“Stand by!” I called to the quarterdeck below, and I saw Kevin’s face briefly illuminated as he lit a lantern. I returned my eye to the night glass.
In two or three minutes, I saw Stilwell’s stern cabin lights disappear as she wore around, and gaps appear between the masts. “Make the signal!” I called, and Kevin ran to the larboard side of the ship and began to swing the lantern back and forth along the side of the ship, keeping it below the bulwark where the enemy would not see it.
Very quickly the flames in the lighthouses went out, and two more fires were lit, fifteen hundred yards to the north, over half a league away.
The two lighthouses were arranged so that they were in line with the safe channel that ran through the sand banks offshore. The inland light was taller than the other, so that if a ship were in the channel, they would see one light atop the other; and they might also judge how far they were out of the channel by the separation of the lights. Because the sandbanks shifted, and the safe channel with them, the towers had been lightly built of wood, so that they could be moved at need.
My plan had been to make false lights to lure Royal Stilwell into danger, and to this end I secured the cooperation of the Lord Governor, Sir Andrew de Berardinis, who had been inclined to douse the lights as soon as the enemy ship appeared, but who I persuaded to keep them lit. It had taken two days to measure the ground for the new lights, and to build them safely on carts—because building new towers on shore would be seen as suspicious—and then to work out with protractors and chains the sites on shore where the new lights would be placed.
I had waited until the tide began to ebb, because the time between the start of the ebb, and the moonrise at three in the morning, would have been the ideal time for Meteor to try to slip out to sea. I also wished the old lights doused, and the new ones lit, while Royal Stilwell was wearing ship, or going about, or some other maneuver, for I knew that every eye on the ship would be fixed on the sails, the tacks and braces, the sheets, the whipstaff, or the compass, and none paying any attention to the lights on shore, which were fixed, and which they had no reason to think would not remain fixed, and continue to provide unshakable confidence to mariners.
I watched as the new fires kindled, then returned to the night glass. My eye was still dazzled by looking into the light, and then it took a moment to locate Royal Stilwell again, but I found the great high-charged galleon in time to see the gaps between its masts narrow almost to nothing, and then the ship came on, sailing on a bearing that took her southeast, across the channel, with the wind right abeam.
In a few moments, I saw that Royal Stilwell wore early, as if her master thought she might have gone farther south than intended, and I saw the stern lights swing into view as she came on her new tack. The ship sailed on northwesterly, and then I saw some maneuvering that was difficult to follow in the dark, and then quite suddenly the ship was ablaze with light as lanterns and torches were kindled in the darkness. The lights ran back and forth over the ship, and some were lowered to the waterline.
“I think she’s run aground!” I called, for in the darkness I still could not be certain, and a cheer came up from below.
The lights marked the Stilwell plainly, and as there was no longer any reason for me to remain aloft in the cold maintop, I came down the shrouds and joined my friends on deck, where I was warmed by a glass of hot whisky punch.
The ebb tide tugged at the ship. Moonrise did not make the situation any clearer, save that Royal Stilwell did not move, and that the lights continued moving up and down her sides. I thought she was probably aground, but there remained the possibility that she had anchored until daylight revealed a path out of the sandbanks. I went to my hammock for a brief rest, but I was far too excited to sleep, and rose before dawn.
Before sunrise, the anchor was hove short and Meteor cleared for action. The ship’s boats were trailed astern so that an enemy shot would not turn them into deadly splinters. The crew stood by the guns, and a rank of royal soldiers, loaned us by the Lord Governor, stood on the quarterdeck with their hackbuts.
Cheers rose from the crew as the dawn revealed that Royal Stilwell had run clean aground, and that she had been completely stranded by the falling tide. The great galleon had toppled over to starboard, and her main topmast and bonaventure mizzen had gone over the side. Waves broke white over her larboard bow, and great sheets of spray seemed to cover nearly the entire ship. Her boats were sculling about in the water, but they were clearly unable to affect the situation.
