Bolitho 19 - Beyond the Reef (44 page)

Bolitho was aware of the sudden silence around him. Tybalt must have been searching for him and had run down on the enemy formation without knowing what it was. They were lucky to be alive.

“Acknowledge. Tell Tybalt to take station to windward.” He ignored the bright flags soaring aloft to break from the yards, the other bunting strewn around the midshipman and signals party like fallen standards on a battlefield.

Jenour was waiting with his book. “General—Prepare for battle.”

Then as the flags soared up again and were acknowledged by the other two ships, Bolitho said, “Then another, Stephen. Form line of battle ahead of the Flag.”

Keen understood. Bolitho was saving the flagship’s massive artillery until he could estimate the enemy’s strength and intentions.

Bolitho turned and saw Allday carrying his coat and hat across the old sword like an offering.

He slipped his arms into the coat, and knew the sailing-master was watching as he took his hat also. Remembering their last fight together, when he had worn Bolitho’s hat into battle.

He raised his arms and allowed Allday to fasten the sword into place. Allday was wearing his best jacket, the one with the special gilt buttons he had given him. Their eyes met and Bolitho said quietly, “So, old friend. It will be warm work today.”

Keen saw the exchange, but was thinking of Zenoria. He would never go home if he was maimed or disfigured. Never.

When he looked again he was surprised by the intensity of Bolitho’s gaze. It was as if he had read his innermost thoughts.

Bolitho smiled. “Are you ready?” He waited, as if to share his strength with him. “Very well, Captain Keen.” He was still smiling, excluding all those nearby. “You may beat to quarters!”

In the confusion of shortening sail yet again to allow the other ships to form line ahead, the sudden rattle of drums from the marine drummer boys, the muffled calls between decks were almost drowned. Then as men stared at each other, while others ran wildly to their stations at the guns or high above the decks in the fighting-tops, discipline seemed to hesitate as full realisation came to those men who had never before faced an enemy.

Petty officers and boatswain’s mates chased the laggards with blows and curses, while beside those guns visible on the upper deck, gun captains were already selecting the first balls from the shot garlands.

Sedgemore peered aft anxiously. “Ready, sir!”

Keen tore his eyes from the hardening shape of the approaching frigate and called, “Faster this time, Mr Sedgemore!”

He glanced at Bolitho for confirmation. “Clear for action!”

There was less turmoil, or so it appeared from the quarterdeck. This was mainly because the ship’s company was separated into smaller groups, men were known to one another, and even their stations for battle were familiar to them.

Jenour watched over his signals party and then started with alarm as Houston called, “Signal from Tybalt, sir! Repeated Valkyrie and Relentless. Estimate six sail of the line to the nor’-west! “

Keen said, “Alter course two points to starboard. Steer westnor’-west.”

Bolitho did not have to think about Keen’s actions; he had proved his skill many times. But he had seen the men on deck peering at one another as if for answers to their fears. The odds remained the same. Two to one. He had faced such odds before, but most of the people had not.

“Acknowledge!”

Up and down the line the pendants rose and dipped again, while with their yards braced round in response to Keen’s signal, the others headed up closer to the wind.

Bolitho called, “Will you go aloft with a glass, Stephen?”

Jenour made for the shrouds but paused as Bolitho called after him. “I must know.” Unconsciously he was touching his eyelid again, his face set with grim determination.

Allday folded his arms and nodded to Tojohns as he hurried to join the boatswain by the boat tier. Here we go, he thought.

He rubbed his chest and saw Bolitho watching him. He gave a slow grin. “Just a habit, Sir Richard.”

Bolitho turned away as Jenour yelled from the crosstrees.

“From Tybalt, sir! One frigate in company! ” Eventually it would be clear enough to see the enemy from the deck. But not that soon. Bolitho shaded his eyes to look at the masthead pendant. Noon then. He saw Julyan putting extra hands on the wheel, the marines trooping to poop and forecastle, and up the quivering ratlines to the fighting-tops where they would try to mark down the enemy’s officers, or rake them with swivel-guns if they drew close enough together.

