Sea Robber

FOURTEEN

IT REQUIRED TWO TEAMS of Chamorro, forty men in all, to haul the sakman from her boathouse. They chanted as they heaved on the heavy coir ropes, and the vessel emerged into the evening light looking, Hector thought, like a crouching sea beast reluctantly dragged from its lair. The Chamorro threw heavy logs down on the sand as skids, and carefully manoeuvred the boat to the water’s edge and pushed her afloat. Clay jars and bamboo tubes filled with water and the last of the stores were loaded. Hector, Maria and the other guirragos were told to climb aboard with their muskets and stay out of the way. Ma’pang was to be the captain, but the greater respect was paid to old Kepuha. He came down the beach, tenderly holding a framework of wooden sticks like the one he had shown to Hector. But this contrivance was brittle with age, its flimsy joints tied together with thin strips of coconut fibre. Here and there seashells had been attached like random barnacles.

Kepuha laid the contraption carefully inside the thatched hut that formed the only accommodation on the sakman. Then the vessel was pushed out farther into the sea until the helpers were chest-deep in the water. For a few minutes they held the sakman in position while Ma’pang shouted orders, and his crew of eight Chamorro fishermen raised the mast and fitted its heel in a central step. Heavy rope stays were led fore and aft, and secured. More rigging was taken out sideways to the float and fastened in place. As soon as the mast was held firm, the bulky cocoon of the single sail was attached to a halyard and unrolled. The fabric of the sail was woven from strips of palm leaf and was so fine that at a distance it could have been mistaken for canvas. Even before the sail was fully hoisted, the sakman began to sidle and shift, answering to the breeze.

The wading men were pulled off their feet and let go their grasp. Instantly the sakman began to gather way, moving so smoothly and quickly that Hector was scarcely aware the voyage had begun. One moment he was within a stone’s throw of the watching crowd of villagers on the beach, close enough to make out their expressions of mingled pride and anticipation, and the next time he looked back, they were far away and indistinguishable. All he could see was the swaying of green palm fronds waved in farewell.

He turned again to look forward over the bows. The sakman had already crossed the width of the bay. He had to restrain himself from shouting out in alarm. The vessel was heading straight towards the barrier reef. In less than a minute she would smash into the jagged coral. Ma’pang, who held the steering paddle in the stern, let out a warning cry. To Hector’s utter astonishment, it seemed that the sakman’s captain had panicked. He threw the steering paddle into the water. In the same instant two of his men loosed the sheets that controlled the sail. Two others seized the forward end and ran with it aft to where Ma’pang was standing. The sakman slowed, hesitated and then began to move backwards. The abandoned steering paddle, Hector now saw, was attached to a cord. It floated past the opposite end of the hull, where another member of the crew retrieved it, placed it in a notch in the gunwale and began to steer. Now everything was back to front. The vessel’s bow had become its stern, and the sakman was accelerating in the opposite direction, heading for the gap in the reef. Ma’pang treated Hector to a jagged-toothed grin. ‘Something else the guirragos have to learn,’ he laughed.

As the sakman cleared the bay, she began to feel the full force of a steady breeze from the north. What had appeared a fast pace earlier now became a swooping rush. The boat seemed to lift, then surge across the surface of the sea, swaying lightly from side to side, barely heeling to the pressure of the wind as it filled the great scoop of the sail. The water bubbled and swirled in her wake. The Chamorro crew hurried from one part of the vessel to another, tightening knots, checking lashings, ensuring the structure of the vessel was snug.

Dan, standing beside Hector at the foot of the mast, watched with undisguised admiration. ‘I would not have believed it possible,’ he said. ‘How fast do you think she is moving?’

‘Quicker than I’ve ever sailed before,’ Hector answered. ‘If we continue at this pace, maybe Ma’pang was right. We’ll catch the patache with ease.’

He ducked as a burst of spray swept across the gunwale and wetted his face. A Chamorro crewman crouched in the bottom of the hull was beckoning to Dan and holding up a wooden scoop. Dan moved away to join him, calling out over his shoulder, ‘She is taking water fast. But as the timber swells, the leaks will slow, and the lighter we keep the boat, the quicker she will move.’

