Dewey Lambdin - A King`s Commander

Yet, how many tiny seaports had they passed, getting closer to Alassio, and no sign of them. It didn't mean that they were really a target, Choundas could tell himself. Perhaps the British didn't know of their presence. That everything would turn out fine.

Diano, to larboard and now astern. Only a few miles more, once around the headland that formed the spine of the western heights of the Bay of Alassio. No sign of any enemy warships further out to sea. A thought did cross his mind, that it was a trap; that whoever that very clever fellow was in the British camp, they'd passed the tale, knowing he would do this-rush to the scene, to assure himself. It made the right sort of sense, to Choundas. Who was more important to the war effort than he? With all modesty, he could not think of anyone else whose loss would do more harm to the cause of the Revolution. It was not hubris, that awareness; it was merely his studied opinion, after coolly weighing the facts, and the rest of the participants. Lewrie. Would Lewrie be there? Would anyone? As bait, or…

"Artillery!" sang out a watch officer. "I hear gunfire!"

"Hй, merdel" Choundas groaned, biting his lip in anguish.

"Sail Ho!" Sang out the foremast lookout. "Dead on the bow!"

He could hear it himself, now. Stuttering. Dull brumbies. A single flat bark. An irregular cannonading, around the headlands. His convoy! The "L'Anglais"-the "Bloodies"-were in Alassio Bay!

"Sail is ship-rigged!" the lookout cried again. "Standing out to sea… larboard tack!"

"Her flag!" Choundas howled aloft, cupping his hands.

"Corvette!" the lookout shouted. "Warship!"

"Her flag! Her damned flag!" Choundas screeched again.

"C'est l'Anglais!"

"Timonier, helm down a point, alee," Choundas snapped, turning clumsily. "Close-haul to windward. Brail up courses, and chain-sling the yards. We will fight her. Drum us to Action!"

"Sail Ho!"

"Where, away?"

"One point off th' star-b'd bows!"

Lewrie scaled the mizzen shrouds on the starboard side, telescope in hand, so he could see for himself. A ship, a proper ship, he thought; not one of those lateen-rigged locals. She was bows-on to Jester, aiming directly at her under a press of sail, flinging a great mustache of sea foam about her forefoot and cutwater, her arrogantly thrust bowsprit and jib boom cocking up and down as she rocked. No more than a league to leeward, standing on nor'east close-hauled, and about four miles offshore. The strange ship's courses, tops'ls, t'gallants, and royals were cusped to the wind, their leaches almost edge-on to him.

Something diff rent, though…? Even as he watched, the greater drum-taut billow astern of her fore-course went slack, winging out alee.

"Brailing up her main course!" Lewrie shouted down to his deck officers. "To fight! She's a French warship! Mister Bittfield, run out the starboard battery, now! Hoist signal, 'Enemy in Sight'!"

He clambered down, to hop the last three feet to the quarterdeck and stride to the nettings overlooking the waist. He lifted his glass again. Should Jester stand on, she'd keep the wind gauge above the foe, but allow her to slip astern. That French ship… a. frigate, perhaps?… was as close to the wind as she could lie, already, and would slide aft as she stood on. Unless she tacked and bore away south to offer battle.

Has to be a frigate, Alan frowned; a lesser ship'd haul her wind and not be confident of the outcome. But she's so close inshore… I think I like her there. I allow her to tack out to deeper water, she's all the maneuvering room in the world, then. Aye, stand on as we are, for a bit more, but then haul our wind and wear down to her. Then, if her captain feels he's trapped himself, hell have to come about, tack 'cross the wind. But I'll still have the wind gauge of her. And rake her, bows-on to me and helpless. She'd have to haul away west…?

"Brail up the main course, Mister Porter. Rig out the boarding nets. Loose, sloppy bights, mind." Lewrie smiled. "Quartermaster… half a point to weather."

Without the force of the main course, Jester slowed, sailing off the wind toward the sou'west, the beginnings of a Levanter, an easterly, on her larboard quarters. Altering course, making it more of a run downwind, which took away the apparent wind, making her seem slower still as she moved no faster than the breeze itself.

"Full-rigged ship, right enough, Captain," Mister Knolles stated. "Small frigate, or large corvette… about our equal?"

"Unless she's a thirty-two-gun frigate, with twelve-pounders, Mister Knolles," Alan speculated with a cautious growl. "Two points off our bow, and a mile nearer. Shell shave the western headland by at least two miles, should she stand on as she is."

He cast a glance to Jester's rear, back toward the bay that lay off her starboard quarter. Surely, there was enough noise coming from there, enough high-piled rags of gun smoke, to tell this Frenchman that there were other British ships about. He rather doubted that she'd be foolish enough to go much further east than the headland's tip, or risk being trapped between Jester and the rest of the squadron's guns.

"Let her slide aft to about… four points, almost but not quite abeam before we wear, Mister Knolles," Lewrie decided aloud. "Perhaps half a point less than four. Then she'll be between…"He felt the urge to snicker, "between Jester and the Deep-Blue Sea! Let's prepare. Hands to Stations for Wearing Ship."

"Aye aye, sir. Mister Porter?" Lieutenant Knolles bellowed, causing a stir, a chorus of piping, a stampede of bare horny feet.

"Three point off th' star-b'd bows!" a lookout cried over that preparatory din, as hands hauled taut on braces and sheets.

"Tacking!" another lookout shouted, followed by the others in a reedy chorus of alarm.

"Avast, Mister Knolles!" Lewrie snapped, countering the order. "Quartermaster, up your helm. Course, due west. Ease her onto a run, wind fine on the larboard quarter!"

It was just possible that the Frenchman had the slant, around the headland's tip, to see all he wished to see, and had spotted the powder palls, perhaps one or two more British warships. The French ship came about across the eye of the wind, slowing and luffing, beginning to present her larboard side to Jester.

"Well-handled, sir," Buchanon noted with professional interest. "None o' 'at lubberly cock-billin' an' noggin' you'd expect."

"Aye, she is, Mister Buchanon." Lewrie frowned, feeling a sudden foreboding. A taut ship's company, a rarity among the Frogs, from what they'd seen so far. A captain who acted with alacrity, and pugnacious aggressiveness; an eagerness, it seemed, for a stand-up fight. Another rarity, that. The Frenchman had come about due south, close-hauled hard on the wind once more, as if to claw himself up and take the wind gauge from Jester. Less than two miles away now, but they were approaching each other quickly.

"Mister Knolles, we'll harden up a mite. Quartermaster, put yer helm alee. Lay her head west-sou'west. Leadin' wind, sir."

"Seed 'er afore, sir!" Seaman Rushing, high aloft on the foremast cried. "Corvette! Toulon, there!"

Aye, it was the pretty corvette that had fired the insolent challenge off Cape Sepet. Lewrie eyed her in his glass. What had they determined… twenty, or twenty-two guns? French eight-pounders, more'n like. Which were the equal of his, rated as nine-pounders. Her pale golden-yellow upperworks had gone to seed since, she'd faded and dulled, turned darker as more linseed, tar, or paint had been slapped on to control the ravages of exposure. Her white gunwale was still bright, though, and the black chain wale…