Signal-Close Action!

15. Disaster

'sTEER nor"-nor"-east." Farquhar remained near the wheel, looking towards Bolitho. "We will weather the headland as close as we dare." He glared at the master. "Do you understand, Mr. Bevan?"-

"Aye, sir." The master shifted under his stare. "It's a bad entrance. Shoals below the headland. Some others offshore, but the charts can"t fix them exactly."

Farquhar walked down to the quarterdeck rail. "No sign of life yet, sir."

Bolitho raised a telescope and moved it slowly along the uneven summit of the headland. About a mile across the larboard bow. But it was still resting in deep shadow, with only the paling sky to give some indication of height and depth. But he could see the writhing movement at the bottom of the nearest point, to mark the sea breaking and sluicing over a steep, stony beach, and jagged reefs, too. He heard Farquhar's sudden impatience with the sailing master, and guessed it had been as much to relieve the tension as anything. But he had been wrong to vent his feelings on him. Bevan, the master, ex-mate of an Indiaman, needed all his wits about him now, and the complete confidence of his three helmsmen, without his captain throwing his temperament to all and sundry.

"I expect none."

Bolitho stiffened as something passed above the nearest hump of land. For a moment he thought it was smoke, but it was a solitary feather of cloud, moving diagonally towards the water beyond the headland which was still in semidarkness. He saw that the forepart of the cloud was pale gold, holding the sun which was still hidden to the men in both ships.

He strode to the nettings and climbed on the top of a nine-pounder to peer across the quarter. Buzzard was right on station. Two cables astern, with her mainsail and topgallants clewed up and her big forecourse braced round to contain the light south-westerly wind. She looked very slender and frail in the dim light, and he pictured Javal with his officers watching the same jutting land, and willing time to pass. To get on with it.

But it would be some while yet, he thought. The French would bide their time and not risk their enemy's escape by opening fire too early.

He stepped down from the gun and almost fell. Despite the liberal scattering of sand along every gun deck, the planks were damp, with night dew and treacherous underfoot. A seaman caught his elbow and grinned at him.

"Easy sir! We’ll not "ave "em sayin" it was our gun which downed the commodore!"

Bolitho smiled. As in every part of the ship, the guns were fully manned and loaded. All it needed to complete her preparedness was to open the ports and run out. But if there was some watcher on the land, there was no point in showing that Osiris's upper line of gun ports was only black squares painted on canvas.

He said, "Nor that I was too drunk to stand upright, eh?" They laughed, as he knew they would. The air around the guns, even in the cool wind, was heavy with rum, and he guessed that far more than a double tot had found its way to each man. Or that some had used their issue to pay old debts, or to purchase something better. Most likely, some had held back their rum to cover bets. What had they bet on? Who would live or die? How much prize money they would receive? Which officer would hold his nerve the longest? He had no doubt that the bets would be many and varied.

He walked forward again to the rail and stared along the shadowed gun deck. Figures moved restlessly around each black barrel. Like slaves as they tested each piece of tackle and equipment for their trade. The gun captains had done their part. Had made certain that the first balls to be fired were perfect in shape and weight, that each charge was just right. After the opening shots, it was usually too desperate, too deafening to pause for such niceties.

He looked up and saw the marine marksmen in the tops, while right forward on the forecastle there were more of them, standing loosely beside their long muskets, or chatting with the carronade crews.

Bolitho heard Allday say, "I’ve brought the sword, sir." He slipped off the boat cloak he had been wearing since three hours before dawn and allowed Allday to buckle on his sword.

Allday said softly, but with obvious disapproval, "You look more like a buccaneer than a commodore, sir! I don’tknow what they"d say in Falmouth!"

Bolitho smiled. "One of my ancestors was a pirate, Allday." He tightened the belt buckle. He had lost some weight during his fever. "When it was a respectable calling, of course. "

He turned as Farquhar hurried past. "Have you extra hands on pumps and buckets?"

