The Flag of Freedom (43 page)

The French swiftly broke off the engagement and fled for the mouth of the bay. Two of them made it – the
Guillaume Tell
and the
Généreux
. A third, the
Timoléon
, ran aground with such force it dislodged the foremast, and then, as the pursuers closed in on her, the crew set her on fire and took to the boats.

The last French ship to hold out was the
Tonnant
. She had been dismasted during the night but her Commander, mortally wounded with both legs blown off, had ordered his men to nail the tricolour to the mast and stand him in a barrel of bran to staunch the blood. And so she had fought on, but now as she tried to follow the fleeing
Timoléon
under a jury rig, she too ran upon the sands and there, her Captain dead and her decks crowded with 1,600 survivors from the rest of the fleet, she finally surrendered.

An hour later, the
Timoléon
exploded. She was the eleventh French ship of the line to be destroyed or captured in the course of the battle. The greatest British victory, Berry announced, since the defeat of the Spanish Armada.

‘What happened to the frigates?' Nathan asked him, and when Berry looked at him blankly: ‘The French frigates.'

Berry's expression cleared but he did not seem greatly interested. ‘One has been taken, I believe, and another ran aground. The other two have escaped, but it is of no conse quence, set against the magnitude of our victory.'

No. Of no consequence whatsoever. Nathan ran up the shrouds to look out over the shoals towards the frigate that was agroud, not far out from the shore. She had lost her mizzen and most of her mainmast, and was so battered about he could not tell if it was the
Unicorn
or not. Then, as he looked, he saw the smoke and the flames rising from her waist.

He found Galway slumped over one of the carronades on the quarterdeck, his eyes shut fast and his mouth hanging slack. Mercilessly Nathan shook him awake.

‘Can I borrow the launch?' he shouted in his ear, for they were both still deafened by the guns. He explained why he needed it and Galway wearily nodded his assent and went back to sleep.

The frigate was burning fiercely before Nathan was halfway there and he met Lieutenant Hoste of the
Theseus
coming back from her. Captain Miller had sent him to take possession, he said, but the crew had set her alight.

‘What ship was she?' Nathan asked, staring over towards the burning vessel.

‘The
Artémise
, thirty-two,' Hoste replied indifferently, ‘but I believe she was one of ours originally. Taken off Toulon in ninety-six.'

Nathan made the men sit at the oars while he watched her burn to the waterline. The last he saw of her was her bowsprit, sticking up out of the water, like a crooked cross, and a charred figurehead that could have been anything.

They were pulling back for the
Vanguard
when he saw another boat heading out from the shore. She was a local craft, a felucca under a single sail, and there was a figure up in the bows waving across the water to him and shouting.

Nathan ordered the men to rest on the oars again, and as the boat came up he saw that it was Spiridion Foresti, back from the dead.

‘I
could not find her,' Spiridion admitted gloomily. ‘There is no news either of Caterina or of Naudé. They have vanished into the sands of the desert. Or the Bedouin have taken them, which amounts to the same thing.'

The news he did bring was of Bonaparte and the French Army.

‘They landed on the beach at Marabut, a day after we left you,' he told Nathan as they sat in the stern of the felucca amid the shoals of Abukir. ‘We were on our way to Alexandria when we ran straight into a patrol of Chasseurs, and they made me go with them as guide.'

‘And George Banjo?' Nathan asked him, for the gunner was not with him and he feared the worst.

‘He is at the caravanserai.' He directed Nathan's attention towards the stone building on the far side of the
bay where they had taken him in the ship's launch a little over a month ago. ‘I thought it better that he did not come with me in case he was taken up for a deserter.'

‘There is little chance of that,' Nathan told him. ‘We have rather more on our mind at present than to be worried about a deserter, even if he were to be recognised, which is unlikely.'

They sat there, gazing at the wrecked and shattered ships all around them.

‘It is a famous victory,' Spiridion said, shaking his head in wonder. ‘But now you have burned their boats, I am afraid they will never leave.'

‘Then we will have to let the Mamelukes deal with them.'

‘The Mamelukes are history,' Spiridion informed him. ‘Bonaparte has served them as he served Venice – but with a great deal more bloodshed.'

The French had marched inland towards Cairo, he said, following the route of the Nile, and the Mamelukes had come out to meet them under their General, Murad Bey, in the shadow of the Pyramids.

‘When he heard they had no cavalry, Murad Bey laughed out loud,' Spiridion recounted, for like all Greeks he loved to tell a good story. ‘He said he would slice through them like watermelons. But these watermelons had muskets and bayonets, and howitzers. The French formed up in squares, ten men deep, with the artillery behind them. But the Mamelukes charged anyway, not knowing how else to fight.

‘It was as I said it would be, when we were in Tripoli,' he reminded Nathan. ‘They were cut to pieces. Those that
were left fled south, and I expect they are fleeing still. And Bonaparte is in Cairo, playing the Great Liberator, as he did in Italy. Come to free the people from tyranny.'

‘But – it cannot be over, surely? Not after one battle?'

‘Well, it is over for the Mamelukes,' Spiridion assured him, ‘for I doubt there were more than twelve thousand in the whole of the country, and most of them died at the Pyramids. But he may have problems yet. The Egyptians are glad to be rid of the Mamelukes, that is for sure, but they are not so sure that they want the French to take their place. And of course, there are the Turks to be reckoned with. They are even less happy to have Bonaparte in Egypt.'

‘And will he march on India?'

