Frigate Captain Blackwood bids good-bye to the Admiral. "I trust, my Lord, that on my return to the Victory, I shall find your Lordship well and in possession of twenty prizes." A gash of blood-colour cuts across the blue sky, or is it that the Admiral's eyes are tired with the flashing of the sea? "God bless you, Blackwood, I shall never speak to you again." What is it that haunts his mind? He is blinded by red, blood-red fading to rose, smeared purple, blotted out by blue. Larkspur sea and blue sky above it, with the flickering flags of his signal standing out in cameo.
Boom! A shot passes through the main topgallantsail of the Victory. The ship is under fire. Her guns cannot bear while she is head on. Straight at the floating half-moon of ships goes the Victory, leading her line, muffled in the choking smoke of the Bucentaure's guns. The sun is dimmed, but through the smoke-cloud prick diamond sparkles from the Admiral's stars as he walks up and down the quarter-deck.
Red glare of guns in the Admiral's eyes. Red stripe of marines drawn up on the poop. Eight are carried off by a single shot, and the red stripe liquefies, and seeps, lapping, down the gangway. Every stu'nsail boom is shot away. The blue of the sea has vanished; there is only the red of cannon, and the white twinkling sparks of the Admiral's stars.
The bows of the Victory cross the wake of the Bucentaure, and one after another, as they bear, the double-shotted guns tear through the woodwork of the French ship. The Victory slips past like a shooting shuttle, and runs on board the Redoubtable, seventy-four, and their spars lock, with a shock which almost stops their headway.
It is a glorious Autumn day outside the puff-ball of smoke. A still, blue sea, unruffled, banded to silver by a clear sun.
Guns of the Victory, guns of the Redoubtable, exploding incessantly, making one long draw of sound. Rattling upon it, rain on a tin roof, the pop-pop of muskets from the mizzen-top of the Redoubtable. There are sharpshooters in the mizzen-top, aiming at the fog below. Suddenly, through it, spears the gleam of diamonds; it is the Admiral's stars, reflecting the flashes of the guns.
Red blood in a flood before his eyes. Red from horizon to zenith, crushing down like beaten metal. The Admiral falls to his knees, to his side, and lies there, and the crimson glare closes over him, a cupped inexorable end. "They have done for me at last, Hardy. My back-bone is shot through."
The blue thread is snapped and the bolt falls from the loom. Weave, shuttle of the red thread. Weave over and under yourself in a scarlet ecstasy. It is all red now he comes to die. Red, with the white sparkles of those cursed stars.
Carry him gently down, and let no man know that it is the Admiral who has fallen. He covers his face and his stars with his handkerchief. The white glitter is quenched; the white glitter of his life will shine no more. "Doctor, I am gone. I leave Lady Hamilton and my daughter Horatia as a legacy to my Country." Pathetic trust, thrusting aside knowledge. Flint, the men who sit in Parliament, flint which no knocking can spark to fire. But you still believe in men's goodness, knowing only your own heart. "Let my dear Lady Hamilton have my hair, and all other things belonging to me."
The red darkens, and is filled with tossing fires. He sees Vesuvius, and over it the single silver brilliance of a star.