Fowler was yelling, 'Come back, sir! Quick, they're boarding us!'
Men were leaping down, already on to the sloop's deck, and while some ran towards the flames others groped through the billowing smoke firing pistols or slashing at wounded and living alike.
Bolitho saw a French seaman charging towards him and felt the wind of a ball past his cheek before he could release the pistol from his own belt. The weapon jumped in his hand and he saw the man swerve and scream, fingers clawing at his chest before he fell back into the smoke. He threw the pistol at another shrouded shape and then pulled out his sword. Still more figures appeared on the quarterdeck, their arms groping like blind men as they ran through the drifting curtain of smoke and ashes. Bolitho noticed vaguely that the clock was chiming again, but from a new angle, and realised that both vessels were now drifting together. Someone aboard the French ship had at last succeeded in cutting her cable, but as an extra powerful gust of wind momentarily cleared the smoke he saw tongues of flame leaping up her rigging and knew that it was already too late to save her.
The smoke dropped again in a choking cloud, and he heard the wind urging the flames along the sloop's deck, the sparks hissing skyward beyond the masthead. Around him men were fighting and yelling, their cries punctuated with the harsh clash of steel and the occasional crack of a pistol. He could feel the deck sagging beneath him, the very timbers vibrating as water poured into the listing hull. It was a race between fire and sea, and with her work done the Fairfax seemed eager to slide beneath the surface, if only to hide her misery and escape the destruction they had wrought upon her.
Fowler was back at his side, his sword shining in the leaping flames while he parried aside the blades as more Frenchmen appeared through the smoke.
He shouted above the din, 'We must leave the wounded, sir!' He lunged forward and down and a man toppled shrieking towards the bulwark. As he fell the deck at his back seemed to open and more searing flames spurted- between the charred planks so that he twisted like a carcase on a spit, his hair on fire, his cries lost in the terrifying roar of flames forced up from the deck below.
Bolitho stumbled and found that Seton still lay by the rail, his head pillowed on his arm as if asleep. The seaman who should have taken him to the gig had either fled or was already killed, and with something like madness Bolitho stood astride his body, his sword cutting down a charging seaman and swinging back to catch another who was struggling with Allday beside the wheel.
But the odds were mounting. It could not last much longer. It seemed as if the Frenchmen were so maddened by rage and despair that they were more intent on destroying the handful of British sailors than of saving themselves or their own ship.
Fowler dropped his sword and clapped his hands across his face. He cried wildly, 'Oh, Jesus! Oh, my God!'. And in the leaping flames the blood which poured across his neck and chest gleamed like black glass.
He droppped choking on his knees, and a French lieutenant, hatless and with his uniform coat scorched almost from his back, lunged forward to strike his unprotected head. Bolitho stepped forward, but caught his foot on a splintered plank and saw the officer's blade change direction, cutting through the air with all his strength. With one last effort Bolitho held his balance and instinctively threw up his left arm to protect himself. lie felt the blade jar against his forearm and sensed a numbing agony, as if he had been kicked by a maddened horse. The French lieutenant slithered sideways, thrown almost to the deck by the force of his attack,, and in the advancing fires his face shone like a mask, the eyes bright and staring as he watched Bolitho's sword scything above Seton's body, the razor-edged blade holding- the flames until the moment of impact. He did not even scream, but hobbled backward, his fingers digging at his belly, his back bowed as if in some grotesque curtsy.
Allday was shouting, `She's going, Captain!'
Bolitho blinked and tried to wipe the sweat from his eyes. But his arm remained at his side, and with a sense of shocked disbelief he saw the blood pouring down his side, soaking his leg and running across the deck at his feet. Dazedly he shook himself and stared towards the bows. The towering bank of flames had shifted to the Saphir, and he could see the furled sails and tarred rigging whipping out in fiery streamers, and other, smaller fires leaping aft urged on by the wind and burning everything they touched. Through the abandoned gunports the ship's interior glowed red like an open furnace, and as he watched he saw men .leaping blindly over the side, calling to one another or screaming pitifully as they were held and then ground to bloody pulp by the two blazing hulls.
