14-Caribbee: A Kydd Sea Adventure

by Julian Stockwin

There was no need to involve Louise but by the time he had finished there was admiration on both sides. With nothing in writing and everything hearsay, there was every likelihood that the man would get away with whatever he could salvage from the sudden demise of his business.

  In a way, Renzi could only honour him for the achievement.

  Chapter 13

  Dodd entered the room diffidently. ‘Can I show you something, sir?’ he asked, hovering.

  ‘Oh, er, I think we’ve concluded our little talk,’ Renzi said. ‘Thank you, Mr Miller, for a very enlightening conversation.’

  He rose and left with the sergeant. There were more than enough men to safeguard their capture and the prisoners could await developments.

  Dodd led him out of the front of the house. ‘There, sir,’ he said, pointing at the fort where a ridiculously large Union Flag flew proudly aloft.

  Renzi beamed. They had done it! Now to savour the sweets of victory.

  He handed over to Curzon and stepped out for the fort. He would hear details of the action first, then join Kydd in L’Aurore for a suitably rousing celebration.

  At the gate two Royal Marine sentries from the ship recognised him and, with huge grins, elaborately presented arms. He doffed his hat to them and went inside.

  It was a bedlam of noisy activity and Renzi quickly picked up that this had been selected as the provisional seat of government of the new military ruler of Marie-Galante.

  ‘Er, where’s the, er, governor?’ he asked a distracted officer.

  ‘Oh – in the end office,’ he said, and bustled off.

  Renzi had a duty before anything else to report that the prime objective of the assault had been secured, so he went down the corridor to the large office at the end. He knocked at the open door.

  At the commandant’s desk sat Kydd, looking worried, an army adjutant politely waiting while he read a document.

  ‘Ahoy there!’ Renzi said lightly.

  ‘Oh? Ah – it’s you, Nicholas.’ He turned to the army officer. ‘Do spare me ten minutes, if you will.’

  ‘Certainly, sir,’ the man said, and left quietly.

  Kydd, deep lines of tension in his face, motioned Renzi to a seat. ‘Did you find your base?’

  ‘Indeed. All’s under hatches, including His Knobbs. It’s the end for them.’

  ‘Glad to hear it,’ Kydd said, but his tone betrayed deep distraction.

  ‘You’re governor, then?’

  ‘I’m senior naval officer in charge, if that’s what you mean. I keep post until relieved by a civil appointee.’

  ‘Not Tyrell?’

  ‘Captain Tyrell fell in the action.’

  ‘I should say I’m sorry to hear that.’

  ‘And I hope even sorrier to hear that I’ll probably swing for it,’ Kydd said bitterly.

  Renzi couldn’t believe his ears. ‘I thought you said—’

  ‘He was shot from behind. Captain Hinckley saw me standing over the body with a smoking gun.’

  ‘You – you didn’t—’

  ‘No,’ Kydd said coldly. ‘I did not. But I’m being blamed for it.’

  ‘How can this be so?’

  Kydd explained the simple circumstances behind the situation, then went on sourly, ‘As there’s none higher than me to have me arrested, I’m free as one of your summer clouds. I can do what I like – which is anything, as here everyone is under martial law and I’m the last authority.’

  It was bizarre – and deadly serious.

  ‘So what will happen?’

  ‘I can’t blame Hinckley. He saw what he saw and has a duty to lay the information at the proper level – after we return.’ His face went bleak. ‘Until then I must do my duty.’

  ‘You’ll see it through, brother, never fear.’

  ‘With every wardroom and mess-deck in the squadron alive with the gossip that I’ve taken my revenge? A hard thing to get by, Nicholas.’

  Renzi could think of nothing to say that was not feeble in the face of what Kydd had to endure now. At a stroke his elation had evaporated and he was left with a lowering sense of inevitability.

  ‘Thus, old friend, you see I have to get on. I’ll join you in L’Aurore when I can.’

  So close to Antigua, the news brought an instant response from St John’s. An interim administrator was appointed and sent in the same vessel that brought Kydd’s recall. He would go in L’Aurore as, in the sight of all, he remained her lawful captain.

