"A little low, Mister Cox?" Alan asked as he saw the trees and bushes just above the beach tremble to a well-directed shot.
"Aim'll lift as the barrels get hotter, sir," Cox said, replying with a touch of petulant whine to his voice, unwilling to be questioned at his science, or his skill in the execution of it. But Alan did note that Cox then sent a gunner's mate to correct the elevation of Number 4 larboard gun, which had been shooting too low.
The boats were having a lively time of it, even inside the reefs that should have protected them from the worst of the offshore rollers that swept in, driven by a fresh Sou'east Trade Wind. They rocked bow to stern, with the oarsmen slaving away to keep them moving.
Then the first stems were grounding on the sands, and Captain Dixon was ashore and waving back at the frigates. A signal went up from Albemarle, ordering "Cease Fire" so their broadsides would not hurt their own landing parties.
"Cease fire, Mister Cox!" Alan shouted down into the waist. "Mister Biggs, water butts for the gunners."
"Aye, sir," their weasely purser replied, sounding as if he even begrudged issuing "free" water.
"Looks like the landing is unopposed," Alan said. "Might be some French troops up in those woods, but they couldn't form for volleys under our fire."
"Marines are going in, sir," Caldwell pointed out.
Through the glass, he could see the thin red ranks form shoulder to shoulder, open out in skirmish order, lower their bayoneted muskets and start off for the interior, being swallowed up by the thick undergrowth almost at once, with the seemingly disordered packs of seamen in their mis-matched shirts following.
From then on, it was anyone's guess as to what was happening inland. There was no mast available for flag signals from the men ashore. Muskets popped, sometimes a whole squad fired by volley, and the rags of spent powder-smoke rose above the greenery, perhaps just above where they had been fired or perhaps blown through the trees before rising. It was impossible to know which side had fired, or where the true positions of whoever had done the shooting were. All in all, it didn't sound or look like much of a battle so far; just a little skirmishing and skulking, very desultorily conducted.
"Can't see a damned thing from the deck, sir,'" Caldwell growled.
"Aye," Alan agreed. "Nothing for it, then."
"Oh, send the lad, do, sir. Mind your leg," Caldwell replied, and, was it perhaps Alan's imagination, but he felt from Caldwell's tone that he was "on to him" about his earlier malingering.
"I told the captain I was spry enough, and I am, sir," Alan shot back, going to the main-mast shrouds. He ascended slowly, but he gained the fighting-top; though instead of trusting his leg's strength to go outboard on the futtock shrouds where he would have to dangle by fingers and toes like a fly, he took the easier path up through the lubber's-hole like a Marine or landsman.
Damme if I'm acting, he thought, massaging his thigh as it complained loudly at the demands made upon it. He sat down on the edge of the top facing inland, legs and arms threaded through the ratlines of the top-mast shrouds, and rested his telescope on one of the dead-eyes. Even from there, sixty or more feet above the deck and higher than the low hills of the island he could see nothing of note. The sun was up high enough to show him the small town on the western side, further down the coast. Was there a battery there, he asked himself, or was that a row of houses with their blank backsides to the offshore winds for comfort?
Mister Edgar came up soon after, scrambling and puffing at the exertion of ascending the shrouds (properly using the futtocks) and the concentration necessary to coordinate his body and mind to the task. He went on up past Alan to the cross-trees with the lookout, saying, "Mister Caldwell sent me, sir," on the way up.
As if his clumsy arrival had set events in motion, the lookout shouted not five minutes later. "Sail ho, to seaward!"
"Where, away?" Alan demanded, getting to his feet with a thrill of dread. Perhaps Lilycrop had been right, and a French ship had come back to check up on her new base. "Mister Cox, prepare the starboard battery to engage!"
"There, sir!" Mister Edgar called with excitement in his voice.
The ship headed for the anchorage was a brig, about five miles off, but she had the wind free and was making good progress. Perhaps a privateer or a French-what did they call them, corvette?
"Think you she's French, sir?" Edgar called down from his higher perch.
"If she is, we'll serve her like Hood did de Grasse at St. Kitts," Alan answered him. "Keep an eye on her, Mister Edgar."
