Alexander Kent - Bolitho 20 Darkening Sea

by Darkening Sea [lit]

  His eyes took in the American frigate, which was drifting further and further downwind, while some of the small vessels she had been escorting headed away as if Unity contained something evil.

  Then he said, The Yankee will not trouble us again, not this time in any case. We will rejoin our ships without further delay." He closed his eyes tightly as if to control the pain.

  Trevenen was staring at him, wild with disbelief.

  "What are you saying? I am in command..." He got no further.

  Herrick took a pace towards him. "You command nothing. You are relieved, and I'll send you to hell for your bloody treachery! Now get off this deck!"

  Trevenen hesitated as if to protest, then, almost blindly, he turned and walked to the companion hatch. He had to push and thrust his way through his men, the same men who had once been afraid even to meet his eyes. Now they watched him in silence, without fear, only contempt.

  Herrick ignored him. "You, Urquhart or whatever your bloody name is can you sail this ship?"

  The first lieutenant nodded like a puppet, his face blanched but determined after what he had witnessed.

  "I can, sir."

  Then do it. We shall rejoin our ships. They will be hard put just now!"

  One of the surgeon's loblolly boys came to support Herrick but he shook him away angrily and tugged his dress coat more firmly around his shoulders. "See to the others, damn you!"

  Bolitho lay stiffly across Allday's knees, and almost cried out as Lovelace's strong fingers prised open his eye and applied a soft dressing and some stinging ointment, while the other battle raged on in the distance as if it were not real.

  What he had always dreaded had happened. With neither warning nor mercy, as it had happened to the men who were even now being dragged below to the hell of Minchin's surgery. How could he go to Catherine now? How could he even consider it?

  Lovelace said, "Hold him firmly, Allday." Then he carefully turned Bolitho's face towards the strengthening sunlight and stared into his eye with fierce concentration. He said, "Look up, Sir Richard."

  Bolitho opened his eye and felt Allday tense as he stared past him. For an instant there was only mist and drifting flecks of blood. Then things stood out in separate, unmatched images. Herrick in his shining rear-admiral's epaulettes, gripping the rail with his hand while he peered at something beyond the torn and bloodied hammock nettings. The boy-midshipman on whose shoulder he had steadied the telescope, staring down at him, sobbing noiselessly as the guns fell silent. Further still, to the severed rigging and punctured sails, a marine in the maintop waving his hat in the air. To whom, he wondered vaguely.

  He hardly dared to say it. "I can see again." He did not resist as Lovelace lifted the lid of his left eye. For an instant Bolitho saw surprise, even shock on his face, but he said calmly, "I do not think this one will change, Sir Richard."

  "Help me up."

  Bolitho stood between them while Lovelace removed tiny splinters from around his eyes. Each one was so small that it could barely be seen in the smoky sunshine. But just one would have been enough.

  Lovelace smiled gravely. "There were paint-flecks as well, Sir Richard." He looked away as somebody screamed out in agony. "I must go, sir. I am needed." He looked at Bolitho, and Avery thought that it was as if he were searching for something. "And yes, I will be glad to accept your offer!"

  Urquhart yelled, "Baratte's Chacal has struck to Anemone, sir!" He was wild with excitement.

  Bolitho strode to the quarterdeck rail with Allday's shadow covering him like a cloak.

  "What of LaertesT He took a telescope and winced as the sunlight lanced into his eyes.

  Before they blurred again he saw Anemone almost alongside the French frigate, her foremast shot away and lying across Baratte's deck like a crude bridge. Two cables away, Laertes had grappled with the renegade's ship Le Corsair. It would be a double blow to Baratte that his ship should be taken by Adam. He saw it all until the brightness forced him to lower the glass. Anemone'?" sails were in tatters, her rigging like tangled creeper, but he thought he heard cheering. Adam was safe. No other captain could have fought his ship like that.

  He felt Herrick beside him and knew Allday was grinning despite the death and destruction which lay around them.

  Herrick said quietly, They didn't need us after all. But if the Yankee had really had his say there's no telling what might have happened."

  Urquhart called, "No signals yet, sir."

  Bolitho nodded. "The most dangerous Frenchman afloat, and they did it. And I saw none of it."

  Herrick swayed and looked at the spots of blood which were falling from his bandaged stump.

  "And he wanted to parade us together as his prisoners, eh? God rot him!"

  Avery asked, "What orders, Sir Richard?"

  "We must assist the others with their prizes. After that..." He swung round and asked, "No signals, Mr. Urquhart? No wonder Captain Hannay gave up the fight. Baratte was playing another old trick!" They stared at him as if the fear for his sight had deranged him. Bolitho shouted, "Where is that brig?"

  "Standing well away to lee'rd, sir!"

  Herrick stood steadily as a warrant officer tried to retie the reddening bandage, but suddenly the pain was too much. He gasped, "We did it, Richard, like those other times..."

  Then he fainted.