  When she picked up her moorings in St John’s Road, Kydd’s pennant still flew defiantly; it would take nothing less than a court-martial to decree its hauling down. Aware that every eye in the fleet was now on him, he boarded his barge in immaculate full-dress uniform with all the dignity he could muster.

  It was more than two miles, past every ship of the Leeward Islands Squadron, before he was able to arrive at the stone jetty. He could feel dozens of telescopes, hundreds of eyes, all feasting on the spectacle of the hour. He sat alone, looking neither left nor right, Poulden giving his orders in a subdued manner, the men avoiding his eye as they pulled their oars.

  And there was not a thing he could do – neither shout his innocence to the skies nor blaze his contempt on all who could believe him capable of the act of murder.

  Instead he ignored the gaping onlookers and boarded his carriage with his head held high to be whisked away to the admiral’s residence.

  Half expecting the guard turned out and a provost with an arrest warrant waiting, he was relieved to be shown immediately into Cochrane’s office.

  ‘Get out, Flags,’ the admiral told his aide and waited impatiently until they were alone.

  ‘Sit down,’ he told Kydd testily. ‘We all know what this is about.’

  He fixed his eyes in a piercing gaze on him. ‘Did you do it?’

  Kydd gulped, as he held back the torrent of feeling that threatened to unman him. ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Hinckley saw only you, standing with a gun just fired over the body, no one else in sight. What do you say to that?’

  ‘I – I can’t account for it, sir. I saw Captain Tyrell, started up towards him and tripped. The gun went off. When I reached him I found he was already dead.’

  ‘Damn it all,’ blazed Cochrane, slamming his hand on the desk and rising in frustration. ‘You – the captain of a prime frigate – and you’re saying you fell over! Tripped! For God’s sake, give me something I can use to stop this going to trial.’ He began pacing the room, his expression grim. ‘You know you’ve robbed me of my victory,’ he said, with a twisted smile. ‘There’s going to be nothing but this affair spoken of in London these six months.’

  Something of the sense of what he’d said penetrated and he tried to make amends. He sat in a chair opposite. ‘I’ll grant he was a tyrant, a miserable dog who deserved his fate – but, Hell’s bells, the world won’t see it that way.’

  Kydd replied in a low voice, ‘One of my previous officers serving in Hannibal told me in confidence he thought the man was mad – he could be right.’

  ‘That’s as may be. But the whole thing’s monstrous! It has to stop – the first post-captain this age to be tried for his life! Boney will make much of this and the Tory press will never let it drop.’

  He got up again and resumed pacing. ‘You know I’m unable to do anything for you, Kydd. I can’t prevent this going forward, for then we’d all be in a pretty pickle.’

  Finally he stopped, went to his desk and regarded Kydd sorrowfully. ‘I now have to act, I’m sorry. Send for some lawyer coves as will put things all shipshape before the, um, trial begins.’

  Kydd’s face was stony. There was nothing to say: his future was now irrevocably cast into a single track with only one ending.

  Cochrane brightened. ‘I can do something, damn it! No open arrest for our victor of Marie-Galante. For you I offer the hospitality of the flag-officer’s residence, quarters fit for a hero.’

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ Kydd said, almost in a whisper. That would be a m
ercy at least – a prison cell of luxury.

  ‘Providing, um, that you give me your word of honour and so forth …’

  It had happened too quickly. Within the space of hours only, Renzi had lost his closest friend to a bolt from the blue that had neatly snared him in as tight a grip as it was possible to get. And for all his learning and logic, he had found that he was totally helpless in the face of it.

  He knew the ways of the Navy: unlike shoreside law there would be swift justice, a need to get a distasteful business out of the way as soon as possible and the ships back on station. In the Mediterranean he recalled the commander-in-chief convicting on the Saturday with executions on the Sunday – would this be Cochrane’s way?

  Renzi had had to try something. His forlorn hope had been to rifle through any legal work he could lay hands on for some stray loophole, but in the thickets of legalese he was getting nowhere.