"Oh, I shall…" Edgar replied as Alan glanced up at him, and Alan winced and sucked in his breath as Edgar, in swiveling back to gaze seaward, almost lost his seat on the slight support of the thin timbers of the cross-tree platform. Only the lookout's quick action in grabbing the lad by the collar had saved him from a deadly tumble to the deck. "Do have a care, Mister Edgar! Remember where you are!"
"Aye, sir," Edgar said, red with embarrassment and fright. He put his telescope back to his eye, then looked down once more. "One of ours, sir. Blue Ensign, and a private signal flag."
"Saying what?" Alan demanded.
"I, un…" Edgar stammered, searching his pockets for his sheaf of notes and almost over-balancing again. "Here it is, sir."
Alan shared a look with the lookout while Edgar thumbed through the papers, almost losing them to the fresh winds, until he found the month's private signals. The lookout raised his eyebrows and sighed heavily, making Alan grin back at him in a moment of secret amusement.
"Admiral Barrington, sir, hired Brig O' War," Edgar announced at last. "Lieutenant Charles Cunningham in command."
"Thank you, Mister Edgar. Why do you not go down to the deck and inform Mister Cox that he shall not have to engage her for now, but stand easy. I'd feel much easier with you there, sir."
"Aye, sir." Edgar nodded, and fumbled his way to a stay which he rode down to the quarterdeck bulwarks.
Admiral Barrington exchanged signals with Albemarle, then took course to Britain Bay, and anchored about an hour later. She was much like Shrike, a brig of only twelve guns, and from the looks of her decks, had only seventy or eighty men aboard total; not much reinforcement.
As she did so, there was more firing from inland, some volleys quite substantial, though they still couldn't see where they were coming from, or from which side. To Alan's ears, though, it sounded as if there might be more firing from higher up and inland, after a while. And more firing than about one hundred fifty French soldiers could make. There were, finally, some larger puffs of smoke and louder cracks of sound that could only come from field-pieces. So the French had artillery on the island, perhaps in some well-sited works, to deny the landing party any further progress towards the town.
Sure enough, around ten in the morning, a runner appeared on the beach and took a boat out to Albemarle to report. And a few minutes after that, small boats made their way from the flagship to the brigs. Alan slung his telescope and stepped out of the top. If his leg was quarrelsome this morning, there was nothing wrong with his arms. He rode a stay to the deck in proper sea-manly fashion, making sure to land on his good leg. Even so, the shock made his game limb twinge.
"Ahoy the boat!" Fukes called.
"Passing!" the bowman shouted.
"Ahoy, Shrike!" an officer in the stern-sheets demanded. The hands eased their stroke to loiter near her side. "Have you an officer aboard?"
"Lieutenant Lewrie!" Alan replied, using a speaking trumpet.
"Lieutenant Bromwich, sir, second into Albemarlel Lieutenant Hinton and I are to take charge of the brigs and direct them to weigh. Captain Dixon is checked by a strong work, and requests we make a diversion with artillery opposite the town, sir. Do you need any assistance in so doing?"
Goddamn the man! Alan thought cynically. Do they think aboard Albemarle that we're cripples? "No, sir, we shall weigh directly. I think we may cope, sir," Alan drawled back.
"Very well, sir!"
"Mister Cox,
secure from Quarters. Mister Fukes, hands to the capstans and prepare to weigh. Veer out on the stream anchor and heave in to short stays on the best and small bowers. I'll have the kedge served out for later use. Slip the stream cable once we've loosed tops'ls, and buoy it. We'll pick it up later."
"Aye aye, sir," Fukes replied, knuckling his thick brows.
Within half an hour, their evolutions were complete. They got up the bow anchors, and were held in check only by the smaller stream anchor off their stern. The fresh winds made the ship strain down from that anchor, and when they loosed tops'ls to put a way on her, and let slip the stream cable, they were underway and under complete helm control from the moment the cable was let go, as smoothly as anyone could ask for, which made Alan grin inside at the ease of it.
It was only a couple of miles to a new anchorage opposite the town, with the leadsman singing out four or five fathoms the whole way, even though the waters were so clear they could see sharp coral below them as if they were skating over glass.
