Ramage & the Rebels (39 page)

Ramage turned away to look for Rennick but Jackson came up, carrying something carefully.

“Breakfast, sir. Some fine slices o' beef. One of the men has roasted them specially. Just about scorched his eyebrows off, too!”

And suddenly, at the thought of munching juicy slices of beef, Ramage felt faint from hunger. He grinned at Jackson as he took the meat, which was stacked like several thin slices of bread and dripping with juice. “Have all the men eaten and packed away some for later?”

“Only you and Mr Aitken to eat now, sir. The men have had enough to last a week.”

“And Mr Orsini?”

Jackson began laughing. “He's been your head chef, sir, standing over the man who was roasting it. Reckon he knows just how you like it, sir, red in the middle and brown at the edges. Most concerned, he was.”

Ramage sat down and began eating. The rising sun was still below the horizon but just beginning to catch the peak of Sint Christoffelberg, which was 1200 feet high, although not yet lighting the top of Tafelberg in front of it, which was only 750 feet.

Where were the rebels making for? There were villages all round Sint Christoffelberg, although it seemed possible they'd make for Sint Kruis Baai, on the coast near the southern slope of the great peak and close to where the
Calypso
had been when she first sighted
La Perle.
Then Ramage dismissed the idea: why make for a bay when you have no boats to rescue you?

This beef is good. It tastes all the better for being eaten with the fingers, juice running down the sleeve and down the chin, tickling, and the chin unshaven and rasping as a sleeve serves as a napkin. All the better, too, knowing that all the men now bustling around have eaten their fill of it. No one at the finest hotel in London could taste such beef—but two hundred Calypsos had just gorged themselves on it. They deserved such a feast, even though there were no vegetables and no tots to wash it down—the Marine sergeant had been ordered to pour away all the wine, otherwise by now several men would be drunk.

It was, of course, a feast in a strangely beautiful cemetery, because the corpses of the Frenchmen were still over there, but the rising sun was casting fantastic long shadows, using rounded hills and mountain peaks and cactus and the small divi-divi trees which always pointed towards the west, leaning in deference to the Trade winds. No clouds yet and the stars have faded, the moon becoming anaemic. In a few minutes the sun will come with its usual rush and the grey countryside will suddenly be dappled with pink as the upper rim—he shook his head and stood up: there had been killing a few hours ago, there was more to come. His cutlass was still stained with the blood of Brune—he refused to think of the grim coincidence which had brought them together, because killing the man gave no satisfaction: he would have preferred a trial. Time, time when Brune was locked alone in a cell and perhaps in the long nights the enormity of what he had done in the
Tranquil
would come to him. Yet it would not; a man who could order the unnecessary massacre of innocent men and women was so beyond the understanding of civilized people that he was almost beyond judicial punishment: one did not try a rabid dog.

“Ah, Rennick!” The Marine officer had seen him get up from his meal, and was ready for orders. “Well, you still have your guide—I'm leaving mine here to get the casualties back to Amsterdam. So let's ferret out the rest of those rebels. Have your guide question anyone you see on the road: we don't want to march a yard more than necessary.”

“I was just going to report, sir,” Rennick said, “but I decided to wait until you'd eaten. A Dutch farmer who rode in to see what was happening—the rebels burned down his house two days ago—has just told the guide that he's just seen them beyond a village called Pannekoek, about six or seven miles along the road. It's a couple of miles short of Sint Kruis Baai. They're just gathered there, in no sort of order, and apparently with no leader. He's emphatic they're in no sort of order. They had small campfires lit and went hunting for cattle and goats to cook—there are very few cattle there, he says, so they'll have to be content with goat, which the local people won't normally eat.”

“We can't trap them, I suppose?”

“No, sir, not from what he says and the map shows. When they see us coming they'll just move west. We can only trap them at the far end of the island, West Punt, when they meet the sea.”

“Very well, let's see your Marines stepping out. A steady pace, not too fast: the seamen have some aching muscles after the night's stroll.”

