Текст книги "Birds of Prey"

Автор книги: Wilbur Smith

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"WARNING!" the notice began, in vivid scarlet letters, and went on to forbid movement by any person beyond that point, with the penalty for infringement being imprisonment or the payment of a fine of a thousand guilders or both. The board had been erected in the name of the Governor of the Dutch East India Company.

Hal kicked open the door of the single room of the guard hut and found it deserted. The fire on the open hearth was cold and dead. A few articles of Company uniform hung on the wooden pegs in the wall, and a black kettle stood over the dead coals, with odd bowls, bottles and utensils lying on the rough wooden table or on shelves along the walls.

Big Daniel was about to put the slow-match to the thatch, but Hal stopped him. "No point in giving Schreuder a smoke beacon to follow," he said, "and there's naught of value here. Leave it be," and limped back to where the seamen were unloading the carriage.

Aboli was turning the horses out of the traces and Ned Tyler was helping him to improvise pack saddles for them, using the harness, leather work and canvas canopy from the carriage.

Katinka stood forlornly at her husband's side. "What is to become of me, Sir Henry?" she whispered as he came up. "Some of the men want to take you up into the mountains and feed you to the wild animals," he replied. Her hand flew to her lips and she paled. "Others want to cut your throat here and now for what you and your fat toad of a husband did to us."

"You would never allow such a thing to happen," van de Velde blustered. "I only did what was my duty."

"You're right," Hal agreed. "I think throat-cutting too good for you. I favour hanging and drawing, as you did to my father." He glared at him coldly, and van de Velde quailed. "However, I find myself sickened by you both. I want no further truck with either of you, and so I leave you and your lovely wife to the mercy of God, the devil and the amorous Colonel Schreuder." He turned and strode away to where Aboli and Ned were checking and tightening the loads on the horses.

Three of the greys had kegs of gunpowder slung on each side of their backs, two carried bundles of weapons and the sixth horse was loaded with Sukeena's bulky saddle-bags.

"All shipshape, Captain." Ned knuckled his forehead. "We can up anchor and get under way at your command." "There's nothing to keep us here. The Princess Sukeena will ride on the lead horse." He looked around for her. "Where is she?"

"I am here, Gundwane." Sukeena stepped out from behind the guard hut. "And I need no mollycoddling. I will walk like the rest of you."

Hal saw that she had shed her long skirts and that she now wore a pair of baggy Balinese breeches and a loose cotton shift that reached to her knees. She had tied a cotton head cloth over her hair, and on her feet were sturdy leather sandals that would be comfortable for walking. The men ogled the shape of her calves in the breeches, but she ignored their rude stares, took the lead rein of the nearest horse and led it towards the gap in the bitter-almond hedge.

"Sukeena!" Hal would have stopped her, but she recognized his censorious tone and ignored it. He realized the folly of persisting, and wisely tempered his next command. "Ald-tuda, you are the only one who knows the path from here. Go ahead with your sister." Althuda ran to catch up with her, and brother and sister led them into the uncharted wilderness beyond the hedge.

Hal and Aboli brought up the rear of the column as it wound through the dense scrub and bush. No men had trodden this path recently. It had been made by wild animals. the marks of their hoofs and paws were plain to see in the soft sandy soil, and their dung littered the track.

Aboli could recognize each animal by these signs, and as they moved along at a forced pace, he pointed them out to Hal. "That is leopard and there is the spoor of the antelope with the twisted horns we call kudu. At least we shall not starve," he promised. "There is a great plenty of game in this land."

This was the first opportunity since the escape that they had had to talk, and Hal asked quietly, "This Sabah, the friend of Althuda, what do you know of him?"

"Only the messages he sent."

"Should he not have met us at the hedge?"

"He said only that he would lead us into the mountains. I expected him to be waiting at the hedge," Aboli shrugged, "but with Althuda to guide us we do not need him."

They made good progress, the grey mare trotting easily with them hanging onto her traces and running beside her. Whenever they passed a tree that would bear Aboli's weight he shinned up it and looked back for signs of pursuit. Each time he came down and shook his head.

"Schreuder will come," Hal told him. "I have heard men say that those green-jackets of his can run down a mounted man. They will come."