‘Cold food from now on, I suppose. No one could possibly cook under these conditions,’ said Jacques morosely. He was half-sitting, half-standing, his feet braced against one side of the hull, his shoulders pressed to the opposite gunwale.

Hector looked for Maria. She peeked out from the little deckhouse where she’d taken shelter. He smiled at her encouragingly. Beside her he caught a glimpse of Stolck looking glum. Ever since he had been stranded ashore by his countrymen, the Hollander had been downcast and listless.

Holding on to the mast’s mainstay to keep his balance, Hector cautiously edged across to the deckhouse.

‘Are you all right, Maria?’ he asked, kneeling down and peering in. Inside the little shelter there was only room to sit or lie down, and the place smelled strongly of coconut oil. He saw that all their muskets had been laid out carefully, side by side, and someone had wrapped them in strips of oil-soaked cloth. The rags were the same colour as the dress that Maria had been wearing on the day they had fled the Presidio.

She caught his glance and shrugged. ‘Jezreel said the muskets would be ruined if they were exposed to the salt air.’

‘It’ll be dark very soon,’ he said. ‘Try to make yourself comfortable for the night.’

‘I’d prefer to be out in the open air,’ she replied. Hector looked back to see what Ma’pang and his crew were doing. Clearly their work was complete. Most of the men were lounging wherever they could find space within the main hull. Ma’pang and one other man squatted in what was now the stern of the sakman. But there was no sign of a steering paddle. They were controlling the direction of the vessel by the set of her sail.

‘Everything seems to have settled down,’ he said. ‘Let’s go up into the bow.’

Together they clambered forward. A Chamorro crew member tactfully moved aside so that they could stand side by side just behind the sharp beak of the prow, the vast open expanse of the ocean stretching before them. The setting sun was very close to the horizon, and the sakman was running directly along the gleaming red-gold path of its reflection. In the far distance a line of fair-weather clouds hung motionless, their undersides tinged with pink. The sakman now had the wind on her beam, and Hector felt something flicker lightly across his cheek. It was a strand of Maria’s hair lifted by the breeze. She put up her hand to tuck it back in place.

‘Let’s hope this wind holds through the night,’ he said.

Maria didn’t reply. He sensed that she was absorbed by the immensity of what lay before them. Very quietly, she laid her head on his shoulder. He feared to move a muscle and stood, barely breathing, and felt the tender weight of her. Gently he put his arm around her shoulder. They stood in quiet, contemplative silence while beneath them the sakman raced onwards, its hull rising and falling to the rhythm of the waves with an urgent, rushing sound.

THE NEXT MORNING dawned clear and bright. The wind had shifted and now blew from slightly ahead of their track. If anything the sakman was moving even faster, racing across the sea, leaving a well-defined wake. By unspoken agreement with Ma’pang, the tiny cabin had been given over to Maria. Dan, Jacques and the others had copied the Chamorro, who curled up wherever they could find a resting place among the baskets and other clutter. Hector had spent the night sleeping by the foot of the mast. Several times in the hours of darkness he’d woken to the sound of someone scooping water from the bilge and tossing it overboard. Each time he’d looked aft and seen the dark shape of Kepuha sitting cross-legged by the stern, a palm-frond cloak around his skinny shoulders. The old man took no part in handling the vessel. He merely sat and watched from his vantage point. He was there now.

Hector rose and made his way aft. Ma’pang held out half a coconut shell filled with water, and he accepted the drink gratefully.

‘How does Kepuha decide which way we steer?’

‘I thought he had explained that to you,’ answered the Chamorro.

‘Not in a way I could understand,’ admitted Hector.

‘You saw the star wall. That is used to instruct learners how to read the skies.’

‘He showed me, but I couldn’t make sense of the twigs he laid out on the ground.’

Ma’pang searched for the right word. ‘It’s what you call a map,’ he said. Seeing that Hector was still puzzled, he went on, ‘All the ocean around tano’ tasi is shown on that map.’

