Book 2 - Post Captain

by Patrick O'Brian

  They were no more than a little late for their tide, and they stood in steadily with the master at the con and two leads going without a pause—'By the deep eight, by the deep eight, by the mark ten, a quarter less ten, by the deep nine, and a half seven, by the mark five, a quarter less five, and a half four.' The bottom was shelving fast. 'We are on the edge of the outer bank, sir,' said the master, looking at the sample of shelly ooze from the lead. 'All well. Tops'ls alone, I believe.'

  'She is yours, Mr Goodridge,' said Jack, and he stood back a step, while the ship whispered through the water and the master took her in. She had been cleared for action long before; the hands were silent and attentive; the ship answered her helm promptly as she worked through the channels, sheets and braces tightening at the word. 'That will be the Galloper,' said the master, nodding towards a stretch of pale water on the starboard bow. 'Starboard a point. Two points. Steady—easy, now. As she goes. Port your helm. Hard over.' Silence. Dead silence in the fog.

  'Morgan's Knock to larboard, sir,' he said, coming aft. Jack was glad to hear it. Their last sure cross-bearing seemed a terribly long time ago; and this was blindman's buff: it was water he did not know. With Morgan's Knock astern, they would have to bear westward round the tail of Old Paul Hill's bank, and then head a little south of east and so into the outer road, crossing the Ile Saint-Jacques. 'Starboard three points,' said the master, and the ship swung to the west. It was wonderful how these old Channel pilots knew their sea: by the smell and feel of it, no doubt. 'Mind your bowline, for'ard there,' called the master in a low voice. A long, long pause, with the Polychrest close-hauled to the now freshening breeze. 'Down with your helm, now. Steady, steady. As she goes. Look, sir, on the larboard bow—that's St Jacques.' A tear in the fog, and there, about a mile away, rose a tall white mass with a fortification on its top and half-way down its side.

  'Well done, Mr Goodridge, well done indeed.'

  'On deck, there,' hailed the look-out. 'Sail on the larboard beam. Oh, a mort of craft,' he added conversationally. 'Eight, nine—a proper old crowd of 'em.'

  'They'll be at the far end of the outer road, sir,' said the master. 'We are in it now.'

  The breeze was tearing great windows in the fog, and gazing over to port Jack had a sudden vision of an assembly of fair-sized vessels, ship- and brig-rigged, bright in the moonlight. These were his prey, the transports and cannonières for the invasion.

  'You are happy that they are in the outer road, Mr Goodridge?' he asked.

  'Oh, yes, sir. We just had St Jacques bearing south-south-east. There's nothing but open water between you and them.'

  'Down with your helm,' said Jack. With the wind on her larboard quarter the Polychrest ran through the sea, going fast in with the tide, straight for the gun-vessels.

  'Out tompions,' he said. 'Stand to your guns.' He meant to run right in among them, firing both sides, to get the very most out of the surprise and the first discharge, for a moment after it all hell would break loose from the batteries, and the men would never be so steady again. The mist had drifted across again, but it was clearing—he could see them dimly, coming closer and closer.

  'Not a gun till . . .' he called, and a shock threw him fiat on the deck. The Polychrest was brought up all standing. She had run full tilt on to the West Anvil.

  This was plain as he got to his feet and the clearing of the fog showed one fort right astern and another almost exactly alike on the starboard bow, forts that woke to instant life with a shattering roar, a blast of flame that lit the sky. They had mistaken Convention for St Jacques, the inner road for the outer: they had come in by a different channel, and the vessels were separated from him by an impassable spit of sand. Those ships were in the inner, not the outer road. By some miracle the Polychrest had all her masts still standing: she lifted on the swell and ground a little farther on to the bank.

  'Up sheets,' he shouted, full voice—no call for silence now. 'Up sheets.' The strain on the masts eased. 'Parker, Pullings, Babbington, Rossall, get the guns aft.' If she were only hanging by her forefoot this might bring her off. On the far side of the bank a great flurry of canvas—ships getting under way in every direction—and amidst this confusion two distinct well-ordered shapes steering to cross his bows. Gun-brigs, which marked their presence by two double jets of fire, meaning to rake him from stern to stern. 'Leave the fo'c'sle guns,' he cried. 'Mr Rossall, Adams, keep up a steady fire on those brigs.'

