Alexander Kent - Bolitho 26

by Man of War [lit]

  The courier shook his head. ”No, ma’am, but thank you. I’ve another call yet. Old Cap’n Masterman’s place at Penryn. Bad news, I’m afraid. His son is reported missing. His ship foundered on a reef, I’m told.”

  Ferguson turned, hearing the step on the cobbles. It was a familiar enough story in Cornwall.

  Adam Bolitho took it in at a glance: the courier standing with his mount, Young Matthew who had been supervising Napier with the pony, Ferguson and Grace the housekeeper, and Yovell who had stopped in his tracks by the gate to the rose garden. Catherine’s roses, or soon would be again.

  Like badly rehearsed players, but joined by something which none of them properly understood.

  The courier had produced a small writing tablet from beneath his stained cloak, the pen already dipped. What Lowenna must have used that day when she had been there to see Unrivalled weigh and stand out to sea.

  He thought of the Old Glebe House, how it had looked that night when he had ridden over to see it. How the horse had whinnied and shied, perhaps because of the stench of sodden ashes and charred timbers. Or because of something more sinister. The burned-out windows, stark and empty against the racing clouds, of the room where she had kept her harp, next to the roofless studio where he had first seen her chained to the imaginary rock. The sacrifice .. .

  He had gone back again in daylight. It had been even worse. He had wanted to go alone but Nancy had accompanied him, had insisted, as if she needed to share it.

  The main part of the house was too unsafe to explore. Ashes, blackened glass from those tall windows he remembered so vividly, broken beams jutting like savage teeth. A few charred canvases. Impossible to tell if they had been empty or partially finished when the fire had raged into the studio.

  Or being repaired. Like the one of Catherine, which she herself had commissioned to hang beside Sir Richard’s portrait, in ‘their room’ as most of the household still called it. Dressed in a seaman’s smock and little else, what she had been wearing in the open boat when she and her Richard had been shipwrecked. Allday, when he could be persuaded to speak of it, had painted his own picture of Catherine and Bolitho, who had won the heart of the country when they had endured the open boat which might have ended everything. Her courage, her example, a woman amongst desperate men in fear of their lives, had left an indelible impression on Sir Richard’s old coxswain. ”She even got me to sing a ballad or two!” He had laughed about it, proudly.

  He had never known Nancy to hide her thoughts from him. She had suddenly faced him in the overgrown drive, the blackened building and chapel a grim backdrop, with the sea beyond. Always waiting. Perhaps a new horizon.

  ”It was Mary, the upstairs maid, who found it, Adam.” She always added a title, like a label, to any member of the household, in case he should forget between visits. Like the lesson which had been handed down to him over the years, when speaking of his sailors, the people, as Richard Bolitho called them. Remember their names, Adam, and use them. A name is sometimes all they can call their own.

  Mary had run screaming to the kitchen. The portrait of Catherine had been slashed, again and again. Only the face had been left intact. As if that some one had wanted the world to know who it was.

  Sir Gregory Montagu had not been optimistic, but he had taken the damaged canvas to his studio. Now they would never know.

  Adam had thought about it ever since. There had been gypsies in the area, more of them than usual, but it was not their way of things. Food, money, something to sell; those were different. He had hated himself for even considering Belinda’s daughter Elizabeth. She would see Catherine as the enemy, the marriage wrecker, but she had been visiting a friend over the border in Devon at the time.

  He realized that he had signed for the envelope and that the courier was climbing into his saddle again.

  He knew that Yovell and Ferguson had followed him into the house, wanting to help, yet keeping their distance.

  He entered the study and picked up the knife that lay beside Elizabeth’s sketch of the mermaid, thinking of the watch which had once stopped a musket ball, and the little mermaid engraved on its case. Just a shell now, and he knew that the boy Napier still carried it like a talisman.

  For a moment longer the knife hesitated, the seal and Admiralty stamp blurred in the thin sunlight. The knife had belonged to Captain James Bolitho. Sir Gregory Montagu had been here then, asked to paint an empty sleeve on the portrait over the stairs, after Captain James had lost an arm in India. Perhaps he was watching the last Bolitho from that portrait now, the son of the man who had betrayed his father’s trust. And his country.

