The Corvette nd-5

by Ричард Вудмен

  'Very well, Mr Hill, will you see to it.'

  Already the white wraiths curled across the deck and the next instant every rope began to drip moisture and the damp chill of a dense fog isolated the ship.

  Chapter Nine

  The Mercy of God

  June-July 1803

  It was intuition that told Drinkwater a change in the weather was imminent, intuition and a nervous awareness of altering circumstances. He was slowly awakened to a growing ache in his neck and a dimming of the brilliance of the ice which combined with a softening of its shadows. The day lost its colour and the atmosphere began to feel oddly hostile. The birds were landing on the sea and were airborne in fewer numbers.

  He touched Quilhampton's arm as the boat ran between two ice floes some seven or eight feet tall. The lead through which they were running was some hundred yards across, with a patch of open sea visible ahead of them from which, when they reached it, they hoped to catch sight of Melusine. Quilhampton turned. 'Sir?'

  'Fog, Mr Q, fog and wind,' he said in a low voice.

  Their eyes met and Quilhampton replied, 'Pray God we make the ship, sir.'

  'Amen to that, Mr Q.'

  Quilhampton, who had been dreaming again of Catriona, pulled himself together and concentrated on working the gig even faster through the lead to reach the open water before the fog closed over them.

  Drinkwater ordered Frey to pass another issue of rum to the men who sat shivering in the bottom of the boat. The warmth had gone out of the sun and the approaching fog made the air damp. He heard Quilhampton swear and looked up. The lead between the floes was narrowing as they spun slowly in the wind. He was conscious of a strong and unpleasant smell from the algae on the closing ice.

  'Get the oars to work, Tregembo!' Drinkwater snapped and the men, looking round and grasping the situation at a glance, were quick to obey. Already the lead had diminished by half.

  'Pull, damn you!'

  The boat headed for the narrowing gap with perhaps a cable to run before reaching the open water. The men grunted with effort as they tugged the gig forwards while in the stern Drinkwater and Quilhampton watched anxiously. The gap ahead was down to twenty yards. The sail flapped uselessly as the wind died in the lee of the converging ice. Drinkwater looked anxiously on either side of them, seeking some ledge on the ice upon which they could scramble when the floes ground together and crushed the boat like an eggshell. But both floes were in an advanced state of melting, their waterlines eroded, their surfaces overhanging in an exaggerated fashion. In a minute or two the oars would be useless as there would be insufficient room to extend them either side of the boat. He wished he had a steering oar with which to give the boat a little more chance.

  'Keep pulling, men, then trail oars as soon as you feel the blades touch the ice. Mr Frey, get that damned mast down.' He tried to keep his voice level but apprehension and a sudden bitter chill from the proximity of the ice made it shake. The floes had almost met overhead so that they pulled in a partial tunnel. Then there was a crash astern. Drinkwater looked round. The lead had closed behind them and a wave of water was rushing towards the gig's transom.

  'Pull!' he shouted, turning forward to urge the men, but as he did so he saw them leaning backwards, the looms of their oars sweeping over their heads as they allowed them to trail. They tensed for the impact of the ice when the wave hit them. The boat was thrust abruptly forward as the ice met overhead. Lumps of it dropped into the boat and there were muttered curses as the midshipman, helped now by idle oarsmen got the mast into the boat not an instant too soon.

  Suddenly they were in open water and, a moment later in a dense fog.

  'Did anyone see the ship?' Drinkwater asked sharply.

  There was a negative muttering.

  'We have exchanged the frying pan for the fire, Mr Q.'

  'Aye, sir.' Quilhampton sat glumly. The heart-thumping excitement of the race against the closure of the ice had had at least the advantage of swift resolution. Catriona might one day learn he had died crushed in Arctic ice and it seemed to him a preferable death to freezing and starving in an open boat. He was about to ask how long Captain Drinkwater thought they could survive when he saw the men exchange glances and Midshipman Frey looked aft, his face pale with anxiety. He pulled himself together. He was in command of the boat, damn it, despite the fact that Melusine's captain sat beside him.

  'Permission to re-ship the mast, sir.'

  Drinkwater nodded. He looked astern. They were well clear of the ice and already feeling the effect of the wind. 'Aye, but do not hoist the sail.'

