Take, Burn or Destroy, page 16
“Can you make out the French boat?” Barthe asked, staring astern.
“I cannot—” But Hayden was interrupted by a flash and then the report of a pistol.
Immediately, his own cutter altered course towards the enemy boat. With every stroke the boat became less defined, the colours duller—then it was grey, dissolving into the murk. Hayden could see Hawthorne in the bow, a musket to his shoulder. They were almost out of sight when several flashes appeared at one time, the reports reaching him almost at the same instant. The French quickly gathered themselves and returned the British fire, but then all was lost in the blear and only the sharp crack of musket and pistol remained. And then silence.
“Can anyone see them?” Hayden asked. But all the men at the guns shook their heads. Not even the sound of oars could be discerned.
For a long moment nothing could be heard but the breathing of the gunners, none of whom shifted or moved in the least degree.
The mist astern of them swirled and a little breeze touched Hayden’s face, the sodden sails half filled. At a word from Barthe seamen ran to tend the mizzen, which threatened to back and gybe. The mizzen sheet running through its block, unnoticed under most circumstances, made the most unholy squeal.
Every eye was fixed astern. “If this wind carries us a hundred paces . . .” Barthe whispered to Hayden. “Ransome may never find us.”
“We can hardly anchor,” Hayden said.
“No, sir, and we will accomplish little by letting sheets fly, they are near slack as it is.”
Although that was true, the ship was moving.
“I told Ransome to keep the ship in sight . . .” Hayden wanted to pound a fist on the rail. If he waited for the lieutenant to find him, he might lose his ship. He turned to the seaman who was running messages. “Pass the word up to Mr Wickham: Can he see our cutter?”
“Aye, sir.” The man went off at a silent run, and in a moment the word reached the midshipman aloft.
Staring up, Hayden saw the boy look down at him and shake his head. The cutter had sunk into the fog.
“Do you think the French might have taken them?” Barthe asked.
“Unlikely, unless there was more than one boat out there in the fog. Not impossible.” Hayden’s indecision passed. “We cannot wait for them, Mr Barthe. I will not send every man aboard into a French prison to save a dozen men from the same fate. Let us make the most of this wind. Mr Ransome will have to look to himself.”
But there was little they could do but let the wind press them on. Hayden dared not send men aloft to loose sail, for silence was more important than speed. There appeared to be French ships all around. Their only hope lay in stealth, in slipping away under cover of fog. If only they could hear the French ships approach so that they might slip off before they were discovered.
The explosion of guns firing rent the air, the angry flashes visible in the fog not so far off. And then Hayden heard men crying out.
“Is there a British ship out there?” Barthe asked, almost breathless.
“Perhaps, Mr Barthe, but I believe a Frenchman just mistook one of his own frigates for the Themis.”
This appeared to sober Barthe considerably.
“Have we gunports open, Captain?” Barthe asked.
“And guns manned to larboard and starboard,” Hayden replied.
A stain appeared in the fog aft. For a moment Hayden thought it was smoke from the guns, but then he saw movement.
“There they are, sir!” Gould whispered, and the word passed back through the ship, a muffled susurration that went all the way out to Hobson on the jib-boom.
Hayden shrugged his shoulders to work the knots out of them. “Yes, bring the men aboard and stream the cutter.”
The cutter caught them up and was brought alongside, the men tumbling over the rail, several wounded. Ransome and Hawthorne came immediately aft.
“We drove the boat off, sir, but there is a ship in our wake—a first-rate, it appears, sir.”
“In this small wind we shall leave any three-decker behind,” Hayden assured them. “You had some wounded?”
“Yes, sir. And they did for Greenfield, Captain. I ordered him put over the side. I am sorry, sir.”
Hayden nodded. “I am sorry as well.” Seamen preferred to be buried at sea with words said over them, preferably by a parson. To be slipped over the side in the midst of an action was one of the men’s nightmares. There were numerous stories, most if not all apocryphal, of men found floating, alive, who had been put over the side because their mates believed them dead. Each story more horrifying than the last.
Ransome was powder-stained and looked shaken, as though something had happened of which he did not wish to speak.
“You may repair below a moment if you wish, Mr Ransome.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“And Ransome?”
“Sir?”
“Well done.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Ransome made his way, swaying, across the deck and disappeared below.
“Is he injured, Mr Hawthorne?” Hayden asked the marine.
“No, sir.” Hawthorne looked almost as out of sorts as Ransome, giving Hayden the impression that he might weep. “Greenfield was crying out and moaning, sir—from the pain of his wound, you see. The lieutenant ordered his mates keep him quiet . . . lest we be discovered.” Hawthorne worked his jaw, but no words came. “I believe they may have—without meaning to in the least—suffocated him, sir.”
“Good God. Are you certain it was accidental?”
“I was in the bow, sir, watching for the French. I cannot answer that with certainty.”
“Who were the men?”
“Again, Captain. I was removed from it . . . Ransome would know.”
“Well, I cannot leave the deck to speak with him now. Why do you think they may have done for him?”
