Dewey Lambdin - A King`s Commander

"Deck, there!" the foremast lookout finally hollered. "They be tops'ls, on th' 'orizon! Dead on th' bows!"

"How many tops'ls?" Lieutenant Knolles shouted back, with the aid of a brass speaking trumpet, as Alan pretended to "wake."

"Dozens, sir!" came the reply. "One point off th' larboard bow, t' two point off th' starb'rd!"

Lewrie arose and took a catlike stretch.

"Well, could be 'at grain convoy," Buchanon opined. "Hun'r'ds o' ships, I heard, Mister Knolles. Indiamen with New Orleans rice… more with corn an' wheat from th' Chesapeake. 'Ose Ew-nited States of America payin' eir debt t'France. And, makin' th' Devil's own profit, I'll warrant. As arse-o'er-tit'z France 's farms an' markets are since their revolution, 'tis import 'r starve this summer. Why their Navy's out… t' p'rtect th' food, 'r the country goes under. Sounds like we found 'em, just'z oP Admiral Howe lit into 'em, sir!"

"Somebody's lit into someone, Mister Buchanon, ' Lewrie agreed. Warily. There was too much thunder for ships of the line in General Chase of prizes. No convoy could ever make such a din, either.

"Perhaps we might gobble one up, Captain?" Knolles asked. He came of a good family, yes, but they weren't that rich, and prize money of his own would be more than welcome.

"I'm going aloft, again. Mister Knolles, might you lend me your glass?"

Forward this time, to scale the foremast, right up to the crosstrees to join the lookout, a spry young topman named Rushing.

"Mine arse on a bandbox!" Lewrie muttered, once he'd had his long look. "That's no grain convoy."

"Nossir, it ain't," Rushing agreed breezily.

" 'Bout twelve miles off, would you say, Rushing?"

"Ay, Cap'um. 'Bout that."

"Be up to them…" He pulled out his new watch. It was nearly gone eleven of the forenoon. An hour-and-a-half… two hours, and they would be up within spitting distance. Or shooting distance.

Without another word, Lewrie took hold of a standing backstay and clambered down it, legs locked and going hand-over-hand, like any topman. Hating every nutmeg-shrinking moment of it, of course, with nothing but oak to stop his fall from nearly 100 feet above the deck, should he slide too fast and burn his hands, or swing away and dangle by his fists alone.

Once on the quarterdeck again, he gathered his breath by taking another peek at the French frigate off to the east. Their closest pursuer was about five miles off, hull-up now, and driving hard. She had slowly gained on Jester, closing the distance between them, and, more importantly, crabbed up a'weather a touch, so she would still hold the wind gauge when they finally met.

"Hard on the wind, Mister Knolles," Lewrie ordered. "Lay her as close as she'll bear. Hoist every scrap of canvas, 'cept for stuns'ls. We've a race to win."

"Aye, sir," Knolles replied, before turning to issue orders.

"Sorry to disabuse you, Mister Buchanon," Lewrie told him with another forced grin, "but we haven't discovered their grain convoy, no. 'Tis their entire Biscay fleet, yonder. And ours. Having at each the other. That's the thunder we've been chasing all morning!"

"Wull, stap me, sir." Buchanon sighed, blanching a bit.

"Another hour or so, and we'll hear all the 'thunder' a man'd ever wish." Lewrie chuckled, genuinely amused this time. "Pass the word for Mister Giles!"

"Aye, sir?" the purser inquired from the midships hatchway.

"Mister Giles, I'd admire should you issue the midday meal as soon as we've completed bracing in and making more sail," Lewrie told him. "The rum issue, too. Today is a Banyan Day, is it not, sir?"

"Well, aye, sir…" Giles frowned.

"Little need for the galley fires, then."

On Banyan Days, the issue was cold victuals; small-beer, cheese, and biscuit, perhaps with the eternal pea soup, but no meat to be simmered in the steep-tubs.

"On the wind, sir," Knolles reported.

"Very good, Mister Knolles. Once the hands have eat, and drunk their cheer, well beat to quarters. Say, 'bout… half-past noon, or so? We've a sea battle before us. From a point off the larboard bow to two points to starboard, and we're going to have to tack around the short end, if the fleet that lies alee turns out to be hostile. Let us hope the Frogs are on the far side, holding the weather gauge. But, be ready for the worst," Lewrie explained to them all. "And, must we tack around to get inside the protection of our own liners, we're going to have to deal with this bastard frigate."

"Aye, sir." Knolles nodded grimly, plucking at his clean silk.

"Thunder, by Jesus!" Alan snorted. "Mine arse on a bandbox, Mister Buchanon. Mine arse on a bandbox!"

And laughed out loud as he strolled aft to study the frigate in his glass, leaving them all perplexed by such good cheer.

Hands at quarters, standing by their charged, shotted and now-primed artillery pieces, swaying as Jester rocked and rolled over the sea. Gun captains would fire them with modern flint-lock strikers in lieu of ancient slow-match linstocks; but slow-match sizzled slowly, wound 'round the mid-deck water tubs, just in case.

The French fleet, unfortunately for Lewrie, were the fighting ships that lay to leeward, those closest to him. There had to be at least thirty of them, it appeared, a ragged procession of proud line-of-battle ships- 74's, 80's, and larger, right up to massive three-decker flagships of 120 guns-in a tormented, shot-racked in-line-ahead formation that headed due west, stretching east-to-west across Jester s track for nearly three miles, like an oak and iron reef. It was no longer the tidy arrangement it had seemed as they'd approached; there were gaps between ships greater than the rigorously ordained half-a-cable separation. There were gaps aloft, too, where ships had lost topmasts and yards. Still, they doggedly plodded west, barring Jester a path as she beat close-hauled to weather, west-by-south.

