Nobody's Slave (34 page)

Afterwards he remembered many things. The shocked, open mouth of the first Spaniard who turned, swinging his clubbed arquebus - too late, as Madu's spear took him through the ribs at the seam of his armour. The way the man shuddered, collapsing like a metal doll as Madu kicked him to pull the spear out. He remembered the muleteer who he shot with an arrow in the throat; and the short desperate struggle with the horseman as he clattered back from the head of the line. The Spanish officer sliced the top off Madu's shield with his sword and drew back his sword to slice off his head as well. But before he could do it Tom stabbed the man hard through the thigh with his spear, which pierced both man and horse in one blow so that the animal shied and galloped away back down the line with the spear pinning the man’s leg to his horse's side and the hooded hawk flapping and clawing desperately to keep its grip on the rider’s arm.

Then all the mules sat down. Once someone had grabbed the reins of the leading mule and brought it to a halt, it bent its legs and eased itself down with a sigh, as it had been trained to do, and all those in the long line behind it did the same, snorting and rolling their eyes in confusion at the murderous antics of the humans rushing around them.

In a few minutes all the Spaniards had gone, running away down the road or into the trees; and there were only mules, the dead, and a few wounded writhing on the ground. Madu looked at Tom, surprised, over the top of his broken shield.

‘So quick? What we do now?’

They hurried back up the road, along an enormous, everlasting line of seated mules, but there was no-one to left to fight. The English sailors were already unbuckling the wooden boxes from the mules' backs, levering open the lids and crying out in delight at what they found within.

‘Silver! More silver!’

‘Gold! Look 'ee here - there must be stuff worth a million ducats here - enough to buy a queen's palace!’

Tom wrenched open a box himself, and saw the same – short bars of rich, gleaming gold, the melted-down riches of Peru. Enough in that one small box, probably, to buy him his own farm at home in Devon - or a ship, or a hundred horses, if he wanted.

‘Look, Maddy - here, take a box for yourself - go on, quick!’

Madu smiled in amused incomprehension. ‘No. Is for you, all this, not me. Why I need gold?’

Tom gaped. ‘Why? Why, to buy things, of course! It’s riches, boy, wealth - huge wealth! You could buy the world with this!’

‘Who I buy it from? I live here, you know. We buy nothing, here in the forest. The trees and rivers give us what we need.’

‘But ... you're not going to leave it here?’ Tom was stunned. He could not believe what he was hearing. There was no time to argue. The Spaniards might come back at any time. Madu moved towards another mule, and began unloading it, still with that strange, mocking grin on his face.

‘Oh no, I take my share - same as Pedro and the others.’ He nodded to where the rest of the Cimarrons were unloading mules beside the sailors. ‘But not for myself - just to annoy Spaniards.’

‘Stack it by the road, lads, quick as ye can!’ cried Francis, laughing as he strode down the road, puffed up with triumph like a game-cock. ‘Didn't I say I'd bring ye the riches of the Indies? Does any man here say that it's not enough?’

There were something like fifteen tons of silver, as well as one of gold - far too much for them to carry without the mules, and mules could not travel through the forest, the way they had to go. So they spent the early part of the afternoon burying the silver in amongst the trees, whilst they listened anxiously for the first sign of the returning Spaniards. The churchbells began to ring alarm in Nombre de Dios; but by that time the silver was buried, and they began their hurried, sweating march northwards through the forest, each man carrying as much gold as he could.

They did not sleep until nightfall, many miles away; and all the time they had been travelling they had been listening, wondering if the Spaniards were on their trail. The next day they were up before dawn, to face another long, sweaty trek through the forest to the river-mouth where the pinnaces were to meet them. From there, they could sail west to a secret bay, Port Pheasant, where the ships were anchored.

T
WO DAYS long weary march through the forest, each man carrying a heavy box full of gold. Several times Tom thought of dropping his altogether, the weight was so heavy. But that was unthinkable. Just a few miles more, he kept telling himself. Over the next hill, and we’ll be there.

And the hill after that. And another one.

Soon they would reach the mouth of a small river, Francis told them. That was where the boats were waiting. The two pinnaces that would carry them and the gold to their ships, and on back to England. Where they would be safe, and wealthy for the rest of their lives, if they wanted.

