Chapter 19 The Black Swan by Rafael Sabatini
The Head of Tom Leach
The last choking cough of the buccaneer was uttered; the twitchings of his body had ceased, and he lay on his back grinning up at the blue sky that was like a dome of polished steel, before there was any movement in the surrounding crowd. After that single outcry, when their Captain had gone down, an awed silence had fallen upon those wild men. Accustomed though they were to scenes of violence and to sudden and bloody deaths, there was something in this abrupt passing of their leader to inspire awe in those wild breasts.
Leach had been of such vitality, and had come scatheless through so many fierce encounters that he had seemed almost immortal to the men he led. And here, almost in the twinkling of an eye, behold him stretched stiff and stark. Wonder, too, now that the thing was done, was stirring in their minds as to what must be the consequences to themselves of their Captain's death.
The silence endured until Bundry roughly now broke his way through the ranks which yielded as readily as earlier they had resisted him. Ellis and Halliwell followed through the gap his passage made.
Monsieur de Bernis looked up at their approach. He was not entirely without alarm, although he contrived to conceal it; but in the main he conceived himself sufficiently protected by the circumstances. Standing where he did, with one shoulder to the sea and the other to the woods, he commanded a wide field of vision. Twenty yards away and above him on the beach, he beheld Miss Priscilla and the Major standing at gaze, and he conceived the fears that must be distressing her, if not on his account, at least on her own, since even now, if this affair should find issue in the avenging upon him of the Captain's death, she must suppose that she would be left at the mercy of these ruffians.
For the moment, however, the buccaneers still made no movement. Perhaps they considered that the matter was one beyond their judgement, and they were content to leave it to those four leaders who were now confronting Monsieur de Bernis within the space they ringed about. For Wogan was there, too, having been there indeed throughout the combat, and it was Wogan whom de Bernis immediately cited as a witness in his own defence when Bundry challenged him.
'How did this happen?' Bundry had asked, his tone harsh, his countenance forbidding, his eyes piercing as gimlets.
'It was forced upon me. I take Wogan here to witness.'
Bundry turned to question Wogan with his eyes, and Wogan blinked nervously and answered, as de Bernis counted that he would answer. He might have been less confident had he known of the understanding that had existed between Wogan and the Captain. But the Captain being dead, Wogan swiftly made up his mind that, since Leach's plot had failed, it only remained to ensure the preservation of one upon whom depended the capture of the Spanish plate fleet.
'Aye, it's the truth. Bad cess to it! Ye all know how the Captain was feeling towards him, and this morning his humour bubbled over, and he put this quarrel upon him. In fact, as some of ye may have seen, he attacked him before he had even got his sword out, and if Charley hadn't been quick and active, it's murder there would ha' been.'
Encouraged by this to greater self-assertion, Monsieur de Bernis supplemented that assurance.
'It would have been unlucky for all of you if things had fallen out otherwise. There would have been no Spanish gold, no broad pieces of eight for you if Leach had killed me as he intended. The dog might have thought of you if he had no thought for his own share of the treasure before yielding to his thirst for my blood. Well, well!' He touched the body with his foot. 'There he lies as he deserves, for his treachery to you and to me.'
And Bundry, grim-faced ever, and seeing no profit in going against de Bernis at present, nodded slowly. 'I warned him. But he was ever a headstrong fool. Maybe he's best quieted.'
And by the men, who had listened and who had been persuaded by what they heard, this seemed to be accounted a sufficient funeral oration, and closed the matter.
Monsieur de Bernis had been reasonably confident that ultimately he must prevail with them, by means of the prospect of that Spanish gold. But he had expected at the outset a violent explosion of passion over the death of their leader, and he had been bracing himself to meet it. It took him by surprise to discover how little any such effort would be required of him. In the circumstances in which it had befallen, Tom Leach's death was no calamity to any of those predatory rogues who followed him. What mattered was that the man who was to lead them to fortune had been preserved.
And so, with scarcely a lowering glance to follow him, Monsieur de Bernis was permitted to sheathe his sword and resume his garments.
The buccaneers broke up the circle and fell into babbling groups, busily discussing the event, its details and its consequences. Already even sounds of laughter began to punctuate their arguments, whilst the dead man lay there almost at their feet, staring up at them from glazing eyes. Wogan actually came to help Monsieur de Bernis into his coat.
