Distant Thunders

CHAPTER 23

“ You may tell Captain Rajendra he can ask to speak to the mo on if he likes,” Princess Rebecca retorted sharply, “and he will be much more likely to get what he wants than by asking to speak to me!”

“But, Your Highness!” the boy in the passageway whispered urgently, “the captain had no choice! If he had refused the order, he would have been placed under arrest! How then could he assist you and your friends?”

“He is a dispassionate murderer,” Rebecca proclaimed. “A stain upon the honor of the Navy and the Empire!”

“Now, hold on just a second,” Silva whispered in the darkness. It was almost pitch-black in the brig. They were supposed to be asleep, and no lights were allowed at this time of night. “Rajendra wants us to trust him, does he? How does he mean to make us?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean why should we trust him? We need proof. Real proof, not just a extra piece o’ cheese.”

“Well… what do you want?”

“I want my goddamn guns, but I bet they’d be missed. They keepin’ ’em in the armory? The magazine?”

“The aft magazine,” replied the boy. “It is the most secure place on the ship. The Marines’ arms are stored there as well, with ready ammunition. Besides, your largest gun would not fit in a weapons locker.”

“Hmm. You’re prob’ly right, at that. Tell you what. I want three things. First, I want a key to this here lock.”

“But-”

“Lookie here, you want us to trust him or not? It ain’t like we’re gonna break out an’ run loose all over the ship. I just want a key to where I can get us outta here if the time comes. ’Sides, what if the ship gets ate by one o’ them big fish? We’d be stuck in here.” That thought actually gave Silva the creeps. Earlier that day, the great guns had opened up, firing furiously for some time. Three full broadsides. At first they thought a battle was under way, until they heard the guns had been used to frighten off a mountain fish.

“Very well. I will see what I can do.”

“Next thing I want is our position. Our exact position!”

“Why?”

“Never you mind. If we take to trustin’ you, we’ll tell you why. One other thing. I want a lantern. A little one so we can look at our map in the dark. It’s too hard to go over it in the daytime ’cause you never know when somebody’s peekin’ in the door at us.”

“I have a one-sided lantern in my quarters,” said the boy. Dennis knew he was a midshipman or something and he actually did trust him, at least. For one thing, the little guy was clearly terrified of Billingsly.

“That sounds fine, just fine. You do that, and maybe I can talk the princess into speakin’ a word or two to Rajendra if he happens to mosey by.”

“Thank you, sir!”

“You bet. Now run along before you get caught-but before you go, there’s one last, final little thing.”

“Sir?”

“I want all that stuff tonight, see?”

“I… I will do my best,” whispered the boy a little shakily. They heard his quiet footsteps retreat.

Silva turned to the others in the brig. He couldn’t really see more than dark shapes in the gloom, but he knew where everyone was. “Good work, li’l sister,” he said to Rebecca. “He seemed ready to pee himself. I figger somethin’s up and Rajendra thinks he’d better do somethin’ before it’s too late.”

“It does seem that way,” Sandra said in a worried tone. “Maybe they think they’re safe enough from pursuit that they can get rid of the ‘extra’ hostages.”

“I fear that may be the case,” Rebecca said. “Billingsly no longer even pretends to care what I do or where I go. Nor does he seem to think it important to maintain the fiction of my status aboard. He may plan to eliminate more than us.”

Silva doubted Billingsly was through with Rebecca yet, but she might be right about the rest. “Cap’n Lelaa?” he asked.

“Rajendra is a murderer,” she said miserably. She’d been badly traumatized by the destruction of her ship, and for quite a while, all she’d done was lie curled in a ball in a corner of the cell. Finally, however, she’d begun to take some interest in their situation. She was a naval officer and she couldn’t indulge in self-pity forever. Silva was glad she was snapping out of it. When things hit the fan, they were going to have to move fast. He knew Sandra, Rebecca, and Lawrence had plenty of guts, but though he didn’t dislike her, he considered Sister Audry a deadweight. He didn’t need another one to worry about when the time came.

“Yeah, I guess he’s a murderer,” Silva said, “but so am I, by most lights. If the kid’s right, he did what he thought he had to so’s to stay where he might help Rebecca. I’m not plumb sure that is what he had to do, but I’ll give him the doubt for now, ’cause I wadn’t there. Somebody else mighta just blown your ship to hell if he didn’t, an’ then where’d we be? He did give us a map, even if it’s kind of crummy.”

