He snatched a glance at Stirk — the same neutral passivity, the unconcern.
Impulsively, Kydd moved closer to him and said in a low voice, “Toby, how c’n you — I mean, why doesn’t it …” He tailed off, feeling his face burning.
Stirk frowned. “Yeah — I know what yer mean, mate.” Idly stroking the top of the massive gun, Stirk went on, “Fair time ago, when I was a nipper, I shipped in Terrier sloop, out east. There was a yellow bugger, name o’ Loola, in the fo’c’sle wi’ us.” He smiled briefly. “Weren’t much chop as a seaman, ’n’ he useta pray at this ’eathen god thing ’e ’ad, with a big belly and fool expression, but ’e ’ad his life squared away right pretty, answers fer everything. ’N’ he said somethin’ savvy that I never forget, ever. ’E said as ’ow it’s dead certain yer’ll get yours one day, but yer never gonna know what that day is when yer wakes up in the mornin’.” He coughed self-consciously. “But yer ’as to know that if it is the day, then yer faces what comes like a hero-and if it ain’t the day, then it’s a waste o’ yer life worryin’ about it.”
A few moments later the ragged strike of a broadside came, this time with no solid impacts sensed through the deck.
“Firin’ at the rigging, they do,” Stirk said derisively. “Thinks they’ll cripple us so’s they can skin out.”
Taking a deep breath, Kydd felt his fear recede. He straightened, and ventured a smile. “Shy bastards — can’t take a mill man to man!”
Stirk studied him and nodded.
Another spasm of cannon fire banged out. The noise was appreciably nearer now, and the sound of balls striking above had a vicious quality.
A boatswain’s mate appeared at the fore hatch. “Sail trimmers aloft!”
Kydd realized that this included him. He ran up the hatchways, aware that he would now be facing a hail of shot unprotected in the rigging.
He was shocked by the disorder on deck. In place of the neatly squared and precisely trimmed appearance of the decks, there was a wasteland of debris — blocks fallen from aloft, some with lines still reeved through them, unidentifiable fragments of splintered wood and unraveled rope. Long gouges in the decking told of the brutal impact of iron on wood.
Looking up, Kydd saw that with the angle of strike of the balls several sails could be pierced at once, and there seemed to be holes everywhere in the sails aloft.
“Get going, lads, fore tops’l yard’s taken a knock,” the boatswain said. Directly above, Kydd saw that the outer third of the spar was hanging at an angle where a shot had mutilated the yard, and the topsail flapped in disorder under it.
He swung into the foreshrouds, cringing at the threat of another broadside in the rigging — but remembering Stirk’s words, he thrust it brutally from his mind. As he climbed he looked to see where the French ships were. There they bore, strung out in a widely separated line passing across their bows. They were shockingly close, a bare mile away, while their own ships closed in roughly abreast of each other.
Royal Albion and Tiberius were ahead of Duke William and would soon fall upon the enemy, while the last French vessel, a large threedecker, would apparently be their opponent. The afternoon breeze had picked up and there was now no chance for the French to avoid action. Kydd reached the foretop and stood waiting for orders while others arrived next to him. A pair of capstan bars would be used in fishing the topsail yard, and he was one of the party assigned to perform the outboard lashing. A sullen bellow of guns rolled across the water. The third enemy battleship disappeared behind a wall of gunsmoke as she fired on the nearer Tiberius, but this time the smoke clouds dissipated, rolling slowly downwind.
On Duke William’s poop, fifes and drums began a jaunty, defiant tune — a thumpity thump, thumpity thump rhythm:
Hearts of oak are our ships!
Jolly tars are our men!
We al-always are ready!
Steadyy, boys, steadyyy!
The gunas of the last French ship in line broke out in a thunderous roar and almost immediately the assault struck.
Unseen missiles slapped through sails and parted ropes — the whirring of chain shot was unmistakable, the two links sliding apart and whirling around through the air in an unstoppable scythe of death. They caught one man climbing around the futtock shrouds, effortlessly cutting him in half. The torso fell silently. A ball slammed past the side of the foretop, its passage so violent that it sent a man staggering over the edge, his scream instantly cut off when his body broke over a carronade below, scattering the gun crew. A twang and thrum of impacts on taut ropes and the onslaught was over. Kydd stirred from his frozen position, heady with the realization that he was spared. This was not to be his day for eternity.