‘What else can he do, now that you have destroyed his fleet?'

‘But was not that always the plan?'

‘Who knows? The men in Paris – maybe they just wanted him out of France – him and his Army. I think they will be very happy that you have destroyed his ships so he cannot get back there in a hurry. And they will be even happier if he vanishes into the desert, like poor Caterina.'

‘Will you go on looking for her?' Nathan asked him.

‘No. With the French here it is too dangerous for me. There are men with Bonaparte who know that I work for the British. No, now that you have destroyed his fleet, I think I will go back to Corfu and join the Resistance. But first I must speak to your Admiral, and tell him what I have learned of the French intentions.'

But Nelson was in no fit state to receive visitors, even ones as important as Spiridion Foresti, and it was two days before the Greek was able to make his report. In the meantime there was work to be done. They had to effect what repairs they could to the battered ships, cater for thousands of French prisoners, tend to the wounded – and bury the dead.

The British had lost fewer than 200 men in the battle, but more than 1,700 Frenchmen had died and almost twice as many had been wounded. There was a great need to dispose of the corpses, and they could not be buried in the shallow waters of the Bay of Abukir. Most were interred beneath the sands of Abukir Island, where the work parties sweated under the Egyptian sun, plagued by the millions of flies.

Nathan, with his knowledge of French, was put in charge of conducting the prisoners ashore under a Marine guard and arranging their transfer under parole to the French garrison at Rosetta. It was no easy task, for they were shadowed by parties of marauding Bedouin, eager for plunder, not to speak of the usual hordes of flies. On the evening of the second day after the battle, he was returning to Abukir when a midshipman came riding up on a mule and told him the Admiral wished to speak with him.

He knew Nelson was sending Berry off in the
Leander
, the fleet's only forth-rate, to take news of their victory to England – she was already making ready to sail on the far side of the bay. However, it was rumoured that the Admiral was keen to send another officer with him, to carry a copy of the report to Sir William Hamilton in
Naples for despatch overland. So when Nathan was sent for, he had hopes that the choice had fallen upon him.

He found Nelson in his day cabin with his secretary and Spiridion Foresti. The Admiral looked very weak and more than a little feverish, but he managed a bleak smile when Nathan was shown into the cabin.

‘Ah, Peake, I am glad they were able to find you. I had thought you had gone gallivanting off with the French again.'

Nathan managed a smile that was only slightly less bleak. Nelson waved him to a chair.

‘I have been having a very interesting talk with your friend Mr Foresti here,' he said, ‘and it is in my mind to send you to India.'

It took a moment for this to sink in.

‘It seems only fair,' Nelson went on, ‘as you were the first to alert us to Bonaparte's intentions, that you should have the honour of conveying the news of our victory to the Governor-General in Calcutta – and to warn him that Bonaparte may march upon India to join with the Sultan of Mysore against the British interest.' In the absence of a response he added after a moment, ‘Or do you not think so?'

Nathan was lost for words. He threw a wild glance at Spiridion whose expression was ambiguous. The Sultan of Mysore, the Governor-General in Calcutta, India … India! What was India to do with him? He clung to the only straw of sanity – his diminishing hope of obtaining a new ship. One of the French prizes, perhaps. One of the smaller ones.

‘A very great honour, indeed, sir,' he heard himself saying. ‘Only that …'

‘Only that?' Nelson put a hand to his head as if the sudden raising of his eyebrows had burst a stitch.

‘I – I was hopeful of obtaining another ship, sir,' Nathan stammered. ‘I am – that is, since I lost the
Unicorn
…'

Nelson exchanged a glance with Spiridion.

‘A ship?' he repeated in tones of wonder, as if it had been a flying machine. ‘Is that conceivable, Mr Foresti? I would have thought he would have to travel overland – by camel perhaps – at least until he reaches the Red Sea when he might pick up a dhow.'

‘By camel?' Again Nathan looked at Spiridion. Were they making game of him? Spiridion said nothing.

‘Well, it will take you far too long to travel by way of the Cape, you know,' Nelson proposed not unkindly, ‘and I can think of no other way. Unless you have it in mind to dig a canal.'

Nathan was in no mood for humour. He thought of the year he had just endured – the long months of imprisonment at Gibraltar, the months of serving under Imlay and the Flag of Freedom. Was this the price of being proved right – to be sent off on a camel in the general direction of India? He was almost overwhelmed by his sense of injustice.

Nelson was still speaking. ‘However, we may be able to employ your talents in some other way. What do you think, Mr Foresti?'

Spiridion inclined his head as if in consideration of this dubious possibility, as Nelson reached for a paper lying upon the table.

‘I have here a recent despatch forwarded to me from
Calcutta. It appears that there are a number of French privateers operating from the island of Réunion in the Indian Ocean, and the Company is anxious for the safety of their shipping through the Straits of Sumatra. There is also a fear that Bonaparte might attempt to force a passage to India by way of the Arabian Sea.' He paused for a moment and observed Nathan through his good eye. ‘Although there are no King's ships at present in the Indian Ocean, the East India Company possesses a small squadron of its own at Madras. I cannot give you the precise details but I believe it includes a former French ship of the line, the
Pondicherry
of fifty-four guns, two very fine sloops of twenty guns or more, and some smaller armed brigs and suchlike. The Company has been petitioning their lordships for some time to propose a serving officer as Commodore, and if you are agreeable I should be very happy to recommend you to the Governor-General as the ideal candidate for the post. What do you say, sir, does it suit you or no?'