Napier had come aft with Squire, calm enough, but he glanced round, startled, as the two cutters were cast adrift and were soon falling astern. Then he stopped by the companion and said deliberately, “I shall be here, sir.” He seemed to nod. “I’m not afraid. Not this time.”
Adam held his arm, and thought he flinched. “Keep on the move, David.”
Napier bit his lip, feeling the bruise left by Fowler’s starter, but no longer caring. This was the closest they had been; had been allowed to be. “You, too.” Then he did smile. “Sir!”
Jago had returned, and Adam saw that he was wearing his broad-bladed dirk. Like Athena and Unrivalled. He said only, “Gig’s gone adrift, Cap’n.”
Adam loosened his belt and moved the old sword into the glare. Jago gave a crooked grin.
“Now we’ll have the bastards!”
There was a sudden explosion, a solitary gun, probably a ranging shot, the sound echoing and re-echoing across the water like something trapped in a tunnel or shaft.
Adam watched the sunlight touching the open port-lids of the oncoming frigate, then the line of guns. He thought he saw the flash of reflected sun: some one training a glass on Onward. Perhaps on me.
He dragged off his hat and waved it toward the men below him at the guns.
Too soon! Or too late?
“Stand by to come about!”
Calls shrilled and men who had been crouching at braces and halliards shouted to one another as they ran to obey.
“Helm a-lee! Hard over!”
“Open the ports! Run out!”
Some one even gave a wild cheer as the eighteen-pounders squealed against the side, the gun captains racing one another to sight and lay on the target even as Onward thrust into and across the wind, topsails flapping and booming while the yards braced round, as if responding to a single hand.
At that moment, Nautilus opened fire.
Only seconds, but it seemed forever: the intermittent flash of gunfire and the shuddering onslaught through canvas and rigging overhead, the shock of iron slamming into the hull. Adam stood quite still, his eye fixed on the bowsprit and jib-boom as it continued to swing, like a giant pointer, as if to reach out and touch the bulging canvas. Nautilus seemed to loom closer, as if she and not Onward was swinging to engage.
His muscles tensed as he felt the deck shake under his feet, expecting the sounds of broken spars, anticipating the agony that would end everything. The ship was still answering the helm, while the headsail sheets were let go to allow her to swing unheeded through the wind.
He saw Nautilus, shrouded in her own gunsmoke, but no longer free to sail past and deliver another broadside. Onward’s agility and sudden, seemingly reckless change of tack and direction had caught her gun crews unawares. Most of the shots had passed overhead.
Here and there small scenes leaped out at him. A seaman seizing one of his companions at the gun below the quarterdeck, and throwing him aside as a massive block, severed from the rigging high above, smashed down beside them. Shock, obscenities, then a grin. Midshipman Hotham, the clergyman’s son, face screwed up in concentration as he loaded and examined a long pistol, flinching as more debris fell clattering nearby. Then he handed the pistol to Monteith, who took it with a curt nod.
And the men at the braces, stiff with crouching, waiting and willing the ship to complete her tack. And hit back. One of them, naked to the waist, was sharing his handhold with another, younger sailor, who was not even daring to open his eyes as the smoke billowed across the water. The scars of the cat were still livid on his back, as if the flogging had given Dimmock some kind of authority.
Adam thrust out his arm and heard Julyan yell, “Ready, sir!”
Perhaps he had not dared to look aft, in case the helm was shot away or manned only by the dead.
“Steady as you go! Meet her!” The spokes were turning, but Adam was staring up at the masthead pendant, stark and clear again above the thinning smoke. Broken cordage jerking in the wind, and a blackened hole in the topsail, where two shots had missed both mast and yard by a few inches. There was blood too, drying on the canvas. One of the topmen. A face he would have known.
“Let go and haul!”
“Heave, me lads! Heave!” Guthrie’s voice, powerful, unhurried, ready to send or push more hands where they were needed.
Adam heard some one cry out in pain, but he kept his eyes on the yards, still swinging in response to the men at the braces.
