Rapscallion

EPILOGUE

"Nice night," Jago said.

Hawkwood couldn't disagree. There were no clouds. The sky was dotted with a thousand stars and moonlight speckled the blue-black water. The only sound to be heard was the soft wash of the waves along the shore and the steady creak of oars. It was a sound Hawkwood had become used to.

But he'd had his fill of midnight meetings on moonlit beaches. He'd had enough, he decided, to last him a lifetime; several lifetimes.

But maybe this one was different.

The two men walked down to the water's edge, their boots crunching into the pebbles. They waited for the black-hulled rowboat to draw closer, stepping aside at the last minute as the bow glided out of the darkness and on to the beach.

Lasseur stepped ashore.

He smiled and held out his hand. "Captain." He shook hands with Jago. "I'm happy to see that you both made a safe return. You'll have forgiven me for my hasty departure, I hope."

"Couldn't be helped," Hawkwood said. "Business called."

"Indeed. I trust the army was suitably generous in its gratitude?"

"That'll be the bloody day," Jago said.

"No reward?"

"Just the thanks of a grateful nation," Hawkwood said. "I'm inclined to think you came out of it better than we did."

Lasseur grinned.

"I hope you gave Pepper a decent burial," Hawkwood said as they left the boat and walked towards the top of the beach where a wall of grey rock rose from the shingle and a line of tall cliffs stretched away into the darkness.

Lasseur nodded. "Wrapped in sailcloth with a six-pound ball at his feet."

"More than the bastard deserved," Jago muttered. "Mind you, it'll give Morgan someone to talk to."

"I'm assuming he wasn't wearing his waistcoat," Hawkwood said.

Lasseur shook his head. "On the contrary, we let him keep it. Without the contents, naturally."

"Spend them wisely," Hawkwood said. "That might be all you'll get for a while. I hear deliveries may be curtailed."

Lasseur had left them the rest of the gold. The British warship had been too close and coming in too fast for Scorpion's crew to pilot the damaged Sea Witch to a safe harbour or transfer the bullion before being apprehended. Even Lasseur's Barbary rig wouldn't have saved them, not given the frigate's heading and speed and the proximity of her eighteen- pounders.

Leaving the frigate to salvage the cutter and what remained of her decimated crew, along with the two individuals who'd been left on her bloodstained deck, Scorpion had reset her canvas and made for the nearest French port.

When the frigate's captain dispatched his second lieutenant to investigate the crippled cutter, he had little idea what his officer would discover in the vessel's hold. He had been forced to admit it had been the biggest prize he'd taken in his career. Though prize wasn't strictly the word for the army's own missing bullion.

They recouped all of it save for the ingots that Morgan and Pepper had attempted to carry ashore. The recovery of the bullion, Hawkwood learned, had not resurrected the career of Lieutenant Burden, for whom the stores depot at Fort Amherst beckoned unenticingly.

"Will they hang them all?" Lasseur asked, referring to the cutter's crew.

"They're up before Maidstone Assizes in two weeks' time. Morgan's not around. His lawyer won't be able to save them. It'll be a meeting with Jack Ketch or else transportation."

"So Morgan's organization is starting to unravel. Cut off the head and the beast withers?"

"I wouldn't say that. More arrests are being made, including the admiral's cook - she was the one passing Morgan information about the layout and people in the house. But the Trade's like a spider: you break its web and it spins another one just as fast. Someone will be along to take Morgan's place."

"The king is dead, long live the king?"

"Something like that," Hawkwood said.

A low whistle came from the darkness.

The three men turned towards the sound. A small horse- drawn cart appeared. The cart drew to a halt and Jethro Garvey dismounted. "Sorry we're late," he said. He walked to the back of the cart and took down a valise.

Lasseur helped Jess Flynn down from the cart. Taking her hand, and without speaking, he held it to his lips and then to his cheek.

While Garvey stayed with the cart, Hawkwood took the valise and he and Jago accompanied Lasseur and Jess Flynn down to the water.

At the edge of the beach, she looked round. "Come on, you," she called softly.

There was a scrabble of paws and the dog jumped down from the back of the cart and loped slowly down the shingle towards them, tail wagging.

"We'll have to teach him French," Lasseur said.

"Just speak loud and slow," Jago said.

Jess Flynn smiled. "He's not deaf, Nathaniel. He's getting on in years, that's all."

"Like me," Jago said.

Hawkwood placed the valise in the boat.

Jess Flynn let go of Lasseur's hand and kissed Hawkwood's cheek.

"Thank you," she said.

Lasseur helped her into the boat then lifted the dog in beside her. With Hawkwood and Jago's help, he pushed the boat off the shingle and climbed aboard. Slowly the boat pulled away. The last sight before darkness swallowed it was of Lasseur raising his hand in a silent farewell.

"What do you reckon?" Jago mused. "You think the real reason he gave up the gold was so's he could come back for her?"

"Maybe," Hawkwood said.

"Daft sod," Jago muttered.

They turned and retraced their steps.

Garvey was still waiting by the cart.

"Thanks, Jethro," Jago said. "Mind how you go."

As the cart trundled off, Hawkwood and Jago walked to where they had tethered the horses.

"You do realize the only person to get anything out of all this was a bloody Frenchman," Jago said. "Bugger sailed away with a pile of gold and the girl."

"Not strictly true," Hawkwood said. He paused and reached into his pocket. "Here, catch -"

The ingot he'd cut from Morgan's waistcoat landed neatly in Jago's hand.

Jago raised an eyebrow.

"Expenses," Hawkwood said.

Jago stared at the ingot in his hand. "What's it worth?"

"No idea. A lot."

Jago handed it back. "The wages they pay you, you need all the help you can get."

They mounted up and turned their horses away from the beach.

And the sound of a single bark echoed over the darkened water behind them.