The Bow (21 page)

‘The blighter has tucked himself in our wake right enough. He’ll
creep up on us, and then dart out to port and try to take the wind
out of our sails.’ He scowled and held up a cudgel that he kept by
the rail. ‘Well let him try that’s all. If it’s broadside he
wants, then we’ll meet him hard and fast.’

James didn’t say anything. He leant over the stern rail and looked
at the pirate ship as it cut through the wake not three hundred paces
away. Though the wind had strengthened and the waves had risen from a
mere chop to a cresting sea, the pirate captain had heeled the
‘lateener’ right over and was making the most of its smooth and
hungry lines.

‘Like a war-hound’ muttered James, and he measured the distance
with his eyes. Too far off, still. Especially in this wind, and with
the deck pitching crazily at every wave and trough: he’d have to
wait until at least a hundred paces, then try and pick his targets.
No point in firing at a venture now. This time he’d have to find
his man and wing him with whatever: bodkins, livery arrows,
cloutheads or swallow tails. It wouldn’t matter which. No pirate
he’d ever heard of wore plate armour at sea, and none would be able
to stand the stripe of his bow at a hundred paces or less. Pieter
also came and leaned against the rail, his eyes still fixed on the
pirate ship. ‘Knows his trade and keeps his nerve,’ he said after
a while. ‘Not bad for an Englishman.’

‘An Englishman!’ James stood up and shaded his eyes. ‘How can
you tell?’

‘By the way she’s rigged. No doubt the keel was laid in Portugal,
but the crew and captain are from England’s southern shores. I’d
bet my life on it.’

'Ye may have to,’ replied James, ‘but if they’re English . . .’

‘Makes no odds either way. English, French or Easterling they’ll
cut your throat and heave you over the side before you can cry
craven. That pretty red cross on your jack will not save you.’

James frowned and peered at the boat as it neared them. All at once
he saw the design on the masthead pennon and forehead sail. ‘You’re
right,’ he said. ‘St George’s cross. They’re my countrymen.’
He unslung his arrow-bag. ‘And I’ll not raise a hand against
them.’

Pieter shook his head. ‘Two things, laddie,’ he said. ‘First,
they’ll cut you down because you’re worth nothing to them,
English or not. That red cross is their licence to kill and plunder,
nothing more. Second I’m master of this ship, and as long as you
are on this ship you are under my command. This deck is your country
now, and I am king here.’

The two men stared at each other, neither flinching, each measuring
the strength in the gaze he saw. The planking groaned and shuddered
beneath their feet as a larger wave thumped against the hull and
spray lashed the cog from stem to stern. At last the ship’s master
spoke, lifting his voice above the roar of the sea:

‘If your bow is not ours in this fight then we are dead men.’

Still James did not answer. The shipmaster’s words seemed lost
against the wind. He was aware of the crew, all in position now,
tensed and waiting, looking at their captain and waiting for his next
command. Within a sword’s length, the tillermen wrestled with the
rudder and gasped to hold it against the thrust of the sea.

‘Will ye not fight?’

The boat staggered and wallowed as another wave struck. James lost
his footing for just a moment, and in that moment a crossbow bolt
hummed by him, brushing his jack-sleeve and burying itself up to the
fletchings in a railing post which straightway split. He glanced at
Pieter who raised one eyebrow and gave the ghost of a smile: ‘Your
countrymen, not mine,’ he said.

James smiled back grabbed his bow, and stripped off the cover. ‘I’m
ready,’ he said and strung the bow in an easy movement despite the
pitching of deck. He took eight arrows from his arrow-bag and stuck
them into the decking. Another bolt sang by and thudded into the
planking by the tillermen. The pirate ship was now directly astern by
about eighty yards, butting through the waves and closing even more
rapidly than before. Its bow was crowded with figures, and James
thought he could make out a deck mounted crossbow. He bit his lip and
nocked an arrow. Such a crossbow would have a draw weight of one
thousand pounds, its steel cable wound back by a two-handed windlass.
He had never seen one before, but he had heard that they were capable
of driving a bolt through the finest of steel plate or ‘white
harness’, and could certainly pierce two men with one shot.

