Ramage's Trial r-14

by Dudley Pope

  And that, Ramage noted, was a very discreet way of describing that drunken scoundrel, and he could imagine the Earl then wondering how to describe Sarah. The First Lord knew Ramage did not use his title in the service, but Sarah was titled both as the daughter of the Marquis and as the wife of an earl's son who bore one of his father's titles.

  Ramage suddenly jerked himself out of the reverie: Earl St Vincent, a man who could make sword steel look like putty, was not a man who ordinarily relayed rumours.

  "The Murex brig was due in Spithead two weeks ago. She has not yet arrived. The weather has been good with a brisk southwester blowing - and a messenger was sent to Plymouth with orders that I should be notified the moment she arrives. All the other southern ports have been similarly instructed.

  "Thus it is my unpleasant duty to inform you that at the time the messenger leaves for Falmouth with this letter in tonight's pouch, we have no news. I have talked with your father and with the Marquis, and while both agree with me that there are many possible reasons why the Murex should not have arrived, ranging from dismasting to taking a prize and having to shepherd her in, we all felt that you should be informed, which I have now done, and remain your obedient servant, St Vincent."

  Sarah was, at best, a prisoner of the French. At worst she had been killed or drowned when the brig was captured or sunk by bad weather or a French ship of war or privateer. A brief honeymoon and, because of some mutinous scoundrels and a drunken young post-captain, she was dead. Killed because she had been witless enough to fall in love with Nicholas Ramage.

  The cabin darkened and shrank round him: his body tightened as an uncontrollable spasm drove out every thought except the one that he had dreaded - Sarah was dead. He was alone, and had lost the love he had begun to despair of ever finding. Yes, he had earlier loved Gianna, but that had eventually only served as a yardstick by which he could measure the depth of his love for Sarah. He began to curse the injustice of it: many couples had twenty, thirty and even more years of marriage before one or other of them went over the standing part of the foresheet. But he and Sarah had been together, as man and wife, for how long - a month? They had known each other for a few months. The stark, blinding unfairness of it all. Why Sarah? Why hadn't a roundshot cut him in half instead? This thought calmed him down. Lord St Vincent was not saying that she was dead: only that she was dead or a prisoner, and given the usual ratio of casualties in an action, the odds were ninety-eight to one that she had been taken prisoner.

  How a crowd of French privateersmen would treat a woman prisoner sent another muscle-tightening spasm of rage through his body, but to have her alive. . .Then he felt himself calming slightly: it was impossible to imagine Sarah dead. Yet surely all lovers must feel their partners were immortal: bereavement was what happened to other couples.

  He suddenly realized that for two or three minutes there had been a steady knocking at his door, and the Marine sentry's call was now being reinforced by the agitated calls of Aitken and Southwick.

  "Come in!" he called and the door flung open, Aitken almost sprawling as he rushed through, crouched so that his head did not hit the beams. He stared at Ramage sitting at the desk but jerked as Southwick, head down, bumped into him.

  Aitken was quick to recover. "Sorry, sir, but you didn't answer."

  "I was thinking," Ramage said lamely, "but come in and shut the door." He saw both men were pale under their tans, and although Aitken might be satisfied with the explanation, Southwick certainly was not: the old master had served with him so long that his role had slowly changed to - well, what? A benevolent grandfather dependent on his grandson's largesse? Anyway, the old man was now standing over him, a puzzled look creasing his face. "Are you sure everything is all right, sir?"

  Ramage thought for a moment. If he did not tell them now, he would have to keep the news to himself all the way to England, like a man nursing a guilty secret, so now was the time. He held up the First Lord's letter. "If you can't read the signature, it's from Lord St Vincent."

  Southwick sighed, as though he knew from long experience that letters from such heights never carried welcome news, and sat down, giving the page a shake to straighten it out. As he read, Aitken said quietly, by way of explanation: "When you came back from the Queen, sir, your face was white as a sheet. You seemed to be trembling. We thought you'd been struck by one of these sudden fluxes."

