Bolitho #13 - The Flag Captain by Alexander Kent

Author:Alexander Kent [Kent, Alexander]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-08-23T23:54:58+00:00

Allday followed Inch towards the companion ladder and muttered, “My God, sir, I thought I yearned for small ships again!” Inch grinned. “You are getting old!” The sea thundered over the upper deck, and a goodly portion of it cascaded down the ladder towards them.

Allday swore and replied, “And, with respect, I should like to get older before I die!”

“Good morning, sir.” Inch touched his hat as Bolitho appeared at the companion and stepped over the coaming.

Bolitho nodded and walked to the lee rail, the sleep already gone from his mind in the keen, damp air. The daylight was as yet only a glimmer, and now that Hekla had gone about to run almost parallel with the coast he guessed they were barely more than two miles offshore. The wind had veered still more and now pushed steadily across the larboard quarter, the spray leaping occasionally above the stout bulwarks to sluice noisily away into the scuppers. He could see the land, although it was little more than purple shadow, and it was strange to accept the fact that due to the slow necessity of clawing away from it to gain the wind’s advantage, Djafou now lay less than thirty miles ahead of Hekla’s blunt bows. Inch had done well, and there was nothing in his long horseface to show he had been on deck for most of the time while his ship had tacked and beaten around one great circle to her present position.

Astern they were being followed by a thick sea mist, so that it gave a false impression of being motionless, an impression made a lie by the flying spray around the bowsprit and the bulging tan sails above the deck.

As he peered forward he saw a sheen of dull silver on the dancing wavecrests, and knew dawn was nearby, but as yet the eastern horizon was still lost in spray and shadow. A few gulls drifted and shrieked above the topmasts, and he wondered whether eyes other than theirs had seen their careful approach. Careful for reasons other than surprise. Even as he considered the treacherous coastline so close abeam he heard the leadsman chant from the chains, his cry almost lost in the crack and thunder of the sails.

“By the mark seven!”

But Inch appeared satisfied, and Bolitho knew he knew his shallow hull better than Bolitho did.

Shadows around the bomb’s decks were already taking on strength and personality, and he saw the hands at work around the guns, while others moved restlessly on the forecastle where Mr Broome, Inch’s elderly gunner, was examining his mortars.

But mortars were not the only teeth in Hekla’s defences. Apart from a few swivels, she mounted six massive carronades.

Altogether they would certainly find any weakness in her stout construction and timbers.

“By the mark five!”

Inch called, “Bring her up a point, Mr Wilmot!” His first and only lieutenant walked straddle-legged up the slanting deck, and as the helm squeaked over he shouted “Steady, sir! East by south!”

“By the mark seven!”

Inch said to no one in particular, “Damme, it’s like a sailor’s lot hereabouts.

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