Hector had a flash of understanding. ‘Those shells on the stick framework, they represent the islands?’ he asked.

‘Yes.’

Hector stole a sideways glance at the shaman. He couldn’t see the twig device. Instead Kepuha was holding in his lap a human skull, desiccated and yellow with age.

Ma’pang dropped his voice to a respectful tone. ‘Kepuha knows the star paths by memory. He does not need to consult the map of sticks. He brought it on this voyage out of respect to the ancestors.’

Kepuha’s lips were moving. He was singing some sort of chant in a low, quavering voice, the phrases long drawn out, and the sound rising and falling. Hector was reminded of how the old shaman had sung before the star wall, but these chants were different.

‘He sings to the sea gods to bring us good weather,’ said Ma’pang.

Elsewhere on the sakman various crew members woke and stretched, beginning the new day. Every few moments Hector glanced towards the little cabin, waiting for Maria to appear.

A shout from one of the Chamorro and an outstretched arm made Hector look to stern. Half a dozen dolphins were surging back and forth about twenty paces astern of the vessel. Their backs glistened as they came thrusting half out of the water, twisted and dived and reappeared in a churning froth of activity. He could hear their explosive grunts as they emptied and filled their lungs. They were in a hunting frenzy. Hector was pushed aside by the sudden rush of a Chamorro crew member running to the stern. He had a coil of fishing line in his hand, and with a quick flash the bone hook hit the water and the man paid out the line. Almost immediately there was a tug and the fisherman hauled in a fish, silver and yellow and a foot long. Another cast of the line, and another fish came tumbling in over the gunwale, flapping and leaping as it thrashed across the bilge, leaving a track of silver scales. The first Chamorro fisherman was joined by another, and in minutes they had caught a dozen fish. Without warning, the hunting dolphin abruptly disappeared, and the fishing ceased.

‘It seems we won’t go hungry,’ observed Jacques, bleary-eyed and scratching his close-cropped head. He must have slept badly.

A whiff of burning surprised Hector. At the foot of the mainmast, deep down in the hull and sheltered from the breeze, one of the Chamorro had struck a flint and set alight a twist of dried coconut husk. He waited until the flame was steady, then touched it to a little pile of charcoal heaped on a flat stone. He crouched over the tiny fire, blowing gently, nursing the flame until the charcoal was glowing. The newly caught fish were gutted and cleaned by his companions, then grilled one by one and distributed.

Hector returned to sit by Ma’pang and discuss the prospects for the voyage. He learned that the sakman carried enough water for ten days at sea. When that reserve was halfway exhausted, the vessel would have to turn back. He found it difficult to concentrate. His attention strayed constantly towards the little cabin. When Maria did emerge soon afterwards, she looked more relaxed than he had yet seen her. Her hair was tied back with a ribbon and she was dressed in a simple petticoat, with her arms and feet bare. Watching her as she made her way to the base of the mast and accepted a serving of the cooked fish, Hector felt thwarted and impatient. She was so close physically and yet, with everyone’s eyes upon them, he had to keep a distance.

So the day wore on. The sakman maintained its remarkable pace. The Chamorro crew took turns to steer, very occasionally adjusting the slant of the sail in response to a murmur from Kepuha. The old man sat unmoving for hour after hour, seemingly impervious to the sun and wind.

The midday meal was a ration of breadfruit washed down with a few mouthfuls of water. The breadfruit came as a mash scooped from a basket, half-fermented. Heated on the stone cooking slab, it had a slightly sour taste. By then Hector was hungry and found it delicious. Then, an hour before dusk, the wind finally failed them completely. It had been easing in strength all afternoon, and the sakman had been travelling slower and slower. Now the vessel moved at less than walking pace. The great sail hung slack, filled and then went slack again. The sakman rose and fell as a long, slow swell passed under her. Ma’pang balanced his way along one of the struts holding the outrigger and lowered himself into the sea. He stayed in the water for a good ten minutes, hanging on to the float, motionless. When he climbed back on the boat, he went immediately to Kepuha and spoke quietly to the old man.

