Armada (31 page)

Robert looked aft as the cannons beneath him boomed once more. His vision was spoiled for a moment by smoke and he coughed violently. Larkin was keeping up a tremendous rate of fire; Robert estimated just under three shots-per-gun-per-hour. He glanced at the target of their heavy guns, the lone Spanish galleon that still sailed defiant and unbroken. Her rigging and canvas was lacerated but the galleon showed no signs of mortal injury and her crew seemed far from the brink of surrender as her small calibre deck guns continued to fire sporadically.

Over the stern more than a dozen Spanish warships were descending rapidly on their beleaguered comrade. Robert studied their line of advance. The wind was holding firm. There was little danger the Spanish would be able to outmanoeuvre the English galleons but they were poised to deprive the English of their first prize.

‘Hard about,’ Robert called over his shoulder, the
Retribution
turning her bow towards the oncoming threat.

Three ship lengths away an English galleon was unleashing bow chasers on the audacious Spanish galleon. Even from four hundred yards, Robert could see Spaniards fall. Parts of the superstructure had shattered under the onslaught. The
Retribution
would be given one last chance to inflict such a blow on the 1000 ton behemoth but Robert already knew it would not be enough to slay the galleon. He prayed that the English fleet might instead take a prize from the smaller ships coming to her aid.

‘Two points to starboard.’

Mendez repeated Evardo’s order and the helmsman responded with alacrity, the
Santa Clara
’s bow turning slightly to larboard. The
San Juan
was now directly ahead, three hundred yards. Two English galleons had just sailed across her stern, raking her decks with a withering fire, but now they were withdrawing in the face of the
Santa Clara
and the dozen ships behind her, bringing themselves back to windward of this new threat.

Off the larboard side, the sea was alive with English warships. The
Santa Clara
had already taken erratic fire from their long range cannon, but Evardo had not responded, knowing he would need every shot in his arsenal.

‘
Capitán
Mendez. Make ready to take in the courses and lay to. Set your helm to take us between the
San Juan
and the English. We must go directly to her aid.’

‘But
Comandante
…’

‘I mean to draw the English fire from the
San Juan
and give her a chance to withdraw.’

Mendez made to argue again but seeing the
comandante
’s expression, he swallowed his retort. With grim resignation he nodded his assent.

The
San Juan
was two hundred yards ahead. The fire directed at the
Santa Clara
began to concentrate, her ever increasing proximity to the centre of the maelstrom drawing the attention of the more heavily engaged English warships. At one hundred yards the
San Juan
filled Evardo’s vision, his mind oblivious to the English jackals and the increasing storm of fire. Fifty yards. Mendez called for a final touch on the whipstaff and the furling of the courses, the
Santa Clara
swooping in like a bird of prey under the larboard beam of the
San Juan
. The squall line of the fire storm swept over the
Santa Clara
, consuming her in a wave of iron. Behind her the other ships of the vanguard wing closed in, determined to bedevil the enemy’s attempt to take one of their own. But for now, the
Santa Clara
stood alone.

For the briefest moment Robert hesitated, awed by the display of courage. The landward wing of the Armada had fled before the English guns, giving Robert cause to hope that the Spanish had no stomach for the fight, but any such thoughts were now banished by the sight of a single Spanish galleon standing square before a stricken comrade, becoming a partial shield for the larger ship.

‘It’s her,’ Seeley shouted angrily beside him. ‘It’s the whoreson who targeted us in the first attack!’

Robert looked to the masthead banners of the Spanish galleon. His eyes narrowed, this unasked-for revenge dual in the midst of a battle filling his thoughts. In the moment of the hull’s perfect pitch, the cannons of
Retribution
fired their deadly charge across the chasm that separated the mortal enemies of England and Spain.

Evardo stood tall at the gunwale, his knuckles white from the intensity of his grip on his sword, his face turned towards the enemy barrage, striving to subdue his instinct to take cover. Some men feared death, but for Evardo it was the somehow more terrible fate of a grievous wound, the loss of a limb, or his sight, or the slow lingering death of a stomach wound. Every passing round shot fed his fear, but he refused to give in. His lips moved almost of their own accord, repeating a benediction to God, asking his divine patron for protection. With feigned indifference he glanced at the crew working around him, willing them strength to endure.

