by Seth Hunter
The captain shook his head wearily, as if this was but one more burden on the donkey’s back. He was no stranger to violent death, though in his experience it tended to be administered less subtly than by an assassin with knife or garrotte. Nor was he immune to the fear of it, but he had been temporarily deafened by cannon fire and though his hearing had returned, the effect on his mind had been more lasting. He was in that state of apathy – almost of anaesthesia – which invariably followed his experience of a battle at sea, as if some vital nerve had been rendered inoperative, stunned into a kind of acquiescence, a surrender to Fate. Death seemed no more frightful to him than a journey into unchartered waters. Doubtless this apathy would pass and he would be restored to a healthy fear of oblivion – or heaven or hell, or whatever else awaited him beyond the grave – and a desire to make the best of the time available to him, but, in the meantime, he was far more troubled by the heat.
He had a sudden, passionate longing for a beer. A tankard of foaming English ale, drawn fresh from the barrel, cool from the cellar. Served to him in the garden of the Market Inn – his favourite resort when he was home at Alfriston. With his feet up on the table, the apple trees in blossom, the sound of a wood pigeon in the evening air, the sun gently sinking beneath the Sussex Downs, and the shadows lengthening over the churchyard.
It was two years since he had last been in England. He doubted he would ever be there again. Not even to be buried there. A spare piece of canvas, more like, with a cannonball at his feet, a stitch of yarn through his nose, and the deep, dark waters of whatever sea awaited his mortal remains.
He became aware that his companion was regarding him with something like irritation.
‘What is the matter?’ he enquired.
‘You are the matter,’ said Spiridion. ‘What ails you, my friend? You have a look of doom about you.’
‘And this is a surprise to you?’ Nathan retorted. ‘Is there anything that you have told me that should cause me to be cheerful?’
‘Only that when you reach India you will have your own squadron. Does that not cheer you?’
‘If I ever reach India,’ Nathan conceded gloomily. Spiridion gave him one final, scathing look, turned his back on him and composed himself for sleep.
And so they passed their days. Nathan attempted to shake away his fatal lethargy by indulging in gunnery practice. He formed his party into a gun crew and they fired at a barrel on a long tow, each taking a turn to be gun captain, while the others loaded and swabbed and heaved upon the tackle. They did not hit it, of course, or come anywhere near it, but it was good exercise. They left the gun loaded, for no particular reason save that it was the custom in the service. And Nathan went back to his pistols and his sextant.
On the third day out of Abukir, everything changed for the worse.
It began with a change in the wind. First, it died on them altogether, leaving them becalmed and fretful about twenty miles off the coast of Sinai. Then it began to blow with renewed vigour from East-South-East. A hot, dry wind that had Spiridion scowling and muttering into his beard, and when he caught Nathan’s enquiring eye upon him, he said just the one word: ‘Khamsin.’
It was enough. Nathan knew about the khamsin. He had experienced it only once, off the coast of Egypt, and had hoped never to experience it again. It was a wind out of the desert, and it brought a good deal of the desert with it, even far out to sea. Apart from the fierceness of the wind itself, which could lay a ship on its beam ends, there was so much sand in the air that you could scarcely breathe, let alone see. It was like navigating in a fog – a fog of stinging sand. Nathan could feel the abrasive dust on his face already, and there was a prominent haze, most dense towards the coast where it had the appearance of a dirty brown cloud advancing across the sea towards them.
Spiridion thought it best to shorten sail and bear due north to take them further out to sea, but they had scarcely agreed on this course, when a shout from the foremast lookout alerted them to the presence of a sail, approaching from the south-west.
Nathan and Tully ascended the mizzenmast shrouds to take a look through the glass. Despite the haze they were shortly able to make out the royals and topgallants of a man-of-war, at a distance, as near as they could judge in the declining visibility, of about three or four miles and on a course which would take her across the Pigeon’s bow in little more than an hour. She was almost certainly a sloop or frigate, which was of some concern, for there was not a single ship of that class in Nelson’s fleet. The hope was that she was a Turk, but she could just as easily be French – possibly one of the few that had escaped from Abukir.
