Michael fired off his weapon inside the same second, and with a group to aim for he could not miss – a man groaned, spun away, and fell. Michael had the bayonet on the end of that weapon as well, but that still left One Tooth and his party unarmed against men with swords and pistols. Knife in one hand, heavy unwieldy cutlass in the other, Pearce had to attack them from the side, ghostly shapes illuminated by the moonlight, or standing in the streak of lantern light coming through the cabin door. Surprise won him a momentary advantage, and he managed to club more than slice at one fellow holding out and aiming a pistol. The hilt of the weapon served to chin another, and he could hear, as well as the continued thudding from below, a wild Irish yell as Michael O’Hagan came to his aid, musket out and blade aiming for the nearest body.
Pearce threw his knife to distract the man who wanted to shoot Michael, but not being a throwing weapon it hit him on the shoulder and clattered to the deck. It was sufficient to spoil his aim, though, and he missed with his shot, which went wide of Michael and lodged itself in one of the Harringtons, who fell back down the companionway. They were not coming on, One Tooth and his mates, which left both Pearce and Michael isolated. Martin Dent was made of better material – he had slid forward to catch hold of Pearce’s knife, and, back on his feet, staying low, was slicing away at any leg that came in range. The Irishman was jabbing away, the sheer fury of his action driving his opponents back. The sword Pearce was wielding was not one for elegance, nothing like the épées or light sabres he had learnt to use at his fencing lessons. This was more a bone-breaking club, heavy and damned difficult to use when the bearer was outnumbered. But he swung it above and around his head with gusto, trying at the same time to count the numbers he was fighting and the effect of that first warning pistol shot.
‘Harringtons, move,’ he yelled, ‘or we’re all done.’
There was a curious sensation of clarity. Even as he fought, Pearce seemed to be able to see in limited light where the next and most dangerous assault was coming from, to parry it or produce a blow that wounded the attacker; this at the same time as he was calling out for assistance – and that damned trembling sensation was gone now. He could also observe that his foes had exhausted their combustible weapons. Could not One Tooth and his mates realise this – that it was sword against anything they could muster, and that these Frenchmen were sluggish? The only two who appeared were Charlie Taverner and Rufus, armed with nothing more than belaying pins, but coming up behind those fighting their messmates and using their weapons to good effect. They created a bit of space, so Pearce was able to back up to the sword rack and grab another weapon. This he slid as hard as he could down the deck so that it lay beyond the fight, and Charlie, who had seen it pass, was quick enough to go for it, then get up just in time to stop another enemy braining Rufus with his pistol butt.
Pearce was grabbing as many swords as he could, in between parrying blows, chucking them overhead or under feet, and slowly, armed, the Harringtons emerged to engage in the fight. Pearce was aware that the thudding below had ceased, which meant that either their labours had been interrupted or the ship was free of the shore.
‘Martin, below! Find out what’s happening.’
The boy slipped away, not without a jab to the groin of one Frenchman that produced a high pain-filled scream. Now the attackers outnumbered the defenders. None too soon, for wielding that heavy cutlass had exhausted Pearce, and Michael had taken several blows and was much slower in his responses than he had been at the outset. The speed with which the fighting stopped had Pearce on his knees for the first time; he had lunged at a Frenchman only to avert his blade quickly as the man dropped his weapon and put his hands up high. He lifted his head to see Charlie Taverner, Rufus and One Tooth pushing those who had surrendered against the cabin bulkhead.
‘Get the swords still in the rack,’ he shouted.
‘The hawsers are cut,’ yelled Martin Dent, only his head showing at deck level.
‘You two,’ shouted One Tooth, pointing, ‘get on that bloody wheel. Two more in the bows to give us a course, and the rest get capstan bars to fend us past that damned Frenchman.’
A ball took the Harrington standing next to One Tooth, hitting him on the shoulder so that he spun round and dropped to the deck. Pearce looked to Michael to load his piece, but the Irishman had already done so, and had his musket aimed over the side to return fire to the shore. Others had picked up dropped pistols and were looking for the means to reload them.
