To the Ends of the Earth (26 page)

“But if she see us only dimly through the mist? And darkness is falling!”

“How will she know we are an enemy? She will burn recognition lights and wait for our answer. If her lights do not appear in our secret list we shall answer with our broadside.”

“And then?”

“One broadside and Captain Anderson can never be accused of giving up the ship without a fight.”

“The devil he cannot!”

“Be easy, Edmund. We are a ship of His Majesty’s Navy and shall do what we may.”

He smiled round at everyone, put on his hat and
withdrew
. Little Pike, his sobs assuaged, positively snarled across the table at me.

“So much for your attempt at heartening us, Mr Talbot!”

“Summers has gone a better way about it. I have no sword. Have you a sword, Bowles?”

“I? Good God no, sir. The ship will have a supply, I don’t doubt. They will be cutlasses perhaps.”

“Mr Brocklebank, you are, forgive me, of a full habit. Will you descend with the ladies?”

“I have an inclination to remain on deck, sir. After all, though I have on numerous occasions depicted the war at sea, I have never before had an opportunity of taking notes in the midst of a battle. You will see me, sir, when the shot is flying, seated on my camp stool and observing with a trained eye whatever is worthy of notice. To take an example, I have often enquired of military men—I include naval in the term military—have often enquired precisely how a cannon ball in flight is visible to the naked eye. Obviously the more nearly the ball is flying directly towards the observer the more slowly it will appear to move. We could
not be better situated for the observation. I only hope
darkness
is not too far advanced before we are engaged.”

“On your reckoning, sir, the most accurate idea of a cannon ball is to be formed by the man who has his head knocked off by it.”

“If it comes, why it comes. ‘Ripeness is all’—indeed if I may refer to my own case, overripeness is all. What is life, sir? A voyage where no one, despite all claims to the contrary—we know not what if you follow me—”

It was clear that Mr Brocklebank was approaching his customary state of inebriety. I stood up therefore and bowed to the company. The oddest thought had come to me. I might in actual fact be killed! I had only now
realized
it which may seem strange to anyone who has not been in a like case. Or say I had realized it and not
realized
it. But now the knowledge was—oppressive.

“I must ask the company to excuse me. I have letters to write.”

It was a confusion of my mental state that led me to say something as simple as that when in fact my abrupt departure needed an elaborate explanation if I had hoped to be understood. The truth was that all the excitement attendant on our sighting of a strange ship had made my head begin to ache even more than it had previously, from the blow with that flying sheet. I had now foreseen a danger to my reputation and was confusedly determined to forestall it. If this acute discomfort in my skull was allowed to increase or even remain as it was I would be in no state to face an enemy! Imagine me, among the
gentlemen
volunteers whining that I would like to take part in our defence but was quite incapacitated by a migraine and must join the ladies in the orlop! I got Phillips to bring me something for an aching head and took it in my bunk where to my astonishment I found it was yet more of the purser’s paregoric so that though mercifully I stopped myself from swigging the lot when I found what it was, my first sip was enough to put the ache in my head about six inches outside it and up to the left as I should judge. It produced in me too a desire and ability to dwell with Fancy and in a few minutes I found myself composing (but in my head and bunk) letters to my mother and father and even to my young brothers which I still think were pieces of prose with a noble ring about them. But the most natural and at the same time most dangerous effect of the drug was (with an enemy hovering ever nearer us in the mist) to send me fast asleep! I woke with a start from an unpleasant dream in which poor Colley in a
supernatural
way only too familiar in that state had summoned the
enemy and was bringing it hourly nearer. I fell out of my bunk rather than climbed out of it, my headache subdued but my confusion complete. I rushed into the waist. At first I thought the mist was enfolding us more closely but then saw it was the swift approach of the tropic night. Our ladies were grouped by the break of the quarterdeck where I suppose they might most immediately descend to the orlop. They were staring towards the larboard beam. Above them, on the quarterdeck, some of Oldmeadow’s soldiers were mustered with the officer himself. Forrard, I could make out in the gloom, parties mustered on the fo’castle. The emigrant women were gathered at its break. All was deep silence.

Deverel came striding aft at the head of a group of
emigrants
. His shoes made the only sound in the ship. He was in a state of high if suppressed excitement. He carried his scabbarded sword in his left hand. He was shivering slightly.

“Why, Edmund! I thought you was mustered at the guns!”

“Devil take it, I fell asleep.”

He laughed aloud.

“That’s cool! Well done, old fellow—but the others are all gone down. Good luck to you!”

“To you too—”

“Oh, I—why just now I would give my right arm for a bloody battle!”

He passed on, bounding up the ladder to the poop. I made my way down the contrary one to the cluttered gundeck.

Here at once a most unfortunate fact became plain. I was too tall for the gundeck. It had been designed for a company of dwarfs, miners perhaps, and I could not stand upright in it. I waited therefore to be directed. The gundeck was not much dimmer than the upper deck, for all the ports were 
open. Our six great guns were in position but their tackles not yet run up. There was a crowd round them but facing inboard where our commissioned gunner, Mr Askew, was pacing up and down as he addressed the company. He wore a belt with two pistols stuck in it.

