by Jan Needle
Once down there, he was seized with cold despair. He had never seen a ship on fire, but it was far more awful than he could ever have imagined. What glims there were were merely glowspots in the filthy murk, while heat attacked him in great waves, stopping his breath, searing his eyeballs.
One way and another, he had lately spent a most unusual time down in these depths, and by feel and guesswork found his way into the cockpit, which was not, thank God, where the fire had been raised. For the last few feet his guidance was the keening wails of the shock-head boy.
Simpson showed no surprise at all to see him. His legs and torso were still tightly bound, but somehow or other he had managed to free his hands. Close to, Raven saw that they were torn and bloody, and his bottom lip was bitten through.
‘You’ve come then, Craven Raven.’ His voice had a sardonic note, but there was no humour in his eyes. ‘Your knife, sir. Cut the boy free first, and may I beg you to be smartish. It is not a well boy, sir, his lungs ain’t of the best.’
Indeed, the boy looked close to death. The keening noise was low and fading, his eyes had rolled back in his head. Thick smoke was gushing along the deck like a tidal bore, two-feet deep now, blacker and more acrid.
Raven had to fumble for his knife. He began to cough, and each cough, drawing more smoke into his mouth and nose, cut his ability to think and move. In the end, Simpson snatched it from him, cutting his fingers yet again. He reversed it, began to saw at the bonds around his son. Raven, almost helpless, retched bitter phlegm and fluid.
Not only smoke was overwhelming them. Behind the blackness, flashes of vivid red and orange tore through the clouds, illuminating the deckhead and the passageways. Tar was boiling, melting, and running down the sides, while tongues of fire flickered in the gaps between the planks.
The big man jerked his son out of the final bonds, then slapped him hard across the face. Eyes and mouth both opened as the boy was pushed forward into Raven’s arms.
‘Take him, sir! Please save him for me. I fear he cannot help himself.’
‘But Simpson —’
Something small and flaming, perhaps a drop of pitch, fell from the deckhead onto the boy, whose hair burst instantly to fire. Simpson reached over to try and beat it out, but his bonds restrained more movement.
‘Go, sir. Go.’
The boy was sobbing as Raven took his arm. When he had been dragged about ten feet he realised what was happening and punched at Raven’s face, scratched at him, and tried to pull him back into the cockpit.
‘Go!’ Simpson shouted. ‘I’ll save myself but give me room! Mr Raven, I am begging you.’
Raven felt that he might sob. He forced his hands behind the boy’s head, jerking and pulling without mercy. The stink of blazing wood was mixed with the viler smell of melting hair. It leapt and crackled sparks into his hands, and his own hair sparked in sympathy.
The boy was screaming now, trying to get back to his father, overwhelmed by Raven’s force. As they reached a downdraught of fresh air, he tried one more feeble punch, then fell limp. He did not hit the deck, for the midshipman had an arm around him, underneath the shoulder. The downdraught became a rising gush of flame, and Raven scuttled up a dozen steps with the burden clamped to his chest and stomach.
‘You are on fire, sir.’ The voice was shaking and bemused. It was Ross, the young midshipman. He dragged them clear onto the deck, then disappeared into a swirl of smoke.
Missiles were raining from aloft. Raven saw one man hit by a runnel of molten lead, watched his face distort in agony. Others tried to dodge strips of burning canvas, others yet were felled by falling yards and blocks. The As de Pique was full ablaze from end to end, with each mast a column of fire, some pale, some garish. The noise was groans and shrieks and crackling as the fire roared to where it next could feed.
No gunshots, though, or clashing blades. An enemy had triumphed, but that enemy was not man. And Charlie Raven, dropping the boy at his feet, turned to the companionway and threw himself below.
He had one duty now, that would not be denied. He would go and save the life of Sawdust Simpson.
But then the magazine blew up.
Chapter Sixteen
Raven, when he came round, was drowning. The first sight that met his eyes was a gigantic pyre of flame, the noise he heard was screaming, and when he opened his mouth and breathed in again cold water blocked his throat. He gagged, but went under water, he was incapable of staying up.
