Slowly, and then with frightening suddenness, the Narval’s sails and yards lifted over the starboard quarter.
Bolitho stood by the rail, his sword dangling from his wrist. So the horror was not yet done. He watched the other ship’s jib boom rise high above the nettings, the broken yard, and the untidy cluster of corpses. Dangling from the bowsprit, bobbing to the motion as if still alive, was the severed head of de Barras.
Bolitho felt the brittle strength coursing through him. He yelled, “Fire as you bear!”
Like rats and moles, his blackened seamen scrambled from hiding, and down the Tempest’s battered side every gun which could find a target exploded in an ear-shattering crescendo, the noise made twinfold by the double- shotted charges and the closeness of the other ship.
He felt the deck lurch as Narval’s jib boom drove through the foremast shrouds, the grinding crash of the two hulls dulled by the terrible screams of those who had been caught in the murderous broadside.
“Boarders away!”
Yelling and cheering like madmen, what was left of Tempest’s company hacked their way across to the other ship, some falling before they could find a handhold, others held and crushed between the two swaying hulls.
Bolitho found himself on Narval’s gangway with steel clanging on every side. He slipped on blood left by that last onslaught, and knew Allday had saved him from pitching over the side.
Marines ran past, with Prideaux leading the attack.
Sergeant Quare waved his musket. “At ’em, marines!” Then, he took a full charge of canister in the chest and stomach, ripping him to fragments.
Blissett saw the marines hesitate, their faces like stone as they stared at Quare’s corpse. He yelled, “Charge!” He was mad, exhilarated, and sad for Quare all in one brief second. Then he was amongst the defenders on the forecastle, his bayonet lunging and stabbing, while his companions closed around him in a tight, merciless group.
Bolitho reached the frigate’s quarterdeck, his mind clear again as he saw his own ship through the drifting smoke.
All around him men were reeling and staggering, crossing cutlasses or fighting with fists and anything they could find. He saw Miller slashing a path towards the poop with his axe, watched him suddenly fall, pinioned by a pike, and covered by his killer as a British seaman hacked him down.
And then, beside the abandoned wheel, his legs astride two dying seamen, he saw Mathias Tuke. He was amazed to find that he felt no sense of surprise, Tuke was exactly as he had imagined. As she had described him.
Now, with his chest heaving, his fist bright red from the blood which ran from his sword, Tuke was staring at him, his eyes blazing with hatred.
He said harshly, “Well, well, Captain! We meet at last! Did she tell you of the mark I put on her soft body, eh?” His mouth opened in his thick beard like an obscene hole and he laughed, throwing back his head, but keeping his eyes fixed on Bolitho.
From the opposite side of the deck Herrick saw it clearly, even as he cut down a screaming pirate and waited for his party of seamen to establish their hold of the gangway above the gundeck.
From two crews they had broken into separate parties. Then into groups. Now into individual fragments of defence and attack.
He saw Bolitho step towards Tuke, watched the two blades circling each other warily, could feel the tension.
He barked, “Haul down their flag! Follow me!” With his fighting sword swinging before him, Herrick charged to the attack.
Bolitho saw none of them. Only Tuke. And even he seemed to be growing in size and stature, his body surrounded by enclosing darkness.
Tuke took a deep breath, startled by Bolitho’s failure to respond.
Then he bellowed, “Now!” And with a wild yell he lunged forward.
Bolitho saw the blade slicing towards his stomach and knew he could do nothing. The strength was gone from his arm, and he felt the deck jar his legs as he stumbled on to his knees. Men were cheering from the other end of the ship, and he knew the flag which was being waved and then thrown over the side was that of the enemy. But he could feel and do nothing.
His vision was obstructed by a white-clad leg, and he heard Allday’s voice break in a sob as he shouted, “Back!” There was a cling of steel. “And back, I say!” More clangs, and Bolitho was able to see Allday driving Tuke towards the side. He was holding the cutlass with both hands like a broadsword, something he had not seen before. He wanted to call to him, to stop his fury before he was cut down.
Allday was almost incoherent with anger and grief, oblivious to a cut on his shoulder and to everything but the towering man before him.
Between blows he gasped, “You bloody, cowardly, murdering bastard!” He saw the man show fear for the first time and brought the heavy cutlass against Tuke’s hilt with all his strength, hurling him to the deck. Then as he made a shadow fall across Tuke’s head and neck he sobbed, “I wish to God this was not so quick for you!” The cutlass swung down once, then twice.
As Herrick and the others rushed to drag him away, Allday hurled his cutlass over the nettings and ran to Bolitho’s side.
Bolitho gripped his arm, wanting more than anything to reassure him. But he was shaking violently and could barely whisper.
Allday said, “You’ll be all right, Captain.” He looked wretchedly at Herrick. “Won’t he, sir?”
Herrick replied, “Help him up. We must get him aboard Tempest.” He saw Keen running towards him. “Take command here.”
With Herrick and Allday guiding and half-carrying him, Bolitho returned to his own ship.
There were no more cheers, and his men parted to let him pass, their strained faces looking and searching for something.
Bolitho saw the shattered companion and knew he had somehow reached the Tempest. But the companion, and the place where he could hide his final shame from his men, still seemed a mile away.
He heard himself murmur, “See to the people, Thomas. After that we’ll…”
Herrick looked at him despairingly as the surgeon hurried to meet them, his butcher’s apron covered with the stains of his trade.
“After that, sir, we’ll be going home.”
Gwyther watched Allday lower the captain on to a cot. “He does not hear you, Mr Herrick.” He knelt down and loosened Bolitho’s neckcloth.
Allday looked at Herrick. “You go, sir. He’d want it. It’s your responsibility now. I’ll tell you when the captain’s feeling better.”
He said it so fervently that Herrick could only reply, “I’m depending on it.”
Above, the cheering was beginning at last, as the two drifting ships were secured, and those who had expected to die were made to accept that they had won a victory.
But to Herrick, as he paused in the square of sunlight below the companion, there was no such feeling, and only a sense of stricken disbelief.
Gwyther said, “There is little I can do.”
He was needed in a dozen places at once, and had already operated on more men than he could have believed possible in so short a time. Yet he could not move, and was held here by Allday’s simple belief.
He added quietly, “We can only wait. And hope. No man in his condition should have done what he has today.”
Allday looked at him and replied firmly, “But he’s not just any man.” He nodded. “I’ll watch over him.”
He heard the muffled cheering and said to Bolitho brokenly, “See, Captain? We did it. Just like we said.”
Silently, Gwyther turned and made for the orlop again. The surgeon had served with Bolitho for several years but had never really got to know him. After this, live or die, he knew he could never forget him.
