Sea Fire (42 page)

Cathy turned into a wildcat. She kicked and clawed and bit, trying to get to Virginia’s side. The men were clearly having trouble holding her. But hold her they did, chuckling, making bawdy comments. They were forcing her down onto her back in the sand. Even as Jon watched, moving toward them as quickly as he dared, she buried her teeth in one of her assailants’ legs. He screamed, hopping about on his uninjured limb, his hand clapped to the wound. The other man lifted his fist and dealt Cathy a blow in the face that sent her spinning backward. And with that, Jon promised the man grimly, he had just signed his death warrant.

He was crossing the beach now, moving up behind the man who was kneeling over Cathy, holding her pinioned to the ground as he tried with one hand to paw up her billowing white skirt. She was fighting him with every inch of her body, writhing and bucking and kicking as she tried to throw him off. The other man was sitting in the sand not far away, one leg hiked up over the other as he gingerly examined the tooth marks on his grimy calf.

They were two to his one, both armed with long sabers thrust into their belts as well as knives. This was no time for Marquis of Queensbury rules. As silently as a shadow, Jon slipped up behind the
man who was now bent over, attempting to force a kiss on Cathy’s elusive mouth. Jon’s hand closed brutally on a hank of his greasy reddish hair. The man looked around, surprise and then fear written plainly on his face. He tried to lunge to his feet, calling hoarsely to his companion. Jon smiled at him, his gray eyes deadly, then as efficiently as a butcher brought his knife up and cut the fellow’s throat.

“Jon, look out!” Cathy cried as blood splattered over her like rain. Jon saw that her eyes were fixed on something beyond him, and whirled. The other man was charging like an enraged bull, his saber drawn and held high over his head.

“Stay back out of the way!” he said fiercely to Cathy as he crouched, his own knife ready in his hand, prepared to meet the man’s rush. As the saber slashed in a whistling arc over his head, and he ducked, pivoting to meet the next onslaught, he saw to his relief that she was obeying, scrambling over the sand to Virginia.

All his attention had to focus on his opponent. The man was coming back for another charge. Jon knew that his only hope was to stay out of reach of that murderous long sword until he could get in close enough to gut the man with his knife. Still he feinted, not wanting the pirate to know what he was about. Then, as the saber chopped down toward his head, he whirled out of range. The blade whistled harmlessly past.

Jon crouched again, the blade of his knife held stiffly before him. He was ready for anything the other might try. The pirate was circling, looking for an opening, his lips drawn back in a snarl. The sun glinted off his gold front tooth.

“I aim to kill you, friend,” he grunted, his eyes never leaving Jon. “And then take your woman!”

Jon smiled, his eyes as hard as agates.

“I don’t think so,” he said slowly, and then as the other man rushed him, he struck out with his knife, at the same time pivoting away.

Cathy, the unconscious Virginia cradled in her arms, felt her heart leap into
her throat as she watched. The other man was easily as big as Jon, and he had the advantage of weapons. Every time that gleaming sword whistled around Jon’s head she felt her breath stop. She was sure he would be killed. She had never seen him fight before, not like this, meaning to kill. His gray eyes were cold as death, his face intent. A savage smile split his dark face. He looked almost as if he were enjoying himself.

The men were circling each other like big, blood-hungry dogs, both crouched low, both with the same deadly intent in their eyes. Then the pirate made another lunge, and she saw Jon’s knife slice the underside of his arm as Jon ducked beneath it.

The pirate was rushing again, the long sword raised threateningly over his head. Blood dripped from his wound. Jon crouched, feinting with his knife, as the other man closed on him. Cathy held her breath, sure that Jon’s head would be severed from his shoulders at any second. Why did he not jump out of the way? Then, as the sword slashed down beside him, she saw Jon crouch even lower, his big hand scooping up sand—and then he was flinging the sand into the pirate’s bulging eyes.

“Arrgghh!”
the pirate howled, clawing at his eyes. Jon took the opportunity to lunge forward, his knife aiming for the other man’s belly. But the pirate was clearly the veteran of many a fight. Half-blinded or no, he managed to jump out of the way. At the same time his booted foot kicked out, catching Jon behind the knees. Cathy, eyes huge with horror, watched Jon go down.

