Seaflower - Kydd 03 Page 19

  Seaflower now sported a pair of chase guns in her bow - and carriage guns at that instead of the swivels of before. Admittedly they were four-pounders only, but a three-inch ball slamming in across the quarterdeck could cause real discomfiture in a quarry. Stirk was eager to try them, but they were crammed in the triangle of bow forward of the windlass and the bowsprit beside. His gun crews could not rely on the usual recoil to bring the gun inboard for loading; they must reload by leaning outside, exposing themselves to enemy sharp-shooters.

  'Know anythin' about this Corbeau?' Kydd asked Stirk.

  He straightened from his gun and wiped his mouth. 'Patch says as how she's a schooner — not yer squiddy trader, but a big bastard, eight ports a side. Guess at least six-pounders, hunnerd men — who knows?'

  Farrell, appearing on deck, put an end to the speculation. 'Mr Jarman. Be so good as to shape course north-about St Lucia.'

  'North-about, sir?' repeated Jarman in puzzlement.

  'Please,' said Farrell, with some asperity.

  'He's chasin' the privateer 'cos he's worried she won't find us,' croaked the helmsman, out of the side of his mouth; north-about would place them between St Lucia and the large island of Martinique, a favourite stalking ground for the more lawless afloat.

  They reached the southern end of Martinique in the midst of another rain squall, curtains of white advancing over the sea under low grey skies, the wind suddenly blustery and fitful while it passed.

  Afterwards there were the usual wet and shining decks as they emerged into bright sunlight — but crossing their path directly ahead was a schooner. A big vessel, one that could well mount sixteen guns and carry a hundred men. She instantly put up her helm and went about, slashing directly towards Seaflower as if expecting her presence, her fore-and-aft rig robbing the navy craft of the best advantage, her superior manoeuvrability.

  'Hard a' larb'd!' Farrell cracked out; they were sheering off not to retreat, but to gain time. The schooner followed downwind in their wake, her two lofty masts allowing nearly twice the sail of Seaflower.

  There would be no stately prelude to war, no pretence at false colours: the two antagonists would throw themselves at each other without pause or pity. Aboard Seaflower there was no fife and drummer sounding 'Hearts of Oak', no hammocks in the nettings, no marines drawn up on the poop. Instead there were men running to whip off the lead aprons from gunlocks, and gun equipment was rushed up from below: rammers, handspikes, crows, match tubs. Tompions protecting the bore of the cannon were snatched away and Seaflower's full deck of six-pounders were run out.

  Farrell waited, then turned Seaflower on her pursuer. Right around she swung — her broadside crashed out into the teeth of her foe, the smoke swifdy carried away downwind, leaving a clear field of fire for her chase guns, which cracked out viciously in a double fire.

  First blood to Seaflower, thought Kydd exultantly, as he centred the tiller. It was, however, a new and unpleasant experience, standing unmoving at the helm, knowing that he was certainly a target for unknown marksmen on the schooner. He glanced at the vessel: there were now holes in her sails, but no lasting damage that he could see.

  Seaflower completed her turn, her other side of guns coming to bear, but the schooner was already surging round to bring her own guns on target — the two ships opened up almost simultaneously. Kydd heard the savage, tearing passage of cannon balls and was momentarily staggered by the displaced wind of a near miss. Through his feet he felt the bodily thud of a shot in the hull, the sound of its strike a crunch as of a giant axe in wood.

  The smoke cleared. The schooner, certainly the Corbeau, was racing along on the opposite tack to Seaflower, her outer jib flapping free where the sheets must have been shot away. Her decks were crowded with men.

  Farrell reacted instantly. 'Hard a'-starb'd!' he ordered. They would stay about and parallel the schooner - but Corbeau was there out to windward, she had the weather gauge, she could dictate the terms of the fight. Firing was now general, guns banging up and down the deck, smothering gunsmoke blown down on them, obscuring points of aim. Seafiower's own guns were served with a manic ferocity.

  'It's a poundin' match,' shouted the boatswain to Farrell.

  'Better that than let those murdering knaves board us,' Farrell replied coolly, lifting his telescope once more.

