Doctor Who_ The Roundheads - Mark Gatiss [64]
A great cheer went up and Stanislaus’s disreputable crew began to pour on to the decks of the Demeter. They teemed everywhere, clambering up the rigging and swarming like rats into the cabins and below decks.
From his vantage point behind a pile of coiled wet rope and a stack of gunpowder barrels, Ben swallowed nervously.
The cutlass in his hand was shaking as he contemplated jumping out and facing the pirates head on.
The Demeter‘s crew began their fight-back at once, swords clattering against the enemy’s as men executed frantic manoeuvres across the decks, looking like gaily dressed crabs as they scuttled about and executed their dance of death.
Right before Ben, a swarthy chestnut-haired man was bravely fending off a much bigger and more fearsome pirate whom Ben recognised as O’Kane.
The Irishman’s bright-green eyes and vast, knotted red beard that spilled almost down to his waist seemed to blaze with energy. He laughed to himself as he forced the smaller man to jump hither and thither over the deck.
Ben was on the point of leaping out to his crewmate’s rescue when O’Kane ducked a blow and brought his cutlass swinging round to pierce the other’s belly. There was a dreadful popping sound and the sailor’s innards spilled from him like a cork from a bottle.
Thrusting his fist into his mouth to stop himself from gagging, Ben sank back behind the coiled rope and closed his eyes.
O’Kane, meanwhile, stood ankle deep in the other man’s steaming guts as they spread in a red pool over the deck. He looked about, anxious for another fight, and was just about to move off towards the action when the sound of retching stopped him in his tracks.
Moving carefully towards the pile of rope, his broad head moving from side to side and his green eyes flashing dangerously, he followed the pool of gore.
At last, he came upon Ben, who was being violently sick as the blood sloshed around his feet.
‘What’s this!’ bellowed the pirate. ‘Not found your sea legs yet, my young buck?’
He laughed horribly and kicked Ben in the stomach. Ben rolled across the deck, clutching his shaking body, retching again as nausea swept over him He managed to stand and lifted his cutlass high above his head, gritting his teeth as he faced o’Kane.
It was only now that he saw that the pirate had tiny twists of gunpowder knotted into his beard. They were each alight and flaring with an unhealthy green phosphorescence, as though he were some crazed Celtic demon brought to chuckling life.
Ben tossed his cutlass from hand to hand, the way he remembered Errol Flynn doing in countless Hollywood films.
But this fight was real, he told himself desperately, and the huge man facing him would spill his insides as cheerfully as he had the other unfortunate sailor’s.
Suddenly, O’Kane frowned and peered at Ben through the drifting smoke of the battle.
‘I knows you!’ he said, incredulously. ‘Were you not the lad Ashdown brought aboard on the way to Dutchland?’
Ben felt suddenly cheered. ‘That I am, mate. So we’ve no quarreI.’
O’Kane laughed his terrifying laugh, his fizzling beard shaking. ‘No quarrel? You’ve deserted our ship, you swine!
And, besides, the captain tortured the truth out of Ashdown this morning. He knows all about your little visit last night.’
Ben swallowed fearfully.
O’Kane raised his cutlass. ‘I’ll slice you open from your guts to your windpipe, so help me!’
He dashed forward, his cutlass trained on Ben’s chest. But Ben was nimble and neatly sidestepped, jumping on top of the pile of coiled rope as the red-bearded pirate swung round to attack again.
Their swords clashed and Ben felt a sickening vibration pass through his arm at the force of O’Kane’s blow.
Immediately he riposted O’Kane’s attack but the massive man was ready for him, smashing against Ben’s cutlass and thrusting his great arm forward. The sword pierced Ben’s striped T-shirt and ripped it apart along the shoulder.
O’Kane brought his cutlass to bear again at once and Ben ducked down as the great steel blade sliced through