LITMIR.BIZ

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your debtor for that welcome,’ he said briefly, but La Bouche was not abashed. Winking broadly at Penner, who was regarding him with distaste, the Frenchman drew up a chair and sat down.

      ‘It is un’erstan’able your frien’ has forgot his manners,’ he remarked easily to Penner. ‘So long at sea, chasing nothing, you know – it makes a man sour. But a big drink, a pretty girl’ – he leered salaciously – ‘all these things make a man content, like me.’ He tapped Rackham on the arm. ‘What you say, mon gars – you have a big drink now, with La Bouche, hey? Later we see about the pretty girl.’ He slapped his thigh and shouted with laughter, in which his followers, standing about the table, joined.

      Rackham looked at him in contempt. ‘When I drink, I drink in company of my choosing,’ he said. ‘You’re not of my choosing. Do I make myself plain?’

      La Bouche’s eyes opened in a stare. ‘Hey, what’s this? What way is this to speak to me?’ He turned to Major Penner. ‘Is the big Jean gone more sour than I thought?’

      Major Penner, scenting here the beginnings of trouble, made haste to intervene. This La Bouche was something of a bully-duellist, and the last man with whom the Major wanted to see Rackham embroiled. He shook his head in deprecation.

      ‘The lad’s had a shock, La Bouche, d’ye see? He means no offence, but he’s not entirely himself. It might be best,’ he added meaningly, ‘to leave him alone to me.’

      But La Bouche ignored the hint. He assumed an expression of exaggerated commiseration.

      ‘And is this so? A shock, you say? Poor Jean!’ He winked at the Major. ‘Perhaps – a lady?’ Taking the Major’s silence for an affirmative, La Bouche pushed his query further, making no effort to conceal his mockery. ‘Perhaps – a Governor’s lady?’

      Without warning, before the Major could move, Rackham struck the Frenchman across the mouth. Caught off balance, his chair on two legs, La Bouche went pitching over backwards to sprawl on the floor. With a curse, Penner bounded from his seat with a speed surprising in so corpulent a man, and flung his arms round Rackham to prevent him throwing himself at the Frenchman as he lay caught in the ruins of his chair.

      ‘John, ye blind fool! What have ye done?’ He exerted all his strength to keep the other from breaking from his grasp. ‘Be still man, in God’s name!’

      ‘What have I done?’ Rackham was glaring over the Major’s shoulder at La Bouche, who was making shift to rise with what dignity he could. ‘What have I done? Nothing to what I’ve yet to do, by God! D’ye think I’ll be rallied by that French scum?’

      ‘French scum? So?’ La Bouche was on his feet now, a very different man from the easy, jesting scoundrel of a moment ago. His face was pale and his mouth tightly set. His eyes gleamed balefully. ‘I think this is a little too much. But a little. I have been struck and then insult’. I think, now, we settle this matter.’

      ‘What the hell d’ye mean?’ roared Penner in con-sternation.

      ‘What d’ye suppose he means?’ growled Rackham. ‘The pimp wants to fight. Well, I’m ready whenever he is.’

      Major Penner thrust himself between them in an attempt to compose matters. ‘Why, this is folly, John! This … this cannot take place. What match are you for this bully-swordsman?’ In sudden rage he swung round on La Bouche. ‘Ye dirty French rogue! If ye’d kept sober enough to be able to hold your dirty tongue in its place this need never have happened. La Bouche by name and La Bouche by nature! Well, if it’s blood ye want ye shall have it – but it’s myself will be acting as chirurgeon.’

      La Bouche waved him aside. ‘No, no, my so gallant Major. My concern is with your friend, not with you. Afterwards, if you will. When I have disposed of this gross piece of English beef. But not yet.’ He addressed himself to Rackham. ‘Where shall I kill you? We can fight here, if you will.’

      Rackham shrugged. ‘Wherever ye please.’

      La Bouche nodded. He was very much master of himself again. ‘Then there is a convenient place behind the house. If you will follow me.’ With exaggerated courtesy he led the way.

      Seeing that further protest must be futile, Penner attended Rackham in gloomy silence to the waste ground behind the Cinque Ports. He could see but one end to this, and that end would find him without a quartermaster. It was futile to curse the chance that had brought this quarrelsome, swaggering Frenchman to the inn at a moment when Rackham’s mood was unusually truculent: the damage was done and Major Penner glumly prepared for the worst.

      Rackham, at least, shared none of the soldier’s regrets. Here was an outlet for the smouldering rage which had been growing inside him, and La Bouche was a fit object on which to vent it. Nor did he give a second’s thought to the possible fatal consequences to himself.

      Word of what was forward spread quickly, and as the two principals were taking their ground, a small crowd began to gather behind the tavern. Loafers, seamen and passers-by hurried to the scene – none so common in Providence these days – and made room for themselves about the small clearing. Black, white and brown, they chatted cheerfully as though they were at a play. Others watched from the windows of the Cinque Ports, and a few squatted on the gently sloping roof.

      The Frenchman, stripped down to his shirt and breeches, and with his long hair clubbed back in a kerchief, was jovial and confident as he stepped forward into the open space of the duelling-ground; he laughed and flung jests to his supporters in the crowd, and swished his rapier to and fro in the air to loosen his muscles, an extravagant display which brought sycophantic murmurs of approval from his adherents. Tall, supple, and active as a cat, La Bouche was confident of the issue.

      Rackham, assisted by the Major, was wrapping a long sash round and round his left forearm to serve him as a shield. This done, he accepted the Major’s rapier, and with it the hurried words of advice which his second bestowed on him.

      ‘Be easy, now, Jack,’ said the Major for perhaps the twentieth time that day. ‘Let him spend his force showing off to his jackals, and watch for a chance.’

      It was lame enough counsel, but it reminded Rackham, whose intent had been to allow his temper to guide his sword hand, that he had best go cautiously to work. He nodded, rubbed dirt on his sword hand, and strode forward to face his antagonist.

      Le Bouche saluted and slid forward, sinuous as a snake, to the attack. The slim, glittering blades clashed together, La Bouche feinted at his opponent’s throat, and as Rackham’s guard came up, the Frenchman extended himself in a quick lunge. To his surprise, it was parried neatly with the forte of the blade, and La Bouche slipped back out of danger before the Englishman had time to riposte.

      But that quick parry had not been lost on Major Penner. It had been speedy – very speedy for a man of Rackham’s build, and the Major took heart. He reminded himself that his principal was an experienced man of his hands, a seasoned practitioner of hand-to-hand fighting. Perhaps he had been wrong to despair.

      La Bouche, more cautiously now, came again to the attack, whirling his point in a circle, feeling his opponent out and watching for an opening. Rackham, circling with him, allowed the Frenchman to force the pace, watching his eyes and keeping his point level with the other’s waist. Their feet scuffing quickly on the hard earth, they fenced warily, and gradually the smile returned to La Bouche’s lips.

      He leaped to the attack, his foot stamping, made a double feint, to the stomach and the throat, and with his enemy’s blade wavering in wide parade, lunged to take him in the arm. With a despairing swing, like a butcher with a cleaver, Rackham diverted the Frenchman’s point, but as La Bouche followed the line of his lunge the bowls of the swords clashed together, and a sudden wrench of La Bouche’s wrist sent the Englishman’s sword clattering to the ground a dozen paces away.

      An involuntary yell from the crowd greeted that sudden disarming; to be followed almost instantly by silence as La Bouche, his evil face agrin, turned to dispose of his weaponless antagonist. Rackham, his chest heaving with exertion,

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