  He heard the envelope fall to the floor, although it must have opened itself; he did not remember returning the knife to the desk.

  The beautiful handwriting, so familiar and precise in its terms. And without heart.

  Addressed to Adam Bolitho, Esq. On receipt of these orders, will proceed with all despatch .. . His eyes hurried on. But no ship’s name or title leaped out at him like a voice, like a picture. Like that first command, the little brig Firefly. Or Anemone. He tried again. Or Unrivalled .. .

  To place yourself at the convenience and service of Sir Graham Bethune, Knight of the Bath, Vice-Admiral of the Blue, and to await further instructions. There was more, and a smaller note with details of travel, lodgings, and other matters which seemed meaningless.

  Yovell was the first to speak.

  ”Is it good, sir?”

  Ferguson was pouring something into a glass. His hand was shaking. Something else I should have noticed.

  ”The Admiralty, Daniel. Their lordships wish to see me. It is a command, not a request.” He added with sudden bitterness, ”Nor a ship!”

  The heavy document had fallen beside its envelope. Despite his girth, Yovell picked it up and said quickly, ”Do you see, sir? There is writing on the reverse.”

  Adam took it. A captain without a ship. God alone knew there were so many like him. No ship.

  He stared at the writing, but saw only the face. Vice-Admiral Bethune. He had met him several times, lastly at Malta. Bethune had begun his service as a young midshipman in the little sloop-of-war Sparrow, Sir Richard Bolitho’s first command. A man easy to like, and to follow, and, in his day, the youngest vice-admiral since Nelson. Once a frigate captain himself, then promotion, and lastly the Admiralty.

  / am sending you a letter very shortly; it concerns some proposals which were brought to my notice. You will treat all instructions with utmost secrecy. On that, I am depending. Then his signature. Adam turned the sheet to the light. Bethune had written, almost like- an afterthought, Trust me.

  He replaced the glass on the desk. Claret or cognac? It could have been anything.

  Yovell said, ”London, sir.” He shook his head and smiled sadly. ”Sir Richard never cared for the place. Not until .. .”

  Adam walked past him, but briefly touched his plump arm. ”Until, Daniel. What a span that one word covers.”

  He left the study and found himself staring into another log fire. Unseen hands always seemed to keep them blazing.

  ”I shall need Young Matthew for the first leg to Plymouth. After that .. .” He moved to the fire and held out his hands. ”It will all be laid down in the instructions.” A long, tiring and uncomfortable journey. And at the end of it? It might be nothing. Or perhaps he would merely be required to describe Unrivalled’^ part in the attack and final victory at Algiers. ”I shall need more kit than usual. I must tell Napier .. .”

  He broke off abruptly. Napier would not be going to London. Bethune’s innocent enough note had been added for a reason. He looked directly at the round shouldered figure of Yovell across the hall. ”Send word to the tailor for me, will you?” He saw Napier watching him from the passage which led to the kitchen. He knew. His eyes said it all.

  Adam thought of Bethune again. It was all he had.

  Trust me.

  Vice-Admiral Sir Graham Bethune moved some papers on his broad des
k and stared at the ornate clock on the opposite wall, with its wind indicator and simpering cherubs.

  He had walked to the Admiralty, across the park for some of the way, declining the offer of a carriage or, as was sometimes his habit, riding his own horse. It was not conceit, but a sense of purpose which carried him through each day.

  He stood up, surprised that the exercise had not calmed his nerves. It was absurd; he had nothing to worry about.

  He walked across the room and paused to study the painting of a frigate in action. It was his own, pitted against two big Spanish frigates. Bad odds even for a daring young captain, as he had been then. He had nevertheless run one of them aground and taken the other. Unconsciously, his hand touched the gold lace on his sleeve. Flag rank had followed almost immediately, and then the Admiralty. Routine, lengthy meetings, conferences with his superiors and sometimes the First Lord; he had even been called to elaborate upon various plans and operations to the Prince Regent.

