ordered colours to be hoisted and said to the master, ‘Mr Woodbine, lay me twenty-five yards from her larboard bow and then back topsails. Doctor, be so good as to stand by to translate.’
There was great activity aboard the French frigate, and they seemed to be casting off their moorings. The polacre had already won her single anchor and her companion was slipping her cable.
The Surprise sailed between them and the Frenchman, backed two of her topsails and lay there rocking gently.
Jack hailed the Frenchman with the usual cry of the sea, ‘What ship is that?’ his words echoed by Stephen Maturin.
A remarkably handsome young man on the quarterdeck- post-captain’s uniform and cocked hat, which he raised - replied, ‘Ardent, of the Imperial Navy.’
At this there was a universal and singularly impressive cry of ‘Vive l’Empereur!’ from the Ardent’s company.
‘My dear sir,’ Jack went on, returning the salute, ‘France is now ruled by His Most Christian Majesty Louis XVIII- by my master’s ally. I must ask you to hoist the appropriate colours and accompany me to Malta.’
‘It grieves me to disappoint you, sir,’ said the Ardent’s captain, now very pale with anger, ‘but it would be contrary to my duty.’
‘It grieves me to insist, but if you do not comply we shall be obliged to use force.’
During this time, lengthened by the need for translation, the Algerians had been making short boards: they now lay on the Surprise’s larboard bow and quarter and their people were shrieking orders or advice.
‘Port-lids, both sides,’ called Jack.
The gun-crews had been waiting for the word, and now the red-painted lids all flew up as one, while two seconds later the guns ran out with a deep echoing thump.
The same happened aboard the Frenchman. ‘Messieurs les Anglais,’ called the Ardent’s captain, ‘tirez les premiers.’
Who in fact fired the first shot was never decided, for once there had been a chance explosion aboard the polacre-settee, both sides went to it as fast as ever they could, a most enormous shattering din that echoed from the castle and the mole, gunfire that covered the immediate shore with a dense cloud of white smoke shot through and through with stabbing orange jets of flame.
At first Surprise’s fire was rather slow - she had not enough hands to fight both sides at once: but very soon the slightbuilt Algerines found they could not bear the weight of her shot and they retreated out of range.
At first the roar of gunfire on the Ardent’s side had been much increased by the shore-batteries, firing eighteenpounders; but even in the tumult of battle the Surprises caught the rapid decline, and those with the odd seconds to spare nodded to one another, smiling, and said, ‘The Jollies.’
And scarcely had the Marines silenced the last of the batteries’ guns than three well-directed shot, fired from Surprise’s aftermost guns on the downward roll, pierced the Ardent’s side, striking her light-room. There was a small explosion, the beginning of a fire, and then some seconds later a second explosion, enormously greater. A vast column of smoke and flame shot into the sky, darkening the sun.
The aftermost third of the frigate was wholly shattered: the wreckage sank directly and the rest followed in a slow hideous lurch, settling on the bottom with only her foretopmast showing. Yet even before she had settled the sea was torn and lashed by falling debris - her whole maintop with several feet of the mast, many great spars, scarcely broken, countless blocks and unrecognizable great smouldering lumps of timber: most of it fell somewhat inshore, but smaller pieces were still raining down minutes later, some trailing smoke.
‘Avast firing,’ cried Jack in the unnatural deafened silence that followed. ‘House the guns. Mr Harding, lower what boats we have left’ - the launch on the booms was pierced through and through - ‘and bid Pomone come within hail.’
He ran below, where Stephen was just straightening after having placed a splint on a torn and broken arm that Poll was quickly, expertly bandaging. ‘The Doctor will soon put you right, Edwardes,’ he said to the patient, and drawing Stephen aside he asked him privately how urgent he thought their mission to Spalato. ‘Of the very first urgency,’ said Stephen. Jack nodded. ‘Very well,’ said he. ‘What is our damage?’
‘Harris shot dead with a musket-ball. Six splinterwounds, one dangerous; and two men hurt by falling blocks.’
A very, very modest butcher’s bill. Jack said a word to each of the men waiting to be treated and returned to the deck. Pomone had already come abreast. ‘Captain Vaux,’ he called, ‘have you
