Sharpe 3-Book Collection 3. Bernard Cornwell

flagship, and Chase, gazing at the Victory, had tears in his eyes. ‘What I wouldn’t do for that man,’ he exclaimed. ‘I never fought for him myself and thought I’d never have the chance.’ Chase cuffed at his eyes as the first of the Pucelle’s guns banged from the weather deck in salute of Lord Horatio Nelson, Viscount and Baron Nelson of the Nile and of Burnham Thorpe, Baron Nelson of the Nile and of Hilborough, Knight of the most Honourable Order of the Bath and Vice Admiral of the White. ‘I tell you, Sharpe,’ Chase said, still with tears on his cheeks, ‘I would sail down the throat of hell for that man.’

      The Victory had been signalling to the Mars, which, in turn, was passing the messages on down the chain of frigates to the Euryalus, which lay closest to the enemy, but now the flagship’s signal came down and a new ripple of bright flags ran up her mizzen. The Pucelle’s guns still fired the salute, the shots screaming out to fall in the empty ocean to starboard.

      ‘Our numeral, sir!’ Lieutenant Connors called to Captain Chase. ‘He makes us welcome, sir, and says we are to paint our mast hoops yellow. Yellow?’ He sounded puzzled. ‘Yellow, sir, it does say yellow, and we are to take station astern of the Conqueror.’

      ‘Acknowledge,’ Chase said, and turned to stare at the Conqueror, a seventy-four which was sailing some distance ahead of a three-decker, the Britannia. ‘She’s a slow ship,’ Chase muttered of the Britannia, then he waited for the last of the seventeen guns to sound before seizing the speaking trumpet. ‘Ready to tack!’

      He had some tricky seamanship ahead, and it would have to be done under the eyes of a fleet that prized seamanship almost as much as it valued victory. The Pucelle was on the starboard tack and needed to go about so that she could join the column of ships which sailed north on the larboard tack, yet as she turned into the wind she would inevitably lose speed and, if Chase judged it wrong, he would end up becalmed and shamed in the wind-shadow of the Conqueror. He had to turn his ship, let her gather speed and slide her smoothly into place and if he did it too fast he could run aboard the Conqueror and too slow and he would be left wallowing motionless under the Britannia’s scornful gaze. ‘Now, quartermaster, now,’ he said, and the seven men hauled on the great wheel while the lieutenants bellowed at the sail handlers to release the sheets. ‘Israel Pellew has the Conqueror,’ Chase remarked to Sharpe, ‘and he’s a fine fellow and a wonderful seaman. Wonderful seaman! From Cornwall, you see? They seem to be born with salt in their veins, those Cornish fellows. Come on, my sweet, come on!’ He was talking to the Pucelle which had turned her bluff bows into the wind and for a second it seemed she would hang there helplessly, but then Sharpe saw the bowsprit moving against the cavalcade of British ships, and men were running across the deck, seizing new sheets and hauling them home. The sails flapped like demented things, then tightened in the wind and the ship leaned, gathered speed and headed docilely into the open space behind the Conqueror. It had been done beautifully.

      ‘Well done, quartermaster,’ Chase said, pretending he had felt no qualms during the manoeuvre. ‘Well done, Pucelles! Mister Holderby! Muster a work party and break out some yellow paint!’

      ‘Why yellow?’ Sharpe asked.

      ‘Every other ship has yellow hoops,’ Chase said, gesturing back down the long line, ‘while ours are like the French hoops, black.’ Only the upper masts were made from single pine trunks while the lower were formed from clusters of long timbers that were bound and seized by the iron hoops. ‘In battle,’ Chase said, ‘maybe that’s all anyone will note of us. And they’ll see black hoops and think we’re a Frog ship and pour two or three decks of good British gunnery into our vitals. Can’t have that, Sharpe! Not for a few slaps of paint!’ He turned like a dancer, unable to contain his elation, for his ship was in the line of battle, the enemy was at sea and Horatio Nelson was his leader.