Touch and Go (17 page)

“They are short of powder then?”

“They are always short. They waste it firing in the air.”

“Firing in the air? What do you mean?”

“They have a game on horseback, to gallop fast, stop suddenly and fire. It is very wasteful and it ruins their horses.”

“But Arab horses are famous, surely.”

“When properly trained. The Arabs work them too hard before they are fully grown, know no pace between the gallop and the walk and wear them out in a few years.”

“So there is a perpetual shortage of gunpowder.”

“Yes, sir. They make none themselves and have to import it.”

“Now, Mr Sulman, you will perhaps understand why I have brought the Alcayde on board this ship.”

“As a hostage.”

“Will this be enough to keep the Arabs quiet until I have the merchantman afloat?”

“Perhaps not. Achmet bin Abu Said is not much liked. He is greedy and mean and inevitably has made enemies.”

“What if I left two small merchantmen behind?”

“With cargo on board?”

“No, in ballast.”

“With gunpowder on board?”

“One barrel in each.”

“That could be just enough, I think. What reward do you give me for acting as your agent?”

“What do you ask?”

“A free passage to Tetuan.”

“Agreed. So go now and talk to the Alcayde. I shall hang him if we have any more trouble. I shall leave two coasters behind if his people will let us alone. His clerk I shall release and he can carry the Alcayde's orders to his deputy.”

“And what if the Arabs refuse your offer?”

“I shall burn the merchantman and sail with the first fair wind for Gibraltar. And our Consul at Algiers will complain to the Dey about the conduct of his subjects at Cherchell.”

“Very well, sir. I'll tell the Alcayde what terms you offer. May I have paper, pen and ink? He will want to send a written message ashore.”

“Go with Mr Sulman,” said Delancey to his clerk, “and see that the Alcayde has what he wants. Bring Mr Sulman back to me when the business has been concluded.”

When Sulman returned it was to report that all was agreed and that the clerk was ready to go ashore with the Alcayde's message.

“I used my discretion, sir,” said the Jew, “in one respect. I said that the two coasters would have gunpowder aboard. I did not say how much. The Arabs are free to suppose that the vessels are laden with gunpowder.” There was a slight pause and he added, “I did not say that; not in so many words.”

“Thank you, Mr Sulman. I congratulate you upon the success of your negotiations. You are a free man and our guest until you go ashore at Tetuan.”

Delancey turned in as the boat left for the shore hoping to snatch an hour or two of sleep before he was needed again. There was a distant sound of musketry but it died away and all was quiet as the sun rose. It was a hot day and almost windless.

A little before noon the
Venturer
was as empty as she was going to be, her valuable cargo shifted to the vessels alongside, her provisions mostly dumped overboard, nearly all her water casks emptied but kept for further use and her guns tipped over the side. The two “camels” were low in the water and now Mather gave the order to secure the “camels” to the
Venturer
by ropes which passed, some of them, under the keel. That done, he ordered the men to begin shifting cargo to the third and larger prize, which had to be moved periodically from one side to the other. Delancey and the carpenter rowed round in the gig, marking the ship's side and hoping to find her higher in the water as the work went on.

“We need to lift her three feet six inches,” said Corbin, “according to Wishart, but she hasn't moved an inch so far. She is wedged, sir, I reckon, held as if in a vice.”

“How big is the vice?”

“She is gripped from a point amidships to a point some fifteen feet forward with deeper water under the bows and stern.”

“Is she leaking much?”

“Not more, sir, than the one pump can deal with.”

After dinner and a double rum ration the work was resumed with urgency. The buoyancy of the “camels” as they emptied was applying a great upward pressure but the lift could not overcome the jamming effect of the Roman walls. The
Venturer
's waterline was exactly where it had been when the ship struck. The men were tiring and even the officers were discouraged. Delancey had foreseen that this moment would come. He played what was almost his last card, ordering all men aft on the quarterdeck.