Nathan watched her grow ever larger in the glass. She did not seem to be flying any colours, which was in itself a bad sign, and she had a predatory look about her. As she closed on them he counted seven black gunports down her starboard side – with a pair of bow chasers beside. Then she broke her colours from the sternpost and he closed the glass with a snap. He exchanged glances with Tully and they scrambled down the shrouds to the deck.
‘She is a Frenchman,’ he told Spiridion. ‘Corvette. Sixteen guns.’
‘She may not bother us,’ Spiridion suggested doubtfully. ‘Not a tramp like this – with a cargo of beans.’
This was certainly a possibility. But it was also a possibility that her commander would send a boarding party to check their papers, or to discover if they had news of the British fleet. It was what Nathan would do in his shoes. He cast a quick glance over his companions. They were in their shirtsleeves, browned by the sun and scruffy enough to pass for members of the crew – apart from Blunt, perhaps, with his sandy hair and a neatness of manner that made him stand out like a virgin in a whorehouse. They might disguise him as a young woman, perhaps, or shove him below with the beans. But no – he shook his head in silent admonition – it would not do. Not that he had any strong objection to serving Blunt in either manner, but there was too much risk that one of the crew might give them away, by word or expression, and besides, even a half-hearted search of the ship would discover their papers, or some other indication of their nationality. Not to speak of a dozen Brown Bess muskets and a couple of Nock guns.
Nathan turned his face to windward and measured the distance to the approaching sandstorm. Five, maybe, six miles at the most. But still too far to be of much use if they held to their present course.
‘We will run to the south,’ he called out to Spiridion, ‘as close to the wind as she will allow.’
Spiridion conveyed this instruction to the ship’s master who was standing by the wheel looking fretful. Spiridion’s advice did nothing to alleviate his concern. Indeed, he became extremely agitated.
‘There is no time to lose,’ Nathan anguished, for there were scarcely three miles between the two vessels and they were drawing together with a rapidity that would very shortly bring the Frenchman within firing distance. He was afraid Spiridion would not be forceful enough with his instructions, for he and the master had struck up an acquaintance over the last two days, aided by several bottles of arak, and he might be reluctant to give offence. He need not have worried. Spiridion brought his face up closer to the object of his attention and delivered a riposte that was as stinging as the wind and considerably louder. Then he elbowed the helmsman aside, seized hold of the wheel, and bellowed the instructions himself. As if this was not forceful enough, the massive figure of George Banjo emerged from the hatchway behind him with the two Nock guns in his hands and a look on his face that would have put the Devil to flight. The bemused crew leapt to the braces with startling alacrity, and in a matter of moments the ambling Pigeon came clumsily about, her blunt beak pointing towards the advancing cloud and as taut to the wind as even Nathan could desire.
He looked back towards the Frenchman. For a few moments she held to her course and he began to hope that Spiridion had been right and that she would not bother with them. Then he saw her bow shift perceptibly into the wind. It was expertly done, with scarcely a feathering of th
e sails – a fast, lean predator with a trained crew. She was travelling at almost twice their speed already, by a rough estimate – but she was a square-rigger, and no matter how well handled, she could scarcely sail closer than six points to the wind. Whereas the Pigeon, with her lateen sails, could come up almost two points closer. So every mile they ran would increase the angle between them. At least, that was the theory; that was the plan.
But, by God, she was fast. For every few yards she was forced to leeward she gained a hundred on them. And now she was clearing for action. Nathan could see the gunports flying open all along her starboard side. Seven black muzzles, trained as far forward as the ports would allow. It seemed all Nathan had achieved by his manoeuvre was to expose them to her full broadside instead of the two guns at her bow.
He leaned out over the rail, peering forward towards the approaching storm. They were closer now, but it was still three or four miles distant, and the closer they came, the less dense it appeared. It was more of a haze than a cloud, a haze of flying sand, shot through with beams of sunlight. And the wind, too, was dropping. Even the khamsin was failing him.
