They held their conference on Telesto's poop deck, under the canvas awnings with lots of liquid refreshments, instead of the airless great cabins below, for the day was sunny, hot but breezy.
"And the estimable Lieutenant Choate is where, sir?" Twigg inquired.
"Off the coast of Borneo, sir," Lewrie stated. "He unloaded his cargo of supplies, then told me to remain here as harbor-guard. He would scout to the sou'east, up to windward, from the Rajang River delta to Balabac Strait. He took along one of the captured praos in tow, sir, so he could go close inshore."
"Good thinking, that," Ayscough said of his first lieutenant.
"A bit too late, that," Twigg retorted.
"Let me remind you, Mister Twigg, that you were still of the opinion that Choundas would be here by mid-June, and in that you were dead-wrong!" Captain Ayscough rumbled deep in his chest, arms folded over his stomach. "I also get the sense that you disapprove of Mister Lewrie's actions here on Spratly. Well, let me tell you, I have read his full report, even if you have not, and as a commission Sea Officer I find no fault with his conduct of our campaign so far, nor with any decision he has made. My report shall contain my highest approbation for his actions, actions in the very best traditions of the Sea Service!"
"Hmmpf!" Twigg sniffed loftily. "Two sea-dogs whelped from the same litter. Your approval is only natural, but a chance was missed!"
If anything, the already strained relationship between Twigg and Captain Ayscough had grown even more testy in the weeks since Alan had last seen them, going past gentlemanly conduct to the words and sneers that back home would have resulted in a pre-dawn duel. Choate had warned him to expect the worst of them, and had expressed worries that their acrimony was bad enough to jeopardize the future conduct of their expedition. Perhaps that was why Choate had been so eager to get back to sea, so he would not be there when they arrived. They had come into port at Spratly three days earlier, the fifteenth of May. Choate had brought Cuddalore, a fine twenty-gunned merchantman, across the bar on the first of May, and had departed in a haste such as if all the imps of Hell were chasing him. Which, in a way, Alan realized, they were. He'd rather be anywhere than around these two headstrong men whose relationship had degraded to an open feud!
"Why, thankee, Mister Twigg." Captain Ayscough beamed. "That was a pretty compliment, to my lights, and I do take it as such! I would like to think I'd been as successful had I been in this lad's shoes. The island taken with minimum casualties, a French cartel ship captured and burned. And not just any hired vessel, but one of Choundas' outright ownership! A cartel ship, I might remind you, we were not even aware of, and she moored not a quarter-mile ahead of us for six months at Whampoa!"
"Hmmpf!" Twigg reiterated, turning beet-red from that insult to his intelligence-gathering powers, his lips going twine-thin.
"The harbor fortified and provisioned as good as any, and the encampment improved, though I am sure we have Sir Hugo's skills as a soldier to thank for that as well," Ayscough continued, inclining his head toward Lieutenant-Colonel Willoughby, who was sprawled in a canvas deck-chair with a glass of brandy in hand, booted feet up on the rickety deal table. Sir Hugo raised his glass and smiled beatifically.
Lewrie could not help but swell with pride as his praises were sung so nicely. If Ayscough were any more complimentary, he imagined they'd commission a Te Deum Mass at St. Paul 's and lay on fireworks!
"An entire pirate fleet destroyed, sir," Ayscough went on, hammering gaily away at Twigg's arguments. "Ten out of eighteen Lanun Rover praos sunk, taken or burned, sir, and over twelve hundred cut-throats dead or made prisoner. Why, these Mindanao pirates haven't suffered such a bloody check in a hundred years! Wiped from the face of God's blue seas. As you demanded back at Bencoolen, sir."
"One might also mention the harbor properly surveyed for the first time in living memory, and the island's exact location corrected, sir," Sir Hugo prompted. "The late Captain Cook could have done no less in these waters, I shouldn't doubt."
"And that American whaler freed, too," Ayscough concluded.
