Post Captain

by Patrick O'Brian

  'A thirty-two-, no, a thirty-four-gun frigate, sir. French, by the cut of her jib. No. No! By God, sir, she's the Bellone.'

  The Bellone she was, in her old accustomed cruising-ground. She had undertaken to escort two Bordeaux merchantmen as far as twenty degrees west and forty-five north, and she had brought them successfully across the Bay of Biscay, not without trouble, for they were slow brutes, and one had lost her fore and main topmasts: she had stood by them, but she had no sharper sense of her obligations than any other privateer and now she was keenly interested in this odd triangular thing bobbing about to windward. Her contract had no stipulations against her making prizes during her trip, and for the last quarter of an hour, or ever since she had sighted the Polychrest, the Bellone had been hauled a point closer to the wind to close her, and the Bellone's captain had been doing exactly what Jack was at now, staring hard through his glass from the top.

  The Bellone. She could outrun any square-rigged ship afloat, on a wind; but for the next ten or twenty minutes Jack had the initiative. He had the weather-gage, and he could decide whether to bring her to action or not. But this would not last long: he must think fast—make up his mind before she could shoot ahead. She had thirty-four guns to his four and twenty: but they were eight and six pounders—she threw a broadside of a hundred and twenty-six pounds, and with his three hundred and eighty-four he could blow her out of the water, given the right conditions. Only eight-pounders: but they were long brass eight-pounders, beautiful guns and very well served—she could start hitting him at a mile and more, whereas his short, inaccurate carronades, with their scratch crews, needed to be within pistol-shot for any certainty of execution. At fifty yards, or even at a hundred, he could give her such a dose! Near, but not too near. There was no question of boarding her, not with her two or three hundred keen privateersmen, not with this crew. Nor must he be boarded, Lord above.

  'Mr Pullings,' he said, 'desire Mr Macdonald to get his men's red jackets off. Fling sailcloth over the guns in the waist. Drabble it about all ahoo, but so that it can be whipped off in a flash. Two or three empty casks on the fo'c'sle. Make her look like a slut.'

  How neatly the roles were reversed! This time the Bellone had not been preparing herself for a couple of hours; her decks would not be clear fore and aft; and she would still be in a state of doubt—it was she who would be taken by surprise.

  Taken: the word rang like a trumpet. He hurried down to the quarterdeck, his mind made up. 'Mr Parker, what are you about?'

  'These mats are to protect my gold-leaf, sir,' said the first lieutenant.

  'Do not square them, Mr Parker: they are very well so.' Indeed, they looked charmingly mercantile. 'All hands aft, if you please.'

  They stood before him in the grey light, some few delighted, some amazed, many despondent, anxious, apt to stare over the water at that dark shape.

  'Shipmates,' he said, loud and clear, smiling at them, 'that fellow down there is only a privateer. I know him well. He has a long row of gun-ports, but there are only six- and eight-pounders behind 'em, and ours are twenty-fours, though he don't know it. Presently I shall edge down on him—he may pepper us a while with his little guns, but it don't signify—and then, when we are so close we cannot miss, why, we shall give him such a broadside! A broadside with every gun low at his mizzen. Not a shot, now, till the drum beats, and then ply 'em like heroes. Thump it into her! Five minutes' brisk and she strikes. Now go to your quarters, and remember, not a shot till the drum beats, and then every ball low at his mizzen. Ply 'em quick, and waste not a shot.' Turning, he saw Stephen watching him from the companion hatchway. 'Good morning, good morning!' he cried, smiling with great affection. 'Here's our old friend the Bellone just to leeward.'

  'Ay. So Pullings tell me. Do you mean to fight with her?'

  'I mean to sink, take, burn or destroy her,' said Jack, a smile flashing across his face.

  'I dare say you do. Please to remember the watch they took from me. A Bréguet repeater, number 365, with a centre seconds hand. And three pairs of drawers, I should know them anywhere. I must go below.'

  The day was dawning fast; the east was golden—a clear sky with white clouds streaked across; the merchantmen were crowding sail to come up with the privateer.

  'Mr Parker, lay the hatches, if you please. Mr Macdonald, your best marksmen into the tops at the last minute: they are to sweep the quarterdeck, nothing but the quarterdeck.'