Three days into his mission and he was faced with disaster: inglorious failure. There was nothing he could do about it. Nothing but to consign Nelson’s precious despatches to the waves, weighed down with roundshot, so that the French would not have them. And the trunk with his travelling expenses. Six bags of Spanish silver dollars and Maria Theresa thalers to the value of 500 English pounds. He could have cried. He was inclined by nature to despair. Tragedy, as he had oft remarked, was his middle name – but there was a streak of stubbornness in him too. So instead of sending Blunt down to his cabin for his treasure he turned to Tully with an apologetic shrug.
‘Damn it,’ he said. ‘I cannot bear to give up without a fight.’
They looked at the 6-pounder, bowsed up against the stern.
‘She is ready loaded,’ Nathan pointed out. ‘It seems a pity to waste it. And there is always a chance of carrying away a spar.’ Even Tully – the eternal optimist – knew this was nonsense, but they crossed to the gun and levered up the port. They had a clear view of their pursuer at a distance of about a mile and a half on their larboard quarter. Within a quarter of an hour or so she would cross their stern, at a range, as near as they could judge, of about a thousand yards, maybe less. Then the gap would begin to widen again, but in the meantime she could bring her whole broadside to bear, probably three or four times.
‘To hell with it, let us run her out.’ Nathan called to Banjo and Tully to give them a hand with the tackle, but at once, there was a wail from the skipper, and to Nathan’s astonishment he threw himself down on his knees at Spiridion’s feet, his hands clasped together and the tears rolling down his cheeks. Nathan had no idea what he was saying but it hardly took a genius to guess. And he was right, of course. The Pigeon was no bruiser; one well-aimed broadside would tear her apart. Nathan knew he had no right to put the man’s life at risk, or the lives of any of his crew, for they had made no vow to fight and die in the King’s service; they were not even at war.
He told himself the French would probably aim high, being French, and no one would come to any harm. He could tell Spiridion to haul his wind before any blood was spilled.
They ran out the gun.
Either the French saw this, or they had decided the Pigeon had flown far enough, because on that instant the corvette fired. It was at very great distance, and they stuck their heads up over the stern rail to watch the fall of shot. Three waterspouts, widely separated, about a cable’s length to their stern. Nathan sniffed disparagingly, but it was a lot closer than he had expected.
‘On the next upward roll,’ he said.
But it was not so easy from the stern. With a broadside you could see when she started to roll. One moment you were looking at the sea, the next at the sky, and you fired on the way from one to the other. At the stern it called for a different, finer judgement, especially running into the wind. You had to wait for the sea to lift the bow and travel under the hull until you could feel it: that exact moment when it began to lift the stern.
Nathan planted his feet like a prizefighter and willed his whole body to sense the movement of the waves through the deck. He had dispensed with his uniform coat and was in his shirtsleeves with a Barcelona scarf tied round his head. ‘Wait, wait …’ he admonished Mr Banjo, who was standing by with the linstock in an agony of restraint, the smouldering fuse inches from the pan. Banjo had served as gun captain on the Unicorn and considered himself the greatest gunner in creation. His principle failing was impatience. Never mind seven days – seven seconds was too long for Mr Banjo. Nathan felt the beak dipping into the trough, the rush of sea under the keel …
‘Now!’ A moment’s delay as the flame travelled along the powder. Too soon? Too late? The stern still rising, teetering almost on the brink.
There was a jet of fire through the touch-hole, a far bigger plume of fire and smoke from the muzzle, the carriage shot back to the end of the tackle, and they capered about like the acrobats at Sully’s Circus, leaping back from the recoil and then racing each other to the rail to watch the fall of shot.
At least a cable’s length short, and a good two points to starboard.
Disappointed, Nathan dropped back to the deck. He did not care to meet Mr Banjo’s eye.
‘One more,’ he said.
But they had to endure two more broadsides from the corvette before they were ready, and on the second, two holes appeared as if by magic in the mizzensail and one of the stays parted with a noise like a snapped violin string, the liberated block crashing to the deck and missing the praying ship’s master by a whisker.