"Yes, that American whaler," Twigg drawled. "Now off in Manila, shouting to high heaven. Letting the world in on our little secret! Did it not occur to you, Mister Lewrie, that our mission out here is secret?"
Twigg got to his feet to pace his anger off.
"It cannot be known publicly by any other power that England had disguised warships in these waters, or the recent treaty is violated, and we might face another disastrous war with France. Or any other nation that might decide to side with them. Those Yankees saw a battalion of East India Company troops, and a vessel flying Royal Navy colors, do battle with the French, sir! Now how secret do you believe our mission is any longer? You should have kept them here, found any excuse to delay their departure, until I could arrive so no one could learn of this, but no! You…"
"Oh, bloody Hell!" Sir Hugo snapped, slamming boots on the deck. "Did it never occur to you, Mister Twigg, that there may have been a tad too much bloody worry about secrecy?"
"I beg your pardon, Sir Hugo?" Twigg snarled back.
'Two years ago, when our first ships started going missing, it would have made eminent sense to raise the hue and cry with every seafaring nation out here and make a concerted campaign to defend trade. Not just our trade, but everyone's. Let the world know there's need to chastise every bloody pirate in the Far East," Sir Hugo went on. "But that may have been too much good sense for our masters back in London. Seems to me, sir, this exposure at last, with our American cousins shouting the loudest, is just the thing for us. In a year, the world'll know it was this Choundas, and the Frogs, backing these pirates. Now, our work's four-fifths done, and public pressure, and an end to all this bloody sneaking and hiding, will do the rest for us, without getting any more good men killed. I say, it's time the wraps came off this bloody business. And as for freeing those Yankees, refitting their ship and all, well, that'll stand us in good credit with those new United States. And should another war break out, we'll need all the good credit we can stand, else they'd side with their former allies."
"I would not normally expect," Twigg said after a long sigh, "such perspicacity in a military man, Sir Hugo. And in private, I might be able to agree with you. But the Crown decided otherwise. And it's not simply about piracy, you see. It's not even about this fellow Choundas, when you get right down to it, sir. It's about laying combinations out here for the next war."
"Oh, bugger," Sir Hugo growled.
"You consider another war with France inevitable, Sir Hugo, as much as I. At this very instant, there may be three dozen schemes in play such as ours, and even I have no knowledge of them, and shouldn 't unless one of the others impinges upon mine. All to see that future foes have no strength or credit here in the Far East, nor any allies or secret bases that could threaten England. To put too much light on ours, sir, to expose any of them, would be to expose all of them, eventually. The best mushrooms, I am told, are grown in the dark."
"The best roses need the most cow-shit, too," Ayscough huffed.
"Nevertheless, sir," Sir Hugo smiled, a disarming, lazy smile that Lewrie knew of old was one of eminent menace, "I do trust that when you come to write of this campaign, you shall sound at least the slightest bit grateful for what we've done for you so far. And commending."
"Of course I shall, Sir Hugo," Twigg relented, obviously seeing the threat that lay behind that smile, and being enough of a political animal, with the ability to read others so he could best use them for his own purposes, or the Crown's, to know he could carp no longer.
"So," Captain Ayscough grunted. "How best to conclude this'un? Now we've hamstrung this Choundas bugger so thoroughly."
"Have we, sir?" Twigg scowled. "And for how long?"
"Well, he's lost this island base of his," Ayscough rambled. "Lost La Malouine, lost Stella Mans, and his secret's soon to be out, thanks to those Yankee Doodle whalermen. Now he may have other cartel ships out here to serve him, but for now he's on his own."
"He still has the Lanun Rovers, sir," Twigg pointed out, with some glee. "And he has his freedom to rebuild a semblance of his web, like some noisome spider."
"Without the silver and opium we captured here, without all the arms he would have given the pirates, or the trade goods, I doubt he still has the Lanun Rovers," Captain Ayscough replied. "They lost too many of their brethren here for Choundas to hold their allegiance. Oh, he saved some few of 'em by showing up when he did, but he failed to rescue the rest. Even with that big, fine ship of his, he didn't sail up and fight us. He may have 'em in name only, but not firmly in his grasp any longer. And for the moment, he's vulnerable."
