by Pope, Dudley
‘For me, the Sibella was the biggest question mark, of course. Suddenly finding yourself with the responsibility of a badly damaged ship and a lot of wounded men – it’s natural enough to do something hasty: something you regret later. But I’ve had time to size up that fellow Jackson – I shouldn’t be telling you this, I suppose – and if he’ll risk the noose round his neck to save your reputation, then I’m prepared to believe you did the right thing in striking to the Barras.’
‘Thank you, sir,’ Ramage said lamely. ‘It’s not the Sibella episode that bothers me: it’s the beach.’
‘Precisely: it did me, until I found the Marchesa wanting to believe you – but getting precious little help from you, I gather. That cousin really was dead?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then why the bloody hell didn’t you convince the girl? She says you won’t explain anything. I suppose she thinks you are either a liar or too proud. You’ve only yourself to blame if she ends up listening to that bag of wind Pisano, haven’t you, eh?’
When Ramage made no reply, Probus appeared to lose his temper. ‘Answer me, man!’
‘Well, sir, to begin with I was pretty shaken at being accused of not going back; then I got angry at being called a coward by Pisano – dammit, sir, he was so yellow he bolted for the beach without so much as ciao to Pitti. So – well, I felt they weren’t worth wasting my breath on. Pisano’s only accusing me of cowardice to cover himself.’
‘But you had one very important person prepared to believe any reasonable explanation you gave – and presumably testify on your behalf.’
‘Oh? Who, sir?’
‘The Marchesa, you fool!’ Probus made no effort to hide his exasperation.
Ramage’s head whirled and perspiration soaked his clothes as the humiliating thought struck him like a dagger thrust that he had been so full of indignation, so puffed up with outraged pride and stung with injured innocence, that he hadn’t sat down and used his brain.
He realized now that Gianna had only wanted to hear from his own lips exactly what he’d seen when he went back: she only needed a few words of explanation and assurance from the stranger with whom she had – according to Probus anyway – fallen in love. Instead, he had just repeated like a pompous parrot that he had done his duty.
‘You look as if you’re going to pass out, Ramage. Here – sit down.’
Probus stood up and pushed a chair across the deck. As Ramage sat down, Probus took a bottle and glasses from a rack on the bulkhead.
‘This brandy’s almost too good for a fool like you,’ he said, handing Ramage a half-filled glass. After pouring himself out a drink he sat down in another chair and began tapping a fingernail against the glass, appearing to be absorbed in the bell-like note it made, then took a sip of brandy and gave an appreciative sigh.
Ramage took the opportunity of asking a question.
‘Why do you think Jackson’s doing this for me, sir?’
‘How the devil should I know! Pisano acts like that because he’s Pisano. Jackson’s a seaman. You know a seaman’s an odd customer – he’ll lie and cheat and get fighting drunk at the sniff of a cork, but he’s got one of the highest developed senses of justice on this earth: you’ve seen enough floggings to know that.
‘I always know when I’m flogging the right man – I just look at the faces of the ship’s company. Although I’m flogging one of their messmates, if he’s guilty, then they accept it. But if he’s innocent, I know by their attitude. No murmurings, no mutterings; but I know.
‘I’d say that’s how Jackson’s mind has worked. He probably knows your father was a scapegoat. He’s been around long enough to know the Ramage family have enemies. Once he knew they were bringing cowardice into the trial, he realized pretty quickly why he and the rest of the Sibellas were being shipped off to the Topaze. Quicker than me, incidentally,’ Probus added.
Ramage said: ‘All this makes me feel pretty humble. First you, then Jackson. I don’t want to sound ungrateful or offend you, sir, but I’d rather you didn’t get mixed up in this any further.’
‘My dear fellow, I’m not going to! Already I feel quite ill, and soon after midnight I’ll be far too sick to think of attending a court martial in the forenoon – as a certificate duly signed by the surgeon will inform the president of the court. Since there are six post captains among the ships here there’ll be one more than the necessary five, so the trial can continue.’
‘Thank you, sir.’
