“Beat to quarters, Mr Daubeny! Then clear for action, if you please!”

Daubeny was staring at him. Reliving the past, trying to face the future.

The marine drummers were already below the poop, and at a signal from their sergeant they began to beat out the familiar rattle, the sounds soon lost in the answering rush of feet as idlers and off-watch hands divided into teams, each of which knew precisely what was expected of them. Bolitho stood quite still, aware of the order and purpose around him, gained by months of drills and exercises, and Tyacke’s own forceful example.

The cabin beneath his feet would be stripped bare like the rest of the ship, screens torn down, all privacy gone, until the vessel was open from bow to stern. A ship-of-war.

“Cleared for action, sir!” Daubeny turned back to his captain.

Tyacke nodded. “That was well done.” Then, formally, he touched his hat to his admiral. “Virtue is engaging without support, Sir Richard.”

Bolitho said nothing. M’Cullom was not the kind to wait. It would be ship to ship, evening old scores, a seizing of the initiative like any frigate captain. Carleton’s voice came down like an intrusion.

“Third sail in sight, sir! There’s smoke!” Bolitho said, “Go aloft, George. Discover what you can.” Avery glanced at him even as he hurried to the shrouds. Afterwards, he was to recall the pain in his eyes, as if he already knew.

More gunfire, and Bolitho saw the smoke for the first time, like a stain on the shark-blue water. He could feel the deck lifting and then shuddering down as Indomitable thrust her fourteen hundred tons into each oncoming roller. Even the yards appeared CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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to be bending like giant bows, every sail full, each shroud and stay bar-taut under her great pyramid of sails.

“Load, sir?” Tyacke’s eyes were everywhere, even aloft, where a man had almost lost his hold as he was securing one of the nets which had been spread to protect the gun crews from falling spars.

Bolitho glanced at the masthead pendant. Like an arrow. The enemy could not outpace this ship, nor did they have the time to beat back into the wind. M’Cullom must have seen all this, and set it against the risk. The odds.

“Yes. Load, but do not run out. Virtue has given us time. Let us use it!”

Avery called down suddenly, “Virtue has lost a topmast, sir!

There are two frigates engaging her!” The rest was lost in an angry growl from the gun crews as they paused to peer up at the mainmast, their legs braced on the freshly sanded deck, their expressions shocked, but free of fear. This was different. Virtue was one of their own.

Bolitho looked away. My men.

More explosions, and then Avery returned to the quarterdeck.

“She can’t hope to last much longer, sir.”

“I know.” He spoke sharply, angry with himself at the cost, which was already too high. “Make to Attacker, Close on the Flag. ” As Avery shouted for the signal party, he added, “Then hoist Close Action! ”

So easily said. He felt for the locket under his shirt.

May Fate always guide you.

A tiny mark on this great ocean, he had said to Allday.

He turned and stared along the full length of the ship, past each unmoving gun crew, the lieutenants at the foot of each mast, then beyond the lion, with its upraised paws ready to strike.

The sea was cleaner, and a darker blue now, the sky empty of cloud in the first frail sunlight.

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He gripped the sword at his side and tried to feel something, some emotion. No place now for any perhaps or maybe. Like all those other times, this was the moment. Now.

And there lay the enemy.

9 A flag captain

BOLITHO waited for the bows to rear across another broken roller, then raised the telescope to his eye. The sea was glinting in a million mirrors, the horizon hard and sharp like something solid.

He moved the glass very slowly until he had found the embattled ships, changing shape in a swirling pall of gun smoke.

Avery said, “Attacker’s on station, sir.” He sounded unwilling to disturb Bolitho’s concentration.

On station. It seemed only minutes since the signal had been acknowledged; perhaps everything had been frozen in time, with only the three distant ships a reality.

Virtue was still fighting hard, engaging the enemy on either beam, her broadsides regular and well timed despite the ripped and ragged sails, and the gaps in her rigging and spars which revealed the true measure of her damage.

Two big frigates. He could see the Stars and Stripes curling from the leader’s gaff, the stabbing tongues of orange flame along her side as her battery fired, and fired again.

The nearest enemy ship was breaking off the action, her smoke rolling down across her adversary as if to swamp her, her sails flapping in disorder but without confusion, as she began to alter course. She was coming fully about. Bolitho searched his feelings: there was neither satisfaction nor even anxiety. To fight, not to run, to grasp what wind she could and use it.

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have outsailed her, and raked her at least twice before the other captain had been made to face an inevitable defeat.

What Adam would have done. He smiled faintly, bleakly. What I would do.

He called to one of the midshipmen. “Over here, Mr Blisset!” He waited for the youth to join him, and then rested the telescope on his shoulder. He saw the midshipman grin and wink to one of his friends. See me? I am helping the admiral!

Bolitho forgot him and all those around him as he watched a tiny cluster of coloured flags break from the other frigate. She was still engaging the defiant Virtue, and the pockmarks in her own sails showed that it was not all going in the enemy’s favour.

He rubbed his left eye with his sleeve, angry at the interruption. The signal was being acknowledged, so the engaging vessel was the senior of the two. Almost certainly the same captain who had bluffed Reaper into surrender and worse. Who had intended to go after the convoy as he had probably done with others. Had they been his guns, too, which had smashed the transport Royal Herald into oblivion? The face in the crowd.

Someone shouted, “Virtue’s mizzen is going!” And Isaac York’s angry retort. “We can see that, Mr Essex!” Bolitho trained the glass still further. He could feel the youth’s shoulder quivering: excitement, fear, it could be both.

The frigate was almost bows-on, leaning over as her yards were hauled round to hold her on the opposite tack. So close now, five miles or thereabouts. She would soon be on a converging course. Tyacke must have anticipated it, had put himself in the other captain’s place when he had ordered York to let Indomitable fall off two points. Either way, they would hold the wind-gage.

It would be a swift, and possibly decisive, embrace.

The enemy frigate was trying to head further into the wind, but her flapping canvas filled again while she held her present course.

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Bolitho heard Tyacke say, almost to himself, “Got you!”

“Royal Marines, stand to!” That was Merrick. A good officer, but one who had always been dominated by du Cann, who had been torn to bloody shreds by a swivel even as he had led his marines onto the American’s deck. Was Merrick hearing his voice even now, as he ordered his men to their stations?

He moved the glass again, his lips dry as he saw Virtue’s blurred shape falling downwind, obviously out of command, her steering gone, her remaining sails whipping in the wind like ragged banners.

Tyacke again. “Starboard battery, Mr Daubeny! Open the ports!”

A whistle shrilled, and Bolitho imagined the portlids lifting like baleful eyes along their spray-dappled side.

“Run out!”

Bolitho lowered the glass and murmured a word of thanks to the midshipman. He saw Avery watching him, and said, “The senior captain is holding off for the present.” Tyacke joined him and exclaimed angrily, “To let another do his work for him, the bastard!”

There was a puff of smoke from the approaching frigate, and seconds later a ball slapped down beyond Indomitable’s thrusting jib-boom. Bolitho said, “You may shorten sail, Captain Tyacke.” He could have been speaking to a stranger.

Tyacke was shouting to his lieutenants, while high above the tilting deck the topmen were already kicking and fisting the wild canvas under control, yelling to one another as they had done so often during their endless drills and contests, mast against mast.

Bolitho straightened his back. It was always the same: the big main course brailed up to lessen the risk of fire, but leaving the crouching gun crews and the barebacked seamen at the braces and halliards feeling exposed and vulnerable.

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He stared at the drifting Virtue. If she survived this day, it would take months to repair and refit her. Many of her people would not see that, or any other day.

But her flag still flew, hoisted with pathetic jauntiness to an undamaged yard, and through the smoke he could see some of her seamen climbing on to the shattered gangways to cheer and gesture as Indomitable surged towards them.

Avery tore his eyes away from the other ship and looked toward Bolitho as he said, “See? They can still cheer!” He pressed one hand to his eye, but Avery had seen the emotion and the pain.

Tyacke leaned on the rail as if to control his ship single-handed.

“On the uproll, Mr Daubeny!” He drew his sword and lifted it, until the first lieutenant had turned towards him.

“When you are ready, Mr York!” York raised a hand in acknowledgment. “Helm a’lee! Hold her steady there!” Responding to the quarter-wind, Indomitable turned slightly and without effort, her long jib-boom slicing above the other ship’s like a giant’s lance.

“Steady she is, sir! Nor’ by east!”

“Fire!”

Controlled, gun by gun, the broadside thundered out from bow to quarter, the sound so loud after the distant sea-fight that some of the seamen almost lost their grip on the braces as they hauled with all their strength to drag the yards round, to harness the wind. The oncoming frigate had been waiting, to draw closer, or to anticipate Tyacke’s first move. By a second or an hour, it was already too late, even before it had begun.

Bolitho watched Indomitable’s double-shotted broadside smashing into the other ship, and imagined that he saw her stagger as if she had run aground. He saw great holes in the sails, the wind already exploring them and tearing them apart. Severed rigging and shrouds dangled over her side, and more than one 166

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gunport had been left empty, blinded, its cannon running free to cause more havoc inboard.

“Stop your vents! Sponge out! Load! Run out!” Even as the enemy fired, the gun crews threw themselves into their work in a barely controlled frenzy.

Gun captains peered aft where Tyacke stood watching the other frigate. Perhaps he could exclude all else but the moment and his duty; he certainly did not seem to notice as one of the packed hammocks was torn apart by a jagged splinter a few yards from his body.

Bolitho felt the hull jerk as some of the other frigate’s iron found its mark. The range was closing fast; he could even see men running to retrim the yards, and an officer waving his sword, before Tyacke’s arm came down and the guns hurled themselves inboard on their tackles once more. Through the black shrouds and stays the American frigate looked as if she would run headlong into Indomitable’s side, but it was an illusion of battle, and the sea churned between the two ships was as bright as before.

Bolitho snatched up a glass and walked to the opposite side, expecting to see the senior American frigate running into the fight, with only the smaller Attacker standing in her way. He stared with disbelief as he realized that she had already gone about, and was making more sail even as he watched.

Avery said hoarsely, “Not bluffing this time, sir!” There was a wild cheer as the frigate’s foremast began to fall.

He imagined he could hear the terrible sounds of splintering wood and tearing rigging, although his ears were still deaf from the last broadside. So slow, so very slow. He even thought he could see the final hesitation before shrouds and stays snapped under the weight, and the whole mast, complete with yards, top and sails, thundered down alongside, dragging the vessel round like some giant sea anchor.

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turning clumsily while some of her men ran to cut the mast adrift, their axes like bright stars in the smoky sunshine.

Daubeny called, “All loaded, sir!”

Tyacke did not seem to hear. He was watching the other ship as she drifted helplessly to the thrust of wind and current.

The American officer was still waving his sword, and the huge Stars and Stripes streamed as proudly as before.

“Strike, damn you!” But Tyacke’s voice held no anger or hatred; it was more a plea, one captain to another.

Two of the enemy’s guns recoiled in their ports and Bolitho saw more packed hammocks blasted from their nettings, and seamen reeling from their weapons while one of their number was cut in half by a ball, his legs kneeling in grotesque independence.

Tyacke stared at Bolitho. Nothing was said. The sudden silence was almost more painful than the explosions.

Bolitho glanced at the enemy ship, and saw that some of her seamen who had been running seconds earlier to hack away the dragging wreckage had stopped as if stricken, unable to move.

But here and there a musket flashed, and he knew that her invisible marksmen could not be cheated for much longer.

He nodded. “As you bear!”

The sword fell, and in one shattering roar the starboard battery fired into the drifting smoke.