"If that's so bloody obvious, then why isn't he running home right now, cutting his losses?" Sir Hugo speculated, sitting back down and refilling his glass. "He must know this is his last raiding summer, and it's riskier now more'n ever."
"Because he is who he is, Sir Hugo," Twigg said with a knowing leer. "I've had a chance to interrogate the surviving Frogs from this Stella Marts. Amazing what a man will confess when threatened with a noose for piracy. The second mate told me that most of the officers thought Choundas a rather odd sort. Odder than most. Not merely in his sexual predific-tions, but in his mind, sirs. Lieutenant Lewrie, do you recall that nonsense he spouted the day of the execution, what he had to say about the ancient Gauls and Celts being related?"
"Aye, sir, I do," Lewrie agreed, tensing for another lesson in just how simply clever Twigg thought himself to be. "He said that the Britons, the Gauls and the Celts were one race, sir. Damned fool."
"Us, kin of Frogs?" Sir Hugo spluttered. "I mean, the Normans aside, what a lot of… you will pardon the play on words, but, what gall!"
"Choundas was born in low circumstances, yes," Twigg related with relish, "though not fishmonger poor. His father owned several boats, and hoped for better things for his son.
Education, and hopes he'd enter the priesthood. Don't have to be a nobleman to do well in France if you wear the cassock. But the boy, besides being a superb sailor, developed a bent for scholarship in history, and in Latin, of course. Why he named Stella Marts by a Latin name, and not Etoile de la Mer, I s'pose."
"Does this have any bearing on anything?" Ayscough groaned.
"What's the thing all Latin students read, sir? Caesar's Gallic Wars. Naturally, as a Breton, Choundas would sympathise with the ancient Gauls under Vercingetorix and such. But most specifically, he imagined himself, and his line, to be kin with the Veneti. When oared galleys daren't go five miles offshore, these Veneti in their oak ships with leather sails would roam the entire known world, much as we do today. Their strength was in their Navy. Even the Vikings of latter days didn't dare as much as they did."
"I think," Lewrie summarized for them, unable to pass up the sterling opportunity to shine, or to spill the air from Twigg's sails, "that what Mister Twigg means is that if he thinks he's the last of this noble seafaring line of Veneti, and goes on about it so much he bores his compatriots to tears with it, we may assume the silly arse will tweak our noses and raid our ships this season, sirs."
"Then why didn't you merely say so, Mister Twigg?" Captain Ayscough asked, with all innocence in his expression. "Right, then!"
Ayscough trotted out his chart of the South China Seas and laid it on the table, anchoring the corners with bottles and glasses so the wind wouldn't scud it off somewhere to leeward.
"If he thinks he's that bloody good, he can't have sailed too far to the east'rd." Ayscough chuckled. "West is out, 'cause he'd have to beat so far to windward against the prevailing sou'easterlies this time of year to get to his cruising grounds. Choate is scouting the Borneo coast now, and we may have good news from him soon. Down there is to windward, where I'd wish to base myself, were I this 'last of a noble seafaring line.' But there's a problem with that, too."
"The Borneo pirates," Lewrie interjected. 'There's little love lost between them and the Lanun Rovers, is there, sir?"
"Exactly so, Mister Lewrie. He may have some relations with 'em as a hole-card, so to speak, and he may be forced to play it to allow him one last chance to go home a winner, but… well, damme!"
"What?" Twigg rapped out.
"Well, here's this lad Choundas, born a commoner, normally denied his chance to shine in the French Navy, but thinking himself kin to ancient sea-kings. I see why you would think he would have to do something grand against us before going home, Mister Twigg, but think on this for a moment…" Ayscough beamed cleverly. "The Borneo boys are river-based, and they don't go out of sight of shore too often. Who would Choundas feel the most in common with?"
'The Lanun Rovers, still!" Twigg exclaimed.
