"Haulin'!" Half a dozen throats spoke at once. She was hauling her wind, falling away from the wind to take it abeam, trying for almost due North! And the taut fullness of her main-course over the middle of her gun-decks was bagging, gone flaccid as it was brailed, buntlined and clewed up. So it wouldn't catch fire when she fought!
"Mister Knolles, haul us two points free, and ease the braces," Alan ordered. "But be ready to come back on the wind when I say so. Mister Crewe?" he called to the Master Gunner below.
"Aye, sir?"
"Ready with starboard broadsides. Load with chain, bar and star shot. Quoins out, and aim for his rigging!" Lewrie chortled. Being alee of their foe had one advantange: His windward guns would be elevated higher than the frigate's, which would be firing her larboard battery, the lee side… the canted-over, low side. Even with her quoins fully out from beneath the guns' breeches, they could not reach quite so far.
He looked astern. Pylades and Lionheart were only three miles back now and close-hauled as dammit, coursing along on the razor's edge of the wind with frothy moustaches of foam under their bows, intenton closing to pistol-shot range. He'd have help soon if they got into trouble. Though he didn't plan on letting this Frenchman best him.
"A point higher, sir. Sidle up and close the range." Lewrie fretted, pacing the starboard bulwarks, from the gangway ladder near the trunk of the main mast, to abeam the wheel-drum. "Wait for it, Mister Crewe! Pick your moment when we round up!"
The frigate was on Jesters starboard quarter now, as if she had become the pursuer, not the pursued. But she had Myrmidon alee on her larboard, abaft of abeam. Lewrie thought Fillebrowne a knacky fellow-he could have pressed on, crossed her stern, got off a quick raking broadside and rushed on to deal with the helpless merchantmen.
'Least he's stayin' to fight, Alan breathed in relief.
"Haulin'!" those half dozen commentators shouted once more. A change in aspect, as the frigate fell away even more off the wind, her gun-ports open and filled with black muzzles. She'd turn on Myrmidon first!
"For what they're 'bout to receive…" Spenser breathed from the helm, with Brauer and two mates now manning it.
"Better them than us'n," Mr. Tucker the Quartermaster's Mate completed.
Savage bellows, far deeper than the barks of a chase-gun, those Frog 18-pounders roared out, her whole side lit up and befogged by a well-timed broadside! Huge pillars and feathers of spray rose round Myrmidon, and her masts swayed drunkenly as she was struck, recoiling from the shock. Canted over, the frigate couldn't hope to dismast her with guns aimed high enough, except the 8-pounders on her quarterdeck; but the brutal shock might suit their purpose just as well.
"Close-haul, Mister Knolles! Get ready, Mister Crewe!" Alan screeched. "As she comes back on the wind!
"Ready… wait'll she steadies, lads! On the up-roll.. .fire!"
Jesters side turned orange for a moment, as nine 9-pounders went off as one, and a blinding torrent of spent sparks and powder-fumes burst into life, the gun-trucks growling like wounded swine as they lurched inboard 'cross the oak deck planking, to snub and groan at the full extent of the breeching-ropes spliced to the heavy iron ring-bolts in her sides.
"Stop yer vents! Swab out! Charge yer guns…!" Mr. Crewe was howling, at men who'd suddenly gone half deaf to the fierce but higher barking of the 9-pounders.
"Off the wind, Mr. Knolles. Two points free, again." "Aye, sir." Knolles coughed, turning his attention inboard after trying to see what damage they'd done.
As the smoke thinned and drifted off alee, Lewrie could espy some damage aloft aboard the frigate, which was rounding back up to lay closer to the wind. They'd caught her at a bad angle-for her, at any rate; almost forward larboard bows-on, their iron-mongery all aimed close together. She was missing her main and fore royal masts, high above the deck, and her fore t'gallant, and fore t'gallant stays'l were holed and flapping, ready to tear apart from the bolt-ropes! They'd crippled her!
More firing, as Myrmidon let loose with a broadside, at last. Terrier-like yips of anger, from those punier 6-pounders of hers on her gun-deck. Splashes and feathers of spray, close-aboard the enemy waterline, along her gunwales and chainwales.
"Ready, sir!" Crewe reported from the foot of the starboard ladder. "Disablin' shot, still, Cap'um."
"Very good, Mr. Crewe, we'll be rounding up shortly." He beamed back. Closer still, too; they were now well within Range-To-Random-Shot-less than a nautical mile! He watched the frigate go hard on the wind, to serve Jester a crushing broadside.
"Helm a'weather, Mr. Knolles! Haul our wind, and show them our stern!" Lewrie called. "Can't stern-rake us bad at that range!" "Aye aye, sir!"