  "Take good care of him." Bolitho laid Herrick's coat over him as some seamen carried him on to a grating. "But for him

  Then he said, "Baratte was directing the fight from the brig but flew his flag from Chacal. Just in case Unity could not frighten us off."

  Avery said quietly, "If Captain Trevenen had had his way..." He shrugged. It already seemed like history. Only the grim reminders were real.

  Bolitho said, "Make all sail, Mr. Urquhart." He glanced down at the sailing master's corpse as if he might still respond. But his face was stiff, `?,:/' frozen at the moment of impact. "Baratte shall not get away this time."

  Allday watched him grimly as he touched his eyelid. "You had me fair troubled, Sir Richard."

  Bolitho turned to look at him, his eyes very clear. "I know, old friend." He fingered the locket through his smoke-stained shirt. "Now Commodore Keen's convoy will be safe. It is up to the military from this point." He seemed to see it in his mind. Too many men, too many ships. The price was always unbearable.

  The depression lifted slightly. "I expect I shall be unemployed for a while."

  A voice called, "The brig has set more sail, sir!"

  Bolitho clenched his hands. "Too late. Tell the master gunner to lay aft."

  Bob Fasken appeared below the rail and knuckled his forehead. "I'm ready, Sir Richard." His eyes seemed to ask, how did you know?

  Bolitho stared past him as the brig seemed to drift into Valkyrie's mesh of rigging.

  Tire when you are ready, Mr. Fasken." He smiled briefly. "Your crews did well this day."

  It seemed to take an eternity to overhaul the enemy brig. Corpses were dropped overboard, and the protesting wounded vanished from the darkly stained decks.

  Trucks squealed as one of the big eighteen-pounder bow-chasers was manhandled into position. The gunner watching with his arms folded. Handspikes were used to train the gun round, and some of the unemployed men stood on the gangway to watch, a few still searching for friends, a familiar face, which would never be seen again.

  The bow-chaser banged out and the smoke was cleared away even as the crew were sponging out and reloading.

  Bolitho saw the shot fall short of the brig's counter, and heard some of the seamen laying bets with one another, when only moments earlier they had been staring death in the face.

  "Ready, sir!"

  "Fire!"

  This time Bolitho thought he saw the actual fall of shot. A dark blur, then wood splinters and rigging flying from the brig's hull to drift along her side.

  Urquhart said in a whisper, "He must strike, damn him!"

  Avery pointed. "Look, sir! He's running up his fla
g!"

  Bolitho lowered the telescope. Like an answer to Urquhart's remark. He would never surrender.

  "Fire!"

  It was another hit, and men could be seen running like mad creatures as spars and rigging smashed down amongst them.

  Fasken shaded his eyes to peer aft. When no order was given he took the trigger-line from the gun-captain and balanced himself in a crouching position inboard of the black breech, something which he had probably not done since he had been part of a gun crew.

  Bolitho felt the deck rise and then settle, saw the trigger line go taut and then jerk to Fasken's strong pull.

  For a moment longer it seemed that the gunner had missed. Then there was a mingled gasp of surprise and horror as the forepart of the brig exploded into a great tower of fire. Driven gleefully by the wind, the sails and tarred rigging were consumed in minutes, the fires reaching out along the hull and spitting through the open ports like tongues of bright sparks.

  The explosion, when it came, was like a single clap of thunder. Perhaps a magazine had been ignited, or maybe the brig was carrying extra powder for Baratte's privateers.

  As the sound rolled away the vessel's death pall was smeared across the sky like a black stain.

  Bolitho watched the sea's face easing away the violent disturbances. For what, he wondered? So that Baratte could further prove he was a better man than his father and loyal to his country's cause? A vanity, then?

  He heard himself say, "Rejoin the others, Mr. Urquhart. Then tell the purser to break out the rum." He looked at the men who had once been too cowed even to speak. "They are all heroes today."

  Avery ventured, "After this, Sir Richard?"

  "Home, if there is still justice in the world." He let his mind linger on it.

  The mood changed just as swiftly. "Besides, we have a wedding to attend!" He slapped Allday's shoulder. "Keep this one up to his word!"

  Surprisingly, Allday did not respond as he had expected.

  He said quietly, "Would you really do that, Sir Richard?"

  The men in the other ships were all cheering now, the fear and pain held at bay. Until the next time.

  But Bolitho heard only the words of his old friend. His oak.

  Somewhere in the past he could recall a signal he had once made. It seemed very apt for this moment, for this special man.

  "I will be honoured," he said.

  Epilogue

  Richard Bolitho gripped the tasselled strap as the carriage swayed and shuddered into some deep ruts like a small boat in a choppy sea. He felt drained, and every bone in his body was aching from this endless journey. In his tired mind it all seemed to overlay in vague, blurred pictures, from the moment he had stepped ashore at Portsmouth to be whisked immediately to London to make his report.

