‘I was thinking of some wild roses, and a lady.’ He turned away, as if afraid of what he might disclose. ‘On my birthday.’ Then, abruptly, ‘The wind! By God, the wind!’
It was as though the ship had sensed his change of mood. Blocks and halliards rattled, and above their heads the main topsail boomed like a drum.
Adam said, ‘Belay my last order! Call all hands directly!’ He gripped Galbraith’s arm as if to emphasise the importance of what he was saying. ‘We shall sight land today! Don’t you see, if we are being followed it’s their last chance to outreach us!’
Galbraith knew it was pointless to question his sudden excitement. At first light they should be changing tack to take station on Matchless again. There was not a shred of evidence that the occasional sightings of a far-off sail were significant, or connected in any way. But the impetuous grip on his arm seemed to cast all doubt to the rising wind.
He swung round. ‘Pipe all hands, Mr Woodthorpe! And send for the master, fast as you can!’
He turned back to the indistinct outline. ‘Captain Bouverie may not approve, sir.’
Adam Bolitho said quietly, ‘But Captain Bouverie is not yet in sight, is he?’
Men rushed out of the shadows, some still dazed by sleep, staring around at the flapping canvas and straining rigging until order and discipline took command.
The master, feet bare, stumped across the sloping deck, muttering, ‘Is there no peace?’ Then he saw the captain. ‘New course, sir?’
‘We will wear ship, Mr Cristie! As close to the wind as she’ll come!’
Calls shrilled and men scrambled aloft, the perils of working in darkness no longer a threat now to most of them.
Blocks squealed, and someone stumbled over a snaking line, which was slithering across the damp planking as if it were truly alive.
But she was answering, from the instant that the big double-wheel was hauled over.
Galbraith gripped a backstay and felt the deck tilting still further. In the darkness everything was wilder, louder, as if the ship were responding to her captain’s recklessness. He dashed spray from his face and saw pale stars spiralling around the masthead pendant. It was all but dawn. He looked towards the captain. Suppose the sea was empty? And there was no other vessel? He thought of Bouverie, what might happen, and knew, without understanding why, that this was a contest.
Unrivalled completed her turn, water rushing down the lee scuppers as the sails refilled on the opposite tack, the jib cracking loudly, as close to the wind as she could hold.
Cristie shouted, ‘Steady as she goes, sir! East-by-south!’
Afterwards, Galbraith thought it was the only time he had ever heard the master either impressed or surprised.
‘Make fast! Belay!’
Men ran to obey each command; to any landsman it would appear a single, confused tangle of canvas and straining cordage.
Adam Bolitho gripped the rail and said, ‘Now she flies! Feel her!’
Galbraith turned, but shook his head and did not speak. The captain was quite alone with his ship.
‘Hands aloft, Mr Lomax! Get the t’gallants on her and put more men on the maincourse! They’re like a pack of old women today!’
Lieutenant George Avery stood beneath the mizzen mast, where the marines of the afterguard had been mustered for nearly an hour. He had heard a few whispered curses when the galley fire had been doused before some of the watchkeepers had managed to snatch a quick meal.
He felt out of place aboard Matchless, alien. Everything worked smoothly enough, as might be expected in a frigate which had been in commission for over three years. But he had sensed a lack of the companionship he himself had come to recognise and accept. Every move, each change of tack or direction, seemed to flow from one man. No chain of command as Avery knew it, but a single man.
He could see him now, feet apart, hand on his hip, a square figure in the strengthening daylight. He considered the word; it described Captain Emlyn Bouverie exactly. Even when the ship heeled to a change of tack, Bouverie remained like a rock. His hands were square too, strong and hard, like the man.
Bouverie said, ‘Attend the lookouts, Mr Foster, you should know my orders by now!’ His voice always carried without any apparent effort, and Avery had never seen him deign to use a speaking trumpet, even in the one patch of wind they had encountered after leaving Malta.
