Read Online In Gallant Company by Alexander Kent - Free Book Online Page A

‘She’s up ahead, lads. From our drift I’d say she’ll be bows on or stern on. We’ll take what comes.’
    Quinn said in a husky voice, ‘Mr Sparke is coming, sir.’
    They heard Sparke call, ‘Are you ready, Mr Bolitho?’ He sounded impatient, even querulous, his earlier doubts forgotten.
    â€˜Aye, sir.’
    â€˜We will take her from either end.’ Sparke’s boat loomed through the fog, the lieutenant’s white shirt and breeches adding to the ghostlike appearance. ‘That way we can divide their people.’
    Bolitho said nothing, but his heart sank. Either end, so the boat which pulled the furthest would have a good chance of being seen before she could grapple.
    Sparke’s oars began to move again and he called, ‘
I
will take the stern.’
    Bolitho waited until the other was clear and then signalled his own men to pull.
    â€˜You all know what to do?’
    Couzens nodded, his face compressed with concentration. ‘I will stay with the boat, sir.’
    Quinn added jerkily, ‘I’ll support you, sir, er, Dick, and take the foredeck.’
    Bolitho nodded. ‘Balleine will hold
his
men until they are ready to use their muskets.’
    Cairns had been insistent about that, and rightly so. Any fool might set off a musket too soon if it was loaded and primed from the start.
    Bolitho drew his curved hanger and unclipped the leather scabbard, dropping it to the bottom boards. There it would wait until he needed it. But worn during an attack it might trip and throw him under a cutlass.
    He touched the back of the blade, but kept his eyes fixed on the wavering glow beyond the bows. The nearer they got,the smaller it became, as the fog’s distortion had less control over it.
    From one corner of his eye he thought he saw a series of splashes as Sparke increased his stroke and went in for the attack.
    Bolitho watched as with startling suddenness the masts and booms of the drifting schooner broke across the cloudy sky like black bars and the lantern sharpened into one unwinking eye.
    Stockdale touched Couzens’ arm, making the boy jump as if he had cut him.
    â€˜Here, your fist on the tiller-bar, sir.’ He guided him as if Couzens had been struck blind. ‘Take over from me when I give the word.’ With his other hand Stockdale picked up his outdated boarding cutlass which weighed as much as two of the modern ones.
    Bolitho held up his arm and the oars rose and remained poised over either beam like featherless wings.
    He watched, holding his breath, feeling the drag of current and holding power of the rudder. They would collide with the schooner’s raked stem, right beneath her bowsprit with any sort of luck.
    â€˜Boat your oars!’ He was speaking in a fierce whisper, although surely his heart-beats against his ribs would be heard all the way to Boston. His lips were frozen in a wild grin which he could not control. Madness, desperation, fear. It was all here.
    â€˜Ready with the grapnel!’
    He watched the slender bowsprit sweeping across them as if the schooner was riding at full power to smash them under her forefoot. Bolitho saw Balleine rising with his grapnel, gauging the moment, ducking to avoid losing his head on the schooner’s bobstay.
    There was a sudden bang, followed by a long-drawn-out scream. Bolitho saw and heard it all in a mere second. The flash which seemed to come from the sea itself, the response from the vessel above him, yells and startled movements before more explosions ripped across the water towards the scream.
    He jumped to his feet. ‘Ready, lads!’
    He shut Sparke from his mind. The fool had allowedsomebody to load a musket, and it had gone off, hitting one of his men. It was too late now. For any of them.
    Bolitho threw up his arm and seized the trailing line as the grapnel thudded into the schooner’s bowsprit and slewed the cutter drunkenly around the bows.
    â€˜At