Hervey 09 - Man Of War (38 page)

‘Might you procure me an apple?’ Admiral Collingwood had munched on an apple as his line ran in at Trafalgar, a fine tradition of sangfroid in which to follow.

‘They’re a deal wormy,’ Flowerdew protested.

‘Even so.’

Peto took the cup, and extra sugar, stirring it for a minute and more without speaking. He drained it in one, and held it for Flowerdew to refill. ‘And I would have you attend on Miss Codrington in the purser’s quarters. Stay with her until the action is finished.’

He expected the usual protests.

Flowerdew surprised him, however. ‘I was going to ask.’

‘She will need reassurance if it comes to a fight.’

Flowerdew merely nodded.

Peto cleared his throat slightly. ‘Miss Codrington has letters . . . you’ll see to it that she is . . . able to get them away.’

‘I will.’

He cleared his throat again. ‘Good, good. Capital. Now, the apple if you please, and then you will go below.’

‘Ay-ay, sir.’

He would make a little more of it when the apple came – no sentiment or the like, but Flowerdew had been with him a good many years.

Left alone again, he reached into his pocket and took out Elizabeth’s letter (it might be his last opportunity to read it for some time). He unwrapped the oilskin package with a reverence some might accord a relic, and held the folded sheet for several minutes without opening it.

‘Flagship signalling, sir!’ Midshipman Pelham’s voice revealed the pride with which he alerted his captain.

Peto carefully returned the letter to its oilskin, and his pocket, and took out his watch: it was just gone one-thirty after noon. It was a slower affair by far than Trafalgar, but at Trafalgar they could see the enemy, unlike here. Until now, when the bay opened up before them . . .

‘It can be but the one signal, I imagine, Mr Lambe,’ he said (
Asia
was a mere couple of cables ahead, and with no room to go about even had Codrington wished it).

‘From flag, sir: “prepare for action”!’

Peto quickened as if by an electric shock. ‘Run out all guns, double-shotted, Mr Lambe!’

‘Ay-ay, sir!’

He had drummed hands back to quarters after dinner with ‘Hearts of Oak’. They had stood or crouched by gun and hatch since, awaiting the order. The entire crew now sprang to frenzied life as if they too had been charged with electricity.

Peto closed to the quartermaster’s side. It was time to take the con directly. ‘One point a-larboard, Mr Veitch!’

‘One point a-larboard, ay-ay, sir!’

He put his glass to his eye again: the Turk forts would see the guns run out; might he see some activity by reply?

‘Captain Antrobus!’

The captain of marines crossed the quarterdeck briskly, and saluted.

‘Yonder fort,’ said Peto, pointing to Sphacteria. ‘Should we need to carry it, it may fall to you and a landing party.’

‘There is nothing I should like better, sir.’

‘We might spare, say, fifty men, perhaps sixty.’ The complement of marines was 138, of whom half had fixed fighting stations; the rest deployed as sharpshooters in the tops and upperworks.

‘Thirty of my men, I suggest, sir, and the same from the afterguard.’

Peto nodded. ‘Very well. Make ready.’ He turned to hail Lambe. ‘Lower two boats, in anticipation, and detail thirty of the afterguard to Captain Antrobus.’

Lambe rattled off the executives to the boatswain and the captain of the afterguard.

The guns running out sounded like distant thunder, noise enough to alert the dullest lookout. Which of the forts would be first to fire? Or would it be the Turk flagship?

Fifteen long minutes passed in silence but for the voice of timber and rigging, and the occasional yap of a petty officer.
Asia
was now within pistol shot of the entrance, but still the forts were unmoved.

‘I can scarcely credit it,’ declared Peto, spying out every detail of Sphacteria with his ’scope. ‘They’re lounging on the walls, smoking!’ He swung round towards New Navarin. It was the same. ‘Nothing, nothing at all! Not a flag flying or the like. Extraordinary!’ He recalled Ava, when they had sailed up the Rangoon River, the wooden fort sullenly silent, until too late, when the Burmans had fired a futile, suicidal shot at his flotilla. Was the Turk just going to allow them to sail into the bay and take possession of the fleet?

A cannon boomed on Sphacteria. Peto swung round.

‘Unshotted, sir,’ said Lambe. ‘I wonder they’re signalling: the whole Turk fleet must be able to see
Asia
now.’

