Signal Close Action (45 page)

And again the smoke surged towards the stranded
Osiris,
sti
rred and blown by another massive broadside. Pascoe said,
'
Buzzard
.'

Allday leaned against him and looked at Bolitho. 'Bless him, sir, did you hear that-?'

'Yes.' Bolitho sheathed his sword without knowing why he had done so. 'No frigate carries that number of men.'

The second lieutenant dropped his head and said brokenly, "That damned
Nicator.
Here at last, too late to save our ship and all our men.'

Sunlight probed through the smoke, and Bolitho saw leaping flames and heard the crackle of burning timber. A mastless hulk, abandoned and well ablaze, was less than fifty yards away. - But as the smoke swirled high in the air, he stared at a ship which even now was firing another broadside downwind, at some other invisible target.

There was no mistaking her.
Lysander
was steering past the scattered transports, firing into individual vessels, or pouring a half-broadside into one isolated or apparently untouched. Her other side was obviously firing at the French seventy-four, which explained the first cheers and violent broadsides.

Bolitho saw and understood all of these things, but found they carried no meaning.

Only one thing counted.
Lysander.
Thomas Herrick had come for them, by some fantastic piece of luck and little less than a miracle, he had sailed down from the north channel and turned the anchorage into a shipbreaker's yard.

Pascoe said,
‘I
think that's
Buzz
ard
now, sir!' He was wild-eyed, his chest and throat moving with emotion. 'Yes, it is her! Her sails are so
holed she is barely making way!
'

Bolitho rubbed his eyes, seeing a corvette following close under
Lysander's
stern. She was listing, but had less damage to her sails than Javal's victorious frigate. Also, above her flapping tricolour she was wearing a large Union Jack.

Bolitho wrenched his eyes away. "They've got boats in the water. Tell our people that help is coming.'

He watched the drifting hulk and prayed she was not one of the ammunition ships.

Another gust of wind moved across the water, and he saw that many of the transports had sunk completely. If they were loaded with those great guns, it was not surprising.

Boats pulled below the
Osiris's
shadow, and he heard voices shouting encouragement, while the oarsmen stared grim-faced at the battered, holed wreck which had once been Farquhar's command.

Plowman limped past carrying the ship's chronometer. He saw Bolitho and gave a tense grin. 'Pity to l
eave it in the wreck, sir. 'Er'll
come in useful.' He hurried to the side adding, 'Glad you're safe, sir.'

Bolitho realised there were many boats nearby now, some with armed marines, and swivels mounted on their stems, while the others got on with the work of rescue.

That, too, became clear as he leaned on the rail to watch. Some boats were painted dark red, from
Nicator
then. So somewhere beyond the scattered transports and burning wrecks Probyn's ship was here to see the price of the battle.

A lieutenant crossed the deck and touched his hat to Pascoe. 'Nobody else survived but you ?' He looked very clean against the horror and death.

Bolitho said, 'I survived.'

The lieutenant gaped at him and snapped, 'Beg pardon, sir!
1
did not recognise you in — '

Bolitho said wearily, 'No matter. It has become a custom.'

The officer blinked. 'I am from
Nicator,
sir. We did not think anyone had survived,' he waved his hand despairingly around the deck, 'all this!'

Guthrie, the
Osiris's
second lieutenant, suddenly ran from the poop and seized the young officer by the coat.

'You
bloody
coward!
You
damned,
crawling
toad!
Look what you did-'

As Pascoe pulled him away from the astonished lieutenant, Guthrie broke down completely, his body shaking violently to his sobs.

The lieutenant gasped,
'Nicator
ran aground, sir. But when
Lysander
appeared out of nowhere, we were able to kedge off fairly well. Without Captain Herrick's arrival I fear we would have been even later.'

Bolitho watched him gravely, seeing his despair, his shame at Guthrie's attack.

'Of that I am quite sure.'

He walked to the sagging gangway. 'Now we can clear the ship.'

He paused above the nearest launch, his eyes on the hull's bare outline. Without masts or sails, and with only the dead and a few trapped and crazed men to crew her,
Osiris
was already a wreck. He felt the hull shudder, as if in protest against his thoughts, and knew that the blazing hulk had drifted along the other side. He heard the crackle of flames, the jubilant roar as they spread along
Osiris's
tarred rigging which lay in huge coils to receive them.

The French, or others, might salvage some of her seventy-four guns, and perhaps her bell as a souvenir. But the keel and ribs would lie in the sand long after the flames had been quenched, and until time and the sea completed the victory.

'Cast off.' He sat on the gunwale, surrounded by silent men, some wounded, some merely stunned by all they had witnessed and suffered. 'Give way all!'

Bolitho looked at the other boats. Every one crowded with survivors. But of
Osiris's
original company of six hundred souls there were about half that number. He tightened his hps and felt his gaze smarting from strain. A very heavy price. It was to be hoped someone would appreciate their sacrifice.

He heard a voice calling, and then Allday croaked, 'God, look at that gig!'

It was Lieutenant Veitch, blackened from head to foot and almost naked, but waving towards him and grinning from ear to ear.