  All the while he had been yearning to get away, to begin the long, long drive from that world to his own West Country. Surrey, Hampshire, Dorset, Devon. He could not remember how many times they had stopped to change horses, how many inns they had visited. Even when he had broken the journey to spend a night in one of the coaching inns the images seemed confused. People who had stared at him, wondering what business was taking him westward but too nervous or polite to ask. The smells of meat puddings and mulled ale, saucy-eyed servant girls, jovial landlords who lived off the coaching trade with far more success than the highwaymen.

  Opposite him Allday sprawled across his seat, his bronzed face rested and untroubled in sleep. Like most sailors he could sleep anywhere, if an opportunity offered itself.

  It was hard to accept that he was in England after all that happened. Baratte was dead, and even Tyacke, who had searched the whole area in his Lame, had found no living soul to survive the terrible explosion.

  Under jury-rig and nursing their injuries and damage, the ships, including the two French prizes, had crawled back to Cape Town. There, to his astonishment, Bolitho had found fresh orders requiring him to hand over his command to Commodore Keen and return home. They had passed Keen's convoy on passage but not close enough to communicate. Bolitho's flag at the fore would tell Keen all he needed to know. The way ahead was clear, and the first military landings on the islands adjoining the main objective, Mauritius, could go ahead.

  Bolitho wiped the window with his sleeve. They had made an early start, as they had on most mornings when the road had been a good one. Bare, black trees, wet from overnight mist or rain, the rolling fields and hills beyond. He shivered, and not only with excitement. It was November and the air was bitter.

  He thought of the good-byes and the unexpected partings. Lieutenant Urquhart had been left in charge of Valkyrie, supervising the repairs until a new captain was appointed. That was the strangest thing of all, Bolitho thought. Trevenen had vanished on the final night before making their landfall at Good Hope. A twist of fate? Or had he been unable to face the consequences of what he had done when Bolitho had been wounded? He had left no letter, no declaration. The ship had been searched from cable tier to orlop: it had been just as if he had been spirited away.

  Or it might have been murder. Either way, the part played by Hamett-Parker in getting Trevenen such an important command might be reopened because of it.

  Farewells. Tyacke, grave and strangely sad, able to forget his disfigurement while they had shaken hands: friends or brothers, they were both.

  And Adam, whose Anemone had seen the worst of the fighting and had suffered the most casualties. Adam had spoken of them with pride and with a deep sense of loss. Two of his lieutenants had been killed. His voice had been full of unashamed emotion when he had described how they had grappled with the Chacal, which had been flying Baratte's own flag, and one of his midshipmen, called Dunwoody, had fallen.

  "I had recommended him for early promotion. He will be greatly missed."

  Bolitho had felt his pain. It was often like that when a battle was permitted to have personality, faces and names: when the cost was so high, and so personal.

  Bolitho had been glad to leave. He had been offered passage in a rakish little sixth-rate of twenty-six guns named Argyll. Her young captain was very aware of the importance of his passenger and the despatches he carried, and doubtless wondered why an officer of such seniority did not wait for a more comfortable vessel.

  There had also been a letter at Cape Town from Catherine. On the speedy journey from the Cape he had re-read it many times. He had experienced a powerful jealousy and apprehension when she had written of her visit to Sillitoe; even fear for her personal safety and reputation.

  I had to do it, for our sakes, yours and mine. I could never allow what has happened in my past to hurt you more than many have done already. You can always trust me, dearest of men, and there was nobody else I myself could trust, for whatever reason, to keep my secrets. There were times when I questioned my actions, but I need not have doubted. In some ways I believe that Sir Paul Sillitoe was surprised at his own sense of decency.

  At London Herrick left him to have further treatment for his amputation. So different from that other Herrick. Still gruff and afraid of showing his innermost feelings, he had said, "They might offer me something else, Richard." His bright blue eyes had dropped to his empty sleeve. "I'd have given a lot more that day if need be, just to regain your respect."

  "And friendship, Thomas."

  "Aye. I'll never forget that. Not again." He had given a slow grin. "I'll put things right. Somehow."

  Bolitho eased his position on the seat and pulled his boat-cloak closer around his body. The change from the Indian Ocean to an English winter had been harsher than he had expected. Getting older? He thought of his face in the looking glass when Allday had shaved him only this morning at an inn in St. Austell. His hair was still black except for the hated lock over the scar above his right eye where the cutlass had hacked him down all those years ago.

  How would she see him? Might she have regretted her decision to stay with him?

  He thought of Yovell and Ozzard, who were travelling at a more
leisurely pace in a second carriage with all their belongings. He glanced at the slumbering figure opposite. The 'little crew' had diminished still further when the carriage had stopped overnight in Dorset. Avery, his companion through so much, would be staying in Dorchester with his married sister. It had been a strangely awkward parting, and Bolitho guessed that his flag lieutenant was considering the promotion which he had offered him. It was not certain if he could be tempted to remain with a vice-admiral who might be unemployed for some time.

  Bolitho felt the carriage pause on the crest of a hill, the horses panting and stamping their feet.