'I was born on a battlefield - what are the lives of a million men to me?'
The horses of the two squadrons of Cossacks were labouring as they breasted the low ridge dominating the shallow valley and the frozen river behind them. They were almost blown by the speed of their recent charge and the violence of their clash with the enemy along the line of the river. As the officer at their head caught sight of the red roofs of the village of Schloditten, he threw up his bloodstained sabre, stood in his stirrups and ordered the fur-swathed cavalry to wheel their shaggy mounts. They reined in, faced about and halted as their officers trotted back to their posts.
'Well done, my children!' the Russian officer called with patriarchal familiarity, smiling and nodding his clean-shaven face to the swarthy and bearded troopers who grinned back at him. The Cossack horses tossed their heads in a jingle of harness, edging their tails round into the biting northerly wind. Breath erupted in clouds from their distending nostrils and the snowflakes that were again beginning to fall melted on contact with their steaming flanks. Lowering their lances across their saddle-bows, the Cossacks exchanged ribaldries and remarks, incongruously crossing themselves as they called the unanswered names of men they had left behind them in the valley. A few bound each other's wounds, or ran their filthy hands gently down the shuddering legs of horses galled by the enemy. Most remained in their saddles, reaching under their sheepskins for flasks of vodka, or for carcasses of chickens that hung in festoons from their belts. Reaching his post at their head, the clean-shaven officer abandoned the dialect of the Don.
'Hey, my friend! Come!' he called in French to another officer. Sheathing his sabre he fumbled in a pistol holster for a flask which he beckoned the other to share.
'What does the esteemed representative of the staff think of today's work?' He held out the flask, his blue eyes intently observing him. 'We made short work of those French bastards, didn't we, eh?'
The staff-officer grinned, but his eyes kept returning to the valley below them, into which they had charged twenty minutes earlier.
'They were Lasalle's bastards, you know, Count. The best light cavalry in the Grand Army'
'And we beat them, by Almighty God.' The count crossed himself piously and his companion raised a sardonic eyebrow at the practice.
'We haven't finished the business yet,' he said, pointing to the southward, where the little town of Preussisch-Eylau lay engulfed in smoke. Only its church belfry showed above the pall as, house by house, it crumbled beneath the storm of shot from two massive Russian batteries close to its eastern outskirts. Beyond the town and spreading out over the gently rolling snow-covered countryside of East Prussia, the dark masses of the Grand Army of France and her allies attempted to roll up the Russian left wing.
Four miles away to the north, just beyond the frozen river at the other extreme of the contending armies and immediately in front of the Cossacks, Lasalle's repulsed hussars were re-forming. Between them the bloody corpses of two dozen men were already stiffening like the trampled and frozen reeds of the river margin. To the south of the French cavalry, the dark swirl of Marshal Soult's Fourth Army Corps had been thrown back from their own assault upon the Russians. The Cossack commander slapped his thigh and laughed with satisfaction.
'Ha! You see, my friend, they are beaten! And was it not us, the squadrons of Count Piotr Petrovich Kalitkin, that took the very orders of the great Napoleon himself from the hands of his courier? Eh? Well, wasn't it?'
'Indeed, your Excellency,' said his companion with exaggerated courtesy, I think we may take a measure of credit for today' He returned the vodka flask amid an outburst of indignation.
'Measure of credit! Measure of credit!' spluttered Kalitkin. 'As a result of us, Marshal Bernadotte never received his orders, and ...' he waved his gloved hand over the battlefield, 'is not here to support his Emperor.'
The staff-officer nodded, his expression of amused irony altering to one of concern. It was quite true that Napoleon's courier had fallen into the Cossacks' hands at Lautenberg, but the staff-officer had a wider appreciation of events than Count Kalitkin.
'You are quite right, Count, but Ney is not here either, and that worries me.'
'Bah! You know too much and it makes you worry too much.'
'That,' said the staff-officer, leveling a small telescope to the north where snow was falling thickly from a leaden sky, 'is my business, Count, and the reason for my attachment to your brilliant command.'
'Ah, you and your damned reports. I know you are a spy; though whether you spy for Bennigsen on me, or for St Petersburg on Bennigsen, I have not yet determined.'
The staff-officer lowered his telescope and grinned at the Count. 'You are too suspicious, Count, and too good a light-cavalryman to need a nursemaid.'
'Bah!' repeated Kalitkin good naturedly, apparently unconcerned at the purpose of the staff-officer's attachment to his squadrons. 'You are an impudent rascal and I should have you whipped, but you would report me and I should be reduced to a troop again, damn you.'
'If I were you, my dear Count,' said the staff-officer, staring again through his glass, I should forget about whipping me and send a patrol to find out who is approaching from the northward; if it's Ney we shall be outflanked.' He passed the glass to Kalitkin whose manner was immediately transformed.
'I'll go myself.' He turned in his saddle. 'Hey! Khudoznik, stop doing that and mount up with your men!' A score of Cossacks fastened their saddle-bags and slung their lances, detaching themselves from the main body and forming a loose column. Kalitkin turned to the staff-officer. I shall leave the fate of Holy Russia in your hands and save Bennigsen's reputation again.' Kalitkin threw the vodka flask to his friend and kicked his horse to a trot. In a few moments he was no more than a blur in the swirling snow.
The staff-officer edged his horse forward to catch a glimpse of the battlefield before more snow flurries obscured it. To his left a battery of 60 cannon kept up a ruthless fire into the re-forming battalions of Soult. Beyond, the orange flashes of a further 120 guns pounded Eylau; but in the far distance heavy columns of French infantry could be seen advancing to attack. For a while the snow curtained everything, even deadening the concussion of the guns, but when it cleared again the French attack seemed to have failed.
Nearer at hand a greater drama was unfolding. About a mile away from the ridge a huge column of Russian infantry, grey-coated and with feet muffled in sacking, hurled themselves forward against the houses of Eylau. Six thousand peasant soldiers followed their officers with the obedience of small children and fought their way into the town like furies. Unseen by the distant Cossacks, Napoleon was driven from his post in the church belfry and only escaped by the self-sacrifice of his bodyguard. But the Cossacks observed his angry response to this insolent bravery; they shook up their horses' heads and grasped their lances, in case they were called upon to react to the great counterattack that burst out of the French position.
The snow cleared completely, torn aside by the biting wind as swiftly as it had come, and this lull was accompanied by a sudden brightening of the sky as Napoleon's brother-in-law, Marshal Murat, led forward more than ten thousand horsemen to burst through the Russian line. Wheeling in its rear and repeatedly breaking the centre, they sabred the indomitable gunners and cut up the devoted Russian infantry that had so recently threatened their Emperor. Behind Murat's cuirassiers and dragoons, Marshal Bessieres followed with the Horse Grenadiers of the Imperial Guard, big men on huge black horses who trampled the remains of Bennigsen's frontal assault beneath their hooves. But the tide of cavalry had reached its limit. It was unsupported and ebbed inexorably back towards Eylau. The guns of the Russian centre were re-manned and began to pour shot into the enemy as they retreated. Then another curtain of snow closed over the mass of dying and mutilated men, so that their cries and groans were unheard.
The staff-officer finished the flask of vodka and tucked it into the breast of his coat. He nodded companionably to a subaltern who rode up from the Cossack flank.
'Well, young Repin, this is a bloody business, but a sweet revenge for Austerlitz, eh?'
'Indeed, sir, it is.'
'Count Kalitkin should rejoin us soon... ah, here he comes, if I'm not mistaken ...' Kalitkin rode up and reined in, his eyes gleaming with triumph, his horse steaming.
'Well, my friend, I have done it again! I have found your Ney for you. Voila!' Kalitkin pointed behind him where some of Lasalle's hussars were moving out to form a screen behind which the head of a marching column could just be made out through the snow. 'And also I have found our valiant ally, or, at least, what remains of him...'
'General Lestocq's Prussians?' asked the staff-officer sharply.
'Exactly, my dear wiseacre. Lestocq and his Prussians, and we must move to the right and cover their march across our rear.' Kalitkin suddenly drew his sabre with a rasp and pointed it across the shallow valley. 'There! See, those French pigs are ahead of us! They will try and harry the Prussian flank ...'
I told you they were the best light cavalry in the Grand Army.'
'You go and tell Bennigsen that the squadrons of Piotr Kalitkin have saved Mother Russia again ... and if he gives me a division I will win the whole damned war ...' He stood in his stirrups and bawled an order. This time the whole mass of the Cossacks moved forward and the staff-officer wheeled his horse aside to let them pass. For a moment he remained alone on the ridge to watch. The trot changed to a canter and then to a gallop; the lance points were lowered, the pennons flickering like fire as the dark wave of horsemen swept over the frozen marshes bordering the river, and crashed into the ranks of the French hussars. The enemy swung to meet them, their breath steaming below their fierce moustaches and their hair braided into dreadlocks beneath their rakish shakos. The staff-officer pulled his horse round and spurred it towards the headquarters of the Russian army at Anklappen.
Night fell early, the short winter afternoon expiring under heavy clouds and the smoke of battle. The French attack failed, largely due to the timely arrival of General Lestocq's Prussians and the late appearance of Ney: Napoleon had received the worst drubbing of his career, but Lasalle's hussars had had their revenge, and Kalitkin's Cossacks had been pushed back beyond the village of Schloditten, to bivouac and lick their wounds. It was past midnight when Kalitkin had posted his vedettes, rolled himself in his cloak and lain down in the snow. A few moments later he was roused as one of his men brought in a strange officer, wearing an unfamiliar uniform and raging furiously in a barbarous French at the Cossack trooper whose sabre point gleamed just below the prisoner's chin.
Kalitkin sprang to his feet. 'Mother of God! What have you there, Khudoznik? A Frenchman?' Kalitkin addressed the prisoner in French: 'Are you a French officer?'
'God damn it, no, sir!' the man exclaimed. 'Tell this ruffian to let me go! I am Colonel Wilson, a British Commissioner attached to General Bennigsen's headquarters. I was reconnoitering when this stinking louse picked me up. Who the devil are you?'
Kalitkin ordered the Cossack Khudoznik to return to his post and introduced himself. 'I am Count Piotr Kalitkin commanding two squadrons of the Hetman's Don Cossacks. So, you are a spy of the British are you?' Kalitkin grinned and made room round the fire.
'You Russians are a damnably suspicious lot,' said the mollified Wilson, rubbing his hands and extending them to the warmth of the fire.
'But you have come to see we don't waste your precious English gold, eh?'
'To liaise with the headquarters of the army, Count, not to spy.'
'It is the same thing. Where are your English soldiers, Colonel, eh? Your gold is useful but it would have been better if some English soldiers could have helped us today, would it not? There would be fewer widows in Russia tomorrow.'
'My dear Count,' replied Wilson with a note of tired exasperation creeping into his voice. 'I am plagued night and day with pleas for which I can offer no satisfaction until the ice in the Baltic thaws and His Majesty's ships can enter that sea. Until then we shall have to rely upon Russian valour.'
'So, Colonel,' said Kalitkin, still grinning in the firelight, 'you are a courtier and a spy. I congratulate you!'
'I hope,' said Wilson with a heavy sarcasm, 'that I am merely a diplomat.'
A stir on the outskirts of the fire lit circle among the half-sleeping, half-freezing men caused both Kalitkin and the Englishman to turn.
'And,' exclaimed Kalitkin triumphantly, 'here is another spy. Welcome back, my friend. I expected you to spend the night in a whore's bed at headquarters. Are there no women with General Bennigsen?'
'Only pretty boys dressed as aides,' said the staff-officer emerging from the night, 'in accordance with the German fashion. Besides, I came back to bring you... this!' The staff-officer produced a bottle from the breast of his cloak with a magician's flourish.
'Ah! Vodka! Next to a woman, the best consolation.' 'One can share it with more facility, certainly ... I see you have company.'
As Kalitkin laughed, snatching the bottle and wrenching the cork from its neck, the staff-officer's expression of cynical levity vanished at the sight of the British uniform.
'Yes, my friend,' explained Kalitkin after wiping his mouth, 'a spy like you. He is an English officer; a commissioner no less.'
In the firelight the staff-officer's mouth set rigid, his eyes suddenly watchful. 'I am Colonel Wilson,' said the Englishman again, waving aside the vodka that Kalitkin companionably offered him after liberally helping himself, 'His Britannic Majesty's representative at the headquarters of His Imperial Majesty's army.'
'Colonel Wilson...' the staff-officer muttered under his breath, his eyes probing the face of the English officer.
'Count Kalitkin has introduced himself,' said Wilson, referring obliquely to Kalitkin's failure to introduce the staff-officer. 'Whom have I the honour of addressing?'
The staff-officer hesitated, looked down and with a muddy boot kicked back a piece of wood that had been ejected from the heart of the fire by a small explosion of resin deep in its core.
'Tell him, my friend,' said Kalitkin, swigging again at the vodka. 'Tell him who you are.'
The staff-officer's obvious reticence combined with the scrutiny to which he had been subject to awaken suspicions in Wilson's mind. Kalitkin's flippant allusions to espionage had been initially attributed to the subconscious reaction to excessive centralisation that Wilson had encountered in his dealings with the Russians. Watching the staff-officer's face he was aware of a quickening interest in this man.
'Come, sir,' he prompted, 'you have the advantage of me.'
'I am Captain Ostroff, Colonel Wilson, aide-de-camp to Prince Vorontzoff and presently attached to Count Kalitkin's squadrons of the Hetman's Don Cossacks.'
But Wilson paid little attention to the details of the staff-officer's status. What interested him far more was the way in which this Ostroff had pronounced Wilson's own name. For the first time since his secondment to the Russian army Wilson had heard his surname without the heavy, misplaced accent upon its second syllable. In a flash of intuition he realised he was talking to a fellow Englishman.
'Your servant, Captain Ostroff,' he said, bowing a little from the waist and holding the other's eyes in a steady gaze. But Ostroff's expression did not alter, not even when a sharp crack at their feet ejected another sliver of wood from the bivouac fire.
'How interesting,' went on Wilson with the smooth urbanity of the perfect diplomat, 'I have not had much opportunity to study the Russian tongue of your muzhiks, but if I am not mistaken, your name is the Russian word for ...'
'Island,' snapped Ostroff suddenly and it was not the abruptness of the interruption that surprised Wilson but the fact that where he had been about to employ the French noun, Ostroff had chosen to head him off with a sideways glance at Kalitkin and the use of a definition in plain English.
As the two men strolled with an affected nonchalance away from the recumbent Kalitkin and his bivouac, the Count lounged back on his sheepskin. 'Spies,' he muttered to himself, 'spies, the pair of them ...' and he stared up at the stars shining through the rents in the clouds, aware that their motion had become suddenly irregular.
His Britannic Majesty's 36-gun, 18-pounder frigate Antigone, commanded by Captain Nathaniel Drinkwater, lay at anchor off the Swedish fortress of Varberg wrapped in a dense and clammy fog. Her decks were dark with the moisture of it; damp had condensed on the dull black barrels of her cannon, giving them an unnatural sheen, and her rigging was festooned with millions upon millions of tiny droplets like the autumn dew upon spiders' webs. Wraiths of fog streamed slowly across her deck, robbing the scarlet coats of her marine sentries of their brilliance and dulling all sounds.
The duty midshipman leant against the quarterdeck rail with one foot upon the slide of a carronade and contemplated the dark oily water and the ice-floes that bumped and scraped alongside. Fifty yards out from the ship's side he could see nothing and the view from the deck was too familiar to engage his slightest interest.
Not that the slowly swirling ice-floes were worthy of study in themselves, for they were fast melting and puny by comparison with those he had seen in the Greenland Sea, but they were hypnotic and drew all active thought from the brain of the idle young man. They set him to dreaming aimlessly and endeavouring to pass the time as pleasantly as possible without the tiresome need to exert himself. For the past forty minutes Midshipman Lord Walmsley had been the senior officer upon the upper deck and in that capacity he saw no reason to exert himself. The sentries were at their posts, the duty watch fussing about routine tasks, and he was perfectly content to leave them to the supervision of the petty officers and their mates. Besides, Walmsley had been cheated of the prospect of an early repast and the trivial sense of grievance only reinforced his inertia. In the absence of the captain ashore, the first lieutenant, Mr. Samuel Rogers, had repaired to the gunroom for a meal he felt he was more entitled to than the midshipman.
Lord Walmsley did not seriously dispute the justice of the contention, for to do so would have involved far more effort than he was capable of. So he let the silly sense of grievance paralyse him and dreamed of a distant milkmaid whose willing concupiscence had long since initiated him to the irresponsible joys of a privileged manhood.
Inertia was endemic aboard the Antigone that morning. Captain Drinkwater had zealously pushed his frigate from the Nore through a succession of gales and into the breaking ice of the Baltic to reach Varberg as soon as he could. The whole of Antigone's company was exhausted, and they had lost a man overboard off the Naze of Norway: a sacrifice to the elements which seemed determined to punish them for every league they stole to windward in a searing succession of freezing easterly gales. It was, therefore, scarcely surprising that once the anchor had bitten into the sea-bed off the coast of Sweden and the captain departed in his barge, the mood on board Antigone should have been one of euphoria. As if confirming the frigate's company in their own merit, the elements had softened, the wind dropped, and within an hour of Captain Drinkwater's departure the fog had closed down on them, wrapping them in a chill, damp cocoon.
'Well now, d'you intend to spend the entire day in that supine way, laddie?'
Walmsley straightened up and turned. Mr. Fraser, the frigate's second lieutenant, crossed the deck to stand beside him.
'I was merely ascertaining whether I could hear the captain's barge returning, Mr. Fraser, by removing my ears from the sounds of the deck and leaning over the side.'
Fraser raised a sandy eyebrow. 'Your lordship is a plausible liar and should have his ears removed from the sounds of the deck to the masthead. A spell of sky-parlour would cure your impudence... but cut along and have something to eat... and send young Frey up in your place,' he added, calling after the retreating midshipman. The Scotsman began a leisurely pacing of the deck, noting the other duty-men and sentries at their places. A few minutes later Midshipman Frey joined him.
'Ah, Mr. Frey,' remarked Fraser in his distinctive burr, 'you well know how my flinty Calvinist soul abhors idleness. Be so kind as to pipe the red cutter away and row a guard around the ship.'
'Aye, aye, sir.'
Fraser regarded the activity that this order initiated with a certain amount of satisfaction. His mild enjoyment was marred by the unnecessary appearance of Rogers, the first lieutenant. Fraser had just left Rogers at table, his big fist clamped proprietorially around the neck of the gunroom decanter as though it was his personal property. Rogers's face was flushed with the quantity of alcohol he had consumed.
'What the devil's all this fuss and palaver, Fraser?'
"T'is nothing, Mr. Rogers. I'm merely hoisting out a boat to row guard about the ship while this fog persists ...'
'You take a deal too much upon yourself ...'
'I think the captain would have ...'
'Damn you, Fraser. D'you threaten me?'
Fraser suppressed mounting anger with difficulty. 'Reflect, sir,' he said with frigid formality, 'we have a considerable sum in specie under guard below and I think the captain would object to its loss in his absence ...'
'Oh, you do, do you? And who the hell's going to take it? The Swedes are friendly and the Danes are neutral. There isn't an enemy within a hundred leagues of us.'
'We don't know there isn't an enemy a hundred yards away, damn it; and as long as I'm officer o' the deck there'll be a guard pulled round the ship!' Fraser had lost his restraint now and both officers stood face to face in full view of the men at the davit falls. Fraser turned away, flushed and angry. 'Lower away there, God damn you, and lively with it!'
Rogers stood stock-still. His befuddled mind recognised the sense in Fraser's argument. He was aware that he should have sent off a boat as soon as the fog settled that forenoon. Knowledge of his own failure only fuelled his wrath, already at a high pitch due to the amount of wine he had drunk. And his mind was clear enough to realise that Fraser had committed the unforgivable in losing his temper and answering a senior insolently. 'Come here, Fraser!' Rogers roared. Fraser, supervising the lowering of the cutter, turned. 'D'you address me, sir?' he asked coldly.
'You know damn well I do! Come here!'
Fraser crossed the deck again slowly, grasping the significance of Rogers's new attack. Once again the two officers were face to face.
'Gentlemen, gentlemen, this is no time for such discordant tomfoolery ...'
Rogers's colour mounted still further as he spun round on the newcomer who, called by the sudden interest stirring between decks, now arrived on the quarterdeck.
'You keep out of this, Hill,' snarled Rogers at the sailing master.
'No, sir, I will not.' He lowered his voice. 'And you are making damnable fools of yourselves. For God's sake stop at once!' Hill's warning ended on an urgent hiss.
'And I suppose, Hill, you'll feel obliged to inform the captain of this matter?' Rogers snarled.
'I'll hold my tongue if you'll hold your temper,' Hill snapped back sharply, fixing the first lieutenant with a stare. Rogers exhaled slowly, his breath strong with the odour of liquor. He turned abruptly and went below. Hill walked forward.
'Coil down those slack falls! Bosun's mate, chivvy those men and put some ginger into it! By God, you're as slack as the drawstrings of a Ratcliffe doxy!'
Normality settled itself upon the ship again.
'Thank you, Mr. Hill,' said Fraser somewhat sheepishly. 'The old devil had me provoked there for a moment ... it would never have happened if the captain had not been out of the ship.'
'Forget it. Fortunately that is a rare occurrence. I must confess to a certain uneasiness, considering the contents of the hold, the fog and the absence of the captain.'
'Mr. Frey is at least a diligent young man ...'
'Boat 'hoy!' The midship's sentry's call stopped the conversation dead and the two officers rushed to the rail while the suspicious marine cocked his musket. The bow of a boat emerged from the fog.
'Antigone!' came the coxswain's Cornish accent.
'By God, it's the captain returning!' Fraser flew to the entry, aware that fog and anger had caused him to fail in his duty and that Captain Drinkwater would reboard his ship with less than half a side-party because of his own inattentiveness. To his chagrin the captain's barge had not even been challenged by Frey's guard-boat which was still on the other side of the ship.
As Captain Drinkwater's head came level with the deck, Fraser set his right hand to the fore-cock of his own hat. He was relieved to hear the squeal of a pipe in his right ear. The marine sentry presented arms and the side-party, though not complete, was at least presentable.
Drinkwater swung his weight from the baize-covered man-ropes and stood on the deck, his eye taking in the details of Antigone's waist even as his own right hand acknowledged the salutes.
'Mr. Fraser,' he said, and Fraser braced himself for a rebuke. 'Sir?' The captain's sharp grey eyes made him apprehensive. 'My compliments to the first lieutenant and the master, and will they attend me in the cabin ...' 'Aye, aye, sir.' 'And Mr. Fraser 'Sir?'
'Mr. Mount is to come too.' 'Very well, sir.' 'Damn this fog.'
'Aye, sir. We were not expecting you so soon.'
'So I perceived,' Drinkwater said drily, 'but the t'gallant masts are clear above the fog from the ramparts of Varberg castle.' He reached beneath his boat-cloak and fished in the tail pocket of his coat. 'I took the precaution of taking this.'
Fraser looked down at the folded vanes of Drinkwater's pocket compass.
'I see, sir.'
With a dull knock of oar looms on thole pins the guard-boat swung clear of the bow and pulled down Antigone's starboard side.
Drinkwater nodded his satisfaction. 'A wise precaution, Mr. Fraser,' he said and made for the ladder below, leaving the second lieutenant expelling a long breath of relief. Fraser turned to the boatswain standing beside him, the silver call still in his hand.
'I'm indebted to ye, Mr. Comley, for your prompt arrival,' Fraser muttered in a low voice.
'Wouldn't like to see 'ee caught atween two fires, Mr. Fraser, sir,' said Comley, staring after the young Scotsman as he went off on the captain's errand. Then he turned and put the call back to his lips. Its shrill note brought silent expectation to the upper deck again.
'Man the yard and stay tackles there! Prepare to 'oist in the barge!'
Captain Nathaniel Drinkwater took off the boat-cloak and unwound the muffler from his neck. He handed them, with his hat, to his steward, Mullender.
'A glass of something, Mullender, if you please.'
'Blackstrap, sir?'
'Capital.' Drinkwater's tone was abstracted as he stared astern through the windows at the pearly vapour that seemed oddly substantial as it swathed the ship. He rubbed his hands and eased his damaged shoulder as the chill dampness penetrated the cabin.
'Damn this fog,' he muttered again.
Mullender brought the glass of cheap blackstrap and Drinkwater took it gratefully. He relaxed as the warmth of the wine uncoiled in his belly. He could hear the creaks of the tackles taking the weight of the barge, felt the heel of the ship as she leaned to it, then felt the list ease as, with half-heard commands, the heavy boat swung inboard. A dull series of thuds told when it settled itself in its chocks amidships. The guard-boat swam across his field of vision, rounded the quarter and vanished again.
He was recalled from his abstraction as a knock at the door announced the summoned officers. Turning from the stem windows he surveyed them. Hill, the sailing master, he had known for many years. Fifty years of age, Hill was as dependable as the mahogany he appeared to be carved from. Balding now, his practical skill and wisdom seemed undiminished by the passing of time. Like Drinkwater himself, Hill bore an old wound with fortitude, an arm mangled at Camperdown ten years earlier.
Drinkwater smiled at Hill and addressed Rogers, the first lieutenant.
'All well in my absence, Mr. Rogers?' he asked formally.
'Perfectly correct, sir. No untoward cir... circumstances.' Rogers's reply was thick. Like Hill, Rogers was an old shipmate, but he was showing an increasing dependence upon drink. Disappointed of advancement and temperamentally intolerant, his fine abilities as a seaman were threatened by this weakness and Drinkwater made a mental note to be on his guard. For the moment he affected not to notice that Rogers had over-indulged at the dinner table. It was not a rare occurrence among the long-serving officers of the Royal Navy.
'Very well.' Drinkwater diverted his attention to the third officer. Mr. Mount was resplendent in the scarlet, blue and white undress uniform of the Royal Marines. His inclusion in the little group was pertinent to Antigone's purpose here, off Varberg. It was Mount who, in addition to his customary duties of policing the frigate, had had in his especial charge eighty thousand pounds sterling, and whom Drinkwater was anxious to keep abreast of the latest news.
'Well, gentlemen, I wished that you should be informed of some news I have just gleaned from the Swedish authorities at Varberg. About five weeks ago, it seems, the Russians administered a severe check to the French army under Napoleon. No,' he held up his hand as Mount began to ask questions, 'I can give you little more information, but that which I can tell you would be the more convivially passed over dinner. Please pass my invitation to the other officers and a few of the midshipmen. Except Fraser, that is. It'll teach him to keep a better lookout in future.'
An expression of satisfaction crossed Rogers's face at this remark and Drinkwater was reminded of the burgeoning dislike between the two men.
'That will be all, gentlemen, except to say that there is, as yet, no news of our convoy. They have not yet come in after the gale but that is not entirely unexpected. Neither Captain Young's nor Captain Baker's brigs are as weatherly as Antigone, but we shall make for the rendezvous at Vinga Bay as soon as the wind serves and disperses this fog.'
They left him to his glass, Mount chattering excitedly about the news of the battle, and Drinkwater dismissed the preoccupations of the ship in favour of more important considerations. The bad weather had separated him from the two brigs whose protection he had been charged with. He had every confidence in locating Young and Baker at Vinga Bay. The Swedes had told him the ice was breaking up fast and The Sound was clear, except for the diminutive fragments of the pancake ice that spun slowly past them towards the warmer waters of the Skagerrak and the grey North Sea. Carlscrona was already navigable and he might have landed his diplomatic dispatches there, closer to Stockholm than the Scanian fortress of Varberg. However, the Swedish governors had assured him that was unimportant. He had personally guaranteed their swift delivery to King Gustavus who eagerly awaited news of support from London.
Drinkwater drained the glass. Exactly how accurate the news was of a check to the French he did not know, but he was acutely aware that the events of the coming summer were likely to be vital in the Baltic. As the cabin door opened to admit the officers the noise of a fiddle came from forward where the hands had been piped to dance and skylark. Drinkwater stood and welcomed his guests as Mullender moved among them with a dozen glasses of blackstrap to whet their appetites.
'You ordered the purser to issue double grog to all hands, Mr. Rogers, I trust?'
'Aye, sir, I did.' Rogers had made some effort to sober up from his injudicious imbibing earlier that day.
'That is as well. I am conscious of having made all hands work hard on our passage. Despite the disappearance of the convoy, which I don't doubt we shall soon remedy, it was necessary that we deliver the Government's dispatches without delay.' Drinkwater turned to a tall, thin lieutenant who wore a hook in place of his left hand and from whose pink nose depended a large dewdrop. I see you have come from the deck, Mr. Q. Is the fog still as dense?'