‘Now!’ cried Nathan again, a fraction of a second after Mr Banjo had applied the linstock. Again, the capering clowns and the four heads above the rail.
They distinctly saw the ball strike the sea, no more than a few yards from her bow, a skip and a jump and it crashed into her hull. With no noticeable effect. At that range, it would scarcely tickle the timbers. But it was a hit. Of sorts. Honour could be said to have been satisfied. There was nothing for it now but to put up their gun, haul their wind, and wait for them to come up.
‘By God!’ Tully said.
Nathan stared, speechless for once. She was falling off the wind. Falling off the wind and turning away.
They looked at each other in astonished disbelief. Then back at the Frenchman. Still veering to leeward and heeling over so far, Nathan could have sworn he saw the garboard strake all along her side and a glint of her copper bottom. He looked again at Tully. His face was a picture.
‘It could not be us,’ said Nathan. It was a question, nonetheless. Had they put the fear of God into her, with the astonishing accuracy of their fire?
But no, they had not. And it was not them. It was the phantom figure that had emerged from the haze of sun and sand to the south, and was now bearing down on them under full sail, a great red battle pennant streaming from her masthead and a belch of black smoke and flame erupting from her bow.
‘Bugger me,’ said Nathan. ‘’Tis Ben Hallowell!’
Chapter Three
The Band of Brothers
Ben Hallowell was a giant of a man, six feet six in his socks and with the build of a Cornish wrestler, but it would have taken sharper eyes than Nathan’s to reveal him at a distance of a mile or more. However, it was certainly his ship. Nathan had seen the Swiftsure in action at Abukir. She had arrived late to the conflict and was one of the very few that had survived the battle more or less intact. But he was never more glad to see her than now, with her seventy-four guns and the spritely figure at her prow – of Hermes or Nike, or what ever heathen god or goddess it was that ran swift and sure – setting its wrathful eye upon the fleeing Frenchman.
They gave her a cheer as she passed – and now they could see Ben quite clearly at the con, ignoring them completely, of course, for he doubtless took them for a rabble of Greeks or Turks, and all his
attention was directed towards the French corvette, doing her best to escape to the north.
They watched the chase with interest. The corvette probably had the legs of her, all things being equal, but she was compromised by the necessity of falling off from the wind, and although this manoeuvre was executed with remarkable skill, a lucky shot from one of the long nines at the Swiftsure’s bow took away her mizzen boom, and before she could sort herself out, Ben had brought his entire broadside to bear.
And after that, as Tully remarked, there was nothing for it but to stow your banter and haul your colours.
The Pigeon came up on the Swiftsure’s weatherside as she was taking possession of her prize. A couple of midshipmen looked down their noses at them and one of the boatswain’s mates shouted at them to sheer off, but Blunt had brought up the Union flag from below and they ran it up the halyard in place of the crescent moon.
This brought her captain to the weather rail and Nathan called out to him, giving him joy of his prize and pulling the Barcelona scarf off his head. He laughed at the look on Ben’s face.
‘Good God!’ he said, reeling a little. ‘What the Devil are you doing here?’ He looked down from his great height into the stern of the little Pigeon with its shabby gun crew still clutching their worms and their spongers, the gun still smoking at the muzzle. ‘And what is this? Promotion at last?’ He grinned at his own wit.
‘Allow me to present Mr Tully, Mr Foresti, Mr Banjo and Mr Blunt,’ announced Nathan as they made their bows. ‘Of His Majesty’s hired vessel Pigeon. The admiral sent us to give you a hand with any prizes you might not be able to take on your own account.’
That would wipe the smile off his face. For if the Pigeon was in the King’s service, she was entitled to half the prize money. Not that Hallowell would fall for that, nor the prize court, not in a million years, but it was worth a try. Ben’s grin barely wavered. But then, he was rich as Croesus already. ‘Come aboard,’ he said, ‘and we will discuss it over dinner. And bring your officers with you.’
