Under Enemy Colours

by Sean Thomas Russell

  “Let us hope it is the Themis, for having heard what befell my servant, I should, myself, like to hang the man who flung poor Joshua into the sea.”

  Wickham nodded. “Mr Hawthorne told me, sir. It saddened me terribly.” A moment’s silence. “And now this papist, Sanson, has followed behind, I am told … ?”

  “Yes. A whole family too intimate with death, I think, though Sanson certainly was melancholic, and such people often take their own lives.”

  “I had a great-aunt did the same, sir, much to every one’s sorrow.” Then his arm shot up. “There! Did you see? Just a dull flash, almost dead ahead.”

  Hayden squinted into the dark, attempting to force a light to appear, without success. For ten minutes he stood on the foredeck, staring into the night, but then he gave it up with a shake of his head, a heave of his taut shoulders.

  “Keep me informed of any sightings, Mr Wickham. It torments me to think that she might be sensible to our presence and drop back in darkness to give us a broadside.”

  “I shall never allow that, sir.”

  As Wickham made this vow, the ship sailed into a dank cloud. In a moment, beads formed on the bulwarks and darkened the deck.

  “Damned bloody fog,” Barthe growled as he joined the others on the foredeck. “Thick as molasses where you find it, but hanging low over the sea, hardly stretching to the masthead. Aloft there,” he cried. “Are you above this deuced fog?”

  “We’re in the thick of it, Mr Barthe.”

  “Well, it is still low to the sea,” Barthe intoned, “you can be certain of that.” The corpulent sailing master had a dwarf-like silhouette due to the slight stoop in his carriage.

  “I have no doubt you’re in the right, Mr Barthe,” Hayden assured him. He gestured at the slowly swirling fog. “In this we could ram the Themis before we knew she was there.”

  Barthe stood by the starboard rail, staring anxiously into the night. “I will be more pleased to see the dawn than I am commonly, and that is saying a great deal.”

  “A few hours, Mr Barthe, and we shall have a shred of light.” Hayden made a slow circuit of the deck.

  Wind and sea, the two things sailors discussed with greater frequency than even the fairer sex, proved that indecision was not exclusively a human distinction. The wind would make for a time, sending the ship rushing through the waters, and then would take off to a mere zephyr. A ground-swell would reach them out of the darkness, and see the men rushing aloft to reduce canvas, expecting the wind that such seas foretell, but the wind would not materialize and the seas would die, mysteriously, away, leaving the old salts to mutter and shake their heads. Stunsails were not reset, though top-gallants were held to.

  The watch crept on, bell by bell, until the morning watch was called. Two hours more and a meagre brightening of the eastern sky marked the advance of the autumnal morning. Hayden was standing by the taffrail when he heard the sailing master’s deeply felt sigh.

  “Your much-longed-for daylight at last, Mr Barthe,” Hayden remarked.

  Barthe gazed a moment more, then turned his bruised face toward the acting captain. “It was a damned long night given the number of hours encompassed.” Barthe looked around. “Where is Mr Wickham? Has he our chase in sight?”

  “Lieutenant Wickham is on the foretop, Mr Barthe,” Hobson reported.

  “It is a bit close for even Wickham to see any distance. Would you join me for a breakfast, Mr Barthe? Mr Landry will take the deck in a moment, I’m sure.”

  “Sail ho!” Wickham shouted from high up among the rigging. “On the starboard beam.”

  Hayden went to the rail and a glass was placed in his hand, but all he could discern was a landscape of varied grey—fog and sea—a scene that reminded him, inexplicably, of winter London. The ship rose and fell, parting the mist and sending it spinning in little dervishes behind. He felt his breath coming in short gasps and endeavoured to master it.

  “Mr Franks,” Hayden addressed the bosun softly. “Go to quarters … but with as little noise as can be managed. Mr Archer? There you are. Silence fore and aft; pass the word.”

  “Aye, Mr Hayden,” Archer whispered.

  Breakfast was forgotten. The watch below was roused quietly—no piping up hammocks—and bleary-eyed sailors crept onto the deck. The bulkheads had been taken down the previous day, and the gun-deck was clear but for the captain’s cabin, which Hayden could hear the men dismantling as silently as could be done. Landry popped out of the companionway aft, glanced around, and came immediately to the rail.