Lieutenant Quilhampton shook his head, sending the dewdrop flying. 'Doing its damnedest to lift, sir, though I cannot depend on half cannon-shot at the moment. But a dead calm still and no sign of any merchantmen.'
'And unlikely to be, Mr. Q. They'll have snugged down and ridden out that gale like sensible fellows, if I don't mistake their temper.'
'Rather an unusual convoy for a frigate of our force, sir, wouldn't you say?' put in Midshipman Lord Walmsley. 'I mean two North-country brigs don't amount to much.'
I don't know, Mr. Walmsley,' replied Drinkwater who from their earliest acquaintance had avoided the use of the young man's title on board, 'their lading is almost as valuable as our own.'
'May one ask what it is?'
'One hundred and sixty thousand stand of arms, Mr. Walmsley, together with powder and shot for sixty rounds a man.'
Drinkwater smiled at the whistles this intelligence provoked. 'Come gentlemen, please be seated ...'
They sat down noisily and Drinkwater regarded them with a certain amount of satisfaction. In addition to the three officers he had summoned earlier, James Quilhampton the third lieutenant, Mr. Lallo the surgeon, and four of Antigone's midshipmen were present. Mr. Fraser was absent on deck, pacing his atonement for failing to sight the captain's barge that forenoon, an atonement that was spiced by Rogers's passing of the instruction, leaving Fraser in no doubt of the first lieutenant's malicious triumph.
In the cabin Drinkwater paid closest attention to the midshipmen. Mr. Quilhampton was an old friend and shipmate, Mr. Lallo a surgeon of average ability. But the midshipmen were Drinkwater's own responsibility. It was his reputation they would carry with them when they were commissioned and served under other commanders. Their professional maturation was, therefore, of more than a mere passing interest. This was the more acutely so since most were protégés of another captain, inherited by Drinkwater upon his hurried appointment to the corvette Melusine during her eventful Greenland voyage. By now he had come to regard them as his own, and one in particular came under scrutiny, for he had both dismissed and reinstated Lord Walmsley.
Midshipmen Dutfield and Wickham were rated master's mates now and little Mr. Frey was as active and intelligent as any eager youngster, but Lord Walmsley still engaged Drinkwater's speculation as, laughing and jesting with the others, he addressed himself to the broth Mullender placed before them. Despite Walmsley being a dominating, willful and dissolute youth, Drinkwater had discerned some finer qualities in him during the sojourn in the Arctic. But the boy had abused his powers and Drinkwater had turned him out of the ship for a period, only taking him back when Walmsley had gone to considerable lengths to impress the captain of his remorse. There were still streaks of the old indolence, and touches of arrogance; but they were tempered by a growing ability and Drinkwater had every confidence in his passing for lieutenant at the next available Board.
Drinkwater pushed his soup plate away and hid a smile behind his napkin as he watched Walmsley, at the opposite end of the table, talking with a certain condescension to Mr. Dutfield, some three years his junior.
'A glass of wine with you, sir?' Sam Rogers leaned forward with exaggerated cordiality and Drinkwater nodded politely, raising his glass. The conversation swelled to a hubbub as Mullender brought from the little pantry the roast capons and placed them before the captain. The homely smell of the meat emphasised the luxury of this fog-enforced idleness and combined with the wine to induce a comfortable mellowness in Drinkwater. He felt for once positively justified in putting off until tomorrow the problems of duty. But Mr. Mount was not of so relaxed a frame of mind.
'Excuse me, sir,' put in the marine lieutenant, leaning forward, his scarlet coat a bright spot amidst the sober blue of the sea-officers, 'but might I press you to elaborate on the news you gave us earlier?'
'I did promise, did I not, Mr. Mount?' said Drinkwater with a sigh.
'You did, sir.'
Drinkwater accepted the carving irons from his coxswain Tregembo, assisting Mullender at the table. He sliced into the white meat of the fowl's breast.
'It seems that a pitched battle was fought between considerable forces of French and Russians at a place near Konigsberg called ... Eylau, or some such ... is that sufficient, Mr. Rogers? Doubtless,' he continued, turning again to Mount, 'it is noted upon your atlas.'
A chuckle ran round the table and Mount flushed to rival his coat. He had been greatly teased about his acquisition of a large Military Atlas, purporting to cover the whole of Europe, India, North America and the Cape of Good Hope to a standard 'compatible with the contemplation, comprehension, verification and execution of military campaigns engaged in by the forces of His Majesty'. Armed with this vade mecum, Mount had bored the occupants of the gunroom rigid with interminable explanations of the brilliance of Napoleon's campaign in Prussia the previous year. The double victory of Jena-Auerstadt, which in a single day had destroyed the Prussian military machine, had failed to impress anyone except James Quilhampton who had pored over the appropriate pages of the atlas out of pity for Mount and was rewarded by a conviction that the likelihood of a French defeat was remote. The completeness of the cavalry pursuit after Jena seemed to make little difference to the naval officers, though it had brought the French to the very shores of the Baltic Sea and reduced the Prussian army to a few impotent garrisons in beleaguered fortresses, and a small field force under a General Lestocq. Mount's admiration for the genius behind the campaign had led him to suffer a great deal of leg-pulling for his treasonable opinions.
'And the outcome, sir?' persisted Mount. 'You spoke of a check.'
'Well, one does not like to grasp too eagerly at good news, since it has, in the past, so often proved false. But the Russians gave a good account of themselves, particularly as the French were reported to have been commanded by Napoleon himself.'
Drinkwater looked round their faces. There was not a man at the table whose imagination was not fed by the prospect of real defeat having been inflicted on the hitherto triumphant Grand Army and its legendary leader.
'And the Russkies, sir. Who was in command of them?'
Drinkwater frowned. 'To tell the truth, Mr. Mount, I cannot recollect ...'
'Kamenskoi?'
'No ... no, that was not it...' 'Bennigsen?'
'You have it, Mr. Mount. General Bennigsen. What can you tell us of him?'
'He is one of the German faction in the Russian service, sir, a Hanoverian by birth, something of a soldier of fortune.'
'So your hero's taken a damned good drubbing at last, eh, Mount?' said Lallo the surgeon. "Tis about time his luck ran a little thin, I'm thinking.' Lallo turned to Drinkwater, manifesting a natural anxiety common to them all. 'It was a victory, sir? For the Russians, I mean.'
'The Swedes seemed positive that it was not a French one, Mr. Lallo. It seems they were left exhausted upon the field, but the Russians only withdrew to prepare positions of defence ...'
'But if they had beat Boney, why should they want to prepare defences?'
'I don't know, but the report seemed positive that Napoleon received a bloody nose.'
'Let us hope it is true,' said Quilhampton fervently.
'And not just wishful thinking,' slurred Rogers with the wisdom of the disenchanted.
'Napoleon's the devil of a long way from home,' said Hill, laying down his knife and fork. 'If he receives a second serious blow from the Russkies he might overreach himself.'
Drinkwater finished his own meat. The uncertainty of speculation had destroyed his euphoria. It was time he turned the intelligence to real account.
'I believe he already has,' he said. 'Those decrees he issued from Berlin last year establishing his Continental System will have little effect on us. Preventing the European mainland from trading with Great Britain will starve the European markets, while leaving us free to trade with the Indies or wherever else we wish. Providing the Royal Navy does its part in maintaining a close blockade of the coast, which is what the King's Orders in Council are designed to achieve. I daresay we shall make ourselves unpopular with the Americans, but that cannot be helped. Napoleon will get most of the blame and, the larger his empire becomes, the more people his politics will inconvenience.' He hoped he carried his point, aware that a note of pomposity had unwittingly crept into his voice.
'So, gentlemen,' Drinkwater continued, after refilling his glass, 'if the Royal Navy in general, and you in particular, do your duty, and the Russians stand firm, we may yet see the threat to our homes diminish. Let us hope this battle of Eylau is the high-water mark of Napoleon's ambition ...'
'Bravo, sir!'
'Death to the French!'
'I'll drink to that!' They were all eagerly holding their glasses aloft.
'No, gentlemen,' Drinkwater said smiling, relieved that his lecturing tone had been overlooked, 'I do not like xenophobic toasts, they tempt providence. Let us drink to our gallant allies the Russians.'
'To the Russians!'
Drinkwater sat alone after the officers had gone. Smoke from Lallo's pipe still hung over the table from which the cloth had been drawn and replaced by Mount's atlas an hour before. He found the lingering aroma of the tobacco pleasant, and Tregembo had produced a remaining half-bottle of port for him.
He had watched the departure of his old coxswain with affection. They had been together for so long that the demarcations between master and servant had long since been eroded and they were capable of anticipating each other's wishes in the manner of man and wife. This uncomfortable thought made Drinkwater raise his eyes to the portraits of his wife and children on the forward bulkhead. The pale images of their faces were lit by the wasting candles on the table. He pledged them a silent toast and diverted his thoughts. It did not do to dwell on such things for he did not want a visitation of the blue devils, that misanthropic preoccupation of seamen. It was far better to consider the task in hand, though there was precious little comfort in that. Locked away beneath him lay one of the subsidies bound for the coffers of the Tsar with which the British Government propped up the war against Napoleon's French Empire. Eighty thousand pounds sterling was a prodigious sum for which to be held accountable.
He drew little comfort from the thought that the carriage of the specie would earn him a handsome sum, for he nursed private misgivings as to the inequity of the privilege. The worries over the elaborate precautions in which he was ordered to liaise with officials of the diplomatic corps, and the missing shipment of arms in the storm-separated brigs, only compounded his anxiety over the accuracy of the news from Varberg. There seemed no end to the war, and time was wearing away zeal. Many of his own people had been at sea for four years; his original draft of volunteers had been reduced by disease, injury and action, and augmented by those sweepings of the press, the quota-men, Lord Mayor's men and any unfortunate misfit the magistrates had decided would benefit from a spell in His Majesty's service.
Drinkwater emptied the bottle and swore to himself. He had lost six men by desertion at Sheerness and he knew his crew were unsettled. In all justice he could not blame them, but he could do little else beyond propitiating providence and praying the battle of Eylau would soon be followed by news of a greater victory for the armies of Tsar Alexander of Russia.
Occasional talks with Lord Dungarth, Director of the Admiralty's Secret Department, had kept Drinkwater better informed than most cruiser captains had a right to expect. Their long-standing friendship had given Drinkwater a unique insight into the complexities of British foreign policy in the long war against the victorious French. All the British were really capable of doing effectively was sealing the continent in a naval blockade. To encompass the destruction of the Grand Army required a supply of men as great as that of France. 'It is to Russia we must look, Nathaniel,' Dungarth had once said, 'with her endless manpower supported by our subsidies, and the character of Tsar Alexander to spur her on.'
He had one of those subsidies beneath him at that moment; as for the character of Tsar Alexander, Drinkwater hoped he could be relied on. It was rumoured that he had connived at the assassination of his own sadistically insane father. Did such acquiescence demonstrate a conviction of moral superiority? Or was it evidence of a weakness in succumbing to the pressure of others?
Wondering thus, Captain Drinkwater rose, loosened his stock and began to undress.
'Here's your hot water, zur,' Tregembo stropped the razor vigorously, 'and Mr. Quilhampton sends his compliments to you and to say that we'll be entering The Sound in an hour.' Tregembo sniffed, indicating disapproval, and added, 'And I'm to tell 'ee that Mr. Hill's on deck ...'
Drinkwater lathered his chin and jaw. 'And my presence isn't necessary, is that it?'
Tregembo sniffed again. 'That's the message, zur, as I told it.'
Drinkwater took the razor and began to scrape his lathered face, his legs braced as Antigone leaned to the alteration of course. 'Huh! We're off Cronbourg, Tregembo, and the Danes are damned touchy about who goes through The Sound. Where are the two brigs?' he asked after a brief pause, pleased that he had located his charges at Vinga Bay as predicted.
'Safely tucked under our larboard beam, zur.'
'Good. We'll keep 'em on the Swedish side.' He concentrated on his shave.
'You'll pardon me for saying, zur,' Tregembo pressed on with the familiarity of long service, 'but you've been under the weather these past two days ...'
'You talk too much, too early in the day, damn you... God's bones!' Drinkwater winced at the nick the razor had given him.
'You'd do better to take more care of yourself,' Tregembo persisted, and for a second Drinkwater thought he was being insolent, referring to his own bloodily obvious need to keep his mouth shut. But a single glance at the old Cornishman's face told him otherwise. Tregembo's concern was touching.
'You cluck like an old hen,' Drinkwater said, his tone and mood mellowing. He had to admit the justice of Tregembo's allegation, although 'under the weather' was an inadequate description of Drinkwater's evil humour. He wiped off the lather and looked at Tregembo. It was impossible for him to apologise but his expression was contrite.
"Tis time we went ashore, zur. Swallowed the anchor, in a manner of speaking.'
'Ashore?' Drinkwater tied his stock, peering at himself in the mirror. 'Ashore? No, I think not, Tregembo, not yet. I don't think I could abide tea and gossip at the same hour every day and having to be polite to the train of gentlewomen who infest my house like weevils in a biscuit.'
Tregembo was not so easily diverted, knowing full well Drinkwater's exaggeration only emphasised his irritability. "Tis time you purchased a bit of land, zur. You could go shooting ...'
Drinkwater turned from the mirror. 'When we swallow the anchor, as you quaintly put it, Tregembo,' he said with a sudden vehemence, holding his arms backwards for his coat, 'I pray God I have done with shooting!'
Tregembo held out the cocked hat, his face wearing an injured look.
'Damn it, Tregembo, I've a touch of the blue devils lately.' 'You know my Susan would run a house fit for 'ee and Mistress Elizabeth, zur.'
'It's not that, my old friend,' said Drinkwater, suddenly dropping the pretence at formality between them. 'Susan and Mistress Elizabeth would both be full of joy if we went home. But d'you think they'd tolerate our interfering indefinitely?' He made an attempt at flippancy. 'D'you think you'd be content to weed the onion patch, eh?' He took the proffered hat and smiled at the old Cornishman.
'Happen you are right, zur. There's many as would miss 'ee if 'ee took it in mind to go.'
Drinkwater hesitated, his hat half raised to his head, sensing one of Tregembo's oblique warnings.
'I know the people are disaffected ...'
'It ain't the people, zur. Leastways not as cause, like. They be more in the nature of effect.'
'Meaning, Tregembo?' asked Drinkwater.
'Mr. Rogers, zur, is shipping a deal of the gunroom vino. 'Tis a fact 'ee cannot hide from the people, zur. They hold 'ee for a fair man, zur. 'Twould be a pity to see Mr. Rogers become a millstone, zur, if 'ee takes my meaning.'
Drinkwater jammed the hat on his head. He should be grateful for Tregembo's warning, yet the old man had only revealed the cause of his own recent ill-humour. Carrying eighty thousand pounds around in an explosive corner of the world with one hundred and sixty thousand muskets tucked under his lee for good measure was bad enough, but to have to contend with a pot-tossing first lieutenant to boot was well-nigh intolerable.
'Belay that infernal prattle,' he snapped and threw open the cabin door. Ducking through with a nod to the marine sentry he sprang for the ladder to the quarterdeck.
Behind him Tregembo shook his head and muttered, 'Jumpy as a galled horse ...' He rinsed the razor, dried and closed it, nodding at the portrait of Elizabeth on the adjacent bulkhead. I did my best, ma'am.'
Lifting the bowl of soapy water he threw it down the privy in the quarter-gallery where it drained into Antigone's hissing wake as she sped past the fortress of Cronbourg at the narrow entrance of The Sound.
On deck, Drinkwater's sudden arrival scattered the idle knot of officers who stared curiously ahead at the red-brick ramparts and the green copper cupolas of the famous castle, above which floated a great red and white swallow-tailed flag, the national colours of neutral Denmark. Drinkwater took Hill's report and left the master in charge of the con. He stopped briefly to stare at the two trim brigs with their cargoes of arms that they had found two days earlier in Vinga Bay, just as predicted; then he fell to pacing the starboard rail, watching the coast of Denmark. The shreds of conversation that drifted across to Drinkwater from the displaced officers were inevitably about the great expedition, six years earlier, which had culminated in Lord Nelson's victory at Copenhagen. Although he had distinguished himself both before and during the famous action, Drinkwater's already morbid humour recalled only a dark and private episode in his life.
It was here, among the low hills and blue spires already slipping astern, at the village of Gilleleje, that Drinkwater had secretly landed his own brother Edward on the run from the law. Edward had had a talent with horses and drifted into the life of a gambler centred on the racing world of Newmarket and the French émigrés who had settled there. His entanglement with a young Frenchwoman had resulted in his murdering his rival. Drinkwater had always felt his honour had been impugned by the obligation Edward's ties of blood had held him to. Even at this distance in time, even after Drinkwater had discovered that in murdering his rival, Edward had inadvertently killed a French agent, Drinkwater was still unable to shrug off the shadows that had so isolated him then. Nor did it seem to mitigate Drinkwater's personal guilt that Edward had found employment as an agent himself. For after landing at Gilleleje and going to Hamburg, Lord Dungarth had sent him eastwards, relying on his ability to speak the French he had learned from his faithless mistress. Drinkwater knew that Edward had been at the battle of Austerlitz and was the origin of accurate intelligence about the true state of affairs in the Russian army after that bitter and shattering defeat. The news, it was said, had killed Billy Pitt; and this too seemed full of a dark accumulation of presentiment. With an effort, Drinkwater cast aside his gloom. Sunshine danced upon the water and they were rapidly approaching the narrowest point of The Sound commanded by the Danish guns in their embrasures at Cronbourg. It was, he thought with sudden resolution, time to make a show, a flourish. He spun on his heel.
'Mr. Rogers!'
The first lieutenant's florid features turned towards him. 'Sir?' 'Call all hands! Stuns'ls aloft and alow! Then you may clear for action!'
'Stuns'ls and clear for action, sir!' The order was taken up and the pipes twittered at the hatchways. Drinkwater stood at the starboard hance and watched the temper of the hands as the watches below tumbled up. Topmen scrambled into the rigging and Comley's mates chastised the slower waisters into place as they prepared to send up or haul out the studdingsails. Drinkwater's gaze rose upwards. Already the agile topmen were spreading out along the upper yards on the fore- and main-masts. Out went the upper booms thrust through their irons at the extremities of the topsail and topgallant yardarms. At the rails by the fore-chains, the lower booms were being swung out on their goosenecks. Festoons of guys straightened into their ordered places. He watched with satisfaction as the midshipmen, nimble as monkeys in their respective stations, waved their readiness to the deck. The upper studdingsails, secured to short battens, were stowed in the tops. At the signal first the weather and then the lee studdingsails were run up to the booms next above. They fluttered momentarily as the halliards secured them, then their lower edges were spread to the booms below. On the fo'c's'le two large bundles had been dragged out of their stowage in the boats. They were similarly bent onto halliards and outhauls stretched their clews to the guyed ends of the lowest booms which were winged out on either side of the frigate's fore-chains. In a minute or so Antigone had almost doubled the width of her forward sail plan.
Rogers, satisfied with the evolutions of the ship's company, gave the men permission to lay in. Watching, Drinkwater knew that there had been a few seconds' hesitation before the nod to Comley had brought the bosun's pipe to his mouth and the topmen had come sliding down the backstays. Rogers crossed the deck and knuckled the fore-cock of his hat.
'Very well, Mr. Rogers, you may beat to quarters.'
As Rogers turned away Drinkwater caught again that slightly malicious grin that he had noticed when he had ordered Fraser to keep the deck off Varberg. Whipping a silver hunter from his fob, Rogers flicked it open as he roared the order. Again, and with a mounting disquiet that he could not quite place, Drinkwater watched the motions of the men. To a casual glance they appeared perfectly disciplined, tuned to the finest pitch any crack cruiser captain could demand but... that element of perplexity remained with him.
The marine drummer doubled aft, unhitched his drum and lifted his sticks to his chin in a perfunctory acknowledgement of the prescribed drill; then he brought them down on the snare drum and beat out the urgent ruffle. The frigate, alive with men still belaying ropes and laying in from aloft, suddenly took on a new and more sinister air. Along the length of her gundeck the ports were raised and round each of twenty-six 18-pounder cannon and the ten long 9-pounder chase guns the men congregated in kneeling and expectant groups. Others mustered elsewhere, the marines at the hammock nettings and in the tops, the firemen unreeled their hoses and worked the yoke of their machines to dampen the decks. Boys scattered sand or stood ready with their cartridge boxes. The activity died to an expectant hush. Each gun-captain's hand was raised. Rogers lifted his speaking trumpet. 'Run out the guns!'
The deck beneath Drinkwater's feet trembled as the gunners manned their tackles and hauled the heavy cannon out through the gun-ports.
With every man at his station, her yards braced to catch the quartering breeze and her charges safely tucked under her lee, Antigone entered The Sound. Drinkwater indulged Rogers in a final look round the upper deck while he studied the ramparts of Cronbourg less than a mile away. Through his glass he could see the tiny dots of heads beneath the gigantic swallow-tailed standard which rippled gallantly in the breeze. At this distance those men could not fail to remark the belligerent preparedness of the British cruiser. Denmark was a neutral state, but not therefore without influence upon international affairs. Her trade, particularly in the matter of naval stores, if directed towards the beleaguered fleets of France, could be damaging to the war-efforts of Great Britain. And since Napoleon had decreed that no European country, whether under the control of his legions or attempting to maintain a precarious neutrality, might trade with Britain, the British must treat her with suspicion.
'Ship cleared for action, sir.' The snap of Rogers's hunter made Drinkwater lower his glass.
'Very well. An improvement?'
'About the same, sir,' replied Rogers non-committally, and in a flash Drinkwater knew what he had been witness to, what had been going on under his very nose. He fixed his keen glance on the first lieutenant.
'I thought they were a trifle faster that time.'
He saw a hint of uncertainty in Rogers's eyes. 'Well, perhaps a trifle faster,' said Rogers grudgingly, and Drinkwater was certain his instinct was right. Between first lieutenant and the hands there existed a state of affairs exactly analogous to that between Britain and Denmark: a neutrality in which each warily sought out the weakness and the intentions of the other. Rogers, the first lieutenant, the all-powerful executive officer, was always ready to punish any gun-crew, yardarm party, or individual, whose standard was not in his opinion of the highest. Against him were pitted the people, hydra-headed but weak, vulnerable to some simple, silly slip, yet knowing that they had only to wait and the bottle would destroy the first lieutenant. The certainty of this knowledge came as a shock to Drinkwater and the colour drained from his face, leaving his eyes piercing in the intensity of their anger.
'By God, Sam,' he said softly through clenched teeth, 'I will not have you judge, lest you be judged yourself.' Rogers's glance fell as they were interrupted.
'I think we have not bared our fangs in vain, sir,' said Hill, stumping across the deck to draw Drinkwater's attention to the events unfolding on the starboard bow. Hill paused, sensing an open breach between captain and first lieutenant where he had anticipated only an exchange of remarks concerning the ship's internal routines. He coughed awkwardly. 'Beg pardon, sir, but ...'
'Yes, yes, I see them,' snapped Drinkwater and raising his glass once more, affected to ignore Rogers.
Standing out from Elsinore Road to the south of Cronbourg was a two-decked line-of-battle-ship, and astern of her a small frigate. They too were cramming on sail, coming in at an angle to Antigone's bow as though to intercept her.
'Their bearing's opening, sir,' offered Hill, coolly professional again, 'only slowly, but they'll not catch us.'
'Very well, Mr. Hill, but we ought not to outrun our charges.' Drinkwater nodded at the brigs, now some distance astern of them. The Danish warships would pass between Antigone and the two British merchantmen.
'Notified of our approach from the castle, I'll warrant,' remarked Hill.
'Yes.' Drinkwater subjected the two ships to a further scrutiny through his glass. The Danes had proved tough opponents in 1801, reluctant to surrender and forcing from Lord Nelson the remark that they played the hottest fire he had ever been under. The two Danish ships broke out their own studdingsails. He watched critically. It was well done.
'I thought we had buggered their damned fleet for them,' said Rogers with characteristic coarseness in an attempt to defuse the atmosphere between himself and Drinkwater.
'Apparently not,' Drinkwater replied as if nothing untoward had occurred, watching the ships as their respective courses converged. But Hill was right, the bearings of the Danes were drawing aft, showing that the Antigone was the faster ship. 'They've had six years to right the damage,' he said, turning to look again at the lumbering brigs on the larboard quarter. 'I don't like exposing our charges like this and I'm rather disposed to test their mettle ... Secure the guns where they are, Mr. Rogers,' he said with a sudden sharpness, 'and get the stuns'ls off her!'
Rogers began bellowing orders. Again Antigone seethed with activity. Whatever discontents might be running through her people, the chance of demonstrating their superiority as seamen before a mob of tow-haired Danes animated the ship. In a few minutes her studdingsails fluttered inboard.
'Clew up the courses!' Drinkwater ordered sharply, for he had not wanted anything to go wrong, or the Danes to put a shot across his bow, turning a voluntary act into a submissive one.
'Lower the t'gallants on the caps!' Antigone's speed slowed, yet she held her course and the hands were sent back to their battle-stations as the Danish warships came up, the frigate ranging out to larboard so that they overtook on either quarter.
Hill was looking at him anxiously.
'My God,' said Rogers to no one in particular, 'if they open fire now they will...' His voice trailed off as he wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. It was, Drinkwater noted, the gesture of a thirsty man.
'They are neutrals, gentlemen,' he said. 'They dare not fire upon us without provoking an act of war. They simply wish to demonstrate their readiness not to be intimidated on their own doorstep ... Just keep the men at their stations in silence if you please, Mr. Rogers, and perhaps we may yet surprise 'em,' Drinkwater added as an outbreak of chatter started up in the waist.
Drinkwater strode forward as the line-of-battle-ship ranged up on their starboard beam, her two tiers of guns also run out so that they dominated the much lower deck of the British frigate.
'Mr. Mount!' Drinkwater called to the marine officer.
'Sir?'
'Form your men in two divisions, facing outboard on either side, then bring 'em to attention.' 'Very good, sir.'
As the quarterdecks of the three ships drew level the marines stood rigid. Drinkwater casually mounted the starboard rail in the mizen rigging. He turned back inboard. 'Have the hands piped aloft to man the yards, Mr. Rogers.' He ignored the puzzled apprehension in Rogers's eyes and turned to the Danish ship, not two hundred feet away and stealing their wind. He doffed his hat in a wide sweep.
'Good day, sir!' he shouted.
A line of Danish officers regarded him and there was obviously some conferring going on on her quarterdeck. After a pause a junior officer was pushed up onto her rail.
'Gut morning, Capten. Vat ship is that, please?'
'His Britannic Majesty's frigate Antigone, upon a cruise with merchantmen in company, sir,' Drinkwater bawled back cheerfully.
'Ve hope you do not vish to stop Dansk ships, no?'
'My orders are to stop all ships carrying cargoes of war material to His Majesty's enemies. This policy is clearly stated in His Majesty's Orders in Council, sir, copies of which have been delivered to your Government's representatives in London.'
The Danish officer bent down, obviously in consultation with a senior, for he stood again. 'You are varned against stopping Dansk ships, Capten.'
'I shall carry out my orders, sir, as I expect you to maintain your neutrality!' He turned to Rogers: 'I want three hearty cheers when I call for 'em.'
He heard Rogers mutter 'Good God!' and turned again to the Dane. The big battleship was drawing ahead now and he could read her name across her stern: Princesse Sophia Frederica.
'Three cheers for His Majesty the King of Denmark! Hip! Hip! Hip!'
'Hooray ...' The three cheers ripped from over his head and Drinkwater jumped down from the rail.
'Now, Sam, let fall those courses, hoist the t'gallants and reset the stuns'ls!' He turned to the sailing master, standing by the wheel. 'Hold your course, Mr. Hill... Bye the bye, did you get the name of the frigate?' Drinkwater nodded to larboard.
'Aye, sir, Triton, twenty-eight guns.'
'Very well.' Drinkwater clasped his hands behind his back and offered up a silent prayer that his pride was not to be humbled in front of such witnesses. But he need not have worried. It was not merely his own pride that was at stake; some of the defiance in his tone had communicated itself to the hands. This was no longer a petty internal matter, no empty evolution at the behest of the first lieutenant, but a matter of national pride. Now the captain was handling the ship and they behaved as though they were in action and their very lives depended upon their smartness.
Antigone gathered speed as she again spread her wings. Her long jib-boom swung across the great square stern of the two-decker as she pointed closer to the wind. She began to overhaul the Danish ship to windward and with an amiable insouciance Drinkwater again waved his hat at the knot of officers who stared stolidly back at him.
The cheering provoked no response from the Danes.
'Miserable bastards,' remarked Rogers sullenly, coming aft as the studdingsail halliards were coiled down. In their wake the Danish battleship hauled her wind and put about, turning back towards her anchorage off Elsinore.
