On the Gundeck

He felt somewhat relieved, and nodded, watching Oxley's fingers move and listening to his humming. It would do for a short while, but it was too obvious that soon they would again hope and wonder when the battle would start already.

He broke off as there was a cry from above: Hey - deck there! She's gettin' away, sir!.

He frowned. She couldn't be, could she? Not getting away from them. That wasn't on, it really wasn't. Though Terpsy was closer to the land than the Frenchy ship, so maybe she'd run into a calmer patch and the other ship still had enough wind to get away?

".." De Guarde turned away and cursed under his breath. Just that luck. Just when it could be possible, just then.. of course, as irony would play it, the ship would be getting away.

He was in luck not yet to know of another thing that had played while they were in chase, for then the feeling that someone had been pointing their finger up there, high above, and laughing with their joke fully successful, would have been complete.

He dropped his fingers from his cartridge case. The Frenchman, their Frog, was getting away. Of course. "...he's going.."He muttered and knew his voice sounded hostile, speaking in resentment, but it was how he had felt inside. All that anticipation and excitement seemed to have been for nothing.

There was an angry and resentful murmur from the other men on the gundeck, clustered around the big twelve-pounders that wouldn't fire a shot now.

"Silence!" Mister George bellowed into the babble of indignant voices, and the gundeck fell quiet, though Oxley could see that the men felt just as annoyed and let down as he did. He shrugged at de Guarde, rolling his eyes as if to say you just couldn't trust a Frenchman to stand and fight.

"...the bloody coward." De Guarde had muttered more quietly then before, but still more than just parting his lips to mouth a word. "..rotten bloody cowards, the lot of 'em..." He added, his hand in a fist, tight enough that his knuckles turned white. "All t' same.. bloody heathens."

He felt as disappointed as the sailors if not more, for his first battle on Terpsy he had missed. Thanks perhaps to his own doing, yet still the question was not of whose fault, but of what was. To sight the ship, sight it first or near first both times. And yet..

He bit at his lip and felt the pain of it, but did not let up, as if punishing the thing as if it were to blame for the Frenchman's escape.

"There goes our prize money," Tom Shepherd complained quietly. "Ain't fair!"

He was briefly silenced by a glare from his gun captain, even though the rest of Number Four's crew were grumbling similarly in low voices.

Mathew nodded in agreement to Tom Shepherd (Tom the second XD) and frowned. " Hope they marked 'er name." He whispered. "So that next we see her, we make sure we got her cornered.. that is some shy capn' that is!" Though prize money wouldn't right matter as much to him as it did to those whose livelihood was based on it near enough, it still was important. And.. he was excited about the prospect of taking part at last. Well none of that now, was it.Not this time at least.

When the order was given, and the sailors were called back to their stations, De Guarde followed. A quick nod and with the ridding of the cartridge case he was up with the others, bare feet tapping light or heavy against the floor. (goes here )