“Listen, men. We have now to work the ship loose from the stones that are gripping her amidships. When I give the word, every man aboard will run forward as if to the heads in a moment of urgent need. When I give the word again, every man will run aft as if he were about to splice the mainbrace. In this way we shall rock the ship and work her clear. One—two—three—GO!”

The men rushed forward and aft, once, twice and a third time. The ship did not move but Delancey felt (or did he imagine?) a slight tremor underfoot.

“Now, men—our last chance. Each man will fetch two 12-pounder shot from the
Merlin
and we shall repeat this exercise carrying that extra weight.”

With a lot of mock despair, the men piled into the boats and rowed back to the sloop. Whatever they might say, this last game was better fun than shifting cargo. Their morale had risen since the rocking attempt had begun. The boat returned and a sling from the yard-arm rigged to sway the round shot aboard. Then the crew reassembled on the quarterdeck, each man loaded with 24 pounds dead weight. The load was too much for two of the boys, whose load was halved, Delancey taking a full load himself.

“Once more!” he shouted. “One—two—three—GO!” This time he ran with the rest, arriving very short of breath on the forecastle. “GO!” he shouted again and found himself on the quarterdeck with his lungs about to burst. Setting an example was all very well but he felt that he had gone too far. . . . His next “GO!” was in more of a conversational tone, and the one after that was no more than a whisper. By the fourth rush, this time aft, he had given up all hope of success.

Then, quite suddenly, it happened. The deck heaved beneath his feet, the whole ship wobbled and shuddered and everyone knew that she was afloat. There were spontaneous cheers, which ended only when Delancey had breath enough to order the manning of the boats.

The
Venturer
was pulled stern-first off the stonework by which she had been trapped. Once she was in deep water her anchor was dropped and a fothered sail pulled over the place where the leak had been found. The men were too exhausted to do more, so Delancey thanked them and announced the splicing of the mainbrace. The pumps had to be kept going and the boats had to row guard, but the crisis was over and most people could sleep.

There was silence ashore and no native craft so much as put to sea. Delancey invited his officers and Dr Rathbone to join him in a glass of wine. They drank his health with words of congratulation. His salvage operation, said Mather, had been a miracle of seamanship. “More credit goes to Mr Stirling,” he replied, “whose raid had been the turning-point.” He thought inwardly that he himself deserved no praise from anyone. It was his fault, indirectly, that the
Venturer
had been wrecked in the first place. Looking up, he found that Dr Rathbone was looking at him curiously as if he had guessed his train of thought. “May I suggest, captain, that we do not judge a man's quality from the way he wins a victory but from the way he recovers after a defeat.”

“I am entirely of your opinion, doctor. I only wish we could go fishing again for classical sculptures!”

“I wouldn't dream of suggesting it, sir, God knows your men have done enough.”

“We shall be tolerably busy tomorrow and will do well if we can put to sea by nightfall. Let's agree to come here again in time of peace.”

It was a long day of effort before the
Venturer
's cargo had been shipped again but the task was completed somehow and the ship fitted with a foremast. A few casks were placed in the two smaller prizes and filled with sand taken after dark from the beach. They were each then topped up with about an inch of gunpowder. After being shown this treasure trove, the old Alcayde was taken ashore and released with a great show of politeness. With a look of bitter hostility, he disappeared among the trees, leaving young Gosling to complain about the loss of his casks. He was told that his supply of water could be replenished at Tetuan, which would be the next port of call.

Soon afterwards the
Merlin
made sail, heading northward with the
Venturer
astern and the
Santa Catarina
bringing up in the rear. The Algerine coast was soon lost to sight and Delancey expressed the hope, inwardly, that he would never be in such a position again.