‘Charlie, get Dysart out of the cutter, but leave it lashed on just in case.’ As Charlie moved he saw Rufus on his knees, head down, and ran to lift him. ‘Rufus, are you all right?’
‘Bugger booted me right in the balls,’ he said, lifting his head with a grimace of pain.
‘And there’s me thinkin’ you didn’t have any,’ Charlie hooted, as he moved away.
Following his gaze, Pearce found himself looking into a row of angry eyes. There were eight still on their feet, not all without wounds but too dangerous to leave to their own devices. Rope them! With what? Confine them! Where was secure? The solution flew in the face of everything his father had ever tried to teach him.
‘Get up, Rufus. Gather some men, and throw those bastards overboard.’
‘Axes?’ The shout came from the bows. ‘We’ve run foul of the French mainmast rigging.’
As men rushed forward, carrying swords rather than axes, Dysart appeared with Midshipman Burns in tow. They were just in time to see Rufus Dommet, with the aid of a Harrington, heaving the man who had kicked him over the side, his yell of alarm killed by the splash as he entered the water.
‘Anyone got a loaded pistol?’ Pearce called.
‘Me,’ a Harrington replied.
‘Give it here!’
Pearce took it, went to the Frenchman nearest the side, and in his own language with the pistol at his head, invited him to jump, the task made harder when a musket ball removed a piece of the bulwark right under his nose. Oddly enough that sped the men over, and splash followed splash until the deck was clear.
Michael got off an occasional shot. Forward, axes and swords were hacking at the point where the rigging had fouled. Free now to look, those on the quarterdeck could see the current was swinging the stern round to a point where it would run them ashore to a quayside crowded with yelling Frenchman, some bearing torches, others so drunk they were unable to shake their fist without falling over. It would be fatal to get near them, for enough of those numerous enemies were sufficiently sober to cause trouble – a pair with muskets and the powder to load them were already doing so.
‘Michael, I need those guns silenced.’
‘Then you’d best come and aim this thing yourself, John-boy, for it is of little use in my hands.’
‘Let me,’ said Martin Dent, putting a hand on the weapon.
‘It will blow you off your feet,’ Michael scoffed, but he did let the boy take it, and Martin laid it on the bulwark and took aim, slowly squeezing the trigger. Michael was right, the discharge threw Martin backwards, but there was an immediate scream from the nearby shore that meant he had found a target in the yelling crowd of drunks.
‘Look,’ said One Tooth, pointing forward. Pearce followed his finger, to see two things. That a fight was going on between the anchor watch of the Mercedes, and at the same time a party of the shore-side Frenchmen with torches was making its way down the quay to commandeer fishing boats. ‘We can’t fight them all if they get aboard.’
There was a hiatus, with no one doing much from the shore to impede their progress. Firing had stopped, the only activity taking place in the bows, where the Frenchmen were trying and failing to get lines on the Lady Harrington so that they could lash her off to their stationary ship. Those on shore must have been pinning their hopes on a number of men getting aboard, sufficient to take back the prize.
‘Then we must ensure they do not.’ Suddenly Pearce added, ‘What is your damned name, anyway?’
‘Twyman.’
‘Everyone forward to keep the crew of that ship off our deck,’ said Pearce, his mind going back to the chase that had started this whole affair. ‘Twyman, have you got a cannon we can aim forward on those boats?’
‘With the swing on the barky any one of the side armament will do.’
‘Powder, balls?’
‘Balls should still be by the guns, though they might have emptied the magazine.’
‘Send someone to look. Dysart, that barrel of powder?’
‘Still in the cutter.’
‘Burns, go with Martin and fetch it.’ The midshipman stood stock still, until Pearce shouted. ‘You must do something, boy!’
‘I’ll go,’ said Rufus. ‘Me and Charlie, it’s sort of ours like.’
‘Slowmatch, Dysart.’
‘Aye. Roond ma waist still.’
‘Well, get your flints on it and get it lit.’
‘We’re clear forrard,’ came the cry.
‘On the wheel, keep us that way,’ shouted Twyman.
