Command a King's Ship

by Alexander Kent

  Bolitho asked, `But there is water available?'

  Mudge moved his chair towards the desk in short, squeaky jerks. Then he jabbed the open chart with his thumb.

  'We'm now in th' Mozambique Channel, as we all knows.' He glared at Midshipman Armitage. "Cept for some too hignorant to learn aright!' He continued in a more unruffled tone, 'Th' African coast is fair wild 'ereabouts, an' not a lot be known about it. Ships put in, of course.' His eyes gleamed as he looked up at Bolitho. Tor water. To trade mebbee. An' to find theirselves some black ivory from time to time.'

  Midshipman Keen was leaning over his shoulder, his face the only one present which showed little sign of strain.

  `Black ivory, sir?'

  Herrick said sharply, `Slaves.'

  Mudge leaned back comfortably. `It follows that we must be careful. Land in force, get the water, if I can recall exactly where it is, and stand out to sea agin.'

  Bellairs said, `My marines will give a good account, thank you !'

  Mudge regarded him scornfully. `Just so, Cap'n Bellairs, sir. In their pretty coats, with their drums and fifes, I can picture it a fair treat!' He added harshly, `They'd 'ave 'em for breakfast afore they could polish their bloody boots!'

  `Well, really!' Bellairs was shocked.

  Bolitho nodded. `Very well then. The wind is staying with us, so we should be able to anchor by noon tomorrow.'

  Mudge agreed. `Aye. But not close inshore, sir. There's a fair bit o' reef just around the point. It'll mean every boat in th' water, an' a 'ard pull for all 'ands.'

  `Yes.' Bolitho looked at Davy. `You can arrange the arming of each boat with the gunner. Swivels for launch and cutter. Musketoons for the rest.' He glanced round at their intent faces. `I'll want an officer with each party. Some of our people will need watching, if only for their own sakes.' He let his words sink in. `Remember it well. Many of them are quite raw to this sort of work, although because we have been together for over two months, you may see them as veterans. They are not, so treat them accordingly. Lead them, do not be content to leave your work to others less qualified.'

  He saw the midshipmen exchanging glances like boys about to take part in some private escapade. Keen, his eyes sparkling with excitement. Little Penn, openly impressed by being included. Poor Armitage, his forehead raw red from being on watch for a few moments without a hat. They were even less experienced than most of the men.

  He looked at the chart. But for Sullivan they might have made the whole voyage to Madras without a pause, despite their shortages. Herrick had tried to help by saying it was bad luck. Puigserver had stated that he was behind him, whatever he decided was best for the ship. But it was still his decision, and nobody else could change that.

  Some of those present in the cabin had stopped speaking with the surgeon altogether, and perhaps for that reason alone Bolitho had made no further comment about his choice of Sullivan as a helper, giving him the opportunity, crazy or not, of fouling the water supply. He saw him only on matters of sick reports, and each time was shocked by his appearance. The man was boiling inside, bitter, and yet unable to share his problems. He did not even want to.

  He heard a woman's voice, saw the others look up at the skylight as feet passed overhead. Mrs. Raymond and her maid taking their usual stroll under the stars. He hoped Soames would ensure they did not stray from the quarterdeck. He would not answer for their safety at the hands of some of the seamen. He could understand how many of them felt.

  To the volunteers it must seem a far cry from the recruiting posters, and to the men from the prison hulks it might now appear to be a bad exchange of circumstances. Even those hiding from crimes committed ashore would find room for doubt and resentment. The crimes would have faded with the fear of arrest and trial. But the heat and thirst, and the daily grind of disciplined duty were only too real.

  He saw Raymond biting his lip, his eyes following the footsteps as if he was seeing through the deckhead itself. If anything, he and his wife were moving further apart by being confined in the ship. It was a strange relationship.

  He thought back over the past days and one particular incident. He had been in his small makeshift cabin in the chart space, and Allday had been changing the bandage on his arm for him. She had entered the cabin without knocking, in fact, neither of them had heard her approach. She had stood by the open port, quite relaxed, and had watched him without saying a word. Bolitho had been stripped to the waist, and as he reached for a fresh shirt she had said softly, `I see you bear yet another scar, Captain.'

