H.M.S. COCKEREL

Chapter 1

He dined alone, dispiritedly, picking at his supper and pushing it about his plate more than he ate. As thoroughly blockaded by land as Toulon now was, there wasn't that much food any longer, and prices had gone through the roof. At least the wine was still good, and cheap.

There were few other diners in the restaurant, half of them officers in strange uniforms, proud with gold or silver lace, sprigged in ornate, gewgawy appurtenances which, no matter their martial gaudiness, still made their wearers look like scared shopkeepers. Sardinians, Neapolitans, Redmontese, Spanish… Lewrie was one of the rare British officers not out on the outposts. Bleak as his mood was, the others seemed even more morose. Large liquid Don and Dago eyes, aswim with fear or self-pity, hesitant gestures, where before they chopped at the air or waved their arms in braggadocio. Soft, sibilant mutterings of defeated conversation, much shrugging and sighing… stopping occasionally, as the drumfire of the artillery barrages increased in tempo or volume. Or a shell crashed into the town itself.

They'd been doing that a lot lately, the Frogs; lofting mortars into their own city, five or six rounds a day. Now they had the range. Kettledrums pounded, the candle flames wavered on his table, and glassware softly tinkled as siege guns tore loose upon Fort Malbousquet, and Fort Malbousquet responded. Worried looks were shared among the foreign officers, bleak little giggles in attempts at gallows humour.

And the French… pausing for a moment, stoic faces frozen in what they called sang-froid. Damnit, but the French always had le mot juste, the perfect word or phrase, he sneered. Alan chewed on a slice of goose and swirled the cabernet sauvignon in his large wine glass, studying his wine through the stuck-in-a-bottle candle flame. Studying the Frogs, the other diners. Pere et maman, with their children. Old aristocrats still clinging to silks and satins, successful merchants in well-cut wool coats and waist-coats, the very image of moderate wealth and the latest styles. And so few of them still wearing their Bourbon-white cockades. The last few weeks they'd slowly shed them, like oak trees giving up their final leaves to the winter winds. On the outskirts of Toulon, it was said, the new style was red- white-and-blue Republican colours. And in the middle of town, there were hastily chalked or painted threats on walls, fresh each morning, no matter the patrols. Long, red-wool stocking caps were seen now in public, sported by sour-faced, hard-eyed commoner 'patriots'… the sans culottes. Swaggering bullies who dared show the Tricolour, and glared at those who didn't, as if memorising faces and names. Later, they seemed to forebode. We'll know who you are… later.

'M'sieur weesh?' his waiter asked, pointing to his half-eaten and bedraggled supper. An ubiquitous omelet, only two eggs per customer now, a last gamy, oily slice of overcooked goose, and a heel of bread aswim in the fats of half-burnt, half-cooked pommes de terre escallopes.

'Non, merci,' he replied sarcastically.

'Plus de vin?'

'Non. L'addition,' Lewrie sighed. Nearly a shilling it cost, for what he'd have paid no more than four pence back home. And kicked the cook's arse for ruining it. He got to his feet, gathered up his hat and cloak, and departed.

The others watched him leave in silence, daunted by the grim look on the naval officer's face, the unspoken sneer of disgust he bore when he deigned to glance in their direction. Who is he to sneer at us, they seemed to say… a 'pinch-beck' Anglais in a ragged, too-large coat, in slop-trousers instead of a gentleman's knee breeches? Worn old Hessian boots, a plain blue civilian cloak, a hat that had seen a previous war… and that pitiful excuse for a sword!

It was cold that night, cold and icily clammy, with a light wind off the sea. Street lanterns wore haloes of mist, and it smelled like it might rain before morning. Lewrie wrapped himself in the too-large and tatty coat purchased off another officer, grateful its lapels buttoned over each other. Until he received his quarterly draft from Courts', he was forced to live on Navy pay, and a borrowed forty pounds-half of that gone already for the hat, cloak and a mediocre smallsword of dubious temper, the best of a table piled with second-hand blades of even more uncertain character at a civilian shopkeeper's bargain sale.

