HMS Diamond (28 page)

      
"Mr. Wilkie, would you be so good as to set a course for that 74 and lay us alongside, larboard side to."

      
"Lay us alongside?" Wilkie was no coward. If he had to die in the king’s service he was as prepared to do that as the next man. But this was such a useless and futile way to go. "You mean to fight it out, sir? With a 74?"

      
"No, Mr. Wilkie, I mean to have a pleasant chat with them and perhaps a cup of tea."

      
Wilkie stood there, mouth ajar, not knowing what to say or do.

      
"Mr. Wilkie, the new course if you please? I would like to reach them before the weekend."

      
While Wilkie was shouting orders, Smith turned to Lt. Pearson. "Mr. Pearson, I want you to double check the guns on the larboard side. Make sure they are properly manned and loaded but
not
run out. I want every man near his gun station but kept out of sight. Above all, when we get near that ship I want no talking, do you understand? NO TALKING! And that goes for everyone from the ship’s boys to the officers."

      
Pearson was clearly confused but glad to have something specific to do. "Yes, sir. Will that be all sir?"

      
"No, when you finish with that I want you to exchange that... ah, your ‘French’ uniform with Monsieur de Tromelin and have him report to me."

***

      
François de Tromelin, had been assigned to the
Diamond
several weeks ago as a liaison by General de Frotté; but he was still something of a mystery. He was a soft-spoken young man who rarely said a word unless spoken to, even though his English, like Smith’s French, was nearly perfect. It was some time before, in bits and pieces, his story came out.

      
He was 25 years old and a former lieutenant in the old French 42nd Infantry, the Limousan Regiment. When the revolution began he fled to England with his family, only to return to take part in the invasion at Quiberon in 1795. That fact alone spoke volumes.

      
In 1795 the British navy landed a force of about 3000 ex-Royalist troops on the beach at Quiberon. An anti-Revolution peasant movement had begun in the Vendee region and the exiled Royalists were being brought in to support them. Unfortunately everything possible went wrong. The local populace failed to rally to the Royalists, the weather was so bad the British ships could offer no support when the invading troops were attacked, and their leaders fled as soon as they saw the battle was going badly. The Royalists were promised they would not be harmed if they surrendered. They were deceived. Almost as soon as the Royalists were rounded up, the Revolutionary soldiers began executing them. Eventually some 750 men were shot and the rest were allowed to escape. They say that the killing only stopped because the soldiers were running low on ammunition. François de Tromelin was among those who escaped, but he did so with a burning hatred in his heart for the revolution.

      
He fled back to England, pausing only to locate his fiancée in Caen and marry her. Once back in England he eked out a living giving drawing lessons to the gentry, but soon heard the call of duty again. When asked to use his linguistic skills as a courier between the British forces and the Chouan leadership, he jumped at the chance.

      
Tromelin arrived on deck looking both bewildered and disheveled in his hastily made up "French" uniform. Smith quickly pulled him aside, however, and explained what he wanted him to do.

      
Wilkie had pulled the
Diamond
alongside the much bigger man-of-war and Tromelin stepped over to the larboard quarterdeck rail to speak to the officer leaning over the other ship’s bulwark.

      
"My captain wishes to speak with yours," he said in French.

      
A moment later an older man with salt and pepper hair and a very tired expression on his face leaned over the side. Smith had taken Tromelin’s place.

      
"Monsieur, is that not the famous
Le Caton
I see before me?" Smith said in near perfect French.

      
"It is, indeed."

      
"And are you the equally famous Captain de Framond?"

      
"Well, no, monsieur. Captain de Framond has... ah... retired from the service. I am Captain Clavel."

      
Smith knew what that meant. De Framond had undoubtedly been guillotined by the revolution as a "Royalist traitor" like so many of France’s best officers. It was one of the main reasons why the French navy was so ineffective.

      
"Nevertheless, it is an honor to meet you and an honor to meet up with a ship that sailed so nobly with de Grasse at the Battle of the Ca... Chesapeake, and later bringing glory to France in the Caribbean." Smith had caught himself just in time. It was known as the Battle of the Capes in England, and the Battle of the Chesapeake in America and France. He knew, because he was there. That’s where he remembered seeing the
Le Caton
both there and later at the Battle of the Saints.

      
"It is a ship that is graced by none but heroes." Smith continued smoothly and with that he doffed his cap and offered a low bow.

      
The French captain was obviously pleased. "You are too kind, monsieur." He said flushing slightly at this unexpected recognition. "But may I help you in some way?"

      
"No, citizen. It is I who was hoping for the honor of asking you that question. I could not help but see that your ship has suffered damage. You have a jury mast up, some of your ports are without guns, and I see you have your pumps working. May I be of assistance in any way? It is why I came over here... that and to meet you, of course."

      
Smith knew that a combination of Gallic pride, plus their being so close to port would force a negative answer. He was not wrong.

      
"No, but thank you anyway, citizen."

      
At this the other officer, the one who originally answered Tromelin’s hail, spoke up. "Captain, forgive me, but I could not help but notice you have a slight accent. It sounds almost... well, it sounds almost English."

      
Smith froze. A tingling shiver of fear ran down his spine, as he didn’t know how to reply. If he were unmasked now, it would all be over. The 74 would utterly destroy the little frigate before they could even begin to get away. Smith opened his mouth to say something but, before he could, Tromelin spoke up.

