Quarterdeck: A Kydd Sea Adventure

by Julian Stockwin

  The man recoiled, but met the side of the boat and fell against it. Mercilessly Kydd slashed out, his blade slithering along the top of his opponent’s to end on the man’s forearm. The Frenchman’s cutlass fell as he clutched at his bloody wound.

  ‘Je me rends!’ he shouted hoarsely. Kydd’s blade hovered at the man’s throat, death an instant away. Then he lowered it.

  ‘Down!’ he snarled, gesturing. ‘Lie down!’ The man obeyed. The blood mist cleared from Kydd’s brain and he snatched a glance around him. As quickly as it had started the brutal fight was ending. In the launch the three or four Frenchmen who had boarded were dead or giving up, and the bulk of the British were in the chaloupe, forcing back the remainder. The end was not far away.

  ‘Tell ’em t’ lie down!’ he yelled. ‘Don’t let the bastards move an inch!’

  High-pitched shouts came from the French boat; they were yielding. Kydd felt reason slowly return to cool his passions. He took a deep breath. ‘Secure the boats t’gether,’ he ordered, the bloodstained cutlass still in his hands.

  His body trembled and he had an overpowering urge to rest, but the men looked to him for orders. He forced his mind to work. ‘Poulden, into th’ Frogs’ boat and load the swivel.’ The petty-officer gunner was nowhere to be seen – he’d probably not survived.

  While Poulden clambered over the thwarts and found powder and shot, Kydd looked around. There was blood everywhere, but he was experienced enough in combat to know that just a pint looked mortal. The wounded men were being laid together in the widest part of the launch as Pybus climbed back in. When he caught Kydd’s eyes on him, he defiantly handed over a tomahawk – bloodied, Kydd noted.

  At Poulden’s call, the French were herded weaponless back into their chaloupe and the swivel brought round inside to menace the boat point-blank. ‘Hey, you, Mongseer!’ Kydd’s exasperated shout was lost on the sullen men in the boat. He turned to his own boat. ‘Any o’ you men speak French?’

  The baffled silence meant he would have to lose dignity in pantomime, but then he turned to the midshipman. ‘Rawson! Tell ’em they’ll be hove overside if they make any kind o’ false move.’ Let him make a fool of himself.

  Kydd realised he was still clutching his cutlass, and laid it down, sitting again at the tiller. His hip throbbed and his head gave intermittent blinding stabs of pain; it was time to return to Tenacious and blessed rest. He would secure the Frenchy with a short towline; they could then row themselves close behind under the muzzle of the swivel. He would send another three men to stand by Poulden.

  Pybus was busy with the men in the bottom of the boat. ‘So, we go home,’ Kydd said, searching around for the compass. ‘Now do ye remember what course . . .’

  Ashen-faced, Rawson held out a splintered box and the ruins of a compass card. With an icy heart Kydd saw that their future was damned. The wall of dull white fog pressed dense and featureless wherever he looked, no hazy disc of sun, no more than a ripple to betray wave direction. All sense of direction had been lost in the fight and there was now not a single navigation indicator of even the most elementary form to ensure they did not lose themselves in the vast wastes of the Atlantic or end a broken wreck on the cold, lonely Newfoundland cliffs.

  Kydd saw the hostility in the expressions of his men: they knew the chances of choosing the one and only safe course. He turned to Rawson. ‘Get aboard an’ find the Frenchy’s compass,’ he said savagely.

  The midshipman pulled the boats together and clambered into the chaloupe. In the sternsheets the man Kydd had bested held up the compass. Rawson raised his hand in acknowledgement, and made his way aft. Then, staring over the distance at Kydd with a terrible intensity, the Frenchman deliberately dropped the compass box into the water just before Rawson reached him.

  Disbelieving gasps were followed by roars of fury, and the launch rocked as men scrambled to their feet in rage. ‘We’ll scrag the fucker! Get ’im!’ Poulden fingered the swivel nervously: if they boarded he would no longer have a clear field of fire.

  ‘Stand down, y’ mewling lubbers!’ Kydd roared. ‘Poulden! No one allowed t’ board the Frenchy.’ He spotted Soulter, the quartermaster, sitting on the small transverse windlass forward. ‘Soulter, that’s your division forrard,’ he said loudly, encompassing half the men with a wave. ‘You’re responsible t’ me they’re in good fightin’ order, not bitchin’ like a parcel of old women.’

