Heart of Oak

by Alexander Kent

  He looked up, eyes slitted against the glare. “Wind’s serving us well enough at present.”

  Adam glanced along the deck, at men off watch who would otherwise have been in their messes, in groups or wandering beneath the taut canvas and the criss-cross of rigging. All waiting. And the familiar figures, aft by the compass and wheel. The master and his mates, Midshipman Deacon with the signals party.

  He said abruptly, “Did you speak with Tucker?”

  “A good hand, sir. He recognized the schooner’s mood, something many would have missed.”

  Adam looked up at the masthead pendant. “Send for the gunner. Time is running out.”

  Vincent hesitated. “But Nautilus is making the rendezvous, sir. And she could outshoot and outsail that schooner, even if it were some kind of trick!” He looked away, then back. “Mr Maddock is standing by.”

  Adam faced him. “The rendezvous is supposed to be at Aboubakr, not at sea, in open water. And yes, Nautilus can outshoot and outsail that schooner—she’d be a challenge even for us, if it came to that…” He broke off. And if I am wrong? He could see the doubt on Vincent’s face.

  “You wanted me, sir?”

  Onward’s gunner held his head slightly to one side as if he were afraid of missing something; he was almost deaf in one ear as the result of his trade, although few would have guessed it. Short and squarely built, he had the brightest pair of eyes Adam had ever seen in any long-serving sailor.

  “The schooner that lies ahead is making for Nautilus. I believe she intends mischief of the worst kind. If the wind holds, and with your help, I will stop it.”

  Maddock was nodding, his mind already busy. “Bowchasers, sir?”

  Adam shook his head. Like stamping a seal on my own court martial.

  “No. We will begin as soon as we are within range. You will lay and fire each gun yourself, understood?” He turned to Vincent. There was no time left for argument. “In a moment you will clear for action. Have the hands piped to quarters, no drums or show of force. They’ll know soon enough.” Their eyes met. “This is what I intend.”

  Luke Jago nodded to the Royal Marine sentry and walked past the screen door and into the great cabin. All these months, years even, and he still expected some one to dispute his right of entry. The coxswain’s privilege. Some tried, but they only did it once.

  There seemed to be people on deck everywhere, unwilling to go to their messes, when usually one watch would be below, washing down the noon meal with a healthy wet or even a mug of the sour red wine called Black Strap. He could feel the tension like something solid. A fight was one thing, but…

  He, at least, knew what was coming.

  Morgan, the cabin servant, stood with his hands on his ample hips and exclaimed, “What say you, Luke? Fit for a post captain, isn’t it?”

  The midshipman was standing by the broad stern windows, wearing a pair of seaman’s trousers and a clean shirt.

  Morgan added, “Those breeks would almost fit me, but he can rest easy until this lot’s over and done with!”

  Napier bent his knee and balanced on one leg. He smiled and said, “I’m all right!”

  Jago breathed out. When he had seen the boy being brought aft, half carried, his face like chalk beneath its sunburn, he had thought the worst.

  He glanced past him into the glare on the empty sea astern. It was unreal. Eerie, Prior the captain’s clerk had described it. It was a new term to Jago, but it suited.

  Onward was holding her course toward the two small shapes on the horizon, one motionless and the other barely moving. Except that they were closer now, the schooner on the starboard bow. As if they might eventually collide. He scowled. If they ever reached that far before the wind dropped completely.

  It was five hours since the prisoner Dimmock had been released from the grating, and taken moaning below. Since Napier had climbed aloft with the captain’s telescope and collapsed. He had seen that cruel wound again when they had stripped him here: as bad as that first time when a few had turned away, and shaken their heads.

  Five hours. They could have sailed from Plymouth to Falmouth Bay in that time.

  Morgan looked in the direction of his pantry. “If you want something, Luke, have it now.” He made a mock bow. “No charge!” Then the mood changed. “They just gave the word to douse the galley stove. You know what that means.”

  Jago pushed the thought aside and said roughly, “When all this is over, you can get some new middy’s breeches made up here on board, right?”