Plowman murmured,
'Said
'e'd make it. Th
at what 'e said. The mad bugger!
'

Bolitho lost sense of time and distance, and as the boats were followed and surrounded by drifting smoke it was almost a surprise when he saw
Lysander's
black and buff hull rising like a cliff to greet him, her gun ports crammed with cheering faces, her gangway thronged with seamen and marines.

He gripped the nearest stair below the entry port and pulled himself from the boat. He felt as if his arms would not hold him, or tear from their sockets.

There were hands gripping his, figures pushing around him, helping, staring.

Herrick took his arm and guided him aft.

He said softly,
'Thank
God.'
He turned and studied Bolitho's face for some seconds. 'Thank God.'

Bolitho swung round as a searing column of flame shot above the smoke.
Osiris's
pyre.

He said, 'See to her people, Thomas. They fought well. Better than I dared hope.' He shrugged heavily. 'But for your arrival, their efforts would have failed. Their losses too great when weighed against the gains.'

He nodded as Pascoe joined them. 'Adam, too, is unhurt.'

Herrick peered through the smoke. 'And the captain ?'

Bolitho watched the leaping flames. 'He died in battle.' He turned to Herrick. 'Bravely.'

More cheering echoed through the din of gunfire, and someone called wildl
y, 'The Frenchie's struck, sir!
'

Bolitho looked at Herrick questioningly. 'The seventy-four ?'

'Aye. We shot her steering away, and raked her twice before she could fight clear. I think her captain was so taken with
Osiris's
defiance he did not see us at all.' He reached out awkwardly. 'So you'll have another ship to replace the one lost.'

Lieutenant Kipling strode aft and touched his hat. 'Boarding party in command now, sir. Mr. Gilchrist has hailed us to say that the French commodore and most of his senior officers are wounded.'

Herrick nodded. 'Very well. Tell Mr. Gilchrist to arrange an exchange with the enemy. Their officers and seamen in return for any of
Osiris's
people who managed to swim ashore. And
we
keep their ship.'

Bolitho watched him. What a change. Herrick had not even hesitated or asked his aid.

Herrick faced him again. 'I'd like to anchor, sir. I understand that the French will not pursue their bombardment for the present. Javal ran their frigate into the shallows and she is hard and fast. He took a sprightly corvette as a prize, and I think the surviving one fled south as fast as
h
e could go.'

Bolitho replied, 'Yes, I agree. But it is your decision as flap captain.'

Herrick looked at him and then smiled sadly. 'About Captain Farquhar, sir.'

'It is over for him, Thomas. He died because he put facts before ideas. Because he put too much value in his own future perhaps. But when he did die, it was with courage.'

Herrick sighed.
'That
I never doubted.'

A figure hurried beneath the poop and said, 'You're back safe and sound!'

It was Ozzard, his sad features set in a rare smile.

'Please come aft, sir!'

Bolitho shook his head. 'Later. I want to watch.'

He looked at the ships which were already anchoring, their boats surging alongside with cargoes of rescued men.
Buzzard
,
pockmarked from the French guns, with her neat prize close by. The other French ship, her broad pendant gone and British flags at every masthead.
Immortalité
The name had served her well, he thought. She had survived, and with luck would make a valuable addition to his little squadron.

He heard a loud explosion and watched scattered fragments falling all around.
Osiris's
powder store or a magazine had ignited at last. He saw her open gun ports glowing like lines of red eyes as the fire consumed her from within. Deck by deck, yard by yard.

His mind ached and he wanted to go to find seclusion, deep in the hull, beyond a man's voice or a sight of the, sea.

But he stood by the nettings, watching
Lysander's
preparations, the hurrying figures of so many familiar faces. Old Grubb, nodding and saying something to him about honour. Major Leroux striding to speak with him, but turning away at the last moment after seeing his expression.

Fitz-Clarence, and Kipling, little Midshipman Saxby with his gap-toothed grin, and Mariot, the old gun captain, who had served with his father.

He heard Herrick shout, 'Tell them to
make
haste,
Mr. Steere! The wind is better placed, and I'd like to weigh before noon.'

Before noon? Had it taken so little time since dawn? Bolitho stared listlessly at the littered water, the corpses and charred timbers. Just hours since dawn. That was all it had been. Many had died, more would die later.

He gripped the nettings and took several deep breaths. And he most of all had expected to be killed. That was the strangest part. He had often been near to death in his life at sea. Sometimes so close he had almost felt its presence like another being. This last time had been the worst yet.

Herrick came back to him again. 'I hate to leave you, sir. With most of the men at quarters, and the rest all wild with their victory, it is hard to seize a moment when you need it the most.'

'Thank you, Thomas.' He looked at the blazing
Osiris.
'For them, and for me.'

Herrick said ruefully, 'Had I only
known,
sir.' He looked away. 'But I thought it useless to remain at anchor when you had done so much, had wanted so much for the squadron.'

Bolitho watched him gravely. 'So you just sailed away, Thomas. With a scrap of paper from your acting-commodore which if it had protected him from higher authority would most certainly have damned you. Your future would have been in ruins.'

He saw the lines on Herrick's homely face and guessed that he had thought him dead or captured. By sailing alone from Syracuse he had made his own gesture, just as Inch had described.