  And it had suited him, like the uniform, and the respect which went with it.

  It had been wet in the park, but there had been all the usual horsemen and women about. He often expected to see Catherine there, riding herself, or in the carriage with the Sillitoe crest embla/oned on it. Like that last, arranged meeting. He bit his lip. The final one.

  He stood by a window and looked down at the jostling carriages, carriers’ carts and horses, always alive, moving.

  It was a life he had grown used to, accepted, and one he lived with a zeal which often surprised his contemporaries. He took care of himself; although he enjoyed good wine with the company to match it, he was always careful not to slide into overindulgence. He had seen too many senior officers deteriorate and age before their time. It was sometimes impossible to imagine them, sword in hand, walking their own decks while death whined and stung all around them. He moved to the desk again, the restlessness stronger than before.

  And what of me?

  Some chose to ignore it, imagined perhaps that rank and seniority were everlasting. He touched the folder uppermost on the desk. And upon his mind.

  At the close of the previous year the Navy List had carried two hundred admirals, and eight hundred and fifty captains. Commanders and mere lieutenants added up to another five thousand. The great fleet and all the squadrons, even those commanded by highly successful or famous officers, had been cut to the bone. Whole forests had been felled to build those ships, and now every anchorage and waterway had its sad reminders.

  And what of me?

  There was not an admiral left under the age of sixty, so that all promotion was at a standstill. A captain, if he was lucky enough still to be employed, could remain thirty years in that rank without moving.

  He grimaced. Or survive on half-pay, shadowy figures who walked the se afront watching. Remembering. Dreading.

  He thought of his wife. Lady Bethune. It was hard now to think of her any other way. ”You can retire when you wish it, Graham. You’re not a pauper. You can see more of the children.” Their two ‘children’ were adults, and they met like pleasant strangers. His wife was in control. Like the night at that reception when she had smiled while Catherine Somervell had been humiliated. The night Catherine might have been raped, even killed, but for the intervention of Sillitoe and some of his men.

  Bethune still relived it, again and again. He had entertained her here in this opulent room in the seat of Admiralty. The youngest vice-admiral on the Navy List since Nelson. And might remain so if things got even worse.

  And she, the woman who had outraged society when she and Sir Richard Bolitho had lived openly together.

  He looked at the chair where she had been seated, remembering her scent of jasmine. Her eyes when she smiled. Laughed, then ... Maybe he could obtain an appointment in one of the dockyards, like Valentine Keen. He had also served under Richard as a midshipman; now his flag flew over the Nore. But a navy without ships was no inspiration. The old, eternal enemies were uneasy allies now, in name anyway.

  Like the anti-slavery campaign, which many had believed over after Exmouth’s victory at Algiers.

  He walked past the chair and tried again to shut it, and her, from his mind. Sillitoe was her protector, although many hinted that they were lovers also. He, too, had made a fool of himself when he had expressed his feelings and his fears for her.

  He recalled the meetings he had had with the First Lord.

  ”Slavery will not go just go away because of an Act of Parliament, Graham. Too many fortunes have been made from it, and survive on it still .. . Their lordships and I have considered it deeply and often. A new command, entrusted with a difficult and possibly dangerous task. A show of force, enough to make plain our determination, but fluid enough not to antagonize or disrupt our ”allies” in this matter.

  ”You will know, Graham, that there is no shortage of applicants.” He had let the words hang in the air. ”But I would prefer you to take it.”

  Bethune was at the window again, looking down at the endless movement. People and the din of traffic, horses and iron-shod wheels. Another world, in which he would be a stranger; and some one else would be sitting here in this room.

  He liked the company of women, and they his. But a risk was a risk all the same. And in any case, he might retain this present position for months. He sighed. Years.

  He tugged down the front of his waistcoat and stared at his reflection in the rain-dappled glass, and thought of Richard Bolitho again. As if it were yesterday. His eyes as he had watched an oncoming enemy, the pain there when he considered the cost in lives. His decision, and a voice very level. So be it, then.

  There was a tap at the ornate doors, timed to the minute.