  Ramage shook his head and nodded towards the letter that Southwick had just finished reading. The old man's features were frozen as he handed the letter back to Ramage without a word. Ramage gave it to Aitken, who took the precaution of sitting on the settee first: he had seen the effect on Southwick. He read it through twice, folded it and gave it back to Ramage without comment, but the skin now seemed too tight on his face.

  Then Ramage remembered Jean-Jacques. The Count had been entranced by Sarah. And the four Frenchmen, Gilbert, Louis, Auguste and Albert, who had come to serve in the Calypso after helping to capture the Murex brig: they regarded Sarah as a woman among women for the part she had played.

  He was bewildered; he pulled himself together enough to realize that. But the news of Sarah had torn a piece of himself away: the part that had feelings, that told him what to do ...

  He then remembered the second enclosure in the packet which was still lying on top of his desk. He opened the seal, more to take his mind off St Vincent's news than because of any curiosity about new orders. For that was what they were.

  They were signed, as usual, by Evan Nepean, the Secretary to the Board of Admiralty, and began in one of the time-honoured fashions, "I am directed by My Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty to acquaint you . . ." which told Ramage at once that whatever the orders were, they would not be radical: new orders usually began: "You are hereby requested and required to ..."

  Ramage glanced quickly through the copperplate writing and, having assured himself there was no petard smouldering among the sentences, waiting to hoist him into more trouble, read through again, more slowly.

  For a bizarre moment he pictured Their Lordships sitting solemnly round the long polished table in the Boardroom with a box in front of them full of slips of paper on which was written the word "whereas". While dictating their instructions to Nepean they would, every minute or so, skim another "whereas" slip across to him, to insert in the letter he was drafting.

  Anyway, whereas Captain Ramage had been on Admiralty-approved leave in France when hostilities had again broken out, and whereas he had managed to escape in the Murex brig and join Admiral Clinton upon the commander-in-chief's arrival off Brest with the blockading force, "and whereas Admiral Clinton had given Captain Ramage command of his former frigate the Calypso" (and there Ramage recognized the gentle rap over the knuckles: although he had applied to the Admiralty for leave to go abroad, as laid down in the Instructions, and been granted it, the fact was when the war suddenly broke out again he was not with his ship. The Admiralty never sought or listened to excuses - officers went on leave by their own choice - and generally had a bovine disregard for fairness or logic).

  "- and whereas Admiral Clinton gave certain orders concerning the capture of the French frigate L'Espoir and the release of French Royalists, among them the Count of Rennes, and whereas Their Lordships have now assumed that these orders have been successfully executed" (an indication, as if one was needed. Ramage thought to himself, that there was no excuse for failure), "Their Lordships direct that having called at Barbados with the prize and the Royalists, the refugees, the Count of Rennes among them, are to be given passages in suitable merchant ships and sent back to England with the first convoy.

  "Their Lordships further direct that you are to remain in command of the Calypso frigate, which should also return to England and is now again under Admiralty orders." Which meant, Ramage noted, that Rear-Admiral Tewtin could not interfere.

  Any prizes taken in the course of the original operation, Nepean continued, should be handed over to the commander-in-chief, the Windward
Island Station, who would buy them in for service or otherwise dispose of them. And Nepean had the honour to be, etc.

  So there it was. Their Lordships (which probably meant in fact a quorum of three members of the Board) blithely assumed one could do the impossible, and afterwards punctiliously sent out fresh orders to keep one gainfully occupied, just as one leaned back to rest a moment and take a deep breath. Still, it was better than facing a court of inquiry (or even a court-martial) because of failure.

  But now there was all the irritating detail, although arranging passages for the refugees should not be difficult - there were a couple of score of merchant ships already anchored in the Bay, and obviously a convoy was being assembled.

  Admiral Tewtin would no doubt present a few problems (no local flag officer liked a ship in his waters receiving direct Admiralty orders) but Ramage could use the actual orders as a talisman: they were as binding on Tewtin as on Ramage himself. The two prize frigates - well, whatever price Tewtin decided on had eventually to be approved by the Admiralty and Navy Board who, to be fair, were just as likely to raise a low one as reduce another that was too high. So within the week the Calypso should be on her way across the Atlantic to England, with the Royalists following in the convoy.

