Enemy In Sight!

by Alexander Kent

  With a sudden impulse he unbuckled his sword and handed it to Allday. "Next time we sight the enemy you had best bring me a white flag instead!"

  Then he swung on his heel and strode to the ladder. Inch looked at Allday. "I have never seen him so angry."

  The coxswain turned the sword over and caught the sunlight on its worn hilt. "Begging your pardon, sir, but it's time someone got angry, if you ask me!"

  Then holding the sword against his chest he followed his captain.

  As the Hyperion's barge pulled swiftly across the choppy wavelets Bolitho sat motionless in the sternsheets, his eyes fixed on the anchored Indomitable. For four hours after the collapse of Pelham-Martin's attack the ships had continued south-west, following the curving shoulder of coastline, their speed reduced to a painful crawl as the crippled Indomitable endeavoured to maintain her lead.

  At a point where the land curved more steeply inshore again and the 'sea's bottom afforded a temporary anchorage the commodore had halted his retreat, and now, tugging above their own reflections the ships lay in an extended and uneven line, their bows pointing towards the land which was less than two miles distant.

  Bolitho lifted his gaze to explore the full extent of the Indomitable's damage, and knew that his bargemen were watching his face as if to search out their own fate from his tight expression.

  Against the two-decker's battered side the Hyperion's barge crew seemed clean and untouched, as from a sharp command they tossed oars and the bowman hooked on to the chains.

  Bolitho said, "Stand off and await my call." He did not look at Allday's concerned face as he reached for the chains. There was enough bitterness aboard his ship without letting the barge crew converse with the Indomitable's people and carry back further gossip to demoralise them to an even greater extent.

  He was met at the entry port by a lieutenant with one arm in a crude sling.. He said, "Could you make your own way aft, sir?" He jerked his head towards the other ships. "Captain Fitzmaurice and Captain Mulder will be coming aboard at any moment."

  Bolitho nodded but did not speak. As he strode towards the quarterdeck ladder he was conscious of the smells of burned wood and charred paintwork, of blistered guns and the sweet, sickly scent of blood.

  Since leaving Las Mercedes the Indomitable's hands had been busy, but all around was evidence enough of their plight and their near destruction. Several guns had been unended, and there was blood everywhere, as if some madman had been at work with bucket and brush, while beneath the foremast's trunk the corpses were piled like meat in a slaughterhouse, and as he paused at the top of . the ladder more were carried from below to add to the grisly array.

  He walked beneath the poop and thrust open the cabin door. Pelham-Martin was leaning with both hands on his table amidst a litter of charts, watched in silence by a captain of marines and a ship's lieutenant who could not have been much more than nineteen years old.

  The commodore glanced up from the charts, his eyes shining in the reflected glare thrown through the shattered stern windows.

  Bolitho said flatly, "You sent for me, sir?"

  "A conference." Pelham-Martin looked round the littered cabin. "This is a bad business."

  Somewhere below decks a man screamed, the sound suddenly terminated as if a great door had been slammed shut.

  Bolitho asked, "What do you intend to do?"

  The commodore stared at him. "When the others arrive I will make my ... "

  He swung round as the door opened and a master's mate said, "Beg pardon, sir, but the cap'n is askin' for you."

  Pelham-Martin seemed to realise Bolitho was watching him and said heavily, "Winstanley fell as we came clear. He is down on the orlop." He shrugged, the movement painful and despairing. "I am afraid he is done for." Then he gestured to the others. "Apart from the lieutenant on watch, these are the only officers not killed or wounded."

  Bolitho replied, "I would like to see Winstanley." He walked to the door and then paused, realising that Pelham-Martin had not moved. "Will you come, sir?"

  The commodore looked at the charts and ran his fingers over them vaguely. "Later perhaps."

  Bolitho gestured to the two officers. "Wait outside."

  The marine captain made as if to protest and then saw Bolitho's eyes.

  When the door was closed behind them Bolitho said quietly, "I think you should come, sir." He could feel the bitter anger welling inside him like fire. "It is the least you can do now."

