Caribbee (36 page)

For the flying column, it was a different matter. Thankfully, they had Renzi’s detailed description, carefully sketched out, with his estimate of its defences. How it would be protected was any man’s guess but if they moved fast and advanced on it from inland they had a good chance of surprise.

Renzi stood at his side as Kydd received his stream of reporting officers. ‘Nicholas, I’m giving you Mr Curzon and a midshipman, with Mr Clinton and eight of his marines, and a dozen armed seamen. Look after them, if you please.’

‘You’ll be requiring Mr Gilbey to head the shore party?’

‘Not on this occasion. Tyrell leads his party so it’s to be expected I shall do likewise.’

‘Interesting. That Tyrell is taking a party himself, that is. Will it be his own men he leads? I wonder if they’ll follow …’

Kydd raised an eyebrow. ‘We’ve both seen him in a tight corner before, against the revolutionaries in Brittany. There’s many a man owes his life to his bloody-minded leadership.’

‘Umm. We shall see, I think.’

On the hour a gun banged in
Hannibal
and her colours rose. They were on their way.

The assault was planned for dawn, allowing the expedition to pass in clear waters by Guadeloupe in the hours of darkness, to appear out of the mists of daybreak directly before the island of Marie-Galante.

As sunrise tinged the sea with pink and gold, the inhabitants of Marie-Galante and their defenders watched with disbelief then fear as a battleship and four frigates closed in to less than a mile offshore and boats, too many to count, started towards them, in each scarlet and gold, blue and white – and the glitter of steel.

From his own boat on its way to the end of the reef to the south, Kydd could see the Hannibals heading in a mile north towards Grand Anse. It was all going according to plan: they were both out of range of the fort above the town and could land unopposed.

The shoreline grew clearer. At Pointe des Basses the reef ended and he took in pale beaches and thick dark vegetation nearly down to the water’s edge. Ideal for the landing.

‘There, where the fallen tree touches the water,’ Kydd instructed Poulden, who obediently put over the tiller. The other craft were strung astern – it was going to be easy, just— But then he saw figures moving urgently among the thick growth and the first shots rang out in the still morning air, gunsmoke rising lazily. The four marines tasked in each boat got to work in the bows, firing at the origins of the smoke, methodically reloading in relays.

It was imperative to get men ashore, whatever the cost. Having the equivalent of five regiments’ artillery afloat was a dead card, however – the ships would be firing on their own men.

As they drew nearer the shore the whip of bullets was more insistent.

‘Pull, y’ bastards! Lay out and pull for your lives!’ Kydd bawled. The men heaved like demons and the boats flew; the firing fell off as they came in and the opposition melted away.

The boat hissed to a stop in the sand and the men scrambled out, following Kydd, army niceties like forming up lost in the urgency to gain a foothold. Fronds and branches whipped across his face as he led them on, nerves stretched to the extreme. He slashed at the vegetation with his sword until he came upon a semblance of a track that wound inland.

‘Move yourselves!’ he bellowed, and went along the path at a trot. He could hear the clink and jingle of the men panting behind him as they followed. Almost certainly the firing had been from a platoon hastily sent to delay them, but their expectation would be that the invaders would turn down the coast road to advance on Grand-Bourg, while of course they were heading inland.

After a couple of hundred yards Kydd slowed at a clearing and waited for his force to come up with him. ‘Well done, you men!’ he acknowledged breathlessly. ‘We head into the country, then hook around until we’re above the town. A mile or two at most. Where’s Mr Renzi?’

His friend, solemnly flanked by both Curzon and Clinton, the Royal Marines lieutenant, was in plain but serviceable civilian dress with a wide hat set at a rakish angle.

Kydd gave him a tight smile. ‘Nicholas, you know where you want to go. Stay with us until you’re ready to move on the base. March on!’

Almost without warning a rearing cliff, hundreds of feet high, loomed above the trees and palms. But they saw the path took a sideways loop following the contours and they made good speed, their altitude rising slightly and Grand-Bourg firmly in sight below.

Tyrell had been right: this route had taken the defenders completely by surprise and now they had only to meet in the heights above the capital, then together descend to victory.