Daubeny yelled, “Reload!”

Stooping like old men, the gun crews sponged out the hot guns and rammed home the fresh charges and shining black balls from the garlands. At one of the ports the men hauled their gun back, oblivious even to the sliced corpse and the blood that soaked their trousers like paint. A fight they could understand; even the pain and fear that kept it close company were part of it, something expected. But a drifting ship, unable to steer and with most of her guns either unmanned or out of action, was something different.

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A lone voice shouted, “Strike, you bloody bastard! Strike, for Jesus’ sake!” Above the wind in the rigging, it sounded like a scream.

Tyacke said, “So be it.” He dropped his sword and the guns exploded, the vivid tongues of flame appearing to reach and touch the target.

The smoke funnelled downwind, and men stood away from their guns, their eyes red-rimmed in smoke-grimed faces, sweat cutting stripes across their bodies.

Bolitho watched coldly. A ship which could not win, and which would not surrender. Where the working party had been gathered there was only splintered timber and a few corpses, tossed aside with brutal indifference. Men and pieces of men, and from her scuppers there were tiny threads of scarlet, as if the ship herself was bleeding to death. Daubeny had removed his hat, probably without knowing what he had done. But he stared aft again, his face like stone as he called, “All loaded, sir!” Tyacke turned toward the three figures by the weather rail: Bolitho, Avery close beside him, and Allday a few paces away, his naked cutlass resting on the deck.

One more broadside would finish her completely, with so much damage below deck that she might even burst into flames, deadly to any vessel that came near her. Fire was the greatest fear of every sailor, in both war and peace.

Bolitho felt the numbness. The ache. They were waiting. Justice; revenge; the completeness of defeat.

His was the final responsibility. When he looked for the other American ship, he could barely find her beyond the smoke. But waiting, watching to see what he would do. Testing me again.

“Very well, Captain Tyacke!” He knew that some of the seamen and marines were staring at him, with disbelief, perhaps even disgust. But the gun captains were responding, answering the only CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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discipline they understood. The trigger-lines were pulled taut, each man staring across his muzzle, the helpless target filling every open port.

Tyacke raised his sword. Remembering that moment at the Nile when hell had burst into his life and had left its mark as a permanent reminder? Or seeing just another enemy, a fragment of a war which had outlived so many, friends and foes alike?

There was a sudden burst of shouting and Bolitho shaded his eyes to watch the solitary figure on the enemy’s torn and bloodied quarterdeck. No sword this time, and one arm hanging broken, or even missing in the dangling sleeve.

Very deliberately and without even turning towards Indomitable, he tugged at the halliards, and almost fell as the big Stars and Stripes spiralled down into the smoke.

Avery said in a tight voice, “He had no choice.” Bolitho glanced at him. Like Tyacke, another memory? Of his own little schooner surrendering to the enemy, while he lay wounded and helpless?

He said, “He had every choice. Men died for no good purpose. Remember what I told you. They have no choice at all.” He looked in Allday’s direction. “Bravely, old friend?” Allday lifted the cutlass and balanced the blade on one hand.

“It gets harder, Sir Richard.” Then he grinned, and Bolitho thought that even the sunshine was dim by comparison. “Aye, set bravely!”

Tyacke was watching the other vessel, the brief savagery of action already being crowded aside by the immediate needs of command.

“Boarding parties, Mr Daubeny! The marines will go across when the ship is secured! Pass the word for the surgeon and let me know the bill—we’ll see the cost of this morning’s show of courage!”

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Indomitable was responding, the carpenter and his crew already below, hammers and squeaking tackles marking their progress through the lower hull.

Then Tyacke sheathed his sword, and saw the youngest midshipman observing him closely, although his eyes were still blurred with shock. Tyacke looked steadily back at him, giving himself time to consider what had so nearly happened.

He barely knew the midshipman, who had been sent out from England as a replacement for young Deane. His eyes moved unwillingly to one of the quarterdeck guns. Right there, as others had just fallen.

“Well, Mr Campbell, what did you learn from all this?” The boy, who was only twelve years old, hesitated under Tyacke’s gaze, unused as yet to the scars, and the man who bore them.

In a small voice he answered, “We won, sir.” Tyacke walked past him and touched his shoulder, something he did not often do. He was more surprised than the midshipman at the contact.

“They lost, Mr Campbell. It is not always the same thing!” Bolitho was waiting for him. “She’s not much of a prize, James.

But her loss will be felt elsewhere!” Tyacke smiled. Bolitho did not wish to speak of it, either.

He said, “No chance of a chase now, Sir Richard. We have others to care for.”

Bolitho stared at the dark blue water, and the other American frigate, which was already several miles clear.

“I can wait.” He tensed. Someone was crying out in agony as others attempted to move him. “They did well.” He saw Ozzard’s small figure picking his way through the discarded tackles and rammers by the guns. So much a part of it, and yet able to distance himself from all the sights and sounds CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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around him. He was carrying a bottle, wrapped in a surprisingly clean cloth.

Tyacke was still beside him, although aware of those on every hand who were demanding his attention.

“They’re lucky, Sir Richard.”

Bolitho watched Ozzard preparing a clean goblet, oblivious to everything but the job in hand.

“Some may not agree, James.”

Tyacke said abruptly, “Trust, sir.” One word, but it seemed to hang there even as he walked away for the final act with a van-quished enemy.

Bolitho raised the goblet to his lips as the shadow of the enemy’s topmast laid its patterns on the deck beside him. He saw some of the bloodied seamen pause to watch him; a few grinned when they caught his eye, others merely stared, needing to recognize something. To remember, perhaps, or to tell somebody later, who might want to know about it. He found himself touching the locket beneath his shirt. She would understand what it meant to him. Just that one word, so simply put.

While the sun climbed higher in the clear sky to raise a misty haze on either horizon, Indomitable ’s company worked with scarcely a pause to cleanse their ship of the scars and stains of battle. The air was heady with rum, and it was hoped that a meal would be ready by noon. To the ordinary sailor, strong drink and a full belly were considered a cure for almost everything.

Below the sounds of repair and the disciplined activity, on Indomitable’s orlop deck the contrast was stark. Beneath the ship’s waterline, it was a hushed place that never saw daylight, nor would it until she was broken up. Through the ship’s length it was a place for stores and spare timber, rigging and fresh water, and in the carefully guarded magazines, powder and shot. Here 172

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was the purser’s store, with slop clothing and tobacco, food, and wine for the wardroom, and in the same darkness, broken here and there by clusters of lanterns, some of Indomitable’s company, midshipmen and other junior warrant officers, lived, slept, and by the light of flickering glims studied and dreamed of promotion.

It was also a place where men were brought to survive or to die, as their wounds and injuries dictated.

Bolitho ducked low between each massive deck beam and waited for his eyes to accept the harsh change from sunlight to this gloom, from the relief and high spirits of the victors, to the men down here who might not live to see the sun again.

Because of their opening broadsides and Tyacke’s superior ship-handling at close quarters, Indomitable’s casualties, her bill, had been mercifully light. He knew from long experience that that was no consolation to the unlucky ones down on the orlop.

Some were lying, or propped against the great curved timbers of the hull, bandaged, or staring at the little group around the makeshift table where the surgeon and his assistants, the lob-lolly boys, worked on their patients: their victims, the old Jacks called them.

Bolitho could hear Allday’s painful breathing, and did not know why he had chosen to accompany him. He must be grateful that his son had been spared this final indignity and despair.

They were holding a man down on the table, his nakedess still revealing the powder stains of battle, his face and neck sweating as he almost choked on the rum which was being poured down his throat before the leather strap was put between his teeth. The surgeon’s apron was dark with blood. No wonder they called them butchers.

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that conditions and the crude treatment of wounds often killed more men than the enemy. After his present commission Beauclerk would return to the College of Surgeons in London, where, with his colleagues, he would contribute his knowledge to a practical guide, which might help to ease the suffering of men like these.

Beauclerk had done well during the fight with the USS Unity, and had offered great support to Adam Bolitho when he had been brought aboard after his escape from prison. He had a composed and serious face, and the palest and steadiest eyes Bolitho had ever seen. He recalled the moment when Beauclerk had mentioned his finest tutor, Sir Piers Blachford, who had been researching the same conditions himself aboard Hyperion. Bolitho saw him even now, his tall, heron-like figure striding between decks, asking questions, talking to anyone he chose, a severe man, but possessing great qualities of courage and compassion, which had made even the hardest seamen respect him. Blachford had been in Hyperion to her last day, when she had finally given up the fight and gone down, with Bolitho’s flag still flying. Many had gone down with her: they could be in no better company.

And they still sang about his old ship, “How Hyperion Cleared the Way.” It always brought a cheer in the taverns and the pleasure gardens, even though those who cheered her name rarely had any idea what it was like. What this was like.

For a few seconds Beauclerk looked up, his eyes like chips of glass in the light of the swinging lanterns. He was a very private man, no easy thing to achieve in a crowded warship. He had known for some time of Bolitho’s damaged eye, and that it had been Blachford who had told him that there was no hope for it.

But he had said nothing.

The wounded seaman was quieter now, whimpering to himself, not seeing the knife in Beauclerk’s hand, the saw held ready by an assistant.

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“You are welcome here, Sir Richard.” He watched him, assessing him. “We are nearly done.” Then, as the seaman twisted his face toward the admiral, he gave a brief shake of his head.

Bolitho was deeply moved, and wondered if this was why he had come. This man might die: at best, he would be one more cripple thrown on the beach. His leg had been crushed, no doubt by a recoiling gun.

Tyacke’s words still haunted him, from that September day when so many others had fallen. And for what? An enemy frigate taken, but so badly damaged that it was unlikely she would survive a sudden squall, let alone fight in the line. Virtue had also been severely mauled, and had lost twenty of her men. Surprisingly, her captain, the devil-may-care M’Cullom, had survived without a scratch. This time.

Indomitable had lost only four men killed, and some fifteen wounded. Bolitho moved to the table and took the man’s wrist, the surgeon’s mate stepping aside, staring at Beauclerk as if for an explanation.

Bolitho closed his fingers around the man’s thick wrist, and said gently, “Easy, now.” He glanced at Beauclerk and saw his lips form the name. “You did well, Parker.” He raised his voice very slightly and looked beyond, into the shadows, knowing that others were listening to his empty words. “And that applies to you all!”

He felt the wrist start to shake. It was not a movement, but a mere sensation, like something running through him, out of control. It was terror.

Beauclerk nodded to his assistants and they seized the leg, their eyes averted as the knife came down and cut deeply. Beauclerk showed no hesitation, no outward emotion, as his patient arched his back and tried to scream through the strap. Then the saw. It seemed endless, but Bolitho knew only a matter of seconds had passed. It was followed by a sickening thud as they CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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dropped the leg into the “wings and limbs” tub. Now the needle, the fingers bright and bloody in the swaying lantern light. Beauclerk glanced at Bolitho’s hand on the man’s wrist, the admiral’s gold lace against the smoke-grimed skin.

Somebody murmured, “No good, sir. Lost him.” Beauclerk stood back. “Take him.” He turned to watch as the dead seaman was dragged from the table. “It’s never easy.” Bolitho heard Allday clearing his throat. Seeing it all again, as if it were his own son, floating away, eventually sinking into the depths. And for what?

He stared at the table, the pools of blood, the urine, the evidence of pain. There was no dignity here in death, no answer to the question.

He walked back toward the ladder and heard Beauclerk ask,

“Why did he come?” and did not linger to hear the reply. Beauclerk saw the instant guard in Allday’s eyes and added, quite gently, “You know him better than any man. I should like to understand.”