  Kydd could see little of Corbeau a few hundred yards to weather, but could feel the injury she was doing to Seaflower. He worried about Renzi, gun-captain of one of the forward six-pounders. If it came to repelling boarders he would be with the first of the defenders, probably going down under the weight of greater numbers. But if—

  A sudden shudder and simultaneous twanging from close by made Kydd grip the tiller convulsively. The cause was ahead of him — there, the weather running backstay had taken a ball and was now unstranding in a frenzied whirl. Kydd instantly threw the helm hard over, sending Seaflower down before the wind.

  Farrell saw what had happened and rapped out orders to ease away sheets to conform to the change in direction. The running backstays were vital sinews in taking the prodigious strain of Seaflower's oversize mainsail without which the mainmast would certainly carry away with the asymmetric forces playing on it. The stay now had some relief — but for how long? 'Mr Merrick—' But the boatswain was already calling for a rigging stopper, shading his eyes and gazing up to where the final strand was giving way. The lower part of the stay fell, its blocks clattering to the deck, leaving the upper length to stream freely to leeward.

  Corbeau had been caught unawares, but now fell in astern in pursuit, the sudden silence of the guns from her bow-on angle allowing the victorious yelling of the enemy seamen to come clearly across the water.

  The fighting stopper, a tackle with two tails, would be applied to each side of Seaflower wound, drawing the stay together again to be tautened by heaving on the tackle, but so high was the wound that someone would have to climb to the ratlines in the face of the storm of shot and musketry. Merrick took the hank of rope and blocks, the lengths of seizing, and without pausing draped them around his neck and swung up into the shrouds.

  'Sir.' Jarman was pointing to the little islet not a quarter of a mile ahead: he seemed to be suggesting some sort of hide-and-seek around the island.

  Farrell stroked his chin. 'One hand forward,' he said, common prudence with coral about, 'and we'll keep in with the island until we are to leeward, then . ..'

  Kydd eased the tiller, snatching a glance astern. The schooner thankfully had no chase guns, but she was clapping on every stitch of sail and was gradually closing on Seaflower.

  Jarman went forward with the lookout, staring intently into the water ahead, and indicated to Kydd with his arm where they should go. Musket balls occasionally hissed past, and one slapped into the transom, but the real danger would be when Corbeau reached and overhauled them. With the size of her crew, aroused to an ugly pitch, the privateer would be merciless.

  Kydd clamped his eyes on Jarman. They were up to the island, and now began to round its undistinguished tip.

  The schooner must have sensed their desperation, for she continued to crowd on sail, her crew clearly visible on her fo'c'sle, the glitter of edged weapons catching the sun as they waved them triumphantly.

  'She's slowing!' Farrell's incredulous gasp came. 'She's - she's taken the ground! Corbeau's ashore!'

  Kydd snatched a look over his shoulder. Corbeau was untouched, motionless on the course she had taken. She had misjudged the offshore reefs and her deeper keel had become firmly wedged among the coral heads.

  Seaflower curved round, but Corbeau lay unmoving.

  'God be praised — we get t' live another day!' muttered a voice.

  An angry shout sounded from above. Merrick had passed the seizing on the upper length of the stay, and was demanding the rest to be hauled up to him. They had the luxury of dowsing sail while the operation was completed, Corbeau a diminishing image in the distance. The jury stay rigged, they could then beat a
dignified retreat.

  'Ready about,' ordered Farrell. 'We finish the job,' he said firmly. They carefully returned on a track that kept the bow of the schooner towards them. He hailed Stirk. 'Grape.'

  Seaflower shortened sail to glide in within a hundred yards, then put up the helm and let go the stream anchor forward and kedge anchor aft. They came to a standstill, but were now in a position to adjust cables to aim her entire broadside to bear on the unprotected length of the big schooner.

  With terrible deliberation Stirk went from one gun to the next, sighting carefully and touching off an unstoppable blast of man-killing grape-shot into the hapless vessel. It took until the third gun before activity was seen in the Corbeau — they were launching their longboat.

  'That will do, Stirk,' Farrell called. Kydd was struck with Farrell's humanity in allowing the enemy to abandon ship without unnecessary killing, and felt ashamed of his own blood-lust.

  'Give y' joy on y'r prize, sir!' Jarman said, with considerable respect.

  'Renzi!' Seaflower's captain ordered. 'The longboat — do ye take possession of our prize.'