“Now pay attention,” he said, “particularly those what have never seen this done before. You have now seen the guns loaded and primed. Should we need to have a reload you will leave it to them that knows the business. You gentlemen and emigrants will lay your hands to such ropes as the captains of guns may direct and when he says ‘Haul!’”—and here Mr Askew’s voice rose to what can only be called a suppressed roar—“you will haul till your guts fall out. I want to see your guts strung out there and there and there and there and there and there! And you will be silent the first time you run up the guns because Mr Summers has directed us to be as quiet as little mice so as the Frogs don’t know we are coming. So”—and his voice sank to a whisper—“when you have run the guns out silent you will pick your guts up, put ’em back, and stand
waiting
. If we should open fire you will see them gun trucks run back so fast you can’t see ’em move! I have seen gun trucks there and I have seen gun trucks back there but I have never seen ’em halfway, gentlemen, they moves so quick. So you better not be lounging behind them or the Frogs when they come aboard of us will think you are what they calls
confiture
. Jam, gentlemen. Jam.”

Little Pike put up his hand as if he were still at school.

“Won’t the enemy be firing by then?”

“How do I know, sir, and what do we care? When fire is opened things is different, oh, you have no idea, sir, how different things is! It’s very queer how different things is once a gun has been fired as they say in anger. So then you have the full permission of His Majesty the King, God bless him, to shout and yell and swear and shit yourselves 
and do what you like so long as it’s noisy and you haul your guts in and out when told to.”

“Good God.”

Mr Askew resumed in a conversational tone.

“It’s all flannel, of course. The Frogs don’t scare so easy as you gentlemen may think. Howsomever we must play our game as long as we can. So if we have to fight and if any volunteer should feel that the other side of the ship is cooler like and just a little farther off from the enemy, these two little fire irons in my belt are loaded. So now, my heroes, run up them guns!”

The next few moments for me were complicated and infuriating. The man whom I supposed to be the captain of the nearest gun pointed to the end of a rope which
projected
behind Bowles who was the hindmost of the four volunteers holding it. I had no sooner crouched close when the captain of the gun roared again, the volunteers leapt and Bowles struck me, cannoned into me so that I reeled two paces then fell, my head once more striking the deck so concussively that the whole world was obscured for a moment by a brilliant display of lights. I struggled to get up and heard, as far off, Mr Askew addressing me.

“Now, now, Mr Talbot, sir, where was you going? Had we been in action I might have been forced to put a pellet in your head, you come so close to the mid-point.”

The pain and the sense of having made myself a common mock was too much to bear. I leapt to my feet—and struck my head a second and even more shattering blow on the underside of the upper deck. This time I saw no lights and knew nothing until through a dizzying sickness I heard roaring laughter being shouted down by Mr Askew.

“Now then, you buggers, belay that and stand to! That was a hard knock the poor gentleman took and as stout a heart and head as there is in the ship I don’t doubt. God knows how much the beams is wounded on their underside. 
Half the deck planking must be started. Silence I said! How is it with you now, sir?”

I am sorry to say my only reply was a rehearsal of all the imprecations I could muster. Blood was trickling down my face. I sat up and the gunner held my arm.

“Easy does it, Mr Talbot. The gundeck is no place for you. Why, with Billy Rogers and Mr Oldmeadow you must be the three tallest men in the ship. You’ll do better on deck, sir, where the Frogs can get an eyeful of you all bloody and glaring. Keep low as you go, sir. Handsomely! A round of applause, my lads, for a gamecock of the afterguard!”

I did not know that fury could overcome dizziness and sickness so soon. I staggered up the ladder. The first person—by his voice—to notice me was Deverel.

“What the devil? Edmund old fellow! You are our first casualty!”

“I am too tall for the gundeck, God curse it! Where are the ladies?”

“Down in the orlop.”

“Thank God for that at least. Deverel, give me a weapon—anything!”

“Have you not had enough? Where it isn’t bloody, your face is corpse white.”

“I am coming to. A weapon for the love of God! A meat axe—sledge hammer—anything. I will engage to carve and eat the first Frenchman I come across!”

Deverel laughed aloud, then caught himself up. He was shivering with excitement.

“Spoken like a true Briton! Will you board with me?”

“Anything.”

“Mr Summers, sir, a weapon for my latest recruit!”

Someone put a cutlass in his free hand. He tossed it, caught the blade and presented the hilt to me.

“Here you are, sir. The plain seaman’s guide to
advancement
. Can you use it?” 

For answer I made the three sabre cuts then saluted him. He saluted back.

“Well enough, Edmund. But the point is queen, remember. Join the band of brothers!”

