The Continental Risque (39 page)

‘What is it, Mr Weatherspoon?' Biddlecomb asked curtly.

‘Beg your pardon, sir, but there's a hail from the masthead and they've spotted a strange sail, sir, on the larboard quarter and three miles or so to leeward.'

It could be anything, Biddlecomb told himself, and of all possibilities it was most likely an American merchantman bound in or out of one of the many ports along that stretch of seaboard. But all the logic in the world was not able to master the tingling on the soles of his feet, the excitement that he felt at the sound of the words ‘a strange sail.'

‘Tell Mr Rumstick I'll be on deck momentarily.' Despite his desire to see what possibilities this sighting offered, he forced himself to continue his rounds, giving each man the attention that he would have received had there been no break in the routine. At last, having finished a whispered and disheartening consultation with Thigpen, he climbed the ladder to the weather deck and stepped aft.

All of the
Charlemagne
's officers were clustered at the leeward rail, and each was aiming a telescope across the water at the distant sail. Biddlecomb took up his own glass and did likewise. There was little to see, just two topgallant sails and two topsails, gray patches against a lighter grey sky.

‘What do you make of her, Mr Tottenhill?' he asked.

‘Brig or a snow, sir, sailing roughly the same course as we are. Can't see any colors.'

After ten minutes of observation none of the ship's officers had anything substantial to add to that assessment, nor could the lookout at the masthead give any further intelligence.

‘Shall I signal the flag, sir?' Weatherspoon asked. He already had the ensign bent to its halyard, the signal for seeing a strange sail being to hoist and lower the ensign as many times as there were strange vessels to be seen.

‘Has
Columbus
already signaled?'

‘Well, sir … to be sure …' Weatherspoon equivocated. He clearly had not bothered to look.

‘
Columbus
has made no signals, sir,' Rumstick offered. ‘I reckon she can't see this fellow, what with the haze.'

‘Hold a moment on that signal, Mr Weatherspoon. Helmsman,' Biddlecomb said, ‘make your head north by east, one-half east.'

‘North by east, one-half east, aye, sir,' the helmsman said, pushing the tiller over half a foot and turning the
Charlemagne
slightly, almost imperceptibly, away from the fleet and toward the stranger on the horizon.

‘I'm laying aloft,' Biddlecomb said at last. His growing sense of anticipation for some pending action was foolish and baseless, he knew, but still it was there, and he could not endure standing around in that uncertain state. ‘Mr Rumstick, I'll thank you to get the foresail off her.'

‘Aye, sir,' Rumstick said, doing an admirable job of hiding his curiosity at that strange order and passing the word even as Biddlecomb pulled himself into the main shrouds.

He climbed steadily upward, not so slow as to look bad and not so fast as to be breathing hard when at last he reached the main topmast crosstrees. He was still fifteen feet below the lookout, who was straddling the main topgallant yard as if riding a horse, but he was high enough to get a decent view of the distant vessel.

It was a brig to be sure, they were close enough and he was high enough to see that for certain. She had no colors flying, but a flag was not the only thing that could give a ship's identity away. Biddlecomb rested his telescope on a ratline and peered at her sails, noting every detail; the narrow roach, the cut of the jib, the steeve of the bowsprit. His glass revealed nothing that diminished his feeling of anticipation.

Morale aboard the
Charlemagne
was all but nonexistent, and his own good name, the immediate jewel of the soul, as Shakespeare called it, was much damaged as well. Nothing would go so far to restoring both as capturing a brig-of-war belonging to the Royal Navy.

For the first time in fifteen minutes he turned away from the sail to larboard and looked over the starboard side toward the
Columbus
. With the wind dead astern and the
Columbus
last in line, she would have been the natural choice for Hopkins to order in pursuit of the stranger.

But she was now abeam of the
Charlemagne
and drawing ahead, the
Charlemagne
's speed having dropped off after Biddlecomb ordered the foresail stowed. And even though she was passing the
Charlemagne
, she was farther away now than she had been half an hour before, a result of Biddlecomb's subtle course change.

