A Brig of War

by Richard Woodman

  ‘Quite, my dear Nathaniel. Fit enough to finish the task that brought us here.’

  At the beginning of May Blankett arrived at Mocha having exchanged his flag into the Leopard, newly arrived from England. He had with him Daedalus and Fox. They had swept the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden without discovering Santhonax. Off Guardafui Blankett had transferred into Leopard and sent the fourth-rates home. He was disinclined to listen to the dire warnings of Griffiths, not admitting the argument that he had not only failed to find the French but had missed Rainier. Annoyed, Griffiths returned to Hellebore and fumed like Achilles in his tent. Then, a week later Rainier returned. He had penetrated as far as Suez and bombarded the place. Although the French army was there no ships were to be seen and it was said that Centurion was the first ship of force seen before the town.

  ‘That,’ said Appleby, ‘is a piece of conceit I mislike. I daresay Egyptian ships of force were off Suez while Rainier’s ancestors were farting in caves.’

  ‘Ah, but not with eighteen-pounders in their batteries,’ said Drinkwater laughing, ‘cannon are a powerful argument to revise history.’

  ‘Pah! A matter of mere comparisons.’

  ‘Like the ingredients of medicines, eh?’ grinned Drinkwater at the surgeon.

  Convinced that the French threat was illusory Rainier departed for India, leaving Hellebore to the mercies of Blankett. After his exertions the rear-admiral was not inclined to cruise further. He took himself to Wrinch’s house to keyf and dally with a seraglio of houris while his squadron settled down to wait. Though for what, no-one seemed quite certain.

  ‘Boat approaching, sir. Looks like that fellow Sinbad.’ Quilhampton interrupted the first lieutenant who had had the carpenter make a small portable desk for him on deck where, beneath the quarterdeck awning, the breeze ruffled his shirt and made the intolerable paperwork that was part of his duty a trifle more bearable.

  ‘Sinbad?’

  ‘That damned Arab Yusuf ben Ibrahim, sir!’ Drinkwater looked up. It was a great pity this idleness was affecting Mr Quilhampton. The contempt the meanest of Hellebore’s people felt for the local population struck Drinkwater as quite incomprehensible. Perhaps it was a result of their being cooped up on board, but there was little contemptible about Yusuf ben Ibrahim. A striking figure with the hawk-like good looks of his race who could handle his rakish sambuk with a skill that compelled admiration.

  ‘Go and inform the captain, Mr Q.’ Ben Ibrahim had assumed the duty of chief messenger between Wrinch and Griffiths now that Blankett’s residence precluded Griffiths’s presence. The Arab clambered over the rail. He salaamed at Drinkwater and handed over a sealed letter. Drinkwater bowed as he took it, straightening up to see three men turning sheepishly back to their work while Mr Dalziell insolently essayed a bow himself.

  ‘Bosun’s mate,’ Drinkwater called sharply, ‘I desire you to keep those men at their duty or I will be obliged to teach ’em better manners. Mr Dalziell you will be mastheaded until sunset.’ He turned away and went below. Griffiths read the letter then handed it back to Drinkwater. ‘Read it,’ he said transferring his attention to the chart before him.

  My Dear Madoc, [Drinkwater read] I am writing to you as I doubt that blockhead Blankett will take alarm from what I have learned. It occurs to me that since you have no written instructions from the admiral you might still consider yourself under Nelson’s orders. Although my official powers are limited, my influence is not. I can offer a considerable measure of protection in case of trouble with your superior.

  I have received news from Upper Egypt that Desaix is everywhere and Murad’s force is scattered. This is confusing. What is certain is that General Belliard has occupied Kosseir and Murad’s reinforcements from the Hejaz are choked. Also the bearer, Ben Ibrahim, has sighted French ships in the Gulf of Aqaba and at Kosseir. I am certain our quarry is accumulating dhows at Kosseir for Bonaparte or Desaix to proceed against India.

  I shall exert pressure upon the admiral but, I beg you my dear Madoc, to go and cruise northwards with your brig. Even now Blankett snores upon my divan but I purpose to wake him to his duty. I know his ships have yet still to water and anticipate he will yet delay. If you regard this Santhonax as dangerous, now is the time to locate him.

  [The letter was signed] Strangford W.

