Free A King's Cutter by Richard Woodman Page A

Nymphe
took
Cleopatre
off the Start and his knighthood sent a quiver of ambition down many an aspiring naval spine.
    Kestrel
, meanwhile, attended to more mundane matters, carrying despatches, fresh vegetables, mail and gossip to and from the detached cruisers, a maid of all work that fled from strong opposition and struck at weaker foes. Pellew took some men from her to supplement his crew of Cornish tin miners, despite Griffiths’s protest, but they suffered only twice from this abuse.
Kestrel
’s people, mostly volunteers were a superlative crew, worthy of a flagship under the most punctilious admiral.
    â€˜Better’n than aught the Cumberland Fleet can offer,’ Jessupclaimed with pride, alluding to the Thames yachts that made a fetish of such niceties as sail drill. Griffiths too reserved an approbatory twinkle in his eye for a smart manoeuvre executed under the envious glare of a frigate captain still struggling with a crew of landsmen. He could imagine the remarks on a score of quarterdecks about the ‘damned insolence of unrated buggers’.
    Amid this activity Drinkwater was aware that he was part of a happy ship, that Griffiths rarely flogged, nor had need to, and that these were halcyon days.
    Whatever his misgivings about his future they were hidden from the taut deck of the cutter and reserved for the solitude of his cabin. The demands of watch and watch, the tension of chase or flight and the modest profits on prizes were in part compensation for the lack of prospects on his own, personal horizon.
    December found them off the low island of Ushant cruising in search of Warren with the news that the commodore’s squadron, after many delays and dockyard prevarications, would assemble under his command at Falmouth in the New Year.
    It was a day of easterly wind which washed the air clear of the damp westerlies that had dogged them through the fall. Depression had followed depression across the Atlantic, eight weeks in which
Kestrel
had sought her principals under the greatest difficulties, her people wet and miserable, her canvas sodden and hard, her galley stove mostly extinguished.
    The bright sunlight lay like a benefice upon the little ship so that she seemed reborn, changing men’s moods, the skylarking crew a different company. Damp clothing appeared in the weather rigging giving her a gipsy air.
    The low island that marked the western extremity of France lay astern on the larboard quarter and from time to time Drinkwater took a bearing of the lighthouse on the rising ground of Cape Stiff. He was interrupted in one such operation by a hail from the masthead: ‘Deck there! Sail to windward!’
    â€˜Pass the word for the captain.’
    â€˜Aye, aye, sir.’
    Griffiths hurried on deck, took a look at the island and the masthead pendant streaming over the starboard quarter in the easterly wind. ‘Up you go Mr Drinkwater.’
    Agilely Drinkwater ascended the mast, throwing a leg over the top-gallant yard. He needed but a single glance to tell him it was not
Flora
and to confirm a suspicion he knew he shared with Griffiths consequent upon the easterly breeze. The great naval arsenal of Brest lay ahead of them. The sail he was looking at had slipped down the Goulet that morning. Beyond he could see another.
    â€˜Two frigates, sir,’ he said reaching the deck, ‘bearing down on us and making sail.’
    Griffiths nodded. ‘Mr Jessup!’ He cast about for the boatswain who was hurrying on deck, struggling into his coat. ‘Sir?’
    â€˜We’ll put her before the wind, I want preventer backstays and every stitch she’ll carry. Mr Drinkwater, a course clear of the Pierres Vertes to open the Fromveur Passage . . .’ He issued more orders as the hands tumbled up but Drinkwater was already scrambling below to consult the chart.
    The Ile d’Ouessant, or Ushant to countless generations of British seamen, lies some thirteen