Under false colours

home his conviction.

'What would the French garrison in Hamburg say when they seized our cargo, Captain, eh? Mercy bow- coup, damn them, and all I'll get in receipt is board and lodging in a cell! You know well enough I have to think of my ship. We'll take our chance to the norrard.'

Littlewood let go his end of the chart and it rolled up like a coiled spring against Drinkwater's hand which held down the opposite margin. The sensation of a tiny wounding, a reminder of Littlewood's ultimate responsibility struck him. Drinkwater was not a naval officer in Littlewood's mind but an encumbrance, and Drinkwater faced a situation over which he had no real control. Matters had gone too far for him to contemplate casting aside his disguise in order to usurp Littlewood's command of the Galliwasp. Besides, his authority to do even that was difficult to prove and impossible to enforce. The first intimation of naval command would reek so strongly of the press in the nostrils of Galliwasp's people that he would very likely be in fear of his life.

Littlewood's assessment was the truth and his solution the only practical one. Clawing their way to the north bought them sea room, time, and the chance of an encounter with a British man-of-war; running to leeward, for all that the British-occupied island lay downwind, was too much like clutching at a straw.

'Very well. I agree.' Drinkwater nodded.

'Pity about that gun-brig ...'

Drinkwater lingered in the cabin after Littlewood returned to the deck. He could be heard exhorting his crew to further exertions as Galliwasp rolled and pitched sluggishly — what remained of the dead burden of her wrecked top-hamper lying over her bow — holding her head to wind. Her buffeted hull creaked in protest and Drinkwater heard the monotonous thump-thump of her pumps starting again as Littlewood sought to prevent his precious cargo being spoiled by bilge water.

'God's bones!' Drinkwater blasphemed venomously and struck his clenched fist on Littlewood's table. What in hell's name was he doing here, presiding ineffectually over the shambles of Dungarth's grand design?

The thing was a failure, a fiasco ...

The matter was finished and Quilhampton was lost, for it was inconceivable that his little brig could have withstood the onslaught of the night's tempest. The mission — if that was what Dungarth's insane idea to force the war to a climax could be called — had foundered with the Tracker. Littlewood was right and there was nothing more they could do except preserve themselves and their cargo. Perhaps, if they regained the English coast, the ruse might be attempted again after the spring thaw. It was something to hope for.

But the loss of Quilhampton, Frey and their people brought an inconsolable grief and Drinkwater felt it weigh upon him, adding to the depression of his spirits. It was then that the idle and selfish thought insinuated itself: with the loss of Tracker had gone his sea-chest and all his personal effects.

CHAPTER 6 Coals to Newcastle

October 1809

Drinkwater woke with a start, his heart hammering with a nameless fear. For a moment he lay still, thinking his anxiety and grief had dragged him from sleep, but the next moment he was struggling upright. Shouts came from other parts of the ship, shouts of alarm as other men were woken from the sleep of utter fatigue. Galliwasp struck for a third time, her hull shuddering, a living thing in her death throes.

He reached the deck as the cry was raised of a light to leeward.

'Where away?' roared Littlewood, struggling into a coat, his face a pale, anxious blur in the gloom.

'To loo'ard, Cap'n! There!'

Both Drinkwater and Littlewood stared into the darkness as Galliwasp pounded upon the reef for the fourth time and the hiss and seething of the sea welled up about her and then fell away in the unmistakable rhythm of breakers.

Then they saw the light, a steady red glow which might have been taken for a glimpse of the rising moon seen through a rent in the overcast except that it suddenly flared into yellow flames and they were close enough to see clouds of sparks leap upwards.

'Tis a lighthouse ... Helgoland lighthouse!' Littlewood called, then bellowed, 'In the waist there! A sounding!'

Drinkwater felt Littlewood's hand grip his arm. 'Cap'n Waters,' he said, his voice strained and urgent. 'They must have been asleep,' — referring to the watch of exhausted men who had laboured throughout the preceding day to prepare Galliwasp's jury rig — 'and we've drifted ...'

'By the mark seven, sir!'

'She's come off!' snapped Drinkwater, watching the bearing of the light and feeling the change in the motion of the Galliwasp.

'By the deep nine!' confirmed the cry from forward.

'They may not have been asleep,' Drinkwater said consolingly, as Littlewood, in his agitation, still clung to Drinkwater's sleeve. 'That light was badly tended.' Both men stared at the now flaming chauffer which seemed to loom above them.

'Do you anchor, upon the instant, sir!'

At Drinkwater's imperative tone Littlewood shook off his catalepsy.

'Yes, yes, of course. Stand by the shank painter and cat stopper!'

It was a matter of good fortune that they had had the foresightedness to bend a cable on to the best bower the afternoon before. Indeed they had mooted anchoring, but decided against it, believing they had sufficient sea room to remain hove-to overnight and able to get sail of the barque before the following noon.

'By the deep eleven!'

The anchor dropped from the cat-head with a splash and the cable rumbled out through the hawse-pipe. Littlewood was roused fully from his momentary lapse of initiative. Drinkwater heard him calling for the carpenter to sound the well and the hands to man the pumps. The pounding that the Galliwasp had taken on the reef must surely have started a plank or dislodged some of her sheathing and caulking. Littlewood must be dog-tired, Drinkwater thought, feeling useless and unable to contribute much beyond feeling for Littlewood a surrogate anxiety. He turned to the flames of the lighthouse as he felt Galliwasp's anchor dig its flukes into the sea bed and the ship jerk round to her cable.

Carefully Drinkwater observed the bearing of the light steady.

Littlewood stumped breathlessly aft. 'He was asleep ... the mate I mean ... God damn his lights ...'

'The bearing's steady ... she's brought up to her anchor.'

'Thank God the wind's dropping.'

'Amen to that,' murmured Drinkwater.

'She's making water, sir.' The carpenter came aft and made his report at which Littlewood grunted. 'We'll have to keep the men at the pumps until daylight.' He raised his voice. 'Mr Watts!'

The mate came aft, a shuffling figure whose shame at having fallen asleep was perceptible even in the darkness. As Drinkwater overheard Littlewood passing orders to keep men at the pumps he reflected on the situation. The Galliwasp's hands had laboured like Trojans, Watts among them. There were too few of them, far fewer than would have been borne by a naval vessel of comparable size. Detached, Drinkwater could almost condone their failure. Littlewood turned towards him with a massive shrug as Watts went disconsolately forward.

'I'll stand your anchor watch for you,' Drinkwater said. 'You have all been pushed too hard.' Littlewood stood beside him for a moment, looked forward, where the thudding of the pumps were beginning their monotonous beat, and then stared aft, above the taffrail, where the flaring coals of Helgoland light burned.