Ramage thought for a moment. A broadside would almost certainly destroy the ship. He decided to give him one more chance. 'Heave-to or I'll blow you out of the water!'
More curses and shouts of defiance showed that the Gascon master was determined to take no notice of the British ship of the line almost alongside him and Ramage told Aitken: 'He refuses to surrender or heave-to. Give him a whiff of the carronades!'
Aitken called up to Orsini on the poop and a few moments later the carronades barked out, sweeping the merchantman's decks with caseshot. Again Ramage hailed through the speaking trumpet and received a shower of abuse in reply.
Very well, he thought to himself, you've brought it on yourself: the carronades gave you a taste of what to expect. 'Fire a broadside into him, Mr Aitken,' he said. 'I've given him four chances to surrender.'
The flash and crash of the broadside caught him unawares, before he could close an eye, and he was blinded for several seconds. He had just heard Southwick exclaim: 'Look, she's afire,' when he saw flames coming up her forehatch. The hatch cover had obviously ripped off and the flames were lighting up the foot of the sails.
He shouted to Jackson to turn two points to starboard and then ordered Aitken: 'Man the fire engine!'
As he quickly looked round the flames began spreading and lighting up the night sky. He caught a glimpse of the surrendered frigate and merchantman ahead, and saw the string of merchantmen astern, their sails lit up.
The Dido seemed to be turning very slowly and already the flames were licking up the sails of the merchantman. Ramage could hear the crackling of burning wood and as, horrified, he watched the flames, the ship's foremast slowly, almost lazily, leaned over forward and crashed down on to the bowsprit.
This stopped the ship as if she had run into a wall, and the Dido continued sailing, passing her as she began her turn away.
'I hope she isn't carrying powder,' Southwick said.
'We're too close if she is,' Aitken commented.
'If she's carrying powder, her master is a fool,' Ramage said. 'You don't invite a broadside from a ship of the line if you've got powder in the hold. Even if you're a Gascon,' he added, half to himself, remembering the reputation that Gascons had for boasting - indeed, giving their name to the word gasconnade.
At that moment the ship blew up. One moment she was dead in the water, flames leaping up from her forehatch; the next moment she was a livid red flash.
Now the darkness seemed more intense.
Ramage suddenly felt sick. The Gascon master's stubborn behaviour, in spite of four warnings, had left him no alternative to opening fire, and he had no particular qualms about the ship being set on fire - the men could always escape in their boats - but blowing up like that, killing those who agreed with their master and those who, given the option, would have surrendered . . .
But there was no time for regrets: he gave orders for the Dido to tack and make her way to the next ship in the convoy. As soon as they were almost alongside her, Ramage called on her to surrender and heave-to. This time the master, having just seen what had happened to his next ahead, shouted his agreement and the Dido went alongside to put a prize crew on board.
As the Dido tacked to get clear and headed for the next merchantman, Ramage looked ahead carefully for the second frigate, but could not see her. 'Where's the other frigate?' he asked Southwick.
'I haven't looked for several minutes, sir, what with that ship catching fire and blowing up.' He opened the nightglass and put it to his eye. After a minute or two he said: 'That's strange, there's no sign of her. Just three more merchantmen, but not a sign of the frigate. D'you think she's bolted?'
Ramage shrugged his shoulders in the darkness. 'Couldn't blame him if he has. There's nothing much he can do to save this convoy.'
Southwick gave one of his famous sniffs but made no comment.
The last three merchantmen surrendered without any fuss, all three obviously intimidated by the fate of their countryman. With the last of the prize crews put on board, Ramage said to Aitken: 'We'll go and see how Hill is getting on with the Sirène.'
It took fifteen minutes to get back up to the Sirène, the Dido having to thread her way between merchant ships which were anyway clumsy sailers but were now being handled by inexperienced midshipmen with very few seamen.
Ramage hailed Hill, who had the frigate hove-to under a backed foretopsail. With the whole convoy now dealt with, Hill might as well carry a despatch to the admiral.
Ramage went to his cabin to write a rough draft of the despatch so that Luckhurst could make a fair copy. The report to the admiral was brief, describing how he had found the convoy, attacked it and captured one frigate and all the merchant ships. He regretted, he said, that a second frigate forming the escort had escaped in the darkness, and a merchantman refusing to surrender and apparently carrying powder had been fired at, catching fire and blowing up. He finished his draft with all the usual formalities and then called Luckhurst to make the fair copy.
He then went out on to the quarterdeck and told Aitken: 'I have a despatch for the admiral which must be taken across to Hill. Also, give him a hail and see if he has enough people. Send Orsini over with the despatch - tell him to make sure Hill is satisfied that he has everything under control.'
Paolo was soon back from the Sirène, reporting that Hill and his Marines had now secured all the prisoners and would be getting under way in about ten minutes, that he did not need more men and that the French were very cowed. 'Most of them saw the merchantman blow up,' Paolo said, 'and that knocked the stuffing out of them.'
Ramage waited with the Dido hove-to until he saw the Sirène's foretopsail sheeted home and braced sharp up as she bore up for Barbados. Then he said to Aitken: 'Set a course for Fort Royaclass="underline" we still have some unfinished business there.'
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Early in the forenoon with the sun hot and the wind still light the Dido hove-to off Pointe des Nègres, half a mile from the stranded Achille. Through his glass Ramage could see that the French ship's boats were busy ferrying the crew to the one small beach at the end of the Pointe, leaving them an arduous climb up the cliff before they could make their way back to Fort Royal. More important she was again flying a Tricolour: the surrender was being ignored.
He told Southwick about the colours and added: 'They've given up any hope of getting her off, for the time being anyway. Perhaps they're going to bring in shipwrights to patch her up, and then pump her out until she floats clear.'
'They'll probably make an effort,' Southwick said. 'After all, she's the only ship of the line they've got out here.'
'She's the only ship of any kind they have,' Ramage corrected. 'So they're bound to make every effort to repair her. They haven't a ship to send to France asking for reinforcements!'
'The Navy is short of everything, but I wonder how badly off the Army is.'
'Well . . . they haven't had the losses that the Navy has had, so perhaps they are not in such a bad way,' Ramage said.
'Let's hope they don't bring out any guns and set them up on the cliff to cover the Achille.'
Ramage shook his head. 'We'll attack the Achille tonight. We'd lose too many men if we attacked in daylight.'
The rest of the day was spent planning the attack on the Achille. All the officers were assembled in Ramage's cabin, and he opened the proceedings by saying: 'Tonight we set fire to the Achille. We can only guess how many men they've left on board. Nor do we know whether they're expecting an attack. We must assume they are - they've seen the Dido come back and anchor close by. So we have to plan the boarding on the basis that it will be opposed.