He said, “Amateur!” Then he was down amongst more of the attackers, his hair flying as he sought out another officer and fought him back against the ladder.

Keverne staggered through the smoke, blood dripping from his forehead. “Sir!” He ducked beneath a swinging cutlass and fired his pistol into the man’s groin, the force of the shot hurling him bodily amongst the others. “We must get clear!”

His voice was very loud, and Bolitho realised dazedly that the guns had ceased firing. Through open ports on both ships men jabbed at one another with pikes or fired pistols in a madness of hatred and despair.

Bolitho gripped Keverne’s arm, his sword hanging from his wrist on its lanyard. “What is it, man?”

“I—I’m not sure, but . . .”

Keverne pulled Bolitho against him and thrust at a yelling seaman with his sword. The man faltered, and Bolitho saw Allday run from aft, his cutlass driving forward and down with such force that the cutlass’s point appeared through his stomach.

Keverne retched and gasped, “The Frenchman’s afire, sir!”

Bolitho saw the admiral slip to his knees, groping for his sword, and watched helplessly as a French petty officer charged towards him with a bayoneted musket.

A slim figure blocked his path and Bolitho heard himself yell, “Adam! Get back!”

But Pascoe stood his ground, armed only with a dirk, his face a mask of stricken determination.

The bayonet lunged, but at the last second another figure jumped through the smoke, his sword dark with blood as he parried the blade up and clear of the boy’s chest. The musket exploded, and Pascoe stood back, horrified as Calvert crumpled at his feet, his face blown away. With a sob he struck at the petty officer with his dirk, hurting him sufficiently to make him recoil. Allday’s cutlass finished it.

Bolitho tore his eyes away and hurried to the side. Beyond the enemy’s mainmast he could see a steady plume of black smoke. Figures darted down the hatchway, and he heard sudden cries of alarm, the urgent clatter of pumps.

Perhaps in the confusion a lantern had been upended, or a blazing wad from one of the guns had found its way through an open port. But there was no mistaking the signs of fire, nor the desperate urgency now needed to get clear.

He shouted, “Pass the word. Lower battery reload. Fire on the order!”

He stared round at the shattered planking, the sprawled corpses and sobbing wounded. It was a faint hope, but it was all he had. Unless they got away from Le Glorieux’s embrace they would become one inferno together.

A midshipman yelled, “Ready, sir!” It was Ashton.

“Fire!”

Seconds later the lower battery erupted in a great, blasting roar. It felt as if the ship would fall apart, and as smoke and pieces of wreckage flew high above the nettings Bolitho saw the other ship reel drunkenly under the full weight of the lower battery’s broadside.