Triton kept them company as far as the island of Hven, then she too put about and the incident was over. To larboard the Scanian coast of Sweden lay in the distance, while closer to starboard the coast of Zealand fell away to a low-lying, pastoral countryside dotted with church towers and white farms. Astern of Antigone the two brigs followed in their wake, while ten miles ahead, faintly blue in the distance, the spires of Copenhagen broke the skyline. The British frigate and her small convoy entered the Baltic Sea.
Mr. James Quilhampton peered over the ship's side and watched the little bobbing black jolly-boat, from the nearer of the two brigs, hook neatly onto the frigate's main chains. The man in her stern relinquished the tiller, stepped lightly upon a thwart and, skilfully judging the boat's motion, leapt for the man-ropes and the wooden battens that formed a ladder up the frigate's tumblehome. He was met by midshipman Lord Walmsley and Quilhampton straightened up as the man, hatless despite the cold and in plain civilian dress, strode aft.
'Good morning, Lieutenant,' he said in the rolling accent of Northumbria.
'Good morning, Captain Young,' responded Quilhampton civilly. 'I have informed Captain Drinkwater of your approach and here he comes now.'
Drinkwater mounted the quarterdeck ladder and cast a swift and instinctive glance round the horizon. Antigone and the two brigs lay hove-to on a smooth grey sea which was terminated to the north and east by an ice-field that seemed at first to stretch to the horizon itself. But beyond it to the east lay the faint blue line of land, a low country of unrelieved flatness, almost part of the sea itself.
'Captain Young,' said Drinkwater cordially, taking the strong hand and wincing with the power of its grip. His right arm already ached from the cold seeping into the mangled muscles of his wounded shoulder and Young's rough treatment did nothing to ease it. 'I give you good day. I take it that you and Captain Baker and your ships' companies are well?'
'Why aye, man. As fit as when we left London River.'
'What d'you make of this ice?' Drinkwater disengaged his arm from Young's eager, pump-handle grasp and gestured eastward.
'The Pregel Bar is not more than two leagues distant, Captain Drinkwater. It is unlikely that the ice will last more than another sennight.' He smiled. 'Why, man, Baker and I'll be drinking schnapps in Konigsberg by mid-month.'
"You think the ice in the Frisches Haff will have cleared by then?'
'Aye, man. Once thaw sets in 'twill soon clear.'
'In view of the presence of ice I think it better that I should remain with you. You might have need of my protection yet.'
'As you wish, Captain.'
'You have your instructions as to the formalities necessary to the discharging of your arms and ammunition?'
'Aye, Captain.' Young smiled again. 'You may allay your fears on that score. They will not fall into the wrong hands.'
'Very well. But I could wish for more positive assurances. News from the shore that Konigsberg is not in danger from the French...'
'No, Captain, I doubt there's any fear o' that. At Vinga we heard that Boney's had both his eyes blacked proper by them Russians. You've no need to fear that Konigsberg's a French port.'
'Let's hope you are right,' said Drinkwater.
'What about your own cargo, Captain Drinkwater?' Young asked.
'Eh? Oh. You know about that do you?'
'Of course,' Young chuckled, 'have you ever known a secret kept along a waterfront?'
Drinkwater shook his head. 'I have to deliver it to Revel but, as you can see, the ice prevents me for the time being.' He attempted to divert the conversation. He had no business discussing such matters with Young. 'What will you do once you have discharged your lading at Konigsberg?'
'Coast up to Memel and see what Munro has for us.'
'Munro?' asked Drinkwater absently.
'A Scottish merchant who acts as my agent at Memel. He and I have been associates in the way of business for as many years as I've owned and commanded the Jenny Marsden. The rogue married a pretty Kurlander at whom I once set my own cap.' Young grinned and Drinkwater reflected that there was a world as intimately connected with the sea as his own, but about which he knew next to nothing.
'The trade and its disappointments seem to keep you in good humour, Captain Young.'
'Aye, and in tolerable good pocket,' Young added familiarly. 'We had better anchor then . ..'
'Aye, Baker and I will work our way inshore a little, if you've a mind to close in our wake.'
'It won't be the first time I've worked a ship through ice, Captain,' said Drinkwater returning Young's ready smile. 'Mr. Q! Have the kindness to see Captain Young to his boat.' He could not avoid having his wrist wrenched again by the genial Northumbrian and felt compelled to dispel his anxiety by more of the man's good-natured company. It would do him no harm to learn more of the Baltic for he might yet have the convoy of the whole homeward trade at the close of the season. 'Perhaps you and Baker would do me the honour of dining with me this afternoon, Captain. 'Tis a plain table, but...'
'None the worse for that, I'm sure. That's damned civil of ye, Captain Drinkwater. And I'll be happy to accept.'
'Very well. Ah, Mr. Q ...'
As the little jolly-boat pulled away, Drinkwater raised his hat to Young and then, his curiosity aroused after the conversation, he fished in his tail-pocket for the Dollond glass and levelled it at the distant smudge of land. The sand-spit that separated the open sea from the great lagoon of the Frisches Haff was pierced at its northern end, allowing the River Pregel to flow into the Baltic. Twenty miles inland lay the great fortress and cathedral city of Konigsberg, once the home of the Teutonic knights and later a powerful trading partner in the Hanseatic League. Now it was the most eastern possession of the King of Prussia and the only one, it seemed, that contained a Prussian garrison of any force to maintain King Frederick William's tenuous independence from Napoleon. As such it formed an important post on the lines of communication between Russia and the Tsar's armies in Poland, a depot for Bennigsen's commissariat and the obvious destination for one hundred and sixty thousand muskets, with bayonets, cartridge and ball to match.
'Beg pardon, sir, but the brigs are hauling their mainyards.'
Mr. Quilhampton recalled Drinkwater from his abstraction. He shut the glass with a snap, aware that he had seen nothing through it apart from grey sea, ice and the blue line of a featureless country. It seemed odd that history was being made there, among what looked no more substantial than a streak or two of cobalt tint from Mr. Frey's watercolour box.
'Filling their sails, eh, Mr. Q? Very well. Do you do likewise. And you may pass word to rouse up a cable and bend it onto the best bower. We shall fetch an anchor when those two fellows show us some good holding.'
Captain Young's forecast proved accurate. Within a few days the ice began to melt and disperse with dramatic rapidity. A soft wind blew from the south-east, bringing off the land exotic fragrances and stray birds that chirruped as they fluttered, exhausted, in the rigging. From here the boys were sent aloft to chase them off and prevent them fouling the white planking of Antigone's decks. The relative idleness of the enforced anchorage served to rest the men, settling those new-pressed into a more regular routine than the demands of passage-making allowed, and Drinkwater detected a lessening of tension about the ship. His warning to Rogers seemed to have been heeded and he felt able to relax, to consider that their earlier problems had been part of the inevitable shaking-down necessary to the beginning of every cruise.
As the ice broke up, the three ships moved closer to the estuary, and ten days after their first anchoring, Drinkwater began to send boat expeditions away to determine the effect of the thaw upon the fresher waters of the Frisches Haff. A few days later local fishing boats appeared and then there were signs of coastal craft beyond the sand-spit that was in sight of them now. And then, quite sudenly and with unexpected drama, proof came that confirmed that navigation was open up the Pregel to the quays of Konigsberg itself. While Drinkwater was breakfasting one morning an excited Midshipman Wickham burst into his cabin with the news that a large and 'important-looking barge' was coming off from the shore. Hurriedly swallowing his coffee, Drinkwater donned hat and cloak and went on deck.
Lieutenant Fraser had already caught sight of the unmistakable flash of scarlet under a flung-back grey cape and the ostentatiously upright figure of a military officer standing in the big boat's stern. He had had the presence of mind to man the side, Drinkwater noted, as he joined Fraser at the entry.
'My congratulations, Mr. Fraser,' he said drily. 'Your vigilance has improved remarkably'
'Thank ye, sir,' replied the Scotsman, sensing the captain's good humour, 'but to be truthful I think yon gentleman was of a mind to draw attention to himself.'
'Yes.' Drinkwater nodded and stared curiously at the approaching stranger. 'He seems to be British, and in full regimentals,' he remarked as the boat came alongside below their line of vision.
A twitching of the baize-covered man-ropes, and then the cockerel plumes, bicorne hat and figure of a British colonel rose above the rail to a twittering of pipes, stamp of marines' boots and the wicked twinkle of sunshine upon Mount's flourished hanger. The officer saluted and Drinkwater tipped his own hat in response.
'Good morning, sir. This is an unlooked-for pleasure. Permit me to introduce myself. Captain Nathaniel Drinkwater of His Britannic Majesty's thirty-six-gun frigate Antigone.'
The newcomer managed a small, sharp bow. 'Your servant, sir. Robert Wilson, Colonel in His Britannic Majesty's Service, attached to the headquarters of His Imperial Majesty's armies in Poland and East Prussia.' He held out a paper of accreditment taken from his cuff and stared about him with an intelligent and professional interest.
Drinkwater gave the pass a cursory glance and said, 'Perhaps we should adjourn to my cabin, Colonel Wilson ...' 'Delighted, Captain ...'
The two men went below leaving an air of unsatisfied curiosity among the men on deck.
In the cabin, as Mullender poured two glasses of wine, Drinkwater checked Wilson's pass with more thoroughness. 'Please be seated, Colonel Wilson,' he said and then handed back the document with a nod. 'Thank you. How may I be of service?'
'You have two brigs with you, sir. The Nancy and the ... Jenny Marsden. They are filled with a consignment of arms and ammunition for the Russian army, are they not?'
'They are indeed, Colonel,' said Drinkwater, relieved that Wilson had come off to assume responsibility for them. 'Are you intending to see them to their destination at Konigsberg?'
'I shall do what I can, though Russian methods can be damnably dilatory'
'Then I am doubly glad to see you.' Drinkwater smiled, 'And I'd welcome reliable news of the action we heard had been fought in February. I have been concerned as to the accuracy of the reports I had from the Swedes and the safety of such a shipment if left at Konigsberg.'
Wilson stretched his long legs and relaxed in his chair. 'You need have no fear, Captain. The Russian outposts confront the French all along the line of the Passage. They have not moved since Eylau...'
'So they were held?
'The French? Oh, good God, yes! Had they been under Suvoroff, well...' Wilson sipped his wine and shrugged. 'Were you there?'
'At Eylau, yes. The Russians fought with great stubbornness and although Bennigsen left the field the French had been fought to a standstill; Boney himself had had the fright of his life and the Grand Army were dying in heaps pour la gloire. Their cavalry were magnificent of course, but even Murat was powerless to break the Russkies.'
'Will Bennigsen complete the matter when you come out of winter quarters?'
'Bennigsen? Perhaps. He's a German and unpopular with many of the Russian-born officers who will want some of the credit if a victory's to be had; but they're only too happy to blame a scapegoat if they're defeated. Bennigsen's competent enough, and he's close to the Tsar.'
'How so?' asked Drinkwater, fascinated by Wilson, whose close contacts with the Russians were interesting to him on both a professional and a personal level.
'Bennigsen was one of the officers present when Alexander's father, Tsar Paul, met his end in the Mikhailovsky Palace. It is said that Bennigsen was the first man to lay his hands on the Tsar. Outside the room was the Tsarevich Alexander, who happened to be Colonel-in-Chief of the Semenovsky Regiment which stood guard that night. Not an attractive story, but Alexander's complicity is well known. Paul was a highly dangerous man. Apart from his secret accord with Bonaparte, he was a vicious and cruel monster. Alexander, on the other hand, nurtures ideal views on kingship.' Wilson tossed off his glass and Drinkwater refilled it.
'Your post is a curious and fascinating one, Colonel. Tell me, what is your candid opinion of the likelihood of the Russians finally trouncing Bonaparte?'
Wilson raised his eyebrows in speculative arches. 'I know that's what your friend Lord Dungarth wants, hence the arms and the specie you have below ...'
Drinkwater coughed into his wine and looked up sharply. 'You know a great deal, Colonel Wilson. What the devil makes you say Lord Dungarth is my friend?'
'Well, he is, ain't he?' replied Wilson. 'That's why you are here, Captain Drinkwater, as I understand it.'
Drinkwater assumed an air of sudden caution. Stories of murder and intrigue from St Petersburg were all very well, but Colonel Robert Wilson figured nowhere in his instructions from the Admiralty. 'I have my orders, Colonel Wilson, respecting the specie about which you seem to know everything. I am directed to hand it over at Revel to Lord Leveson-Gower in his diplomatic capacity as Ambassador to St Petersburg and not to yourself.'
'My dear sir,' said Wilson smoothly, crossing his legs, 'that ain't what I mean at all, damn me. I assumed that it was you as had been given this assignment in view of your unusual personal connections hereabouts.'
Drinkwater felt the colour leave his face. Surely Wilson could not know about his brother? The feeling that, in some way, providence would make him expiate his guilt for Edward's escape from justice suddenly overwhelmed him. It was an irrational fear that had haunted his subconscious for six years. 'What the devil do you mean?'
Drinkwater's extraordinary reaction had not escaped Wilson, but he had not thought it caused by guilt.
'Come, Captain Drinkwater, I think you need not alarm yourself. I have myself been, if not directly employed by Lord Dungarth's Secret Department like yourself, connected with it in view of my duties here. I am frankly amazed that my presence surprises you. Were you not told? Is it not part of your orders to liaise with any British agents in the field?'
'In so far as I am permitted to discuss my orders, Colonel, I can only shake my head to that question,' Drinkwater said cautiously.
'Some damnable back-sliding between the Horse-Guards and the Admiralty I don't doubt. A confounded clerk that's forgotten to copy a memorandum, or lost a note he was supposed to deliver.' Wilson smote his thigh with a relatively good-natured and contemptuous acceptance. 'Still, that's as may be. Then your orders, after you've turned your convoy and your specie over, are those usual to a cruiser, eh?'
Drinkwater nodded. 'Watch and prey is the formula off Brest, but here 'tis tread the decks of neutrals without upsetting anyone. A difficult task at the best of times.'
'Then you had better know more, Captain, in case we want you...'
'We?'
'Yes. Doubtless Lord Leveson-Gower will have something to say to you, but there are men in the field whom I will advise of your presence on the coast. Should they want swift communication with London they will be looking out for you. Often a frigate is the best and safest way. Chief among them is Colin Mackenzie. Whatever names he uses in his work he is not ashamed to own Ross-shire ancestry on his father's side, though what his mother was only his father knows. I would advise you offer him whatever assistance he might require. There is another man, a Captain Ostroff, in the Russian service. Both these fellows use a cryptogramic code for their dispatches — I am sure you are familiar with the type of thing — and all are sent to Joseph Devlieghere, Merchant of Antwerpen ...'
'The clearing house ...'
'Yes. And for all I know, where Bonaparte's people open 'em up before popping them into a Harwich shrimp-tub together with a keg or two of Holland’s gin. The way Paris seems to know what's going on is astounding. That man Fouche is diabolical ... You smile, Captain...'
'Only because he outwits us, Colonel,' said Drinkwater drily. 'If he was one of our fellows he would be considered brilliant.'
'True,' said Wilson smiling.
'I understand. I shall, of course, do what I can, but I assure you I have had no direct orders from Lord Dungarth, nor have I executed any commission for him since April last year.' Drinkwater refilled the glasses, then went on, 'But tell me, if you are confident about Russian prospects, why all this anxiety about agents? Indeed you did not fully answer my question about the military situation.'
'No more I did.' Wilson sipped his wine, considered a moment, then said, 'It is not entirely true to say the situation is static. With Napoleon in the field any thoughts of immobility can be discounted. Colberg and Dantzig have been invested and may fall to the French any day; that much we must expect. Marshal Mortier is occupying our supposed allies, the Swedes, before Stralsund, in Pomerania...' Wilson shrugged, 'Who knows what might happen. As to the main theatre here, well ... I will give Boney one last throw. He is a damned long way from Paris. He's been absent for a year and when the cat's away we all know what the mice get up to. Bennigsen gave him a drubbing. He can't afford to retreat, either politically or militarily. But then he can't risk a defeat which the Russkies are quite capable of giving him. My guess is a battle of his own choosing and a big stake on a single hand.'
Drinkwater digested this. 'I should not care to bear such a responsibility,' he said slowly.
'No more would I,' said Wilson tossing off his glass and making to stand. 'The Russians are a rum lot, to be sure. Touchy, secretive and suspicious, but brave as lions when it comes to a fight.' He rose and looked pensively round the cabin. 'You seem to have a little piece of England here, Captain.' Drinkwater smiled and drained his own glass. 'The other man's grass always appears a little greener.'
Wilson rose. 'The sooner you deliver your specie to Revel, Captain, the better. My stock at Imperial headquarters may rise a little and I may be less importuned and accused of British lassitude. The Russians are constantly asking why we do not send troops to their assistance. Money and arms seem to disappear without effect.'
'God knows it costs enough without our having to fight their battles for them!' Drinkwater said indignantly.
'Ah, the pernicious income tax!'
'I was not thinking merely of the money, Colonel.' Drinkwater gestured vaguely around him. 'It is not merely ships that make up the navy. It takes many men. Do the Russians not appreciate that?'
Wilson raised his eyebrows, his expression one of amused cynicism, and, pulling himself upright, caught his head on the deck beam above. Wincing, he said, 'They are a land-power, Captain. We cannot expect them to understand.' He extended his hand.
'Let us hope,' said Drinkwater, shaking hands, 'that you and Bennigsen finish the business. Then we can enjoy our next glass together in London.'
'A cheering and worthy sentiment, Captain Drinkwater, and one that I endorse with all my heart.'
Drinkwater accompanied Wilson on deck and saw him over the side. He watched as the barge was pulled across to Young's brig, the Jenny Marsden. Wilson looked back once and waved. Drinkwater acknowledged the valediction then turned to the officer of the watch. 'Well, Mr. Fraser ...'
'Sir?'
'Not all the lobsters strut about St James's. Now do you prepare to get the ship under weigh.'
'It comes on to blow, Mr. Q!' Drinkwater clamped his hat more securely on his head. 'You were quite right to call me.' He staggered as Antigone's deck heeled to the thump of a heavy sea. The wave surged past them as the stern lifted and the bow dropped again, its breaking crest hissing with wind-driven fury as it was torn into spume.
'We must put about upon the instant! Call all hands!'
'Aye, aye, sir!' Quilhampton shouted forward and the bosun's mate of the watch began to pipe at the hatchways, then he turned back to the captain who had crossed the heeling deck to glance at the compass in the binnacle. I've had Walmsley aloft this past hour and there's no passage as yet...'
Drinkwater moved to the rail, grasped a stay and stared to leeward as Antigone lay down under the sudden furious onslaught of a squall. Through his hand he could feel the vibration of the wind in the frigate's rigging, feel the slackness in the rope as it bowed to leeward. He wiped his eyes and stared across the white-streaked water that heaved and boiled in the short, savage seas that were the result of comparatively shallow water and a quickly risen gale. The rim of the sea terminated, not at the skyline, but in a line of ice.
'Damned unseasonable,' Drinkwater muttered — unconsciously rubbing his shoulder which ached from damp and the chill proximity of the ice — while he considered the effect of the gale on the sea. It occurred to him that it might bring warmer air to melt the ice, and the thought cheered him a little, for it was clear that until the ice retreated further northwards any hope of reaching Revel was out of the question.
Drinkwater left Quilhampton to tack the ship. The frigate came round like a jibbed horse, her backed fore-yards spinning her high-stabbing bowsprit against the last shreds of daylight in the west.
'Mains'l haul!' The blocks clicked and rattled and the men hauled furiously, running the lee braces aft as the main- and mizen-yards spun round on their parrels.
'Pull together there, damn you!' Comley roared, his rattan active on the hapless backs of a gaggle of men who stumbled along the larboard gangway.
'That's well with the main-braces! Belay! Belay there!'
'Fore-braces! Leggo and haul!' The fore-yards swung and Antigone gathered headway on the starboard tack.
'A trifle more on that weather foretack there! That's well! Belay!'
He stepped up to the binnacle, then looked at the shivering edge of the main-topsail. 'Full and bye now, lads,' he said quietly to the four men at the frigate's double wheel, and the overseeing quartermaster acknowledged the order.
'She's full an' bye now, so she is.'
'Very well.' He turned to Drinkwater. 'She's holding sou' by east a quarter east, sir.'
'Very well. Mr. Q! Do you shorten down for the night. We'll keep her under easy sail until daylight.'
'Aye, aye, sir!'
Drinkwater watched patiently from his place by the weather hance, one foot on the little brass carronade slide that he had brought from the Melusine. The big fore-course, already reefed down, was now hauled up in its buntlines and secured, forty men laying out along the great yard to secure the heavy, resistant canvas. When they came down it was almost dark. They were waiting for the order to pipe down.
'Mr. Quilhampton!'
'Sir?'
'Pass word for Mr. Comley to lay aft.'
'Aye, aye, sir.' The lieutenant turned to Walmsley. 'Mr. Walmsley, cut along and pass word for the bosun to lay aft and report to the Captain.'
'Aye, aye, sir.'
Lord Walmsley made his way along the lee gangway to the fo'c's'le where Mr. Comley stood, the senior and most respected seaman in the ship, at his post of honour on the knightheads. 'Mr. Comley!'
'Mr. Walmsley, what can I do for you?'
'The Captain desires that you attend him on the quarterdeck.'
'Eh?' Comley looked aft at the figure of Drinkwater, shadowy in the gathering gloom. 'What the devil does he want me on the King's parade for?' he muttered, then nodding to Walmsley he walked aft.
'You sent for me, sir?'
Drinkwater stared at Comley. Hitherto he had never had the slightest doubt that Comley's devotion to duty was absolute. 'Have you anything to report, Mr. Comley?'
'To report, sir? Why ... no, sir.'
'The four men at the lee main-brace, Mr. Comley — Kissel, Hacking, Benson and Myers, if I ain't mistaken — are they drunk?' 'Er...'
'Damn it, man, you'd do well not to try and hide it from me.'
Comley looked at the captain, his expression anxious. 'I, er, I wouldn't say they was drunk, sir. Happen they slipped ...'
'Mr. Comley, I can have them here in an instant. They are all prime seamen. They didn't slip, sir. Now, I will ask you again, are they drunk?'
Comley sighed and nodded. 'It's possible, sir. I... I didn't know until ... well when they slipped and I got close to 'em. I could smell they might be in liquor, sir.'
'Very well, Mr. Comley.' Drinkwater changed his tone of voice. 'Would you answer two questions without fear. Why are they drunk and why did you not report it?'
Even in the twilight Drinkwater could see the dismay on Comley's face. 'Come, sir,' he said, 'you may answer without fear. And be quick about it, the watch below are waiting for you to pipe 'em down.'
'Well, sir, beggin' your pardon, sir, but the men ain't too happy, sir ... It's nothing much, sir, we ain't asking no favours, but we ... that is the old Melusines, we was volunteers, sir, back in the year three. Now we're all shipped with pressed men an' quota-men, men that ain't prime seamen, no, nor don't take no shame from that fact, sir; and the length of the commission and there bein' no pay last time at the Nore, sir, and the men beginning to run...' His voice faded miserably.
'Personal discontent is not a crime, Mr. Comley. I too should like to go home, but we have not yet destroyed our enemies ... Be that as it may, you have not answered my question. Why did you not report it?'
Drinkwater could see a gathering of pale and expectant faces staring aft, waiting to be dismissed from the tasks they had been called on deck to carry out. All hands were witness to Mr. Comley's talk with the captain.
'I don't want no trouble, sir... that's all...'
'I understand that, Mr. Comley...' Drinkwater saw Comley's eyes slide across to the figure of the first lieutenant whom, he realised with a sharp feeling of guilt, he had not noticed on deck until that moment. Comley's predicament was obvious. He was supposed to report all misdemeanours direct to Rogers, but Rogers had not been on deck. No doubt Comley, if he really had intended to report the four men, would have let the matter blow over, since the first lieutenant had failed to answer the call for all hands. Rogers's strictness was well known and in that game of each trying to catch out the other, first lieutenant and crew had developed a subtlety of play that Drinkwater was only just beginning to grasp. Even now Comley's stuttering excuses, although they might be understood as the genuine, if ill-expressed, discontent of the best and oldest hands on board, were evidence of a game that became increasingly deadly with every round.
Drinkwater thrust his own culpability out of his mind for a moment or two. Although Rogers's absence had compromised Comley in the strict line of his duty, it had given a round to the hands. That much was obvious to all of them as they stood there in the twilight watching. And now Rogers was compromising Drinkwater, for it was clear that the first lieutenant was the worse for drink. In a second Drinkwater would be compelled to take very public notice of Rogers's condition; and at the moment he wanted to avoid that. He affected not to have noticed Rogers.
'Mr. Comley,' he said with every appearance of ferocity, 'I'll not have the ship go to the devil for any reason. D'you clearly understand me?'
His tone diverted Comley's eyes from the person of Rogers to himself.
'Aye, aye, sir.'
'I hold you personally responsible. It's your duty to report such things, and if you can't I'll turn you forrard and find someone who can!' He paused, just long enough to let the words sink in. 'Now have those four men confined in the bilboes overnight and pipe down the watches below.'
'Aye, aye, sir.'
Drinkwater left the deck as Comley put the silver call to his mouth. The captain was raging inwardly, furious with Rogers and himself, himself most of all for his self-delusion that all was well on board. The marine sentry held himself upright at what passed for attention on the heeling deck as Drinkwater stalked past him.
'Pass word for the first lieutenant and the marine officer!' he snapped, banging the door behind him.
Mullender was fussing about in the cabin. 'Why aren't you on deck, Mullender? Eh? Ain't the call at every hatchway enough for you? Don't you hear properly, damn it? The call was for all hands, Mullender!'
'But, sir, the first lieut...'
'Get out!' It was no good Drinkwater making Mullender the surrogate for his anger. The unfortunate steward fled, scuttling out through the pantry. Drinkwater flung off his cloak, massaged his shoulder and groaned aloud. The damp was searching out the old wound given him long ago by the French agent Santhonax in an alley at Sheerness and made worse by a shell-wound off Boulogne. It reminded him that his cross was already heavy enough, without the added burden of Rogers and the fomentation of an exhausted crew. The pain, resentment and momentary self-pity only fuelled his anger further and when Mount and Rogers came into the cabin they found him sitting in the darkness, staring out through the stern windows where the heaving grey sea hissed and bubbled up from the creaking rudder and as suddenly dropped away again.
'Gentlemen,' he said after a pause and without turning round, 'the men are in an evil mood. The grievances are the usual ones and most are justified. Mr. Mount, your own men must be aware of the situation, but I want them to be on their guard. Any reports of meeting, combinations ... the usual thing, Mr. Mount. Make sure the sentinels are well checked by your sergeant, and change their postings. I know they've enough to do watching the specie but I'll not have a mutiny, by God I'll not!'
He turned on them, unwilling to let them see the extent of his anger. A light wavered in the pantry door and Mullender stood uncertainly with the cabin lamps he had obviously been preparing when Drinkwater threw him out. 'Yes, yes, bring them in and ship 'em in the sconces for God's sake, man!' He looked at Mount, 'You understand, don't you, Mr. Mount?'
'Yessir!'
'Very good. Carry on!' 'Sir.'
Mullender and Mount both left the cabin and Drinkwater was alone with Rogers who remained standing, one arm round the stanchion that rose immediately forward of the table.
'Well, sir,' said Drinkwater, looking upwards at Rogers, 'it was ever your dictum to flog a man for every misdemeanour. I have apprehended four men drunk at their stations tonight. Had you been on deck you might have attended to the matter yourself, as you are in duty bound. Had you brought those men to the gratings tomorrow I would have had to flog 'em. But now your conduct has ensured that if I am to flog them I must, in all justice, flog you, sir! Yes, you, sir! And hold your tongue! Not only are you in liquor but you prevented my steward from mustering on deck as he should have done. Why that was I'll forbear enquiring, but if it was to obtain the key to the spirit-room, by God I'll have you broke by a court martial!'
Drinkwater paused. There was a limit in the value of remonstrance with a drunken man. Either rage or self-pity would emerge and neither was conducive to constructive dialogue. Rogers showed sudden and pathetic signs, not of the former, as Drinkwater had expected, but of the latter. Drinkwater had had more than enough for one day and dismissed Rogers as swiftly as possible.
'Get to bed, Mr. Rogers, and when you are sober in the morning, be pleased to take notice of what I have said.'
Rogers stepped forward as though to speak, but the ship's movement, exaggerated here at the stern, checked him and the lamps threw a cautionary glint into Drinkwater's grey eyes. In a sudden access of movement Rogers turned and fled.
