Sword of Honour

by Alexander Kent

  ‘Yes…. But for you ….’

  He said harshly, ‘He is diseased, the last stages of syphilis. He is dying from it, God damn his rotten soul!’

  She thought of the spasms of apparent pain, the wildness and desperation. He had wanted revenge, but against what? She had heard of men who had been so badly infected that they had gone insane before dying. Too late to spare those they had themselves defiled.

  She did not realise she had spoken aloud. ‘I would have killed myself if he had done that to me.’

  Sillitoe held her, recalling those last tense seconds. The lightning holding her naked body like silver, her pinioned arms, the crouching figure forcing her legs apart, oblivious to everything else. A moment later? He pursed his lips. I would have killed him.

  She was lying against him, in shock, exhaustion, disbelief. Like a very young girl, the self she had described to him when he had gone with her to Whitechapel, after her father had died.

  As his men had kicked Oliphant to the floor he had held on to that picture. Her helplessness. And he had wanted her then.

  ‘What will become of him?’

  Sillitoe considered it, without anger, and without emotion. It was not his way.

  ‘Lord Rhodes and his clique have gained too much power by rattling other people’s skeletons in public. It will be interesting to see what happens when he has a live skeleton of his own in the closet.’

  She could feel his breathing; the strength of the arm around her shoulders. She was safe, even with this man whom no one trusted.

  Sillitoe heard his carriage returning. Did no one in this street ever question such nocturnal comings and goings?

  He looked at her hair spilling across his arm.

  The one woman he could never have. The only woman he would never give up.

  12

  Face to Face

  RICHARD BOLITHO AWOKE from the dream, and for a few lingering moments was confused by the sounds and movements around him. He lay on his back in the cot and stared up into the darkness and waited for the old familiarity to return. He had once believed that he could never forget the feel of a frigate.

  Instinct and experience told him that Halcyon was changing tack yet again; the thud of bare feet on the damp planking, the crack of unruly canvas and the squeal of blocks spoke for themselves.

  He propped himself on one elbow and swallowed hard. Halcyon’s officers had invited him to their wardroom for a last meal before landfall. That had been strange, too. After a big cut-down two-decker like Indomitable, and the other ships which had flown his flag in recent years, it had all seemed so small, so intimate: Captain Robert Christie, a guest in his own ship to conform with the time-honoured custom, Avery and himself. Halcyon’s three lieutenants, sailing master, surgeon and captain of marines had completed the gathering. And the wardroom itself had been packed tight. One midshipman had also been invited, the youngest in the ship; he had proposed the loyal toast, but otherwise remained awed and silent throughout the meal and lively conversation.

  It was hard not to make comparisons. This mixture of youthful exuberance and excitement; the way it had once been for him, when he had taken command of his first frigate, Phalarope. He winced and rubbed his eyes. All of thirty years ago. How was that possible? The headache would go when he went on deck. Too much wine … the rare chance to relax and speak with just a handful of officers who were typical of all those under his command…. He peered over the side of the cot and saw that the door into the main cabin was unfastened, swinging this way and that while the hands on deck brought Halcyon back under control and laid on a new tack.

  There was an early greyness from the stern windows; in no time, it would be bright and hot once again.

  Captain Christie knew his ship well. They had logged six hundred miles in less than four days, in spite of contrary winds one minute and the chance of lying becalmed the next. But that was the Mediterranean, no better place for a frigate captain to work his ship and her company until they became one.

  He thought of Tyacke, recalling their last words together before he had transferred to Halcyon. Tyacke had been opposed to the idea of his visit to Algiers from the first mention of it.

  Christie, on the other hand, had confined his comments to the matters of navigation and a final landfall. He, better than most, would be aware of the possible danger to his ship if their reception was hostile, and if injury or death befell his admiral his chances of further advancement would be ruined. A thinking man, and an intelligent one.

  Avery had suggested that he might go ashore and make the first contact with the Dey or his advisers. Like Tyacke, he was not convinced that his admiral was fully apprised of the risks.