  Drinkwater looked up at Griffiths. ‘I warned them both, damn them.’ Griffiths beckoned Drinkwater over to the chart. The long sleeve of the Red Sea ran almost north to south. At its head, in a gesture of vulgar contempt as if refusing to link up with the Mediterranean at the last minute, the two fingers of the Gulfs of Aqaba and Suez were divided by the mountains of Sinai.

  Griffiths moved his finger up the Gulf of Aqaba. ‘Those two numbskulls scoured the Egyptian coast while Santhonax hid round the corner and snapped up potential transports like a fox does chickens. Du bach, what fools these Englishmen are . . .’

  Drinkwater smiled ruefully. ‘Not quite all, sir. Nelson’s an Englishman, he could see clearly enough.’

  Drinkwater put down the letter, seeing the postscript.

  Take Yusuf and his dhow with you. I have instructed him to go as your eyes and ears. Though he does not speak English he understands the situation.

  ‘Send that Arab down and pass word to get the spring off the cable. We’ll slip out an hour after dark. Send Lestock to me and have the water casks topped off.’

  ‘With the greatest of pleasure, sir.’ Drinkwater left the cabin eagerly.

  Chapter Ten

  Winging the Eagle

  June–July 1799

  The favourable southerly breeze left them in the region of sixteen degrees north and they worked patiently through the belt of variables for a hundred miles before picking up the northern wind. Their passage became a long beat to windward with Yusuf ben Ibrahim laughing at their clumsy progress from his graceful and weatherly sambuk. But the wind, though foul, was fresh and cooling while the spray that swept over the weather bow sparkled in the sunshine and gave the occasion a yachting atmosphere. North of Jeddah they encountered several large dhows which Yusuf investigated, shepherding them alongside the brig. They were seen to be full of green-turbanned ‘Meccans’ who waved enthusiastically, having proclaimed a jihad against the infidel army of Desaix and Moallem Jacob.

  ‘They say,’ said Griffiths watching them through his glass, ‘that Murad Bey deploys them in front of his Mameluke cavalry as a breastwork. Have the men give the poor devils three cheers.’

  Sheepishly the Hellebores on deck raised a cheer for their expendable allies. The warlike enthusiasm of the ‘Meccans’ left an indelible impression of great events taking place over the horizon to the west; of the strength of Islam that could summon up such zealous cannon fodder and of the energy of French republicanism that it could raise such a ferment in this remote corner of the world.

  They beat on to the north, passing the reef discovered for the Royal Navy by the frigate Daedalus, but they saw no sign of the tricolour of France. Griffiths declined to put into Kosseir until their southward passage, assuming Santhonax and his frigate might be there in overwhelming force.

  ‘No, Mr Drinkwater, first we will reconnoitre the Gulf of Aqaba then cross from Ras Muhammad to the west coast and pass Kosseir with a favourable wind. I have no desire to meet our friend at anything but an advantage.’

  Both of them wondered what would be the outcome if Santhonax was elsewhere.

  Two days later they were off Ras Muhammad at the southern extremity of the Sinai peninsula. The land closed in upon them, the dun coloured landscape rising in row upon row of peaks that lay impassive under the blue skies and sunshine of noon and were transferred at sunrise and sunset into ruddy spines and deep purple gullies. Between this forbidding barrier the Gulf opened up, a deep blue channel of white-capped sea over which the wind funnelled with gale force.

  Regarding this cradle of religions, Appleby observed wondering, ‘You can imagine Moses striking those rocks and Almighty God handing do
wn the commandments from such a place . . .’ Robbed of his usual pomposity Appleby seemed reduced to a state of awe.

  But if this grim landscape failed to impress the majority of Hellebore’s people, daylight the following morning had a different impact. From the masthead the news of several ships to windward included the intelligence that one was the square sail of a European vessel. There was no doubt that there was a French warship in the offing, though of what force they had yet to discover.

  ‘Get aloft Nathaniel,’ growled Griffiths anxiously and Drinkwater went forward and swung himself into the foremast shrouds. Around him Hellebore’s deck swarmed with activity as the men prepared for action.

  At the topgallant doubling the wind was distinctly chilly. Stokeley was the lookout and he pointed the newcomers out. Settling himself against the exaggerated motion of the brig Drinkwater levelled his glass to larboard and caught the image of a dhow in the lens. There were five such craft being convoyed south by the warship. He searched the latter for details to determine her size. He counted her mastheads: there were three. A ship rigged corvette or a frigate? He transferred his attention to the hull. At this angle it was difficult to say as the enemy approached them, yawing slightly, a bone of white water in her teeth, but there was a simplicity about her bow that inclined Drinkwater to dismiss his worst fears. He descended to the deck.

