"And Mister Gamble? I s'pose it's time to let our 'passengers' on deck," Lewrie chuckled. "No point in hidin' 'em below any longer."
"Aye, sir." And Marine Lt. Ford and his hundred men clattered up from the pre-stripped gun deck to join Lt. Devereux's fourty, some of them looking sweaty and red in the face even though the morning had come cool, and the approaching mid-day did not promise much of a rise in temperature. Some fanned themselves with their hats, and some japed and elbowed their mates, but the bulk of them, Devereux's Marines and Lt. Urquhart's landing-party, appeared sobered by what they were to attempt, with the chance to go bayonet-to-bayonet with French infantry.
"We've the depth to go within a cable of the point, in your estimation, Mister Winwood?" Lewrie asked the Sailing Master, who was also looking as if a final prayer might not go amiss.
"Argosy skirted the point after dark last week, sir, and by her soundings with the lead, at the peak of high tide, which should be…," Winwood pulled out his pocket-watch and peered at its face, "just past four minutes ago, we should have five and a half fathoms within a two cable range, Captain. I'd not advise going closer, for they did not trawl a grapnel looking for any wrecks which might have gone aground on the point over the years. God knows what lurks below."
"Two cables it will be, then, Mister Winwood," Lewrie decided. Savage's 18-pounder great-guns, and their 32-pounder carronades, could hurl solid shot at the stone battery with great effect at such short range, and could switch to bags of grape-shot, as well. Beyond musket-range, fifty or sixty yards, grape-shot would scatter rather far, but it could keep any defenders' heads down, and still would have enough force when it struck the unwary (or the unfortunate) to reap lines of opposing infantry in windrows. In Army practice, Lewrie knew from his brother-in-law Burgess Chiswick (the one who would still talk to him) defending artillery would switch to grape when a foe's infantry approached within three hundred yards, so he supposed his own pieces, much larger and of greater calibre, would suit.
He strolled to the hammock nettings overlooking the waist, now arseholes and elbows thick with men and weapons. He took another peek at his watch, looked outward to Erato and Mischief, which were close to within a single point off the larboard bows, about to be occluded by a fluttering mass of inner and outer jibs. It was time.
"Lieutenant Ford… Lieutenant Devereux, and Lieutenant Urquhart…," he called down. "Do find a way t'make yourselves thinner and flatter amidships, if ye please. Mister Gamble? Beat to Quarters!"
Major Loudenne's personal mount, and Captain Dournez's horse, were good'uns and goers, and Lt. Brasseur and the aide-de-camp, whose name Brasseur had learned was Carnot, were making good time along the coast road. A spell at the trot, a spell of cantering, a few minutes at the gallop, then checking back to an easier lope, in cavalry fashion-for cavalry could not gallop all the time, no matter how dashing they were-and the lone spire of the church in St. Palais sur Mer was in sight. A newly installed kilometre post by the side of the road-one of First Consul Bonaparte's many vigourous edicts-told them that they were within one kilometre of the town. Carnot felt inspired to put heels to his horse; not to the full gallop, though the image in his mind of "dashing" purposely through the town was pleasing to his martial ego, but a fast enough pace to tell the world that he was on urgent duty, bearing vital despatches, and making the girls of St. Palais turn their heads in admiration.
"The woods thin out, at last, m'sieur," Carnot told his nautical partner, hiding a smile at how clumsily Brasseur rode; like a large sack of turnips. "Ah, there's the beaches again, and the sea."
Jean Brasseur's thighs ached like sin, his breeches were soaked with his own sweat and foul-smelling horse sweat that had seeped into the saddle skirts, whilst his buttocks had gone thankfully numb, after shrieking in dull pain, and why he wished to see the coming battle, he could no longer fathom. St. Palais was a small, dull place, but there was rumoured to be a good tavern that served a decent meal and their wine would be a better-than-average Bordeaux, of course. He was about to beg off, plead a sudden need to return to Royan…
He looked seaward as they left the last copses of pines behind, and the left-hand side of the road became blue and open to the horizon, with low, wind-sculpted shrubbery, dune grasses, gritty sands, and the low dunes between beach and overwash barrows.
"What?" he exclaimed, sawing at his reins to bring the brute he bestrode to a merciful halt. "Where the Devil are they? They could sail much faster than we could ride."
"Uhm, back there, m 'sieur," Carnot pointed out, one arm aimed up-river. "I do not believe they have moved a single metre. No…"
Brasseur brought out his telescope, cursing the horse under him as it shifted its shoulders, tried to plod a step or two towards some likely-looking grass along the verge of the road. "Mon Dieu, they've made sail, they're under way! God rot and damn them!"
"What is it, m'sieur}" Lt. Carnot asked. "They are coming?" "They are going, Lieutenant," Brasseur spat. "Going up-river towards the narrows. They were not a feint to distract us from an attack on the Cote Sauvage. They were after the forts from the beginning!"
"The Fifty-seventh of the Line!" Carnot exclaimed. "We can get them to turn about and march back. They are the only troops close enough to save Fort Saint Georges. I must ride on."
"And tell your General Fournier that there may not be a landing on the Cote Sauvage," Brasseur said with a snarl of impotent rage, for he had been very badly fooled, and the shame of it was just sinking in, strangling his ego. "But… something still might be saved. It will take the 'Bloodies' hours to get their troops ashore, form up and assault Fort Saint Georges, over-run the battery on Pointe de Grave, and place explosives. Your general has cavalry?"
"Quel dommage, non, m'sieur," Carnot had to confess. "He has only infantry and artillery… the closest cavalry is going into winter encampment inland of Rochefort. To feed and rest their horses back to health. Most of our cavalry units are hundreds of kilometres from here, standing ready on the eastern fronti…"
"Ride on, dammit!" Brasseur barked. "Do what you can. I will wait for you and that regiment in the town, for there's nothing I can do any longer."
"Oui, m'sieur/" Lt. Carnot said with a bright, eager smile, despite his sour surprise, for it meant a gallant and glorious ride. "I am off like a rabbit. Bonne chance, Lieutenant Brasseur."
"Bonne chance, d vous," Brasseur echoed, as Lt. Carnot put his spurs to his borrowed horse and galloped away, shod hooves throwing up divots of sand and dirt. "And go to the Devil, you idiot," Brasseur grumbled as he kneed his horse to a walk towards St. Palais. He had no urgency now, but for a satisfying meal, a bottle or two, and a welcome rest for his abused backside and thighs; on the softest pillows the innkeeper had. Lt. Carnot could gallop on to recall that regiment, dash up to his general to announce the deception that the Anglais had pulled off… Brasseur doubted the lad's arrival would be well received. He would kill a perfectly good horse for nothing; perhaps a second, if he galloped all the way back to Royan or Fort St. Georges.