If the commodore ever perceived what he had done, holding off signaling the flag until the
Charlemagne
was the closest in the fleet to the enemy, then he would stamp out what little part of Biddlecomb's reputation was still glowing, cussing like a fiend the whole time. And that was only fair; Biddlecomb was aware that his actions were selfish and unprofessional.

And he did not care a whit.

He closed his telescope and stepped down to the topmast shrouds and made his way to deck. ‘Gentlemen,' he addressed the quarterdeck in general, ‘I believe the sail yonder is a British brig-of-war, about the same size as ourselves. We are going to take it. Please clear for action.'

There were smiles all around as this information was digested and the officers envisioned the pending action. Not one among them was unaware of the
Charlemagne
's tarnished reputation, and though each believed that the others were at fault, all were equally anxious to make improvements in that quarter. With a chorus of ‘Aye, sir's' and the lieutenants hurried off to their respective stations, shouting orders to the men, who could not possibly move as quickly as the officers would have liked.

‘Helmsman, fall off. Hands to the braces, starboard tack!' Biddlecomb shouted, and the
Charlemagne
turned boldly away from the fleet until her jibboom was pointed at the place on the ocean that she and the stranger to leeward would meet if they held their present courses.

‘Sir, shall I run up the colors?' Weatherspoon asked.

‘No, not quite yet.' Biddlecomb thought of the many flags that he had brought aboard, colors of half a dozen countries. There was no reason to reveal themselves this early in the game.

Ten minutes later Weatherspoon reported a signal from the flagship. ‘White pendant at the mizzen topmast head – that's to speak with us – and a red pendant at the mizzen peak. That's fall into line ahead.'

The midshipman's report was followed by silence as Biddlecomb considered the tactical situation. The flagship had finally noticed that something was going on. As well they might; the
Charlemagne
was sailing diagonally away from the fleet, and he was certain now that the fleet could not see the stranger.

The proper thing to do, of course, was to hoist the signal for seeing a strange vessel. But that involved using the ensign, and if this stranger saw the Grand Union flag and recognized it, he might run. Biddlecomb thought it unlikely that the
Charlemagne
, battered about, undermanned, and heavy laden, could catch her.

It had already occurred to him that the captain of the distant brig probably did not know what he was looking at. All of the ships of the fleet, save for the
Charlemagne
, were converted merchantmen, and if he could not see their gunports (which he probably could not over that distance), then he might take the ships for a convoy. That would explain why he was not running away, and Biddlecomb did not wish to disabuse him of that notion.

‘The brig is running up colors, sir,' Weatherspoon reported. The stranger was less than two miles away now, and even without a glass Biddlecomb could see the patch of color flying from the mainmast head. ‘Oh.' Weatherspoon sounded disappointed. ‘Oh, sir, he's a Frenchman.'

‘I have no doubt. And I'm the king of China. Mr Weatherspoon, let us do this. Signal the flag that there's a strange vessel, but use the British ensign to do it, rather than our flag, then haul the British ensign up and leave it there.'

The two vessels, the
Charlemagne
and the strange brig, were converging quickly now with just over a mile of water separating them. The
Charlemagne
was cleared for action; it had taken fifteen minutes with their diminished crew, but now each man stood at his station, guns loaded and ready to run out, match smoldering, as the gun crew fidgeted with rammers, sponges, linstocks, and handspikes.

Faircloth's marines in their green coats, not quite as immaculate as they had been four months before, were poised in the tops and along the quarterdeck. They had an air of great confidence about them, having just conquered an entire British colony with a total of six cannonballs having been fired at them. Biddlecomb wondered if they knew that this little brig was likely to put up a greater fight than had the entire island of New Providence.

And indeed the brig was not shying away from a confrontation. She had turned to larboard and was sailing more directly at them, as if both vessels were sailing down the opposite legs of a great triangle to the apex where they would meet.

‘She's hauling down her colors, sir,' Wesatherspoon reported. No sooner had the French ensign reached the deck than another jerked aloft. Biddlecomb watched the flag through his glass, frowning as he recognized the colors. This was not what he had expected.