  Bolitho's hand had gone to his side, suddenly conscious of the ragged mark where a pistol ball had missed his ribs by a thread. He had seen it exactly, as he was seeing it now. The privateer's tilting deck, the American lieutenant running towards him, taking aim. The crash of a shot. The sharp, stabbing agony. Oblivion.

  Allday had said rudely, `The captain's dressing! Ships' ways are different from those ashore, it seems!'

  But she had stood firm, her lips slightly parted, while she watched him. But how could she have understood what he was thinking? That the ball had been fired by one of his own brother's officers. A traitor. A wanted renegade, now dead and forgotten by most.

  But not by me.

  He shook himself out of his brooding thoughts. Nothing mattered now but the work in hand. Water. All that he needed to take them to Madras. Beyond that was another challenge. It could wait.

  He said, `That is all, gentlemen.' He realised he had spoken more abruptly than intended and added, `We have a fine ship. One of the most efficient and modern devices created by man. We can give a good account of ourselves to any vessel but a ship of the line.' He paused as Herrick smiled at him, bridging the gap between them as he, too, remembered. `Except for rare, and not to be encouraged, occasions! But without water to drink we are like stumbling old men, with neither the means nor the will to face another day. Remember what I have said. Be vigilant. For the moment that is all I ask of you.'

  They filed out of the cabin, leaving him with Puigserver and Raymond. Raymond looked hopefully at the Spaniard, but when he made no attempt to take his usual walk on deck he, too, left the cabin.

  Bolitho sat down and watched the moonlight as it played across the Undine's bubbling wake.

  `What is the matter with him, Senor?' It was strange how easy it was to talk to him.

  Just over a year back he had been an enemy. One Bolitho would have killed in battle had he not called for quarter. He smiled to himself. Or the other way round. He was a powerful man, that was certain, and much of his counsel he kept to himself. But Bolitho trusted him. The ship's company, for the most part, had also accepted him as their own. Like Allday, who had long given up trying to pronounce his name, they called him Mister Pigsliver. But they said it with something near to affection.

  Puigserver regarded him with quiet amusement.

  `My dear Capitan, he is like a watchdog. He fears for his wife, what she will do, rather than what others will do to her!' He chuckled, the sound rising from his belly. `She, I think, is beginning to enjoy the game, knowing that every man aboard sees her in a different eye. She stands proudly, a tigress in our midst.'

  `You seem to know a great deal about her, Senor.'

  The smile broadened. `You know your ships, Capitan. Unlike me, I fear you still have much to learn about women, eh?'

  Bolitho made to protest and then changed his mind. The memory was still too painful to leave room for a denial.

  6

  Attack Overland

  `Well, Thomas, what d'you make of it at close quarters?' Bolitho's voice was hushed, as with the others around him he stared towards the shore.

  They had made a careful approach since dawn, seeing the land gaining shape and substance, and then as the sun had found them again, they had watched the colour, the endless panorama of green.

  With two experienced leadsmenin the chains, and under minimum canvas, Undine had felt her way towards the land. It had looked like an untouched world, wi
th jungle so thick it seemed impossible for anything to move freely away from the sea.

  Herrick replied quietly, `The master seems satisfied, sir.' He trained his telescope over the hammock nettings. `As he described it. A round headland to the north. And that strangelooking hill about a mile inland.'

  Bolitho stepped on :to a bollard and peered down over the nettings. Undine had finally dropped anchor some four cables offshore to give her sea-room and a safe depth at all times. Nevertheless, it looked very shallow, and he could even see the great shadow of Undine's coppered hull on the bottom. Pale sand. Like that on the various small, crescent-shaped beaches they had seen on their cautious approach.

  Long trailers of strange weed, writhing to the current far below the ship as if in a tired sort of dance. But to larboard, as the ship swung to her cable he saw other shapes, browns and greens, like stains in the water. Reefs. Mudge was right to be so careful. Not that anyone would need reminding after Nervion's fate.

