Ramage’s Mutiny r-8

by Dudley Pope

  Southwick was pacing round the quarterdeck like a bear dressed up for a carnival: he too was wearing a pair of purser's trousers and a bloodstained shirt, and his usually unruly white hair looked more than ever like a twice-used mop. He had a pistol tucked into the top of his trousers; his great sword slapped against his leg as he walked. The once-smart First Lieutenant now wore a red shirt; his white duck trousers were smeared with blood and dirt. A black cloth served as a scarf tied over his hair and gave him the look of a Highland brigand.

  The Calypso's cook was - under orders - swaggering round the ship with a great meat cleaver hanging from his waist; thirty men were perched in various parts of the rigging while a dozen more were skylarking, occasionally scrambling down the mainstay. The frigate yawed from time to time, and Ramage knew that all the Spaniards watching from Castillo San Antonio and its twin of El Pilar must realize she was being badly sailed. What they did not see was Jackson, acting as quartermaster and giving the orders to the men at the wheel which produced the sudden flapping of the topsails. The courses and topgallants were badly furled - it had taken Southwick an hour before he was satisfied with them, straining his patience as he complained that it was harder to furl them badly than neatly.

  Ramage walked aft, hitching at the cutlass belt over his shoulder and kicking at a piece of bread lying on the deck. The ship stank of rum; not fifteen minutes ago Southwick and the purser had sluiced a bucket of it over the quarterdeck and now a barrel was lashed against the skylight with half a dozen mugs beside it. It normally held forty gallons of rum and was obviously placed so that any man could have a mugful when he felt like it - or so it would seem to a casual eye.

  The Santa Barbara was following a hundred yards astern, sailing in the Calypso's wake, the red, gold and red of the Spanish flag streaming out in the breeze. From her foremast flew two flag signals - "Lead the fleet" and "Keep in close order". The Calypso, like an obedient bear obeying a small boy, was leading the way into Santa Cruz, obviously a prize. Instead of the Red Ensign, she also flew the flag of Spain; a flag of the same size as the one hoisted in the Santa Barbara, which had obviously supplied it. And from her foreyardarm the frigate flew two more flags which the Spanish lookouts should by now have interpreted: a plain red flag - the "bloody flag" of buccaneer days and now the symbol of revolution - and below it, obviously vanquished, a Red Ensign.

  "Brother Jackson, " Ramage called, "I'll trouble you to bear up for a moment and shiver those luffs! "

  "Aye, aye, brother Ramage, " Jackson said cheerfully.

  "Brother Ramage, " Southwick called selfconsciously, "according to my revolutionary quadrant we're exactly a mile off the entrance."

  Ramage nodded. They were approaching the coast at an angle, and there was now no doubt that the wind in the channel was blowing out through the entrance. In another ten minutes they would be in position. He looked aft anxiously, but Wagstaffe was waiting deliberately in the Santa Barbara: he could measure distances as well as Southwick. One mile: they were within range of the guns of both forts, but neither had opened fire.

  "Brother Jackson, " Ramage growled, "there's no need to flog the sails into shreds. If you luff too much again I'll bring you before the committee."

  All the men on the quarterdeck laughed cheerfully and gave their Captain credit for being a waggish fellow, but in fact Ramage could detect a stiffness among them. The habit of discipline, the respect for officers and obedience to orders was hard to drop in a couple of hours, but they were now supposed to be mutineers. There were no officers on board; according to the story that each of them would tell if questioned, all the officers had been murdered two days ago and their new officers were the leaders of the mutiny - brother Ramage (the former bosun), brother Aitken (a Marine sergeant) and brother Southwick (who, Ramage decided, had been the cook's mate, a choice which brought Southwick close to mutiny). The automatic use of the word "brother" might serve to convince a doubting Spaniard; it might gain a few minutes when seconds mattered. Or it might be a complete waste of time. In any case, Ramage had decided, it amused the men; it took their minds off the menace of the forts.

  "Brother Ramage! " a seaman hailed from aloft. "The Santa Barbara's hoisting a signal! "

  Ramage put the telescope to his eye. Number twenty-nine.