"Yes, sir." Farquhar ran a finger around his neckcloth. "If they use heated shot on us, I’m as ready as I can be." He looked at the nets spread above the gun deck, at the looser ones draped along the shrouds to prevent a sudden rush of boarders. To the sentries at each hatch and companion, and the boatswain's party who waited to hack away fallen spars, or clear corpses from an upended gun.

Bolitho watched him, seeing his mind examining each part of his command for a flaw or a weak point, Under their feet, and beneath the crowded gun deck, the lower batteries of thirty-two-pounders would be ready and waiting. And below them, standing like ghouls in a circle of lanterns, the surgeon and his assistants, watching the empty table, the glittering knives and saws. Bolitho recalled Luce" s pale face, his pleading His one frantic scream. He looked across at Pascoe who stood on the lee side by the main shrouds, talking with a petty officer and a midshipman. Was he thinking about Luce, he wondered?

Aft, on the poop, the bulk of the marines waited by the nettings, in three lines, for if Osiris was to engage from her larboard side, they would have to fire rank by rank, like soldiers in a square.

Bolitho tried to pick out faces he knew, but there were hardly any. Anonymous, yet familiar. Typical, but un- known. Marines and seamen, lieutenants and midshipmen. He had seen them in a dozen ships, in as many fleets.

A marine lieutenant's silver shoulder-plate gleamed suddenly as if heated from within. As Bolitho turned his head to starboard he saw the sun's rim on the horizon, the rays filtering down across the ruffled water towards him like molten metal.

Allday remarked, "Going to be a fine day."

Lieutenant Outhwaite was standing by the main companion way, his eyes glowing like little stones as he stared towards the sunrise. Like his captain, he was impeccably dressed, his hat set exactly square on his head, his long queue straight down his spine.

Farquhar wore no hat, but a midshipman stood near him, carrying it, and his sword, as if for an actor waiting to begin his most difficult role. In fact, Bolitho saw that Farquhar's mouth was moving. Speaking to himself, or rehearsing a speech for his men, he did not know.

His hair was very fair, and he had it pulled back to the nape of his neck and tied with a neat black bow. Whatever happened in the next hours, Farquhar was dressed for it.

He seemed to sense Bolitho's scrutiny and turned towards him. He gave a slow smile. "A new uniform, sir. But I recalled your own custom before a fight of consequence. " He gave a brief shake of the head. "And as your tailor is else- where, I thought I would set the example."

Bolitho replied, "A kind thought. "

He peered along the deck again, seeing the land-mass growing and looming towards the bowsprit, as if they were touching.

"The enemy will not fire until he has a sure target. His gunners will have the sun in their eyes directly, but once we are standing well up the eastern shore it will not help us much. There is a dip behind the bay I have in mind. A good site for long-range guns."

He strained his eyes beyond the bows as a voice yelled, 'surf! Fine on the larboard bow!"

The master said tightly, "That’ll be the damned reef, sir." "Let her payoff a point, Mr. Bevan. Steer nor" -east by north." Farquhar looked at his first lieutenant. "D"you have a good leadsman in the chains?"

"Aye, sir," The frogface watched him questioningly. "I have stressed the importance of his task this morning. "

Bolitho found he could smile, in spite of the gnawing uncertainty of waiting. Farquhar and Outhwaite were well matched. So maybe Farquhar was right in his methods of selection. After all, they said of West Country ships that they were foreign to all but the Cornish and Devonians who manned them. The ways of St. James's and Mayfair were as hard to learn.

The light was spreading and filtering on to small beaches now and winkling out shadows from hillsides and coves. The sea's face, too, was clearer, the tiny white cat's-paws moving away to starboard to merge in the colourful horizon and the sun.

Maybe the real Lysander has seen such a sea, Bolitho thought. When the fleets of triremes and galliasses had smashed into each other and the sky had been dark with arrows and darts of fire.

From astern he heard the sudden squeak and rumble of guns being run out, and knew that Javal was getting ready.