“’Cause he blames himself.” He recalled his own words when the American flag had come down. “It gets harder, see?”

“Yes. I think I do.” He wiped his bloody hands. “Thank you.” He frowned as two of the injured men raised a hoarse cheer.

“That will not help him, either.” But Allday had gone.

When he returned to London it would all be so different. His experience might help others one day: it would certainly assist him in his chosen career. He looked around, recalling the admiral’s austere face after that other battle, as it must have been after all those which had preceded it. And the day his nephew had been brought aboard. More like two brothers, he thought.

Like love.

He smiled, knowing that if they saw it, his assistants might think him callous. London or not, nothing would ever be the same.

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The captain’s quarters in Indomitable were no longer as spacious as they had been during her life as a two-decker, but after his previous command of the brig Larne James Tyacke still found them palatial. Although cleared for action like the rest of the ship, they had remained undamaged by the swift bombardment, as they were on the larboard and disengaged side.

Bolitho sat in the proffered chair and listened to the muffled thuds and dragging sounds from his own stern cabin, as screens were replaced and the smoke stains were washed away, until the next time.

Tyacke said, “We got off very lightly, Sir Richard.” Bolitho took a glass of cognac from Tyacke’s coxswain, Fairbrother. He looked after his captain without fuss or fancy, and seemed a man pleased with his role, and the fact that his captain called him by his first name, Eli.

He gazed around the cabin; it was neat but spartan, with nothing to reveal any hint of the character of the man who lived and slept here. Only the big sea-chest was familiar, and he knew it was the one in which Tyacke used to carry the silk gown he had bought for the girl he intended to marry. She had refused him after his terrible injury at the Nile. How long he had carried the gown was unknown, but he had given it to Catherine to wear when he had found them after their ordeal in Golden Plover’s longboat. Bolitho knew she had sent it back to Tyacke when they had reached England, beautifully cleaned and pressed, in case there should be another woman in the future. It was probably in the chest at this moment, a reminder of the rejection he had suffered.

Tyacke said, “I’ve made a full report. The prize is nothing much.” He paused. “Not after we’d finished with her. She had over fifty killed, and twice as many wounded. She was carrying a lot of extra hands, for prize crews, no doubt. If they’d managed to board us . . .” He shrugged. “A different story, maybe.” CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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He studied Bolitho curiously, having heard about his visit to the orlop and that he had restrained one of the badly wounded as the surgeon had taken off his leg. He thought with a mental shudder of Beauclerk’s pale eyes. A cold fish, like the rest of his breed.

Bolitho said, “She was the USS Success, formerly the French Dryade. ” He looked up at Tyacke, and felt his scrutiny like something physical. “Her captain was killed.”

“Aye. It was like a slaughterhouse. Our gun captains have learned well.” There was the pride again, which even the horror he had described could not diminish.

He held his goblet to the light and said, “When I became your flag captain, it was an even greater challenge than I had expected.” He gave his faint, attractive smile. “And I knew I was going into deep water from the start. It wasn’t just the size of the ship, and my responsibility to all her people, but also my role within the squadron. I had been so used to a small command—a seclusion which, looking back, I know I myself created. And then, under your flag, there were the other ships, and the whims and weaknesses of their captains.”

Bolitho said nothing. It was one of those rare moments of confidence, something he did not wish to interrupt, a mutual trust which had made itself felt between them from the very beginning, when they had first met in Tyacke’s schooner Miranda.

Tyacke said abruptly, “I started keeping my own log book. I discovered that a flag captain should never rely on memory alone.

And when your nephew was brought aboard wounded, after his escape from that Yankee prison, I made notes on everything he told me.” He glanced at a sealed gunport as if he could see the American prize riding under Indomitable’s lee. Victors and vanished were working together aboard her to fit a jury-rig, which, with luck and fair sailing, might take her to Halifax.

“There was a lieutenant aboard the Success. A young man, so 178

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badly hurt by splinters that I wondered what was keeping him alive.” He cleared his throat, as if embarrassed by the emotion his voice revealed. “I talked with him for a while. He was in great pain. There was nothing anyone could do.” Bolitho saw it with a poignant clarity, as if he had been there with them. This strong, remote man sitting with an enemy, perhaps the only one truly able to share his suffering.

“In some ways he reminded me of your nephew, sir. I thought it was the battle, being beaten, knowing he was paying with his life. But it wasn’t that. He simply could not believe that their other ship had cut and run—had left them to fight alone.” There were whispering voices outside the door, officers needing advice or instructions. Tyacke would know of their presence, but nothing would move him until he was ready.

He said, “The lieutenant’s name was Brice, Mark Brice. He had prepared a letter to be despatched should the worst happen.” He was momentarily bitter. “I’ve warned others about that kind of maudlin sentiment. It’s . . . it’s asking for death.”

“Brice?” Bolitho felt a chill of recognition run through him, as though he were hearing Adam’s own voice as he had described it to him. “It was a Captain Joseph Brice who invited Adam to change sides when he was captured.” Tyacke said, “Yes. He was that captain’s son. An address in Salem.”

“And the letter?”

“The usual, sir. Duty and love of country, not a lot of value when you’re dead.” He picked up a small book from the table.

“Still, I’m glad I wrote it down.”

“And the other ship, James? Is that what’s troubling you?” Tyacke shrugged heavily. “Well, I learned quite a bit from them. She’s the USS Retribution, another ex-Frenchman, Le Gladiateur. Forty guns, maybe more.” Then he said, “There’s no doubt in my mind that these were the ships that took Reaper.” CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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He glared at the door. “I shall have to go, sir. Please make use of these quarters until yours are ready.” He hesitated by the door, as though grappling with something.

“You were once a flag captain yourself, sir?” Bolitho smiled. “Yes. A very long time ago, in a three-decker.

Euryalus, one hundred guns. I learned a great deal in her.” He waited, knowing there was more.

Tyacke said, “The American lieutenant had heard about it.

Your time in Euryalus, I mean.”

“But that was all of seventeen years ago, James. This lieutenant, Brice, would hardly have been old enough . . .” Tyacke said bluntly, “Retribution’s captain told him. About you, about Euryalus. But he died before he could tell me anything more.”

He opened the door a few inches. “Wait!” There were a few murmurings from beyond, and then he added sharply, “Well, do it, or I’ll find somebody else better suited.” He turned toward Bolitho again. “Retribution’s captain is named Aherne.” He hesitated. “That’s all I know.”

Bolitho was on his feet, without realizing that he had left the chair. The big three-decker Euryalus had seemed the final step to flag rank, and he had carried even more responsibility than was usual for a flag captain. His admiral, Rear-Admiral Sir Charles Thelwall, had been old for his rank; he was dying, and he knew it. But England was facing heavy odds, with France and Spain confident of an early invasion. It had been in Euryalus that he had first met Catherine . . .

Tyacke’s coxswain held out the bottle. “Another, Sir Richard?” Bolitho saw Tyacke’s unconcealed surprise when he accepted.

He said slowly, “Dangerous times, James.” He was thinking aloud.

“We were ordered to Ireland. A French squadron was reported ready to support an uprising. Had it come about, the balance might have shifted against England there and then. There was 180

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even worse to follow . . . the great mutinies in the fleet at the Nore and Spithead. Dangerous times, indeed.”

“And Ireland, sir?”

“There were a few battles. I think the strain of the responsibility finally killed Sir Charles Thelwall. A fine man, a gentle man. I much admired him.” He faced Tyacke, his eyes suddenly hard. “And of course there was the inevitable aftermath of recrim-ination and punishment meted out to those who had conspired against the King. It proved nothing, it solved nothing. One of those hanged for treason was a patriot called Daniel Aherne, the scapegoat who became a martyr.” He picked up his glass, and found that it was empty. “So, James, we have found the missing face: Rory Aherne. I knew he had gone to America, but that is all I know. Seventeen years. A long time to nurture hatred.” Tyacke said, “How can we be sure?”

“I am certain, James. Coincidence, fate, who knows?” He smiled briefly. “Retribution, eh? A good choice.” He thought suddenly of Catherine’s words to him, when they had first been thrown together. Men are made for war, and you are no exception.

That was then, but can we ever change?

Aloud he said, “Call me when we get under way, James. And thank you.”

Tyacke paused. “Sir?”

“For being a flag captain, James. That, and so much more.” 10 T ime and distance

SIR WILFRED LAFARGUE put down the empty cup and walked to one of the tall windows of his spacious office. For such a heavily-built man he moved with remarkable agility, as if the young, eager CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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lawyer was still there, a prisoner of his own success. Lafargue had once been described as handsome, but now, in his late fifties, he was showing signs of good living and other excesses which even his expensively cut coat and breeches could not disguise.

The coffee was good: eventually, he might send for more. But he was content for the moment to stand looking out of this window, one of his favourites, across the City of London, where, despite more buildings than ever before, there were still many restful parks and ornamental gardens. This was Lincoln’s Inn, one of the centres of English law, and the prestigious address of many legal practices which served a world of both power and money.

This particular house, for instance, had once been the London residence of a famous general, who had met an ignominious death by fever in the West Indies. Now it held the offices of the legal firm which bore his family name, and of which Lafargue was the senior partner.

He idly watched some carriages as they rattled past on their way to Fleet Street. It was a fine day, with clear blue sky above the spires and impressive buildings. From the far window he would be able to see St Paul’s, or at least the dome of the cathe-dral; it was a sight that always pleased him. Like the centre of things, in his world.

He considered the visitor who was waiting to see him. His staff had been busy on her behalf, but this would be his first meeting with the lady in question, Lady Catherine Somervell. When he had mentioned the appointment to his wife she had been sharp, even angry, as if it offended her personally in some way.

He smiled. But then, how could she understand?

Now he would see for himself what the notorious viscountess was really like. She was certainly one of the most discussed women of the day: if only a tenth of it was true, he would soon discover her strength and her weakness. She had risen above it all, the scandal and the secret slander. The fact that her last husband had 182

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died mysteriously in a duel had been conveniently forgotten. He smiled more broadly. Not by me.

He turned with irritation as a door opened slightly, and his senior clerk peered in at him.

“What is it, Spicer?” The offices revolved around the senior clerk, a dedicated man who missed no detail in all the legal papers and documents that passed through his hands. He was also very dull.

Spicer said, “Lady Somervell is about to leave, Sir Wilfred.” He spoke without expression. When the Prime Minister, Spencer Perceval, had been assassinated by some lunatic at the House of Commons the previous year, he had announced it in much the same fashion, as if it was a comment on the weather.

Lafargue snapped, “What do you mean, leaving? That lady has an appointment with me!”

Spicer was unmoved. “That was nearly half an hour ago, Sir Wilfred.”

Lafargue contained himself with an effort. It was his practice to keep clients waiting, no matter how high or low they stood on the social scale.

It was a bad beginning. He said curtly, “Bring her in.” He sat at his vast desk and watched the other door. Everything was in its place, a chair directly opposite him, an impressive background of leather volumes from floor to ceiling behind.

Sound, reliable, like the City itself. Like a bank.

He rose slowly as the doors were opened and Lady Catherine Somervell entered the room. It was far too large for an office but Lafargue liked it for that reason: it often intimidated visitors who had to walk almost its full length to reach the chair by the desk.

For the first time in his experience, the effect was completely reversed.

She was taller than he had expected, and walked without hesitation or uncertainty, her dark eyes never leaving his face. She CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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was dressed all in green, and carrying a broad-brimmed straw hat with a matching ribbon. Lafargue was intelligent enough to appreciate that his clumsy ploy of allowing her to wait could never impress a woman like this.