Samuel Rogers woke in the night, his head thick and his mouth dry He lay staring into the creaking darkness as the ship rose and fell, riding out the last of the gale under her reefed topsails and awaiting the morning. The events of the previous evening came back to him slowly. The pounding of his headache served to remind him of his folly and, once again, he swore he would never touch another drop. He recalled the interview with Drinkwater and felt his resolve weaken, countered by his deep-seated resentment towards the captain. They were of an age; once a few days had differentiated them in their seniority as lieutenants. Now there was a world of difference between them! Drinkwater a post-captain, two steps ahead of Rogers and across the magic threshold that guaranteed him a flag if he lived long enough to survive his seniors on the captains' list.
It was convenient for Rogers, in the depths of his misery, to forget that it was Drinkwater himself who had rescued him from the gutter. Samuel Rogers was no different from hundreds of other officers in the navy. He had no influence, no fortune, no family. Fate had never put him into a position in which he could distinguish himself and he lacked that spark of originality by which a man might, by some instinctive alchemy of personality, ability and opportunity, make his own luck. To some extent Rogers's very sense of obligation fired his steady dissolution; his jealousy of Drinkwater's success robbed him of any of his own. In his more honest moments he knew he had only two choices. Either he went to the devil on the fastest horse, or he pulled himself together and hoped for a change of luck. In the meantime he should do his duty as Drinkwater had advised and the consideration that he was on a crack frigate under an able officer seemed to offer some consolation. But after that one drink that was all he needed to settle himself, the axis of his rationality tilted. After the inevitable second drink it lost its equilibrium, leaving him ugly with ill-temper, inconsiderate and tyrannical towards the gunroom, cockpit and lower deck.
As he lay in the darkness, while above him the bells rang the middle watch through the night, he knew that some form of turning-point had been reached. Up until that moment his drunkenness had not come to Drinkwater's attention. Until that had happened, Drinkwater was simply the captain, a man of influence and advantage, one of the lucky ones in life's eternal lottery seen from the perspective of one of its losers. Now, however, the captain assumed a new role. His power, absolute and unfettered, could confront Rogers and demolish his alcoholic arrogance with fear.
For although the service had disappointed him, Rogers had nothing beyond the navy. If he was broken by a court martial as remorse said he deserved to be, he would have only himself to blame. The penury of half-pay in some stinking kennel of lodgings alongside the whores and usurers of Portsmouth Point was all that disgrace and dismissal would leave him with.
He lay in his night-shirt, sweat sticking it to his body, staring into the darkness of his tiny cabin. Loneliness possessed him in its chill and unconsoling embrace as he knew that, come the morning, he would be unable to resist the drinks that even now he swore he would never touch again.
Drinkwater was on deck at dawn. He, too, had slept badly and woke ill-at-ease. He had not liked humiliating Rogers any more than discovering four men turned up drunk from their watch below. It was manifestly unfair to expect men who had more than a liberal amount of alcohol poured into them by official decree to offset the deficiencies of their diet, to remain as sober as Quakers, particularly in their watch below. But, Drinkwater reasoned, four drunkards probably indicated that a hardened group had illicit access to liquor. In addition to these men, Rogers was obviously abusing his own powers to gain access to the spirit-room. The addictive qualities of naval rum were well known and many a man, officer and rating alike, had died raving from its effects upon the brain. Furthermore it was possible that whoever was aiding and abetting the first lieutenant was probably taking advantage of the opportunity to plunder an equal quantity for the hardened soaks among the crew.
The thought tormented Drinkwater as he lay awake, shivering slightly as a faint lightening of the sky began to illumine the cabin. He abandoned his efforts to sleep, swung his legs out of the cot and began to dress. Ten minutes later he was on deck. The wind had eased during the night and the approaching daylight showed it to be backing. They would have to tack again soon, and stand more to the west-north-westward. Hill had the morning watch and, having passed instructions to tack at the change of watch, Drinkwater fell to pacing the quarterdeck.
His mind was in a turmoil. He loathed using the cat-o'-nine tails except for serious crimes. For most minor punishments, public humiliations and loss of privilege served to make a man regret his folly. Besides, it was Drinkwater's firm belief that a strong discipline, strictly enforced, prevented most men from overstepping the mark. At home he tired of debates with Elizabeth upon the subject. She considered his rule illiberal, but failed to understand the cauldron of suppression that a man-o'-war on a long commission became: some ten score of men whose only reason for existence was to pull and haul, to hand, reef and steer, to load and ram and fetch and carry and fight when called upon to do so, in the name of a half-witted old king and a country that cared more about the nags and fillies of Newmarket than their seamen.
Drinkwater's anger grew as he paced up and down. It was Rogers's business to manage this motley mixture of seamen, this polyglot collection of the 'jolly-jack tars' of popular imagination, who were everywhere shunned once they got ashore among the gentry of the shires. It was a simple enough matter, if attended to sensibly. The might of the Articles of War stopped the poor devils from being men and turned them into pack-animals deserving of a little attention. God knew they asked little enough! Damn Rogers! He had no business behaving like this, no business prejudicing the whole commission because he could not leave the bottle alone!
Little Midshipman Frey skidded across the deck on some errand for the master.
'Mr. Frey!' he called, and the lad turned expectantly. 'Mr. Frey, give my compliments to the surgeon and ask him to step on deck as soon as he can.'
'Aye, aye, sir.'
Drinkwater stared grimly after the retreating figure. It was not yet time for Mr. Lallo to be called. He was one of the ship's idlers, men whose work occupied them during daylight hours and absolved them from night duty except in dire emergencies. From his eventual appearance it was obvious Drinkwater's summons had called him from the deepest slumber. Drinkwater was suddenly touched by envy of the man, that he could so sleep without the interference of troublesome thoughts.
'You sent for me, sir?' Lallo suppressed a yawn with difficulty. 'Is there something amiss? Are you unwell?'
Drinkwater turned outboard, inviting Lallo's confidence at the rail. 'The matter is not to become common gossip, Mr. Lallo.'
Lallo frowned.
'The first lieutenant... I want you to have him confined quietly in his cabin for a day or two, starve him of liquor and convince him it is in his own best interests. Tell the gunroom he is sick. D'you understand?'
'Yes, I think so, sir. You want Mr. Rogers weaned from the bottle ...?'
'And quickly, Mr. Lallo, before he compels me to a less pleasant specific. I cannot hold my hand indefinitely. Once I am forced to recognise his true state then he is a ruined man. Quite ruined.'
'I cannot guarantee a cure, sir, I can only ...'
'Do your best, yes, yes, I know. But I am persuaded that a few days reflection may bring him to his senses. Do what you can.'
'Very well, sir.' Lallo sighed. ‘I fear it may be a violent business ...'
'I am sure that you will see to it, Mr. Lallo. And please remember that the matter is between the two of us.' 'The three of us, sir,' Lallo corrected.
'Yes, but it is my instructions that I want obeyed, damn it! Don't haze me with pettifoggin' quibbles and invocations of the Hippocratic oath. Rogers is half-way to the devil unless we save him,' Drinkwater said brusquely, turning away in dismissal.
'Very well, sir, but he is a big man ...'
He was startled by someone at his elbow.
'Beg pardon, zur, but your shaving water's getting cold in the cabin.'
Drinkwater nodded bleakly to his coxswain. He thought that Tregembo already knew of the strong words that had been passed between captain and first lieutenant the previous evening. Doubtless Mullender had let the ship's company know too, but that was unavoidable. He led Tregembo below.
Taking off cloak, coat and hat, and unwinding the muffler from his neck, he began to shave. 'Well, Tregembo ... what do they say?'
'The usual, zur.'
'Which is one law for the officers ...' 'And one for the hands, zur.'
'And what do they expect me to do about it, eh?' He pulled his cheek tight and felt the razor rasp his skin. The water was already cold. He swirled the blade and scraped again.
'They are content that you are a gennelman, zur.'
Drinkwater smiled, despite his exasperation. It was a curious remark, designed to caution Drinkwater, to place upon him certain tacitly understood obligations. Only a man of Tregembo's unique relationship could convey such a subtlety so directly to the commander of a man-o'-war; while only an officer of Drinkwater's stamp would have taken notice of the genuine affection that lay beneath it. 'Then I am content to hear it, Tregembo.'
'There are four men in the bilboes, zur ...'
'Quite so, Tregembo.' The eyes of the two men met and Drinkwater felt forced to smile again. 'Life is like a ship, Tregembo.' He saw a puzzled look cloud the old man's face. 'Nothing ever stays still for long.'
Picking up the napkin he wiped the remaining lather from his face and held his hands out for his coat.
Drinkwater looked down at the faces of the ship's company assembled in the waist. They were the usual mixed bag, some thirteen score of men from all four corners of the world, but most from Britain and Ireland. There were the prime seamen, neat in their appearance, fit and energetic in their duties, those men for whom, in the purely professional sense, he had the highest regard. Yet they were no angels. Long service had taught them all the tricks of the trade. They knew when to 'lay Tom Cox's traverse' and avoid work, how to curry favour with the petty officers and where to get extra rations, tobacco or spirits in the underworld that flourished aboard every King's ship. Neither were they exclusively British or Irish. There was at least one Yankee, on board a British ship for a reason he alone knew though many suspected. There was also a Swede, two Finns and a negro whose abilities aloft were, within the little world of the Antigone, already part of legend. But the bulk of the frigate's people were made up of 'ordinary' seamen, waisters and landsmen, in a strictly descending order of hierarchy as rigid as its continuation upwards among the officers. It was a social order imposed by the uncompromising nature of the sea-service and extended in its inflexible formality from Drinkwater to the stumbling, idiotic lunatic whose only duty consisted of keeping the ship's lavatories clean. Each man had a clearly defined task at sea, at anchor, in action and during an emergency in which the strength of his arm and the stamina of his body were the reason for his existence.
They spread right across the beam of the ship, no further aft than the main-mast. Some ships bore a white line painted across their deck planking there, but not the Antigone. She had been acquired from the French and no such device had ever been added. They were perched in the boats on the booms, up on the rails and sitting on the hammock nettings. Men crowded into the lower ratlines of the main shrouds and all wore expressions of expectancy.
Between the untidy mob of 'the people', the midshipmen, master's mates and warrant officers occupied the neutral ground. Abaft them the files of marines made a hedge of fixed bayonets, cold steel ready for instant employment in defence of the commissioned officers.
The murmur of comment that noted the absence of Rogers subsided the instant Drinkwater's hat began to rise in the stairwell, but he heard it, as he was meant to. He strode to the binnacle and looked at the men and took his time, opening the punishment book with great deliberation, gauging the mood of the hands. He looked about him, checking that the helmsmen, quartermaster, sentinels and look-outs were at their stations.
'Bring up the prisoners!'
The ship's corporal guarding the four seamen with a drawn bayonet shoved them forward from the companionway. They stood miserably after a cramped night in the bilboes, their ankles sore from the chafing of the irons. They could expect, by common custom, three dozen lashes apiece. Drinkwater turned to Fraser and raised an eyebrow. 'Mr. Fraser ...' he reminded.
'Off hats!'
'Benson, Hacking, Kissel and Myers ...' Drinkwater read their names and then fixed the four guilty men with a baleful grey eye. He was not in the mood for the lugubrious formalities of the Articles of War with their dolorous recital of the punishment of death for each and every offence, scarcely suggesting that 'such lesser punishment' was ever employed in mitigation. 'You four men were drunk last night at the call for all hands ...' Drinkwater pitched the words forward so that they could all hear. 'If you had been topmen such conduct might have caused you to fall to your deaths. Indeed you might have killed others. Understand that I will not tolerate drunkenness...' he looked from the four wretches in front of him and raked the whole assembly, officers included, with his eyes,'... from anyone, irrespective of station. At the next occurrence I shall punish to the very extremity of the regulations.'
He turned to the four prisoners. 'You four men are stopped all grog until further notice. Mr. Pater,' he turned to the purser, 'do you see to it: no grog.'
'Aye, aye, sir.'
A murmur broke out amidships, but this time Fraser needed no prompting. 'Silence there!'
'Very well. Dismiss the ship's company, Mr. Fraser, and send Mr. Comley aft.'
Drinkwater stalked away and, tucking the punishment book in his pocket, grasped the taffrail with both hands and stared astern. Behind him Fraser ordered the ship's company to disperse and they did so in noisy disorder, only the measured tramp of the marines' boots conveying the impression of discipline. A few minutes later Comley appeared.
'You sent for me, sir?'
'Yes.' Drinkwater turned and faced the bosun. 'I shall flog on the next occasion, Mr. Comley, be quite certain of that.' 'Yes, sir.'
'You must see to it that it ain't necessary'
'Very well, sir. Them four men'll suffer more from loss o'grog...'
'A flogging still hurts 'em, Mr. Comley, and I'd not have any of them thinking I've no stomach for it. You do understand, don't you?'
Comley looked at the captain. He was not used to being intimate with Drinkwater twice in two days, preferring his daily encounters with the first lieutenant. He had the measure of Mr. Rogers who was no different from half-a-hundred first luffs in the navy. He had seen the captain in action and heard more of him from his old Cornish coxswain. For all that a shrewd cockney knew that a Kurnowic man could spin a lie like an Irishman and make it sound like the unvarnished truth, there was something in Drinkwater's eyes that bade Comley take care.
'I understand, sir,' he said hurriedly.
'Very well. And now, Mr. Comley,' said Drinkwater more brightly, 'I want you to put it about the hands that there'll be a good-conduct payment at the end of this cruise, payable in cash ... do close your mouth there's a good fellow.'
Comley did as he was bid, but stared after the retreating figure of the captain as he was left standing thunderstruck by the taffrail.
'Did you hear that, soldier?' he asked the marine whose sentry post was across the frigate's stem, ready to hurl a lifebuoy at any man who went overboard.
'Does that include the sojers, Bose?'
'I dunno,' ruminated Comley.
'He's a rum bastard,' offered the marine.
'He is that,' said Comley, going forward with the extraordinary news.
Mr. Lallo stared unhappily at the snoring figure in the cot. Inert, Lieutenant Rogers seemed even larger than the surgeon remembered him when standing. If he woke now, what the devil did one say to him?
'Please, Mr. Rogers, the captain says you're a drunken oaf and would you be so kind as to keep quietly to your cabin for a day or so. After you have rested and your body has acclimatised itself to no rum, you'll be fit as a fiddle to resume your duties.' It was impossible. For days Rogers would toss and rave and drive himself to the edge of sanity. Lallo shook his head. In his younger days the surgeon had eaten opium. It had only been a mild addiction, but the memories of those hallucinations still haunted him.
"Ere ye are, Mr. Lallo ...'
He turned, his finger to his lips, as his loblolly boy, Skeete, entered the first lieutenant's cabin. Skeete wore an expression of impish glee that revealed a mouth full of carious teeth. Lallo took and shook out the heavy canvas strait-jacket.
'Very well, work your way round the cot and if you wake him I'll have you at the gratings.'
Rogers stirred as Lallo moved forward and Skeete moved round the cot. 'What the ... what the devil?'
'Hold him!'
'I am holding him!'
'Let me go, damn you! Help, murder!'
Lallo thrust a rag into Rogers's gaping mouth and knelt upon his struggling body, trying to avoid the halitosis of Skeete. They passed the lashings of the jacket, rolling Rogers over and avoiding his thrashing feet. In that position it was easy to secure the leather gag and, wiping the sweat from their eyes, roll him face upwards once again.
'There! It is done.' Skeete grinned, his face hideous. "Tis like trussing a chicken . . .' His pleasure in so dealing with a person of Rogers's importance was obvious.
'Hold your tongue!' snapped Lallo as the man's stinking breath swept over him yet again. 'Help me settle him a little more comfortably.'
The fight had gone out of Rogers. The skin on his forehead was pallid and dewed with drops of heavy perspiration. His eyes were wide open, the pupils unnaturally dilated and expressive of a bursting sense of outrage.
'Get out... and Skeete, try and keep your damned mouth shut about this, will you?'
'Anything to oblige.'
Lallo stared disgustedly at his assistant. His manner had the sincerity of a Jew proclaiming a bargain. The surgeon sighed and turned to Rogers when they were alone. He and Skeete were guardians of the frigate's most arcane secrets. Mostly they consisted of who was receiving treatment for the clap or the lues, but now Rogers's infirmity was to be included, under disguise, since the whole ship knew he was 'indisposed'. Such an open secret had to be treated with due form, in accordance with the ritual that maintained the inviolability of the quarterdeck.
Rogers grunted and Lallo gave his patient his full attention. 'Now, Mr. Rogers, please try and behave yourself. You have been drinking far too much. Your liver is swollen and enlarged, man. You are killing yourself! You know this, don't you?' Rogers's eyes closed. 'You have got to stop and the captain has ordered you be confined for a day or two, to see you over the reaction ... now you try and relax and we'll see if we can't dry you out, eh? Until I'm sure you'll behave, I am compelled to restrain you in this way. Do you understand?'
Rogers grunted, but the malevolent glare from his eyes was full of a terrible comprehension.
Drinkwater laid down the pencil and stared at the little column of figures with a sense of quiet satisfaction. With only a one per cent commission on the specie in the strongroom, to which as captain he was entitled, he would be able to pay a 'good conduct' bounty of three pounds per man and still have a few guineas left over for himself. Not only that, he had acquired another form of punishment: that of cancelling the bounty if an individual deserved it.
It was true that his own fortune would be the poorer, but he was not a greedy man. The days of being an indigent midshipman and making free with gold taken aboard a prize or two were behind him, thank God. A small bequest by an old and bachelor shipmate had rescued him from the poverty of reliance upon pay and his home was comfortable if modest. Although he had withered Tregembo's suggestion that he purchase a gentleman's estate, the idea occasionally occupied his thoughts, but in a sense he thought the money better spent this way. Commissions on specie were a perquisite of which his puritan soul did not wholeheartedly approve. Besides, he knew Elizabeth would have appreciated his action and that she, unlike so many post-captains' wives, did not measure her husband's success by the number of horses that drew her carriage.
Drinkwater's mood of self-esteem was ruptured by the sudden appearance of Midshipman Frey. 'Beg pardon, sir, but the lookout's reporting a sail...'
A few minutes later he stood beside the master, levelling his glass and focusing upon the newcomer. 'What d'you make of her, Mr. Hill?'
'Swede, sir ... naval dispatch vessel, from Carlscrona probably ... ah, that's interesting.'
Drinkwater saw it at the same time. In addition to the yellow and blue of the Swedish national colours at her main peak, the schooner had broken out a flag at her foremasthead as she altered course towards them. The flag was the British Union.
'She wants to speak to us. Heave to, Mr. Hill, and a whip and a chair at the main-yardarm.'
Half an hour later a damp civilian gentleman in a caped surtout stood uncertainly upon Antigone's deck and looked curiously about him. Drinkwater approached and extended his hand. 'May I present myself. I am Captain Nathaniel Drinkwater of His Britannic Majesty's ...'
'I know, Captain,' the stranger cut him short, 'and damned glad I am to have found you.' He laughed at Drinkwater's surprise. 'Yes, I'm British. Straton, British Resident at Stockholm.' They shook hands. 'May we adjourn to your cabin? I have something of the utmost importance to communicate.'
'Of course, Mr. Straton.'
'Would you be so good as to hoist in Johansson, the pilot?'
'Pilot? Why should I need a pilot? Where is he for?'
'Carlscrona, Captain. Come, let me explain in your cabin.'
'Very well. Mr. Hill, you are to hoist in another person. It seems you are right about Carlscrona. Come, sir, this way.' He led Straton below.
In the cabin he indicated a seat and sent Mullender for a bottle of wine.
'Our present position is about twenty miles south-east of Gotland, I believe, Captain,' said Straton non-committally as Mullender fussed around.
As soon as the steward had gone Drinkwater said, 'Well, sir?' expectantly.
'Well, sir. To be brief, you are not to deliver your consignment of specie to the Russians.'
'The devil I'm not! And on whose instructions, may I ask?'
'Those', said Straton, drawing a slim leather wallet from a voluminous pocket in his greatcoat, 'of His Majesty's Government...' He handed a paper to Drinkwater who took it and examined it closely. As he did so Straton studied the captain. Grey eyes were masked by his eyelids, one of which was freckled by blue powder burns, tattooed into the soft skin like random ink-spots, his tanned face was disfigured by a thin scar that ran down his left cheek and the mop of brown hair bowed over the paper was shot with grey and tied at his nape in an old-fashioned queue. The epaulettes, Straton noticed shrewdly, were not level, betraying an inequality in the height of the shoulders, the evidence of a serious wound. It was obvious to Straton that Captain Drinkwater had seen a deal of service, but to his courtier's eye the captain still seemed something of a tarpaulin officer, perhaps too set in his ways to appreciate the tangled diplomacy of the Baltic. He would have preferred a younger man, in his late twenties perhaps, and from his own class. The captain looked up and returned the papers.
'You must forgive me my suspicions, Mr. Straton.' 'They are quite understandable.'
'The truth is I am astonished at the change in my orders, but they are dated recently'
'Yes, they arrived by fast cutter at Helsingborg and were delivered overland by a courier. I received them less than a fortnight after your own dispatches from Varberg. All I can tell you is that there is some doubt as to the wisdom of forwarding further subsidies to the Tsar at the moment.'
Drinkwater frowned. 'Why is that? Not many days ago Colonel Wilson sat in that very chair and emphasised how important they are to the continued maintenance of the alliance. Besides, from what I hear, Sweden is scarcely a safe haven for such a sum.'
Straton dismissed his doubts about the political capacity of Captain Drinkwater.
'You are concerned about the reliability of the King, no doubt, Captain. Well, it is common knowledge that His Majesty King Gustavus Vasa is quite mad, but he isn't insane enough to lose sight of reality. This situation creates a state of uncertainty which keeps even his court guessing! Although he has foolishly quarrelled with Berlin and petulantly withdrawn troops from Stralsund as a consequence, he is unlikely to fall out with us. It is true that internally Sweden is in trouble, for Gustavus has no interest in the welfare of his people, hates the French and therefore hates the reforming faction of his own nobility who are Francophile in sentiment. The people of Sweden are opposed to the King's foreign policy, concerned about their ruined economy and apt to contrast their plight with their prosperously neutral neighbours in Denmark whom they used to regard as inferior.'
'On the face of it then, hardly a place for eighty thousand pounds ...'
'Government instructions are explicit, Captain Drinkwater,' Straton said and Drinkwater shrugged. It was no concern of his, but he remained curious.
'But why deny Russia the money?'
'I believe it is only a temporary delay'
'What on earth for?'
'As an inducement, I assume. You have heard of the action at Eylau?' 'Yes.'
'Well, there has been some agitation in St Petersburg to have General Bennigsen removed, a court intrigue you understand, probably related to the fact that certain people do not want a German to reap the credit for the death-blow to Napoleon.'
'Let them argue about that when they have secured the victory. At least the Russian rank and file have proved themselves the equals of the Grand Army
'Exactly, Captain, and the removal of Bennigsen would be a disaster. The campaigning season is already open. If the Tsar is swayed by the anti-German lobby then the damage to the Russian army may be incalculable. A large number of officers of German extraction occupy key posts; Bennigsen's dismissal would unsettle them and reduce the chances of success in the next, vital, clash with the French. A brief withholding of your subsidy is the British Government's caution to the Tsar to maintain the status quo. Bennigsen's army did well at Eylau and he has it in his power to deal the fatal blow to the over-extended divisions of France. Then ...' Straton brought the edge of his hand down on the table like the blade of a guillotine, 'c'est fini, n'est-ce pas?'
'It seems a devious and damned risky gamble to me,' replied Drinkwater uneasily, 'but then it doubtless would to a sailor.' He paused and drained his glass. 'So I am to accompany you to Carlscrona, eh?'
'Exactly, Captain.'
'Then perhaps I can offer you the hospitality of my cabin while I go and pass the requisite orders.'
As the south-westerly gale blew itself out, the warm air it had drawn into the southern Baltic cooled on the distant ice-edge and Antigone became shrouded in rolling banks of damp fog. To the north the ice began to melt rapidly but, in the open sea south of Gotland, the fog and the calm kept the British frigate and her smaller Swedish consort immobilised for almost two weeks. Then, quite suddenly, as if impetuously relenting, the long northern winter metamorphosed into summer and on a day of brilliant sunshine, on a sea as blue as the Mediterranean ruffled by a light easterly breeze, the Antigone closed the Swedish coast. Only the islands littering the approaches to Carlscrona remained gloomy, hump-backed under their dense mantles of fir trees.
Johansson, the pilot, stood at the weather rail and guided their course as they wove between the islands. All hands were on deck, trimming the yards as the frigate followed the schooner towards the Swedish naval arsenal of Carlscrona. Drinkwater remarked the dark spikes of the fir trees and the scent of the resin they gave off, sharp in his nostrils. Under her three topsails and a jib, Antigone ghosted through the still water, the hiss and chuckle of her wake creaming out from under her round bows.
'You seem to have a most expertly drilled company, Captain, though I am no judge of such matters.'
'You are very kind, Mr. Straton, but I daily wonder how long they can be kept at this ceaseless task. Many of these men have not seen home for four years.'
'Yours is not an enviable task.'
'Nor yours, sir.'
'We must both stand to our posts, Captain,' Straton said sententiously, 'and bring this damnable war to an advantageous conclusion.'
'I should rather you had said "victory", Mr. Straton. "Advantageous conclusion" smacks too much of half-measures for my liking now.'
Straton laughed. 'You are right, Captain Drinkwater. I have been too long at the Swedish court!' He pointed ahead to where, beyond a rocky point, the citadel and anchorage of Carlscrona was coming into view. There were men-of-war anchored in the road. 'And here we are. The nearest vessel is the Falken. She flies the flag of a rear-admiral which you should salute as we arranged. It is into her that you are to turn the specie.'
Drinkwater nodded. 'Mr. Fraser! Have the chasers manned and prepare to make the salute. Mr. Hill, you may bring the ship to her anchor under the lee of yonder man-o'-war.'
A few minutes later the hands were away aloft to stow the topsails and the surrounding islands flung back the echoes of Antigone's guns as she paid her respects to her Swedish allies.
Drinkwater leaned over his chart of the Baltic Sea. He was tired and the candlelight played on features that betrayed his anxiety. He had fondly imagined that, once the specie had been discharged and he had Straton's signature for it, he would be free. But one responsibility had exchanged itself for another and he was now faced with the unnerving problem of what to do next. Once free of his convoy and the Tsar's subsidy his orders were far from explicit. He was instructed to act 'with discretion, bearing in mind the paramount importance of His Majesty's Orders in Council'. Theoretically the duties of blockading were simple enough, but during his brief stay at Carlscrona he had learned that in the tangled diplomacy of the Baltic states, where the very crisis of the war seemed to be developing, the discretionary part of his orders might place far greater demands upon him. He recalled Wilson's surprise that he had no specific instructions from Lord Dungarth and now he studied the chart as if, like Mount's Military Atlas, it would provide him with all the answers.
Along the southern shore of the Baltic lay the coast of Germany, mostly the territory of Frederick William of Prussia but now under the control of the French. The large island of Rugen was still in Swedish hands, as was the town of Stralsund, now under siege by Marshal Mortier's army corps. Drinkwater's gaze moved east, along the coast from Pomerania towards another port holding out against a French force: Dantzig. Beyond this allied outpost and its bight, the coast swept northwards, past the Frisches Haff and Konigsberg to Russia beyond and the Kurland ports of Memel and Revel. Somewhere near Konigsberg the main armies of France and Russia faced each other along the line of the River Passarge.
Straton had made it clear that the British Government was now meditating moves which not only could influence Drinkwater, but also be significantly affected by his own operations in this period of uncertainty. This was the nub of his own dilemma.
A knock at the door interrupted his deliberations. 'Enter. Ah, come in, Mr. Hill.'
'She's under easy sail for the night, sir.' His eyes fell on the chart.
'Very well.' Drinkwater studied the face of the master. 'What the deuce d'you make of it, Mr. Hill, eh? Do we sit here and stop neutrals or d'you fancy a spar with Johnny Crapaud?'
Hill grinned. 'I don't understand, sir.'
'Would to God that I did,' said Drinkwater, 'but Straton came off to see me again before we left Carlscrona. He told me his instructions from London, just arrived, are to urge King Gustavus to reinforce his troops in Rugen and Stralsund ...' Drinkwater laid his finger on the chart. 'Gustavus insists our subsidies are too small and wants British troops to help him. The problem seems to be that if London sends troops, Gustavus insists on commanding them personally.'
'Good God,' Hill chuckled, 'then he's as mad as they say!'
'Yes. But that ain't all. There's a considerable faction at his court which is pro-French and wants reform. In short, the threat of a revolution is simmering in Sweden.'
'What a mess!'