He heard a lieutenant yelling out names, and thought he knew why. Soon now Unrivalled would be sighted, provided Adam Bolitho had kept on station as instructed. He recalled the meeting aboard the flagship. Bouverie had vetoed the suggestion that Avery should sail with Unrivalled instead of ‘the senior officer’s ship’, and Bethune had concurred. Looking back, Avery still wondered if it was because he had truly agreed, or if he had simply needed to demonstrate that no favouritism would be shown Sir Richard Bolitho’s nephew.
He gazed aloft as the topgallant sails broke free from their yards and filled to the wind, the topmen spread out on either side, all aware of their captain’s standards.
Pride, jealousy? It was difficult to have one without the other. Matchless had been in these waters for more than three years, and despite her coppered hull was heavy with weed and marine growths. Unrivalled had been forced to shorten sail several times during the day to remain on station, while at night they must be almost hove to. He could imagine Adam Bolitho’s frustration and impatience. And yet I hardly know him. That was the strangest part. Like handing over the locket. When I wanted it for myself.
He realised that Bouverie had joined him by the mizzen. He could move swiftly when it suited him.
‘Bored, Mr Avery? This may seem a mite tame after your last appointment!’
Avery said, ‘I feel like a passenger, sir.’
‘Well spoken! But I cannot disrupt the running of my command with a wrong note, eh?’
He laughed. In fact, Bouverie laughed frequently, but it rarely reached his eyes.
‘All secure, sir!’ Somebody scuttled past; nobody walked in Matchless.
Bouverie nodded. ‘I’ve read the notes and observations on your last visit to Algiers. Could be useful.’ He broke off and shouted, ‘Take that man’s name, Mr Munro! I’ll have no damned laggards this day!’
That man. After three years in commission, a captain should have known the name of every soul aboard.
Again, the ambush of memory. How Richard Bolitho had impressed upon his officers the importance of remembering men’s names. It is often all they can call their own.
He turned, startled, as Bouverie said, ‘You must miss the admiral,’ as if he had been reading his thoughts.
‘I do indeed, sir.’
‘I never met him. Although I too was at Copenhagen, in Amazon, Captain Riou. My first stint as a lieutenant. A real blooding, I can tell you!’ He laughed again, but nobody turned from his duties to watch or listen. Not in Matchless.
Bouverie’s arm jerked out once more. ‘Another pull on the weather forebrace and belay! Far too slow!’
He changed, just as suddenly. ‘Did you have much to do with Lady Somervell? Turn a man’s heart to water with a glance, I’m told. A true beauty – caused more than a few ripples in her time!’
‘A woman of courage also, sir.’
Bouverie was studying him in the gloom. Avery could feel it, like the stare of a prosecuting officer at a court martial. As he could feel his own rising resentment.
Bouverie swayed back on his heels. ‘If you say so. I’d have thought –’ He broke off and almost lost his balance. ‘What the hell was that?’
Someone shouted, ‘Gunfire, sir!’
Bouverie swallowed hard. ‘Clod!’ He strode to the opposite side. ‘Mr Lomax! Where away?’
Avery licked his lips, tasting the brine. A single shot. It could only mean one thing, a signal to heave to. He stared at the horizon until his eyes throbbed. Every morning since leaving Malta it had been like this. As soon as Unrivalled was sighted Bouverie would make a signal, as if he was a
lways trying to catch them out. Without looking he knew that the first signal of the day was already bent on, ready to soar up to the yard, when most ships would have been content to remain in close company. He shivered, from more than the rising wind, recalling Adam Bolitho’s impatience at the meeting when doubts had been voiced about the brigantine. Only some ridiculous obsession, something to command attention, to impress. Not any more.
He heard the first lieutenant say, ‘Unrivalled must be off her station, sir!’
‘I know that, God damn it! We are to alter course when . . .’ He turned towards Avery. ‘Well, what do you think? Or do “passengers” have no opinions?’
Avery felt very calm.
‘I believe Unrivalled has found something useful, sir.’
‘Oh, very diplomatic, sir! And what of Captain Adam Bolitho? Does he truly believe he is above obeying orders, and beyond the discipline that binds the rest of us?’
An inner voice warned him, take care. Another insisted, you have nothing more to lose.
