Bolitho rubbed his streaming eyes and turned to watch as with something like tired dignity the Frenchman's topmast staggered and then began to topple. He could see small figures clinging to the severed yards, and then being shaken off like dead fruit as with a splintering crash the whole spar, complete with rigging and lacerated sails, pitched forward and down into the smoke alongside.
But the Hyperion was already reeling round, the men at the braces and sheets coughing and choking as the guns fired yet again, their minds dulled by the din of noise and the blinding fog of battle.
Bolitho hurried across the deck, his eyes on the smokeshrouded topsails, pockmarked and ragged from his ship's attack, as once more the Hyperion went about to cross the enemy's stem. A gust of wind cleared a patch of water, so that he saw the other ship's counter within fifty feet of the bows. He could see the tall windows, the familiar horseshoeshaped stem so beloved by French designers, and the small figures clustered above her name, Saphir. They were firing muskets, and as he watched he saw some of the forecastle hands falling and kicking in the smoke, their cries lost in the bombardment.
But then, as the Hyperion's bowsprit cast a black shadow across the open patch of water the carronade fired. For a brief instant before the smoke eddied across the water once more he saw the whole section of stern windows fly open as if in some maniac wind, and in his mind's eye he pictured the carnage in the Saphir's crowded lower gundeck as the packed charge smashed through the ship from end to end. On Cozar's pier it had been terrible enough. In a confined space filled with dazed seamen who were already unnerved by the Hyperion's swift vengeance it would br like a scene from hell.
He forcibly thrust the picture from his mind and concentrated instead on the Hyperion's upper deck. As the ship tacked heavily around the Frenchman's stern the larboard battery were only getting off half the shots which they had achieved in the first assault. All the grating apprehension which had gripped the men earlier while the French ships had approached with such confidence had been replaced by a kind of delirious excitement, and as he peered down through the billowing smoke Bolitho saw more than one gunner capering with wild delight. intent on watching the havoc across the narrow strip of water rather than attending to his own duties.
Bolitho cupped his hands and shouted, `Mr. Inch! Double up the gun crews from the starboard side, and pass the word.too the lower deck to do the same!!' He saw Inch nodding violently, his hat awry, his long face blackened by the powder smoke.
The Saphir had stewed slightly to larboard, the fallen topmast acting as a great sea anchor, so that it took more precious minutes to sail around bet counter. Although Hyperion was now technically downwind of her adversary once more the earlier advantage had been rendered useless by the damage to the Saphir's spars and sails. As the bowsprit edged purposefully past the Frenchman's high poop and the forward guns belched out with renewed anger, Bolitho saw great fragments of splintered timber flying up from the bulwarks and the flare of sparks as one of the enemy's guns was hurled bodily sideways on to its crew, the screams only urging the British gunners to greater efforts.
Then as both ships ploughed abeam through the smoke the French upper battery fired back for the first time. It was a ragged salvo, the tongues of flame lancing through the drifting fog, the crashing detonations mingling with the Hyperion's broadside as the distance slowly lessened until both ships were less than thirty feet apart.
The Saphir's gunners had fired on the downroll, and Bolitho felt the deck shake under him as ball after ball smashed into his ship's stout hull or shrieked towards the unseen world beyond the smoke. Men were shooting down from the French tops, and he caught a brief glimpse of an officer waving his sword and then pointing at him as if to will the marksmen to bring him down. Musket-balls slapped into the hammock nettings at his side, and he saw a seaman staring aghast at his hand where a ricocheting ball had clipped away a finger with the neatness of an axe.
Ashby's marines were yelling insults as they returned the fire, and more than one man hung lifeless on the French tops as silent witness to their accuracy.
Again a ragged salvo ripped along the Saphir's upper ports, but still the Hyperion's masts were unscathed. Her sails were well pitted with holes, but only a few severed blocks and halyards bounced unheeled on the nets which he had ordered to be strung across the upper deck to protect the sweating gunners.