‘What’s happening?’ Hector asked.

‘The makhana must be kept informed.’

‘Informed of what?’ asked Hector, puzzled.

‘Of the current.’

Hector looked at the big native in open disbelief. The water had not yet dried after Ma’pang’s swim. His dark skin glistened, and a few beads of water gleamed in his bushy hair.

‘You can tell what the current is doing by immersing yourself?’

‘Of course,’ Ma’pang replied as if speaking to a simpleton. ‘If you keep still, you can feel the current. The direction it goes and how strongly.’

Hector suppressed his doubts. Anything that would help Kepuha in his navigation was valuable.

‘How long do you think the calm will last?’

Ma’pang shrugged. ‘Kepuha says that the wind will come again tomorrow in mid-morning. After the full moon.’

‘And what about the patache? Does Kepuha know whether it too is delayed?’

Ma’pang shook his head. ‘We can only hope that the patache is caught in the same calm as us.’

As the sun dipped below the horizon, the sakman was completely motionless on a glassy sea. The meagre supper of leftover fish scraps and another gulp or two of water were consumed in silence. An air of patient resignation settled over the company. Everyone knew there was nothing they could do but wait for the wind to return. Even Kepuha ceased his prayers and chants. After the brief tropical dusk, a full moon rose, shining hard and bright. Hector joined Maria as she sat on an outrigger strut beside the shelter, suspended above the calm sea. Neither of them spoke. The moonbeams were so strong they penetrated several feet into the water. Looking down from their perch, Hector could see three or four fish, each as long as his arm, cruising slowly back and forth beneath the shadow of the vessel. He recognized their blade-shaped bodies and high, blunt heads. They were the same voracious creatures that hunted flying fish by day. Now they seemed relaxed and sociable, spreading their fins so that they appeared to be balancing on underwater wings of blue. The only sound was the gentle swash of water against the hull as the sakman rocked a few inches at a time.

‘Do you think we will overtake the patache?’ Maria asked softly.

‘It all depends on the wind,’ Hector answered. ‘Kepuha forecasts a good breeze tomorrow.’

‘The crew seem to respect him.’

‘Ma’pang says that Kepuha is one of the greatest navigators the Chamorro have ever known.’ He looked up at the sky. Beyond the halo of the moon he could faintly detect the pinpoints of the distant stars. ‘The Chamorro believe that at the beginning of time their god-like ancestors made voyages through the heavens. They marked their passage with stars. Kepuha knows their paths and follows them. Above every island the gods left certain stars to mark their location.’

‘Does that make sense to you?’

‘It’s a different way of looking at the heavens. I measure the stars and sun to decide where I am, then use a chart and compass to plot a course to my destination. Kepuha’s system is more direct. For him, the stars are signposts in the sky.’

They sat together in companionable silence for several minutes. Then she said softly, ‘If only we had signposts.’

Hector took a deep breath. ‘To show us where to direct our lives?’

‘Yes.’

‘And if you had to select a way, where would you wish to go?’

‘Somewhere safe and calm, a place where our differences and backgrounds are of no concern to others.’

‘If such a place exists, then we’ll search for it and find it,’ he said, though he was conscious that his reply sounded a little boastful.

She seemed to accept his answer. ‘Hector, I’m so happy that we are together. I know you love me, and I have the same feeling for you.’ She hesitated before continuing. ‘But until we find that place, something will be left unfinished. I hope you can understand that.’

Hector struggled to put his thoughts into words. He knew that Maria was setting the boundaries for their relationship in the days or weeks to come. ‘I do understand, Maria, and I will be content for us to cherish one another. We’ll wait to find that place where we can be safe together.’

She turned and kissed him lightly on the mouth. ‘Hector,’ she said, ‘sometimes when I’m with you, I feel just like this, floating on a quiet expanse of calm.’ Then she moved to one side and disappeared into the little cabin.

