'Don't keep on, sir,' Aitken pleaded, 'or you'll have me shedding tears of remorse over the way we led that poor Frenchman astray.'
Ramage examined the 'poor Frenchman' once again with his telescope. Yes, from the moment the Frenchman began his turn to starboard he was doomed. If he'd turned to larboard immediately, following the Calypso, he would still have hit the rock because he had no time to let go an anchor to stop and then turn him quickly. By turning to starboard he had just missed the rock, passing it close to larboard, only - as Ramage had intended - to drive up on the rocky shoal stretching north-west from the rock.
The frigate would bounce from rock to rock for a few yards with an impact that must have ripped her bottom as it sent her masts by the board, before heeling to starboard and coming to rest, still looking as though any moment she might topple off the edge of the shoal into deep water and sink.
Although the sea had eased down a little since last night, the waves still made a foaming white collar round the rock and swept on to hit the Frenchman's stern, frequently driving green seas unbroken over her quarterdeck. Already the sternlights of the captain's cabin had been stove in and seas swept through, to pour down into the gunroom. She must be holed badly: in fact, staring at her in the circle shown by the glass, it was clear that despite the largest of the swell waves swirling round her, she was not lifting to any of them: she was inert, resting (impaled rather) on the hidden rocks of the shoal.
The stricken ship was heeled so far that the men in the Calypso had the same view as a gull flying high over her starboard side.
As Ramage had seen fleetingly in the night before, her masts had gone at deck level, each falling forward. The foremast had crashed down on the fo'c'sle and launched the topmast on to the bowsprit, while the topgallant mast had gone like a giant javelin into the jibboom, carrying it away so that it was crumpled over the bow like a giant's broken fishing rod.
All the standing and running rigging - shrouds which should keep the masts braced athwartships, stays holding them fore and aft, the halyards for hoisting the yards, and the braces for trimming them - all this cordage looked like a carelessly thrown gladiator's net. The yards themselves were slewed across the deck; some, broken, hung over the side. Sails, what was left of them, fluttered like shredded bedsheets, dark patches showing where the sea sluiced over the canvas and occasionally, like a dog shaking itself, throwing up fine spray.
Yet Ramage was less interested in all that than what was stowed on deck amidships and what was hanging from davits aft.
'There are two boats on the booms amidships which don't seem to be damaged,' he told Aitken. 'Why the devil they weren't crushed I don't know. Some wreckage - from the mizenmast, probably - has stove in the boat in the larboard quarter davit, but the one on the starboard quarter - the one you can see - looks undamaged.'
'So some of the Frenchmen can row on shore and raise the alarm,' Aitken commented.
'When the sea has eased down. They'd never launch a boat in this. In fact they've only one useful boat for the time being - the one in the quarter davits - because without masts, and thus stay tackles, they can't hoist out the boom boats.'
'No, but with a calmer sea they can manhandle them and just shove 'em over the side, and then bail,' Southwick commented.
'Oh yes,' Ramage agreed. 'We've got to smash them all before we leave. And, because she's so heeled over she can't aim a single gun at us, we can take our time.'
'At the moment we can't aim a gun at them either,' Southwick grumbled. 'Not until we get a spring on our cable.'
'Exactly,' Ramage said, 'and now you gentlemen have had a morning promenade and digested your breakfast, let's get a spring on our cable and start knocking some holes in those boats before our friends launch them and row on shore.'
As Southwick bustled forward and Aitken started giving orders, using the speaking trumpet, Ramage looked towards the east. The coastline was little more than a bluish-grey line low on the horizon, rising slightly to the north to form Punta Ala, and again to the south where Monte dell' Uccellina slid down to Talamone. The scirocco haze was too thick to see Monte Argentario or the island of Giglio - and, more important, it was unlikely that a watcher on the nearest shore (the flat coastline each side of the river Ombrone) would be able to see a couple of frigates at the Formiche di Grosseto.
He saw Sir Henry coming up the quarterdeck ladder, and as he could see the rest of the hostages examining the wreck from the maindeck, he was thankful that Sir Henry must have said something which kept them off the quarterdeck.
'Well, she's there for good, eh?' Sir Henry said cheerfully, gesturing at the wreck. 'And I doubt if they'll be able to see a hulk like that from the mainland until this scirocco clears up. Her profile isn't much bigger than the dam' rock!'
'No, it's only the Calypso that sticks out like a sore thumb, and most likely we'd be mistaken for her, sir,' Ramage said.
'Exactly. But her boats ...?'
Sir Henry was being tactful.
'Two on the booms haven't been damaged, nor the one you see in the starboard quarter davits. Still, I'll soon be making sure they won't swim again: we're just putting a spring on the cable now, sir.'
'Good, good,' Sir Henry said, but left unspoken the 'Then what?' Putting the French frigate on the shoal had - well, only wrecked the French frigate: it had not solved the problem of the wives. Were the former hostages wondering if he would now decide he had carried out his orders, declaring they made no mention of wives? The orders did not, of course, and Sir Henry knew that. And Sir Henry probably knew that many frigate captains (and captains of seventy-fours, too, for that matter) would stick to the precise wording and make for Gibraltar . ..