He said, ‘I was with Sir Richard Bolitho at Algiers, sir. Things have changed since then. If we attempt to enter without permission . . .’ He glanced round, seeing the first touch of gold spill over the horizon. The moment he had always loved. But that, too, was past. ‘This ship will be destroyed. Your ship, sir, will be blasted apart before you can come about. I have seen the anchorage, and the citadel, and some of the fanatics who control those guns.’
‘I have faced worse!’
Avery relaxed. He had always been able to recognise bluster.
‘Then you will know the consequences, sir.’
Bouverie stared at him. ‘God damn you for your impertinence!’ Then, surprisingly, he grinned. ‘But bravely said, for all that!’ He looked at the clearing sky as a voice yelled, ‘Sail on the starboard quarter!’ The merest pause. ‘Two sail, sir!’
Bouverie nodded slowly. ‘A prize, then.’
The first lieutenant climbed down from the shrouds with a telescope.
‘She’s a brigantine, sir.’
Avery looked at his hands. They were quite still, and warm in the first frail sunlight. They felt as if they were shaking.
Bouverie was saying, ‘No, not that signal, Mr Adams.’ He took a glass from the signals midshipman and steadied it with care. He was studying Unrivalled’s topsails, like pink shells in the clear light, although the sun had not yet revealed itself.
‘When she is on station again, make Captain repair on board.’
Avery turned away. How many times would Adam Bolitho read that signal with different eyes from other men? When his uncle had called him to his flagship to tell him of the death of Zenoria Keen. We Happy Few . . . It had been their secret.
Bouverie said, ‘Breakfast, I think. Then we shall hear what our gallant Captain Bolitho has to say.’ The good humour seemed even more volatile than his usual mood. ‘I hope it pleases me!’
But, out of habit or memory, Avery was watching the signals party bending on the flags.
Bouverie sat squarely in a broad leather chair, hands gripping the arms as if to restrain himself.
He said, ‘Now, Captain Bolitho. In your own words, of course. Share your discoveries with me, eh?’ He glanced towards his table where Avery was sitting with a leather satchel and some charts, while beside him the ship’s clerk was poised with his quill at the ready. ‘For both our sakes, I think some record of this conversation should be kept. Sir Graham Bethune will expect it.’
Adam Bolitho walked to the stern windows and stared at his own ship, her sheer lines and shining hull distorted in the weathered glass. Hard to believe that it had all happened so quickly, and yet it was exactly as he had imagined when he had ordered Unrivalled’s change of course. They had all thought him mad. They were probably right.
He could recall the calm, professional eye of old Stranace, the ship’s gunner, when he had explained what he required. Stranace was more used to the deadly quiet of the magazine and powder store, but like most of his breed he had never forgotten his trade, or how to lay and train an eighteen-pounder.
It must have taken the brigantine’s people completely by surprise. Day in, day out, following the two frigates, knowing almost to the minute when they would reduce sail for the night, then to see one of the quarry suddenly looming out of the last, lingering darkness with every sail set, on a converging tack with no room for manoeuvre and no time to run . . .
One shot, the first Unrivalled had fired in anger.
Adam had watched the splash, the succession of jagged fins of spray as the ball had skipped across the water no more than a boat’s length from her bows. He had touched the gunner’s shoulder; it had felt like iron itself. No words were needed. It was a perfect shot, and the brigantine, now seen to be named Rosario, had hove to, her sails in confusion in the wind which had changed everything.
He heard the quill scratching across the paper and realised he had been describing it. He looked again and saw the brigantine’s outline, more like a blurred shadow than reality. Unrivalled had put down two boats, and they had done well, he thought, with the lively sea, and their movements hampered by their weapons. Jago had been with him. Amused, but deadly when one of Rosario’s crew had raised a pistol as the boarders had flung their grapnels and swarmed aboard. He had not even seen Jago move, his blade rising and falling with the speed of light. Then the scream, and the severed hand like a glove on the deck.
Lieutenant Wynter had been in the second boat, and with his own party had put the crew under guard. After Jago’s example there was no further resistance.