They’d spent many days explaining maps to Lawrence, describing them as pictures of the world from high in the sky, as if drawn by some bird that could fly higher than the eye could see. It finally began to sink in, and then they showed him places they’d been: Talaud, the Philippines, even as far west as Baalkpan, though the map was so out-of-date in that respect as to be almost useless. Between Lawrence and Rebecca’s imperfect memory of how long and in which directions they’d drifted in her boat with O’Casey, they pieced together which island or atoll they thought they’d found Lawrence on in the first place. Finally, from that, Lawrence was able to pinpoint roughly where he thought his home island was. “There is no land called Tagran on the chart, though,” he’d accused, “and I ne’er saw it fro’ the sky. I think it is this, though,” he’d decided, pointing at a rough rendition of what Silva thought was Yap Island. He’d never been there, but he’d seen plenty of charts and the screwy name had always stuck with him.

“Okay, I hope you’re right,” Silva had replied. “So long as they don’t eat us.”

Lawrence had glared at him and hissed. “They’ll take care o’ all o’ us. La’rence ’riends their ’riends! You all heroes, ring La’rence to Tagran Island land,” he’d said.

It wasn’t much, but it was a chance. An escape attempt to Talaud or even Mindanao would have been their best bet, but Abel had still been weak, and tension before and after Ajax ’s confrontation with Lelaa’s ships had made any attempt then impossible. Now that Billingsly knew there were no other Allied outposts, security surrounding them had grown lax. They were down to only two choices: they could stay aboard and risk whatever fate Billingsly had in store for them, or they could try to get off the ship and hope Lawrence’s Grik-like people would take them in.

For some reason, Silva didn’t seem particularly concerned with the mechanics of escape. He apparently thought Rajendra could be trusted, for selfish reasons at least, and believed his assistance might be handy, if not necessarily essential. Evidently, he didn’t even think he needed the key he’d asked for. He’d probably just thrown in the request as a further test of Rajendra. Ever since he started feeling more like himself, he’d given the impression that escape was just a matter of Sandra deciding when. According to the map, their approximate speed and position, and Lawrence’s best estimate regarding which island was his home, “when” would have to be the following night. That was when Ajax would pass most closely to the island where he thought his people dwelt.

Their discussion was interrupted by more footsteps in the passageway, followed by a quiet voice at the door. “Your Highness, it is I, Captain Rajendra. Midshipman Brassey is here as well. He says you might speak with me. I tell you it is of the utmost importance that you do. All our lives are at risk.”

“What of the lives of Captain Lelaa’s crew?” Rebecca hissed.

“I could not stop that!” Rajendra insisted. “I had hoped you would understand!”

So it was as Brassey said and Silva had speculated. There was no doubting the torment and sincerity in Rajendra’s tone. Either he was telling the truth or he’d missed his calling as a stage performer. Silva still thought there was one way Rajendra might have prevailed, but there was little point in bringing that up now. “Did you bring the stuff we asked for?” he asked instead.

“Yes. I will open the door and pass them through… Please make no attempt at the moment; I would prefer to help coordinate an escape by being elsewhere when it begins!”

There was a tiny clack as the tumbler in the lock disengaged and the door opened a fraction. A hooded lantern, already lit, preceded a piece of paper with some numbers written on it. Finally, Silva felt the large brass key pressed into his hand.

“Well, you done what we asked,” Dennis said, announcing the key transfer. “Whaddaya say, li’l sister?”

“I will trust him,” Rebecca replied. “Captain Lelaa?”

“I suppose we have no choice,” she said ominously. “For now. But if there is further treachery of any kind-”

“Hush now,” said Silva, and his tone hardened. “That goes without even sayin’!” He paused. “Loo-tenant Tucker?”

Sandra cleared her throat. “Tomorrow night, Captain Rajendra, providing the position you gave us corresponds with our calculations, we’ll be leaving your ship one way or another. If you can facilitate our escape, it would be appreciated.”

“Tomorrow night should work well,” Rajendra agreed. “Much later than that might be too late.” So. Rebecca was right. “This is what I have done, and can do. You may incorporate as much of it into your plans as you see fit. The carpenter has repaired the launch Mr. Silva shot such a gaping hole through. Tomorrow, I shall have it swung out to tow, to swell the wood. I would prefer the pinnace because it is larger and will carry more, but I have no excuse to put it in the water.”

“Sounds fine, but why would we need room for more?” Sandra asked.

“Midshipman Brassey has overheard a certain conversation,” Rajendra said stiffly. “Most of you are to be hanged for abducting the princess and holding her against her will. My loyal officers and myself will then be hanged for committing a crime against humanity when we fired on Captain Lelaa’s ship without warning.” Rajendra’s voice was full of irony. “Clearly both are legal fictions concocted by Billingsly to eliminate any story but his own should things at home be different than he suspects, but there it is. Some of us will be coming with you.”

“Why not just rise up, take back your ship from these Company bastards?” Sandra asked. “We would help!”

