open, the dazzling, mid-morning sunlight shone down upon her, and upon the gold, pearls, jewels and brightly enamelled and beribboned medals and awards with which she was adorned so that she seemed to sparkle and glow more like a goddess than a mortal woman. A sound rose from the crowd, less a cheer than an awed gasp. But though she smiled and waved to the people, Judith’s eyes and her heart were given to one man only.
Hal Courtney stood waiting for her at the foot of the steps. Though he was the captain of a fighting ship, he wore no badge of rank. Though he, too, was entitled to call himself a member of the Order of the Golden Lion of Ethiopia, and held the rank of a Nautonnier Knight of the Temple of the Order of St George and the Holy Grail – the band of navigators whose origins lay in the medieval Knights Templar, to which he, like his father before him, belonged – he bore no medals nor badges of honour. Instead he stood there before her, with his hair tied back with a plain black ribbon, wearing a freshly laundered white shirt, loosely tucked into his black breeches and open at the neck. The gleaming fabric billowed a little in the gentle breeze, giving occasional hints of the lean, strongly muscled torso beneath it. At Hal’s hip hung his sword, a blade of Toledo steel, below a hilt of gold and silver, with a large star sapphire on its pommel that had been given to Hal’s great-grandfather by the greatest of all Elizabethan admirals, Sir Francis Drake himself.
As she looked at her man, so filled with strength, and confidence and vigour, his face, which had looked almost stern as she first caught sight of it, broke into a grin filled with boyish glee, enthusiasm and unabashed desire.
Judith had stood firm in the heat of battle. She had held her own in the council chamber against men twice or even three times her age, who towered over her in both physical stature and hard-won reputation. Neither they, nor her enemies, had ever intimidated her. And yet now, in the presence of Hal Courtney, she felt her legs weaken beneath her, her breath quicken and she was suddenly seized by such a feeling of light-headedness that if he had not stepped forward to take her in his arms, she might easily have fallen. She let him hold her for a second, letting herself enjoy the delicious sense of helplessness, barely hearing the cheers of the crowd, or even the words that Hal was saying over the beating of her heart.
She was dimly aware that he was leading her through the mass of delirious townspeople, with guardsmen up ahead of them using their horses to force a path down to the jetty. She heard cheers for ‘El Tazar’ – the Barracuda – for that was the name by which Hal had come to be known as he preyed upon their enemy’s shipping. Then she held Hal’s hand as he guided her down the stone steps and said, ‘Be careful now, my darling,’ as she stepped onto the Golden Bough’s pinnace, an armed launch whose single sail was furled, though there was a man at every one of her eight oars and Big Daniel Fisher, Hal’s senior coxswain, was standing at the rudder.
‘Welcome aboard, ma’am,’ Big Daniel said. ‘I hope you won’t think me forward or nothing, but you’re the prettiest sight any of us have clapped eyes on in a very long time.’
‘Thank you, Daniel,’ said Judith with a happy little laugh. ‘I don’t think that’s forward at all.’ She looked around the boat and then asked Hal, ‘Where’s Aboli? I can’t believe he’d let you out of his sight on an occasion like this.’
Hal gave a huge shrug, throwing his hands up as if to suggest complete bafflement and with an exaggerated look of wide-eyed innocence replied, ‘I don’t have a clue where he’s got to. You seen him, Daniel?’
‘No, sir, can’t say as I have.’
‘Anyone?’
The crewmen shook their heads in a pantomime of ignorance and said no, they didn’t know either. It was obvious that they were up to something, but Judith was happy to play along with the game. ‘Well, I am sorry not to see him,’ she said, and then settled herself on a bench next to Hal as he ordered, ‘Cast off and take us back to the ship, please, cox’n.’
‘Aye-aye, sir,’ said Big Daniel who started barking out orders to the oarsmen to back them away from the jetty, before he swung the pinnace around and set a course to the Golden Bough which lay on the water, a couple of hundred yards or so ahead of them.
‘She looks beautiful,’ said Judith, watching Hal look towards his ship and knowing the pride that he took in her.
‘Well, the men and I did a bit of cleaning and tidying up,’ said Hal, nonchalantly.
‘Had us working our fingers to the bone, night and day for a week, more like, ma’am,’ Daniel observed.
‘Poor Daniel, I hope he wasn’t too much of a hard taskmaster,’ said Judith.
‘Oh you know what Captain Courtney’s like, ma’am. Takes after his father, so he does, likes to run a tight ship.’
The words were almost thrown away, but Judith knew Hal well enough to realize that Daniel could not have paid him a higher compliment and she gave his hand a squeeze to signal that she heard and understood it. As they drew close to the Golden Bough, Daniel ordered the men to stop rowing and ship their blades. As one, the oars were raised into a vertical position and the pinnace was brought to rest with just the lightest of touches against the larger ship. Lines were thrown down from the deck above and made fast against the pinnace’s cleats. A net was hanging down the Bough’s hull to enable those in the pinnace to climb up to the deck. Judith stood and took a pace towards the net, but Hal gently held her arm to stop her and shouted up.
‘Lower the swing, lads, nice and gently if you please.’
Judith looked up and saw a boom hanging over the side of the ship.
‘We use it to bring supplies aboard,’ said Hal. ‘But I thought we could put it to a better purpose today.’
The boom was garlanded in a profusion of vividly coloured flowers, like a horizontal, tropical maypole. From it there hung a canvas sling that had been decorated with coloured ribbons, signal flags and anything else the men could find to make it look jolly. The sling was lowered down to the pinnace and Hal helped Judith sit on it, as if on a garden swing.
‘Make sure she’s safe and sound,’ he ordered Daniel, then pecked Judith on the cheek and said, ‘I’ll see you on deck, my darling.’
Hal leaped onto the net and started clambering up it with what looked to Judith like the speed and agility of a monkey up a tree. She giggled at the thought, then held on tight to the sling as Daniel shouted, ‘Haul away!’ and she was lifted up into the air. By now all trace of the warrior General Nazet had disappeared and Judith was simply a young woman in love, having the time of her life. She gave a little squeal of alarm and excitement as she rose up through the air, watching Hal come to the top of the net and then spring onto the deck where he stood, surrounded by the ship’s company.
‘Three cheers for the captain’s lady!’ shouted the Bough’s veteran helmsman Ned Tyler. ‘Hip-hip!’
A great cheer rang out as Judith appeared on her swing, several feet above the level of the deck.
‘Hooray!’ the men cried, waving their hats in the air as the boom swung her over their heads.
As the second cheer rang out she was lowered to a patch of deck that had been cleared to receive her. As Ned Tyler gave the third ‘Hip-hip!’, Judith let go of the sling and jumped the last few feet to the bare wood, landing with the grace and agility of an acrobat, and as she found herself again in Hal’s arms the third cheer echoed around them and grew even longer and louder as he gave her a single, all-too-short kiss whose burning intensity filled her with a thrilling sense of anticipation of what would
