The Tartessians. And they were making sail too, putting distance between themselves and the beach. Even with the rain there were fires there; she could see mortar shells bursting amid the wreckage of the beachhead, and further north the bright stab of Gatling fire through the gloom. She cased the binoculars and leaned out, gripped a backstay and braced her feet against the ribbed surface of the line to control her descent, then slid down to the quarterdeck in a long gliding flight.
She landed and caught Swindapa's quirked eyebrow. All right, so I enjoy being able to do that, Alston thought.
"Lieutenant Commander, message to the fleet. Enemy bearing"- she gave the direction and number. "All ships will follow flagship's lead en echelon; I intend to force a general engagement." Which she could, with the weather gauge and the Farragut.
Alston stepped over to the wheels and gave the course as Swindapa ducked into the radio shack. The four crewfolk heaved at the double wheels, and the Chamberlain lay further over, shipping foam on her starboard rail. Down below, the gun crews would be hanging on in the swaying dark, lit only by the dim glow of the battle lanterns, waiting.
Not long now, she thought, as the enemy's sails loomed higher and Nantucket sank astern. Not long at all.
The Chamberlain was leading the flotilla, heading south and east to put herself between the wind and the Tartessians and trap them against a lee shore. The enemy weren't cooperating, of course, cutting at right angles across the wind and nearly due east. That put the two fleets on an intersecting course, like the two sides of a triangle about to come to a point. As always at sea, after the long waiting the closing came with a sudden rush.
"Signal to the Farragut," she said. "Signal is You may proceed."
The steamer turned out of line, giving a long, melancholy scream from its whistle that cut through the creak and thrum of a sailing ship under way. Its axe-bow butted a huge spray into the air, steel gray and ice white.
It 's fairly rough, she thought. Their gun decks are closer to the surface than the ones in these frigates. That will give them problems.
The ram drew away with shocking speed, lunging across the waves. It had picked the fourth in line of the Tartessian vessels, to cut that one and the ships behind off from the foremost division. Alston watched the gunports on the port side of the Tartessian vessel fly open and the muzzles run out. Almost immediately the deep booming of cannon fire cut through the hiss of the rain.
"Too soon," she said. "They should have waited another minute."
Flying iron threw gouts of spray into the air a hundred yards in front of the Farragut; few of the balls skipped along the surface in today's weather. Thunder rumbled across the waves as well, like a huge series of doors thudding shut. Ten guns, she thought. Twelve-pounders. She and Swindapa and Jenkins were all looking at their watches. One minute ten seconds later the first cannon of the second broadside fired, and the rest within fifteen seconds more. Not bad. Not as good as ours, though. If you limited "ours" to the Guard frigates and schooners; God alone knew about the dozen civilian Reserve rag-tag-and-bobtail following behind.
Black smoke was pouring up from the Farragut's stack. One more broadside landed; then the paddle wheels thrashed into reverse, just before the steel-plated bow struck. It hit at a slight angle to the perpendicular, with the momentum of two six-hundred-ton bulks moving together at a combined speed of nearly thirty miles an hour.
The Tartessian ship shivered and pitched, stopping as if it had hit a reef. The foremast whipped forward and then snapped. Sails and mast fell down across the bows of the ship, and the rest of her rigging quivered and shook. And all that was nothing beside the brief glimpse of the damage to her hull as the Farragut reversed. Ribs had been smashed and the oak stringers stripped off the side of the ship in a swath fifteen feet long. The Tartessian war craft rolled back to port as the ram released her, and the sea poured in at once. The remaining two masts developed a list, and the open gunports were pointing down toward the sea.
The Farragut backed off. The next in line of the Tartessian fleet had yawed, turning further from the wind to bring her guns to bear.
They lashed the steamship and the water around it, but that necessarily presented her flank to the ram. With a dolorous whistle of steam, the Farragut began to pick up speed.
Alston turned her attention back to the four ships ahead. The Chamberlain was closing in on the first, no more than fifteen hundred yards now, less every second.
"Jenkins," she said, "we'll range up and give the leader a couple of broadsides at… mmmm, nine hundred yards." Fairly long range for the Tartessians.
"Then we'll touch up, cut across his stern, rake him-and give the ship following our starboard a broadside at the same time-range alongside, hit him another time or two, and board. Lieutenant Commander, convey my intentions to the rest of the flotilla. Marine sharpshooters to the fighting tops, action stations all."
The drum began to beat, a long, hoarse, rolling call. There was little to do, though, except for the Marines to scramble up the ratlines and take their places in the triangular platforms from which they would rake the enemy deck. Below, all was in readiness as it had been since they'd left port, decks clear, fearnought screens rigged and damped, corpsmen standing by for the casualties. The two Gatling guns clamped to the rails swung, loaders ready with more cylindrical drums of ammunition, gunners' hands on the cranks.
The enemy ship-probably the flagship-grew closer. It was a three-masted bark-rigged vessel; she counted twelve gunports and lighter weapons on deck. The same number of muzzles as her vessel, but surely a lighter weight of metal. The decks were black with men, though, and the rigging thick with them too-heavy crew.
Closer. Closer. Below: "Out tampions! Run out your guns! "
Drumming thunder below, squeal of carriages, and to her right the black port lids flipping up to show thick muzzles.
"Ready…"
"Fire as you bear!"
The two ships were running parallel, just under a thousand yards apart, their sails braced hard to starboard and the wind on their port. BOOOOMMMMM, a roaring world of sound as the twelve heavy cannon spoke as one, the Chamberlain heeling under their thrust, long blades of flame and clouds of smoke. Jenkins cast a quick look and then turned his eyes back to sail and helm; Alston noticed and felt a quick stab of approval.
"Thus, thus," he said to the helmsmen. "Don't close her- Zenarusson, keep your eye on your work! Thus!"
Her own attention was focused on the results. One ball raised a geyser of foam in the enemy's wake. The others all struck, solid smashing impacts on deck or hull. Then the Tartessian's cannon ran out, each muzzle seeming to point straight at her. She forced herself to objective appraisal; eighteen-pounders, probably.
BADUMMPF. One gunport wasn't firing, the cannon dismounted, perhaps. The others snarled flame and disappeared backward, recoil hurling the great weights of metal back against the lines and tackle. Three paces in front of her, an iron cannonball cut a seaman in half, blood and matter spraying out in all directions. Alston wiped sticky wetness from her face, knowing that she'd feel it again, in her sleep. Her mind was a calculating machine right now. Two solid hits, from the thumping beneath her feet; a couple of misses, from the splashes in between.
Wounded crewfolk being hurried down the companionways, headed for the surgeon's station. A rattle of lines and blocks on the splinter nets overhead, cut by the passing shot. Bosun and petty officers and riggers swarming upward, knotting and splicing; no major sails down or uncontrollable, a quick flurry of hauling on deck to correct the yawing produced by a severed buntline.
As the guns spoke again, individually this time, the crews completed their leaping dance of reloading and ran them out again. A glance at her watch; ninety seconds, very fast. A slow crackle of rifle fire came from the tops above, snipers with scope-sighted weapons trying their luck. A staysail went flying loose, flapping and entangling. The Tartessian's head started to turn away from the wind, then came back.