“Impossible. I count perhaps seventy loyalists among my crew, opposed by two hundred. It would be a bloodbath and would ultimately fail.”

“There’ve been longer odds,” Silva prodded.

“True, but how could we coordinate any effort? I need be wrong about only one of the seventy and our plans will be undone.” He shook his head in the darkness. “I cannot let those who are loyal die to no purpose.”

“Okay,” Sandra said, “we’ve got a boat and a few extra passengers. We’ll need provisions, a compass, sextant, weapons… and a means of getting to the boat in the first place.”

“The carpenter is one of us. Provisions and navigational aids have already been stowed in the boat,” said Brassey. “If a ‘sextant’ is like a ‘quadrant,’ that has been included as well. As soon as night falls, I shall bring sufficient ship’s clothing to disguise you all.” He cleared his throat. “More care than usual must be taken with Captain Lelaa and, uh, Mr… Lawrence, I presume.” Lelaa bristled, but knew it was true. What would they do? Tie her tail around her body?

“Otherwise,” Rajendra said, “I will adjust the watch so we will have the greatest number of known loyalists on deck as possible. They will sway out an anchor beneath the bowsprit and allow it to fall back against the hull as though we have struck a leviathan. Action stations will be sounded and we should find our chance in the general confusion.”

“Silva?” Sandra asked.

“Not bad,” he answered, somewhat distracted. He was mentally adjusting certain elements of his own plan to fit. “Sometimes it’s better to do sneaky stuff right out in the open. Slinkin’ around in the dark always looks sneaky.” He spoke in Sister Audry’s direction: “Guess you’ll have to ditch the nun suit!”

“I will not!”

“Well, you’ll have to cover it up somehow, or stash it in something.” He turned back toward their visitors. “As for weapons”-he found Brassey’s form in the gloom-“I figger the boy an’ me an’ maybe a few other hands can take care o’ that. I want my guns back!”

“Very well,” Rajendra said, sounding a little unnerved by something in Silva’s tone. “Shall we regard the blow against the bow as our signal to begin, then?”

“I suppose that would be best,” Sandra said. “But we must move quickly after that. Where will we gather?”

“On the starboard quarter. The first thing that will happen is that the engine will stop and steam will vent. It will be noisy and add to the confusion. The boat will already have been drawn alongside and each will go over as they arrive. I and some other officers will provide security there by sending anyone whose loyalty is unknown to perform some task or other.”

“Sounds swell then,” Silva said. “You do your part and we’ll do ours. Okay with you, li’l sister?”

“Swell,” Rebecca replied.

“Um, there is one other thing,” Rajendra said. “Our destination. After we escape, assuming we do, where are we going? Our lives are as much at risk in this venture as yours and it is a terrible sea. You have determined a safe landfall, have you not?”

“Yes,” Sandra said, but offered nothing more.

After an expectant but disappointed pause, Rajendra straightened. “Well. Then I suppose we must all trust one another.”

“Guess so,” Lawrence answered in his distinctive voice.

Late the following night, during first watch, according to Silva, they felt a distinct and surprisingly violent blow strike the ship. Already dressed as Imperial crewmen, with both Lelaa’s and Lawrence’s tails secured as well as possible (far more difficult in Lawrence’s case, and he could hardly walk), they began their escape by evacuating the compartment that had been their prison for weeks. Quickly, they scrambled or shuffled down the corridor, Rebecca and Sister Audry helping Lawrence. Lawrence had a nightcap pulled down over his face, but it was so misshapen the disguise wouldn’t stand close scrutiny at all. Lelaa might pass as a ship’s boy in the dark, but, of course, neither she nor any other female must speak. Other forms began appearing in the corridor, but Silva burst through them shouting, “Gangway!” in a terrible accent. About then, the alarm bells began to ring, and if anyone noticed the strange, hurrying group in the dark, their attention was quickly diverted.

Up a companionway they lurched, now heading aft across the gun deck as Ajax ’s crew began assembling at their action stations. Most were confused, barely awake. A few had felt or heard the bump and there was a cacophony of wild, almost panicky speculation. Silva grunted with frustration and suddenly swept poor Lawrence up in his arms. The Tagranesi was slowing them down and Dennis thought he’d draw less attention if he appeared to be injured. There were a few lanterns on the gun deck, but only enough for fighting light-enough that the gun’s crews could serve their pieces, but not enough to damage their night vision a great deal, or provide much fuel for a fire. Again, if anyone had begun to grow suspicious of them as they made their way through the building, only slightly controlled chaos, the sudden roar of venting steam distracted them. Reaching the quarterdeck companionway, they ascended and rushed to the starboard rail, where several men were heaving on a line. “Get that boat in, afore somethin’ eats it!” one shouted. “I didn’ spend two days fixin’ it ta pre-vide a toothpick fer one o’ them divils!” Clearly the carpenter.