As Ramage watched the French camp through his telescope he cursed the Dutch farmer, although it was not the poor fellow's fault that the French had marched another couple of miles and then spent the busiest morning of their lives since the Dutchman passed. The Frenchmen's backs would be aching, their hands sore, their heads aching from the triple assault of last night's drinking, this morning's effort, and the scorching sun beating down on them as they picked up hundreds—thousands more likely—of the rocks and stones littering the fields and used them to build up three or four dozen little defensive positions, like miniature butts built for a partridge or pheasant drive, along the top of a hill at the eastern side of Sint Kruis Baai.

Obviously this was where the French and the rebels had decided to stand and fight. With the sea at their backs in the protected bay, perhaps they intended to retreat to ships or boats—there might be other privateers around, though Ramage doubted it. Were some privateersmen going to try to seize one or two of those anchored in Amsterdam and sail them round here? That too seemed doubtful, and even if they tried they were unlikely to succeed.

Rennick, who was also lying beside Ramage inspecting the French defences, was impressed by the amount of work but scornful of its effectiveness. “All that shifting of stone would be admirable if they were building a barracks,” he said. “The masons could pick and choose. But they've fallen into the trap of fixed defences.”

Ramage smiled to himself; it was a trap from which Rennick had been rescued only yesterday, when he had planned a defence for Amsterdam. “They've chosen a good place, though,” he said mildly. “That hill rising gently means they look down on us, and behind there's only a few feet of cliff to jump down if they want to get away in boats.”

“Oh yes,” Rennick said airily, “they can watch us, but each of our men needs only a dozen rocks and he's safe behind his own musket-proof rampart.”

“But we have to storm them uphill,” Ramage said, curious to see what Rennick had in mind. “And with all these divi-divi trees and cactus and whatever those other bushes are called, the men will be slowed up. Why, you can't even see the ground for the undergrowth!”

“Attack in the dark, sir,” Rennick said. “Or, rather, just as darkness falls. Then we can see them against the afterglow of the sunset, but we are coming from the east and attacking out of the dark half.”

“Rennick, is that really a good bet? The odds mean the book-maker can't lose. Two defenders to one attacker, the attackers slowed up by the slope of the hill and undergrowth, with no surprise possible …”

The Marine officer was silent for a minute or two and then admitted: “Their position does in effect give them another hundred men, I admit; but they'll be fighting with their backs to the sea, so they've cut off their own line of retreat.”

“Then they must be pretty sure they won't have to retreat,” Ramage said, deliberately making his voice sound grim. “Militarily we don't seem to be in a very good position.”

Rennick wriggled, looked again through his telescope, and then said judicially: “I have to agree with you, sir.”

“All this military business baffles me,” Ramage suddenly admitted. “I'd be lost the moment I went through the gateway at the Horse Guards. But as a sailor I can see we have one advantage.”

Rennick waited to hear about it and when Ramage said nothing, finally asked: “What advantage had you in mind, sir?”

“We have the weather-gage; with this south-east wind we are to windward of them.”

“But sir, I don't see how that can help us.”

“Oh, there are many advantages. We can breathe garlic over them. If they look hungry we can roast some beef over a bonfire and drive them mad with starvation as they smell the aroma. We can call out insults and be sure they hear every word.”

He scrambled back, followed by Rennick, and learned that all the lieutenants had managed to get some sleep after arriving at Sint Kruis, and they reported that except for sentries their companies were also sleeping, the seamen quite cheerfully curling up on the hard ground and in the blazing sun, the only requirement being a small pile of rocks to protect them from French fire. Sentries squatting behind larger piles were also watching for any of their own shipmates who while asleep rolled over beyond the shelter of the rock piles.

The lieutenants soon received their orders, grinning at their simplicity, and Ramage, taking one last look at the French positions, glanced over to his right and saw that the wind was still steady in strength and direction, a breeze from the east, with an extra gust every few minutes that was just strong enough to make the dust rise up in little eddies. Yes, it was east now, but one could never be sure it would not back to the north-east or veer to the south-east. There was very little cloud; a few cotton balls whose whiteness was emphasized by the hard blue of the sky. It was strange to be lying here on earth, smelling all the strange odours that went with life on land. The sharp sweetness of thyme, the spicy smells of plants and shrubs whose names he did not know.