Our seamen manned the capstan, and began their stamp about the deck. Meteor lurched as the anchor broke free of the river bottom, and close-hauled under the spritsail and lateen mizzen, with the spritsail yard cocked up almost to the vertical, we made slow headway against the incoming tide until we were clear of the river mouth. Then the helm was put up, and the crew manned the tacks and sheets and set the topsails. The yards were braced around hard, the sails filled with a noise like present thunder, one after the other; and then we were on our way, close-hauled on the larboard tack, the bone of foam growing white beneath the bow as we gained way.
The pilot, Foster, went up to the foretop to better see the sandbanks, which at this point was scarcely necessary, for the tide had so fallen that the reefs were all visible as vague brown forms beneath the water, with the sea frothing white over them. We steered confidently for blue water, and in ten minutes Meteor would range up under Royal Stilwell’s stern.
“Load the guns!” Oakeshott cried. “Grape on top of roundshot!”
Meteor’s guns were a miscellaneous collection of weapons, almost a history of artillery, from the old iron breechloaders on the forecastle, welded iron bars hooped together like barrels, to modern demiculverins, three on each side, that took pride of place in the middle of the lower gundeck. Meteor carried thirty-two guns in all, but half of these were small pieces, minions, falcons, and falconets, that were known commonly as murderers or mankillers. The minions, which shot a four-pound ball, were old fieldpieces mounted on carriages with large wheels; but the smaller of these weapons were mounted on swivels and were fixed above the bulwark.
The old iron forecastle guns sat on wooden blocks that rested on the deck and would dig a trench in the planks when fired, others were field guns lashed to the ports, and some had proper naval gun carriages with four small wheels. The immobile guns had to be loaded by men hanging outboard, and this took time; so it was important that the first broadside be effective, because with the great miscellany of weapons, and ammunition and powder charges of different sizes, any subsequent shots would of necessity be more ragged.
“Run out the guns!” Oakeshott cried, and the gunports creaked open. Those guns with proper carriages were hauled up the slanting deck, and the rest made ready as well as they could. Quoins were driven beneath the breeches to bring the barrels level with the sea, and then the decks fell silent, and for a long moment we heard only the sound of the sea swirling along the ship’s side, the keen of wind in the rigging, and the slap of waves on the bow.
I went to the weather side of the quarterdeck and peered out at Royal Stilwell. She had rolled so far onto her starboard side that her larboard battery pointed only at the sky, and the starboard guns stared point-blank at the water. Nevertheless, the crew had tried to make ready for us—the boats were bobbing unmanned alongside, the sailors having been recalled; and I could see handgunners crowding the taffrail, to welcome us with a volley of small shot.
Oakeshott put up the helm a trifle, to draw us right across the enemy’s stern, and backed the fore topsail so that its canvas thundered in the wind, great cracking booms that provided a foretaste of the gunfire to come.
At the sound, I felt my own spirits give a leap, and suddenly my heart crashed louder than the canvas. I stood stock-still at the bulwark and watched the enemy ship come closer, the sun glittering on the helmets and hackbuts of the men who waited to receive us, and suddenly there seemed not enough air in all the world to fill my lungs, and the seascape seemed t
o whirl in my head.
There was a bang from the enemy quarter, and I gave a convulsive shudder at the sound. The lead ball buzzed like a bee over my head, and then I heard the voice of an enemy officer as he admonished the overeager marksman.
“Take your places!” This came from our soldiers’ captain, and the two ranks of handgunners came to the bulwark, crowding about me in their breastplates and helmets. The brimstone odor of slow-matches spiced the sea air. I felt a hand clap my shoulder and draw me out of the press, and I turned to see Kevin.
“Be not so eager!” he said. “Let the soldiers have their turn!”
“Oh, ay, very well,” I muttered, as if I grudged the handgunners their chance at glory, as if apprehension hadn’t seized me in its claws and half-paralyzed me where I stood.
“Fire as you bear!” called Oakeshott. The backed foretop slowed us perceptibly, so that we would cross the Stilwell’s stern at a slow walking pace, with plenty of time for each gun captain to take his aim.
