They aimin' high? Lewrie asked himself. That's their usual wont t'cripple first. Usually do it much sooner, were they ready to fight. Take our masts down, then close. But we're already closed, ain't we?
"Two and a half, Captain," Mr. Winwood said, tenser and edgier.
"Take aim, Mister Catterall!" Lewrie barked. "Take careful aim. No rushing, men. Be sure of your shots, with nothing wasted. By God just 'cause you wish t'hear some more loud bangs, this lovely mornin'! Slack in those trigger lines, now. Easy…!"
11 Wait for it!" Lt. Catterall was wailing, sword held high, and almost on his tip-toes in expectation.
"Two, sir," the experienced Winwood adjudged, at last.
"By broadside… on the up-roll… fire/" Lewrie bellowed.
Over Proteus rolled, with her sails straining wind-full from astern, slowly and majestically, larboard side dipping then rising up, to linger for a breath or two, pent atop the gentle scend of inshore waters. "Fire/" Lt. Catterall howled, slashing down dramatically to the deck, almost bowed from the waist.
"Helm up a point, Mister Langlie," Lewrie shouted in the roar as all her guns went off together. "Due South, again!"
"Aye-aye, sir!" Langlie cried back, his voice lost in the din.
The larboard horizon disappeared in a sudden cumulus of powder smoke that the wind shoved back in their faces, keeping pace with them as Proteus bowled onwards, but slowly thinning to reveal…
"Damn my eyes, just lovely shootin'!" Lewrie crowed eagerly by the larboard bulwark. "Choke on that, you snail-eatin' bastards!" he said in a chortle that didn't carry too far, filled with an impatient, leg-jiggly boy's elation, as if ready to titter or giggle with the joy of a Christmas Eve's anticipation.
The French frigate's upper masts and sails had been riddled and shattered. Her main top-masts over the fighting-top had been sheered away completely, hanging to windward. Her mizen tops'l had split open and the sail-less cro'jack yard sagged in two, in a downward vee. Her spanker had been shot free of its sheets and was winged out so far that Lewrie was seeing it edge-on of its leach. Ladder-like shrouds showed gaps where star-shot or chain-shot had scissored them above and below the fighting-top platforms, which had been swept clean of sharpshooters and swivel-guns. Her fore top-masts swayed forward ten degrees out of true, her mizen top-masts were slowly whip-sawing at each long roll.
"By broadside.. .fire!" Lt. Catterall shrieked as the frigates fell together at an angle, gun-drunk and lost in battle lust.
The French reply broadside, rushed and disorganised, was ragged. Heavy round-shot howled past in satanic moans and keens. Amid the gun-smoke, tall white feathers of spray leaped skyward as some balls struck short and caromed upwards over the deck, missing bulwarks and attacking Proteus in her rigging by accident, unintentionally cracking upon masts or spars, or pillow-thumping through rigidly wind-arced sails.
Even so, there were a few parrot-squawks, the quick rrawrks! of shot striking home " 'twixt wind and water," along with the yelps and shrieks of alarm or sudden pain and disbelief as sailors and Marines were showered with iron shards or flying splinters, some as long as a man's forearm and half as thick!
"Well, I'm damned!" Lt. Langlie cried, wiping his face, looking outward as the gun-smoke thinned once more. "Sir! 'Less she bears up abeam the wind, we'll bow-rake her!"
The French frigate had already taken a fearful drubbing at that second broadside. Great shot-holes along her line of mid-ships ports had turned several into one long, bloody gash. Below her gunn'ls and gun-deck her glossy black hull had been punctured, leaving star-shaped holes and ragged plank ends, with one smallish one right on the waterline. And, music to Lewrie's battered ears, the Nor'east Trades bore sounds of fright, suffering, and consternation as the enemy frigate's way fell off from the loss of so much sail, and her attempt to swing abeam to them by brute helm force. She could not turn quick, though, could not protect her vitals from a bow-rake!
"As you bear… fire!"
Amid squeals of agony, many tortured rrawrks! of rivened wood, and the pistol-pop of stays, they bowled shot down her entire length through her flimsier bow planking. Her foremast tumbled into ruin and her mizen top-masts swayed, pivoted, then plummeted down, taking the broken cro'jack yard, fighting-top, and spanker gaff with it burying her quarterdeck in a blizzard of trash!
"Cease fire, Mister Catterall!" Lewrie shouted, going forward. "I think the Frogs've had their fill of us for a good long while, hey, lads? Think we've left a calling-card they'll remember next time?"
Then, more softly to Mr. Langlie, "Take us dead off the winds, sir. Seaward, and alee of the Saintes, yonder. Stand ready to wear her onto starboard tack, the wind fine on the quarter, should it be necessary. Let fall the main course and sheet home, too. We've done a good morning's work."
"We'll not stay to take her, sir?" Langlie just had to wonder.
"And risk them getting even a little of their own back, Mister Langlie? I think not. Far as they know, we didn't lose a single man, and sank or crippled three vessels in an hour. Let 'em think on that and be daunted," Lewrie said with a smug sniff. "Damme! What in the hell…?"
Light shot had moaned overhead, smacking through the mizen tops'l and t'gallant.
"That schooner, sor, he's up our stern, sor!" Mr. Larkin said, so close that Lewrie almost tripped over him.
"Hands to the braces, Mister Langlie. Mister Catterall, you will man the starboard battery, once we wear about!" Lewrie snapped. "And why didn't you alert me, Mister Larkin, when I-"
"Couldn't make ye hear me, sor! All but tugged at yer coat, Oi did, but niver th'…" Larkin spluttered in sudden fear.
"Oh," Lewrie grunted, knowing how remiss he'd been. "Thankee, Mister Larkin. My pardons, but I do that sometimes. Tug away, next time, if you must. It saves our ship and our people's lives, I'll not chide you for it."
"She'll most-like duck away, cross our stern once we've altered course, sir," Mr. Winwood sourly supposed.
"Perhaps we'll get lucky and wing her, first," Lewrie replied. "Either way, we force her to cut and run. Then we'll sail away to the Nor'west and out of reach of her puny broadsides. Like she's not worth our attention." Lewrie paced aft to stand by the taff-rail and lifted his telescope, then snorted in disgust.
"Will you look at this?" he scoffed. "She's firing at half a mile, perhaps a tad more… with four-pounders, I expect," he guessed as he gauged the keen of a ball passing to larboard, well clear of any hope of striking.
"Ready to come about, sir," Langlie reported. "Larboard guns secured, and the starboard battery manned."
Lewrie watched the schooner haring up their wake, swaying back on course after yawing to open her gun-arcs for her last "broadside." Did Proteus come about, she'd rapidly lose speed, whilst the schooner kept lashing along, reducing the range to a quarter-mile, hopefully too quickly for that schooner captain to appreciate his danger. One good broadside from his 12-pounders should put the wind up him!