Regarding this cradle of religions, Appleby observed wonderingly. 'You can imagine Moses striking those rocks and Almighty God handing down the commandments from such a place…' Robbed of his usual pomposity Appleby seemed reduced to a state of awe.
But if this grim landscape failed to impress the majority of Hellebore's people, daylight the following morning had a different impact. From the masthead the news of several ships to windward included the intelligence that one was the square sail of a European vessel. There was no doubt that there was a French warship in the offing, though of what force they had yet to discover.
'Get aloft Nathaniel,' growled Griffiths anxiously and Drinkwater went forward and swung himself into the foremast shrouds. Around him Hellebore's deck swarmed with activity as the men prepared for action.
At the topgallant doubling the wind was distinctly chilly. Stokeley was the lookout and he pointed the newcomers out. Settling himself against the exaggerated motion of the brig Drinkwater levelled his glass to larboard and caught the image of a dhow in the lens. There were five such craft being convoyed south by the warship. He searched the latter for details to determine her size. He counted her mastheads: there were three. A ship rigged corvette or a frigate? He transferred his attention to the hull. At this angle it was difficult to say as the enemy approached them, yawing slightly, a bone of white water in her teeth, but there was simplicity about her bow that inclined Drinkwater to dismiss his worst fears. He descended to the deck.
'I believe her to be a ship-sloop, sir, say about twenty guns.'
'Very well.' Griffiths paused and studied the approaching dhows. 'D'you think they're fitted with teeth or are they under convoy for Kosseir or Suez?' He did not wait for an answer, glancing astern at the supporting sambuk of Ben Ibrahim. 'We'll engage, Mr Drinkwater, take the topgallants off her and hoist French colours.' Drinkwater acknowledged the order and turned away while Griffiths bellowed forward for all to hear. 'Mr Rogers! Load canister on ball, run your larboard guns to the sills and secure them! Keep your ports closed and all the larbowlines to cheer as we pass the Frenchman, all except the gun captains who are to lay their pieces at the horizon and fire on command.' He lowered his voice. 'Mr Lestock, have a quartermaster ready to hoist British colours the moment I say, and men at the braces below the bulwarks. I shall wear to starboard then cross his stern.' Griffiths stood beside the men at the wheel. Drinkwater returned from amidships, casting his eyes aloft where the topgallants flogged impotently in their bunt-lines. The topmen were spreading out along the yards. Already Hellebore began her deception, peacefully clewing up her topgallants as she waited for her 'friend' to approach. 'Duw', Nathaniel, tell them not to be so damned fast aloft.'
Drinkwater grinned and raised the speaking trumpet.
'Fore t'gallant there, take your time, you are supposed to be Frenchmen!' He could see from the attitudes of the men aloft who shouted remarks to their mates on the main topgallant that the business amused them. The obvious high spirits and exaggerated pantomime that followed this order spoke of a soaring morale amongst the hands at the prospect of action. Battle, conducted in such a spirit in such a breeze and in such brilliant sunshine could not fail to be exhilarating.
'That's better,' nodded Griffiths approvingly. 'Take station on the poop, Mr Drinkwater, when he is abeam I shall open fire then wear downwind. It means exposing the stern but I doubt he'll take advantage of it. Wave your hat as we pass, bach, do your best to look French.'
Rogers came aft and reported the larboard battery ready as directed.
Drinkwater wondered if the French squadron included a brig like themselves. If not then they were going to look decidedly foolish in a quarter of an hour. Astern of them Yusuf ben Ibrahim was dropping into Hellebore's wake. He would be mystified as to their intentions unless he guessed from the tricolour now snapping out over the quarter. Yusuf might ruin their deception but then he might also enhance it, appearing to the approaching Frenchman like his own captured dhows. Drinkwater shivered slightly in his shirtsleeves. He waited impatiently for the order to open fire. Drinkwater motioned to the men at the after starboard guns. 'Stand by to brail in the spanker there!'
He saw them grin, glad of something to do while their mates in the larboard battery went into action.
The dhows ahead had dropped back while the French corvette came on suspiciously, a private signal flying from her foremast. Drinkwater saw Mr Quilhampton instructed to hoist a string of meaningless bunting. As the enemy signal flew almost directly towards them a little confusion might be permitted. The two vessels were a mile apart now, the Frenchman broad on Hellebore's larboard bow. The brig had slowed without her topgallants and she lay in wait for her opponent, her guns still hidden and several of the lar-bowlines hanging casually in the rigging waving.