  ‘I believe her to be a ship-sloop, sir, say about twenty guns.’

  ‘Very well.’ Griffiths paused and studied the approaching dhows. ‘D’you think they’re fitted with teeth or are they under convoy for Kosseir or Suez?’ He did not wait for an answer, glancing astern at the supporting sambuk of Ben Ibrahim. ‘We’ll engage, Mr Drinkwater, take the topgallants off her and hoist French colours.’ Drinkwater acknowledged the order and turned away while Griffiths bellowed forward for all to hear. ‘Mr Rogers! Load canister on ball, run your larboard guns to the sills and secure them! Keep your ports closed and all the larbowlines to cheer as we pass the Frenchman, all except the gun captains who are to lay their pieces at the horizon and fire on command.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Mr Lestock, have a quartermaster ready to hoist British colours the moment I say, and men at the braces below the bulwarks. I shall wear to starboard then cross his stern.’ Griffiths stood beside the men at the wheel. Drinkwater returned from amidships, casting his eyes aloft where the topgallants flogged impotently in their buntlines. The topmen were spreading out along the yards. Already Hellebore began her deception, peacefully clewing up her topgallants as she waited for her ‘friend’ to approach. ‘Du, Nathaniel, tell them not to be so damned fast aloft.’

  Drinkwater grinned and raised the speaking trumpet.

  ‘Fore t’gallant there, take your time, you are supposed to be Frenchmen!’ He could see from the attitudes of the men aloft who shouted remarks to their mates on the main topgallant that the business amused them. The obvious high spirits and exaggerated pantomime that followed this order spoke of a soaring morale amongst the hands at the prospect of action. Battle, conducted in such a spirit in such a breeze and in such brilliant sunshine could not fail to be exhilarating.

  ‘That’s better,’ nodded Griffiths approvingly. ‘Take station on the poop, Mr Drinkwater, when he is abeam I shall open fire then wear downwind. It means exposing the stern but I doubt he’ll take advantage of it. Wave your hat as we pass, bach, do your best to look French.

  Rogers came aft and reported the larboard battery ready as directed.

  Drinkwater wondered if the French squadron included a brig like themselves. If not then they were going to look decidedly foolish in a quarter of an hour. Astern of them Yusuf ben Ibrahim was dropping into Hellebore’s wake. He would be mystified as to their intentions unless he guessed from the tricolour now snapping out over the quarter. Yusuf might ruin their deception but then he might also enhance it, appearing to the approaching Frenchman like his own captured dhows. Drinkwater shivered slightly in his shirtsleeves. He waited impatiently for the order to open fire. Drinkwater motioned to the men at the after starboard guns. ‘Stand by to brail in the spanker there!’

  He saw them grin, glad of something to do while their mates in the larboard battery went into action.

  The dhows ahead had dropped back while the French corvette came on suspiciously, a private signal flying from her foremast. Drinkwater saw Mr Quilhampton instructed to hoist a string of meaningless bunting. As the enemy signal flew almost directly towards them a little confusion might be permitted. The two vessels were a mile apart now, the Frenchman broad on Hellebore’s larboard bow. The brig had slowed without her topgallants and she lay in wait for her opponent, her guns still hidden and several of the larbowlines hanging casually in the rigging waving.

  To the Frenchman the brig lay off his bow, supinely furling her upper sails, men congregating about her decks while he came down before the wind to pass close under the stranger’s stern where he could rake her if she ultimately proved to be an enemy. But no enemy, least of all a British captain, would lay so passively before a windward foe. It was a deception lent piquancy by the remoteness of their location, and the belief, briefly true, that Egypt was a possession of France.

  Drinkwater saw the corvette take in her own topgallants, as if about to round to and hail her ‘compatriot’. His heart was thumping with excitement. He knew in a moment the weeks of waiting, of struggling off the Cape, of listening to the sweaty moanings of the members of the gunroom, of solving the problem of the hands, of Dalziell and of Catherine Best, would all dissolve in the drug-like excitement of action. There was also the possibility that they might find a permanent solution in death. He felt dreadfully exposed as fear and exhilation fought for possession of him. He remembered an old promise to Elizabeth that he would be circumspect and run no needless risk. The recollection brought a rueful smile to his face.