The going got thicker as they neared the town. Sheltered depressions were covered with luxuriant growth, and at one of these Renzi decided to make his move. ‘The villa – it’s down further, about a quarter-mile. I’ll, er, leave you now, if I may.’

Kydd watched Renzi and his party vanish downwards into the lush green, then ordered his men onwards.

The joining up would be very soon now.

Bowden was in the second boat behind Tyrell and could hear the man’s roars as he urged on his rowers. It had been a fraught time in the lead-up to the landings; Tyrell seemed to have no idea of the knife-edge of feeling among the men. While the squadron was formed up there was no danger of a bloody mutiny, but there would be other times and places …

Tyrell’s bulldog character, aroused by the coming battle, was transforming him. Petty spite and vindictiveness was replaced by a towering eagerness to fall on the enemy. The moods, the suspicions, the menace were gone, leaving a roaring, raging warrior.

Away to the right
L’Aurore
’s boats were nearly in, white puffs along the coastline showing where they were meeting with opposition. It seemed to have drawn the enemy’s full attention for their own length of coast was quiet and the boats came to a rest in a sheltered sandy cove. Bowden remembered it was here that Columbus had landed to name the island.

There was an uncanny stillness but Tyrell stormed fearlessly inland and found a clearing. ‘To me!’ he bellowed, raising his naked sword.

The men came on warily, sullen. Bowden formed them up in a rough file and moved them to Tyrell, who was waiting impatiently. They tramped forward into the thickening growth after him, but from none came the customary joking and easy talk to be expected of Jack ashore.

Next to him marched Hinckley, an older captain in charge of the small detachment of the 69
^th
Gloucestershires that made up a third of their force. ‘I mislike this quiet,’ he muttered. ‘I’d be happier were there scouts on our flank.’

Bowden glanced at him. Hinckley had seen service around the world and was much respected by his men. ‘We’d be slowed, surely.’

‘We’d be slowed more should they press home an attack while your men are strung out like that.’ He had his own troops in a tight formation, muskets a-port, alert for anything.

As they trudged on inland, from out of sight ahead came the occasional bull roar of Tyrell’s hectoring. Bowden fancied he could hear musket fire in the direction of the
L’Aurore
landing and, with a pang, wondered how they were faring – so like a dream had been his service in the frigate, utterly different from the sour moodiness in
Hannibal
.

But he had to accept that this was his duty … and with a turn of the stomach he remembered that after this action was over there had to be an accounting – a resolution to the dilemma the
Hannibal
officers faced.

Ragged firing broke out ahead. As one, the seamen dived for cover, wriggling into bushes and under broad-leafed ferns. The soldiers stayed in formation, nervously eyeing Hinckley.

‘I’ll go up and see what’s afoot,’ Bowden said, loping forward in a crouch.

They were not far from the join-up position, the ridge above the town, but it quickly became clear that something had happened.

‘God damn them for a parcel of old women!’ choked Tyrell, hunkered down and gesturing angrily at the strewn articles of abandoned kit on the path and his men cowering in the vegetation. ‘As it’s only a few Crapaud militia sent to delay us!’

There was desultory firing from positions off to the left and a stray bullet whipped through the branches and leaves above.

‘Get up and move!’ Tyrell roared in vexation. He stood up. ‘To the fore, advance, you mumping rogues – or I’ll have every man jack o’ you flogged to within an inch o’ your lives.’

None came out from their hiding places.

‘By God!’ he yelled. ‘I’ll have the hide off you for as cowardly a bunch of lubbers as ever I’ve heard on. We’ve an island to conquer – get on your feet
and go
!’

Still there was no movement and Tyrell’s face turned red. ‘To hell and damnation with you for a scurvy crew who know no discipline! If I have to go alone I’ll do it – d’ you hear there?’

He hesitated for a few moments more. Then, with a roar of frustration and with drawn sword, he raced forward across the seventy yards or so of clear ground ahead. There was no firing, and he made the ridge safely, flopping down at its crest. ‘Move, you chicken-hearted shabs!’ he yelled, beckoning urgently back at them. ‘Forward, or fry in Hell for ever after I’ve hanged the lot o’ you!’

There was a stirring but not one broke cover to join him.