  Bolitho sat upright. More sleep was out of the question. He felt the ship lean over, and imagined the sea boiling around her stem while her sails filled again to the wind.

  He was not here to incite another war. But the Dey had to be made to understand that that was where it would end, if the outrages committed by Barbary corsairs and Algerine pirates were allowed and encouraged to continue. In spite of all the treaties and promises, slavery remained a fact. Six years after prohibition, the trade still flourished; according to his Admiralty instructions, between fifty and sixty thousand slaves were being transported each year. And here in the Mediterranean, the Dey of Algiers condoned the seizure of luckless sailors and fishermen, mostly Sicilians and Neapolitans, simply because they were Christians. It could not be tolerated.

  He smiled as he heard someone moving about in the other cabin. Allday had known or guessed he was awake. He would be fetching hot water from the galley, for the morning shave which had become so much a part of their rituals and relationship.

  He climbed down from the hanging cot and remembered this time to duck his head; even here down aft, Halcyon was smaller than Phalarope had been. He glanced up at the skylight. It was lighter. He touched the locket around his neck and tried to imagine what she was doing. If she woke missing him as he missed her. Or did she ….

  Allday’s shoes creaked on the painted deck covering.

  ‘Fine morning, Sir Richard.’ He watched his pale shape in the gloom, waiting to test his mood, like an old Jack smelling the sea changes.

  ‘We shall anchor during the forenoon.’ He saw Allday unshutter a lantern for the shave. How many times, he wondered. How many dawns like this?

  Allday saw the lantern throw its light across the cabin. The watch on deck would see it. The admiral’s up and about! Trying to fathom out a reason, when he could stay in his comfortable cot while they were lashing up and stowing their hammocks to provide some room on the crowded messdecks. The watch below had their hammocks slung so close together they were usually touching. You could hear what a man was thinking.

  He grinned. They only knew the admiral. They would never know the man.

  Bolitho lay back in the chair. ‘What are your thoughts today, old friend?’

  Allday worked busily on the blade. ‘I think it’s a risk. Maybe I don’t believe it’s worth it. Let somebody else take the weight, or get a bloody nose for a change.’

  ‘Is that what you really think?’

  No wonder the imposing major-general had not understood. How could he?

  ‘It’s what most of the Jacks will be thinking, an’ that’s no error!’

  Bolitho heard the familiar, uneven step directly overhead. Avery was up and dressed already. There would be another argument from him. But so much better than making them seal it up and say nothing. Like the fragment of news Avery had gleaned about Frobisher’s previous captain, Oliphant. A man who gambled heavily and usually lost most of it; a womaniser who hardly came up to the high moral standards of his influential cousin, Rhodes. Perhaps the future First Lord had hoped and intended that Oliphant’s future might be assured as flag captain? It was like a puzzle where the clues refused to fit, but sooner or later he would hear about it. Some might already be making comparisons with Hugh, his own dead brother, a gambler who had cost their
father so dearly in debts and in grief.

  He thought, inevitably, of Adam; but he could find small trace of Hugh in him, apart from his quickness with a sword or pistol. And what some called his recklessness. What they said of me.

  The deck tilted, and the lantern swung giddily until the rudder took command again.

  Allday stood with the razor upraised. He had seen the shaft of light pass over Bolitho’s injured eye and his attempt to shield it. Like the time when Bryan Ferguson had caught him trying to lift a cask full of ale, and the agony of his old wound had knocked him witless.

  Always the pain ….

  ‘Done, Sir Richard.’ He watched him get to his feet, his body adjusting to the deck and the lively movement. How it had always been, and they were still together. Instead of comfort, it brought him a momentary sadness.

  Bolitho faced him, vaguely silhouetted now against the grey light.

  ‘I know, old friend. I want that, too.’

  Allday watched him return to the sleeping compartment, and then shook his head.

  He could not ask Lieutenant Avery to write about that, either. He would save it and tell Unis himself. When it was all over.

