1805 nd-6 Page 13

  'Villeneuve?'

  'Or Nelson, perhaps. But we must assume the worst. My theory is wrong if you are right. And they have a wind. Perhaps we will too in an hour.'

  He looked aloft at the pendant flying from the mainmast head. It was already beginning to lift a trifle. Drinkwater crossed the deck and stared into the binnacle. The compass card oscillated gently but showed clearly that the breeze was coming from the west.

  'You know, James, that report we had that Ganteaume got out of Brest proved false.'

  'Yes, sir.'

  'Well, perhaps Villeneuve is coming back to spring Ganteaume from the Goulet and then make his descent upon the Strait of Dover.'

  'Possibly, sir,' replied Quilhampton, unwilling to argue, and aware that Drinkwater must be allowed his prerogative. In Quilhampton's youthful opinion the Frogs were not capable of that kind of thing.

  Drinkwater knew of the young officer's scepticism and said, 'Lord Barham has the same opinion of the French as myself, Mr Q, otherwise he would not have gone to all the trouble of ensuring they were intercepted.'

  Thus mildly rebuked, Quilhampton realised his minutes of intimacy with the captain were over. While Drinkwater considered what to do until the breeze gave them steerage way, Quilhampton considered that, as far as second lieutenants were concerned, it did not seem to matter if Lord Melville or Lord Barham were in charge of the Admiralty; the lot of serving officers was still a wretched one.

  The breeze came from the west at mid-morning. Setting all sail, Drinkwater pressed Antigone to the east-north-east. Then, at six bells in the forenoon watch there was a brief lifting of the visibility. To the north-west they made out the pale square of sails over the shapes of hulls, while to the north-east they saw Calder's look-out ship, Defiance. Both Antigone and Defiance threw out the signal for an enemy fleet in sight and fired guns. Drinkwater knew that Calder could not be far away. Immediately upon making his signal, Captain Durham of the Defiance turned his ship away, squaring her yards before the wind and retiring on the main body of the fleet. Taking his cue, Drinkwater ordered studding sails set and attempted to cross the enemy's van and rejoin his own admiral. Shortly after this the fog closed in again, although the breeze held and Drinkwater cleared the frigate for action.

  'We seem destined to go into battle blind, Sam,' he said to the first lieutenant as Rogers took his post on the quarterdeck. 'Snow in January and bloody fog in July and this could be the decisive battle of the war, for God's sake!'

  Rogers grunted his agreement. 'Only the poxy French could conjure up a bloody fog at a moment like this.'

  Drinkwater grinned at Rogers's prejudice. 'It could be providence, Sam. What does the Bible say about God chastising those he loves best?'

  'Damned if I know, sir, but a fleet action seems imminent and we're going to miss it because of fog!'

  Drinkwater felt a spark of sympathy for Rogers. Distinguishing himself in such an action was Rogers's only hope of further advancement.

  'Look, sir!' Another momentary lifting of the fog showed the French much nearer to them now, crossing their bows and holding a steadier breeze than reached Antigone.

  'We shall be cut off, damn it,' muttered Drinkwater, suddenly realising that he might very well be fighting for his life within an hour. He turned on Rogers. 'Sam, serve the men something at their stations. Get food and grog into them. You have twenty minutes.'

  It proved to be a very long twenty minutes to Drinkwater. In fact it stretched to an hour, then two. Drinkwater had seen no signals from Calder and had only a vague idea of the admiral's position. All he did know was that the French fleet lay between Antigone and the British line-of-battle ships. At about one in the afternoon the fog rolled back to become a mist, thickening from time to time in denser patches, so that they might see three-quarters of a mile one minute and a ship's length ahead the next. Into this enlarged visible circle the dim and sinister shapes of a battle-line emerged, led by the 80-gun Argonauta, flying the red and gold of Castile.

  'It is the Combined Fleet, by God,' Drinkwater muttered as he saw the colours of Spain alternating with the tricolour of France. He spun Antigone to starboard, holding her just out of gunshot as she picked up the stronger breeze that had carried the enemy thus far.

