CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The first carts arrived an hour after dawn. Two nervous Dutch surgeons had come on horseback, obviously unwilling and acting under orders, and with them was the guide, who told Ramage that he had reported to the Governor.

'Is there any message from His Excellency?'

The guide shook his head. 'More carts come soon and the hospital has been warned to - how do you say? - to stand by.'

'Do you speak French?'

'Some - enough, I think.'

'I'm leaving you a dozen men to help you get the wounded back to Amsterdam. If you have spades and picks you can bury the dead here; otherwise take them back to the city.'

The seven missing British seamen had been found: two were dead, killed in sword fights, and five were wounded, one badly. A total of six dead and twelve wounded. For the moment Ramage did not want to know the names of the dead; there would probably be more before sunset The British dead and wounded - they go in the first carts.'

'Of course,' the Dutchman said. The doctors are already attending them with your surgeon's mates.'

The guide was an unimaginative but competent man, and it was clear that he hated Dutch rebels, Frenchmen and anyone else who wilfully interrupted the normal peace and quiet of life in Curacao. The British were helping to restore that peace and quiet and for that reason (for that reason only, Ramage was certain) they had his loyalty and assistance.

Ramage turned away to look for Rennick but Jackson came up, carrying something carefully.

'Breakfast, sir. Some fine slices o' beef. One of the men has roasted them specially. Just about scorched his eyebrows off, too!'

And suddenly, at the thought of munching juicy slices of beef, Ramage felt faint from hunger. He grinned at Jackson as he took the meat, which was stacked like several thin slices of bread and dripping with juice. 'Have all the men eaten and packed away some for later?'

'Only you and Mr Aitken to eat now, sir. The men have had enough to last a week.'

'And Mr Orsini?'

Jackson began laughing. 'He's been your head chef, sir, standing over the man who was roasting it. Reckon he knows just how you like it, sir, red in the middle and brown at the edges. Most concerned, he was.'

Ramage sat down and began eating. The rising sun was still below the horizon but just beginning to catch the peak of Sint Christoffelberg, which was 1200 feet high, although not yet lighting the top of Tafelberg in front of it, which was only 750 feet.

Where were the rebels making for? There were villages all round Sint Christoffelberg, although it seemed possible they'd make for Sint Kruis Baai, on the coast near the southern slope of the great peak and close to where the Calypso had been when she first sighted La Perle. Then Ramage dismissed the idea: why make for a bay when you have no boats to rescue you?

This beef is good. It tastes all the better for being eaten with the fingers, juice running down the sleeve and down the chin, tickling, and the chin unshaven and rasping as a sleeve serves as a napkin. All the better, too, knowing that all the men now bustling around have eaten their fill of it. No one at the finest hotel in London could taste such beef - but two hundred Calypsos had just gorged themselves on it. They deserved such a feast, even though there were no vegetables and no tots to wash it down - the Marine sergeant had. been ordered to pour away all the wine, otherwise by now several men would be drunk.

It was, of course, a feast in a strangely beautiful cemetery, because the corpses of the Frenchmen were still over there, but the rising sun was casting fantastic long shadows, using rounded hills and mountain peaks and cactus and the small divi-divi trees which always pointed towards the west, leaning in deference to the Trade winds. No clouds yet and the stars have faded, the moon becoming anaemic. In a few minutes the sun will come with its usual rush and the grey countryside will suddenly be dappled with pink as the upper rim - he shook his head and stood up: there had been killing a few hours ago, there was more to come. His cutlass was still stained with the blood of Brune - he refused to think of the grim coincidence which had brought them together, because killing the man gave no satisfaction: he would have preferred a trial. Time, time when Brune was locked alone in a cell and perhaps in the long nights the enormity of what he had done in the Tranquil would come to him. Yet it would not; a man who could order the unnecessary massacre of innocent men and women was so beyond the understanding of civilized people that he was almost beyond judicial punishment: one did not try a rabid dog.

'Ah, Rennick!' The Marine officer had seen him get up from his meal, and was ready for orders. 'Well, you still have your guide - I'm leaving mine here to get the casualties back to Amsterdam. So let's ferret out the rest of those rebels. Have your guide question anyone you see on the road: we don't want to march a yard more than necessary.'

'I was just going to report, sir,' Rennick said, 'but I decided to wait until you'd eaten. A Dutch farmer who rode in to see what was happening - the rebels burned down his house two days ago - has just told the guide that he's just seen them beyond a village called Pannekoek, about six or seven miles along the road. It's a couple of miles short of Sint Kruis Baai. They're just gathered there, in no sort of order, and apparently with no leader. He's emphatic they're in no sort of order. They had small campfires lit and went hunting for cattle and goats to cook - there are very few cattle there, he says, so they'll have to be content with goat, which the local people won't normally eat.'

'We can't trap them, I suppose?'

'No, sir, not from what he says and the map shows. When they see us coming they'll just move west. We can only trap them at the far end of the island, West Punt, when they meet the sea.'

'Very well, let's see your Marines stepping out. A steady pace, not too fast: the seamen have some aching muscles after the night's stroll.'

As Ramage watched the French camp through his telescope he cursed the Dutch farmer, although it was not the poor fellow's fault that the French had marched another couple of miles and then spent the busiest morning of their lives since the Dutchman passed. The Frenchmen's backs would be aching, their hands sore, their heads aching from the triple assault of last night's drinking, this morning's effort, and the scorching sun beating down on them as they picked up hundreds - thousands more likely - of the rocks and stones littering the fields and used them to build up three or four dozen little defensive positions, like miniature butts built for a partridge or pheasant drive, along the top of a hill at the eastern side of Sint Kruis Baai.

Obviously this was where the French and the rebels had decided to stand and fight. With the sea at their backs in the protected bay, perhaps they intended to retreat to ships or boats - there might be other privateers around, though Ramage doubted it. Were some privateersmen going to try to seize one or two of those anchored in Amsterdam and sail them round here? That too seemed doubtful, and even if they tried they were unlikely to succeed.

Rennick, who was also lying beside Ramage inspecting the French defences, was impressed by the amount of work but scornful of its effectiveness. 'All that shifting of stone would be admirable if they were building a barracks,' he said. 'The masons could pick and choose. But they've fallen into the trap of fixed defences.'

Ramage smiled to himself; it was a trap from which Ren - nick had been rescued only yesterday, when he had planned a defence for Amsterdam. They've chosen a good place, though,' he said mildly. 'That hill rising gently means they look down on us, and behind there's only a few feet of cliff to jump down if they want to get away in boats.'