'Mr Southwick - stand by to wear ship!'
The fourth carronade fired: one more round to go: he looked at the fifth gun, the last of his puny broadside. The Gunner's Mate, Edwards, was kneeling down aiming it: even now he was calling for a slight adjustment in elevation.
The trigger line was tight in his hand. Would the damned man never fire? He looked along the barrel, glanced through the port to make sure no large waves were coming, paused a moment for the roll - and then jerked the line.
Ramage was hardly conscious of the crash of the gun: but saw the smoke spurting from the muzzle.
'Wear ship!'
The Quartermaster and his mate swung the tiller; seamen hauled desperately at the main sheet to ease over the main boom; others heaved at runners and jib sheet. The cutter's bow began to swing seaward, but slowly, hell, how slowly. Ramage watched the big boom bang across, then glanced astern.
He was looking right into the muzzles of four 12-pounders on the frigate's main deck, and four smaller guns on the deck above: staring straight at the proof of his error of judgement. Because the Belette's fat hull curved round to her narrower quarters, the aftermost guns could train farther round: he'd misjudged the extent of that curve, and even now the French gunners must see the Kathleen filling their sights.
Jackson was muttering, 'Jesus... Jesus!'
The muzzle of the aftermost gun on the Belette's lower deck winked a red eye and spurted yellowish smoke. A split second later there was a crash overhead and Ramage glanced up to see the Kathleen's topmast slowly toppling down. He could not stop himself looking back at the frigate. The next gun forward winked and breathed smoke. A sudden sound like ripping canvas warned him the shot had passed within a few feet, but a hideous metallic clanging and the shrieks of wounded men told him, even before he could glance round, that it had ploughed down the line of guns on the starboard side.
But as Ramage's eyes were drawn back to the frigate the aftermost gun on her upper deck fired, followed a moment later by the second.
He waited for pain and noise; instead there was a splash in the sea thirty yards astern of the cutter and a vicious whine as the shot, ricocheting off the water, spun away overhead. The second shot must have been too high.
'One man aiming the upper-deck guns,' commented Jackson. 'Don't know where he sent the last one, though.'
The third of the upper-deck guns fired, followed by the third on the main deck. A heavy thud and splintering wood warned a shot had smashed through the Kathleen's taffrail, but a quick glance at the tiller showed the steering had not been damaged: then he saw the men hauling in the mainsheet had dissolved into a bloody tangle of bodies: the shot had landed in the middle of them.
The Kathleen was heading north-eastward and still swinging fast. Ramage waited for the fourth of the lower-deck guns to fire. With a bit of luck the rest still could not be brought to bear.
Southwick was already sending men aloft to clear the wreckage of the topmast and he came over and reported.
"We can cut the topmast away without difficulty, sir: hasn't damaged anything else. Three of the starboard side guns dismounted. At a guess, a dozen or so of the lads killed, and maybe a couple of dozen wounded.'
'Very welclass="underline" see the wounded are taken below at once.'
A bloody mess - but it could have been a lot worse. What now, though? How the devil was he going to get the men from the Tower on board if he couldn't use the frigate as a landing stage? All right, all right, he told himself: don't panic. Itemize, Ramage; itemize carefully.
Hmm ... Item: only two guns left out of the five on the Kathleen's starboard side. Very well, if I want to attack again on the starboard side, shift over larboard side guns to take their place. That'll take time, though, with the ship heeled.
Item: all three of the shots fired by the Belette's lower deck guns hit the Kathleen; so if I have a whole broadside fired at me, I can reckon on at least ten hits out of thirteen. Ten hits would leave the Kathleen as so much driftwood.
Item: the Belette is impregnable so far as the Kathleen's concerned: despite being raked with grapeshot, her aftermost guns had fired, and fired accurately. The guns' crews might have been killed, but others quickly replaced them.
Item: the - a sudden thought struck him: although the Belette's impregnable so far as the cutter is concerned, what about the Belette's former crew in the Tower? Supposing they made a sally and recaptured her by boarding, using the masts as ladders?
Short of the Kathleen boarding, which is impossible because we can't get alongside without being blown out of the water, that's the only chance. The more Ramage thought about it, the more convinced he became.
It left two unknown factors: how many French soldiers are there in the Belette; how many French soldiers are besieging the Tower?
Ramage reckoned there were at least six score seamen and Marines in the Tower; and he'd have to chance that most of them had muskets or cutlasses. If he organized it properly, the Belettes would have a vital ally - surprise; often the most decisive factor in any battle. A horde of British seamen suddenly yelling and whooping their way out of the Tower and making a bolt for the cliff top might well get them through a French cordon of twice their number. And in the Belette herself, the seamen would have all the advantage of fighting in a ship they knew intimately, while the French soldiers would be tripping over everything.
That settled it. Ramage rubbed his forehead: how could he convey the idea to the Belette's captain, marooned in his lofty Tower? There's no signal in the book to cover it.
Meanwhile the Kathleen was still running north-eastward, wasting time. He glanced up and saw the men lowering the last few pieces of the shattered topmast to the deck, and Jackson was walking towards him.
'All the wounded have been taken below, sir. Ten dead and three won't last long.'
Thirteen men killed unnecessarily, Ramage thought bitterly.
'How many wounded altogether?'
'Fifteen, sir.'
Twenty-five killed and wounded out of a ship's company of sixty-five: more than a third - nearly a half, in fact. Enough to satisfy anyone who rated a ship's effectiveness in battle by the size of the butcher's bill, even if her captain was still 'on trial'.
Yet he was lucky - Southwick, Appleby, Jackson and Evans had all escaped.
'Mr Southwick - a moment, if you please.'
The Master came striding over, a cheerful look still on his face: a man who thrived on difficulties, Ramage noted thankfully.
'How long before I can tack? We're wasting time standing out to sea like this.'
'Give me two minutes, sir. I’m just making sure all the halyards are free to run and checking the shrouds and stays.'
'Very well.'
He said to Jackson: 'Signal book, please.'
Ramage flicked over the pages, glancing at the numbers of the signals on the left and their meanings on the right.
First, he would hoist 'Prepare for Battle'. The Belettes will understand that easily enough. They'll have seen the damage to the cutter and the captain's no doubt wondering what Ramage was going to do next.
Ah! Ramage jabbed the page with his finger - he should have thought of that: the 'Preparative' flag, followed by the signal to board the enemy. The actual wording was 'To lay the enemy on board as arriving up with them', but when hoisted with the 'Preparative' flag, the Belette's captain would not obey it until the Preparative flag was hauled down.