No one said a word as Pender cast off, to join the already departed launch and jolly boat. Even the hoisting of the sails was undertaken in total silence, evidence that the captain wasn’t the only one affected by what they were being forced to do. But once they’d cleared the ship many an anxious eye was aimed at their pursuer, in case the Frenchman should alter course. He didn’t, and they could still see both ships when the drifting Bucephalas was finally overhauled.
‘I hope one of the bastards drops a candle in the magazine,’ growled the gunner. ‘I left enough powder on the floor to start a right good blaze.’
‘Never mind that,’ Pender replied. ‘Just worry that the sod don’t put a prize crew aboard and set off after us.’
Harry looked up at the mass of the Milky Way, so dense it was almost like a cloud. The whole sky was full of stars, but one, to the north, shone brighter than the rest. He put the tiller round till the prow was aimed right at it, and ordered Pender to keep it there.
Dawn, grey and overcast, found the little flotilla in line ahead, the jolly boat struggling as, being towed, it shipped more water than its larger consorts. Everyone was cold, hungry and uncomfortable, with the wounded, including Harry, suffering from the cramped conditions. The wind was increasing, promising even more discomfort as the size of the swell increased. At the top of each rise, those who were awake searched the horizon eagerly for any sign of a sail, most, though they wouldn’t openly admit it, not caring whether it was friend or foe.
Harry was using a small compass to steer, an imperfect instrument, the main purpose of which was to put him 15° east of magnetic north. Kept steady it would provide a guaranteed marker by which they could find their way home. Sailing north, he knew he couldn’t miss the south coast of England, his preferred landmark Beachy Head. Once spotted that would allow him to bear up for the Downs.
He dredged his memory to recall how the tides ran, though he lacked the chronometer which would allow him to use Dover as the fixed point in time. But the way the sea flowed back and forth in this confined stretch of water allowed for a margin of error. Judged right the north-westerly wind would hold him to his chosen course, the very worst that could happen would be a sight of the French coast. That mattered little, since the Channel current, still strong from ebbing through the Dover Strait, would take him back out into the open sea, whence he could haul round to reach his destination.
As long as the wind wasn’t dead foul, when that tide turned it would carry him up to a point where he could contend with the variable flows and breezes around the South Foreland then reach the southern tip of the Goodwin Sands.
The sea was too fickle an element. The wind shifted slightly overnight to the south-west, gusting rather than blowing steadily, which engendered the weary business of tacking and wearing. In the darkness Harry hauled in his sails, and attached a line to the launch so that contact wouldn’t be lost, a rope light enough to break under pressure, so that they were no threat to stability. Little movement was possible in any of the boats, and once dawn came again changing direction was difficult, a discomfort which bore heavily on the wounded. Two more men died, burial immediate upon the discovery of their demise. Pender had loaded as much water as he could, but still Harry insisted on strict rationing, well aware that the weather could easily change and drive them away from the safety of land rather than towards it.
They made their landfall within three days, having, from their low elevation, not sighted a single sail. Then, with the wind right abaft, and the current in their favour, progress became both more comfortable and swift. Numerous boats appeared as they got closer to the Dover Straits, mostly cutters but some ketches, there to meet the incoming merchantmen and trade for goods that could later be smuggled ashore. Once they’d ascertained that Harry’s trio were nothing to do with the excise they ignored them. Closer inshore were the pilots from places as far apart as Hastings and Ramsgate, sent out by the harbour-masters to entice captains into their various anchorages to boost the port revenue. One or two of these looked set to exchange a word, but Harry steered away from them and they let him be.
Soon they spied the huge bluff of white cliffs that rose out of the sea south of Dover. Then, after the port itself, the depression to the north that stood between the town and the steep escarpments of St Margaret’s Bay. The swell eased as they entered the southern end of the biggest anchorage on the east coast. The Downs ran from just off St Margaret’s all the way up to Pegwell Bay, three miles deep in parts, with the huge bank of the Goodwin Sands providing shelter for an armada of ships, protecting them from anything but the most severe weather.
