Back on board the Calypso, with the Jason abeam as the two ships beat back towards the convoy, Ramage tried to make up his mind. There was a choice: although he had by no means finished questioning the Jason's officers and ship's company, he was still just near enough to take the Jason back to Barbados and hand over the whole wretched and puzzling business to Admiral Tewtin. Or he could keep the Jason with him, carry on with the convoy, and hope to get it all settled in England.
If there were six reasons why he should do one thing, there were half a dozen why he should do the other - and that was only choosing between returning to Barbados or going on to England.
There were plenty of variations lurking around to distract him. He could escort the Jason back to Barbados with the Calypso, leaving La Robuste and L'Espoir to carry on with the convoy and arranging a rendezvous for, say, a week's time. (But what hope was there of clearing up this business in a week? Tewtin would want dozens of depositions: Shirley, if he had any sense, would want even more. Very well, forget that choice.)
What about sending the Jason back to Barbados with, say, La Robuste, giving her captain a written report for Rear-Admiral Tewtin? How the devil could he describe all this in a written report that was not as long as the Regulations and Instructions, the largest volume a King's ship carried? And what yarn was Shirley (and his officers, whatever their role was) likely to tell, if Ramage and the Calypsos were out of sight and sound, even if not out of mind? Shirley could have the Calypso raking the Jason, and those officers of his would probably back him up, judging from the story Southwick brought back after his talk with the Jason's master.
Yet if he was honest, his main concern was that the Jason business was so unusual and complex that Rear-Admiral Tewtin was not the man to deal with it: this was something for Their Lordships at the Admiralty, and the Judge Advocate's department.
And he was involved in it only because he - well, first he had got married, then he and Sarah had had to escape from Bonaparte, and all that had led to him crossing the Atlantic to Devil's Island, to rescue Jean-Jacques, the Count of Rennes. In turn he had brought two French prizes into Barbados . . . and been stuck with the job of escorting this convoy back to England. But why - why, why - had the Jason chosen to interfere with his convoy? Why could she not have gone on to Britain, where her orders sent her?
He answered the Marine sentry's call and Southwick came into the cabin. Ramage waved him to a chair, and the master threw his hat on to the settee.
"I've been reading the Articles of War again, sir."
"They don't help," Ramage said, "unless you want to get into more of a muddle."
"But there must be something we can do, sir."
"There isn't," Ramage said shortly. "Not so long ago, while I was escaping from the French at Brest, none of you could do anything about a drunken captain sent to the Calypso. Their Lordships in their wisdom have drawn up the Articles of War on the assumption that a captain can do no wrong."
"A surgeon can have him replaced on medical grounds," Southwick offered hopefully but without much conviction.
"Oh yes. What do you suggest Bowen diagnoses in Captain Shirley's case? That the black coat proves he has a poor tailor? That a bulge in his right shoe shows he has a bunion? The fellow doesn't drink, doesn't smoke (or even chew tobacco in secret), he doesn't swear or keep a mistress on board. He seems identical with dozens of other post-captains, except perhaps he reads his Bible more frequently."
"Those officers," Southwick said. "Apart from Price . . ."
"Apart from the master they seem a weak-kneed crowd," Ramage said. "I wouldn't want to go into action with them, especially Ridley, who is a fool as well. But apart from keeping their mouths tight shut, they haven't done anything to harm us. Indeed, keeping their mouths shut isn't harming us; it's just puzzling."
"It's not my place to say this, sir, and I'm presuming on the years -"
"Oh, for God's sake," Ramage said impatiently, "out with it!"
"Well, sir, are you sure of your ground in putting Captain Shirley under an arrest? You were just saying about the Articles of War."
"What gave you the impression that Captain Shirley is under an arrest?" Ramage asked innocently. "I've no grounds for arresting him. No authority, rather. I may have, but I can't find any backing in the Articles of War or the Admiralty Instructions."
Southwick frowned, the wrinkles on his brow like a much folded leather pouch. "But when you spoke to him in his cabin and left Wagstaffe there, I thought you said ..."
"I know you did, and so did Aitken and so did Wagstaffe. More important, so did Captain Shirley. You all expected me to arrest him - and so you heard words I didn't actually say."