He watched the big arrowhead of water changing shape, the Nautilus very bright now in the sun, her gunports empty and with every crew trying to reload and run out again, before…He shut his mind to it, surprised that he felt neither doubt nor anger. Only hatred.
“Steady as she goes, sir!”
Adam did not hear. He had drawn his sword, and held it lightly across his right shoulder. He saw a slight movement, sunlight disturbing the pattern as the first gun to reload thrust through its port. Too late.
He brought the sword down to the rail, and thought he heard some one cheer.
“Fire!”
Every gun fired as one, recoiling from its port and brought under control before the full impact of their combined, double-shotted broadside exploded against the enemy. They were already sponging out and reloading with fresh charges, shouting and cheering like madmen, and despite the neckerchiefs tied around their ears were too deaf to hear or share the excitement and relief after hours of waiting behind sealed ports while the larboard side had bared its teeth.
Adam covered his mouth and nose as the smoke billowed inboard in a solid cloud. The roar of the full broadside seemed to hang in the air, an echo perhaps of the double-shotted onslaught which had found its target.
Men were coughing and retching, but some were peering around in the smoke for friends. Gun crews were calling to each other, throwing their weight on tackles and handspikes, their world concentrated on the open ports before them.
Adam reached for his telescope, then waved it aside as a hand offered it through the thinning smoke. He did not need it. The regular drills and the gun crews’ patience and trust had done their work today.
Nautilus’s proud beauty was broken, disfigured. Her foremast had gone completely, dragging over the forecastle and into the water alongside, the tangled mass of spars and severed rigging already dragging her round like a giant sea-anchor. The main topmast was also shot away. He thought of Maddock the gunner, down below the waterline, sealed in his cavern of explosives and instant death. He must have heard it, felt the success of his training and hard work, and been proud.
Somebody exclaimed, “That’ll make ’em put their bloody heads together an’ think again!”
Squire sounded wary, impatient. “They’ve got plenty of those, for God’s sake!”
Adam walked aft to the wheel, men turning toward him, still too dazed and deafened to grasp the significance of the lieutenant’s warning. Nautilus was not responding to her rudder, and it seemed nothing was being done to cut away the burden of mast and sails which was dragging her further and further downwind. Squire had seen it. The wind was no longer an ally.
He looked at the smoke, drifting just above the water. The wind was dropping, biding its time. The real enemy.
Napier was beside him, as if he had expected to be called.
“Ask the first lieutenant to lay aft.” He saw him touch his hat and hurry to the larboard gangway.
He heard musket shots, far-off and ineffectual. Some of the Royal Marines of the afterguard were listening, gripping their muskets, gauging the range.
They would not have long to wait.
The wind had almost dropped, but there was still enough to carry a new sound, more threatening than the infrequent report of a musket. Voices, hundreds of them, joined together like a muffled roar.
Vincent had reached the quarterdeck, his eyes on the loosely flapping topsails, and then the men at the wheel. “If the wind returns, I can bring our guns to bear.”
Adam shook his head. �
�So might Nautilus. But she’ll need a dockyard before she can fight and win under any flag.”
He saw the familiar frown, the old challenge. Then he said quietly, “They’ll try to board us, sir. Their only chance. Fight or die.”
Adam turned the old sword over in his hands. “And ours, Mark.”
He stared along the upper deck, the men at their guns, others dragging away fallen rigging. There were two bodies lying by the empty boat-tier, already covered. Wasted.
“So be it. Close quarters!”
Julyan called, “She’s swingin’, sir!”
Adam laid the sword on the rail and took his telescope.
Onward was answering the helm again, the quartermaster peering at the compass as a gust of air lifted the big ensign above the poop defiantly, and another volley of musket fire made some of the seamen duck for cover.
Adam stood motionless, the telescope hot against his skin.
Nautilus was turning very slowly, the sun suddenly like a mirror across the quarter, and then more slowly still over the poop itself. He felt something crack against the deck and saw splinters blown aside. More shots, this time from the maintop, some of Gascoigne’s marksmen returning fire.