  'Aye, aye, sir.' Quilhampton nodded at the junior midshipman. 'Step that mast forrard!'

  There was a scrambling and a knocking as the stumpy spar with its iron traveller and single halliard was relocated in the hole in the thwart. The men assisted willingly, glad of something to do. When it was done they subsided onto the thwarts and again looked aft.

  'Have all the oars secured inboard and two watches told off. You will take one and I the other. Tregembo pick the hands in Mr Quilhampton's watch and Mr Frey you will pick those in mine. I will take the tiller, Mr Q, whilst you make an issue of grog and biscuit. We will then set the watches and heave the gig to. At regular intervals the bowman will holloa and listen for the echo of his voice. If he hears it we may reasonably expect that ice is close but from what we saw there is little ice to leeward, though some may drift that way at a greater speed than ourselves. In this case we have only to put up the helm and run away from it while its protection to windward will reduce the violence of the sea. The watch below will huddle together to get what warmth it can. Captain Sawyers was only just relating many whaleboat crews have survived such circumstances so there is little to be alarmed about.'

  The last sentence was a bare-faced lie, but it had its effect in cheering the men and they went about their tasks with a show of willingness.

  With greater misgivings and the pain in his shoulder nagging at him appallingly, Drinkwater sat hunched in the stern-sheets.

  Singleton looked at the blade of the catling as the loblolly boy held the lantern close. There was no trace of mist upon it. Francis Germaney had breathed his last.

  'One for the sail-maker, eh sir?' The loblolly boy's grin was wolfish. It was always good to bury an officer, especially one who had the sense to blow his brains out. Or make a mess of it, the man thought, thereby casting doubts on whether he had them in the first place.

  Singleton looked coldly at Skeete who stared back.

  'I'll plug his arse and lay him out for the sail-maker, sir.'

  'Be silent, Skeete, you blackguard!' snapped Singleton impatiently, rising and for the hundredth time cracking his head on the deckbeam above. He left the first lieutenant's cabin hurriedly to the accompaniment of Skeete's diabolical laughter. A loblolly 'boy' of some twenty years experience and some fifty years of age, Skeete was enjoying himself. To the added pleasure of witnessing the demise of an officer, a circumstance which in Skeete's opinion was all too rare an occurrence, he derived a degree of satisfaction from the office he was about to perform upon such an august corpse as that of Lieutenant Francis Germaney, Royal Navy. Further, since ridding themselves of the drunken oppression of Macpherson, Skeete and his mate had enjoyed an autonomy previously unknown to them. Mr Singleton's remarkable ability in reviving Leek had impressed the surgeon's assistants less than the rest of the crew. To Skeete and his mate, Singleton was not a proper ship's officer and, being a damned parson with pronounced views upon flogging and the Articles of War, could be insulted with a fair degree of impunity. Skeete could not remember enjoying himself so much since he last visited Diamond Lil's at Portsmouth Point.

  In search of Drinkwater Singleton arrived on deck to be knocked to his knees by a seaman jumping clear as Number Nine gun fired and recoiled.

  'Mind you f… Oh, beg pardon, sir,' the man grinned sheepishly and helped the surgeon to his feet. Somewhat shaken and uncertain as to the cause of the noise and appar
ent confusion as the gun crew reloaded and hauled up the piece, Singleton made his way aft.

  'Is something the matter, Mr Hill?' he asked the master.

  'Bosun's mate, take that man's name and tell him I'll give him a check shirt at the gangway the next time he forgets to swab his gun… matter, Mr Singleton? Merely that there is a fog and the captain has yet to return.'

  'Fog?' Singleton turned and noticed the shroud that covered the ship for the first time. He looked sharply at Hill. 'You mean that the captain's lost in this fog? In that little boat?'

  'So it would seem, Mr Singleton. And the little boat is his gig… now if you will excuse me… Mackman, you Godforsaken whoreson, coil that fall the other way, God damn you bloody landsmen!'

  Singleton pressed aft aware that not only was the Melusine shrouded in dense fog but that the wind was piping in the rigging and that the ship was beginning to lift to an increasingly rough sea as she came clear of the ice.