Jester sagged down off the wind, showing the frigate her stern, making a slimmer target of herself, as a duelist would to expose less of himself to his opponent's pistol. The frigate's side lit up again, smothering her in a shoal of smoke.
"Steady, thus!" Knolles shouted, chopping his forearm to show the course, after a glance aft.
Spray, close-aboard, the fatal moaning and screeching of heavy shot as it missed the ship by inches, caroming off the wave-tops near the starboard side. More feathers of spray to starboard and larboard, first tall and impressive at First-Graze, then ricocheting past in a series of, bounds. And a quick, hard shudder, and the deadly thonk! of a ball striking/ester's sides. And another, a twisting yaw, as if the stern had been struck so hard it had been shoved alee by main force-with the thonk! of a hit followed by the parroty squawking Rrwwarkk! of shattering timbers and punctured planks.
"Helir alee, Mister Knolles. Lay us full-and-by. Mr. Crewe? Stand ready!" Lewrie barked, angry that his beautiful ship had been hit, and suddenly filled with a need for vengeance.
Up to the winds edge they swept again, the deck canting over hard before she steadied. Mister Crewe paced aft behind his gunners, judging the best moment, kneeling to peer out a gun-port. "Ready… on the up-roll! Fire!"
A monstrous jarring bellow of noise, the decks blotted out by an opaque, reeking fog. The deck shuddered in sudden recoil as she heeled once more.
The smoke cleared quickly as Mr. Crewe fisted and shoved his men to hasten their work, kept them hopping to stop their vents and swab out, to align the run-out tackle and recoil tackle, then begin to reload.
"Splendid, Mister Crewe! Serve 'em another!" Knolles cried, slamming his right fist into his left palm over and over.
They'd decapitated the French frigate! Now she was missing both fore and main royals entirely, and both fore and main t'gallant sails were flagging bits of shredded laundry. Lewrie eyed her with a telescope and saw ant-figures scurrying from her main top along the main-course yardarm to free the gaskets of that large sail, to restore the power she'd just lost. The frigate rode more upright on her keel, now they'd shorn her of that over-press of sail. Slower, unable now to scamper off to weather, she'd have to stand and fight. But, like a wounded bear, she'd be a more dangerous foe, with her guns at last firing level, not heeled over and limited in range.
"Avast, Mister Crewe!" Lewrie exulted. "Load with solid shot! We'll pass ahead of her and bow-rake her. Mister Knolles! Haul our wind again! Two points free, for a smaller target, while we reload."
"Aye aye, sir!"
And there was Myrmidon, off the frigate's larboard stern, with a broadside of her own that peppered the sea round her transom of a sudden, worrying at her flanks like a terrier.
And astern…! Lewrie turned to look aft. Lionheart and Pylades had almost leapt windward, as if conjuring themselves within one mile or so of Jester. They'd be in the thick of it soon!
Gunfire! Bags of it, as the frigate lit off a broadside, very ragged and irregular, still cocked up as close-hauled as her damaged sails would let her. Still aiming for Jester, to give as good as she got, and die game!
Shot-splashes towered from the sea, and Alan could see one dark darting ball come bowling up from First-Graze over the quarterdeck in a shrieking bound! Black and fearsome as it s
izzled past almost within arm's length, leaving a hot gust of wind that fluttered his coat.
The Thonk! and Rrwwarkk! of a hit that struck Jesters weak stern! Another squawking cry as another grazed her starboard side, but didn't penetrate, flinging a hen-coop's worth of fractured hull-planking over the quarterdeck bulwarks. The forward gangway bulwark seemed to burst to yet another hit, bulging inward but not breaking, yet flinging foot-long splinters about in a flurry of engrained dust and smoke. A waister from the starboard fore-braces was hurled off the gangway to the gun-deck, quilled like a porcupine!
And a last, shuddering Thonk-Rrwwarkk! as an 18-pounder shot smashed into her starboard side, down low, up forward, screaming in at over twelve hundred feet per second, and nothing could withstand that-no sloop of war ever built was made to take such a pounding.
"Bloody…!" Lewrie breathed, once he knew the last of that French broadside was done. The waister was clawing at his stomach, screaming high and rabbity as Mr. LeGoff the Surgeon's Mate and his loblolly boys came up from the fore hatchway with a carrying board. The waister's belly was pierced by almost a baulk of oak, groin pierced as well by less of a splinter, more like a two-by-four. LeGoff looked aft and shook his head to Lewrie s brow-cocked question; there was nothing to be done with a set of wounds like that. The Surgeons Mate turned his attention to those three other people-a Marine private and two seamen-who'd been splintered, but stood a chance.
