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"You have the wheel lashed, I see, Captain," she said to Jenkins.
He nodded, exaggerating the gesture to be seen in the chaotic darkness. "Foretopsail's braced sharp and staysail's sheeted flat!" he yelled, his face indistinct under the flapping brow of his sou'wester except for a white flash of teeth. "You showed us that trick on Eagle, Commodore!"
Braced like that, the square sail slowly forced the Chamberlain's bow up into the wind, until it started to luff; then she fell away to the east pushed by the staysail and helped by the pounding waves crashing on her port bow, until the topsail filled again and the cycle repeated. Everything would be fine if they stayed far enough away from the cliffs somewhere behind them, unseen in the night. They were moving forward a bit, but the ship slid a little more sideways and to the rear every time, and the whole mass of water it sat in was making a couple of knots eastward.
"Lieutenant Commander!" Marian said. "Order to the fleet, Heave to and Report status."
"Aye, aye, ma'am!" Swindapa replied, before she turned and made her way to the deckhouse that contained the radio.
Marian looked out into the blackness, where only the white tops of the great waves heading toward them were visible before they broke in frothing chaos across the forecastle and waist of the ship, feeling the vessel come surging up again each time to shrug the tons of water overside. And if I'm any judge of weather, it's going to get worse, she thought grimly.
It did; the next few hours brought what was technically dawn, but without any lightening that she could see. Breakfast was flasks of coffee brought up by the wardroom steward, hard-boiled eggs, and sandwiches made of pitalike flatbread wrapped around cold corned beef. By that time they had to duck their heads to breathe, or turn around for an instant; there were more dimly seen oilski
The radio shack abaft the wheels was a little better, since it rated some of the precious electric lights, ru
"Let me see the latest reports from the fleet," she said to the technician on radio watch.
Quickly she ruffled through the sheaf of papers. The tone of a few was increasingly panic-stricken, but nobody had actually started to founder, or lost masts or major spars yet. She frowned over one from the Merrimac; the ship was riding far too low and rolling sluggishly. Captain Clammp to flag: I suspect cargo is shifting on its pallets and increasing the working of the seams. All pumps ma
Marian Alston shaped a silent whistle. Putting crews into the tops in weather like this to rerig meant Clammp was really worried. And if the rolling was that bad, he was right to worry; losing a sail in weather like this could be catastrophic. Losing a mast didn't bear thinking about.
"Ma'am, message coming through from the Farragut."
There was a spare headset. She put it on, and immediately winced at the blasts of lightning-static that cut across it. The voice blurred behind it, every second or third word coming loud and clear. Masts… boiler… buckle… hatchway… port paddle… repairs.
"Farragut, this is Commodore Alston. Repeat, please. I say again, repeat!"
Nothing but more static. God-damn. If she had a hatchway staved, got cold water pouring in and dousing her boiler, losing power in this…
"Inform me if there's anything more from either Farragut or Merrimac, please, Ensign."
"Aye, aye, ma'am!"
Back out into the darkness, but just as she left there were a series of lightning flashes that cast the whole ship into stark black-and-white. There were four crewfolk standing by the wheel, with safety lines rigged from their waists; most of the rest of the deck watch were huddled under the break of the quarterdeck. Those around the wheel were catching the full fury, and it struck her breathless; either it had worsened in the last ten minutes, or she'd been unable to remember just how bad it was. On the transports, with hundreds of panic-stricken, seasick landsmen belowdecks, things must be indescribable. She was profoundly glad she'd had at least a couple of platoons of the Marine regiment shipped on every keel that carried Alban volunteer auxiliaries.
She rejoined Swindapa and opened her mouth to speak. Then her head whipped up, alerted by some subliminal clue, a hint her conscious mind couldn't have named. Several others did the same; and without the slightest warning the wind backed and turned ninety degrees. The lunging twist of the ship turned into a heel that had crew clutching for the safety lines or rigging or the circle of belaying pins around the masts.
With a screech the lines holding the staysail gave way, and it bellied out and filled to splitting. That pulled the ship's head violently around dead into the wind and jerked her forward into the oncoming wave, accelerating fast enough to be felt as a surge. Alston's eyes went wide as she watched the frigate's knife bows ram into the oncoming wave, not rising to it at all, no time to ride up the cliff-steep face of the wild water. She clenched her hands into the brass rail around the bi
As the surge knocked her feet from under her, she could see the faces of the hands at the wheel, shocked and pale in the bi
"Mind your helm!" Jenkins roared in a fine sea-bellow, cutting away the lashings on the wheel; blood from his nose ran down his face, whipping away in the blasting spray. He sprang to the steering platform, and the others heaved with him to spill wind from the sail. "Keep her so! Mr. Oxton, turn out the watch below-all hands! Ms. Tauranasson-"
A quick glance around showed her Swindapa on the starboard line. Tauranasson was hanging limp from her safety line, probably slammed headfirst into something, and in no condition to do anything much. A middy and hand were hauling themselves toward her to take her below to the sickbay.
"Clew up the topsail-man the fore clew-garnets! Take the way off her!" He fumbled for the speaking-trumpet slung over his shoulder.
Not even a powered megaphone would do any good at present, much less an ordinary speaking-trumpet, and it had to be done now. "I'll see to it!" Alston shouted into his ear, then turned and plunged forward.
Another surge took her as she grabbed for the railing of the companionway that led down from the quarterdeck to the waist. Her feet went out from under her again, the base of her spine struck something hard, and sensation vanished in a wash of white-hot ice from stomach to feet. Then Swindapa was hauling her upright; she forced paralyzed lungs to work, saw the watch still clinging to the safety lines, moved forward.