Invasion

Now there was a chance: once past, they had to leave the protection of the sandbanks, which did not extend any further. And the little haven of Gravelines on the way was near useless on an ebbing tide, so somewhere off the low, endless sand dunes between Dunkirk and Calais, action must be joined.

The sun was high and warm to the skin when the time came. Careful bearings of the tall, four-square tower in the centre of the town told Kydd and the other members of the squadron when the armada was finally clear of the protecting shoals. First away was Locust, her red cockerel brazenly at the mainmast head, with Bruiser and Falcon close behind then Teazer joining the rush in an exhilarating charge straight into the heart of the enemy.

Kydd willed his mind to icy coolness.

The swarm resolved to individuals: the schuyts or the prame? The first guns opened up but Teazer would hold her fire to make every shot count. The enemy sloops came round to meet them but, surprisingly, showed no inclination to close. Kydd looked back: Actaeon was astern—the biggest threat, she must be their target. He grinned savagely: All the better to allow Teazer to get among the flotilla.

Locust disappeared in a haze of gunsmoke into the very centre and Kydd made up his mind. 'We take the schuyts and draw the big 'uns towards us. Lets the cutters and gun- brigs have a chance.'

Teazer made for a gaggle of four ahead. White splashes kicked up around her. It was small-calibre: the bigger guns they carried must be on crude slides and could not bear on them. Then a vicious whip of bullets all around him showed that they were making up for it with musketry.

Kydd tested the wind once more—fair and brisk on the larboard beam. 'Bring us astern o' the last,' he ordered calmly. The schuyts maintained course, unsure of his intentions, and he was quickly able to reach his position. Swinging round before the wind he tucked in astern of the last, then surged forward to overtake the craft on its shoreward side.

'Fire!' he barked. The forward half of the starboard guns smashed into it. Screams and hoarse shouts came from beyond the choking mass of powder-smoke and then they were up with the second, and the after half of the guns opened up.

The next in line jibbed in fear at what was bearing down on it. Teazer 's helm went over and she plunged between the opening gap to the seaward side and, with a furious spin of the wheel, straightened and passed the next schuyt. The same trick again—but this time it was the unused guns of the larboard side that did the execution, taking the next with the forward guns and the last of the four with the rest.

Beside Kydd, Purchet pounded his fist into his palm. Then, in the hellish noise, Hallum snatched at Kydd's sleeve and pointed. Looming out of the roiling smoke and appallingly close, a powerful prame as big as a frigate was lunging towards them.

As Teazer passed beyond the schuyts, the prame slewed about parallel to bring its full broadside of twenty-four-pounders to bear— at near point-blank range it would be slaughter, and with Teazer's guns not yet reloaded they could not fire back.

Kydd agonised as he waited for the eruption—his skin crawled as the moment hung—then suddenly he swung round to look in the other direction. As he suspected, a lumbering transport was to leeward; the prame dared not open up on Teazer while it was in the line of fire.

Light-headed with relief, Kydd tried to think of a way out. They couldn't stay with the transport for ever. It was hard to concentrate as a chaotic swirl of noise and smoke battered in on his senses but the matter was shortly taken out of his hands. With an avalanche of muffled thuds and a sudden rearing of gunsmoke on the other side of the prame, the ship-sloop Falcon had taken her chance to attack while its attention was on Teazer.

The prame wheeled about on its tormentor and Teazer pulled into the clouds of powder-smoke rolling downwind from the two. Suddenly, with a hideous splintering crash, they were careering along the side of a ship—timbers smashing to wreckage, sails snatched and torn away, ropes parting with a vicious twang in a long agony of collision.

They stopped, two ships locked together in a hideous tangle and, for a moment, a shocked quiet descended. 'It's a Frenchy!' someone screamed, and broke the spell. Kydd fought to keep cool: this was an enemy and it was bigger than Teazer. 'Teazers t' board!' he yelled. 'T' me, the boarders!' He whipped out his precious fighting sword and leaped on to the enemy deck where Teazer's bulwarks had been beaten flat.

The French gun crews gaped at him, caught off-balance and dazed by the sudden turn of events. The first to recover was a dark-featured officer with a red sash who snarled in anger and rushed at him, swinging a massive sword. Kydd dropped to one knee with his own blade above his head. The weapons met in a clash, the shock numbing his arm, but his fine Toledo steel held and deflected the blow to one side.

He let the stroke spend itself and, with a dextrous twist, got inside it and thrust out savagely, taking the man in the lower body. With a howl of anguish he dropped his sword and clutched at the skewering blade, then crumpled, knocking Kydd sprawling and tearing it from his grasp.

The Teazer gun crews had snatched up rammers, tomahawks, anything to hand and were racing toward the unarmed Kydd. With an urgent thump on the deck, Renzi arrived first, taking position over Kydd with a boarding pike out-thrust, its lethal point questing for the first to dare an assault.

The Teazers soon had their bridgehead; the disorganised gun crews saw no chance against fully equipped boarders and skidded to a stop. The rush turned to a rout.

More Teazers arrived and the ship was theirs. Trembling with reaction to the near-disaster, Kydd sent parties to secure the vessel and looked about the battlefield. The action had moved away from them: the flotilla was doggedly pressing on towards Calais, and the English, firing wildly, were staying with them.

He looked across at Teazer. The wreckage seemed confined to the bulwarks and fore-shroud channels but there was a trail of dismounted guns and, at more than one spot, the dark staining of blood on the decking.

Purchet loped up and reported, 'Spars still sound, sir, but th' standin' rigging t' larb'd is in a sad moil.'