  Grinning, Kydd watched Renzi climb into the longboat with his crew, but they were only half-way across when the first wisps of smoke arose. The boat's crew lay on their oars and watched blue smoke bursting into flame as tarry ropes caught, spreading the consuming blaze to the upper rigging. A crackling, bursting firestorm turned the schooner into an inferno, the shape of her hull only just perceptible in the flames. The climax came when first her foremast and then her main crashed down in a gout of sparks and the rapidly charring ruin forlornly settled to the reef. Corbeau's crew watched silently, lined along the shoreline. They were still there when Seaflower brought her longboat aboard and sailed away.

  'Barbados?' asked Jarman. They had been cut about; it stood to reason they refit.

  The beady eyes of Snead, the carpenter's mate, announced his presence on deck. 'Sir,' he said, touching his shapeless felt hat, 'we've taken a ball in midships, an' takin' in water.' The clinker build of Seaflower's hull was proving its worth - the strake where the ball had entered would need replacing but the rest were sound.

  'How bad?' Farrell asked.

  'Can swim a-whiles,' said Snead, *but she can't take a blow.'

  'Dockyard,' said Merrick.

  Snead looked at him and nodded.

  Jarman turned to Farrell. 'Antego,' he said, without hesitation.

  'Antigua — a couple of days only, thank the Lord,' said Farrell, but Kydd flinched. Of all places ...

  Chapter 11

  English Harbour shimmered under the noon-day heat it was quite the same as Kydd remembered — the beauty, the rank effluvia, the calm solidity of spacious stone buildings. Here it was that he had nearly ended his existence on earth, here it was ...

  Seaflower came to anchor a few hundred yards off. There were hardly any ships in harbour, only a small sloop alongside at the capstan house without her upper masts. Signal flags mounted Seaflower's main topgallant peak. Kydd knew what they were asking and determined to be elsewhere when Caird came aboard for his survey.

  Uncaring of the still, clammy heat building below decks in the absence of a clean sea-breeze, the boatswain ordered the platforms in the crew space overlaying the hold taken up. Kydd as quartermaster had the task of re-stowing their stores — firkins of butter, barrels of salt beef, hogsheads of water — over to one side of Seaflower in order that the damaged strake could be lifted clear for repair.

  When the master shipwright made his survey, unaccountably the cutter's quartermaster was not free to accompany him, but from his busy job shuffling the master's charts, Kydd was able to hear through the skylight. 'A strake 'twixt wind and water — a trifling matter,' came Caird's voice. 'As we have so few to care for at this time, my party will attend on you presently.'

  Indistinct words came from Farrell, and Caird replied, 'No, I do not believe that is necessary. Our riggers will perform the task. We have skilled hands among the King's Negroes, you'll find.'

  A bumping on the hull told Kydd that the dockyard boat was putting off. He waited a little before coming on deck. The shipwright's punt would be making its way out soon, and there were some he would welcome to see again, but in no circumstances would he venture ashore.

  Farrell did not go ashore either. Curiously, Kydd saw him in the shade of the after awning, his attention seeming to be on the nondescript sloop tied up off the capstan house. Farthing said quietly, 'Old ships! That's Patelle, it's fr'm her that he got his step, cap'n o' Seaflower?

  A distant boom sounded — Kydd looked automatically to Shirley Heights, the army post high up on the point. Smoke eddied away: strange sail had apparently been sighted far out to sea. Signal flags appeared, and were answered in the dockyard. Minutes later a boat under sail left the shore and headed directly for them. Kydd hoped that it wasn't a French squadron out there: English Harbour was particularly helpless now with only one warship — their own — available to meet them.

  ‘Four strange sail sighted!' hailed a seaman in the boat, 'an' Patelle unable ter shift!'

  Farrell stiffened. 'Secure the vessel, Mr Merrick,' he rapped. 'Do you and Mr Jarman remain aboard — I am going ashore. Stirk, you and Kydd attend on me in the longboat.'

  Reappearing in full uniform, Farrell saw Kydd and Stirk in their comfortable loose shirts and snapped, 'Jackets, at the least, please!'

  They tumbled down the hatchway and Kydd grabbed at his blue jacket with the brass buttons that marked him a petty officer. 'What d'ye think, Toby?' Kydd asked, slipping it on.

  'Dunno,' Stirk said flady, and they bounded up the ladderway.