  ‘South-east by east, sir! Steady as she goes!’

  Bolitho remained on the larboard side of the quarterdeck, watching the land spread away on either bow, almost colourless in a shimmering haze. The wind had dropped and had backed slightly to the north-west, and it had taken them longer to reach their destination than Christie and his sailing master had predicted.

  Bolitho tried to ignore the heat across his shoulders, the stabbing reflections from the sea. A grim, inhospitable place, he thought, with deep water close inshore, so that any strange vessel would have to anchor within easy range of the guns of which Major-General Valancy had spoken.

  He took a glass from the midshipman of the watch and levelled it with great care on the nearest land. Rough and broken; he could imagine the dust between his teeth, the heat rising from the ground itself.

  The ship had probably been under observation since daylight: a man-of-war, unexpected, and more to the point, unaccompanied. It was a risk, but curiosity might overcome the use of direct action.

  He touched the locket beneath his damp shirt. If not ….

  He looked at the men working on deck, some pausing to peer at the land, then at the officers on the quarterdeck as if to gauge their chances. He recalled Allday’s words. What most of the Jacks will be thinking. He was rarely wrong.

  He returned the telescope to the midshipman and caught him staring at him. It would be something worthy of a letter home.

  Christie joined him by the rail, his hat tugged down over his eyes to protect them from the blinding glare.

  ‘When we reach the outer anchorage, Sir Richard, what then?’

  Bolitho replied, ‘We shall fire a salute to the citadel, if we can see it. Then you may anchor.’

  Christie nodded doubtfully. ‘The wind troubles me, sir. If it veers we shall be on a lee shore.’ Unexpectedly, he chuckled. ‘It might make a speedy departure difficult!’

  Bolitho smiled at him, and did not see a master’s mate nudge his companion by the wheel.

  ‘The next move will be theirs.’

  Christie touched his hat and moved away. ‘Have the gunner lay aft.’

  Another madness, some would think. To fire a salute to a lot of murdering heathen.

  Avery said, ‘Your flag, sir.’ He glanced meaningly at the mainmast truck. ‘Is it wise?’

  ‘They must see us for what we are, George. If they fire on my flag without provocation, they will know the consequences. I am relying,’ he smiled again and touched his arm, ‘depending on their curiosity!’

  He thought of Djafou, the harshness of the land, the cruelty of their enemy. Napoleon was beaten; if the allies did not stand together now, there would be another conflict. It could begin here.

  The maintopsail filled and boomed and the hull tilted over very slightly. Men scampered to braces and halliards, cupping the wind while it held.

  Avery said, ‘Perhaps the major-general was misinformed about the guns, sir. Over six hundred, did he say?’

  Bolitho turned to the midshipman. ‘Give my flag lieutenant your glass.’ To Avery he said, ‘You will see it was no exaggeration.’ He watched Avery’s profile as he trained the big signals telescope; the haze had cleared a little, and he would be able to recognise the telltale stone walls of old fortifications, and newer ones along the high ground.

  It would take an army to prepare such defences. An army of slaves.

  Avery said, ‘A lot of shipping, sir. One of them must be the vessel they seized, Galicia.’

  Bolitho turned away. Avery missed nothing, but rarely seemed to write anything down. It was a great pity about the fair Susanna, like his uncle’s offer of security and a prosperous future. He had given up both. For me. For us.

  Ozzard appeared on the gangway and, after a quick, incurious glance at the land, threw something over the side. He was giving up nothing. This was all he had.

  Bolitho saw Halcyon’s gunner speaking to his selected gun captains. One of them glanced aft, and his expression was as clear as if a voice had shouted it.

  A proper salute? For them bastards!

  But whoever was watching their slow approach would be waiting for it, the one gesture of peaceful intent when Halcyon’s guns would be empty. When she would be at the mercy of those hidden batteries.

  ‘Hand me the glass.’ He was surprised by a sudden edge in his voice. ‘Mr Simpson, is it not?’ He saw the midshipman’s alarm give way to astonishment that he should know his name. ‘I shall require your shoulder also!’

