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He looked at the two guns critically. They were beautifully made and no doubt very accurate but, he wondered, bow would they stand up to the kind of harsh use that was usually the pistol's lot in a ship of wan fired and then often hurled at an enemy's head, dropped on the deck, used as a club? The regular Sea Service pistol had the grace of a hammer compared with these, but it could also stand up to being used as a hammer, a bung starter or a wedge driver. Accuracy as such was not really important; it was rare that a man with a pistol fired at a target more than twenty feet away, in fact, Jackson realized, he could not remember ever aiming at a target even that distant fighting on board a ship was a close - range business, often little more than jamming the muzzle of a pistol in an enemy's ribs and squeezing die trigger.
As Ramage came into the cabin, having changed, Jackson held out the pistols, which Ramage took and slid the belt clips into the waistband of his breeches. Jackson saw that he now wore a cutlass belt over his shoulder the usual sword, used for ceremonial occasions and which he had worn on shore for his visit to the Dutch Governor, must be back on its rack on the bulkhead. It was a good job that the Marchesa, who had also bought that, did not know . . .
'Do you think well have any trouble, sir?'
Ramage shrugged his shoulders. 'I doubt it.'
The lads hope we will,' Jackson commented, and when Ramage raised his eyebrows questioningly he added: 'After what that Spanish privateer did to those people, the lads won't be giving quarter to privateersmen . . .'
These are French, though,' Ramage said, more because he was interested to hear Jackson's reaction than by way of defending privateersmen.
They're as bad. Any man that goes privateering is no better than a thief and a murderer, sir. Why, they say most of the privateersmen are on shore, attacking the Dutch and burning their villages. They'd loot this place as soon as look at it. . .'
Ramage knew only too well that Jackson, in his unique position as the captain's coxswain and respected by the ship's company, was well placed to relay information to the men, information that was in effect official but not a
The chief of these privateers, a man called Brune, has already warned the Governor that they'll burn down this town and murder the people unless he surrenders it to them.'
'Brune, eh?' Jackson repeated. 'Means "brown", doesn't it, sir? Must be a nasty sort of man to want to burn down his ally's capital . . .'
Ramage led the way out of the cabin, knowing that the information would pass through the ship like a gust of wind, and was soon walking along the gangway to the entry port, where Aitken and Southwick were waiting.
'Your gig's ready, sir,' Aitken reported, 'and the rest of the boats are holding on astern, each with the number of seamen and Marines you specified.'
Aitken's voice was polite, as became a first lieutenant reporting to his captain, but the tone made it clear that the Scot was not overly keen on staying behind while Ramage went off, even though the expedition seemed little more than routine.
Southwick, telescope under one arm, said lugubriously: 'I've been watching those privateers for an hour or two. There's something odd about 'em, but I'm damned if I know what it is.'
They might be like us, brandy in - the water casks.'
Southwick grimaced: he had not been allowed to forget the purser's concern, nor had he yet devised a satisfactory way of disposing of it.
Ramage settled himself in the sternsheets, careful that the butts of the pistols did not jab his ribs, and the gig cast off. Jackson steered the boat at the head of a small armada: immediately astern was the launch with twenty - four boarders and commanded by Wagstaffe, then the pi
In Ramage's gig Re
As the gig leapt forward, the rowers' faces soon glistening and then ru
Then, as the gig approached, Ramage watched the privateers. The ten were anchored in pairs, the Trade wind swinging them diagonally across the cha
The second privateer, beyond, was ketch - rigged, her hull painted green, the dark - green of slave ships, the colour of mangrove leaves so that they could hide in the narrow inlets, their hulls blending with the bushes lining the banks. Her lower masts were buff and her topmasts white, so anyone looking for them would be unlikely to spot them against the white of clouds. Ramage once remembered explaining all that to an Army officer, who expected the topmasts to be blue, to match the sky, not realizing that in the Tropics, and particularly on the Guinea coast, there was nearly always broken cloud scudding along. Yes, with that sweeping sheer and low freeboard the ketch was probably a former slaver now finding that in wartime privateering was more profitable.
He felt sure that the nearest privateer, the schooner, belonged to Brune; the leader, or most senior of the privateers, would choose the best berth. In an emergency, the schooner would be the first out of the harbour because she was the nearest to the entrance. And when Brune was on board but felt lie an evening in one of Amsterdam's brothels or cafes his boat had the shortest distance to row. ''
There I A definite movement behind that bowchaser, which was a carronade. And a blur of blue behind the first gun, die washed - out blue that French seamen always favoured. Ramage stood up, drawing his cutlass and waving it a couple of times to attract the attention of the boats astern before pointing to left and right. Even without looking astern he knew that Wagstaffe had started to turn the launch to larboard and Baker would swing the pi