A single black dot rushed towards him from the pirate ship, standing
out for an instant against the pale brown sail. Instinctively he
swayed to one side, but the bolt sped well wide, clipped the rigging
and disappeared into the greyness. Waiting briefly till the ship
steadied at the base of a trough, he leant forward, tensed,
straightened and sent a shaft winging back in reply. And another, and
another, then four more, but still no counter-shot from the pirate
bow.

James was leaning to his eighth arrow when the bolt came. The first
he knew of it was the sound of breaking timber, then a splinter of
wood struck him in the cheek. He was hurled backwards against the
railing, and fell to the deck. When he regained his footing he saw
that the tiller had been smashed and both tillermen lay dead beside
it, one transfixed by the steel shaft.

Almost immediately the ship broached, and waves crashed over its
deck. Shouting instructions above the rising wind and sea, the
shipmaster ran to the broken tiller, and began to lash it to what
remained of its wooden supports. Other crewmen dashed to his aid,
while still more hurried to the rigging and sail ropes.

By the time they had regained control and steadied the ship the
pirates were almost upon them. But they too were bouncing crazily in
the heavy sea, and James could see that their captain had shortened
sail, and was preparing to come alongside the floundering cog.

‘Ware boarders!’ he heard the master cry, and saw him take up his
cudgel. Gasping and slipping, James caught up his bow, snatched a
brace of arrows and ran to the starboard railing. He found himself
looking down onto the deck of the pirate ship. It was crowded with
armed men looking up at him. Almost without thinking he fired twice
into the upturned faces. With that the ships struck one another
broadside throwing men about on both decks. There were cries and
warning shouts followed by a flicker of crossbow arrows. Two men
pitched forward into the narrow, pulsing gap between the cog and
lateener. Drawing out the last of his arrows, James took aim at man
he took to be the captain: a broad-faced, red-bearded giant with
old-style breastplate and a mail aventail. He was carrying a
double-headed axe, and roaring at his men in a deep west-country
brogue. Unused to the sudden shifting of the cog, James loosed a
shade early. The arrow missed its target but felled the pirate
standing next to the giant who turned to see where the shot had come
from.

All at once the rain came lashing down, driving across the ships in
freezing gusts that mixed with the sea spray and white-tops, and
turned the decking slick. For a moment the pirates seemed to
hesitate, and the lateener sheered away two spear lengths. But then
it came surging back on a sudden wave and crashed against the hull of
the John de Groen. Even before James could draw his broadsword
there were men swarming over the railings and onto the deck. He
grabbed one by the shoulders as he swung across the rail and butted
him hard with the rim of his pot-helm. The man gasped, flung his arms
back and disappeared over the side. Immediately, another came at
James, his short-hafted axe raised, and teeth bared below a shaggy
moustache. With no time to draw his sword, James snatched his
ballock knife, and drove it at the attacker’s throat. The blade
struck home, there was a choking cry, and the pirate dropped to the
deck. The rain came down harder still making it difficult to see more
than a few feet, and as the ships pitched and buffeted in the heavy
sea, the fight quickly lost all sense of order, and became no more
than a deadly brawl. It was the kind of set-too that archers were
used to in the taverns of Flanders when indentured men, goaded by
rough maize beer and gaming dice would turn on one another and fight
until the watch came through the door. There was no mercy, no call
for quarter, and each man fought for himself, striking out blindly
wherever he could.

Twice James felt himself dragged down from behind, and twice he
twisted like an eel and broke the grip before the killing stroke
could fall. Once he narrowly missed stabbing one of Pieter’s men,
and several times he was driven to his knees as a body fell against
him.

He was exhausted now, fighting in a mad frenzy, but struggling to
keep his footing. His dagger was knocked out of his hand by a jarring
blow from an axe haft, and he snatched wildly for his sword. It
jammed in the scabbard, and he gasped as a dark figure reared up in
front of him, out of the driving rain and spume. Then just as at
Agincourt, all that while ago, a strike from over his shoulder, and
the swift shadow of a cudgel as it broke the darkness ahead of him.