'My head aches with the complexity of it all.' Drinkwater looked up and, catching Hill's eye, appeared to make up his mind. 'Damn it, we can't dither like this, Hill. We're like a couple of old women! The men are spoiling for a fight...' He bent over the chart and Hill leaned over with him. Drinkwater's finger traced a strait of water between the island of Rugen and the mainland where it ran past the engraved outline of the town of Stralsund.
'Let's see what is to be done against Marshal Mortier.'
'Beg pardon, sir ...'
Fraser turned at the waft of malodorous breath. The obscenely grinning features of Skeete, Lallo's elderly loblolly boy, were thrust expectantly into his face.
'Skeete, what the de'il d'you want on the upper deck?'
'Mr. Lallo's compliments, sir, and would you step down to the first lieutenant's cabin.'
'The first lieutenant?'
'Mr. Rogers, sir.'
'I know fine well who the first lieutenant is, damn your insolence.'
'Aye, aye, sir.' Nothing seemed to wipe the grin from Skeete's face. He had been too long an intimate with death not to find most situations in life full of morbid amusement. He followed Lieutenant Fraser below.
The door to Rogers's cabin swung ajar with the roll of the ship and from inside Lallo beckoned him. The surgeon closed the door against Skeete. After the upper deck the cabin was dark, the air stale and for a second he did not see the trussed figure of Rogers lying in the cot. His dislike of Rogers had not encouraged him to enquire too eagerly into the nature of the first lieutenant's 'indisposition'.
As his eyes focused he saw a pale face, the hollow cheeks slashed by the cruel line of the gag, and was unable to master an over-riding feeling of revulsion at the harshness of the surgeon's treatment.
'Dear God, Lallo, take that thing off him!' 'I cannot, Mr. Fraser ... the captain ...'
'The captain did not tell you to gag him. Take it off, I say.' Fraser leaned forward and began to fumble.
'No, sir! Don't, I beg you!' Lallo put out his hands to prevent Fraser's loosening of the gag. 'I asked for you to come down in the hope that you might help ...'
'Sweet Jesu, Lallo, how much of all this does the captain know?' Unable to get the gag off, Fraser gestured round the tiny cabin.
'Look, Mr. Fraser, I have no mind to confine him a moment longer than I have to ...'
'Then let him out of that
'For God's sake, sir, do me the favour of listening,' hissed Lallo, suddenly very angry. 'I have twenty-eight men on the sick list and cannot mollycoddle one who's over-fond of the bottle. There are the usual bruises and ruptures, three consumptives, an outbreak of the flux, a man with gravel and one with a paraphimosis, plus the usual clutch with clap. Rogers can only be treated by Procrustean methods and I'm damned if I'm prepared to have you interfere like this!'
'Away with your blather, man! What the de'il d'ye want with me then?'
'I do want your assistance to enable me to get him out of that thing as fast as possible.'
Now that his active participation was required Fraser was suddenly cautious.
'In what way?' Fraser looked at the first lieutenant, whose eyes seemed unnaturally large and held his own in a glare of intensity.
'I am prepared to release him today, but if I do I need you to stand surety for me.'
'Why me?'
'Because,' said Lallo, a note of weary contempt entering his voice, 'you are the next senior lieutenant and I am concerned that he may attempt to revenge himself.' Lallo spoke as though Rogers was not there, but his worry was clear enough to Fraser.
'Look, Mr. Lallo, if the captain ordered you to confine the first lieutenant, why must you drag me into the imbroglio?'
'The captain didn't order me to truss him up.'
'He didn't? But you just claimed he did!'
'No, he ordered me to keep the first lieutenant quiet for a day or two ... Mr. Fraser, where the hell are you going?'
But Fraser had gone. Uncertain of the correct course of action, he thought it proper to inform Captain Drinkwater. Much though he disliked Lieutenant Rogers, the thought of a man of Lallo's stamp having the power to truss up a commissioned officer like a pullet appalled him.
Lallo shook his head over his patient. 'Another young pipsqueak with all the answers, Mr. Rogers,' he said, putting the palm of his hand on the lieutenant's sweating forehead, 'and I thought we might have you quietly out of there today'
Fraser found the captain poring over Mount's atlas and the charts spread out on the cabin table.
'Ah, Mr. Fraser, and what brings you rushing in here?' Drinkwater asked, looking up.
'It's the first lieutenant, sir. The damned surgeon has him trussed like a lunatic!'
Drinkwater frowned. It was in his mind to enquire how Fraser had come by this knowledge, but he knew it had been a vain hope to expect the confinement of the first lieutenant to be kept a secret. He recollected he had given Lallo a free hand and had thought the surgeon would have used the powerfully sedative properties of laudanum, but, on reflection, that was Lallo's business.
'Mr. Fraser, you are a young man. Your outrage does you credit but I am sure that Mr. Lallo was only being cruel to be kind. What was your business in the matter?'
'The surgeon sent for me ...'
'The devil he did!' Drinkwater snapped. So Lallo had deliberately' involved Fraser in direct contravention of his own instructions. 'To what end?' he enquired coldly.
'To stand guarantee for Rogers's good behaviour.'
Drinkwater frowned and felt the sense of affront drain out of him. He had, he realised, been unreasonable in expecting Lallo to work a miracle in secret. Rogers presented them with a problem that only proved their woeful inadequacy to deal with such things. He sighed. 'Well, Mr. Fraser,' he said wearily, his thoughts drifting back to the plan formulating in his mind, 'you are the next senior lieutenant. Hadn't you better heed the surgeon?'
'But sir, he's no' a man of much sensibility.'
Drinkwater looked up sharply. 'What the devil d'you mean by that? That he ain't got a commission like yourself? By God, Mr. Fraser, you surprise me! Mr. Lallo's a professional officer holding a warrant as surgeon, just as Hill holds one as master. Your own status as a gentleman of honour does not entitle you to make such social distinctions among persons of ability! You seem an able and active enough fellow but I'll have none of that damnable cant aboard here! You may save that for the pump-room or Lord Keith's with-drawing room, but not here, sir, not here!'
The unexpected onslaught from the captain took Fraser aback. His face was white and his mouth hung open. Drinkwater cast another look at the papers spread out before him and then up again at the hapless young officer. 'Very well, Mr. Fraser; I am aware there is a growing fashion among young men of breeding to consider these matters of some importance, and that may well be the case ashore. However I suggest you might see Lallo at his true worth were a ball to shatter your thigh. Now cut along and pass word to him to get Rogers up here at once.'
Only the direct summons to the captain's cabin prevented the outbreak of rage the surgeon feared from a freshly released Rogers. Pale from his confinement, Rogers entered the cabin and stood menacingly close to Drinkwater, his mouth a hard line, his eyes glittering.
Drinkwater, sensitive to Rogers's fury, ignored it and, after a brief look at the first lieutenant, stared down at the maps and charts.
'Mr. Rogers,' he said levelly, 'you're better, I understand. Now I have it in mind to employ you . ..'
'Do you mean to pretend that nothing has happened?' Rogers's voice was strangled as he sought to control himself. 'I have been bound and gagged, you heartless ...'
Drinkwater looked up, his own eyes blazing. 'What would you have me do? Eh? If I wished, Sam, you'd be going home for a court martial for that remark alone! What was done was done for your own good, and you know it. Lallo says you're over the worst. Hold off the drink for a month and your victory is complete. If I pretend that you've had the flux that's my own business. What would you have me write in the Sick Book?'
Rogers opened his mouth and then shut it again.
'Look,' persisted Drinkwater, 'I'm meditating an attack on the French here. You lead it. Take the post of honour. It's an opportunity. God knows it's one you can't afford to pass up.'
'Opportunity,' Rogers's voice became almost wistful, 'I haven't had an opportunity ...'
'Well, enough's said then. Come, this will be a boat attack. We are crossing the Greifswalder Bight and will anchor somewhere here, work our way into the strait as far as we can. Then you take all the boats, the marines and a hundred-odd seamen and press an attack against the French lines around Stralsund; do what damage you can and come off again before Johnny Crapaud knows what's hit him. Just the very thing for you. Get you a mention in the Gazette.'
Drinkwater smiled encouragingly and met Rogers's eyes. The confusion of the man was plain to be seen. 'A perfect opportunity, Sam.'
'Well, gentlemen,' said Drinkwater, glancing round at the assembled officers, 'when the sun gets high enough to burn off this mist I think we might find some amusement for the hands today.' He kept his tone buoyant. The awkwardness of the officers in Rogers's presence was obvious. The poor fellow was being treated like a leper. A single glance at his face told Drinkwater that Rogers's torments were not yet over. He could only guess at the remarks that had been passed at every mess in the ship: from the gunroom to the cockpit, from the marines' mess to the ratings messing on the berth deck, the scuttlebutt would have been exclusively about the first lieutenant and his mysterious illness. Drinkwater hoped the action today would give them all something else to talk about and, more important, make them act as a ship's company.
Antigone lay on a sea as smooth as a grey mirror in the twilight of the dawn. In the distance, scarcely discernible, a reedy margin could be seen dividing sea and sky. From time to time the quack of ducks came from the misty water's edge.
'From what information we have gleaned,' Drinkwater resumed, 'Mr. Hill and I estimate that the French siege lines are no more than about five miles from the ship. They are investing the Swedish town of Stralsund but at present a state of truce exists between Marshal Mortier, commanding the French, and the garrison of Stralsund. No such armistice exists between ourselves and the French, however, while anything we might do to provoke more activity on the part of the Swedes can only be of benefit to the Alliance. So we intend to annoy the French by mounting a boat attack on their lines wherever opportunity offers. The mist offers you good cover for your approach.' He smiled again and felt the mood changing. The officers' preoccupation with the restitution of Rogers was diminishing: fear and excitement were stirring them now. He had only one more thing to say to complete the shift in their thinking.
'Mr. Rogers will command the expedition in the launch.' He paused, measuring the effect of his words. Disappointment was plain on Fraser's face, but he ignored it and went on. 'Now, gentlemen, I think you had better break your fasts.' They trooped below and Drinkwater added, 'Perhaps, Sam, you would join me in my cabin.'
In the gunroom, as the burgoo was cleared away and the toast and coffee spread its crumbs and ring-stains upon the less-than-clean table-cloth, the officers deliberated over the coming day.
'Don't look so damned bereaved, Wullie,' said Mount, impishly aping Fraser's accent. 'You couldn't expect the Old Man to have done anything else.'
'It's all right for you and your leathernecks,' grumbled Fraser, irritated by Mount's eagerness at the prospect of action, 'you're just itching to get at the enemy. At least you've something to do.'
'So have you.' Mount took up a piece of toast and regarded it with some interest. 'D'you know this looks quite palatable, damned if it don't.'
'Just a bloody boat-minder ...'
'You might get an opportunity to distinguish yourself,' put in James Quilhampton, pouring himself more coffee. 'I can tell you that poor Rogers will be looking for an opportunity to cover himself with glory.'
'Rogers?'
Quilhampton looked at the second lieutenant. 'You haven't known him as long as I have, Willie. He might be an old soak, but he's no coward.'
'Ah,' said Mount, "but if he leads, will the men follow?'
The question and the doubt associated with it hung over the table, stirring the cold and personal apprehensions that forgathered before action. Quilhampton shrugged the shadow off first. Like Rogers he too awaited his 'opportunity' and his youth was easily convinced it might be soon. He stood up, his chair scraping in the silence.
'Mount,' he said lightly, 'you rumble like a bad attack of borbo-rygmus.'
'Thank you, my young and insolent friend. I suppose I could prescribe myself the carminative of being proved right.'
'I hope you're damn well not,' said Fraser, obviously getting over his pique, 'I haven't written my will this commission.'
'I didn't know you had anything to leave behind you,' laughed Mount.
Fraser made a face, wiped his mouth and looked up. Lord Walmsley stood in the gunroom door. 'What do you want?'
'Mr. Hill's compliments, gentlemen,' said Walmsley in his easy manner, 'but the mist's beginning to clear, the first lieutenant is making the dispositions for the boats and the captain's going aloft. Mr. Hill is also awaiting the opportunity to come below and have his breakfast.'
'Oh! Damn me, I forgot.' Quilhampton shoved his chair in and reached for his hat and sword. Fumbling with the belt as he made for the door he shouted over his shoulder to the negro messman, 'King! Be a good fellow and bring my pistols on deck!'
In the main-top Drinkwater trained his glass carefully, anxious not to miss the slightest detail emerging from the upper limit of the mist as it hung low over the marshy shore. From their landfall at Cape Arcona they had sailed round the east coast of the island of Rugen, across the mouth of Sassnitz Bay where the Swedish fleet lay at anchor, and round into the Greifswalder Bight. Yesterday they had worked patiently westwards, towards the narrow strait that separated Rugen from the Pomeranian mainland. With a man in the chains calling the soundings they had manoeuvred Antigone as far into the strait as wind and daylight permitted, and learned of the state of truce between the Swedes and French from a Swedish guard-boat. As daylight finally faded, and with it the breeze, they had fetched their anchor.
Above the mist, the rising sun behind Drinkwater picked out tiny reflections ahead: the pale gold of a church spire, a sudden flash as a distant window was opened. It was curious how he could see these details twelve miles away, while closer-to there was nothing to see beyond the rounded shapes of tree-tops, elms he thought, and some willows lower down; but that was all that emerged from the nacreous vapour that hung over the water margin. An observer in one of those trees would be able to see Antigone's masts and spars above the mist, while her hull, with its rows of cannon, was invisible. Not that he thought for a moment they had been observed, and the presence of the Swedish fleet in Sassnitz Bay had persuaded him that by flying Swedish colours he would be perfectly disguised.
He heard a distant trumpet and a drum beat, staccato and oddly clear as it rolled over the water, its rat-a-tat-tat mustering Mortier's corps to morning parade. Drinkwater pondered the wisdom of his proposed attack. It was to be made on slender intelligence and he knew his intention had far more to do with the state of his command than any real damage he would inflict upon the enemy. Somehow the unreality was emphasised by the mist and it seemed that the only real danger lay below him in that unhappy relationship between Lieutenant Rogers and the people.
Drinkwater had taken Rogers as his first lieutenant out of pity, knowing him for a dogged fighter and competent seaman. But drink and disappointment had soured the man, and although Drinkwater curbed Rogers's excesses, in his everyday behaviour he had given ample cause for offence and grievance among the hands. He received their daily petitions with an unpleasant contempt, used an unnecessary degree of foul language towards them and provoked a general grumbling. Drinkwater's reluctance to flog was a liberality Rogers disapproved of and which seemed to provoke him to greater unpleasantness towards men whom the iron rule of naval discipline held in a state of thrall.
It was clearly a situation that could not go on. A boat attack under Rogers, Drinkwater had reasoned, gave them all a chance to wipe the slate clean; or at least as good a chance as men in their circumstances were likely to get.
Drinkwater felt the mast jerk and looked down into the waist. Wraiths of mist trailed across the deck but he could clearly see the ordered lines of men straining at the tackles as they lifted the heavy launch off the booms and began to transfer its weight from the stay to the yard tackles. He watched the boat lifted outboard and then lowered into the water. Drinkwater pocketed compass and glass, swung himself over the edge of the top and felt for the futtocks with his feet.
As he jumped down onto the deck, Rogers, Fraser and Quilhampton were telling the men off into the waiting boats. Marines filed along the deck, their muskets slung over their shoulders. Together with the seamen being armed with cutlasses and tomahawks at the main-mast, they scrambled down the nets hung over the ship's side and into their allocated places in the boats.
Drinkwater crossed the deck to where Rogers was stuffing loaded pistols into his waistband. He smiled encouragingly. 'Good luck, Mr. Rogers,' he said formally.
Rogers nodded his acknowledgement and paused, as though to say something. But he seemed to think better of it, murmured 'Aye, aye, sir,' and slung a leg over the rail.
'It's up to you, Sam,' persisted Drinkwater, 'you and those men down there.'
Their eyes met and both knew what the other thought. Then Rogers had gone, and a few minutes later the boats had vanished in the mist.
Lieutenant Rogers, his hand on the tiller of the launch, cocked one eye on the boat-compass at his feet and stole occasional glances at the faint line in the mist that marked the Rugen shore. The surface of the water was as smooth as glass, disturbed only by the concentric and ever expanding rings that marked the progress of the oar blades as they propelled the boats along. Rogers led in the launch followed by Quilhampton in the red cutter, Lord Walmsley in the blue and Lieutenant Fraser in the barge.
Rogers was seconded by Mount and Midshipman Frey, and it was Mount's marines that made up the bulk of the launch's crew, apart from the oarsmen. In the boat's bow, mounted on its slide, a 12-pounder carronade was being fussed over by a gunner's mate.
The boats pulled on in comparative silence, moving in a world that seemed devoid of time or distance, so disorienting was the mist. It hung heavily, close to the water, discouraging speech, so that the only noises were the laboured breathing of the oarsmen, the dull regular knocking of oar looms against thole pins and the dip and splash of the oar blades. Under the bow of each boat a chuckling of water showed as they pulled on for mile after mile. After two and a half hours Rogers drew out his watch and consulted his chart. Then he stood in the stern of the boat and waved the others up alongside. The boats glided together, their oars trailing, their men panting over the looms, dark stains of sweat on the backs of their shirts.
'By my reckoning we must be bloody close to the French lines,' hissed Rogers. 'We'll move across the channel to the mainland side. If we sight a decent target we land and do our worst. Now you buggers keep in close contact, I'll give the order to attack. Understand?'
There was a general nodding of heads.
'Very well. Get your lobsters to fix bayonets, Mr. Mount.'
Mount gave the order and the whispering hiss and click of the lethal weapons was accompanied by a sudden twinkling of reflected sunlight from the silver blades.
'There's a bit o' breeze coming up,' observed Fraser and, for the first time, dark, ruffled patches appeared on the water. The heat of the sun was warming the marshes and water meadows on either side of the strait, the rising air sucked in the sea-breeze, a strengthening zephyr which began to disperse the mist in patches.
'Very well, keep your eyes open then.' Rogers waved the boats onward. The oars began to swing again and the boats resumed their passage.
Rogers stared into the mist ahead. He felt the public shame of his recent humiliation like a wound and could still only half comprehend why Drinkwater had sanctioned Lallo's treatment. But he was pragmatist enough to know that, if nothing else, his future hung upon the day's events. He had under his command the greater part of the ship's marines and a large detachment of seamen. He was seconded by most of the officers and had left the frigate almost without boats. What was more, he was alone in a mist and was determined, at any cost, to make an impression upon the enemy. His mouth set in a grim line and, as he looked forward, the eyes of the men tugging at the oars avoided his own. Well, that was as it should be. He was the first lieutenant again, and by heaven they would feel his wrath if they did not do their utmost to secure him a paragraph in the Gazette! 'Boat, sir! Starboard bow!'
Rogers jerked from his introspection and looked to starboard. At the same instant a challenge rang out. A large boat, pulling a dozen oars a side with a huge-muzzled cannon in her bow and the blue and gold of Sweden lifting languidly over her stern, loomed out of the mist. It was a 'gunsloop' rowing guard in the supposedly neutral water of the strait.
Rogers swore and pulled the tiller over, turning to watch the other boats follow in his wake, and headed more directly for the southern bank. Astern he heard shouting and the splash of oars holding water, turning the big gunsloop after them. But after five minutes, despite the gradual dispersal of the mist, they had lost the Swedish boat.
A few minutes later the grey margin of Pomerania was visible ahead and then on the larboard beam as Rogers straightened their course parallel to it. A few cows, brindled black and white, stood hock-deep in the lush grass that swept down to the water. Ruminating gently they stared at the passing boats.
The appearance of the guard-boat had galvanised the oarsmen. Before, the stroke had been that leisurely and easy swing that a practised oarsman could keep up for hours, now the men tugged at their oars and the boats began to leap through the water. Then, quite suddenly, the mist lifted and at the same instant Rogers saw the means of realising his long awaited 'opportunity'.
'By God, Mount!' he said in a low and excited tone. 'See there, ahead! A whole bloody battery with its back to us!'
Ahead of them a sudden bend in the channel brought the Pomeranian shore much closer. A small, low bluff formed a natural feature, a patch of beaten earth which the French had taken advantage of and on it constructed a demi-lune with an earthen rampart reinforced by fascines and gabions. The rampart was pierced by crude embrasures and in each, facing away from the approaching boats towards the town of Stralsund, were eight huge siege guns and a pair of howitzers. A smaller field piece faced across the strait and commanded any approach from Rugen. In quieter times the little bluff had been used as a quay, for behind the battery was a small inlet, the estuary of a stream that wound, willow-lined, inland towards a village. The edge of the inlet was piled with rotten wood staithing from which local peasants had shipped their hay and other produce to the markets of Stralsund. It took but an instant for Rogers to perceive that the inlet and quay gave direct and undefended access to the rear of the battery.
He was standing now and he commanded his oarsmen to pull with greater vigour. Behind him the officers in the other boats had also seen the enemy position and acknowledged his frantic wave.
'Make ready, men,' said Mount quietly beside him.
Rogers looked again at the battery. He could see a pair of artillery-men, each carrying a bucket and wearing fatigues, walking slowly across the beaten earth of the compound. A group of men were gathered round one gun intent upon some task or another and one further man was lounging on the rampart, staring in the direction of Stralsund. Rogers could see quite clearly the puffs of smoke from the indolent sentry's pipe.
'We've got 'em, by God, Mount! The buggers are as good as asleep!'
Rogers put the tiller over and the launch swung in towards the inlet and the quay. He could not believe his luck. 'Come on you lubbers! Pull!'
'We are pulling ...' someone muttered and Rogers's eyes narrowed and he scanned the boat for the insolent seaman. Perhaps he would have taken the matter further but at that instant emerging from the mist astern of them, the Swedish gunsloop hailed them. The cry made the sentry turn. He jerked upright and then began to shout, a hoarse bellow of surprise and alarm. The gunners carrying the buckets dropped them and ran; the group round the siege gun turned and ran also. More men were shouting and appearing from somewhere. Rogers was vaguely aware of trees, horse-lines and a row of limbers, ammunition-boxes and shot piles.
The sight of red coats and the glint of sunshine on bayonets swiftly raised the alarm. Even as the launch closed the last few yards to the quay the French artillerymen were dropping to one knee and levelling muskets fetched from the arms stacks.
'That gun ready?' roared Rogers at his gunner's mate forward.
'Aye, sir!'
Then clear those bastards out of our way!'
The launch jerked and the carronade roared, recoiling up its slide and flinging its reek back over the gasping oarsmen. The marines were fidgeting and Mount was standing beside Rogers. Most of the canister splattered against the wooden piling, but sufficient balls raked the compound to knock down three or four of the defenders.
'That's the way!' yelled Rogers, drawing his sword.
The next moment the launch bumped alongside the staithe and, as the oarsmen dragged their oars inboard, Rogers leaped from thwart to thwart, closely followed by Mount. Rocking violently the launch spewed its cargo of marines onto the quay as the other boats arrived and more and more men poured ashore.
There were far more soldiers in the demi-lune than had at first been apparent. Hidden by the willows were the bivouacs of the eighty gunners that made up the complement of the battery. They were forming into a rough line, led by a pair of officers on foot. Behind them another officer was struggling into the saddle of a trace-horse.
'Drop that man!' Rogers screamed to Mount, pointing.
Mount turned to a marine who was already levelling his musket, but the shot missed and the officer escaped down a lane that ran alongside the little stream.
'Form line, platoon fire!' Mount was drawing up his men and they began to fire volleys at the enemy. Behind the marines the seamen milled, those of them who had been rowing still getting their breath back.
'Rush the bastards!' roared Rogers impetuously, waving his sword at the other lieutenants, but Mount ignored him. He was advancing his line of marines platoon by platoon.
'Come on, lads, charge them!' Rogers began to run, leading his men through the line of marines.
'Hold on, Rogers!' Mount shouted as the first lieutenant began to block his field of fire, but there was no stopping him. Only a few of the seamen had followed Rogers and there were murmurs among the others, murmurs that, overheard on board, would have earned their makers a dozen at the grating.
'Let the bastard go!'
'Hope he gets a ball in his brain-pan ...' 'Better his balls ...' 'Good riddance to him ...'
Mount stood for a second, furious, and behind him Quilhampton suddenly divined the intentions of some of the men. 'Come on, Mount! Forward! Bayonets!'
'Bayonet charge!' bawled Mount as the artillerymen, taking advantage of the brief pause in the attack, loosed off a well timed volley. Several of the marines dropped, but Rogers, twenty yards from the French, was untouched.
'The devil looks after his own ...'
They were all running forward now, marines and seamen mixed together, all mad with blood-lust and tripping over their fallen comrades. Then suddenly they clashed with the enemy. The fighting became hand to hand. The artillerymen dropped their muskets and lugged out short swords which each man had slung on a baldric over his shoulder. They were old faces, almost faces they knew, dark with campaigning, slashed by scars, as moustached as their attackers were clean-shaven. They grunted, swore, cut, thrust, killed and died as well as their opponents, but they fell back under the onslaught, out-numbered by the British who fought with a maddened ferocity. For a few blessed moments they were free of shipboard constraints and could swear and stab and hack at anything that stood in their path. With every slash and lunge they paid back the cheating of the purser, the heartlessness of the bosun's mates, the injustice of the lash and the venality of the Dockyard commissioners. In the merciless killing they found outlets for their repressed passions and frustrated desires. It was not the enforcers of Napoleon's Continental System that they killed, but the mere surrogates for the rottenness in their own.
Lieutenant Quilhampton knew this and kept his wits about him. He had heard of men shooting their own officers in the heat of battle and kept a weather eye on Rogers. He did not fear for himself, for the constraints of naval discipline, once they had been laid upon a man, could never be entirely thrown off, even under such circumstances. Intuition told him he was perfectly safe, for he had long ago learned the wisdom of consideration and justice towards the men in his own division. But Rogers was at risk although he seemed safe now, surrounded by Mount and his marines as they swept the last of the gunners out of the battery at the point of the bayonet. The British did not pursue beyond the limit of the rampart. A few of the marines got up on the rough parapet and took pot-shots at the retreating Frenchmen as they ran stumbling over the tussocks of grass and boggy marshland of the water meadows beyond.
'Keep an eye on 'em, Mount. That bloody officer will have gone for reinforcements!'
'Very well!'
All around men panted for their breath. The dead and wounded lay in heaps, their blood soaking darkly into the dry earth. Little Frey with his toy dirk was trying to bandage a cut arm. Other men were attending to the wounded.
'Tom's lost his bonus, then,' said one man, staring down at a dead messmate. Quilhampton recalled the bonus Drinkwater had promised the men.
'You lads start getting the wounded back to the boats now.'
'Aye, aye, sir.'
Rogers was still bawling orders.
'Mr. Fraser, bring a party over here! You too, Mr. Q! I want those three limbers over to the guns. We'll blow the wheels off! And see here, these Frog bayonets are thinner than ours. You, Walmsley and Frey, gather 'em up and stick 'em in the touch-holes of these guns. Look ...'
Rogers picked up a French bayonet and stabbed it downwards, into the touch-hole in the breech of the nearest gun. Then he jerked his hand sideways and the narrow blade snapped, leaving the hole neatly blocked. 'See, that should fuck 'em up for a while... and stuff those shell carcasses under the guns and they'll blow the whole bloody shebang to kingdom come.'
Officers, marines, midshipmen and men ran about at his bidding, fetching and carrying. Kegs of powder, shell cases and combustibles were placed under each of the siege guns. The field gun close to the strait was rolled into the water and every gun was rendered at least temporarily useless by spiking.
At the height of this activity a strange officer was seen walking slowly across the open space behind the guns. Everyone had forgotten the Swedish gunsloop.
'Excuse ... you are British, yes? I must protest very much. There is no fighting ... truce, between the forces of His Majesty King Gustavus and the army under Marshal Mortier.' He approached Rogers who, from his activity and lively direction of affairs, was clearly the senior officer.
'Will you get out of my way ... hey, you! More powder over here ... no, no, a keg if you've got one ...'
'You must not fight... not break the truce ...'
'Will you get out of my way?' Rogers turned on the Swedish officer who suddenly understood he was being rebuffed and drew himself up.
'I am a Swedish officer.'
'I don't give a damn if you're the Grand Turk, fuck off!' snarled Rogers, shoving the Swede aside. The man spun round and reached for his sword, as angry as Rogers.
Quilhampton hurried up. 'Come sir,' he said civilly to the Swede, 'I know you have a truce with the French, but regrettably we do not. I am sure you understand that we mean no offence to yourself.'
The Swedish officer looked down at his sleeve. The point of the iron hook that this tall, gangling English officer wore in the place of a left hand had caught in the fabric of his uniform. It was covered in blood.