They were at some little distance from the others, and Wogan, with his back to them, muttered so that only de Bernis could hear him.
'You'll come to the hut presently. We'll be after electing a new Captain, and you'll be needed.' More softly still he added: 'Ye'll not be forgetting how I stood your friend, Charley, just now when ye called upon me, and that but for me ye might be carrion this minute. Sure, now, didn't your life hang upon my answer?'
'Did it so? I thought it hung upon the Spanish plate fleet. But if ye covet dead men's shoes, ye may have them for me. I'll follow presently.'
He turned from the Irishman, and went briskly up the beach to the three who remained there still at gaze.
Miss Priscilla watched his approach with eyes that were almost of awe. He was so calm, so entirely master of himself, so apparently unruffled, as if he came from some normal daily task. Was he made of iron that he could bear himself thus within a few moments of, himself, facing death and after killing a man?
At closer quarters, when at last he stood before them, she saw that he was very pale under his tan and she was thankful, relieved--though she scarcely knew why--to discover in him at least this sign of feeling.
'I hope that you were not unduly alarmed,' she heard him saying, in his pleasant, level voice. 'It was my wish that you should be spared that spectacle.' Then he was addressing the Major, who stood there goggle-eyed and loose-mouthed with little of his usual colour in his florid face. 'Our practices were not in vain, you see. I had a presentiment that I should need them before we left Maldita.'
'Have you...Is he dead?' the Major asked him, stammering.
'I do not do things by halves, Major.'
There was a significance in this that prompted an awed question from Priscilla.
'You meant to kill him? You sought him for that purpose?'
He sensed the recoil in her. 'It had become necessary. For some days, indeed. But I had to wait. I had to wait until the time was ripe for it. It was not easy waiting; for he had become a danger. Above all, he had become a danger to you, Priscilla.'
'Was that...Was that why you killed him?' she asked in a hushed, faltering voice.
He considered her gravely an instant before replying. 'Not entirely. But if it did not supply all the reason, it supplied all the desire.
Because of you, and because of what he had dared and what he hoped I killed him without compunction.'
She set a hand upon his arm. At the impulsive gesture, the Major frowned a little and looked down his nose. But no heed was paid to him.
'I was afraid--so afraid--that I supplied the only reason. If you had fallen...' She seemed to choke. When she recovered, she continued on another thought. 'Afterwards, I was even more afraid. I thought his men would have torn you in pieces. I still do not understand. It seemed to me you must be in great danger.'
'I am in danger,' he answered quietly. 'But I was in no danger there. The danger is still to come.'
As he spoke, Pierre, from a pace or two in the background, leapt suddenly forward.
'Monsieur!'
De Bernis turned to face the sea. Into view round the shoulder of the bluff, a cable's length beyond the entrance of the cove came three tall red ships, sailing almost abreast, and taking in sail as they majestically advanced into fuller view. Across the water came the creak of blocks and the rattle of spars.
Monsieur de Bernis appeared to stiffen. 'It has come, this danger,' he said, in a low voice.
On the beach below them the buccaneers stood staring out across the lagoon in an utter stricken silence, as if suddenly paralysed. Thus for a half-dozen heart-beats. Then, as the Union flag broke from each main-truck, and the ships began to swing into line to starboard, heading straight for the entrance of the lagoon, it was as if hell had vomited all its devils onto the shore. Shouting, cursing, raging all together, the groups broke up and the men ran this way and that, blindly, aimlessly scattering. Thus had de Bernis seen rats scamper and run when into the dark hold of a ship a light had suddenly been lowered.
In that first sudden panic, only a few of them were purposeful in their flight, and ran deliberately for cover behind the careened hull of the Black Swan. For the thought in the minds of all must have been that these heavily armed vessels, obviously hostile, and probably belonging to Morgan's Jamaica squadron, which for months had been scouring the seas in quest of Tom Leach, would presently be sweeping the beach with their guns.
It was Wogan who led the way to cover, whilst Bundry stood and cursed him for a loathly coward and a fool, who by his very conduct was betraying them all to observant eyes upon the ships. For Bundry kept his head, and succeeded, when that first spasm of surprised terror had spent itself, in recalling the main body of the buccaneers to their senses and to some semblance of order.