Just one more hill. Through the forest. And the hill after that …

But at the river-mouth, disaster struck.

The two pinnaces were gone. From a clifftop at the end of the cape, five small ships could be seen. But they were all flying the flag of Spain.

Tom was aghast. So near, and yet so far. The heavy box of gold in his hands seemed worthless, a mockery - he would have given it all for the sight of an English ship. He stood with the others beside Francis, gazing out to sea in disbelief.

‘But how could the Spaniards get here so soon? How did they know where to come?’

Francis shook his head without speaking, the light southerly breeze ruffling the dark curls of his hair while the chorus of panic rose around him.

‘They must’ve taken our pinnaces. Likely two of those are ours!’

‘The poor lads who were guarding them! They’ll be dead or tortured now!’

‘’Twill be our turn next! We must march further north to where the ships are!’

‘That's another two days’ march away by land! And if they have caught our boats they’ll be holding someone's hand in the fire, now, till he tells 'em where the harbour’s to!’

Francis turned away from the sea to confront his men, decisive as always. ‘Even if the Spaniards have caught ’em, which we don’t know, our lads have told them nothing yet. Look! Why else are they sending three pinnaces south, when our harbour’s two days north of here? And I don’t believe those are our boats at all. They don’t look the same. Ours are probably hidden, further north or out to sea ...’

‘No-one could tell at this range, Francis, without the eyes of an eagle,’ broke in the slow, drawling voice of another man, John Oxenham. ‘Anyhow, the fact remains the pinnaces aren’t here, when we need them.’

‘So what do we do? Sit and wait, like bullocks in a field, or go in search?’

‘How? ’Tis two days’ march, and I can hardly stand.’

‘What if we do march north, and the ships aren't there?’

‘Or the Spaniards are there before us?’

Again the chorus of weary, worried voices all around. Tom felt frantic and exhausted, both at once; all that hurry, all that effort, for nothing. He saw Madu and the other Cimarrons standing quietly together. They seemed impassive, a clear contrast to the desperate Englishmen. But then they were not marooned. They didn’t need a ship; this was their own country.

‘We'll build a new craft!’ Francis said. ‘See those logs in the river there, brought down by the storm? We'll sail north to find the ships - 'tis a more seamanlike way than walking!’

The exhausted sailors gazed dully at the jam of logs by the beach; but such was Francis's energy and their own desperation that by mid-day a crazy raft had been built, with a dozen logs lashed together, a ten-foot mast with a sack for a sail, and a small tree shaped into a steering oar. Four makeshift oars could be roughly pivoted between short upright thole-pins, if they did not work loose. But as they were building it, the southerly wind got up, and white waves could be seen breaking in the estuary. The breeze eased the oven-like heat of the sun, but Tom felt the enthusiasm around him cooling also.

‘There now,’ Francis said. ‘She’s ready as she'll ever be. We’ve half the day before us, and the wind’s in the right quarter. Time to put to sea. Who’s coming with me?’

An embarrassing silence fell. Red beard jutting, one hand on the mast, the short, determined captain stared challengingly at his sailors. The raft rocked unsteadily in the quiet bay of the river, the ripples lapping against her stern.

‘Come on - I can’t sail her single-handed!’

‘Wouldn’t it be better to wait until ...’

‘I’ll go!’ Tom stepped forward, even before he had decided. It was their only chance; the quavering voices behind him reminded him too much of the helplessness that had led them all to surrender before, at Tampice in Mexico.

‘Good lad, Tom!’ Francis clapped him on the back as he stepped on board, and Tom realised with embarrassed pride that since he had been on the
Jesus
he had grown several inches taller than his older cousin.

‘No more?’ Two men followed, but the rest of the sailors still stayed behind, gazing mistrustfully out beyond the estuary. ‘I could do with a couple more, lest we have to storm one of their galleons.’

It was crazy, quite absurdly crazy; yet Tom felt his heart leap with pride at the confidence of the little man beside him. He laughed at the anxious faces on the beach, and saw Madu muttering urgently to the Cimarron leader, Pedro. Then Madu and Pedro stepped forward, with four other black men. Pedro was grinning hugely, as though it was the greatest joke in the world.