Farquhar snapped, "Alter course three points. Steer north. " He craned over the nettings to watch a hump of sand or rock edging past the quarter. Some gulls rose squawking from their little islet, very white against the land's backdrop.

They circled above the mastheads, hoping for food, noisy in their greed.

Bolitho looked up at his pendant as one gull dipped near it, screaming angrily. It was flapping less persistently, for the land was creeping past, dampening down the wind. He thought of Probyn. It was to be hoped he had worked his ship into position early, to allow for adverse winds, the treacherously narrow channel.

He pulled his watch from his breeches and examined it. He could see it well now, even the beautiful lettering on the face, Mudge and Dutton of London. He closed the guard with a snap and saw Midshipman Breen jump with alarm.

He said, "Very well. We are past the headland." Outhwaite swung round, his speaking trumpet to his mouth. "Mr. Guthrie! Pass the word! Run out!"

As the port lids squeaked open there was a brief pause, and down on the lower gun deck the seamen; stripped and ready, would be seeing the land for the first time. A whistle shrilled, and with a mounting tremble Osiris ran out her artillery…

"Brail up the forecourse!"

Farquhar watched the great sail being subdued and brailed to its yard, and snapped his fingers. The midshipman gave him his sword and then his hat. He adjusted his hat with care, and after a moment walked forward to the weather gangway.

The forecourse had completed the illusion. The stage was set. The actors were prepared.

Bolitho drew his sword and laid it flat on the rail, feeling the steel, cool under his palms.

"Run up the Colours."

He heard the squeak of a block and saw the flag's great shadow rippling across the gangway and above the gentle bow wave.

"Now stand-to, lads, and make each ball count."

He glanced quickly at the nearest gun crews. They could have been placed in any part of history. One seaman, standing by a sixteen-pounder immediately below the "quarterdeck, was leaning on a rammer, his neckcloth tied around his ears to withstand the first deafening roar. Men like him had sailed

with Drake aboard his Revenge, and had cheered as the Armada had been "drummed up the Channel." But this time there were no cheers, not even an isolated one. The men looked grim, watching the open gun ports, or standing close to one another as if for support. He saw Farquhar's fingers opening and closing repeatedly around his sword scabbard, his head very erect as he stared towards the wavering coastline, from where the enemy would open fire.

A light blinked from the nearest hilltop but did not reappear. A broken bottle reflecting the first ray of sunrise. The window of some concealed dwelling. Bolitho shivered. Or a ray of light catching the lens of a telescope? He imagined the signal being carried over the hill to the waiting artillery. The English are coming. As expected and predicted. He frowned. No matter what happened, they had to hold the enemy's attention until Probyn swept down on the anchored ships from the northern channel. A few heavy broadsides amongst a crowded anchorage and the odds could change considerably.

He remembered suddenly what his father had once told him. There is no such thing as a surprise attack. Surprise is only present when one captain or another has miscalculated what he has seen from the beginning.

He glanced at Pascoe and smiled briefly. He now knew exactly what his father had meant.

Bolitho re-crossed the quarterdeck and trained a glass on an out-thrust shoulder of land. A few tiny dwellings were visible at the foot of a steep slope, nestling between some scrub and the nearest beach. Fishermen's homes. But their boats lay abandoned on the coarse shingle, and only a dog stood its ground by the water's edge, barking furiously at the slow- moving ships.

He heard Farquhar say sharply, "The next bay will be the one."

Outhwaite turned and called, "Be ready! Hold your fire till the order, then shoot on the uproll!"

Allday muttered scornfully, "Uproll! Until we get clear of this headland and find some sort of wind again, there’ll be no uproll!"

"Deck there!" The masthead lookout's voice seemed unusually loud. 'ships at anchor around the point!"

Bolitho breathed out slowly. 'signal the information to Buzzard."

An acknowledgement broke from the frigate's yards within seconds. Javal was like the rest of them. On the last edge of tension.

