Simultaneously, scores of noble families were embarking; among them the de Pombals. From a distance Roger saw them taken off and rowed out to the Nunez, which was close inshore. Quickly he secured a boat and was rowed out after them. As he went aboard the Nunez he noted with satisfaction that the merchantman's gunwale was not too high out of the water for a person to be dropped overboard into a waiting boat, without risk of injury, provided his or her fall was broken by someone in the boat.
The de Pombals were still on deck, superintending the bringing aboard of some of their baggage. Roger bowed to the ladies, then said to the Marquis, 'My lord, I am come aboard to ask if there is anything I can procure for you in the city which might make your voyage more supportable.'
De Pombal returned his bow. 'That was good of you, Mr. Brook; but I have brought with us as many comforts as the confined space here permits finding room for. And it is not yet certain that we shall make the voyage.'
'Of that, my lord, I am aware; so I will not yet take final leave of you. Should His Highness decide to sail, my Admiral will have several hours' notice of it; ample time for me to come across and wish you fair winds and good fortune in Brazil.'
Standing nearby, Lisala had heard what he said, and gave him a sad smile. He then spent a quarter of an hour talking to them before returning to shore.
That evening he said to Sir Sidney, 'Admiral, I have been pursuing a private project while here in Lisbon. I am deeply in love with a Portuguese lady and wish to make her my wife. Would you have any objection to my bringing her aboard, then giving us both passage to England?'
The Admiral laughed. 'What a fellow you are! When we were together at Acre, I recall that you were in love with a Turkish Princess. But no matter. If you have a mind to form a more permanent association with some charming Portuguese, by all means bring her to Hibernia, and we'll do our best to make her voyage a pleasant one.'
In the afternoon Strangford went to see the Prince Regent in his flagship. Still, the Prince refused to give his fleet sailing orders, and insisted that he must await developments. When the Minister returned, the Admiral snapped at him:
'Bad weather is blowing up and I'll not stay to sec my ships encounter it on a lee shore. Go again tomorrow and tell this cowardly oaf that, should his ships not cross the bar tomorrow, I'll blow his fleet out of the water.'
Unhappy and impatient, Roger waited next day until Strangford returned from giving this final ultimatum to Don Joao. On the Minister's return, bursting with pride in his achievement, he said, 'I used no threats, but by gentle words succeeded in persuading him to put his trust in us and honour the agreement he made with our Government many months ago. He has consented to sail tomorrow for Brazil.'
Hearing this, Roger decided that the time for action had come. That evening he asked Sir Sidney to let him have a boat to take him across to Nunez, and the Admiral placed a gig at his disposal.
When she was well away from Hibernia, Roger produced a small bag of gold. Clinking the coins in it, he said to the Petty Officer in charge, 'I go to the Nunez to collect a Portuguese lady. But her friends may prove reluctant to let her go, so there may be trouble. Obey my orders implicitly and this gold is yours to divide between yourself and the boat's crew.'
The Petty Officer grinned, and replied, 'Aye, aye, Sir. We'll stand by, and to hell with the Portuguese should they prove troublesome.'
On boarding the Nunez, Roger found a number of the gentry of both sexes strolling round the deck, taking the evening air. De Pombal was nowhere to be seen, but he soon spotted Lisala and her duenna. Directly Lisala caught sight of him, she came hurrying over with Dona Christina to the place where he was standing, beside the bulwark amidships.
Gravely Roger said, 'I am come as I promised to wish you a pleasant voyage, and to hope that in Brazil you will find happiness.'
With equal gravity she replied, 'That was kind of you; but it will do nothing to heal my broken heart. Will you not, at this eleventh hour, change your mind and accompany me?'
He shook his head. 'No, dear Lisala, my mind is set. But will you not change yours and let me make a home for you in England?'
As he spoke, he moved a little sideways, so that he would be able to seize her the more easily, heave her over the low bulwark, shout to the Petty Officer below to be ready to break her fall, then drop her down into the boat.