  “Indeed, yes. Jeff Lloyd,” grinning, “another Welshman, see?”

  “Him that patched up one of the Cap’n’s coats? He was well pleased.”

  Morgan winked. “He’s a craftsman right enough. Did some work for our late and lamented Captain Richmond, God rest his soul.” He looked toward the screen door as if he were listening. “Jeff Lloyd’s good, right enough. But don’t trust him with your—”

  There was a rap at the door.

  “Ship’s corporal, sir!”

  The man peered around the door, his eyes everywhere but on the occupants. Like most visitors to this sanctuary.

  “Hands to quarters, sir,” he said to Napier. There was a bloodstain on his jacket; he had helped cut the prisoner from the gratings.

  The door closed, and Morgan said softly, “So, now we know.”

  Jago looked over at the midshipman. “Ready?” He heard the thump of feet, some running, and the muffled scrape of screens being lowered. They would be here soon, and this would be a cabin no more, but a part of the ship. This silent clearing for action, without the urgent rattle of drums and the shrill of calls deck to deck, somehow seemed more threatening.

  Napier stood by the long, high-backed bergère, and touched its worn leather for a few more seconds.

  I lay here.

  He lifted his chin.

  “Aye, ready!”

  Adam Bolitho climbed on to the nettings and trained his telescope across the tightly packed hammocks; even through his sleeve, they felt hot in the strong sunlight. Behind him, the ship was quiet again, as if it had been only another drill or exercise. Waiting for a verdict, before being dismissed.

  He gripped the telescope, so familiar to his hand now, like an old friend. He could sense Vincent standing nearby, had felt his disapproval when he had been told to clear for action. Perhaps they all shared his doubts about their captain’s judgment.

  He took a deep breath, focusing it, and saw the schooner spring to life in the powerful lens. Scarred paint, and the patches which were different shades of canvas in her sails, hard-worked like the vessel herself. He blinked, waiting for the image to steady once more. There were some figures in a group, almost midships. And one in uniform further aft near a small deckhouse or companion. Probably the schooner’s helm. Her colours were vivid against the sky, but the signal, whatever it was, had been hauled down.

  Vincent said, “Maybe they’ll lower a boat, sir. They can hail each other, if she stays on course.”

  Adam lowered the glass. He had seen the boat towing from the schooner. Some kind of galley, probably a local craft. He had seen plenty of them at Algiers. It was closer to the schooner than before. Under her quarter…

  The thought was like a hand on his shoulder, shaking him. The boat was not a threat. It was a means of escape.

  He raised the telescope again. They are watching us right now.

  “Bring her up two points to larboard.” He dropped to the deck as the order was repeated, and the big double wheel began to respond. He stared forward, seeing the faces at each gun peering aft, and Maddock standing just inboard of the first eighteen-pounder. He was ready, no matter what he might be thinking.

  “Nor’ east by east, sir.”

  Adam watched the schooner slowly change her bearing as Onward responded to the rudder. His mind told him it was Julyan’s voice. Taking no chances.

  “Open the ports!” He was at the quarterdeck rail but did not recall moving. There was no turnin
g back. My decision.

  “Run out!”

  Maddock’s drills had not been in vain. Along Onward’s starboard side, the eighteen-pounders thudded against their ports. Showing her teeth…

  Maddock was staring aft, one hand raised against the pitiless glare, the other on the shoulder of his senior gun captain.

  Adam watched the schooner, almost abeam now as Onward settled on her new course. It was as if Nautilus, and the headland, did not exist.

  “On the uproll!” Like counting the seconds. “Fire!”

  The forward gun recoiled, its crew leaping aside, hand-spikes and sponge ready, as if they had been doing it all their lives.

  The crash of gunfire was still echoing over the water. A jagged burst of spray showed the fall of shot, directly across the schooner’s bows.

  Vincent said sharply, “Nautilus is making more sail!”

  “That woke ’em up!” Jago’s voice. Adam scarcely heard them. Men were running along the schooner’s deck, and some were already down in the boat alongside.