“No, damn your vitals!” Rajendra’s voice rose toward another group. “Get you and your party down in the forepeak! Check for sprung timbers! We’ll be taking water after a thump like that, I shouldn’t wonder!” He raised his speaking trumpet. “Run out the guns! Handsomely now! We must fire before the monster returns!” Another man, burly and dark, approached the captain. “The safety valve has suffered a mischief, I fear,” he said in a satisfied tone. “There’s no fixin’ it either, more’s the pity. She’ll vent steam till the boiler’s cold enough to replace the valve!”

Rajendra glanced about. “Very well. Into the boat with our guests! It will add to the confusion if our engineer cannot be found!”

“Aye, Captain!” The man rushed to the rail. “Over the side with ye, Yer Highness!” he said. “There’s a man waitin’ below ta catch ye!”

“But what of Lawrence?”

“I can ’anage!” Lawrence said. “As soon as this huge creature puts La’rence down!”

“Dee-lighted, you ungrateful little turd,” Dennis said. “Snatch onto that line. You can turn your tail loose in the boat! Maybe you’ll be good fer somethin’ then.” He looked at Rebecca. “After you, li’l sister!”

With only the slightest hesitation, perhaps reliving old memories, the far different person who’d become Princess Rebecca grasped the rope and disappeared into the darkness below. Lawrence went next.

“Now you, Sister Audry!” Dennis ordered, after the engineer disappeared.

“I… I’m not sure I can!”

“Sure, you can. It’s a cinch. Besides, if you don’t go, I’ll just drop you over the side and hope you land in the boat.”

Audry looked at him, utterly uncertain whether he was serious or not. He’d spoken with the flat firmness of fact. “Very well, Mr. Silva,” she said sharply.

“Prepare to fire!” Rajendra roared.

“You’re next, Loo-tenant Tucker!”

“No. You must get weapons. Where’s Midshipman Brassey?”

“Here, ma’am!”

“Good. Lead Mr. Silva to the magazine. Take two of these other men. We need weapons and ammunition! We’ll pass well enough up here for now, Mr. Cook and I.”

Silva knew she meant to guard against treachery. He wasn’t sure how she’d do that, but he also knew it would be pointless and time-consuming to argue with her. “All right, Miss Tucker, we’ll be back in a flash!” He turned to Brassey and two of the men who’d been hauling the rope. “C’mon!”

“Fire!” bellowed Rajendra. With a stuttering, rolling, earsplitting bark of thunder, Ajax vomited an uneven broadside port and starboard. Silva and his pickup team of commandos vanished in the swirling smoke.

“Follow me,” Brassey cried. As he’d explained, Ajax had two magazines. The one they sought was aft, beneath the orlop and essentially below the waterline, which afforded it some protection from enemy shot. They met a steady stream of grim-faced, sweaty boys hurrying back to the guns, charges in their pass boxes. Reaching the magazine, they found it virtually deserted, the powder boys having already come and gone. The first compartment had a lantern illuminating racks of muskets. Silva was surprised and joyful to see the Doom Whomper secured at the far end of one rack along with his shooting pouch and belt. From the belt still hung his holster, magazine pouches, cutlass, and ’03 bayonet in its scabbard. The bayonet was a respectable “sword” in its own right.

“Hot damn!” he hissed, wrapping the belt around his waist and clipping it in place. He then grabbed his massive rifle. He could see movement in an adjoining compartment through a thick pane of wavy glass. The gunner and his mates, most likely, preparing charge bags.

“Whose side’s the gunner on?” Silva asked.

“I don’t know,” Brassey confessed.

“Okay. You fellas get a double armload o’ them muskets and some cartridge boxes. Anything in ’em?”

“There should be a battle load of forty rounds apiece,” one of the men supplied. “The door is usually locked and guarded.”

“Huh. Well, gather all you can carry and take ’em up.” He grinned. “If anybody asks, say it’s Billingsly’s orders!” While the men did as he said, Silva turned to Brassey. “Loose shot and powder? How ’bout musket flints?”

Brassey pointed. “Those small kegs hold balls and flints, but powder will be in there,” he said, referring to the space where the gunner was.

Silva nodded. Taking off the Imperial ordinary seaman’s striped shirt, he quickly knotted the sleeves and dropped two thirty-pound kegs of shot and a single keg of flints into it. Tying it all together, he handed it to Brassey, who staggered under the weight. “You handle that?”

“I’ll manage,” said the youngster.

Seeing the other men festooned with muskets, cartridge boxes, and a few baldrics with cutlasses and bayonets, Silva sent the group on its way. “I’ll get powder,” he said, shooing them off.