As he began to thrash hopelessly, he felt one shoulder seized, then a hand attempt to lock into his hair. His head was jerked upwards and back, and suddenly he was able to take in breath. It was wonderful. He filled his lungs with desperate power, and his instincts then took over. Unlike many seamen, Charlie Raven was a swimmer and it saved his life. Within seconds he knew the greater danger was from heat.
He was six feet or less from the frigate’s side, and it was a mass of blazing wood and tar. As the hull settled in the water, it fizzed and popped along the waterline, with balls of pitch projecting boiling fire as they burst.
Above him was a vision straight from hell. Only the mainmast stood upright, but the foremast, what was left of it, formed a blazing triangle as it crashed, dropping burning materials to the deck.
Worst of all, he could see the human forms in the fire, howling as they ran, seeking a way overboard. Those who made it to the bulwark came across like elongated fireballs, arms and legs and heads discernible. As they hit the sea, both flames and screams were snuffed.
There was too much smoke for Raven to see much more around him, but he knew it all. The ship’s powder had exploded and the ship was doomed. God only knew how few or many could survive.
On board the As de Pique, there was in fact more hope. It was not the main magazine that had ignited, but a smaller store that had been moved in the course of the repair work she was undergoing. Many men, including Swift and Bullen, had survived, as had a fair number of both crew and Scilly islanders. Midshipman Ross, however, had not. His ma and pa would never know his new maturity.
And far across the bay, came another sound that raised some spirits if not everyone’s. A naval gun was fired, but not in anger. Swift could not make a ship out yet, but it was coming from the east. A signal gun for certain. Hector Maxwell had returned.
His optimism was immediately confirmed. To the dismay of many struggling in the water, the Scilly gigs began to break away. They had already rescued many of their men, but the more helpless were left to Navy mercies.
But there were other boats in the question, Raven realised. As his vision cleared he saw a yole he recognised as French, which must be there to save the Frenchmen who had been snatched from their own coast days before. Had he been able, he would have also seen a frigate in the southern offing. The As de Pique’s consort that had escaped the cutting out.
The yole had done her work, and was raising a single lugsail hurriedly. There were many men on board her, some badly hurt, and she would also have heard the Pointer’s gun. But as she began to slip away, a shrieking voice emerged from behind a piece of floating wreckage.
‘Messieurs! Amis! Sauvez moi! Sauvez mon père! Nous sommes amis!’
He was invisible to Raven, but there could be no doubt. The shock-haired boy he had assumed dead, was in the water, calling to be saved. The French seamen in the yole looked round, responded, started to pull back.
‘Mon père! Mon père! Vous devez le sauver! Mon père!’
Raven felt ineffably sad. His father could not be saved, tied up down below on the orlop deck. He thought to swim across to help the boy, but he was too late.
Above him, at the frigate’s broken rail, an awful sight appeared. A giant of a man, blackened, crushed, diminished stood rocking, almost naked. His hair was gone, his beard was gone, much of his skin, perhaps, was gone. He could still bellow, though.
‘Papa is here,’ he shouted. His voice had not diminished, nor was it crushed. He sounded, for all the world, like the spirit of
great joy.
Through the flame and smoke Sawdust Simpson launched himself towards his son, entering the water with an almighty splash. Within a second they were wrapped in a hard embrace. Within ten seconds the yole had come to them. Strong arms reached down for the father, who had no strength left at all. He was massive, incapable of helping himself, a dead weight entirely.
As he was dragged across the gunwale, more hands made to seize the small, light, boy. And on board the As de Pique there was another mighty bang, and the burning mainmast shook like a blasted tree. Then it tottered, broke its burning shrouds, and fell.
There seemed few screams left among the survivors, but a concerted movement to get overboard. Raven, almost to his surprise, was missed again by all the falling debris, but the rescue-yole was not. A piece of timber struck the gunwale and nearly pushed it underwater. Crewmen leapt to the other side to act as counterweight, and the overloaded boat rolled heavily. The boy was washed sideways by the shifting water, and disappeared.
