Beyond the Reef

by Kent, Alexander

  It was little enough. Bolitho walked to the tightly packed hammock nettings and rested against them while he levelled his telescope like a musket. He saw the ornate gingerbread across Relentless’s counter and poop reflecting and holding the flicker of feeble sunshine. Valkyrie led the line, and he was thankful. He knew Flippance; he would be like an extension of his right arm and would likely be the first to engage the enemy. So they had a frigate with them. In his heart he knew it was the Dutch-built one which Owen had described. The other ships, whichever they were, must have slipped through the blockade during the foul weather or even earlier. At the second attack on Copenhagen several had broken out, and not all had been recovered or brought to battle. They would be from different ports, perhaps with captains who had never fought together before. The man who commanded such a mixed squadron would have had to travel fast and independently in order to rally the ships he must lead.

  It struck Bolitho like a fist. Why did I not think of it before? There was one French officer who stood head and shoulders above the others, a young frigate captain when they had been fighting out here, in these same waters. A voice seemed to mock him from the past. Were a frigate captain, Bolitho . . . He held flag rank now, having survived the terrible bloodletting of the Terror. A brilliant man, and one who would certainly use a frigate, no matter who had built her, to restore the pride which had been lost at the Nile and Trafalgar.

  “André Baratte, Val. That’s who we are facing today.”

  Then he remembered that none of those around him had been here in that other war. Except for Allday, and he would not have known. We Happy Few. All gone, wiped away in time if not memory.

  Keen tried to understand, sensing his sudden depression. “What is it, sir?”

  “Baratte was a very daring frigate captain, Val. I have no doubt of his equal ability as an admiral.”

  He glanced down at the spitting crests alongside. “Make a signal to that effect to Valkyrie through Relentless. Spell it out with care. It may be useless to Captain Flippance, but he should be prepared.”

  He stepped aside as midshipmen and seamen ran to the flag halliards again.

  The name seemed to taunt him. Thomas Herrick would know, and it had likely been in the despatches he had refused to open. The Admiralty would send a frigate to carry such news. It sickened him to think of Herrick refusing to act; and it was impossible to see him as he had once been. Or was he himself the only one who still trusted in their old friendship?

  High above their heads, perched on the main crosstrees and watched with curious amusement by a pigtailed seaman, Lieutenant Stephen Jenour watched the sea’s face shining, and felt the first heat on his skin. With great care he adjusted his telescope and waited for the ship to heave herself upright again from a long trough. He could feel the mast and spars trembling beneath him, hear the wind moaning through the rigging and into the booming canvas. Unlike Bolitho he had a good head for heights, and he never grew tired of being this tall—above everything.

  “Oh, my God.” He tightened his fingers on the telescope again. He could just make out the ships Tybalt had reported, and one, a frigate that stood apart from all the rest. She was even managing to stay on a different tack.

  The lookout asked, “Be it bad, zur?”

  Jenour glanced at him. An old sailor. One of the few still left.

  He said, “Take this glass. Tell me what you see.”

  The man squinted through it, the crowsfeet around his eyes creasing his leathery skin.

  “Beyond them ships, zur?” He shook his head, as if shocked that he could still be surprised. “’Tis a fleet, zur!”

  Jenour lowered himself swiftly past and around the maintop, where the marine marksmen lounged against the barricades watching his descent with interest.

  Bolitho listened to him without comment, then said, “It will be an army of invasion. Adam saw only a part of it, but this is the truth of the matter.”

  Keen said, “Can they be stopped, sir?”

  “Until aid arrives, yes, Val.”

  He looked towards the horizon, still dim with mist, like the smoke of a silent battle.

  “Get rid of the boats. The victors can recover them.”

  He ignored the calls and the rush of seamen to the hoisting tackles. “Well, there it is, Stephen. I thank you for your eyes today.” He saw other men running to prepare chain lifts to rig from the yards, to prevent them from falling on the unprotected gun crews if they were shot away. “What will he do, I wonder?”

