He saw Stepkyne glance up at him from the main deck and then turn his head to speak with a gunner's mate. And there was Tomlin, already pushing his men to the braces again, his voice carrying like a trumpet above the bedlam of sea and canvas.
Now there was more gunfire, louder than before, and Bolitho twisted his head to watch as several columns of water burst close to the frigate's counter.
'Deck there! 'Nother ship comin' out!'
Pelham-Martin was clinging to the rail, his eyes half closed with concentration.
Bolitho said, 'Now we shall see!' He ran to the lee side to study the first ship while she clawed away from the treacherous line of reefs and then tilted steeply on the larboard tack. It was a dangerous manoeuvre. At any second she could be all aback and at the mercy of the reefs, but her captain had no choice but to fight clear and give himself searoom.
Bolitho lifted his hand. 'Steady as you go!' His eyes watered in the spray and wind but he kept them fixed on the other ship. Two miles only separated them. He heard the grate of handspikes as the gun captains increased their elevation, and wondered momentarily if Fox was remembering the hill battery as he managed his own section on the lower deck.
Inch shouted wildly, 'Sir, sir! The second ship is the
Spartan!' He sounded stunned. 'She's signalling!'
Bolitho turned away and looked at Pelham-Martin. If Spartan was close astern of the enemy it meant one thing only. There were no other ships to attack.
Carlyon yelled, 'From Spartan, sir! One enemy ship to the south-west!'
He swung round, his mind grappling with the signal as a lookout shouted, ''Nother ship on th' laboard bow, sir!'
Inch squinted up at the masthead. 'What the hell is he talking about?'
But Bolitho pointed with the telescope, his voice bitter. 'She must have found her way through another channel! Look, man, you can-see her topmasts!'
He felt fingers locked into his sleeve and swung round to stare into the commodore's wind-reddened face.
'Do you see what you've done? She's escaping, and you cannot catch her now!' He was almost screaming. 'I'll see you hung for this, damn you! Damn you!'
Bolitho tore his arm free. 'Alter course three points to larboard! Steer south by west!'
The men threw themselves on the braces again, as with her sails booming and wrenching at the yards the Hyperion swung heavily towards the second islet, against which the Frenchman's topsails seemed to shine as if in one final mockery.
The enemy frigate seeing the Hyperion swing back on her original course turned towards the open sea. Her attempted escape could have been a ruse to allow her consort to gain the other channel, or her captain might still have believed he had a chance for his own ship. But as the Spartan tacked dangerously around the reefs the Hermes began to wear ship. For those with time to watch she was an impressive sight, her sails very white against the dull clouds and her tall side shining with spray as she presented her double line of guns to the French frigate. Then she fired. It was at an extreme range, and when Bolitho turned his eyes from the other ship to look he guessed that Fitzmaurice had fired across more than a mile of tossing water. But it was enough. The frigate's foremast and bowsprit crumpled in the barrage, and as the wind took charge he saw the ripped canvas and broken rigging whipping about like things gone mad, while the ship, moments before a picture of grace and beauty, ploughed drunkenly into a deep trough between the waves and began to broach to.
He turned back to look for the other vessel, and felt the anger and despair tugging at his throat as he saw her grow into sharp silhouette beyond the jutting prow of land.
She was a two-decker, probably one of those damaged by Hyperion's blind broadside during the first fruitless attack on Las Mercedes. Now she was clearing the land, and if she got away, as well she might, Lequiller would soon know the failure of this attack and the weakness of Pelham-Martin's squadron.
Gossett said harshly, 'We can still catch 'im, sir!' But he sounded wretched.
'Deck there!' Every eye went aloft. Surely nothing worse could happen? 'Sail weatherin' the 'eadland!' A brief pause. 'It's the Dutchman, sir!'
Bolitho ran to the nettings and jammed his telescope tightly against his eye.
The French ship was well away from the reefs now, but beyond her, her sails yellow in the strange light, he saw the other vessel. It was the Telamon. There was no mistaking that high poop and the shining splendour of her figurehead. She was close hauled and standing almost into the teeth of the wind, and in the jerking glass appeared to be touching the land itself.
Inch muttered fiercely, 'For God's sake, Mulder'll be aground if he's not careful!'
Pelham-Martin seized Inch's glass. 'What's happening? Is the Telamon going to engage?'
Bolitho closed his telescope with a snap. He could feel the ship straining every spar and timber, and when he looked up he saw the hard-bellied sails gleaming like steel as the ship threw herself in pursuit.
Mulder's ancient command stood no chance at all against the powerful two-decker, and he must know it. Just as he must have seen that if the French ship maintained her present course she could slip around the headland and make for one of a hundred hiding places until further help arrived.
There were more dull explosions from astern and he heard the marines on the poop yelling to the men at the quarterdeck guns. 'The frigate's hauled down her colours, lads! She's struck to the Spartan.' The responding cheers only added to Bolitho's growing anxiety. To the ship's company any victory was an event, but viewed against the overall pattern it was almost nothing.
Inch said thickly, 'God, look at the Dutchman!'
The Telamon had changed her tack, and when Bolitho lifted his glass again he saw her swinging wildly across the wind, her sails in confusion and her masthead pendant streaming out abeam like a strip of metal.
'Frenchman's wearing ship, sir!' Inch was hoarse with excitement.
It was true. The enemy captain had little alternative now. With the reefs to starboard and the careering Telamon swinging across his bows, he had to act quickly to avoid collision or grounding his own ship in a last attempt to slip past.
But as the French ship's shape lengthened to overlap that of the Telamon everyone on the quarterdeck heard the ragged crash of a full broadside, and watched with dismay as the Dutchman's sails disappeared in a towering pall of dense smoke.
Bolitho pounded the rail, willing Mulder to tack again and break from the deadly embrace. He could hear the Telamon's ancient cannon firing now, disjointed but defiant, the smoke billowing inboard to blind the gunners as Mulder continued to hold a course parallel with his adversary.
Gossett said, 'Gawd, the Telamon's given us time to get to grips with the bugger!'
'Stand by on deck!' Bolitho saw Stepkyne touch his hat. 'Starboard battery, ready!'
He heard Pelham-Martin whisper fervently, 'Catch him, Bolitho! In the name of God, catch him!'
The French two-decker was still firing with hardly a pause between salvoes, and as the wind drove some of the smoke clear Bolitho saw the Telamon's mizzen vanish in a welter of broken rigging, and imagined he could hear the enemy's weight of iron smashing into her hull.
Lieutenant Roth muttered tightly, 'There goes her foremast!'
At the mercy of wind and sea the Telamon was already dropping past the Frenchman's starboard quarter, and although a gun still fired here and there along her side, she was crippled almost beyond recognition.
Bolitho needed no glass to see the enemy's yards swinging, and while she ploughed past the Telamon's shattered bows men were already aloft as in final desperation her courses broke out to the wind so that she tilted still further, showing her copper in the dull sunlight.
It had to be now or never.
Bolitho yelled, 'Starboard your helm!'
Drunkenly the Hyperion started to edge round, every spar and shroud slamming and creaking in protest. Muffled cries came from below, and he guessed that the impetus of the turn was sweeping the sea through the lower ports.
Round and still further round, until the two ships lay almost level with some two cables between them. It was a difficult range, but with every sail holding the ship over as rigidly as a fortress there would never be another chance.
