Birds of Prey - Smith Wilbur (версия книг TXT) 📗
The Ethiopian pilot guided the Golden Bough southwards in the night under top sails alone. With a leadsman taking soundings they crept up into the lee of Dahlak Island off the mouth of Adulis Bay.
Anxiously Hal listened in the darkness to the chant of the leadsman, "No bottom with this line!" and minutes later, "No bottom with this line!" and then the plop of the lead as it was swung out ahead of the bows and hit the surface. Suddenly the chant altered and the leadsman's voice took on a sharper tone. "By the deep, twenty!"
"Mister Tyler!" Hal barked. "Take another reef in your top sails. Stand by to let the anchor go!"
"By the mark, ten! "The leadsman's next cry was sharper still.
"Furl all your canvas. Let go your anchor!"
The anchor went down and the Golden Bough glided on a short distance before she snubbed up on the cable.
"Take the deck, Mister Tyler," Hal said. "I am going aloft." He went up the shrouds from deck to the top of the mainmast without a pause, and was pleased that his breathing was merely deep and even when he reached the canvas crow's nest.
"I see you, Gundwane!" Aboli greeted him, and made room for him in the canvas nest. Hal settled beside him and looked first to the land. Dahlak Island was a darker mass in the dark night, but they were a full cable's length clear of her rocks. Then he looked to the west and saw the sweep of Adulis Bay, clearly outlined by the fires of El Grang's army encamped along the shoreline around the little port of Zulla. The waters of the bay sparkled with the riding lanterns of the anchored fleet of Islam. He tried to count those lights but gave up when the tally reached sixty-four. He wondered if one of those was the Gull of Moray, and felt his guts contract at the thought.
He turned to look into the east and saw the first pale promise of the dawn silhouette the rugged peaks of Arabia, from which came El Grang's transport dhows laden with men, horses and provisions to swell his legions.
Then, below the dawn on the dark sea, he saw the riding lanterns of other ships winking like fireflies as they sailed in on the night breeze towards Adulis Bay.
"Can you count them, Aboli?" he asked, and Aboli chuckled.
"My eyes are not as sharp as yours, Gundwane. Let us say merely that there are many, and wait for the dawn to disclose their true numbers," he murmured.
They waited in the silence of old companions, and both felt the chill of the coming dawn warmed away by the promise of battle that the day must bring, for this narrow sea swarmed with the ships of the enemy.
The eastern sky began to glow like an ironsmith's forge. The rocks of the island close at hand showed pale through the gloom, painted white by the dung of the sea birds that for centuries had roosted upon them. From their rocky perches the birds launched into flight. In staggered arrowhead formations they flew across the red dawn sky uttering wild, haunting cries. Looking up at them Hal felt the morning wind brush his cheek with cool fingers. It was blowing out of the west as he had relied upon it to do. He had the flotilla of small dhows under his lee, and at his mercy.
The rising sun flared upon the mountain tops and set them aflame. Far out beyond the low rocks of the island a sail glinted on the dark ting waters, and then another and, as the circle of their vision expanded, a dozen more.
Hal slapped Aboli lightly on the shoulder. "It is time to go to work, old friend, "he said, and slid down the shrouds. As his feet hit the deck he called to the helm, "Up anchor, Mister Tyler. All hands aloft to set sail."
Released from restraint the Golden Bough spread her canvas and wheeled away. The waters rustling under her bows and her wake creaming behind her, she sped out from her ambush behind Dahlak Island.
The light was bright enough by now for Hal to make out clearly his quarry scattered across the wind-flecked waters ahead. He looked eagerly for the piled canvas of a tall ship among them, but saw only the single lateen sails of the Arabian dhows.
The closest of these vessels seemed unalarmed by the Golden Bough's appearance, her high pyramid of sails standing right across the entrance to Adulis Bay. They held their course and, as the frigate bore down upon the nearest of them, Hal saw the crew and passengers lining the dhow's side and peering across at them. Some had scampered up the stubby mast and were waving a greeting.
Hal stopped beside the helm and said to Ned Tyler, "Tis likely that they have seen only one other ship like ours in these waters and that's the Gull. They take us for an ally." He looked up to where his topmast men hung in the rigging, ready to handle the great mass of canvas. Then he looked back along the deck, where the gunners were fussing over the culver ins and the powder boys were scurrying up from below decks with their deadly burdens.
"Mister Fisher!" he called. "Load one battery on each side with ball, all the others with chain and grape, if you please." Big Daniel grinned, with black and rotten teeth, and knuckled his brow. Hal wanted simply to disable the enemy vessels, not sink or burn them. Even the smallest and poorest of those craft must be worth a great deal to the exchequer of His Most Christian Majesty, if he could capture them and deliver them to Admiral Senec at Mitsiwa. The battery on each side loaded with ball would be held in reserve.
The first dhow was so close ahead that Hal could see the expressions on the faces of her crew. They were a dozen or so sailors, dressed in ragged and faded robes and haik turbans. Most were still smiling and waving but the old man at the tiller in the stern was looking about wildly, as if to seek some providential escape from the tall hull that was racing down upon his little vessel.
"Break out our colours, if you please, Mister Tyler," Hal ordered, and watched the croix pott6e unfurl alongside the white Coptic cross of the Empire on its royal blue ground. The dismay on the faces of the dhow's crew as they saw the cross of their doom spread before their eyes was pathetic to behold and Hal gave his next order. "Run out your guns, Master Daniel!" The Golden Bough's gun ports crashed back and the hull reverberated to the rumble of the guns as the culver ins poked out their bronze muzzles.