  The Calypso, he remembered with a shock like a gun going off beside him, would be going to an England where Sarah would not be waiting to greet them. And now he must go to tell Jean-Jacques.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Admiral Tewtin read through the Admiralty's orders once again and then looked up at Ramage, who was sitting opposite him across the big desk in the Queen's great cabin, the sun reflecting harshly through the sternlights and almost blinding Ramage when each wave threw up a flash of sunlight, as if deliberately trying to dazzle him. "Yes," Tewtin said, folding the page, "it all fits together very well: I'll buy in the prizes because I need frigates to escort this next convoy; we'll arrange passages in the merchant ships for the refugees - for the Royalists," he corrected himself, "and then you can command the convoy when it sails for England."

  "But ... but that's not my understanding of the orders, sir," Ramage protested.

  "It's my understanding," Tewtin said shortly, "and that's what matters."

  And Tewtin was right: it would be six months or more before the Admiralty could reprimand him for delaying the Calypso, and only a fool would think that the Admiralty valued the frigate's speedy arrival in England more than the safe arrival of a large trade convoy.

  The Count was safe, which was what mattered as far as the Prince of Wales was concerned, and would be coming home in the convoy. In addition, Ramage reflected, from Tewtin's point of view there was a good chance of the convoy arriving unscathed if Ramage commanded it: all too often convoys were commanded by frigate captains who were fit for nothing else or had fallen out of favour with the admiral. It was not too difficult to fall out of favour with some admirals - when sent to "cruise", a euphemism for hunting for prizes, it was no good coming back too often with stories of bad luck. The admiral's share in a prize was an eighth of its value; a couple of years on a good station usually meant he could buy a large country estate and put enough in the Funds to run it, apart from buying a knighthood or baronetcy and, with luck, having a seat in Parliament, being in effect issued one of those like Rochester which, with several others, the Admiralty regarded as its own property . . . Admiral Sir Hyde Parker was thought to have made £200,000 in prize money during his recent four years as commander-in-chief at Jamaica, generally reckoned the most lucrative station of all. So no doubt Tewtin had high hopes, and those hopes rested almost entirely on his frigate captains. That in turn depended on having frigates. No commander-in-chief ever had enough of them, so Tewtin was very lucky to have three arrive unexpectedly out of the south, a bonus he could use for the convoy without losing any of his own yet two of which he could fill with his own people. Each of the two prizes now needed a captain and three lieutenants, apart from warrant and petty officers. The commander-in-chief of the station made all such promotions, although they had to be approved afterwards by the Admiralty.

  Watched by Tewtin, Ramage picked up the Admiralty orders and read them through once more. They had been drafted in good faith and neither Their Lordships nor Nepean could have anticipated the present situation. Tewtin could not interfere with a ship acting under direct Admiralty orders, but he was too cunning for that. The Admiralty had ordered the Calypso back to England, but they had not added a phrase like "with all possible despatch", or "without delay". This, Ramage noted bitterly, allowed Tewtin to claim that since the Calypso was returning to England anyway, she might as well take the convoy under her protection.

  There was just one more card to play, a poor and miserable card but the only one he had left.

  "To be perfectly honest, sir, I'm worried about the Count of Rennes. He is in a desperate hurry to get back to England, to see the Prince of Wales - and of course he has large estates in Kent. I had been wondering whether or not I should keep him on board the Calypso and make a dash for it."

  Tewtin nodded understandingly. "I see your problem, but I hope the Count is grateful to you - and the Royal Navy - for rescuing him. Now is not the time to show impatience - why, but for you he would be rotting on Devil's Island. From what I hear, the prisoners don't last very long down there. If your Count of Rennes makes a fuss," he said portentously, "I'll have a word with him. In the meantime, transfer him to that merchant ship - what's she called? - where he has a suite awaiting him

  At that point Ramage knew he was beaten: at the end of a week in Barbados, he was going to have to command a convoy back to England, and all he could do now was hope that the merchant ships were not too undermanned, that their sails were not so ripe they were furled in anything of a breeze, that their spars were not so sun-dried and shaken that they would forever be signalling to one of the escort that they needed assistance - which meant sending across a carpenter and his mates to fish a spar.