“Please be seated, Lady Somervell.” He watched the easy way she sat in the straight-backed chair, confident, but wary. Defiant, perhaps. “I regret the delay. Some difficulty arose at the last minute.”

Her dark eyes moved only briefly to the empty coffee cup.

“Of course.”

Lafargue sat down again and touched some papers on his desk.

It was hard not to stare at her. She was beautiful: there was no other possible description. Her hair, so dark that it might have been black, was piled above her ears, so that her throat and neck seemed strangely unprotected. Provocative. High cheekbones, and now the merest hint of a smile as she said, “So what news may I expect?”

Catherine had seen the assessing glance. She had seen many such before. This illustrious lawyer, recommended by Sillitoe when she had asked for his advice, was no different, in spite of the grand setting and the air of showmanship. Sillitoe had remarked,

“Like most lawyers, his worth and his honesty will be measured by the weight of his bill!”

Lafargue said, “You have seen all the details of your late husband’s affairs.” He coughed politely. “Your pardon. Your previous husband, I mean. His business ventures prospered even during the war between Great Britain and Spain. It was his surviving son’s wish that you receive that which was always intended for your own use.” His eyes flicked down to the papers. “Claudio Luis Pareja was his son by his first marriage.” She said, “Yes.” She ignored the unspoken question: he would know, in any case. When Luis had asked her to marry him he had been more than twice her age, and even his son, Claudio, had 184

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been older than she. She had been afraid, desperate, lost, when the small, amiable Luis had taken her as his bride. It had not been love as she now knew it to be, but the man’s kindness, his need of her, had been like a door opening for her to step through.

She had been a mere girl, and he had given her vision and opportunity, and she had learned the manners and graces of the people he knew or did business with.

He had died when Richard Bolitho’s ship had taken control of the vessel in which they had been passengers, on their way to Luis’s estate in Minorca. She had known afterwards that she loved Richard, but she had lost him. Until Antigua, when he had sailed into English Harbour with his flag flying above the old Hyperion.

She could feel the lawyer’s eyes exploring her, although when she looked at him directly he was examining his papers again.

She said, “So I am a very rich woman?”

“At the stroke of a pen, my lady.” He was intrigued that she had shown neither surprise nor triumph, not since they had first exchanged letters. A beautiful widow, envied, wealthy: the temptation would be a great one for many men. He thought of Sir Richard Bolitho, the hero, whom even common sailors seemed to admire. He glanced at her again. Her skin was brown like a country woman’s, like her hands and wrists. He speculated on their life together when they were not separated by the ocean, and the war.

The thought made him remark, “I have heard that things are moving at last in North America.”

“What is that?” She stared at him, one hand moving to her breast. How quickly it could happen. Like a shadow, a threat.

He said, “We received word that the Americans attacked York, crossed the lake in force and burned the government buildings there.”

“When?” One word, like a stone falling into a still pond.

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“Oh, some six weeks ago, apparently. News is very slow to reach us.”

She stared at the window, at the fresh leaves visible beyond it.

Six weeks. The end of April. Richard might have been there: he would be involved, in any case. She asked quietly, “Anything else?” He cleared his throat. Her unexpected anxiety had encouraged him: perhaps she was vulnerable after all.

“Some story of a mutiny in one of our ships. Poor devils, one can hardly blame them.” He paused. “But there are limits, and we are at war.”

“What ship?” She knew he was enjoying her concern in some way. It did not matter. Nothing else did. Not the money, unexpected gift though it was from poor Luis, dead these many years.

She asked more sharply, “Can you remember?” He pursed his lips. “Reaper. Yes, that was it. Do you know her?”

“One of Sir Richard’s squadron. Her captain was killed last year. I do not know her, beyond that.” How could he understand?

Mutiny . . . She had watched Richard’s face when he had described it, and what it cost the guilty and the innocent alike. He had been involved in the great naval mutinies, which had stunned the entire country at a time when the enemy was expected to invade. Some had believed it was the first fire of the same revolution which had brought the Terror to France.

How Richard would hate and loathe such an outbreak in his own command. Would blame himself for not having been there when the seeds were sown.

A total responsibility. And a punishment to him, also.

Lafargue said, “Now, the other matter we discussed. The lease of the property has become available.” He watched her hand at her breast, the glittering pendant moving to betray the height-ened pulse. “The owner of the lease, an earl impoverished by bad luck or over-confidence at the tables, was more than willing to 186

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exchange deeds. Expensive property, madam. And occupied.” He knew; of course he knew. She said, “By Lady Bolitho.” She glanced down at the ruby ring on her hand, which he had given her in the church at Zennor on the day Valentine Keen had married Zenoria. It wrenched at her heart. They would all be waiting for her in Falmouth: the admiral’s lady, or whore, as the mood dictated. “It was my decision. I intend to lower the cost of the lease.” She looked up suddenly, and Lafargue saw the other woman in her eyes, the woman who had braved the sea in an open boat after shipwreck, who had captured the hearts of all who knew her.

Now, in her face, he could see that everything he had heard of her was true.

She added, “And I intend that she shall know it!” Lafargue rang a small bell, and his senior clerk, with one other, appeared as if by magic.

He stood up and watched Spicer preparing the documents, a fresh pen already placed by her hand. He looked at the ring, assessing the cost: it was of rubies and diamonds, like the pendant she wore, which was in the shape of a fan. He thought of his wife and wondered how, or even if, he would describe his day to her.

Spicer said, “Here and here, my lady.” She signed her name quickly, recalling the small, untidy lawyer’s office in Truro, which had handled the Bolitho affairs for generations. Chairs filled with files and dog-eared documents, far too dusty to ever have been used. Not surprisingly, it had been the portly Yovell who had guided her there when she had told him what she had heard from Seville. From Spain, where she had left childhood behind.

Untidy, yes, but she had been received there as if she had always belonged. As John Allday would have described it, one of the family.

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lady. A head so beautiful should never be troubled by affairs of business.”

She looked up at him, and smiled. “Thank you, Sir Wilfred.

I value your skills as a lawyer. Flattery I can have at any time from a Billingsgate porter!”

She stood, and waited while Lafargue took her hand, and after a small hesitation held it to his lips.

“It has been an honour, my lady.”

She nodded to the two clerks, and saw the smile on the impassive features of the one named Spicer. It was a day he would remember, for whatever reasons of his own.

Lafargue made a last attempt. “I noticed that you arrived in Lord Sillitoe’s carriage, my lady . . .” He almost flinched as the dark eyes turned toward him.

“How observant of you, Sir Wilfred.” He walked beside her to the double doors. “An influential man.” She regarded herself in a tall mirror in passing. Her next visit was to the Admiralty, and she wondered if Bethune would eventually tell her about the attack on York and the mutiny.

“With respect, my lady, I think that even Lord Sillitoe would regard you as a challenge.”

She faced the lawyer again, her heart suddenly heavy. Wanting not to be alone: wanting Bolitho, needing him.

“I have found that a challenge can so easily become an obsta-cle, Sir Wilfred. One which may need to be removed. Wouldn’t you agree?”

Back at his favourite window, Sir Wilfred Lafargue saw the liveried coachman hurry to open the carriage door for her. One of Sillitoe’s hard men, he thought, more like a prize-fighter than a servant. He saw her pause to watch a clutter of sparrows drinking from a horse-trough’s overflow. Distance hid her expression, but he knew she did not see or care for the passers-by who glanced at her.

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He tried to arrange his impressions rationally, as he might marshal facts and arguments in a law suit, or with an opposing brief. But all he could find was envy.

The Old Hyperion inn at Fallowfield was crowded on this warm June evening, mostly with workers from the surrounding farms, enjoying the companionship of their friends after a long day in the fields. Some sat outside at the scrubbed trestle tables, and the air was so still that the smoke from their long pipes hung in an unmoving canopy. Even the banks of tall foxgloves barely quivered, and beyond the darkening trees the Helford River gleamed in the fading light like polished pewter.

Inside the inn every door and window stood open, but the older customers, as was their habit year round, gathered by the great fireplace, although it was empty but for a tub of flowers.

Unis Allday glanced from her parlour door and was satisfied with what she saw. Familiar faces, thatchers from Fallowfield, and the carpenter and his mate who were still working on the local church, where she and John Allday had been married. She repressed a sigh, and turned to the cot where their child, little Kate, lay sleeping. She touched the cot: another reminder of the big, shambling sailor who was so far away. He had even made the cot with his own hands.

She heard her brother, another John, laughing at something as he drew and carried tankards of ale. A one-legged former soldier of the 31st Foot, he lived in a tiny cottage nearby. Without his company and support, she didn’t know how she would have managed.

She had had no letter from Allday. Over four months had passed since he had walked through that door to take passage to Canada, with the admiral he served and loved like no other. Lady Catherine would be feeling much the same loneliness, she thought, with her own man on the other side of the ocean, even though she had travelled far and wide herself. Unis smiled. She had never CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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been further than her native Devon before coming to live in Cornwall, and although she had settled in well, she knew that to the local people she would always be a foreigner. She had been attacked on the coast road on her way here, by men who had attempted to rob and assault her. John Allday had saved her that day. She could even talk about it now, but not to many. She touched some flowers on the table. The stillness, the warm, unmoving air was making her restless. If only he was back. She tested the idea. For good and always . . .

She looked once more at the sleeping child, and then walked out to join her brother.

He said, “Good business today, love. Picking up.” He watched an unwavering candle flame. “There’ll be a few ships’ masters cursing and swearing if they have to lie becalmed all night in Falmouth Bay. It’ll mean they’ll have to pay another day’s wages!” She said, “What about the war, John? Out there, I mean.” He said, “Soon be over, I expect. Once the Iron Duke forces the French to surrender, the Yankees’ll lose the stomach for a war on their own.”

“You do think that?” She remembered John Allday’s face when he had finally told her about his son, and how he had died in the fight with the Americans. Was it only last year? When he had come home and had taken their child, so tiny in his big hands, and she had told him she would not be able to carry another, would never give him another son.

His reply was still stark in her mind. She’ll do me fine. A son can break your heart. She had guessed then, but had said nothing until he was ready to tell her.

“Someone’s on the road.” He looked toward the window, and was not aware of the sudden fear in her eyes.

She heard the sound of a single horse, and saw the men around the empty grate pause in their conversation to stare at the open door. A horse usually meant authority out this way, so close to 190

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Rosemullion Head. The coastguard, or revenue men, or some of the dragoons from Truro, searching for deserters or hunting down footpads.

The horse clattered across the cobbles and they heard someone hurrying to assist the rider. Her brother said, “That’s Lady Catherine. I’d know her big mare anywhere.” He smiled as his sister straightened her apron and her hair, as she always did.

“I’d heard she was back from London. Luke said he saw her.” She came through the door, her dark hair almost touching the low beam. She seemed startled that there were so many customers, as if she were hardly aware of the time of day.

Some of the men stood up, or shuffled as though they would make the effort, and one or two voices called, “’Evenin’ to ’ee, m’lady.”

She held out her hand. “Please sit down. I am sorry . . .” Unis reached her, and guided her to the small parlour. “You shouldn’t be out alone on this road, m’lady. ’Twill be dark soon.

’Tisn’t safe these days.”

Catherine sat and pulled off her gloves. “Tamara knows the way. I am always safe.” She took Unis’s hand impulsively. “I needed to come. To be with a friend. And you are that, Unis.” Unis nodded, shocked by the quiet desperation in her voice.

It did not seem possible. The admiral’s lady, a woman of courage as well as beauty, accepted even here where scandal, like sin, could be condemned openly every Sunday in church and chapel . . .

