He walked swiftly towards the sunlight again, past the unattended wheel, to where Grindle stood watching the approaching craft as if he had never moved.

Along both bulwarks of the upper deck the Spanish sailors stood or crouched beside their guns, the largest of which were twelve-pounders. Here and there, wherever they could find some sort of cover, he could see some of the passengers, hastily provided with muskets from the arms chest, while others had appeared carrying elaborate sporting guns from their own baggage to add their weight to the defences.

He shut his ears to the distant drums and tried to visualise the ship’s firepower as it would display itself within the next few minutes. Several of the larboard guns were useless, upended and smashed by the Euryalus’s brief onslaught. Much depended on what the enemy would do first.

The pumps were still working steadily enough, and he wondered whether Pareja’s translation had brought home to those trying to control the intake of water the true value of their work. Or whether at the first crash of gunfire they would run from the pumps and give the sea its own victory.

There had been a good few peasant women amongst the passengers. Tough, sun-dried creatures, who had not shown either resentment or fear when he had suggested they might help by assisting on the pumps, For, as he had wanted to explain, there were no longer any passengers in the Navarra. It was a ship’s company upon whose determination and strength depended survival and life itself.

Grindle called, “Them’s splittin’ up, sir!”

The two rearmost vessels were already swinging steeply from the line and pulling parallel with the drifting Navarra, their long stems cutting the water apart like scythes as they glided purposefully towards the bows.

Bolitho looked along the upper deck to where Witrand was standing by the foremast, a pistol in his belt and another laid nearby on a hatch cover. Ashton was with him, his pale face screwed up with determination and pain as he waited for his orders from the poop.

Bolitho called, “You may run out, Mr Ashton.”

He bit his lip as the guns squeaked protestingly towards the open ports. Now the gaps in the defences were all the more apparent, especially on the larboard side and quarter where the damage was most severe.

He beckoned to Pareja who had been standing as if mesmerised below the poop ladder.

“Tell them to fire on the order. No random shots, nor do I want them to waste time and energy by aiming at empty sea.”

He narrowed his eyes against the glare and watched the two graceful craft turning slowly as if to cross the Navarra’s bows. They were about two cables clear. Biding their time.

Astern it was much the same, with the three boats moving in perfect unison towards the larboard quarter, and at a similar distance.

He could hear Meheux rapping out orders, and wondered if he had any faith in his ability to hold off the attackers.