Pearce went down the starboard gangway to look at the guns, aware that the ship was moving – slowly, but it was moving, running out on the falling tide. On the opposite deck the Harringtons were fending off with their capstan bars. The Frenchmen opposing them could have used a cannon – not more than one for they were too few. Was it that they were stupid, or did they fear to damage their prize? What difference did it make?
Being an East Indiaman, the ship was well armed, with half a dozen long nines a side. Twyman was right, there were balls left in the garlands, and within a minute he had a flintlock to fire the piece, the ship’s own powder in cartridges, swab and rammers, linstock burning slowly in case the flint didn’t fire, two buckets of water and his own mates as gun crew.
‘Martin, you’re powder monkey. Let go of the breechings. Open the port. Michael, Rufus, Charlie, on the tackle. Mr Twyman we need more hands.’ Charlie didn’t wait – he was already swabbing the gun just in case it had been fired when the East Indiaman had been taken. Dysart showed Pearce how to attach the flintlock while a cartridge was picked, the touchhole covered and the rest rammed down the barrel with the ball.
‘Now all ye have to dae,’ instructed Dysart, handing Pearce the firing line, ‘is look doon the piece, point it where you want the ball tae go, and pull this hard.’
‘You know what you’re doing, Dysart.’
‘Aye. But I’m no up tae bein’ the gun captain, Pearce, especially no with this gammy arm. You are.’
It was an odd way for the Scot to say he was grateful, but that, judging by the look on his face, was what it amounted to. Pearce realised that he was, and had been, enjoying himself; his blood had been racing for an age now, a strange and compelling feeling that had first surfaced when he started fighting, and had still not diminished. Leaning down, picking out one of the bobbing torches as a target, he called for the gun carriage to be levered round as far forward as the cannon would bear. They had to take the quoin out and reverse it to depress the muzzle, but the time came when one torch was in sight right down the line of the cannon.
‘Stand clear,’ said Pearce, stepping back himself so that he was holding on to three feet of firing lanyard, his own arm fully stretched. He pulled, saw the spark, then jumped even further back as the cannon fired, sending out an orange tongue of flame that lit the night sky, and a solid ball that crunched into a berthed fishing boat and turned it to matchwood, as the gun shot back into its straining breechings.
‘Reload,’ Pearce shouted.
‘We’re clearing the Mercedes.’
That shout made Pearce look aft to where the privateer’s foredeck was slowly, for they were still drifting, but surely coming abreast of the Lady Harrington’s poop. Behind him, amidships and well away from the powder, he could see the slowmatch fizzing as it burnt into a tub of sand. Dysart was sitting on the small barrel of gunpowder they had fetched aboard, with his broken arm sticking straight out. The ropes which had carried the barrel were still there, loops of hemp that were too tempting to resist.
‘Dysart, can you make that barrel you’re sitting on live?’ The questioning look made Pearce continue. ‘I think a little bit of that slowmatch, inserted, might make it into a useful bomb. Only you can tell what would happen if that went off on an enemy deck.’
‘Why, it wid be terrible.’
‘Can I ask you to make it so?’
The cannon was reloaded, Pearce had it hauled up, adjusted his aim and elevation, them pulled the firing lanyard again. This time, with shortened range, the effect was even more devastating, as the ball sliced through the flimsy scantlings of the small fishing boats, sending slivers of wood in all directions and bringing in its wake the satisfying sound of men receiving wounds.
‘That cleared the buggers,’ shouted Charlie Taverner, looking over the bulwarks, ‘and some of them have taken splinters.’
Pearce moved forward to follow Charlie’s finger, and to see the privateersmen seeking cover, with the exception of those half dozen writhing on the ground.
‘Mr Burns, sir,’ called Dysart, ‘will you oblige me by turning this wee barrel on its side.’
Pearce turned to look at that. The boy did not respond, indeed he seemed to be getting ready to slink away again. Pearce’s harsh tone stopped him. ‘Move, Mr Burns! You wear an officer’s coat. It would benefit us all greatly if, just this once, you were to behave like one.’