Southwick was by now grinning broadly. "Well, as long as Captain Shirley and that sorry collection of commission and warrant officers accepted it, and continue to do so until we reach Plymouth, we'll have no complaint."
"No, we just have to hope for an understanding port admiral at Plymouth. Once we have the convoy safely dispersed, everything should be all right."
"But if he talks to the wrong people in Plymouth?" Southwick asked.
"Half-pay for my officers, if they are lucky."
"But what about you, sir?"
"Best for you not to think about it."
Southwick shook his head and picked up his hat. "You said the Jason's station is a cable off our larboard beam?"
"She'd better stay a cable to leeward of us, unless she gets a signal to the contrary. Wagstaffe understands."
"Yes, I had a word with him before he went across. It was a good idea putting him in command. It'd be risky with Aitken."
"Yes, Aitken is too near being made post: if there's trouble, it could count against him."
"If there's trouble it'll count against you," Southwick said gloomily.
Ramage shrugged his shoulders. "If I am dismissed the Service, I've plenty to keep me occupied, but it's Aitken's whole life. Though thanks to prize money, I doubt if he depends on his pay."
"Pay! Thanks to you no one in the Calypso now depends on his pay, even allowing for the villainy of the prize agents."
Ramage grinned at Southwick's forthright statement. "Still, I expect Aitken would like to get his flag eventually, so that when he retires to his estate in the Highlands, it'll be as Rear-Admiral Aitken. Perhaps even Vice-Admiral, with a knighthood."
"Could be," Southwick agreed. "He would if it just depended on merit. This stepping into dead men's shoes is no good. Promotion by seniority is just an insurance policy for the dullards. If you live long enough you're bound to end up the most senior admiral in the Navy."
"Providing you make that first jump on to the Post List," Ramage pointed out. "Unless he is a post-captain, he doesn't even put a foot on the bottom rung ..."
"That's understood, sir. Don't forget he's already refused one chance. Admittedly that was because he reckoned he wasn't ready, and would learn a lot more by staying with you."
"Yes, but now he's learned all he can from me. He's ready for the Post List, and I don't want anything like this -" he gestured in the direction of the Jason, "- getting in the way. Now, leave me to write up my journal. Between now and the time we reach the Chops of the Channel, I have to write a full report on all this business ..."
"Aye, and if you'll allow me to stick an oar in, sir, you'd be well advised to get signed reports from the Calypso's officers, and perhaps some of the senior petty officers."
"You are gloomy," Ramage commented.
"I just wonder who this Captain Shirley has for friends. As I see it, his friends are going to be our enemies, if all this business comes to trial."
Southwick was right, of course: whatever happened, it was all bound to come to a trial which would clear or condemn Shirley. It could even turn into a situation where clearing Shirley meant condemning Ramage . . . All the Calypsos were certain that Shirley was mad. Perhaps not permanently, but at least temporarily. Touched by the sun, perhaps. Anyway, Bowen was going to examine him tomorrow and would write a report, but all that would not stop Shirley getting a fair trial.
It was more likely, Ramage thought ironically, to bring odium and attacks down on the head of Captain Ramage, if Shirley had friends in high places and money to pay off the press and get lampoons and pamphlets sold in the streets. Ramage knew how vicious were the attacks made on his own father, when the Earl of Blazey was made the government's scapegoat for sending a fleet too weak and too late to deal with a French attack on the West Indies. And most shameful of all (perhaps the most shameful episode in recent British political history) there was the Byng affair: there a not-very-bright but honourable admiral had been accused of cowardice and shot to disguise the vacillating weakness and stupidity of the First Lord, Anson, and the prime minister, the Duke of Newcastle.
Stupidity? No, it was the very essence of politics: viciousness, self-interest, hunger for power and cowardice. In.the case of Admiral Byng the whole crowd of them, the Duke of Newcastle, the Earl of Hardwicke (and his son-in-law Anson) and most of the rest of the party were trying to cling to power in Parliament, and they were quite prepared to murder Byng (judicially, of course: why use a stiletto when you have the law to do it?). Byng was executed and they kept power. Byng, Ramage reflected, lost his life, but the government under Newcastle and the Admiralty under Anson lost their honour (without realizing what it was).