  Alongside, the first boats had already been swayed out, and Shellabeer, the boatswain, was gesticulating with his fists at some Spanish seamen who were baling one of them. It would do the frail hulls good to be afloat again, Bolitho thought.

  He said absently, `I shall go with the boats, and you will keep a good watch in case of trouble.'

  He could almost feel Herrick's unspoken protest, but added, `If anything goes wrong ashore it might help some of our people if they see I'm sharing it with them.' He turned and clapped Herrick's shoulder. `Besides which, I feel like stretching my legs. It is my prerogative.'

  On the gun deck Davy was striding back and forth inspecting the men mustered for the boats, checking weapons and the tackle for hoisting and lowering water casks when the work was begun.

  Overhead the sky was very pale, as if the sun had boiled the colour from it and had spread it instead across the glittering stretch of sea between ship and shore.

  Bolitho marvelled at the stillness. Just an occasional necklace of white surf along the nearest beach and at the foot of the headland. It was as if it was holding its breath, and he could imagine a thousand eyes watching the anchored frigate from amongst the trees.

  There were loud thumps as the swivel guns were lowered into the bows of launch and cutter, and more shouted orders while the bell-mouthed musketoons found their proper mountings in gig and pinnace. The jolly boat was to remain with the ship. It was too small for the great casks, and might be needed in an emergency.

  He rubbed his chin and stared at the land. Emergency. It appeared safe enough. All the way along the coast, as they had slipped past one bay or inlet after another, and all of which had seemed identical to everyone but Mudge, he had waited for some sign, a hint of danger. But not a boat drawn up on the sand, not a wisp of smoke from a fire, not even a bird had broken the stillness.

  `Boats ready, sir!' Shellabeer tilted his swarthy face in the glare.

  Bolitho walked to the rail and looked down at the gun deck. The seamen seemed altered yet again. Perhaps because of their cutlasses, the way they glanced at each other, their torment of thirst momentarily put aside. Most of them were very different from the men who had first joined the ship. Their bared, backs were well browned, with only an occasional scar of sunburn to mark the foolish or the unwary.

  He called, `Over yonder is Africa, lads.' He felt the rustle of excitement expanding like a wind over corn. `You'll be seeing many more places before we are homeward bound again. Do as you are bid, stay with your parties, and no harm should come to you.' He hardened his tone. `But it is a dangerous country, and the natives hereabouts have had little cause to like or trust the foreign sailorman. So keep a good watch, and work well with the casks.' He nodded. `Man your boats.'

  Mudge joined him at the gangway as the first men swung their way down the side.

  `I should be a'goin' with you, sir. I've told me best master's mate, Fowlar, what to look for, an"e's a good man, that 'e be.'

  Bolitho lifted his arms as Allday buckled on his sword.

  `Then what troubles you, Mr. Mudge?'

  Mudge scowled. `Time was when I could swim 'alf a mile an' then march another with a full load on me back!'

  Herrick, grinned. `And still have the wind to bed a fine wench, I'll be bound!'

  Mudge glared at him. `Your time'll come, Mr. 'Errick. It ain't no pleasure, gettin' old!'

  Bolitho smiled. `Your value is here.'

  To Herrick he said, `Rig boarding nets during our stay. With only an anchor watch and the marines at your back, you might be in bother if someone tries to surprise you.' He touched his arm. `I know. I am over-cautious. I can read your face like a chart. But better so than dead.' He glanced at the shore. `Especially here.'

  He walked to the entry port. `The boats will return two by two. Send the rest of the men as soon as you can. They'll tire easily enough in this heat.'

  He saw Puigserver wave to him from the gangway, and Raymond watching from right aft by his wife's little canopy. He touched his hat to the side party and climbed quickly down into the gig where Allday waited by the tiller.

  `Shove off!'

  One by one the boats idled clear of the frigate's shadow, and then with oars moving in unison turned towards the land. Bolitho remained standing to examine his little flotilla.