  A vague shape to the north westward looked for a little like the topsails of a frigate and Drinkwater hoped it was Sirius. At six bells in the afternoon watch he decided to shorten sail, hauled his yards and swung north, crossing the Spanish line a mile ahead of the leading ship which was flying an admiral's flag. Rogers was looking at him expectantly. At extreme range it seemed a ridiculous thing to do but he nodded his permission. Rogers walked the line of the larboard battery, checking and sighting each gun, doing what he was best at.

  As he reached the aftermost gun he straightened up. 'Fire!'

  Antigone shook as the guns recoiled amid the smoke of their discharge and their crews swabbed, loaded and rammed home. She trembled as the heavy carriages were hauled out through the open ports again and their muzzles belched fire and iron at the long-awaited enemy. As the smoke from the second broadside cleared they were rewarded by an astonishing sight. Little damage seemed to have been inflicted upon the enemy at the extremity of their range, but the Combined Fleet was heaving to.

  'Probably thinks that Calder's just behind us out of sight,' Rogers put in, rubbing his hands with glee.

  Drinkwater wore Antigone round and immediately the yards were squared they made out the shapes of two frigates on their larboard bow, dim, ghostly vessels close-hauled as they approached from the east.

  'The private signal, Mr Frey, and look lively!' He did not want to be shot at as he retreated ahead of the French, and already he recognised Sirius with her emerald-green rail.

  The colours of flags clarified as the ships closed and Drinkwater turned Antigone to larboard to come up on Sirius's quarter. The second British frigate, Égyptienne, loomed astern. Drinkwater saw Prowse step up on the rail with a speaking trumpet. 'Heard gunfire, Drinkwater. Was that you?'

  'Yes! The Combined Fleet is just to windward of us!'

  'Form line astern of the Égyptienne. Calder wants us to reconnoitre!'

  'Aye, aye!' Drinkwater jumped down from the mizen chains. 'Back the mizen tops'l, Mr Hill. Fall in line astern of the Égyptienne.' Drinkwater watched Sirius disappear into a fog patch and the second frigate ghosted past. For one glorious moment at about seven bells in the afternoon the fog lifted and the mist rolled back, giving both fleets a glimpse of each other. Astern of the three westward-heading British frigates, the British fleet of fifteen ships-of-the-line was standing south-south-west on the starboard tack, their topgallants set above topsails, but with their courses clewed up. From Sir Robert Calder's 98-gun flagship, the Prince of Wales, flew the signal to engage the enemy. This was repeated from the masthead of his second in command, Rear-Admiral Stirling, on board the Glory.

  To the southward of the three frigates the Combined Fleet straggled in a long line of twenty ships and a few distant frigates. Since they had hove to, they had adjusted their course, edging away from the British frigates which, in order to hold the wind, were also diverging to the north-west. Prowse made the signal to tack and Sirius began to ease round on the enemy rear. She was holding the fluky wind better than either Antigone or Égyptienne. A few minutes later the mist closed down again. Drinkwater set his courses in an attempt to catch up with Sirius and lost contact with the Égyptienne. He heard gunfire to the south and then the sound of a heavier cannonade to the south-east. Next to him Rogers was beside himself with impatience and frustration.

  'God damn it, God damn it,' he muttered, grinding the fist of one hand into the palm of the other.

  'For God's sake relax, Sam. You'll have apoplexy else.'

  'This is agony, sir…'

  'Steer for the guns, Mr Hill.' It was agonising for Drinkwater too. But whereas all Rogers had to do was wait for a target to present itself, Drinkwater worried about the presence of other ships,
dreading a collision. Ahead of them the noise of cannon-fire was growing louder and more persistent. Then, once again, the fog rolled back, revealing broad on their larboard bow the shape of a battleship. This time the enemy were ready for them.

  The roar of forty cannon fire in a ragged broadside split the air. The black hull of the 80-gun vessel towered over them as Rogers roared, 'Fire!'

  Antigone's puny broadside rattled and thudded against the stranger's hull as they saw the red and yellow of Spain and an admiral's flag at her mainmasthead. The wind of the battleship's broadside passed them like a tornado but most of the shot whistled overhead, parting ropes and holing sails. One casualty occurred in the main-top and the main-mast was wounded by two balls, but the Antigone escaped the worst effects of such a storm of iron. As the great ship vanished in the mist Drinkwater read her name across the stern: Argonauta.

