huge shapes, each with cutlass in hand. They had killed five men before the pirates had gathered themselves to face this fresh onslaught.

Those around Hal were given new heart. they rallied to Hal's hoarse shouts and, with Big Daniel leading them, rushed back into the fight. Caught between Aboli with his savages and the rejuvenated seamen, the pirates wailed with despair and fled. Those unable to swim scuttled down the hatchways into the bowels of the frigate while the others rushed to the rail and jumped overboard.

The fight was over and the frigate was theirs. "Where is Sam Bowles?"Hal shouted across at Daniel.

"I saw him run below."

Hal hesitated a moment, fighting the temptation to rush after him and have his revenge. Then, with an effort, he thrust it aside and turned to his duty.

"There will be time for him later." He strode to the captain's place on the quarterdeck and surveyed his ship. Some of his men were firing their pistols over the side at the men splashing and swimming towards the beach. "Avast that nonsense!" he shouted at them. "Stand by to get the ship under way. The Buzzard will be upon us at any moment now."

Even the strangers he had released from the hold rushed to obey his command, for they recognized the tone of authority.

Then Hal dropped his voice. "Aboli and Master Daniel, get the women on board. As quick as you can." While they ran to the entry port he turned his full attention to the management of the frigate.

The topmast men were already half-way up the shrouds, and another gang was manning the capstan to weigh the anchor.

"No time for that," Hal told them. "Take an axe to the anchor cable and cut us free." He heard the clunk of the axe into the timbers at the bows, and felt the ship pay off and swing to the ebb.

He glanced towards the entry port and saw Aboli lift Sukeena onto the deck. Big Daniel had little Bobby weeping on his chest and Zwaantie on his other arm.

The main sail blossomed out high above Hal's head, flapped lazily and filled with the gentle night breeze. Hal turned to the helm and felt another great lift of his heart as he saw that Ned Tyler was already at the whipstall.

"Full and by, Mister Tyler,"he said. "Full and by it is, Captain." "Steer for the main channel!" "Aye, Captain!" Ned could not suppress his grin, and Hal grinned back at him.

"Will this ship do you, Mister Tyler?"

"It will do me well enough," Ned said, and his eyes sparkled.

Hal seized the speaking trumpet from its peg and pointed to the sky as he called the order for the top sails to be set above the courses. He felt the ship start under his feet and begin to fly.

"Oh, sweet!" he whispered. "She is a bird, and the wind is her lover."

He strode across to where Sukeena was already kneeling beside one of the wounded seamen.

"I told you to leave those bags ashore, did I not?"

"Yes, my lord." She smiled sweetly up at him. "But I knew that you were jesting." Then her expression changed to dismay. "You are hurt!" She sprang to her feet. "Let me attend to your injuries."

"I am scratched, not hurt. This man needs your skills more than I do." Hal turned from her, strode to the rail and looked across to the beach. The fire had taken fierce hold on the forest, and now the scene was lit like the dawn. He could clearly make out the features of the horde of men at the waterside. They were dancing with rage and frustration for they had realized at last that the frigate was being cut out under their noses.

Hal picked out the giant figure of Cumbrae in the front of the press of men. He was waving his claymore and his face was so swollen with rage that it seemed it might burst open like an overripe tomato. Hal laughed at him and the Buzzard's fury was magnified a hundredfold. His voice carried over the hubbub that his men were making. "There is no ocean wide enough to hide you, Courtney. I will find you if it takes fifty years."

Then Hal stopped laughing as he recognized the man who stood a little higher up the beach. At first he doubted his own eyesight, but the flames lit him so clearly that there could be no mistake. In contrast to the Buzzard's antics and transparent rage, Cornelius Schreuder stood, arms folded, staring across at Hal with a cold gaze that placed a sudden chill on Hal's heart. Their eyes locked, and it was as though they confronted each other upon the duelling field.

The Golden Bough heeled slightly as a stronger eddy of wind over the heads caught her, and the water began to gurgle under her forefoot like a happy infant. The deck trembled and she drew away from the beach. Hal gave all his attention to the con of the ship, lining her up for the run through the dangerous channel into the sea. It was long minutes before he could look back again towards the shore.

Only two figures remained on the beach. The two men whom Hal hated most in all the world, both his implacable enemies. The Buzzard had waded out waist-deep into the lagoon, as though to remain as close as he could. Schreuder still stood where Hal had last seen him. He had not moved and his reptilian stillness was every bit as chilling as Cumbrae's wild histrionics.