AS KEPUHA PREDICTED, the wind came next morning. It arrived in dramatic fashion, bringing a torrential rainstorm that swept down from the north and enveloped the sakman. Visibility was reduced to a few yards, and within moments everything on the vessel was soaked. The sakman leaped forward, her waterlogged sail filling with an alarming creaking of the mast and stays. Ma’pang eased the mainsheet to reduce the pressure of the wind, and the Chamorro crew scrambled to place clay jars where they would catch the runnels of fresh water cascading off the sail. Then the vessel ran blindly through the murk.

When the rainstorm passed on, it left behind a dull, overcast sky and a sullen, lumpy sea, no longer deep blue but a dingy slate-grey. The air was still warm, but damp and clammy. Nothing dried. Hector watched to see if Kepuha would manage to set a course now that he no longer had the sun to guide him. The makhana appeared unruffled. He sat at the stern as if nothing had changed.

‘How does he know which way to steer?’ Hector asked Ma’pang quietly as they ate a meal of raw fish. The charcoal for the cooking fire had been saturated.

‘The wind and waves tell him,’ answered the Chamorro. ‘Kepuha will not lose his way. You need not worry.’

But Hector did continue to fret. All that day and the next a veil of heavy cloud obscured the sky, and he became increasingly doubtful that the makhana could succeed in tracking down the patache. The more he thought about their mission, the worse seemed the odds against success. Quietly he resigned himself to the moment when Ma’pang would announce that they must turn back for Rota before their supplies ran out, and he wondered how his companions would react to the failure. Maria, he was relieved to observe, had come to terms with the tedium and the cramped conditions of the voyage. She would sit in the door of the little shelter, watching the pattern of the waves. Occasionally her watchfulness was rewarded with a brief sighting of sea life – the leap of a dolphin or, once, a pod of whales so close to the sakman that the fishy smell of their exhalation swept across the boat. By contrast, Jezreel with his massive frame accumulated bruises and scrapes as he moved around the crowded vessel. Jacques showed an almost limitless capacity to doze away the time, and Dan was happy to pass hour after hour with a fishing line. Stolck, however, was a cause for concern. A rash of salt-water sores, raw and oozing, had developed on his wrists and ankles where his clothes rubbed, and he appeared to be sinking into a profound depression.

The fifth day of their voyage began under the same lowering grey sky. The sakman had run smoothly all through the night with a steady breeze on the beam, and Hector calculated that she was covering ten miles every hour on the long swell rolling across their track. He had just finished eating his breakfast – a fist-sized lump of the sour breadfruit mash – when he noticed that Kepuha had risen to his feet and was staring intently downwind. The young man turned to look in the same direction, but could see nothing except the rounded backs of the waves as they travelled towards the horizon. Nevertheless, Kepuha stood there for several minutes. He seemed alert, yet puzzled. After an interval he spoke to one of the Chamorro crewmen, who made his way to the foot of the mainstay and began to haul himself aloft. From there the lookout called down to the deck.

‘What’s he say?’ Hector asked Ma’pang.

‘There’s a guirrago ship in the distance. About ten miles away.’

Kepuha was beckoning. ‘You better come with me,’ said Ma’pang to Hector. ‘This is a surprise and may change our plans.’

Ma’pang and the makhana conferred briefly. Then Ma’pang turned to Hector and said, ‘Kepuha is certain the ship to the south of us cannot be the patache. It is in the wrong place.’

Hector refrained from asking how the shaman was so sure about the distant vessel. He feared the question would offend the old man. Instead he said, ‘Perhaps we should investigate.’

There was a rapid exchange between the two Chamorro, and then Ma’pang nodded. ‘Kepuha says that if we change course now, we’ll lose time and may not catch up with the patache.’ His deep-set brown eyes searched Hector’s face. ‘I leave the choice to you.’

Hector was in a quandary. The sakman had shown that she was fast enough to overtake her prey, but even if both vessels had shared the same weather conditions – and that was by no means certain – the Chamorro might already have overhauled the Spaniards and sailed right past them in the darkness or in poor visibility. On the other hand, the unknown vessel could be well armed and powerful enough to beat off an attack by Chamorro pirates. Then he remembered Maria’s fears that they’d kill her countrymen. The unknown vessel might not be Spanish and yet might carry weapons the Chamorro could plunder.

