Alexander Kent: Passage to Mutiny

“Deck there! Sail on th’ larboard quarter!”

Herrick swore, “Damn! They will hold the weather-gage.”

Bolitho beckoned to Romney and seized the telescope from him. His heart was going like a smith’s hammer, and it took time and effort to steady the glass. He saw the blurred outline of the headland falling rapidly away on the quarter, its silhouette made more confused by the spray which was bursting across the reef in wild abandon.

There she was, just as he remembered, thrusting towards him with all but her royals set to the following wind. Her beakhead vanished repeatedly in great swooping plunges, and he could imagine the sea sluicing over her guns as she was driven to her capacity.

He heard Lakey say, “Pity the wind don’t shift and dismast the bastard!”

Bolitho forgot the voices around him as he concentrated on a sliver of sail which had appeared almost astern of the other frigate. The second schooner. He lowered the glass, biting his lip to control his reeling thoughts. Viola had told him about the other schooner. When she had been Tuke’s captive. There would probably be another heavy cannon aboard her, too. Some may have been transferred to Narval also.

He pulled himself along the spray-soaked planking until he had reached the tail above the nearest twelve-pounders.

He saw Borlase and Swift pause in their walking between the guns and called to them, “I want you to double-shot the guns.” He held up his hand to silence Borlase’s protest. “After the first broadside there’ll be no time. It’ll be gun for gun.” He felt the grin prising his lips apart. “What say, lads! Give him a headache from the start!”

Somebody gave a cheer, and he saw Blissett, his corporal’s chevron very bright against his scarlet tunic, waving his hat in the air.

Sprawled in the maintop, the marine called Billy-boy examined his long musket and eased the stiffness in his leg.

Behind him the captain of the maintop asked uneasily, “What d’you reckon?”

The marine shrugged. “Two to one. I seen worse. Anyroad, I’d rather be here than on some poxy island.”

The other man looked at the mast, trembling to the great weight of spars and rigging. He was thinking of the man he had replaced. Blasted to bloody pulp by one of those iron balls.

Bolitho said, “Prepare to shorten sail, Mr Herrick. We’ll have the t’gallants off her directly.”

He pictured the other ship in his mind, flying downwind towards their quarter. Tuke would be expecting a fight, and would need to get to grips while he held the wind. Against that, Tempest’s heavier build would slow her when she came about on the opposite tack. It would be a temporary advantage, but it was all they had. They would never match the French ship for agility. He knew Herrick was thinking the same.

Herrick raised his speaking trumpet. “Hands aloft! Take in the t’gans’ls!”

Romney peered up at the tightly braced yards. It would be no easy work up there today, with the wind buffeting the bulging canvas and trying to dislodge the topmen one by one.

Bolitho felt the deck trying to level off as the sails were fisted and hauled into submission and lashed to the yards.

He made himself look towards the Narval again, and saw she was much closer. No more than a league away. He saw a brief puff of smoke, and flinched as a ball moaned overhead to raise a feather of spray on the opposite beam.

Keen said, “They must have one of Eurotas’s twenty-fourpounders as a bow chaser.”

No one answered him.

Bolitho concentrated on the other ship, expecting her to follow his example and shorten sail. There was some activity on her upper yards, but not enough to hold her headlong attack. If Tuke tried to make a violent alteration of course in either direction, to follow Tempest or to track her round on a new tack altogether, he would, as Lakey remarked, tear the masts out of the ship.

“Stand by to come about!” Bolitho had to cup his hands because of the boom of canvas. “Mr Borlase! Are you ready to engage with the starboard battery?” He saw him nod, confused no doubt by the fact that the enemy was on the opposite side. Bolitho added, “Well, tell me in future! I am not a magician!”

He walked back to the nettings, fighting for breath, angry with himself for wasting energy, with Borlase for being so stupid.

Herrick looked up the slanting deck, his eyes very clear in the light. “Ready, sir!” He glanced up with a start as a ball whipped between the main and mizzen without hitting even a halliard. He had not even heard the gun fire.

Bolitho glanced quickly aft to the helm and the leaning group of men around it. Lakey, dependable and as steady as a rock. Keen with his gun crews, and the marines spread along the nettings behind him, their muskets already cradled over the tightly packed hammocks.

He turned to look forward, seeing the new men at the braces, grim-faced, some no doubt wondering if their momentary heroics were worth all this.

The older men were waiting to let go the headsail sheets so that Tempest would swing unhindered across the wind’s eye, and near them he saw Pyper and the crews of the two carronades waiting for a chance to pour their murderous charges into the enemy’s stern if a chance offered itself.

“Ready! Put the helm down!”

Slowly and noisily, Tempest started to swing to windward, the air shaking to the onslaught of shrouds and vibrating rigging. He saw men hauling at the braces, one falling in a confused heap as he lost his footing, only to be chased and pushed back to his position by Schultz, the boatswain’s mate.

Round and further still, the tossing panorama of breaking crests and glass-sided troughs swinging across and under the jib boom while every stitch of canvas protested noisily.

And there, like an hitherto unseen vessel, was the Narval, rising above the starboard bow instead of the opposite quarter, her pyramid of sails creamy white in the sun’s glare.

Bolitho saw the deep shadows on her forecourse and topsail and knew she was trying to alter course. The sails hardened again, and he guessed Tuke knew it was impossible to match his opponent’s manoeuvre.

Bolitho ignored the confusion on deck, the whine of blocks and the overwhelming groan of spars as the yards were hauled still further round to lay Tempest on the opposite tack. He watched intently, seeing the other ship forging towards his jib boom, making an arrowhead between them. It was the best part of a mile away, although it looked from aft as if both bowsprits would lock like tusks.

“As you bear, Mr Borlase!” He felt unsteady and sick.

Borlase sliced the air with his hanger. “Fire!”

Double-shotted, the starboard guns crashed out in one tremendous broadside, the trucks hurling themselves inboard while dense smoke funnelled through the open ports in a choking cloud.

Above the receding echo of the broadside Bolitho heard a terrible scream and saw blood splashed across the deck close to where Borlase was standing. One of the convicts had changed his position at the moment of recoil and had been smashed in the chest by one of the guns as it came hurtling inboard.

Borlase tore his eyes from the droplets of blood which had spattered across his legs and yelled, “Stop your vents! Sponge out! Load!” His voice as shrill as a distraught woman’s as he peered through the swirling smoke.

Bolitho saw the smoke swirl and quiver as the French frigate fired back. Iron hammered into the lower hull, and he heard the whine of more balls passing overhead. Tempest’s sudden change of tack had confused their aim.

The smoke thinned and billowed away downwind, and Bolitho caught his breath as he stared at the enemy. Sails punctured in several places, and at least two gun ports empty of muzzles.