Scarborough Fair - Chris Scott Wilson [79]
“My God,” Dale said in disbelief, rubbing a grubby hand across his eyes. “Alliance is raking us. Our own ship is trying to sink us!”
The petty officer was muttering. “He’s a bloody maniac, that damned Frenchie. Or else he’s bloody blind. You couldn’t mistake us for t’other. Christ, Richard’s black as night and yon Serapis has got yellow topsides.”
As the other men shook fists and cursed, Lt. Dale turned his back in order to watch the seaward quarter. Alliance loomed out of the darkness, swinging to starboard, so close he could see expressions clearly on faces lit by battle lanterns. They were reloading as she crabbed to cross their bows. She was going to rake them again! Dale cupped a hand to his mouth. “Ahoy Alliance! Lay on board the enemy!”
The seamen joined in. “Don’t fire!” They even heard a boy’s voice call from the mast-top: “I beg you not to sink us!”
They fell silent as Alliance’s battery was run out again. There could be no doubt. It was deliberate. The petty officer shook his head, whispering. “God help us, and the Devil damn his soul for all eternity.” Then they saw the flashes, long tongues of orange licking from the guns. One, two, three, they rippled along the frigate’s flank, seven, eight, nine. Huge chunks of chain whirled over their heads as the noise of the detonations reached out over the North Sea. Grapeshot pounded the hull, punching holes the size of sovereigns.
Not one gun was fired in reply to the treachery. Richard’s decks were a shambles of burst and useless cannon from Serapis’s continuous broadsides at point-blank range, the shattered planking strewn with the dead and the dying.
On the foc’sle Lt. Dale came up onto his knees for a better view. Alliance, untouched, was sailing calmly onward as though a player in some bizarre game. How much more could Bonhomme Richard take? Surely to God, they must be sinking now, he thought. There could be nothing left keeping her afloat but dreams, and there were precious few of those left. He looked over his shoulder at the sailors still crouched by the rail. Some had recovered and were shooting their muskets. Others were stunned, plumbing new depths of despair now their hope of aid was dashed.
“Keep your men here, and keep them fighting,” Dale ordered. When the petty officer ignored him, he put a hand on his shoulder. The man keeled over to sprawl on the deck. Dale rolled him over. Dead. Another one gone. Suddenly, he was exhausted. He was sick of it. A shadow crossed his face.
“Sir? Sir?” A junior lieutenant knelt to shake his arm. “Sir? The commodore wants to see you aft.”
Dale’s gaze was bankrupt. Slowly, he forced his eyes to refocus and his breath rushed out in a long hiss. “Very well. Take command here. Keep them busy. Preferably keep them fighting.”
***
The prisoners crouched helplessly in the brig below the main gun deck, shackled together in rows of misery. The air was fogged with gun smoke, the stench of burnt black powder in their nostrils. Those not deafened by the bursting eighteen-pounders watched the roof timbers fearfully as salvo chased salvo from the English guns, ripping through the ship. Between the stutters of cannon were always the sharp cracks of musket fire and deeper detonations from grenades. Here and there they heard a burst of cheering or a wail of agony.
Even the normally talkative Billy had fallen quiet. His hopes of freedom had sapped away during the long hours of the battle. Reflexes dulled, his chin rested on his arms. He no longer darted glances upward when explosions occurred close by. His thoughts were full of his lost sloop Speedwell. Without her he had nothing, not even the means to make a living. The other two Whitby men were silent too,