associated with anything outside their private hell.
On the upper deck the air was filled with death as musket and pistol-fire was directed towards officers and seamen alike.
Bolitho watched the gap narrowing between the hulls, the trapped water leaping over the tumblehome and changing to steam on the blistered gun muzzles.
Shots hammered the deck or smacked into the hammock-nettings, while from the fighting tops a murderous hail of canister ripped above the smoke and painted the decks of friend and foe alike with glittering rivulets of blood.
Keen clung to the quarterdeck rail with one hand while he pressed the other to his side, so that his coat helped to slow the loss of blood from his wound. But his face was deathly pale, and he made no effort to move as musket balls ploughed into the deck by his feet or cracked among the men around him.
Adam drew his curved hanger and yelled, 'Here they come!'
His eyes were very bright as the two hulls crashed together and more broken spars fell from aloft to hold them fast.
Allday thrust his shoulder against Bolitho, the cutlass weaving about as if to reach the enemy as he shouted, 'They'll make for you, sir!'
Indeed, some French boarders had already clambered across from the Argonaute's beak-head as it ground over the forecastle, the rigging and nets becoming further entwined as the sea lifted and rolled both ships together.
But a crackle of musket-fire brought some of them down before they could cut the nets, and several were run through with boarding pikes even as they tried to retreat.
Captain Dewar waved his sword. 'At 'em, Marines!'
They were his last words on earth as a ball took away his jaw and flung him down a poop ladder to the deck below. His lieutenant, Hawtayne, stared aghast at his superior, unable to accept that he was dead.
Then he yelled, 'Follow me!'
Bolitho watched the scarlet coats dashing into the smoke towards the bows, some falling, others firing their last shots before using their bayonets as more boarders dropped seemingly from the sky itself on to the decks.
It was too much and the enemy too many. Bolitho heard them cheering, the sound changing to screams and curses as another swivel cut through their ranks like a bloody scythe.
He saw Midshipman Evans cowering by the companion hatch.
'Get below! Tell them to keep firing! Tell them it's my order!'
It might set both ships ablaze but it was their only chance.
From the corner of his eye he saw more French seamen climbing their mizzen shrouds, the smoky sunlight glinting on steel as they waited for the sea and wind to push the two hulls into a closer embrace. Soon there would be more men to support them from the lower deck.
Bolitho winced as some of the Achates' twenty-four-pounders roared out against the Frenchman's side. Smoke, sparks and splinters flew above the gangway and several of the enemy boarders vanished to be trapped or ground between the ships.
There were Frenchmen running along the gangway, although he had not seen them fight their way aboard. One, a lieutenant, cut down a seaman as he tried to jump clear, and several shots cracked over the quarterdeck where Knocker and his men stood around the wheel like survivors on a raft.
The French officer saw Keen by the rail and lunged forward with his sword. Bolitho realized that Keen had his eyes tightly closed against the pain and stood no chance of saving himself.
Bolitho shouted, and when the lieutenant's eyes turned towards him he struck him across the neck with the old blade, and as he tumbled over, his scream choking on blood, Allday brought his cutlass down on his ribs like a woodsman with a rebellious tree.
Steel clashed on steel as Achates' seamen rallied on the quarterdeck, their eyes and minds empty of everything but the need to fight and not to fall under those stamping feet and cruel blades.
Bolitho saw Adam lock swords with another French lieutenant and wanted to reach him, to help in any way he could. But even in the noise and horror of the hand-to-hand fighting Bolitho was able to see his nephew's skill as a swordsman, the way he took the weight of a heavier opponent and used it against him. Then he began to advance, stamping down with his right foot as with each thrust and parry he forced his adversary back towards the forecastle.
Allday yelled, 'Watch out!'
Bolitho swung round and saw a petty officer aiming a pistol at him. A blade flashed past his eyes and the pistol dropped to the deck and exploded. The Frenchman's hand was still gripped around it.
With a cut across his forehead, a cutlass in one hand and a belaying-pin in the other, Tyrrell managed to gasp, 'Near thing!' Then like an unsteadying giant he forced his way amongst the struggling men, his weapons swinging and hacking while he bellowed encouragement to anyone who could still understand him.
On the lower gun-deck it was frightening because of the clatter and slap of feet overhead. It was as if a mob had gone completely mad and out of control.
Midshipman Evans groped through the smoke as he tried to find his way back to the upper deck. He slipped on some blood and almost fell across the body of a dead gun captain, then as he regained his feet he saw figures clambering through an open port where a gun had recoiled and had been abandoned for lack of powder. They were the enemy.
The shock held him motionless, unable to breathe, as he realized that the other ship was pressed tightly alongside.
He wanted to run, to hide from the fighting and terrible sights around him. But a wounded seaman staggered away from one of the guns, his fingers clutching a deep wound in his stomach, his eyes white and rolling with agony as he tried to escape.
Two French sailors saw him and charged beneath the deck beams. The seaman fell and tried to grasp Evans' foot with his fingers.
He gasped, 'Help me! Please, in the name o' God!'
Evans was only thirteen years old, but even in his pain and despair the seaman had recognized authority and perhaps safety in the blue coat and white breeches.
Evans dragged out his short midshipman's dirk and pointed it at the two Frenchmen.
They both slithered to a halt, their madness checked by the sight of their small opponent.
In the half-darkness old Crocker's white hair moved through the smoke like a patch of light.
He swung a rammer with both hands and knocked the men to their knees. Another seaman joined him, his cutlass just a blur as he finished it.
Crocker twisted his head to stare at the midshipman and then wheezed, 'Proper little fire-eater, ain't 'e?'
Evans stared up the ladder as someone clattered down towards him. His mind could not accept what had happened, other than that he was alive.
Adam Bolitho wiped his eyes as the smoke funnelled up around him. It was hard to breathe, let alone see what was happening.
'Where's the fourth lieutenant?'
He saw the long rammer in Crocker's hands, the reddened cutlass held by one of the seamen.
Lieutenant Hallowes lurched through the smoke, his hanger held at the ready.
'Who the hell wants me?' He saw Adam and grinned. 'Why, our dashing flag-lieutenant!'
Adam asked urgently, 'How are you managing?'
Hallowes waved his blade carelessly. 'I've got my people at the starboard ports, as you can see.' He gestured angrily. 'Simms! Cut that Frog down!'
It was like a macabre dance. A French seaman dashed from the smoke, his hands over his head as if to protect himself. He must have flung himself bodily through a gun-port expecting to find the gun-deck filled with his companions. He dropped to his knees, his eyes very white in the smoky gloom.
A marine sentry from the main companion lunged forward with his bayonet, the force so great that he pinned the luckless Frenchman to the deck.
Adam tore his eyes away. 'I've an idea. We'll go aft, through the wardroom.' He wondered if Hallowes understood or cared. He looked half-mad. 'The Argonaute has a big stern gallery…'
Hallowes exclaimed, 'Board her?' He looked up as a violent crash shook the deck timbers. 'How is it up