They moved on steadily across the plain, stopping only at the swampy waterholes they passed. Hal hung onto the horse to ease his injured leg and, as he limped along, Aboli recounted all that had happened in the months since they had last been together. Hal was silent as he described, in his own language, how he had retrieved Sir Francis's body from the gibbet and the funeral he had given him. "It was the burial of a great chief. I dressed -him in the hide of a black bull and placed his ship and his weapons within his reach. I left food and water for his journey, and before his eyes I set the cross of his God." Hal's throat was too choked for him to thank Aboli for what he had done.

The day wore on, and their progress slowed as men and horses tired in the soft sandy footing. At the next marshy swamp where they stopped for a few minutes" rest, Hal took Sukeena aside.

"You have been strong and brave but your legs are not as long as ours, and I have watched you stumble with fatigue. From now on you must ride." When she started to protest he stopped her firmly. "I obeyed you in the matters of my wounds, but in all else I am captain and you must do as I say. From here on you will ride."

Her eyes twinkled. She made a pretty little gesture of submission, placing her fingertips together and touching them to her lips, "As you command, master," and allowed him to boost her up on top of the saddle-bags on the leading grey.

They skirted the swamp and went on a little faster now. Twice more Aboli climbed a tree to look back and saw no sign of pursuit. Against his natural instincts Hal began to hope that they might have eluded their pursuers, that they might reach the mountains that loomed ever closer and taller without being further molested.

In the middle of the afternoon they crossed a broad -open vlei, a meadow of short green grass where herds of wild antelope with scimitar-curved horns were grazing. They looked up at the approach of the caravan of horses and men, standing frozen in wide-eyed astonishment! their coats a metallic blue-grey hue in the afternoon sunlight.

"Even I have never seen beasts of that ilk Aboli admitted.

As the herds fled before them, wreathed in their own dust, Althuda. called back, "Those are the animals the Dutch call blaauwbok, the blue buck. I have seen great herds of them on the plains beyond the mountains."

Beyond the vlei the ground began to rise in a series of undulating ridges towards the foothills of the range. They climbed towards the first ridge, with Hal toiling along at the rear of the column. By now he was moving heavily, in obvious pain. Aboli saw that his face was flushed with fever, and that blood and watery fluid had seeped through the bandage that Sukeena had placed on his leg.

At the top of the ridge Aboli forced a halt. They looked back at the great Table Mountain, which dominated the western horizon. To their left, the wide blue curve of False Bay opened. However, they were all too exhausted to spend long admiring their surroundings. The horses stood, heads hanging, and the men threw themselves down in any shade they could find. Sukeena slid off her mount and hurried to where Hal had slumped with his back to a small tree-trunk. She knelt in front of him, unwrapped the bandage from his leg and drew a sharp breath when she saw how swollen and inflamed it was. She leaned closer and sniffed the oozing punctures. When she spoke her voice was stern.

"You cannot walk further on this. You must ride as you force me to do." Then she looked up at Aboli. "Make a fire to boil water," she ordered him. , "We have no time for such tomfoolery," Hal murmured halfheartedly, but they ignored him. Aboli lit a small fire with a slow-match and placed over it a tin mug of water. As soon as it boiled, Sukeena prepared a paste with the herbs she had in her saddle-bag, and spread it on a folded cloth. While it still steamed with heat she clapped the cloth over Hal's wounds. He moaned and said, "I swear I would rather Aboli pissed on my leg, than you burned it off with your devilish concoctions."

Sukeena ignored his immodest language and went on with her task. She bound the poultice in place with a fresh cloth, then from her saddle-bags she fetched a loaf of bread and a dried sausage. She cut these into slices, folded bread and sausage together, and handed one to each of the men.

"Bless you, Princess." Big Daniel knuckled his forehead, before taking his ration from her.

"God love you, Princess," said Ned, and all the others adopted the name. From then on she was their princess, and the rough seamen looked upon her with increasing respect and burgeoning affection.

"You can eat on the march, lads." Hal hauled himself to his feet.

"We have been lucky too long. Soon the devil will want his turn." They groaned and muttered but followed his lead.

As Hal was helping Sukeena to mount, there was a warning shout from Daniel. "There the bastards come at last." He pointed back down at the open vlei at the bottom of the slope. Hal pushed Sukeena up between the saddlebags and limped back to the rear of the column. He looked down the hillside and saw the long file of running men who had emerged from the edge of the scrub and were crossing the open ground. They were led by a single horseman who came on at a trot.