Now there seemed an eternity between each throb of my heart, and over the shoulders of the soldiers I could see the enemy, the pale faces that stared down from the tall canted stern, and the royal arms, the quarterings of triton and griffin, that were carved above the great glittering expanse of the quarter galleries and stern windows. One of the windows was open, and a great hawser passed out of it, leading to a kedge anchor that one of the ship’s boats had dropped astern—but with the water so low, they would have to wait hours yet for a chance to kedge the ship off.
“Present your pieces!” called an officer, and for a moment I did not know whether the voice came from our ship or that of the enemy, but then I heard a rustle and clatter from Royal Stilwell as their soldiers’ hackbuts were leveled to sweep our decks, and my heart gave a lurch as I knew that we were about to be fired upon.
Then the first of our old iron breechloaders went off in the forecastle, and I heard a crash as the ball lodged home in the enemy ship. Firing right into their stern in this fashion, our iron shot could travel the length of the enemy vessel, rending crew and wreaking havoc as they flew.
The guns went off one after the other. At this range they could not miss, and through gushing clouds of white gunsmoke I could see splinters of wood and showers of glass flying from the enemy stern. There was a rattle of enemy hackbuts in reply, and once again I was paralyzed where I stood, not unwilling to act but unable, in the din and flying shot, to think what I might do. The Stilwell’s response was drowned out by our own cannon fire. The first rank of our soldiers replied, then fell back to let the second rank take their shots. The wind blew drifts of cloud into my face.
Then we were past, and there was silence again for perhaps two seconds before the officers and gun captains began shouting at the crews to reload. The fore topsail filled with wind again, and Meteor increased speed, the water foaming under the counter. The soldiers fell back from the bulwark and began plying their powder flasks and ramrods, and men with sponges hung outboard to swab out the guns that were lashed to the ports.
I was jostled again by the soldiers, and found myself on the lee poop by the taffrail, and so I watched Royal Stilwell as the gunsmoke streamed away downwind, and the ship was revealed. The quarter galleries were smashed, no glass remained in the stern windows, and the royal arms had suffered badly. But flags still flew from the foretop and the stump of the main, and as the deck was tilted toward me by the ship’s list, I could see the enemy soldiers busy reloading while the officers dashed about to survey the damage. I saw also limp bodies, for our murderers had wreaked fine execution with grapeshot.
We ourselves seemed to have suffered no loss, at least on the quarterdeck where I stood.
I watched the enemy fall away for at least a quarter league, and then I heard Oakeshott’s powerful voice, amplified to a vast echo by his leather speaking trumpet.
“Ready about! Stations for stays!” And then, to the timoneer, “Full and bye!”
We fell off the wind about half a point and our speed increased. I tried to work out where the sail-handlers would have to run, and then to station myself so as to keep out of their way. I found myself standing next to Kevin.
“We’re tacking?” I asked. “Is it not safer to wear the ship, when we have been in action and there is danger the rigging may have been damaged?”
“They fired no weapon that could damage the rigging,” said Kevin. “Ay, there is a chance that we will be caught in stays, but Oakeshott is a thorough captain, and the crew is well drilled. Remember that I have been on this ship longer than you, and know well its temper.”
I looked to leeward and saw plenty of blue water, and realized we were in little danger.
“Ease her down!” Oakeshott called to the helm. The timoneers drew on the whipstaff and Meteor began to turn into the wind. The lateen over my head was braced up to windward, to push the stern around, and I heard canvas flapping forward as the spritsail sheets were let go.
“Helm’s a-lee!” called one of the timoneers, and Oakeshott immediately echoed the words through his speaking trumpet.
The topsails rattled as they began to lift, then thundered as they spilled wind. Suddenly, where I stood at the taffrail, there was no wind at all, and the lateen over my head flapped a few times and fell limp. Oakeshott stood at the break in the poop, watching the sails with a critical eye. Then he threw one arm in the air as if calling the heavens to his aid, and his voice boomed over the silent ship.
“Haul taut! Main tops’l haul!”
Men came running aft with the main braces, then stopped short as the braces took the full weight of the big yards. The sailors’ bare feet dug into the planks, and they threw themselves almost level with the deck as they dragged the yards around. Orders came fast.
