By the Mast Divided

by David Donachie

  ‘Let us see how she fares. She is a good sea boat I think, and will serve us well.’ It was a gamble, because Barclay was risking carrying away something major. Brilliant would not be thrown on her beam-ends but one of his tightly lodged and stiff masts might go by the board with so much pressure on them. ‘Mr Roscoe, a party standing by to ease the wedges on the mainmast.’

  ‘Chase is altering course to the south, sir,’ said Collins.

  Even given the time it was taking to close there was added tension on the ship. Pearce had the feeling that not everyone was happy. Collins, from what he could see was incapable of the emotion and Roscoe was miserable, convinced that what his captain was about was wrong. But it was the crew that interested him most, or those he could see. All were looking forward one minute, then at a mast when it, and the rigging that held it, groaned with the strain. It looked to be a strange combination of exhilaration and fear.

  ‘A bow chaser, Mr Roscoe,’ Barclay ordered, never once taking his eye off the prize. ‘Only the windward port can be opened with any safety I think. Get it manned and run out if you please. Let’s try the range as soon as it is loaded.’

  Burns was sent with the message and the bow chaser was fired within minutes, sending a great spiral of black smoke billowing out and across the front of the ship before it was carried away on the wind. Craning, Pearce tried to see the fall of the shot, but at the height of the deck and in a choppy sea that was impossible. The information came from the masthead, where they could see.

  ‘A whole cable length shy of the target, your honour.’

  ‘Very well,’ said Barclay. If he was disappointed it did not show.

  Every ten minutes the guns fired, it being noted that although the range was closing it was not yet true. Ralph Barclay knew that he could have the fellow, because at some time soon, when they were in range, he could change course to bring more guns to bear.

  ‘Chase has altered course again, your honour,’ called the lookout.

  ‘Heading due west by my reckoning,’ said Collins.

  ‘The man’s a fool,’ hooted Barclay, ‘though I cannot say his stupidity displeases me.’

  ‘He’s bending on more sail, stun sails and kites by the look of it.’

  Moving forward Ralph Barclay raised his telescope to his eye, and an enemy ship that was in plain view anyway swam into focus. He could see the crew on the deck, numerous, as befitted a privateer vessel, as they struggled to get aloft a mass of canvas. It was ten minutes before they succeeded, during which Ralph Barclay felt he was holding his breath, for what his adversary was about made little sense. With a frigate on his quarter he should have kept his previous course, maintaining as much distance as he could so that when the gap between the two ships closed, Brilliant would still be at maximum range. By his present actions he was exposing himself to a broadside at a distance where it could do serious damage in the very first salvo, damage that would make escape impossible.

  Being disabused of the notions he was considering was a moment of deep discomfort for Ralph Barclay. Almost as soon as the Frenchman had sheeted home his extra sails the barque leapt forward. Fresh from port she had a clean bottom, and her lines were such that she had always looked swift. Now she showed just how good she was, leaving the captain of HMS Brilliant in no doubt that, if he did not react, he would be lucky if she ever came in range.

  ‘Alter course to the south, Mr Collins.’

  ‘Sir,’ said the Master, ‘we are carrying too much canvas.’

  ‘Get those wedges knocked out on the mainmast now,’ growled Barclay, ‘and Mr Collins, do as I bid.’ Then he shouted in a stentorian voice, ‘Bow chaser, maximum elevation. Try the range again.’

  As Brilliant turned, the wind took her over until the boom end of her maincourse yard was nearly in the water. Everywhere on the steeply canted deck people were hanging on for dear life. But that did not last long, for the forecourse ripped right across its length from the pressure of the wind and the decrease in force began to right the ship. But without that sail the pressure on the rest would increase and it was only a matter of time before a mast went by the board or another stretch of canvas ripped itself asunder.

  ‘Mr Collins, ease the braces then bring me round onto a parallel course to the chase. Mr Roscoe, a new forecourse from the sail locker immediately, and all hands to bend it on.’