  Now the moon shone out with surprising brilliance, and as the wind blew away the smoke, it showed the batteries as clear as day. It showed the whole inner road, crowded with shipping—a corvette moored right up against Convention, under its guns; certainly the ship Thetis and Andromeda had chased in, his quarry. 'A damned-fool place to moor her'—one thought among countless others racing through his head. It showed the deck of the Polychrest, most of the men well disciplined, over their amazement, working fast at the guns, trundling them aft, not much concerned by the thunder of the forts. St Jacques was firing wide, afraid of hitting its own people ahead of the Polychrest. Convention had not yet got the range: the iron hail was still high overhead. The gun-brigs were more dangerous.

  He clapped on to a rope, helped run a gun aft, called for coigns to wedge them until they could make fast.

  'All the people aft. All hands, all hands aft. We'll jounce her off. All jump together at the word. One, two. One, two.' They jumped, a hundred men together: would their weight and the weight of the guns slide her off into deep water? 'One, two. One, two.' It would not. ' 'Vast jumping.' He ran forward, looking hard and quick right round the port; glanced at his watch. A quarter past nine—not much left of the flood. 'Get all the boats over the side. Mr Parker,' he said, 'carronade into the barge.'

  She had to be got off. A bower anchor carried out, dropped in deep water and heaved upon would bring her off: but even the barge could not bear the weight of such an anchor. A larger vessel must be cut out. A ball passed within a few feet of him, and its wind made him stagger. A cheer from forward, as the starboard carronade hit one of the gun-brigs square on the figurehead. Something had to be cut out. The transports were all crowding sail for the Ras du Point; they could not be caught in time. There were some small luggers in the harbour mouth; the corvette alone under Convention's guns. Absurdly close under Convention's guns, moored fore and aft, fifty yards from the shore, broad-side and headed towards St Jacques. Why not the corvette herself? He dismissed the question as absurd. But why not? The risk would be enormous, but no greater than lying here under the cross-fire, once the batteries had the range. It was very near to wild mad recklessness; but it was not quite there. And with the corvette in his possession there would be no need to carry out an anchor—a time-consuming job.

  'Mr Rossall,' he said, 'take the barge. Draw off the fire of those brigs. Plenty of cartridge, a dozen muskets. Make all the noise you can—shout—sing out.' The barge-crew dropped over the side. Drawing a deep breath he shouted above the guns, 'Volunteers, volunteers to come along with me and cut out that corvette. Richards, serve out cutlasses, pistols, axes. Mr Parker, you will stay in the ship.'—The men would not follow Parker: how many would follow him? 'Mr Smithers, the red cutter: you and your Marines board over her starboard bow. Mr Pullings, blue cutter to her larboard quarter, and the moment you are aboard cut her cables. Take axes. Then lay aloft and let fall her tops'ls. Attend to nothing else at all. Pick your men: quick. The rest come along with me and look alive, now. There's not a moment to be lost.' Killick handed him his pistols and he dropped into his gig, never looking behind him. The Polychrests poured over the side, thump thump thump down into the boats. The clash of arms, a voice bawling in his ear 'Squeeze up, George. Make room, can't you?' How many men in the boats? Seventy? Eighty? Even more. A magnificent rise in his heart, all the blackness falling clear away.

  'Give way,' he said. 'Silence, all boats. Bonden, right over the bank. Go straight for her.' A crash behind him as a salvo from Convention took away the Polychrest'
s foretopmast.

  'No great loss,' he said, settling in the stern-sheets with his sword between his knees. They touched once, a bare scrape, on the top of the sand-bank, then they were beyond it, in the inner road, going straight for the corvette half a mile away. The risk was enormous—she might have two hundred men aboard—but here again there was the chance of surprise. They would scarcely expect to be boarded from a grounded ship, not right under their own guns. Too far under their own guns—what a simple place to moor—for the Convention battery was high-perched up on the headland: its guns could never be depressed so far as to sweep the sea two or three hundred yards in front of the fort. Only five hundred yards to go. The men were pulling like maniacs, grunt, grunt, grunt, but the boat was crammed, heavy and encumbered—no room to stretch to their oars. Bonden wedged next to him, little Parslow—that child should never have come—the purser, deathly pale in the moonlight, the villainous face of Davis; Lakey, Plaice, all the Sophies . . .