  He raised the telescope, cursing the time it took to focus. The schooner was still under way. The solitary figure in uniform was standing where he had last seen him. Closer now, but partly obscured by drifting gunsmoke.

  The image seemed to hold him in a vise. The man by the helm had not moved because he was tied upright, helpless. Probably dead. And it could not be gunsmoke at that range.

  He leaned on the rail and saw Maddock turn.

  “Fire!”

  Maddock might have hesitated, but only for a few seconds. Then he was stooping at the second gun, gesturing almost unhurriedly to his crew, until he was satisfied.

  Some one gave a wild cheer as the ball slammed into the schooner’s side. More smoke, and Maddock’s voice, strong and clear.

  “Lay for the foremast an’ fire on the uproll! Ready!”

  Adam did not hear the order to fire. It was as if the sea had exploded in his face. But the picture remained starkly before his eyes, as it had been when the telescope was jolted from his hands.

  Men in the boat, struggling, fighting to cast off from the schooner’s side, knocked over by others leaping down to join them in a panic which distance could not hide. One figure running in the last moment of sanity before bursting into a human torch, arms and legs flailing as he pitched into the sea alongside.

  And then the explosion, bursting through the schooner’s deck: a giant fireball blasting masts and sails into ashes, the heat enough to sear the skin at a cable’s distance.

  Fragments were splashing around the stricken vessel, some ablaze and breaking up, burning on the water so that the sea became a final torment for those still alive.

  Men stood by their guns staring at the smoke, the debris still falling so near. Some one cried out as another explosion rebounded against the hull, like a ship running aground. Final. But muffled this time, no searing glare.

  The schooner, or what remained of her, was on her way to the bottom. And through it all the wind was holding, cool after the inferno.

  Adam picked up his telescope and cradled it in his arm.

  “We will heave to, Mr Vincent.” He rubbed his forehead with the back of his wrist. “Fall out guns’ crews.” To his own ears, he sounded like a stranger. Calm. Dispassionate.

  “Boat’s crew, sir?” Guthrie, the boatswain.

  Adam licked his lips. They tasted of smoke and sudden death.

  “Have them standing by.” He raised the glass with both hands, knowing that others were watching him. “But there’s little chance.”

  He felt the deck tilt uneasily as Onward turned into the wind, headsails flapping and filling again in confusion.

  He moved the telescope slowly, giving himself time, allowing his hand to steady. And there was Nautilus, topsails braced and full on a fresh tack, gangway and lower shrouds alive with tiny figures. Gunports still closed, as Maddock and his crews would notice. The silent witness.

  He thought of the French captain, Marchand. How he must be feeling even as he watched the ever-spreading litter of charred remains and ashes. Seeing again the fireball which would have been Nautilus. His ship, his men. Himself.

  Vincent was beside him. “No survivors, sir.” His voice seemed hushed, as if he were dazed by the swiftness of near disaster. Treachery. Perhaps the commodore was right. “But for you…”

  He said nothing more.

  “There’s your answer, Mark.” He did not trust himself to raise the telescope.

  Midshipman Deacon shouted, “Nautilus is dipping her ensign, sir!” He was staring around at the others. “The Frenchman’s saluting us!”

  There were cheers from the upper deck. Adam turned deliberately toward the other frigate and raised his hat in acknowledgment. Marchand would see, and understand.

  Vincent asked, “Shall we go ahead?”

  Adam held the hat to shade his eyes. Or hide them.

  “As ordered. Under two flags.”

  Lieutenant James Squire reached the quarterdeck and paused to stare abeam at the land: no longer lines and figures on a chart, but real and alive. He prided himself on his vision, and even without a glass could see the shades and depths of colour of the coastal waters, spray shining on a spur of rock or fallen cliff which marked the entrance to the bay; tiny figures by the water’s edge; a track or rough road leading inland; and a lone horseman raising a trail of yellow dust, soon lost from view over a ridge or bare hillside.

  Local people, caught in the crossfire of war or revolution, and hardened enough to gather and watch a vessel blowing apart, destroyed in its own trap.