But the sloop's deck was dipping rapidly, and from below he heard the hiss of seawater as it surged in triumph to quench the flames. The foremast had gone completely and he had not even noticed amidst the savagery of destruction and death around hire. Corpses lolled down the tilting deck, and a few wounded crawled whimpering away from the flames or made a last effort to reach the poop.
Allday shouted, `The gig is standing clear! Come, Captain, I'll help you over!'
Bolitho still stared around him, waiting to fight, to beat off another attack. But he was sharing the deck with corpses.
Allday yelled, 'There are no more! You've done for 'em!' Then he saw Bolitho's arm. 'Here, Captain! Take my hand!' They reeled together as the sloop wallowed heavily on to her side, the small deck guns tearing from their lashings to squeak across to the other bulwark or plunge hissing into one of the great fiery craters.
Bolitho spoke between his teeth, his face pouring with sweat as the pain reached up his arm like a pair of white-hot pincers. 'The boy! Get him, Allday!' Jerkily he thrust the sticky blade back into its scabbard and with his good arm pulled himself aft towards the taffrail while Allday picked up the unconscious midshipman and threw him across his shoulder.
He saw ONeil by the rail, naked to the waist as he wrapped his shirt around Fowler's face while the lieutenant rocked from side to side, his words choking on the cloth and in his blood.
The bargeman said, 'Oi done what Oi could, sorrl' He ducked as one of the sloop's guns exploded in the heat as if fired by some invisible hand. `The poor man has lost most of his face!'
Bolitho managed to croak, `There is the gig! We will have to jump for it!'
He hardly remembered falling, but was conscious of the salt rasping in his lungs, the cool air across his face as he broke surface. The gig seemed to tower above him, and there was Piper, his monkey face black with grime as he pointed with his dirk, his voice as shrill as a woman's.
'here's the captain! Hold him, you lads!'
Bolitho caught the gunwale and gasped, 'Help Mr. Fowler and Seton!'
The water was surprisingly cold, he thought vaguely, and when he looked up he saw that above the billowing smoke the sky was pale and devoid of stars, and the gulls which circled angrily high above the harbour were touched with gold. Not from the fires, but from the sun. While men had died and the ships had burned the dawn had crept across the distant horizon. He was even more astonished when he turned his head, for where the church tower should have been was the tall side of a headland and above it, gleaming white below its lantern, stood the beacon.
He bit back the pain as more hands hauled him inboard to lie panting beside Allday and the others. He wanted to close his eyes, to give in to the sweeping curtain of darkness which waited to ease his growing agony. To shut out the sounds of exploding gunpowder and the crash of falling spars as the Saphir started to settle down, her gunports already awash, her maindeck ablaze from stem to stern.
'How many have we lost?' He clutched at Allday's knee while Piper struggled to stem the blood on his arm. 'Tell me man!'
Allday's plain face was shining with frail sunlight and when he looked down at Bolitho he seemed somehow remote and indestructible. He said quietly, 'Never you fear, Captain. Whatever the cost, it was worth it to see this.' Then with Piper's help he lifted Bolitho's shoulders above the smoke blackened gunwale while the oarsmen rested on their looms and watched his face with a kin
d of awe.
The Saphir was almost gone and there was little left of the once proud ship. With the sloop she had drifted the full length of the harbour, and now gutted and blazing she was hard aground below the captured beacon.
But Bolitho had no eyes for her, nor even for the few pieces of flotsam bobbing on the current to mark the passing of the Fairfax's final remains. In the centre of the channel, with all but her topsails and jib clewed up, his ship, his old Hyperion was entering harbour. Her ports were open, and as she edged slightly towards the anchorage the dawn sunlight lanced along her double line of guns and painted her, rounded hull with gold.
Bolitho licked his dry lips and tried to smile as he saw Ashby's marines in a tight square across the quarterdeck and heard the faint strains from the ship's small band. It was faint because of the cheering.
Cheering from the men who lined the yards and those who waited to drop the great anchor. From the gunners in their bright head-scarves and the marksmen in the tops.
As the old seventy-four's shadow passed the severed boom he saw Inch standing in his cutter waving his hat, his voice lost in distance, but his pride and relief all the more obvious.