At that moment she, too, moved, and away from the bulwark, as she said, 'Alas, I cannot bring myself to it. But before we part, come below and we'll drink a glass of wine together, to some future love that may expunge from our minds the grief we now feel.'
For a moment Roger hesitated; then, feeling certain that she would come on deck again to see him off, agreed.
Dona Christina, hitherto knowing nothing of their passion for each other, had been staring at them with startled disapproval. As they turned away to go below, Lisala snapped at her, 'Remain here, old woman, and keep a brace upon your tongue, or I'll claw your eyes out.'
Leaving the duenna mouth agape and petrified with fear, Roger followed Lisala down the after ladder. She led him along a passage and, pointing to two adjacent doors, said, 'That is Papa's cabin and that is Aunt Anna's.' Turning into a narrower passage, she added, 'They are quite roomy and I could have had a similar one next to Papa's, but I would have had to share it with my sanctimonious old duenna; so I preferred a much smaller one along here.'
Unlocking a door, she motioned him into what was no more than a slip room, measuring about seven feet by four. It had a single bunk, beneath which Lisala's trunks were stowed. Above the bunk were cupboards. From one of them she took two china mugs half full of wine. Handing him one, she smiled.
'This was the best I could do. Knowing you intended to come aboard to bid me farewell, I purloined it from a bottle that Papa opened last night.'
Raising their mugs, they drank to each other in silence. As Roger swallowed, then lowered his mug, he asked. 'What is this wine? I don't recognise it.'
She shrugged. 'I have no idea. Papa could bring only the oldest wines from his cellar, so it is probably something very rare. But drink up. We dare not linger here for long, and I want to carry away a last memory of your loving me.'
Quickly they finished the wine and set aside the mugs. Lisala gave him a gentle shove and whispered, 'Lie down on the bunk, my love. I wish to play the man and have a glorious ride on you.' Two minutes later, they were locked together. When their first ecstasy was over, she made no move to clamber off him, but insisted that they should enjoy another. Its consummation was delayed, because Roger was feeling an unusual weakness in his limbs. When he did at length achieve it, she still did not get up, but lay, her mouth glued to his, kissing him fiercely.
Several more minutes passed before she withdrew her arms from round his neck, rolled off the bunk and quickly adjusted her lower garments.
He made to rise, but was seized with giddiness. With a sudden laugh, she slipped out of the cabin. Calling to her in a husky voice, he managed to throw his legs over the side of the bunk. Then he heard the key turn in the lock.
Staggering to his feet, he lurched towards the door, stumbled, fell against it, managed to reel back to the bunk and collapsed. Two minutes later he was out cold.
When he came to, it was pitch dark. He had a splitting headache and a frightful taste in his mouth. For some moments he could not imagine where he was. Then the motion of the ship ploughing through the waves told him that he was at sea. Memory flooded back. With bitter fury he realised that Lisala had got the better of him. He was on his way to Brazil.
The Ghastly Journey
On realising what had happened to him, Roger's rage knew no bounds. That a man such as himself, who had few equals in experience of plots and the taking of subtle measures to achieve his secret ends, should have been tricked and kidnapped by a girl was a terrible blow to his amour propre. Yet, after a while, his resentment on that head was slightly lessened by his sense of humour, causing him to sec the
funny side of it.
There remained the fact that he was being carried off to Brazil; and that was no laughing matter. For some minutes he wondered whether he could still evade such an unwelcome prospect. British warships would, he felt certain, be escorting the Portuguese flotilla for at least the first part of the voyage and, if he could succeed in geting himself transferred to one of them, he would escape making this most undesirable journey. But this was a Portuguese ship. She must now be well out at sea and, the weather being roughish, it seemed very improbable that any boat's crew would agree to take the risk of transferring him from the Nunez to a British frigate.
Jumping up from the bunk, he beat hard with his fists on the cabin door, hoping to attract attention. But the groaning timbers of the ship partially muffled his hammering and, apparently, no-one heard it. Hunger now added to his unhappy state and further hours dragged by while he still sat, in increasing misery, a prisoner on the edge of the bunk.