  Mr Bourne, now in command, stood miserably at the windward rail with a worried looking Rispin, promoted abruptly and unwilling to first lieutenant. It was clear, even to Singleton's untutored eye, that Stephen Hill was in real command. Although he realised with a pang that he felt very uneasy without Drinkwater's cock-headed presence on the quarterdeck, he felt a measure of reassurance in Hill's competence. Knowing something of the promotion-hungry desires of lieutenants and midshipmen Singleton wondered to what extent efforts were being made to recover the captain, then he recollected his duty and struggled across the deck towards Bourne.

  A patter of spray flew aft and drove the breath from his body as he reached the anxious lieutenant. 'Mr Bourne!'

  'Eh? Singleton, what is it?'

  Bourne's cloak blew round him and his uncertainty seemed epitomised by the way he clutched the fore-cock of his hat to prevent it blowing away.

  'Mr Germaney has expired.'

  'Oh.' There seemed little else to say except, 'Thank you, Mr Singleton.'

  Frozen to the marrow Singleton made his way to the compan-ionway. As he swung himself down a second dollop of spray caught him and Number Nine gun roared again. Reaching the sanctuary of his cabin he flung himself on his knees.

  Afterwards Drinkwater was uncertain how long they nursed the gig through that desperate night, for night it must have been. Certainly the fog obscured much of the sunlight and prevented even a glimpse of the sun itself so that it became almost dark. After the twists and turns of their passage through the ice, and his preoccupation in avoiding damage to the boat, Drinkwater had to admit to being lost. The pain in his neck and the growing numbness of his extremities seemed to dull his brain so that his mental efforts were reduced to the sole consideration of keeping the boat reasonably dry and as close to the wind as they were able. He dare not run off before it for, although its effect would be less chilling, he feared far more the prospect of being utterly lost, while every effort he made to retain his position increased his chances of being not too far distant from the whalers or the Melusine when the fog lifted.

  The boat's crew spent a miserable night and at one point he recovered sufficient awareness to realise he had his arm round the shoulders of little Frey who was shuddering uncontrollably and trying desperately to muffle the chattering of his teeth and the sobbing of his breath. Tregembo and Quilhampton huddled together, their familiarity readily breaking down the barriers of rank, while further forward the other men groaned, swore and crouched equally frozen.

  Occasionally Drinkwater rallied, awakened to full consciousness by a sudden, agonising spasm in his shoulder, only to curse the self-indulgence that had led to this folly and probable death. He realised with a shock that he was not much moved by the contemplation of death, and with it came the realisation that his hands and feet felt warmer. For a second sleep threatened to overwhelm him and he knew it was the kiss of approaching death. A picture of Charlotte Amelia and Richard Madoc swam before his eyes, he tried to conjure up Elizabeth but found it impossible. Then he became acutely aware that the boy beside him was his son, not the baby he had left behind, but Richard at ten or eleven years. The boy's face was glowing, his full lips sweet and his eyes the deep brown of his mother's.

  'Farewell, father,' the boy was saying, 'farewell, for we shall never meet again…'

  'No, stay…!' Drinkwater was fully conscious, his mind filled with the departing vision of his son. A seaman whose name he could not remember looked aft from the bow. Drinkwater came suddenly to himself, aware that the extremities of his limbs were lifeless. He tried to move the midshipman. Mr Frey was asleep.

  'Mr Frey! Mr Frey! Wake up! Wake up, all of you! Wake up, God damn it… and you, forrard, why ain't you holloaing like you were ordered… Come on holloa! All of you holloa and sing! Sing God damn and blast you, clap your hands! Stamp your feet! Mr Frey give 'em grog and make the bastards sing…'

  'Sing, sir?' Frey awoke as though recalled from a distant place.

  'Aye, Mr Frey, sing!'

  Realisation awoke slowly in the boat and men groaned with the agony of moving. But Frey passed the keg of grog and they drained it greedily, the raw spirit quickening their hearts and circulation so that they at last broke into a cracked and imperfect chorus of 'Spanish Ladies'.

  And just as suddenly as Drinkwater had roused them to sing, he commanded them to silence. They sat, even more dejected now that the howl of the wind reasserted itself and the boat bucked up and down and water slopped inboard over them.

  The minute gun sounded again.

  'A six-pounder, by God!'

  'M'loosine, zur,' said Tregembo grinning.