  "Brother Aitken, I'll trouble you to heave-to the ship, but not too skilfully please."

  Having spent all his sea-going life in ships that were always handled correctly, Aitken had to concentrate on his orders so that as the Calypso's bow swung across the eye of the wind the foretopsail was not braced up enough to ensure that the pressure on the forward side trying to push the frigate's bow one way was balanced by the pressure on the after sails trying to thrust the bow the other. Instead of lying stopped in the water like a waiting seagull, the bow continued to swing.

  "Brother Aitken! " Ramage said, surprised how easily he could substitute "brother" for the more usual "mister", "if we wear right round now and try again I think we'd demonstrate to our new Spanish friends on shore that we are lubbers! "

  "Aye, aye, sir - brother, rather."

  The Calypso's bow paid right off, spinning the ship round like a top. Sails flapped and slatted like enormous curtains, then filled with a bang; men hauled on sheets and braces, Jackson gave quick, sharp commands to the men at the wheel. The Santa Barbara, taken by surprise, had to bear away to avoid risk of collision and then tack to get up to windward of the frigate.

  Soon the Calypso was lying hove-to, with the Santa Barbara hove-to a hundred yards to windward. Ramage could see the corpulent cook's mate over on the brig, resplendent in the gold-trimmed uniform of a Spanish captain, climbing down into the brig's boat, which had been towing astern and was now hauled alongside. With him was a seaman rigged out in a lieutenant's uniform. Now the boat was cast off and the seamen began rowing down to the Calypso.

  Army officers would be watching with telescopes from the walls of the forts. Ramage hoped it would all be clear to them by now. Somewhere along the coast the Santa Barbara, one of His Most Catholic Majesty's ships, would have found the Calypso flying the "bloody flag" of mutiny and with her mutineers anxious to follow in the footsteps of the Jocasta. Captain Lopez would have ordered her to make for Santa Cruz after having put people on board to keep an eye on things.

  Hoisting the signal "Lead the fleet", the Santa Barbara had then followed the Calypso. Now, off the entrance to Santa Cruz, Lopez would have found the wind foul for the entrance, so that both the Calypso and the Santa Barbara would have to be towed in. What could be more natural than having both ships heave-to while he went across to the Calypso to give the mutinous Englishmen their final orders?

  The Santa Barbara's boat came alongside and the cook's mate climbed on board with his lieutenant to make his way to the quarterdeck while the boat was hauled aft to tow astern. The cook's mate's appearance at the gangway was met with hoots of laughter and catcalls: he was a popular man and, with the cook, one of the wealthiest men on the lower deck. Selling slush to his shipmates was one of his perquisites: it helped soften the board-like bread, or bind it together when it had become so old it began to crumble. The cook's mate had quick wits and a ready tongue, and as he made his way aft he kept up a barrage of imitation Spanish. Finally he reached the quarterdeck with his lieutenant and Ramage called: "Don't salute anyone: come up to me! "

  The Calypso was close enough to Castillo San Antonio that anyone with a powerful telescope could see down on to the frigate's quarterdeck. When the cook's mate - looking remarkably like Lopez - reached him, Ramage saluted him with a flourish.

  "Captain Lopez! "

  "Well, brother Ramage - that's what Mr Wagstaffe said I was to call you once I got this uniform on - well, as I was saying, sir, Mr Wagstaffe said as 'ow I was to tell you for sure, sir, that there weren't no message, sir."

  "Good. Now I want you and your lieutenant to keep striding up and down here on the quarterdeck. Make sure that you can be seen by everyone in these forts
up here - they're watching us with telescopes. You see the entrance channel? Good, point along it. You've just given me my orders. Now I understand what you mean. Oh no I don't! " He called to the seaman dressed as the Spanish lieutenant. "Come closer - you are supposed to be translating everything to me."

  Ramage turned back to the cook's mate. "Point up at one of the forts. Now the other. When I salute, you start marching up and down. Not like a Marine, " he added hastily. "You're in charge of everything, so swagger about! "

  It was time to hoist the boats out. The men already had their orders - that was the only way to ensure enough confusion to satisfy the watchers from the forts - and Ramage said: "Brother Aitken, the committee would like you to hoist out the boom boats and choose enough men to row them. You'd better double-bank 'em; it's not a long row but the quicker we . . ."

