"Bone dry, sir. I've sent hands to break out another cask. And the rum issue was cancelled, as well. Should I…?"
"Aye. Fetch it up. Bosun? Be ready to pipe 'Clear Decks And Up Spirits,' soon as the water and rum are on deck," Lewrie bade. "Make it a full measure, Mister Coote. No 'sippers' or 'gulpers.' "
"How long, sir?" Wandsworth asked, licking dry lips.
"At least a half hour, sorry t'say," Lewrie told him. "We are not supplied with grape and cannister the way your Army guns are. You have what… half your caissons full of that, half of roundshot?"
"About that, yessir," Wandsworth agreed.
"We carry about one-in-five loads. We're almost depleted."
"Hmmm… perhaps, once yon two-decked ship of the line comes into harbour, I should go aboard her, then," Wandsworth decided, gesturing with his chin towards Halifax and her small convoy, that had yet to get within three miles of an anchorage. The wind, as it always did under a long cannonading, had been shot to a funereal stillness, and 3rd Rates were nowhere near as agile or as weatherly in light airs as a frigate. It might be sundown before Halifax hauled up within hailing distance, much less gun-range.
"She may not be able to anchor as close inshore as us," Lewrie speculated. "Might be better, did we borrow grape and cannister from her. She mounts twenty-four pounders, those should fit into our carronades. But once the six-pounder stands and bags are gone…"
"Ah, I see," Wandsworth seemed to agree. "And, did Scaiff and I 'shift our flags,' as it were, we'd have to recalculate our figures for the height of her gundecks, distance from shore, and all. I agree. Better we borrow than let that ship supercede us, Captain Lewrie."
"Uhm… sorry I have to ask, Captain Wandsworth, but… once it's dark, what do we do?" Lewrie wondered aloud.
"Ah, well… hmmm!" Wandsworth said, tugging at an ear, as if trying to get it to work properly once more. "Now that's a poser, if I do say so. Can't see signals from my men or yours, after dark. We could fire blind, since we know we're striking beyond our trenchworks. But, do the Samboes pull back to rest, we'd be wasting our shot in harassing fire. Might keep 'em awake, might not."
"And then once they come at our troops in the morning, we would really be low on effective shot," Lewrie grimly concluded.
"Well, it may be moot, after all, sir," Wandsworth said with a weary grin. "Surely, those ships coming into port are here to take us off. Another day of this, and we'll have everything loaded aboard the little ships, and won't leave the Samboes a torn shoe or dirty sock."
"One may pray," Lewrie said, nodding with hopeful agreement. He was weary, too, even from mostly standing and pacing about, on his feet for hours. He strode over to the larboard side, hands pressed against his kidneys to ease the kink in his back, arching it, and lifting his feet high and shaking his calves to spur life back into them and ease the slow burn in his soles.
"Signal, sir!" Midshipman Grace yelped. "From Halifax… our number. 'Up Anchor' and… ' Make Way ' sir. She's spelling out…"
There was a much longer string of code flags to interpret.
" 'Clear… Way… To Quays,' sir!" Grace puzzled out slowly.
"Damme, do we move, Mister Wandsworth's calculations'll be off, and he'd have to start from scratch," Lewrie muttered. "Mister Grace? Hoist 'Unable,' followed by 'Am Engaged.' And we can only hope all of this gun smoke'll tell 'em what we've been up to."
A new cask of water was fetched to the main deck; the Marines, with muskets and fixed bayonets, and fife and drum, ceremoniously got the gay red-and-gilt rum keg to the forecastle belfry, and the people began to queue up for their tots, chattering and laughing along as the merry tinkle of the string of copper measuring/drinking cups jangled.
"She repeats her first signals, sir," Mr. Grace said, turning a worried eye to his captain, knowing that there was bad blood between Captain Blaylock and Lewrie already.
"We'll explain, once in hailing distance," Lewrie said, though feeling that he was in for a "cobbing," no matter what he did.
Boom-boom-boom-b'boom. The drums began once more, now that the punishing guns, the ones that struck from nowhere, had ceased. A shot sounded, a thin and weak crack! from a lone musket. A desultory spatter of two more, a gust of gunfire, then the field guns began to bark anew. There was a massive shout, a challenging roar that caused a blizzard of musketry in reply, and then things fell silent again.
"Flag's waving!" Wandsworth's deputy, Scaiff, pointed out.
"Need us again, I expect. My my," Wandsworth grieved wearily.
"Your midshipman fellow's runnin' off inland," Scaiff said.
"Who? What?" Lewrie snapped, returning to the starboard side. "What the Devil? He's takin' a horse!"
"Into the woods. Curious," Scaiff said, yawning. "That rum ye issue, Captain Lewrie? Could a poor soldier get a taste? I'm dry as dust."
"Aye, go forrud and tell the Purser you want a tot," Lewrie muttered, intent with his spyglass on the doings ashore, wondering why young Nicholas would go dashing off towards the trenchworks so suddenly.
"Water, sir?" Aspinall offered, coming onto the quarterdeck.
"God, yes, thankee," Lewrie said, turning to accept a tall mug and drain half of it in one gulp.
"Fresh batch, sir. Good an' cool from the orlop."
"Quite fine, quite fine," Lewrie answered, sighing with contentment, and relief. His mouth had been as dry as a private soldier's, a man who'd been biting off cartridges all day. " Toulon 's hiding down below, I take it?"
"Down in the midships hold, sir. Like he always does. Poor ol' puss, the guns scare him somethin' pitiful," Aspinall chuckled.
The sound of gunfire in the forest erupted again, louder this time, more sustained and urgent, the volleys of two-ranked soldiers on top of each other as fast as they could load, the artillery crashing a steady tolling up and down the lines.
And men were running down the short streets of the town to the docks, men in red coats bearing weapons, but bearing the corners of a series of blankets, too… jogging along as fast as they could, with wounded! Thirty or so sentries who had been guarding the diminishing piles of stores were massing, led by a sword-waving officer who looked very much like that Major James who had come aboard earlier, and were trotting double-time the other direction, into the forest.
Lewrie lifted his telescope to see better, and found a figure in white slop-trousers and a short midshipman's coat, hatless, waving at him! It was Nicholas! And his right sleeve and hand were smeared with gore! He clung with his left hand to a side of a blanket which bore a wounded man, and tears could be seen coursing down his face in terror or grief.
"Andrews!" Lewrie roared for his cox'n. "Away my gig to shore! Mister Nicholas is coming back wounded. Hurry, man, hurry!"
"Awn de way, sah! Furfy, Sharp, you two bastids, ovah de side!"
Lewrie felt glued to the ocular of his spyglass, wishing for a stronger one, ruing his cheapness on his last shopping trip to London chandlers. Nicholas trotted-no, staggered!-closer to the end of the longest pier, four soldiers still bearing their burden-to which he clung with a white-faced death grip-'til they reached the very end and laid it down.
Midshipman Nicholas sank to his knees beside the blanket, then lifted the man in it, taking the wounded fellow by the chin to try to shake him back to consciousness, pointing out towards their ship.