He glanced at his watch. Nicator should be well through the other channel by now and setting more sail to begin her vital part. Even if French pickets had sighted her, it would be too late to move artillery to the other end of their defences.

The bang, when it came, was like an abbreviated thunderclap. Bolitho saw neither smoke nor flash, but watched the ball's progress across the swirling current. It must have been fired from a low level, for he could see its path in a line of tiny wavelets, like an unnatural wind, or a shark charging to the attack.

The crash of the ball into the forepart of the hull brought a great chorus of shouts and yells, and Bolitho saw the second lieutenant hurrying from gun to gun, as if to reassure the crews.

"Look there, sir!" Allday pointed with his cutlass. 'soldiers!"

Bolitho watched the tiny, blue-coated figures bursting from the trees and scurrying towards the point. Perhaps they believed that the second wave of attacking ships would attempt a landing, and were getting ready to repulse them. Bolitho licked his lips. If only there was a second wave.

He said, "Bring her up a point, Captain. Give our upper battery a target."

Farquhar protested, "Eighteen-pounders against infantry, sir?"

Bolitho said quietly, "It will give them something to keep their minds occupied. It may also shake the enemy's confidence up ahead. They are anticipating a squadron, remember!"

He winced as another bang echoed across the water, and he heard the ball hiss viciously overhead.

'stand by to larboard!" Outhwaite pointed at the running soldiers. "On the uproll!" He raised his speaking trumpet. "Fire!"

The long line of guns hurled themselves inboard on their tackles, the smoke rising and swirling above the packed hammock nettings. Bolitho held his glass on the land, seeing the balls whipping through trees and scrub, throwing up stones and clods of earth in haphazard confusion. The soldiers had obviously held the same ideas as Farquhar, for many were caught out in the open, and Bolitho saw bodies and muskets whirling through the air with the other fragments.

It was little enough, but it had given the gun crews some heart. He heard a few cheers, and yells of derision from the lower battery who had not been allowed to fire.

Outhwaite had caught some of the excitement. "Move roundly, lads! Reload! Mr. Guthrie, a guinea for the first to run out!"

From a comer of his eye, Bolitho saw the headland drop- ping back, the first group of anchored ships glinting in frail sunlight, their sails furled, and their unmoving rigidity suggesting that each vessel was attached to the next, and so on, making them into an unbroken barrier. He had expected the French to anchor in this manner. It had been a favourite defence since long before a revolution had even been dreamed of.

Then he saw a flash. It came from a deep green saddle between two hills, and he knew the gunners had fired earlier to obtain a ranging shot.

It hit Osiris amidships, deep down and close to the waterline. The planks under Bolitho's feet rebounded, as if the ball had struck a few paces away instead of three decks down. He saw Farquhar's anxiety as he watched his boatswain dashing for a hatch with his seamen, and the wisps of dark smoke which eddied above the nettings as evidence of the gun's accuracy.

From astern he heard the controlled crash of cannon fire and knew that Javal was following his example and raking the nearest hillside in the hope of finding a target.

"Deck there! French ship o" the line at anchor beyond the transports!".

Bolitho swung the glass across the rail, seeing faces on Osiris's forecastle looming like visions in the lens before he found and trained on the French seventy-four. Like the packed mass of transports, she was anchored. But her sails were only loosely brailed up, and her cable shortened home in readiness for weighing. And beyond her, gliding very slowly downwind, was a frigate, setting her foresail and shining momentarily as sunlight passed along her hull. The two smaller escorts, corvettes, Plowman had said, were hidden elsewhere. It was not surprising. For the assembled fleet of supply ships overlapped in what appeared to be a hopeless tangle of masts and yards. He watched them grimly through* the glass. Deep-laden. Guns; powder and shot, tents, weapons and supplies for an army.

He felt the deck stagger as another ball smashed close alongside.

