When the order was given aboard Hecate, it meant little more than ‘clear away the crockery’. For one thing, it was behaviour unlikely to go unnoticed by the enemy, and my attacks, so often against far heavier opponents, invariably depended upon surprise. A hatch was opened; a pair of goats and a hen-coop were stowed below, while the boats were trailed astern. The off-watch, summoned to quarters by the boatswain’s whistle, set about filling buckets with sea-water and distributing them amongst the guns. Powder and shot were passed about and sand was spread on the decks, lest they become slippery with blood. In every spare socket of the pin-rails a pistol or a cutlass was put, and a myriad other things done to make Hecate ready for combat.
Polly returned, a look of triumph on his face, waving his watercolour in exultation. Behind him, each carrying a fat folio, trotted Hawke and Godfrey, looking as pleased with themselves as they might had they just discovered the Ark of the Covenant.
“Milady! Milady!” Polly crowed, “We have found him!”
Turning to young Godfrey (the prettier one, you will recall), I asked,”Qu’est ce que c’est que tu as trouvé?”
His reply came without hesitation:
“Madame, this House of Guise – it is not truly a house at all, nor even a proper Dukedom. There are lands, but it is the title itself that is the distinction.”
“Go on, boy,” I urged, noting with some apprehension a veritable thicket of bookmarks sprouting from the volume in his hands.
“Madame, if you please, the Dukedom was created in 1528, elevating a branch of the House of Lorraine, and…” Young Hawke chimed in – evidently he was not, as I had assumed, entirely ignorant of French –“And Milady, the coat of arms – they are the arms of royal families, Lorraine, Anjou, Luxembourg, Condé…” I cut him off.
“Peace, boy! One at a time! And if you please, Master Godfrey, spare us the entire family history – just tell me the state of the title as it stands.”
“Aye, Ma’am. The last to hold the title was Henriette of Bavaria, the Princess Palatine. Some say her husband had a rare disease, some, even, that he was a, a werewolf, Ma’am, but the Princess had a kindly heart, and cared for him until his death. They had ten children; several died in infancy and one, a daughter, ‘tis said was lost at sea. Under Spanish law, Ma’am, a daughter may inherit while the French, subject to the King’s wish, would revert the title to her husband. The fate of this lost daughter, Ma’am, cannot be verified.
“The only surviving son is Louis, the Duke of Bourbon and Prince of Conti or Condé – these titles, from his father, take precedence, Ma’am. The arms on yonder pennon are not his.”
I did not turn to look at Hasdrubal Bonaparte’s face at that moment, for I knew it would be more triumphant than I could abide. Instead, I asked the boys, “Can you tell me who might lay claim to this title?”
The buck-toothed Hawke was the first to answer: “If you please, Ma’am, the fairest claimant is the lost daughter, if she lives, but most would say the title belongs to Signor Gonzaga, the Duke of Mantua…”
“That’s absurd,” I snapped. The Gonzaga family has held absolute rule in Mantua and most of Lombardy for centuries. “I have had…” I paused, choosing a word, “…dealings with the present Duke – he can have no interest, on that I stake my life.” The nature of my dealing with Ferdinand Gonzaga was nobody’s business but my own, but I knew full well that he was fully occupied with keeping Mantua in his own clutches and out of those of his uncle-in-law, who happened to be the Holy Roman Emperor. I need not again remind the Reader that the politics of this period are somewhat intricate.
“Master Hawke, have you another suggestion?”
“Beg pard’n Milady, there might be two dozen pretenders, any of them wealthy enough to fit out a ship…” I was warming to this boy; behind his plain features seemed to lurk a quick and subtle brain, but at that instant a cry from the lookout intervened:
“Ahoy on deck! Making Sail!”
Sure enough, while I and most of my officers had been distracted by our discussion, the anonymous vessel in the distance had hoisted her spankers and, for all that the breeze was still very light, was making away from us. This could mean only one of two things – he either did not know who shared that patch of sea with him, or he did not care. In either case, he was in a hurry.
“Mr. O’Sullivan?”
“Aye, Ma’am?”
“We shall engage this wretch, but we shall not yet take him. Sail me into his wake and hold there – I wish to see whether he will run from me, for if, indeed, he is the anonymous Duke in that letter, he must know who pursues him. If he is any sailor at all he may attempt to turn and bring us under his guns, but you shall not let him.”
“Aye, Ma’am.”
I turned to young Hawke and Godfrey, “Well done, lads. If you are still alive, you shall dine with me in my cabin tonight.”
I had just commanded my Sailing-Master to play a dangerous game. We had the weather gage, which is to say, the wind would drive us constantly toward the enemy. He could not escape, but he could, at any instant, turn to larboard or starboard, spilling the wind from his sails while Hecate sailed headlong into his broadside – two dozen guns, each spitting thirty pounds of hot iron. If he was skilled enough, and his crew well-trained, he could steer a snake’s course, bringing each broadside to bear in alternation. Well I knew that most of his shot would miss, but some must strike and half a dozen hits might cripple us. What I had ordered was, in effect, to demand constant vigilance; to put the life of my ship in the hands of her lookouts. A dangerous game, to be sure, and one that could not last beyond nightfall.
I did have one advantage, to take it I spoke quietly to the Helmsman, my mysterious Navajo witch-doctor.
“Helm, can you find me a mark for the long nines?”
These weapons were unique in the Caribbean in that century. Mounted on Hecate’s fo’c’stle, this beautiful pair of cast bronze pieces were death to an enemy who let me fall in behind him. Twice the length (so twice the range) of any other ship-borne gun in the world, they were like a vampire’s fangs. I will not go into the technicalities, but ship-building and gun-founding were yet to advance to a state where such artillery was either common or practical. The Helmsman stood silent, wooden, one eye fixed on his compass, the other on my quarry, fully three leagues ahead. He squinted upwards, at the ripple in the windward edge of the mizzen royal, Hecate’s loftiest sail.
Finally, he spoke, “Bring balls.”
“Guns!” I called.
“Ja, min Kapten?” replied the burly Swede.
“Send up a dozen nine-pound shot, good ones.” Not all round-shot, you understand, are quite round.
When the shot were deposited on the deck at his feet, the steersman squatted and ran his leathery fingers over each one, weighing it, turning it this way and that, until he found four that he liked; these he placed in a line upon the deck. Returning to the helm, he turned a few points to port, and back, to starboard, and back, causing the round-shot to roll, and return, roll, and return. All the while he muttered a strange, wordless, tuneless song. In a few minutes he had brought the iron balls to life, they danced a little ballet around each other and finally, he turned to me and spoke.
“I have mark,” he said. To Günnar Günnarson, “Load very careful. For powder, use freshest, one fifth weight of ball.”
I would call anyone a liar who told such a tale, but I saw it with my own eyes.
VI The Long Nines
Turning to my Gunnery-Master, I quietly asked, “Pappenheim, at Lützen – tell me, was it a fair shot?”
“Nie, Morm,”