Peto nodded. ‘How do you judge the current, Mr Veitch?’

‘Little or none, sir.’

He had thought as much. He would have to bring
Rupert
round a point or two into the wind to heave to; dropping anchor, even with a spring attached, was out of the question under those guns – and he wanted to have his broadsides as square-on as might be. ‘Prepare to heave to.’

Lambe hailed the sailing-master: ‘Prepare to back main-topsail, Mr Shand.’

Veitch brought
Rupert
into the wind.

Peto judged it the moment. ‘Heave to!’

The topmen did their work fast and sure. Shand barely needed his trumpet.

‘Boat ahoy!’

Peto looked up, cupping a hand to his mouth. ‘More advice if you please, Mr Simpson!’

‘Pinnace, sir, I believe from the Turkish flagship, heading straight for
Asia
!’

‘Indeed,’ said Peto to himself, though clearly audible to Lambe.

‘The Turks submitting, sir? The only reasonable course.’

‘The only reasonable course, Mr Lambe, as you say. But what Turkish admiral could present himself in Constantinople in consequence? No, I think there’s a deal of joukery yet ahead.’

‘And a deal of powder for the Turk to hoist himself with.’

Peto looked at the horseshoe of men-of-war. There were no three-deckers, but if it came to a fight they would be closer engaged than ever Nelson managed at Trafalgar. ‘Have the fo’c’s’le lookouts keep a sharp eye on those
brûlots
yonder,’ he said, pointing ahead and to starboard. ‘It’ll be like the burning fiery furnace if they’re loosed.’

Lambe sent a midshipman forward with the word.

Peto was now intent on the pinnace. What terms did the Turkish admiral propose?
Rupert
’s crew – the crew of every one of Codrington’s ships, indeed – would be disappointed if he struck without a fight. But the cost would be high if he did otherwise. Peto did not doubt that every Turkish ship would end at the bottom, but the lack of sea space would mean a good number of allied ships might go down with them. He turned to the forts again: the guns commanded the entrance rather than the bay itself; once the squadrons were in there would be no need of
Rupert
’s fire. Where might he then place himself to advantage?

A quarter of an hour went by in the same silence.
Genoa
and then
Albion
passed him, their captains acknowledging his quarterdeck, but no cheering as at Trafalgar. ‘Recollect, gentlemen,’ Codrington had insisted, ‘that no act of hostility is to be attempted by us on any account.’ Neither were they to provoke a fire, and cheering was bound to inflame a proud Turk.

Asia
dropped anchor alongside the Turkish flag.

Lambe, intent for the moment only on the trim of
Rupert
’s sails, acknowledged the report without looking.

‘And the pinnace makes for the shore,’ added Peto. He checked his watch. ‘Ten minutes past two o’clock. Make note of that, Treves,’ he said to his clerk, touching his hat now to
Dartmouth
, the first of the frigates, passing so close on the starboard beam that he could have exchanged words with his old friend Captain Fellowes without much raising his voice. He rather envied him: a frigate would be a veritable cat among the pigeons in such an affair, able to manoeuvre with far greater facility than
Rupert
. And, at forty-four guns, by no means incapable of crippling a two-decker with raking fire.

He turned back to the pinnace. What did she do thence to New Navarin? But
Asia
made no fresh signal: there was no change in Codrington’s design.

Dartmouth
bore to starboard as she entered the bay, making for the fireships to the south-east, while the rest of the squadron advanced steadily, line-ahead. The pinnace reached the south shore. Peto observed an officer jump out, throw off his turban and race up the hill to the gate of the fort, where others had assembled. There was a hurried conference, and then a red flag was run up on the walls. A gun fired, again unshotted. But still Peto could detect no activity on Sphacteria: the gunners remained entirely at ease (and in spite of the flag and the signal gun, New Navarin looked no more lively). Was it a ruse? Did the Turks
want
them to enter the bay?

‘Boat ahoy!’

This time Peto would wait for Midshipman Simpson to gather his advice, since evidently his eye was to be trusted.

In a couple of minutes he had it: ‘Barge from the Turkish flag to the Egyptian flag, sir!’

Ten minutes passed as silently as before.

‘Boat ahoy!’

Peto imagined it too would now be making for New Navarin. ‘Deuced queer business, this, Mr Lambe. You might suppose we’d taken them by surprise.’