After three days' sail along the African coast there was more shipping to be seen. The shores of Spain and Africa were now closer together, converging on the Straits of Gibraltar, squeezing the traffic into what would become a single shipping lane. Anxious for news, Delancey spoke with a Danish brig, from which he learnt that Admiral Linois had been seen off Cartagena, heading south, and could not be very far away. This intelligence was confirmed by a Portuguese coaster and again by a privateer out of Gibraltar. But the privateer had other news, having spoken to a British sloop the day before. “She was the
Speedy,”
said the privateer captain, “commanded by a lord with a Scots accent. She is well named, I should say, for she carries a big spread of canvas. Which way? She was heading south but in search of a Spanish merchantman. I could not help him there and might not have wanted to. I have my own living to make.” Later the same day, the
Merlin
fell in with an American brig. She had actually been intercepted by the
Speedy
and two of her men had been impressed as deserters from a British man-of-war. “Were they? It would be hard to say. They all tell lies, don't they?”

Delancey pored over the chart, marking his own position and course and lightly pencilling in the possible track of the French squadron. He had many doubts and queries but had already decided that his approach to Tetuan would have to be in darkness. The ease with which he obtained news about Linois would be matched by the ease with which Linois would have gained intelligence about the
Merlin.

Luckily, the Frenchman was less likely to be interested, presumably being intent on reaching Cadiz. It sounded as if Cochrane was taking risks but then he always did. When another sail was sighted, Delancey swore to himself. Ships were jostling each other like pedestrians at Charing Cross.

Next morning, July 3rd, yet another sail was sighted, a cutter with the mails from Gibraltar to Minorca. The news she brought was second-hand, obtained at daybreak from a Maltese coaster. Some Spanish merchantmen had been driven ashore near Alicante and had been set on fire. One of them was laden with oil and had blazed all the previous night. Delancey asked the cutter's master whether it was a British man-of-war that had burnt them. Seemingly it was, said Delancey's informant. There had certainly been a sloop in the vicinity. It was Cochrane again, Delancey thought, and he had failed to learn from example when it came to burning a prize with cargo unknown.

Going back to the chart he drew a semicircle with thirty miles' radius and with centre at Alicante. Then he drew another semicircle with the same centre and fifty miles' radius. Then he prolonged the estimated course he had pencilled in for Linois, finding that it cut both semicircles. After a few more calculations involving wind direction and speed, he came to the conclusion that Linois must have seen the blaze and that the
Speedy
would still be within the larger semicircle. On paper Cochrane's chances of escape looked very slight. He was, of course, a magnificent seaman and had every chance of knowing that a French squadron was in the area. He would escape if anyone could, but the wind was failing and might die away to nothing.

Then came the sound which Delancey had been expecting; the distant rumble of gunfire. The sound came from the north-west and was spasmodic, single guns firing and the occasional broadside. People not on duty came on deck to listen and Delancey found that Dr Rathbone was among them. The old scholar asked him whether a battle was in progress.

“Not a battle, doctor; perhaps a pursuit.”

“Should we not expect then, that the sound of gunfire would approach or die away?”

“What would you say was happening?”

“Why, sir, I picture a single ship trying to escape from a squadron.”

The distant thunder dwindled, resumed fitfully, came and went. After about four hours, the sound came to a climax with a series of broadsides. Then the firing ceased abruptly and there was silence. “He was too self-centred,” thought Delancey “and too cocksure.” He hoped at the same time that Cochrane had not been killed. He thought, on the whole, that he was the sort of man who would survive.

Shortly before nightfall, Delancey intercepted a small Spanish coaster, releasing her again as valueless. She was heading eastwards and her master had seen the recent action. He spoke a Catalonian dialect, knowing only a few words of Castilian, but eked out his story with gestures and a rough diagram.

He conveyed the idea of three big ships hunting a small one which twisted and turned in its efforts to escape. In the end, he indicated, the small ship had been taken. Yes, she was English and about the same size as the
Merlin,
maybe a little smaller. Her pursuers were French sail of the line, one flying a Rear-Admiral's flag. Had the sloop been greatly damaged? The Catalan thought not. Her sails and rigging, yes, but not much otherwise. The conflict had been so unequal that he and his men had wanted to see the English escape even if they were not Christians, for the French these days were not Christians either. Avoiding any theological discussion, Delancey thanked his informant and made him a present of a captured barrel of wine.