The only way" to avoid being destroyed slowly by the hidden guns was to set more sail, to attack and close with the anchored vessels and make accuracy impossible.

He heard Farquhar say fervently, "Where is Nicator? In God's name, she should be in sight by now!"

"French seventy-four's weighed, sir."

Bolitho looked at Farquhar, but he had not heard the report. He said, "Thank you. Tell your starboard gun crews to prepare, Mr. Outhwaite."

Bolitho watched the boatswain emerging from beneath the quarterdeck and waited for him to come aft.

Oled in two places, sir. But no damage below the waterline yet. She's sound enough, if it gets no worse." Farquhar nodded abruptly. "Yes."

Bolitho said, 'set the fores"l, Captain. Make to Buzzard, I am about to pass through the enemy's line."

Farquhar stared at him. "We could get fouled in their moorings, sir. I’d advise-"

They ducked as another ball passed low above their heads, and Bolitho felt the breath of it across his shoulders like the wind of a cutlass blade.

Bolitho said, "Nicator should be in sight. At least from the masthead. Probyn must have met some opposition. If neither of us can get to grips, we are being destroyed for nothing!"

He strode to the lee side and watched a thin waterspout rise far abeam. The French were very good, as were their new guns. At this range they could hardly miss. And yet they were biding their time. Saving their aim for the rest of the squadron, or to decide on the English tactics.

No. It was wrong. No gunnery officer could be that confident.

He heard the wheel going over, the sudden flap and boom of canvas as the foresail was reset and its yard trimmed by the men at the braces. It made some difference. He could see the way one of the quarterdeck nine-pounders was tugging at its tackles as the deck tilted to leeward. The sudden increase of sail might make the French gunners show their hand.

He walked as slowly as he could to the other side, peering across the crowded gun deck towards the French two-decker. Under minimum canvas, she was standing off about two miles distant. Even that was wrong. Her captain commanded the most powerful ship present. His first duty was to defend the merchantmen and supply vessels, no matter what.

Half a mile to go, and through his glass he could see the tiny figures of seamen running about the decks of the nearest transport. They probably still believed Osiris was a three-decker, and that they would take the first overwhelming broadside.

"Bring her up a point, Captain." "Aye, sir. Nor" by west."

Bolitho looked at Pascoe. "Any sight of Nicator?"

"None, sir." Pascoe gestured towards the massed shipping. 'she's missing a promising target!"

But Bolitho knew him well enough to see through his calm remark. He saw Midshipman Breen, who was helping Pascoe, stare at him, as if to seek confirmation that all was well.

The nearest transports, anchored at the head of two separate lines, opened fire with their bow guns, the balls whimpering overhead, one forcing a neat hole in the main topsail.

The master called suddenly, "Lee bow, sir! Looks like shallows!"

Farquhar replied, tersely, "They"re well clear, man! What do you want me to do? Fly?"

Bolitho heard nothing for the next few seconds. Like something from his feverish dreams, he saw the larboard bulwark burst apart, the deck planking tom diagonally in a gash of flying splinters, while wreckage and the complete barrel of a nine-pounder landed with a crash on the opposite side. The primed gun exploded, and its ball upended another gun on to some of its crew, the screams and sobs lost in the explosion.

When Bolitho stared aft he saw that the great ball, probably double-shotted, had smashed the wheel to fragments. Two helmsmen lay dead or stunned, and a third had been pulped to bloody gruel. Men and fragments of men lay scattered around the quarterdeck and others tried to drag themselves away. Bolitho saw that Bevan, the master, had been all but cui in half by the exploding nine-pounder, and his blood was pouring across the splintered deck, while one of his hands still clawed at his exposed entrails, as if it alone still clung to life.

Plowman dashed out of the drifting smoke. "I’ll take over, sir!" He dragged a terrified seaman from behind some scattered hammocks. "Up! Come aft and we’ll rig a tackle to the tiller head!"

Another crash, this time into the side of the poop. Several marines toppled down a ladder, and Bolitho heard the heavy balls smashing through the cabin and careering amongst the crowded gun deck.