  Then there were other ships passing them, the Terrible and America, both disdaining to fire on a frigate, and Drinkwater realised that the Combined Fleet had tacked and were standing north. In the confusion he wondered what on earth Calder was doing, and whether the British admiral had observed this movement. Then the outbreak of a general cannonade told him that the two fleets were still in contact, and the sudden appearance of spouts of water near them convinced him that the British fleet were just beyond the line of the enemy and that Antigone was in the line of fire of the British guns.

  A little after five in the afternoon they made contact again with the Sirius. Both frigates then hauled round and stood towards the gunfire. Once they caught a glimpse of the action and, from what could be discerned, the two fleets were engaged in a confusing mêlée.

  'I don't know what the devil to make of it, damned if I do,' remarked Hill tensely, his tone expressing the frustration they all felt. Antigone continued to edge down in the mist until darkness came, although the gunfire continued for some time afterwards.

  'What in God Almighty's name are we doing?' asked Rogers, looking helplessly round the quarterdeck.

  'Why nothing, Mr Rogers,' said Hill, who was finding the first lieutenant's constant moaning a trifle tedious. To windward of the group of officers Captain Drinkwater studied the situation, privately as mystified as his officers. On the day following the action the weather had remained hazy and the two fleets had manoeuvred in sight of each other. Both had been inactive, as though licking their wounds. After the utter confusion of the 22nd, the British were pleased to find themselves masters of two Spanish prizes. It was also clear that they had badly damaged several more. However, the British ships Windsor Castle and Malta were themselves in poor condition and preparing to detach for England and a dockyard.

  The wind had held, the Combined Fleet remained with the advantage of the weather gauge, and Calder waited for Villeneuve to attack. But the allied commander hesitated.

  'All I've had to do today,' remarked Rogers in one of his peevish outbursts, 'is report another three casks of pork as being rotten! I ask you, is that the kind of work fit for a King's sea-officer?'

  Although the question had been rhetorical it had brought forth a sotto voce comment from Midshipman Glencross for which the young man had been sent to the foremasthead to cool his heels and guard his tongue. As Drinkwater had written in his journal, the last days had been inconclusive if our task is to annihilate the enemy. And today, it seemed, was to be worse. The wind had shifted at dawn and every ship in the British fleet hourly expected Calder to form his line, station his frigates to windward for the repeating of his signals, and to bear down upon the enemy. As hour after hour passed and the wind increased slowly to a fresh breeze and then to a near gale, nothing happened. Villeneuve's fleet edged away to the north. By six o'clock in the evening the Combined Fleet was out of sight.

  'Well,' remarked Lieutenant Fraser as he took over the deck and the hands were at last stood down from their quarters, 'at least we stopped them getting into Ferrol, but it's no' cricket we're playing. I wonder what they'll think o'this in London?'

  Chapter Fourteen

  The Fog of War

  July-August 1805

  'Dear God, how many more?'

  'Best part of the ground tier, sir, plus a dozen other casks among the batch shipped aboard off Ushant. I'd guess some of that pork was pickled back in the American War.'

  Drinkwater sighed. Rogers might be exaggerating, but then again it was equally possible that he was not. 'If we ain't careful, Sam, we'll be obliged to request stores; just at the moment that would be intolerable. Apart from anything else we must wait on this rendezvous a day or two more.'

  'D'you think there's going to be a battle then? After that farting match last week? There's a rumour that Calder is going to be called home to face a court-martial,' Rogers said, a note of irreverent glee in his voice.

  'I'm damned if I know where these infernal rumours start,' Drinkwater said sharply. 'You should know better than believe 'em.'

  Rogers shrugged. 'Well, it's not my problem, sir, whereas these casks of rotten pork are.'

  'Damn it!' Drinkwater rose, his chair squeaking backwards with the violence of his movement. 'Damn it! D'you know Sam,' he said, unlocking the spirit case and pouring two glasses of rum, 'I've never felt so uncomfortable before. That business the other day was shameful. We should never have let the French get away unmolested. God knows what'll come of it… we don't know where the devil they are now. The only ray of hope is that Calder has joined forces with Gardner or Cornwallis if he's back on station, and that Nelson's rejoined 'em from the West Indies. With that concentration off Ushant, at least the Channel will be secure, but it is the uncertainty of matters that unsettles me.'