They steered through the mass of shipping, including Admiral Duncan’s line-of-battle ships; the twin Tudor castles, shaped like royal roses, of Walmer and Deal, standing watch over the great strand of shingle where Julius Caesar had landed nearly two thousand years before. This was home to a lot of the men in the boat, as well as some of those they’d buried at sea. Harry, once he’d seen a doctor, and had his wounds properly dressed, would have the heartbreaking task of telling women and children that their husbands and fathers had perished because of his blind stupidity.
‘Steer past the jetty, Pender,’ he said, ‘and run us in upshore of the Three Kings.’
Pender did as he was asked, the other two boats in his wake, calling to some of the local hovellers to help him get the wounded out, before rolling the boats further up the beach. Harry insisted that he was the last attended to, with a messenger sent ahead to the Three Kings to fetch medical help. In ten minutes half the folk in Deal knew that Harry Ludlow was home, that he’d lost his ship, and that in his two-year absence something like half his crew had perished.
But that was nothing new to the people of a seafaring town; parents, wives, and children who saw men depart each day of their lives with no knowledge of when, if ever, they’d return. The sea was cruel enough without a war to fight, even here when the wind blew strong from the north-east, and vessels dragged their anchors. Pulling fifty bodies out of the spume after a gale, some from ships, others from the boats that tried to help them, was too commonplace for long despair. So those that came to see him lifted ashore were sympathetic rather than angry. One of them was his brother-in-law, Lord Drumdryan.
‘What are you doing here?’ Harry asked him, struggling, and failing, after so much time spent sitting, to stand upright.
Arthur Drumdryan looked down into Harry’s drawn face, saw the way that Pender was supporting him, and knew this was not the time to tell him that every penny he owned had gone down with Cantwell’s Bank; that as soon as the courts were informed that he had landed, which would be just as quick in Deal as in Portsmouth, there would be a tipstaff calling on him for payment of his outstanding debts.
‘Coincidence, Harry,’ Arthur replied.
James responded to Arthur’s note, arriving at the Three Kings from Cheyne Court within two hours of Harry coming ashore. In the meantime, his brother-in-law, using a variety of coins from the chest Pender handed over to him, had sent the most seriously damaged off to the local hospital, a charitable institution built for the purpose of treating sailors; organised food and a change of clothing for those well enough to stand, and arranged for a carter to transport them to the family home, having sent instructions ahead to prepare for their arrival.
‘The physician examined him,’ he said, as James entered the smoky, panelled room which overlooked the busy anchorage. Among the locals and the sailors who occupied the place, rough men bred to the sea, Arthur, in his old-fashioned cream silk coat and elegant white wig, looked totally out of place. He and James didn’t get on, a mutual dislike that was of long standing, but the circumstances precluded any outward show of animosity.
‘How bad is he?’ James asked.
‘The wound is serious, but not threatening without infection. He took a ball across the back, which seared the skin and then lodged itself close to the blade in his right shoulder.’
‘Is Pender with him?’
Arthur nodded. ‘Fell sound asleep in a chair as soon as Harry was laid on the bed.’
The surgeon, his coat covered in a thick layer of dried blood, came into the room. Spying the pair by the great fire in the hearth, he walked over to join them, turning and lifting his coat to warm his hams.
‘He passed out when I went into his skin for the ball.’ James shuddered as the surgeon continued, his mind filled with the notion of the long probe and the following pincers entering his own flesh. ‘He’ll sleep for an age, since he had a lot of rum to dull the pain.’
‘But he will be well again, soon?’
‘Oh, yes. Whoever stitched him up in the first place was hamfisted enough, but they washed the wound with ardent spirits, and took care to remove the cloth that had adhered to the gore, so it was clean. I’ve re-sewn him properly. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s up and about in a day or two, stiff mind you, and in pain. But he’ll be well recovered inside the month.’