Other patches of scarlet marked each hatchway and ladder: sentries to prevent terrified men from running below to hide. To cut them down, if necessary, to maintain the others’ will to fight.

Bolitho heard Julyan murmur, “‘Less the wind backs a piece, them buggers’ll hold the advantage, sir.”

Keen nodded, dismissing what he already knew.

The breeze was a lively one and showed no sign of failing. If the enemy held the wind-gage, it was just possible they might be unable to run out their lower deck artillery with the ports almost awash. Black Prince on the other hand would keep the advantage with her main armament as the ship heeled over to the sail’s demands.

It was little enough. Bolitho walked to the tightly packed hammock nettings and rested against them while he levelled his telescope like a musket. He saw the ornate gingerbread across Relentless’s counter and poop reflecting and holding the flicker of feeble sunshine. Valkyrie led the line, and he was thankful. He knew Flippance; he would be like an extension of his right arm and would likely be the first to engage the enemy. So they had a frigate with them. In his heart he knew it was the Dutch-built one which Owen had described. The other ships, whichever they were, must have slipped through the blockade during the foul weather or even earlier. At the second attack on Copenhagen several had broken out, and not all had been recovered or brought to battle. They would be from different ports, perhaps with captains who had never fought together before. The man who commanded such a mixed squadron would have had to travel fast and independently in order to rally the ships he must lead.

It struck Bolitho like a fist. Why did I not think of it before? There was one French officer who stood head and shoulders above the others, a young frigate captain when they had been fighting out here, in these same waters. A voice seemed to mock him from the past. Were a frigate captain, Bolitho … He held flag rank now, having survived the terrible bloodletting of the Terror. A brilliant man, and one who would certainly use a frigate, no matter who had built her, to restore the pride which had been lost at the Nile and Trafalgar.

“Andre Baratte, Val. That’s who we are facing today.”

Then he remembered that none of those around him had been here in that other war. Except for Allday, and he would not have known. We Happy Few. All gone, wiped away in time if not memory.

Keen tried to understand, sensing his sudden depression. “What is it, sir?”

“Baratte was a very daring frigate captain, Val. I have no doubt of his equal ability as an admiral.”

He glanced down at the spitting crests alongside. “Make a signal to that effect to Valkyrie through Relentless. Spell it out with care. It may be useless to Captain Flippance, but he should be prepared.”

He stepped aside as midshipmen and seamen ran to the flag halliards again.

The name seemed to taunt him. Thomas Herrick would know, and it had likely been in the despatches he had refused to open. The Admiralty would send a frigate to carry such news. It sickened him to think of Herrick refusing to act; and it was impossible to see him as he had once been. Or was he himself the only one who still trusted in their old friendship?

High above their heads, perched on the main crosstrees and watched with curious amusement by a pigtailed seaman, Lieutenant Stephen Jenour watched the sea’s face shining, and felt the first heat on his skin. With great care he adjusted his telescope and waited for the ship to heave herself upright again from a long trough. He could feel the mast and spars trembling beneath him, hear the wind moaning through the rigging and into the booming canvas. Unlike Bolitho he had a good head for heights, and he never grew tired of being this tall—above everything.

“Oh, my God.” He tightened his fingers on the telescope again. He could just make out the ships Tybalt had reported, and one, a frigate that stood apart from all the rest. She was even managing to stay on a different tack.

The lookout asked, “Be it bad, zur?”

Jenour glanced at him. An old sailor. One of the few still left.

He said, “Take this glass. Tell me what you see.”

The man squinted through it, the crowsfeet around his eyes creasing his leathery skin.

“Beyond them ships, zur?” He shook his head, as if shocked that he could still be surprised. “‘Tis a fleet, zur!”

Jenour lowered himself swiftly past and around the maintop, where the marine marksmen lounged against the barricades watching his descent with interest.