“None stronger, m’ lady.”

Catherine stood, and crossed to the cot. “Young Kate,” she said, and reached down to adjust the covering. Unis watched, and was oddly moved.

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Catherine barely heard her. She had rested very little since her return from London. There had been no letter waiting from Richard: anything might be happening. She had ridden to the adjoining estate to visit his sister, Nancy, and found Lewis Roxby very ill. Despite the stroke he had suffered, he had taken little heed of his doctors’ warnings. Without his hunting and his entertaining, and his hectic life as landowner, magistrate and squire, he could neither see nor accept any future as an invalid. Nancy had known: she had seen it in her eyes. Lewis was not merely ill this time; he was dying.

Catherine had sat with him, holding his hand while he had lain propped up in his bed, his head high enough for him to see the trees, and his stone folly, which was almost completed. His face had been grey, his grip without strength. But from time to time he had turned his head to look at her, as if to reassure her that the old Lewis Roxby was still there.

She had told him about London, but had not mentioned the unexpected settlement with which Luis’s estate had endowed her.

Nor had she told him about her visit to Richard’s town house.

The lawyer, Lafargue, had sent word to Belinda of her intended arrival, but her visiting card had been returned at the door, torn in two halves. But Belinda knew now that the house where she lavishly entertained, and lived in a style to which she had been unaccustomed before her marriage, was the property of the woman she hated. It would change nothing between them, but it might prevent her asking for more money. She would never admit to her circle of friends that she was living in a house owned by the one she had openly called a prostitute.

She heard herself say, “Something a little stronger, Unis. Some brandy, if you have any.”

Unis hurried to a cupboard. Was it possible, that there was no one else she could turn to now that Sir Richard was away? Perhaps Bryan Ferguson and his wife at the big grey house were too 192

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close, painful reminders of those others who were absent: Bolitho’s

“little crew,” as she had heard John call them.

Catherine took the glass, wondering where the brandy had come from. Truro, or run ashore along this rocky and treacherous coast by freetraders in the dark of the moon?

Beyond the door, the conversation and laughter had resumed.

It was something to relate to their wives when they finally reached their own homes.

Unis said gently, “When . . . I mean . . . if Sir Lewis gives up the fight . . . what will become of all that he’s worked for? Just the son of a local farmer, they tells me, and now look at him. A friend of the Prince himself, owner of all that land—will his son not take over?”

Now look at him. A grey, tired face. Every breath an effort.

“I believe that his son is making a name for himself in the City of London. Lewis wanted it. He was so proud of him, and of his daughter. There will be many changes, no matter what happens.”

She sat for some time in silence, thinking of the visit to the Admiralty, which had been her final task in London. Bethune had greeted her warmly, professing surprise at her arrival, and had offered to take her to a reception somewhere, and introduce her to some of his particular friends. She had declined. Even as she had sat in that familiar office, watching him, listening to him, she had sensed his genuine interest in her, the undeniable charm which might lead him into serious trouble if he became careless or over-confident in his affairs. He had been unable to give her any information about the war in North America, although she had suspected that he knew more than he was saying. On her last night in Chelsea she had lain awake on the bed, almost naked in the bright moonlight across the Thames, and had considered what might have happened if she had pleaded with Bethune to use all CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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his influence, and his obvious affection and admiration for Richard, to enable him to be brought back to England. She had had little doubt what the price would have been. She had felt the sudden tears scalding her eyes. Could she have gone through with it? Given herself to another, whom instinct told her would have been kindness itself? She knew she could not have done it. There were no secrets between herself and Richard, so how could she have pretended with the man she loved?

To think that she could even consider such a bargain disgusted her. They called her a whore. Perhaps they were right.

Nor had she been able to tell Lewis what had happened after she had left Belinda’s house. In the square, she had seen the child walking with her governess. If the place had been crowded with a hundred children, she would still have known it was Elizabeth, Richard’s daughter. The same chestnut hair as her mother, the poise and confidence, so assured for one so young. She was eleven years old, and yet a woman.

“May I speak with you?” She had immediately sensed the governess’s hostility, but she had been totally unprepared when Elizabeth had turned to look up at her. That had been the greatest shock of all. Her eyes were Richard’s.

She had said calmly, “I am sorry. I do not know you, ma’am.” She had turned away, and walked on ahead of her companion.

What could I have expected? Hoped for? But all she could think of was the child’s eyes. Her contempt.

She stood up, listening. “I must leave. My horse . . .” Unis saw her brother in the doorway. “What is it, John?” But he was looking at the beautiful woman, her long riding habit torn in places where she had ridden carelessly, too close to the hedgerows.

“The church. The bell’s tolling.” Then, as though making a decision, “I can’t allow you to ride at this hour, m’ lady.” 194

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She appeared not to hear him. “I must go. I promised Nancy.” She walked to the open window, and listened. The bell. An end of something. The beginning of what?

John had returned. “One of the keepers is here, m’ lady. He’ll ride with you.” He hesitated, and looked at his sister as if appeal-ing to her. “Please. Sir Richard would insist, if he were here.” She held out her hands to them. “I know.” Some envied her, others hated her, and one at least feared her after her visit to the lawyer. She must not give way now. But without him I am nothing, have nothing.

She said, “I needed to be with friends, you see. Needed to be.” Tamara was already outside the door, eager to leave.

Sir Lewis Roxby, Knight of the Hanoverian Guelphic Order and friend of the Prince Regent, was dead. She remembered his many bluff kindnesses, and particularly the day when, together, they had found Zenoria Keen’s body.

The King of Cornwall. So would he always remain.

11 a W arning

RICHARD BOLITHO and Rear-Admiral Valentine Keen stood side by side and stared out across the crowded anchorage of Halifax harbour.

The sun was strong, the air warmer than for a long time, and after the restricted confines of a frigate, even one as large as Indomitable, Bolitho was very conscious of the land, and the peculiar feeling that he did not belong here. The house was the headquarters of the general officer commanding the garrisons and defence of Nova Scotia, and below the wooden verandah soldiers were marching back and forth, drilling in platoons, front ranks CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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kneeling to take aim at an imaginary enemy while the second ranks prepared to march through them and repeat the process: manoeuvres the army had perfected over the years, which had eventually turned the tables on Napoleon.

But Bolitho was looking at the anchored frigate directly opposite.

Even without a telescope, he could see the damage and the piles of broken timber and rigging on her decks. She still flew the Stars and Stripes, but the White Ensign was hoisted above it as a symbol of victory. She was the USS Chesapeake, which had been brought to action by His Britannic Majesty’s ship Shannon. The fight had been brief but decisive, and both captains had been wounded, the American mortally.

Keen said, “A welcome victory. Shannon towed her prize into Halifax on the sixth. Couldn’t have happened at a better time, with all our other setbacks.”

Bolitho had already heard something of the engagement.

Shannon’s captain, Philip Bowes Vere Broke, was both experienced and successful, and had been cruising up and down outside Boston, where Chesapeake lay at anchor. It was rumoured that he had been grieving over the loss of so many of his contemporaries to the superior American frigates. He had sent a challenge into Boston in the best tradition of chivalry, requesting that Captain Lawrence of the Chesapeake should come out and “try the fortunes of their respective flags.” If Broke had had one advantage over his American adversary, it was his dedication to and insistence upon gunnery and teamwork. He had even invented and fitted sights to all his main armament. It had won the day, but nobody had shown more distress than Broke himself when Lawrence had succumbed to his wounds.

Now, lying just beyond her like a guilty shadow, was the smaller frigate Reaper. A guard-boat was moored alongside, and her upper deck was marked with tiny scarlet figures where Royal Marine sentries kept watch over the imprisoned mutineers.

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Keen glanced at him, seeing the strain on his profile as he lifted his face to the sun.

“It is good to be of one company again.” Bolitho smiled. “Only for the moment, Val. We shall have to be on the move again shortly.” He shaded his eyes to look across at Indomitable, where Tyacke was taking on fresh water and supplies while final repairs were carried out. It was Tyacke’s reason, or rather his excuse, for not accompanying him to this meeting.

He heard Avery talking quietly with Keen’s flag lieutenant, the Honourable Lawford de Courcey. They would have little or nothing in common, he thought, and he had gathered that Adam did not care much for him, either. It was just as well. There was no room for complacency here, even amongst friends. They needed an edge, a purpose, like the old sword at his side.

There had been letters awaiting his return to Halifax, both from Catherine: he could feel them now in his coat. He would read them as soon as he could, then again later, and more slowly.

But there was always the first anxiety, like a fear, that she would have changed towards him. She would be lonely beyond measure.

He turned away from the sun as he heard de Courcey greeting someone, and then another voice, a woman’s.

Keen touched his arm. “I should like you to meet Miss Gilia St Clair. I sent you word of her presence aboard Reaper.” So easily said, but Bolitho had already gone through Keen’s carefully worded report on Reaper’s surrender, and the discharge of her guns into empty sea. He felt that Keen and Adam had disagreed about something at the time. It might reveal itself later.

His shoe caught on something as he turned, and he saw Avery’s vague outline move towards him. Troubled; but protective of him, as always.

It was so dark after the brilliant sunlight and the dazzling reflections from the harbour that the room could have been curtained off.

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Keen was saying, “I wish to present Sir Richard Bolitho. He commands our squadron.”

It was not to impress: it was genuine pride. Val, as he had always been, before Zenoria’s death, before Zenoria. Perhaps Catherine was correct in her belief that he would easily recover from his loss.

The woman was younger than he had expected, in her late twenties, he thought. He had an impression of a pleasant, oval face and light brown hair; the eyes were level and serious.

Bolitho took her hand. It was very firm; he could easily imagine her with her father aboard the stricken Reaper, watching Valkyrie running out her powerful broadside.

She said, “I am sorry to intrude, but my father is here. I had hoped I could discover . . .”

Keen said, “He is with the general. I’m sure it is quite all right for you to stay.” He gave his youthful grin. “I will take full responsibility!”

She said, “I wanted to know about York. My father was going there to assist with the completion of a ship.” Bolitho listened in silence. Her father’s plans were not the source of her concern.

Keen said, “I expect you will be returning to England sooner rather than later, Miss St Clair?”

She shook her head. “I would like to remain here, with my father.”

The door opened, and an urbane lieutenant almost bowed himself into the room.

“The General’s apologies, Sir Richard. The delay was unin-tentional.” He seemed to see the girl for the first time. “I am not certain . . .”

Bolitho said, “She is with us.”

The adjoining room was large and crammed with heavy furniture, a soldier’s room, with two vast paintings of battles on the 198

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walls. Bolitho did not recognize the uniforms. A different war, a forgotten army.

The general seized his hand. “Delighted, Sir Richard. Knew your father. Fine man. In India. He’d be damned proud of you!” He spoke in short, loud bursts, like mountain artillery, Bolitho thought.

Other faces. David St Clair: good handshake, firm and hard.

And there was another soldier present, tall, very assured, with the unemotional bearing of a professional.

He bowed slightly. “Captain Charles Pierton, of the Eighth Regiment of Foot.” He paused, and said with a certain pride,

“The King’s Regiment.”

Bolitho saw the girl’s hands gripped together in her lap. Waiting with a curious defiance which succeeded only in making her appear suddenly vulnerable.

David St Clair said quickly, “Are you feeling well, my dear?” She did not answer him. “May I ask you something, Captain Pierton?”

Pierton glanced quizzically at the general, who gave a brief nod. “Of course, Miss St Clair.”

“You were at York when the Americans attacked. My father and I would have been there too, had circumstances not dictated otherwise.”