Raven dived towards him, then dived under the surface and seized him by his hair. The boy struggled, and more debris smashed into the water all around them. By the time they reached the surface, the yole was yards away and her mainsail had caught a gust from the explosion. She buried her stern and creamed away from the burning vessel like a racehorse.
The boy was screaming, and the sinking ship seemed determined to roll them under. Raven began to kick away, still gripping the boy. Within moments the yole was lost in smoke and chaos. Both of them swam now, not to try and catch it but to avoid being sucked down in the swirling water.
In the new harsh light from the blazing frigate, Charlie Raven discerned the Pointer drawing near. She had another warship with her, a handsome brig, and boats were racing out ahead of them to save the drowning men.
Although the boy fought, there was no way of avoiding rescue. Not many minutes later both he and Raven were dragged into a cutter, which, already full, turned round to meet the mainland flotilla. They were handed up on board with all the other casualties, and Raven, wrapped up in a blanket, was taken aft, as befitted a young gentleman. The shock-haired boy, howling like a banshee, got shorter shrift. Try as he might, shout as he did, Charlie did not see the going of him.
Chapter Seventeen
It was three days before Raven was interviewed by Captain Hector Maxwell. It would doubtless have been earlier, except for two key things: first Lieutenant Stewart fought robustly to stop the captain’s casual cruelty; and secondly the Pointer was in a hot pursuit.
When they had rescued all the men they could off As de Pique – it was not many, for most who could still move had chosen the English Channel as their preferred location if they had to die – they pulled back clear in case of more explosions.
She was quite gone, however, without the bottom needing to fall out. Like some fine bonfire she blazed and crackled for not more than half an hour after everyone had quit, then slowly and majestically bubbled and groaned her way beneath the surface. A stump of mast was the last thing seen, a sort of festive burning bush.
The Scilly gigs had disappeared like wraiths, but Bullen, still glued to his telescope on board the Pointer as disaster followed disaster, had caught a sight of canvas he bet his mother’s honour would be French.
‘They’ve run us down at last,’ he said to Maxwell. ‘I know those headsails from the last time I was over there. Maybe she went cruising and the islanders have sought her out. All in it together, these Free Trade swine.’
‘Well, we’ve got her this time,’ Maxwell responded. ‘Mr Stewart, set everything you can, rouse out every man whose arsehole is not a mystery to his elbow! Mr Gunner, there’ll be hot work presently. Bullen, set on that smug youth Ross to whisk a message over to our escort. Tell her captain —’
‘He’s dead, sir. I’m sorry, Mr Ross is dead.’
‘Well find somebody else then! Before God, man, can you do nothing without a quibble?’
Within ten minutes both ships were under way to try and catch the Frenchman. But even from the masthead she could no longer be picked up. A haze had risen on the water, and visibility was bad and failing. None of which made Hector Maxwell’s temper any better. They ranged across the channel like a pair of hunting dogs, the fast brig making wide swoops ahead and to the sides of Pointer’s course.
Two sunrises later, though, they gave up the pursuit. Maxwell, in a filthy temper, caused the signal to be made, and a course was set back to the Scilly Islands, where he promised bitterly that justice would be done. By justice, as far as any man could see, he meant slash and burn, an orgy of Cromwellian laying waste. He had convinced himself, if no one else, that the law in England would back him to the hilt, however hard he came down on the miscreants.
It was in this bitter spirit that he called for Raven to be carried from the sickbay to answer for his sins. Raven, in fact, could fairly walk by now, although hardly an inch of him was without cuts and abrasions. Without a by-your-leave, he asked the first question of the captain, not vice versa.
‘The boy, sir? Where is the boy? He is not a Frenchman, that is just his language. He is not as other boys are, and I fear, sir, he is touched.’
Maxwell, strangely, did not explode. In fact he gave a little laugh, amused by such impertinence.