The decks of the
Santa Clara
were alive with a disciplined turmoil that only battle could create. The voices of the captains could be heard at every quarter, overriding the gutter curses of the crew who shouted at the English foe. On the upper castles men were rapidly servicing the breech loading
falcon pedreros
, firing them at the English in an act of defiance, the range too far for an effective kill. The preloaded broadside had long since been fired. Now only the sporadic vibration of single cannon shots could be felt by those on the main deck, the fired rounds too few and too interspersed to spoil any English attack.

Devastation swept over the
Santa Clara
as one English galleon after another sailed in to fire their cannon, cutting men and material down with impunity before turning neatly away from the fray. A voice in Evardo’s mind screamed at him to concede his ground, not out of fear, but to stop this slow annihilation of the crew and ship he had sworn to protect. That voice was echoed by the injured and dying, their cries increasing in number with every sweeping attack. Evardo’s mouth twisted in anger. Only if the enemy closed for ship-to-ship, hand-to-hand combat would the men of the
Santa Clara
be able to exact an equal measure of butchery.

Evardo looked to the sea on the flanks of the
Santa Clara
. The other ships of the vanguard wing were deploying to leeward of his ship, completing a screen behind which the
San Juan
could safely withdraw. The sea was becoming rough, the wind no longer steady but gusting and fewer English ships were coming forward to engage, wary of the sea change and the newly formed wing.

A cannon ball slammed against the fo’c’sle of the
Santa Clara
, while another struck the hull amidships, parting shots from the withdrawing English galleons. Evardo finally sheathed his sword, the clean un-bloodied blade rasping against the scabbard. He had never drawn his sword in anger without using it. The frustration sat like a knot in the pit of his stomach. He turned his back on the English, taking a moment to survey the ravaged deck of his galleon. The
Santa Clara
had taken the heaviest casualties amongst the ships coming to the aid of the
San Juan
. As the firing ceased Evardo looked to the groups of men huddled around their stricken comrades, tending to their wounds as best they could, their cries of pain becoming louder in the absence of cannon thunder.

‘
Santa Clara
!’

Evardo spun around at the call. The
San Juan
was beginning to pull away, coming about under the press of the wind to withdraw to the sanctuary of the main battle group. On the quarterdeck stood the imposing figure of de Recalde, his hand cupped to his mouth. Evardo acknowledged the hail. There was a moment’s pause. De Recalde raised his hand to his forehead and casually saluted his thanks. Evardo returned the gesture but his eyes were no longer on de Recalde. They had shifted to the man who had come forward to stand beside him – his mentor Abrahan.

The gap between the ships increased, passing fifty yards, but Evardo’s gaze never wavered. Just as the
San Juan
was poised to sail behind another galleon Evardo, saw Abrahan nod slightly. It was a small movement, barely discernible across the distance, but it was there. Evardo smiled. After half a lifetime spent under his care Evardo knew it was as much ground as his taciturn mentor would ever give. One act of reckless courage would not erase his failure in Abrahan’s eyes. Evardo nodded to himself. The battle had only just begun.

4 p.m. 31st July 1588. The English Channel, two leagues off Plymouth.

R
obert paced the width of his cabin, his thoughts consumed by the events of the morning. He held a goblet of Madeira wine loosely in his hand, the last of his stock taken a year before during the Cadiz campaign, and he gulped from it with each turn of his heel. Outside the wind whistled through the rigging. Erratic gusts played merry hell with the sails and Robert could hear Miller sending the men to the running rigging.

Robert finished the goblet and went for the bottle. He poured out the last of its contents and slammed it down on the table. The wine had done nothing to quell his anxiety. He began to go through the sequence of the morning’s fight once more, trying to examine each aspect in turn. Larkin had reported after the battle that he and his men had fired off nearly 120 rounds during the four hour fight. It was almost a tenth of the ammunition on board and for all that, and the fire of the other English ships, not one Spanish vessel had been taken.