  ‘Sir?’ The dark-featured Laffin levered himself above the level of the thwarts from the bottom boards where he had been treated for a neck wound.

  ‘Thank ’ee, Laffin,’ Kydd said, trying to hide his gratitude. If it came to an ugly situation the boatswain’s mate would prove invaluable.

  ‘We’ll square away now, I believe. All useless lumber over the side, wounded t’ Mr Pybus.’ Smashed oars, splintered gratings and other bits splashed into the water.

  ‘Dead men, sir?’ There was a tremor in Rawson’s voice.

  Kydd’s face went tight. ‘We’re still at quarters. They go over.’ If they met another hostile boat, corpses would impede the struggle.

  After a pause, the first man slithered over the side in a dull splash. His still body drifted silently away. It was the British way in the heat of battle: the French always kept the bodies aboard in the ballast shingle. Another followed; the floating corpse stayed with them and did not help Kydd to concentrate on a way out of their danger. The fog swirled pitilessly around them.

  ‘Is there any been on th’ Grand Banks before?’ Kydd called, keeping his desperation hidden.

  There was a sullen stirring in the boat and mutterings about an officer’s helplessness in a situation, but one man rose. ‘I bin in the cod fishery once,’ he said defensively. Kydd noted the absence of ‘sir’.

  ‘Report, if y’ please.’ The man scrambled over the thwarts. ‘This fog. How long does it last?’

  The man shrugged. ‘Hours, days – weeks mebbe.’ No use, then, in waiting it out. ‘Gets a bit less after dark, but don’t yez count on it,’ he added.

  ‘What depth o’ water have we got hereabouts?’ It might be possible to cobble together a hand lead for sounding, or to get information on the sea-bed. He vaguely remembered seeing on the chart that grey sand with black flecks turned more brown with white pebbles closer to the Newfoundland coast.

  ‘Ah, depends where we is – fifty, hunnerd fathoms, who knows?’

  There was nowhere near that amount of line to be found in the boat. Kydd could feel the situation closing in on him. ‘Er, do you ever get t’ see th’ sun?’

  ‘No. Never do – like this all th’ time.’ The man leaned back, regarding Kydd dispassionately. It was not his problem. ‘Y’ c’n see the moon sometimes in th’ night,’ he offered cynically.

  The moon was never used for navigation, to Kydd’s knowledge, and in any case he had no tables. There was no avoiding the stark fact that they were lost. There were now only two choices left: to drift and wait, or stake all on rowing in a random direction. The penalty on either was a cold and lengthy death.

  ‘We got oars, we get out o’ this,’ muttered one sailor to stroke oar. There were sufficient undamaged oars to row four a side, more than needed; but the comment crystallised Kydd’s thinking.

  ‘Hold y’r gabble,’ Kydd snapped. ‘We wait.’ He wasn’t prepared to explain his reasons, but at the very least waiting would buy time.

  The fog took on a dimmer cast: dusk must be drawing in. Now they had no option but to wait out the night. Danger would come when the cold worked with the damp of the fog and it became unendurable simply to sit there.

  In the chaloupe the French sat tensely, exchanging staccato bursts of jabber – were they plotting to rise in the night? And now in the launch his men were talking among themselves, low and urgent.

  He could order silence but as the dark set in it would be unenforceable. And it might cross their minds to wait until it was fully dark, then fall upon Kydd and the others, claiming they had been killed in the f
ight. The choices available to Kydd were narrowing to nothing. He gripped the tiller, his glare challenging others.

  For some reason the weight of his pocket watch took his notice. He’d bought it in Falmouth, taken by the watchmaker’s claims of accuracy, which had been largely confirmed by the voyage so far. He took it out, squinting in the fading dusk light. Nearly seven by last local noon. As he put it back he saw derisive looks, openly mocking now.

  Night was stealing in – the fog diffused all light and dimmed it, accelerating the transition, and soon they sat in rapidly increasing darkness.

  ‘All’s well!’ Laffin hailed loyally.

  ‘Poulden?’ Kydd called.

  ‘Sir.’ The man was fast becoming indistinct in the dimness.