Bolitho listened to him without comment, then said, “It will be an army of invasion. Adam saw only a part of it, but this is the truth of the matter.”

Keen said, “Can they be stopped, sir?”

“Until aid arrives, yes, Val.”

He looked towards the horizon, still dim with mist, like the smoke of a silent battle.

“Get rid of the boats. The victors can recover them.”

He ignored the calls and the rush of seamen to the hoisting tackles. “Well, there it is, Stephen. I thank you for your eyes today.” He saw other men running to prepare chain lifts to rig from the yards, to prevent them from falling on the unprotected gun crews if they were shot away. “What will he do, I wonder?”

“If …” Jenour shivered as he recalled what he had just seen. “If it is indeed the same French officer, and if, as you suspect, he was in that frigate …”

Bolitho tried to smile, but he could not. “Too many ifs, Stephen.”

“He will know you are here, Sir Richard. Know, too, that you have never run from the enemy.”

Bolitho touched his arm. “Then I have lost one ruse before it is begun. But I believe you are right.”

He watched the first of the boats being lowered, then cast adrift and left under the control of a canvas sea anchor. He thought suddenly of the Golden Plover. Was Fate so certain after all? Had death merely been postponed until today?

Yet again he seemed to hear her voice, Don’t leave me, and he answered her, but only in his mind. Never.

He saw Keen staring around the orderly decks, where men stood or crouched to await the next command. Perhaps he was already calculating the cost, seeing these same decks strewn with the dead and dying as Herrick’s flagship had been.

Bolitho said abruptly, “Let us have some music to pass the while, Captain!” The formality was for those nearest to them. If they lived, they would remember.

Keen gave a faint smile. “Portsmouth Lass, sir?”

Their eyes met. Another memory. “None other.”

So while the ships sailed slowly towards an unknown enemy, the small marine fifers marched up and down the deck, piping out a sailor’s tune neither Bolitho nor Keen would ever forget.

Bolitho felt for the locket beneath his shirt and pressed it against his skin.

I am here, Kate, and you are with me.

Lieutenant Sedgemore had been watching Bolitho and the flag captain, his mind as yet unable to grasp the enormity of the enemy’s strength. But once this was over … He allowed his eyes to stray to that part of the deck where his predecessor had died so horribly. As if he expected to see him lying there, torn apart.

He felt cold, despite the strengthening sun. He had seen something which he had only known as a stranger. It was fear.

19

WE HAPPY FEW

BOLITHO plucked the shirt from his skin and watched some ship’s boys carrying drinking water beneath either gangway for the gun crews. It had seemed an eternity since Valkyrie’s signal, “Enemy in sight!” had been repeated down the line, and Bolitho knew that despite their superiority in strength and numbers it was probably much worse for the oncoming French vessels. Black Prince had her yards braced hard round and was as close to the wind as such a large ship could stand, but at least they were holding formation and staying in line, with only half a mile between each of them. The enemy had the wind striking directly across their larboard bows, so that they appeared to weave this way and that, leaning over one minute with their sails like metal breastplates, and the next caught aback in a confusion of thrashing canvas.

Bolitho shaded his face to look through the mass of rigging. Nets had been rigged to catch falling blocks or broken spars, any of which could kill a man as efficiently as an iron ball. It was like being sealed in a trap. Men, weapons of war, everything they had come to accept as their daily existence.

Bolitho sought out the frigate Tybalt and saw her beating against the wind with no less difficulty than the enemy. But once the liners were close enough to engage, Captain Esse would run down from his hard-won position to windward and attack the enemy’s fleet of transports and supply vessels to scatter or destroy any which fell under his broadsides. He might have little hope of survival, but every frigate captain knew the risks of independent action. Tybalt’s hull was created and designed for just such operations, but her timbers were no match at all for the massive firepower of a line-of-battle. Bolitho took a telescope from Midshipman De Courcy and trained it with care until he had found the ragged formation of ships which lay far away across the starboard bow. So slow. He had been right the first time. It would be at noon when the first guns tested the range.