Despite a moment of panic the Armada’s formation remained intact and was now sailing some four miles ahead of the English fleet. It had never stopped. Even when its trailing wings were under attack, the main body of the fleet had continued under shortened sail, allowing them to make headway and maintain cohesion.

As an inexperienced battle-captain of a ship Robert knew it was not his place to resolve the tactical problems of the English attack, but as a veteran sailor he could do little else. Ahead on the English coast lay the safe anchorages of Weymouth and the Solent. Perhaps the Spaniards were planning on taking one of these havens to support their invasion of England, or perhaps they were intent solely on linking up with Parma in the Low Countries. Whatever their ultimate plan, their formation was an impregnable fortress and as long as it remained so there was nothing the English fleet could do to stop them.

Seeley pored over his charts in his tiny cabin under the poop deck, his finger tracing every inlet and headland of the Devon coastline. There was a knock on his cabin door. Shaw and Powell entered.

‘Well?’

‘Nothing to report, Mister Seeley,’ Shaw replied.

‘Curse it,’ Seeley spat. He had warned the boatswain, his mate and the surgeon to be extra vigilant now that battle had been joined. Whatever Young’s position on the ship he was bound to reveal himself when asked to fight against his own kind. His hesitation would be his undoing.

‘This battle has only just begun,’ Powell said assuredly. ‘We’ll find him.’

‘Perhaps we should widen our circle of confederates,’ Shaw suggested. ‘It would increase our chances of catching Young.’

‘We can’t,’ Powell replied, ‘not without running the risk of having a papist in our midst. A significant proportion of the population of England is still Roman Catholic. Given the size of the crew it is wise to suspect there are at least a handful of them on board.’

‘You believe there are others besides Young?’

Powell nodded.

‘But surely we would know of them,’ Shaw protested. ‘I grant you one is difficult to find amongst over two hundred men. But a group of them?’

‘They are well hidden, Mister Shaw, even in battle,’ Powell explained. ‘They fight like any other Englishman.’

‘Against their fellow papists?’

‘Many Roman Catholics consider themselves to be loyal recusants. Despite their religion they fight because Spain is the enemy of England.’

‘You consider these traitors to be loyal Englishmen?’ Seeley asked menacingly.

‘I did not say that I did, only that these recusants believe they can be both Roman Catholic and loyal to the Crown.’

‘Protestantism is the religion of England and our Queen,’ Seeley retorted angrily. ‘To believe in another foreign faith is treason in itself. Now, return to your posts.’

Shaw and Powell left the cabin. Seeley returned to his charts but he could not concentrate.
Loyal recusant
. The term was offensive. Roman Catholic Englishmen were traitors by their very existence and to suggest otherwise was an act of complicity. He called to mind Powell’s warning that there may be other papists on board beside Young and his thoughts went to the moment the Armada changed formation before battle was joined.

‘
Sancta Maria, ora pro nobis
,’ he said quietly, enunciating each syllable slowly. ‘
Holy Mary, pray for us
.’

The words sounded foreign in his ears, not merely because they were spoken in Latin, but because he had never heard a Protestant say them before. Captain Varian had undoubtedly said them without thinking. The sight of the Armada skilfully redeploying into the crescent formation had struck every man with awe, but this made their utterance all the more baffling.

As a Protestant, Seeley revered Mary, but only because she was the mother of Jesus and therefore deserved veneration. His faith taught him that he could pray
with
Mary, but he should not pray
to
her, that prayer and entreaties should be recited only to God.
Sancta Maria, ora pro nobis
. This was the prayer of a Roman Catholic, a misguided petition based on a fallacy inherent in their corrupt faith. But Captain Varian wasn’t one. He couldn’t be. Seeley recalled what he had witnessed at the sack of Sagres, how the captain’s first instinct when he saw the Roman Catholic church under attack was to rush to join the others at the door, and how he had raised his pistol to shoot the priest, only to be denied by another.