Ramage knew he should talk again to Shirley and his officers before drafting his report. Yet after talking to any of them he came away with the feeling that he had been dreaming; their answers were so incoherent or remote from reality that recalling them later was like trying to remember how you had behaved while drunk at a party.
Captain Shirley had never seen such grim-faced men sitting round his dining table, and he seemed more puzzled than alarmed. Both Wagstaffe and Aitken held pens and had to share the same inkwell as they wrote down the questions, and Shirley's answers, making him slow down or repeat an answer. The demands for repetition were frequent because many of Shirley's answers were difficult to credit.
The Jason was rolling her way along, astern of the convoy, in good weather. Wagstaffe had the big awning stretched over the quarterdeck and the captain's coach, cabin and sleeping place were cool. Ramage had thought deeply about making Shirley move down into one of the officer's cabins in the gunroom but had finally decided to leave him in his quarters and instead put Wagstaffe in the first lieutenant's cabin, making all the lieutenants shift round one.
As soon as Ramage had come on board and Wagstaffe had the frigate under way again (at the speed the convoy was making good, nothing was lost by heaving-to the frigate to avoid getting soaked by spray which would be thrown up if the ship had to tow the Calypso's boat alongside), Shirley - still in his long black coat - had walked over and greeted Ramage.
"Ah, my dear Ramage, how thoughtful of you to pay us a call," he had said in a completely sincere voice, rubbing his hands as though washing them. "Can I persuade you to dine with me this time? No - then a cup of green tea, or a glass of something stronger?"
The man had been genuinely upset when Ramage refused, and again Ramage was reminded of an anxious parson who felt he was being rebuffed by his patron.
Even now, sitting round the dining table, Ramage at the head, Shirley to his left and with Aitken and Wagstaffe on his right, facing Shirley, the man exuded sincerity. Sincerity? Well, again and again Ramage was reminded of the last occasion he had met the Archbishop of Canterbury, who proved to be a most unctuous individual exuding the secretive bonhomie expected of the doorman at one of the better houses of pleasure in Westminster.
Ramage tapped the table to emphasize what he was going to say.
"Captain Shirley, for the eleventh time I must ask you why you raked the Calypso although she was displaying British colours and her pendant numbers, and was flying the correct challenge?"
"My dear Ramage, why should the Jason fire at the Calypso?"
"Don't dodge the question," Ramage snapped. "I am asking you."
"On what authority, pray?"
Ramage waited until Aitken and Wagstaffe had finished writing. It gave him time to think, although God knew he had already given the subject enough thought.
"On the authority of a captain of one of the King's ships trying to discover the reason for a traitorous and treasonable attack by another of the King's ships."
"But no one attacked you, treasonably or traitorously. Ask my officers. Ask my men. You have done so once already, but you have my permission to ask them again."
This man was so calm and cool. Both Wagstaffe and Aitken were perspiring - although that could be from the effort of writing fast and concentrating. But this man Shirley - there was not even a single bead of perspiration on his brow. A belly of pork! Ramage suddenly realized that the man's complexion, dead white and only wrinkled by lines running from each side of his nostrils to the corners of his mouth, reminded him of a familiar sight in a pork butcher's shop. The man's baldness heightened the effect: not only was the skull utterly hairless, but Ramage was sure (probably because of some illness, malaria, perhaps) no hair grew on the man at all. Did he have to shave? There was none of the shadow on his face that most men had by late afternoon (and even earlier in the Tropics, where the heat made hair grow faster).
His eyes were small but unusually widely spaced. However, the nose seemed to belong to another face altogether. This face was cadaverous, the skin tight over the bones, with no pouches beneath the eyes, no hint of middle age in jowls. No, there was not much flesh to wrinkle, apart from the lines beside the nose. But the nose!
It seemed to belong to a much bigger and heavier man; someone with Falstaffian girth and a plump face, and a great club of a nose that commanded attention like a blunderbuss when its owner aimed it. In keeping with the rest of the face it was bloodless, yet for its size one would have expected a healthy pink glow, something that would show up on a dark night.
