Touch and Go (10 page)

“You all know that the French are besieged in Valletta. The fortress is too strong for us to storm, so we are starving them out. They made this morning what may have been their last attempt to break the blockade. Their convoy was intercepted by Lord Keith and Lord Nelson, their ships were chased off and probably made to haul down their colours. It seems possible, however, that a second convoy may be following the first, hoping to find the coast clear. We don't know that this is their plan but we think it possible. But they won't find the coast clear. They will be confronted, in fact, by the
Lion,
by the
Gannet
and, above all, by the
Merlin.
If they attempt to enter Grand Harbour it must be tonight. In that event we shall intercept them and that means a night action.

“As you can see for yourselves, it is a dark night, moonless and overcast. It is not going to be simple to see the target. Under such conditions it is easy to waste ammunition, firing at nothing. Our only remedy is to fire at the flashes of the enemy's guns. You will all be on your own so far as that goes, and I rely upon each of you to aim carefully, taking your time. It is useless to fire into the darkness, hoping that the enemy will be there. That is what we might expect the French to do, but we must be wiser. We shall use flares at first, enough of them to distinguish friend from foe. After that we must rely upon good eyesight, careful aim and steadiness under fire. If you have questions to ask, now is the time for them.”

“Begging your pardon, sir,” said an oldish gun captain called Dyer. “Shouldn't we do better to close with the enemy and deal with him at half-pistol-shot range? That way, we couldn't miss, not even in the dark!” Some of the others murmured agreement with this, one of them adding: “Aye, sir, close range is what the Frenchies don't like!”

“Least of all,” said a third called Philips, “if we load with nails and bolts and bits of hoop iron!” There was some laughter at this and scattered applause. “That's the way to give them a belly-ache!”

“Listen, men,” replied Delancey, “and take heed of what I say. First, I won't fight at close range and I'll tell you why. Any ships sent to relieve Valletta will have troops on board, scores or even hundreds of them. Come to close range and we shall have muskets against us in numbers we can't match. So I shall keep out of musket shot. There are risks enough in battle without adding that one. Second, I'll have no firing of scrap metal. Why not? Because these fragments may wedge the cannon-ball. What happens then? You burst the gun. Oh, I know what the old seamen say! But it's a fool's trick, really, and I'll not allow it.”

“Can you tell us, sir, whether we shall have men-of-war to beat or merely transports?” The question came from one of the younger men called Gilling.

“I've no means of knowing but I should guess that there might be both. If I have a choice, I'll take the transports, since they are of more value, probably, to General Vaubois.”

There were no more questions and Delancey dismissed the gun captains, telling them to pass on the information to their gun crews. Looking along the deck, he could see each group collected under a lantern, the warm light revealing the sunburnt faces. He could have addressed them all together but the way he had done it had given more authority to the gun captains. He had tried to make them feel that it was their battle and he knew that this was the fact.

The
Merlin
was cruising north of Gozo, alone in the darkness, her position verifiable only from a few scattered lights ashore. The only sails seen at sunset had been those of Maltese fishermen. The sloop was cleared for action but the men had been told to lie down between the guns and take what rest they could. As time passed men on the look-out strained ever harder to pierce the darkness and Delancey, pacing the quarterdeck, came near to exhausting his patience. Mather joined him and they discussed for a while the likelihood of action before daybreak.

An hour or so passed and then, suddenly, the sky was lit beyond Gozo and there was the distant boom of a gun. There was another flare soon afterwards revealing the hills of Gozo in sharp silhouette. It might, of course, be some trading polacre that the
Lion
had sighted. Ten minutes later, however, a third flare was the prelude to some more persistent firing, four or five shots in succession. Then there followed what Delancey had been waiting for, a single red rocket.

“Mr Langford—a white flare, please.” The shores of Gozo were lit for an instant and Delancey glimpsed a sail off the island's north-westerly point.

“Mr Mather. Beat to quarters!” The drum beat urgently to bring the men to their guns.

“Pass the word for Mr Stirling.”

When both lieutenants were there Delancey told them what little he knew.

“One enemy sail has been sighted from the
Lion.
My guess is that there are others and that some of them will prove to be transports, more important to the enemy than their men-of-war. They must be prevented, at all costs, from entering Grand Harbour.”

“With respect, sir,” urged Stirling, “couldn't we leave the merchantmen to the
Sirena
and the
Gannet?”

“I wish we could. But the
Gannet
is rather distant and a Neapolitan frigate is a doubtful quantity. She is or appears to be in tolerable order but her crew, I would guess, have never been under fire. What is her accuracy of shooting at night? We don't even know that her men can hit anything in daylight, or have ever, for that matter, fired her guns at all.”

The conversation died away but there was a further flare from the
Lion
's direction, to which the
Merlin
replied in kind. With night-glasses already focused in the right direction, Delancey and the other could now distinguish three sail where one had been seen before.

“A schooner in the lead,” said Mather, “followed by two ships, one a corvette, the other a merchantman.”

“Agreed,” said Delancey. “A red rocket, please, Mr Langford. Pause for one minute and then let us have a blue and two green.” The rockets soared and burst overhead, conveying their message to Delancey's senior officer. From the
Lion's
direction there came, in reply, a single green rocket.

“Now, gentlemen,” said Delancey, “we have the complete picture. The convoy comprises a corvette and three merchantmen or transports. Of the three, one should fall to the
Lion
and the other two to us.”

Despite the problems which were going to face him—and he had already begun to foresee them Delancey had a certain feeling of satisfaction. He had formed a theory about the French plan for the relief of Valletta and he had been proved right. Their convoy
had
sailed in two divisions and here was the second division, already more or less trapped. Whoever commanded it must know by now that he had been seen. What would he decide to do?

