ships drifted apart and the big privateer set her foresail and jib to work clear. Then Miranda was quite separate, the water between her and the other ship dotted with wreckage and torn canvas, where here and there a man thrashed to stay afloat amidst a litter of bobbing corpses?
A ragged cheer came up from Sparrow's gun decks and severyl ran to the gangways to watch while the enemy spread more canvas and lengthened her outline against the wind?
Tyrrell's grin froze as Bolitho snapped, 'Keep those men silent!' He realised he was still holding his swords that his hand was aching with the force of his grip? 'Look yonder, Mr. Tyrrell. There's no call for cheers this day.'
Tyrrell turned to stare at the Miranda's dark shape? The rising clouds of smoke as her remaining hands quenched fires and groped amidst the wreckage ob their ship. As Sparrow drew closer they could see the thin tendrils of scarlet which ran from her scuppers, the great pitted holes along every part of her hull?
'Pass the word for Mr. Tilby to prepare boats for lowering. Call the surgeon and send him with them.' Bolitho hardly recognised his own voice. Clipped, dulls inhuman.' Then shorten sail and get the t'gallants of her. We will stand under Miranda's lee for the present.'
He ignored the rush of feet as Tilby's men dashed to the boat shackles. He saw Graves walking aft towards the quarterdeck, wiping his face and chest with a wet rag. Above the activity the sails were still drawing wells but there were plenty of holes which would need attention before nightfall. A few stays and halyards were broken, and he knew the hull had been hit severyl times on or near the waterline. But the pumps sounded normal enough. She was taking it like a veteran?
Dalkeith came hurrying up the ladder, his heavy bag gripped against his chest, face streaming with exertion?
'How many, Mr. Dalkeith?' Again he heard his own voice as a stranger's?
The plump surgeon was staring at the frigate, his eyes dull.' Two killed, sir. Five wounded by splinters.'
Bolitho tried to recall the man who was killed by his side. Manners. That was his name?
He said, 'Manners. Who was the other?'
'Yelverton, sir. He was killed by a ball at the foremast.' He looked down.' Took his head off.'
Graves was halfway up the ladder but recoiled as Bolitho said, 'Yelverton. Did you hear that, Mr. Gravest The one man who kept his senses when all others were too blind to see the truth. The one you wanted to flog?' He turned away.' Well, he'll not trouble you further, Mr. Graves. Nor we him.'
Blindly he saw Stockdale watching from the foot ob the mizzen mast.' Call away the gig. I will visit Captain Selby and see what must be done.'
'Aye, sir.'
Stockdale glanced back at him as he hurried to the boat tier. He had never seen Bolitho so stricken or so moved before. And for once he did not know what to do to help?
Bolitho entered his cabin and unbuckled his sword before throwing it on to the bench seat below the windows. Fitch and a young seaman were busy replacing the furniture, and another was mopping away smoke stains from the low deckhead. For in action even the captain's quarters were not spared. With the hasty removal of screens the cabin became an extension of the gun deck, and on either side of it was a squat twelve-pounder, now once again hidden by discreet chintz covers?
He stared at the nearest gun, his eyes blurred with strain. A woman's touch. Then he turned abruptly to face Tyrrell and Grave who had followed him into the cabin upon his return from the crippled Miranda?
His mind was so filled with questions and suppositions, his brain so wracked by the sights and sounds aboard the frigate, that for a moment he was unable to speak at all?
Beyond the bulkhead he could hear the steady thud of hammers, the rasp of saws as the ship's company continued work on repairs. After a full hour aboard the Miranda he had returned to find his own command settling down to the task of making good the damage from their encounter with the privateer with such orderly dedication that he had been unable to compare the scene with what he had just left. The sailmaker and his mates had already replaced the punctured canvas, and with their needles and palms flashing in the sunlight covered every foot of deck space as they patched the others sent down from the yards?
Garby, the carpenter, had greeted him at the entry port and had told him that the brig's gunnery had not been too damaging. Two shot holes below the waterline which his men were already plugging, and
severyl others which he would repair before sunset? Garby had spoken quickly, professionally, as if like the rest he was unwilling to think about the Miranda and the fate which could have been theirs?
Graves was the first to break the silence?
'All guns secured, sir. No damage to tackles or ports.' He dropped his eyes under Bolitho's unmoving stare.' Better'n we could have hoped.'
Tyrrell asked quietly, 'How was it, sir?'
Bolitho let himself drop into a chair and thrust out his legs in front of him. The breeches were black with powder stains and his climb up the frigate's side. How was it? Once again he saw the pictures of death and horror, the few uninjured men who were trying even now to put the frigate to rights. Smoke stains and great patches of drying blood, gaping corpses littered amongst the fallen spars and broken planking. It was a miracle that Miranda was still able to keep afloat?
He said, 'They hope to get a jury rig hoisted by sometime tomorrow. Provided the wind doesn't get ups or the pumps foul, they will obtain steerage way.' He rubbed his eyes with his knuckles, feeling the weariness enclosing him like a vice.' Some of the wounded will be transferred to the transports directly? There they will have more room to recover.'
He tried again to shut the agony from his mind. Men so badly mutilated by splinters that they should be dead already. Midshipmen and even seamen in charge of repairs because of the carnage on the quarterdeck. He had found the frigate's first lieutenant supervising the recovery of the mizzen topmast when he had climbed aboard. The man had had one arm in a sling and his forehead had looked as if it had been laid open by a hot iron?
Graves breathed out very slowly.' They did well against such odds.'
'Yes.'
Bolitho wanted to get them out of the cabin. Seal the door and shut them away from his uncertainty?
Tyrell said, 'I've passed th' word around th' ship, sir.] think our people know how satisfied you…'
Bolitho's tone made him fall back.' Satisfied?' He lurched to his feet.' If you feel cause for complacency, Mr. Tyrrell, then please contain it!' He moved to the
windows and back again.' I have seen it for myself? Our people are not moved by a sense of victory. They are relieved, and nothing deeper than that! Thankful to be spared a similar mauling, and all too eager to overlook their own shortcomings!'
Tyrrell said quickly, 'But that's a mite unfair, surely.'
'You think so?' He sank down at the table, his anger spent.' Raven had the measure of it. He saw what he expected to see, as did Captain Selby in Miranda. And like you, Mr. Tyrrell, our people thought that fighting an enemy was just an extension of drill, a few cuts and a few curses, and all would be well. Perhaps we have been too victorious in the past and have been overreached by this newer kind of warfare.'
There was another silence, so that the hammering somewhere deep in the hull became insistent, and to Bolitho suddenly urgent?
Graves asked, 'What will we do now, sir?' He sounded wary?
Bolitho faced them gravely.' Captain Selby is dead? Killed in the first broadside.'
He walked to the quarter windows and stared towards the drifting frigate. Without effort he could picture the wounded first lieutenant, the man who had somehow fought his ship alongside the enemy? Knowing it was all he could do despite the crippling losses and damage already suffered. Now, without a single lieutenant, aided by a mere handful of junior warrant officers, he was doing his utmost to repair the ship. To get her to safety before the sea or an enema found him again?
In the shattered chaos of Selby's cabin he had unlocked the safe and handed Bolitho the despatches without hesitation. Even now that he was back in his own cabin he found it hard to believe. Junior command, and then, almost in the twinkling of an eyes he was to shoulder the total responsibility for them all? Colquhoun and Maulby were beyond reach. And Selba was dead. He had seen his corpse on the splintered quarterdeck, pinned beneath an upended nine-pounder, one hand still clutching his sword like a useless talisman?
Tyrrell's voice made him turn towards them again?
'Then you are in command, sir?'