To the Frenchman the brig lay off his bow, supinely furling her upper sails, men congregating about her decks while he came down before the wind to pass close under the stranger's stern where he could take her if she ultimately proved to be an enemy. But no enemy, least of all a British captain, would lay so passively before a windward foe. It was a deception lent piquancy by the remoteness of their location, and the belief, briefly true, that Egypt was a possession of France.
Drinkwater saw the corvette take in her own topgallants, as if about to round to and hail her 'compatriot'. His heart was thumping with excitement. He knew in a moment the weeks of waiting, of struggling off the Cape, of listening to the sweaty moanings of the members of the gunroom, of solving the problem of the hands, of Dalziell and of Catherine Best, would all dissolve in the drug-like excitement of action. There was also the possibility that they might find a permanent solution in death. He felt dreadfully exposed as fear and exhilaration fought for possession of him. He remembered an old promise to Elizabeth that he would be circumspect and run no needless risk. The recollection brought a rueful smile to his face.
The gun crew waiting at the mainmast fiferails for his order nudged one another and grinned too, taking encouragement from Drinkwater's apparent eagerness, seeing in his introspection their own relief at imminent action. For them action meant an interruption of the endless round of drudgery, of hauling and pumping that was their life, an opportunity to throw off the fear of the lash, to swear and kill to their heart's content.
'Brail in the spanker!' Drinkwater nodded to the men watching him. The outhaul was started and the huge sail billowed, flapped and was drawn to the mast, by the helm, Griffiths corrected the rudder for that loss of pressure aft. Drinkwater took off his hat and waved it with assumed Gallic enthusiasm about his head.
'Dip the ensign,' he ordered and the quartermaster at the peak halliards lowered the tricolour a fathom. Perhaps, by such a refinement, if the enemy captain did not expect to see a French brig hereabouts, he might be fooled into thinking it was a new arrival paying her respects to an old Red Sea hand.
The enemy ship was very close now. Men could be seen on her topgallant yards looking curiously across at them and Drinkwater heard a thin cry of 'Bonjour mes enfants.'
From the main topgallant he heard the ever resourceful Tregembo yell back 'Vive la République,'
The cheer that erupted from the enemy was echoed by the Hellebores whose joy at achieving such a complete deception lent their mad excitement a true imitation of revolutionary fervour.
'Braces there,' growled Griffiths in a low and penetrating voice. Drinkwater saw a French officer on the quarter-rail bowing. He swept his own hat across his chest in response. 'Bonne chance!' he yelled across the diminishing gap between them. An angle of sixty degrees lay between the ships, with every one of Hellebore's guns levelled at that crowded rail.
'Colours!'
Griffiths threw aside the mask.
Above their heads Old Glory replaced the half lowered tricolour. The gunports snapped open.
'Fire!'
The gun captains jerked their lanyards as the crews leapt back to the deck and grabbed rammers, swabs and buckets. The charr
ing of the port lintels was quickly extinguished as the men toiled to reload.
'Up helm! Braces there! Wear ship!'
Hellebore turned, pointing her vulnerable stern at the Frenchman but avoiding the ignominious possibility of failing to tack. Griffiths had gambled on his plan working and, had it not done so, he had only to stand on and carry himself swiftly out of range. But a single glance astern told the ruse had been complete. Details were obscure but amidships the corvette's rail was a splintered and jagged shambles. The human wreckage behind that smashed timber could be imagined.
'Aloft there, let fall! Let fall!' Tregembo and his mates slipped the topgallant gaskets and the sails fell in folds.
'Leggo bunt and clewlines there! Sheet home!'
Hellebore was before the wind and still turning, bringing the wind first astern and then round, broad on the starboard quarter. Drinkwater descended from the tiny poop. 'The advantage of surprise, sir,' he said.
Griffiths nodded, his mouth suppressing a grim smile of self-congratulation. 'Do unto others, Mr Drinkwater, before they do unto you… clew up the foresail, I intend to rake.'
'Aye, aye, sir. D'you intend boarding?' Griffiths shook his head.
