Not one of the Peacock's starboard side guns had fired back at the Triton yet and Ramage decided to take advantage of the fact. Leaping down from the bulwarks he ran over to Southwick and shouted, above the thunder of the carronades: "Stay twenty yards off - I want to give them a good pounding with the guns, otherwise we don't stand a chance against all those : they'll swarm over us!"
Southwick bellowed into his speaking trumpet, choosing moments between the guns firing, and as Ramage rejoined Jackson at the bulwark the brig settled down to a course parallel with the Peacock but twenty yards to windward. Ramage watched warily for the first sign that the Peacock was going to try to luff up and get alongside the Triton.
The gunners were settling into a steady rhythm and the flash as each carronade fired momentarily lit up the Peacock, like a furnace door being opened quickly and shut. The flashes showed the Peacock's deck was now clearing: there were small dark piles of bodies where grapeshot had torn into her boarders, but the rest had dispersed to find some shelter. Ramage knew many must be crouching in the lee of the bulwark, waiting for the Tritons to board.
Suddenly Ramage realized the Topaz was no longer ahead of the Peacock. He glanced round in alarm and it took him several moments to realize that the Peacock must have come round to starboard a little - with the Triton conforming - and, sailing faster than the convoy, had left the rest of the ships astern. The nearest part of the convoy was now a good half a mile away on the starboard quarter. The Topaz was safe now, whatever happened to the Triton.
There was a flash from the Peacock's side: one of her guns had been loaded and fired. Ramage heard neither the thud of a hit nor the noise of a shot passing close. As soon as all the Peacock's starboard side guns were firing, it would be time to try the other tack.
He banged Jackson on the shoulder. "Tell Mr Southwick to make sure all the starboard side guns are loaded with grape, and to pass the word when that's done and he's ready to wear ship!"
Another flash from the Peacock's side, and then another. Three guns manned and firing, and three more to go. With luck one or two had been damaged...
Jackson, pulling at his shoulder, reported that the starboard guns were already loaded and the Master ready to wear.
Another flash from the Peacock's side warned him four guns were now manned. He knew it was time to attack from the other side...
He jumped down on to the deck and strode over to Southwick, but even before he could give any orders Jackson was beside him gesticulating. Ramage turned to see another ship coming up on the Peacock's larboard quarter.
"The Greyhound frigate, sir!" Jackson yelled.
So there was no need to wear round to attack the Peacock on the other side.
As he watched the frigate, Ramage heard yelling and shouting coming from the Peacock; excited cries that carried over the noise of carronades and musketoons.
The shouting was in French, and he thought he could hear "Board her!" being constantly repeated. He went back to the bulwark and tried to concentrate his thoughts while, one after another, the carronades gave enormous, heavy coughs as they fired and then crashed back in recoil in a series of rumbles which shook the whole deck.
The stretch of water between the two ships, the waves slopping darkly but constantly reflecting the flash of gunfire, was too narrow. Too late, Ramage realized what was happening. The Peacock, sheering away from the approaching Greyhound, was running aboard the Triton.
"Stand by to repel boarders!" Ramage shouted at the top of his voice and at the same instant realized he was unarmed: the cutlass given him by Southwick was still stuck in the deck somewhere. He could hear the Master repeating his cry, but it was unnecessary: there was not a man in the Triton who did not realize there was no chance of the Triton avoiding the Peacock crashing alongside.
Ramage glanced back at the Greyhound: she was coming up fast - she had perhaps two ship's lengths to go before she was alongside the Peacock. A matter of minutes, almost moments. And in that time the bunch of cut-throats in the Peacock - obviously French privateersmen, although he hadn't the slightest idea how they got there - would have slaughtered every man in the Triton.
There was no point in standing up here on the bulwark like a pheasant on a gate, Ramage told himself; he could see all that was necessary from the deck. He jumped down and ran over to the rack of boarding pikes fitted round the mainmast. As he snatched one, the brig gave a sudden lurch: the Peacock had crashed alongside.
Boarding nets, Ramage thought with irritation: I didn't order them to be rigged up. But there was no sudden swarm of screaming Frenchmen over the top of the Triton's bulwarks; instead the men at the guns continued sponging, loading, ramming, running out and firing into the French ship.
As he realized the enemy was not still alongside he saw Southwick was standing beside him, shouting something ... "Managed to turn to starboard enough to dodge ... Should I repeat it if the Peacock -"
"Yes, right now!" Ramage yelled as he felt the Peacock crash alongside once more and saw men holding on to her rigging, poised to jump and waving cutlasses that glinted in the flash of the guns.
Every available Triton was waiting at the bulwarks. Many had muskets, with cutlasses slung over their shoulders; others held boarding pikes, the seven-feet-long ash staves with long, narrow spear tips.
A flash and a noise like tearing canvas warned Ramage that a roundshot from one of the Peacock's guns had missed him by a matter of inches. Then he saw, in the flash from one of the Triton's guns, eight or ten Frenchmen toppling from the Peacock's main shrouds. It took him a few seconds to realize that the Triton's Marines were clearing the Peacock's rigging by firing volleys from the musketoons. It said something for the coolness of the Marine corporal...
Suddenly there were twenty Frenchmen screaming and scrambling at the bulwarks where Ramage had been standing: they had all leapt at the same instant and, Ramage guessed, misjudged the distance slightly in the darkness. Instinctively Ramage lunged with the boarding pike, felt the wood jar his arms as the point came hard up against bone, and wrenched it back ready to stab again into the mass of men.
Jackson and Stafford were beside him, screaming like madmen and slashing with their cutlasses; a stream of blasphemy in Italian, the Genoese accent unmistakable, showed that Rossi was close by.
More Frenchmen were streaming on board and overrunning the carronades, and out of the corner of his eye Ramage saw Jackson slip. A Frenchman paused above him, bracing to slash down with his sword. Without thinking Ramage hurled the boarding pike like a spear and caught the Frenchman in the side of the chest. As he fell, Jackson got to his feet again and waved cheerfully before leaping at the nearest group of boarders.
Ramage caught sight of a cutlass lying on the deck, snatched it up and turned back towards the Peacock. There was a bellow of wrath a few feet away and he caught sight of Southwick, hatless and his white hair sticking up like a mop, slashing away with his enormous sword and driving three Frenchmen before him.