Post Captain (44 page)

An isolated scuffle and a single shot on the forecastle, to join the firing from the shore. Bodies on deck: the wounded crawling.

She was heading westward, and the blessed wind was just before her beam. She must go round the tail of the West Anvil before she could tack to reach the Polychrest, and all the way she would be sailing straight into the fire of St Jacques: half a mile's creep, always closer to that deadly raking battery.

'Foresail and driver,' cried Jack. The quicker the better, and above all she must not miss stays. She seemed to be handling beautifully, but if she missed stays she would be cut to pieces.

Convention was firing behind them: wildly at present, though one great ball passed through all three topsails. He hurried forward to help sort out the foresail tack. The deck was swarming with Polychrests - they called out to him: tearing high spirits, some quite beside themselves. 'Wilkins,' he said, putting his hand on the man's shoulder, 'you and Shaddock start getting the corpses over the side.'

She was a trim little vessel. Eighteen, no, twenty guns. Broader than the Polychrest. Fanciulla was her name - she was indeed the Fanciulla. Why did St Jacques not fire? 'Mr Malloch, clear away the small bower and get a cable out of a stern-port.' Why did they not fire? A triple crash abaft the mainmast - Convention hulling the corvette - but nothing from St Jacques. St Jacques had not yet realized that the Fanciulla had been carried - they thought she was standing out to attack the grounded Polychrest. 'Long may

it last,' he said. The tack was hard down, the corvette moving faster through the water - slack water now. He looked at his watch, holding it up to the moon: and a flash from St Jacques showed him just eleven. They had smoked him at last. But the tail of the sandbank was no great way off.

'I killed one, sir,' cried Parslow, running across the deck to tell him. 'I shot him into the body just as he was going for Barker with a half-pike.'

'Very good, Mr Parslow. Now cut along to the cable-tier and give Mr Malloch a hand, will you? Mr Goodridge, I believe we may go about very soon.'

'Another hundred yards, sir,' said the master, his eyes fixed on St Jacques. 'I must just get those two turrets in a line.'

Nearer, nearer. The towers were converging. 'All hands, all hands,' shouted Jack. 'Ready about ship. Mr Pullings, are you ready, there?' The towers blazed out, vanished in their own smoke, the corvette's mizen topmast went by the board, sheets of spray flew over the quarterdeck. 'Ready oh! Helm's a-lee. Up tacks and sheets. Haul mains'l, haul.' Round she came, paying off all the faster for the loss of her after sails. 'Haul of all, haul with a will.' She was round, had spun like a cutter, and now with the wind three points free she was running for the Polychrest - the Polychrest with no foremast, no maintopgallant and only the stump of her bowsprit, but still firing her forward carronades and cheering thinly as the Fanciulla ran alongside, came up into the wind on the far side of the channel and dropped anchor.

'All well, Mr Parker?' hailed Jack.

'All's well, sir. We are a little knocked about, and the barge sank alongside; but all's well.'

'Rig the capstan, Mr Parker, and make a lane for the cable.' The roar of guns, the din of shot hitting both ships, tearing up the water, and passing overhead, drowned his voice. He repeated the order and went on, 'Mr Pullings, veer the cutter under the' stern to take the line.

'Red cutter was stove by that old topmast, sir, and I'm afraid the Marine's painter came adrift like, somehow. Only your gig left, sir. The Frenchmen went ashore in all theirn.'

'The gig, then. Mr Goodridge, as soon as the cable is to, start heaving ahead. Pullings, come with me.' He dropped into the gig, took the line in his hand - their life-line - and said, 'We shall need at least twenty more men for the capstan. Ply to and from as quick as ever you can, Pullings.'

The Polychrest again, and hands reaching eagerly from the stern-port for the line. A mortar-shell burst, brilliant orange, closer to the gun-brigs than to its target.

'Hot work, sir,' said Parker. 'I wish you joy of your prize.' He spoke with an odd hesitation, forcing the words: in the light of the flashes he looked an old, old man, bent and old.

'Thankee, Parker. Pretty warm. Clap on to the line, there. Heave hearty.' The line came in hand over hand, followed briskly by a small hawser, and then far more slowly by a great heavy snake of cable. Pullings' men kept coming aboard, and at last the cable was to the capstan. While the bars were being swifted, Jack looked at his watch again: just past midnight: the tide had been ebbing for half an hour.