‘The boy, sir. You hanker after him, do you? Well, I am not surprised, know you as I do. And let me put your mind at rest. He is my servant now, and under my command and care. I have cut his hair off, but beyond that no one shall misuse him any more.’
Raven was wrong-footed. And before he spoke again, Maxwell stuck in another oar.
‘You are my quandary, Craven Raven, not some odd-shaped boy. You are a traitor, some might say, others might argue an outright mutineer. You have aided and abetted that villain Simpson, and there is still some question as to how he got out of this alive. He was bound and gagged below decks, and there is talk among the people that you cut his bonds. Where is your knife, sir? I am told it’s not been found. You have spoken French to them, you had gone below just as the fire broke out. Give me one reason why I should not have you hanged?’
They were alone in the great cabin. Clearly, no one else was meant to hear this intercourse. Raven felt his face begin to burn, and as his colour rose, so did Maxwell’s smile.
‘You are my sister’s son,’ the captain said. ‘Your father is a disgrace to her, and so are you. Question is, would it be better to be the uncle of a live poltroon, or a strangled traitor? What do you think?’
No answer was expected, Charlie Raven guessed. Certainly, no answer came to mind. He wondered, almost idly, how long he could survive. On this ship, in this company, with Maxwell as his master. That he’d spoken French was the latest accusation, another bitter pill. It was a language the captain loved to dabble in, but clearly did not know. Not even that the As de Pique was the Ace of Spades.
Sawdust Simpson, it slipped into his mind, called Maxwell mad. He was sailing them towards the Scilly Isles to wreak more madness on the population.
He wondered if Simpson had reached France yet, and if so, whether he would come back to seek the captain out. To see if his son still lived, to see what sort of treatment he was getting. In short, to gain revenge. Sooner or later, Raven thought, it was inevitable.
But in the meantime, he must survive. He thought of poor, fat Edward Ross, his fellow midshipman – who had not. The chaplain had already gathered up his few possessions, which included letters to and from his parents, and a squashy toy that might have been his sister’s; maybe not. Raven’s lot, he guessed, would be to write yet more to them, to tell them tales of heroism, and duty well fulfilled. He hoped that Ross had drowned, or perhaps been cleanly shot. The alternative, in his mind’s eye, was terrible. A melting mass of burning, stinking flesh.
Back in the sick berth, barely keeping consciousness, he felt at times he had been dealt the death card. Truly.
Maxwell was his uncle. He was also surely mad…
If you enj
oyed The Death Card you might be interested in Nelson: The Poisoned River by Jan Needle, also published by Endeavour Press.
Extract from Nelson: The Poisoned River by Jan Needle
One
Timothy Hastie, surgeon’s mate, had come ashore at the Palisades with a certain air of relief. His ship, the frigate Hinchinbrook, had been ranging the Caribbean for long enough to have brought her people to the point of disaffection. They had seen action only of the most unsatisfactory kind, and news was that they had missed the chance of prize money worth at least one million. And the man he looked on as his sole charge and responsibility was sick again. One day, he feared, he would be mortal sick.
As they brought up and rounded to the jetty that the port command had indicated, that officer, Horatio Nelson, was standing tense and upright as a ramrod – albeit a shortish one – supporting himself with a hand upon the rail. His yellowish wig was a shade askew, and Hastie could see sweat beaded on his skin. He could get no closer; they were on the hallowed quarterdeck, but he could see the suffering on the ravaged face.
Within a minute, happily, the first lines were ashore, and the captain signalled to the sailing master that all was now in his hands. Tim Hastie moved briskly up to Nelson’s side, and laid a hand upon his blue-clad arm. Beneath the cloth he felt it shaking. But Nelson stayed upright, and he smiled.
‘God, Timothy. Maybe the men ashore are right and you are wrong. Your medication is leaving me a wreck.’
In the bustle of docking, the surgeon’s mate was able to move in closer to support him, and use his own weight to direct him down below. The first lieutenant, who was a clever man, moved in for consultation, then moved out once more. Tim Hastie nodded to him. Good man.