  As if to pour on the irony the dull silver glow of a half-moon became distinguishable as the fog thinned a little upward towards the night sky. If only . . .

  Then two facts edged from his unconscious meshed together in one tenuous idea, so fragile he was almost afraid to pursue it. But it was a chance. Feverishly he reviewed his reasoning – yes, it might be possible. ‘Rawson,’ he hissed. ‘Listen to this. See if you c’n see a fault in m’ reckoning.’

  There was discussion of southing, meridians and ‘the day of her age’ and even some awkward arithmetic – but the lost seamen heard voices grow animated with hope. Finally Kydd stood exultant. ‘Out oars! We’re on our way back, lads.’

  They broke free of the fogbank to find the convoy still becalmed, and away over the moonlit sea the silhouette of a 64-gun ship-of-the-line that could only be Tenacious.

  A mystified officer-of-the-watch saw two man-o’-war boats hook on as the missing Kydd came aboard. At the noise, the captain came out on deck. ‘God bless my soul!’ Houghton said, taking in Kydd’s wounds and empty sword scabbard.

  ‘Brush with th’ enemy, sir,’ Kydd said, as calmly as he could. ‘Compass knocked t’ flinders, had to find some other way back.’

  ‘In fog, and at night? I’d be interested to learn what you did, Mr Kydd.’

  ‘Caused us quite some puzzling, sir, but I’ll stake m’ life that Mr Rawson here would be very pleased to explain th’ reasoning.’

  Rawson started, then said smugly, ‘Oh, well, sir, we all knows that f’r any given line o’ longitude – the meridian, I mean – the moon will cross just forty-nine minutes after the sun does, and falls back this time for every day. After that it’s easy.’

  ‘Get on with it, then.’

  ‘Well, sir, we can find the moon’s southing on any day by taking the day of her age since new, and multiplying this by that forty-nine. If we then divide by sixty we get our answer – the time in hours an’ minutes after noon when she’s dead in the south, which for us was close t’ eight o’ clock. Then we just picked up our course again near enough and—’

  Houghton grunted. ‘It’s as well Mr Kydd had such a fine navigator with him. You shall take one of my best clarets to the midshipmen’s berth.’ Unexpectedly, the captain smiled. ‘While Mr Kydd entertains me in my cabin with his account of this rencontre.’

  Chapter 5

  The Newfoundland convoy was now safely handed over off St John’s, along with Viper and Trompeuse, the ship signalling distress in the fog missing, presumed lost. Tenacious hauled her wind to sail south alone to land her French prisoners and join the fleet of the North American station in Halifax.

  As they approached there was a marked drop in temperature; chunks of broken ice were riding the deep Atlantic green of the sea and there was a bitter edge to the wind. Thick watch-coats, able to preserve an inner retreat of warmth in the raw blasts of an English winter, seemed insubstantial.

  Landfall was made on a low, dark land. It soon resolved to a vast black carpeting of forest, barely relieved by stretches of grey rock and blotches of brown, a hard, cold aspect. Kydd had studied the charts and knew the offshore dangers of the heavily indented rock-bound coast flanking the entrance to Halifax.

  ‘I’m advising a pilot, sir,’ the master said to the captain.

  ‘But have you not sailed here before?’ Houghton’s voice was muffled by his grego hood, but his impatience was plain: a pilot would incur costs and possibly delay.

  Hambly stood firm. ‘I have, enough times t’ make me very respectful. May I bring to mind, sir, that it’s less’n six months past we lost Tribune, thirty-four, within sight o’ Halifax – terrible night, only a dozen or so saved of three hundred souls . . .’

  While Tenacious lay to off Chebucto Head, waiting for her pilot, Kydd took in the prospect of land after so many weeks at sea. The shore, a barren, bleached, grey-white granite, sombre under the sunless sky, appeared anything but welcoming. Further into the broad opening there was a complexity of islands, and then, no doubt, Halifax itself.

  The pilot boarded and looked around curiously. ‘Admiral’s in Bermuda still,’ he said, in a pleasant colonial drawl. ‘Newfy convoy arrived and he not here, he’ll be in a right taking.’

  Houghton drew himself up. ‘Follow the motions of the pilot,’ he instructed the quartermaster of the conn.