“I believe they tried to muffle Greenfield’s cries with a shirt, sir, but they smothered him instead.”
“You do not think he died of his wounds?”
“Perhaps the doctor could say, Captain, but I do not possess such knowledge.”
“We will never know now,” Hayden said softly. “You may go, Mr Hawthorne.”
“Thank you, sir,” but the marine stood a moment more.
“Mr Hawthorne?”
Hawthorne nodded, groping for words. “They were all good men, sir. Not a blackguard among them.”
“I have no doubt of it, Mr Hawthorne. I am certain it could never have been done a-purpose, but . . .” Hayden looked up at his lieutenant. “But murder without intent is . . . murder under the law . . . God save them, if that is the case.”
The marine lieutenant retreated and left Hayden standing at the rail alone. Despite the near-flat sea, he reached out and took hold of the rail. He swore under his breath. There had been a murder aboard this very ship before Philip Stephens had sent him aboard. Maybe she was a bad-luck ship, as many said. Hayden muttered another curse. He would have to enquire into this matter most carefully—there would almost certainly be a court-martial. And Ransome . . . he should have spoken up. Hayden should not have heard it first from Hawthorne. He found this possibility of murder more distressing even than their present situation. Certainly it must have been an accident—certainly it must.
Hayden tried to turn his mind from this matter. It would be dealt with in its own time. There was far more pressing business before them.
Again guns were heard out in the fog. A series of three evenly spaced shots, a pause, and then two more.
He glanced at Barthe, who twisted about on his bench every few moments, first looking this way, then that.
“What are they saying, I wonder?”
Barthe shrugged. “I wish I knew, sir. That is a different signal to what we heard before.”
From all points of the compass, the signal was answered.
“Six ships,” Barthe counted. “And all of them too near, sir . . . wherever they are.”
The Themis sailed, ever so slowly, into a thick bank of fog, the air seeming to cool all around. At almost the same instant, the sails fell limp and barely rippled as the ship rolled ever so slightly, forth and back.
“Can this little wind not hold for half of the hour!” Barthe muttered.
The bow of his ship was devoured by the fog until Hayden could not make out his foremast. They could have been floating through the sky, the world far below them, for even the sea immediately aft was lost in fog.
“I’ve never seen fog so thick, sir,” Barthe whispered.
“Nor I, Mr Barthe.”
A few moments they drifted, unable to tell if they made way or lay becalmed or even made stern way. And then, in the depth of silence, a muffled running of bare feet, and one of the hands shot out of the fog, running like he was pursued by devils.
“Ship off the starboard bow, Captain!” the man said, trying to pitch his voice low.
“Helm to starboard,” Hayden ordered the helmsman, and then cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted, in French, up into the rigging. “Ship on the starboard bow!”
Wickham took up the call and repeated it as loudly as he was able. Hayden grabbed the pull and rang the ship’s bell madly. All the while he stared into the fog, thinking for a moment that Hobson had made a mistake, there was no ship, or it was not so near as he’d thought.
But then a jib-boom thrust through the cloud, not ten yards to starboard, drawing in train the bow of a ship. The bow seemed to be moving so slowly that it was minutes until the rest of the ship was revealed—a two-decker, not thirty feet distant, two rows of gunports open. And there she lost all way, her crew and officers staring down at the British frigate from their higher deck.
“Praise to God,” Hayden called out in French. “We did not collide . . . even going so slowly . . .”
The French captain came and leaned over the rail, looking down at Hayden. “Capitaine,” he said, “we know you are an English ship. Do not attempt to claim otherwise. Surrender or I shall fire into you. At this short range, I don’t think even your gunnery will preserve you, Capitaine.”
Hayden was looking directly down the barrel of a French gun. All around he could feel his men holding their breath. He was about to claim his innocence again and argue that he was French, but he fixed his eyes upon the French captain standing at the rail and realised that the man was not going to be bluffed—he knew the truth.
“I regret, Capitaine,” Hayden answered in French, “that I cannot, with honour, surrender without firing a shot.”
The French captain—a man of middle years—nodded. “Fire your larboard battery and strike your . . . our colours, Capitaine. And then, please, prepare to surrender. I will send my lieutenant aboard.”
Hayden turned to find Archer standing in the companionway, a look of utter shock upon his face.
“Mr Archer. Fire the larboard battery, if you please.”
Archer nodded dumbly, touched his hat, and went below. A moment later the larboard battery fired as one, a horrible explosion, and then the smoke blossomed up, covering the deck. The silence that followed seemed so utterly profound and complete, as though the entire world had lost its voice.
“Strike the French colours,” Hayden ordered into that terrible void.
Seamen hurried to do as he bid.
At that instant, Hayden heard the sound of a gallery window opening and then a splash—the British signal book in its lead covers had gone into the sea. Perse had performed this last duty flawlessly, as always.
A strange numbness had crept over Hayden, as though he had breathed in the cold fog and it had frozen his heart. His mind seemed very clear and uncluttered, with no extraneous thoughts creeping in.
He had lost his ship . . . He had lost his ship!