"It's Schreuder again. He has found another mount." Even at that range there was no mistaking the Colonel. He sat tall and arrogant in the saddle, and there was a sense of deadly purpose about the set of his shoulders and the way he lifted his head to look up the slope towards them. It was obvious that he had not yet spotted them, hidden in the thick scrub.

"How many men with him?" Ned Tyler asked, and they all looked at Hal to count them. He slitted his eyes and watched them come out of the thick scrub. With their swinging trot they kept up easily with Schreuder's horse. "Twenty," Hal counted.

"Why so few?" Big Daniel demanded.

"Almost certainly Schreuder has chosen his fastest runners to press us hard. The rest will be following at their best speed." Hal shaded his eyes. "Yes, by God, there they are, a league behind the first platoon, but coming fast. I can see their dust and the shape of their helmets above the scrub. There must be a hundred or more in that second detachment."

"Twenty we can deal with," Big Daniel muttered, "but a hundred of those murdering green-backs is more than I can eat for breakfast without belching. What orders, Captain?" Every man looked at Hal.

He paused before replying, carefully studying the lie and the grain of the land below before he said, "Master Daniel, take the rest of the party on with Althuda to guide you. Aboli and I will stay here with one horse to slow down their advance."

"We cannot outrun them. They've proved that to us, Captain," Daniel protested. "Would it not be better to fight them here?"

"You have your orders." Hal turned a cold, steely eye upon him.

Daniel again knuckled his brow. "Aye, Captain," and he turned to the others. "You heard the orders, lads."

Hal limped back to where Sukeena sat on her horse, with Althuda. holding the lead rein. "You must go on, whatever happens. Do not turn back for any reason," he told Althuda, and then he smiled up at Sukeena "Not even if her royal highness commands it."

She did not return his smile but leaned down closer and whispered, "I will wait for you on the mountain. Do not make me wait too long."

Althuda led the column of horses forward again, and as they crossed the skyline there was a distant shout from the vlei below.

"So they have discovered us," Aboli muttered.

Hal went to the single remaining horse, and loosened one of the fifty-pound kegs of gunpowder. He lowered it to the ground, and told Aboli, "Take the horse on. Follow the others. Let Schreuder see you go. Tether it out of sight beyond the ridge and then come back to me."

He rolled the keg to the nearest outcrop of tock and crouched beside it. With only the top of his head showing, he again studied the slope below him, then turned his full attention to Schreuder and his band of green-jackets. Already they were much closer, and he could see that two of the Hottentots ran ahead of Schreuder's horse. They watched the ground as they came on, following exactly the route that Hal's party had blazed.

They read our sign from the earth, like hounds after the stag, he thought. They will come up the same path we followed.

At that moment Aboli dropped back over the ridge and squatted beside him. "The horse is tethered and the others go on apace. Now what is your plan, Gundwane?"

"Tis so simple, there is no need to explain it to you," said Hal, as he prised the bung from the keg with the point of his sword. Then he unwound the length of the slow match he had tied around his waist. "This match is the devil. It either burns too fast or too slow. But I will take a chance on three fingers" length," he muttered as he measured, then lopped off a length. He rolled it gently between the palms of his hands in an attempt to induce it to burn evenly, then threaded one end into the bunghole of the keg and secured it by driving back the wooden plug.

"You had best hurry, Gundwane. Your old fencing partner, Schreuder, is in great haste to meet you again."

Hal glanced up from his task and saw that the pursuers had crossed the meadow and were already starting up the slope towards them. "Keep out of sight," Hal told him. "I want to let them get very close." The two lay flat on their bellies and peered down the hillside. Sitting high in the saddle, Schreuder was in full view, but the two trackers who led him were obscured by the scrub and flowering bushes from the waist down. As they came on Hal could make out the ugly gravel graze down Schreuder's face, the rents and dirt smears on his uniform. He wore neither Hat nor wig, had probably lost them along the way, perhaps in his fall. Vain though he was, he had wasted no time in trying to regain them, so urgent was his haste.

The sun had already reddened his shaven pate and his horse was lathered. Perhaps he had not bothered to water it during the long chase. Closer still he came. His eyes were fastened on the ridge where he had seen the fugitives cross. His face was a stony mask, and Hal could see that he was a man driven by his volcanic temper, ready to take any risk or brave any danger.