Both Aitken and Wagstaffe had written down the answer. Ramage looked at Shirley again.
"Have you threatened any of your ship's company so that they are frightened of answering my questions?"
"Why should I? I have nothing to hide! Ask them anything you like, my dear fellow."
"When I asked you to smell the muzzle of that gun - number nine gun on the starboard side - you said you could smell nothing."
"Nor could I! Just the usual blacking, of course."
"In your opinion the gun had not been fired recently?"
"No. Nor was that just my opinion; it was the opinion of the men serving that gun."
"But my officers and those of my men who were asked all smelled burnt powder and gave their opinion that the gun had been fired within the last half an hour."
"Yes, they did, and most singular I found it. Had you threatened them?" Shirley asked archly.
"Why were you the only commission officer on deck when the Calypso came alongside?"
"Apart from two or three midshipmen, who were running messages, my officers have various different duties, of course! Really, Ramage, I do find some of your questions naive."
"Perhaps so, but why were all your officers at that moment confined to their cabins with a Marine sentry guarding the gunroom door?"
"There you are, that's what I mean. You know as well as I do that in a frigate like the Jason or the Calypso there is always a Marine sentry at the gunroom door, just as there is one at the door to the captain's quarters and, in hot weather, at the scuttle butt, so what is so singular about this particular sentry? What is curious is that you choose to go down to the gunroom at a time when the officers are in their cabins. I was on the quarterdeck - you saw me - and surely you agree that I am competent to handle the ship without assistance from some callow lieutenant?"
Ramage had a mental picture of the Jason racing across the Calypso's bow, her shrouds missing the jibboom by inches, but this was not the time to thrash it out: it was not a subject that could be reduced to questions and answers even though, according to lawyers (indeed, the whole legal system), every situation must be, even when a man's guilt, and thus his life, depended on answering yes or no to particular questions. "When did you stop beating your wife?" Everyone but lawyers and judicial authorities had heard that "Answer yes or no" joke but whether a man was on trial for murder or treason, or stealing a trinket or poaching a hare, it was "yes" or "no".
Shirley turned and faced Ramage squarely. "Tell me, my dear fellow, are you attempting to remove me from my command? I am your senior by dozens of places on the Post List, as I am sure you are well aware."
And that first question was the one I hoped you would not ask, Ramage thought to himself. He was now standing on the edge of the great pit dug by the Articles of War to trap scoundrels but also equally dangerous to officers trying to carry out their duties in the King's Service.
Board him in the smoke: a good rule when you are not sure what to do next. "Don't you think that attacking the Calypso justifies you being removed from your command?"
No sooner had Ramage asked the question than he realized he had provided a loophole, and Shirley was quick to stick his musket through and open fire.
"I keep telling you, Ravage, and so do my officers and men, that I did not attack the Calypso. You have questioned all of us, yet you persist in this absurd allegation."
Ramage considered for a minute or two, considered the risk of the Jason suddenly attacking ships in the convoy or one of the other frigates, and made his decision. Shirley did not dispute that Ramage had the authority to remove him from his command if there was sufficient justification (something about which Ramage was far from certain). No. Shirley was only disputing whether or not the Jason had fired on the Calypso; whether or not, in fact, he had provided the justification.
"We do agree on this point, then," Ramage said. "We agree that you say your ship did not fire on the Calypso, and we say she did."
"Yes, indeed," Shirley said, "that seems a very fair summary."
Both Wagstaffe and Aitken wrote quickly.
Aitken pushed the paper across to Ramage with the quill resting on top. "I've written down your question and Captain Shirley's answer," he said. "There's nothing else written there."
Ramage immediately guessed his first lieutenant's purpose. He took the pen, wrote in the date and headed it "On board His Majesty's ship the Jason frigate" and, dipping the quill again, said to Shirley: "To avoid any misunderstanding later, perhaps you would care to read that and sign it?"
Shirley read it slowly, nodded as though there could never be any doubt that he would agree, and wrote his signature with a flourish. He gave the pen back to Ramage and slid the paper along the table. "Now you sign it, eh? Then there can be no question of what we disagree about."