Safety, unfortunately, lay on the other side of that bellowing reef of warships. Howe's thirty or so liners had gained the wind gauge and followed a parallel course to the French, lost in the foggy towers of gun smoke that rose from every ship.

Worse yet, there were even more French frigates to leeward of their battle line, to serve as aides to the combatants-as rescuers for those forced to break away, as occupiers aboard any British ship that was forced to strike and be towed away as prize; and as signal repeaters, down in clear air, to relay their admiral's wishes.

And some of those repeating frigates toward the rear of that battle line had begun to show interest in the strange ship approaching them with no flag flying. The one that appeared to be pursued by one of their sisters!

And the pursuing frigate…

Lewrie turned to have another look, no longer needing the telescope. She was up to them, within a mile or less, well within range-to-random shot. It had taken her awhile to recognize that Jester had hardened up to windward. She'd soldiered on, still sailing a point-free for about a quarter-hour, before going close-hauled to keep the wind gauge, herself. She'd lost some windward advantage, but…

There she lay, off the larboard side, nicely framed behind the mizzen stays, almost on a parallel course of west-by-south as a mate to Jesters. Another ten minutes and Lewrie would face a hard choice of standing-on within range of the repeating frigates, perhaps the disengaged broadside guns of the French battle line, or fighting a larger, heavier-armed frigate that blocked her only chance to come about to starboard tack and jink around the stern of the French liners!

"A tack'd lay our head sou'east-by-east, Mister Buchanon?" Lewrie speculated aloud.

"Aye, sir. 'Bout that." Buchanon grunted. "Excuse me, Cap'um, but I'd not stand on five minutes more, on this tack, else we fetch too near th' Frog liners, an' have no wind alee of 'em, e'en for a reach to th' east t'sail around the last in line. A close shave e'en now, sir."

"Quite so, Mister Buchanon." Lewrie nodded, unconsciously rubbing his own raspy and unshaven chin at the mention. There'd been more to worry about this morning than his toilet. "Mister Hyde? Dig into the flag lockers, aft. I b'lieve Our Lords Commissioners issued some false flags? Find the Frog Tricolor."

"Aye, aye, sir!" The lad yelped, dashing off to search.

"A legitimate ruse de guerre." Lewrie shrugged to his officers. "Give a few minutes' confusion, perhaps."

"Aye, sir! Found it!" Hyde shrilled forward.

"Bend it on, Mister Hyde, and hoist it aloft," he ordered.

He was hoping that the French line-of-battle ships had just a tad too much on their plate, at the moment, to care one way or another, and the repeating frigates that could come about and intercept him would lose interest; just another corvette arriving with orders from Brest-some silly civilian nonsense from the landlubbers of the revolutionary Directory, or however they now styled themselves.

He raised his glass, as the French Tricolor was two-blocked high on the mizzenmast. What would that pursuing frigate do, now? he wondered. Wasted a whole morning, chasing some idiot who ignored his signals to fetch-to…

Come to think on't, Lewrie grinned, he never sent me a signal! Saw me as a chase, right from the start. And if we're both galloping for his fleet flagship like John Gilpin on a good horse… I have to be French, same as him. A body'd be daft as bats to get this close, else!

Three-quarters of a mile separation now, between Jester and her pursuer. Good gun range. Damned good gun range!

"Ah, sir…?" Buchanon prompted uneasily.

"Aye, Mister Buchanon. Mister Knolles, stations for stays, sir! We will put the ship about on the starboard tack. And anyone who puts her in irons… I'll have his nutmegs off with a damn' dull knife!"

"Bosun Porter, hands to the braces! Hands to the sheets!" Lieutenant Knolles bellowed. "Ready to come about?"

A breathless minute of preparation, hands tailing on braces and sheets, laying paws on tacks, easing all but the last over-under turn around belaying pins and bitts.

"No more than half-a-point free to ease her around, Quartermaster!" Lewrie snapped. " 'Tis all the leeway we may spare." Ships were usually eased a full point off the wind, to gather an extra surge in speed to assure a clean tack.

"Helm alee!" Knolles screeched, at last.

Around she came, driving back up on the wind with a quarter-knot more speed, jib boom and bowsprit sweeping like a pointer across the embattled warships before her bows. Jibs and stays'ls fluttering and canvas popping like gunshots as Jester neared the eye of the wind, as sails lost their luffs-yards creaking and wood-ball parrels crying as they were swung around. For a heart-stopping moment, she slowed to a crawl, everything aloft aback and banging, before the fore-and-aft stays'ls and jibs whooshed across the deck to larboard as she took the wind fine on her starboard bows. The spanker over the quarterdeck and the royals and t'gallants rustled, flagged, then filled, with the hard crack of laundry airing on a line.

"Sou'east-by-east, Quartermaster!" Lewrie cried. "Meet her!"

The wheel spun, spokes blurring as they tried to catch up with her momentum, as she paid off half-a-point to the new lee in spite of their best efforts, as the hands braced hard on the gangways to make a proper spiral set aloft, royals more sharply angled to the wind than t'gallants, t'gallants more than tops'ls.