Before Jon could leap to his feet, the pirate, blinking and shaking his head to clear his eyes, pressed his advantage. Savagely he slashed downward with his saber, the blade missing Jon by just inches as it bit deeply into the sand. Time after time the blow was repeated. Jon, scrambling backward, just managed to stay out
of reach. In such circumstances, his knife was almost as useless as a toothpick.

“Jon!” he heard Cathy cry from somewhere close on his left hand. Daring to turn his head for just an instant, he saw that she had retrieved the dead pirate’s sword. As she saw his eyes register what she intended, she tossed it to him. His eyes fixed on it, his hand rose to catch it and it fell into his hand just as he felt the blade of his opponent’s sword dig deep into his shoulder. Pain rocketed through him, but there was no time now to feel—not if he wanted to live. Blood pouring from the wound, he planted his feet under him just as the pirate drew back for another savage blow. Grinning tigerishly, Jon used his legs to propel him upward in a fierce lunge. The saber penetrated the man’s stomach, its tip thrusting out through his back.

Jon withdrew the sword in a rush of crimson. The pirate, both hands clapped to the pouring wound, staggered backward. His eyes fixed on Jon, glazed over. His knees buckled under him, and he fell to the sand, rolling onto his back. Then, grunting, he died.

Panting heavily, his hand moving to close over his injured shoulder, Jon sank down on his knees on the sand. Cathy ran across to him, her blue eyes burning in a face that was as white as her petticoat. Daubs of blood covered her like droplets of brilliant red paint.

“Oh, dear God, how badly are you hurt?” she sobbed, falling to her knees beside him. Sweat rolling from his brow into his eyes half-blinded Jon, but he could see the terror staring out from her face.

“I’ll live,” he managed, then gritted his teeth as a searing pain shot through his shoulder. Turning his head, he saw blood oozing up between his fingers that were clapped to the wound.

“Let me see that,” she ordered shakily, her hand coming up to gently set
his aside. The saber had opened a gash the length of his shoulder. Blood welled from it to run down over his chest and back. It looked to be perhaps half an inch deep. Quickly Cathy caught up the skirt of her petticoat, gnawing at its hem with her teeth. When she felt the material give, she ripped it with both hands. A wide swath of material tore free all around the hem, leaving her standing in a garment that was just a little longer than knee-length.

“Good God, if this keeps up we’ll both be naked!” Jon sounded suddenly amused. Cathy cast him a sharp look, then pressed the pad to the wound, bearing down hard to stem the flow of blood.

“Ouch!” he said, wincing. Then he turned his head to watch what she was doing, his expression quite dispassionate.

“Did they hurt you?” he asked after a moment, his eyes on the smears of blood that streaked her face and neck and what was left of her petticoat. Cathy, seeing where his eyes rested, shook her head.

“That isn’t my blood,” she explained. “When you cut that man’s throat. . . .” She broke off, shuddering. Jon, seeing her face turn even whiter than it had been, hastened to distract her thoughts.

“How is Virginia?”

Cathy frowned, sending a worried look over his shoulder to where she had put the child down on the sand.

“I don’t think she’s badly hurt,” she said slowly, biting her lower lip. “She’s breathing normally, and none of her bones seem to be broken. But she won’t wake up. I think she must have hit her head on something, when that man threw her down.”

“Bind up my shoulder and then go and get her,” Jon directed, grimacing a little at the pain as Cathy started to do as he said. “We’ve got to get out of here before they send someone looking for those two.”

“Before
who
sends someone looking?” Cathy asked, puzzled.
Jon, realizing that she didn’t know about the ship he’d seen in the cove, quickly told her.

“Then that must have been the sail I saw. . . .” she said half to herself. Jon looked at her sharply.

“You saw a sail? When?”

Cathy told him about the flash of white she’d seen on the horizon just before the two men had accosted her. Even as she talked, she realized that it couldn’t possibly have been the same ship.

“The ship in the cove has been at anchor at least overnight,” Jon confirmed her conclusion. “That means there’s another ship out there. We’ve got to try to get to it. Once those bastards find two of their crew dead, they’ll come looking for whoever did it. Leave me, and go get Virginia.”

Cathy tied the last knot in the bandage she had made for his shoulder, then moved to obey. Behind her, Jon got rather slowly to his feet. After a moment he walked on unsteady legs toward the shelter.