On the steep slope even his indefatigable trackers began to flag. Hal could see the sweat streaming down their flat yellow Asiatic faces and hear their gasping breath.

"Come on, you rogues!" Schreuder goaded them. "You will let them get clear away. Faster! Run faster." They came scrambling and straining up the slope.

"Good!" Hal muttered. "They are sticking in our tracks, as I hoped." He whispered his final instructions to Aboli. "But wait until I give you the word," he cautioned him.

Closer they came until Hal could hear the Hottentots" bare feet slapping the ground, the squeak of Schreuder's tack and the jingle of his spurs. On he came, until Hal saw the individual beads of sweat that decorated the points of his moustache, and the little veins in his bulging blue eyes as he fixed his obsessed and furious stare on the skyline of the ridge, overlooking the enemy who lay hidden much closer at hand.

"Ready!" whispered Hal, and held the burning slow match to the fuse of the powder keg. It flared, spluttered, caught, then burned up fiercely. The flame raced down the short length of fuse towards the bung hole.

"Now, Aboli!" he snapped. Aboli seized the keg and leapt to his feet, almost under the hoofs of Schreuder's horse. The two Hottentots yelled with shock and ducked off the path, while the horse shied and reared, throwing Schreuder forward onto its neck.

For a moment Aboli stood poised, holding the keg high above his head with both hands. The fuse sizzled and hissed like an angry puff-adder, and the powder smoke blew around his great tattooed head like a blue nimbus. Then he hurled the keg out over the hillside. It turned lazily in the air before striking the rocky ground and bounding away, bouncing and leaping as it gathered speed. It jumped up into the face of Schreuder's horse, which reared away just as its rider had recovered his balance. Schreuder was thrown forward again onto its neck, lost one of his stirrups and hung awkwardly out of the saddle.

The horse spun and leaped back down the slope, almost into the platoon of infantry that was following close upon its heels. As both maddened horse and bouncing powder keg came hurtling back among them, the column of green jackets sent up a howl of consternation. Every one recognized that the smoking fuse was the harbinger of a fearsome detonation only seconds away, and they broke ranks and scattered. Most turned instinctively downhill, rather than breaking out to the sides, and the keg overhauled them, bouncing along in their midst.

Schreuder's horse went down on its bunched hindquarters as it slipped and slid down the hillside. The reins snapped in one of its rider's hands while the other lost its precarious hold on the pommel of the saddle. Schreuder fell clear of his mount's driving hoofs, and as he hit the earth the keg exploded. The fall saved his life for he had tumbled into the lee of a low rock outcrop and the main force of the blast swept over him.

However, it ripped through the horde of routed soldiers. Those closest to it were hurled about and thrown upwards like burning leaves from a garden fire. Their clothing was stripped from their mangled bodies, and a disembodied arm was thrown high to fall back at Hal's feet. Both Aboli and Hal were knocked down by the force of the blast. Ears buzzing, Hal scrambled upright again and stared down in awe at the devastation they had created.

Not one of the enemy was still on his feet. "By God, you killed them all!" Hal marvelled, but at once there were confused Cries and shouts among the flattened bushes. First one and then more of the enemy soldiers staggered dazedly upright.

"Come away!" Aboli seized Hal's arm and dragged him to the top of the ridge. Before they dropped over the crest Hal glanced back and saw that Schreuder had hoisted himself upright. Swaying drunkenly he was standing over the mutilated carcass of his mount. He was still so dazed that, even as Hal watched, his legs folded under him and he sat down heavily among the broken branches and torn leaves, covering his face with his hands.

Aboli released Hal's arm, and changed his sword into his right hand. "I can run back and finish him off," he growled, but the suggestion stirred Hal from his own daze.

"Leave him be! It would not be honourable to kill him while he is unable to defend himself."

"Then let us go, and fast." Aboli growled. "We may have put this band of Schreuder's men up on the reef but, look! The rest of his green-jackets are not far behind."

Hal wiped the sweat and dust from his face and blinked to stop his eyes blurring.. He saw that Aboli was right. The dust cloud from the second detachment of the enemy rose from the scrub of the flatlands on the far side of the vleil but it was coming on swiftly.