  He glanced across the deck where the marines of the afterguard, some by the hammock nettings, were leaning on their muskets. Grim-faced after what they had witnessed, contemplating the fate they might have shared. The senior midshipman by the flag locker, silent and unsmiling: the same one who had shouted with such wild excitement to the deck at large when Nautilus had dipped her ensign in salute. And the young topman who had been sent for by the captain, cornered now by some of his mates, grinning, but still mystified by whatever he had said which had proved so significant. He looked aft again, and saw the captain with the master and his crew by the compass box, and another midshipman writing on a slate, teeth gritted against the sound of the squeaking pencil.

  He saw the land moving aside, the bay slowly opening beyond the bows. Some small houses, white and hazy in the sunlight. He pictured the chart, and the captain’s own rough map; how he had made light of the possible inaccuracies and flaws in their information, even if it had come from the admiral. And all the time he must have been confronting the real danger, which only at the last minute they had all glimpsed for themselves. And he had still found time to thank a common seaman. For doing his duty, many would say.

  Squire heard some one laugh and thought, And we are alive.

  “Boat’s crew mustered—sir.”

  It was Fowler, boatswain’s mate, tough, experienced, and ruthless. Years had passed since they had served together, yet it was all so clear. Even just glancing around, here and now. Stowing hammocks together. Hauling on the braces or lying back with all their strength to run out a gun, like today.

  Then he had taken the irrevocable step from messdeck to wardroom, and even fame in a minor way when he had been chosen to join the voyage of exploration under Sir Alfred Bishop. And then Onward, a new frigate when so many shipyards were empty, and men crying out for work. And a captain of repute: who would not envy him?

  When Bolitho had assigned their duties upon arrival here, and given him charge of the cutter as guardboat and liaison with the French, Squire had been pleased and surprised.

  But Fowler couldn’t leave it at that. Gave it to you to spare his precious first lieutenant, or one of his favourites. Can’t you see that?

  Their eyes met, and Squire said, “I didn’t know you were coming.”

  Fowler looked over at some seamen by the boat-tier. “I ‘volunteered.’ Need somebody to keep an eye on you!” And
he laughed.

  “You watch what you’re saying. Or one of these days—”

  “You’ll what?”

  “Bosun wants you!” A seaman was peering up from the gangway.

  Fowler grunted. “Tell ’im I’m with the second lieutenant!”

  Squire walked to the side again as more of the bay opened out across the bow. The fortress above the anchorage reminded him more of an old monastery than a place fought over for more than a hundred years. Nautilus was turning into the wind, her anchor catted and ready to let go.

  There were people on and above an embrasured wall. The battery. The captain had been right, and brave to follow his instinct.

  He heard Fowler threatening some one who was too slow for his taste.

  It went through his mind yet again. He saved me from disgrace. I was a coward, and others paid for it.

  “Ready below, Mr Squire!”

  He raised his hand and smiled, outwardly at ease.

  But the other voice persisted.

  I want him dead.

  Lights were already burning in the great cabin, although it had been daylight when he left the upper deck. Adam rubbed his eyes and threw his hat on to a chair. Men were still working throughout the ship, replacing screens, dragging chests and furniture from the holds. The cook was trying to rekindle his galley fire; the anchor was down and there were lights across the water, above the ancient fortress and its battery.

  Just in time.

  He had passed a party of seamen restoring hammocks to the messdecks. Some had grinned, and one had called after him, “You showed ’em, Cap’n!”

  And yet, only hours ago, he had seen the cold hostility in their eyes as one of their number had been flogged.

  Morgan was here, as if he had never moved. “Visitor, sir.”

  It was Murray, the surgeon, come to make his own report. “No injuries, sir. A few cuts and bruises, but only from preparing for the worst.” The keen eyes were assessing him. “Dare I suggest that our captain find time to rest his limbs? Richly deserved, if I may say so.”

  Adam knew that Morgan was already nodding on his feet. If I close my eyes…

  “I have to visit Nautilus before nightfall. I don’t want to be fired on by one of the guardboats, especially ours!”