I followed him to the poop where Mr Brocklebank sat in the gloom on his camp stool, an unopened portfolio on his knees. His head was on his chest or perhaps I should say the upper part of his stomach. His hat was over his eyes. On the quarterdeck the captain was now addressing Summers in a low and furious tone.

“Is this the silence I ordered, Mr Summers? Did I give you directions at the top of my voice? I command silence and am answered by a gale, a positive hurricane of
laughter
, orders shouted, conversations—is this a ship, sir, or a bedlam?”

“I am sorry for it, sir.”

Old Rumbleguts subsided a little.

“Very well, sir. You may proceed with your duties.”

Summers put his hat on and turned away. Captain Anderson went to the rail and peered down at the lighted binnacle.

“Mr Summers, she has drifted off half a point to the norrard.”

Summers ran to the after rail and spoke down to the boat idling under our stern.

“Williams, bring her stern across half a point to starboard and roundly!”

He turned back. My eyes were full of water. I was still dazed and my head ached confoundedly. A settled rage had converted me from any, dare I say, usual calculating attitude to one of wishing for nothing so much as the opportunity to vent it on someone physically! I glanced round and saw that the quarterdeck was full. Some of Oldmeadow’s men knelt by the larboard rail with muskets at the ready. I could just see that the waist was lined with 
men holding pikes to jab off any fool so thick-witted as to climb into our netting. In fact the whole of the ship’s length on the larboard side was in a state of defence. I had the ridiculous thought that perhaps the nameless ship drifting inexorably towards us would after all approach from our starboard and completely defenceless side so that Captain Anderson would have to fire his great guns at nothing if he wished to be credited with an attempt at defence.

But Deverel was speaking or rather, since we were so near the captain, muttering in my ear.

“Now, old fellow, you’ll follow me close. You’ll have to scramble, d’you see? Wait till Oldmeadow’s men have fired though or you’ll get lead through you. Don’t forget your boots.”

“My boots, Jack?”

“Kick ’em in the balls, it’s as good as anything. Mind your own. Go low with the point! But it’ll be all over in seconds one way or another. Nobody goes on fighting—that’s only in books and the gazette.”

“The devil.”

“If you’re alive after one minute you’ll be a hero.”

“The devil.”

He turned from me as he spoke and whispered into the crowding men.

“Are you all ready?”

The answer was a kind of muted growl and with it there blew a thick waft of an aroma that came near to making me fall. It was rum and I made a mental note never to go into the commonest kind of danger without my hunting flask filled to the stopper. I was far, far too sober for this escapade, and the dullness of paregoric was fading.

“How d’you think it’ll go, Jack?”

He breathed in my ear. “Death or victory.”

I heard Summers speaking to the captain. “All is ready, sir.” 

“Very good, Mr Summers.”

“Might I suggest that some heartening message should be passed among the various groups of men at their stations, sir?”

“Why, Mr Summers, they have had their rum!”

“Trafalgar, sir.”

“Oh well, Mr Summers, if you think it proper, have them reminded of the unforgettable signal.”

“Very good, sir.”

“And, Mr Summers.”

“Sir?”

“Remind them that with the way the war is going this may well be our last opportunity of prize money.”

Mr Summers touched his hat. The men on the
quarterdeck
clearly being seized of his information, he stepped down the ladder and disappeared in the gloom. I heard a succession of noises, that same muted growl spreading from the waist and then forrard to the fo’castle. Heroics and rum! The thought of that combination made me a little less of a madman and more aware of the silly
position
I had got myself into. Deverel, I knew, was the proper careless, dashing kind of fellow for such an
enterprise
. Besides, he was driven by the unquestionable fact that a gallant exploit would get him out of his difficulties. Even Captain Anderson would not be so mean-spirited as to proceed with the trial and punishment of a young officer who had led a desperate boarding party—but I, what had I to gain? All I had was everything to lose!

Then all reflection was banished from my mind. From out there in the darkness of the night and the mist there came the sound of a kind of whispering and multiplying creak. This was followed at once by a series of dull thumps.

Deverel muttered in my ear. “She has run out her guns!” 

Silence again—and surely, a faint washing and rippling and splashing, as if some heavy object was being moved bodily sideways through the water, two bodies, two ships, we and they—There had been in Deverel’s voice the fierce anticipation of a beast of prey which hears its victim close! But I—all at once I was vividly aware that out there in the darkness the round muzzles of guns were pointed at me! I could not breathe. Then instantly I was blinded by a brilliant flash, not the dagger in my head, but out there in the darkness: and the flash was followed, no, surrounded, by the awful explosion of the gun—a kind of wide roar with a needle-point of instantaneity in it. The roar was like no peacetime salute. It rebounded
awesomely
from the very sky in a brazen replication which set me jerking and shuddering with excitement. The cutlass fell from my hand and must have clattered on the deck though I heard nothing through the sound of blood
beating
in my head. I scrabbled after the hilt but my right hand was frozen and would not open to pick it up or close on the grip. I had to use both hands, then staggered up again.