  This was his simple plan: he would edge down, never allowing her to forereach him, keeping rigorously to windward, puzzling her as long as he possibly could, and so batter her at close quarters, keeping her there by taking the wind out of her sails. Anything more complex he dared not attempt, not with this ship, not with these men—no quick manoeuvres, no crossing under her stern—just as he dared not hide his men below, these raw hands who had never seen an angry gun.

  'Ease her half a point, Mr Goodridge.'

  Their courses were converging. How near would the Bellone let him come? Every hundred yards meant a minute less of enduring her long-range fire. Nearer, nearer.

  If he could dismast her, shoot away her wheel—and it was just abaft the mizzen in the Bellone . . . Now he could see the white of the faces on her quarterdeck. And yet still they sailed, on and on, drawing together, closer, closer. When would she fire? 'Another quarter, Mr Goodridge. Mr Rossall, you have the Papenburg . . .?'

  A puff of smoke from the Bellone's bows, and a shot came skipping along the Polychrest's side. The British colours appeared aboard the Frenchman. 'She's English!' cried a voice in the waist, with such relief, poor fellow. A hail, just audible in a lull of wind: 'Shorten sail and heave to, you infernal buggers.' Jack smiled. 'Slowly, Mr Rossall,' he said. 'Blunder around a little. Half up, down and up again.' The Papenburg flag wavered up to the mizzenpeak and appeared at last, streaming out towards the privateer.

  'That will puzzle him,' said Jack. The moment's doubt brought the two ships yet closer. Then another shot, one that hit the Polychrest square amidships: an ultimatum.

  'Up foretopsheet,' cried Jack. He could afford to let the Bellone range up a little, and the confusion might gain another half minute.

  But now the Bellone had had enough: the white ensign came down, the tricolour ran up: the frigate's side vanished in a long cloud and a hundredweight of iron hurtled across the five hundred yards of sea. Three balls struck the Polychrest's hull; the rest screamed overhead. 'Clap on to that sheet there, for'ard,' he cried: and as the sail filled, 'Very well, Mr Goodridge, lay me alongside her at pistol-shot. Our colours, Mr Rossall. Mr Pullings, off canvas, casks over the side.'

  An odd gun or two from the Bellone, and for a hideous moment Jack thought she was going to tack, cross his stern, and try a luffing-match to gain the wind, hitting him from a distance all the time. 'God send her broadside,' he muttered; and it came, a great rolling crash, but ragged—by no means in the Bellone's finest style. Now the privateer was committed to a quick finish, out of hand. All that remained was to wait while the master took the Polychrest down into action, foiling every attempt at forereaching, keeping her just so in relation to the wind and the Bellone—to last out those minutes while the gap was narrowed.

  'Mr Macdonald, Marines away aloft,' he said. 'Drummer, are you ready?'

  Across the water the guns were being run out and aimed again; as the last thrust out its muzzle he roared 'Lie down. Flat down on deck.' This was a mixed broadside, mostly grape: it tore through the lower rigging and across the deck. Blocks rattled down, ropes parted, and there was Macdonald at his side, staggering, a hand clapped to his arm. A wretched little man was running about, trying to get down the forehatch: several others on their hands and knees, looking wild, watching to see if he would succeed. The bosun tripped him up, seized him and flung him back to his gun. The smoke cleared, and now Jack could see the dead-eyes in the Bellone's shrouds. 'Stand to your guns,' he cried. 'Stand by. Wait for the drum. All at the mizzen, now.'

  The officers and the
captains of the guns were traversing the carronades, training them at the Bellone, glaring along the barrels. The little drummer's huge eyes were fixed on Jack's face. Closer, even closer . . . He judged the roll, felt the ship reach the long slow peak, and the instant she began to go down he nodded and cried 'Fire!' The drum-roll was drowned by the universal blast of all the starboard guns, stunning the wind, so that the smoke lay thick, impenetrable. He fanned it with his hand, leaning out over the rail. It cleared, sweeping leeward, and he saw the murderous effect—a great gaping hole in the Bellone's side, her mizzenchains destroyed, the mast wounded, three gun-ports beaten in, bodies on her quarterdeck.