Bowden’s every instinct was to urge them on to go up with him but where did his real duty lie? His own men were still on their way and his place was with them.

He turned and raced back to call for Hinckley’s soldiers.

This was the climax, Renzi told himself, as they pressed forwards down the path. Not only for the process of clearing his reputation but for the elimination of the biggest threat that existed to the British holdings in the Caribbean, the largest source of revenue to a country locked in war against a world-toppling tyrant.

He led the way; Curzon hurried close behind. He’d taken care before to register that the villa lay in a particular fold in the hills slightly to the north-east, which they were now descending.

He stopped. The faded orange tiles of the roof were visible through the foliage below.

Now for the final act.

‘I believe their attention will be on our fleet and the landings and they are not troubling to look behind them,’ he told Curzon and Clinton. ‘They’ll be considering their position, whether to abandon now or wait until the situation is clearer. I do believe they’ll remain for a while longer – to destroy such a successful operation unnecessarily would be a sad mistake for them.’

Scouts returned with the welcome news that, but for watchers on the balcony, there seemed to be no sign of anything approaching a frenzied defence.

They had the luxury of time to prepare.

‘Your suggestions, gentlemen?’ Renzi invited.

Clinton began crisply, ‘A file of men to each side, out of sight. L’tenant Curzon with the remainder at the ready here. The two files meet and advance with me from the front. The instinct of the defenders is to break for the rear, where we will give them due welcome.’

‘Then I will be with you, Mr Clinton,’ Renzi said firmly.

‘Oh – no, sir. We’ve brought you here now and Mr Kydd was most insistent that—’

‘We cannot delay further, sir.’

‘Very well, Mr Renzi,’ Clinton said, with a lopsided grin. ‘Sar’nt Dodd – the right-hand side.’

Stealthily they threaded down past the villa to the road. Clinton watched for Dodd’s signal that his group was ready, then the two broke into a run, approaching each other and turning to take position. With shouts of dismay, the balcony cleared on an instant.

Renzi paused, letting first one then the other squad enter the garden, firing as they went. Three men burst out from the house but were dropped with musket fire before they had made a few yards. Dodd raced for the door and took position to one side. Musket butts smashed it inwards. Dodd and three others disappeared inside.

Unable to contain himself, Renzi hurried to join them. In the disorder he heard shouts and a single shot, followed by running feet. Then came a smell of burning. He knew where it had to be and motioned to a marine to deal with the door to the operations room. It flew open and inside he saw a man bent over a small fire trying to burn papers. He jerked up in despair. Renzi knocked him aside and stamped on the flames.

Everything was in a chaos of disarray, documents and empty drawers, with office paraphernalia scattered about the floor.

‘Secure the room!’ Renzi ordered loudly.

He picked up a singed paper. With rising exultation he saw it was an order on a vessel to assume a specified position to take the English trading ketch
Sunrise.
Another was a return on goods seized on a prize, signed by an illegible hand.

‘Sah!’ It was Dodd, fighting down a broad smile. ‘Mr Curzon’s compliments an’ could you attend on him, out the back, like.’

‘Very well. Nothing to be touched here, if you please.’

Curzon was in the garden. Two lines of marines and seamen grinned triumphantly at a huddle in the centre of nearly a dozen individuals, some in uniform.

‘Ah, Mr Renzi,’ he drawled. ‘I’d like to introduce the former owners of this villa who thought to run. None got away, o’ course, so you have the entire gang here for your inspection.’

Renzi gave a short bow. It was the end of a perfect day. From them he would learn just how the operation functioned: where the fleet was located, its system of communication, intelligence … So many things needed answers to draw a line under the whole incredible enterprise.

Kydd stopped and held up his hand. ‘Quiet!’ he hissed. They heard shots from the general direction of the ridge selected for the joining up.

‘Forward!’ he growled. ‘And watch your front.’

The path wound along the contour on the flank of the hill, but until they were fully around, whatever was happening was obscured.

A little further on, they came to a ravine and a small wooden bridge.

‘Stop!’ He heard popping on the other side of the hill where he guessed the ridge must begin. If that was so, Tyrell was in some kind of engagement – but this bridge would make a classic defensive position that could stop an army.