Another shattering broadside shook the ship. Any minute now, the compartment would fill with powder boys again. Hmm. Backing out of the magazine, he slipped into a compartment across the passageway, leaving the door open a crack so he could see. He smelled something pungent and glanced behind. “Well, well,” he muttered. “Rum, by God!” One of the short, thick black glass bottles must have cracked and soaked the padding around it. There was a sack hanging on a hook and he filled it with the bottles, leaving two aside. Pulling the cork on one, he took a long swig. “Ghaaa!” he hissed appreciatively. Not great, but not bad. He wondered what they used for sugar? Lowering the bottle, he took a length of light line that had probably once bound the padding together and stuck one end into the bottle. Then he wrapped it around the open mouth and tied it. Nothing to do now but wait.

Soon, the boys had all apparently come and gone and he slipped back across the passageway. He held both bottles by their necks between the fingers of his left hand, and drew the cutlass with his right. Anyone who saw the cutlass would know it didn’t belong. It was longer, straighter-and much better-than anything like it on the ship. He shrugged. Time to do his thing. He’d behaved himself long enough.

“Open up!” Silva growled at the inner door. A short man with spectacles and the almost universal Imperial mustache opened the heavy door and peered out. Silva drove the cutlass into his chest and pushed his way inside. Without a sound, the man slid off the blade and onto the deck when Silva lowered the cutlass and regarded the other man. He was bigger and might require more exercise.

He screamed shrilly.

So much for first impressions, Silva thought, and pinned the man to the bulkhead. The gunner, or mate-whichever he was-screamed even louder. “Well, shit!” Dennis hissed indignantly, skewering the man again. “I’ve seen bunnies make manlier noises when a dog gets ’em by the ass!” Still sobbing, but mortally wounded, the big man fell to the deck when Silva freed the blade.

Quickly, he laid the cutlass on the gunner’s table and hung the rope and rum bottle from a hook on the beam overhead. Snatching up a fifty-pound keg of powder, he hurried to place it in the passageway. He knew he was running out of time. Imperial drill for deterring mountain fish seemed to be three broadsides, and the next would fire any minute. He didn’t know what would happen after that. He doubted the powder boys would return the pass boxes to the magazine-there was limited space inside, after all-but somebody was liable to come down. He ran back inside, picked up another barrel of powder, and smashed it against the deck.

“I thought I might find you here,” came a voice from the armory compartment.

Silva looked up. “Well, how do, Mr. Truelove,” he said. “For some reason, I thought you might too.” He nodded at the pistol held casually in Truelove’s hand. “You gonna shoot that in here?”

Truelove grimaced at the pistol and slid it on his belt, where it hung by a hook. “I don’t suppose I really need it. I’m actually quite good with a sword. I’ve seen you use one, you know, at Baalkpan, before I gave you that little tap on the head. You fight quite… dynamically and enthusiastically… but your sword work is just that: work. To me, it is play.”

“Why’d you conk me then?”

Truelove shrugged. “Unsportsmanlike, I know, but necessary at the time. Perhaps now we might meet each other properly?”

“Sure. Just a couple o’ questions first. ’Twixt gentlemen.”

Truelove nodded. “Of course. Adversaries should know each other at times like this, and I already know a good deal about you.”

“How did you know I’d be here?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Call it intuition. You are a resourceful man. I thought it likely you might take advantage of the situation facing the ship. I don’t know what you hope to accomplish, but I’ve no doubt you have a plan. I almost regret thwarting you. I view you as a fellow professional in a way, and suspect I would have enjoyed seeing your plan unfold.”

So, thought Silva, he’s here on a whim. Everything else might still be going swell. He had no doubt Truelove was better with a sword, since Silva had no proper training at all. A real fight wouldn’t do, and besides, it might take too long and draw too much attention. A moment earlier he’d been in a rush. Now he needed to stall. “Why Billingsly?” he asked conversationally. “A fella like you’d go just as far on the right side, I figger.”

Truelove laughed. “Well, let us just say that I had gone quite as far as I could in His Majesty’s Secret Service, and I like money. Yes, indeed.” He nodded at Silva’s cutlass and reached for his sword. “Shall we be about it then?”

“Sure, but there’s just one thing you may not know about me,” Silva said, shaking his head with a conspiratorial grin and a prolonged display of being a man with a great secret.

“Oh?”

The third broadside erupted, jarring the ship and making the lantern in the adjoining compartment jump. Silva launched himself like a torpedo and struck Truelove in the chest with his head before the man could clear his blade. They sprawled together in the armory compartment, and quicker than his opponent could recover, Silva’s mighty fists were already slamming into his face like pile drivers. Truelove was still trying to free his sword, but with six inches of the blade free, Dennis paused long enough to grasp the man’s hand in his and wrench it to the side, breaking several of Truelove’s fingers against the guard and snapping the blade off at the top of the scabbard. He pitched the twisted guard in among the musket stocks. The last thing Truelove might have heard before darkness took him was Silva’s final, gasping explanation: “Sometimes I can be a little unsportsmanlike too.”