Pearce’s censure brought compliance – slow, not enthusiastic, but forward movement nonetheless. With the barrel on its side, Dysart handed Burns a knife, with which the boy went to work on the bung, creating a hole down the side of the cork into which the Scotsman could feed his linstock, all the while talking the young midshipman through.
‘We want it cut short, Mr Burns, very short, an inch showing and nae mair.’
A cry came from the men on the wheel. ‘Mercedes has cut her cable.’
Pearce was forced to leave off gun-laying to find out from Twyman what that meant.
‘They are lighter than us, a shallower draught, so they might drift out with greater speed.’
‘So?’
‘They will hope to foul us, run their bowsprit over our rail, snare us on lines and act as a sheet anchor so that we drift into the shore.’
‘Then,’ said Pearce emphatically, ‘I think spoiling their game comes first. Charlie, Rufus, you said that powder barrel was yours.’
‘It is, Pearce,’ shouted Charlie, for the first time in an age his face happy, something like it had been that night in the Pelican. ‘It most surely is.’
Pearce wanted to light the slowmatch before they moved from the gangway, but Dysart had too healthy a respect for powder to let him. He insisted on patience until the entire party was on the poop. Then, and only then, would he take the small piece of linstock, already burning, and apply it to the bare inch left exposed.
‘The honour,’ Pearce said to his two messmates, ‘is yours.’
‘Dinna rush,’ warned Dysart. ‘See how slow it burns.’
What crew remained on the Mercedes must have sensed something coming, even if they could not see what it was. Those who could be spared took up position to fire a couple of muskets at the party on the Indiaman’s poop, but they were rebuffed by a fusillade, led by Michael O’Hagan, made by his musket and numerous captured pistols.
‘Get ready,’ warned Dysart as the burning fuse reached the very edge of the bung. Charlie and Rufus lifted the barrel by the ropes and started to swing, with the Scotsman intoning an interminable one-twa-three for the throw. On three, the two Pelicans gave a mighty heave backwards, then forwards, and slung the barrel of powder, its fuse fizzing angrily, onto the privateer’s deck.
‘Now get doon,’ the Scotsman ordered.
It was as well they obliged. Almost as soon as the barrel hit the enemy deck, following no more than a couple of rolls, it went off, a great crashing explosion that tore lumps out of the French ship. Flaming staves rose into the rigging and lodged there, setting light to tarred rope wherever they came into contact. It seemed only minutes until the Mercedes was ablaze all along her forepeak, those who had been left aboard no longer seeking to close her in on the Indiaman. Now they were looking for a way to survive.
‘Back on the gun,’ Pearce shouted, finding he had to drag some away from the terrifying sight.
‘Aye, aye, Captain,’ called Charlie.
Pearce grinned, and in doing so realised how tense he had been. ‘Only a gun captain, Charlie.’
They got off one more shot, that one aimed at a target that lay astern of the ship, and this time the ball landed on the shore to bounce along, sending Frenchmen flying in all directions.
‘I never wanted to be a sailor, Michael,’ said Pearce, leaning wearily on the Irishman’s shoulder. ‘But right now I would be happy to change places.’
‘Only a fool would believe that, John-boy,’ Michael replied, ‘an omadhaun in the Erse.’
‘Is that what it means, a fool?’
‘Aye, though one tinged with madness.’
‘Then I have found my true rating.’
The flash of the exploding powder that set in motion the destruction of the Mercedes lit the night sky and was visible for fifty miles, brilliant fading to constant, reflected off the cloud cover. Lieutenant Digby, who had the watch aboard HMS Brilliant, deliberated about waking his captain, worried that a man who seemed to have clutched at so many straws would do likewise with this. He knew that the frigate should not be here, three days sailing at least from the convoy. If Gould had obeyed his instructions and cleared the great headland at Ushant he would be well on his way to passing Brest and entering the Bay of Biscay. But reluctant as he was, he had no choice – Barclay’s standing orders were quite specific.