'Too great a risk of heavy casualties. Flesh wounds'll be the very devil to heal in this climate. No, we'll stand off and pound him.' Griffiths nodded to the distant Ben Ibrahim. 'He's playing a waiting game.'
They clewed up the forecourse as they made to cut across the corvette's stern. She was still running before the wind though many ropes had been severed at the pin rails on deck. Smoke appeared from her guns now as she attempted to halt the Nemesis that bore relentlessly down upon her. Then they were suddenly very close to her, surging across her stern, masking her from the wind. Rogers was shouting and running aft, commanding each gun to fire as it bore into the corvette's stern. Drinkwater read La Torride a split second before it was blown to atoms, saw the crown glass windows of her cabin shatter and the neat carvings about her quarters disintegrate into splinters. A row of men with pistols and muskets fired at the British ship as she rushed past and the hat that he had so insouciantly waved but a few moments ago was torn from his head. He aimed his own pistols, his mouth pulled back in a grimace. Then Griffiths was putting Hellebore on a parallel course with the Frenchman.
'Starbowlines to larboard!' Drinkwater roared. As if eagerly awaiting the call the frustrated men from the starboard guns hopped nimbly across the deck to fling their weight on the tackles of the larboard six pounders.
La Torride fired her starboard battery as the brig overtook and a storm of shot poured across Hellebore's deck. Men were flung back clutching their heads and bellies. One stood staring at a vacant arm socket and from aloft a body fell on the deck with an obscene impact.
But the surprise of Hellebore's manoeuvre had robbed the French of their greater weight of metal. The sudden appearance of a British cruiser had utterly surprised them, the more particularly as they had known Blankett's squadron did not include a brig. To this psychological advantage the British had added that first devastating broadside. The lethal spray of canister combined with the round shot to produce an appalling effect. The destructive power of the shot was augmented by the splinters it caused while the range concentrated its effect. French resistance was robbed of its edge. Half of La Torride's gun crews were already dead or wounded, her wheel was shot away, her rudder stock split and her commander mortally wounded in the space of a few minutes.
Hellebore ran past her adversary as La Torride swung to starboard, broaching into the trough of the sea, out of control. Hellebore also swung to avoid being raked and came round to starboard, tacking through the wind and, once on the larboard tack, running back on to her victim. As the yards were secured there was a mad rush across the deck where the starbowlines returned to their guns.
'Maximum elevation there!' yelled Drinkwater, judging the angle of heel as the brig lay over to the wind. 'Cripple her, Rogers!' roared Griffiths and Drinkwater leapt at the after guns to pull out the quoins. Spinning round he grabbed a tiny powder monkey. 'Boy! Get Mr Trussel to send up some bar shot.'
But La Torride had recovered slightly, her men were not yet finished. Under her first lieutenant she had had the time to prepare another broadside for the British.
'Heel's too much, sir,' shouted Drinkwater straightening up from sighting along a gun barrel. 'Leggo t'gallant sheets!'
The pressure at her mastheads eased slightly and the brig came nearer the vertical as she sped past La Torride. Both ships fired their broadsides simultaneously. Amidships a gun was dismounted at the moment of discharge with a huge crash. Men fell back and blood spurted from the a dozen wounds while splinters of wood flew about. Griffiths was spun round by a musket ball that left his single epaulette hanging drunkenly from his shoulder. Drinkwater was hit by a splinter which lanced across his face, missing his eye and cheek and nicking his right ear. Then Hellebore was past and preparing to tack again. In the temporary respite Drinkwater supervised clearing the deck of wounded, while Lestock hauled the yards. He was aware of a large number of casualties, of blood staining the sanded planks in the waist but also of an unshaken band of men who toiled to make their lethal and brutish artillery ready for another broadside.
La Torride had had enough. A cheer from first one gun's crew then another spread along Hellbore's deck. Looking up Drinkwater saw the tricolour that lay over the corvette's shattered rail. Her foremast had gone by the board.
'Take possession, Mr Drinkwater; Mr Lestock, heave to.' Drinkwater went to inspect the boats and found the cutter serviceable. Griffiths came up to him.
'I want neither prisoners nor prize, Nathaniel. Toss her guns overboard and order an officer aboard her as hostage against her good conduct. They may proceed to Suez if they are able.'