  The gun crew waiting at the mainmast fiferails for his order nudged one another and grinned too, taking encouragement from Drinkwater’s apparent eagerness, seeing in his introspection their own relief at imminent action. For them action meant an interruption of the endless round of drudgery, of hauling and pumping that was their life, an opportunity to throw off the fear of the lash, to swear and kill to their heart’s content.

  ‘Brail in the spanker!’ Drinkwater nodded to the men watching him. The outhaul was started and the huge sail billowed, flapped and was drawn to the mast. By the helm, Griffiths corrected the rudder for that loss of pressure aft. Drinkwater took off his hat and waved it with assumed Gallic enthusiasm about his head.

  ‘Dip the ensign,’ he ordered and the quartermaster at the peak halliards lowered the tricolour a fathom. Perhaps, by such a refinement, if the enemy captain did not expect to see a French brig hereabouts, he might be fooled into thinking it was a new arrival paying her respects to an old Red Sea hand.

  The enemy ship was very close now. Men could be seen on her topgallant yards looking curiously across at them and Drinkwater heard a thin cry of ‘Bonjour mes enfants.’

  From the main topgallant he heard the ever resourceful Tregembo yell back ‘Vive la Republique!’

  The cheer that erupted from the enemy was echoed by the Hellebores whose joy at achieving such a complete deception lent their mad excitement a true imitation of revolutionary fervour.

  ‘Braces there,’ growled Griffiths in a low and penetrating voice. Drinkwater saw a French officer on the quarter-rail bowing. He swept his own hat across his chest in response. ‘Bon chance!’ he yelled across the diminishing gap between them. An angle of sixty degrees lay between the ships, with everyone of Hellebore’s guns levelled at that crowded rail.

  ‘Colours!’

  Griffiths threw aside the mask.

  Above their heads Old Glory replaced the half lowered tricolour. The gunports snapped open.

  ‘Fire!’

  The gun captains jerked their lanyards as the crews leapt back to the deck and grabbed rammers, swabs and buckets. The charring of the port lintels was quickly extinguishe
d as the men toiled to reload.

  ‘Up helm! Braces there! Wear ship!’

  Hellebore turned, pointing her vulnerable stern at the Frenchman but avoiding the ignominious possibility of failing to tack. Griffiths had gambled on his plan working and, had it not done so, he had only to stand on and carry himself swiftly out of range. But a single glance astern told the ruse had been complete. Details were obscure but amidships the corvette’s rail was a splintered and jagged shambles. The human wreckage behind that smashed timber could be imagined.

  ‘Aloft there, let fall! Let fall!’ Tregembo and his mates slipped the topgallant gaskets and the sails fell in folds.

  ‘Leggo bunt and clewlines there! Sheet home!’

  Hellebore was before the wind and still turning, bringing the wind first astern and then round, broad on the starboard quarter. Drinkwater descended from the tiny poop. ‘The advantage of surprise sir,’ he said.

  Griffiths nodded, his mouth suppressing a grim smile of self-congratulation. ‘Do unto others, Mr Drinkwater, before they do unto you . . . clew up the foresail, I intend to rake.’

  ‘Aye, aye, sir. D’you intend boarding?’ Griffiths shook his head.

  ‘Too great a risk of heavy casualties. Flesh wounds’ll be the very devil to heal in this climate. No, we’ll stand off and pound him.’ Griffiths nodded to the distant Ben Yusuf. ‘He’s playing a waiting game.’

  They clewed up the forecourse as they made to cut across the corvette’s stern. She was still running before the wind though many ropes had been severed at the pin rails on deck. Smoke appeared from her guns now as she attempted to halt the Nemesis that bore relentlessly down upon her. Then they were suddenly very close to her, surging across her stern, masking her from the wind. Rogers was shouting and running aft, commanding each gun to fire as it bore into the corvette’s stern. Drinkwater read La Torride a split second before it was blown to atoms, saw the crown glass windows of her cabin shatter and the neat carvings about her quarters disintegrate into splinters. A row of men with pistols and muskets fired at the British ship as she rushed past and the hat that he had so insouciantly waved but a few moments ago was torn from his head. He aimed his own pistols, his mouth pulled back in a grimace. Then Griffiths was putting Hellebore on a parallel course with the Frenchman.