Adam wiped his eye and steadied the glass again. Figures running along Nautilus’s gangway, above the entry port, where Marchand had welcomed him aboard. More were already clambering around the cathead, trying to hack away the remaining shrouds which held the fallen mast alongside.
“As you bear!” He heard Napier, then another voice passing the order to the guns.
More shots, and a louder bang: a swivel gun, he thought. The glass remained steady, but he could feel sweat running down his spine like blood.
It was now. The crash of the first eighteen-pounder seemed sharper, louder, not double-shotted this time. The stern windows were blown aside, pieces of carved “gingerbread” splashing and resurfacing beneath the counter even as the next gun fired, blasting through Nautilus’s stern.
Adam picked up the sword, the stench of smoke and charred timber searing his throat and eyes. He saw a marine reloading his musket, and pausing to fix the bayonet, before running to join his section. He was shouting, but Adam could barely hear over the gunfire.
Julyan shouted, “You got your wish, sir!” and turned to say over his shoulder to the quartermaster, “Watch your helm, Carter!” Then he stepped over the man’s body and added his own weight to the wheel. The quartermaster had been a trusted friend. But there was no time to think about him, even as he was trying to drag himself to his feet.
He shook his fist, swearing as more shots pounded the deck and clanged aside from one of the nine-pounders.
Adam saw the Nautilus looming over the side, and felt the two hulls shudder together. On deck, the gun crews were reloading, some falling, wounded or dying, as grapnels clattered on to the gangway above them.
“Repel boarders! At ’em, lads!” The marines ran to obey, bayonets gleaming, as others fired down from the main and mizzen tops. A mob was clambering on to the gangway and reaching for shrouds and ratlines, only to be trapped by the loosely rigged boarding nets.
Blade against blade, teeth bared: almost inhuman as they tried to hack the stout netting aside. No time to reload; it was man to man. Some were through the defenses, to be met by cutlass and boarding axe, and sometimes fists, as they fought and struggled above the guns.
The boatswain was using a cutlass; it looked like a dirk in his massive fist. “They’m runnin’, th’ bastards!” Then, like a great tree, he fell, his own men still cheering as they ran across him in pursuit.
Adam hurried to the midships part of the gangway, where the nettings had been hacked away completely. Men were shouting and cursing, some too exhausted even to cry out if they were cut down. There were bodies fallen and trapped between the two hulls, and Adam saw some of the attackers wilt and retreat in confusion as they were confronted by some marines and their cherished musketoon.
Wild cheers now: Vincent was running along Nautilus’s quarterdeck with some of his seamen, climbing back to Onward after pursuing the attackers.
Too late, Adam became aware of his own danger, and found himself face to face with a strongly built figure brandishing a double-bladed sword as if it were weightless. Perhaps he had seen the uniform, or maybe he was too crazed by the fighting and death all around him, that it was merely a final spur to his madness or his courage. Their blades locked, and Adam thought he heard Squire yell, “No heroics!” then he drove his own sword into the man’s ribs.
He staggered as his shoe slid on blood, and yelled to the gun crews below him. The attackers had fallen back to Nautilus’s deck, but they were rallying, being led or driven by the same relentless chanting.
“More men!” Adam waved his sword. Monteith should be ready with a party of seamen and the last loaded swivel gun on the opposite gangway. But he was lying on the main deck, his uniform impeccably clean amidst the blood and filth of fighting.
Adam saw Napier coming to join him, a hanger drawn and ready, and shouted, “Fall back! Watch yourself, David!”
He pushed two struggling men aside, but another had climbed on to the gangway, a long knife clenched between his teeth. Napier lost his balance, and the hanger slithered out of reach. His attacker leaped on to his shoulders, dragging him down, gripping the knife as two more of his companions hauled themselves on to the gangway.
“No, you don’t, you bastards!” Some one was running from the side, a boarding pike held like a lance as he charged across the deck.