Her father leaned forward in his chair. “The 30-gun ship Sir Isaac Brock was burned on the slipway before the Americans could take her. I would have been too late in any case.” Bolitho knew that she did not even hear him.

“Do you know Captain Anthony Loring, of your regiment, sir?”

The soldier looked back at her steadily. “Yes, of course. He commanded the second company.” He turned to Bolitho and the other naval officers. “Ours was the only professional force at York.

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the Royal Newfoundland Regiment.” He glanced at the girl again.

“And about one hundred Mississauga and Chippewa Indians.” Bolitho noted how easily the names rolled off his tongue: he was a seasoned campaigner, although this vast, untamed country was a far cry from Spain or France. But the others would know all these facts. It was merely an explanation for the girl’s benefit, as if he thought it was owed to her.

He continued in the same grave, precise manner. “The defences at Fort York were poor. My commanding officer believed that eventually the navy would be able to send more vessels to the lakes, to hold off the Americans until larger men-of-war were constructed. There were some seventeen hundred American soldiers that day, almost all of them regulars and well-trained. We had to gain time, to evacuate the fort and finally to burn the Sir Isaac Brock. ”

She stood, and walked to the window. “Please continue.” Pierton said quietly, “Captain Loring took his men to the lower shore where the Americans were landing. He gallantly led a bayonet charge and dispersed them. For a time. He was wounded, and died shortly afterwards. I am sorry. A good number of our men fell that day.”

Keen said, “I think you might be more comfortable in another room, Miss St Clair.”

Bolitho saw her shake her head, heedless of her hair, which had fallen loosely across her shoulder.

She asked, “Did he speak of me, Captain Pierton?” Pierton looked at the general, and hesitated. “We were hard pressed, Miss St Clair.”

She persisted. “Ever?”

Pierton replied, “He was a very private person. A different company, you understand.”

She left the window and crossed over to him, then she put her hand on his arm. “That was a kind thing to say. I should not 200

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have asked.” She gripped the scarlet sleeve, unaware of everyone else. “I am so glad that you are safe.” The general coughed noisily. “Sending him to England on the first packet. God knows if they’ll learn anything from what happened.”

The door closed quietly. She had gone.

Captain Pierton exclaimed, “Damn!” He looked at the general. “My apologies, sir, but I forgot to give her something. Perhaps it would be better to send it with his other effects to Ridge . . .

our regimental agent in Charing Cross.” Bolitho watched as he took a miniature painting from his tunic and laid it on the table. Charing Cross: like the casual mention of the Indians fighting with the army, it seemed so alien here.

Another world.

Keen said, “May I?”

He held the miniature to the sunlight and studied it. “A good likeness. Very good.”

A small tragedy of war, Bolitho thought. She had sent or given him the miniature, even though the unknown Loring had decided not to encourage a more intimate relationship. She must have been hoping to see him again when her father visited York, perhaps fearing what she might discover. Now it was too late. Her father probably knew more than he would ever disclose.

Keen said, “Well, sir, I think it should be returned to her. If it were me . . .” He did not go on.

Thinking of Zenoria? Sharing the same sense of loss?

The general frowned. “Perhaps you’re right.” He glanced at the clock. “Time to stop now, gentlemen. I have a very acceptable claret, and I believe we should sample it. After that . . .” Bolitho stood near the window, studying the captured American, Chesapeake, and the Reaper beyond.

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“Unfortunately, no, Sir Richard. My regiment withdrew in good order to Kingston, which is now doubly important if we are to withstand another attack. If the Americans had gone for Kingston in the first place . . .”

“Well?”

The general answered for him. “We would have lost Upper Canada.”

Two servants had appeared with trays of glasses. Keen murmured, “I shall not be a moment, Sir Richard.” Bolitho turned as Avery joined him by the window. “We shall not wait longer than necessary.” He was concerned at the expression in the tawny eyes: they were deeply introspective, and yet, in some strange way, at peace. “What is it? Another secret, George?” Avery faced him, making up his mind. Perhaps he had been struggling with it all the way from the ship to this place of stamping boots and shouted orders.

He said, “I received a letter, sir. A letter.” Bolitho twisted round and grasped his wrist. “A letter? Do you mean . . .”

Avery smiled, rather shyly, and his face was that of a much younger man.

“Yes, sir. From a lady.”

Outside, in the sun-dappled passageway, Keen sat beside the girl on one of the heavy leather couches.

He watched her as she turned the miniature over in her hands, recalling the calm acceptance in her face when he had given it to her. Resignation? Or something far deeper?

“It was good of you. I did not know . . .” He saw her mouth quiver, and said, “While I command here at Halifax, if there is anything I can do to serve you, anything you require . . .”

She looked up into his face. “I will be with my father, at the 202

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Massie residence. They are . . . old friends.” She lowered her eyes.

“Of a sort.” She looked at the miniature again. “I was younger then.”

Keen said, “It is . . .” He faltered. “You are very brave, and very beautiful.” He tried to smile, to break the tension within himself. “Please do not be offended. That is the very last thing I intend.”

She was watching him, her eyes steady once more. “You must have thought me a fool, an innocent in a world I know not. The sort of thing to bring a few laughs in the mess when you are all together as men.” She thrust out her hand, impetuous, but sharing his uncertainty. “Keep this, if you like. It is of no further use to me.” But the careless mood would not remain. She watched him take the miniature, his lashes pale against his sunburned skin as he gazed down at it. “And . . . take care. I shall think of you.” She walked away along the passage, the sun greeting her at every window. She did not look back.

He said, “I shall depend on it.”

He walked slowly back toward the general’s room. Of course, it could not happen. It could not, not again. But it had.

Adam Bolitho paused with one foot on the high step and looked up at the shop. With the sun hot across his shoulders and the sky intensely blue above the rooftops, it was hard to remember the same street obscured by great banks of snow.

He pushed open the door and smiled to himself as a bell jingled to announce his entrance. It was a small but elegant place which he thought would fit well into London or Exeter.

As if to some signal, a dozen or so clocks began to chime the hour, tall clocks and small, ornate timepieces for mantel or drawing room, clocks with moving figures, phases of the moon, and one with a fine square-rigger which actually dipped and lifted to each stroke of the pendulum. Each one pleased and intrigued CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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him, and he was walking from one to another examining them when a short man in a dark coat came through a doorway by the counter. His eyes instantly and professionally examined the uniform, the bright gold epaulettes and short, curved hanger.

“And how may I be of service, Captain?”

“I require a watch. I was told . . .” The man pulled out a long tray. “Each of those is tested and reliable. Not new and untried, but of excellent repute. Old friends.” Adam thought of the ship he had just left at anchor: ready for sea. It was impossible not to be aware of the captured American frigate Chesapeake in the harbour, which he had seen from Valkyrie’s gig. A truly beautiful ship: he could even accept that at one time he would have wanted no finer command. But the emotion would not return: the loss of Anemone had been like having part of himself die. She had been escorted into Halifax by her victorious opponent Shannon on the sixth of June. My birthday.

The day he had been kissed by Zenoria on the cliff track; when he had cut the wild roses with his knife for her. So young. And yet so aware.

He glanced at the array of watches. It was not vanity: he needed one now that his own had disappeared, lost or stolen when he had been wounded and transferred to the USS Unity. They might as well have left him to die.

The shopkeeper took his silence as lack of interest. “This is a very good piece, sir. Open-faced with duplex escapement, one of James McCabe’s famous breed. Made in 1806, but still quite perfect.”

Adam picked it up. Who had carried it before, he wondered.

Most of the watches here had probably belonged to army or sea officers. Or their widows . . .

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making comparisons with Zenoria, whom he had rescued from a convict transport. She had carried the mark of a whip across her back as a constant and cruel reminder, the mark of Satan, she had called it. He was being unfair to Keen, more so perhaps because of his own guilt, which never left him. That, willing or otherwise, Zenoria had been his lover.

He asked suddenly, “What about that one?” The man gave him an approving smile. “You are an excellent judge as well as a brave frigate captain, sir!” Adam had become accustomed to it. Here in Halifax, despite the heavy military presence and the comparative nearness of the enemy, security was a myth. Everyone knew who you were, what ship, where bound, and probably a whole lot more. He had mentioned it with some concern to Keen, who had said only, “I think we give them too much credit, Adam.” An indefinable coolness had come between them. Because of Adam’s threat to fire on the Reaper, hostages or not, or was it something of his own making or imagination, born of that abiding sense of guilt?

He took the watch, and it rested in his palm. It was heavy, the case rubbed smooth by handling over the years.

The man said, “A rare piece, Captain. Note the cylinder escapement, the fine, clear face.” He sighed. “Mudge and Dutton, 1770.

A good deal older than yourself, I daresay.” Adam was studying the guard, the engraving well worn but still clear and vital in the dusty sunlight. A mermaid.

The shopkeeper added, “Not the kind of workmanship one finds very often these days, I fear.” Adam held it to his ear. Recalling her face that day in Plymouth, when he had picked up her fallen glove and returned it to her. Her hand on his arm when they had walked together in the port admiral’s garden. The last time he had seen her.

“What is the story of this watch?”

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The little man polished his glasses. “It came into the shop a long while ago. It belonged to a seafaring gentleman like yourself, sir . . . I believe he needed the money. I could find out, perhaps.”

“No.” Adam closed the guard very carefully. “I will take it.”

“It is a mite expensive, but . . .” He smiled, pleased that the watch had gone to a suitable owner. “I know you are a very successful frigate captain, sir. It is right and proper that you should have it!” He waited, but the responding smile was not forthcom-ing. “I should clean it before you take it. I can send it by hand to Valkyrie if you would prefer. I understand that you are not sailing until the day after tomorrow?”

Adam looked away. He had only just been told himself by Keen before he had come ashore.

“Thank you, but I shall take it now.” He slipped it into his pocket, haunted by her face once more. The local people of Zennor still insisted that the church where she and Keen had been married had been visited by a mermaid.

The bell jingled again and the shopkeeper glanced around, irritated by the intrusion. He met all kinds of people here: Halifax was becoming the most important sea port, and certainly the safest, set as it was at the crossroads of war. With the army to defend it and the navy to protect and supply it, there were many who regarded it as the new gateway to a continent. But this young, dark-haired captain was very different from the others.

Alone, completely alone, alive to something which he would allow no one else to share.

He said, “I am sorry, Mrs Lovelace, but your clock is still mis-behaving. A few days more, perhaps.” But she was looking at Adam. “Well, Captain Bolitho, this is a pleasant surprise. I trust you are well? And how is your handsome young admiral?”

Adam bowed to her. She was dressed in dark red silk, with a 206

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matching bonnet to shade her eyes from the sun. The same direct way of looking at him, the slightly mocking smile, as if she were used to teasing people. Men.

He said, “Rear-Admiral Keen is well, ma’am.” She was quick to notice the slight edge to his reply.

“You have been shopping, I see.” She held out her hand. “Will you show me?”

He knew that the shopkeeper was observing them with interest. No doubt he knew her well, and her reputation would make a fine piece of gossip. He was surprised to find that he had actually taken out his watch to show her.

“I needed one, Mrs Lovelace. I like it.” He saw her studying the engraved mermaid.

“I would have bought something younger for you, Captain Bolitho. But if it’s what you want, and it takes your fancy . . .” She glanced out at the street. “I must go. I have friends to entertain later.” She looked at him directly again, her eyes suddenly very still and serious. “You know where I live, I think.” He answered, “On the Bedford Basin. I remember.” For a second or two her composure and her humour were gone. She gripped his arm, and said, “Be careful. Promise me that.