  ”Well, Tolan?”

  ”Captain Adam Bolitho is here, Sir Graham.”

  The shadow moved over the rich carpet, his face as Bethune remembered it. Like a younger version of Richard; even then, people had often taken them for brothers.

  The same firm handshake; the elusive smile. And something else, desperation. It would have been uppermost in his thoughts all the way from Cornwall. The journey would have taken almost five days, changing horses, sharing a carriage with strangers, and, all the time, wondering .. .

  Adam Bolitho had more than proved his worth, his skill, and his courage. The armchair strategists at the Admiralty had described him as reckless. But then, they would.

  He recalled his own uncertainty, which had made him write Trust me on the back of the orders to this dark, youthful man. / was like him. The frigate captain. That was then.

  To prolong this meeting which could be the start of many, or the last, would be insulting to both of them.

  He said, more abruptly than he had intended, ”I have been given a new appointment, Adam, and I want you for my flag captain.” He held up his hand as Adam seemed about to speak. ”You have done a great deal, and you have won the approval of my senior officers, as well as the un stinting praise of Lord Exmouth. I, too, have seen you in action, which is why I want .. .” He reconsidered. ”I need you as my flag captain.”

  Adam realized that the elderly servant had dragged up a chair for him and vanished into an adjoining room.

  It was all he could do to put events into some kind of order. The endless journey, his arrival here at the Admiralty. Blank faces, and heads bowed to listen, as if he were speaking a foreign language.

  He looked up at the gilded ceiling as somewhere high in the roof a clock began to chime, and he was aware of birds flapping in alarm, although they must hear the same sound at every half-hour.

  He massaged his eyes and tried to clear his mind, but the images remained. He had told Young Matthew to take a different route into Plymouth, where he had been instructed to change carriages.

  He could see the words like blood. Never look back.

  With a telescope he had eventually found Unrivalled, not far from her previous anchorage. In a week she had changed almost beyond recognition, topmasts and standing rigging gone, her d
ecks littered with discarded cordage and spars, crates and casks piled where the eighteen-pounders had once been ranged like marines at their sealed ports. The ports empty. Dead.

  Only the figurehead remained intact and unchanged. Head flung back, breasts out thrust proud and defiant. And, like the girl in the studio, helpless.

  Never look back. He should have known.

  Bethune was saying in his quiet, even voice, ”You have been in commission for a long time without much rest, Adam. But time is not on my side. Your appointment will take effect as soon as convenient to their lordships.”

  Adam was on his feet, as if invisible hands were forcing him to leave.

  Instead he asked, equally quietly, ”What ship, sir?”

  Bethune breathed out slowly, half-smiling. ”She’s the Athena, seventy-four. She is completing fitting-out at Portsmouth.” He glanced at the painting of the embattled ships, a flicker of regret crossing his features. ”Not a frigate, I’m afraid.”

  Adam reached out and clasped his hand. Was it said so easily, the most important moment for any captain? He looked at Bethune and thought he understood.

  For both of us.

  He said, ”Perhaps not a frigate, sir. But a ship.”

  A goblet, chilled in readiness, was put into his hand.

  Her name meant nothing to him. Probably an old two-decker, perhaps like the one where it had all begun for him. But a ship.

  He touched the sword at his thigh.

  He was not alone.

  3

  Absent Friends

  The coach jerked violently as the brake was applied and came to a swaying halt, the horses stamping on cobbles, very aware that their journey to Portsmouth was ended. Adam Bolitho eased forward on the seat, every muscle and bone offering a protest. He had only himself to blame; he had insisted on leaving his temporary lodgings the previous evening, at an hour when most people would have been thinking of a late supper or bed.

  But the coachmen employed by the Admiralty were accustomed to it. Driving at night, the wheels dipping and grinding in deep ruts, or through rain-flooded stretches of the long Portsmouth Road, two stops to change horses, another to wait for a farm wagon to be moved after it had cast a wheel. They had paused at a small inn in a place called Liphook, to drink tea by candlelight before starting on the final leg of the journey.