"Mister Knolles, put her on the wind," Lewrie growled in rage. "Serve her the same… in bloody spades!"
"Helm alee, Quartermasters. Full-and-by!" Knolles obeyed.
"Wait for it, Mister Crewe!" Lewrie called, eying the range. They would almost be close enough to use the 18-pounder carronades on the forecastle and quarterdeck. His cox'n, Andrews, was gun-captain on one of them. He shared a look with him, and Andrews nodded, grim and ready. "Double-shotted… a bow-rake!"
Far faster than the frigate now, which was hauling her wind to aim for Myrmidon, which had gotten up almost abeam, Jester would pass ahead of her at last. Faced with the danger of a bow-rake into her frailer curved bow-timbers, the frigate must turn up almost "in-irons" to the wind, or haul her wind alee even more, to avoid it.
"Ready, sir!" Crewe reported eagerly.
Only two cables off, Alan speculated; a toucher under five hundred yards. "Fire as you bear, Mister Crewe!"
"Right, lads! As you bear, hear me? As you bear.. .!" Crewe scampered forward to the Number One starboard-side 9-pounder. "Fire!"
Bowstring-taut flintlock lanyards were pulled as each cannon came level with the frigate's bows, even as she tried to wheel up to wind once more to avoid the fire, trying to take what was coming at an angle, so the balls wouldn't punch through but would carom off, sparing her bare gun-deck from sudden slaughter. Carronades bellowed with deep, coughing roars, the 9-pounder artillery barking, then more carronades went off from the quarterdeck as they sailed past. There were keener gun-slams somewhere off to starboard, unseen in the clouds of powder residue. It was Myrmidon, spared by Jesters actions from a close-range broadside that she would have had to tack to avoid. She fired her own broadside first, on a parallel course with the French frigate, adding to the carnage Lewrie most devoutly wished for.
And then the smoke thinned and blew alee, and Jester was out in the clear, to windward of the frigate at last. Lewrie turned to give her a scathing search, pleased by what he saw. Her beak-head rails and her figurehead were gone, the petty-officers' roundhouse by the focs'le bulkhead were starred with shot, and no one living stirred by her chase-guns or foresail sheets. Her fore-mast was canted over as if shot from its keel step.
"Damn knacky," he whispered. Myrmidon had put about in her gun-smoke, was swinging up 'cross the wind and rapidly falling astern of the frigate, to avoid that delayed broadside. She'd cross their stern and boot her up the arse with a stern-rake, into the bargain! Fillebrowne was a shrewd tactician, he had to confess.
"Sandwiched her, by God," Lewrie laughed.
"Or is that 'shrewsburied,' sir," Knolles drawled, even if he was a tad pinch-mouthed and pale from their hammering.
"Not you, too, Mister Knolles." Lewrie groaned.
"Stand on after the merchantmen, sir?" Knolles enquired.
"Aye, we'll take the left-hand'un, fine on our starboard bows," Mister Knolles," Lewrie decided, lifting his telescope to eye her and estimate how long it would take to catch her up. "Well leave t'other on the right hand for Myrmidon. Assuming Lionheart doesn't recall us?"
"Signal, sir!" Midshipman Spendlove shouted from the taffrail.
Lewrie frowned, wondering if Captain Charlton would need their presence to finish off the frigate. Was he the overly cautious sort?
"Our number, sir!" Spendlove read off, stepping up onto the signal-flag lockers and balancing with one hand about the larboard lanthorn post. " 'Pursue Chase More Closely,' sir!"
"Well, right, then." Lewrie sighed in relief. They'd begin the cruise with prizes. Another good omen, he thought.
"More, sir!" Spendlove shouted. "She sends… 'Well Done,' sir! Our number, and 'Well Done'!" he concluded proudly.
"Mister Crewe, secure the guns," Lewrie instructed the Master Gunner from the forrud quarterdeck nettings overlooking the waist and the still-smoking barrels. "And pass the word. The flag sends us a 'Well Done.' Pass the word for the Purser, too," he called down to the grinning, smoke-fouled sailors of his crew. "Small-beer to be served up, a mug a man. 'Tis thirsty work, beatin' the French, hey lads?"
That raised a cheer from them. There'd be prize money from a big French frigate. Hull and fittings, stores and guns might earn a total of Ј20,000, with them receiving an eighth-plus "head and gun money" for every seaman aboard, and each artillery piece. For battle, it had been relatively bloodless, too, barely a whit of what a real slaughter it might have been.
Mister Rees, their ship's carpenter, came up from the midships ladderway, brushing past the happy and relieved sailors, a look of some worry on his face, and Lewrie steeled himself for bad news.