'What's to alarm you, you rats?' he roared at them, straining a voice that was anything but powerful until it cracked upon his words. 'What's to alarm you? Whoever these may be, what can they know of us? What can they see here except a ship careened, and another riding peacefully at anchor?'
Men paused, steadied themselves, and came clustering about him to hear him.
'Keep your heads,' he bade them. 'Why should these ships be hunting us? They may be coming here for fresh water. How should they have known we are here? Don't you see this is but a chance arrival? Even if they be Morgan's ships, how should they recognize the Black Swan, careened as she is? If they see you scuttling to cover like those who've followed that fool Wogan, they'll learn the very thing we must conceal from them. Calm, then, in hell's name. Let 'em land, if so be that wants to. We'll see where we stand then, and what's to be done.'
Thus he harangued them, and thus restored, gradually, some of their spilled courage. Ellis and Halliwell, themselves encouraged by Bundry's obvious common sense, went to his assistance in this task of restoring order. The buccaneers broke into groups again, and squatted on the sands or moved now, as if unalarmed, like men whose consciences are at ease. Thus, until the leading ship, a powerful vessel of forty guns, being within the neck of the lagoon, swung broadside on, and revealed open gun-ports with the guns run out ready for action.
At this the buccaneers fell again to muttering ominously, their adopted calm dissolving before that menacing sight. Still, Bundry held them in leash.
'A pox on you, you fools! What if she shows her teeth? What then? Not knowing who we are or what we may intend, she puts herself on guard. That's all.'
But, to give him the lie, a white cauliflower of smoke broke suddenly upon the flank of that leading ship, followed instantly by the boom of a gun, and simultaneously with this the Centaur staggered where she rode so peacefully at anchor, and, with a crash, there was a flight of splinters from her bulwarks where they had been struck high up by that shot at short range.
A cloud of gulls rose from the bluff, and circled mewing in affright at this sudden shattering of the silence. And like those white birds, the buccaneers too started up again in panic from the calm into which Bundry had laboured to bring them.
A second shot, following hard upon the first, to batter the bulwarks of the Centaur, riveted them there at gaze, awe-stricken and momentarily silent, expecting a broadside to follow that should sink the appropriated merchantman.
But none came. That second shot evoking no response from the Centaur, her gun-ports remaining closed, and her decks displaying no sign of life, the newcomer held her fire. She had taken in sail by now, as had the other two; and in the queer, uncanny silence rang the rattle of chains and the creaking of windlasses. They were coming to anchor there in the roadstead, within a half-dozen cables' length of the shore.
That the buccaneers had to deal with a foe, and with a foe who was well-informed of their identity, they could doubt no longer in view of that demonstration against the Centaur. What particular action would be taken by these ships when they had anchored, these men could not surmise. But that it would be action to their undoing they were assured, and in their rage at finding themselves thus trapped, helpless here ashore, in the very situation that Leach had always feared, they cast about them for a scapegoat, as stupid men will in their anger.
Thus it happened that presently there was a surge of them up the beach to the spot where Monsieur de Bernis was standing, with Miss Priscilla on his left, the Major on her other side, and Pierre, with a strained and anxious look on his coppery countenance, in the immediate background.
Monsieur de Bernis, who never in all his adventurous life had been more alert and watchful than in the last few moments, expecting precisely this development, and exercising his wits as to how to meet the onslaught when it came, drew closer to Miss Priscilla until his arm touched her shoulder.
'It comes now, this danger,' she heard him murmur. 'Stand firm, and do not be afraid.'
With that he stepped forward boldly to meet this human wave that was sweeping forward to engulf him. Very straight he stood, his chin high, his plumed hat slightly cocked, his left hand resting on the hilt of his long rapier, so that the weapon standing out behind him made a right angle with his body.
Wildly clamouring that fierce wave--that mob of close upon two hundred men--came to break and recoil a little at his very feet. A sea of angry, evil faces confronted him; curses and foulnesses almost deafened him; brawny bare arms were outflung towards him; fists were shaken in his face, and one there was at fairly close quarters who brandished a machete as if to cut him down.