  All of which meant that all too many shipowners sent their ships to the West Indies with too few men and ancient sails, with rigging and cordage that should have been replaced a year ago, spars and yards that had shakes in them wide and deep enough to trap a man's finger, if not a whole hand - and always relying on the Royal Navy in an emergency to help them. And usually the Royal Navy had no choice: a disabled ship left behind by the convoy could be a ship lost to French privateers, and there would be violent letters of protest arriving at the Admiralty from the outraged owners and the insurance underwriters, and woe betide the poor frigate captain who was exasperated beyond control by these constant demands on his men and resources. Not for nothing did most commanders of convoys and the escorts refer to the masters of merchant ships as "mules".

  When would the Admiralty in its collective wisdom put its collective foot down and stop these profiteering shipowners from running their ships at the taxpayers' expense? With very few exceptions, shipowners were making their fortunes, thanks to the war. To begin with, the convoy system stopped any rush for a ship to be among the first dozen or so to arrive in England with the new harvest of sugar, tobacco, nutmeg or whatever it was to reap a high price in the market place. The convoy system meant all the ships arrived at once, their cargoes swamping the market, which was bad luck for the shippers (the planters in the West Indies, in this case) but fine for the shipowners. In peacetime, the faster ships (well kept and well commanded) could reasonably charge the highest freight because the planters, first at the market with their produce, made a good profit. In wartime there was no need for fast ships, and unscrupulous shipowners were quick to buy up any hull that would swim and could be insured: the convoy system ensured that she would not be beaten into port by faster ships and the Royal Navy was forced (blackmailed, in fact) to keep her afloat. And, to save any strain and wear on sails, spars, masts and cordage (costs, in other words), the damned mules always reefed at night, no matter how scant the breeze.

  In turn that meant that each could sail with a
smaller crew: with no risk of having to reef in a squall, many of these smaller traders sailed with only a master, mate, a couple of apprentices (whose indentures meant they were paying to be on board) and half a dozen men. Food, from what Ramage heard, was bad, and any complaints by the crew to a master met with a standard response: a man or two could easily be handed over to the next pressgang that came in sight. The choice was simple: serve in a merchant ship with bad food but higher pay, signing on for a single round-trip voyage, or be swept into one of the King's ships, serving until the next peace, which at the moment seemed a lifetime away.

  When he returned to the Calypso and stepped through the entryport, Aitken met him with a broad grin on his face. "Mr Southwick wanted to talk to you before you go below, sir," he said, "and I've passed the word for him."

  "What's all this about?" Ramage asked impatiently: he had been sitting in his cutter so long that the heat now soaking him with perspiration seemed to come from inside his body, as though it was a glowing coal. At that moment Southwick, also grinning, bustled up.

  "You have visitors, sir, and I took the liberty of taking them down to wait in the cabin, where it's cooler."

  Why was Southwick so concerned about visitors? Why the grin? Why the "I've got a surprise for you" way he was rubbing his hands like a parson with the Easter offering? Ramage, still at the entryport, looked outboard along the boat boom, rigged out at right-angles to the ship's side and to which the painters of boats were secured. Only the Calypso's cutter was now secured there, so how had the visitors arrived? Had they dropped from a passing cloud? And who wanted visitors at this moment: he was still so angry over Tewtin's behaviour that he just wanted to go down to his cabin and brood in peace and quiet. Sulk, really, because Tewtin had trapped him with an Admiralty order, and the prospect of driving a convoy of a hundred mules back to England at an average speed (if he was lucky and found the right winds and persuaded the mules to keep enough canvas set) of perhaps four knots. Days and weeks must pass before he could discover anything about Sarah.