Turning, he gazed along the deck at all the men mustered at their guns or waiting to handle sail. They stared back, pale-faced, their thoughts impenetrable. No doubt they had all heard stories of French prisons. There were no illusions on that score.
The French flag came down to the deck—though Hayden was not sure why. It would be raised again in a moment.
Hayden ordered the starboard guns run in and secured and the gunports closed, and then he mustered the men on the foredeck and along the larboard gangway.
“Offer no resistance,” Hayden said to them. “I believe we shall not be treated unkindly. It is no dishonour to surrender here, to a much superior ship, becalmed and unable to effect an escape. You have all performed your duties in a manner that would make any captain proud. Not once have you shied or failed out of fear. It has been an honour to be your captain.” Hayden saluted them and the men all returned that salute.
A boat from the French ship came alongside and a young lieutenant clambered quickly up the side, looking both apprehensive and excited at the same moment, though the former he tried to hide. Hayden met him at the rail. The young man—hardly more than twenty—saluted and Hayden returned it. He had never expected to do what next he must do. He offered up his sword.
“My captain has instructed me to inform you that you may keep your sword, Capitaine. My boat will carry you over. Do not be concerned, your crew will be fairly treated.” The young man gestured, and with a single look back at the anxious faces of his men, Hayden climbed down into the waiting boat.
The boat pushed off, and someone on the deck called out, “Three cheers for Captain Hayden!”
And the men huzzahed three times with such energy that it must have carried for miles—and though Hayden was more moved than he could say, he thought it was also a shout of defiance. His crew had lost their ship but would not so easily give up their pride.
Ropes were being carried from the French ship to the Themis, and armed men ferried across by boat. His ship, lifting and falling on the swell and adrift in curling mist, appeared utterly forlorn to him. A prize of the enemy. A symbol of his failure. It even occurred to him to curse Stephens, who had informed him that there was but a single French frigate sailing from Le Havre. He knew, however, that the failure had been his. Bad luck might have played a part, but he had made poor decisions. He could see a few men watching him go. Upon their faces looks of utter hopelessness. Hayden had always pulled them through before, no matter what the circumstances, but this time there was nothing he could do. They were prisoners of the French and the French were killing each other by the thousands—how would friendless British sailors fare in such a world?
Some of the hands were stirred away from the rail and sent aloft—to take in sail, no doubt.
That was all the time Hayden was allowed to gaze at his ship or even worry about the fate of his crew, for he was alongside the French seventy-four and climbing up the side. As he came over the rail he was met by the same officer who had demanded his surrender. The man saluted him, and Hayden returned the gesture.
“So,” the captain said in cultivated French, “at last I am allowed the honour of meeting le comte.”
Hayden could not have been more surprised. “I must disappoint you, Capitaine,” Hayden protested, “for I am no count, nor a nobleman of any kind. Charles Hayden, a mere master and commander. Not even a post captain.”
“Raymondde Lacrosse, capitaine of Les Droits de l’Homme.”
“‘The Rights of Man,’” Hayden repeated.
“Oui, Capitaine. Exactly so.”
“I offered my sword to your lieutenant.”
“I require only your word that you will not use it against my people while you remain our guest.”
“You have my word.”
“Come, there is a meal awaiting in my cabin.”
As they passed along the gangway, Hayden realised he was the object of the greatest fascination to the hands and officers alike, as though they had never seen an Englishman before. Certainly, they had not seen many who had just surrendered their ships.
Down they went to the gun-deck below. Hayden could not help but notice that there appeared to be no shortage of men aboard this ship, unlike British ships, which commonly sailed short of their proper complement. Here each gun had its proper number.
He was led into the captain’s cabin, which had not been disassembled as would be the case on a British ship. Here a table was spread with simple serving dishes and servants stood silently by.
“Forgive my table, Capitaine,” Lacrosse said. “Since the revolution it is no longer acceptable to display too much silver.”
Hayden was shown to a chair, which a servant pushed in behind him.
“Pardon me, Capitaine Lacrosse, but I must ask what will be done with my crew and officers.”
“They will all be fairly treated, you need not trouble yourself in the least in that regard. As long as they cause no trouble, that is. But once they are ashore, they will be sent who knows where and I will have no influence over their treatment, I am sorry to say. I doubt they will be treated worse than the French sailors you have locked up in your hulks. Of course, your officers will be exchanged, and quickly, I should think.”
“Thank you, Capitaine,” Hayden said. “Why did you call me the count?”
Lacrosse smiled charmingly. “It is said, because of your command of our language, that you are a Frenchman. An émigré captain from the French Navy, in fact, a nobleman and a royalist.”
Hayden felt a little shudder of apprehension and realization, as though he had been cast into the winter sea. Unwilling to admit his heritage for fear of reprisals against his mother’s family, Hayden responded. “When I was a small child, my nursemaid was a lovely French woman. You see, my mother was an invalid and had very little to do with raising me. She died when I was a boy. As a result, I spoke French before I learned English, or so I am told. My father was a post captain in the Royal Navy—Captain William Saunders Hayden.”