  Pelham-Martin stepped back from the table as if he had been struck. "How dare you speak to me in that tone?"

  "I dare, sir, because of what you have done!" Bolitho heard his words and could not control them. Nor did he want to any more. "Yours is the honour of commanding these ships and these men. It is also your responsibility. Yet you threw both away, with no more thought than a blind fool!"

  "I am warning you, Bolitho!" Pelham-Martin's hands were opening and closing like two crabs. "I will have you court martialled! I will not rest until your name shares the ingnominy of your brother!" He paled as Bolitho took a step towards him and added thickly, "It was a trap, I did not expect . . ."

  Bolitho gripped his hands behind him, feeling the commodore's words in his mind, knowing they were the man's last desperate defence.

  He said, "There may be a court martial, sir. We both know whose it will be." He saw it strike home and added 'slowly, "I do not care one way or the other. But I will not stand by and see our people shamed and our cause dishonoured. Not by you, or anyone else who thinks more of his own personal advancement than his duty!"

  Without another word he threw open the door and hurried along the sundrenched quarterdeck. At any moment he expected Pelham-Martin to call for the captain of marines and place him under arrest, and if it had happened he did not know how his own fury and contempt would use him.

  He did not remember finding his way down to the orlop, and his mind only recorded vague scenes of men working at repairs, faces and bodies still blackened with powder smoke, eyes staring and wild from fatigue and worse.

  The orlop was in darkness but for the swinging deckhead lanterns, all of which were clustered above the central spectacle of agony and horror. Around the curved sides of the hull the waiting wounded twisted and sobbed, their faces or broken limbs catching a brief pattern of lamplight before the ship swung again and plunged them into merciful darkness once more.

  Captain Winstanley lay propped against one of the stout timbers, one eye covered with a thick dressing, the centre of which gleamed bright red like an additional unwinking stare. He was naked to the waist and his lower body was covered with a square of canvas. Beside it lay his curved hanger which he had been carrying during the action.

  Bolitho dropped on one knee, seeing the sweat pouring from Winstanley's broad chest, the slow, heavy breathing which told its own story.

  Gently he took the other captain's hand. The fingers were like ice. "I am here, Winstanley." He saw the remaining eye turn towards him, and then the recognition, as slow as the man's breathing.

  The fingers moved slightly., "It was you I wanted." He closed his eye and screwed up his face in sudden agony. Then he added faintly, "I-I was going to tell PelhamMartin ... was going to tell him'..." The eye swivelled away and towards a thin man in a long bloodied apron. The Indomitable's surgeon nodded briefly and walked back towards the lanterns, where his assistants were dragging a limp body from his butcher's table.

  Winstanley's mouth tried to smile. "Mr. Tree is impatient, Bolitho. He is wasting time on me." He lolled his head to stare around the orlop. "Let him see to these poor fellows. I am done for." Then his fingers tightened over Bolitho's hand like a steel trap. "Don't let him leave my ship to carry his disgrace! In the name of Christ, don't let it happen!" The eye was fixed on Bolitho's face, willing him to answer.

  Nearby a young midshipman shrunk back against the ship's side, his eyes wide with terror as the assistant surgeon said curtly, "This one next. His arm will have to come off." The boy rol
led on to his side, weeping and struggling as the surgeon's mates loomed from the shadows.

  Winstanley gasped, "Be brave lad! Be brave!" But his words went unheard.

  Bolitho turned away, sickened. He was thinking of Pascoe, of what might have happened if he had obeyed Pelham-Martin's signal to close around this ship and await complete destruction.

  He said, "I have a plan, Winstanley." He shut his ears to the sudden shrill scream at his back. It was like a tortured woman. "I will do what I can for your ship." He tried to smile. "For all of us."

  Bolitho felt someone brush his shoulder and looked up to see the surgeon and his assistants standing beside him.

  Winstanley said quietly, "It seems I cannot be moved, Bolitho."

  The surgeon muttered impatiently, "I am sorry, Captain

  Bolitho, you will have to leave now."

  Bolitho recoiled as the canvas was dragged aside. Even the attempt at bandaging could not hide the horror of Winstanley's leg and thigh.