‘It came from the Estuary de Trieux?’ Barclay demanded, night glass to his eye, nightshirt flapping in the breeze.
‘I can only report that the explosion came from the general direction, sir.’
‘An opinion, Mr Digby.’
‘I feel obliged to decline to give one, sir. It could be anything.’
‘And what, sir,’ Barclay enquired drily, passing the lieutenant his telescope, ‘would you say that was?’
Digby looked, not knowing whether to be pleased or despairing about the orange glow that tinged the sky. ‘Fire, sir.’
‘A large fire, sir, perhaps even a ship fire?’
‘We cannot assume that, Captain Barclay.’
‘No Mr Digby, we cannot. But I think we are obliged to investigate. Please set me a course for the mouth of that estuary. I want to be close inshore by dawn.’
‘Aye, aye, sir.’
Unbeknown to Pearce, Twyman had been busy getting some kind of sail on the ship that would enable the helmsman to hold her head steady. Firing his cannon, watching the gunpowder bomb and the subsequent fire, he had not even been aware that men had gone aloft. They had rigged a jib and the gaff, as well as a topsail that could be braced round into what were now light airs. With this the Lady Harrington could set and maintain a course, with the added advantage that the topsail, backed, could slow their progress down the channel, very necessary if they did not wish to run aground.
Nor was he aware, as a nautical novice, just how swiftly the tide fell in the bight of Brittany, the speed with which the water exited from this estuary. At the mouth of the inlet it was like a tidal race, a cataract that met the incoming seawater, breaking over rocks in abundance, to create a maelstrom of white water, something the locals avoided like the plague.
‘I need hands on the braces,’ Twyman yelled. ‘For if we don’t have sails set right we could broach to in that water, an’ that don’t take no account of the rocks.’
He had caught Pearce cold; he was still, like his shipmates, basking in the glow of the martial success. One Tooth Twyman had no tact at all, so when he yelled at them for some activity it was well larded with expletives.
‘Are we being required,’ Michael scoffed, with an expression that boded argument, ‘to do willingly what we hated to do for Barclay?’
‘We are,’ Pearce replied, ‘and I fear we must.’
In a voice full of irony he simulated what he had heard on Brilliant. ‘So clap on to them falls, me hearties, an’ pull like the very devil.’
Which the Pelicans did, their spirits as high as his, running to where they were told, hauling on ropes like demons, aware that Martin Dent was aloft doing what he did best on Brilliant, handling the highest sails, while Mr Burns was likewise replicating his naval behaviour, standing by the wheel being utterly useless. Dysart, with only one good arm, had taken on the task of ensuring that ropes were properly attached to their cleats, that they would not fly off and endanger the whole ship.
The Indiaman hit the disturbed water to rear and buck like a horse, with Twyman and two others fighting a wheel that wanted to rip itself out of their hands. The bows dipped alarmingly, and the long bowsprit shot well east. Pearce and his mates raced to loosen one set of braces, then ran with equal alacrity to tighten those on the larboard side. The wind on the sails, in that configuration, brought the head round and the Lady Harrington ploughed out into less tempestuous waters.
The boom, and the shock that hit them seconds later, took everyone aboard by surprise. They had been too busy seeing to the needs of their ship to think of what was happening to the Mercedes, illuminated like a torch by the flames that ran through her sails and rigging. The hull had been ablaze too and as the flames reached her store of gunpowder she simply blew up, a great cataclysmic explosion that sent most of the decks skywards, while the scantlings were blown out to reveal the fiery red ball that was the seat of the blast.
‘Jesus,’ said Michael, crossing himself.
‘Fire got the magazine,’ said Dysart.
There was a moment of uncertainty for Pearce; part elation, part regret at the death of a ship and quite possibly several men aboard her, pride at what they had achieved tugging at every pacifist tenet he had ever been taught. If that had been Brilliant and Barclay would he care so much? That was a thought that brought him abruptly back to consideration of the next dilemma.
‘Twyman,’ he shouted, ‘is it possible to set a course that would take us east?’
‘Whatever for?’