"If we run hard now, we might be able to hold them off until nightfall and by then we should be into the mountains,"Aboli estimated. " Within a few paces, Hal stumbled and hopped as his injured leg gave way under him. Without a word Aboli gave him his arm to help him over the rough ground to where he had tethered the horse. This time Hal did not protest when Aboli boosted him up onto its back and took the lead rein.

"Which direction?" Hal demanded. As he looked ahead the mountain barrier was riven into a labyrinth of ravines and soaring rock buttresses, of cliffs and deep gorges in which grew. dense strips of forest and tangled scrub. He could pick out no path nor pass through this confusion.

"Althuda knows the way, and he has left signs for us to follow." The spoor of five horses and the band of fugitives was deeply trodden ahead of them, but to enhance it Althuda had blazed the bark from the trees along his route. They followed at the best of their speed, and from the next ridge saw the tiny shapes of the five grey horses crossing a stretch of open ground two or three miles ahead. Hal could even make out Sukeena's small figure perched on the back of the leading horse. The silver colour of the horses made them stand out like mirrors in the dark, surrounding bush, and he murmured, "They are beautiful animals, but they draw the eye of an enemy."

"In the traces of a gentleman's carriage there could be no finer," Aboli agreed, "but in the mountains they would flounder. We must abandon them when we reach the rough ground, or else they will break their lovely legs in the rocks and crevices."

"Leave them for the Dutch?" Hal asked. "Why not a musket ball to end their suffering?"

"Because they are beautiful, and because I love them like my children," said Aboli softly, reaching up and patting the animal's neck. The grey mare rolled an eye at him and whickered softly, returning his affection.

Hal laughed, "She loves you also, Aboli. For your sake we will spare them."

They plunged down the next slope and struggled up the far side. The ground grew steeper at each pace and the mountain crests seemed to hang suspended above their heads. At the top they paused again to let the mare blow, and looked ahead.

"It seems Althuda is aiming for that dark gorge dead ahead." Hal shaded his eyes. "Can you see them?"

"No," Aboli grunted. "They are hidden by the folds of the foothills and the trees." Then he looked back again. "But look behind you, Gundwane!"

Hal turned and stared where he pointed, and exclaimed as though he were in pain. "How can they have come so quickly? They are gaining on us as though we were standing still."

The column of running green-jackets was swarming over the ridge behind them like soldier ants from a disturbed nest. Hal could count their numbers easily and pick out the white officers. The mid-afternoon sunlight flashed from their bayonets and Hal could hear their faint but jubilant cries as they viewed their quarry so close ahead.

"There is Schreuder!" Hal exclaimed bitterly. "By God, that man is a monster. Is there no means of stopping him?" The dismounted colonel was trotting along near the rear of the long, spread-out column but, as Hal watched him, he passed the man ahead of him on the path. "He runs faster than his own Hottentots. If we linger here another minute, he will be up to us before we reach the mouth of the dark gorge."

The ground ahead rose up so steeply that the horse could not take it straight up, and the path began to zigzag across the slope. There was another joyous cry from below, like the halloo of the fox hunter, and they saw their pursuers strung out over a mile or more of the track. The leaders were much closer now.

"Long musket shot," Hal hazarded, and as he said it one of the leading soldiers dropped to his knee behind a rock and took deliberate aim before he fired. They saw the puff of muzzle smoke long before they heard the dull pop of the shot. The ball struck a blue chip off a rock fifty feet below where they stood. "Still too far. Let them waste their powder."

The grey mare leaped upwards over the rocky steps in the path, much surer on her feet than Hal could have hoped. Then they reached the outer bend in the wide dogleg and started back across the slope. Now they were approaching their pursuers at an oblique angle, and the gap between them narrowed even faster.

The men on the path below welcomed them with joyous shouts. They flung themselves down to rest, to steady their pounding hearts and shaking hands. Hal could see them checking the priming in the pans of their muskets and lighting their slow-match, preparing themselves to make the shot as the grey mare and her rider came within fair musket range.

"Satan's breathP Hal muttered. "This is like sailing into an enemy broadsideP But there was nowhere to run or hide, and they laboured. on up the path.

Hal could see Schreuder now. he had worked his way steadily towards the head of the column and was staring up at them. Even at this range Hal could see that he had driven himself far beyond his natural strength. his face was drawn and haggard, his uniform torn, filthy, soaked with sweat, and blood from a dozen scratches and abrasions. He heaved and strained for breath, but his sunken eyes burned with malevolence. He did not have the strength to shout or to shake a weapon but he watched Hal implacably.