  He said tightly, "I'll not wait, Winstanley. I will visit you later to explain my plan, eh?"

  The other man nodded and let his hand drop beside him. He knew as well as Bolitho there would be no other meeting on earth. And something in the single eye seemed to pass a message of thanks as Bolitho stepped back into the shadows. Thanks for a promise of a plan that even he did not truly understand. Thanks for not staying to watch his final misery and degradation under the knife, which even now gleamed beneath the lowhung lanterns.

  On the quarterdeck the sun was hotter and brighter than ever, but the sickness in Bolitho's stomach remained, leaving him cold, like Winstanley's hand.

  Some of the seamen watched him pass, their expressions guarded but in some ways defenceless. They had been fond of their captain,, and he had served them well, whereas Bolitho was a stranger.

  In the stern cabin he found Fitzmaurice and Mulder waiting with the commodore, their faces towards the door, as if they had all been watching it for some time.

  Bolitho said quietly, "I am ready, sir."

  Pelham-Martin looked around their faces. "Then I think we shall discuss ..."

  He glanced up as Fitzmaurice said harshly, "Lequiller's other ships are on the high seas somewhere while we stand here talking! We cannot leave Las Mercedes without destroying those we have just fought." He watched the commodore without emotion. "Yet if we attack again we face the same treatment now that the balance has shifted against us."

  The commodore dabbed his forehead automatically. "We tried, gentlemen. No one can say we did not do our best."

  Bolitho tugged at his neckcloth. The words, the heat of the cabin were making his head swim.

  He said, "There is still a way in which we might surprise the enemy." He watched narrowly as PelhamMartin's features endeavoured to cover his inner confusion. "Time is not on our side and this plan, any plan may prove better than total failure."

  The others were watching him, but he did not drop his eyes from the commodore's face. It was like a line stretched between them, and one sign of faltering or uncertainty could finish everything.

  As if from far away he heard Pelham-Martin -say, "Very well. Then be so good as to explain it." As he lowered himself into a chair his hands were shaking badly, but there was no hiding the hatred in his eyes.

  Bolitho saw the expression and rejected it. He was thinking of Winstanley down there on the orlop. Amongst his men, and suffering the agonising torment of the surgeon's saw.

  10

  CODE OF CONDUCT

  The Hyperion's lieutenants and senior warrant officers stood shoulder to shoulder around Bolitho's desk, their faces set in various attitudes of concentration as they watched their captain's chart and listened to the quiet insistence of his voice.

  Beyond the stem windows the sea was in total darkness, and while the ship still tugged at her anchor the deck and gangways were alive with busy feet and the creak of tackles as a boat was hoisted outboard to the accompaniment of orders and muffled curses.

  Bolitho sat down on the bench seat so that he could see the faces below the lanterns, to try to estimate how much or how little they understood and accepted his plan.

  When he had described it earlier before Pel.ham-Martin and the other captains he had been surprised just how clearly the words had come to him. His anger and contempt, as well as his sorrow for Winstanley, had perhaps made his mind extra clear, so that the plan, vague and hazy when he had climbed from the misery of the Indomitable's orlop, had unfolded in time with his words, had hardened into possibility with each passing second.

  He said, "We will take four cutters. Two will be ours and the others will come from Hermes. Captain Pitzmaurice will be supplying the bulk of the landing party, as his ship is best supplied with men at present. The importance of timing and discipline are paramount, gentlemen. Also I shall expect every man and each boat to be checked before we leave. Just enough beef and biscuit and no more. Fresh water barricoes for the same period of time, but no extra allowance for accident or mistiming." He looked at each face in turn. "It is going to be a very hard task, and to complete it with any hope of success we must travel light, no matter what the discomfort."

  Captain Dawson said gruffly, "I'd be happier if you were taking my marines, sir.

  Bolitho smiled. "You will have your chance later." He cocked his head to listen as more thuds and shouts announced the arrival of boats alongside. The rest of his landing party must be here already.