Pearce looked out into the inky western darkness of the sea, lit only by a streak of moonlight. ‘I think our frigate is out to the west, and I have good reasons for wanting to avoid her.’
‘Then if that’s what you want you’d best get back on those bloody falls and haul away on command, though I won’t put the helm down till we are well clear of that damned shore.’
Once on a settled course, sailing easy, everyone aboard could relax and count the cost of what they had done. They had one Harrington dead; the two wounded were brought in to rest in what had been the Indiaman captain’s sleeping cabin and rendered what aid was possible. It was not much, and worryingly, Michael identified one fellow who had saved his life as critical. It was that smooth-faced cove that Pearce had first met at their prison window, the one known as Dusty.
‘Seen it before, John-boy, that lack of colour. Poor sod can barely breathe. He needs a medical man.’
‘How long, Twyman, till we raise the home shore?’
‘God alone has knowledge of that, mate, and if you was a sailor you would know better than to ask. The wind will decide. If it favours us, and the weather stays clear, two to four days. But I’ve been stuck in this stretch of water for a whole fortnight, beating up the Channel into the teeth of an endless easterly, and that with a full crew of hands.’
‘I would hate to be responsible for anyone’s death.’
‘We’s all got to go sometime,’ Twyman replied, heartlessly.
Pearce was now feeling guilty, his mood black, not only about the remarkably few casualties they had suffered, but also about those amongst the Frenchmen – he was sure he had killed more than one – which he knew to be absurd. They would have killed him if they could, and probably celebrated the fact of doing so. But being irrational did not make that emotion any easier to avoid. He was assailed by the stupidity of some of the decisions he had made, easily able to imagine the consequences had the whole party not been favoured with remarkable good luck. Added to that was the certain knowledge that he had risked a great many lives to achieve an utterly selfish end – his own return to England. The excuse that he was acting for them collectively was now, obviously, so much moonshine. His mood rendered him uncommunicative, which did not register with the crew of the Indiaman, but offended those with whom he had come ashore.
‘Anybody wid think we lost,’ moaned Dysart, unaware that the look Pearce gave him was not one of annoyance, but yet another twinge of conscience; if the Scotsman was not to lose the full use of his arm for life, he needed a surgeon as well.
Sitting in the capacious main cabin, his mood was not helped by his surroundings. Pearce could only wonder at the area allotted to the man who ran the ship compared to that given to everyone else. The whole space, which could fore and aft be divided in two, seemed to occupy a third of the length of the vessel. The captain had his own privy and a separate space for his bed. The furniture would have graced any salon at home and the quality of the late captain’s private stores – the Frenchmen aboard had been heavily at the wine – reeked of easy wealth.
‘He was of a high colour, mind,’ said Twyman, talking of the previous occupant, while happily occupying his chair. ‘And choleric, forever yelling and going blue with it. So when he had his seizure none of us were like to be shocked.’
‘What happens to the ship now?’
‘God knows,’ Twyman replied, his single fang gnawing at his lower lip. ‘Sail into an English port, send a note to the owners and see what happens.’
‘Some of us would need to be put ashore prior to that.’
‘Was you pressed?’ Pearce nodded, as Twyman added, ‘And freshly so judging by your skills.’
‘Not much more than a week ago,’ Pearce replied, ‘though it feels like a lifetime.’
The thought of his destination had obviously made Twyman gloomy, but he brightened considerably when responding to Pearce’s request. ‘I’d be an ungrateful swab if I couldn’t manage that, mate. Don’t you fret, I’ll get you clear.’
‘Lying one-toothed bastard,’ said Dysart, when Pearce accosted him to ask him what he wanted to do – come ashore with them or stay on the ship. He kicked the bulwark by which they were standing. ‘The bugger is salvage at least.’
‘So?’
‘The value o’ the ship and the cargo has tae be redeemed by the insurers – them bastards that tak their coffee at Lloyds. It’s worth thousands, maybe tens of, since we dinna know the cargo. Nae wonder he’s happy to get you off the bluddy thing so you’ll no get a share.’