He walked downhill towards the harbour and the basin, listening to the drumming of the guns. The batteries on des Moulins and Reinier were blazing away, round the clock now. The Little Road had all but been abandoned. So fierce was their fire that no line-of-battle ship or floating battery could dare it for very long.

The streets were suspiciously empty of strollers or late shoppers, even of whores and Corinthians. And where almost every shop window or appartement above had been open and ablaze with light, they were now dark and shuttered, or out of business 'temporarily.' A waggon creaked down the street, drawn by four heavy dray horses. Moans of wounded could be heard within-a hospital waggon bearing the day's detritus to Hopital de la Charite north of town, outside the walls. A half mile from the site of the latest disaster of two weeks before.

The Republicans had massed a battery on the Heights d'Arenes west of Fort Malbousquet, twenty guns or better, and had begun a deluge of shellfire against that most important strongpoint, the key to the western side. Dundas and O'Hara had marched out next day on 30 November with 2,200 men: Spanish, Neapolitan, Sardinian, 400 of the few French Royalist troops, along with 300 of their precious British; a majority of the mobile reserves who weren't tied to fixed positions, the best of their mediocre, ill-matched lot.

A brisk attack uphill had driven the French from their guns again. But instead of stopping there and consolidating, the troops had rushed on, down into a valley behind the Heights d'Arenes to attack the next-west eminence. But upon that bill, all behind it, was hidden the bulk of General Dugommier's main body, over 20,000; Carteau's men, Mouret's, thousands of soldiers Kellerman and Dugommier had brought in from Lyons and the north.

It had been a sharp slaughter, then a rout, and the French drove the remnants scurrying into Fort Malbousquet. General O'Hara had been wounded and taken prisoner, attempting to rally the troops by the guns. Twenty British had died, ninety wounded, ninety-eight had gone missing, and the allied casualties had been just as severe. The French got their guns back intact. And were now putting them to good use.

And the Austrians… damn their eyes, Lewrie silently fumed! God, how they'd sworn they were on their way, yet… Suddenly, the 5,000 men they'd promised from Italy couldn't be spared, and Rear- Admiral Gell and his squadron, waiting for weeks at Genoa and Vado Bay, had at last sailed back to Toulon, empty.

Sardinians and Neapolitans… liars, too, Alan cursed. Their commissariats too incompetent, disorganised or lazy to arm, equip or train the men promised; no matter how much mon-ey'd been thrown at them, they weren't up to the task. In the spring… perhaps, for more money?

'Fat lot of good they'll do us in the spring,' Lewrie snarled in a harsh mutter. 'Place doesn't have a month left in it.'

And British regiments. That was the worst disappointment. With their so-called allies so suspicious and jealous of England and each other, hedging bets for after the war, arguing points of pride and honour, not cooperating… what looked at times as nigh to treachery… they had need of stalwart British regulars more than ever.

Yet where were they? Dundas and Grenville, the new prime minister William Pitt, the Younger… they'd settled for 'war on the cheap.' They planned long before the war started to fritter the Army away overseas in the West Indies, to destroy the economy of the French, to take the rich Sugar Isles they'd always lusted after. March up the Hooghly to Chandernagore above Calcutta, destroy the French Indian and Indian Ocean colonies. Destroy their trade and choke them to submission.

That's where the bulk of the British Army had gone, there or into Holland with the Duke of York. And for the enterprise at Toulon, they could not spare one regiment more. And the Army was now doing what all white troops did in the tropics… dying by the battalion of Yellow Jack and malaria without firing a shot, of no use to anyone, gaining nothing, barely able to muster enough strength to take what they'd been sent for!

Drumfire to the south. The Frogs had erected five new batteries in front of Fort Mulgrave on the Hauteur de Grasse, digging and trenching forward, moving nearer each day. If Mulgrave fell, there went Balaguer and L'Eguillette. And with them, any approach to Toulon 's basin, or any hope of sheltering ships in the Great Road, too.

That little coxcomb Buonaparte's work, Alan suspected with a sour groan; aye, take joy of it, ya arrogant little bastard! They were quartered once again in the guardhouse by the dockyard gate. De Crillart spent his nights at