  “If . . .” Jenour shivered as he recalled what he had just seen. “If it is indeed the same French officer, and if, as you suspect, he was in that frigate . . .”

  Bolitho tried to smile, but he could not. “Too many ifs, Stephen.”

  “He will know you are here, Sir Richard. Know, too, that you have never run from the enemy.”

  Bolitho touched his arm. “Then I have lost one ruse before it is begun. But I believe you are right.”

  He watched the first of the boats being lowered, then cast adrift and left under the control of a canvas sea anchor. He thought suddenly of the Golden Plover. Was Fate so certain after all? Had death merely been postponed until today?

  Yet again he seemed to hear her voice, Don’t leave me, and he answered her, but only in his mind. Never.

  He saw Keen staring around the orderly decks, where men stood or crouched to await the next command. Perhaps he was already calculating the cost, seeing these same decks strewn with the dead and dying as Herrick’s flagship had been.

  Bolitho said abruptly, “Let us have some music to pass the while, Captain!” The formality was for those nearest to them. If they lived, they would remember.

  Keen gave a faint smile. “Portsmouth Lass, sir?”

  Their eyes met. Another memory. “None other.”

  So while the ships sailed slowly towards an unknown enemy, the small marine fifers marched up and down the deck, piping out a sailor’s tune neither Bolitho nor Keen would ever forget.

  Bolitho felt for the locket beneath his shirt and pressed it against his skin.

  I am here, Kate, and you are with me.

  Lieutenant Sedgemore had been watching Bolitho and the flag captain, his mind as yet unable to grasp the enormity of the enemy’s strength. But once this was over . . . He allowed his eyes to stray to that part of the deck where his predecessor had died so horribly. As if he expected to see him lying there, torn apart.

  He felt cold, despite the strengthening sun. He had seen something which he had only known as a stranger. It was fear.

  19 WE HAPPY FEW

  BOLITHO plucked the shirt from his skin and watched some ship’s boys carrying drinking water beneath either gangway for the gun crews. It had seemed an eternity since Valkyrie’s signal, “Enemy in sight!” had been repeated down the line, and Bolitho knew that despite their superiority in strength and numbers it was probably much worse for the oncoming French vessels. Black Prince had her yards braced hard round and was as close to the wind as such a large ship could stand, but at least they were holding formation and staying in line, with only half a mile between each of them. The enemy had the wind striking directly across their larboard bows, so that they appeared to weave this way and that, leaning over one minute with their sails like metal breastplates, and the next caught aback in a confusion of thrashing canvas.

  Bolitho shaded his face to look through the mass of rigging. Nets had been rigged to catch falling blocks or broken spars, any of which could kill a man as efficiently as an iron ball. It was like being sealed in a trap. Men, weapons of war, everything they had come to accept as their daily existence.

  Bolitho sought out the frigate Tybalt and saw her beating against the wind with no less difficulty than the enemy. But once the liners were close enough to engage, Captain Esse would run down from his hard-won position to windward and attack the enemy’s fleet of transports and supply vessels to scatter or destroy any which fell under his broadsides. He might have little hope of s
urvival, but every frigate captain knew the risks of independent action. Tybalt’s hull was created and designed for just such operations, but her timbers were no match at all for the massive firepower of a line-of-battle. Bolitho took a telescope from Midshipman De Courcy and trained it with care until he had found the ragged formation of ships which lay far away across the starboard bow. So slow. He had been right the first time. It would be at noon when the first guns tested the range.

  And for what? It might rate a comment in the Gazette as had Hyperion’s last battle. That had been almost lost in the resounding echoes of Trafalgar, and the death of the nation’s hero.

  Ferguson would hear it first, either in the town or from the post-boy. Then Catherine. He glanced at Keen’s handsome profile. One did not need to be a magician to know what he was thinking as the time dragged by and men leaned on their weapons, some already gasping for breath as the suspense wore them down like exhausted survivors from a battle still to fight.