  Ramage turned to the Master as Aitken hurried forward: “Brother Southwick, I must disturb your revolutionary thoughts long enough to have the quarter boats lowered."

  "Aye, brother Ramage. You know, sir, I get a strange feeling when I think this was the way the Jocasta really did come in."

  Ramage grinned reassuringly. "I had the same feeling yesterday when you and the cook were scattering all that sheep's blood! "

  Ramage watched the cook's mate and the seaman: they made a passable counterfeit of the real thing - the cook's mate was waving his arms, gesturing with Latin exuberance. The seaman, not to be outdone, began gesturing back and Ramage was just going to interrupt when he realized that the real Captain Lopez probably had to put up with a lot of interference from his young but influential second-in-command.

  Shouts from amidships and the squeal of ropes rendering through blocks told him that a tackle was beginning to lift one of the boats and would soon be swinging it over the side and lowering it.

  "Brother Baker, " Ramage called. "To the fo'c'sle please, and stand by the hawsers ready for taking the ship in tow."

  "Aye, aye - I mean, yes brother Ramage."

  Everything was proceeding at a leisurely pace; the current was slowly sweeping the Calypso and the Santa Barbara to the westward, but Ramage had allowed for an hour's delay. Normally, heaving-to and hoisting out the boats would take less than fifteen minutes. However, the longer the Calypso was lying in front of the two forts the better; the Spaniards were getting used to the idea and there was time for messengers on horseback to be sent off to report to the Mayor. Everyone, Ramage thought to himself, was being reassured; it was another Jocasta all over again; another frigate to be added to His Most Catholic Majesty's fleet for the expenditure of a small reward to the leading mutineers.

  Finally Aitken came back to the quarterdeck. "All ready for towing, sir - I'm sorry, sir, I mean brother Ramage. The boats are alongside, the hawsers are ready to run."

  Ramage looked over towards the entrance. He could sail the Calypso another five hundred yards, and save the men rowing, but could the leader of a group of mutineers? Summers could, from his own account, but it was not worth the risk of arousing the suspicion of the Spaniards.

  "It's time for our Captain Lopez and his lieutenant to return to the Santa Barbara. As soon as they're clear, we'll furl the topsails. First the main, then the fore. That'll pay off the bow to starboard, and by the time the boats have the slack out of the hawsers we'll be heading in the right direction."

  He called over to the cook's mate, giving instructions. The man strutted over, stopped in front of Ramage and then swung round and pointed dramatically to the maintopsail. A moment later his hand moved out again towards the foretopsail.

  "How's that, sir?"

  "Fine. Now - you are the translator, " he told the seaman in the lieutenant's uniform. "Translate! "

  "Do I need any of the armwaving, sir?"

  "No, just talk. All right, that's enough! Now, Captain, you will go back to the Santa Barbara - after I've saluted you."

  With that Ramage saluted and went to the break of the quarterdeck as the two men walked to the gangway. It was all going well - even to the thin layer of cloud forming to leeward of Pico de Santa Fe, which would cause a spectacular sunset. But in fifteen minutes, he realized, the Calypso would be in the entrance to Santa Cruz, midway between the forts, the muzzles of their guns a bare seventy-five yards away on either side.

  Aloft, the men furled the maintopsail quickly, but they were deliberately careless with the gaskets. Some of the strips of canvas were tied tighter than others; three were not tied at all. The Calypso's bow began to pay off, and then the foretopsail was furled, and again some gaskets were left untied. All the fewer to untie when he gave the order to let fall the sails, Ramage noted, and was pleased that the men had remembered their orders.

  Now the Calypso's bow was turning towards the harbour entrance, pulled by the boats which were out of sight from the quarterdeck, hidden by the bow. And the closer the frigate approached, the narrower the channel seemed to become.

  "Brother Aitken, " Ramage said, "take your mutinous thoughts to the fo'c'sle and pass them aft at the top of your voice if we seem to be straying out of the fairway. I can't see properly from here."

  "Aye, aye."