To get to Virginia, Cathy had to pass the body of the gold-toothed pirate. He lay flat on his back, his eyes staring sightlessly at the sky, his mouth open in a silent scream of pain. His blood had soaked into the sand, framing him in a dark crimson pool. Cathy tried not to look at the other man, but she couldn’t help but get a glimpse of him out of the corner of her eye. He, too, lay on the beach where he had fallen, his grotesquely splayed limbs obscene against the gleaming white sand. His split throat gaped open like a second mouth, the blood already congealing. . . .

To Cathy’s relief, Virginia whimpered slightly when she picked her up.

“Poor baby,” Cathy crooned tenderly, cradling the child against her breast. She could see a bruise just beginning to form above the child’s right eye. A harsh scraping noise brought her swinging nervously
around. Her muscles relaxed as she saw that it was caused by Jon dragging the boat across the sand. Cathy followed him down to the water’s edge.

“Get in,” he said, when he had the gig all the way in the water, its prow pointing out toward the open sea. Cathy did as he told her. When she was seated, with Virginia held gently across her knees, he waded out into the bay, pushing the boat before him.

sixteen

H
er Majesty’s ship
Victoria
was a brigantine, part of the Royal Navy fleet. She had been sent to patrol the seas off the African coast after British merchants had complained of suffering heavy losses of ships and cargos in that area. The merchants were inclined to be hysterical and blame the missing ships on pirates, said Miles Davis, the
Victoria
’s captain, but so far his men had spotted nothing that even remotely resembled a pirate vessel. Personally he felt that the whole thing was pretty much a bag of moonshine, and he had already directed his crew to put about and head for England and home when a keen-eyed sailor had spotted Jon’s small boat. Both Cathy and Jon forbore to contradict him, or to mention that the very prey the
Victoria
sought was anchored off a little island less than half a day’s sailing from where they had been picked up—Cathy because she was heartily sick of bloodshed, and Jon because, after so many close calls, his only desire was to get Cathy safely home again.

Neither Captain Davis nor any of his crew had apparently heard of the mutinied
Cristobel
, or of an escaped convict named Jonathan Hale. For
safety’s sake, Jon introduced himself as plain John Hale, a merchant, who had been delivering a cargo of molasses to Saint Vincent in the Cape Verde Islands when his ship had gone down in a storm. His wife and infant daughter had been traveling with him, and as far as he knew the three of them were the only ones to survive his ship’s loss. But it was clear from the first that no one on the
Victoria
was inclined to be suspicious, so Cathy and Jon were able to settle down to life aboard ship with relatively few worries.

Virginia, except for a bruise on her forehead, was soon as well as ever. The ship’s crew made much of her, and of Cathy, which didn’t go down too well with Jon. Cathy also sported a bruise on her jaw where the pirate had struck her while Jon wore his left arm in a black silk sling which, in Cathy’s opinion, made him look very dashing. These wounds were explained as having happened while trying to escape the sinking ship. Beyond a great deal of solicitous comment lavished on Cathy by the sailors, they occasioned no remark.

Cathy and Jon were given the first mate’s cabin. It was small, and extremely spartan, but Cathy was grateful for the privacy and very prettily thanked Mr. Corrigan, who had turned out for them. Bed sheets were obligingly donated to diaper and clothe Virginia, and Jon was able to wear the best dress uniform of the bosun, who was a tall man, though quite a bit larger in girth than Jon. Still, belted, the uniform jacket did very well, and if the pantaloons beneath were held in place by a belt, the whole effect was to make Jon look breathtakingly handsome, to Cathy’s eyes at least. Cathy herself presented something of a problem. There were, quite simply, no dresses aboard the ship. Finally she was forced to make do with the cabin boy’s best going-ashore outfit. The breeches were of dark blue broadcloth, and they fitted loosely about Cathy’s hips and legs. The shirt was of plain white linen, without frills or ornamentation of any kind. Beneath the thin material Cathy’s full breasts jutted very noticeably. Jon’s eyes popped when he saw
her outfit, and he absolutely forbade her to go outside their cabin dressed in such garb. Cathy, to tease him, pretended to pout, but in reality she had no intention of going out amongst so many men in such immodest apparel. Finally the captain hit upon the idea of loaning her his voluminous cloak. With that all-enveloping garment fastened about her shoulders, even Jon could make no objection to her taking the air on deck.