Black dots fell to the water from the Royal Savage’s bowsprit. Her crew, or what was left of it, was abandoning her. My anxiety over Nathaniel was leavened by my overwhelming desire to see the end of the black schooner which still, miraculously, towered unharmed amid the shot-lashed waters.

Arnold ran up the companionway. His buckskin breeches were sponge-smeared, his right eye circled by a powder smudge. “What’s she doing? Anchoring?” he asked. “We can’t see for the smoke.”

That was what she was doing, and when her anchor went over the side, it had a spring on it. A moment later her stern began to come in sight as the men clapped onto the spring and walked it in through the after port.

“Now we’ll get it,” Arnold said. He scratched his swarthy jaw and eyed the nearing gunboats. All of them, by now, had turned from the silent Royal Savage and were moving up, strange misshapen waterfowl, their long guns stretched forward like eager heads, bent on reaching their distressed mother, the black schooner.

“What about the crew of the Royal Savage?” I asked. “Their boat capsized. They had to go ashore.”

“Yes, send our boat,” he said. “Send Bickford. No, I need Bickford to lay guns. We’ve only got three men who can lay a gun properly. You’d better send Verrieul. Tell him to take boats from the other galleys. Tell him to bring Hawley back here, and some of his men. Divide the others among the galleys.”

He watched the black schooner swing slowly broadside to us, his swarthy cheeks vibrating from the unceasing explosions of our cannon. “We’ll need extra men before we’re through!” he added ominously.

He turned to the companionway. “Keep your eye on the dead and wounded. Get the dead overboard as fast as you can. The men don’t like ’em around. Oh, and take off their clothes before you put ’em over the side. We’ll need ’em.” He ran back to the guns.

Verrieul prowled up and down behind Cap Huff’s marines while Cap, bawling his loudest, directed the activity of four sharpshooters, perched on the lookout steps of our stumpy masts. Ropes, encircling them and the masts, made it possible for them to use both hands for loading and firing. When I told Verrieul he was to lead the rescue party to the Royal Savage, he took affectionate leave of Cap. He must have thought he might never see Cap alive again.