It was not until six o'clock that the door was unlocked and Lisala stood framed in it. Looking anxiously at him, she enquired, 'Are you greatly enraged at my having carried you off?'
Roger had long since learned that there were times when it paid to show anger, and others when it could do only harm.
In the present instance no display of the fury he was feeling would get him back on shore and, since he was now condemned to a long sea voyage, quarrelling with Lisala could make it even more uncongenial. Restraining himself, he replied with a wry grimace, 'Knowing my feelings about going to Brazil it was a scurvy trick to have kidnapped me in this way. But since it is further evidence of your love for me, how can I not forgive you?'
Smiling, she replied, 'I am much relieved. I am glad, too, not to find you still under the influence of the dnig. Had I done so, I should have been terrified that I had given you too much. I took it from Papa's medicine chest, and had to guess at the dose. It now remains for us only to secure my papa's acceptance of your having smuggled yourself aboard to accompany me.'
'Smuggled myself?' Roger repeated with a frown.
'Why, yes. I'd not dare confess to having locked you in my cabin. We must say that, out of love for me and without my knowledge, you hid yourself and sailed as a stowaway.'
'And where, if you please, am I supposed to have spent the night?'
'Where I did, most uncomfortably, concealed between some bales of stores on the lower deck.' As Lisala spoke, she put a hand to her disordered hair and added, 'Just look at the state I am in. And I feel quite dreadful. Please go on deck now and show yourself, so that meanwhile I can unpack some of my things and tidy myself.'
Seeing no alternative to doing as she asked, Roger embraced and kissed her, then made his way up on deck. There were already some forty or fifty people, mostly men, standing gloomily about there. The coast of Portugal was no longer visible but, near and far, could be seen other ships ploughing through the waves on the same course as the Nunez. Within a few hundred yards there was a frigate flying the White Ensign. Roger looked longingly at her but, as he had feared, the sea was much too choppy for there to be any prospect of a boat taking him across to her. He had always been a bad sailor and was already beginning to feel queasy. But, for once, he resigned himself to that unhappy state on the grounds that it would enable him to cut short his difficult interview with de Pombal.
Scanning the faces round about, he soon saw the Marquis standing with a group of other gentlemen just below the poop. As he advanced towards them, de Pombal caught sight of him and exclaimed in surprise, 'Mr. Brook! How do you come to be aboard the Nunez?'
With a bow, Roger said, 'May I have a word with Your Lordship in private?'
Inclining his head, the Marquis left his companions and walked over to a place on the windward side of the ship, where there were fewer people. When he halted, Roger bowed again and resumed:
'My lord, I have a confession to make. I am passionately enamoured of Lisala and could not support the thought that I would never see her again. This led to my forming a resolve to emigrate to Brazil. Having taken my decision hastily, I had no opportunity of securing for myself suitable accommodation for the voyage; so, yesterday afternoon I came aboard Nunez and stowed away. I need hardly assure you that my intentions are honourable. I am by no means without fortune, and own a pleasant property in England. I request your permission to pay my suit to your daughter.'
Greatly taken aback, dc Pombal stared at Roger. After a moment he said, 'Mr. Brook, I hardly know what to say. By leaving Europe in this fashion you have clearly demonstrated your devotion to my daughter. But my choice of a husband for her is a matter requiring grave consideration. During the voyage I can do no more than allow you to make her the subject of your attentions.'
For the time being, that was all Roger required and to have gone into the matter further might have led to complications. Putting his hand quickly to his mouth, he bowed and said, 'I thank you, Sir. Now . .. now, if you will forgive me, I must leave you, as I am feeling far from well.' Then he turned and hurried away to the fo'c'sle where he knew the 'heads' lay.