  The command to ease echoed down the ship – one loop being taken off the belaying pins by men who knew they had to leave the second one be, to keep a grip on the falls. The great sails began to flap, cracking like angry gods as they lost the pressure of the wind. As the rudder was hauled round and the bows trended eastwards, on one side of the deck they were pulling hard, while on the other Mess Number Twelve was easing out the ropes while maintaining control with a single loop. Ralph Barclay was pleased by the way the manoeuvre was carried out, because his ship never lost steerage way and once the head was round the command to sheet home was given and the yards were tied off.

  ‘Jesus,’ said Michael, ‘did we do that right or what?’

  ‘Nobody cursed us,’ said Ben Walker, ‘and that has to be a first.’

  ‘Now, Mr Roscoe,’ said Barclay, with grim determination, ‘we will see what our ship can do.’

  ‘Firefly signalling again, sir,’ called Farmiloe. ‘Do you require assistance?’

  ‘Negative.’

  Ralph Barclay’s mind was teeming. He was on a course now that would suit his ship, with the wind coming in over his starboard quarter, probably her best point of sailing. He could get aloft as much sail as his ship could bear, but he would not discern for an age if he had the legs of the chase – although he knew she was a bit of a flyer. Against that he had a standing order to stay in sight of the convoy.

  ‘A signal to Captain Gould, Mr Farmiloe, to take station to the east of our charges.’

  Firefly’s masthead would be the convoy as far as he was concerned, and he hoped that Gould would smoke his intention and put himself as far eastwards as he dare. This would allow him to extend the range to which he could chase a quarry running before him.

  ‘Now, Mr Collins, I require to be shown what my ship will bear aloft.’

  By the time the men had been released to have their dinner, Ralph Barclay knew that with the wind now steady in the west, blowing stiff but not hard, he could catch the Frenchman, but what was worrying, as the afternoon wore on, was the season. There was not much daylight left. It was gratifying to observe that his crew was eager – few stayed snug below for long, though it was cold on deck, for what they were after represented a cash bounty to every man aboard. His dinner had been a hurried affair, taken in full view of those on the maindeck, for his cabin walls were still in the holds, and Emily, who had craved to do so, was allowed to join him on deck. There he pointed out to her the various sails he had aloft, near a full suit, rising through courses, topsails, topgallants to kites.

  ‘While those, my dear, on the weather side, that being where the wind is coming from, are called studdingsails. Look behind us and you will see how the mizzen gaff is braced right round to take the wind, and forward we have everything twixt foremast and jib boom she will carry, spirit sails included. We are, at present, maintaining a steady nine knots.’

  Pearce, back at his station on the larboard side where the gangway joined the quarterdeck, watched Barclay as he patiently explained matters to his wife. The wind, still strong but now of a more even temper, coming over the other side of the stern, carried the captain’s words to him, not all distinct but enough for him to follow what the captain was alluding to. Pearce was impressed, as much by the rate of progress through the water as by the beauty of the huge quantity of taut sails.

  The ship they were pursuing, drawing gradually closer, but at an imperceptible rate, had a beauty of her own, showing a clean white wake astern. The air, now that the wind was not coming in over the bows, was not wet, but it had about it a tang of cleanliness the like of which he had rarely experienced. Hate
his situation he might, but he felt it would be churlish not to take pleasure from what he could, though the prospect of what was coming to the Frenchman was not something he could be happy about.

  ‘First,’ Dysart had told him and his fellows, ‘we will gie the bugger what for wi’ the bow chasers. Maybe knock away a spar or two. Then we will range alongside and if he disna strike his colours damn quick we will give him a what for of a broadside, aimed high, mind, so that the hull will no be damaged.’

  ‘Then?’ asked Charlie Taverner.

  ‘Well, if he’s an eejit, we will board.’

  ‘Idiot,’ Pearce had translated, which earned him a raised eyebrow from Dysart, as if he was saying, maybe you’re a Scot after all.

  ‘But like as not he will strike, and then we can do a wee calculation and see how much everybody has made.’

  ‘Do you have any notion now?’ asked Gherson, long lashes fluttering in a way that made Dysart frown.

  ‘Two eighths of the whole is what we get.’

  ‘That is a quarter,’ Gherson added pedantically.