For the moment, Truelove was out. Sore from his leap, Silva struggled to his feet and dragged the heavy, limp form into the magazine. Tearing off a piece of wadding made of something he didn’t recognize, he stuffed it into Truelove’s mouth and propped him against a heavy upright beam. Finding a spool of slow match, he fiercely tied the man’s head to the post, across the gag, then proceeded to secure him quickly and professionally against any attempt to escape. Tearing away a piece of Truelove’s shirt, he lit it from the lantern and carefully lit the rum-soaked cord that held the bottle suspended. He had no idea how long the cord would hold, five minutes or half an hour, but he needed to be gone.

As he fled the armory, as an afterthought he snatched Truelove’s pistol from where it had fallen from his belt, then shut the outer door and locked it with his heavy brass key. He’d taken a chance the same key would work, but he’d expected it would. He knocked the top off the second rum bottle and liberally doused the passageway on both sides of the magazine, taking pains not to spill any right in front of it. Finally, he slung his big rifle and hoisted the keg of powder onto his shoulder. He lit another piece of Truelove’s shirt from the lantern in the passageway and pitched it onto the far splash of rum. It lit with surprising fervency. Beyond the sudden flame, he saw a boy’s panicked face appear and then quickly vanish, yelling, “Fire!” Oh, well. Dropping the lantern on the nearest splash, he hoisted his sack of rum bottles with a clinking sound and dashed up the companionway.

Things on the gun deck had calmed significantly when the leviathan they’d apparently struck failed to reappear. He even caught a snatch of a rumor that the starboard anchor had been discovered hanging in the sea. Maybe it was all just a false alarm. Silva paid no heed. His old maxim of doing sneaky stuff right out in the open seemed to be holding up. If a guy with a strange-looking gun came running by with a keg on one shoulder and a canvas sack on the other… he must have a good reason-or whoever had ordered him to did. Cries of “Fire!” began to increase, further distracting the crew. The alarm bell was sounding again when Silva reached the quarterdeck-and saw Billingsly pointing a pistol at Sandra, Rajendra, and Cook.

He was dressed in a probably stylish robe, with clashing colors and frills, and stood in stocking feet. He must have finally emerged from his spacious cabin to investigate all the commotion. Like Truelove, perhaps he suspected something and armed himself. Or maybe he was just paranoid. Regardless, there he stood with his long pistol aimed at Sandra. Again. He was shouting for guards, Marines-anyone-but no one could hear him over the alarm bell, the renewed uproar, and the still-venting steam. He didn’t hear Silva either, when the big man stepped up behind him and laid him flat with the sack of rum bottles. To Silva, the wild pistol shot was only slightly more alarming than the mournful crash and tinkle of an unknown number of the little prizes in the sack.

“Silva!” cried Sandra. “Thank God! I don’t know whether to yell at you for taking so long, or hug you for showing up when you did!”

He flashed a grin. “A hug’ll do, but later! We’d better scram! Over the side with you!” He ran to the rail. “Here, somebody strong’d better catch this!” he said, and tossed the powder barrel at the boat. Next went his sack, and he heard someone cry out when they must have found some broken glass. Sandra and Abel were sliding down the rope.

“You next, Mr. Silva!” Captain Rajendra said. “I must be last to leave my ship!”

“I know that sounds all noble an’ shit, but not this time,” Silva replied. He nodded at a group of men approaching, cutlasses out. Billingsly was beginning to revive as well. “I can handle ’em a lot quicker than you.” Rajendra hesitated; then, with a nod, he left Dennis Silva alone on Ajax ’s quarterdeck. Almost nonchalantly, Silva popped open the holster flap and drew his beloved 1911 Colt. He’d considered it-and all his weapons-as much a hostage as the rest of them. There was a magazine in the well, but if he remembered, he’d emptied it. Besides, the weight was wrong. Depressing the magazine release with his thumb, the-sure enough-empty magazine clattered on the deck at his feet.

“Stop him, you fools!” Billingsly screamed at the swordsmen. “That is a repeating pistol of some sort!” The crewmen hesitated. A few more scampered up the stairs; one was an officer. “Kill that man this instant!” Billingsly shrieked.