  A furious, savage cheer from the Polychrest. 'Another, another,' he cried. 'Another and she strikes!'

  But her colours were flying still, her wheel was unhurt, and on her quarterdeck Captain Dumanoir waved his hat to Jack, shouting orders to his men. To his horror Jack saw that the Polychrest's cursed leeway was carrying her fast aboard the privateer. The Frenchmen, all but the gun-crews, were massing in the bows, some two hundred of them.

  'Luff up, Goodridge . . .' and his words were annihilated by the double broadside, the Bellone's and the Polychrest's, almost yardarm to yardarm.

  'All hands to repel boarders—pikes, pikes, pikes!' he shouted, drawing his sword and racing to the forecastle, the likely point of impact, vaulting a dismounted gun, a couple of bodies, and reaching it before the smoke cleared away. He stood there with twenty or thirty men around him, waiting for the grinding thump of the two ships coming together. Through the cloud there was an enormous shouting—orders in French—cheering—and now far astern a rending, tearing crash. Clear air, brilliant light, and there was the Bellone sheering off, falling off from the wind, turning; and the gap between them was twenty yards already. Her mizzen had gone by the board, and she could not keep to the wind. The fallen mast lay over her starboard quarter, hanging by the shrouds, acting as a huge rudder, swinging her head away.

  'To your guns,' he shouted. The Bellone's stern was turning towards them—a raking broadside now would destroy her.

  'She's struck, she's struck!' cried a fool. And now the lack of training told—now the disorganized gun-crews ran about—match-tubs upset, shot, cartridge, swabs, rammers everywhere. Some men cheering, others capering like half-wits—guns in, guns out—Bedlam. 'Pullings, Babbington, Parker, get those guns firing—jump to it, God damn you all. Up with the helm, Goodridge—keep her bearing.' He knocked down a little silly weaver, skipping there for joy, banged two men's heads together, compelled them to their guns, heaved one carronade in, ran another out, fired it into the Bellone's open stern, and ran back to the quarterdeck, crying 'Bear up, Goodridge, bear up, I say.'

  And now the vile Polychrest would not answer her helm. Hardly a sheet of her headsails remained after that last broadside, and all her old griping was back. The helm was hard over, but she would not pay off; and the precious seconds were flying.

  Malloch and his mates were busy with the sheets, knotting like fury: here and there a carronade spoke out—one twenty-four-pound ball hit the Bellone plumb on the stern-post. But the privateer had squared her yards; she was right before the wind, and they were separating at a hundred yards a minute. Before the headsheets were hauled aft, so that the Polychrest could pay off and pursue the Bellone, there was quarter of a mile of open water between them; and now the Bellone was replying with her stern-chaser.

  'Mr Parker, get two guns into the bows,' said Jack. The Polychrest was gathering way: the Bellone, hampered by her trailing mast, yawed strangely. The distance narrowed. 'Mr Parslow, fetch me a glass.' His own lay shattered by the fife-rail.

  'A glass? What glass, sir?' The little pale dazed face peered up, anxious, worried.

  'Any glass—a telescope, boy,' he said kindly. 'In the gun-room. Look sharp.'

  He glanced up and down his ship. The bentincks holed like sieves, two staysails hanging limp, foretopsail in rags, half a dozen shrouds parted: jibe and mizzen drawing well, however. Something like order on deck. Two guns dismounted, but one being crowed up and re-breached. The rest run out, ready, their crews complete, the men looking eager and determined. A great heap of hammocks in the waist, blasted out of their netting by the Bellone's last broadside. The wounded carried below, skirting the heap.

  'The glass, sir.'

  'Thank you, Mr Parslow. Tell Mr Rolfe the bow carronades are to fire the moment they can be run out.'

  Aboard the Bellone they were hacking at the starboard mizzen-shrouds with axes. The last pair parted, the floating mast tore clear, and the frigate surged forward, drawing clear away, going, going from them. But as he watched, her maintopmast lurched, lurched again, and with a heavy pitch of the sea it fell bodily over the side.