Shrugging his shoulders he allowed himself to be led away with as much dignity as he could muster. Quilhampton had hardly seen the intruder into his boat than another crisis occurred. On the rampart a sudden shout from Mount brought both the first lieutenant and Quilhampton running across the compound. Flinging themselves down on the earth beside him, they followed the marine officer's pointing finger.
Jogging towards them, their pennons gay in the sunshine, was a squadron of lancers.
'Jesus Christ!' whispered Rogers and a thrill of pure fear ran through the three men. The thought of being speared by one of those lances was hideous.
'I think it's time for a tactical withdrawal
'Get your men back to the boats to cover us, Mount,' snapped Rogers.
'I can keep some here and pick a few of those fellows off...' 'Do as you're fucking well told!' 'Very well.'
'Mr. Q, get the men back in the boats, load up the carronade, tell Fraser... where the hell is he?' 'I don't know but I'll find him.'
Rogers ran across the open space. 'Hey, Walmsley, get that last powder keg and lay a trail back towards the boats. Make sure no stupid turd runs in it...'
'Aye, aye, sir.' Lord Walmsley picked up a keg and knocked out the bung. He bent over and scuttered backwards, spreading a liberal trail across the earth. 'Mind your confounded feet, damn you!' he shouted at some marines.
'Into the boats, you men!' Quilhampton was shouting at the seamen. 'Get to your oars!'
'They're coming!' Mount was yelling, running back from the rampart. 'One volley, sergeant,' he called, 'then tumble into the boats as quick as you can!'
'Sah!' Sergeant Blixoe lined his men up. 'Steady now, lads. Take partiklar aim and shoot the lubbers' horses in the chest. . . make ready.
The boats were a confusion of legs and oar looms as men tried to sort themselves out. They were stumbling on the wounded whose shrieks and curses lent a nightmare panic to the scene. Somehow the word had spread that they were about to be ridden down by lancers. Round shot and cutlass slashes were one thing. Lances and horses quite another.
Walmsley's powder trail had stopped several yards short of the quay. Rogers stood over him as he tipped the last of the powder out of the keg. 'Get to the launch. Back it off the quay and point the carronade ashore. Leave your cutter alongside for me.' Rogers drew a pistol from his waistband and looked quickly round him. He could feel the earth shaking under the advancing hooves of the horses.
'Get down, Rogers, let me fire over your head,' Mount was shouting at him.
'Damn you, be silent! Fire and get your men in the boats.'
A wild and magnificent feeling swept over Rogers. He stood alone in the middle of the enclosed space. Behind him the boats were full of men and the edge of the quay was lined with Mount's marines, their muskets pointing at the end of the rampart where the little track wound round the battery's defences. All eyes were on him. The humiliation of his confinement, the long-standing and corrosive effects of disappointment and missed opportunity seemed to coalesce in one moment of sublime defiance. Like the men, action had given Lieutenant Rogers the means of defying the system whose injustices had tormented him in proportion to his rank. He was filled with a hysterical disregard for the danger he was in.
The cavalry swept into the battery. Confined to a narrow front of six or seven horses they spread out, their red and white lance pennons lowering. They were in green, wearing tall crested brass helmets, and their horses snorted and plunged as they advanced across the compound.
'Fire!' yelled Mount and then waved his men backwards. A cutter pushed off, so did the barge.
'Come on, sir!' yelled Quilhampton.
Rogers turned. 'Fire that boat gun!' he roared as though bawling out the topmen in a gale. The lancers came on, only yards separating them from Rogers. Mount's men had only succeeded in knocking over one horse, so distracted had they been by the defiant spectacle of Lieutenant Rogers.
'What is the silly bastard doing?' agonised Mount as he turned and watched from the safety of a boat.
'Bein' a fuckin' hero, sir,' a man muttered.
'Gettin' 'is name fair an' square in the Gazette,' said another, but Mount ignored them.
In the launch the gunner's mate jerked the lanyard of the carronade. Full of men aft and backed off from the quay, the gun took better effect than it had when they had made their approach. The canister tore through the cavalry and threw back three lancers who were within feet of Rogers.
'It's bloody unbelievable,' muttered Mount, half in admiration of the madness being displayed by an apparently fearless Mr. Rogers. As if knowing the three men who most nearly threatened his life would be blown away by the shot from the carronade, Rogers bent over the pile of powder, levelled the cocked pistol and pulled the trigger. The spark landed on the powder, grew dim and then suddenly the powder trail took fire. There was a brief searing light but Rogers felt nothing from the burn on his hand. He stood for a second staring at the leaping flame and then seemed aware of the danger round him. He dodged the next lancer who was trying to rein in his horse as he approached the edge of the quay. Rogers ran for the cutter, bending low as the marines stood in the boats and fired over his head. Behind him the powder fired and sputtered and the horses jibbed at the demon under their hooves. There were shouts and plunging horses and then the launch carronade got off another shot. Rogers leapt for the cutter which backed swiftly off the quay.
The cheated cavalrymen were pulling their horses up at the edge of the water. An officer had jumped off his horse and was trying to stamp out the burning train. Some of his men had slung their lances and were levelling their carbines. The little sputter of flame could no longer be seen. Perhaps it no longer threaded its way over that patch of beaten earth.
The shouts and popping of carbine and musket were suddenly eclipsed by the deafening roar which broke into several subsidiary explosions as limbers and carcasses and powder kegs took fire. The redoubt was suddenly transformed into a lethal rocketing of wood, iron and flame among which horses reared in terror and men fell amid the stamping of hooves. Heavy axle-trees, wheels and spokes, even the massive barrels of the cannon themselves were hurled into the air. Pieces of shell-case whistled into the blue sky, then the boats were being showered by black debris which fell into the water alongside them with a hiss.
The boats were swinging into the channel now, the men settling into the rhythm of the long pull back to the ship. They swept past the Swedish gunsloop and Rogers stood and raised his hat in a gesture of arrogant and exaggerated courtesy.
'Bye the bye,' he said to no one in particular as he sat down again, 'did any of you fellows catch a glimpse of Stralsund?'
Drinkwater sat in his cabin in a happier frame of mind than he had enjoyed for weeks. Although the butcher's bill for the boat action was heavier than anticipated, there was no doubt that the attack had been a success. The real damage to Marshal Mortier's Army Corps was not great, but the unexpected destruction of a battery showed the long arm of the British Admiralty, and could not fail to have its effect upon the general morale of the French corps.
There had been a little necessary diplomacy at the protest they had received from a Swedish officer who had come on board as Antigone entered Sassnitz Bay; but it had been passed off easily enough with a glass or two. Most important to Drinkwater was the effect the action had had upon Rogers and the people. He had heard several versions of the affair and gathered that a sneaking admiration had been aroused for Rogers, on account of his coolness under attack. It was undoubtedly only a temporary lull in the hostility between the lower deck and the first lieutenant, but it was a lull nevertheless, and Drinkwater was relieved to see that Rogers himself seemed to have recovered some of his old self-possession.
But it was not merely the raising of the morale of his own ship's company that occasioned Drinkwater his present good humour. On their return to Sassnitz Bay and the Swedish fleet, they had found a flying squadron of British frigates. Supposing at first that he was to place himself under the orders of the senior captain, Drinkwater found to his delight that special orders awaited him. Taking the opportunity to send mails home, including a highly laudatory report on the affair before Stralsund, he had hurried back to Antigone to digest the import of his written instructions. It was clear that Home of the Pegasus was somewhat jealous of Drinkwater's independence and had wished to include Antigone in his flying squadron.
'You seem to enjoy a kind of privilege,' Home had lisped. 'I have to give you written orders of your own.' Reluctance was written plain on the man's face and even discernible in the way he handed over the sealed package.
'The forward berth ain't always the most pleasant,' Drinkwater replied, happy to escape from the constraints of serving under someone young enough to be his son. Home would be a rear-admiral by the time he reached Drinkwater's age, but that was not Drinkwater's concern at the moment; he was more interested in the other news newly arrived at Sassnitz Bay.
'I heard one of your officers mention Dantzig when I came aboard,' he prompted.
'Dantzig? Oh, damn me yes, the place has fallen to the French.'
It seemed inevitable that, failing a major Russian victory, the French would mop up the resistance in their rear. Making his excuses as early as he could, Drinkwater had returned to Antigone, set a course to the eastward and retired to his cabin to open the package Home had given him. Slitting the fouled anchor seal of the Admiralty Office, he unfolded the papers and began to read.
His instructions from Mr. Barrow, Second Secretary at the Admiralty, were a mere repeat of those he had left the Nore with. The same stock phrases: You are requested and required to cruise against the enemy ... to examine all vessels and in particular those of neutral nations ... detaining those whose cargo is of advantage to the enemy ... and so on. In short, there was nothing to suggest that he had earned Home's envy or that his 'independence' had much advantage to it. But appended to Mr. Barrow's formal instructions was another letter, similarly sealed but not signed by the Admiralty's civil administrator; this document bore the scrawled and familiar name of the Director of the Secret Department. It was brief and undated, typical of the writer's economy of style when using plain English.
My dear Drinkwater,
Until you are able to ascertain the outcome of military operations in East Prussia, you are to cruise to the eastward of the Gulf of Dantzig and inform London the instant you learn anything of significance. You should afford any assistance required by persons operating on the instructions of this Department.
Yours & c Dungarth
Drinkwater laid the letter down and turned his chair to stare through the stern windows and watch Antigone's furrowing wake, where the sea swirled green and white from under the frigate's stern. He saw nothing of the gulls dipping in the marbled water; his mind was turned inwards, contemplating the full implication behind Dungarth's instruction, and it seemed that his independence was no coincidence. That last sentence, that he should afford assistance to persons operating on the instructions of Lord Dungarth's Secret Department, was a clear order. And both Dungarth and Drinkwater knew that one of those 'persons' was Drinkwater's own brother, Edward. Drinkwater's frigate was cruising independently for reasons beyond the arbitrary processes of normal Admiralty planning. Dungarth knew that Drinkwater was the one post-captain on the Navy List who would take more than a passing interest in 'persons operating on the instructions of this Department' in East Prussia, where the Tsar's armies were in the field.
Drinkwater sighed. Surely this was only a partial truth, and one that was engendered by his own long-held guilt over the whole affair of his brother. Colonel Wilson, whose presence in the area would be well known to Lord Dungarth, had given him almost identical advice, mentioning in particular a certain Mackenzie. Nevertheless that strange and fleeting feeling of presentiment could not be denied. Brief and passing though it was, it had the reality of one of those glimpses of the hungry gulls quartering their wake.
Drinkwater mused on the likely outcome of those military operations that were obviously preoccupying Dungarth and, by implication, His Majesty's Government. Home had told him of the fall of Dantzig to the French on 26 May. Dungarth could not have known of that when he had written his letter. Yet Drinkwater knew, as Wilson had told him, the coming weeks of the new campaigning season were vital to the outcome of the long and increasingly bitter war. Antigone was to be, for the foreseeable future, the Government's eyes and ears; to learn of the outcome of what promised to be a crucial clash of arms between France and Russia somewhere in East Prussia, Poland or Kurland.
There was a knock at the cabin door; Drinkwater folded Dungarth's letter and slipped it into the drawer.
'Enter!'
Midshipman Wickham's face peered into the cabin. 'Beg pardon, sir. Mr. Quilhampton sends his compliments and we shall have to tack, sir. The island of Bornholm is two leagues distant.'
'Very well. Thank you.'
'Aye, aye, sir. And I'm to tell you, sir, that Mr. Rogers is on deck.' There was more than a hint in this last remark. It annoyed Drinkwater that a youngster like Wickham should be privy to such innuendo. He frowned.
'Very well, Mr. Wickham. Be so kind as to give Mr. Rogers my compliments and ask him to take the deck and tack ship.'
'Mr. Rogers to tack ship ...' There was a slight inflection of doubt in Wickham's voice.
'You heard what I said, Mr. Wickham,' Drinkwater said sharply. 'Be so kind as to attend to your duty.'
The little exchange robbed Drinkwater of some of his former sense of satisfaction. He swore under his breath and, determined not to lose the mood entirely, he reopened the drawer beneath the table, pushed aside Dungarth's letter and drew out the leather-bound notebook and unclasped it. He also took out his pen-case and picked up the steel pen Elizabeth had given him. Uncapping his ink-well he dipped the nib and began to write in his journal.
It would seem that Ld Dungarth's Interest has influenced their L'dships to appoint us to this Particular Service. I am not inclined to enquire too closely into his L'dship's motives ...
He paused as the pipes twittered at the hatchways. The muffled thunder of feet told where the watches below were being turned up.
There was no need for him to go on deck. Rogers would benefit from any public demonstration of the captain's confidence, though there would doubtless be a deal too much in the way of starting. Drinkwater sighed again. He regretted that, but there was a deal too much of it in the naval service altogether. Shaking his head he continued to write.
I therefore directed our course to the eastward, as far as the wind would admit, intending to try for news at Konigsberg; for, with Dantzig capitulated to the Enemy, what news there is will surely be discovered there.
He sanded the page, blew it and put book and pen-case away. Flicking the cap over his ink-well he rose, took his hat from the peg and went on deck.
Antigone was turning up into the wind as he emerged onto the quarterdeck. Rogers was standing by the starboard hance. He looked at Drinkwater but the captain shook his head. 'Carry on, Mr. Rogers.'
Clasping his hands behind his back, Drinkwater affected to take little notice of what was going on on deck. Ahead the jib-boom pointed towards the long, flat table-land of Bornholm. Dark with fir trees, it impeded their making further progress to the northeast, and they were in the process of going about onto the larboard tack, to fetch a course of south-east until they raised the low coast of East Prussia, fifty miles away.
'Mains'l haul!'
Rogers's order was given with every appearance of confidence and the hands obeyed it willingly enough. He was not sure that his presence on deck had not toned down the usual activity of the bosun's mates with their rope starters. The frigate paid off on the new tack.
'Fore-yards there! Heads'l sheets! Leggo and haul!'
The fore-yards came round, the sails filled and the ship began to drive forwards again. 'Steer full and bye!'
'Full an' bye it is, sir ... Full an' bye steering sou'-east three-quarters south, sir.'
'Very well. Mr. Frey!'
'Sir?'
'Move the peg on the traverse board, Mr. Frey ... course sou'-east three-quarters south.'
'Sou'-east three-quarters south, sir. Aye, aye, sir.'
A comforting air of normality attended these routine transactions and, much heartened, Drinkwater crossed the deck.
'Very well, Mr. Rogers.' He smiled and added with less formality, 'Will you join me for dinner, Sam?'
Rogers nodded. 'Thank you, sir.'
It proved an odd meal. They dined alone and Drinkwater avoided serving wine, drinking the thin small beer that was usually drunk in the cockpit. Its very presence seemed an obstruction to any form of conviviality. Indeed, serving small beer and avoiding any reference to Rogers's recent unhappy experience only seemed to emphasize the matter. Drinkwater tried to fill the awkwardness and attempted an appraisal of the complex state of affairs among the Baltic States. But Rogers was not a man to interest himself in anything beyond the confines of the ship and such had been the mental disturbance he had so recently undergone that he was quite incapable of anything beyond the most subjective thinking. At the end of ten minutes of monologue, Drinkwater's lecture foundered on the first lieutenant's apathy.
'Well, Sam, that is the situation as I comprehend it. Now it remains to be seen who will outmaneuver whom. D'you understand?'
'Yes, sir,' said Rogers mechanically, avoiding Drinkwater's eyes.
There was a silence between the two men. It was not the companionable silence of contentment between friends. Drinkwater could sense the hostility in Rogers. Once, long ago on the brig Hellebore, it had been open and obvious; now it was concealed, hidden behind those downcast eyes. Drinkwater could only guess at its origins but that letter from Lord Dungarth made it imperative that Rogers suppressed it. He changed the subject.
'You did very well at Stralsund, Sam.'
'Didn't you think I'd be up to it?' Rogers jibbed at the patronisation. 'Look, if you're implying they didn't put up a spirited fight...'
'I'm implying nothing of the kind, Sam,' Drinkwater said with a weary patience he was far from feeling. Silence returned to the table. Then Rogers seemed to come to a decision. He pulled himself up in his chair as though bracing himself.
'Did you order Lallo to put me in a strait-jacket?'
Drinkwater looked directly at Rogers. To deny such a direct question would put poor Lallo in an impossible situation and give Rogers the impression that he was dodging the issue.
'I gave orders for the surgeon to restrain you with such force as was necessary, yes. It was for your own benefit, Sam. Now that you are weaned off the damnable stuff and have been recommended in a letter to the Admiralty — oh, yes, I sent it off with Captain Home's dispatch boat — you have a much better chance of ...' Drinkwater paused. He knew Rogers craved promotion and the security of being made post. Yet of all his officers Rogers was the one he would least recommend for command. Rogers would turn into the worst kind of flogging captain.
'Advancement?' said Rogers.
'Exactly,' Drinkwater temporised.
Rogers sat back, apparently appeased, looking at Drinkwater from beneath his brows. Drinkwater had told Rogers nothing of the real reason for their new station. The prevailing political situation was one thing, the complexities of secret operations quite another. Nevertheless it was not inconceivable that Rogers might wring some advantage out of their situation. Drinkwater would feel he could encourage Rogers if he could also avoid the man commanding a ship.
'Sam,' he said, 'I have a trifling influence; suppose I was able to get you a step in rank. What would you say to a post as Commander in the Sea-Fencibles?'
Rogers frowned. 'Or of a signal station?' he said darkly.
'Just so ...'
But Drinkwater had miscalculated. Rogers rose. 'Damn it,' he said, 'I want a ship like you!'
'Damn,' muttered Drinkwater as Rogers withdrew without further ceremony and, reaching for the hitherto untouched decanter, he poured himself a glass of wine.
The waters of the eastern Baltic, which two months earlier had presented a desolate aspect under pack-ice, were alive with coasting and fishing craft the following morning. Convention decreed that all fishing boats were free to attend to their business and Drinkwater was not much interested in stopping the small coasting vessels that crept along the shore. But mindful of the underlying task of every British cruiser, Drinkwater's written orders to his officers included the injunction to stop and search neutral vessels of any size. At two bells in the forenoon watch the lookout had sighted a large, barque-rigged vessel of some three hundred tons burthen. As Fraser eased his helm the barque set more sail and Drinkwater was sent for.
Coming on deck Drinkwater heard Rogers remark to Fraser, 'A festering blockade runner, eh?' with enough of his old spirit to dispel any worries as to permanent damage after the previous evening's conversation. He acknowledged the two lieutenants with a nod and a smile. Rogers's face was impassive.
Almost without any conscious effort on anyone's part, the news that the ship was in chase of a possible prize attracted every idler on deck. Gathering amidships were Mount and Lallo, with Pater the purser. Forward, on the triangular fo'c's'le, a score or so of seamen were crowding the knightheads to sight their quarry. James Quilhampton ascended the quarterdeck ladder and touched his hat to the captain.
'Morning, sir,' he said.
'Morning, James,' Drinkwater replied, dropping the usual formalities since Quilhampton not only was a friend but was not on duty. Fraser looked anxiously at the captain. He was eager to crack on sail for all he was worth.
'D'ye wish that I should set... ?'
'Carry on, Mr. Fraser, carry on. You are doing fine. Just forbear carrying anything away if you please.'
Drinkwater raised his Dollond glass and levelled in on the chase. 'Now what nationality do you guess our friend is, James?' He handed the glass to Quilhampton who studied the quarry.
'Er ... I don't know, sir.'
'I think he's a Dane, Mr. Q; a neutral Dane with a cargo of ... oh, timber, flax, perhaps, and bound for somewhere where they build ships. We shall have to exercise our right of angary.'
'Of what, sir?'
'Angary, Mr. Q, angary. A belligerent's right to seize or use neutral property: in our case temporarily, to ascertain if he is bound for a port friendly to the French,' Drinkwater took back his glass and again looked at the barque. Then he turned to Fraser. 'You are coming up on him hand over fist, Mr. Fraser. Let us have a bow-chaser loaded, ready to put a shot athwart his hawse!'
In the brilliant sunshine and over a sparkling sea the Antigone soon overhauled her deep-laden and bluff-bowed victim. A single shot across her bow forced the barque to bring-to and an hour and a half after they had first sighted her, the blockade runner lay under Antigone's lee.
'Very well done, Mr. Fraser, my congratulations.'
'Thank you, sir.' Mr. Fraser, looking pleased with himself, acknowledged the captain's compliment.
Drinkwater turned to Quilhampton. 'Do you board him, Mr. Q. Examine his papers and, if you think it necessary, his cargo. Take your time. If you consider the cargo is bound for a port under French domination or of use as war material we are authorised to detain him. D'you understand?'
'Perfectly, sir. Angary is the word.' And he went off to the quarter, where the lee cutter was being prepared for lowering.
Rogers and Hill were active about the deck as, aloft, the flogging topgallants were dropped onto the topmast caps and the big main-topsail was backed in a great double belly against the mast. Both courses and spanker were brailed in and Antigone pitched, reined in and checked in her forward dash.
'Lower away!' There was a loud smack as the cutter hit the water and a few minutes later she was being pulled across the blue sea towards the barque, her dripping oarblades flashing in the sun.
Drinkwater settled down to wait patiently. The hiatus occasioned by Quilhampton's search could be long, depending upon the degree of co-operation he received from the vessel's master. Drinkwater watched idly as a fishing boat crossed the stern, her four-man crew standing up arid watching the curious sight with obvious interest.
'She's Danish, sir,' said Fraser suddenly. Drinkwater looked up and saw that the barque was hoisting the colours that she had studiously avoided showing before. That very circumstance had made her actions sufficiently suspicious to Drinkwater. 'Hm. I thought as much.'
'This'll annoy the Danes,' added Rogers, joining them, and Drinkwater recalled the incident off Elsinore. It seemed an age ago.
'Yes, they are somewhat sensitive upon the subject of Freedom of the Seas,' Drinkwater remarked. 'At least they ain't escorted by a warship.'
At the turn of the century British men-of-war had detained an entire Danish convoy escorted by the frigate Freya. The incident had almost caused open hostilities and had certainly contributed to the rupture that had resulted in Nelson's victory at Copenhagen a year later.
'Well, to be neutral during such a war as this carries its own penalties and entails its own risks,' Drinkwater remarked. 'I feel more pity for others whose lives are more deeply affected by French imperialism than a few profitmongering Danish merchants.'
Fraser looked sideways at the captain. Did Drinkwater refer to the widows and orphans they themselves had made in the destruction of the battery at Stralsund? Or was he alluding to the families of the pressed men that milled in the ship's waist?
'Boat's returning,' said Rogers, recalling Fraser from his unsolved abstraction.
'Yes,' said Drinkwater peering through his glass. Beside Quilhampton in the cutter was another figure who seemed by his gesticulations to be arguing.
'Damnation,' muttered Drinkwater, 'trouble.'
'Capten, I protest much! Goddam you English! Vy you stop my ship?'
'Because you are carrying a cargo proscribed by the Orders in Council of His Majesty King George, to the port of Antwerp which is invested by ships of King George's Royal Navy.'
Drinkwater studied the papers Quilhampton had brought him, then looked up at the Danish master. 'The matter admits little argument, sir; Anvers, Antwerpen, Antwerp, 'tis all the same to me.' He held up the papers and quoting from them read, 'Der Schiff Birthe, Captain Nielsen, von Grenaa, Dantzig vox Antwerpen ... your cargo is, er, sawn timber, flax, turpentine. They make excellent deals in Dantzig, Captain, and with such deals they make excellent ships at Antwerpen. About a dozen men-o'-war a year, I believe.'
'And vot vill you do now, eh, Capten English?'
'Detain you, sir,' Drinkwater said, folding the Birthe's papers and tucking them in his tail-pocket, 'and send you in as a prize.'
'A prize! A for helvede!'
'To be condemned in due form according to the usages and customs ...'
'No! Goddam, no!'
Drinkwater looked at the man. He had expected anger and despised himself for hiding this unpleasant necessity behind the jumble of half-legal cant. The Danish mariner could scarcely be expected to understand it, beyond learning that he and his ship were virtually prisoners.
'A disagreeable necessity, Captain, for both of us.' Drinkwater spread his hands in a gesture to signify helplessness. Oddly, the man seemed to be considering something. This suspicion was almost immediately confirmed when Nielsen stepped forward, taking Drinkwater by the elbow and saying in his ear:
'Capten, ve go below and talk, yes?'
'I think that will not be necessary.'
Nielsen's grip on his arm increased. 'It is important ... ver' important!' He paused, then added, 'Before Dantzig I was in Konigsberg, Capten ...' and nodded, as if this added intelligence was of some significance. Nielsen suddenly stepped back and gave a grave nod to Drinkwater. Frowning, Drinkwater suspected he was to be made a bribe, but something in the man's face persuaded him to take the matter seriously. After all, Konigsberg was a Prussian port and Dantzig now a French one. Was Nielsen trying to placate him with some news?
'Mr. Rogers, take the deck. Watch our friend carefully. Mr. Fraser, this man wants to talk to me privately. I'd be obliged if you'd come as a witness.' And leaving the deck buzzing with speculation, Drinkwater led them below.
'Now, sir,' he said to Nielsen the instant Fraser had closed the cabin door, 'what is it you want?'
The Danish master put his hand up to his breast and reached under his coat.
'If you intend to offer me money ...'
'Nein ... not money, Capten... this,' he drew a package from his breast, 'is more good than money, I tink. I come from Konigsberg, Capten, plenty Russians Konigsberg.' He handed Drinkwater the sealed packet.
'What the devil is it?'
'It is, er ...' Nielsen searched for a word, '... er, secret, Capten ... for London from Russia ... for many times I, Frederic Nielsen, carry the secret paper for you English.'
Drinkwater turned the package over suspiciously. 'You intended taking this where? To Antwerp?' Drinkwater fixed the Dane with his eyes, searching for the truthful answers to his questions. Any fool could wrap up an impressive bundle of papers scribbled in a supposed 'cipher' and try it as a ruse. 'Together with your cargo for the French, eh, Captain. Is that how you trade first with Konigsberg and then with Dantzig, eh?'
Nielsen shrugged. 'A man must live, Capten ... but yes. To Antwerpen. In two days from Antwerpen it can be to London — by Helvoetsluys or Vlissingen — who know? This is not for me. I only make my ship go ver' fast.' He shrugged again. 'Now it is stop by you.'
'Are you paid?'
'Yes.'
'How?'
Nielsen hesitated, reluctant to admit his private affairs. He looked first at Drinkwater then at Fraser. He found comfort in neither face. 'How?' Drinkwater repeated and Fraser stirred menacingly.
'Ven the paper to London, den is money made to me, to Hamburg.'
Drinkwater considered for a moment. 'If I undertake to deliver this, will you get your money?'
A look of alarm crossed Nielsen's face.
'Have a look at the thing, sir,' said Fraser, unable to remain silent any longer. 'He's trying to get you to let his cargo through on the pretext o' this cock-and-bull story.'
'What is the news in here, Captain Nielsen?' Drinkwater tapped the packet.
Again Nielsen shrugged. 'I do not know. Is some good news for London I hear at Dantzig.' 'Good news! At Dantzig?'
'Yes. French have battle at Heilsberg. Russian ver' good.' Drinkwater frowned. 'You say the Russians beat the French at Heilsberg?'
Nielsen nodded. Drinkwater made up his mind, turned to the table and picked up the pen-knife lying there.
'No, Capten, I tell good, if you cut paper I not get money! Gott!'
It was too late. Drinkwater had slit the heavy sealing on the outer, oiled paper and unfolded the contents. They consisted of several sheets of handwriting at the top of which was a prefix of seven digits. The message was meaningless in any language and was either in cipher or an imitation cipher. Drinkwater looked up at Nielsen.
'Any damned fool could write a few pages of gibberish,' said Drinkwater. He lifted the final sheet. At the bottom was a signature of sorts. At least it was a series of signs in the place one would write a signature. They seemed to be in Cyrillic script whereas the body of the thing was in Roman handwriting; Drinkwater could make nothing of them, but then his eye fell on something else that stirred a memory of something Colonel Wilson had said. When he had mentioned Mackenzie, the British agent to whom he should offer assistance, he had also spoken of a Russian officer, a lieutenant whose name he had forgotten. Were those Cyrillic letters this man's signature? Both men used a cryptogramic code, Wilson had said, and both sent their reports to Joseph Devlieghere, Merchant of Antwerpen. He did not have to recall the Flemish name: it was written at the bottom of the page.
'Capten, if you take my ship prize, you make London ver' angry. Frederic Nielsen help you English ...'
'For money!' said Fraser contemptuously.
'No!' Nielsen was angry himself now and turned on Fraser. 'Why you not to trust Nielsen, eh? You English not like business of oder people! Only for English it is good. Yes! But I tell you, Capten,' here he rounded on Drinkwater, 'if Nielsen not bring paper, sometimes London not know what happen in Russia, Sweden an' oder place.