  Hearing the boatswain’s mate piping aboard an officer he looked up from his reading. Strange, he’d heard that all L’Aurore’s officers who could had resolved to stay ashore in sympathy and support of their captain.

  Shortly there was a knock at the door of the great cabin.

  ‘Why, Mr Bowden,’ he said, sincerely pleased to see the young man. ‘How kind in you to visit.’

  ‘I’d rather it were in different circumstances, Mr Renzi, I really do,’ he said, looking around wistfully, before awkwardly taking Kydd’s armchair.

  ‘You’ve come to see what’s to do, old fellow.’

  ‘In a word – yes.’

  Renzi sighed. ‘One thing we can be sure of …’

  ‘… that he did not kill Captain Tyrell.’

  ‘Just so.’

  ‘And another: that unless the real murderer is caught there’s every prospect that … it will end badly.’

  Bowden bit his lip. ‘That is so true, Mr Renzi. And what gives me the most pain is that there’s not a shadow of a doubt in my mind that the Hannibals did this thing. However, they gave their sworn and solemn testimony that it was none of them.’

  ‘So the world will say Captain Kydd it must be. With motive and good opportunity, together with the evidence of a just-fired musket, I think we must take it there’s little chance he’ll escape.’

  ‘It … it would appear that is so,’ Bowden said quietly, his face tight. ‘Am I right – that is to say, is it realistic to trust that the captain will be afforded a firing party rather than the noose?’

  ‘Let’s not think on these things, my friend,’ Renzi said, his head in his hands. ‘It may not come to pass.’

  ‘There must be something we can do!’ burst out Bowden, ‘We can’t just sit and wait for things to happen.’

  Renzi looked up wearily. ‘I’m no lawyer but in this little reading I’ve managed there’s not the slightest hope. Whether the jury is of naval captains or men from the street, with the facts they have, they’ll be obliged to convict.’

  ‘Then …’

  ‘Then we cannot prevent events taking their dolorous course.’

  On the way back to Hannibal Bowden felt anger rising. That a man he admired above all others was to be brought down through none of his doing – there had to be a way out!

  The irony of it was, of course, that Kydd was being unjustly condemned by the very men he had arisen from, those he understood so well, the kind with whom he had once been shipmates.

  There were legends that, as a young officer, Kydd had set aside his uniform to take on at their level a common seaman in a bare-knuckle duel, and other tales of him directly appealing to his men, who had not let him down.

  So Bowden would do the same. Follow Kydd’s example and appeal to the Hannibals directly. It was the only course left open, the last remaining chance, and, by God, he would take it.

  There was one terrible risk, however: in going to the men he was laying himself and Kydd open to the charge of interfering with witnesses, which would have the inevitable consequence of sealing his fate beyond retrieving.

  It stopped him cold.

  What would Kydd himself do? There could be no doubt: he would go ahead in faith.

  Hannibal was in a very different state. The dread presence in the after cabins was no longer there – it was as if a hellish portent always present had passed on. Men spoke in subdued tones, only half believing what had happened. The officers had gone ashore to be away from the sense of death and menace and Bowden had the wardroom to himself.

  In a rising fever of resolution he considered his move.

  How would Kydd go about this? The last thing he’d do was muster them by division. Instead he would doff his uniform. He would go down on the mess-deck to pass among them, feel their temper, show that he knew them and cared about them.

  Bowden stood up, then self-consciously took off his coat and tucked his cocked hat under his arm as he had seen Kydd do when on informal visits to a forward part of the ship.

  Then, quite deliberately, he left the cabin spaces and went to the after hatchway, hearing the accustomed noise and rough jollity of the men at their supper and grog. At the top of the ladder he teetered at the thought of what he was about to do – then descended.

  The long-hallowed custom was that the men were left to themselves for their meal and grog, to talk freely and get off their chest any rankling matter without fear of being overheard by an officer. He had now broken that code.

  Heads turned in astonishment at his appearance; as he walked slowly between the tables conversations stopped. Like a widening ripple, the sudden quiet spread out until the whole mess-deck was craning round to see what was happening.