‘I say we try our luck with that stranger,’ he said.

At a shout from Ma’pang, two of his crew began to ease out the mainsheet. Two others brought the forward corner of the sail aft until it was level with the mast, and a third eased on the halyard. The great sail ballooned out across the vessel, almost flying free. The sakman turned and began to sail downwind, the bow dipping and rising as the ocean swells overtook her.

‘WHAT SORT OF ship do you think she is?’ Hector asked Dan half an hour later. The two men, loaded muskets in hand, were in the bow of the sakman, trying to make sense of what they saw less than half a mile away.

The unknown vessel appeared to be a small merchantman of about a hundred tons. She had an unusual, very old-fashioned appearance. Two small aft decks rose one on the other to give a high, narrow stern, and there was a long run amidships to a low, shortened forecastle, so that she looked as though at any moment she would topple forward and bury her nose in the sea. She was rigged with three masts, but had only her foresail set, barely enough to propel her forward. She sat unnaturally low in the water, and was wallowing and pitching aimlessly. The sail flapped and slatted, and there were regular glimpses of a rich green coating of weed and growth clinging to her hull. Her rigging was slack and slovenly, and even at that distance an unhappy groaning could be heard as her masts worked in their steps. Most puzzling of all, she showed no signs of having seen the sakman bearing down on her.

‘There,’ exclaimed Dan. ‘Did you see it? Someone on her quarterdeck.’

Hector looked closely, but could see nothing. The vessel’s rudder was banging back and forth, swinging loosely from side to side. It appeared there was no one at the helm.

‘It could be a trap,’ said Stolck, who had come up behind them. He looked more animated now that there was something unusual happening, and he too carried a loaded musket.

‘Dan thought he saw a movement,’ said Hector.

Stolck gave a grunt and crouched down. He rested the barrel of his musket on the edge of the canoe’s hull and aimed at the merchantman. ‘If anything moves again, I’ll deal with it.’

The sakman was closing the gap very rapidly. Hector had advised Ma’pang to approach from directly astern, the point at which the strange vessel would be unable to use her broadside, if she had one. Now he worried that the sakman was moving so quickly she’d overshoot her victim.

‘Where is everyone on that ship?’ asked Jacques.

It was puzzling. Aboard the merchantman there was no one in the rigging or on deck. Several ropes trailed over her side, dragging through the water.

Stolck was muttering under his breath. He sounded irritable and impatient. ‘They’re waiting until we are alongside. Then they run out their guns and we’ll be blasted to pieces. I’ll give them something to think about.’

Without warning he pulled the trigger of his musket. The sound of the gunshot echoed across the water, and Hector saw splinters fly up from a stanchion under the poop rail. But once again there was no reaction.

Hector glanced back over his shoulder. Ma’pang was in the stern at the steering paddle, and three of his crew had made their way to the outrigger struts. They crouched behind the little cabin, hidden from anyone on the merchantman. With a knot in his stomach, Hector realized the cabin was the obvious target for any gunfire from the strange vessel. Maria had decided to stay out of sight inside, and its flimsy thatch would provide no shelter from a musket ball. She’d be far safer crouched in the bottom of the sakman’s main hull. But it was too late to do anything about that now.

The sakman was very close, less than a stone’s throw from the high stern of the vessel. Hector looked up, trying to distinguish the flag. But the cloth was tangled around its staff. He could only make out part of a white stripe on a blue background and a small red blotch.

The sakman suddenly swerved as Ma’pang twisted hard on the steering paddle, and the boat swept under the stranger’s overhanging stern. There was a brisk flurry of action as the palm-leaf sail was dropped, and at the same moment the three crouching crew members raced out along the struts and put their full weight on the outrigger. The float dipped into the water, caught and held, and the sakman slowed abruptly to a halt, almost as if she had dropped anchor in mid-ocean.

