Guns crashed and men cried in agony, while the ships continued to grind together, but Bolitho threw himself through the stem windows and plunged wildly across a deserted cabin, his sword ready, his mind empty of everything but the fury of battle.
Then there was a door, kicked open by a bosun's mate, who dropped dead from a pistol shot before he could jump aside. A midshipman holding the pistol screamed as a cutlass hacked him down. And then they were through and out on to the Tornade's great quarterdeck. Startled faces and flashing steel seemed to pin Bolitho against a ladder, but as more of his small party surged beneath the poop and fighting became general he forgot everything but the need to reach the forepart of the deck, where he could see a gold-laced hat surrounded by a group of officers and several armed seamen.
When the smoke swirled clear he saw his own ship close alongside, held fast by grapnels which might have been cast by either side. She looked small and strangely unreal, and as he turned away to parry a cutlass he saw her mainmast going over the side, leaving her bare, like a listing hulk in some forgotten shipyard.
He did not even hear the mast fall, but saw only faces and wild eyes, his ears deafened by cries and savage curses, the clash of steel and the fierce determination which gripped his men like insanity.
But it was no use. Step by step they were being forced back to the poop again as more men ran from the guns in support and others fired down from the mizzen top, heedless of friend or foe in the desperation to clear their ship of boarders.
A figure darted beneath his arm and he saw it was Pascoe. As he reached out to stop him a French lieutenant struck the sword from his hand and then brought the hilt savagely against the side of his head, knocking him to his knees. Bodies and swords swerved and slashed all around him, and he saw Pascoe reaching to help him to his feet, while framed against the sky a French petty officer stood quite still, a pistol aimed straight at the boy's shoulder.
Another figure blotted out the light, momentarily silhouetted by the pistol's bright flash. Then as a body rolled against him Bolitho saw it was his brother.
Sobbing for breath he snatched up his sword from betwetn the stamping feet and lunged upwards at the petty office, seeing his face open from mouth to ear in a great scarlet gash. As the ma-i reeled back shrieking he hacked down the French Lieutenant and kicked his body aside even as he fell.
He gasped, "See to him, Pascoe! Take him aft!"
Allday was striding at his side, the cutlass swinging back and forth, up and down with merciless precision. Men were screaming and dying, but so many were crammed on the quarterdeck it was impossible to measure the rising cost. There was no quarter asked or given, and Bolitho threw himself to the forepart of the deck, realising only vaguely that his men were advancing once more. He cut down a distorted face and drove his sword between the shoulders of an officer who was trying to fight his way through the press behind him.
He had lost his hat, and his body felt bruised and broken, as if he had been struck a hundred times.
But above and through it all he saw only his brother. His last gesture as he had thrown himself as a shield for his son, and perhaps for him.
A man in captain's uniform, his forehead laid open in a deep gash, was shouting at him through the struggling seamen, and Bolitho stared at him, trying to understand what he was saying.
The French captain yelled, "Strike! You are beaten!" Then he went down as a marine impaled him on his bayonet.
"Beaten!" Bolitho shouted, "Strike their colours!" He saw a man running to slash away the halyards and drop from a musket ball even as the great Tricolour fell and covered him like a shroud.
Stepkyne was pushing up beside Allday, his curved hanger crossing with a French lieutenant's sword. He raised his arm and then screamed as a man darted beneath his guard and drove a dirk up and into his stomach. The man ran on, too dazed to know what he had done or where he was going. A pigtailed seaman watched him dash past and then hacked him across the neck with his cutlass with no more expression on his face than a keeper killing a rabbit.
Bolitho reeled against the bulwark, his eyes blinded with sweat. He was cracking, he had to be. For above the harsh grate of steel and the awful screams he thought he could hear cheering.
Allday was yelling into his face. "It's Cap'n Herrick, sir!"
Bolitho looked at him. Allday had never called him sir in living memory.
He dragged himself past the interlocked, swaying figures and peered across his ship at the braced yards and tan coloured sails of another vessel driving alongside. Then as grapnels thudded into the splintered bulwark he saw seamen and marines pouring across the Hyperion like a bridge, cheered on by the wounded and the surviving gunners still left to work the dismasted ship, their voices mingling with those of the enraged attackers.
No guns were firing now, and as more men surged hacking their way through boarding nets and defenders alike, Bolitho saw the French admiral's flag fluttering down to the deck, and heard the hoarse cries of Herrick's lieutenants for the French to submit and lay down their arms.
Herrick himself came aft to the poop, his sword in his hand. Bolitho stared at him. All fighting had ceased, and as the wind moved the limp sails overhead he saw the Spartan driving close by, her men cheering in spite of the damage and death around them.
Herrick seized his hand. "Two others have struck to us! And the San Leandro is ours!"
Bolitho nodded. "The rest?"
"Two made off to the north'rd!" He wrung his hand wildly. "My God, what a victory!"
Bolitho released his hand and turned towards the poop. He saw Pascoe kneeling beside Hugh's body, and with Herrick beside him pushed between the exhausted but jubilant seamen.
Bolitho knelt down, but it was over. Hugh's face seemed younger, and the deep lines of strain were gone. He closed his brother's eyes and said quietly, "A brave man "
Pascoe stared at him, his eyes very bright. "He saved my life, sir."
"He did." Bolitho stood up slowly, feeling the pain and exhaustion clawing at his nerves. "I hope you'll always remember him." He paused. "As I will."
Pascoe looked at him searchingly and some small tears ran down his stained cheeks. But when he spoke his voice was steady enough. "I shall never forget. Never."
Allday – said, "They've caught the French admiral, Captain."
Bolitho swung round, the despair and the sense of loss flooding through him like fire. The chase and the disappointments, and all the dead still to be counted. And Lequiller had lived through it.
He stared at the little man standing between Lieutenant Hicks and Tomlin. He was bent and bearded, a-small, wizened man whose stained uniform seemed too large for him.
Bolitho looked away, unable to watch the expression of stunned disbelief on Lequiller's face. He felt suddenly cheated and ashamed.
In war it was better for the enemy to be faceless.
"Take him under guard to Impulsive." He walked towards the ladder, his men cheering him, their hands, some covered in blood, reaching out to touch his shoulders as he passed without a word.
On the Hyperion's quarterdeck he found Inch waiting for him, one arm in a sling, his tattered coat across his shoulders like a cape. Bolitho reached his side and studied him. The sight of Inch did more than he would have thought possible to control his rising emotion.
He said quietly, "I believe I ordered you below?"
Inch showed his teeth in a painful grin. "I thought you would like to know, sir. The commodore was unconscious throughout the battle. But he is astir now and demanding
brandy."
Bolitho grasped his good hand, Inch's face suddenly blurred and out of focus, "And he shall have it, Mr. Inch!"
He looked past Gossett's huge grin. and the capering, cheering gunners. The ship was mastless and heavy in the water, and he could almost feel her pain like his own.