'Aye, aye, sir.'
'I think we have winged the eagle, Nathaniel,' he added confidentially. Drinkwater grinned back. 'Indeed sir, I believe you are right.'
Drinkwater threw a leg over the rail to descend to the cutter bobbing alongside.
'Knocked the bollocks of that Froggie, eh, Drinkwater?' said Rogers, smiling broadly, his tendency to criticise temporarily quiescent.
'Then perhaps you will consider our commander less senile than you are wont to assert.'
Drinkwater and his party scrambled over the side of the corvette to the disquieting crackle of musketry and the shouts and screams of intense fighting. The sight that met their eyes was astonishing. Amid the ruin of her upper deck, covered as it was by the wreckage of her foremast, broken spars and torn sails, amid the tangled festoons of rope, amid the bodies of her dead and the writhing tortures of her wounded La Torride's survivors fought a furious hand to hand action with Yusuf ben Ibrahim and his men. The Arab's sambuk had held off, awaiting the outcome, but was now alongside the defeated corvette her men boarding in search of loot. Catching sight of the British a young aspirant waved frantically at the folds of the tricolour lying over the stern.
'M'sieur… J'implore… m'aidez…' The boy looked wildly round, seeing Drinkwater's bare sword blade, drawn in self defence at what he might find aboard the prize. The young officer had fallen at his feet in terror and Drinkwater put a calming hand upon his shoulder, but even so it was several minutes before the combined bullying of Drinkwater and his men had beaten off the fury of the Arabs.
Yusuf himself seemed angry at Drinkwater's refusal to allow his men to butcher the French. 'In'sh Allah,' he said shrugging, his eyes wild with the effects of hashish: 'It is the will of Allah.'
Drinkwater shook his head 'Bism' Allah,' he said in the only Arabic he knew, 'In the name of God, Emir Yusuf, the dhows…' he conveyed the gift of the captured dhows with dramatic gestures, knowing Griffiths was not interested in prizes so far from home. God knew there were enough Frenchmen aboard them to satisfy Yusuf's bloodlust without putting the corvette's crew to the sword. 'You,' he said pointing at Yusuf's chest, 'take dhows. This,' he said stabbing a finger at the deck of La Torride
and to the French cadet, 'this belongs to me…' he waved his arm in a circular motion ending up pointing at his own chest.
To Drinkwater's surprise Yusuf rocked back on his heels and roared with laughter. Several members of his crew that had come menacingly to his support during the argument joined the laughter, after Yusuf had addressed a stream of Arabic at them. Yusuf made an aggressively sexual gesture with his forearm, tousled the cadet's hair and slapped the amazed Drinkwater upon the back. Then, still laughing, he took himself off, followed by his men who made a series of good naturedly obscene gestures in Drinkwater's direction.
Beneath his tan Nathaniel flushed at the implication. 'Dirty bastards, zur,' muttered Tregembo loyally but Drinkwater was not to escape so lightly. To his further embarrassment the young Frenchman, who was trying to smile while tears made furrows through the powder grime upon his face, embraced him.
Drinkwater shook the youth off. 'Vôtre capitaine? Où est vôtre capitaine?' he asked. The reply was a torrent of French, incomprehensible to Drinkwater but containing what he took to be names, each succeeded by the word mort, from which he deduced that most of La Torride's officers were either dead or dying. Certainly no other uniformed figure appeared. Leaving the aspirant to muster his crew and draw up a list of the casualties Drinkwater made a brief inspection of the ship before returning to Hellebore.
'She's the ship corvette La Torride of the Rochefort squadron, sir, hulled in several places and unmanageable with her steering destroyed…' He went on to outline the shambles he had found. When he had finished Griffiths pursed his lips and thought for a moment.
'If we can get a dhow back from Ben Ibrahim we'll let them go, bach, on parole for Suez. Take out of her powder, any useful shot, stores, water and rope, I recollect you want rope. In fact ransack her, though no man is to touch an item of personal belongings, we'll leave looting to our Arab friends. Go on, get back to her, quick now. I'll send Rogers and the other boat to requisition a dhow if that pirate has already grabbed them all. Bring back the cadet, he may be more forthcoming than a recalcitrant officer with ideas of his honour.'
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