  Four hundred yards, and at last the corvette had woken to her danger. A hail. An uneven broadside, musketry. And now musketry crackling all along the shore. A deluge of water from Convention's great guns, no longer firing at the Polychrest but at her boats, and missing only by a very little. And all the time the barge, banging away behind them at the gun-brigs with its little six-pounder carronade, roaring, firing muskets, wonderfully diverting attention from this silent rush across the inner road. Convention again, at extreme depression, but firing over them.

  Two hundred yards, one. The other boats drawing ahead, Smithers to the right, Pullings turning left-handed to go round her stern.

  'mizzen chains, Bonden,' he said, loosening his sword in its scabbard.

  A shattering burst of fire, a great roaring—the Marines were boarding her over the bows.

  'mizzen chains it is, sir,' said Bonden, heaving on the tiller. A last broadside overhead, and the boat came kissing against the side.

  Up. He leapt on the high roll, his hands catching the dead-eyes. Up. No boarding-netting, by God! Men thrusting, grasping all round him, one holding his hair. Up and over the rail, through the thin fringe of defenders—a few pikes, swabs, a musket banging in his ear—on to the quarterdeck, his sharp sword out, pistol in his left hand. Straight for the group of officers, shouting 'Polychrest! Polychrest!' a swarm of men behind him, a swirling scuffle by the mizzenmast, an open maul, men grappling silently, open extreme brutal violence. Fired his pistol, flinging it straight at the next man's face. Babbington on his left running full into the flash and smoke of a musket—he was down. Jack checked his rush and stood over him; lunging hard he deflected the plunging bayonet into the deck. His heavy sword carried on, and now with all his weight and strength he whipped it up in a wicked backhanded stroke that took the soldier's head half off his body.

  A little officer in the clear space in front of him, sword-point darting at his breast. Swerve and parry, and there they were dancing towards the taffrail, their swords flashing in the moonlight. A burning stab in his shoulder, and before the officer could recover his point Jack had closed, crashing the pommel into his chest and kicking his legs from under him. 'Rendez-vous,' he said.

  'Jé mé rendre,' said the officer on the deck, dropping his sword. 'Parola.'

  Firing, crashing, shouting in the bows, in the waist. And now Pullings was over the side, hacking at the cables. Red coats, dark in the moonlight, clearing the starboard gangway, and everywhere, everywhere the shout of Polychrest. Jack raced forward at the tight group by the mainmast, mostly officers; they were backing, firing their pistols, pointing swords and pikes, and behind them, on the landward side, their men were dropping into the boats and into the water by the score. Haines ran past him, dodging through the fight, and hurled himself aloft, followed by a string of other men.

  Here was Smithers, shouting, sweating, a dozen other Marines—they had reached the quarterdeck from the bows. Now Pullings, with a bloody axe in his hand, and the top-sails were letting fall, mizzen main and fore—men already at the sheets.

  'Capitaine,' cried Jack, 'Capitaine, cessez effusion sang. Rendez-vous. Hommes desertés. Rendez-vous.'

  'Jamais, monsieur,' said the Frenchman, and came for him with a furious lunge.

  'Bonden, trip up his heels,' said Jack, parrying the thrust and cutting high. The French captain's sword flashed up. Bonden ran beneath it, collared him, and it was over.

  Goodridge was at the wheel—where had he come from?—calling like thunder for the foretopsail to be sheeted home; already the land was gently receding, gliding, sliding backwards and away.

  'Capitaine, en bas, dessous, s'il vous plait. Toutes officiers dessous.' Officers giving up their swords; Jack taking them, passing them to Bonden. Incomprehensible words—Italian? 'Mr Smithers, put 'em in the cable-tier.'

  An isolated scuffle and a single shot on the forecastle, to join the firing from the shore. Bodies on deck: the wounded crawling.

  She was heading westward, and the blessed wind was just before her beam. She must go round the tail of the West Anvil before she could tack to reach the Polychrest, and all the way she would be sailing straight into the fire of St Jacques: half a mile's creep, always closer to that deadly raking battery.

  'Foresail and driver,' cried Jack. The quicker the better, and above all she must not miss stays. She seemed to be handling beautifully, but if she missed stays she would be cut to pieces.

  Convention was firing behind them: wildly at present, though one great ball passed through all three topsails. He hurried forward to help sort out the foresail tack. The deck was swarming with Polychrests—they called out to him: tearing high spirits, some quite beside themselves. 'Wilkins,' he said, putting his hand on the man's shoulder, 'you and Shaddock start getting the corpses over the side.'