  'Listen for the next to determine whether the distance increases.' They sat silent for what seemed an age. The concussion came again.

  ''Tis nearer, zur.'

  'Further away…'

  They sat through a further period of tense silence. The gun sounded yet again.

  Three voices answered at once. They were unanimous, 'Nearer!'

  'Let us bear off a little, Mr Q. Remain silent there and listen for the guns, but each man is to chafe his legs… Mr Frey perhaps you would oblige me by checking the priming of those muskets. Then you had better rub Mr Q's calves. His hand may be impervious to the cold but his legs ain't.'

  Half an hour later they were quite sure the Melusine's guns were louder, but the sea was rising and water entering the boat in increasing amounts. The hands were employed baling and Drinkwater decided it was time they discharged the muskets. They waited for the sound of the guns. The boom seemed slightly fainter.

  The muskets cracked and they waited for some response. Nothing came. The next time the minute gun fired it was quite definitely further away.

  The fog lifted a little towards dawn. Those on Melusine's quarterdeck could see a circle of tossing and streaked water some five cables in radius about them.

  'With this increase in visibility, Mr Bourne, I think we can afford to take a chance. I suggest we put the ship about and stand back to the northward for a couple of hours.'

  Bourne considered the proposition. 'Very well, Mr Hill, see to it.'

  Melusine jibbed at coming into the wind under such reduced canvas as she was carrying and Hill wore her round. She steadied on the larboard tack, head once more to the north and Hill transferred the duty gun-crew to a larboard gun. It was pointless firing to windward. After a pause the cannon, Number Ten, roared out. Melusine groaned as she rose and fell, occasionally shuddering as a sea broke against her side and sent the spray across her rail.

  'Sir! Sir!' Midshipman Gorton was coming aft from the foremast where he had been supervising the coiling of the braces.

  'What is it?'

  'I'm certain I heard something ahead, sir…'

  'In this wind?…'

  'A moment, Mr Rispin, what did you hear?'

  'Well sir, it sounded like muskets, sir…'

  The quarterdeck officers strained their eyes forward.

  'Fo'c's'le there!' roared Hill. 'Keep your eyes open, there!'

&
nbsp; 'There sir! There!' Midshipman Gorton was crouching, his arm and index finger extended over the starboard bow.

  'Mark it, Mr Gorton, mark it. Leggo lee mizen braces, there! Mizen yards aback!'

  'Thank God,' breathed Mr Rispin.

  'Thank Hill and Gorton, Mr Rispin,' said Lieutenant Bourne.

  Mr Frey saw the ship a full minute before Mr Gorton heard the muskets.

  'Drop the sail, Mr Q! Man the oars my lads, your lives depend upon it!'

  They were clumsy getting the oars out, their tired and aching muscles refusing to obey, but Tregembo cursed them from the after thwart and set the stroke.

  Drinkwater took them across Melusine's bow to pull up from leeward. He could see the sloop was hove-to and making little headway but he felt easier when he saw the mizen topsail backed.

  As they approached it was clear that even on her leeward side it was going to be impossible to recover the boat. He watched as several ropes' ends were flung over the side and men climbed into the chains to assist. The painter was caught at the third and increasingly feeble throw and the gig was dashed against Melusine's spirketting and then her chains. The tie-rods extending below the heavy timbers of the channels smashed the gunwhale of the boat, but as the gig dropped into the hollow of the sea Drinkwater saw one pair of legs left dangling over the ledge of the chains where willing hands reached down. It was not a time for prerogative and Drinkwater refused to leave the boat until all the others were safe. He had little fear for the seamen, for all were fit, agile and used to scrambling about. But Frey was very cold and his limbs were cramped. Drinkwater called for a line and a rope snaked down into the boat. He passed a bowline round Frey's waist as the men scrambled out of the boat. As the gig rose and the rope was hauled tight, Drinkwater tried to support the boy. Suddenly the boat fell, half rolling over as the inboard gunwhale caught again and threatened to overset it. Frey dangled ten feet overhead, the line rigged from the cro'jack yardarm had plucked him from the boat. One of his shoes fell past Drinkwater as he grabbed a handhold. He looked down to find the gig half full of water. The mizen whip was already being pulled inboard and Drinkwater shouted.