He had his doubts about the probable effectiveness of mines built with seventeenth-century technology, no matter what pointers the builders might have acquired from purloined up-timer sources. On the other hand, he'd seen sufficient proof of seventeenth-century ingenuity to prevent him from investing too much confidence in those doubts of his. He'd come to the conclusion that the contempt some up-timers-Quentin Underwood came rather forcibly to mind-felt for the inherent ability of native-born denizens of this century was… misplaced. Given the persistent reports of King Christian's fascination with the concept of moored mines (and the fact that, for all his fondness for alcoholic beverages and his famed bouts of excessive enthusiasm, Christian was anything but stupid), John Simpson had no intention of entering the narrow waters of the Sound until he had to.
And I'm not coming in from the north when I do enter it, he thought dryly. If there's one place where these people could make even crappy mines effective, that's it.
And since he'd already demonstrated that seventeenth-century artillery wasn't going to do much more than scuff the paint on his ironclads, he'd been perfectly willing to take his chances on whatever he might happen to meet as he sailed calmly through the Great Belt from the Kattegat and from there to the Bay of Kiel.
The wind was from the southeast, ideally placed for shipping headed for the North Sea from the Baltic, even if it wasn't very strong. He was sure the timberclads preferred the current conditions to the awkward, corkscrew roll that had afflicted them in the Skaggerak, and although visibility was patchy (not uncommon for these waters, especially in the spring), they'd already encountered several outbound ships and fishing vessels. That was one reason he'd reduced speed to little more than three or four knots; it had turned particularly patchy over the last fifteen minutes or so, and he didn't want to run anyone down.
Of course, he thought as he watched the warship-French, from the look of her-solidifying out of the mist at a range of less than two miles, worse things could happen to a ship than a simple collision.
Grosclaud gaped in disbelief. For a second or two, he couldn't imagine what he was seeing. It was too alien, too unlike anything he'd ever seen before. It was more like some sort of slab-sided building floating toward him than any proper sort of vessel.
But it was only for a second or two. Then he knew what it had to be, and his blood ran cold as a second dark silhouette started blending out of the mist behind it.
"Clear for action! Clear for action!"
Even as he heard his own voice shouting the order, a part of his mind wondered what point there was to it. It had been far easier to decide the rumors about the newest American deviltry had to be grossly exaggerated when the ships those rumors swirled about were still sitting in the Elbe River at Magdeburg. It was quite a different thing, he discovered, when one saw them altering course directly toward one's ship.
Shouts, the rousing tattoo of the drum, bellowed orders, and pattering feet sounded all about him as Railleuse's startled crew responded to his orders, and he stared up at the set of the sails.
There was no wind, not really. The Kattegat this morning might almost have been a millpond, and Railleuse's canvas was scarcely even drawing. She couldn't have been making more than one or two knots, with barely a ripple around her cutwater, which meant there was no point trying to evade the oncoming monsters, and he looked at the suddenly white-faced sailing master.
"At least we know now what the fellow was trying to tell us," Grosclaud said with a smile that held no humor at all. Then he shrugged. "Come four points to starboard. We'll try to engage with the port broadside."
Simpson watched the other ship swinging to starboard, turning away from the squadron's line of advance and opening its port broadside. The range fell steadily as Constitution and her consorts foamed ahead, working up towards a speed of ten knots in obedience to his last maneuvering orders, and he wondered what the idiot in command of that ship thought he was doing.
"Bullhorn!" he snapped.
"Aye, aye, sir!" one of the bridge signalmen acknowledged sharply, and disappeared briefly into the conning tower. He reappeared on the bridge wing almost instantly, carrying the bullhorn that had once belonged to the Grantville Fire Department and now bore the crossed anchors of the Navy.
"Ahoy!"
Grosclaud had no idea what the single word booming impossibly across the narrowing gap of water between him and the Americans might mean. No doubt it was yet another of those "up-timer" words that were working their way into the world's proper languages.
"This is Admiral John Simpson, United States Navy," the hugely amplified voice continued, this time in recognizable German. "Lower your sails and surrender, or I will be forced to fire into you!"
"Captain?" a merely mortal voice asked closer to hand. Grosclaud turned his head and saw Leon Jouette, his second in command. Jouette's face looked like curiously mottled porridge, and Grosclaud wondered if his looked the same.
"What do you expect me to do, Leon?" he demanded harshly.
"But if the reports are accurate, what can we-"
"Even if they are accurate, I can't simply haul down my flag the first time someone threatens me!"
Jouette looked as if he wanted to continue to argue, but he closed his mouth with a click as Grosclaud glared at him. Then he nodded spastically and turned and hurried away, shouting orders of his own as he went.
"I repeat," the voice thundered again. "Strike your sails and surrender, or I will destroy your vessel!"
"-destroy your vessel," Simpson said the into the microphone, then lowered it and watched the other vessel.
It continued to swing to starboard, slowly under the current wind conditions, and his mouth tightened.
"Clear the bridge," he said as gun ports began to open here and there along the other ship's side. The bridge wing lookouts moved smartly past him into the conning tower's protection, and he lifted his binoculars, looking across the water at the Frenchman-now less than eight hundred yards away.
Eighteen-pounders, at best, he decided.
He looked astern to where President foamed along in Constitution's wake. Captain Lustgarten's carronades were run out on either broadside, as were Constitution's. Despite their stubby barrels, both ships' carronades would have the range to engage the French ship within the next few minutes, whatever the other captain did. When that happened, there could be only one outcome. He knew that-which didn't mean he had to like it.
"Captain," he said through the bullhorn, "I have no desire to destroy your ship and kill your crew, but if you do not surrender, I will have no other option. This is your final warning."
"-your final warning!"
Grosclaud's jaw set tight.
The closest American was little more than five hundred yards away. The second ship followed perhaps two hundred yards astern of it, and he saw two more, identical ships beyond them. And beyond them was something else, something streaming smoke as it followed along behind.
A voice deep inside gibbered that Jouette had been right, that not surrendering immediately was insane. Yet he couldn't do it. He simply couldn't do it.
Simpson sighed, shook his head, and followed the lookouts and signalmen into the conning tower. Little though he might care for what was about to happen, he had no intention of standing heroically-and stupidly-on an open bridge while somebody fired eighteen-pounder cannon balls in his direction.
"Very well, Captain," he said to Halberstat. "If he won't stop, we'll have to encourage him to see reason. Let's try firing one shot across his bow, first, though."
"Yes, sir." Captain Halberstat looked at the signalman manning the voice pipes. "Pass the order to Lieutenant MacDougall. One shot across his bow, whenever is convenient."