“Right the helm! Shift over the spritsail sheets! Shift the mizzen sheets!”
Meteor turned neatly on its heel, and suddenly the main topsail lifted and filled. The lateen yard was run ’round the mast, and the sail filled with a sharp crack. The fore yards were braced around, and now we were on the starboard tack, the water hissing and gurgling beneath the counter. My heart lifted, and I wanted to cheer.
Kevin looked at me with a bright smile on his face, and I knew he felt the same joy and relief as I. “That was well done!” I told him.
“Oakeshott is brilliant at working up a crew,” he said.
“I know that we are enacting my own scheme,” I confessed, “but at this moment I’m feeling rather superfluous.”
“So am I,” said Kevin.
“But you are part owner of the vessel,” said I. “Were you to give a command, they would be obliged to hear you, if not perhaps to obey. Whereas I am of no use in this business whatever, except perhaps to take a bullet that might otherwise strike a more useful man.”
“Try to stay out of everyone’s way,” Kevin advised.
“There seems to be no safe corner on a ship of war,” I said. “For a perilous moment, I regretted my decision to forego Sir Basil’s armor.”
“Armor yourself with hope,” Kevin said, “for I think we’re going to make a great prize this day.”
Oakeshott’s decision to tack meant we were coming right at Royal Stilwell without losing way—if we had worn ship instead, we’d have had to fight our way into the wind to get close to our target, and lost time. The next broadside was a repetition of the first, Meteor crossing below Stilwell’s stern at point-blank range, and a thorough hammering to which the enemy could only reply with small arms. This time, as the murderers on the poop deck were loaded, I saw that the powder came premeasured in bags, not ladled into the mouth of the gun as the Cannoneers had with Roundsilver’s guns. It seemed a practical innovation, the more so because the dangers of using powder on a crowded deck, and with all the gun-captains and soldiers carrying lit slow-matches, seemed all too obvious.
As soon as the guns were loaded, Oakeshott tacked again, and then we repeated the exercise twice more, for a total of six broadsides delivered into S
tilwell’s increasingly battered stern. Stilwell’s small arms fire grew increasingly feeble, but scored a few hits, and some wounded hands were sent below to the orlop, where the ship’s barber and the carpenter, between them, would do their best for them.
For myself, I became somewhat used to being shot at, and missed.
The tide was coming in strongly, a stir of white foam flooding up Stilwell’s sides, but there was not nearly enough water on the bar to tip the ship upright, let along refloat her. We had hours yet.
We came about for the sixth time, and as we gained way on the larboard tack, we heard from our pilot, Foster, who had gone into the foretop early in the voyage and not come down.
“I cannot see their boats!” he called. “I think they have manned their boats, and are hiding them on the starboard side, and mean to board us as we come by!”
Which seemed to me a desperate endeavor, though I suppose desperation was all the enemy had left. An inspection with our glasses showed that the boats, which had been bobbing about Stilwell like a pack of hounds about a huntsman, had indeed disappeared from sight. Oakeshott laughed and let Meteor fall slightly off the wind, and he passed word to the gun captains concerning what was afoot. So, we crossed Stilwell’s stern over a cable’s length away, and the boats were forced to charge across a gap of open water that our shot soon filled with leaping white feathers. Half the boats were destroyed, and we left the rest far astern.
While the crew busied themselves with reloading and getting ready to put the ship about, I had nothing to do, so I took a long glass from the wreck and studied the enemy. I watched as the surviving boats pulled as many of their comrades from the water as they could, then returned to Royal Stilwell. Crew climbed, or were carried, from the boats into the great galleon, and then the boats, with a few men still aboard, pulled away. I thought that perhaps they would try to board us again, but instead I saw masts rising on the boats, and sails blossoming.
“They’re in flight!” I cried, and everyone rushed to the taffrail to watch the boats as they scudded away to the south. Even from a quarter league away we could hear the groans and angry shouts of the crewmen who had been abandoned on the galleon, and through the glass I could see fists raised in anger.
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