I know of your reputation, and a little of your background. I think perhaps you do not care for your own life any more.” When he would have spoken she silenced him, as effectively as if she had laid a finger on his lips. “Say nothing. Only do as I ask, and be very careful. Promise me.” Then she looked at him again: the invitation was very plain. “When you come back, please call on me.” He said coolly, “What about your husband, ma’am? I think he may well object.”

She laughed, but the first vivid confidence did not return. “He is never here. Trade is his life, his whole world!” She played with the ribbon of her bonnet. “But he is no trouble.” He recalled their host, Benjamin Massie, that night when the CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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brig Alfriston had brought the news of Reaper’s mutiny and capture. Massie’s mistress then, and perhaps the mistress of others as well.

“I wish you well, ma’am.” He recovered his hat from a chair, and said to the shopkeeper, “When I check my ship’s affairs against my watch, I shall remember you and this shop.” She was waiting on the steps. “Remember what I have said to you.” She studied his face, as if seeking something in it. “You have lost that which you can never rediscover. You must accept that.” She touched the gold lace on his lapel. “Life must still be lived.” She turned away, and as Adam stepped aside to avoid a mounted trooper, she vanished.

He walked back toward the boat jetty. Be very careful. He quickened his pace as he caught sight of the water and the great array of masts and spars, like a forest. Whatever action they took, it would be Keen’s decision: he had made that more than clear.

But why did it hurt so much?

He thought suddenly of his uncle, and wished he could be with him. They could always talk; he would always listen. He had even confessed his affair with Zenoria to him.

He saw the stairs and Valkyrie’s gig moored alongside. Midshipman Rickman, a lively fifteen-year-old, was speaking with two young women who were doing little to hide their profession from the grinning boat’s crew.

Rickman straightened his hat and the gig’s crew came to attention when they saw their captain approaching. The two girls moved away, but not very far.

Adam said, “Back to the ship, if you please, Mr Rickman. I see that you were not wasting your time?” Two blotches of scarlet appeared on the youth’s unshaven cheeks, and Adam climbed quickly into the boat. If only you knew.

He glanced toward the captured American frigate and the other, Success, which Indomitable’s broadsides had overwhelmed in 208

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minutes, recalling the young lieutenant who had died of his wounds, son of the Captain Joseph Brice who had interviewed him during his captivity. A sick but dignified officer, who had treated him with a courtesy reminiscent of Nathan Beer. He wondered if Brice knew, and would blame himself for guiding his son into the navy.

Face to face, blade to blade with men who spoke the same language but who had freely chosen another country . . . Perhaps it was better to have an enemy you could hate. In war, it was necessary to hate without questioning why.

“Oars up! ”

He stood and reached for the hand-rope. He had barely noticed the return journey to Valkyrie.

He saw the flag lieutenant hovering by the entry port, waiting to catch his eye. He raised his hat to the quarterdeck, and smiled.

It was, of course, easier to hate some more than others.

Rear-Admiral Valentine Keen turned away from Valkyrie’s stern windows as Adam, followed by the flag lieutenant, entered the great cabin.

“I came as soon as I could, sir. I was ashore.” Keen said gently, “It is no great matter. You should have more leisure.” He glanced at the flag lieutenant. “Thank you, Lawford.

You may carry on with the signals we discussed.” The door closed, reluctantly, Adam thought. “More news, sir?” Keen seemed unsettled. “Not exactly. But the plans have changed. Success is to leave for Antigua. I have spoken with the Dock Master, and I can see we have no choice in the matter. Halifax is crammed with vessels needing overhaul and repair, and Success was in a very poor condition after her clash with Indomitable— as much due to severe rot as to Captain Tyacke’s gunnery, I suspect.”

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badly damaged, yes, but would sail well enough after work was completed on her rigging. But Antigua, two thousand miles away, and in the hurricane season . . . It was taking a chance.

“There is another big convoy due within a week or so, supplies and equipment for the army, nothing unusual in that. Sir Richard intends to take Indomitable and two others of the squadron to escort them on the final approach. There is a possibility that the Americans might attack and attempt to scatter or sink some of them.” He regarded him calmly. “Success must have a strong consort.” He glanced around the cabin. “This ship is large enough to fight off any foolhardy privateer who might want to take her.” He smiled thinly. “And fast enough to get back to Halifax, in case of more trouble.”

Adam walked to the table, and hesitated as he saw the miniature lying beside Keen’s open log book. It took him completely by surprise, and he scarcely heard Keen say, “I am required to remain here. I command in Halifax. The rest of our ships may be needed elsewhere.”

He could not take his eyes from the miniature, recognizing the subject at once. The smile, which had been painted for someone else to cherish, to keep.

Keen said abruptly, “It will be nothing to you, Adam. Certain other commanders, I would have to consider more carefully. Success will be safer in English Harbour. At best, she can be used as a guard-ship, and at worst, her spars and weapons will be put to good use there. What do you say?”

Adam faced him, angry that he could not accept it, that he himself had no right to refuse.

“I think it’s too risky, sir.”

Keen seemed surprised. “You, Adam? You talk of risk? To the world at large it will merely be the departure of two big frigates, and even if enemy intelligence discovers their destination, what then? It will be too late to act upon it, surely.” 210

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Adam touched the heavy watch in his pocket, remembering the small shop, the peaceful chorus of clocks, the owner’s matter-of-fact mention of Valkyrie, almost to the time of her departure.

He said bluntly, “There is no security here, sir. I shall be away for a month. Anything could happen in that time.” Keen smiled, perhaps relieved. “The war will keep, Adam. I trust you with this mission because I want you to carry orders to the captain in charge at Antigua. A difficult man in many ways.

He needs to be reminded of the fleet’s requirements there.” He saw Adam’s eyes move to the miniature once more. “An endearing young lady. Courageous, too.” He paused. “I know what you are thinking. My loss is hard to believe, harder still to accept.”

Adam clenched his fists so tightly that the bones ached. You don’t understand. How can you forget her? Betray her?

He said, “I will make all the arrangements, sir. I’ll pick a prize crew from spare hands at the base.”

“Who will you put in charge of Success? ” Adam contained his anger with an almost physical effort.

“John Urquhart, sir. A good first lieutenant—I’m surprised he hasn’t been chosen for promotion, or even a command.” The door opened an inch, and de Courcey coughed politely.

Keen said sharply, “What is it?”

“Your barge is ready, sir.”

“Thank you.” Keen picked up the miniature, and after a moment’s hesitation placed it in a drawer and turned the key. “I shall be aboard later. I’ll send word.” He looked at him steadily.

“The day after tomorrow, then.”

Adam thrust his hat beneath his arm. “I’ll see you over the side, sir.”

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the professionals do things.” He seemed about to say something else, but changed his mind.

As the barge pulled away from Valkyrie’s shadow, Adam saw the first lieutenant walking across the quarterdeck in deep conversation with Ritchie, the sailing-master.

They eyed him as he approached, and Adam was again reminded that he did not truly know these men, just as he accepted that it was his own fault.

“Come forward with me, Mr Urquhart.” To the master he added, “You’ve been told, I take it.”

“Aye, sir. The Leeward Islands again. Bad time o’ year.” But Adam was already out of earshot, striding along the starboard gangway with Urquhart in step beside him. Below, men working at the gun tackles or flaking down unwanted cordage paused only briefly to glance up at them.

Adam halted on the forecastle deck and rested one foot on a crouching carronade, the “smasher,” as the Jacks called them.

Opposite them lay the captured Success, and although her side and upperworks still bore the scars of Indomitable’s iron, her masts were set up, with men working on the yards to secure each new sail. They had done well to achieve so much in so short a time.

And beyond her, the beautiful Chesapeake, and Reaper swinging, untroubled, to her cable. Did ships know or care who handled, or betrayed, or loved them?

Urquhart said, “If the weather stays friendly, we’ll not have much trouble, sir.”

Adam leaned over the rail, past one great catted anchor to the imposing gilded figurehead: one of Odin’s faithful servants, a stern-faced maiden in breastplate and horned helmet, one hand raised as if to welcome her dead hero to Valhalla. It was not beautiful. He tried to thrust the thought aside. Not like Anemone. But through the smoke and the din of war, it would certainly impress an enemy.

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“I want you to take charge of Success. You will have a prize crew, but only enough hands to work the ship. Her fighting ability has not yet been determined.”

He watched the lieutenant’s face, strong, intelligent, but still wary of his captain. Not afraid, but unsure.

“Now hear me, Mr Urquhart, and keep what I ask of you to yourself. If I hear one word from elsewhere it will lie at your door, understood?”

Urquhart nodded, his eyes very calm. “You can rely on that.” Adam touched his arm. “I rely on you. ” He thought suddenly of the miniature of Gilia St Clair. Her smile, which Keen had appropriated as his own.

“Now, this is what you must do.”

But even as he spoke, his mind still clung to it. Perhaps Keen was right. After the battle, losing his ship and the agony of imprisonment, there was always a chance of becoming crippled by caution.

When he had finished explaining what he required, Urquhart said, “May I ask you, sir, have you never feared being killed?” Adam smiled a little, and turned his back on the figurehead.

“No.” He saw John Whitmarsh walking along the deck beside one of the new midshipmen, who was about his own age. They both seemed to sense his eyes upon them and paused to peer up into the sun at the shadows on the forecastle. The midshipman touched his hat; Whitmarsh raised one hand in a gesture which was not quite a wave.

Urquhart remarked, “You certainly have a way with youngsters, sir.”

Adam looked at him, the smile gone. “Your question, John. It is true to say that I have . . . died . . . many times. Does that suit?”

It was probably the closest they had ever been.

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12 code of C onduct

LIEUTENANT George Avery leaned back in his chair and put one foot on his sea-chest as if to test the ship’s movement. In the opposite corner of the small, screened cabin Allday sat on another chest, his big hands clasped together, frowning, as he tried to remember exactly what Avery had read to him.

Avery could see it as if he had left England only yesterday, and not the five months ago it was in fact. The inn at Fallowfield by the Helford River, the long walks in the countryside, untroubled by conversation with people who only spoke because they were cooped up with you in a man-of-war. Good food, time to think. To remember . . .

He thought now of his own letter, and wondered why he had told the admiral about her. More surprising still, that Bolitho had seemed genuinely pleased about it, although doubtless he thought his flag lieutenant was hoping for too much. A kiss and a promise.

He could not imagine what Bolitho might have said if he had told him all that had happened on that single night in London.

The mystery, the wildness, and the peace, when they had lain together, exhausted. For his own part, stunned that it could have been real.

His thoughts came back to Allday, and he said, “So there you are. Your little Kate is doing well. I must buy her something before we leave Halifax.”

Allday did not look up. “So small, she was. No bigger than a rabbit. Now she’s walking, you say?”

“Unis says.” He smiled. “And I’ll lay odds that she fell over a few times before she got her proper sea-legs.” Allday shook his head. “I would have liked to see it, them first steps. I never seen anything like that afore.” He seemed troubled, rather than happy. “I should’ve been there.” 214

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Avery was moved by what he saw. Perhaps it would be useless to point out that Bolitho had offered to leave him ashore, secure in his own home, after years of honourable service. It would be an insult. He recalled Catherine’s obvious relief that Allday was staying with her man. Maybe she sensed that his “oak” had never been more needed.

Avery listened to the regular groan of timbers as Indomitable thrust through a criss-cross of Atlantic rollers. They should have made contact with the Halifax-bound convoy yesterday, but even the friendly Trades could not always be relied upon. This was a war of supply and demand, and it was always the navy who supplied. No wonder men were driven to despair by separation and hardships which few landsmen could ever appreciate.