You English send gold ... much gold... but not keep it good ... Ha! Ha! Ver' funny! You English crazy! You lose much gold but stop poor Frederic Nielsen to take some deals to Antwerpen ... bah!'
Drinkwater had only the haziest notion of what Nielsen meant and was only paying partial attention to the Danish master for there was something else about the papers he held that was odd; not merely odd but profoundly disquieting. Something had tripped a subconscious mechanism of his memory. Now he wanted Nielsen and Fraser out of his cabin.
'Take Captain Nielsen on deck, Mr. Fraser. I want a moment to reflect.'
'Don't be misled by such a trick, sir,' Fraser said anxiously.
'Cut along, Mr. Fraser,' Drinkwater said with sudden asperity, waiting impatiently for the two men to leave him alone. When they had gone he sat and stared at the document. But he could not be certain and gradually the beating of his heart subsided. He cursed himself for a fool and began to fold the letter, then thought better of it and opened his table drawer, drew out journal, pen-case and ink-well. Very carefully he copied into the margin of his journal the strange exotic letters of the document's 'signature': ИCЛAHД.
Then he stowed the things away again, stuffed Nielsen's dispatch into the breast of his coat, strode to the cabin door and took the quarterdeck ladder two steps at a time.
'Mr. Rogers!'
'Sir?'
'Be so kind as to have Captain Nielsen returned to his ship.' Drinkwater turned to the Dane. 'Captain, I apologise for detaining you.' He handed the dispatch back. 'You must re-seal it and please tell Mynheer Devlieghere the news of the defeat at...'
'Heilsberg,' offered Nielsen, visibly brightening.
'Yes. Heilsberg. Good voyage and I hope you have good news soon from Hamburg.'
Nielsen's face split in a grin and he held out a stubby hand. 'T'ank you, Capten. You English are not too much friend with Denmark, but this,' he wagged the dispatch in the air, 'this is good news, yes.' He strode to the rail where a puzzled Quilhampton waited.
'You are not going to let the bugger go, are you?' asked Rogers with some of his wonted fire, seeing a plum prize slipping once again beyond his grasp.
'Yes, Mr. Rogers,' said Drinkwater, fixing the first lieutenant with a cautionary eye, 'for reasons of state ...' Then he turned to the master. 'Mr. Hill, be so kind as to resume our course for Konigsberg when the boat returns,' he said and added, by way of a partial explanation, 'we must investigate the nature of a French defeat at a place called Heilsberg.'
'Aye, aye, sir,' replied the imperturbable Hill.
'And Mr. Mount?'
'Sir?'
'Can we locate Heilsberg on that atlas of yours?'
'I should hope so, sir,' said the marine officer with enthusiasm as Drinkwater led him below.
Lieutenant Rogers strode to the lee rail and watched the boat pulling back towards Antigone.
'Reasons of state!' he hissed under his breath, and spat disgustedly to leeward as the Danish barque made sail.
'No, Mr. Rogers, no wine, I beg you.' Lallo put out a restraining hand.
Rogers, his fist clamped around the neck of the decanter which he had ordered the negro messman to bring, looked from one to another of the gunroom officers. They returned his stare, watching his pale face with its faint sheen of perspiration showing in the dim light of the gunroom.
'God damn and blast you for a set of canting Methodisticals,' he said. 'God damn and blast you all to hell,' and drawing back his arm he sent the decanter flying through the air. It smashed on the forward bulkhead and in the silence that followed they could hear Rogers's laboured breathing.
'Mr. Rogers . . .' began Fraser, but he was instantly silenced by Lallo. They watched as Rogers calmed himself. After a pause Rogers ceased to glare at them all, picked up his knife and fork and addressed himself to his plate. In an embarrassed silence the others dutifully followed suit. For fifteen minutes no one said a word and then Rogers, flinging down his utensils, rose from the table and stumped out. His exit provoked a broadside of expelled breath.
'Phew! How long will he go on like this?' asked Fraser. 'If he isn't damned careful he'll end up with the other irredeemable tosspots in Haslar Hospital.'
'That was what I tried to tell you, Mr. Fraser,' said Lallo, 'when you interfered.'
'I'm damn sorry, Mr. Lallo, but I couldna tolerate him being trussed like a chicken for the table.'
'I was not aware,' said Lallo archly, 'that there was any love lost between you.'
'Nor there is, but...'
'The captain ordered me to restrain him. It was out of kindness, to avoid too public a humiliation for the man.' 'But was all that really necessary?'
'In my opinion yes. Despite being anorexic, which was attributable to his reliance on strong drink, he was quite capable of doing himself and myself a great deal of damage in his ravings. The aboulia ... the loss of will-power associated with addiction, disturbs all the natural processes and inclinations of the body. He was by turns lethargic and extremely violent. At times he was almost cataleptic, but at others his strength was amazing.' Lallo paused, then added, 'I'd say the treatment, though drastic, was successful.' He turned and looked down on the deck where the broken decanter lay amid a dark stain on the planking. 'At least he resisted the stuff.'
'Well, it was a damnable thing ...' said Fraser.
'It was a damnable thing that you had a man gagged yourself for the use of strong language the day before yesterday ...'
'That's preposterous ...'
'And furthermore,' Lallo interrupted, 'I'd diagnose your own condition...'
'For goodness sake, gentlemen,' put in Quilhampton, raising his voice to overcome the rising argument, 'I conceive Mr. Rogers to be upset because we let the Danish ship go. He has never enjoyed much luck in the way of prize-money.'
'There would have been nothing very certain about making any out of that Dane,' snapped Fraser. 'Condemning neutrals usually turns upon points of law. It isn't the same thing as taking a national ship or a privateer.'
Lallo was grateful for the changed mood of the conversation. 'What did happen in the cabin, Mr. Fraser? Did the scoundrel offer the captain money?'
'No,' said Fraser after a pause. 'The Dane, Frederic Nielsen, claimed he was carrying secret papers for London, or some such nonsense. The fellow was adamant and I don't think the captain believed him. Then ...'
'Go on ...'
Fraser shrugged. 'Well, he suddenly looked closer at the papers and appeared to change his mind. Bundled Nielsen and myself out of the cabin and a few minutes later came up, handed the papers back to the Dane and let him go.'
'Just like that?' asked Lallo.
'Yes. Or that is how it seemed to me.'
'I wonder ... mused Quilhampton, attracting the attention of the other two.
'You wonder what, James?' asked Fraser. 'Have you any idea what's afoot?'
'The captain's been mixed up in this sort of thing before.' 'What sort of thing?' asked Fraser. 'This sort of thing.'
'What sort of thing, for God's sake?' Fraser repeated in exasperation.
'Well, secret operations and suchlike.'
'Secret operations?' said Lallo incredulously. 'Are we bound on a secret operation? I thought we were on a cruise against blockade runners.'
'Can't you be more specific, James?' Fraser's curiosity was plain and almost indignant.
Quilhampton shrugged. 'Who knows ...?' he said enigmatically.
'Oh, for Heaven's sake, James!'
'Well, ask Hill. They were both on the cutter Kestrel years ago, doing all sorts of clandestine things ... Oh, my God!' Quilhampton jumped up.
'What the devil's the matter?'
'It's Hill! I've forgotten to relieve him again!' Quilhampton grabbed his hat and trod in the broken glass from the smashed decanter.
'Damn! Hey, King! Come and sweep up this damned mess, will you?'
Drinkwater paced up and down the deck as the hands went aloft to stow the sails. Antigone rocked gently in the swell that ran in over the Pregel Bar. The desolation of two months earlier was scarcely imaginable in the present lively scene. The sea, now clear of ice, was an enticing blue. The distant line of coast was a soft blue-green and, above the long yellow spit that made it a lagoon, the Frisches Haff was dotted with the sails of coasting craft and fishing vessels. There were others in the open sea around them and the activity seemed to indicate that events ashore were having little effect on the lives of the local population who were busy pursuing their various trades. Perhaps Nielsen had been right and the French had been badly mauled at Heilsberg. Perhaps another battle had been fought and the Russians had flung back the Grand Army. Perhaps the French were in headlong flight, a circumstance which would explain all this normality! Drinkwater checked his wild speculation. He was here to gather facts without delay. He would have to send to Konigsberg as soon as the ship was secured and a boat was prepared. He contemplated going himself. Properly it was Rogers's prerogative to command so important an expedition but, despite his success at Stralsund, Rogers's lack of interest in political matters did not recommend him for the service. On the other hand, if he sent Fraser, the next in seniority, a slight would be imputed to Rogers. He did not wish to risk a reversal to the first lieutenant's progress back to normality. But that left Hill or Quilhampton, and Hill could not be sent because the same imputation attached to the dispatching of the sailing master as the second lieutenant. It would have to be Quilhampton.
Drinkwater, irritated by all these trivial considerations, swore, consoled himself that Quilhampton was as good a man as any for the task, and made up his mind. He passed orders for the preparation of the launch for a lengthy absence from the ship and summoned the third lieutenant to his cabin.
'Now, Mr. Q,' he said, indicating the chart and Mount's borrowed atlas. 'See, here is Konigsberg. You are to take the launch, which is being provisioned for a week, and make the best of your way there. I shall provide you with a letter of accreditment to the effect that you are a British naval officer. Your purpose is to ascertain the truth and extent of a report that the French suffered a defeat at Heilsberg.' Drinkwater placed his finger on a spot on a page of the atlas. 'You must get the best information you can and try to determine if anything else has occurred. Was the French army routed or merely checked? Have there been any further engagements? That sort of thing. Do you understand?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Very well. Now, I suggest that initially you search out a British merchant ship. There will almost certainly be at least one in the port. Do that first. Do not land until you have made contact and obtained advice from a British master. The port is Prussian and there may be Russian troops there. You would do well to avoid any problems with language and your best interpreter will be the master of a British ship who will have an agent and therefore someone acquainted with local affairs.' Drinkwater remembered Young and Baker and added, 'Sometimes, I believe, these fellows have quite an effective intelligence system of their own.'
'What force will I take, sir?'
'Twenty-four men, James; no marines, just seamen.'
'Very well, sir ... May I ask a favour?'
'Well?'
'May I take Tregembo, sir?'
'Tregembo?' Drinkwater frowned. 'You know I dare not expose him to any unnecessary danger, I shall never hear the last of it from his wife ...' Drinkwater smiled.
'Well, Konigsberg is supposed to be a friendly port, sir. I cannot see that he can come to much harm.'
'True. Why do you want Tregembo?' Drinkwater paused and saw Quilhampton's hesitation. 'Is it because you do not trust the temper of the men?'
Quilhampton shrugged, trying to pass his concern off lightly. 'One or two may try and run, sir. They are still somewhat mettlesome. With Tregembo there they will be less inclined to try. Besides, I shall have to leave the launch.'
'You will take two midshipmen, Dutfield and Wickham.'
'I should still like Tregembo.'
Drinkwater raised his voice. 'Sentry! Pass word for my coxswain!'
A minute or two later Tregembo arrived. 'You sent for me, zur?'
'Aye, Tregembo. Mr. Q here wants you to go in the launch with him to Konigsberg. To be particular, he has requested you go. I'd like you to accompany him.'
'Who'll look after you, zur?' Tregembo asked with the air of the indispensable.
'Oh, I expect Mullender will manage for a day or two,' Drinkwater replied drily.
Tregembo sniffed his disbelief. 'If you'm want me to go, zur, I'll go'
'Very well.' Drinkwater smiled. 'You had better both go and make your preparations.'
An hour later he watched the launch pull away from the ship's side. On board Antigone the men were coiling away the yard and stay tackles used to sway the heavy carvel boat up from its chocks on the booms in the frigate's waist and over the side. Half a cable away the men in the launch stowed their oars, stepped the two masts and hooked the lugsail yards to their travellers. An hour later the two lugsails were mere nicks upon the horizon, no different from half a dozen others entering or leaving the Frisches Haff. Drinkwater settled down to wait.
For two days Antigone swung slowly round her anchor. On board, the monotonous routines of shipboard life went on, the officer of the watch occasionally studying the low, desolate shore for the twin peaks of the launch's lugsails. Once a watch Frey or Walmsley climbed to the main royal yard and peered diligently to the eastward, but without seeing any sign of the ship's boat. Then, early in the morning of the third day, an easterly breeze carried with it the sound of gunfire. Sent aloft, Frey brought down the disquieting intelligence that there was smoke visible from the general direction of Konigsberg.
All the officers were on the quarterdeck and Mount, as if disbelieving the boy's report, ascended the mast himself to confirm it.
'But what the devil does it mean, Mount?' asked Hill. 'Your atlas shows Heilsberg as to the south and west of Konigsberg. If the Russkies threw the French back, what the hell is smoke and gunfire doing at Konigsberg?' He crossed the deck and checked the wind direction from the weather dog-vane to the compass. 'That gunfire isn't coming from anywhere other than east.'
'It means', said Drinkwater, 'either that Heilsberg was wrongly reported or that the French have counter-attacked and reached Konigsberg.'
'Bloody hell!'
'What about Quilhampton?'
And Tregembo, thought Drinkwater. Should he send another boat? Should he work Antigone closer inshore? He had no charts of the area accurate enough to attempt a passage over the bar and into the Frisches Haff, and did not relish the thought of grounding ignominiously within range of the shore. A picture of French batteries revenging themselves on him from the shingle spit enclosing the great lagoon presented itself to him. Napoleon would make much of such an event and he Moniteur would trumpet it throughout Europe. No, he would have to give Quilhampton his chance. The man was not a fool. If he heard gunfire he would assume the place was under attack and, as it could only be attacked by one enemy, he would come off to the ship as his orders said. But the officers were looking at him, expecting some response.
'I think that we can do little but wait, gentlemen,' Drinkwater said, and turning he made his way below, to brood in his cabin and fret himself with anxiety. For two hours an uneasy silence hung over the ship, then Frey, suspended in the rigging with the ship's best glass, hailed the deck, his voice cracking with excitement.
'Deck there! Deck there! The launch, sir! It's in sight!' His frantic excitement promised to unseat him from his precarious perch and it was only with difficulty that Hill persuaded him that his own safety was more important than the precise bearing of the launch. But Frey would not desert his post and kept the image of the launch dancing in the lens by lying full length on the furled main-topgallant. It was he, therefore, who spotted the reversed ensign flying from the launch's peak as she approached the ship. 'She's flying a signal for distress, sir!'
Once again all were on deck; the waist and fo'c's'le were crowded with Antigone's people training their eyes to the eastward where the launch was now clearly visible.
'Mr. Comley!' Rogers called sharply and with no trace of his former debility. 'Stir those idlers! Man the yard and stay tackles! Prepare to hoist in the launch!'
'Mr. Lallo,' said Drinkwater lowering his telescope, 'as far as I can ascertain there is nothing amiss with the launch itself. I can only assume the signal of distress refers to the people in the boat. I think it would be wise if you were to prepare your instruments.' A chilling foreboding had closed itself round Drinkwater's heart.
The launch came running down wind, the men in her hidden behind the bunts of the loose-footed lugsails. She was skillfully rounded up into the wind and, sails a-flapping, came alongside Antigone's waist. With an overwhelming sense of relief Drinkwater saw a disheveled Quilhampton at the tiller, his iron hook crooked over the wooden bar. Then he saw wounded men amidships: one of them Tregembo.
The fit men clambered from the launch up Antigone's tumble-home. With her sails stowed and masts lowered the boat was hooked and swung up and inboard onto the booms. Here eager arms assisted in lifting the wounded men out and down below to the catlings and curettes of Mr. Lallo.
Drinkwater waited until Quilhampton reported. His eyes followed the inert body of Tregembo as, his shoulder slung in a bloodstained and makeshift bandage, he was taken below. He was therefore unaware of a dusty stranger who stood upon the deck ignored amidst the bustle.
'Well, Mr. Q? What happened?'
James Quilhampton looked five years older. His face was drawn and he was filthy.
'I have your intelligence, sir, Konigsberg has fallen to the French. There has been a great battle, just two days ago. It was disastrous for the Russians. There is chaos in the port...' He paused, gathering his wits. He was clearly exhausted. 'I made contact, as you suggested, with the master of a Hull ship. We went ashore to gather news at a tavern much used by British shipmasters. To my surprise Captain Young was there, together with Captain Baker.' Quilhampton shook his head, trying to clear it of the fog of fatigue. 'To my astonishment their ships had still not discharged their lading ...'
'Good God ... but go on.'
'The fellows were debating what should be done, as the news had just arrived of the precipitate flight of the Russians. I said Antigone was anchored on the Pregel Bar and would afford them convoy. Most felt that with their cargoes not yet completed they could not stand the loss. They affirmed their faith in the garrison and the defences of the city. I tried to tell Young that his cargo must not fall into the hands of the enemy. He assured me it wouldn't. The men had had a tiring passage with the necessity of rowing up the river, so I judged that we should remain alongside Young's ship. Her chief mate offered us accommodation and I accepted, intending to see how matters stood in the morning and, if necessary, help to get the Nancy and the Jenny Marsden to sea. I thought, sir, that if the threat from the French persisted, I might better persuade Captain Young to change his mind. You see, sir, the evening before he had been somewhat in his cups and difficult to move ...' 'I understand, James. Go on.'
'There is not much more to tell. I slept badly, the town was shaken throughout the night by artillery fire, and the bursting of the shells was constant. In the morning French cavalry were in the town. Young was not on board and I attempted to get his mate to sail and bring out Baker's ship as well. They would not move unless their respective masters were with them. I undertook to return to the tavern where it was thought they had lodged. I got caught in a cross-fire between some infantry, I don't know whether they were Prussians or Russians, and some French sharp-shooters. Tregembo and Kissel were with me. Kissel was hit and Tregembo and I went back for him. As we dragged him towards the Jenny Marsden's jolly-boat we were ridden down by French dragoons. They dispatched Kissel and wounded Tregembo ...'
'Go on. What happened to you?'
'Oh, nothing, sir.'
'He unhorsed a dragoon, Captain, pulled the fellow clean out of his saddle.
Drinkwater turned and was aware of an unfamiliar face. 'And who, sir, are you?'
The stranger ignored the question. 'Your officer unhorsed the dragoon with that remarkable hook of his. You see, sir, they were pursuing me. I had evaded them in an alley and they took their revenge on your officer and men. However, as I swiftly made him out to be a seafaring man as well as an Englishman, I made myself known to him and assisted him in getting his wounded comrade into the boat.'
'I doubt I could have done it alone, sir,' explained Quilhampton, 'before the other dragoon got me. Fortunately the fellow missed with his carbine and we were able to get to the Jenny Marsden without further ado, but I could not get either of them to unmoor and, with shot flying about the shipping and this gentleman here insisting on my bringing him off, I decided that discretion was the better part of valour ...'
'What is the extent of Tregembo's wound?' Drinkwater cut in.
'A sabre thrust in the fleshy part of the shoulder, sir. I do not believe it to be mortal.'
'I hope to God it ain't.' Drinkwater turned on the stranger. 'And now, sir, who are you and what is your business?'
'I think, Captain,' said the stranger with that imperturbable coolness that was rapidly eroding Drinkwater's temper, 'that this should be discussed in your cabin.'
'Do you, indeed.'
'Yes. In fact I insist upon it.' His cold blue eyes held Drinkwater's in an unblinking gaze. The man made a gesture with his hand as if their roles were reversed and it was he who was inviting Drinkwater below. 'Captain ...?'
'Mr. Q, get below and turn in. You, Mr. Frey, cut along to the surgeon and tell him to debride those wounds immediately or they will mortify' He turned to the stranger. 'As for you, sir, you had better follow me!'
Drinkwater strode below and, shutting the door behind the stranger, rounded on him.
'Now, sir! Enough of this tomfoolery. Who the deuce are you and what the devil d'you mean by behaving like that?'
The stranger smiled coolly. 'I already have the advantage of you, Captain. Your lieutenant informed me that you are Captain Drinkwater. Captain Nathaniel Drinkwater, I understand ...' A small and strangely threatening smile was playing about the man's mouth, but he held out his hand cordially enough. 'I am Colin Alexander Mackenzie, Captain Drinkwater, and in your debt for saving my life.'
Drinkwater felt awkward under Mackenzie's uncompromising scrutiny. He hesitated, then took the outstretched hand. Everything about the stranger irritated Drinkwater, not least his proprietorial air in Drinkwater's own cabin.
'Mr. Mackenzie,' he said coldly, 'Colonel Wilson mentioned you.' Drinkwater was not ready to say the British Commissioner had urged him to offer this cold-eyed man as much assistance as he required. The manner of Mackenzie's arrival seemed to indicate he already had that for the time being.
'So,' Mackenzie smiled, 'you have met Bob Wilson. I wonder where he is now?'
Drinkwater indicated a chair and Mackenzie slumped into it. 'Thank you.'
'A glass?' Drinkwater asked.
'That is very kind of you. What did Wilson say?'
Drinkwater poured the two glasses of wine and handed one to the Scotsman. He did not hurry to answer, but observed the man as he relaxed. After a little he said, 'That I was to afford you such assistance as you might require. It seems we have already done so.'
The two men were still weighing each other up and Drinkwater's manner remained cool. Now, however, Mackenzie dropped his aloofness.
'I'm damn glad you did, Captain. I had to ride for my very life. I am almost sure those dragoons knew who I was ...' He shrugged, passing a hand over his dust-stained face. 'The Russians were smashed, you know, on the fourteenth, at a place called Friedland. Bennigsen got himself caught in a loop of the River Alle and, though the Russians fought like bears, the French got the better of them. Bennigsen was forced to retreat and Konigsberg has fallen. The Russians are falling back everywhere to the line of the Nieman. I was lucky to get out... and even luckier to find you.' He smiled, and Drinkwater found himself feeling less hostile. However he did not pass up the opportunity to goad Mackenzie a little.
'What exactly is your function, Mr. Mackenzie? I mean what was it you feared the French dragoons took you for?'
Mackenzie looked at him shrewdly, again that strangely disquieting smile played about his mouth, again Drinkwater received the impression that their roles were reversed and that he, in goading Mackenzie, was in some obscure way being put upon.
'I am sure you are aware of my function as a British agent.' He paused and added, 'A spy, if you wish.'
Drinkwater shied away from the dangerous word-game he felt inadequate to play. This was his ship, his cabin; he switched the conversation back onto its safer track.
'I heard that the French were defeated at a place called Heilsberg. After Eylau we were expecting that the Russians might throw Boney back, once and for all.'
Mackenzie nodded tiredly, apparently equally relieved at the turn the conversation had taken. 'So did I, Captain. It was true. The Russians and Prussians moved against the French at the beginning of the month when Ney's Corps went foraging. Le Rougeard was caught napping and given a bloody nose. But Napoleon moved the whole mass of the Grand Army, caught Bennigsen ten days later at Friedland and crushed him.'
'I see.' Drinkwater considered the matter a moment. He did not think that the news left him much alternative. The retreat of the Tsar's Army beyond the Nieman, the French occupation of Poland and East Prussia, the fall of Dantzig and now Konigsberg, left Napoleon the undisputed master of Europe. In accordance with his orders, London must be informed forthwith.
'Well, Mr. Mackenzie, having rescued you and rendered that assistance required of me, I must now take the news you bring back to London. I take it you will take passage with us?'
Mackenzie hesitated then said, 'Captain Drinkwater, how discretionary are your orders?'
'Those from their Lordships are relatively wide.'
'You have, perhaps, orders from another source?' Mackenzie paused. 'I see you are reluctant to confide in me. No matter. But perhaps you have something else, eh? Something from the Secret Department of Lord Dungarth?'
'Go on, Mr. Mackenzie. I find your hypothesis ... intriguing,' Drinkwater prevaricated.
'The Russians are defeated; the shipments of arms in the two merchantmen at Konigsberg have fallen into enemy hands. In commercial terms the Tsar is a bad risk.' Mackenzie smiled. 'Sweden is led by an insane monarch and on the very edge of revolution. Now, Captain, what is the victorious Napoleone going to do about it all? He has destroyed Prussia, driven the Russians back into Mother Russia itself, he is suborning the Swedes, threatening the Danes. He has the Grand Army in the field under his personal control, his rear is secured by Mortier at Stralsund and Brune's Corps of Hispano-Dutch on the borders of Denmark. Austria is quiescent but...' and Mackenzie paused to emphasize his point, 'he has not been in Paris for over a year. The question of what is happening in Paris will prevent him sleeping more than anything. He has a few more months in the field and then,' he shrugged, 'who knows? So what would you do, Captain?'
'Me? I have no idea.' Drinkwater found the idea absurd.
'I would conclude an armistice with the Tsar,' said Mackenzie evenly.
Drinkwater looked sharply at him. The idea was preposterous. The Tsar was the sworn enemy of the French Revolution and the Imperial system of the parvenu Emperor, and yet such was the persuasion of Mackenzie's personality that the cold, cogent logic of it struck Drinkwater. He remembered Straton's cautionary removal of the Tsar's subsidy, and his own now-proven misgivings. He said nothing for there seemed nothing to say.
Then Mackenzie broke the seriousness of their mood. His smile was unsullied and charming. 'But then, 'tis only a hypothesis, Captain Drinkwater ... and it is my business to speculate, intelligently, of course.'
'And it's not my business to verify the accuracy of your speculations, Mr. Mackenzie,' said the captain brightening, 'but to take this intelligence back to London as quickly as possible.'
'Have you heard of any preparations against the Baltic being made at home?'
'Yes," said Drinkwater. 'Home of the Pegasus mentioned some such expedition to be mounted this summer in support of Gustavus at Rugen. There were problems of command: the King of Sweden wanted to command British troops in person ...'
'They would walk into a trap," said Mackenzie, his voice a mixture of contempt and exasperation.
'Well then,' said Drinkwater, 'the sooner we prevent that, the better.'
'I think you are mistaken, Captain, to think our news would stop His Majesty's ministers from acting in their usual incompetent manner. Hypotheses are not intelligence. Lord Dungarth would be pleased with the news, but not ecstatic. They will know of the Battle of Friedland in London in a day or so, if they do not already. There are other channels ...' Again Drinkwater was confronted by that strange, ominous smile.
'Well,' expostulated Drinkwater, feeling his irritation returning, 'what do you suggest I do?'
'I know what we should do, Captain Drinkwater. The question is, can we do it?' Mackenzie's eyes closed to contemplative slits, his voice lowered. 'I am certain that there will be an armistice soon. The French dare not overextend themselves; Napoleon must return to Paris; yet, if he withdraws, the Russians will follow like wolves. There must be an accommodation with the Tsar.'
'And will the Tsar agree to such a proposal, particularly as it reveals Boney in a position of weakness?'
Mackenzie chuckled. 'My dear Captain, you know nothing of Russia. There is one thing you must understand, she is an autocracy. What the Tsar wills, is. Alexander professes one thing and does another. The Tsar can be relied upon to be erratic'
Drinkwater shook his head, still mystified. 'So what do you advise I do?'
'You already asked that question.'
'But you did not answer it.'
'We should eavesdrop on their conversation.'
'Whose?' asked Drinkwater frowning.
'Alexander's and Napoleon's.'
'Mr. Mackenzie, I am sure that you are a tired man, that your recent excitement has exhausted you, but you can scarcely fail to notice that this is a ship of war, not an ear trumpet.'
'I know, I know, Captain, it is only wishful thinking.' Mackenzie's eyes narrowed again. He was contemplating a scene of his imagination's making. 'But a frigate could take me to Memel, couldn't it?'
'Is that what you want?' asked Drinkwater, the prospect of returning Mackenzie to the shore a pleasing one at that moment. 'A passage to Memel?'
'Yes,' said Mackenzie, seeming to make up his mind. 'That and somewhere to sleep.'
Drinkwater nodded at his cot. 'Help yourself. I must get the ship under weigh and see the wounded.'
Picking up his hat Drinkwater left the cabin. Too tired to move suddenly, Mackenzie stared after him. 'Captain Drinkwater,' he muttered, smiling to himself, 'Captain Nathaniel Drinkwater, by all that's holy ...'
In the dark and foetid stink of the orlop deck Drinkwater picked his way forward. Antigone listed over, and down here, deep in her belly, Drinkwater could hear the rush of the sea past her stout wooden sides. Here, where the midshipmen and master's mates messed next to the marines above the hold, Lallo and his loblolly boys were plying their trade.