He stood like a rock before it all, dominating them by his height and his intrepidity. His voice rang like a trumpet, clear and sharp, audible even above their howls.
'What's here?' he demanded. 'You fools! Do you attack the only man with the wit to save you from this danger?'
Their noise fell to a mutter, a rumble as of receding waters, and presently it was still so that they might hear him before they made an end of him. Bundry, he saw, was trying to break his way through to the front rank. And presently that clay-faced, resolute shipmaster struggled up to him, and there turned to wave the assailants back. Bundry, after all, had a practical mind. He was not a man to be swept by passion into blindness. Never in any situation did he lose sight of the essential thing.
'Wait! Back there!' he croaked at them. 'Give us air! Let's hear what Charley has to say.' And he turned to de Bernis. 'What are these ships? Do you know?'
'Don't you? The leader there is the Royal Mary, Morgan's flagship. They are all three of the Jamaica squadron. We've Morgan on our hands. Sir Henry Morgan. But he comes too late for what he seeks. It's Tom Leach he's hunting.'
They roared at him that they, themselves, still remained to be brought to account, and how did he suppose that they would fare at Morgan's hands?
'I know how I shall fare,' he answered them, and he actually laughed as he spoke, though with more than a touch of bitterness. 'There's no doubt at all on that score. No need to be a prophet to foretell it. So if ye want to cut my throat, so as to thwart Morgan of the pleasure of hanging me, by my faith, ye're welcome. I dare say it will be the pleasanter end.'
This reminder that, whatever might betide any of them at Morgan's hands, he, who had been Morgan's lieutenant, and who, deserting, had taken to the sea again and gone a-roving in their company, would certainly meet with no mercy, gave them sudden pause. Here was something they had overlooked. There was no argument by which he could have made a stronger appeal to their sympathy.
And then, suddenly, Wogan came sliding through them. He had come from cover with several fellows at his heels, intent as most of the men were intent upon making a scapegoat of de Bernis; intent that, since destruction perhaps awaited most of them, de Bernis should certainly not escape, but should be the first to pay.
And there he stood, tall and lanky, threshing the air with his long arms in his excitement as he poured forth his venom.
'Let him talk as he pleases, it's Topgallant Charley we've to thank for this. It was he brought us here! It's his fault, so it is, that we're caught with never a keel under us: trapped like rats in a gin, and helpless at the mercy of Morgan!' He flung out an accusing arm, so that his hand almost struck Monsieur de Bernis in the face. 'It's Charley's doing! Bad cess to him!'
With that he thought to destroy de Bernis, and might have destroyed any man less prompt and resolute. As it was, and as he was presently to learn, he merely supplied de Bernis with a weapon at once defensive and offensive.
Before the rage which Wogan fanned in those wild ruffianly souls could blaze forth, de Bernis was answering him, and by tone and manner and very words was compelling attention.
'Will you make a scapegoat of me for your own blundering incompetence, you lubberly oaf?'
He paused upon that question which struck Wogan dumb with amazement and arrested the attention of all. Then, with an increasing vehemence, with a simulation of indignation, he went on to scarify the Irishman.
'If we are helpless as you say, the fault lies between you and that dead cut-throat Tom Leach whose worthy lieutenant you are. If either of you had known anything of your trade, there would be guns emplaced on that bluff with which to have given Morgan a warm welcome.'
Again he paused, and this time no fear of interruption made him hurry to resume. He knew that what he had said must whet the men's appetite for more. It was something that leapt to the eye when uttered. One and all of them must perceive the force of it, and, perceiving this, they would wait for his amplification of the charge he brought, he, the accused, turned suddenly accuser.
'Pardieu! You come bleating here to make it seem that I am to blame, you numbskull! Ha! Why, you and Tom Leach between you were never fit to command anything, afloat or ashore! And here's the proof of it: in the disaster to which we are now betrayed. And you say it was I. I brought Leach to careen here because there is no better beach than this for careening in all the Caribbean. But I did not tell him to take no precautions against surprise. I did not tell him to pile his guns there on the shore like so much rotten dunnage.' He pointed to the spot where the guns had been stacked when first they were landed from the Black Swan. 'How do you know that I did not warn him? Do you suppose that I did not advise him to set up earthworks on the bluff there, and mount guns to command the entrance of the lagoon? We dispose of sixty guns between the two ships. With those we could have defied the whole Jamaica squadron. We could have sunk any ship that tried to force an entrance here. But how did he receive my advice?'
