As Hawkwood thrust the pistol into his belt and leapt to add his weight to the helm, Lawrence shouted a warning, only to have his words eclipsed by an ear-splitting howl as steam was blasted through the steamboat’s hooter vent. Vomiting fire and ash, the vessel bore down upon the Snake with the fury of a nightmare come to life, disproving the myth that fire-breathing dragons were only the stuff of fairytales.

The smaller boat stood no chance. Her matte-black hull, dun-coloured sail and lack of running lights meant that she’d been invisible to the steamboat crew until the moment the fog had parted, thus rendering it impossible for evasive action to be taken, by either craft.

The steamboat struck the sloop on her starboard quarter, some ten feet forward of her mainmast.

A thousand tormented souls could not have produced a more terrible sound than that made by the sailboat’s timbers as they took the full brunt of the charge. The grinding and splintering almost drowned out the hiss and rumble of the steamboat’s engine as her bow surged through what remained of the sloop’s exposed foredeck and jib.

As the shock ran through the hull, Hawkwood, flung aside, made a grab for the tiller. By some miracle he managed to hang on. The crewman was less fortunate. With a despairing wail, he was gone, pitched backwards over the starboard gunwale. Limbs thrashing, his mouth opened in one last frenzied plea for help as his struggling body sank beneath the surface.

Arms clamped around the tiller bar, Hawkwood saw that Lawrence had also managed to remain upright and was trying to clamber his way aft. But then, as he watched helplessly, the deck shifted again and as the mast, shorn of its braces, toppled across the thwarts in a confusion of broken spars and torn canvas, the major’s legs gave way and he disappeared from view.

The Snake’s stern rose sharply. Boots braced against the binnacle, and with the water rushing towards him along the already half-submerged scuppers, Hawkwood knew his only chance lay in abandoning ship. He closed his eyes.

Christ, not again.

He’d been in similar straits back on the Griffin. Convinced she’d been on the point of capsizing, he’d consigned himself to the mercy of the Channel, only to discover later that the cutter had in fact survived the storm. The thought of making the same mistake filled him with dread even though it didn’t take a master mariner to see that the Snake, unlike the Griffin, was beyond salvage.

He let go of the tiller and clambered to the rail.

Coat! he thought suddenly. Realizing that the added weight would surely drag him down, he scrabbled at the buttons. As he did so, a loud groan came from deep within the sloop’s stricken hull and the deck rose sharply. The Snake was turning turtle. Forget the damned coat. No time left.