Although Ramage did not use his title in the Service, this sheet of paper was becoming (was already?) a legal document, so he signed simply: "Ramage".
"Ah yes," Shirley said jovially, "you fellows with titles don't have so much writing to do as we more common folk."
Ramage smiled. "Our tailors charge us twice as much, so in the long run I'm sure you gain."
"Ah yes, innkeepers too, no doubt," Shirley said sympathetically. "Even ostlers would expect half a guinea tip from a lord, whereas an impoverished post-captain like me in the lower half of the list gets away with a shilling."
Yes, Ramage thought to himself, you look the sort of fellow who would tip a shilling when half a guinea was appropriate: no doubt you would also take mustard with mutton.
"Well, is that all?" Shirley inquired.
"You are so obliging," Ramage said hypocritically and hating himself for it, "that there are two other things I'd like to get cleared up while we're at it. Three things, actually."
"You have only to ask," Shirley said expansively.
"Your orders, what are they?"
"You have no right to ask, of course, but as there is nothing particularly secret about them, I've no objection to telling you. I am taking despatches to the Admiralty from the commanders-in-chief at Barbados and Jamaica."
How the devil could one dislike a man like this? Ramage asked himself. He was not a man one liked in the sense of making him a friend, but he was thoughtful and courteous (when he was not raking you: do not forget that).
Ramage nodded his thanks as Shirley said: "And the second thing? You mentioned three, if I remember correctly. "
"Yes. I would like my surgeon to examine you. I presume you would have no objection to that?"
"Ah, back we go to removing a captain from the command of his ship. You know it can only be done on medical grounds, so it follows your sawbones has to make an appearance."
"Yes, but my surgeon is far from being a 'sawbones' - he was in a practice in Wimpole Street before entering the King's Service."
"He must have done something very dreadful to cause the change, then," Shirley commented. "Still, I'll agree - as long as he doesn't bleed me. I won't be bled. Achieves nothing, bleeding a sick man; just drains the life from him. Remember Ramage, if you want to kill something you cut its throat to let the blood run out. Yet these doctors try to say it does human beings good. Rubbish, sheer rubbish! Hold on to your blood, never know when you'll need it. Very well, now what's the third on your list?"
"I would like to leave Lieutenant Wagstaffe on board with you."
"I'll be glad to have him on board. I'm sure he'll find the experience invaluable. Experience - it's everything for the young naval officer. Battles, boarding parties, hurricanes, wooding and watering - everything!"
Ramage glanced at Wagstaffe who, red-faced but apparently more amused than angry, was writing with great concentration.
"Speaking of surgeons," Shirley said, "always remember one thing." His voice was solemn and Ramage expected he was about to go back on his agreement to be examined by Bowen. "Two things, rather, and stand by them no matter what the surgeons might say. Three things, in fact. There are only three sovereign remedies. Just three. Mind you, the sawbones don't like to admit it because knowing the three sovereign remedies puts them out of business. Would you care to know them?"
Anything, Ramage thought, which throws any light on what is going on in your head and keeps you agreeable to Bowen's examination. "I would regard it as a favour on your part," he said.
Shirley nodded agreeably. "Yes, well, for any common distemper - upset of the bowels, for example, then rhubarb. I carry a good supply of dried sticks and use it ground up and dissolved in water. In wine, if you prefer it. For headaches, general malaise, muscular pains - brimstone and molasses. Fresh mixed and well stirred, a large spoon four times a day. And last, for any agues, feverishness, or trembling of the extremities, then the bark. I know that many surgeons use the bark. I expect they have heard of my success with it."
Shirley ran his thumbs under the collar of his coat, as if he was going to turn it up because of a chill wind, but then Ramage realized he had done it several times and it was a nervous gesture, the only thing that Shirley did that was not absolutely normal.
"Thank you," Ramage said politely, "I'll make sure my surgeon has supplies of those items. Now," he said as he stood up, "we'll leave you in your cabin while I have a chat with your officers."
"Ah yes, indeed," Shirley said with unexpected heartiness. "You don't need my inhibiting presence, do you!"