  After all, what did Martinique really matter? They had taken it from the French by force in 1794 but, typically, had handed it back during the brief Peace of Amiens. It was always the same, and Bolitho had often been reminded of the words of an embittered sergeant of marines who had exclaimed, “Surely if it’s worth dyin’ for, it’s worth ’oldin’ on to?” Down over the years his lonely protest had remained unanswered.

  Now, with the war changing direction in Europe, the prospect of throwing lives and ships away to no lasting purpose went against everything he held important.

  Once again, they were faced with action, not because it was logical or unavoidable, but because war had started to outstrip the minds of men who planned its strategy from afar.

  Keen had joined him. “If the rest of the squadron finds us, sir, we could still win the day. But if Captain Crowfoot has no inkling . . .” He turned and stared into the bright sunshine as Tybalt completed another tack.

  “I cannot send Tybalt to find him, Val. She is our only hope today.”

  Keen watched the men at the helm, Julyan speaking quietly with two of his master’s mates. “I know.”

  Bolitho took a cup of water from one of the boys. And what of Thomas Herrick? Had he rallied some of his local patrols, and was he already heading out to offer support? It seemed far more likely that he would take charge of the 74 Matchless under the command of his latest enemy, Captain the Lord Rathcullen. Her repairs would be almost completed, and in any case, the sight of just one additional sail of the line might make a difference to an invasion fleet which would wish to avoid battle at any cost. It was unnerving: this constant comparison with the events which had led to Herrick’s court martial. In her letter Catherine had touched briefly on the sudden death of Hector Gossage, Herrick’s flag captain at that costly battle for the convoy. He had never recovered fully after losing his arm, and even the unexpected promotion to flag rank could not protect him from the onslaught of gangrene. Had he known he was doomed that day in the great cabin below, his version of the evidence might have been very different. Bolitho had his suspicions, but they were not something he could voice freely without proof. Either way, Gossage had saved Herrick’s future and probably his very life.

  The only constant factor had been in the presence of Sir Paul Sillitoe.

  Keen said, “They’re forming into two lines, sir.”

  Bolitho raised the glass again, knowing that as he did so, Midshipman De Courcy was watching him fixedly. Another admiral in the making. How different his navy would be, he thought.

  He settled on the two ships leading the enemy’s lines, sails writhing while they tacked yet again, with the frigate passing through them, the terrier between the bulls.

  The masts and yards were bright with signals and the streaming Tricolour flags, just as the short English line had hoisted extra ensigns as a gesture of defiance. Or was it only a hopeless obstinacy.

  Major Bourchier called, “Royal Marines, stand-to for inspection!”

  He gestured to his second-in-command, Lieutenant Courtenay, a veteran for one so young. Who but the Royals would have an inspection in the presence of the enemy and, perhaps, in the face of death?

  Bolitho touched his eye. It was itching badly, so that it watered whenever he looked towards the sun.

  “What is the range, do you think, Val?”

  “Two miles, sir. No more.” He thought again of the jolly-boat, and Bolitho’s desperate attempt to conceal his blindness from those who were relying on him.

  He saw Allday loosening his cutlass, and Jenour peering up at the flags while Midshipman Houston listened to his instructions.

  And there was the sixth lieutenant, James Cross, a boy dressed as an officer and in charge of the afterguard and the mizzen-mast with its less complicated sail plan and rigging. He looked neither right nor left, and never towards the slowly advancing Frenchman. And Lieutenant Whyham, the fourth senior who had served under him in the old Argonaute six years ago as a cheerful midshipman. He looked resolved enough as he watched his division of guns, and the spare hands who would be employed on the mainmast, the true strength of any ship of the line.

  And down below in the darkened gun decks all the others would be waiting, straining their ears, trying to recall a home or loved ones, but finding nothing.

  The Royal Marine lieutenant was saying, “I’ve never seen such a turnout, Colour Sergeant! Give him extra work after this is done with!”