"Right, then!" Ayscough said once more, rubbing his horny palms in satisfaction. "Were I looking for prizes, I'd be far south, opposite the Johore Straits. Around Anambas or Pulau Natuna, where we met that pirate fleet last year. Here at Spratly, maybe up farther north and still to windward of the Canton run on the Tizard Bank. No shelter there, though, if the winds pipe up."
'Too close to Dutch or English patrols down south, sir," Lewrie commented. "That's why he chose Spratly in the first place."
"Yes, so we must assume that he's somewhere up to windward, but not too far to the east'rd. With his resources reduced, he has to be close to the scene of action and do his own dirty work for a while. So if I were constrained in such a way, I'd be somewhere around the mouth of Balabac Strait." Ayscough frowned, pacing off a divider across the chart. "I'd not be too deep inside the Philippine Archipelago. If my allies started disliking me, there'd be no escape for a single ship, even as well-armed as we assume Poisson D'Or to be. So he would be west of the Sulu Sea. Still allied, even tenuously, with the Mindanao pirates. And using what's left of that alliance, and their reputation, as a shield to prevent pursuit."
"Is this not a Spanish naval base, here on Palawan?" Sir Hugo asked, leaning over the chart. "This Puerto Princesa? Seems they'd have this area covered. Why let some outsider upset what arrangement they have with their own native pirates? They'd kick him out soon as those Yankees let them know of it."
"Ah, but he doesn't even know that Stella Maris took a Yankee as prize, Sir Hugo," Ayscough grinned, hugely enjoying himself. "It don't signify, anyway, that the Spanish would even be aware of them being there. All they have are Guarda Costa luggers and such, not ships of worth. Hell, it's two hundred miles from Puerto Princesa to the Balabac Strait. The Dons are flat-broke, and all they care about are the northern islands. Anything south of Leyte is pretty much controlled in name only. They have a loose agreement with the natives in the south-'You don't kill us, we won't bother you!' Healthier for Spanish fortunes in the long run." Ayscough chuckled with mirth. "So aspiring young Dons don't get their throats cut, or their reputations ruined, by a raggedy-arsed pack of fanatics."
"So this Balabac Strait is pretty much the King's Highway to these pirates, sir?" Lewrie asked, peering at the chart.
"Yes, just so. And I'd expect Choundas to be somewhere near the western entrance, around the island of Banggi on the north tip of Borneo, or on the island of Balabac itself," Ayscough concluded, tossing down his dividers.
"We have little time, then, before the first ships sail from Calcutta and Madras for this year's trading season," Twigg fretted. "We'll not see him playing innocent in Canton again. One raiding season, then back he goes to the Indian Ocean, leaving other ships to be his bearers for the last loads of loot, whilst he's off like a hare to France. We might be able to stymie his designs by our presence, and defeat him that way. But there's the matter of all those ships we've lost the last two years. All those murdered men. Damme if I care much for him escaping with even the slightest hint of success, sirs! I wish him destroyed, utterly!"
"Like Cato's demand," Sir Hugo mused. "Carthage must be destroyed."
"Exactly, Sir Hugo," Twigg said firmly. "For everyone's peace of mind, Choundas must be destroyed."
"Mister Lewrie," Captain Ayscough asked. "Whatever did happen to those Veneti?"
"Caesar sank the lot of them in 56 B.C., sir," Lewrie replied.
Chapter 10
To ease the overcrowding aboard Lady Charlotte, and not knowing how long they would be at sea, the battalion of troops had been spread out among all three ships. As had the fortune in silver, the captured powder and shot. Unfortunately, they had been forced to burn the bulk of the opium and trade goods, disposing of the remainder in the deeper part of the harbor at Spratly Island along with the cannon barrels and stands of arms. They would leave nothing behind that required a guard force to deplete their strength, and nothing for Choundas to regain should he double back on them.
The praos were burned as well, and the prisoners disarmed and left to fend for themselves with the wild livestock for sustenance and only the rudest remnants of the encampment for shelter.