"Hulled, sir," Mr. Reese reported at the top of the starboard quarterdeck ladder, doffing his knit cap. He was fairly young for his warrant, hawk-faced and eagle-beaked, but baked into premature middle age by a lifetime at sea, his dark Welsh complexion permanently bronze. "One int' yer great-cabins, sir, an' yer stern-lights all smash. One, alow that'un, Cap'um. Fish-room an' bread-room stores're scattered Hell t'breakfast… can't breathe down t'ere fer all t'biscuit-dust. Starb'd quarter scantlin's all smash, but nought below t'waterline. Forrud bulwark… but ye seen that'un, I guess, sir. A day's labour, in harbour, t're-plank, starb'd. Last'un, sir…" Rees said with a gleam in his eyes. "Clean puncture… t' rough t'surgery, sir."
"Good God, was anyone…?" Lewrie gawked. That was a shot in the orlop, below the waterline, even if…!
"T'surgeon, Mister Howse, sir…" Rees marveled. "Wearin' a clean set o' breeches, I'm told, Cap'um. Clean t'rough scantlin's, an' t'second futtock, caromed off t'berth-deck wale, int' t'orlop, an' jammed int' a knee-timber. Blieve t'gent'man collected himself a wee splinter'r two, sir, but all's well."
Lewrie found it very hard to hide a spiteful smile. He coughed to clear his throat and turned his gaze outboard. But he saw Rees in much the same predicament.
"Aye, Mister Rees, thankee for your report," Lewrie said. "Do you sound the well, though, just in case one lodged below."
"I'm on it, sir," Rees said, knuckling his brow and turning to go. Then here came Cony in his wake to make his report.
"Sir, we come through right fair," he related. "No riggin' in danger, no damage below th' waterline, no guns dismounted. I run into Mr. LeGoff, an' 'e toP me t'tell ya… three wounded. Marine Private Dykes… Landsmen Orick and Siler. 'T ain't too bad, consid'rin'. Be a few weeks o' light-duty, God willin', an' they'll be right as rain. Ord'nary Seaman Butturini, though, sir… well, 'e ain't got long."
"One of our Maltese seamen, aye." Lewrie sighed. It was such a short "butcher's bill"; but any
one was much too long. "Didn't see much hope for him right off. I s'pose you've a bottle of rum handy?"
"Well, o' course, sir," Cony said with a sad grin. "I'm th' Bosun, ain't I?"
"Him and his mates… see he goes comfortable, if you would," Lewrie told him. "I'd be obliged."
"Aye, sir. An' I'll tell th' sailmaker."
"Right." Lewrie nodded abruptly. It would be Mr. Paschal's duty to sew up a canvas shroud for Ordinary Seaman Butturini and be ready to stitch him into it, once he passed over; with a final stitch through the nose, so everyone would rest easy that he was really gone.
"Pity 'bout Mr. Howse, though, ain't it, sir?" Cony chuckled. " 'Eard-tell Mr. Buchanon swore they wuz blood on th' wind. Didn't think h'it'd be his, though. Why, 'tis enough t'put th' fear o' God in a man, Cap'um Lewrie, sir! Which god, now…"
"Get along with you, Mister Cony," Lewrie said with a smirk.
"Aye aye, sir." Cony grinned, doffing his plain cocked hat.
There was muffled gunfire astern. Lewrie turned to see that French frigate, now being engaged by Lionheart and Pylades, two miles or more alee. That wouldn't last long, he thought. Nor would those two merchantmen, which were clawing their way eastward, into the teeth of the wind, but too heavily laden to escape. It had barely gone two bells of the First Dog Watch-half past four p.m. They'd be up with the merchantmen they were chasing a little after sunset, he reckoned; and Myrmidon level with hers a bit before. Prize-money, and a handsome letter to Jervis-then the Admiralty-from Charlton for a plucky afternoon's work. So promising a beginning, aye… yet…
A man had died. One of their Jesters had died. And what sort of foreboding omen was that? Alan wondered.
CHAPTER 3
They were two big, fine three-masted ships, almost large enough to be mistaken for 4th Rate 50-gunners or very large but older two-deck frigates, and their arrival in the Austrian port of Trieste, with the British ensign atop their mizzen masts, might have led an observer on shore to think them part of a powerful squadron at first glance. A closer inspection, though, would have shown the French Tricolour flag flown lower, from their stern gaffs. Led by a pair of sloops of war, followed by two unmistakably British frigates, the six vessels swept into harbour about midday, their eighth on-passage, after calling for pilots beyond the bar, then standing off-and-on until someone in authority woke up and took notice of their arrival.
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