"Bring to. Mister Svensen," Alan ordered at last. "Round up into the wind and back the fore tops'l. Ready forrard!"
Her progress checked against the wind, they let go the best bower and veered out half a cable. The cable thumped and shuddered a few times before they found good holding ground.
"Kedge anchor into the boat and row her out, there," Alan said, pointing aft and a little to larboard. "And once she's holding, place springs on the cables to adjust our fire."
"Aye, sir." Fukes nodded.
It felt good, Alan decided, to have complete charge of Shrike, with Lieutenant Lilycrop off ashore. There were none of the nerves he had suffered before, in being asked to shift their anchorage or commit her to battle against a shore battery, if battery there were. Some concern that he did not look ridiculous, but none of the nail-biting fear of taking any action at all he had once experienced. With a wry grin, he was forced to believe that the Navy had drummed enough competency in him at last, enough to make him aspire to more opportunities for independence from someone's leading strings.
"Springs is rigged, sir," Fukes reported.
"Very well. Mister Cox, stand by to open fire!"
Drake, as the flagship of their extemporized little subdivision, hoisted a signal, and all ships began a cannonade against the town.
"Seems a shame, sir," Caldwell said, after measuring any change from shore marks that would indicate Shrike was dragging her anchors or being blown out of position.
"What is, sir?" Alan asked off-handedly.
"Well, sir, looks as if the Frogs has already torn the town up for building material, and here we go, shooting the rest of it apart. It may not look like much to our lights, but it's their homes, sir."
"Umm, not for much longer, at this rate," Alan commented as the round-shot from the light guns tore holes in walls and roofs.
"Who was it, sir, one of those pagan Roman poets, said 'they make a desert and call it peace'?" Caldwell mused.
"Tacitus, perhaps," Alan answered. "Couldn't have been Virgil or Caesar. They were too proud of making deserts."
"Batt'ry, sir!" Cox shouted as a wall of gunpowder erupted from shore above the town. A round-shot, almost big enough to see in mid-flight, came howling over the bulwarks, and passed close enough to create a little back-eddy of wind.
"Damme, sir, that was a twenty-four-pounder, or I'm an Arabee!" Caldwell groused with un-wonted vehemence, shaken from his Puritan demeanor for once enough to curse.
"Mark that, Mister Cox?" Alan asked, scanning through the smoke of the broadside for sign of the guns.
"I think so, sir. There, or close enough as makes no diff'rence."
The newly discovered French battery began to put shot around all the brigs. As Cox re-laid his guns to respond, Alan counted the shots, and tried to gauge what caliber they were.
"Mister Cox, let's concentrate our fire on one embrasure, if you will!" Alan shouted down to the waist. "That one, there!"
"Aye, sir!"
"Six-pounders, there," Alan said. "About four or five of them."
"Seems about right, sir," Caldwell replied, his voice still a little shaky.
"And at least four twenty-four-pounders," Alan added, feeling a little grim himself. "This is going to be warm work for three little thin-sided brigs. And works with field-pieces up towards Britain Bay to counter Captain Dixon's shore party. More Frogs on this island than a dog's got fleas, more than reported, at any rate."
They had to duck as one of those twenty-four-pounders placed a round-shot close aboard, close enough to raise a great waterspout that fell over the quarterdeck and wetted them down in a twinkling as it skipped overhead to fall into the sea on the disengaged side. Shrike was, at least, out of the main line of fire, a little more sheltered than the Drake or Admiral Barrington. As the day wore on towards noon, Drake took a ball aloft which brought down the gaff of her spanker, and the Admiral Barrington was hulled with solid thonks of iron smashing wood.
The artillery killed the wind; that was something Alan had heard mentioned before but had never witnessed for himself. Where before there had been fresh winds offshore that stirred up the waters of the deep passages and set the brigs to rocking like cradles, now the sea was flat as a mill-pond, and the wind had died to almost nothing. The ships were wreathed in their own palls of smoke, and the fort ashore could only be espied by looking for the base of the towering pillar of spent powder. It didn't do much for their aim, but at least it made the job of the French troops serving their larger pieces just as hard.