‘Up lad! Up! There’s more to be done!’ Pieter, ship’s master,
hauled him to his feet, laughed and struck about him with the cudgel.
Three more English pirates had fallen with stoved-in skulls before
James could even nod his thanks. He finally managed to free his
sword, and brought it straight to parry as a war hammer swept down on
his helmet. His blade, which he kept so well oiled and honed, cut
deep into the shaft below the iron rivets. With a cracking sound the
shaft gave way and he smashed the pommel of his sword hard against
the pirate’s jaw. The pirate jeered, spat teeth, then took him by
the throat. James knew the move: one hand to grip the throat and
crush the windpipe, the other to strike low at the stomach or groin.
He wrenched himself sideways, at the same time hacking down hard with
his sword against the pirate’s wrist. He felt the edge of his blade
smash the bone. At the same time the jagged shaft of the war-hammer
scored across his hip, the fingers about his throat released their
grip, and the pirate stepped back with a scream of rage and pain. A
moment later the man was dead, struck down from behind, and James
stood over him breathing hard and swaying with the deck.

The fight for the John de Groen was over as quickly as it had
started. The attackers suddenly turned and melted away, scrambling
over the side, and back onto their ship, leaving their wounded to be
despatched by cheering sailors. A flash of lightning lit the waters
all about them, and a clap of thunder shook the rigging and masts.
‘Away! Away!’ roared Pieter, as the boatswain cut through the
boarding ropes. ‘They’ve no more taste for us.’ He kicked a
body at his feet. James glanced down, and saw that it was the pirate
captain, spread-eagled among the dead and dying, his eyes already
glazed over, and his breastplate all stoved in.

The ship lurched, crashed once more against the lateen-rig, and then
turned slowly to windward as the crew brought her back under control.
At the same time the pirate ship, short of crew, and without its
captain, heeled over in the driving seas, sails flapping, and slowly
disappeared into the murk.

A wave of nausea swept over James and he sank down on one knee,
reaching out for what remained of the broken railing. The deck seemed
awash with blood and sea water and filth. The stench struck at his
nostrils and stomach. He retched.

‘Not pretty, is it?’ said Pieter, breathing hard. ‘Still, I
s’pose ye’ve seen worse.’

James looked up, smiled and shook his head. ‘It’s the deck,’ he
said. It won’t stay still.’

The crew cleared away the dead, both pirate and friend, casting them
over the side with either a curse or a muttered prayer. The wounded
were carried below and left in the care of an old cordwainer, working
his passage to Harfleur, and the two young women from Bruges who had
emerged after the fighting stopped.

Within the hour the ship’s carpenter had repaired the tiller, and
Pieter had set course for Harfleur. Just as the last of the rigging
was checked, and the sail was trimmed, the windstorm began to die
away. Overhead the cloud broke up, the sun came through, and daylight
swept across a flattening sea.

'That’s more like it!’ Pieter breathed in deeply again and smote
his chest. ‘Calm waters at last, and a friendly breeze to see us
safe to port. But look now! Your English friends, James! They put
their tails between their legs and run for home!’ He pointed
westward at the faint silhouette of the lateener bobbing against the
grey-green horizon. ‘We’ll not be seeing them again.’ Resting
his hand on the tiller arm, he nodded at the tillerman. ‘Keep her
firm to south and west. I’ll call the shoals when we round the
headland at Cap le Havre.’

James who had been sitting on the deck with his back to a gunwale,
sighed and got slowly to his feet. The bruises were beginning to
smart, and the keen wind, though much lighter now, was chilling him
to the bone. Half buried among some broken weapons and discarded
armour, he noticed his bow and arrow-bag. Stooping over, he picked
them up. ‘I’ll be glad for solid ground,’ he said.

Over the next hour they sluiced the decks with buckets of sea water
and fixed the shattered railings and gunwales as best they could.
Feeling sick, James sought out the sailor who had given him the leaf
to chew. The sailor grunted, laughed, and slapped him on the back.
Then he gave him three more leaves from his wallet. ‘Nearly home,
lad!’ he said.

The sun grew brighter, the sea became no more than a gentle swell
once more, and as the sun reached its final quarter the two women of
Bruges came out on deck. They stood on the battered forecastle,
looked eastwards to France, and let the wind blow their corn-blond
hair free.