The pike struck Napier’s attacker in the back, with such force that Napier could see the bloodied tip protruding from his chest as he went down and over the side. He staggered to his feet, staring with shock and dismay as his rescuer threw up both hands and fell after the man he had killed. He was bleeding badly, probably hit by a stray shot even as he watched the boarder fall from view between the hulls.
“Did you see that?”
Adam grasped his shoulder, guiding and pushing him toward the quarterdeck. Just a brief glimpse, as he had tried to wrench the pike free of its victim. Mouth wide in a shout or a laugh of jubilation, even as he had been shot down. Jeff Lloyd, one of the sailmaker’s crew, who had repaired his old uniform.
Adam shouted, “Stand by, on deck!” There was a gap now between the two ships, widening and gaining colour even as he watched. He could feel it on his face, and wanted to yell it aloud. The wind was returning, and not only in his mind. Or his prayers. Nautilus was already further away. He could see broken timber and corpses floating free.
More men running along Nautilus’s deck, but confused now, perhaps leaderless.
Adam saw a gunner’s mate peering up at him while Midshipman Simon Huxley continued to tie a bandage around his arm, taking his time.
“As you bear, lads!” He saw the gunner’s mate acknowledge it.
Adam walked along the gangway and saw Jago coming to meet him. The crash of the first gun seemed to swamp everything as the two ships continued to edge apart, the water clearer, reflecting the smoke like harmless clouds. Nautilus was turning again, and would soon expose her side, ready to reopen fire. There was more smoke swirling from her stern, from the great cabin itself.
He saw the eighteen-pounder standing inboard, its crew sponging out and tamping home another charge, a fresh ball already held, ready to follow. The gun captain was gazing at Nautilus, and the smoke that marked his last shot. But there was no cheering this time.
Jago turned as Napier muttered to himself, “He saved my life,” and touched his sleeve, as he had seen his captain do many times.
“We needs you, for better days!” But the habitual wry grin had deserted him.
The gun was already being run up to its port, its captain staring over the breech. He did not even turn his head as the next gun crashed and recoiled, and was being sponged out before the smoke had cleared.
Adam glanced up at the topsails. They were still filled and steady. Onward could break off the fi
ght and go with the wind. Who would blame him?
“Standing by, sir.” That was Squire, who was watching the gun crews impassively as they stared aft, waiting for his signal.
Adam was studying Nautilus’s line of ports, still at an angle, but they would soon come to bear again. No jury-rig as yet, nor any attempt to hoist one. But the wreckage had been cut away. Already drifting clear. He saw two boats close by, Onward’s own cutters, unlikely witnesses to a necessary killing on both sides.
He walked to the rail and saw Monteith, sitting now on an upturned box, his head buried in his hands, a crude bandage beneath his fingers. He had apparently been knocked unconscious by a piece of falling timber.
A marine, leaning with his musket against the tightly packed hammock nettings, said, “Mister Monteith is goin’ to be all right.” A pause. “Pity, ain’t it?” But nobody laughed.
Adam clenched his fist and pressed it against his side. More of Nautilus’s guns were visible now. A full broadside…he could wait no longer.
She was a much older ship than Onward. He thought of the empty and abandoned vessels that filled so many ports and inlets in England. Once proud, even famous names, waiting for the breakers’ yards, or ignominy as hulks. But most of them would remain afloat. And still withstand a broadside if necessary.
He did not look along his ship again. She had been built for speed and agility. Endurance had outpriced itself, and stripped the forests.
“Full broadside!”
He knew that every fist would be raised, lanyards taut, ready to obey.
He reached out, not daring to take his eyes off the Nautilus.
It was a trick, to prolong the inevitable. The slaughter.
He gripped the telescope, still without turning his head, wasting seconds which could cost the lives of those who trusted him.
He saw part of Nautilus’s upper deck, guns run out, the scars and broken timbers stark in the lens. Nothing moving except the shadows of torn and blackened canvas from her mainyard, which had somehow escaped destruction.
Heart of Oak Page 26