‘Are you sure?’ asked Pearce, feeling rather foolish.
‘As sure as a canny straighten my arm,’ Dysart responded, his normally kindly face a mask of real fury. ‘That’s the law o’ the sea, man. You wouldna credit it, would ye? Having saved the bastard’s arse, he wants tae diddle you oot of ony reward.’
‘It’s not one we could claim anyway Dysart, since we intend to desert.’
‘Well, dinna tae it near to any naval port, for the sake of Christ. There’s an army of glass-combing buggers in them towns that’ll spot you in nae time an’ will hand you o’er for a bounty.’
‘I will have to talk with Charlie, Rufus and Michael, and see what they want to do.’
Dysart’s voice was soft now, fatherly even. ‘Just remember, Pearce, drop anchor in this and you and yer friends are safe, ’cause you’re no deserters. Yer still Navy and you might also be in for a right good dose of coin when this barky is condemned.’
‘And then?’
‘I grant ye that’s no sae nice. You’ll be sent aboard another man-o’-war.’
‘It’s not worth it,’ Pearce replied.
The lookout on HMS Brilliant called at dawn. ‘Sail ho! Ship bearing due west. I just picked up the masthead on the rise.’
‘Bugger’s run for St Malo,’ Barclay spat.
For the first time in forty-eight hours he felt able to look and act as he should, like a senior Post Captain, giving the eye to his deck officers instead of avoiding contact. If he had not insisted on closing the Estuary de Trieux they would have missed the enemy.
The next call came fifteen minutes later. ‘Looks like the India ship, your honour.’
‘There might be two sail.’
It was a good five minutes before the lookout responded, a period in which Ralph Barclay swung between euphoria and despair, hope rising only to be killed off by pessimism, the feeling that all his hopes, dashed more than once, were about to be sunk again.
‘There’s only one ship to see and it is definitely the Indiaman, ’cause she is flying the company pennant.’
‘No tricolour above it?’
‘No.’
‘Mr Collins, more sail.’
It was Martin Dent who spotted the frigate, sitting as he was on the crosstrees, right at the top of the Lady Harrington’s masts. His gleeful identification of HMS Brilliant was not shared on deck by anyone other than Dysart, and the mood deepened when Twyman denied the possibility of outrunning a frigate.
‘You’re sure?’
‘As I stand here and breathe.’
Pearce looked towards the low line of land, just visible. ‘How far offshore would you put us?’
‘A good ten miles.’
‘Could we take to a boat?’ asked Charlie Taverner.
It was Dysart who replied, not Twyman, the Scot’s face angry at what he saw as stupidity. ‘You wouldna get two miles. Barclay’s got boats an ‘aw, and men who can row better than you daft buggers. Think what will happen if yer taken up as deserters. The first thing you’d face is the grating, and this time it will be a proper cat, no’ some damp and useless hemp.’
The deck fell into silence, Harringtons and Brilliants alike struck into silence. John Pearce was aware that others were waiting for him to make a decision, and that annoyed him – had he not done enough? But even as he deliberated on the ineptitude of his fellow men, he could not help but filter through the alternatives they faced. And the conclusion was as unpleasant as it was unwelcome.
‘Twyman,’ he said eventually, his voice heavy as he glanced around to what was a totally empty seascape, ‘if we cannot outrun Brilliant then we had best heave to.’ He answered the looks of disappointment with the words. ‘That way, at least, the wounded men will get quick attention.’
‘Let fly the sheets,’ Twyman shouted, his face a mask, giving nothing away regarding his own feelings.
‘John-boy,’ asked Michael, with an enquiring look. ‘You’re sure?’
‘No, Michael, I am as unsure as anyone on this deck.’
The Irishman pulled out the first belaying pin, releasing the mainsail to flap uselessly as the way came off the Lady Harrington.
The decision had been made and the emotions of those on board varied. Rufus put the best face on it, pointing out that they would be reunited with Ben Walker, which Charlie Taverner spoilt for him by mentioning Gherson. Charlie was looking glum, Pearce thought, like a man on his way to the guillotine or the gallows. Michael just looked angry.