  Rogers nodded his agreement. 'Worse than a damned fog.'

  'But you want to know about the pork,' Drinkwater sighed. 'How many weeks can we last out at the present rate?'

  Rogers shrugged, considered for a moment and said, 'Ten, possibly eleven.'

  'Very well. I'll see what I can do about securing some from another ship in due course.'

  'Beg pardon, sir, but what are our orders?'

  'Well, we are to sit tight here on Calder's rendezvous for a week. Aeolus and Phoenix are within a hundred miles of us, with the seventy-four Dragon not so far. We are intended to observe Ferrol.' Drinkwater opened one of the charts that lay, almost permanently now, upon his table top. He laid his finger on a spot a hundred miles north-north-west of Cape Finisterre, 'The four of us are holding Calder's old post between us while he retires on the Channel Fleet in case Villeneuve makes his expected push for the Channel.'

  'And if Villeneuve obliges and the Channel Fleet does no better than Calder did t'other day, then I'd say Boney had a better than even chance of getting his own way in the Dover Strait.'

  'I doubt if Cornwallis would let him…'

  'But you said yourself, sir, that Cornwallis might not yet be back at sea. What's Gardner's fighting temper?'

  'We'll have little enough to worry about if Nelson's back…'

  'But maybe he isn't. And even Nelson could be fooled by a fog. 'Tis high summer, just what the bloody French want. I reckon they'd be across in a week.'

  Drinkwater fell silent. He was not of sufficiently different an opinion to contradict Rogers. He poured them each another glass.

  'To be candid, Sam, things look pretty black.'

  'Like the Earl of Hell's riding boots.'

  No such strategic considerations preoccupied James Quilhampton as, for the duration of his watch and in the absence of the captain, he paced the weather side of the quarterdeck. His mind was far from the cares of the ship, daydreaming away his four hours on deck as Antigone rode the blue waters of the Atlantic under easy sail. He was wholly given to considering his circumstances in so far as they were affected by Miss Catriona MacEwan. From time to time, as he walked up and down, his right hand would clasp the stump of his left arm and he would curse the iron hook that he wore in place of a left hand. Although he possessed several alternatives, including one made for him on the bo
mb-vessel Virago that had been painted and was a tolerable likeness to the real thing, he felt that such a disfigurement was unlikely to enable him to secure the young woman as his wife. He cursed his luck. The wound that had seemed such an honourable mark in his boyhood now struck him for what it really was, a part of him that was gone for ever, its absence making him abnormal, abominable. How foolish it now seemed to consider it in any other way. The pride with which he had borne home his iron hook now appeared ridiculous. He had seen the pity in Catriona's eyes together with the disgust. As he recollected the circumstances it seemed that her revulsion had over-ridden her pity. He was maimed; there was no other way to look at the matter. Certainly that harridan of an aunt would point out James Quilhampton had no prospects, no expectations, no fortune and no left hand!

  But she had been undeniably pleasant to him, surely. He pondered the matter, turning over the events of their brief acquaintanceship, recollecting the substance of her half-dozen letters that led him to suppose she, at least, viewed his friendship if not his suit with some favour. Reasoning thus he raised himself out of his despondency only to slump back into it when he considered the uncertainty of his fate. He was in such a brown study that the quartermaster of the watch had to call his attention to the masthead's hail.

  'Deck! Deck there!'

  'Eh? What? What is it?'

  'Eight sail to the norrard, sir!'

  'What d'you make of 'em?'

  'Clean torps'ls, sir, Frenchmen!'

  'Pass word for the captain!' Quilhampton shouted, scrambling up on the rail with the watch glass and jamming himself against the mizen shrouds. Within minutes Drinkwater was beside him.

  'Where away, Mr Q?'

  'I can't see them from the deck, sir… wait! One, two… six… eight, sir. Eight sail and they are French!'

  Drinkwater levelled his own glass and studied the newcomers as they sailed south, tier after tier of sails lifting over the horizon until he could see the bulk of their hulls and the white water foaming under their bows as they manoeuvred into line abreast.