  A cheer went up from the Polychrest. They were gaining on her—they were gaining! The bow carronade went off: the shot fell short, but almost hit the Bellone on the ricochet. Another cheer. 'You'll cheer the other side of your faces when she hauls her wind and rakes us,' he thought. The two ships were some five hundred yards apart, both directly before the wind, with the Polychrest on the Bellone's larboard quarter: the privateer had but to put her helm a-lee to show them her broadside and rake them from stem to stern. She could not come right up into the wind with no sails aft, but she could bring it on to her beam, and less than that would be enough.

  Yet she did not do so. The topmast was cut away, but still the Bellone ran before the wind. And focusing his glass upon her stern he saw why—she had no helm to put a-lee. That last lucky shot had unseated her rudder. She could not steer. She could only run before the wind.

  They were coming down to the merchantmen now, broad low ships still on the larboard tack. Did they mean to give any trouble? To stand by their friend? They had five gun-ports of a side, and the Bellone would pass within a cable's length of them. 'Mr Parker, run out the larboard guns.' No: they did not. They were slowly edging away, heading north: one was a lame duck—juryrigged fore and main topmasts. The Polychrest's bow gun sent a fountain of water over the Bellone's stern. They were gaining. Should he snap up the merchantmen and then go on after the privateer? Content himself with the merchants? At this moment they could not escape: but in five minutes he would be to leeward of them, and slow though they might be, it would be a task to bring them to. In half an hour it would be impossible.

  The carronade was firing two shots for the Bellone's one; but that one came from a long eight, a more accurate gun by far. A little before they came abreast of the merchant ships it sent a ball low over the Polychrest's deck, killing a seaman near the wheel, flinging his body on to Parslow as he stood there, waiting for orders. Jack pulled the body off, disentangled the blood-stained child, said 'Are you all right, Parslow?' and in reply to Parker's 'The merchantmen have struck, sir,' he cried, 'Yes, yes. See if it is possible to lace on a bonnet.' A minute gain in speed would allow him to draw up on the Bellone, yaw and hammer her with his broadside again. They swept close by the merchantmen, who let fly their sheets in submission. Even in this heat of battle, with the guns answering one another as fast as they could be loaded, powder-smoke swirling between them, bodies on deck, blood running fresh in the scuppers, there were eyes that glanced wistfully at their prizes—fair-sized ships: ten, twenty, even thirty thousand guineas, perhaps. They knew very well that the moment the Polychrest had run a mile to leeward, all that money would get under way, spread every possible stitch of canvas, haul to the wind, and fly: kiss my hand to a fortune.

  South-east they ran, the merchant ships dwindling fast astern. They ran firing steadily, first the one gaining a little as damaged rigging was repaired, then the other; neither dared risk the pause to bend new sails; neither dared risk sending up a new topmast or topgallants in this steep pitching sea; and as they stood they were exactly matched. The least damage to either would be decisive, the least respite fatal; and so they ran, and the glass turned and the bell rang right through the forenoon watch, hour after hour, in a state of extreme tens
ion—hardly a word on deck, apart from orders—never much more or less than a quarter of a mile away from one another. Both tried setting studdingsails: both had them blown away. Both started their water over the side, lightening themselves by several tons—every trick, device, contrivance known to seamen for an even greater urgency of thrust. At one point Jack thought the Bellone was throwing her stores overboard, but it was only her dead. Forty splashes he counted: the slaughter in that close-packed ship must have been appalling. And still they fired.

  By noon, when they raised the high land of Spain among the clouds on the southern horizon, the Polychrest's bows were pockmarked with shot-holes, her foremast and foretopsailyard had been gashed again and again, and she was making water fast. The Bellone's stern was shattered to an extraordinary degree and her great mainsail was a collection of holes; but she was steering again. This she did by a cable veered out of the stern-port, which allowed her to turn a couple of points from the wind—not much, but more than she could do by steering with her sheets. She altered course deliberately on sighting Cape Peñas, and it cost her dear: the drag of the cable lost her a hundred yards—a great distance in that desperate race—and Rolfe, the Polychrest's master-gunner, red-eyed, black with powder, but in his element, sent a ball smashing into her stern-chaser, and from dead silence the Polychrest burst into wild cheering. Now the Bellone ran mute, apart from musket-fire. But still she ran, and it was Gijon that she was running for. Gijon, a Spanish port and therefore closed to British ships, though open to the French.