Ramage waved towards the big black rock of the Formica Maggiore in sight to the north of them, and forming the northern end of the Formiche di Grosseto, and then turned to gesture at the swirl of broken water in the distance ahead which showed the southernmost of the three rocks. 'Favourite fishing area for the local people,' Ramage said. 'Boats come down from Punta Ala and Rocchette, and out from Castiglione della Pescaia. And up from Talamone and Santo Stefano.'
'Yes, they would,' Sir Henry agreed.
'Still, they stay in harbour when there's a scirocco blowing.'
Sir Henry nodded, content to let Ramage make his point in his own fashion.
'Once it's blown out, they'll be out here fishing. And they'll see the wreck. They'll come straight over to see what pickings there are, expecting plenty of rope and timber. They'll find the French crew still on board,' Ramage continued, almost dreamily, and Sir Henry realized that he was thinking aloud. 'Still on board because even if they'd made a raft, they'd never reach the shore with a northgoing current.
'But not for a couple of days ... I can't see the fishermen venturing out before then. The French persuade or threaten, so that the fishermen take the captain and a few others on shore. To Talamone or Castiglione . . . No, most probably Rocchette, because that'd be a run or a broad reach.
'The nearest French headquarters to Rocchette?' Ramage shrugged his shoulders. 'Grosseto, I should think. That must be a good thirty miles from Rocchette. The French frigate captain arrives in Grosseto and reports - yes, it would have to be to the Army - that he's stuck on the Formiche di Grosseto, and there's a British frigate on the loose somewhere.'
Sir Henry laughed. 'He wouldn't get a very sympathetic hearing, I imagine.'
'No. And the commandant at Giglio still thinks he's handed over his hostages in proper form and doesn't realize they've been rescued. So neither the French frigate captain nor the French authorities at Grosseto have any cause to connect this wretched British frigate with hostages ...'
'No,' Sir Henry agreed, 'they'd all think she was - or is - in the area by chance.'
'So in Port' Ercole, no one would know anything about all this, and with average luck no one now in Grosseto is likely to be gossiping in Port' Ercole for a few days. It must be forty miles by land from Port' Ercole to Grosseto.'
'So there's a chance, eh, Ramage?'
'They tell me the fishing off Port' Ercole is good, and most of us were round there a year or so ago with the Calypso and a pair of bomb ketches, so we know what the countryside looks like.'
'It must be charming,' Sir Henry said lightly. 'The sort of view that watercolour artists like.'
'Yes. I only managed some pencil sketches last time because we were in a hurry. Ah, I see they're at last getting a spring on the cable.'
Sir Henry eyed the French frigate. 'At this distance it's going to mean some good shooting.'
'Yes,' Ramage agreed. 'Just smash the boats, that's all I want. No need to kill a lot of men who are in enough trouble already.'
Sir Henry gave a dry chuckle. 'Have you thought of what the French authorities will do to that captain when they finally work out what has happened?'
'Not in detail, sir; just enough to be thankful it's not me.'
Sir Henry made no comment. It was now clear to him that Ramage still intended to try to rescue the rest of the hostages. The admiral thought soberly that he was damned if he could see how the youngster would achieve it, but then, who else would have had the thundering cheek to march up to Castello and coolly sign the commandant's receipt for the people he was rescuing?
'So there should be time,' Ramage went on, and Sir Henry guessed that Ramage was both thinking aloud and letting him know his idea on the situation. 'We wait near Port' Ercole for the weather to clear. By then the fishermen up here will be taking this sorry crowd of Frenchmen on shore. We land ... we can't risk more than that night and the next day. And the following night, if necessary. Then away, round the coast south of Sardinia and hurrah for Blackstrap Bay and Gibraltar. All being well.'
Sir Henry stayed at the quarterdeck rail with Ramage as the Calypso's men started fitting a spring on the frigate's cable. Ramage always thought this method of training round an anchored ship so that the broadside guns could be aimed at the target was like a bull's head being held by one rope tied to a ring in its nose and the rest of the animal being turned bodily by tying a second rope to its tail and heaving.
Southwick had supervised the men securing a hawser to the anchor cable using a rolling hitch. The hawser was put over the larboard side and brought aft, outside all the rigging. It was then taken round the stern and led back on board, coming in through a sternchase port and then to the capstan.
As soon as Aitken was satisfied that the hawser led clear, directly from the cable, along the ship's side and back in through the sternchase port, he signalled to Southwick. The master's party veered some of the anchor cable so that as the Calypso dropped back several yards the hawser attached to it led forward and, as Aitken's men paid out more from aft, both it and the cable where it was secured dipped beneath the water.
Finally both first lieutenant and master were satisfied: the bull's tail, Ramage noted contentedly, was secured (by the hawser) to the rope attached to the ring in its nose (the anchor cable).
As soon as Aitken formally reported that everything was ready for them to begin hauling, Ramage said: 'Beat to quarters, then, Mr Aitken; we may as well make an early start.'
Sir Henry watched the drummer boy flourishing his drumsticks and commented: 'Surely that lad's drum has French colours painted on it!'
'French colours and the name of a French frigate, sir,' Ramage said, half apologetically. 'We captured the frigate off Devil's Island last year. Up to then we'd used