"No," Ramage agreed because there was no point in disguising the fact that no one in the ship would dare say more than "Good day" with that black-coated figure pacing up and down, like a crow on the lawn presaging a death in the family.
It was humid and almost dark down in the Jason's gunroom, which reeked of the sickly-sweet smell of bilges that needed pumping. The officers and warrant officers, Ramage quickly realized, were still sulking from yesterday, although at first it was not obvious whether their resentment was directed at Shirley or against Ramage, who had freed them from their arrest and put them back on normal watches.
The atmosphere, Ramage decided, was not ripe for either comfort or the exchange of confidences. "Join me on the fo'c'sle," he told Ridley, noting that the man still had not shaved.
TheJason's bow lifted and fell as she stretched along astern of the convoy under topsails only. The wind was light and she needed little canvas set to keep up with the merchant ships, which were jogging along under all plain sail and, Ramage noted, in good formation.
Ramage found some shade made by the foretopsail and waited with Aitken and Wagstaffe.
"What do you make of this Ridley fellow, sir?" Wagstaffe asked.
"Scared stiff of something," Ramage said. "Reminds me of an animal trapped in a cage. Eyes flicking from side to side, looking for a way out. Apart from that, he looks intelligent ... or, rather, not too stupid."
Wagstaffe laughed as he saw the man coming up the ladder. "I'm glad you qualified that, sir; I was thinking he got this job because his father knows Captain Shirley."
"His tailor, perhaps," Aitken said, and the other two laughed. It was one of the oldest jokes in the Navy that a certain type of captain would pay for his uniforms, shirts and hose by taking the tailor's son or nephew to sea as a midshipman (officially a captain's servant) - a gesture which cost him nothing since he was allowed to take a certain number and he did not pay them, nor did they act as servants.
Ridley walked up and stopped in front of Ramage, saluting with a listless gesture, as though all spirit and energy had been drained out of him.
Ramage looked him up and down carefully, noting the unshaven face, uncombed hair, creased breeches and jacket, soiled stock.
"Is that your usual rig? Do you always sleep in full uniform and has the carpenter borrowed your razor to split wood? Is there a shortage of soap in the ship?"
Ramage spoke quietly but contemptuously, his voice intended deliberately to provoke the man, who straightened his shoulders and sighed. Ramage recognized it as a sigh of despair and ignored it.
"I'm sorry sir. I didn't expect you, otherwise I'd have tidied myself up."
Ramage took the watch from his fob pocket, looked at it and slowly put it back. "Is the Jason's first lieutenant usually still en déshabilléat this time of the day?"
"Sir, these are not normal times for the Jason's officers," Ridley muttered plaintively, as though that sentence alone explained his appearance.
"In what way?" Ramage said, encouragingly.
Ridley shook his head. "I can't explain, sir; but I'd be grateful if you'd just take my word for it."
"Ridley," Ramage said sharply, "your ship opened fire on the Calypso. I'm trying to find out why."
Ridley shook his head. "I'm sorry, sir, I know nothing about it. You must ask Captain Shirley."
"Have you and the other officers been threatened?"
"I'm sure the captain can tell you all you need to know, sir. I'm only the first lieutenant," Ridley said doggedly.
"Which means you are the second-in-command and take command if anything happens to the captain."
Ridley stared at the deck and said, almost absently: "But nothing has happened to the captain ..."
"Listen," Ramage said quietly, "tell me in confidence what has happened. I'll tell these two officers to move out of earshot so there will be no witnesses to whatever you say."
"It's no good," Ridley said miserably, "there's nothing to say, witnesses or no witnesses."
Very well, Ramage decided, persuasion will not work so it has to be a threat. "You realize there will be courts of inquiry and courts-martial when we reach England. You are going to be asked about the Jason's guns firing. You are going to have to give your evidence on oath. Your word against mine. Your word against that of all my officers and men. Can you guess which the court will accept?"
"You must ask Captain Shirley, sir," Ridley said woodenly. "I know nothing about courts and oaths." He looked at Wagstaffe as he asked Ramage: "If you have no further questions, it's my watch in a few minutes."
