Newspapers! Lewrie thought of a sudden, feeling remiss that he had not mentioned them. French newspapers, half lies though they might be, could still provide a treasure trove of information; mostly unintentinally, for not every pa-per could be pored over by government censors.
"Uhm, sir…," Lt. Adair spoke up again, all but muttering confidentially, "I noted that, whilst that Papin fellow was doing his rant and dance, he, well… from the first moment he came aboard, he kept darting rather shrewd eyes about our ship. Counting our guns and such? And, we haven't seen a single other fishing boat as large as his quite this far out near the mouth of the Gironde. Perhaps there are others, but… why would this fellow dare the blockade, sir? Might Papin be spying for his own Navy, sir? Or, passing information to us as quick as he passes observations to shore? Playing both ends against the middle?"
"Oh, fu…!" Lewrie began to blurt with a yelp of dismay, but quickly substituted "Mine arse on a band-box!" instead. The son of a bitch was spyin on me? he had to recognise.
"Didn't notice his demeanour," Lewrie huffed, "and thankee for keepin' your own eyes on him, Mister Adair. And, for your suspicions. Papin may be only the first middlin'-sized boat we've come across. It may be that others sail out this far on a regular basis. We're so new t'these waters, we've no idea, at present. We find Erato or Mischief, one of the cutters or sloops, and speak their captains, we'll have a better idea of what t'look out for… and who… Whom, rather."
"Well, there is that, sir," Adair replied, unsure whether to be eased of his suspicion, or not.
"Rather like Mister Winwood and his fear of where the driftwood logs lurk on the tides hereabouts, Mister Adair," Lewrie tried to make a jest of it. " 'Til he's secure in his mind, he'll spend all night on deck, lookin' out-board for ship-killin' trees."
Adair doffed his hat and returned to his duties, leaving Lewrie to pace the length of the quarterdeck nettings and railings, hands in the small of his back, head down, and his neck burning in embarrassment.
Spied on? he chid himself; just let the bastard aboard t'see any thing he wished? Gawd, which o' these Frogs can ye trust? This whole endeavour could turn out t'be a rare shitten business!
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
T he safe, and navigable, outermost reaches of the Gironde river estuary measured about twelve miles across on a line drawn from Pointe de la Coubre, the tip of a narrow, hook-shaped peninsula on the north shore, an appendage to a clenched-fist larger peninsula whose Atlantic face was labelled the Cote Sauvage-which Lewrie took as auspicious-to a seaside village south of Pointe de Grave on the southern Atlantic coast named Soulac sur Mer.
The south shore peninsula narrowed and bent back to the nor 'east at Pointe de Grave, near another coastal village called Le Verdon sur Mer, which actually lay on the inner river bank. From Pointe de Grave to the north shore, and the small town of St. Georges de Didonne just a mile or so south of the larger town of Royan, lay the narrows of the Gironde, which was only about three miles across; a short row for a determined boat crew, or an even shorter sail.
Temptingly beyond those narrows, the Gironde widened considerably, remaining deep and six miles across, only narrowing slightly until it reached the long and skinny river aits that Rear-Admiral Lord Boxham had mentioned, near Pauillac and Blaye. Any number of French warships or merchant vessels could be moored below those Pointe de Grave narrows, but as to the getting to them, or even sneaking a ship's boat up the river to spy them out, it just didn't look like it was do-able…
"Now in King Louis the Fourteenth's day, sir," Mr. Winwood said in his usual bleak manner, "the key fort guarding the river was on the eastern bank, 'bout twelve or thirteen miles up-river, ah… here, at Saint Fort sur Gironde. One might suppose they deemed fortifications by Le Verdon sur Mer, the tip of Pointe de Grave, and Saint Georges de Didonne too vulnerable to armed landings. Now, though… my word!"
Keeping a chaste three miles offshore as they cruised down the north bank past La Grande Cote, St. Palais sur Mer, and to within sight of Royan in case some monstrous 42-pounder coastal guns might lurk in the forests and bleak fields, they had not seen all that much sign of military preparations. They had not been fired upon… yet… Though, as they neared St. Georges de Didonne, they could finally espy a stout pile of stonework sited about halfway between the village and the town of Royan. It appeared to be no more than one hundred yards long overall, a place formed in a shallow, three-sided U, with the crenellations that served as gun-ports no more than sixteen or twenty feet above the shoreline; but, with an even lower water battery mounting lighter guns to deter an assault by boats at the foot of its centre face.
"I count only four openings atop the walls for heavy guns along the walls… well, four per face, sir," Lt. Urquhart pointed out. "It might be open on its land face."
"But, a landing-party would have to go ashore west of Royan," Lewrie replied, peering intently through his day glass, "then stumble their way to the fort, and, is Royan garrisoned, they might run into a stiff fight before they ever got to musket range of their objective."
It didn't help Lewrie's lingering hang-over, or his wariness of what might lay hidden, that the Sailing Master's glum prediction had come true; just past One Bell of the Day Watch, the wind had slackened and a sullen, steady rain had begun to fall, blurring the coastline so that, at a cautious three miles offshore, vital details they wished to see now lay partially veiled.
As they watched, a bright and fresh French Tricolour flag was run up the flagpole of the fort, and tiny blue-and-white uniformed figures could be seen scurrying like a disturbed ant hill.
"We'll come about, Mister Gamble," Lewrie told the officer of the watch. "Make course Sou-west by West… Half West, if she will allow. Full-and-by on starboard tack."
"Aye aye, sir. Mister Thomlin, pipe hands to stations to come about," Lt. Gamble ordered.
"Does that fort possess fourty-two-pounders, it could hurl shot as far as Pointe de Grave all by itself," Lewrie surmised aloud as the scurry of hands drummed upon his frigate's timbers. "Heated shot, as well, do they have enough warning."
"Even twenty-four-pounders, or eighteen-pounders, would serve, Captain," Mr. Winwood commented. "Is there a matching battery near the Pointe de Grave, the cross fire would effecively close the narrows."
"I'd wager on the lighter guns," Lewrie reluctantly had to agree. "Hell, even twelve-pounders could do the job… fire and be re-loaded quicker, and engage even rowboats. I don't see the French investing all that many expensive guns in a place like that, Old King Louie was right… a determined fleet of Third Rates, with the equivalent of a regiment or two of foot, could open the narrows in one day. Take Royan and Saint Georges, and all of Pointe de Grave right down to this Soulac 'By The Sea'.
"And, why in Heaven does a French town honour Saint George?" he concluded.
"Eleanor of Aquitaine, sir," Lt. Urquhart piped up. "All this once was English territory, when Henry Plantagenet, our good old King Henry the Second, married her, 'stead of King Louis the Seventh! We owned it 'til the 1450s. Where we get our best clarets. I believe, ah…," Urquhart said, beginning almost whimsically amused, but ending stiff-backed and ready to cough into his fist for slipping from his usual grim demeanour. "The city of Bordeaux was our capital of the province."