‘Don’t thank me: I’m not helping you – I’m looking after myself. I don’t propose running foul of Goddard, but I know far too much about the case to be able to sit as a member of the court. Since it’d be a trifle difficult to explain to the president of the court how I came by that knowledge, it’s fortunate I now feel quite feverish and sick, and must take to my cot. So good night to you.’
‘Jackson, sir?’
‘Leave him to me. Insolence, didn’t I say? To me, not to you. You were a witness: the only witness. It happened – as far as I can remember – some time before I received the order to transfer him and the rest of the Sibellas to the Topaze. I must write a report for Captain Croucher. Oh yes,’ he added absent-mindedly, ‘that reminds me. I’ve another letter to write, too.’
Ramage waited, thinking Probus had more to say about the letter, but the Captain glanced up and said, ‘It’s all right, you can go; I’m not writing it to you. Good night.’
Chapter Fifteen
When the gunroom steward woke him next morning with a cup of tea, Ramage had the usual brassy taste in his mouth and headache resulting from sleeping in the tiny, almost airless cabin. He knew the tea would be tepid and taste awful; it always was, and presumably – for lieutenants, anyway – always would be. His trial was due to begin in an hour or so: the condemned man drank a hearty breakfast.
The steward returned. ‘Mr Dawlish said to give you these, sir,’ and he put a sword and hat on top of the small chest of drawers. ‘There are some other things I’ve got to get, and there’s this, sir: it came off from the shore just now, sir.’
He handed Ramage a letter which had been closed with a blob of red wax but bore no impression of a seal. In the half-darkness of the cabin it was difficult to read, but he saw the writing was bold but jerky, and the calligraphy indicated the writer was probably Italian: certainly not English.
He climbed out of his cot to read the letter under the gunroom skylight. There was no greeting and no signature. Just three lines of writing:
‘Nessun maggior dolore,
Che ricordarsi del tempo felice
Nella, miseria.’
He recognized Dante’s words from the Divine Comedy: there is no greater sorrow than to recall a time of happiness in misery.
True enough, he thought; but who wants to remind me on a morning like this. He held the page to the skylight and could just distinguish a watermark: a crown on a sort of urn, with ‘GR’ beneath it. So the writer had access to official notepaper…
Suddenly he was back in the Tower, standing before a beautiful girl in a black cape who was pointing a pistol at him and demanding: ‘What’s all this about L’amor che muove il sole e l’altre stelle?’ So she’d sent the letter, writing jerkily because of the wound in her shoulder, on notepaper borrowed from the Viceroy. But what ‘time of happiness’ was she recalling?
The steward entering the gunroom brought Ramage back to the present with a start: finding an officer standing naked under the skylight stopped the man as effectively as if he had walked into a wall, and he simply held out an armful of clothing.
‘Mr Dawlish, sir. One pair o’ shoes is his, but the uvvers belong to uvver officers. Question of which of ’em fits, sir.’
‘Quite – leave them in the cabin.’
‘And Mr Dawlish said to say for you to pass the word when you was ready, sir, ’cos the Provost Marshal’s arrived, and the boat’s due to leave in fifteen minutes, sir.’
In fifteen minutes one of the Trumpeter’s cannon
would fire, and the Union Flag would be run up at her mizen peak: the signal that a court martial was to be held, and warning everyone concerned to repair on board.
Under the Regulations and Instructions, when the senior of five captains ordered a court martial he could also act as president; so that Croucher would preside today and be in the fortunate position of both accuser and judge.
But, Ramage reflected, why think about it? Realizing he was still naked, he hurriedly washed: the water was almost cold because he had not noticed the steward bring it in.
The surgeon, no doubt, was examining Lord Probus and writing the certificate which, by law, was necessary to excuse him from attending the court martial; the Master would be carrying out the usual morning routine of seeing the yards were squared, inspecting the rigging, and probably arranging for empty water casks to be sent on shore to be refilled; while the purser would be preparing to issue victuals. The lieutenants would have made sure the ship was spotless: the decks had been scrubbed at dawn, the brasswork polished with brickdust until it gleamed, and awnings rigged to keep the hot sun off the decks.