He closed the telescope and slid it into a pocket. The French seemed to be dozing; they had not—so far, anyway—put out sharpshooters to keep up a hail of musket fire every time a Briton moved. Were they short of muskets, powder or shot? Surely not every man had bolted from the bonfire leaving his gun behind? Perhaps, but at least each man would have a cutlass, and this was the sort of situation which must be settled finally with the blade of a sword, the edge of a tomahawk or the point of a pike.

The wind was freshening, there was no doubt about that, and the cotton-ball clouds were swelling up with the warmth of the sun. In half an hour, with the land heating up, the breeze would be brisk as the Trade winds set in for the day. He wanted no more than that, of course. It had taken only five minutes to tell the lieutenants what he wanted done and to make sure they all understood. Some men might be killed or wounded but once again, if they obeyed orders they would have the advantage of surprise, the invisible armour which had so often protected them in the past.

Half an hour gave plenty of time for the preparations. In an hour's time, when the small hand of the watch had moved a twelfth of the way round the dial, the whole thing should be over, one way or the other: either the rebels and Frenchmen would control the island (in which case they'd hang the Governor and most of the Calypsos would be dead) or the bodies of the rebels and Frenchmen would be piled up at the top of the slope, and waggish seamen would refer to the Battle of Sint Kruis Baai. Ramage rubbed his bristly jaw and wished he could shave and clean his teeth.

At first glance it looked as if it would be a repetition of the previous night's attack, except it was broad daylight and instead of being in front of a bonfire the enemy were hiding at the top of a sloping hill. Ramage was lying flat on the hard ground with, from the feel of it, the same sharp stones digging into the same soft parts of his body. Jackson was to his left and Stafford to his right, and the only difference from the previous night's attack was that the companies were grouped evenly on each side, so that his own company was in the middle to form the vanguard, the sharp point of a wedge driving up the hill in—he glanced at his watch yet again—eleven minutes' time.

Now he was holding his watch in front of him, impatiently staring at the dial, unsure whether to regard the slowly-moving hands as friends or enemies. The two pistols pressed against his stomach, the belt-hooks held them securely against the waist-band of his breeches. His cutlass was beside him, ready to be snatched up. His feet throbbed, the glare made his cheek muscles ache from continually squinting. Insects buzzed or crawled while the air shimmered from the heat, the wind only moving not cooling it. There was no sign of movement up the hill; the French were having a siesta, no doubt, except for their sentries.

Ten minutes to go. They would be hungry and very thirsty, those Frenchmen. Were they waiting for a vessel to come into the bay to take them off? In theory they could, of course, be penned in until thirst forced them to surrender, but in practice many would escape in darkness.

Eight minutes. Some could scramble down the small cliff at night and into the water, and swim for a hundred yards or so, then come ashore beyond the encircling British. Perhaps half of them could swim—that was the usual proportion of swimmers in a British ship.

Seven minutes. Of course, the idea of keeping the French trapped up the hill until they surrendered for lack of water would mean quite a feat of endurance for the British, too, because they had only a quart each. A quart, rather, less what they had already drunk this morning, although they could get more.

Six minutes. This bloody soldiering: how he hated it. Heat, dust, physical weariness, the sheer length of time an action took. If you wanted to move from here to there you walked—marched, rather. If it rained you marched through mud. Then, as night came on, you pitched camp in more mud and at daybreak put on your wet clothes and marched again. You could and often did get soaking wet at sea, but once you came off watch you could sleep in the dry and put on dry clothes.

Five minutes. A faint and passing smell of burning. Jackson had noticed it and glanced round him from behind his little cairn of rocks, watching for telltale smoke. Ramage peered round his own cairn and searched the hillside. No movement, and the hillside looked so peaceful one half expected to see a few goats walking delicately among the stones and bushes, standing up on their back legs to wrench at the higher leaves of bushes.