‘We come, Capitan Francisco. The boy here tell me you have some skill at sailing, and when is time for fight you can leave that to us.’

‘Then you're welcome.’ And so with ten men, a dozen gourds of water, and a box of fruit, the ramshackle little raft was pushed out into the stream.

‘If it please God I reach the ship, I’ll be back for the treasure, and get ye all on board, too,’ Francis called out to the sailors left behind. It reminded Tom of the promise John Hawkins had given, long ago, when he sailed away in the
Minion,
leaving him and the others on a beach. He never wanted to risk that again.

But this raft had risks of its own. For the next few minutes there was a flurry of action as they learned how to sail it. The raft turned completely round three times in the current while they were hoisting the sail, and it needed two men leaning on the steering oar to get it pointing in the right direction.

Tom sat down on the soaking deck, with an arm round Madu's shoulder, as much to stop himself from falling overboard as for friendship. They were more likely to drown, he thought, than to sail very far in this.

‘What have you come for, Maddy? 'Tis madness - can't you see it?’

Madu laughed. ‘Is more mad to stay on land, and wait for Spanish to come. Besides, you are our allies - we must guard you safe to your ship.’

‘That's the spirit!’ A hearty laugh came from astern, where Francis still wrestled with the steering oar. ‘Didn't I tell 'ee long ago, Tom, how these Africans are as brave heroes as us? Braver, by the look of it today!’

Tom's answer was drowned in a sheet of spray that came leaping aft, drenching them all; they had reached the turbulence at the mouth of the estuary, where the incoming breakers battled with the current of the river. For the next few minutes the sailors tried to straighten the raft with the oars and sail, as it lurched through the short, steep waves that broke constantly over the deck and soaked them all. At last they came through, and adjusted the little sackcloth sail to take them clear of the northern cape, over the steady rollers and out to sea. The Cimarron leader, Pedro, turned to Madu and said, in his deep, careful English: ‘You have telled me these English are good seamen, and I see you are right. But to be bad seaman must be worse than I had thought.’

There was a shout of derisive laughter from Tom and Francis.

‘You mock, Pedro,’ said Francis, ‘but to come through there in this craft is like you taking a small knife to spear a leopard. Don’t worry, we’re past the worst - 'tis all plain sailing now.’

Tom gaped at his cousin in awe. Already, as they came past the point, the waves were becoming bigger. In the troughs between the waves the land vanished from sight; then as they rose to the top of the next wave there was a burst of white water, breaking with a rush and gurgle all around them and then fading, like a cat flexing its claws. As they came past the point the land fell away to the west, leaving a vast bay of heaving, blue-grey sea, flecked everywhere by white horses. To take ten men across that in a raft twelve feet long and six across, and call it plain sailing, was an experiment with the truth that took his breath away.

Francis winked at him. ‘Well, we’ve a good wind aft, haven’t we, Tom? What more could our little galleon want?’

That was true, sure, but with the land falling away to the west, it meant they would have to trim the little craft's sail almost fore and aft when they wished to come in to land, and no-one knew if that would work. If it didn't, they would be blown out to sea. But at the moment there were other problems.

‘All of ye keep your eyes open for ships! Any ship, whatever it is. We want to see before we’re seen. Take a part of the horizon each!’

It was by no means easy to see anything from so low in the water, with every third wave breaking over the raft, and the horizon rising and rumpling like a living thing. But Madu saw something, far out to the east where the ocean went on forever.

‘There!’ he called. ‘A sail - behind us, there!’

It was true. The ship was sailing across the wind, towards them. As it came closer, one of the sailors was sure he could make out a flag at her masthead. The royal standard of Spain.

‘Well, ’tis a bit hard for us to bear up and take ’em there,’ said Francis loudly. ‘If they're after entertainment 'tis up to them to come down and seek it. Are you gents ready to give them a broadside, there?’

It was a silly boast; they had no cannon, no guns at all. It was then, when he found his bowstring was soaked, stretched, and useless, that it occurred to Madu the Spaniards might have big guns, which could sink this raft before they even came near. And he could not swim, even to the enemy ship’s side! But if they were all insane, it was too late to change it now.