  Farrell took the tiller and they rapidly pulled ashore, the bowman hooking on at the stone steps while they landed. It was close by, the Admiral's House, but the absence of the appropriate flag showed it had no occupant. Mounting the steps in a hurry, Farrell bumped into a clerk. 'Who is the senior officer?'

  Eyebrows lifting in astonishment, the clerk replied, 'The commissioner is with Captain Mingley in St John's at the moment - sir.'

  'Then, sir, who is in command, may I ask?'

  The clerk paused, as if to take his measure. 'Sir, in the absence of Captain Mingley that would necessarily be the senior officer afloat.'

  'Is Captain Fox still with the Patelle?

  'He is at St John's at the same court-martial.'

  "Then who is in command?'

  'Patelle is under the temporary command of one of her lieutenants.'

  Farrell, followed by the clerk, entered an anteroom on the ground floor, and glanced about. 'I shall set up headquarters here. Desire the Shirley Heights garrison to send an officer to attend me here for an immediate council-of-war.'

  The clerk looked affronted but, at Stirk's grim look, quickly left. A sergeant of marines shortly appeared and gave a crashing salute. 'Sah!' With his local knowledge, Kydd helped to pull things together, and within the hour a captain of the Royal Scots Fusiliers was in respectful attendance.

  Meanwhile, Farrell had the marine messenger busy with orders: 'To the officer commanding, Shirley Heights: "It would be of some service to me should you see fit to begin heating shot as of this moment."' Guns mounted on the commanding heights above the harbour could send red-hot shot among invading ships.

  'My compliments to the commander of Patelle and he is to send her longboat, mounted with a swivel, to lie at grapnel in the entrance to the harbour.'

  There was a small number of marines, less the usual number of sick, but the army was in some strength in forts at Shirley Heights and Blockhouse Hill. Barracks at Monks Hill and The Ridge held an unknown number of soldiers, depending on how many had fallen victims to the yellow fever. Would it be enough?

  'Sah!'

  'Yes, Sergeant?' Farrell looked up from his desk.

  The man looked ill at ease. Farrell frowned. 'What is it, man?' 'Sah!'

  'Yes,' said Farrell impatiently. 'Get on with it.'

  'Sah, Lieutenant Powell o' the Patel
le says — er, L'tenant Powell tol’ me that 'e's unable ter comply with y'r orders, sah!'

  Farrell rocked back in his chair. 'Do I understand you to say that Lieutenant Powell is unable to send his ship's boat out?'

  The sergeant hesitated. ‘Er, it's like this, sah. L'tenant Powell says as 'ow he, er, don't recognise yer orders, like.'

  Everyone in the room froze. The dockyard clock ticked heavily.

  'Where is the officer now?' Farrell asked finally.

  The sergeant, still rigidly at attention, said tightly, 'Don't rightly know, sah.'

  Farrell opened his mouth, but Kydd broke in, 'You mean t' say he's in the capstan house, do ye not?'

  The sergeant's eyes swivelled to Kydd. 'Could be.'

  Kydd went on carefully, 'Sir, seems th' l'tenant is enjoyin' an evenin' jug, didn't quite understan' y'r orders.'

  Farrell gave a wintry smile. 'As it happens, I know Mr Powell.' The smile vanished. 'Send word to the master of Patelle that Lieutenant Powell is to be confined to his cabin immediately.' The sergeant saluted and left hastily.

  Stirk looked meaningfully at Kydd but said nothing. Another languid sunset was on its way, but there was tension in the air. 'Have my orders been carried out?' Farrell demanded. The unknown four sail at last sighting were lying becalmed fifteen miles away; the focus of attention was now narrowing to this vexing insubordination.

  'Oil' Outside, the sergeant of marines beckoned furiously to Kydd. 'Yer L'tenant Powell - y' knows about 'im an' Farrell?'

  'No?' said Kydd guardedly.

  The sergeant pursed his lips. 'Well, see, they was both lootenants in Patelle t'gether, but hated each other's guts somethin' wicked. Now, I got a bad feelin' about this, I has, goin' to end in no good a-tall fer anyone.'

  Kydd looked at the sergeant intently. 'Is Powell confin'd?'

  'No. See — it's the sailin' master he's bin drinkin' with,' he added, 'an' now, well, yer Jack Tars are gettin' upset at their cap'n being taken in charge like, an—'