  “Is it the Themis, Mr Hayden?”

  “We don’t know, Mr Landry, but very likely.”

  Guns were run out, sails dampened, the boats streamed aft. Glancing one to the other, men shifted about, saying nothing—anxious and excited, wondering if today would make their fortune or see them dead. A tired-looking Wickham materialized at the rail.

  “Did she appear to be the Themis, Mr Wickham?” Hayden asked the acting lieutenant, who was a little out of breath.

  “I think it was, Mr Hayden, but couldn’t be certain. She keeps to the same heading or very nearly so.”

  Hayden nodded and was silent a moment, calming his mind so that he might weigh their situation. “Mr Barthe? Prepare to wear ship. Send the men to their stations and stand ready to shift our yards.”

  “What have you in mind?” Landry asked.

  “We will wear and try to range up astern of them. Before they know we’re there, we’ll rake them once.”

  “Sail, sir!” Wickham’s arm shot up and he pointed into the mist.

  Slowly, a ship began to take shape, sails and rigging, the dark smudge of a hull—impossible even to count the gun ports.

  “She is the Themis!” someone blurted.

  “Silence, there,” Landry cautioned. And then to Hayden: “I do think the man was right. That is our ship … is it not?”

  Whoever she was, Hayden was certain she was a frigate. She lay about an English mile distant, under lowers, top sails, and top-gallants, but the inconstant fog still obscured her sufficiently that Hayden could not be certain she bore the mutineers.

  Wickham was gazing intently into his glass. “They’re going to quarters, sir.”

  “And so passes our small advantage.” Hayden raised his own glass, damning the fog.

  “Men are at their stations, Mr Hayden,” Barthe informed him. “Shall I give the order to wear?”

  Hayden lowered his glass but did not take his eye from the distant vessel. “Wait but a moment, Mr Barthe. Let us be certain of this ship. We might want to slip off into the fog yet.”

  “She’s running up her colours, Mr Hayden,” Wickham said quietly.

  Hayden raised his glass in time to see a flag jerk to the mizzen gaff, waft once, then spread against the grey. “That would appear to be the tricolore upon the canton,” he said.

  The silence was broken by whispering.

  “She could easily be the Themis,” Mr Barthe asserted. “We flew the French ensign to confuse our enemies many a time. Many a time.”

  Smoke blew out from the ship and a hoist of signals hauled aloft. An instant later the report reached them over the seas.

  “If it is the Themis then they are hoping the fog will make that appear to be the French navy’s private signal,” Wickham ventured.

  “Where is my writer?” Hayden asked. “Someone find Perse and send him down to my cabin for the book I had him put away this morning.”

  Barthe looked at Hayden oddly, as though he thought it a strange time to do a little reading.

  A moment later Perseverance Gilhooly came running onto the deck and put the weighty, sailcloth-covered volume into his master’s hand. Hayden tucked his glass under an arm and began thumbing the pages. After a moment he stopped at a loose page that had been inserted. “I fear, Mr Wickham, that these are not our mutineers. Either that, or they have learned the enemy’s private signal.” He turned and glanced around the quarterdeck. “Mr Archer? You read a little Frenc
h?”

  “I do, sir, though I do not speak it as well as yourself and Mr Wickham.”

  “It will not matter.” Hayden gestured the young officer nearer, and showed him the book. “Here is the answer to the private signal. Run it up immediately, if you please.”

  “Aye, sir.” Archer took the offered book. “Is this the French captain’s signal book?”

  “It is.”

  Archer stood a moment, stunned, then hurried to the flag cabinet.

  “How in the world was that overlooked?” Barthe asked. “They had all the time in the world to throw it into the sea.”

  “So they did, but it was entrusted to Monsieur Sanson, who kindly passed it along to me.”

  “Three cheers for melancholy French gypsies, sir,” Wickham declared, making Hayden smile.

  A moment later Archer ordered a gun fired and he ran up a hoist of flags in reply. Hayden stared at the distant vessel, still half-obscured in the grey.

  “What effect has that had, Mr Wickham?”

  “Difficult to be certain, sir, but I would venture that they appear a little relieved.”