  Bowden reached the gratings over the main hatchway and stopped. The atmosphere was close. It stank of bodies and the smoke of the rush dips that lit each table in flickering gold, and which touched, too, the massive black iron of the guns between in a martial gleam.

  He looked forward, then aft, until he was sure of their attention.

  Then he spoke. ‘Hannibals. Shipmates. I think you know why I’m here.’

  There was a ripple of murmurs that quickly died away.

  ‘In fact I’m sure you do. That’s why I’ll be brief. I do apologise for my intrusion into your time, which I would never contemplate in any other circumstances.’

  He saw interest turn to guarded resentment and realised, in a pang of despair, that while he could follow Kydd’s lead in going among them he could never talk to them in their own cant, the sea-talk common to all seamen that revealed beyond doubt that the speaker was one of them.

  ‘It’s a plea. For common humanity to as noble an officer as it’s been my honour to serve with.’

  There was a stillness that was absolute. ‘And for justice. Is it right that a man should be punished for the sins of another?’

  Now the sea of faces showed nothing but a stolid blankness. He knew the signs: they were closing ranks to an officer.

  ‘I appeal to you! On your manhood, do not let this thing happen!’ The surge of passion caught him by surprise but he didn’t care. This was Kydd’s last chance.

  ‘Let the truth come out – I beg of you …’

  There was no whisper, no movement. Simply a glassy stare.

  ‘I – I’m going now to the foredeck. There I’ll be waiting – for any who cherishes justice and truth, who will save a great man for his country. And for the sake of his own conscience before God.’

  He could do no more.

  Slowly he walked forward, past the mess-tables, the young seamen, old shellbacks. Ignorant waisters, long-service petty officers and the countless honest Jack Tars who were the core of any ship’s company.

  Up the ladderway, slowly, dignified, and past the ship’s bell to the furthest deck forward. He went to the centre, sat cross-legged, motionless, and waited.

  Time passed. He had chosen this place deliberately. It was before-the-mast territory, a seaman’s recreation space and sacred to the purpose, which any officer would not dream of trespassing upon in times of relaxation, as now
.

  This way they could approach him without fear, on their own ground. There might be before long a shamefaced confession, the men in a body coming forward with the truth.

  He waited longer.

  There was the sound of footsteps. A single person – who would it be that was—

  But it was merely the watch-on-deck, a seaman sent to trim the riding light in the bows. He passed by with his lanthorn, his set face studiously ignoring Bowden. He performed his task, returning without a single glance at the extraordinary sight of an officer sitting on the foredeck, where by now there should have been companionable knots of sailors with clay pipes and leather pots of grog talking easily about their day, perhaps some with a violin or a tuneful voice.

  Bowden realised he had to face up to the bitter fact: he had failed completely. None had come up to the foredeck. In a way it was not surprising: if some were inclined to break ranks and approach him they would be seen and marked down as informers. But he had been hoping for a collective resolve. And it had not happened.

  ‘You realise you were taking a terrible risk, old chap.’

  ‘Interfering with witnesses, I know. But, by God, I had to try – and I truly believe they would not have informed upon me to the authorities.’

  Renzi felt for Bowden, his helplessness in the face of a pitiless Fate, but he carried its weight on his shoulders, too. He had come up with two schemes for rescuing Kydd by stealth but both foundered on the knowledge that he would certainly refuse, sturdily trusting in decency and common law.

  He was hollow-eyed with worry, and Bowden looked much the same. They had run out of ideas and, with that, any options for the future.

  Bowden wrung his hands over his failure with the Hannibals. ‘As I talked, I could see I’d lost them. There was no common ground, no way to communicate, speak their language …’

  ‘Stop!’ Renzi cried, as a flash of desperate inspiration came. ‘We’ve one last throw of the die. What if …’

  The boat put off once more for Hannibal. It held only one passenger and hooked on at the fore-chains where no visiting boat would ever deign to go. Hannibal’s mate-of-the-watch sent the quartermaster hurrying forwards to intercept the stranger, but by the time he reached the fore-mast a figure had swung over the bulwarks and was inboard.