Silva fished another magazine out of a pouch on his belt, inserted it, and racked the slide. “Too late,” he said, and shot the officer. A large red hole appeared on the white jacket, exactly in the center of his chest, and he toppled backward onto the gun deck. Methodically, he then shot the three closest men and they sprawled on the deck around Billingsly. The other crew, who’d arrived with the officer, fled into the waist. Silva pointed the Colt at the Company warden and grinned hugely, his single eye gleaming. Smoke was beginning to coil up out of the ship and there was a growing panic.

“Well, Mr. Billingsly! Just you an’ me!” He gestured with the pistol. “’S a wonder you didn’t fiddle around with this thing, learn how it works. A fella like you coulda used it-at a time like this!” He laughed.

“Just do it!” Billingsly shouted. “Do you mean to mock me to death? Shoot! I swear I will kill you and all your pathetic friends! I’ll hang that precious princess of yours, damn you!”

Silva’s grin vanished and something akin to… regret crossed his face. “I already have killed you, you stupid, measly son of a goat! And at least you deserve killin’. You know, I was kinda groggy at the time, but seems I remember ol’ Spanky yellin’ somethin’ about you not knowin’ who you was monkeyin’ with.” He shrugged. “Now you do.”

With that, Silva slid down the rope to the waiting boat below. “Cast off!” he said. “Out oars! Get us the hell outta here!”

“They’ll fire on us!” Brassey shouted.

“No, they won’t. Row.”

Rajendra gave Silva a strange look. “Do as he says. All together!”

“I want this ship turned in pursuit of that boat this instant!” Billingsly shouted.

“There’s no steam!” returned Ajax ’s first lieutenant. “Someone has wrecked the emergency valve! We’ll have to let the boiler go completely cold before we can fix it!”

“Then make sail! I want that boat! Where’s Truelove? Has anyone seen him?”

“No, sir. We have almost extinguished the fire in the orlop passageway. It is very strange. The fire was deliberately set, but also set in such a way as to make it difficult for us to reach the magazine! With all those flames that close… it makes me shudder to think!”

Billingsly’s eyes went wide. “Has anyone inspected the magazine yet?”

“No, sir. It is locked, would you believe it? Locked!”

“Quickly! Who has a key?”

The executive officer was taken aback, both by the line of questioning and by Billingsly’s intensity. “Why, Captain Rajendra, that traitor, would have one.”

“Who else?”

“Only the master gunner.”

Billingsly covered his face with his hand. “Get axes! Every man who will fit in that passageway this instant, with axes! You must chop a way into the magazine! There isn’t an instant to lose!”

The officer raced off and Billingsly turned to face in the direction the boat had pulled away. It was invisible in the darkness, but he knew they would be watching. Probably that fool Rajendra had no idea, but Silva would be watching… and waiting. As he’d said, Billingsly was a man with few regrets, but one nagging little minor regret-letting the hostages live as long as he had-suddenly lunged to the very top of his list.

Truelove managed to open one eye but the other was swollen shut. For several moments he couldn’t figure out where he was, why he was there, or why he was so uncomfortable. Slowly it all returned to him. Unsportsmanlike! He would have chuckled if he didn’t hurt so badly and if something painfully large and well secured wasn’t stuffed in his mouth. He’d been in the business long enough to appreciate the work of a professional, even at his own expense. Sometimes, given the nature of that brilliant fool Billingsly and the treacherous cause they served, Truelove couldn’t help but appreciate a fellow professional, especially when it came at his expense. He’d been at it too long and he’d grown jaded. He did like the money, but his heart just wasn’t much in it anymore. Another thought would have made him laugh. He’d told his adversary his swordsmanship was work while Truelove’s own was play. It suddenly occurred to him that, though that may be true, Silva’s… “professionalism” was still play, while his own had become work. Such irony.

He could barely move his head, but with his one good eye, he gazed around the compartment. Two dead men. A lot of blood. Wait! He was back in the magazine itself! There were no muskets, just barrels of powder secured all around. If I’m in the magazine, where is that flickering light coming from? He looked up, but couldn’t quite see. After much wriggling, he managed to force his head back just far enough.

Oh, bravo! he said to himself as the charred rope parted and the burning rum bottle dropped.

The current ran swiftly here and the men and women in the launch had rowed for their lives. All knew Ajax might turn at any moment and chase them down, but a couple of those on the boat suspected there might be further reason for gaining distance while they could. Ajax ’s own momentum and the prevailing wind kept her pointed east, while the current carried the launch and its occupants west-northwest. Therefore, they’d gained almost two miles’ distance from the ship when the night suddenly lit with a blinding flash that drew all their stares.