The stockings were silk – a thoughtful gesture on Dawlish’s part, since lieutenants could rarely afford them – and Ramage straightened them out, heaved on the breeches, tucked in the shirt and carefully tied the stock. The waistcoat and coat fitted quite well and were obviously Dawlish’s best; but the shabbiest pair of shoes were the only ones that fitted. He could imagine Pisano having difficulty in getting himself rigged out for the trial – there’d be nothing sufficiently elegant and gaudy to suit the Count’s taste in Sir Gilbert’s house…
Well, he was ready for the Provost Marshal, and he called to the sentry to pass the word for him to come down to the gunroom. Interesting to see whom Croucher had appointed, since only a flagship had a regular provost marshal.
Someone came clattering down the after ladder and he heard the sentry salute. Suddenly there was a thump and a body hurtled headlong through the gunroom door. In the split second before the man fell flat on his face, cocked hat flying out ahead of him and sword caught between his legs, Ramage recognized the pimply young lieutenant from the Trumpeter, Blenkinsop. Ramage swiftly snatched up the hat and hid it behind him. Blenkinsop, his face red, stood up, extricating from between his legs the offending sword which had catapulted him through the door, pulling his coat straight and tugging at his stock. He glanced round for his hat, barely conscious in his embarrassment that Ramage was standing only a few feet away. He looked like an owl on a branch of a tree: the similarity was striking.
‘Are you looking for this?’ Ramage asked innocently, offering the hat. ‘It arrived a few moments before you.’
‘Thank you,’ he answered stiffly. ‘You are Lieutenant Nicholas Ramage?’
‘Indeed I am,’ he said politely.
‘Then I–’ he paused, looking for the paper he had been holding as he fell.
‘I think you’ll find that the warrant appointing you “Provost Marshal on the occasion” has slipped under the table.’
Blenkinsop went down on his knees to retrieve it, his hat falling off in the process. Finally, hat back on his head and the warrant unfolded, he began reading: ‘To Reginald Blenkinsop, a lieutenant of His Majesty’s ship Trumpeter. Captain Aloysius Croucher, of His Majesty’s ship Trumpeter and senior officer present at the port of Bastia, having ordered a court martial to be assembled to try Lieutenant Nicholas Ramage, formerly of his late Majesty’s ship–’
‘His Majesty’s late ship,’ interrupted Ramage.
‘–formerly of His – His Majesty’s late ship Sibella, for the loss of the said ship: the aforementioned Captain Croucher hereby authorizes and appoints you to officiate as Provost Marshal on this occasion; and you are to take the person of the said Lieutenant Nicholas Ramage into your custody, and him safely keep, until he shall be delivered by due course of law; and for so doing this shall be your warrant–’
‘Oh stow it,’ Ramage interrupted impatiently, ‘you must like the sound of your own voice.’
‘I’m duty bound to read this to you,’ Blenkinsop said primly.
‘No, you’re not. You are supposed to present it to the Captain of this ship as your authority to remove me. But you’ve already done that, naturally.’
Blenkinsop looked embarrassed. ‘Oh – well, I – I say, do I really have to?’
‘Well, it’s not for your prisoner to tell you what to do; but his Lordship might take a serious view of you removing one of his officers without showing him your authority.’
‘Oh dear. Well, I’d better go and do that.’
‘Excellent! Capital!’ said Ramage. ‘But keep your voice low – his Lordship is on his sick bed. Run along, now: I’ll wait for you on the gangway.’
Ramage picked up Dawlish’s sword, and collected the few papers he had to take with him. There was a letter from the Deputy Judge Advocate which had arrived the previous evening informing him – with an unbecoming briskness, he thought – that of the witnesses he had requested for his defence, only the Bosun and Carpenter’s Mate would be available. Ramage had noted down some facts about the wind and weather, times and casualties, and the courses steered before the Sibella’s surrender, but had not prepared the usual written defence, since he had no idea what accusations he would eventually be facing.