Allday said gently, 'Look yonder, Captain.' He was pointing to the headland where the artillery breastworks of raw earth and stones stood out like scars against the rain-soaked grass.
A flag had risen above the hidden guns, but not the Tricolour. It was pale and fragile and lifted easily in the dying wind, so that the sunlight showed clearly the golden insignia of the fleur-de-lis.
Allday said, 'You gave 'em their gesture, Captain! There is your answer!'
Fowler muttered thickly beneath the bloodied shirt. 'My face! Oh Jesus, my face!'
But Bblitho was looking once more at his ship as she swung sedately into the wind, her sails flapping like banners as the anchor splashed down within yards of the spot where the Saphir had been moored.
Boats were moving cautiously from the land, each with its royalist flag, and every one crowded with waving and cheering townspeople.
Allday said, 'Out oars! Give way together!' And to the boat at large added, 'They are coming to see the captain, lads!' Then he looked down at Bolitho and smiled. 'And so they
shall!'
13
RETURN TO COZAR
The barge crew tossed their oars and sat motionless on the thwarts as the boat slid neatly alongside the jetty where it was instantly made fast to the great rusting iron rings.
Bolitho gathered his cloak around him and stepped carefully on to the worn steps, then he stood for a few moments looking back at the crowded harbour. It was evening, and in the purple twilight the anchored ships looked at peace, even gay, with their twinkling lanterns and glowing gunports, the latter thrown open to clear the heat and humidity of the day. The flagship Tenacious anchored in the centre of the stream had strings of coloured lanterns along her poop, and as he stood on the old jetty Bolitho could hear some of her people singing one of the sad songs beloved by sailors the world over.
Now, looking round, it was hard to believe so much had happened, that at dawn this very day the Hyperion had sailed past the burning Saphir to take command of the port. He eased his arm painfully beneath his cloak and felt the stab of agony lance through him like fire. Without effort he could relive the sickening minutes as Rowlstone had cut the coat sleeve and shirt from the gaping wound, the blood pouring afresh as he had pulled the remnants of cloth from the deep slash left by the French lieutenant's blade. Tentatively he moved each finger in turn, gritting his teeth against the immediate pain, but thanking God that the surgeon had not found it necessary to amputate his arm.
Herrick climbed up from the boat and stood beside him. He said, 'It's difficult to grasp that we're in France, sir. The ships look as if they belong here.'
It was true. Within hours of Pomfret's squadron arriving in the inlet the transports had been unloaded, and gratefully the soldiers had formed up in the bright sunlight before marching through the town inland to the hills and to positions abreast the coast road. In addition to Colonel Cobban's infantry and a small detachment of light artillery there had been a thousand Spanish troops and a full squadron of their cavalry. The latter had looked resplendent and proud in their pale yellow tunics. On perfect horses they had cantered through the narrow streets, watched with fascinated awe by crowds of townspeople and cheered by the many children along the route.
But now the town was like a dead place, for as soon as the landing force had cleared the streets Pomfret had ordered a curfew. The narrow lanes, the bridge across the river and most of the main buildings were guarded by some of the two hundred and fifty marines landed by Pomfret's ships, and foot patrols moved constantly about the town to enforce his orders.
The boom across the entrance had not been replaced, but half a dozen guardboats rowed back and forth in regular sweeps, with the gutted hulk of the Saphir close by to remind them of the price of negligence and over-confidence.
Bolitho said, 'Carry on back to the ship, Allday. I will signal for the barge when I require it.'
Aiday stood in the boat and touched his hat. 'Aye, aye, Captain.'
He sounded worried, and Bolitho added quietly, 'I do not think that this visit will-be prolonged.'
It was strange how Allday fretted about him, he thought. Had he been present aboard the flagship when he had reported to Pomfret he might have been even more disturbed.
The admiral's reception had been cool, to say the least. He had listened in silence to Bolitho's account of the raid and the events leading up to it, his face completely expressionless.
