Tenacious(99)

He considered for a moment, then said, ‘We have no reliable knowledge of the French advance. It might be prudent to begin a regular reconnaissance south until their presence is detected. One of you will take a boat away at dusk for this purpose.’

‘So, we have our orders, an’ our task is tolerably clear. I only hope we can get away in time.’

‘You are not confident of a favourable outcome?’ Hewitt responded coolly.

‘Are you?’

‘I know my duty, I believe,’ Hewitt said stiffly.

‘F’r me…’ Kydd began, and thought better of it. ‘Then let’s be started. Where’s Suleiman, the translator we’ve been promised?’ He turned out to be the tall man at the seraglio.

‘Er, Mr Suleiman, I want t’ see the serang – whatever you’d call th’ chief of the workers on the wall. There’s not a moment t’ lose.’

The first gun from Tigre was landed at the mole soon after midday: a heavy twenty-four-pounder, laid along the thwarts of a launch, and its two tons of cold iron swayed ashore by improvised sheer-legs. A gun-carriage followed, then boats with powder and shot, some with stores and rum casks.

Soon after, the grinning faces of Dobbie, his close friend Laffin and others arrived in Tenacious’s cutter, volunteers all, ready to man the guns that would soon face the great Napoleon Buonaparte. Their twenty-four-pounder, which had come earlier in the launch, was man-hauled through the streets and into place.

‘Dobbie, you’re gun captain here. There’ll be a Frenchy along presently as will tell ye where, er, you’ll best direct y’r fire.’ There would be no looming enemy ship to fire into: presumably it would be columns of men or random waves of attackers. He ignored the puzzled looks of the men at the word ‘Frenchy’.

The Tenacious gun was mounted at the end of the wall where it met the sea to the south and commanded the open ground in front of the town, now being broken up to form a discouragement to attackers. Kydd let his gaze move across the littered landscape: wild fig trees and hovels had been levelled out to line-of-sight of the nearest high ground some quarter of a mile away. Beyond that was the anonymous dry, scrubby country that stretched inland to distant purple hills. It would be from this direction that the army of Napoleon Buonaparte would come.

Kydd watched Dobbie dispose his men in imitation of shipboard, handspike and crow to hand. He had ensured that there was a semblance of a magazine along the inside of the wall and gave orders for the safe handling of powder and shot. But he was becoming uneasy in this unfamiliar world and hoped their withdrawal would not be long delayed; it had been in a similar siege on land at Calvi that Nelson had lost the sight of one eye to the splintering stone of a ricocheting shot.

Hewitt had concluded his gun dispositions at the other end of the wall – they could now converge fire and, judging from the chattering fascination of gaping onlookers, they were giving heart by their presence.

They met later back at their musty headquarters for a snatched meal. ‘We get marines t’morrow,’ Kydd said, through the last of his lamb stew, ‘t’ use as we please.’

‘Orders are strict enough in the matter of sentries. I’d far rather trust a leatherneck on sentry-go than a Turk, if you take my point.’

‘I do. An’ I notice that we’re on watch an’ watch – days on an’ split the nights?’

‘Alternately?’

‘Agreed.’ Kydd lifted his cup in acknowledgement; the wine was dry and resinous but pleasant enough. Hewitt looked disapprovingly at the china cup but drank.

‘And the dusk patrol?’

‘That’s f’r me,’ Kydd said quickly – the chance for some sea time was not to be missed. It was also an opportunity to show Smith what he could do.

‘Then I’ll take the first watch.’

‘Aye.’

Hewitt seemed moody, distracted. Kydd sensed that he was having misgivings. ‘Rum sort of place,’ Kydd tried. ‘Ye can see how old it is.’

‘Old? You might say that,’ said Hewitt bleakly. ‘This is Canaan – that is to say, the Phoenician lands from centuries before Rome. And that’s the road to Nazareth over the hills – St Paul was here, and this was the very place, St John of Acre, where Richard the Lionheart and the crusaders marched against Jerusalem. It’s been fought over by all the tribes of man for thousands of years, and now we are come to add our blood…’

Kydd would not be depressed: this was a passing strange and unusual task for a sea officer but it was also the best and only chance in sight for notice and advancement.