  “We will know if they answer our signal with a broadside,” Barthe muttered.

  “On deck!” the lookout cried. “Sail. Almost dead ahead.”

  “Mr Wickham. Would you hop forward and see if you can distinguish the nationality of this ship? I hope we’re not in the middle of a French squadron. Mr Landry. Give the order—no calls in English. Let us not give ourselves away.”

  Wickham jogged down the gangway, onto the forecastle, along with Hobson, and the two of them trained glasses forward. For a moment the middies made no move, and then Wickham whirled around.

  “Capitaine,” he called out. “C’est l’anglaise. La Themis.”

  “Fucking hell,” Barthe muttered. “Mutineers ahead and a French frigate on our beam—no doubt fully manned. We’re in the fire now.” The master worried the stay he held by one hand, unable to hide his alarm.

  Hayden hurried the length of the ship, joining the two midshipmen on the foredeck. “You’re certain, Mr Wickham?”

  “I am, sir. The fog parted a moment and I could see her plainly. That is our ship, Captain. I know her.”

  Raising his glass, Hayden picked out the frigate in question. The mist obscured her somewhat while he watched, but not so much that he couldn’t distinguish the French naval ensign as it was hoisted. A gun was fired and signals sent aloft, impossible to make out in the gloom.

  “Well, they’re not as foolish as one might hope,” Hayden observed.

  “Do you think they’ll deceive the Frenchman, sir?”

  “Difficult to know.” Hayden glanced from the Themis to the French frigate. His situation had turned rather abruptly: two hostile ships, one fully manned, almost certainly. He wondered if he shouldn’t use the thinning fog to slip away, but somehow Hart lying below in a fury at his chase of the mutineers made this seem craven—the course a man like Hart would choose.

  “Mr Wickham, if we open fire on the Themis do you think the Frenchman will realize we’re Englishmen in disguise?”

  Wickham lowered his glass and gravely considered the question. “They will certainly presume that one of the two ships is British. What else could they think?”

  An idea formed in Hayden’s mind—a rash idea, certainly, an idea fraught with hazards … “Exactly so,” he muttered. For a brief moment he hesitated—utterly unlike him—then turned to the other midshipman. “Mr Hobson, jump back to the quarterdeck and have Mr Archer make the signal for ‘chasing enemy vessel’ or whatever the French equivalent would be.”

  “I will, sir.” The middy set off at a run.

  Hayden stood for a moment, trying to regain his breath. It was a bold decision—and in very little time it might be proven foolish.

  Wickham raised his glass again, but Hayden felt he was being regarded all the same.

  “Is that not a dangerous game to begin, sir? The Frenchmen will almost certainly come to our aid.”

  “But if we engage the Themis—without explanation, as it were—they will almost as certainly decide the chasing ship is British and come to the aid of the mutineers. We have no other choice but to sail away and let Bill Stuckey and his company take our ship into Brest Harbour. But confronted by two French ships I believe the mutineers will haul down their colours—their false colours. We will board and take possession before they realize we are their former shipmates.”

  “But what will we do then, sir? That is what I wonder. That Frenchman will have a full muster. What do we do if she sends a boarding party to aid us?”

  “There is a heavy fog. We will have to slip away or at least deceive them long enough to do so.”

  Wickham hesitated, lowered his glass, and turned toward Hayden. “Your experience is beyond mine, Mr Hayden, and your judgement is proven. But I fear this Frenchman might penetrate our disguise”—a glance at his over-large coat—“which is rather thin. Not every one can pass for a Frenchman as you can.”

  Hayden turned to see Archer running up a hoist of signals. “We will have to keep some water between ourselves and this French frigate, then, Mr Wickham. Let us hope she is happy to stand off and let us do the fighting.”

  They were silent a moment, staring into the roiling grey. The Themis— and Hayden was beginning to agree with Wickham regarding her identity—was under courses and topsails. This meagre suit of canvas was the only thing about her that would alert an observer to the truth that she was no longer a ship of His Majesty’s Navy—but for her false colours. Her course was true, her too-few sails trimmed to a nicety, there appeared to be order on deck—not a scene of drunken anarchy, as one might expect. Four pale, colourless dabs at the taffrail were, no doubt, mutineers—peering through officers’ stolen glasses.