‘Did he speak?’ asked Arthur.
‘Not much. Said he’d been a fool, and that I should hurry since he had to get back to Normandy and retake his ship. I’ll look in on him tomorrow and check his dressings for bleeding.’
‘Thank you,’ said James.
‘So,’ said the surgeon, pushing himself up on to his toes as his buttocks were scorched. ‘All that remains is my fee for today.’
Arthur and James looked at each other. Neither had said anything about Harry’s losses to a soul in Deal. Yet it was obvious by that remark that everyone knew. Harry Ludlow had been one of the richest men in the area. Just to have him as a client was considered a reward. He was a man who was billed for any service rendered, and not hurriedly. It was Arthur who replied, his manner cold enough to chill the heat from the flaming, crackling logs.
‘I think that can wait until you’ve finished with the patient.’ Pender finished his tale as darkness fell, the light from the lanterns throwing shadows across his face.
‘Capt’n blames himself. Says he should have known it was a trap. But no one else saw it that way, and that Frog set it so well a nervous badger would have walked straight in.’
‘Harry told the surgeon he intends to get the ship back,’ said James.
‘Don’t see how he can, ’less he has half the navy to help him. And then, given the condition she was in, she’d need a tow to get back to England. He’d be better off forgetting her and buyin’ another.’
James opened his mouth to speak, but hesitated for a second as Arthur shot him a warning glance. That made him bridle. It was typical of Arthur Drumdryan, with his snobbish ways and old-fashioned opinions, his ‘Versailles manner’ James called it, to see Pender as no more than a servant, instead of what he was, a friend and confidant.
‘I think Pender should be told.’
‘And I think not,’ Arthur answered, his eyes arched and commanding, in a way that James recalled with no pleasure from his childhood.
‘Saving your presence,’ said Pender, looking at both of them. He was well aware of the nature of their relationship, and wise enough to see that whatever truce had been brokered was about to break down. ‘Is what you’re going to tell me likely to see me expire?’
‘No,’ James replied.
He smiled, that full grin which James knew so well, one that lit up his whole face. ‘Then I dare say it will keep till the captain’s up on his feet again.’
He was up on several pillows when he heard the sorry tale from his relations.
‘I am forced to ask, Arthur, why, when you had the power to do so, you didn’t prevent this happening.’
Lord Drumdryan reached into his silk coat and produced a piece of parchment. ‘I was forestalled by this.’
Harry winced as he tried to sit forward to receive it, and fell back helplessly. ‘What is it?’
‘A letter you signed some two years ago, Harry. I don’t know if you recall the time when you suspected me of playing ducks and drakes with your money.’
Harry remembered it only too well, it being another occasion when his hot temperament had led him to a false conclusion. ‘Have I not apologised enough for that?’
‘You have, and I take no pleasure in reminding you. But, Harry, you didn’t alter this.’
‘What is it?’ asked James, with evident impatience.
Arthur held it open, as Harry turned his head away, proof that he at least no longer needed to be told.
‘It is an instruction, James, in writing, giving Cantwell control of Harry’s account. Neither you, nor he, saw fit to mention it to me. And at no time did the bank ever treat me in any way different to the manner they’d employed before. That is, until, on hearing of Cantwell’s difficulties, I tried to withdraw your money.’
‘I forgot all about the damn thing,’ said Harry.
‘And I didn’t know it existed,’ added James, softly.
‘You will need to mortgage property,’ Arthur continued, seemingly oblivious to the pain he was causing. ‘Otherwise you will join that fool of a banker in Newgate.’
‘Harry, are you sure those bonds you bought in America have no value.’
‘Of course they have a value,’ snapped Arthur. ‘But only if you are willing to let them go at a usurious discount. What I am proposing is that Harry borrows money on his property, which will allow him the time to redeem them for their full value and clear his debts.’