‘Ho there! Anyone aboard?’ Hector shouted up at the silent ship. There was no answer. He put down his musket and grabbed for one of the trailing ropes. He hauled himself upwards hand over hand, his feet scrabbling for purchase on the stained side of the ship. Beside him he was aware of Ma’pang armed with a spear and moving even faster, and of Jezreel with his backsword hanging from a lanyard around his wrist.

Hector reached the ship’s rail and clambered over. He found himself standing in the waist of the vessel, on the deserted main deck. To his right a short ladder led to the foredeck, and to his left a similar companionway gave access to the half-deck and the quarterdeck above it. All around him was the usual clutter of ship’s gear – blocks, ropes, a wooden bucket, several chests lashed to the rail, a small skiff lashed upside down over the central grating. He counted six cannon ranged along each side. None of them was prepared for action, their gun carriages were still lashed to ring bolts in the deck. He heard someone’s tread on the deck behind him and turned hastily, heart pounding. It was Stolck. The Hollander was breathing heavily, his shaven head shiny with sweat. He had his reloaded musket in his hand.

‘What’s going on?’ he asked.

‘There’s no one aboard,’ answered Hector.

Just then he caught a whiff of something burning. Stolck let out an oath, ran across the deck and began to stamp frantically on a thin rope. Hector saw a wisp of smoke beneath his feet.

At that moment a musket shot rang out, and a musket ball whirred past his head. Shocked, he spun round on his heel and was just in time to get a glimpse of a musket barrel being withdrawn through a small hatch in the bulkhead under the foredeck. A cloud of gun smoke hung in the air.

Hector dived for cover behind the skiff. Now he knew. The crew of the merchantman had retreated to close quarters. They had barricaded themselves into the forecastle, from where they would shoot down any boarders at point-blank range.

He lay flat on the deck, his eyes searching out the objects around him. A crew in close quarters usually left explosive devices on deck. They filled chests and glass bottles with gunpowder and scraps of metal and fitted fuses that could be lit from within their refuge. When the boarders arrived on deck, the home-made bombs and grenades were exploded, with devastating results. Stolck must have stamped on one such fuse. Perhaps there were others.

Ma’pang appeared from behind the mainmast, sprinting towards the forecastle. Another musket shot, and it must have missed, for the naked Chamorro vaulted up on to the foredeck in one huge leap. Now he was out of the line of fire.

Hector watched as Ma’pang poked and prised with his spear point, searching uselessly for a way to break into the stronghold from above.

Someone inside the forecastle began coughing loudly. The black powder must have blown back into the loophole. Then came a shout, and Hector caught words that sounded like ‘swart bastert’.

The accent sounded familiar, and Hector was trying to identify it when Stolck’s voice came from less than an arm’s length away, from the other side of the launch, where the Hollander had also taken cover. Stolck bellowed, ‘Halt ofsjitte, du idioat.’

There was a sudden silence.

‘Hwa bisto?’ called the voice from inside.

‘Stolck ut Friesland.’

Another long silence. Hector could hear the creaking of the ship. He wondered what was happening on the sakman, still lashed alongside the merchantman and out of sight.

There was another shout from within the forecastle.

‘What’s he saying?’ Hector hissed.

For the first time in several weeks the Dutchman gave a smile. ‘He asks what the hell I am doing in the company of naked savages.’

‘Tell him we’re trying to get a lift,’ Hector said. When Stolck relayed the answer, there was a pause. Then a heavy wooden door in the forecastle slowly opened and a strange figure emerged shakily. It was a heavily bearded man, coughing and stooped, dressed in worn sea-going clothing, his greasy, matted hair hanging down to his shoulders. He was nervously fingering a musket. He gave a great start as Ma’pang dropped down on the deck from behind him and wrenched the gun from his hands.

‘Don’t be afraid,’ called Hector, rising to his feet. ‘He’s a friend.’

Now that the man was closer, Hector could see he had the pasty skin and rheumy eyes of an invalid. ‘Are you in charge of these sea robbers?’ the sick man wheezed, speaking English now and in a very evident, deep guttural accent.

‘Ma’pang here is our leader. Who are you?’