‘Sorry, Michael.’
‘Sure, I have no idea what you are after saying that for.’
‘I thought to get us free,’ Pearce said, nagged once more by the thought of his true motives, and wondering why, having got clear of Lézardrieux, he hadn’t asked to be put ashore at once. Too late now!
‘Free. What is free, John-boy? The right to toil until your body fails, then to die in a gutter?’
Pearce gave him a tired smile. ‘You’re not recommending the Navy, are you?’
The Irishman shook his head. ‘Not for you, and not on that there ship, ’cause all I can see for you there is trouble, enough trouble to see you dangle, for one day I swear that you will take a swing at Barclay.’
‘The tree of liberty must from time to time be refreshed with the blood of tyrants.’
‘What?’
‘Thomas Jefferson, an American patriot, said something like that. I’m not sure I have the absolute right of it.’
Michael was not impressed by the quotation. ‘Me, I care not where I am, a hull is as good as a ditch.’ Pearce looked at him in disbelief, until he realised that the Irishman was speaking to reassure himself.
‘It’s not just you.’
‘Charlie will sulk but survive, and Rufus, though he will haul on ropes for eternity and learn little, is as well off at sea as he is ashore.’
‘Which leaves me as the problem.’
O’Hagan favoured Pearce with a huge grin, then put a hand on his shoulder. ‘Sure, you’re that all right, and one I am right glad I met.’
Brilliant was within hailing distance within the hour, with a boat in the water seconds after she hove to. Pearce could see Barclay in the sternsheets, and observed that the frigate captain was not going to come aboard without a strong party of red-coated marines. Lifting a telescope that he had borrowed from Twyman, he ranged over the deck of the man-o’-war, picking out the cloaked figure of the captain’s wife, Lieutenant Digby and further forward, leaning over the rail, Ben Walker and Cornelius Gherson.
‘Man ropes,’ said Twyman. ‘We need to rig man ropes for your captain to come aboard.’
‘Those,’ Pearce replied, bitterly, ‘you can do yourself.’
A call brought one of the Harringtons to drop two lines over the side that looped through eyebolts and acted as the side of the ladder needed to get aboard at sea. Barclay climbed the wooden battens on the side of the ship with ease and came on deck with a look of deep curiosity. That he was not pleased to see Pearce was obvious by the glare aimed in his direction, nor was he about to favour anyone on the deck, Brilliants or Harringtons, with a smile, though Dysart was worth a nod. But when he spotted Midshipman Burns by the wheel, a wave of relief swept over him.
‘Mr Burns, an explanation if you please.’
‘Sir,’ the mid replied, stepping forward and lifting his hat.
‘Who commands here?’
‘Well, I do,’ said Twyman.
Barclay looked him up and down, then called to Burns, ‘Would I be right in assuming, young sir, that this ship was taken from under the noses of that dammed privateer?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘By men from my ship?’
‘Partly.’
Barclay glared at the boy. ‘Partly?’
‘We took it back with the help of the ship’s own crew, sir.’
‘Only right and proper, Mr Burns, but that does not alter the fact that this ship was in enemy hands for a full thirty-six hours.’
‘She were not,’ protested Twyman, ‘not more’n twenty four.’
Barclay reacted as though Twyman had not spoken, his remarks still aimed at Burns. ‘Which means, young sir, that this vessel became property of our enemies, and, retaken, is now a lawful prize of His Britannic Majesty, King George. And that means, Mr Burns, that until I myself set foot on this deck, you had the command here.’ Then Barclay lifted his hat. ‘And it behoves me, before superseding you, to give you your due salute.’
Burns had not the wit to reply, but he did, once more, lift his own hat.
‘Thank you, Mr Burns. Now be so good as to escort me to your cabin.’
‘I protest,’ said Twyman.
‘Noted,’ Barclay replied, without giving the man a glance.
There was not a jaw that did not drop as Burns complied with his captain’s request – taking Barclay to his cabin, and two marines, who took station at the cabin door, made sure no one, not even Twyman, could follow.