Kings and Emperors

Captain Chalmers followed all that with many a sniff or gasp, as if the tale was just too fabulous to be believed.

“That night, Caroline and I were warned t’flee Paris if we valued our lives, and made it to Calais before they caught up with us,” Lewrie related, leaving out the juicier parts concerning wigs, and costumes, play-acting, and the aid they’d gotten from a man who’d whetted his skills during the Terror of ’93, and styled himself the Yellow Tansy; Chalmers already sounded dubious enough.

“Whatever it was I did to set him off,” Lewrie concluded with a grin, “I pissed him in the eye once. With any luck at all, do we pluck our army from his clutches and get ’em clean away, we’ll piss him in the eye, again!”

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

When Lewrie’s little convoy had at last sailed from Gibraltar, its pace was heart-breakingly slow. It took a few days to breast the in-rushing current through the Strait, short-tacking into the stiff Winter winds, then bashing Westward many leagues to round Cape Finisterre and gain enough sea-room to avoid being blown onto a lee shore.

Once safely far out at sea, the struggling ships should have been able to turn North on a beam wind and rush on to Vigo, where information had it that part of the army was being evacuated, but the prevailing Westerlies turned into one howling gale after another, and the seas were steep, forcing all ships, transports and escorts alike, to reduce sail, brailing up to second or third reef lines, striking top-masts, and slowing them even more, and scattering them wide over many miles of sea. Even stout and slow HMS Sapphire, at over 1,100 tons burthen, rolled, pitched, and hobby-horsed like the merest wee gig, pricking every hand’s ears in dread to the great groans and moans of her hull timbers and masts, to the thundrous slamming and jerking each time the bows ploughed into the tall, disturbed waves, flinging icy water high over her beakhead rails and forecastle, and anyone in need of the “seats of ease” for their bowel movements risked being flung right off the ship!

No matter how tautly the deck seams had been tarred, the upper gun-deck berthing dripped cold water on hammocks, blankets, and wildly swaying men who tried to snatch a few hours’ rest from it all. Wood buckets were used for toilets, but no matter how often they were taken to the weather deck, dragged overside to clean them, then hauled back in, the stench became almost unbearable. The sailors who berthed on the lower gun deck might be drier, but their air was even closer, and foetid, to the point that serving watches in the open air, rain and cold and spray, was reckoned refreshing.

Despite tarred tarpaulin over-clothing, everyone’s shirts and trousers got soaked when on deck or aloft tending sail, and there was no way to dry anything out below, or in the great-cabins or the officers’ wardroom, either, and every morning’s sick call featured people with salt-water boils where their salt-crystal laden clothes chafed them raw. Even boiling rations in the swaying, rolling, pitching galley proved extremely risky. Christmas supper was a Banyan Day, with only oatmeal, cheese, hard ship’s bisquit, small beer, and a raisin duff for each mess to liven it.

Lewrie was amazed each raw dawn to see that all sixteen of his transports were still with him, and that Undaunted, Peregrine, and Blaze were still with him, dutifully chivvying stragglers back into their columns and urging the more widely scattered ships to rejoin.

They weren’t wanted at Vigo, though; Blaze had dashed inshore and had returned with word that Admiral de Courcy had been replaced by Admiral Hood, and that Moore would be making for Coru

*   *   *

“It’s clearing a bit, sir,” Sailing Master George Yelland said as he sniffed the winds and rubbed his chilled hands. “The wind and sea are almost moderate, thank God.”

“Is that a lighthouse I see on yon headland?” Lewrie asked, his telescope to his eye. “To the left of that inlet?”

“Ah, hmm,” Yelland pondered, employing his own telescope for a long moment. “Aye, it is, sir, the lighthouse at Coru

“At last!” Lewrie breathed with relief that the ship could be brought to anchor, and blessed stillness, after too many days of risk. He had spent so much time on deck that he still felt chilled to the bone, and so in need of missed sleep that he could nod off on his feet and jerk back to wakefulness.

“Hawse bucklers removed, cables seized to the anchors and free to run, sir,” a weary and storm-ravaged First Officer, Lieutenant Westcott, came aft to report. Shaving had been such a deadly endeavour that everyone had given it up, so he looked as if he could have been a bearded courtier to Henry VIII.

“We’ll stand off a bit, and let the transports have the best anchorages nearest the town,” Lewrie told him. “Mister Kibworth?” he shouted aft to the Midshipman at the signal halliards. “Bend on a signal hoist for the transports to go in first, and for the escorts to stand in trail of us.”

“Aye aye, sir!” Kibworth shouted back.

Slowly, slowly, the little convoy, with Sapphire in the lead, rounded the tall headland and wore away South, standing into the harbour bay, with the escorts swinging wider out into the sheltered bay while the transports angled in round the fortified San Antonio Castle on a small island off the tip of the town.

Coru

“Christ, what a pot-mess,” Lewrie wondered aloud. “Who’s in charge, and who do I report to?” He could see several ships of the line anchored, mostly Third Rate 74s, but only one larger Second Rate, so far. Admiral Hood’s armada of troop ships must still be working their way out of Vigo, or thrashing North through the same strong gales as Sapphire had.

“You’ll take time to shave and freshen yourself, first, sir?” Westcott asked.

“No time for the niceties,” Lewrie said with a shake of his head. “I may have to go ashore t’find where they want our ships to anchor … off the town here, or close to the piers down yonder.”

“Taking your Ferguson along, too?” Westcott teased.

“I’ll leave soldierin’ to the people in red, this time, no, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie said with a chuckle. “Though I would wish to see the ground. Why? Ye wish t’borrow it and shoot a few Frogs, yourself, sir?”

“Signal from the Second Rate, sir!” Midshipman Kibworth called out. “The Interrogative.”

“Make our number to her, Mister Kibworth, and add that we’ve sixteen transports with us.”

“Aye, sir!” followed moments later by the news that the Second Rate had a Rear-Admiral aboard, and was showing the summons of Captain Repair On Board.

“Damme, we’ll have t’fire him a salute suitable to his rank,” Lewrie groaned. “Pipe hands to the twelve-pounders, Mister Westcott, and fetch up salutin’ charges from the magazines. And have a cutter brought round to the entry-port.”