‘Are you incapable of explanation without hectoring, Arthur?’ James demanded.
‘Only when I’m faced with bovine incomprehension.’
‘Please,’ said Harry, holding up a hand that looked as weak as his voice had sounded.
‘I’m sorry,’ said James, quickly, glaring at his brother-in-law. ‘Fate has played you a rotten hand.’
‘It’s not fate, James. It is the same run of luck that has followed me all the way from New Orleans.’ The single laugh that followed was soft and humourless. ‘Imagine if I’d brought Hyacinthe back to this.’
Arthur, clearly confused, looked as if he was about to ask Harry what he was talking about. James waved a hand, stood up, and opened the door, making it perfectly plain that it was not a subject to pursue. ‘We’ll leave you be for a while.’
‘Yes,’ Harry replied, in a weary, listless voice that his brother-in-law had never heard him use before.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
PENDER laughed, which echoed off the panelled hallway of Cheyne Court and made James wonder if anything could depress the man. They were heading for one of the barns, which had been turned into a temporary shelter for the crew. Harry was in the house, ordered to his bed by the surgeon. Just as well, since James had decided that if anyone was going to tell the men of what had been lost it would be him.
Pender had agreed, adding, ‘He’s got enough on his plate, what with all those papers he’s having to sign. And it don’t take a genius to work out what he’s up to.’
‘But I’d like you there.’
‘I can’t think why,’ he’d replied, which is what had made him laugh. ‘The lads never lost faith in you, the way they did in the captain.’
James wondered if Pender knew just how much Harry was borrowing. Not content to settle his own debts, he was raising everything he could for the men, insisting that it could be between three and six months before his affairs were in order. The dependants of those who had died, or were so badly wounded they’d never get to sea again, would take priority. But Harry was determined that no single member of his crew should suffer for what he saw as his own stubborn stupidity.
The house he was walking round now might well have to be sold. Not that James was bothered. He’d never really cared for the place, a red-brick pile from the reign of Queen Anne that had all the inherent problems of an old property. People might praise the proportions, and wax lyrical about the colour of the brickwork in a setting sun. But to James’s mind it was draughty, with an awkward and cramped interior layout. More than that, it was the house in which he’d grown up.
Th
at turned his mind to Arthur, whose presence and interference during that upbringing had sown the seeds of their mutual antipathy. It was he who’d arranged matters with various lenders. Having gained a minor sinecure in the government he was using his proximity to Henry Dundas to exert maximum pressure for good terms.
‘I take it you’re not going to tell me,’ said Pender.
‘What?’ James responded, dragged back from his musings on childhood, houses, and felonies.
‘How deep the captain is in,’ Pender continued. ‘I don’t care for myself, but my nippers reside in this house. The way you was walkin’ so slow, and lookin’ at it just now, had farewell written all over.’
‘It won’t come to that,’ James replied, hoping that he was right. He nodded towards the nearby barn, dark brown, wooden, and with a steep-pitched roof. ‘And as for my dilatory pace, I’m just trying to put off what I must do.’
Crossing the driveway their boots crunched noisily on the gravel, with James leaning close to hear what Pender was saying about the various members of the crew. He stopped talking as they entered the barn, the sound of Flowers whistling and playing his bones ceasing abruptly and the eyes of everyone present quickly on them. They might not know the details, but every sailor present had an inkling that something was amiss. The loss of the ship, and their comrades, as well as Harry being wounded, was bound to put a dampener on things. But they could smell, as all sailors could, that there was a deeper reason for the air of misery that filled the house and grounds of Cheyne Court.
And they listened in silence. Not that James was fooled by that. If they had any opinion, it wouldn’t be expressed while he was present. They’d wait till he’d left, so that they could speculate freely about the truth, or otherwise, of what he was saying. It was odd, the way that these men, many of whom would seek him out to talk to him on board ship, were now looking at him with deep suspicion.
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