Patrick O'Brian - Master & Commander

'Yes, sir.'

'With the cutter and the launch full of men you can take her before she's aware. You make a noise, and the ship bears up to protect her: he has no way on him to tack – he must wear; and if you put the snow before the wind, I can pass through the gap and rake him once or twice as he goes round, maybe knocking away a spar aboard the settee at the same time. On deck, there,' he called in a slightly louder voice, 'silence on deck. Send those men below' -for the rumour had spread, and men were running up the forward hatchway. 'The boarders away, then – we should be best advised to send all our black men: they are fine lusty fellows, and the Spaniards dread them – the sloop cleared for action with the least possible show and the men ready to fly to their quarters. But all kept below out of sight: all but a dozen. We must look like a merchantman.' He swung over the edge of the top, his nightshirt billowing round his head. 'The frappings may be cut, but no other preparation that can be seen.'

'The hammocks, sir?'

'Yes, by God,' said Jack, pausing. 'We shall have to get them up precious fast, if we are not to fight without 'em -a damned uncomfortable state. But do not let one come on deck until the boarders are away. Surprise is everything.

Surprise, surprise. Stephen's surprise at being jerked awake with 'Quarters, sir, quarters,' and at finding himself in the midst of an extraordinarily intense muted activity -people hurrying about in almost pitch darkness – not a glim – the gentle clash of weapons secretly handed out -the boarders creeping over the landward side and into the boats by twos and threes – the bosun's mates hissing 'Stand by, stand by for quarters, all hands stand by,' in the nearest possible approach to a whispered shout – warrant officers and petty officers checking their teams, quieting the Sophie's fools (she bore a competent share), who urgently wanted to know what? what? and why? Jack's voice calling down into the gloom, 'Mr Ricketts. Mr Babbington.' 'Sir?' 'When I give the word you and the topmen are to go aloft at once: topgallants and courses to be set instantly.' 'Aye aye, sir.'

Surprise. The slow, growing surprise of the sleepy watch aboard the Santa Lucia, gazing at this brig as it drifted closer and closer: did it mean to join company? 'She is that Dane who is always plying. up and down the coast,' stated Jean Wiseacre. Their sudden total amazement at the sight of two boats coming out from behind the brig and racing across the water. After the first moment's unbelief they did their best: they ran for their muskets, they pulled out their cutlasses and they began to cast loose a gun; but each of the seven men acted for himself, and they had less than a minute to make up their minds; so when the roaring Sophies hooked on at the fore and main chains and came pouring over the side the prize crew met them with no more than one musket-shot, a couple of pistols and a half-hearted clash of swords. A moment later the four liveliest had taken to the rigging, one had darted below and two lay upon the deck.

Dillon kicked open the cabin door, glared at the young privateer's mate along a heavy pistol and said, 'You surrender?'

'Oui, monsieur,' quavered the youth.

'On deck,' said Dillon, jerking his head. 'Murphy, Bus-sell, Thompson, King, clap on to those hatch-covers. Bear a hand, now. Davies, Chambers, Wood, start the sheets. Andrews, fiat in the jib.' He ran to the wheel, heaved a body out of the way and put up the helm. The Santa

Lucia paid off slowly, then faster and faster. Looking over his shoulder he saw the topgallants break out in the Sophie, and in almost the same moment the foresail, mainstaysail and boom mainsail: ducking to peer under the snow's forecourse, he saw the ship ahead of him beginning to wear – to turn before the wind and come back on the other tack to rescue the prize. There was great activity aboard her: there was great activity aboard the three other vessels of the convoy – men racing up and down, shouts, whistles,

the distant beating of a drum – but in this gentle breeze, and with so little canvas abroad, they all of them moved with a dream-like slowness, quietly following smooth predestinate curves. Sails were breaking out all over, but still the vessels had no way on them, and because of their slowness he had the strangest impression of silence – a silence broken a moment later as the Sophie came shaving past the snow's larboard bow with her colours flying, and gave them a thundering cheer. She alone had a fair bow-wave, and with a spurt of pride James saw that every sail was sheeted home, taut and drawing already. The hammocks were piling up at an incredible speed – he saw two go by the board – and on the quarter-deck, stretching up over the nettings, Jack raised his hat high, calling 'Well done indeed, sir,' as they passed. The boarders cheered their shipmates in return; and as they did so the atmosphere of terrible killing ferocity on the deck of the snow changed entirely. They cheered again, and from within the snow, under the hatches, there came a generalized answering howl.

The Sophie, all sails abroad, was running at close on four knots. The Gloire had little more than steerage-way, and she was already committed to this wheeling movement was already engaged upon the gradual curve down-wind that would turn her unprotected stern to the Sophie's fire. There was less than a quarter of a mile between them, and the gap was closing fast. But the Frenchman was no fool;

Jack saw the ship's mizen topsail laid to the mast and the main and fore yards squared so that the wind should thrust the Stern away to leewaids and reverse the movement – for the rudder had no bite at all.

'Too late, my friend, I think,' said Jack. The range was narrowing. Three hundred yards. Two hundred and fifty. 'Edwards,' he said to the captain of the aftermost gun, 'Fire across the settee's bows.' The shot, in fact, went through the settee's foresail. She started her halliards, her sails came down with a run and an agitated figure hurried aft to raise his colours and lower them emphatically. There was no time to attend to the settee, however. 'Luff up,' he said. The Sophie came closer to the wind: her foresail shivered once and filled again. The Gloire was well within the forward traverse of the guns. 'Thus, thus,' he said, and all along the line he heard the grunt and heave as the guns were heaved round a trifle to keep them bearing. The crews were silent, exactly-placed and tense; the spongers knelt with the lighted matches in their hands, gently blowing to keep them in a glow, facing rigidly inboard; the captains crouched glaring along the barrels at that defenceless stern and quarter.

'Fire.' The word was cut off by the roar; a cloud of smoke hid the sea, and the Sophie trembled to her keel. Jack was unconsciously stuffing his shirt into his breeches when he saw that there was something amiss – something wrong with the smoke: a sudden fault in the wind, a sudden gust from the north-east, sent it streaming down astern; and at the same moment the sloop was taken aback, her head pushed round to starboard.

'Hands to the braces,' called Marshall, putting up the helm to bring her back. Back she came, though slowly, and the second broadside roared out: but the gust had pushed the Gloire's stern round too, and as the smoke cleared so she replied. In the seconds between Jack had had time to see that her stern and quarter had suffered – cabin windows and little gallery smashed in; that she carried twelve guns; and that her colours were French.

The Sophie had lost much of her way, and the Gloire, now right back on her original larboard tack, was fast gathering speed; they sailed along on parallel courses, close-hauled to the fitful breeze, the Sophie some way behind. They sailed along, hammering one another in an almost continuous din and an unbroken smoke, white, grey-black and lit with darting crimson stabs of fire. On and on: the glass turned, the bell clanged, the smoke lay thick: the convoy vanished astern.