‘Indeed, sir.’

He contemplated going forward for a better look, but checked the instinct. His place was on the quarterdeck. And besides, it mattered little what he saw: he could take no action until they were fired on.

‘Barge making for fireships, sir!’

This was it! He put his telescope under his arm, clasped his hands behind his back and concentrated hard on giving no appearance of agitation.

The captain of marines came up. ‘Sir, might I get the landing party into the boats, ready? It will be tricky otherwise once firing begins.’

Peto shook his head. ‘I can’t help it, Captain Antrobus. This is politics. The Turks will deem it a hostile act. I fear it must be “
Tirez les premiers
”.’

Antrobus looked disappointed, put out, even, as he saluted and took his leave. Peto wished he had been a little less peremptory with him. He had the highest regard for the marines’ offensive spirit.

But then, the entire ship’s complement was possessed of nothing but desire for a battle. The quarterdeck, lately a place for sunny recreation, swarmed with gun-crew; jollies, bristling for some sharpshooting, lined the gangways; and hands danced impatiently about the forecastle carronades. Here was death in twenty different calibres, and every man eager for its issue.

A pigeon walked along the strings of the
sauve-tête
above the waist. Peto recalled he had not seen netting on a three-decker since Trafalgar . . .

Another quarter of an hour, and then: ‘
Dartmouth
lowering a boat, sir!’

Was there ever occasion when the quarterdeck listened so intently on a midshipman? Peto shook his head:
politics
.

Five more minutes: ‘Pinnace sir, from
Dartmouth
, pulling for the fireship.’

Peto saluted Admiral de Rigny’s flag in the frigate
Sirène
. As he turned to speak to his signal midshipman, a shot rang out from towards
Dartmouth
– a musket, perhaps a pistol, but a crack like fork lightning in the silent auditorium of the bay. And then a whole fusillade.

‘Shots from the fireship, sir! She’s firing on
Dartmouth
’s pinnace,’ called Midshipman Simpson.

Peto leaned out over the weather rail to see how close was the first of the French line-of-battle ships, what support he could expect: but they had fallen well astern of
Sirène
. ‘Damn me if they haven’t reduced sail too soon!’

He made for the poop for a better view. ‘Who is she, Mr Pelham?’

‘
Scipion
, sir. And
Trident
, I think, astern of her.’

‘She is either
Trident
or
Breslau
, Mr Pelham,’ replied Peto brusquely. ‘There is no good in being uncertain which.’

‘Ay-ay, sir.’

‘Fireship alight, sir!’ came the voice from the tops again.

Codrington had not said if firing a
brûlot
was to be taken as
the
hostile act.

‘
Dartmouth
lowering her cutter, sir.’ Midshipman Simpson’s voice was becoming hoarse, but decidedly less reedy. ‘I believe the shots have struck the pinnace’s crew.’

Peto cursed beneath his breath. He had to admire Codrington’s nerve, but it was like chipping flints atop a powder keg.

Ten minutes crept by.
Scipion
drifted past, and
Trident
a hundred yards astern of her, as if pulled by plodding barge horses. Peto, back on the quarterdeck, shook his head. ‘A little bolder, our French friends might be, think you not, Mr Lambe? Our Russian friends press them hard.’ He nodded to the third column of sail fast approaching.

‘I do, sir. T’gallants
and
royals, at least.’

Peto lowered his telescope, resolved. ‘We are too inactive, Mr Lambe. Lower the cutter.
Dartmouth
may require assistance towing the
brûlot
clear.’

‘Ay-ay, sir!’

Captain Antrobus came up. ‘Permission to embark my landing party, sir?’

Peto scowled. He did not require prompting to give his orders. Yet from the marines’ narrow perspective, Antrobus was right. He hated evasion – ‘
Tirez les premiers
’. It was a damned muddle-headed business, this: the government took sides in a war without taking any responsibility for action . . .

He had an idea. ‘Wait for the cutter to get away and then get your men into the boats. The Turks will think you’re to make for
Dartmouth
, too. Have your men take off their jackets. God knows I detest such skulking, but if the devil drives . . .’

‘Ay-ay, sir,’ said Antrobus, keenly.

‘And show yourself well to us, mind, if you do land. I want no men killed by our guns.’ (He had seen it often enough in the French war, even if Antrobus had not.)