He yelled, 'shorten sail, Captain!" He raised his sword like a pointer. "The French artillery judged it well."

He felt neither fear nor bitterness. Just a sense of anger.

Osiris, her steering gone, was falling heavily downwind. Bevan, the dead sailing master, had seen the danger without understanding what it meant. Now it was too late. The pressure of wind into her sails and against her hull was enough to guide Osiris into that one shoulder of hard sand.

The enemy had used their opening shots like goads on wayward cattle. A prod here, a tap there, to send the helpless beast into a carefully ranged and sited trap.

Both of the hidden guns renewed firing with sudden vigour, the shots crashing into the hull, or falling dangerously near the Buzzard, which alone still headed towards the anchored ships.

Pascoe yelled, "The enemy frigate is making more sail, sir!

And I see one of the corvettes breaking clear of the anchorage! "

Bolitho trained his glass through the drifting smoke. The frigate first. Long and lean. Thirty-eight guns against Javal's thirty-two. Provided he had managed to avoid the heavy artillery, he would stand a good chance. If he could hold off the corvette. If, if, if It was like hearing a taunt in his brain.

Something made a dark flaw in the side of the lens, and he swung it further to hold the French seventy-four in view. She was still under minimum canvas, and was moving very slowly towards Osiris on a converging tack, her guns run out, but in shadow. He considered this fact. In shadow. So her captain had no intention of trying to hold the wind-gage. Even now she was steering across Osiris's starboard bow, her reefed topsails braced hard round, her forecastle and even the beakhead alive with waving seamen and glittering weapons. He could see her name quite clearly, Immortalite.

Farquhar shouted hoarsely, "How is the helm, Mr.

Outhwaite? Have they rigged emergency steering?"

Bolitho watched the water rippling above the concealed sand-bar. Fifty yards. Less. Even if they anchored they would be unable to fight clear now, let alone do any damage to the transports.

"He watched the two-decker, her tricolour very bright in the sunlight. He stiffened as he saw another flag at her mainmast. A dovetailed broad pendant.

Pascoe looked at him. "A commodore, sir." He tried to grin. "It should have been a full admiral to do us honour!" A ball thundered through a lower port, and Bolitho heard the attendant chorus of screams and cries for the surgeon's helpers.

He turned again to the French ship. Pascoe was wrong. It should have been Probyn, pouring his broadsides into the anchored transports, now completely undefended as the two-decker and her smaller consorts came down the coast to give battle. Nicator would have had nothing to oppose her. He felt the anger welling up like a burning flood.

The deck shuddered slightly, and with the sound of a pistol shot the fore topgallant mast plunged down and over the side, dragging broken rigging in its wake like black serpents.

Farquhar stared at him wildly. "Aground! He moved a few paces to the side, his shoes slipping on blood. "God's teeth!" He shielded his face with one arm as a ball slammed through the bulwark again, upending another gun and cutting down two men who were dragging a wounded comrade away from their port.

Farquhar asked flatly, "What orders, sir?"

Bolitho kept his eyes towards the transports, they seemed to be moving now, edging across the bows in one vast mass. But it was only because Osiris was swinging very slowly to the pressure of wind, her stem and forepart of the hull firmly embedded on hard sand.

He said slowly, "It is my belief that we will soon be able to use the starboard guns."

He saw Farquhar nod, his face ashen as more explosions threw spray high above the nettings. The painted strip of canvas which had been their only deception had long since gone, tom away in the hot wind of those guns. He gripped his arm tightly, dragging his mind from the threat and damage all around.

'see the Frenchman, Captain? Now he is making more sail..

Farquhar's eyes widened. "In God's name!"

Slowly, inexorably, her bow pivoting on the bar, Osiris was swinging away from the land. No wonder the French commodore. had stayed his hand. Within half an hour, when he passed to leeward of the sand-bar and the trapped ship, he would see only Osiris's exposed stem. No commander could hope for a better, or a steadier target, and-one broadside would sweep through the ship from stem to bow.

