Signal Close Action by Alexander Kent

Author:Alexander Kent [Kent, Alexander]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: C429, Kat, Extratorrents, Military, Historical Novel, Nautical
ISBN: 9780099497639
Publisher: Arrow
Published: 1999-09-30T23:00:00+00:00

Bolitho did not answer. But it was uppermost in his thoughts. A strong north-westerly was a curse to his squadron. To any French commander trying to gauge the right time to quit Toulon it would be merciful, a chance he could not possibly ignore.

He watched as Gilchrist's beanpole figure emerged above the quarterdeck ladder, shining dully in his long tarpaulin coat. Gilchrist had probably been more frightened of his captain than he had of the first storm signs. Or so eager to prove that he could manage any eventuality he had left it far too late for anything but submission.

He wiped his streaming face with one sleeve, feeling the sting of salt in his eyes and mouth. When he peered aloft again he saw that much of the canvas had vanished, although the fore topsail was only lashed to its yard at one end. At the other a great balloon of canvas filled and puffed as if it contained a living, savage monster. Something passed across the scudding cloud formations, and he ran to the rail as it struck the forecastle with a sickening thud.

A voice called hoarsely, 'Get that man below to the sickbay' Then Lieutenant Veitch. 'Belay that order. There's nought the surgeon can do for him'

Poor wretch, he thought. Fighting the lashing sail, with only his feet to support his body as he craned over the great, swaying yard. His messmates on either side of him, all cursing and yelling into the darkness, punching the wet, hard canvas until their nails were torn out, their knuckles raw. One slip, an extra gust of wind, and he had fallen.

'Man the braces there! Stand by on the quarterdeck' Grubb snarled, 'Ease the spoke when I gives the word!

Treat 'em like they was babies!' 'Helm a'lee!'

More figures staggered through the dismal gloom, a midshipman bleeding from the head, a seaman holding his arm to his side, teeth bared with agony.

'Lee braces! Heave!'

The Lysander dipped her seventeen-hundred tons of oak and artillery heavily into a maelstrom of bursting spray. Above, in a shortened, iron-hard rectangle, the reefed topsail seemed to swing independent of their muscle and bone, every mast groaning to the strain of wind and sea.

Bolitho saw it all, heard his ship and seamen fighting to bring the bows round and into the wind, to hold her under command. If the rudder failed, or the topsail was ripped to ribbons like the forecourse, it might be too late for them to set the staysail. And that could carry away just as easily.

But with the wheel hard over, the helmsmen's bare feet treading wet planking as if they were walking uphill, the two-decker responded. Bolitho watched the sea boiling inboard from the weather gangway to the beakhead, saw it surging across and down to the opposite bulwark, taking men and loose gear in its path. Much of it would find its way deep into the hull. The pumps must be going now, but in the din he could not hear them. Stores would be spoiled, fresh water, as precious as gunpowder, polluted and rendered useless.

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