  ‘Is that a fact?’ Dysart replied, without much certainty.

  There was general air of excitement, but that soon faded as reality intruded, despite the best efforts of Dysart to fabricate a better case. Pearce wondered, as the Scotsman explained, at a system of rewards so heavily weighted in favour of officers. Up to three eighths for the captain, two if he had to give one to an admiral; one for the superior officers, one for the warrants, one for the petty officers and just two for the men who did the actual fighting, who naturally, being the largest numerical group, had a portion sliced exceedingly thin. It was the kind of arrangement against which his father had railed half his life – those who had the most, got the most, while the needy were given what would, when it was split with so many, be a pittance. It was good to discern that the crew of the ship, as they discussed the matter, were as unimpressed as he and they had made it plain that, while any payment was welcome, the way monies were split was a bone of contention throughout the entire fleet.

  ‘Masthead,’ Barclay called, ‘do you still have sight of HMS Firefly?’

  ‘She’s hull down now, your honour, but I can still see the main jack yard as she rises on the swell, and her pennant is plain regardless.’

  ‘Mr Roscoe. What was the name of that missing East Indiaman, the one that hauled his wind last evening?’

  ‘She was the Lady Harrington out of London, sir.’

  Barclay stared right at Roscoe then, as if challenging him. ‘Tell our lookouts to keep an eye out for her.’

  He got a stare back, then the beginnings of comprehension. Barclay could leave sight of the bulk of his convoy in only one instance; to look for and chivvy stragglers. That would be entered in the ship’s log, to cover the captain against chastisement.

  ‘Mr Roscoe,’ Barclay added, ‘I think we must try the bow chasers again, both cannon this time. The hour demands it.’

  Pearce had to stand aside as Ralph Barclay took his wife forward, so that she could witness the firing of the guns from beneath her feet, and, Barclay hoped, see the spouts of water created by the shot, though it was a forlorn hope that she would see a ball strike the chase. Emily Barclay smiled at Pearce. Here before her was that writer of the coded letter, and with that in her mind she said, softly, ‘Pardonnez-moi.’

  The object of the apology had returned her look until she spoke, grey eyes steady, then he nodded his head and executed one twentieth of a bow to accept her greeting, wondering why she had spoken to him in French. Ralph Barclay was curious regarding two things; why his wife had addressed him at all, for he had only heard the sound not the words, and what this low-life was doing reacting like a gentleman in a fashionable salon.

  ‘Mr Digby,’ he called. ‘This fellow on the gangway does not know his manners. Please be so good at to show him how to salute a captain and his lady.’

  The face was close enough to see each broken vein. Pearce was thinking, don’t respond, his fists clenched and his whole body as tight as a drum – that damned trembling afflicting him again. Fortunately Barclay and his wife moved on, Burns in tow like a footman, as Lieutenant Digby came to obey his captain’s instructions.

  ‘Officers, Pearce, lift their hats,’ Digby said gently: then he made a loose fist, and touched the knuckle to his forehead. ‘You salute in this manner.’

  ‘And,’ Pearce responded, staring straight at the officer, his voice even and his body beginning to relax, ‘if I do not choose to make such a demeaning gesture?’

  ‘Not to do so is a punishable offence.’

  ‘So, in order to avoid punishment I must show my knuckle to a man I despise.’

  Digby tried very hard to look furious, his face succeeding while his voice failed. ‘I could have you at the grating for that.’

  ‘Then you must do so, Lieutenant Digby, for nothing on this earth will get me to salute Captain Barclay.’

  ‘Then stay out of his damned way, and his eye line.’

  The booming cannon allowed Digby to turn away from a look he was at a loss to cope with. He knew it to be one of his failings as an officer, his inability to impose discipline by any other method than persuasion. Up till now, in the main, it had worked for him but as he moved away from Pearce he had very serious doubts if it would work with the man who had just challenged him. Suddenly, he spun round.

  ‘Be assured Pearce, I will have you at the grating if need be. That I will take no pleasure in doing so will not stop me.’

  Slowly, with just a trace of a smile on his face, Pearce raised a fist, and knuckled his forehead. ‘Sir.’