  He said quickly, "The Hermes' first lieutenant will be my second in command. That is only fair as his ship is supplying the major part of the force." He saw Inch nod, accepting the sense of the argument, but no doubt realising at the same time that his own prospect of advancement or sudden death had retreated accordingly. Bolitho added, "Mr. Lang will go with us as the other officer."

  Lang was the third lieutenant, and had been slightly wounded during the battle at St. Kruis. His wound had healed well enough, but he had seemingly been left with badly stretched nerves, so that his round, open face was now almost permanently set in a puzzled frown.

  He bobbed his head. "Thank you, sir." He was still frowning.

  Stepkyne said abruptly, "As second lieutenant I think it is my right to take part, sir."

  Bolitho had been expecting the protest, and could hardly blame him for making it. Promotion was hard to win at any time, and for a man like him it was doubly difficui .

  He said, "This ship is under strength, Mr. Stepkyne. You are very experienced and cannot be spared."

  "It is my right, sir!" Stepkyne seemed oblivious to those around him.

  Bolitho pushed Stepkyne's problems to the back of his mind. "There is more at stake here than your promotion or my funeral! And I would remind you that what you tend to regard as a right is in fact aa privilege. So let that be an end to it!"

  The cabin door opened and Captain Fitzmaurice walked into the lamplight, his first lieutenant at his heels.

  He held up his hand. "Forgive the intrusion, Bolitho. I thought I would speak with you before you leave." He nodded curtly to the others. "This is Mr. Quince, my senior."

  Quince was a tall, lean lieutenant with a hard mouth and extremely bright eyes. Bolitho had already learned from Fitzmaurice that Quince was ripe for advancement and more than capable should the chance come his way.

  Bolitho said, "For the benefit of our guests, gentlemen, I will go over it briefly once again." He straightened the chart across his desk. "The landing party will consist of four cutters and eighty officers and seamen. They will be tightly packed, but to use more boats would deprive the squadron of the ability to provide a diversion elsewhere."

  It was not merely for Fitzmaurice's entertainment that he was repeating his instructions. It took time for words to set in men's minds, to translate into probability or solid fact. As he glanced quickly at the men around him he knew he had been right. They were looking at the chart, but the eyes were more relaxed, more thoughtful, as each saw the scene from his own point of vew.
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br />   "As you have seen, the mouth of the river which protects the rear of Las Mercedes is about a mile wide. You may also have observed it is little more than a swamp, filled with rushes and sandbars, and for that reason is not suitable for large craft. Deeper inland it gets much worse, which is why our four boats must be as light as possible." He let his words sink in. "The landing party has to cover thirty miles in three days. Little enough when walking across Bodmin Moor to visit your mistress." Several smiled, in spite of his words. "But the swamp is uncharted and dangerous. Some might say it is impassable. But we will do it."

  Fitzmaurice cleared his throat. "Three days. Not much time."

  Bolitho smiled gravely. "Tomorrow the squadron is making a mock attack on Las Mercedes. The French will be expecting us to do something, and unless some sort of action is mounted they will guess what we are about. The sloop Dasher is patrolling the entrance of, the bay this moment, so Lequiller's men will see we mean to try again."

  He looked at Captain Dawson. "The rest of the squadron's boats will be used to mount a mock landing below the headland. Every ship will send her marines, and you will take charge overall." Some of Dawson's earlier resentment melted as he added, "Make a good display, but do not risk losing men to no purpose. They will earn their keep later."

  He faced the others again. "This diversion will of course be terminated, but by that time the landing party will be well inside the swamp. But in three days from dawn tomorrow the squadron will attack in earnest, gentlemen, so you can see the vital importance of the thirty miles we must travel before we can pave the way to success."

  Inch asked, "If you cannot reach there in time, sir, what will happen?"

  Bolitho looked at him thoughtfully. "You will have to decide, Mr. Inch. For if that happens, Hyperion will have a new captain, eh?"

  Inch stared at him, his jaw hanging open. Now, maybe for the first time, he understood why Bolitho was leaving him behind.

  Bolitho added sharply, "Carry on, gentlemen. From our own people I will want a good gunner's mate and a bosun's mate. Also two midshipmen, but not Gascoigne."