The shadow of the eagle

who had shed his cumbersome helmet and fought in a forage cap and a short stable coat. The dragoon slashed wildly, but Ashton was supported by two sailors and the three of them cut the man to his knees in a second. The dragoon fell, bleeding copiously. Lieutenant Ashton felt a surge of confidence as he swept his men forward.

Smoke enveloped them and Ashton half turned, again shouting 'Come on, Sergeant!' his voice full of exasperation. Unable to see the full fury of the action on the quarterdeck, Ashton hacked a path forward and then, as the pressure eased, McCann advanced at a quickening pace. The line of marines began to gain momentum as the column of gunners continued to emerge from the gloom of the gun-deck. Below, their remaining colleagues carried on adding their remorseless thunder to the air as they fired indiscriminately without aiming, into the wooden wall that heaved and surged alongside.

Sergeant McCann followed Lieutenant Ashton as he clambered over the bulwark amidships, and stretched out for the fore chains of L'Aigle. He could have killed Ashton at that moment, stabbed him ignominiously in the arse as he had sworn to do, but he faltered and then Ashton had gone, and with him the opportunity.

Further aft Lieutenant Marlowe had reached L'Aigle's mizen chains and was hacking his way down upon the quarterdeck of the French frigate. Between the two British officers, the line of defenders bowed back, but it had already transformed itself as the French attack was repulsed and the tide turned. As Marlowe struck a French aspirant's extended arm and deflected the pistol ball so that it merely grazed his cheek, the whole line began to scramble aboard L'Aigle.

Carried forward by this madness, Drinkwater felt his ankle twist as he landed on the enemy deck, and he fell full length, cushioned by the corpse of a half-naked French gunner who lay headless beside his gun. The stink of blood, dried sweat and garlic struck him and he dragged himself to his feet as a fellow boarder knocked him over again. The seaman paused, saw whom he had hit and gave Drinkwater a hand to rise.

'Beg pardon, sir, but 'ere, let me ...'

'Obliged...'

It seemed quieter now and Drinkwater took stock. There were fewer of the enemy, which seemed strange since they were now aboard L'Aigle. The wave of men he had led aboard dissipated, like a real wave upon a beach, running faster and faster as it shallowed, until, extended to its limit, it stopped and ran back. Bloody little fights took place everywhere, but the numbers of men already slaughtered had robbed L'Aigle of all her advantage, and it now became apparent to what extent Andromeda's cannon-fire had damaged the French ship.

About the helm lay a heap of bodies and Drinkwater caught the gleam of sunlight on bullion lace. Was one of the ungainly dead Contre-Amiral Lejeune? The boats on L'Aigle's booms were filled with holes, her main fife-rails were smashed to matchwood, releasing halliards and lifts. Parted ropes lay like inert serpents about the decks, drawing lines over and about the corpses, like some delineation of the expiring lives which had left an indelible impression upon the carnage.

About the broken boats on the booms amidships and at the opening of the after hatchway, Hyde's marines were clustered, firing down into the gun-deck below, thus preventing any reinforcement of the upper-deck such as Ashton had managed, and which had turned the tide of the battle. Elsewhere a handful of British jacks chased solitary Frenchmen to their deaths, and it seemed in that short, contemplative moment that they had achieved the impossible and seized L'Aigle. Drinkwater thought he ought perhaps to order his own guns to cease fire, but when he stopped to think about anything the pain of his broken arm came back to him and he wanted to give in to it. Surely providence was satisfied: surely he had done enough. Then, as if from a great distance, Drinkwater heard a cry.

'Look to your front, sir!' There was something urgent and familiar about the voice. Slowly he turned about and saw through the smoke, the hazy figure of Birkbeck standing above Andromeda's rail and gesturing. 'Look to your front!'

'What the deuce are you talking about?' Drinkwater called, unaware that the terrible noise of battle had partially deafened him and he had been shouting his head off so that his voice was a feeble croak.

'The Russian! The Gremyashchi!' Birkbeck waved over Drinkwater's head, gesturing at something and Drinkwater turned again. Looming above the port bulwark of L'Aigle, unscathed and perhaps a foot higher in her freeboard, the big Russian frigate appeared. Drinkwater could see her bulwarks lined with men, many of them fiercely bearded, like the Russians he had seen on the coast of California many, many years ago ...

And then he suddenly felt the naked exposure of his person.

'Take your men below, Sergeant!'

Ashton shoved a marine aside and pointed down into L'Aigle's gun-deck.

'Sir?'

'You heard me! Lead your men below and clear the gun-deck.'

McCann hesitated; Ashton was ordering him to a certain death.

'Are you a coward?'

'The hell I am ...'

'Then do as you are ordered! I'll take my men down from forward.'

Furious, McCann ported his musket and began to descend into the smoke-filled hell. 'Catten,' he instructed one marine, 'run back aboard and let the master know we're going below before that stupid bastard has us all shot by our own gunners. The rest of you, follow me!' he cried.

Ashton was right: he, McCann, was a coward. Only a coward would have submitted to the thrall of soldiering; only a coward would have passively acquiesced to this madness and only a coward would have let slip the opportunity to rid the world of Josiah Ashton. Almost weeping with rage, McCann charged below.

What confronted the invaders when they spread out across L'Aigle's gun-deck was horrifying. The planking was ploughed up by shot. In places, splinters stood like petrified grass. Stanchions were broken and guns were dismounted. Sunlight slanted into the fume-filled gloom through the frigate's gun-ports. Andromeda's 12-pound shot at short range had beaten in the ship's side in one place, while the grape and langridge she had poured into L'Aigle had piled the dead about their guns in heaps.

On Andromeda's gun-deck, Lieutenant Frey received the message to cease fire from Mr Paine who also added the request for the larboard guns to be withdrawn and the ports shut.

'What's amiss?' asked Frey, unable to do more than shout to hear his own voice.

'We need your men on deck, sir. Most of our fellows are aboard the Frenchman and that bloody Russian's just coming up on her disengaged side!'

'Where's the captain?' Frey asked.

'I last saw him going over the side with his hanger in his teeth.'

'Good God!'

Frey turned and began bellowing at his men.

As McCann shuffled forward in the oppressive gloom of L'Aigle's gun-deck, resistance became increasingly fierce. It was clear that some of the soldiers had either retreated to the shelter of the guns amidships, or had been held in reserve there. A volley met the marines and several men fell. McCann took shelter behind the round bulk of the main capstan and prepared to return fire as if in his native woods, sheltering behind the bole of a hickory tree.

As his eyes became accustomed to the semi-darkness McCann began to select targets and fire with more precision. A small group of marines took cover either with him or behind adjacent guns. He was conscious of an exchange of fire at the far end of the deck where Ashton was attacking down through a pale shaft of sunlight lancing in by way of the forward companionway. It was clear that there, too, resistance was disciplined and effective. Then above the shots and yells, McCann heard Ashton's voice.

'McCann! Where the devil are you? Come and support me you damned Yankee blackguard!'