He was never allowed to tell them. For here, Wogan, quivering with fury, interrupted him. 'It's a lie! Don't be listening to him! He never advised it at all! It's a lie!'
'Is it?' quoth de Bernis, and now he was actually smiling, if very grimly. 'We will agree it is a lie. We will agree I never warned him; I never told him or you that guns should be emplaced there.' And now his voice suddenly swelled up. 'But, my faith, what were you doing, what were you and he doing, that you did not think of it for yourselves? He was the Captain and you were his lieutenant, Wogan; and between you lay the responsibility for the safety of your men. How does it happen that neither you nor he thought of placing this cove in a state of fortification? Can you shift the blame for that on to any other shoulders? Leach is dead, and cannot answer. But you are alive, and you can answer. There are your men: the men who, through your carelessness and incompetent leadership, are now trapped here as you say. Answer to them, then! Answer them!'
And from the throats of those buccaneers whom de Bernis' indictment had lashed into sudden fury came in a raucous roar the demand: 'Answer! Answer!'
'Holy Virgin!' screamed Wogan, in sudden affright to see the storm so swiftly and craftily deflected upon his own head. 'Will ye be listening to this liar? Have ye never heard tell of Topgallant Charley's artfulness, that ye'll be deceived by it? Will ye be the dupes of his foxy, cozening tongue? I tell you he's...'
'Tell us why ye mounted no guns on the bluff!' a buccaneer interrupted him.
'Answer for your cuckoldy self!' cried another, and--'Answer as he bids you, you son of a slut!' a third demanded, whereafter in a roar he was assailed by the cry 'Answer! Answer!'
Quaking and livid, he stood before them, accounting himself lost, seeing himself in fancy already torn to pieces. But de Bernis, having used Wogan as a lightning conductor so as to deflect their frenzy from himself, could now afford to despise and spare him. He stepped forward once more to claim and hold attention.
'Let the fool be!' he admonished them. 'After all, considering where the blame lies will not save us from this danger. It's how to meet it we must consider.'
That made them all attentive. He saw the round moon face of Halliwell turned upon him, and the fiery Ellis at the ponderous shipmaster's elbow. Bundry, dry and snappy, at his side made an interjection.
'Faith! It'll need a mort of considering!'
'Courage, Bundry! There's no reason yet to despond.'
'I don't want for courage,' Bundry snapped back. 'But I don't want for sense either.'
'A man may have both, and yet want for invention,' said de Bernis.
'If ye can invent anything as'll help us, Charley,' cried Halliwell, 'we'll follow you to hell after this!' And from the men came a roar of confirmation to encourage de Bernis. His brow was dark with thought. He turned his shoulders upon Wogan, who, shaken and still trembling from the fright he had sustained, had fallen back a little, and waited white-faced and half-numbed for whatever might follow now that he had shot his bolt and found it turned into a boomerang.
Monsieur de Bernis was smiling wistfully as he replied. 'I doubt if Topgallant Charley will lead any buccaneers after today, whatever may betide the rest of you. And yet, voyons, it is possible that I may save myself with you; for you, I think, I certainly can save.'
There came from that villainous multitude an inarticulate sound such as is made by a great wave against a rock. It was a gasp expressive of their incredulity before such an announcement. And then, as the sound of it was dying down, a gun boomed from the flagship, to turn them startled towards the sea once more.
The shot had been fired high to draw their attention. The ball crashed into the palm trees beyond them. And now, as they looked, they saw the reefed foretopsail being raised and lowered. Monsieur de Bernis, with his eyes upon that signalling, was quietly counting.
'It is a call to send a boat.'
They turned to him again for direction. He took command, quite naturally. 'We must obey, or we shall be swept with langrel. Some of you launch the longboat. See to it, Halliwell.'
'D'ye want me to go?' quoth Halliwell, aghast.
'No, no. But be launching the boat, so as to let them see that we are obeying. Thus they will hold their fire. Take your time in doing it.'