  She was a trim little vessel. Eighteen, no, twenty guns. Broader than the Polychrest. Fanciulla was her name—she was indeed the Fanciulla. Why did St Jacques not fire? 'Mr Malloch, clear away the small bower and get a cable out of a stern-port.' Why did they not fire? A triple crash abaft the mainmast—Convention hulling the corvette—but nothing from St Jacques. St Jacques had not yet realized that the Fanciulla had been carried—they thought she was standing out to attack the grounded Polychrest. 'Long may it last,' he said. The tack was hard down, the corvette moving faster through the water—slack water now. He looked at his watch, holding it up to the moon: and a flash from St Jacques showed him just eleven. They had smoked him at last. But the tail of the sandbank was no great way off.

  'I killed one, sir,' cried Parslow, running across the deck to tell him. 'I shot him into the body just as he was going for Barker with a half-pike.'

  'Very good, Mr Parslow. Now cut along to the cable-tier and give Mr Malloch a hand, will you? Mr Goodridge, I believe we may go about very soon.'

  'Another hundred yards, sir,' said the master, his eyes fixed on St Jacques. 'I must just get those two turrets in a line.'

  Nearer, nearer. The towers were converging. 'All hands, all hands,' shouted Jack. 'Ready about ship. Mr Pullings, are you ready, there?' The towers blazed out, vanished in their own smoke, the corvette's mizzen topmast went by the board, sheets of spray flew over the quarterdeck. 'Ready oh! Helm's a-lee. Up tacks and sheets. Haul mains'l, haul.' Round she came, paying off all the faster for the loss of her after sails. 'Haul of all, haul with a will.' She was round, had spun like a cutter, and now with the wind three points free she was running for the Polychrest—the Polychrest with no foremast, no maintopgallant and only the stump of her bowsprit, but still firing her forward carronades and cheering thinly as the Fanciulla ran alongside, came up into the wind on the far side of the channel and dropped anchor.

  'All well, Mr Parker?' hailed Jack.

  'All's well, sir. We are a little knocked about, and the barge sank alongside; but all's well.'

  'Rig the capstan, Mr Parker, and make a lane for the cable.' The roar of guns, the din of shot hitting both ships, tearing up the water, and passing overhead, drowne
d his voice. He repeated the order and went on, 'Mr Pullings, veer the cutter under the' stern to take the line.

  'Red cutter was stove by that old topmast, sir, and I'm afraid the Marine's painter came adrift like, somehow. Only your gig left, sir. The Frenchmen went ashore in all theirn.'

  'The gig, then. Mr Goodridge, as soon as the cable is to, start heaving ahead. Pullings, come with me.' He dropped into the gig, took the line in his hand—their life-line—and said, 'We shall need at least twenty more men for the capstan. Ply to and from as quick as ever you can, Pullings.'

  The Polychrest again, and hands reaching eagerly from the stern-port for the line. A mortar-shell burst, brilliant orange, closer to the gun-brigs than to its target.

  'Hot work, sir,' said Parker. 'I wish you joy of your prize.' He spoke with an odd hesitation, forcing the words: in the light of the flashes he looked an old, old man, bent and old.

  'Thankee, Parker. Pretty warm. Clap on to the line, there. Heave hearty.' The line came in hand over hand, followed briskly by a small hawser, and then far more slowly by a great heavy snake of cable. Pullings' men kept coming aboard, and at last the cable was to the capstan. While the bars were being swifted, Jack looked at his watch again: just past midnight: the tide had been ebbing for half an hour.

  'Heave away,' he called to the Fanciulla. 'Now, Polychrests, step out. Heave hearty. Heave and rally.' The capstan span, the pawls going click-click-click; the cable began to rise from the sea, to tighten, squirting water.

  And now, with the gun-brigs sheering off, frightened by the shell, St Jacques let fly—heavy mortars, all the guns they possessed. A shot killed four men at the bars; the maintopmast toppled over the forecastle; the gig was knocked to pieces alongside just as its last man left it. 'Heave. Heave and rally,' cried Jack, slipping in the blood and kicking a body out of his way as he forced the bar round. 'Heave. Heave.' The cable rose right from the sea, almost straight. The men saved from the gig flung themselves on the bars. 'Heave, heave. She moves!' Clear through the roar of guns they could hear, or rather feel, the grind of the ship's bottom shifting over the sand. A kind of gasping cheer: the pawls clicked once more, twice, and then they were flat on their faces, no resistance in the bars at all, the capstan turning free. A ball had cut the cable.