"Run along," Ramage said sarcastically, "you don't realize the depth of the water you're standing in. Send up Mr Price."
As Ridley went down the ladder, Ramage shook his head wonderingly. "I've got it!" he exclaimed. "There was something about these men that seemed familiar, and I've just realized what it is. Two things, in fact. One concerns the officers, warrant officers and men; the other Captain Shirley."
Aitken and Wagstaffe waited expectantly but after a minute or two Aitken realized his captain's thoughts were miles away.
"What's familiar, sir?"
"Voodoo! I last saw this sort of thing in Grenada. The witch doctor had a spell put on the local people. He threatened terrible things if they didn't keep a secret, so when they were questioned they denied everything in the same way, as though their minds were not in their bodies. And the witch doctor (of course he denied he was one or that he had anything to do with Voodoo) was just like Captain Shirley: friendly, polite, apparently willing to answer questions - yet for all that remote, as though the real man was hidden behind a pane of glass."
"I've a slight idea of what you mean, sir," Aitken said. "Not from having had anything to do with Voodoo, but in the Highlands there are some very odd happenings; people with strange gifts and strange powers ..."
He broke off as the Jason's master, Price, came up to Ramage and saluted.
"You wanted to see me, sir?"
"Yes, and you can guess what it is about because Southwick mentioned it yesterday."
Price shook his head and glanced aft at the quarterdeck.
"The captain is down in his cabin," Ramage said. "You can talk in absolute safety."
"What's there to talk about?" the man said insolently. "I'm sure Captain Shirley or the first lieutenant can answer all your questions."
"Different men give different answers," Ramage said carefully, deciding to accept the man's insolence for a few more minutes in the hope that his attitude would change. "There are just a few questions."
Price shrugged his narrow shoulders indifferently.
"Tell me Price, why do you think the Jason fired at the Calypso yesterday? Was it an accident?"
The Jason's master ignored the suggested excuse. "I never heard tell of ships firing at each other yesterday," he said. "Leastways, nothing until Southwick asked me, and you too."
"Sir."
"You too, sir," Price amended. "You'd better ask the captain."
"Price," Ramage said slowly, "Southwick speaks highly of you and you know as well as I do that when we reach England there'll be a court of inquiry and courts-martial. Obviously if you help us now I will speak up for you."
"You want me to turn King's evidence, eh?" Price sneered.
"Don't be absurd. Just look at it from my point of view: my ship comes up to greet another of the King's ships, and gets raked. I could have had masts sent by the board and dozens of men killed."
"But you didn't, though," Price said slyly and for a momen Ramage thought the man would reveal more, but he simply waved an arm towards the Calypso. "I see she has a full complement of masts . . ."
"Price, I'm giving you a last chance. I'm not threatening you. But you know the danger you're in. You know my offer to speak on your behalf is your only chance -"
"No one's got a chance," Price interrupted angrily. "We had one chance but we lost, and that's that."
"A chance to do what?"
"Forget I ever said that," Price said, suddenly nervous. "I said too much. S'more than a man can stand being up here on the fo'c'sle and 'terrogated like this by strangers. If you've got questions, ask Captain Shirley, don't pick on us - sir. And don't go telling Captain Shirley we said anything, 'cos we didn't." With that Price quickly saluted, turned and bolted down the ladder, hurrying along the main deck back to the gunroom.
"They 'had one chance, but we lost'," Ramage murmured to himself. "Who are 'we'? The gunroom officers? Everyone on board the Jason?Is Captain Shirley included or excluded?"
"I think we'd be better off if Price hadn't said that," Aitken said bitterly. "It's just tantalizing, and no one is going to tell us any more."
Ramage nodded in agreement. "I had the impression that 'we' probably referred to the gunroom officers. I don't think the men were involved."
Both Aitken and Wagstaffe reminded Ramage that the guns' crews denied the guns had been fired, but Ramage said: "No, I'm not talking about the whole business. I think the 'chance' is one thing and the attack on the Calypso is another."
Aitken agreed. "I'm thinking about the way everybody seems ..."