Farquhar said, "Then we"re done for."

Bolitho walked past him. "Pass the word. Engage with every gun that bears. We’ll sink a round half-dozen of them with any luck."

He heard the order being passed, the squeak of trucks as the gun captains brought their weapons round as far as they would move towards the supply ships.

They would see only the enemy, and even if they had guessed at their predicament, it was unlikely they understood Its full meaning. Farquhar knew well enough.

"Fire!"

The long battery of thirty-two-pounders crashed out in a ragged broadside, and at full elevation Bolitho knew that many of the balls would find targets. "Fire!"

The eighteen-pounders hurled themselves inboard, their crews working like madmen to sponge out and ram home new charges.

Bolitho darted a quick look at the captain. It showed on his face with each savage crash of a broadside. The recoil of so many guns was enough to edge Osiris still firmer aground. It told him that the ship was already finished, and that Bolitho was carrying on with the attack despite it.

Allday said hoarsely, "The hillside seems to be afire, sir!" Bolitho wiped his eyes with his sleeve and stared across the larboard bow. Osiris had pivoted right round now, and he could seethe dense wan of smoke, darting tongues of flame, too, rolling towards the sea and adding to the scene of chaos and despair.

Allday said it for him. "Must be Mr. Veitch. Set the hillside ablaze. It's probably like tinder." He sighed. "A brave man. One of those guns will be blinded by smoke. They’ll not thank Mr. Veitch for that."

A violent explosion thundered across the water, and through the thickening smoke Bolitho saw a vivid red heart.

Pascoe coughed in the smoke. "We have hit one of the transports, sir! Must have been loaded with powder!"

Fragments splashed down lazily and bobbed around the embattled ship. Beyond the smoke Bolitho could hear sharp- er notes of gunfire, and knew Javal was there, fighting probably two enemies at once.

The masthead yelled above the din, 'some of the French are making sail!"

Bolitho said, "Cutting their cables."

He did not blame them. With one or more of their number ablaze or badly crippled by Osiris's broadsides, they had nothing to gain by remaining where they lay. He felt the deck under his feet. Lifeless, but for the guns" savage vibration. And nobody could stop them.

Something fanned past him, crashed against a nine-pounder in a shrieking wave of splinters. Men fell kicking and gasping, and Bolitho felt blood splashed across his breeches like paint.

He turned and saw Farquhar leaning back against the quarterdeck rail, his gaze fixed on the lower yards while he clutched his chest with both hands. Bolitho ran to his side. "Here! Let me help!"

Farquhar's eyes swivelled down towards him. He bared his teeth, spacing out each word to hold back the pain. "No. Leave me. Must stay. Must."

He had bunched the front of his new uniform coat into a tight ball. A ball which was already bright red.

Allday said, "I’ll take him below."

The ship quivered again as the lower battery vented its anger on the anchorage. Several masts had fallen, and the two leading ships were listing towards each other, one almost awash, the other a blackened wreck in the path of that terrible explosion.

Farquhar tried. to shake his head. "Keep your damned hands off me!" He reeled against Bolitho. "Mr. Outhwaite!" But the first lieutenant was sitting against one of the abandoned guns, his head lolling, and the deck around him spreading in blood.

Bolitho looked at Allday. "Get Mr. Guthrie! Tell him I want all the wounded brought to the lower gun deck, larboard side, and be quick about it!"

He saw the smoke from the hillside mingling with that from the guns. At least Veitch's courage had given the wounded a chance. Without the smoke's screen, any attempt to get boats alongside would have been prevented by the two siege guns. As it was, the French were still firing blindly across the water, the great balls adding their strange notes to the screams of the dying and wounded men.

A small man darted through the smoke, and Bolitho saw it was the surgeon.