'How are they?' he asked, stepping into the circle of light above the struggling body of a seaman. Lallo did not look up but Skeete's evil leer was diabolical in the bizarre play of the lantern. Drinkwater peered round in the darkness, searching for Tregembo, one hand on the low deck beam overhead. The prone seaman groaned pitifully, the sweat standing out on his body like glass beads. His screams were muted to agonised grunts as he bit on the leather pad Skeete had forced into his mouth. With a twist and a jerk Lallo withdrew his hand, red from a wound in the man's thigh, and held a knife up to the dim light. The musket ball stuck on its point was intact. Lallo grunted his satisfaction as the man slipped into a merciful unconsciousness, and looked up at the captain.
'Mostly gunshot wounds ... at long range... spent...'
'They came under fire getting out of the river. Where's Tregembo?'
With a grunt, as of stiff muscles, Lallo got to his feet and, stepping over the body that Skeete and his mate were dragging to a corner of the tiny space, he led Drinkwater forward to where Tregembo lay, half propped against a futtock. Drinkwater knelt down. Tregembo's shirt was torn aside and the white of the bandage showed in the mephitic gloom.
'A sabre thrust to the bone,' explained the surgeon. 'It would have been easier to clean had it been a cut. It is too high to amputate.'
'Amputate! God damn it, man, I sent particular word to you to ensure you debrided it.'
Lallo took the uncorked rum bottle that Skeete handed him and swigged from it.
'I took your kind advice, sir,' Lallo said with heavy irony, 'but, as I have just said, the wound is a deep one. I have done my best but...'
'Yes, yes, of course . ..'
Tregembo opened his eyes. He was already on the edge of fever, slipping in and out of semi-consciousness. He made an effort to focus his eyes on Drinkwater and began to speak, but the words were incomprehensible, and after a minute or two it was plain he was unaware of his surroundings. Drinkwater touched his arm. It was hot.
'The prognosis?' Drinkwater rose, stooping under the low deck-head.
Lallo shook his head. 'Not good, sir. Uncertain at best.'
'They spent a long time in the boat after the wounding.'
'Too long ...' Lallo corked the rum bottle and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
'Mr. Lallo, I will risk the chance of offending you by saying that, when I was a prisoner aboard the Bucentaure, I observed a method of dressing a wound that was considered highly effective.'
'A French method, sir?'
'Yes.'
'Humph!'
'Soak a pledget in sea-water or camphorated wine and add a few drops of lead acetate. D'you have any lead acetate? Good. Bind the wound firmly with a linen bandage in which holes have been cut. Do not disturb the dressing but have the purulent matter which seeps through the holes wiped away. A compress of the same type is bound tightly over the first dressing and changed daily.' Drinkwater looked at the men groaning at his feet. 'Try it, Mr. Lallo, as I have directed ... and perhaps you will have less need of rum.'
He turned and made for the ladder, leaving Lallo and Skeete staring after him. On deck the fresh air was unbelievably sweet.
Mackenzie woke among unfamiliar surroundings. He tried to get out of the cot and found it difficult. When he got his feet on the deck Antigone heeled a little, the cot swayed outboard and in getting out he fell, sending the cot swinging further. Disencumbered of his weight the cot swung back, fetching Mackenzie a blow on the back of the head.
'God!' He got to his feet and stood unsteadily, feeling the bile stirring in his gullet. Casting desperately about he recalled the privy and reached the door to the quarter-gallery just in time. After a little while he felt better, and being a self-reliant and resourceful man he diverted his mind from his guts to the matter in hand. He carefully crossed the cabin and stood braced at Drinkwater's table, staring down at the chart and the open pages of Mount's Military Atlas. The latter attracted his interest and he swiftly forgot his seasickness.
'By God, that's providential,' he murmured to himself. After a moment or two his curiosity and professional interest turned itself to Drinkwater's desk. The left-hand of its two drawers was slightly open. Mackenzie pulled it out and lifted Drinkwater's journal from it. He flicked the pages over and, on the page on which the neat script ceased, he noticed a strange entry in the margin. It consisted of a short word in Cyrillic script: ИCЛAHД.
'So, I was right...'
'What the devil d'you think you're doing?'
Mackenzie looked up at Drinkwater standing in the doorway, his hat in his hand. He was quite unabashed.
'Is this how you abuse my hospitality?' Drinkwater advanced across the cabin, anger plain in his face. He confronted Mackenzie across the table; Mackenzie remained unruffled.
'Where did you come across this?' he pointed to the strange letters.
In his outrage Drinkwater had not seen exactly what Mackenzie had found. He had assumed the spy had been prying. Now the sudden emphasis Mackenzie put on those strangely exotic letters recalled to his mind his own, intensely personal reasons for having written them. He was briefly silent and then suddenly explosively angry.
'God damn you, Mackenzie, you presume too much! That is a private journal! It has nothing to do with you!'
'Be calm, Captain,' Mackenzie said, continuing in a reasonable tone, 'you are wrong, it has everything to do with me. What do these Russian letters mean? Do you know? Where did you learn them?'
'What is that to you?'
'Captain, don't play games. You are out of your depth. This word and the hand that wrote it are known to me.' He paused and looked up. 'Do you know what these Cyrillic letters mean?'
Drinkwater sank back into the chair opposite to his usual one, the chair reserved for visitors to his cabin, so that their roles were again reversed. He shook his head.
'If you transpose each of these letters with its Roman equivalent you spell the word island.'
Drinkwater shook his head. 'I do not understand.'
'If you then translate the word island back into Russian, you have the word Ostroff. It is a passably Russian-sounding name, isn't it?'
Drinkwater shrugged. 'I suppose so.' 'Do you know who Ostroff is?' 'I haven't the remotest idea.'
'Oh, come, Captain,' Mackenzie remonstrated disbelievingly. 'You went to the trouble of making a note of his name and in a book that was personally significant.'
'Mr. Mackenzie,' Drinkwater said severely, 'I do not know what you are implying, but you have obviously invaded my privacy!'
But Drinkwater's anger was not entirely directed at Mackenzie, furious though he was at the man's effrontery. There had been a reason why he had noted that incomprehensible Russian lettering down in his journal; and though he did not know who Ostroff was, he had his suspicions. He resolved to clear the matter up and settle the doubts that had been provoked by the sight of Nielsen's dispatch.
'Who the devil is this Ostroff then?'
Mackenzie smiled that tight, menacing smile, and Drinkwater sensed he knew more than he was saying. 'A spy. An agent in the Russian army. And now perhaps you will trade one confidence for another. Where did you get these letters from? Are you in correspondence with this man?'
Drinkwater's heart was thumping. Mackenzie's words closed the gap between speculation and certainty.
'From a dispatch intercepted in the possession of a Danish merchantman which I stopped a week or two ago.'
'What was the name of the ship?'
'The Birthe of Grenaa, Captain ...'
'Nielsen?' interrupted Mackenzie.
'Yes. Frederic Nielsen.'
'And what did you do with Nielsen and his dispatch?' 'I let him go with it. I was satisfied that he and it were what they said they were.'
'But you copied out the name by which the dispatch was signed?' 'Yes.' 'Why?'
Drinkwater shrugged.
'Captain, you say you were sure of the authenticity of a dispatch carried by a neutral and you let the vessel go. Yet you were not sure enough not to note down the signatory. Odd, don't you think? Where was the dispatch bound?'
'I do not think that a proper question to answer, Mackenzie. I am not sure I should be answering any of these questions. I am not sure I ought not to have you in irons ...'
'Captain,' said Mackenzie in a suddenly menacing tone, 'mine is a dangerous trade in which I trust no one. I am curious as to who you thought this man was; why you copied out this signature. It is almost inconceivable that any obviously trusted servant of their lordships of the Admiralty should behave traitorously . ..'
Drinkwater was on his feet and had leaned across the table. He spat the words through clenched teeth, beside himself with rage:
'How dare you, you bastard! You have no right to come aboard here and make such accusations! Who the hell are you to accuse me of treason? Get out of my seat! You stand here and make your report to me, before I have this ship put about for The Sound and confine you in the bilboes!'
'By God, Captain, I apologise ... I see I have misjudged you.' Mackenzie stood and confronted Drinkwater. 'I think you have reassured me on that point at least...'
'Have a care...'
'Captain, you must hear me out. It is a matter of the utmost importance, I assure you. I know you have had previous contact with Lord Dungarth's Secret Department; I assume from what you implied earlier that you have some freedom in the interpretation of your orders, perhaps from his Lordship. I also assume that you let Frederic Nielsen proceed because he had a dispatch addressed to Joseph Devlieghere at Antwerp ... Ah, I see you find that reassuring ... Tell me, Captain, did you ever know a man called Brown?'
'I saw the Dutch hang him at Kijkduin.'
'And do you think the Dutch were responsible?'
Drinkwater looked sharply at Mackenzie, but he did not answer.
'Come, Captain, have you not come across a French agent named Edouard Santhonax?'
Drinkwater strode across the cabin, pulled out his sea-chest and from it drew a roll of frayed canvas. He unrolled it.
'Identify this lady and I'll believe you are who you say you are.'
'Good God!' Mackenzie stared at the cracking paint. The portrait showed a young woman with auburn hair piled upon her head. Pearls were entwined in the contrived negligence of her classical coiffure. Her creamy shoulders were bare and her breasts just visible beneath a wisp of gauze. Her grey eyes looked coolly out of the canvas and there was a hint of a smile about the corners of her lovely mouth. 'Hortense Santhonax, by heaven!'
'A celebrated beauty, as all Paris knows.'
'Where the devil did you get it?'
Drinkwater nodded at the portrait of Elizabeth that had not been done with half as much skill as that of Madame Santhonax. 'It used to hang there. This ship, Mr. Mackenzie, was once commanded by Edouard Santhonax when she was captured in the Red Sea. I was one of the party who took her.' He rolled up the portrait. 'I kept it as a memento. You see, I rescued Madame Santhonax from a Jacobin mob in ninety-two ... before she turned her coat. She was eventually taken back to France. I was on the beach with Lord Dungarth when we released her...'
'And he didn't shoot her,' put in Mackenzie, shaking his head. 'Yes, he has told me the story.' He looked about him. 'It's incredible ... this ship ... you. Captain, I am sorry, I acted hastily. Please accept my apologies.'
'Very well. It is of no matter. I think you have provided proof of your identity. We had better sink our differences in a glass of wine.'
'That is a capital idea.' Mackenzie smiled and, for the first time since meeting him, Drinkwater felt less menaced, more in control of the situation. He poured the two drinks and behind him he heard Mackenzie mutter 'Incredible' to himself.
'This man Ostroff,' said Drinkwater conversationally, seating himself in his proper place at last, 'is he of importance to you?'
'He will be invaluable if my hypothesis proves accurate.'
'You mean if an armistice is concluded between Alexander and Napoleon?'
'Yes. Whatever terms are agreed upon, they will clearly be prejudicial to Britain. Ostroff is the one man in a position to learn them. Now, with the loss of Konigsberg, Ostroff's communications are cut. The situation is serious but not fatal. We still have access to Memel, at least until the two Emperors meet, hence my request that you carry me there. You see, I am Ostroff's post-boy. I forwarded his dispatch through Nielsen.'
'You ... you know him well then, this Ostroff?' Drinkwater's heart was thumping again; he felt foolishly vulnerable, although Mackenzie's manner towards him had so drastically altered.
'Oh yes, I know him, Captain Drinkwater. That is why I could not understand your attitude.'
'I do not understand you.'
Mackenzie frowned. 'You mean you really do not know who Ostroff is?'
'No,' he said, but he felt that his voice lacked conviction.
'You share the same surname, Captain Drinkwater ...'
The blood left Drinkwater's face. So, he had been right! Despite the cipher, despite the years that had passed, he had recognised the hand that had penned Nielsen's dispatch.
'So Ostroff is my brother Edward,' he said flatly.
'It is a chain of the most remarkable coincidences, Captain,' said Mackenzie.
'Not at all,' replied Drinkwater wearily, rising and fetching the decanter from its lodgement in the fiddle. 'It is merely evidence of the workings of providence, Mr. Mackenzie, which rules all our fates, including those of Napoleon and Alexander.'
'How did you discover the connection between us?' Drinkwater asked at last, after the two men had sat in silence awhile. 'I understood my brother to be living under a nom de guerre.'
'Oh, it isn't common knowledge, Captain Drinkwater; you need have no fear that more than a few men know about it. Dungarth does, of course, and Prince Vorontzoff, your brother's employer and a man sympathetic to the alliance with Great Britain, knows him for an Englishman. But I think I am the only other man who knows his identity, excepting yourself, of course.'
'But you have not said how you knew.'
'It is quite simple. He told me once. He was sent to me from Hamburg. I introduced him to the elder Vorontzoff and, one night, shortly before I left St Petersburg, we got drunk ... a Russian custom, you see,' Mackenzie said and Drinkwater thought that Mackenzie had probably ensured Edward's loose tongue by his own liberality. 'He had reached a turning-point. A man does not put off the old life overnight and he seemed over-burdened with conscience. He made some thick allusions to drinking water. The joke was too heavy for wit and he was too drunk to jest, yet his persistence made me certain the words had some significance ... but it was only when I learned your name from Lieutenant...'
'Quilhampton.'
'Just so, that I began to recall Ostroff's drunken pun. Then, having had my professional curiosity aroused, I felt it was necessary to,' Mackenzie shrugged with an irresponsible smile, 'to invade your privacy, I think you said. And my effrontery was rewarded; you had inscribed Ostroff's Russian signature in your journal. Quod erat demonstrandum.'
'I see.' It was very strange, but Drinkwater felt an enormous weight lifted from him. Somehow he had known for years that he must atone for his own crime of aiding and abetting Edward's escape from the gallows. It was easy to excuse his actions, to disguise his motives under the cant of reasons of state. The truth was that his own rectitude made him feel guilty. Edward was a man who drifted like a straw upon the tide and who, through some strange working of natural laws, managed to float to the surface in all circumstances. To Edward, and probably Mackenzie, his own misgivings would seem utterly foolish. But he knew himself to be of a different type, a man whose life had been dogged by set-backs, wounds and hardships. Perhaps the atonement would still come but he could not deny the relief at Edward's identity no longer being quite so hermetic a secret.
He looked at Mackenzie. A few moments earlier he had been ready to consign the man to the devil. Now they sat like old friends sipping their wine, bound by the common knowledge of Ostroff's true identity. It occurred to Drinkwater that, yet again, Mackenzie had a superior hold over him; but he found the knowledge no longer made him angry.
'I knew my brother to have found employment with Prince Vorontzoff, on account of his abilities with horses, but I do not fully understand how he serves you and Lord Dungarth.'
'He is a brilliant horseman, I believe, and on account of this he formed a close friendship with Vorontzoff's son. Good horsemen are much admired in Russia and the younger Vorontzoff, being appointed to the army in the field, got some sort of commission for Ostroff. That sort of thing is not difficult in the Tsar's bureaucracy. Ostroff was at Austerlitz and attached to the Don Cossacks at Eylau, though what he has been up to lately I do not know. I was trying to make contact with him and Wilson when I was chased into Konigsberg by those French dragoons.'
'And now you want to make another attempt at reaching him through Memel?'
'Yes. And I would wish you to wait there for my return.'
'And then convey you to London with all dispatch?'
'I see, at last, that we are of one mind, Captain Drinkwater,' Mackenzie smiled.
'Then we had better drink to it,' Drinkwater said, rising and fetching the decanter.
'A capital idea,' replied Mackenzie, holding out his glass.
Drinkwater woke sweating and staring into the darkness, trying to place the source of the wild laughter. He had been dreaming, a nightmare of terrifying reality, in which a white-clothed figure loomed over him to the sound of clanking chains. The figure had been that of Hortense Santhonax, her beauty hideously transformed. The Medusa head had laughed in his face and he had seemed to drown below her, struggling helplessly as the laughter grew and the breath was squeezed from his lungs.
In the darkness of the cabin, surrounded by the familiar creaking of Antigone, he found the laughter resolve itself into a knocking at the cabin door. He pulled himself together. 'Enter!'
'It's Frey, sir.' The midshipman's slight figure showed in the gloom. 'Mr. Quilhampton's compliments, sir, and we've raised Memel light.'
'Very well. I'll be up shortly.'
Frey disappeared and he lay back in the cot, seeking a few minutes of peace. The nightmare was an old one but had not lost its potency. Usually he attached it to presentiment or times of extreme anxiety, but this morning he managed to smile at himself for a fool. It was the unburdening of the secret of Edward that had brought on the dream; a retrospective abstraction haunting his isolated imagination while he slept.
'Damn fool,' he chid himself and, flinging back the blankets, threw his legs over the edge of the cot. Five minutes later he was on deck.
'Mornin', Mr. Q.'
'Morning, sir. Memel light three leagues distant, sir.' Quilhampton pointed and Drinkwater saw the orange glow. 'It's supposed to rival the full moon at a league, sir.'
'I'm pleased to see you have been studying the rutter, Mr. Q,' said Drinkwater drily, amused at Quilhampton.
'To be fair, sir, it's Frey who has studied the rutter. I merely picked his brains.'
'Tch, tch. Most reprehensible,' Drinkwater laughed. 'Incidentally, Mr. Q, I will want you to put our guest ashore later.'
'Mr. Mackenzie, sir?' 'Yes.'
Drinkwater could almost hear Quilhampton's curiosity working. He considered the wisdom of revealing something of Mackenzie's purpose. On balance, he considered, it would not hurt. It was better to reveal a half-truth than risk stupid speculation growing wild. He had known a silly rumour started on the quarterdeck reach the fo'c's'le as a hardened fact magnified twentyfold. It had caused a deal of resentment among the hands, and even a denial by the first lieutenant had failed to extinguish it. The old saw about there being no smoke without fire was murmured by men starved of any news, whose days were governed by the whims of the weather and the denizens of the quarterdeck, and by whom any remark that intimated yet greater impositions upon them was accepted without question. In the end it was better that the people knew something of what was going on.
'I expect you are wondering exactly who, or what, Mr. Mackenzie is, eh, James?'
'Well, sir, the thought had crossed my mind.'
'And not just yours, I'll warrant.'
'No, sir.'
'He's an agent, Mr. Q, like some of those mysterious johnnies we picked up in the Channel a year or two ago. We shall put him ashore in order that he can find out what exactly the Russians are going to do after Boney beat 'em at Friedland.'
'I see, sir. Thank you.'
Drinkwater fell to pacing the quarterdeck as, in the east, the light grew and the masts, rigging and sails began to stand out blackly against the lightening sky. By the time the people went to their messes for breakfast they would know all about Mr. Mackenzie.
A few hours later the barge was swung out and lowered as, with her main-topsail against the mast, Antigone hove to. It was a bright summer morning and the port of Memel with its conspicuous lighthouse was no more than four miles away. Mackenzie came aft to make his farewells.
'I rely upon you to cruise hereabouts until my return, Captain,' he said.
'I shall maintain station, Mr. Mackenzie; you may rely upon it. I may chase a neutral or two for amusement, Drinkwater replied, ‘but my main occupation will be to ensure the ship is in a fit state for a swift passage home.'
Beyond Mackenzie, Drinkwater saw the word 'home' had been caught by a seaman coiling down a line. That, too, would not hurt. It would brighten the men's spirits to know the ship was destined for a British port.
'Do you wish me to keep a boat at Memel to await you, Mr. Mackenzie?'
'No, I think not, Captain. In view of the possible results of our ... hypothesis, I think it unwise. I can doubtless bribe a fishing boat to bring me off.' He smiled. The cupidity of fishermen was universal.
Mackenzie held out his hand and moved half a pace nearer. 'Do you have a message for Ostroff?' he asked in a low voice.
'Yes ... wish him well for me, Mackenzie ... and ask him if he is still afraid of the dark.'
Mackenzie laughed. 'He does not strike me as a man who might be afraid of the dark, Captain.'
Drinkwater grinned back. 'Perhaps not; but he was once. Good luck, Mackenzie.'
'A bientot, Captain ...'
For two days Drinkwater kept Antigone under weigh. He was merciless to the entire crew, officers and men alike. The British frigate stood on and off the land, first under easy sail and then setting every stitch of canvas she possessed. When ropes parted or jammed, he chastised the petty officers and midshipmen responsible with verbal lashings from the windward hance. It brought him a deep inner satisfaction, for junior officers were rarely blamed for the many small things that went wrong on board. They buried such failings more often than not by starting the unfortunate hands, a practice that usually assuaged the quarterdeck officers. Midshipmen had the worst name for these minor malpractices which caused such resentment among the men, and it did them good to be chased hither and thither and called to account for their failures in full view of the ship's company.
As the studdingsails rose and set for the eighth or ninth time, as the topgallant masts were struck and the yards sent down, the men worked with a will, seeing how at every misfortune it was a midshipman, a master's mate or a petty officer that was identified as being the culprit. The hands were in high glee for, with the captain on deck throughout the manoeuvres, there was little revengeful starting carried out by the bosun's mates who well knew Drinkwater's aversion to the practice. It was one thing to start men aloft in an emergency or when faced with the enemy, when the need to manoeuvre was paramount; but quite another to do it when the ship was being put through her paces.
Even the officers bore their share of Drinkwater's strange behaviour, Rogers, as first lieutenant, in particular. But he bore it well, submitting to it as though to a test of his recovery. At the end of the second day, as the men secured the guns from a final practice drill, Drinkwater pronounced himself satisfied, ordered a double ration of three-water grog served out to all hands and brought the ship to anchor a league from Memel light.
'Well, Mr. Rogers, I think the ship will make a fast passage when she is called upon to do so, don't you?'
'Yes, sir. But a passage where, sir?' asked Rogers, puzzled.
'Well, if we get the right slant of wind, we shall make for London River!'
Rogers's smile was unalloyed. 'Hell's teeth, that's good news. May I ask when that might be?'
'When Mr. Mackenzie returns, Sam, when Mr. Mackenzie returns. '
Mr. Mackenzie returned shortly before noon three days later, hailing them from the deck of a fishing boat and obviously in a state of high excitement. Drinkwater was on deck to meet him and found Mackenzie had lost his air of cool self-possession. His dust-stained clothes flapping about him, he strode across the deck, his face lined with dirt which gave its expression a compulsive ferocity.
'Captain, your cabin at once.' He seemed breathless, for all that he must have been inactive during the boat's passage.
'Prepare to get under weigh, Mr. Rogers,' Drinkwater ordered, turning towards Mackenzie, but the agent shook his head.
'No ... not yet. There is something we must attend to first. Come, Captain, every second counts!'
Drinkwater shrugged at the first lieutenant. 'Belay that, Mr. Rogers. Come then, Mr. Mackenzie.' He led the way below and Mackenzie collapsed into a chair. Pouring two glasses of blackstrap Drinkwater handed one to the exhausted agent. 'Here, drink this and then tell me what has happened.'
Mackenzie tossed off the glass, wiped a hand across his mouth and stared at Drinkwater with eyes that glittered from red-rimmed sockets.
'Captain,' began Mackenzie, 'I need you to come with me. I have returned to persuade you. It is imperative. It is a mad enterprise, but one on which everything hangs.'
'Everything?' Drinkwater frowned uncertainly.
'Yes, everything,' Mackenzie insisted, 'perhaps the history of Europe. You are the one man who can help!'
'But I am a sea-officer, not a spy!'
Drinkwater's protest roused Mackenzie. 'It is precisely because you are a sea-officer that we need you ... Ostroff and I. You see, Captain Drinkwater, my hypothesis has proved correct. Napoleon and Alexander are to meet in conditions of the greatest secrecy, and to gain access we need a seaman's skills.'
The British spy made out a desperate case for Drinkwater's help and he had to concede the justice of the argument. What Mackenzie demanded was incontrovertibly within the latitude of Dungarth's special instructions. Whatever the bureaucrats at the Admiralty might think of him leaving his ship, he felt he was covered by Lord Dungarth's cryptic order: You should afford any assistance required by persons operating on the instructions of this Department. Now he knew why the old, recurring dream had woken him a few mornings before; he had felt a presentiment and he knew the moment for full atonement had come.
'Damn these metaphysics,' he growled, and turned his mind to more practical matters.
Mackenzie had suggested they took a third person, someone with a competent knowledge of horses, for they had far to travel, yet one who would play up to the fiction of Mackenzie masquerading as a merchant and Drinkwater as the master of an English trading vessel lying in Memel. For this there was only one candidate, Midshipman Lord Walmsley, the only one of Antigone's people who was familiar with horses, and who spoke French into the bargain. His lordship showed a gratifying willingness to volunteer for a 'secret mission' and was ordered to remove the white patches from his coat collar and to dress plainly. His preparations in the cockpit spread a sensational rumour throughout the ship.
For himself Drinkwater begged a plain blue coat from Hill, leaving behind his sword with the lion-headed pommel that betrayed his commissioned status. Instead he packed pistols, powder and ball in a valise together with his shaving tackle and a change of small clothes.
'You will not need to worry about being conspicuous,' Mackenzie had yawned, 'the countryside is alive with travellers all going wide-eyed to see their Little Father the Tsar meet the hideous monster Napoleon.'
The hours of the afternoon rushed by. He had left instructions with Quilhampton to execute his will should he fail to return, and had attempted to write to Elizabeth but gave the matter up, for his heart was too full to trust to paper. Instead he went to the orlop to see Tregembo who was recovering well, and passed on a brief message to be given in the event of his disappearance. It was inadequate and ambiguous, but it was all he could do.
'I wish I could come with 'ee, zur,' the old man had said, half rising from the grubby palliasse upon which he lay. Drinkwater had patted his unhurt shoulder.
'You be a good fellow and get better.'
'And you look after yourself, boy,' Tregembo had said with a fierce and possessive familiarity that brought a sudden smile to Drinkwater's preoccupied face.
Finally, he had written his orders to Rogers, placing him in temporary command. Should he fail to return within ten days, Rogers was to open a second envelope which informed their Lordships of the state of affairs Mackenzie had so far discovered and his own reasons for leaving his ship. As the dog-watches changed, Mackenzie woke, and half an hour later they left the ship.
Lieutenant Quilhampton commanded the boat, making his second trip to Memel to land agents and scarcely imagining why the captain found it necessary to desert them like this. The mood in the boat was one of silent introspection as each man contemplated the future. Drinkwater and Mackenzie considered the problems ahead of them while James Quilhampton and the oarsmen gazed outboard and wondered what it would be like to be under the orders of Samuel Rogers. The only light heart among them was Lord Walmsley who had a thirst for an adventurous lark.
The long northern twilight offered them no concealment as they pulled into the river, past the lighthouse tower and its fire. The quays of Memel were still busy with fishing boats unloading their catches. Drinkwater tried to assume the character of Young, master of the Jenny Marsden, as typifying the kind of man he was trying to ape. He tried to recall the jargon of the merchant mariners, mentally repeating their strange terms in time with the oars as they knocked against the thole-pins: loss and demurrage; barratry and bottomry; pratique and protest; lagan and lien, jetsam and jerque notes, flotsam and indemnity. It was a bewildering vocabulary of which he had an imperfect knowledge, but in the event there were no Custom House officers to test him and with a feeling of anticlimax Drinkwater followed Mackenzie up a flight of slippery stone steps onto the quay, with Walmsley bringing up the rear.
There were no farewells. Quilhampton shoved the tiller over and the bowman bore off. Ten minutes after approaching the quay the barge was slipping seawards in the gathering darkness. Quilhampton did not look back. He felt an overwhelming sense of desolation: Drinkwater had deserted them and they were now to be subject to the arbitrary rule of Samuel Rogers.
Lieutenant Samuel Rogers sat alone at the captain's desk. His eyes looked down at the table-top. It was clear of papers, clear of Mount's long-borrowed Military Atlas, clear of everything except a key. It was a large, steel key, such as operated a lock with four tumblers. A wooden tag was attached to it and bore the legend: SPIRIT ROOM.
Rogers stared at the key for a long time. He was filled with a sense of power quite unattached to the fact that he was now in effective command of the Antigone. This was something else, something strange stirring in a brain already damaged by alcohol and the horrible experience of being lashed in a strait-jacket. Rogers was quite unable to blame himself for his addiction. He blamed fate and bad luck and, in a way, that obligation to Drinkwater which had become a form of jealousy. And Lallo's justification for his treatment had rested on Drinkwater's own instructions. He had been 'confined quietly' ... the meaning was obvious. That it had been done for his own good, Rogers did not dispute. Disagreeable things were frequently done for one's own good and a streak of childishness surfaced in him. Perhaps it was a weakness of his character, perhaps a by-product of his recent chronic alcoholism, but it was to darken his mind in the following days, worsened by the isolation. Drinkwater's absence had placed him in and the position of trust that he now occupied. That, too, was attributable to Drinkwater, and it was this sense of being in his place and having to act in his stead that suffused Rogers with an extraordinary sense of power. In this peculiar and unbalanced consummation of a long aggrieved and corrosive jealousy, Rogers found the will to reject his demon.
With a sweep of his hand he sent the spirit-room key clattering into a dark corner of the cabin.