  Lieutenant Soames with the launch, Undine's ' largest boat, every inch of space filled with men and casks, while in the bows a gun captain crouched over the loaded swivel like some kind of figurehead. Then the cutter, also deeply laden, with Davy in control, his figure very slim against that of Mr. Pryke, Undine's portly carpenter. As was proper, Pryke was going ashore in the hopes of finding timber suitable for small repairs about the ship.

  Midshipman Keen, accompanied by little Penn, had the pinnace, and Bolitho could see them bobbing about with obvious excitement as they pulled steadily across the water.

  Bolitho glanced astern at his ship, seeing the figures on her deck already small and impersonal. Someone was in the cabin, and he guessed it was Mrs. Raymond, watching the boats, avoiding her husband, probably neither.

  Then he looked down at the men in the gig, at the weapons between their straddled legs, at the way they avoided his scrutiny. Right forward he saw a man moving the musketoon from side to side to free the mount from caked salt, and realised it was Turpin, the one who had tried so desperately to deceive Davy at Spithead. He saw Bolitho watching him and held up his arm. In place of his hand he had a hook of bright steel. He called, `The gunner had it fixed up for me, sir!' He was grinning. 'Better'n the real thing!'

  Bolitho smiled at him. He at least seemed in good spirits.

  He watched the slow moving hulls. About eighty officers and men with more to follow when he could spare the boats. He sat down and shaded his eyes with his hat. As he did so he touched the scar above his eye, remembering that other watering party he had been with so long ago. The sudden charge, screams all about him, that great towering savage brandishing a cutlass he had just seized from a dying sailor. He had seen it only for a second, and then fallen senseless, his face a mask of blood. It had been a close-run thing. But for his coxswain, it would have been the end.

  Herrick probably resented his landing with this watering party. It was work normally given to a lieutenant. But that memory, like the scar, was a constant reminder of what could go wrong without any sort of warning.

  `Cable to go, Captain!' Allday eased the tiller bar slightly.

  Bolitho started. He must have been dreaming. Undine looked far away now. A graceful toy. While right across the bows and reaching out on either hand like huge green arms, was the land.

  Once again Mudge's memory proved to be sure and reliable. Within two hours of beaching the boats and sorting the hands into working parties, the master's mate, Fowlar, reported finding a little stream, and that the water was the freshest thing he had tasted for years.

  The work was begun immediately. Armed pickets were placed at carefully chosen vantage points, and lookouts sent to the top of the small
hill, below which Mudge's stream gurgled away into the dense jungle. After the first uncertainty of stepping on to dry land, with all the usual unsteadiness to their sealegs, the sailors soon settled down to the task. Pryke, the carpenter, and his mates quickly assembled some heavy sledges upon which the filled casks would be hauled down to the boats, and while the cooper stood watchfully at the stream the other men were busy with axes, clearing a path through the trees under Fowlar's personal supervision.

  With Midshipman Penn trotting at his heels to act as messenger, Bolitho retained contact between beach and stream, making several journeys to ensure the operation was working smoothly. Lieutenant Soames was in charge of the beach, and of allocating more men to the work as they were ferried ashore. Davy had the inland part, while Keen was usually to be seen with some armed men at his back trudging around the labouring sailors to make sure there were no unwelcome visitors.

  Fowlar had discovered two native fireplaces almost immediately. But they were decayed and scattered, and it seemed unlikely that anyone had been near them for months. Nevertheless, as he paused to watch over the progress of each party, Bolitho was conscious of a feeling of menace. Of hostility, which was hard to define.

  On his way inland to the stream yet again he had to stand aside as a heavy sledge, hauled by some two dozen blaspheming seamen, careered past him, shaking the undergrowth, and making several great red birds flap between the trees, squawking discordantly. Bolitho watched the birds and then stepped back on to the crude trail. It was good to know something was alive here, he thought. Beneath the trees, where the sky was hidden from view, the air was heavy, and stank of rotting vegetation. Here and there, something clicked and rustled, or a small beady eye glittered momentarily in filtered sunlight before vanishing just as swiftly.

  Penn gasped, `Might be makes, sir!' He was panting hard, his shirt plastered to his body from his exertions to keep up.