'The signal is 'General,' though, sir,' Lt. Farley pointed out.
It was not directed to Nelson in Elephant; Sir Hyde Parker's signal was speaking to every ship under his command, his own squadron up to the North, and Nelson's, and Graves's, and Capt. Riou's, too. For any ship, any captain, to disobey would mean a court-martial!
'The signal is dog shite, sir!' Lewrie snapped back. 'A steamin' pile o' horse turds!' Sir Hyde can't see we've got the Danes beaten.'
'Uhm, sir… signal from Defiance,' Midshipman Tillyard called out, sounding nervous. 'Now she's hoisted Number Thirty-Nine to her main tops'l yardarm… but, she's still Number Sixteen aloft at the main-mast head!'
'By broadside… Fire!' Lt. Fox rasped behind the guns, even as shot from the Lynetten and Three Crowns forts still howled overhead, and a fresh squadron of Danish warships, anchored in the merchantman channel behind the forts, began to fire.
Lewrie turned his back on Defiance and her contradictory flags, looking to Amazon, and the sturdy Capt. Riou. 'Mine arse on a band-box!' he said with a groan to see HMS Alcmene, then the Blanche frigate, acknowledge HMS London's signal and hoist Number Thirty-Nine as well!
'Alcmene and Blanche appear to be cutting their kedge anchor cables, sir,' Lt. Farley gravelled. 'Really isn't much we could hope to do against stone forts, I suppose, so…'
Lewrie stood and stared, hands on his hips and glaring at the Amazon, waiting to see what Riou would do. Did he not acknowlege the damned signal and continue the action, his mind was made up that he, and Thermopylae, would stand by him to the last.
Oh, for the love o'…! Lewrie despaired, his heart sinking at the sight of Amazon suddenly ceasing fire, and almost shame-facedly hoisting Number Thirty-Nine. Even Riou was daunted.
'Cease fire, Mister Farley,' he spat in anger. 'Hands aloft to make sail, and just cut the damned kedge cable. Mister Tillyard, I'll thankee t'find that bloody Number Thirty-Nine in the flag lockers, and hoist it.'
'Very well, sir,' Lt. Farley said with a weary sigh. 'Hoy, Fox! Cease fire, and secure your guns! Cease fire, d'ye hear, there! Bosun, pipe hands aloft to make sail. Mister Pulley, do you fetch boarding axes and cut the stern cable. Save the spring, mind.'
Within ten minutes, HMS Thermopylae was once more under way for the North end of the Middle Ground shoals, the Southerly wind on her starboard quarters, fine, bound to join Vice-Admiral Sir Hyde Parker and his squadron… as ordered. It was galling, especially given the fact that the line-of-battle ships anchored astern of her still fought, despite their commander-in-chief's signal, and the Danish line was now a ragged string of silenced warships, grounded and dis-masted hulks, or half sunk, with one of them spectacularly ablaze!
'The foremast trunk won't take much sail, sir,' Lt. Farley cautioned. 'I expect we'll have need of a yard re-fit to replace it. For now, there's a spare main course yard we can use to 'splint' it, sir.'
'As you say, Mister Farley,' Lewrie glumly agreed, massaging his aching forehead, and clawing the wax plugs from his ears. 'Perhaps Sir Hyde thought to bring along spare masts and spars, and will give us one.'
No matter how disputatious and insubordinate it was, Lt. Farley heaved a loud, sarcastic snort of derision concerning Sir Hyde Parker.
Even though Riou's small squadron had cut and made sail, both the Lynetten and the Trekroner forts, and the un-damaged Danish ships in the far-off merchant's channel-which showed absolutely no indication that they would up-anchor, make sail, or sally out from their protected positions-still conducted a desultory fire, drumming the frigates out of the battle. They were now smaller targets, with their sterns pointed at the forts, but their fragile transoms were exposed to long-range raking fire.
Thermopylaeslowly gained on Amazon, coming up to within two hundred yards of her starboard quarters. Lewrie went to his larboard side, looking for Capt. Riou. He saw him, the same instant that Riou spotted him, and they both shrugged at each other, shaking their heads at the futility of it all. Riou lifted a brass speaking-trumpet as if to shout something across, just as a fresh salvo from the Trekroner Fort arrived, raising great shot splashes round both frigates, howling overhead like baritone harpies.
