It was a complex series of factors, and Peabody turned his attention to another complication — the setting of the sun. Red and angry it was setting, beyond the convoy. There was not much more than an hour's daylight left, and he needed daylight to do his work well. He glanced to windward; there was the familiar black cloud coming down with the wind, as might have been expected, for it was two hours at least since the last rainstorm. He held doggedly on his course, aware that Hubbard was looking at him with faint surprise and that even the men at the guns were glancing over their shoulders, wondering why their captain was running like this from the enemy. The enemy to leeward, the squall to windward; Peabody transferred his attention first to the one and then to the other. Now the squall was close upon them. There was a warning flap from the sails and Peabody heard Crane cautioning the men at the wheel. Now it was here, heavy fiuky gusts of wind and torrential warm rain, heavy as if from a shower bath, drumming on the decks and streaming like a cataract in the scuppers.
"Wear ship, Mr. Hubbard, if you please. I'll have her before the wind again."
Round she came, the heavy gusts of the squall thrusting her forward perceptibly. She was in the heart of the little storm, traveling down wind with it for several minutes before it drew ahead of her. As Peabody turned his head a little cascade of water poured out of the brim of his cocked hat, but the rain was already lessening. Yet even when it had ceased entirely, and the decks were beginning to steam in the hot evening, it was still ahead of her, blotting the Calypso from Peabody's sight, and presumably concealing the Delaware from the Calypso.
"Stand to your guns, men!" called Peabody. He was glad to see Murray attending to the distribution of lighted slow-match round the ship — he wanted nothing to go wrong with that first broadside.
Only a scant mile ahead of the Delaware a gray shape emerged from the rainstorm — gray one moment, sharply defined the next; the Calypso still holding her course and beyond the immediate help of her consorts. Certainly there was no time now for the British ships to close together, not with the Delaware rushing down upon them at eight knots. There was a chance of raking the Calypso, of crossing her bows and sweeping her from end to end, but her captain was too wary. As the two ships closed he put up his helm — Peabody saw her broadside lengthen and her masts separate.
"Larboard a point," snapped Peabody to the helmsman. He wanted that broadside delivered at the closest possible range.
The Calypso was just steadying on her new course as the Delaware forged up alongside her. The forecastle twelve-pounder went off with a bang; Peabody took note of that, for the captain of that gun must be punished for opening fire without orders. Peabody could see the white deck and gleaming hammock of the British frigate, the gold lace of the officers and the bright red coats of the Marines on the quarter-deck. Where he stood by the mizzen rigging he was just opposite the frigate's taffrail; it was almost time for the broadside — it was interesting to see how Murray down on the main deck came through this test of nerves. At last it came — a crashing simultaneous roar from the main-deck guns, followed instantly by the spar deck carronades. The Delaware heaved to the recoil of the guns, and the smoke poured upwards in a cloud, enshrouding Peabody so thickly that for a moment the Calypso was blotted from his sight. Something struck the bulwark beside him a tremendous blow which shook him as he stood. There was a gaping hole there; something else struck the mizzenmast bitts and sprayed all the deck around with fragments. Peabody watched death flitting past him; and in the sublime knowledge that he had done all his duty he felt neither awe nor fear.
The carronades beside him, speedily reloaded, roared out again. The ship trembled to the recoil of the guns, while Peabody could feel, through the deck beneath his feet, the heavy blows which the Calypso's guns were dealing in return. The British frigate was firing fast, accurately, and low; the earlier defeats of British single ships had shaken up the service into renewed attention to gunnery, as the action between the Shannon and the Chesapeake showed. Peabody peered through the smoke to see what damage was being done to the enemy, but with the wind directly abaft it was hard to see anything. There was the Calypso's mainmast standing out through the smoke, mistily visible from the main yard upward. Yet everything there was in such confusion that Peabody actually found it hard to recognize what he saw. The main-topsail was in ribbons, with strips of canvas blowing out from the yard, which was canted wildly sideways and precariously supported the topgallant yard, which, slings, ties and braces all shot away, was lying balanced upon it in a wild tangle of canvas and rigging. As Peabody watched, half the main shrouds parted as though a gigantic knife had been drawn across them, the mast lurched, and the whole mass of stuff came tumbling down into the smoke.
The Delaware was drawing ahead fast; the chance of crossing the Calypso's bows and raking her was obvious. Peabody leaned forward to the man at the wheel.
"Larboard your helm," he said.
Hubbard had seen the chance too, had heard his words, and was bellowing his orders into the smoke. Over went the helm, round came the yards, and Peabody turned back to watch the Calypso. But she was coming round too — the distance between her vague mainmast and mizzenmast was slowly widening. Peabody saw a red-coated Marine come running out towards him along the Calypso's mizzen topsail yard, musket in hand; the man must have been mad with the lust of battle to have attempted such a feat. He reached the yardarm, but as he was bringing his weapon to his shoulder something invisible struck him and he was tossed off the yard.
With the wind abeam they were passing out of the smoke, and the Calypso's outlines became more distinct. From the deck upward she was more of a wreck than Peabody would ever have thought possible, her canvas in shreds and her running and standing rigging cut to pieces. Her headsails were trailing under her forefoot; her spanker gaff hung drunkenly, with the upper half of the spanker blowing out from it like a sheet on a clothesline, and although the main-topgallant was the only yard which had fallen all her spars sagged and drooped as if a breath would bring them down. There could be no doubt whatever as to the efficacy of dismantling shot, Peabody decided.
Midshipman Shepherd was beside him. His cheek had been laid open over the bone, so that half his face was masked in blood which dripped down onto his torn coat.
"Number seven gun has burst, sir," said Shepherd. His chest was heaving with his exertions as he tried to hold himself steady. "Mr. Atwell sent me to report. The ship caught fire on the main deck but the fire's out now, sir."
"Thank you, Mr. Shepherd. Get that cut bandaged before you return to duty."
Peabody made his reply steadily enough, but he had felt a wave of bitterness at the news. These cursed iron guns! The Belvidera had escaped from Rodgers in the President because of just such an accident. The Pennsylvania foundries had not learned yet to cast iron without flaws. Shepherd's report explained the slackening of the main-deck fire which Peabody had detected just before. Another shot hit the deck beside him at that instant, sending a ringbolt flying through the air with a menacing whirr — the Calypso was still firing rapidly and well; a wreck from the deck upwards, her gun power was not in the least impaired. Through the roar of the carronades beside him he could hear the smashing blows which the Calypso's guns were still dealing out, but the main-deck guns were firing back again as fast as ever now. The Calypso's tottering fore-topmast came down, falling nearly vertically — she was dropping astern fast again. Peabody wanted to hurl his ship close alongside her, to pound her in a mad flurry of mutual destruction, to sink her, to burn her, to cover her deck with corpses. Mad lust for battle wrapped his mind like a cloak.