  “Are they clearing for action, Mr Wickham?”

  “I believe they are. Starboard gunports are opening.”

  “They’ve only enough men to fight one side of the ship, and even then the gun crews will be short at least a man.”

  “What shall we do, sir?”

  “Signal our sister ship to engage her starboard battery. We’ll engage her to larboard, let the French pour in a broadside or two, and then we’ll come alongside and board her, though I think she’ll strike before then.”

  “They might strike and try to talk their way out of this—if they plan to turn themselves over to the authorities in Brest, why not do it at sea?”

  “Because there is a very real danger that any French captain will claim them a prize anyway, and then it will be off to a French prison until the end of hostilities, whereupon they will be returned to English soil and an appointment with Jack Ketch.”

  “I have no doubt you’re right, sir, but Stuckey and his gang are clearly not in the habit of looking so far ahead. Men are lying aloft, Mr Hayden … to set top-gallants, I believe.”

  It was not managed in a seaman-like manner, but eventually the main top-gallant yards were raised and the sails loosed to belly in the breeze.

  “Well, that is plain. They’re going to run for Brest and keep their French colours flying. Not an unwise decision. Do you still think this the faster ship, Mr Wickham?”

  “Not to be disloyal to the Themis, but I do, sir.”

  “We shall soon see.”

  Hayden went quickly back to the quarterdeck, where he found Landry and Barthe in conversation with Hawthorne. “Mr Barthe, are you content with the speed we’re making? The Themis has decided to run for Brest. Can we overhaul her?”

  “I shall have the stunsails reset in a moment, sir.”

  “Thank you, Mr Barthe.” Hayden found Archer examining the French frigate through a glass. “Mr Archer, how goes our correspondence with the French?”

  The second lieutenant lowered his glass and touched his hat. “Well enough, Mr Hayden. They hoisted their number a moment ago. They’re the La Rochelle, sir. Mr Barthe says she’s a new-built thirty-eight, but hasn’t been seen in these waters for a ye
ar. She’s been in the West Indies, he believes.”

  Hayden raised his glass and inspected the French frigate again—for as the day brightened she was a little easier to make out. She did have the look of a ship that had just crossed the Atlantic: paint dull and flaking, some seams in her topsides in need of a caulking mallet.

  “Excellent,” Hayden said to himself.

  “Pardon, sir?”

  “Let us hope Mr Barthe is right. If they’ve just crossed the Atlantic they likely won’t have heard about the taking of the Dragoon by British seamen, and her bottom will be fouled, as well. It might be too much to hope that her crew are ill or depleted, but a foul bottom will let us slide away, especially in this slippery maiden.” He patted the rail. “Let us hope the Themis does not outrun La Rochelle; I’m counting on her assistance.”

  “Shall I make our number in return, sir? I found it in the book.”

  “Yes. Do that, Mr Archer. We wouldn’t want them to stop believing in us.”

  If La Rochelle’s bottom were foul there was little sign of it. She set as much canvas as Hayden’s prize, and held her place in the little triangle that the three ships made on the grey sea.

  As the sun warmed it began to burn away the fog, revealing the Themis in all her mutinous glory.

  “When we curse the damned fog, it will not leave us,” Barthe growled. “And now that we have need, it will abandon us.”

  “Helmsman,” Hayden said, “half a spoke to larboard. Don’t allow the Frenchman to narrow the distance between us.” Wickham had planted a little worry in Hayden’s mind. He was willing to take this risk with the Frenchman because he could pass for one himself, but the rest of the crew were not so able. Perhaps the French would penetrate their ruse if they drew near enough. Now that the fog had left them, Hayden had no intention of letting that happen.

  He turned a slow circle, subjecting the sea to a cold scrutiny. The coast of France formed an undulating blue line to the east; a headland, he was certain, must be Pointe du Raz. Beyond La Rochelle, a few flecks of white and oak bark stood out against the azure sea—the sails of fishermen and small transports. The breeze was filling in a little from the south-west, though there were still no whitecaps to be seen—seven knots, he reckoned. Before them the Themis rocked gently on the Biscay swell, her top-gallants billowing. It was too soon to know if the Dragoon was gaining on her, but he imagined she was.