Despite Farquhar's protests, he ripped open the gold-laced coat, his hair blowing in the wind from another shot directly above the deck, and placed a heavy dressing above the bright stain.

Farquhar gasped, "Get below, Andrews! See to our people!"

The surgeon looked despairingly at Bolitho. "I’m getting the wounded up, sir." He peered dazedly at the shattered bulwarks and sprawled corpses. Even after the gruesome work he had to perform deep on the orlop deck, this must seem a worse horror. "Will you strike, sir?"

Farquhar heard him and gasped, 'strike? Get below, you bloody fool! I’ll see you in hell before I strike my colors!" Bolitho beckoned to Pascoe. "Attend the captain. You stay here, too, Allday."

He ignored their anxiety and ran to the rail, straining his eyes through the smoke until he had found the boatswain. He could not remember his name, but shouted wildly until the man looked up at him, his face as black as any Negro's from powder-smoke and charred wreckage.

"Get the quarter boats alongside to larboard! A raft, too, if you can manage it!"

He turned as Pascoe called him and saw a pale square of canvas rising through the smoke, the ship beneath still hidden.

His sword blade touched the deck as his arms dropped to his sides. Time had run out. The Frenchman was here. Crossing their stem with the precision of a hunter stalking a wounded beast.

He saw, too, the enemy's broad pendant lifting and curling in the offshore wind, and wondered vaguely if its owner had seen his above the ruin and carnage.

The smoke seemed to fan upwards to a freak gust, but the ripple of red and orange tongues which spurted through it told Bolitho that this wind was man-made…

Deck by deck, pair by pair, the seventy-four's armament poured its broadside into Osiris's stern.

It seemed to go on and on forever. The cringing, reeling men around him lost shape and meaning, their faces merely masks of pain and terror, their gaping mouths like soundless holes as they ran blindly before the onslaught.

Bolitho found that he was on his knees, and as his hearing started to return he groped for his sword, using it like a lever to prise himself from the deck.

Hardly daring to breathe, he staggered to the rail, or what was left of it, and saw that Pascoe and Allday stood as before, with the captain propped between them. Allday had a bad cut on one arm, and Pascoe had a "dark weal on his forehead where he had been hit by a flying piece of timber. Bolitho could not get his breath to speak, but clung to them, nodding to each in turn.

Beyond the quarterdeck there was not a mast left standing, and the whole of the upper gun deck, forecastle and gang-ways were buried under a mountain of broken spars and rigging. Smoke billowed from everywhere, while beneath the heaped wreckage he heard voices calling for help, for each other, or cursing like men driven mad.

Allday gasped, "Mizzen’ll come down any minute, sir!" He sounded faint. "Only the shrouds holding it, I’d say!" Faintly through the din of shouts and splintering woodwork Bolitho heard cheering. Frenchmen cheering their victory.

Farquhar thrust Pascoe away and reeled towards the broken hammock nettings. His uniform was torn, and several wood splinters were embedded in his shoulders like darts. Blood ran unheeded down his chest and marked his passage towards the side, and when Bolitho caught him he had his eyes tightly shut.

He gasped, "Did we strike, sir?"

Bolitho held him firmly as Pascoe ran to help. The mast with his pendant, the halliards which had held the ensign, all had been blasted away in the enemy's broadside.

"No, we did not. "

Farquhar opened his eyes very wide and looked at him. "That is good, sir. I-I’m sorry about-" He closed his eyes against another searing pain, but exclaimed fiercely, "I hope Probyn rots in hell! He's finished us this day."

Bolitho supported him, knowing that Pascoe was watching his face as if for an answer to something.

Farquhar said quietly, "Let me stand, sir. I will be all right now. Get that fool Outhwaite to-" Some last understanding flashed across his eyes, and then froze there.

The second lieutenant staggered through the funnelling smoke, but stopped motionless as Bolitho said, "Take your captain, Mr. Guthrie." He watched a few men emerging from beneath the poop. 'sir Charles Farquhar is dead."