Halliwell picked out six or eight men for the task, and these reluctantly departed, stifling their curiosity to hear what de Bernis might have to propose, by what means it was in his mind to work this miracle he had promised them.
The Frenchman addressed himself particularly to Bundry, but spoke so that all might hear him.
'You are to remember that there is one thing that Morgan wants, and that he wants it desperately; one thing that he is seeking, one thing for which, in the name of the English Crown, he has offered five hundred pounds. That is what he offers. But if I know him at all, to secure that thing which so long he has coveted, he would pay even more; a deal more. It might be possible even to drive such a bargain with him as would secure the lives and liberty of all of us in exchange for that one thing. Fortunately we are in a position to offer him this to him so precious object. It is the head of Tom Leach.'
Bundry sucked in his breath in surprise. He understood; but he was mistrustful. Not so the men; there was a stir among them, even a laugh or two. They perceived a grim humour in such a bargain as Monsieur de Bernis proposed to drive; an ingenious swindle, diverting to the rascals that were to profit by its perpetration; for Morgan was not to know that Leach was dead already.
And then Ellis, stepping forward, showed a difficulty.
'Aye, aye. That may well be. But who's to bear him that offer? Which of us would be safe in Morgan's lousy hands? I knows the mangy old wolf of old. If any of us was to go to him with this, that one'ld never return. Morgan'Id hang him from a yardarm and demand Tom's head as well. That's if held consent to the bargain at all.'
'He'll never consent,' said Bundry, with sudden conviction. 'Why should he? He has us all at his mercy. The old wolf'll ask unconditional surrender, and you should know it, de Bernis. Ye're a fool to think otherwise, and we're fools to listen to you.'
There was a momentary start from de Bernis. But he recovered at once.
'Fools, maybe. But not because you listen. Are you so sure he has us at his mercy? What if we take to the woods? Will he dare to land a force and follow us? Has he no ambush to fear? And how long would he take to starve us into surrender?' He felt about him a revival of the hope which Bundry had momentarily damped. 'What I propose may be a forlorn chance. Morgan may utterly reject it, as you fear. But at least let us try him with this bargain. Remember how desperately he covets the head of Tom Leach; in what danger he stands of disgrace with his Government until he gets it.'
The men loudly insisting, Bundry was overborne. He shrugged. 'Very well. But, as Ellis says, who's to bear that message? Which of us can trust himself in Morgan's hands? Unless we send Wogan. And, faith, why not? It's Wogan is to blame next to Leach for this situation.'
'Me?' cried Wogan. 'Rot you, ye swine, Bundry! Ye're as much to blame yourself!'
'I'm but a shipmaster, not a fighting seaman,' Bundry answered him.
Monsieur de Bernis interposed. 'Wait! Wait!' He half-turned and looked at Priscilla, who, with the Major's protecting arm about her waist, stood there aloof, with all the sense of living through an ugly, terrifying dream.
'There is my wife,' he said. 'Morgan does not make war on women. He never did, not even before he came to be Governor of Jamaica. Nor can he treat a woman as a buccaneer. She will be safe in his hands. Her brother and my servant Pierre will suffice to man the longboat and pull her out across the lagoon. That resolves the difficulty. She shall bear our message, our offer to Morgan: our lives and liberty, with freedom to depart from here in our ships, in exchange for the head of Tom Leach.'
'Can ye hope he'll accept?' quoth Bundry, his beady dark eyes searching the calm face of the Frenchman.
'But why not?' He spoke confidently. 'He looks upon Leach as the soul and brain of you all. It is his conviction that, if Leach were taken, this company would disband. Moreover, as I've said--and it is upon this I stake all--he fears that unless he can shortly report to the Government that he has made an end of Tom Leach, the Government may make an end of him.'
There was some muttering and some considering among the men, some argument between Ellis and Bundry.
But whatever they considered, it certainly played no part in their deliberations whether Morgan would be as tender of Madame de Bernis as her husband hoped. If they thought he took too sanguine a view of that, they did not allow the thought to weigh. What mattered was that here was someone who would bear the message. What might afterwards befall her was purely the affair of de Bernis who had proposed it.
And so in the end it was even with a measure of gratitude, and a deal of admiration for the wit which had discovered this possible way of escape, that they urged de Bernis to put his plan into execution.