Leaving Lady Charlotte to make her slower way astern, Telesto and Culverin ranged sou'east, beating up to windward, with an eventual rendezvous planned several days hence, once they had met up with Lieutenant Choate and Cuddalore as he scouted northward towards the Strait, too, and delivered his report, or lack of news, on Choundas' possible whereabouts.
Telesto had to stand off to seaward whilst the shallow-drafted Culverin did the main work closer inshore. Which arrangement was pleasant for Lewrie, since it got him out of snapping distance when Twigg and Ayscough had at each other like snarling wolves.
"And a half, four!" the leadsman in the chains said, getting bored and sunburned at his thankless task. They were skirting round the foetid, marshy tip of Borneo, near enough to a native settlement marked on the chart as Kudat (which was about all that the chart had gotten right in the past few days) to have seen several single praos out at sea. These at least had been peacefully fishing, but had run ashore as they drew close, leaving them sole possession of the sea.
"Time to change the leadsmen, sounds like," Lewrie said. He drew out his watch and looked at the time. "Almost the end of the day watch. Five minutes to eight bells, Mister Hogue."
"Stand off-shore once the watch changes, sir?" Hogue asked.
"I think we'll continue as we are for the first hour of the first dog-watch. After that, the light will be too far westerly for us to spot shoal-water," Lewrie replied.
"We'll alter course after four bells."
"Aye, sir," Hogue said, yawning.
"And a quarter less five!" the leadsman sounded out.
Borneo reeked, as did its shoals. Rotting vegetation, rotting weed washed up on her shores, stagnant mud-flats and dead-fish odors, and the heights inland blocked a proper sea-breeze to waft it all off. Now and then a hint of cooking, now and then some gorgeous aromas from riotously thriving flowers- but mostly it stank horribly like some gigantic slaughter-house. They'd all be glad to get out to sea.
"Something in the water!" the lookout on the tall main-mast shouted. "Three points off the starboard bows!"
"Shoal?" Lewrie wondered, raising his telescope for the umpteenth time that day. "It looks low enough. No, a rock, perhaps."
"Native boat, sir," Hogue said with the advantage of his almost uncanny eyesight. "Turned turtle, looks like. God, no! It's a ship's boat!"
"Fetch-to, Mister Murray!" Lewrie shouted to his bosun. "Lead the cutter 'round from astern and call away a boat crew."
"Shall I go, sir?" Hogue asked anxiously.
"No, you stay aboard," Lewrie said. "It's not half a cable off, and we're at least three-quarters of a mile offshore. Keep the hands near the guns, though, just in case. I'll be back shortly."
They rounded Culverin up into the slack winds, jibs backed to force her bows off the breeze, but mains'Is still drawing and trying to drive her forward, stalling her "in-irons" cocked up to the wind and unable to go forward or back, to drift on the slow current.
Cony was already in the boat at the tiller, with eight hands at the oars, held aloft like lances as they waited for Lewrie.
"Shove off, Cony," Lewrie said, once he had taken his salute at the rail and settled himself onto a thwart near the stern.
"Aye, sir. Shove off, bow man. Ship yer oars. Give us way, larboard. Backwater, starboard," Cony instructed. "Now, avast. Now give us way t'gether!"
Once the cutter was moving shoreward with both banks of rowers pulling at an easy stroke, Cony turned slightly on his buttocks and leaned over the tiller-bar. "D'ya think them pirates got fed up an' done fer this Choundas feller, sir?"
"T would be a fitting end for him, no error, Cony," Lewrie said in reply. "A thing devoutly to be wished."
"Boat-hook ready, there," Cony snapped, turning back to his duties. "Easy all. Un-ship yer oars… toss yer oars… boat yer oars."
It was a European ship's boat, right enough, half-sunk at the bows, and charred to crumbling cinders for much of its length, which sight made Lewrie shiver with dread that somehow it was La Malouine's boat he'd seen burn and capsize, that it had drifted all this way to confront him after all those months.
