Betrayal Read Online Free PDF

clear?’ Of all things, a musket shot would be best calculated to arouse the enemy instantly.
    Clinton smiled and offered him a bag that clicked as he passed it over. ‘I’ve taken precautions, sir. These are their flints without which their muskets will not fire.’ Mollified, Kydd nodded.
    A mile or so downstream from the corvette, they would travel in a straight line over the knee-bend in the river to arrive at a point upstream and out of sight from the French, on the way leaving the marines to take position. The boats would retire and wait until full daylight before coming up. Then all would depend on the island party.
    They set out. The low, undulating land was mainly open scrub with thicker areas of bushes. The moonlight was not enough to locate the corvette but Kydd had a small pocket compass that allowed him to set a course to intersect the river above the vessel and led off in that direction.
    At night the African bush was a petrifying experience: every little sound seemed loaded with menace, and although there were more than fifty men with Kydd, they were strung out behind. His imagination conjured up all manner of dangers. If a lion sprang out on him . . . or one of those beasts with a horn on its nose? If it took a rage against him at the head of the column, then well before the others could . . .
    ‘Keep closed up,’ he snarled at the marines behind him, drawing his cutlass to slash at an inoffensive bush, then keeping it out at point. He had left his fighting sword aboard ship – in the bloody hacking of a boarding, its fine qualities would not be essential, and if it was lost in a swamp somewhere he would never forgive himself.
    ‘Sir!’ Clinton pointed into the silvery distance on the left. The upper spars of the
Marie Galante
were visible about a mile away.
    ‘Very good,’ Kydd said, stopping. ‘You know your orders. Keep the men at a distance until daybreak, then close up to your positions when you hear firing begin.’
    ‘Yes, sir.’
    ‘It’s of the first importance that you are not seen before—’
    ‘I understand, sir,’ the young officer said stiffly.
    ‘Of course you do. Farewell and good luck.’
    Kydd strode ahead with nervous energy. They reached the river unexpectedly, its glittering expanse suddenly in view.
    ‘Down!’ he hissed. The others in his little group lowered themselves gingerly to the ground, its earthy odour pungent, while Kydd checked forward. On his left was the tight bend that, according to his reckoning, opened to the long reach – and the French corvette.
    Bent double, he skirted some bushes but before he reached the end he froze: a playful night breeze had brought with it a wafting hint of tobacco smoke. And, by its pungency, not the honest Virginian issued aboard
L’Aurore
. Parting the bush infinitely slowly, he swallowed. Not more than a dozen yards away two sentries stood in the moonlight, the occasional glow of their pipes startlingly red. They were conversing with each other in low tones, their muskets slung over their shoulders.
    Kydd withdrew with the utmost care. The sentinels posted upstream spoke of a thoroughly professional opponent: were there more at the far end of the reach? This would make it near impossible for the boats to assemble unseen – but doing so would draw all attention downstream, as he wanted.
    ‘Sentries!’ he whispered to his party, when he reached them. ‘We’ll go a little further upstream.’
    Another hundred yards brought them to the next curve of the river and a convenient slope to the water. It would do.
    ‘Er, how about them crocodiles, sir?’ Pearse asked edgily, quite out of character for the brash youth on the quarterdeck.
    ‘Take no mind o’ them,’ Kydd said confidently. ‘They’re all asleep.’ They were cold-blooded so it stood to reason, didn’t it?
    They settled in the bushes to wait for the night to end. Then the moon vanished and blackness enfolded them. Continuous rustles and scurries came from