'No!' Lewrie cried as one of those heavy 36-pounder shot struck Amazon on the quarterdeck, snatching Capt. Riou from sight. Was Riou slain? A long minute later as Thermopylae slowly crawled abeam of Amazon, a lieutenant appeared with the speaking-trumpet.
'Hoy, Thermopylae, Captain Lewrie?'
'Aye!' Lewrie shouted back through cupped hands.
'What is the date of your 'posting,' sir?'
'April, of Ninety-Seven!' Lewrie shouted back, mystified. 'Why?'
'Lieutenant Quilliam here, sir! Captain Riou has fallen! I am to pass squadron command to the next senior officer present. Perhaps to Captain Sutton in Alcmene, then.'
'Riou's fallen?' Lewrie shouted, shocked and suddenly saddened.
'Cut in half by a round-shot, sir!' Lt. Quilliam shouted back, his voice shaky with emotion. 'Said… 'Let us all die together, my brave lads,' and… not a quarter-hour later, sir…!'
'A damned good man, sir!' Lewrie told him, with a speaking-trumpet of his own, this time. 'My condolences to you and all your Amazons. And, by God, may he not have fallen in vain!'
The next salvo from the Danes fell short by two cables as they finally stood out of range, still creeping slowly ahead of HMS Amazon.
'Secure from Quarters, Mister Farley,' Lewrie ordered, slumped wearily, un-captain-like, on the hammock nettings. 'Fresh water butts are t'be fetched up for our people.'
'Aye, sir.'
Lewrie plodded back towards the binnacle cabinet and double-helm, but the Ship's Surgeon, Mr. Harward, was slowly dragging himself up to the quarterdeck by the starboard gangway ladder, his breeches and his shirt cuffs still stained with gore despite the long leather apron he wore when at his grim trade.
'Beg to report, sir,' Harward wearily said, 'we've seven killed and eighteen wounded… four seriously. Midshipman Privette's regained consciousness, but he's taken a hard knock, and must be counted on light duties for a few days, may you spare him.'
'And Mister Ballard?' Lewrie had to ask.
'Passed over, sir, sorry,' Harward replied, idly wiping hands on a damp towel that thankfully did not bear too many blots of blood. 'We succeeded in seizing his femoral artery, the great artery found in a man's leg, and cauterised it, staunching the loss of blood, and we managed to neaten up his thigh bone for a stump, with enough flesh as a covering, for later…'
Lewrie held up a hand to shush him, damning surgeons for being so enamoured of their learning that they just had to prose on about the arcana of their trade.
'Well, the loss of blood was too massive, in the end, sir. He is gone. Sorry. I know he was an old friend and shipmate of yours,' Harward told him. He reached into an inside pocket of his unbuttoned waist-coat and produced a letter. 'He surely must have had a premonition, sir, for he pressed me to deliver this to you.'
'Thankee, Mister Harward,' Lewrie said, taking it and turning it over and over, for wont of something better to do. 'I know you did your best for him.. for all our brave lads.'
'Thankee for saying so, sir,' Harward said, bowing himself away to the starboard side for a breath of fresh air, after hours cooped up in the foetid horror of the cockpit surgery.
Lewrie looked up at the signal halliards on the main-mast, and saw Number Thirty-Nine still flying. 'Mister Tillyard? Now we've ackknowledged it, haul that shameful thing down, sir!'
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Full darkness, at last, after an eerily red and gold sunset that silhouetted Copenhagen's spires, castle towers, and bastioned walls in war-like colours, as if a battle still raged, though by mid-afternoon, the guns had fallen silent. The mild winds had long before blown away the last wisps of gunsmoke arisen in impenetrable thunderheads from ships and shore batteries, and now only a few faint mists from burning or sunken Danish floating batteries or warships remained.
HMS Thermopylae lay peacefully at anchor among her sister ships by the North end of the Middle Ground shoal,
