Veitch was shouting above the thunder of billowing canvas, 'starboard battery! Run out!"
Bolitho looked aloft at his pendant, willing it to hold direction, while-all around him seamen and marines were rushing to obey the demands from their officers and bosun's mates.
He lowered his head and watched the leading French ship. Was it imagination? He held his breath, and then as the deck under his shoes began to heave over the opposite way he saw the French ship gathering speed, swinging past Lysander's bowsprit and flapping jib as if caught in a tide-race.
"Old"er steady!" Grubb sounded fierce. " "Nother man on th" wheel, "ere!"
The yards ceased, their creaking and steadied on the larboard tack, the topsails hard-bellied again, thrusting the ship over until spray sluiced above the lower line of port lids where the gun captains were already shouting their readiness to fire.
Herrick tugged at his hat as the wind blew more spindrift over the hammock nettings and across the smooth planks between the guns. It dried almost as soon as it had fallen, like summer rain, Bolitho thought.
"Course nor"-east, sir!"
'steady as you go."
Bolitho raised his glass, feeling the wind whipping at his coat as he trained it on the enemy. His sudden alteration of course had caught the two French captains by surprise. He saw the leading ship's ornate stem slipping past Lysander's starboard bow, the gap widening more and more until he could see the second seventy-four's jib boom pushing through the left side of his lens.
A ripple of orange tongues darted from the leading Frenchman's hull, and he heard some of the balls hissing overhead, the sharp crack of a stay parting somewhere in their path.
He strode across the deck and seized Herrick's arm. "The fool fired too soon. "He gestured towards the waiting seamen. 'starboard batterv, Thomas. Give him a broadside! With luck there’ll be time to reload before we cut across his stem. "
Herrick waved his arm. "As you bear!"
The earsplitting roar of the broadside, the great spouting bank of choking smoke as it was blown towards the enemy, made several of the marines loose off their muskets. They had no hope of finding a target, and Sergeant Gritton
bellowed, "Punishment for the next bugger to fire without orders!"
Bolitho stood on a bollard to peer above the hammock nettings, his eyes smarting in smoke as he watched for some sign of damage. -The enemy's sails were pockmarked with shot holes, and he saw a gap in the boat tier, an upended launch split in halves. But the tricolour was still there, and the ship was holding direction as before.
He heard his men cheering and whooping and snapped, "Reload! I want three rounds every two minutes." He saw Gilchrist staring at him. "Gunnery is all we have now. "
There was a ragged crash of cannon fire from larboard. and he realised that the second Frenchman was trying to hit Lysander with his forward guns, the only ones which would bear.
Veitch was yelling, "Larboard battery!" His hanger glittered above his head. "As you bear, lads!"
Bolitho saw one of the midshipmen scuttling to the hatch to pass the order.
The hanger cut downwards. "Fire!"
Once more the ship shook and bucked violently as both gun decks erupted in a slow and regular broadside. Men were already hurling themselves on the tackles and handspikes, reaching blindly for charges and fresh shot, many of them retching as smoke funnelled downwind to hide the deck from view.
Veitch shouted wildly, "Faster! Come on, number three! Sponge out"
Bolitho wiped his streaming face, his mouth like dust as he watched the Frenchman's foresail flapping in all directions like a torn sheet, the long black scars along the enemy's forecastle where some of the broadside had gone home.
The leading French ship was still on the same course, her captain probably unwilling to expose his stern until the last moment. Or hoping his consort might produce some kind of miracle.
Herrick said, "All loaded and run out again." His face was streaked with grime. "Less than two minutes, by my reckoning! "
"Fire!"
The starboard guns hurled themselves inboard on the tackles, the orange-tinged smoke rolling downwind towards the Frenchman which now appeared to lie diagonally across the starboard bow.
Bolitho gritted his teeth, seeing Lysander's drifting smoke light up again to the enemy's immediate reply. The deck jerked under him, and he saw men duck as the balls shrieked low over the quarterdeck, some dropping in the sea almost a mile away.
Bolitho shouted, "Now, Thomas! Pass the word to the carronade crews forrard!"
Herrick nodded, his face a stiff mask as more shots crashed into the side or sliced between the sails.
Bolitho strode down the deck to the lee side, seeing the leading French ship's stern rising like a golden horseshoe above the eddying smoke. Lysander's forecastle was already passing through the gap between them. He winced, in spite of his warning, as a carronade blasted out its great grape packed ball with an accompaniment of Veitch's foremost eighteen- pounders as they came to bear on the enemy's most vulnerable point.
Veitch was almost screaming. 'stop your vents! Sponge out! Load!
The thunder of cannon fire, the squeal and rumble of guns being run out, the endless mad chorus of yells and cheers seemed to be reaching out from another world, or from the depths of hell.
Severed rigging twisted like snakes on the protective nets across the upper deck, and as the gun crews stooped and heaved, their naked bodies running with sweat and powder, they looked like the servants and not the masters of their bellowing black charges.
"Fire!"
Bolitho heard a man scream, saw a body bounce down from the main top before pitching over the side.
More shots slammed through the smoke, but he heard Grubb exclaim hoarsely, "The old smasher "as done it, sir!" He took off his crumpled hat and waved it over his head. "Must "ave got "er rudder!"
Bolitho watched narrowly, realising that although Lysander had sailed through the gap, the leading Frenchman's stem was still pointing straight at him. The murderous charge of grape from the carronade, accompanied by the forward guns, which by their harsher bark suggested they had been double-shotted for the purpose, must have ripped through the stern and disabled the steering. She was falling downwind, swinging her stem round, and he saw that her once ornate gallery was in ruins, her poop pitted and splintered from the on-slaught.
As he watched he saw her mizzen stagger, held upright by stays and shrouds a while longer, and then begin to fall. Tiny figures were sliding down from the mizzen top, others ran like mad things to escape the great plunging mass of rigging and spars as with a crash, audible even above the thunder of guns, it swayed down into the smoke, the bright, flapping tricolour with it.
"T "other one is tryin" to follow us round, sir." Grubb's eyes were streaming. " "E’ll take our wind."
Bolitho pointed towards the second ship. "Mr. Gilchrist!
Prepare the larboard carronade!"
He saw the other ship's jib boom thrusting through the smoke like a black lance, the tiny pin pricks of musket fire from her beak head and foretop. With her yards hard-braced and the wheel over, she was struggling round to star-board, presenting more and more of her scarred side as the range shortened rapidly.
The larboard carronade slammed back on its slide, the ball exploding in a whirling mass of splinters and broken rigging, directly abaft the enemy's beakhead.