Birds of Prey - Smith Wilbur (версия книг TXT) 📗
Robben Island was only a league dead ahead, and as the bay opened before them they could make out the Gull lying on the moonlit waters.
"Hoist a lantern to the masthead," Cumbrae ordered, "We we'll put a wee stretch of water between us before the cheese-heads in the fort rub the sleep out of their eyes."
As the lantern went aloft, the Gull repeated the signal to acknowledge. Then she hoisted her anchor and followed the prize out to sea.
"There is bound to be a good breakfast in the galley," Cumbrae told his men. "The Dutchies know how to tend their bellies. Once you have them locked neatly in their own chains, you can try their fare. Boatswain, keep her steady as she goes. I'm going below to have a peep at the manifest, and to find what we've caught ourselves."
The Dutch officers were trussed hand and foot, and laid out in a row on the deck of the main cabin. An armed seaman stood over each man. Cumbrae shone the lantern in their faces, and examined them in turn. The big warlike officer lifted his head and bellowed up at him, "I pray God that I live to see you swinging on the rope's end, along with all the other devil-spawned English pirates who plague the oceans." It was obvious that he had fully recovered from the blow to the back of his head.
"I must commend you on your command of the English language," Cumbrae told him. "Your choice of words is quite poetic. What is your name, sir?"
"I am Colonel Cornelius Schreuder in the service of the Dutch East India Company."
"How do you do, sir? I am Angus Cochran, Earl of Cumbrae."
"You, sit, are nothing but a vile pirate."
"Colonel, your repetitions are becoming just a wee bit tiresome. I implore you not to spoil a most protriising acquaintanceship in this manner. After all, you are to be my guest for some time until your ransom is paid. I am a privateer, sailing under the commission of His Majesty King Charles the Second. You, gentlemen, are prisoners of war."
"There is no war!" Colonel Schreuder roared at him scornfully. "We gave you Englishmen a good thrashing and the war is over. Peace was signed over two months ago."
Cumbrae stared at him in horror, then found his voice again. "I do not believe you, sir." Suddenly he was subdued and shaken. He denied it more to give himself time to think than with any conviction. News of the English defeat at the Medway and the battle of the Thames had been some months old when Richard Lister had given it to him. He had also reported that the King was suing for peace with the Dutch Republic. Anything might have happened in the meantime.
"Order these villains of yours to release me, and I will prove it to you." Colonel Schreuder was still in a towering rage, and Cumbrae hesitated before he nodded at his men. "Let him up and untie him," he ordered.
Colonel Schreuder sprang to his feet and smoothed his rumpled moustaches as he stormed off to his own cabin. There, he took down a silk robe from the head of his bunk. Tying the belt around his waist he went to his writing bureau and opened the drawer. With frosty dignity, he came back to Cumbrae and handed him a thick bundle of papers.
The Buzzard saw that most were official Dutch proclamations in both Dutch and English, but that one was an English news-sheet. He unfolded it with trepidation, and held it at arm's length. It was dated August 1667. The headline was in heavy black type two inches tall. PEACE
SIGNED WITH DUTCH REPUBLIC!
As his eye raced down the page, his mind tried to adjust to this disconcerting change in circumstances. He knew that with the signing of the peace treaty all Letters of Marque, issued by either side in the conflict, had become null and void. Even had there been any doubt about it, the third paragraph on the page confirmed it. All privateers of both combatant nations, sailing under commission and Letters of Marque, have been ordered to cease warlike expeditions forthwith and to return to their home ports to submit themselves to examination by the Admiralty assizes.
The Buzzard stared at the news-sheet without reading further, and pondered the various courses of action open to him. The Swallow was a rich prize, the Good Lord alone knew just how rich. Scratching his beard he toyed with the idea of flouting the orders of the Admiralty assizes, and hanging on to it at all costs. His great-grandfather had been a famous outlaw, astute enough to back the Earl of Moray and the other Scottish lords against Mary, Queen of Scots. After the battle of Carberry Hill they had forced Mary to abdicate and placed her infant son James upon the throne. For his part in the campaign his ancestor had received his earldom.
Before him all the Cochrans had been sheep thieves and border raiders, who had made their fortunes by murdering and robbing not only Englishmen but members of other Scottish clans as well. The Cochran blood ran true, so the consideration was not a matter of ethics. It was a calculation of his chances of getting away with this prize.
Cumbrae was proud of his lineage but also aware that his ancestors had come to prominence by adroitly avoiding the gibbet and the hangman's ministrations. During this last century, all the seafaring nations of the world had banded together to stamp out the scourge of the corsair and the pirate that, since the times of the pharaohs of ancient Egypt, had plagued the commerce of the oceans.
Ye'll not get away with it, laddie, he decided silently, and shook his head regretfully. He held up the news-sheet before the eyes of his sailors, none of whom was able to read. "It seems the war is over, more's the pity of it. We will have to set these gentlemen free."
"Captain, does this mean that we lose out on our prize money?" the coxswain asked plaintively.
"Unless you want to swing from the gallows at Greenwich dock for piracy, it surely does."
Then he turned and bowed to Colonel Schreuder. "sir, it seems that I owe you an apology." He smiled ingratiatingly. "It was an honest mistake on my part, which I hope you will forgive. I have been without news of the outside world these past months."