During the course of the day he had good cause to resent more than ever having been forced to undertake this long voyage. He learned that over fifteen thousand people: nobles and officials with their families and servants, were accompanying the Prince Regent into exile. Every warship and merchantman in the great fleet was crowded beyond her normal capacity. Only persons of high rank enjoyed the privilege of sleeping in narrow cabins; the rest dossed down where they could on the deck or below it, in odd corners with their cloaks wrapped round them and only the valises they had brought with them for pillows.
He learned that, on the previous evening, the fleet had got away only by the skin of its teeth. Junot and his weary, bedraggled vanguard had entered Lisbon while many of the ships had still been at anchor. The French had even prevented a few ships from leaving by sending off boats packed with troops who had shot down the sailors in the rigging, then boarded the ships and captured them.
But Don Joao, in the flagship Principe Real and his principal Ministers, Antonio de Aranjo and the Viscount de Anadia, had got away. Other Counsellors, the Marquis dc Belas, Don Rodrigo da Sousa, the Duke of Cadaval and Dr. Jose Carreira Pieanco, were in Medusa and, like de Pombal, temporarily separated from their master.
In Nunez, no orderly routine had yet been established. When food was produced in the main cabin at the usual dinner hour, protocol soon went by the board. Normally, the Grandees and their ladies would have been given ample time to take their pick of the most enjoyable edibles, but after a few minutes, there ensued a wild scramble and everyone piled on to his own plate spoonsful from the dishes nearest to hand.
Faced with the problem of where to sleep in the overcrowded ship, Roger went to the Captain and bartered some of his gold for permission to doss down in the flag locker. It was no more than a cubby-hole adjacent to the deck house on the poop; but at least it would not be as stifling as the crowded cabins below decks, and the flags provided a not uncomfortable couch on which to lie.
Next morning he presented himself to Lisala and her aunt They showed no surprise, as the Marquis had already told them of Roger's presence aboard. De Pombal, who was with them, made no reference then or later to Roger's having asked Lisala's hand in marriage. Apparently, in conformity with his long career as a diplomat, he had decided to leave the matter open and await developments.
After a few days, life aboard the Nunez began to form a pattern. De Pombal and six other noblemen had formed a committee, the decisions of which were accepted as orders by the other passengers. A roster was drawn up, dividing them into three classes: the aristocracy, the bourgeoisie, and the servants. To prevent the unseemly jostling at meal times, three services took place at hourly intervals. The poop was reserved for the nobility, the waist of the ship for the ordinary citizens and the fo'c'slc for the menials. The stock of food was listed and strictly rationed. To minimise the appalling congestion, thos
e who had no cabins were divided into watches which alternately spent eight hours below and eight hours on deck. Masses were said at eight o'clock in the morning and four o'clock in the afternoon, so that both watches could perform their devotions daily. Hours were set for games and competitions, the educated were formed into reading circles and held Spelling Bees; those having vocal or musical talent helped to while away the long evenings as a choral society or by giving concerts. The gentry also amused themselves with charades and playing cards.
Thus, as the flotilla ran down the coast of Africa in better weather, boredom and distress at having been uprooted from their homes was, to some extent, alleviated. But little could be done to lessen the discomfort of their quarters, the monotonous, inferior food and the claustrophobia resulting from spending all one's waking hours with hardly space to move about among the swarm of people constantly occupying the crowded decks.
Roger consoled himself as well as he could with the companionship of Lisala. As they sat side by side during the mornings and sometimes in the afternoons, he taught her to speak English. The frequent lessons enabled her to pick it up quite quickly, and soon they were able to talk together of matters that it would not have been desirable for their neighbours on the deck to hear and understand.
But for them to make love in such conditions was impossible. By night and day every comer of the ship either had someone squatting in it or it was liable to be invaded at any moment. To visit her in her cabin was equally out of the question, as at all hours people were passing up and down the passage outside, so the risk of his being seen going in or out was too great to be taken.
The fact that they were constantly together added to their frustration and, in Roger's case, it strengthened his secret determination to abandon Lisala rather than go to Brazil, if he could possibly manage to escape from the Nunez.
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