The entire aft half of Ajax erupted amid a yellow-red ball of fire, scattering masts, beams, yards, timbers, shards of burning rope and drifting canvas far across the sea. There was little steam left in her boiler, but a great steamy plume shot skyward when seawater touched the hot iron. Another similar blast demolished the forward part of the ship when the other magazine went. The bowsprit was launched entirely out of view like an enormous javelin. Ajax ’s death took only seconds, but to those in the distant boat, it seemed to last much longer. The rolling, staccato, thunderous punch of the blast finally reached them with a physical jolt, and for what felt like whole minutes, flaming debris, blocks, an entire gun and carriage, bodies-or parts of bodies-rained down to splash amid the already vanishing flames.

“My ship,” murmured Rajendra.

“My God, Silva, what have you done?” Sandra whispered.

Dennis stood up in the boat and glared around at the dozen or so survivors. “Why is it ever’ time somethin’ like this happens, it’s ‘Lawsy me, what’s ol’ Silva done now’? I’m sick an’ tired of it, hear! Might give a fella the benefit o’ the doubt now an’ again!”

“Did you… do something… that might have destroyed that ship?” Rebecca asked quietly.

Dennis looked harshly at her for a moment, then glanced at his feet. “Well… what if I did? What were we gonna do? Row off from ’em? That wadn’t ever gonna work, not after Rajendra and his bunch decided they wanted to come with us! Sneakin’ off ourselves was one thing. They wouldn’ta noticed us gone till they came to feed us the next day, and we woulda had a lot of ocean to hide in.” He glared at the men from Ajax again. “A ship’s captain, engineer, carpenter-an’ who knows what else-disappear in the middle of a distraction like was necessary to get so many off, somebody’s gonna take notice! Somebody did!”

Rajendra stood too, slightly jostling the boat. “You… murdering filth! You murder my ship and all her crew and then have the nerve to say you did it because of us? Because we came with you? How would you have escaped without our help-without the help of some of the men you killed this night who had to stay behind?”

“It wadn’t your ship no more, genius!” Silva bellowed. He was fed up. “You were in the same fix we were. Don’t you dare stand there an’ act all sancti-fidious at me when you wouldn’t even rear up on your hind legs an’ try to take your ship back! When you blew Cap’n Lelaa’s ship outa the water with all her people on it! You coulda saved your ship then, if you’d pulled your pistol an’ shot Billingsly square betwixt the eyes! That prob’ly woulda been the end of it right there, because whatever else you are, or your crew was, you were the goddamn captain! Instead, you said, ‘Yes, sir! You’re the boss!’ an’ killed two hundred of our folks! Then you slunk around whinin’ how it wadn’t your fault!”

Silva looked at Sandra, knowing she, at least, would believe his next words. “I had me a little plan to get us off the ship. Mighta worked. We mighta got off without killin’ hardly anybody”-he shrugged-“or I mighta still blown up your ship. That was always plan B. When I heard your plan, I figgered it ’ud be easier-an’ safer-for us an’ the princess. But only if I dusted off plan B an’ made it part o’ plan A! Well, the plans worked, yours an’ mine, an’ here we are. I’m sorry if I killed some good fellas, but I ain’t that damn sorry.” He pointed at the pistol on Rajendra’s belt. “You can try to shoot me now, an’ maybe that’ll prove you ain’t as yellow as I think you are, but I’ll kill you an’ you’ll just be dead instead o’ helpin’ out now, when your princess needs you. Or you can prove you weren’t never yellow at all-just confused an’ a little scared, in a fix you hadn’t come upon before. I’ve heard that happens to folks. You can prove that by bein’ a good captain for what’s left of your crew, an’ by helpin’ Larry an’ Captain Lelaa-if she’ll have you-navigate our way to the boosum o’ Larry’s lovin’ home.”

Slowly, Rajendra sat. Some of what Silva had said must have struck a chord, because he lowered his eyes and then stared at the few distant flickering fires that marked the grave of his ship and crew. His expression was desolate. “Who is to be in charge, then?” he finally asked, controlling his voice.

“Lieutenant-rather, Minister-Tucker,” Princess Rebecca said in a tone that brooked no argument. “Now that we’re all on the same side, she is the highest-ranking official present, myself excluded. If you prefer, you may consider her as my proxy, but you will obey her.”

“What about him?” asked the engineer, referring to Silva.

“As has been most… eloquently… presented, if Mr. Silva is to be arrested, I must have Captain Rajendra arrested as well. What purpose would that serve? Mr. Silva will retain his position as my chief armsman and personal protector-provided he at least consults me before destroying any more of His Majesty’s property.”

Dennis looked at the girl. He’d more than half expected her to despise him for what he’d done, and the relief he felt was indescribable.

“Well,” he said, a bit huskily, “I’ll sure try.”

Sandra took a deep breath. “All right, let’s get on with it. Captain Lelaa, you have the helm. Lawrence, assist her with the compass, if you please. Captain Rajendra? I assume this vessel has a sail?”