  With a south-easterly fair for entry, HMS Tenacious passed into a broad entrance channel and the pilot took time to point out the sights. ‘Chebucto Head – the whole place was called Chebucto in the old days.’ The ship gathered way. ‘Over yonder,’ he indicated a hill beyond the foreshore, ‘that’s what we’re callin’ Camperdown Hill, after your mighty victory. Right handy for taking a line of bearing from here straight into town.’

  Running down the bearing, he drew their attention to the graveyard of Tribune. Up on rising ground they saw the raw newness of a massive fortification. ‘York Redoubt – and over to starb’d we have Mr McNab’s Island, where the ladies love t’ picnic in summer.’

  The passage narrowed and they passed a curious spit of land, then emerged beyond the island to a fine harbour several miles long and as big as Falmouth. Kydd saw that, as there, a southerly wind would be foul for putting to sea, but at more than half a mile wide and with an ebb tide it would not be insuperable.

  Tenacious rounded to at the inner end of the town, there to join scores of other ships. Her anchors plummeted into the sea, formally marking the end of her voyage.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ Houghton began, ‘be apprised that this is the demesne of Prince Edward, of the Blood Royal. I go now to pay my respects to His Royal Highness. I desire you hold yourselves ready, and when the time comes, I expect my officers to comport themselves with all the grace and civility to be expected of a King’s officer in attendance on the civil power.’

  The wardroom took the orders with relish. Every port had its duties of paying and returning calls; some were more onerous than others, with entertainments that varied from worthy to spirited, but this promised to be above the usual expectation.

  For Kydd it would be high society as he had never dreamed of. Receptions, royal dinners, lofty conversations. All grand and unforgettable. But would he be able to carry it through like a true gentleman? Just how could he strut around as though born to it? It was daunting – impossible.

  Soon the wardroom and spaces outside became a beehive of activity with servants blacking shoes, boning sword scabbards, polishing decorations, and distracted officers finding deficiencies in their ceremonials. The ship, however, lay claim to attention first: dockyard stores brought from England were hoisted aboard lighters and taken in charge, and a detachment of the 7th Royal Fusiliers came aboard to escort the regimental pay-chest ashore.

  Fore and aft, Tenacious was thoroughly cleaned down, then put in prime order: the cable tiers were lime whitewashed, brickdust and rags were taken to the brasswork, and cannon were blackened to a gloss with a mixture of lamp-black, beeswax and turpentine. Bryant took a boat away and pulled slowly round the ship, bawling up instructions that had the yards squared across exactly, one above the other.

  Then the first invitations came. The captain disappeared quickly, and Pringle, who had old friends in Halifax, vanished as soon
as he was decently able, accompanied by Lieutenant Best. The others prepared to find their own way ashore.

  ‘Spit it out, man!’ Adams demanded. The note handed in by a messenger was addressed to Renzi, who gravely announced to the wardroom that it seemed both himself and Lieutenant Kydd were invited to the home of the commissioner for lands, Mr Lawrence Greaves.

  ‘Ah, as this eminent gentleman no doubt wishes to honour Tenacious in the proper form,’ said Adams smoothly, ‘it would be seemly, therefore, that a more senior officer be present. As it happens, gentlemen, I shall be at leisure . . .’

  The boat landed them next to the careening wharf where a carriage waited. The stone steps of the landing-place were reasonably dry, but when they moved forward the hems of their boat-cloaks brushed the snow-mush.

  On leaving the dockyard area they turned north, away from the town, and had their first glimpses of a new land. Kydd marvelled at the rugged appeal of the snow-patched raw slopes, the countless spruce and jack-pine – and the silence.

  At their destination a gravel track led to a mansion, and as they drew up their Falmouth acquaintance came to the door. ‘This is most kind in you,’ Renzi said, with a bow. ‘May I present Lieutenant Gervase Adams, sir, who cannot be denied in his desire to learn more of your remarkable realm.’

  Greaves acknowledged him with a bow and slight smile. ‘Calm seas and a prosperous voyage indeed, gentlemen. Your brisk action at the outset of our voyage has been particularly remarked.’

  They settled inside by the large fire. ‘Calibogus?’ Greaves offered. At the puzzled looks he smiled, ‘A Nova Scotian cure for the wind’s chill – spruce beer stiffened with rum. I believe we will have King’s calibogus, which is taken hot, and is a sovereign remedy.’