He saw a small ship's boy scurrying across the deck bowed down with powder from the magazine. A man was hurled from one of the twelve-pounders to lie writhing and almost disembowelled at the boy's feet. He hesitated, then blindly ran on towards his own gun, too dazed to care for the thing which turned the planking into a scarlet pattern with each agonised convulsion.
Up through the smoke Bolitho saw the French ensign rising at last to the gaff. The white flag with its bright tricolour looked strangely clean and detached from the bedlam beneath, and he found time to wonder who had bothered to take the trouble to hoist it.
Gossett yelled hoarsely, 'Er main tops'l 'as carried away, sir!' He was shaking one of the helmsmen in time with his words. 'By God, look at the bugger now!'
Ashby strode across the quarterdeck, his white 'breeches splashed with blood and his sword dangling from his wrist on a gold cord. He touched his hat, ignoring the whining musketballs and the screams and cries which came now from both ships.
'If you give the word, sir, we can board her! One good rush and we can knock the backbones out of 'em!' He was actually grinning.
A marine fell back from the nettings clawing at his face and then dropped motionless to the deck. A musket-ball had smashed his skull almost in two, so that his brains spewed across the planking like porridge.
Bolitho looked away. 'No, Captain. I am afraid that much as-I would like to take her as a prize I must think first of the convoy.' He saw a tall French seaman standing up on the settings a musket trained at him with fierce concentration. He was outlined against the smoke and oblivious of everything but the need to hit and kill the British captain.
It was strange that he could stand and watch, like an onlooker, as the musket flashed brightly, the sound of the shot swallowed by the heavy guns as the Hyperion rocked wildly to another broadside. He felt the ball pluck at his sleeve with no more insistence than a man's fingers. He heard a shrill scream at his back and knew without looking that the ball had claimed one victim. But his gaze was held by that unknown marksman. He must be a brave man, or one so crazed with anger by what had happened to his own ship that he no longer cared for his own safety. He was still standing on his precarious perch when a nine-pound shot from the Hyperion's quarterdeck battery smashed him apart, so that as his trunk and flailing arms pitched down into the churning water alongside, his legs still stayed resolute and firm for another few seconds.
The French ship was in bad shape. Her sails were little more than blackened streamers, with only a jib and mizzen course still fully intact. Thin red ribbons of blood trailed from her scuppers and ran unheeded down her battered side, and Bolitho could only guess at the extent of her casualties. It was significant that the enemy's lower gundeck with its big twenty-four-pounders remained silent and impotent, and it was a marvel that the whole ship had not burst into flames.
But he knew from hard experience that such appearances were deceptive. She could still put up a good fight, and one well-aimed salvo could cripple the Hyperion long enough to pare away their hard-won advantage.
He shouted, 'Mr. Rookel T'gallants and royals, if you please!' He saw the seamen below him gaping as if they could not believe that he was going to give up the stricken twodecker. `Then have the starboard guns run out!'
To Gossett he added firmly, `Lay a course for the convoy! We will beat to windward and see what there is to be done.'
Petty officers were already driving the battle-drained men to the braces, and even as he looked round he saw that the Frenchman was drifting astern in the smoke. Almost jauntily the Hyperion gathered the wind into her pockmarked sails and pushed after the other vessels.
A naked gun-captain, his muscular torso black and shining like a Negro's, leapt on to his carriage and yelled wildly, 'A cheer for th' cap'n, lads!' He was almost beside himself as the men joined in an uncontrolled wave of yelling and cheering. One gunner even left his station on the quarterdeck and danced up and down, his bare feet flapping on the stained deck, his pigtail bobbing crarily in time with his ecstasy.
Ashby grinned. `Can't blame 'em, sir!' He waved down at the cheering men as if to make up for Bolitho's grim features. 'That was a wonderful thing back there! My God, you handled her like a frigate! Never believed it possible…
,Bolitho eyed him gravely. 'At any other time I would be gratified to hear it, Captain Ashby. Now for God's sake