  At that moment Southwick sidled up to him and sniffed: "Don't like this one bit, sir - brother, rather."

  "How so?"

  "I don't know. The feeling that those damned Dons are watching every move we make. It's uncanny. Here we are, towing in, large as life, and they're just staring at us . . ."

  "You'd sooner they were shooting, eh?"

  Southwick laughed, a laugh which began deep in his large belly. "Not at this range! But I never guessed, and that's a fact; I had it all wrong! "

  "Never guessed what?"

  "How you were going to get us into the place, sir - brother! I thought all the blood on the deck was to show how the Santa Barbara captured us. Didn't seem very likely to me; I nearly said so. Aitken was worried, too."

  Ramage swung round and stared at the Master. "You never guessed? Why, it was so obvious I didn't bother to explain! "

  "Not to us, it wasn't, not until you said we'd mutinied and we were to call each other 'brother'. I suppose we'd got it into our heads that you'd take the Santa Barbara in, and leave the Calypso anchored outside. Fill the brig up with men and send her in under the Spanish flag to cut out the Jocasta."

  "Too risky, " Ramage said, and stared up at Castillo San Antonio, now towering over the Calypso's larboard side. He counted the muzzles. "Fourteen guns facing this way, and fourteen to seaward. And that other one over there, El Pilar, has twenty to seaward and sixteen covering the channel."

  "Why too risky with the Santa Barbara alone, sir - brother?" Southwick persisted.

  "The Dons in the forts would get suspicious. Just think about it. If mutineers had handed the Calypso over to Lopez his first concern would be to get her into Santa Cruz. He wouldn't trust them an inch and he wouldn't leave her anchored outside with her ship's company still on board while he went in with the Santa Barbara. Why leave her there? No, he'd want to see her go in first."

  Southwick sniffed again, showing his doubts. "He might want to rush in first to make sure he gets all the credit."

  "No one else can take that away from him. Anyway, if the Santa Barbara went in first, the Mayor, Port Captain, Bishop - they'd all swarm on board. Where would you hide your boarding party? How would you persuade the real Lopez to make the right answers?"

  "Didn't think of that, " Southwick admitted cheerfully. "We tied ourselves up with the idea of making use of the Santa Barbara. Here! Look at that! "

  Flags had been hoisted from on top of San Antonio. Ramage grabbed a telescope and saw that they made up a three-number signal. Three? There were only one- and two-flag signals in the Spanish book. It was obviously addressed to the Santa Barbara, and whoever had ordered it to be hoisted knew that Lopez would understand it. What the devil could it mean? Suddenly the fourteen muzzles came into sharp focus. Through the telescope he could see the heads of the Spanish artillerymen. There was
an officer peering down at them, using a small glass.

  What if they opened fire? The Calypso must not fire back. Cause confusion - yes, if San Antonio opened fire, Ramage decided, then the Calypso would hoist signal flags wherever a signal halyard was rove. Two-flag signals which would send the Spaniards running to the book; two-flag signals which would buy time because every minute that passed saw the Calypso getting further along the channel, further from the muzzles of those guns.

  Fear was chilling him; the breeze dried the cold perspiration that was soaking his shirt. Three flags, three pieces of coloured bunting flapping at the top of San Antonio's flagstaff, could wreck everything. He glanced at the channel. If there was any chance of the Calypso being badly damaged, he'd sink her so that she blocked the middle of the channel.

  He swung the telescope round to look at the Santa Barbara and remembered telling Wagstaffe that the whole operation could depend on him. It could, and at this moment it did. He saw two flags being hoisted on board the brig: number 50. Yes, Wagstaffe had been quick to react; number 50 meant: "Signal not understood though flags distinguished."

  What the devil were the Dons asking Lopez? Something was needed to divert their attention! Ramage picked up the speaking trumpet, noting that the Calypso was now in the middle of the channel and precisely between the two forts.

  "All you men - quickly, get up in the rigging and stand by to cheer. You on the fo'c'sle, get muskets and pistols and stand by to fire into the air when I give the word! "

  In a minute the shrouds of all three masts were thick with men.

  "Now - wave like madmen. Stand by to cheer. Hip, hip . . ."