Free Deadly Shoals by Joan Druett

a while, though he cantered briskly through thickening weather, the flagpole did not seem to come closer. It wasn’t until the sun was low in the sky, penetrating the fog and silvering the edges of the black-bellied clouds, that he abruptly arrived at the edge, to look down on the beach where he and Stackpole had landed the morning before.
    Wiki immediately spied the squadron, because the ships were just a mile off, floating between rolling banks of mist. Seagulls patrolled the sky above the masts, their screeching faint with distance. For a transient moment the vessels were sharply delineated in a column of misty light slanting down to the sea from a hole in the roiling clouds. Wiki could see every detail, and count the ships, too—a couple of large sloops of war, a gun brig, a smaller brig, and two schooners … The so-called enemy French squadron was the United States Exploring Expedition!
    He laughed out loud, because it was so easy to guess what had happened. The fleet had emerged from the fog, and the local populace, being in a state of terrified expectation already, had jumped to the wrong conclusion.
    Then Wiki saw that the expedition was accompanied by a flamboyantly overcanvased brigantine. Like the other ships, she was vividly familiar—being none other than Captain William Coffin’s Salem trader Osprey ! What the devil, Wiki thought, was his father up to? The last time he had talked with him it had been in Rio, a couple of days before they had all weighed anchor, and the last time he had seen the brigantine Osprey was when the Vincennes and then the Peacock had run afoul of her. The damage had been relatively minor, or so Wiki had been assured, and Captain Coffin should be homeward bound. So what had happened since?
    Just as the fog closed in again, Wiki saw that one of the expedition schooners was beating her way into the mouth of the Río Negro, and recognized the Sea Gull . She was making a pretty mess of it, too, as she was heading unerringly for the shoals. If she kept on the same course she’d be stranded on a bar within an hour, he calculated, easy prey for whatever unseen ambush was lying in wait on the banks of the river. However, he could not see what happened next. Frustratingly, the clouds came down, accompanied by squalls of rain. Surely her captain had ordered a retreat, he thought, and kicked his mare into moving again.
    Scenting grass and water, she readily obliged, cantering down the narrow track that meandered through bushes, and arriving at the open door of the pilothouse just as dark fell. Wiki jumped down, and tied her to the hitching rail. He called out, but got no answer, and when he went inside and lit a lamp, it was to find that the two pilots had absconded, which was not particularly surprising, considering that one of them was French. Otherwise, the cabin looked just as it had the day before. Strangely, the weapons were still hanging on the wall—cutlasses, carbines, and pikes, all burnished and in excellent condition, which made Wiki wonder what arms the pilots were carrying.
    They had abandoned their stores as well, taking the liquor instead, which didn’t worry Wiki a jot, because like most of his people he had no taste for spirits. To his delight, there was a wheaten loaf of the durable kind that was usually sold in pulperías . He split this, daubed it generously with good butter scooped from the cowhide bag in which it had been churned by being towed behind a horse, and then sprinkled it with coarse brown sugar that he found in a little sack, usually kept for sweetening maté. It went down well, because he was very hungry, not having eaten since the night before.
    After finishing off his meal, Wiki filled a basin for his mare from the rainwater cask outside the door. The night was clammy, filled with swirling mist, and the slurping noises as she drank seemed unnaturally loud. Then he frowned as he heard distant shouts echoing over the water.