      
"English? No citizen, far from it. The captain is from the north of France, not far from Dunkirk. But I have always been of the opinion that perhaps one of his female ancestors might have occasionally strayed a little too far out into the English Channel, eh?" De Tromelin said all this in an obviously native French accent, and everyone laughed. Smith went along with it by looking appropriately embarrassed.

      
"If you are sure you are all right, captain, then we’ll be on our way."

      
Tromelin then turned and rattled off a string of orders in French. The crew had no precise idea of what he said; but, along with his hand gestures, they understood the gist of it and began to get the ship underway. Smith was even more startled than the crew because Tromelin’s orders were exactly correct. Mercifully, hearing those commands and seeing the crew respond appropriately was the final touch needed to convince the
Le Caton
officers that nothing was amiss.

      
As the sails dropped and were being sheeted home, Smith looked around and saw that the cutter, not to mention a frigate that had also appeared, had lost interest in his ship. If
Le Caton
was not alarmed, then they had no reason for alarm and they turned away. That was exactly what Smith hoped would happen when he formulated his plan.

      
Smith then pulled Tromelin aside, nonchalantly studied the sky for a moment and quietly asked, "François, where the blazes did you learn to get a ship underway?"

      
"I am from a little port city called Ouistreham, not far from Caen. I grew up on the sea, captain. In fact, I could probably master this ship as well as Wilkie—at least for the simple things."

      
"I want to thank you for your quick thinking back there. When he challenged my accent, I didn’t know if..."

      
Before he could complete the sentence Lord Howell strode up. "Well captain, what are you going to do?" He demanded.

      
"What am I going to do about what?" Smith replied irritably.

      
"That ship you were ever-so-pleasantly chatting with just now. You have your larboard guns loaded and manned. All you have to do is run them out, swing around her stern and rake her. A broadside at this close range traveling down her length would be devastating. You would kill scores, if not hundreds of her men."

      
"No."

      
"No? Did I hear you right? NO?" It was too much for Howell and his voice started rising. "First you refuse to protect the king’s gold shipment to go on this little junket; and, now that we’re here, you refuse to kill the enemy? Must I also add cowardice to your other irresponsible actions in my report to the Admiralty?"

      
Smith did his best to control himself. "I say no for two reasons. First, there is no way we could take that ship as a prize even if we fired into her unprotected stern. That cutter and that frigate over there would be on us before the smoke cleared from the first shot.

      
"And your second reason?" Howell asked having already dismissed the first one.

      
"Because..." Smith spoke slowly and distinctly. "Because, Lord Howell, it would be dishonorable. It is a concept you might look into some day."

      
Smith knew he shouldn’t have added that last sentence, as it would certainly seal his fate with the Admiralty when they got home, but he couldn’t resist it.

      
Lord Howell, speechless with fury, stormed down the larboard ladder from the quarterdeck and aft into his quarters. Smith looked around to see both Wilkie and Tromelin frozen in place staring at him.

      
"Mr. Wilkie, a course for Herqui if you please."

***

      
Within a few hours the sky had gone from overcast, to gray, to black. It was almost as if the sun had decided to retire early that day and turn over his kingdom to the wind. The problem was that the
Diamond
had not had time to reach open water and soon found herself in trouble. The wind had risen to gale force and had trapped the
Diamond
between itself and the shoreline. Turning back to Brest was not an option because, by now, the French would have figured out that they had no ship named the "Diamond" and they had been duped. The only thing they could do was to fight the storm.

      
Ordinarily in a gale like this the
Diamond
would have simply put up storm sails and run before the wind; but she had no room to do that. Instead, she had to carry a large press of canvas in order to claw her way free of the threatening coastline. She was literally between a large number of rocks and a hard place. If she took sail off, the wind would eventually blow her ashore. If she kept sail on, she was in danger of snapping her masts and thus making herself completely at the mercy of the storm.

      
By noon the wind had picked up even more, driving mountainous seas before it; and the
Diamond
was taking it hard. Thirty-foot waves were crashing over the bow of the ship when it went into a trough, swirling and sluicing its way down the deck from the forecastle to the foot of the quarterdeck. The men on watch were frantically trying to keep the bow pointed into the waves and, at the same time, tack as far away from land as possible.

      
Smith inspected the sails for the hundredth time and scanned the sky for the thousandth. Knowing that nothing more could be done at the moment, he turned the deck over to Mr. Wilke and decided to tour the ship. What he found generated a flash of pride in his crew.

      
Every hatch and gun port that could be secured was firmly battened, preventers had been run to back up the standing rigging and all of the ship’s chain-pumps were fully manned and working hard. The guns were secured with double breechings and stay tackle. Someone had even nailed cleats behind the trunnions, for the ship occasionally rolled so far over that the guns would have been dangling by their ropes if it were not for those cleats. The men knew that if one of those guns ever broke loose it would shoot through the opposite side as if the bulkhead was made of paper.

      
Then he did one additional thing—something that he viewed as important as any secured gun or battened hatch. He intentionally walked through the mess deck where the men were struggling through their noon meal. That, in itself, was not earth shaking; but it was the way he did it. He strolled along like a man without a care in the world. Commenting to one man here and joking with another there, he looked like he was taking a walk in the park. Smith knew that if he showed even a tenth of the concern he actually felt, that the men’s morale and discipline would come apart. He couldn’t have that. Not now. Not ever. He needed to show confidence and lack of concern. After all, if the captain wasn’t worried, what reason had a common seaman to worry?