A few moments later he was standing talking to Dawlish when a flustered Blenkinsop came up from the Captain’s cabin and said, ‘It seems there’s also someone else for me to take over to the Trumpeter.’
Dawlish looked blank; then Ramage remembered Jackson.
‘Yes, one of my witnesses.’
‘Oh, very well,’ Blenkinsop said condescendingly.
‘By the way,’ said Ramage, ‘you forgot to ask me to surrender this,’ handing Blenkinsop the sword and scabbard.
‘And be careful with it,’ said Dawlish, ‘because it’s mine. Tell me’ – his voice suddenly became almost deferential – ‘aren’t you one of the Wiltshire Blenkinsops?’
‘Yes,’ he answered with affected modesty.
‘Am I right in thinking you are the only one in the Service?’
‘Yes, that is so.’
‘Thank Christ for that!’ said Dawlish viciously. ‘Now, don’t let me delay your departure with all this idle social chatter. Be careful you don’t get boarded by one of these bumboats – the women are absolutely riddled with terrible diseases, and the prices they charge are outrageous.’
‘Really!’ exclaimed Blenkinsop, and bolted for the entry port, blushing furiously.
As he disappeared down the ship’s side to the waiting boat, Ramage went to follow him, but Dawlish, with a grin on his face, motioned him to wait a moment and went to the port.
‘Mr Blenkinsop – shall I send your prisoner down?’
Chapter Sixteen
The Trumpeter’s great cabin, now in use as the courtroom, looked very different from when Ramage had first seen it two days earlier: the long, polished table was placed athwartships, and six naval captains sat along the far side, facing forward, with Ramage’s borrowed sword in front of them.
The captains had Ramage facing them on their left, sitting on a straight-backed wooden chair, and to the right an empty chair was ready for the first witness. To one side of Ramage sat Blenkinsop, a sword across his knees, while behind, at the forward end of the cabin, a dozen chairs for spectators were arranged in two rows, facing the table.
The deck was covered in canvas which had been painted in a pattern of large black and white squares. Ramage noticed the four legs of a chair just fitted inside a square, as though everyone in the court was a chessman. As far as the trial was concerned, he knew what moves the court was allowed by law to make and, providing he kept his head, he might be able to prevent them checkmating him… He waited for the opening gambit to be made by the Deputy Judge Advocate, who was sitting to his left at the far end of the table.
The man’s temporary title could never disguise that he was a purser. Small,
steel-rimmed spectacles perched precariously halfway down a long and bulbous red nose, while the nose itself appeared to have been stuck on to a fat face, rather as if some cruel humorist had thrust the thin end of a carrot into an over-ripe pumpkin. It was the face of a prosperous tradesman – as indeed a purser was: a man who knew all there was to know about prices and percentages; who had grown rich serving out provisions to the men in pounds weighing fourteen ounces and, quite legally, pocketing the two ounces’ difference.
Mr Horace Barrow, the Trumpeter’s purser, could probably buy out a captain any day of the week; but now – equipped with a sheaf of papers, several quill pens, and a knife to sharpen them, a bottle of ink, sandbox, a leather-bound Bible, an ivory and silver Crucifix – in case any witnesses were Catholic – and books of reference, including the slim volume containing the Articles of War and a thicker one, the Regulations and Instructions, by which the Navy was governed, he was ready to start the trial.
Five of the six captains sitting at the table had watched Ramage as he came in. All were smartly dressed, as befitted the occasion: the order summoning each officer to the court martial always specified that ‘it is expected you will attend in your uniform frock’.
Certainly the uniform frock was drabber now, Ramage reflected; only last year the Admiralty had decreed the white facings of the turned-back lapels should be replaced with blue, although not everyone had yet complied, but the lapels, held back by nine buttons on each side, and the stand-up collar, were still edged with gold. All but one of the captains wore epaulets on each shoulder – another new idea ordered by the Admiralty at the same time that the lapel facings were changed – and not at all popular with some officers, who regarded as Frenchified the gold lace sewn on the shoulder pads, and the tight spirals of gold bullion hanging down in a fringe.