Then he had said shortly, 'You take too much upon yourself! You knew my orders, yet you decided to act entirely on your own.' He had begun to pace the cabin. 'The French might have been trying to play a double game. All this socalled ardour for their dead king could be a mere tactic to delay our own operations!'
Bolitho had remembered Charlois, his desperate determination to warn him.
'Charlois gave his life, sir. I acted as I thought fit to prevent what might have been a military disaster and a great loss of life
Pomfret had regarded him searchingly. 'And you entered harbour first, Bolitho. Before me and the squadron. Very convenient!'
Bolitho had replied, 'I could not contact you in time, sir. I had to do what I did.'
There is a point when tenacity becomes stupidity!' Pomfret had not proceeded further with the matter for at that moment Captain Dash had entered to announce that the soldiers were ready to disembark.
Bolitho had been too weary, too sick with pain and effort to care about Pomfret's anger. Looking back, it seemed as if the admiral actually suspected he had planned and carried out his attack on the Saphir merely to gain favour, to grasp rewards for himself, even at the expense of losing his ship and every man aboard.
He said to Herrick, 'The admiral wishes all his senior officers to take wine with him. We had better make sure we are on time.'
They walked in silence along a narrow, cobbled lane where the houses on either side seemed to reach towards each other as if to touch.
Herrick said, 'How long will it be before the enemy launch an attack on the port, sir?'
'Who can say! But Cobban has his scouts around the town, and no doubt Sir Edmund intends to keep up his coastal patrols to watch the road from the north.'
He tried to keep his tone casual, but he could not put the feeling of disappointment to the back of his mind. Pomfret seemed to put a blight on everything. This curfew for instance. The townspeople had greeted the ships and soldiers like their own, had thrown flowers to the grinning redcoats, as if to show that they believed in what they had helped to start and would share the cost, no matter how hard it became.
And aboard the Hyperion the wild excitement had soonbeen pushed aside as Pomfret ordered the squadron to disembark troops and stores with a minimum of delay. Just one word from him would have made all the difference. Hyperion's raiding party had lost fifteen killed and missing,
with another ten badly wounded. Viewed against what would have happened had they failed to sink the Saphir it was a negligible amount. But in the ship's tight community it was still very personal and deeply felt.
Pomfret had shifted his flag ashore almost immediately, and as the two officers walked across a deeply shadowed square it became obvious that the admiral had chosen his new headquarters with no little care. It was the house of a rich wine merchant, a pleasant, wide-fronted building, with a pillared entrance and surrounded by a high wall. Cross-belted marines snapped to attention at the gates, and nervous-looking servants waited at the tall double doors to take the hats and cloaks as various officers arrived from ships and garrison alike.
Herrick watched gravely as Bolitho eased his bandaged arm more comfortably inside his dress-coat, noting the deep lines around his mouth, the dampness of sweat below the rebellious lock of hair.
He said at length, `You should have sent me, sir. You're not fit yet. Not by a long shot!'
Bolitho grimaced. 'And miss the chance of seeing this fine house? Certainly not!'
Herrick looked at the hanging tapestries, the rich glitter of perfectly matched chandeliers.
'Sir Edmund seems to find luxury adequate, sir.'
There was no hiding the bitterness in his tone, and Bolitho wondered if Herrick hated Pomfret for what he had once been in the past or for what he imagined he was doing now to his captain.
He smiled briefly. 'You will fall over that tongue of yours one day, Thomas!'
A bewigged footman threw open a door and as a British petty officer muttered in his ear called loudly, 'Captaine de vaisseau, M'sieu Boli . . .' He faltered, unable to complete it. The petty officer glared at him threateningly and then bellowed in a voice more suited to addressing foretopmen, 'Cap'n Richard Bolitho! Of 'Is Britannic Majesty's Ship Hyperionl'
Bolitho smiled and stepped into a long, panelled room. It seemed to be full of officers, both military and naval, and the buzz of noisy conversation died as every face turned towards him. Bellamy of the Chanticleer was the first to start clapping, and while Bolitho stood momentarily confused and off guard the clapping became cheering until the noise filled the building and spread to the quiet gardens outside where the sentries craned their heads to listen to the thunderous applause.
Form Line Of Battle! Page 23