He paused, and Ramage finished his sentence: "Wrapped in fear and apprehension."
"That's it, sir; like schoolboys who have been told to see the headmaster in the morning, and not sure whether they're going to get a good beating or not."
"Well, we're only getting ourselves more puzzled by staying on board here. Keep an eye open," he told Wagstaffe, "and sleep with a pistol to hand."
"Sir," Wagstaffe began tentatively, "supposing Captain Shirley starts doing something that is, well. . . sort of . . ."
"You'll have to decide whether or not what he's doing (or proposing to do) is prejudicial to the King's Service. If it is, you have to do whatever you think fit. I can't give you orders to cover everything, but I'll back whatever you do."
"Supposing one of the officers refuses to carry out an order ..."
"Look, Wagstaffe, what we're doing is by way of being a bluff: I am trying to get the Jason back to England without Captain Shirley attacking some other ship. Unless Bowen gives me a report tomorrow showing that Captain Shirley is mad, there's nothing I can do about him, officially. Putting you on board, sending Bowen to examine him, questioning the officers, questioning Shirley himself - all this lays me open to various charges, I expect, if we can't prove that Shirley attacked us without cause and that he's crazy."
Ramage warned both men: "Don't forget that at the moment we're safe as long as we can prove that the Jason raked us, and we have all our own people as witnesses. Shirley, on the other hand, can produce witness for witness to deny everything. So it depends who the members of a court want to believe. However, I think Shirley's missed his most plausible defence."
'I'm glad to hear that, sir," Aitken muttered. "What would that be?"
"Shirley would have had a good defence for raking us if he'd sworn he never saw the convoy in the distance. Then he could claim that because the Calypso has French lines, he assumed she was French, flying British colours as a ruse de guerre."
Wagstaffe said: "He could have claimed he thought we were about to attack the convoy and that he arrived just in time to save it."
"That's true, but keep the thought to yourself," Ramage said dryly. "I haven't even thought of it in Shirley's company in case he has the same powers as some of those old biddies in the Highlands, and reads my mind."
"He's got some weeks to think of it," Aitken pointed out. "They say there's nothing like a sea voyage to clear the mind."
"No," Ramage agreed, "but he denies firing a gun, so he'd have to change everything to use that defence."
"You'll have to tell Bowen to think of some vile disease that Shirley has, sir," Wagstaffe said. "Something that'll keep his mind occupied, worrying!"
"They get damned ethical, these medical men," Aitken grumbled. "At least, ones like Bowen do. He'd faint if you suggested he prescribe a dram of brandy on a cold night 'for medicinal purposes'."
"Damnation take it!" Ramage swore. "The Jason's surgeon! We haven't questioned him."
"Haven't seen him," Aitken said. "And I remember that when we were down in the gunroom yesterday, winkling out the officers from their cabins, I noticed the only open door and empty cabin had 'Surgeon' painted over it."
Ramage was already hurrying down the ladder to the maindeck and a couple of minutes later the Marine sentry was announcing him at the door of Captain Shirley's cabin.
Shirley was sitting back on his settee with his feet up reading a book. He closed it and swung his feet down, but Ramage waved him to remain seated. "Please don't get up. I'm sorry to interrupt your reading."
"My dear Ramage, you are always welcome, as I continually tell you. I am beginning to think you have a poor opinion of yourself!"
"Certainly you make me a welcome guest. There was just one question I forgot to ask you. Your surgeon. I have not seen him."
Shirley shook his head sorrowfully, and Ramage thought that being the possessor of such a sad, long face would make Shirley an excellent professional mourner: all he needed was a tall hat with a thick ribbon of black silk round it, and a pair of black silk gloves: he already had the long black coat.
"Ah yes, a sad business. Died very suddenly - just off Barbados. We don't know what it was, since we have no medical knowledge -" he permitted himself a slight smile, "- but we all agreed that it was something in the nature of a stroke. Yes, a stroke; that's what we agreed to enter in the log and I put it in my journal. A moving funeral because he was a popular man. Not as well qualified medically as your fellow, I imagine, but widely experienced, especially in the diseases of the East. He had served in John Company ships as a surgeon's mate, I think."