‘Sir, it's the Pine Tree flag, the Appeal to Heaven, like we used to fly,' Weatherspoon observed.

And so it was. Biddlecomb had no reason to think that the Pine Tree flag was any less a subterfuge than was his own British ensign, but the sight of it made him uneasy and, for the first time, uncertain.

‘Very well, Mr Weatherspoon, please run up the Grand Union flag.'

Biddlecomb stepped up to the break of the quarterdeck. ‘Gunners, listen to me. I want all of the men on the larboard side to help those on the starboard. We'll hold off running out the guns, let these whoresons think they've fooled us. When I give the word, you run out and fire as quick as ever you can. Remember the drills, train your guns before you fire, but if we're as close as I hope, you'll be hard-pressed to miss. Hands to the braces, stand by to heave to.'

The
Charlemagne
turned up into the wind. The mainsails came aback and she stopped in her wake with her bowsprit and jibboom now pointing directly at the other brig.

The stranger turned as well, turned toward the
Charlemagne
until she was coming bow-on, charging at the Americans as if determined to crash, bow to bow. Half a mile, a quarter mile, she closed the distance, her yards braced up sharp, the Pine Tree flag rippling from her mainmast head.

Biddlecomb spared a glance at the fleet. They had turned in their course and were heading toward the
Charlemagne
, but it would be some time before they came up to the two combatants. Enough time for the
Charlemagne
to take the other, or for the other to beat the
Charlemagne
to splinters.

Biddlecomb's left hand moved to his side in what was now an unconscious gesture, but nothing was there. He frowned and looked down at his waist.

‘Oh,' he said, ‘Mr Weatherspoon, be so good as to run down to the great cabin and fetch up my sword.'

Weatherspoon nodded and disappeared below, and Biddlecomb fidgeted, paced, and wished that the midshipman would hurry. Standing on the quarterdeck, with the enemy bearing down on him, with what was left of his ship and his reputation at stake, his familiar sword absent from his grip, he felt vulnerable, terribly vulnerable. All but naked.

What would he do, the captain of this British brig-of-war? Assuming that the vessel with which they were closing was, in fact, a British brig-of-war, what would he do?

Biddlecomb stared at the other vessel churning along through the gray sea. He was oblivious to the tension aboard his own command, oblivious to the nervous yawns and the drumming fingers and the tapping feet.

No British captain would fire until he had hoisted the proper ensign, of that much Isaac was certain. And he was equally certain that this enemy would try to rake the
Charlemagne
, fire on her bow or stern. At least that was what
he
would try to do, were he in command.

‘Mr Rumstick,' Biddlecomb shouted. ‘Please see that the boarders are armed, pistols and cutlasses. If I am not mistaken, we shall be boarding them over the starboard bow. On the foredeck, stand ready on the jib and staysail sheets and halyards. We'll have to swing the bow off the wind quickly. I want them set in a flash on my signal.'

‘Here, sir.' Weatherspoon appeared on deck with Biddlecomb's sword and belt held like some religious artifact in his hands.

‘Thank you.' Biddlecomb took the belt and wrapped it around his waist and buckled it, adjusting the sword until it hung in just the right spot. His left hand moved back to his side, and this time it found the brass wire-bound hilt that it sought. He felt as if a missing limb had been restored.

The British brig-of-war was one hundred yards off, that distance falling quickly away. And it
was
a British brig-of-war – Biddlecomb had no doubt about that now. The heraldic shield under the bowsprit, the heavy spars, the line of gunports down her black sides, were attributes of a naval tradition hundreds of years old. Nothing about her suggested the upstart rebel Yankee she was pretending to be.

‘Foredeck! Set the jib and staysail! On the main braces, let go and haul!' On those orders the men laid into the lines and the
Charlemagne
came to life, swinging away from the wind, presenting her broadside to the bow of the oncoming vessel, a raking broadside that would send round shot hurtling down the length of her deck.

‘Starboard battery, run out!'