'Heave away,' he called to the Fanciulla. 'Now, Polychrests, step out. Heave hearty. Heave and rally.' The capstan span, the pawls going click-click-click; the cable began to rise from the sea, to tighten, squirting water.

And now, with the gun-brigs sheering off, frightened by the shell, St Jacques let fly - heavy mortars, all the guns they possessed. A shot killed four men at the bars; the maintopmast toppled over the forecastle; the gig was knocked to pieces alongside just as its last man left it. 'Heave. Heave and rally,' cried Jack, slipping in the blood and kicking a body out of his way as he forced the bar round. 'Heave. Heave.' The cable rose right from the

sea, almost straight. The men saved from the gig flung themselves on the bars. 'Heave, heave. She moves!' Clear through the roar of guns they could hear, or rather feel, the grind of the ship's bottom shifting over the sand. A kind of gasping cheer: the pawls clicked once more, twice, and then they were flat on their faces, no resistance in the bars at all, the capstan turning free. A ball had cut the cable.

Jack fell with the rest. He was trampled upon. Clearing himself from the limbs and bodies he leapt to the rail. 'Goodridge' Goodridge ahoy! Can you bring her alongside?'

'I dare not, sir. Not on the ebb. I've only got a couple of fathoms here.

" No boat?'

'No boat. Heave in quick and bend on another line. D'ye hear me, now?' He could scarcely hear himself. The gun-brigs had worked round and were firing over the bank from near the harbour. He stripped off his coat, laid down his sword and went straight in; and as he dived a jagged piece of iron caught him on the head, sending him deep under. But dazed or not his body swam on, and he found his hands scrabbling at the Fanciulla's side. 'Haul me aboard,' he cried.

He sat, gasping and streaming, on deck. 'Is there anyone here can swim?' Not a word, no answer. 'I'll try on a grating,' said an anxious voice.

'Give me the line,' he said, walking to the stern-ladder.

'Won't you sit down, sir, and take a dram? You're all bloody, sir,' said Goodridge, with a beseeching look into his face. Jack shook his head impatiently, and the blood spattered the deck. Every second counted, on the ebb. Even now there was six inches less of water round the Polychrest. He went down the ladder, let himself into the water and pushed off, swimming on his back. The sky was in a state of almost continual coruscation: between the flashes the moon shone out, her face bent like a shield. Abruptly he realized that there were two moons, floating apart, turning; and Cassiopeia was the wrong way about.

Water filled his throat. 'By God, I'm tiring. Wits going,' he said, and slid round in the water, straining his head up and taking his bearings. The Polychrest was far over on his left: not ahead. And hailing; yes, they were hailing. He took a turn with the line round his shoulder and concentrated his whole spirit on swimming, fixing the ship, plunging with every stroke, fixing it again: but such feeble strokes. Of course, it was against the tide: and how the line dragged.

'Thus, very well thus,' he said, changing his direction to allow for the current. In the last twenty yards his strength seemed to revive, but he could only cling there under her stern - no force in his arms to get aboard. They were fussing about, trying to haul him in. 'Take the line, God damn you all,' he cried in a voice that he heard from a distance. 'Carry it for'ard and heave, heave..

At the foot of the stern-ladder Bonden lifted him out of the water, guided him up, and he sat on a match-tub while the capstan turned fast, then slower, slower, slower. And all the time they heaved the slow steady swell lifted the Polychrest's stern and set it down with a thump on the hard sand; and all the French artillery played upon her. The carpenter hurried past with still another wad to stop a shot-hole; they had hulled the Polychrest perhaps a dozen times since he had been back aboard, but now he was utterly indifferent to their fire - a mere background, a nuisance, a hindrance to the one thing that really mattered. 'Heave and rally, heave and rally,' he cried. The full strain was on: not a click from the capstan-pawls. He staggered to an empty place on a bar and threw his weight forward, slipping in blood, finding his feet again. Click: and the whole capstan was groaning. Click. 'She moves,' whispered the man next to him. A slow, hesitant grind, and then as the swell came along from aft she lifted clear. 'She swims! She swims!' Wild cheering, and an answering cheer from over the water.

'Heave, heave," he said. She must be pulled full clear. Now the capstan turned, now it fairly span, faster than the cable could be passed forward, and the Polychrest surged heavily right into the deep channel. "Vast heaving. All hands to make sail. Mr Parker, everything that can be set.'