D
ELANCEY'S plan was to wear when abreast of the convoy and then close on the leading vessel, the schooner. But the next flare revealed the enemy's response to his expected move. The three vessels had begun to scatter, the schooner heading nearer the coast, the leading merchantman coming closer to the wind and the corvette holding her course as if to challenge the
Merlin.
The purpose of the manoeuvre was clear enough. If Delancey fought the corvette the other two would race for Grand Harbour under every scrap of canvas they could spread. If the
Gannet
intercepted one of them it would be the schooner and the other and larger vessel might still get through.

“Damnation!” said Mather, softly. “We are made to take our pick.”

“Could we cripple one and take t'other?” asked Stirling.

“What—at
night?”
was Delancey's reply. He needed to say no more because the task of shooting down an opponent's mast, difficult enough in daylight, was plainly impossible in the dark when the gunners had little or nothing to aim at.

“Not even if we closed the range?” asked Stirling.

“Against a ship carrying infantry? It would be madness. Haul close to the wind, Mr Mather, and aim to intercept the merchantman on our starboard bow.”

Delancey left the quarterdeck, with young Topley at heel, and made a tour of the main deck, having a final word with each gun captain. “Aim at the flash,” he said to each of them, “but if you can't see anything, don't waste your shot.” He asked himself, meanwhile, whether he had made the right decision. The enemy had wanted him to fight the corvette, which was enough in itself to make him decide against it.

But could the French be more subtle than that, guessing that he would turn aside from the challenge? The merchant ship was certainly bigger but what if the corvette were laden with the more vital supplies, the more important men: medical stores, mortars, explosives, artillerymen, engineers and staff? In that event he himself could be made to look too clever and perhaps too cowardly. Anyway, he had made his decision and he knew that, in war, any decision is better than an inability to decide.

Back on the quarterdeck and peering once more into the darkness, he had now to wrestle with a problem in mental arithmetic. At the time of lighting his last flare the enemy transport had been, he guessed, about six miles away. What was his own speed? There was a stiff breeze blowing but he was close to the wind . . . call it, seven knots. Allow the enemy the same speed—no, five knots, more likely—and interception should take place in half an hour, say, after the last flare. That had been fifteen minutes ago. He must give it another five minutes. To light his next flare too soon would be a mistake, revealing his plan before it was too late for the French to change theirs. To leave it too late, on the other hand, would be worse still for he might cross his opponent's wake without firing, or even collide with her and see his crew massacred by small-arms fire.

Straining his eyes afresh he could see nothing in the darkness except the foam on the nearer waves. He forced himself to wait another three minutes. It was, however, the Frenchman whose nerve failed first. A flare was lit on board the corvette, now on the
Merlin
's port quarter, and the momentary light revealed the French transport, less than half a mile away on the port bow, nearer than Delancey had expected and crowding all the canvas she had.

“We are forereaching on her,” said Mather, and Delancey could see that this was true. He would cross her bows in about four minutes' time and at a distance of two cables. That was not, however, what he wanted for he would have to tack immediately afterwards and might even be caught in irons.

“Helm hard up!” he shouted and then, “Steady as she goes.” and “Another flare, Mr Langford.” The Frenchman was now close on the
Merlin's
starboard bow. “Tack!” he yelled and there was frenzied activity as course was altered and the yards braced round. “Helm's a-lee,” called the quartermaster and “Another flare!” shouted Delancey. The
Merlin
had lost ground and was about to cross the French ship's wake. Being now, however, on the same tack, Delancey could afterwards engage her from to windward, choosing his own range. Ten minutes later he judged that the moment had come.

“Flare, Mr Langford,” he shouted, and then, “Fire!” This last order was addressed to the gun captain of the after carronade on the quarterdeck. Firing this weapon was the signal to the rest, who would fire as they sighted the target. There was no attempt to fire the guns simultaneously but even a ragged broadside heeled the ship over for a minute, making the last shots go too high.

Then the helm was put up and the next flare revealed the French ship ahead of the
Merlin
at three cables' distance and on a parallel course to leeward. The enemy guns fired at that moment but were poorly aimed. There was a simultaneous crackle of musketry, some of the bullets thudding into the
Merlin
's timber. Delancey's small-arms men prepared to reply but Delancey told them to hold their fire, since the enemy was out of effective range.

Until the action began, the two sides had seen nothing of each other except by the light of flares but each ship was now faintly visible to her opponent. There was a battle lantern beside each gun and the glimmer from the ports could just be seen. Because of the smoke added to the darkness the gun captains could see less than anyone, but the French ship's musketry marked her position, the sparkle defining the length of her deck. It was now Delancey's duty, as he knew, to assess the weight of the enemy's broadside. So far as he could make out, the French ship had nine ports a-side on her main deck, four a-side on her quarterdeck. It seemed, however, as if her midship ports were empty, leaving her with only five main-deck guns to the
Merlin's
eight but with four on the quarterdeck to the
Merlin's
three; eight all told against eleven.

In calibre the guns on either side were probably much the same but the French ship must be cluttered with stores for Valletta. So, given a higher British rate of fire (which could be assumed) the enemy should be beaten in about thirty minutes. Calling for another flare, Delancey could see by its light that the French corvette was still heading southwards and that the schooner, still more distant, was doing the same. His immediate opponent was to be left to her fate while the other two (or three?) made their dash for Grand Harbour.

Firing as blindly as they were, the guns on either side were slow to find their target. From being to leeward, the French guns tended to have too much elevation, some of their shot going through the
Merlin
's sails but more of them going into the void. The first serious damage that Delancey saw was the destruction near him of a quarterdeck carronade. A shot hit the muzzle while the men were reloading, driving the piece off its slide and across the deck. The two men unhurt carried the other two below, one bleeding profusely and the other badly mangled.