"Ah, Jaysus!" the bow-man gagged as he peered down into the boat. Up forward, two men lay in the bottom, stuffed under thwarts to keep them from sloshing about in the foot-deep water that flooded her. Or what was left of two men. They had bloated and split open with rot in the cruel heat and humidity, swelled like leather-hued steer carcasses and their clothing stretched taut as drum-heads where the seams had held together. Their wounds, where exposed to the air above the water level, swarmed with flies, blue-black and festering. One man had lost his leg below the knee, and some attempt had been made to tie it off with a tourniquet and bandage the stump. The other had the marks of several bullet wounds that had also been treated with scraps of clothing for bandages. But both faces gaped wide-mouthed under the scummy water in final, ghoulish rictuses of agony, and their eyes had gone for gull-food.
"They're sailors, anyway," Lewrie coughed on his bile as the odor hit them. "But whose?"
In the stern, which was somewhat dryer where only an inch or so of water sloshed about, there was a barricoe of water, a sodden biscuit bag and many bones and feathers littering a tarpaulin that might cover other supplies.
"Looks like they mighta et some sea-birds afore they died, sir." Cony shuddered. "Mighta been driftin' fer weeks out 'ere."
Lewrie prodded the water butt with his sword, and it tumbled into the water, floating high and empty, the bung gone.
"Jesus Christ!" the bow-man screamed as the tarpaulin stirred. Lewrie felt the hairs on his head stand up in terror as a shape came up from the bottom boards of the boat, draped in the tarpaulin.
"A ghost!" one of the oarsmen keened in shrill horror.
Then the tarpaulin was flung back, revealing a ravaged face. That face also split in horror and screamed like a banshee, just as terrified as the boat crew! A bony, sun-scarred arm emerged with a seaman's knife clenched in a lean and bony fist. Lewrie put his sword forward, ready to lunge. "Hold!" he shouted.
"Oh God no don't kill me please don't kill me, h'ain't I been through enough?" the apparition managed to say through a dry throat and blistered lips. But he dropped the knife.
"Are you English?" Lewrie asked, aghast.
"Aye, sir. 'R you? Please don' be them Frog devils, oh, say yer English, please!"
"Cony, fetch the water butt," Lewrie instructed.
"Water, God yes, lord love ye, sir, water!" the man raved. "I h'ain't 'ad no water fer days, jus' some blood outen a gull, once't!"
"What ship?" Lewrie asked, feeling another shiver of dread.
"Cuddalore, sir."
"Cuddalore!" Lewrie burst out. "What happened to her?"
" 'At Frog ship Poison Door took 'er, sir. A week ago 'n more."
"Goddamn my eyes," Ayscough sighed, so pale and shaky it was as if he'd seen a ghost himself. "Is this Choundas in league with the devil? What the hell are we up against?"
"A bloody clever man, sir," Twigg replied. "A bloody lucky one, but still, just a man, Captain Ayscough."
"What else did he say, Mister Lewrie?"
"Sir, he said Cuddalore fought Poisson D'Or about a week ago," Lewrie informed them somewhat gloomily. "Close inshore of Banggi and with the help of several praos. They put up a good fight, the man said, but eventually they were overwhelmed. Lieutenant Choate was killed."
"Oh, poor man," Ayscough groaned. "His poor family…"
"Dismasted, shot to pieces," Lewrie went on. "They captured her, sir. Murdered the survivors. Lieutenant McTaggart and all the mates and warrants. This fellow Prouty was lucky to get away, sir. His mates got into the boat, cut it loose from being towed astern, but the French shot them, dropped a round shot through the bow to sink it and set it afire. Prouty went over the side and clung to the rudder where he couldn't be seen. They drifted ever since, forward or back on the currents and tides. No oars, no masts. 'Tis a wonder he lived. Had to use their corpses to staunch the inflow."
"What a gruesome experience he must have had," Ayscough said. "Will he live?"
"The surgeon is not too hopeful, sir. Burns and exposure to the sun, no food but for one gull in all those days." Lewrie sighed. "Prouty did inform us he watched Poisson D'Or take Cuddalore in tow, though, sir. Downwind to the north'rd."