  ‘I hope you believe me,’ Digby insisted, as a pair of cannon boomed out behind him.

  ‘I believe you would take no pleasure in it, sir.’

  ‘Short by the length of the chase, your honour.’

  There was no need for the masthead report. Ralph Barclay had seen how short the balls had fallen, and if his wife was excited by the waterspouts that shot fifty feet in the air he was not, for it took no great genius to calculate that the rate that they were overhauling the chase would mean that he would sail not only into darkness, but out of sight of the convoy. He looked at the sky, which was nothing like the lowering clouds of the morning. As the day had gone on the cloud-base had lifted, but it was still overall grey, which meant that when darkness came there would be no moon or stars. Also the wind had moderated, although that applied to both him and the chase, yet there was no sense that it might fall away completely – this was the bight of Brittany. A calm here in March was as likely as a snowstorm in June.

  Yet he so nearly had the fellow, another two or three hours and he would pour so much shot into him that he would be forced to strike. Where was he headed?

  ‘Mr Burns, fetch me a glass.’

  The telescope, on the rise, showed him he was pursuing the Mercedes out of the port of St Malo. To the south lay the wild shore of Brittany, a place no man in his right mind would head for in darkness. Quite apart from the hazards of rocks both submerged and above water, the tidal rise and fall was huge. The Frenchman could turn north, but with a wind fair for his home-port why bother, and if he did so he risked at dawn finding HMS Brilliant between him and safety.

  The notion that he was hunting a straggler of an East Indiaman would not pass muster under malign scrutiny, but Ralph Barclay knew that if he had a capture the examining eyes would look more kindly.

  ‘Mr Burns, please tell Mr Roscoe that the hands are to be piped to supper.’

  Emily looked at her husband then with admiration, and he, returning that look thought of what success would bring for her. That she was a lady was not in doubt; neither was the fact that she would grace his rank to whatever heights he rose. In his mind he imagined the benefits she would enjoy from being wife to a successful sailor, a taker of numerous prizes: carriages, a beautiful home, servants, and children so well found in wealth and position that if they ever did decide to go to sea, they would do so with
none of the constraints which had dogged his career.

  ‘And Mr Burns, please ask Mr Roscoe to prepare to darken ship. We are going to continue the chase once the light goes, but I have no notion to let the fellow know it.’

  It was ghostly sailing along in the dark. A tarpaulin had been rigged before the binnacle locker so that no light showed forward. Below decks only enough lanterns were lit to allow a man to pass from one place to the next without injury, and screens had been rigged to ensure that nothing showed aloft. HMS Brilliant ploughed on in stygian darkness that, with solid cloud cover, allowed for no phosphorescence, either from the crest wave, the frigates bow, or even the wake of the chase. Men were forward, one out on the bowsprit, eyes peeled for a glimmer of inadvertent light – for the chase had darkened likewise – or for some clink of sound as someone moved around the deck, able to report back to Ralph Barclay, sat in his cabin, that the odd noise could be heard as, ‘those lubberly French dogs moved around.’

  ‘Orders to Mr Roscoe,’ Barclay replied. ‘Men to sleep by watches, two hours each. Any man making a sound I will flog to oblivion.’

  That such reports of noises ceased as the night wore on did not bother Ralph Barclay over-much. He assumed that with everything set and braced, on a breeze that was holding steady, his adversary had sent most of his crew to their hammocks. He started to doze in his chair, unaware that his wife, worried about him, was having difficulty sleeping at all in the restored and screened off cot.

  ‘Pearce, wake up!’

  Dragged from a lubricious dream that largely featured the captain’s wife – naked as well as willing – and life on land and comfort, Pearce was slow to respond to the shake, reluctant to leave such an agreeable fantasy. When he did awake it was to the immediate knowledge, through sound and smell, that he was still aboard ship. Such interruption was doubly unwelcome given that sleeping two hours on and two off exacerbated the exhaustion of the normal four-hour regime. Eyes open, he had to think hard to recognise the voice that was urgently repeating his name, for there was no light at all on the maindeck of the darkened ship.