‘Hendrik Vlucht, captain and part-owner of this shitten, luckless Westflinge.’

A slight movement in the open doorway behind Vlucht caught Hector’s attention. Another man emerged. He hung on to the door jamb to keep from falling. He too was coughing, his skeletal frame racked with spasms.

As the newcomer tottered forward, Hector noticed Ma’pang backing away, keeping his distance. There was an expression on his face that Hector hadn’t seen before: a look of alarm.

Hendrik Vlucht spoke again. ‘Thought our luck couldn’t get any worse, and then we saw your vessel coming towards us. No one fit to man the ship, let alone fight her guns.’

‘Where’s the rest of your crew?’ Hector asked.

‘Haven’t had time to check recently,’ answered the Dutchman sourly. ‘Started out with twenty-three, and dropped a dozen of them overboard before we lost the strength to do so.’ He doubled up and retched. When he straightened up, his knees sagged and he had to reach out to hold on to the launch for support. He nodded vaguely towards the poop deck. ‘Piet and I are strong enough to pull a trigger. But the others are too weak to move.’

‘What about the surgeon? Couldn’t he help?’

The Dutchman gave a cadaverous grin. ‘Never shipped a surgeon. Couldn’t afford one and there were no volunteers.’

‘But I thought every Company ship had to carry a surgeon.’ It was a piece of information that Hector had picked up from Stolck. Every ship of the Dutch East India Company carried a medicine chest and some sort of doctor. He presumed that the Westflinge belonged to the Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, which held Holland’s monopoly of the East India trade.

‘Who says we’re a Company vessel?’ retorted Vlucht with a twist of his mouth. Hector recalled the colours of the ensign on the stern. They were not the red, white and blue of the Company.

Ma’pang broke into their conversation. The Chamorro warrior was still standing several paces away. ‘Hector, we must get off the ship at once. They have the shivering sickness.’

‘No, Ma’pang. I think they are suffering from sea fever.’

He could see that the big Chamorro did not believe him. Ma’pang’s voice was thick with fear and disgust. ‘If my people become ill like this, they die.’

He was already moving away across the deck, returning to the sakman.

‘Believe me, Ma’pang. I have some knowledge of this illness. I was once an assistant to a doctor,’ Hector called out to him.

Ma’pang shook his head vehemently. ‘Even the most skilful makhana cannot drive out the evil spirits that cause this sickness.’ He had reached the rail now.

‘At least take some guns with you,’ Hector said. ‘That’s what you came for.’

‘I know that the sickness travels. I do not want to bring it back to Rota with me. You and your people can do what you want.’

‘Then ask Dan, Maria and Jacques to join me,’ said Hector. He turned to face Vlucht. ‘There are four healthy men with me, all experienced seamen.’ He was speaking hurriedly, trying to make his point before Ma’pang left with the sakman. ‘There’s also a woman, and she can nurse your invalids. If you supply these natives with muskets and powder, we will stay aboard and help bring your vessel to safe harbour.’

The Dutch captain allowed himself a cynical laugh. ‘And if I refuse, then these savages will take our guns anyway. Of course I accept your offer.’

‘Wait, Ma’pang, wait just a few minutes,’ Hector called out. He turned back towards Vlucht. ‘Quick, where’s the arms chest?’

The Dutchman pointed towards a door under the overhang of the quarterdeck. Hector beckoned to Jezreel and together they ran to find the Westflinge’s store of guns. Moments later they had dragged the arms chest to the ship’s rail. Jezreel smashed open the lid and they began handing its contents down to the Chamorro, who nervously accepted the weapons while keeping as safe a distance as possible.

Maria and the others had scarcely set foot on the deck of the Dutch vessel before the Chamorro were casting off the lines holding the sakman alongside. They were in near-panic, handling the ropes as though fearful to touch them. They wouldn’t even reach out and fend off against the side of the merchant ship. Instead they waited for the rise and fall of the swell to drift the sakman clear. Nor was there a backward glance as the spidery shape of their vessel turned and headed back to the Thief Islands.