"Balabac!" Twigg exclaimed. "Where else to leeward could he find harbor in which to strip her."
"And haul her in front of his Mindanao pirates to prove to them he's still worth alliance," Ayscough growled. "Aye. So, if it be Balabac, the best and most sheltered harbor is on the north end. See here."
Ayscough shuffled through several rolled-up charts to find the one he wanted, and rolled it out onto his desk. "A good channel to east and west, some small spits of land to the north to shelter against the winds when they come nor'westerly. And a village."
"A pirate village, sir?" Twigg asked.
"Not as I recollect." Ayscough shrugged. "We patrolled around here during the last war after the Spanish came in on the Rebels' side with France. Watered there, once. They were a peaceful enough lot. No big seagoing praos, just fishing boats and such. But if the Lanun Rovers put in, they'd have to go along with whatever those devils want, for safety's sake. Better to suffer some looting and a rape or two than end up massacred."
"Are there no better harbors, sir?" Lewrie asked, peering at the chart, which indicated several settlements and coves.
"There are others, to be sure, Mister Lewrie," Ayscough allowed. "But most of those are more suited to praos, which may be beached like Greek ships of old. But Choundas needs at least five fathoms of water at low tide to feel comfortable with a proper ship, and this is the only one of which I am aware. If one were to need a snug harbor for repair, and a place to strip another vessel, this would be my choice."
"And anything on the southern coast would be too exposed, no matter how tempting it would be to base closer to open water, I take it," Twigg added.
'The east-west channel leaves two avenues of approach or escape, yes," Ayscough agreed. "And open water, deep water, either way. Without having to claw off a lee shore whilst the winds are out of the sou'east each time one leaves port."
Ayscough drummed his fingers on the chart for a time, then slapped his palm on the chart, making them all jump. "My regards to Colonel Willoughby and Captain Cheney in Lady Charlotte. Signal 'Captains Repair on Board.' With luck, if we're quick enough, we may have this bastard at last!"
After his successful defense at Spratly Island, Captain Cheney was almost resigned to playing warship one more time, in company with Culverin and Telesto. Sir Hugo peered at the chart for a long time in silence, cocking his head this way and that. When he did leave off an irritating humming, he asked a few questions about the various beaches, what the interior was like, what Ayscough remembered from years before about the terrain.
"Do you put my troops ashore here," he finally said. "Three or more miles shy of the village. We shall proceed inland to here, where you remember crops and fields, Captain Ayscough. Open country where I may employ my troops to best advantage. That is, if you're set upon this completely, without reconnaissance."
"Oh, we'll scout, sir," Ayscough retorted. "We'll put a boat down and send her inshore once we're close enough."
"Then I should request some cloth," Sir Hugo said, smiling bleakly. "Something that could resemble yellow silk. A Navy Ensign as well, and some wood for staffs."
"Hey?" Ayscough asked, perplexed.
"I shall also have need of your pipers, sir," Sir Hugo added.
Chapter 11
Lt. Alan Lewrie, Royal Navy, paced his tiny quarterdeck as the hours dragged past. Hands in the small of his back, head down deep in thought. And in worry.
A launch from Telesto had assured them that there were two European ships at anchor in the rude harbor at the north end of Balabac Island: one painted a golden ochre with white gunwales and one vessel that bore no masts above her lower masts and tops. There were also at least twenty native praos beached by the Filipino settlement, big seagoing boats with hulls painted blood red. It hadn't been much of a reconnaissance; just a quick peek in from seaward at sundown of the second day after they had discovered the lone survivor from Cuddalore.
Choundas is a clever animal, Lewrie fretted to himself during his limited pacing. He's sure to have hidden batteries on the harbor approaches. Perhaps hidden batteries off-shore on those low islands that to the north shelter the harbor. His minions in Stella Mans had not deployed artillery at Spratly past the palisade's walls, but they could not assume Choundas would make that sort of mistake.