Rosario was Portuguese but had been chartered repeatedly, at one time by the English squadron at Gibraltar. The master, a dirty, unshaven little man, seemed to speak no English, although he produced some charts to prove his lawful occasions. The charts, like Rosario, were almost too filthy to examine. As Cristie later remarked, ‘By guess an’ by God, that’s how these heathen navigate!’
A sense of failure then; he had sensed it in the restlessness of the boarding party, the apparent confidence of Rosario’s master. Until Wynter, perhaps the least experienced officer in the ship, had commented on the brigantine’s armament, six swivel guns mounted aft and near the hold. And the smell . . .
Adam had ordered the hatches to be broached. Only one cargo had a stench like that, and they found the chains and the manacles where slaves could be packed out of sight, to exist, if they could, in terror and their own filth until they were shipped to a suitable market. There had been blood on one set of irons, and Adam guessed that the wretched prisoner had been pitched overboard.
He had seen Wynter’s eyes widening with shocked surprise when he had said coldly, ‘A slaver then. Worthless to me. Fetch a halter and run this bugger up to the main yard, as an example to others!’
Wynter’s expression had changed to admiring comprehension when the vessel’s master had thrown himself at Adam’s feet, pleading and sobbing in rough but completely adequate English.
‘I thought he might remember!’
Confident and less gentle, they had continued their search. There was a safe, and the gibbering master was even able to produce a key.
Adam turned now as Avery opened the satchel.
‘Rosario had no papers as such. That alone makes her a prize.’ He smiled faintly. ‘For the moment.’
Avery laid out the contents of the satchel. A bill of lading, Spanish. A delivery of oil to some garrison, Portuguese. A log book, crudely marked with dates and what could be estimated positions. Some shadowed Unrivalled.
Bouverie said abruptly, ‘Many such men are paid to spy and inform their masters of ship movements, theirs and ours.’ He gave the characteristic nod. ‘But I’ll give you this, Bolitho. You did not imagine it!’
Adam felt the sudden surge of excitement. The first time since . . . He said, ‘And there is a letter. I do not speak French, but I recognise it well enough.’
Avery was holding it. ‘For the captain of the frigate La Fortune.’
He gave a grave smile. ‘I learned my French the hard way. As their prisoner.’
Bouverie rubbed his chin. ‘So she is in Algiers. Under a great battery, you say.’
Adam said, ‘The bait in the trap, sir. They will not expect us to ignore it.’
It was as if some invisible bonds had been cut. Bouverie almost sprang out of the chair.
‘Out of the question! Even if we hold Rosamund –’
Avery heard himself correcting gently, ‘Rosario, sir,’ and cursed himself. Always the good flag lieutenant . . .
Adam persisted, ‘No, sir, we use her. To spring the trap. They know we are trailing our cloaks, and they will be expecting the brigantine. I am sure she is a regular visitor there.’
He was aware of the tawny eyes on him, Avery watching but not seeing him. As if he were somewhere else . . . He was suddenly deeply moved. With my uncle.
‘Rosario appears to be an agile vessel, sir. It would seem only fair if we were to “chase” her into Algiers?’
Bouverie swallowed. ‘A cutting-out expedition? I’m not at all certain –’ Then he nodded again, vigorously. ‘It might work, it’s daring enough. Foolhardy, some will say.’
Adam returned to the stem windows. One of the Rosario’s crew had told him that they had often carried female slaves, some very young girls. The master had delighted in abusing them.
He thought of Zenoria, her back laid open by a whip. Keen had rescued her, and she had married him. Not out of love. Out of gratitude.
The mark of Satan, she had called it.
He heard himself say, ‘Time is short, sir. We cannot delay.’
‘The authority for such an act, which might provoke another outbreak of war . . .’
‘Is yours, sir.’
Why should it matter? Bouverie would not be the first or the last officer to await a decision from a higher authority. But it did matter. It had to.
He said, ‘I can take Rosario. I am short-handed, but we could share the burden between us. Then so would the laurels be equally divided.’
He saw the shot go home. Like one of old Stranace’s.
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