  The other marines grinned. They were not new to the ship, and but for a mere handful of recruits were of one unit, the scarlet line that stood through thick and thin between officers and forecastle. In spite of the crowded world between decks they still managed to keep to themselves, in their own “barracks,” as they called their messes.

  There was a dull bang, and seconds later a thin waterspout shot up from the sea to leave a wisp of smoke where it had fallen.

  The first lieutenant forced a grin. “They’ll have to do better than that!” But his eyes were empty.

  Keen said, “I cannot see the sense in dividing their strength, sir.”

  “I think I know what they intend, Val. Three will go for our two consorts.” He saw his words sink in. “The other half will come for us.” All at once the plan was so clear he could almost see it in action.

  “Shall I load and run out, sir?”

  He did not reply directly. “Pass the word to the gunner and Lieutenant Joyce on the lower gun deck. We still have time. Valkyrie will be the first to engage.” He considered. “Yes, there is time enough. The enemy will try to do as much damage to our spars and rigging as possible to keep us from supporting our friends. But our thirty-two-pounders will outshoot them. How much bar-shot and anything for that very purpose do we have? We will race them at their own game.”

  It was not hard to understand the French tactics. It was customary for them to aim for the rigging to disable their opponents, whereas the English put their faith in rapid broadsides to smash the hulls into submission.

  Keen said, “It is unlikely that we carry enough for more than a few full broadsides. But I shall pass your instructions to the gunner immediately. Mr Joyce is a good officer—I shall see that he is instructed to point each gun himself. With the wind holding us over, we should be able to maul them badly.”

  “After that, Val, pass the order to load and run out.”

  There were a few more shots but nobody saw where they fell, probably ahead of Valkyrie in the van.

  The three other French ships had shortened sail, preparing to fight the three-decker with a vice-admiral’s flag at the fore. The first embrace would be vital. The wind’s steady strength would carry the enemies apart immediately afterwards, and it would take more time to regain any sort of advantage.

  Whistles shrilled below decks and as the port lids were hoisted, the whole ship seemed to hold her breath. Then, with her decks shaking under their tremendous weight, she ran out her guns, their crews busy with handspikes while they peered over the black muzzles to catch a glimpse of the enemy
. More whistles. Every gun loaded, the great lower battery packed with murderous linked shot, some like bars which doubled in length as it screamed through the air, others shaped like iron spades which when fired spun around like the sails of a mill.

  Keen said, “Let her fall off two points. I want to draw the others away.”

  It was at that moment that Valkyrie and then Relentless opened fire, the pale smoke fanning through their sails and rigging like low cloud. Much of the broadside fell short, flinging up banks of broken water, some of which reached the enemy vessels. The air quivered as the French line responded, the long orange tongues spitting out along the gunports. As Bolitho had predicted it was not a powerful reply; the lower guns were cruising just above the sea, and it seemed likely that the officers could not elevate them enough to reach the two 74s.

  “Steady as you go!” Keen crossed the quarterdeck, his eyes everywhere as he stared from the set of the sails to the enemy formation. They were beginning to draw near on a converging tack, whilst beyond them he could make out the sleek hull of the solitary frigate. He turned to say so to Bolitho, but saw him smile.

  “I’ve seen her. She flies a rear-admiral’s flag. It would be exactly what Baratte would do. This way he can remain in control, but move between the formations without delay.”

  Keen found himself able to smile back. “What you might do, sir, if I’m not mistaken!”

  Sedgemore was striding along the upper gun deck, his bared sword resting on his shoulder as he looked quickly at each crew. From the gun captains with their trigger lines already pulled taut, to the seamen on either side of the carriage, ready to sponge out the smoking muzzles and reload as they had done so many times in Keen’s relentless drills. The boys had sanded the decks, while others stood ready to fetch fresh powder from the magazine so long as it was needed. Boys from the seaport slums, or unwanted children from families already worn down by childbirth. The same age as the midshipmen for the most part. A million miles apart.