wind. Her studdingsails disappeared, and she turned to pursue the Bellone, setting a press of staysails. She would deal with the Frenchman and then come back to see about this hypothetical prize.
‘Surely to God you must see she’s spilling her wind,’ cried Jack within himself. ‘Surely to God you’ve seen that old trick before?’ They slipped away and away across the distant sea, the frigate with a fine bold bow-wave at her stern and the Bellone keeping just beyond the reach of her chasers; and when they were no more than flecks of white, hull down to the north-north-east, Jack climbed heavily out of the top. The seaman gave him a compassionate yet philosophic nod; this had happened to him before; it was happening to jack now; it was one of the little miseries of life.
After dark Captain Azéma altered course according to his instructions, and the Indiaman headed into a lonely sea, drawing her slow furrow a hundred miles in the four and twenty hours, never to be seen by the frigate again.
At the far end of that furrow lay Corunna; he had no doubt of Captain Azéma’s making his landfall to within a mile or so, for not only was Azéma a thorough-going seaman, but this clear weather continued day after day
– perfect weather for observation, for fixing his position.
Corunna: Spain. But now that jack was known for an officer they would never let him ashore. Unless he gave his parole, Azéma would put him in irons, there to lie until the Bellone or some chasse-marée carried him to France -his was a valuable carcass.
The next day was a total void: the unbroken round of the sea, the dome of the sky, thin cloud lightening to blue above. And the next was the same, distinguished only by what Jack thought to be the beginnings of the influenza, and a certain skittishness observed in the Misses Lamb, pursued by Azéma’s lieutenant and a sixteen-year old volunteer with flashing eyes.
But Friday’s sea was all alive with sails – the ocean
was speckled with the sober drab of a fleet of bankers, coming home with codfish from Newfoundland; they could be smelt a mile downwind. And among the bankers a bean-cod, a double-lateen with a host of odd, haphazard-looking sails, a strange vessel with an archaic prow; and a disagreeable reminder that the coast was near – your bean-cod was no ocean crosser. But though the bean-cod was of absorbing interest to a sailor, the plain cutter far down to leeward wiped it entirely from their attention.
‘You see the cutter, sir?’ said Pullings.
Jack nodded. The cutter was a rig more favoured by the English than the French; it was used by the Navy and by privateers, by smugglers and by those who pursued smugglers, being fast, nimble and weatherly, lying very
close to the wind; it was of no great use to merchants. And this particular little vessel was no merchantman: what
merchantman would steer that erratic course among the bankers? She did not belong to the Navy, either, for as soon as she sighted the Lord Nelson a gaff-topsail appeared above her mainsail, a modern sail not countenanced in the service. She was a privateer.
This was Captain Azéma’s opinion too. He had the guns drawn, reloaded and run out on both sides; he was in no particular hurry, because the cutter had to work straight up into the eye of the wind. Furthermore, as she came nearer, tacking and tacking again, it was clear that she had had a rough time of it not long ago – her mainsail was double-reefed, presumably from some recent damage; there were strangely-patched holes all over it and more in her foresail and ragged jib; her upper works had a chewed appearance; and one of her seven little gun-ports on the starboard side had been hastily repaired. There was not much danger to be feared from her, but still he was going to take no risks: he had new boarding-netting rigged out, a great deal of cartridge filled, and shot brought up; and his acting-bosun, helped by all the Lascars who were capable of work, secured the yards.
The Lord Nelson was ready long before the cutter fired a gun and hoisted English colours; but she did not reply at once. Azéma looked at Jack and Pullings. ‘I will not ask you to go downstairs,’ he said, ‘but if you will to hail or to signal, I shall be compelled to shoot you.’ He smiled, but he had two pistols in his belt and he meant what he said.
Jack said, ‘Just so,’ and bowed. Pullings smiled diffidently.
The cutter was lying on the Indiaman’s bow, her mainsail shivering; Azéma nodded to the man at the wheel. The Lord Nelson turned gently, and Azéma said, ‘Fire.’ The broadside, the eighteen-pounders alone, parted on the downward roll; beautifully grouped, the shots struck the sea just short of the cutter’s larboard bow and beam, ricocheting over her, adding new holes to her sails and knocking away the outer third of her bowsprit. Startled by this reception, the cutter tried to fill and come about, but with so little way on her and with her jib flying in the breeze she would not stay. She fell off, giving the Lord Nelson her seven six-pounders as she did so, and wore round on the other tack.
The cutter knew she had come up against a tough’un, a difficult article – half a broadside like this would send her to the bottom; but gathering way she crossed the Lord Nelson’s stern, fired again, gybed like a dancer and crossed back to lie upon her starboard bow. At two hundred yards her six-pounders did the Indiaman’s thick sides no harm, but they did Cut up her rigging, and it was clearly in the cutter’s mind to carry on with this manoeuvre.
Azéma was having none of it. The cutter had gone to and fro in spite of his yawing to fire, and now he brought the wind right abeam, swinging the ship through 90°. He ran down the line of guns, speaking to each crew, and sent a deliberate broadside to the space of sea the cutter had filled two seconds earlier – as though by magic, intuition, telepathy, the cutter’s master put his helm a-lee the instant
of the call to fire, coming about in a flash and heading for the Lord Nelson. He did so again two minutes later, less by magic than by a calculation of the time it would take these gunners to have him in their sights again. He was going to board, and he had only one more short tack to bring him up against the Lord Nelson’s bows. Jack could see the men there, cutlasses and boarding-axes ready, twenty-five or thirty of them, the master at the tiller, a long sword in his other hand: in a moment now they would start their cheer.
‘Fire,’ said Azéma again, and as the smoke cleared there was the cutter with her topsail gone, hanging drunkenly over her side, no captain at the tiller, a heap of men struggling or motionless upon her deck. Her way carried her on past the Lord Nelson’s bows, out of reach of the next discharge; and now she was racing away, fleeing to gain a hundred yards or so before the Lord Nelson’s ponderous turn should bring her starboard broadside to bear.
She survived it, though it was difficult to see how she did so, with so much white water kicked up all round her; and Azéma, who did not feel passionately about either taking or sinking her, sent only a few more shots after her before returning to his course. Ten minutes later she had sent up a new jib and foresail and she was dwindling, smaller and smaller among the distant bankers. Jack felt for his watch; he liked to note the beginning and the end of all engagements – it was gone, of course.
‘I think it was temerarious, immoral,’ said Azéma. ‘Suppose he had killed some of my people! He should be broken on the wheel. I should have sunk him. I am too magnanimous. That is not courage, but hardfooliness.’
‘I would agree,’ said Jack, ‘if it had been the other way around. A sloop that does not strike to a ship of the line is a fool.’
‘We see things differently,’ said Azéma, still cross over the time lost and the damage to his rigging. ‘We have different proportions. But at least’ – his g6od humour returning – ‘I hope your countrymen will give us a day of rest tomorrow.’
He had his day of rest, and another morning too; but shortly after he had taken his noon observation – 450 23′ N., 10° 30′ W. – and had promised his prisoners Spanish bread and real coffee for breakfast, there was the cry of a sail to windward.