'What? I beg pardon, sir? I did not -, It did not matter. The seamen who had heard were aloft: the tattered mainsail dropped, the mainstaysail almost whole, and the Polychrest had steering-way. She was alive under him, and the life rose into his heart, quite filling him again. 'Mr Goodridge" he shouted with new strength, 'cut your cables and lead me out by the Ras du Point. Veer out a towline as soon as you are under way.'

'Aye, aye, sir.'

He took the wheel, moving her over to the windward side of the channel, so that her leeway should not run her aground again. Lord, how heavy she was, and how she wallowed on the swell! How low in the water, too. A little more sail appeared - mizen topmast staysail, a piece of driver, odd scraps; but they gave her two knots, and with the run of the tide, setting straight down the channel, he should carry her out of range in ten minutes. 'Mr Rolfe.'

'Mr Rolfe's dead, sir.'

'His mate, then: the guns back into their places.' It was no good asking Parker; the man was only just holding himself upright. 'Mr Pullings, take some lively hands forward and see if you can pick up the towline. What is it, Mr Gray?'

'Six foot of water below, sir, if you please. And the Doctor says may he put the wounded into your cabin? He moved 'em from the cockpit to the gun-room, but now it's all awash.'

'Yes. Certainly. Can you come at any more of the holes? We'll have the pumps going directly.'

'I'll do my best, sir; but I fear it's not the shot-holes. She's opening like a flower.'

A fury of shot drowned his words, some of it glowing red, for now they had the furnaces at work: mostly wide and astern, but three went home, jarring the water-logged ship from stem to stern and cutting the last of her starboard mizen shrouds. Babbington came staggering aft, one sleeve hanging empty, to report the towline aboard and made fast to the knight-heads.

'Very good, Mr Babbington. Allen, take some hands below and help Dr Maturin move the wounded into the cabin.' He realized that he was shouting with great force, and that there was no need to be shouting. Everywhere, apart from one wicked long gun in the Convention battery, there was silence: silence and dimness, for the moon was dipping low. He felt the towline tighten, plucking at the Polychrest; and she gave a little spurt. The corvette just ahead had set her courses as well as main and fore top-sails, and they were busy clearing the wreck of her mizen topmast. What a pretty thing she was, taut and trim: great strength in her pull - she would be a fast one.

They were running along the landward edge of the East Anvil - the bank was above the surface now, with a gentle surf breaking over it - and ahead of them was the opening of the Ras du Point, full of the transports. They too seemed unaware of the Fanciulla's changed character - sitting ducks - the chance of a lifetime.

'Mr Goodridge, there. How are your guns?'

'Prime, sir, prime. Brass twelve-pounders: and four eights. Plenty of cartridge filled.'

'Then lead right through those transports, will you?'

'Aye aye, sir.'

'Jenkins, how is our powder?'

'Drowned, sir. The magazine is drowned. But we got three rounds a gun, and shot a-plenty.'

'Then double-shot 'em, Jenkins, and we'll give them a salute as we pass by.'

It would be no stylish broadside; there were scarcely enough men even to fire both sides, let alone run the guns in and out, loading fast; but it would mark the point. And it was in his orders. He laughed aloud; and he laughed too to find that he was holding himself up by the wheel.

The moonlight faded; the Ras du Point glided very slowly nearer. Pullings had set up some kind of a jury-rig forward, and another sail was drawing. Parslow was fast asleep under the shattered fife-rail.

Now there was movement, agitation, among the transports. He heard a hail, and a muffled response from the Fanciulla, followed by low laughter. Sails appeared, and with them confusion.

The Fanciulla was a hundred yards ahead. 'Mr Goodridge,' called Jack, 'back your maintops'l a trifle.' The Polychrest ploughed heavily on, closing the distance. The transports were moving in several directions: at least three had fallen foul of one another in the narrow channel. The moments passed in dreamlike procession, and then suddenly there it was, the immediate vivid action, vivid even after all this saturation of noise and violence. One transport on the port bow, two hundred yards away; three locked together, aground, to starboard. 'Fire as they bear,' said Jack, putting down the helm two points. At the same moment the Fanciulla burst into flame and smoke - a much shriller crash. Now they were in the middle of them, firing both sides. The grounded vessels waved lanterns, shouting something that could not be heard. Another, having missed stays, drifted down the Polychrest's side after the last carronade had shot its final charge. Her yards caught in the Polychrest's remaining shrouds; some bright spirit lashed her mainyard fast; and standing there right under the mouth of her empty guns her commander said he had struck.