"Signal from Drake, sir," Edgar said at his side, coughing on the sour smell of burned niters. "Cease fire."
"Very well, Mister Edgar. Mister Cox, cease fire!" Alan said. "Mister Edgar, my compliments to the purser, and tell him it's past time for dinner. Have him issue some cold rations and small-beer for the hands."
"Aye aye, sir."
A rowing boat sped down from the frigates anchored in Britain Bay, and went aboard Drake while the men were eating and curing their battle-induced thirsts. After half an hour, the boat came back along the anchored brigs.
"Sir, Captain Nelson directs me bid you to weigh," the midshipman in the stern yelled, his voice cracking a little; he was awfully young. "You are to return to Britain Bay and re-embark your party."
"Very well," Alan replied. "Well, that's another fine mess we've made," he added, turning to his quarterdeck people. "It'll take the frigates down here tomorrow to shoot that battery silent."
"And make another landing, maybe on the other side of the island, now we know where the Frogs is concentrated, sir," Cox said, free of his gun deck. He and his gunners looked black as Moors from all the grime of powder smoke on their skins. Alan could see the closest gun being sponged out with a water-soaked wool rammer, and other hands hoisting up buckets of seawater to sluice off the muzzles and touch-holes. The guns were hissing as the water cooled them like sated dragons.
"Bowse 'em down to the port-sills and secure, Mister Cox," he said. "Mister Fukes, get your people ready to veer out on the bower and take up the kedge soon as the gun crews are available. Wind's coming about a little more westerly. Quick as you can, both of you, or we'll end up rowing her out with the sweeps if the wind goes foul and leaves us on a lee shore."
The wind had swung, not so noticeable during the cannonading that had deadened it; now more southerly, with a touch of westing. Sure sign of a change in the weather, and that was usually a sign of worsening weather, especially in the Caribbean.
They got the kedge up, heaved into short stays on the bower, but could not get it to release from the bottom. Damme, and this was going so well! Alan thought sadly.
"Flukes hung up on a coral head, feels like, sir," Fukes told him. "I can almos' see 'er down there."
"Belay what you have, Mister Fukes. Hands aloft! Let go the driver and jibs! With a little forward way, we might sail her off."
"Aye, sir." Fukes sounded dubious. And with good cause. The anchor obstinately refused to le
t go her grip on the coral bottom, and no amount of straining at the capstans was going to shift her. The ship sailed up until she was almost standing directly over the anchor, with the cable bar-taut, and if anything, inclined slightly from the vertical, bent back under Shrike's forefoot and cutwater.
"Least this'un ain't the best bower, sir," Fukes offered after coming aft from the beakhead. "An' them other brigs ain't havin' much more luck'un us'un. Drake's arready cut, sir."
"The captain will have my hide if I lose an anchor, even the small bower, Mister Fukes," Alan groaned, thinking what a tongue-lashing he would receive when Lilycrop came back aboard.
With nowhere else to go forward, Shrike was now beginning to circle about her anchor, and the timbers around the hawse-holes were groaning alarmingly. The bow was slightly down and thumping.
"Well, shit," Alan sighed, giving in to the inevitable. "Cut the cable, Mister Fukes. Aloft there, loose tops'Is! Helm hard alee and hold her wind abeam if you can. Braces, shift the braces to the larboard tack!"
It was a sad trek back to Britain Bay, making slow progress until they could come to anchor again and clew up the sails to allow the boats to come alongside. Doctor Dorne and his loblolly boys from the surgery appeared, ready to receive any wounded men from the shore party, and Alan thought to have a bosun's sling rigged from aloft to help hoist injured men aboard.
Then their first boat was coming up to the starboard entry port, and Alan could look down into her. Rossyngton had the tiller, and Alan was ready to rate him for preceding the captain's boat to the chains, but a quick look at the second boat showed no sign of their captain, either. Yet Lilycrop's old cox'n was in the first boat. Was he dead?
"Sir!" Rossyngton shouted up as the boat thumped into Shrike's chainwales. He was filthy and sweaty, his hat gone somewhere. "It's the captain, sir!"
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