  It was the worst part. Tricks born out of experience. Deceit…. If he was wrong, this youth could be dead within the hour, and yet he was grinning at one of his companions, the midshipman who had called the loyal toast in the wardroom.

  He eased the draw of the glass very slowly and saw the outline of the citadel harden into something solid, like a mist clearing away. As marked and described on the chart, and the information on the chart was about all they knew of this place.

  And there it was. A tiny patch of scarlet floating above it as if detached. The flag. He measured the distance with his eye. Half an hour, perhaps less if this breeze continued to favour them.

  Christie was there again. ‘The salute, Sir Richard?’

  Bolitho kept his eye on the land. ‘Seventeen guns, if you please.’

  Christie said nothing. He did not need to. Seventeen guns: an admiral’s salute. He would probably be wishing it was a full broadside instead.

  Avery watched him, and thought of Catherine; she must have seen him like this when they had been together in the open boat after shipwreck. Jenour had been his flag lieutenant then, and afterwards, Bolitho had given him a command of his own, when all Jenour had really wanted was to remain with his admiral.

  Am I so like poor Jenour? I watch his moods, I share his excitement, and often his pain in the aftermath of victory. And now, we are sailing towards an unknown force, a power of evil. He half-smiled. How his father, the clergyman, would have described it.

  And yet I feel no fear, nor would I be anywhere else.

  He saw Allday standing by the companion way, his arms folded while he looked along the deck, recognising each move, understanding every sheet and halliard, the bones of a ship as he had once described them. Briefly their eyes met, and Allday gave a slight nod. Like that very first time, when Avery had known that he was accepted by others of Bolitho’s ‘little crew’.

  He saw Bolitho return the big telescope and say something to the midshipman. He wondered what it had been. Words which had suddenly made the lively midshipman become so serious. So proud.

  Bolitho turned and looked at him, his hand touching the hilt of the old sword.

  ‘Soon now, George.’

  Someone yelped with alarm as a single shot crashed out from the land, the sound lingering long afterwards. Every glass was rai
sed, but nobody moved, as if the whole ship were under a spell.

  Then there was a yell. ‘They’m dippin’ their flag, sir!’

  Bolitho gripped the old sword and stared at the land. His eye was painful, and he could not see the distant citadel. But in his mind it was very clear, like an image in a telescope.

  Dipping their flag, not to him, but to His Majesty King George the Third. Perhaps they did not know that His Majesty was shut away, insane. Maybe it no longer counted for anything. He wanted to dab his eye, but knew Avery would see and become anxious.

  He said, ‘Begin the salute, if you please.’

  Halcyon’s gunner took charge himself, striding to each crew in turn. As the first shot banged out and the gun recoiled inboard on its tackles, he was already moving on to the next, repeating the couplet slowly and deliberately to time each shot.

  If I wasn’t a gunner I wouldn’t be here. ‘Number two gun, fire!’

  Between shots, Bolitho said, ‘Now is the time for eyes and ears, George.’ To Christie he called, ‘There is a guard boat yonder, Captain! Anchor when it suits you.’

  Then he looked at the men who were running to their stations for shortening sail, and murmured, ‘Well done.’

  Allday heard and understood that, too. He was speaking to the ship.

  Captain Christie lowered his telescope and said, ‘They’re sending a boat, sir.’

  Bolitho walked across the quarterdeck, feeling the impact of the heat as Halcyon swung listlessly to her anchor. Close inshore now, he could see the old fortifications. You could lose an army trying to work around the town from inland, and a fleet would fare little better against the many guns facing the bay.

  Allday was watching the approaching boat with obvious suspicion. It was double-banked, with two men to every oar, more like a galley than a longboat.

  ‘Man the side!’

  Avery murmured, ‘It is not difficult to imagine what the marines are thinking about, sir.’

  Christie said, ‘There’s an officer of some kind, sir.’ He took another quick glance with his telescope and exclaimed, ‘A white man, by God!’