One of the green-jackets fired and they heard the ball hum close over their heads. Aboli was urging on the mare at her best pace over the steep, broken path, but they would be within musket range for many more minutes. Now a ripple of fire ran along the line of soldiers along the path below. Musket balls thudded among the rocks around them, some flattening into shiny discs where they struck. Others sprayed chips of stone down upon them, or whined away in ricochet across the valley.

Unscathed, the grey mare reached the outward leg of the path and started back. Now the range was longer and most of the Hottentot infantrymen jumped to their feet and took up the pursuit. One or two started directly up the slope, attempting to cut the corner, but the hillside proved too sheer for even their nimble feet. They gave up, slid back to the angled pathway and hurried after their companions along the gentler but longer route.

A few soldiers remained kneeling in the path, and reloaded, stabbing the ramrods frantically down the muzzles of their muskets, then pouring black powder into the pan. Schreuder had watched the fusillade, leaning heavily against a rock while his pounding heart and laboured breathing slowed. Now he pushed himself upright and seized a reloaded musket from one of his Hottentots, elbowing the other man aside.

"We are beyond musket shot!" Hal protested. "Why does he persist?"

"Because he is mad with hatred for you," Aboli replied. "The devil gives him strength to carry on."

Swiftly Schreuder stripped off his coat and bundled it over the rock, making a cushion on which to rest the forestock of the musket. He looked down the barrel and picked up the pip of the foresight in the notch of the backsight. He settled' it for an instant on Hal's bobbing head, then lifted it until he had a slice of blue sky showing beneath it, compensating for the drop of the heavy lead ball when it reached the limit of its carry. In the same motion he swept the sight ahead of the grey's straining head.

"He can never hope for a hit from there!" Hal breathed, but at that instant he saw the silver smoke bloom like a noxious flower on the stern of the musket barrel. Then he felt a mallet blow as the ball ploughed into the ribs of the grey mare an inch from his knee. Hal heard the air driven from the horse's punctured lungs. The brave animal reeled backwards and went down on its haunches. It tried to recover its footing by rearing wildly, but instead threw itself off the edge of the narrow path. just in time, Aboli grabbed Hal's injured leg and pulled him from its back.

Hal and Aboli sprawled together on the rocks and looked down. The horse rolled until it struck the bend in the pathway, where it came to rest in a slide of small stones, loose earth and dust. It lay with all four legs kicking weakly in the air. A resounding shout of triumph went up from the pursuing soldiers, whose cries rang along the cliffs and echoed through the gloomy depths of the dark gorge.

Hal crawled shakily to his feet, and quickly assessed their circumstances. Both he and Aboli still had their muskets slung over their shoulders and their swords in their scabbards. In addition they each had a pair of pistols, a small powder horn and a bag containing musket balls strapped around their waists. But they had lost all else.

Below them their pursuers had been given new heart by this reverse in their fortunes and were clamouring like a pack of hounds with the smell of the chase hot in their nostrils. They came scrambling upwards.

"Leave your pistols and musket," Aboli ordered. "Leave the powder horn and sword also, or their weight will wear you down."

Hal shook his head. "We will need them soon enough. Lead the way on." Aboli did not argue and went away at full stride. Hal stayed close behind him, forcing his injured leg to serve his purpose through the pain and the quivering weakness that spread slowly up his thigh.

Aboli reached back to hand him up over the more formidable steps in the pathway, but the incline became sharper as they laboured upwards and began to work round the sheer buttress of rock that formed one of the portals of the dark gorge. Now, at every pace forward, they were forced to step up onto the next level, as though they were on a staircase, and were skirting the sheer wall that dropped into the valley far below. The pursuers, though still close, were out of sight around the buttress.

"Are we sure this is the right path?" Hal gasped, as they stopped for a few seconds" rest on a broader step.

"Althuda is leaving sign for us still," Aboli assured him, and kicked over the cairn of three small pebbles balanced upon each other which had been erected prominently in the centre of the path. "And so are my grey horses." He smiled as he pointed out a pile of shining wet balls of dung a little further ahead. Then he cocked his head. "Listen!"