He heard the clatter of dishes from the wardroom, somebody laughing too loudly at some bawdy joke already heard too often.

He glanced at the white screen. And beyond there, right aft, the admiral would be thinking and planning, no doubt with the scholarly Yovell waiting to record and copy instructions and orders for each of the captains, from flagship to brig, from schooner to bomb ketch. Faces he had come to know, men he had come to understand. All except the one who would be uppermost in his mind, the dead captain of Reaper. Bolitho would regard the mutiny as something personal, and the captain’s tyranny a flaw that should have been removed before it was too late.

Justice, discipline, revenge. It could not be ignored.

And what of Keen, perhaps the last of the original Happy Few? Was his new interest in Gilia St Clair merely a passing thing? Avery thought of the woman in his arms, his need of her.

He was no one to judge Keen.

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at first light, what then? They were some five hundred miles from the nearest land. A decision would have to be made. But not by me. Nor even by Tyacke. It would fall, as always, to that same man in his cabin aft. The admiral.

He had not mentioned the letter to Tyacke: Tyacke would probably know. But Avery respected his privacy, and had come to like him greatly, more than he would have believed possible after their first stormy confrontation at Plymouth more than two years ago.

Tyacke had never received a letter from anyone. Did he ever look for one, ever dare to hope for such a precious link with home?

He handed Unis’s letter to Allday, and hoped that he had read it in the manner he had intended. Allday, a man who could recognize any hoist of signals by their colours or their timing, whom he had watched patiently instructing some hapless landman or baffled midshipman in the art of splicing and rope-work, who could carve a ship model so fine that even the most critical Jack would nod admiringly, could not read. Nor could he write. It seemed cruel, unfair.

There was a tap on the door and Ozzard looked in. “Sir Richard’s compliments, sir. Would you care to lay aft for a glass?” He purposefully ignored Allday.

Avery nodded. He had been expecting the invitation, and hoping that it would come.

Ozzard added sharply, “You too, of course. If you’re not too busy.”

Avery watched. Another precious fragment: Ozzard’s rudeness matched only by Allday’s awakening grin. He could have killed the little man with his elbow. They knew each other’s strength, weakness too, in all likelihood. Maybe they even knew his.

His thoughts dwelled again on the letter in his pocket. Perhaps she had written it out of pity, or embarrassment at what had happened. She could never realize in ten thousand years what that 216

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one letter had meant to him. Just a few sentences, simple senti-ments, and wishes for his future. She had ended, Your affectionate friend, Susanna.

That was all. He straightened his coat and opened the door for Allday. It was everything.

But Avery was a practical man. Susanna, Lady Mildmay, an admiral’s widow, would not remain alone for long. Perhaps could not. She had rich friends, and he had seen for himself the confidence, born of experience, she had displayed at the reception attended by Bolitho’s wife and by Vice-Admiral Bethune. He could recall her laugher when he had mistaken Bethune’s mistress for his wife. Is that all I could hope for?

Susanna was available now. She would soon forget that night in London with her lowly lieutenant. At the same time, he was already composing the letter he would write to her, the first he had written to anyone but his sister. There was no one else now.

He walked aft towards the spiralling lantern, the rigid Royal Marine sentry outside the screen doors.

Allday murmured, “I wonder what Sir Richard wants.” Avery paused, hearing the ship, and the ocean all around them.

He answered simply, “He needs us. I know very well what that means.”

It was cold on the quarterdeck, with only the smallest hint of the daylight which would soon show itself and open up the sea.

Bolitho gripped the quarterdeck rail, feeling the wind on his face and in his hair, his boat-cloak giving him anonymity for a while longer.

It was a time of day he had always found fascinating as a captain in his own ship. A vessel coming alive beneath his feet, dark figures moving like ghosts, most of them so used to their duties that they performed them without conscious thought even in complete darkness. The morning watch went about their affairs, CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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while the watch below cleaned the messdecks and stowed away the hammocks in the nettings, with barely an order being passed.

Bolitho could smell the stench of the galley funnel; the cook must surely use axle-grease for his wares. But sailors had strong stomachs. They needed them.

He heard the officer-of-the-watch speaking with his midshipman in brusque, clipped tones. Laroche was a keen gambler who had felt the rough edge of Lieutenant Scarlett’s tongue the very day Scarlett had been killed in the fight with the USS

Unity.

It would be six in the morning soon, and Tyacke would come on deck. It was his custom, although he had impressed on all his officers that they were to call him at any time, day or night, if they were disturbed by any situation. Bolitho had heard him say to one lieutenant, “Better for me to lose my temper than to lose my ship!”

If you doubt, speak out. His father had said it many times.

He found he was walking along the weather side, his shoes avoiding ring bolts and tackles without effort. Catherine was troubled; it was made more apparent by her determination to hide it from him in her letters. Roxby was very ill, although Bolitho had seen that for himself before he had left England, and he thought it a good thing that his sister felt able to share her worries and hopes with Catherine, when their lives had been so different from one another.

Catherine had told him about the Spanish inheritance from her late husband, Luis Pareja. All those years ago, another world, a different ship; they had both been younger then. How could either of them have known what would happen? He could recall her exactly as she had been at their first meeting, the same fiery courage he had seen after the Golden Plover had gone down.

She was concerned about the money. He had mentioned it to Yovell, who seemed to understand all the complications, and 218

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had accompanied Catherine to the old firm of lawyers in Truro, to ensure that “she was not snared by legal roguery,” as he had put it.

Yovell had been frank, but discreet. “Lady Catherine will become rich, sir. Perhaps very rich.” He had gauged Bolitho’s expression, a little surprised that the prospect of wealth should disquiet him, but also proud that Bolitho had confided in him and no other.

But suppose . . . Bolitho paused in his pacing to watch the first glow of light, almost timid as it painted a small seam between sky and ocean. He heard a voice whisper, “Cap’n’s comin’ up, sir!” and a few seconds later Laroche’s pompous acknowledgement of Tyacke’s presence. “Good morning, sir. Course east by north.

Wind’s veered a little.”

Tyacke said nothing. Bolitho saw it all as if it were indeed broad daylight. Tyacke would examine the compass and study the small wind-vane that aided the helmsmen until they could see the sails and the masthead pendant: he would already have scanned the log book on his way here. A new day. How would it be? An empty sea, a friend, an enemy?

He crossed to the weather side and touched his hat. “You’re about early, Sir Richard.” To anyone else, it would have seemed a question.

Bolitho said, “Like you, James, I need to feel the day, and try to sense what it might bring.”

Tyacke saw that his shirt was touched with pink, as the light found and explored the ship.

“We should sight the others directly, sir. Taciturn will be well up to wind’rd, and the brig Doon closing astern. As soon as we can see them I’ll make a signal.” He was thinking of the convoy they were expecting to meet: there would be hell to pay if they did not. Any escort duty was tedious and an enormous strain, especially for frigates like Indomitable and her consort Taciturn.

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They were built for speed, not for the sickening motion under the reefed topsails necessary to hold station on their ponderous charges. He sniffed the air. “That damned galley—it stinks! I must have a word with the purser.”

Bolitho stared aloft, shading his eye. The topgallant yards were pale now, the sails taut and hard-braced to hold the uncoopera-tive wind.

More figures had appeared: Daubeny the first lieutenant, already pointing out tasks for the forenoon watch to Hockenhull the boatswain. Tyacke touched his hat again and strode away to speak with his senior lieutenant, as though he were eager to get started.

Bolitho remained where he was while men hurried past him.

Some might glance toward his cloaked figure, but when they realized that it was the admiral they would stay clear. He sighed faintly. At least they were not afraid of him. But to be a captain again . . . Your own ship. Like Adam . . .

He thought of him now, still at Halifax, or with Keen making a sweep along the American coast where a hundred ships like Unity or Chesapeake could be concealed. Boston, New Bedford, New York, Philadelphia. They could be anywhere.

It had to be stopped, finished before it became another drain-ing, endless war. America had no allies as such, but would soon find them if Britain was perceived to be failing. If only . . .

He looked up, caught off-guard as the lookout’s voice penetrated the noises of sea and canvas.

“Deck there! Sail on larboard bow!” The barest pause. “’Tis Taciturn, on station!”

Tyacke said, “She’s seen us and hoisted a light. They have their wits about them.” He looked abeam as a fish leaped from the glassy rollers to avoid an early predator.

Laroche said in his newly affected drawl, “We should sight Doon next, then.”

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Tyacke jabbed his hand forward. “Well, I hope the lookout’s eyesight is better than yours. That fore-staysail is flapping about like a washerwoman’s apron!”

Laroche called to a boatswain’s mate, suitably crushed.

And quite suddenly, there they were, their upper sails and rigging holding the first sunshine, their flags and pendants like pieces of painted metal.

Tyacke said nothing. The convoy was safe.

Bolitho took a telescope, but clung to the sight before he raised it. Big and ponderous they might be, yet in this pure, keen light they had a kind of majesty. He thought back to the Saintes, as he often did at times like this, recalling the first sight of the French fleet. A young officer had written to his mother afterwards, comparing them with the armoured knights at Agincourt.

He asked, “How many?”

Tyacke again. “Seven, sir. Or so it said in the instruction.” He repeated, “Seven,” and Bolitho thought he was wondering if their cargoes were worthwhile or necessary.

Carleton, the signals midshipman, had arrived with his men.

He looked fresh and alert, and had probably eaten a huge breakfast, no matter what the galley smelled like. Bolitho nodded to him, remembering when a ship’s rat fed on breadcrumbs from the galley had been a midshipman’s delicacy. They had said it tasted like rabbit. They had lied.

Tyacke checked the compass again, impatient to make contact with the senior ship of the escort and then lay his own ship on a new tack for their return to Halifax.

Carleton called, “There is a frigate closing, sir, larboard bow.” He was peering at the bright hoist of flags, but Tyacke said, “I know her. She’s Wakeful . . .” Like an echo, Carleton called duti-fully, “Wakeful, 38, Captain Martin Hyde.” Bolitho turned. The ship which had brought Keen and Adam out from England, after which the Royal Herald had been pounded CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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into a coffin for her company. Mistaken identity. Or a brutal extension of an old hatred?

Carleton cleared his throat. “She has a passenger for Indomitable, sir.”

“What?” Tyacke sounded outraged. “By whose order?” Carleton tried again, spelling out the hoist of flags with extra care.

“Senior officer for duties in Halifax, sir.” Tyacke said doubtfully, “That must have been a potful to spell out.” Then, surprisingly, he smiled at the tall midshipman. “That was well done. Now acknowledge.” He glanced at Bolitho, who had discarded his cloak and was facing into the frail sunlight.

Bolitho shook his head. “No, James, I do not know who.” He turned and looked at him, his eyes bleak. “But I think I know why.”

Wakeful was coming about, and a boat was already being swayed up and over the gangway in readiness for lowering. A smart, well-handled ship. The unknown senior officer would have been making comparisons. Bolitho raised the glass again and saw the way falling off the other ship, the scars of wind and sea on her lithe hull. A solitary command, the only kind to have. He said,

“Have the side manned, James. A boatswain’s chair too, although I doubt if it will be needed.”

Allday was here, Ozzard, too, with his dress coat, clucking irritably over the admiral’s casual appearance.

Allday clipped on the old sword, and murmured, “Squalls, Sir Richard?”

Bolitho looked at him gravely. He of all people would remember, and understand. “I fear so, old friend. There are still enemies within our own ranks, it seems.”

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would not question an order to place him in front of a firing-squad.

Avery hurried from the companion hatch, but hesitated as Tyacke looked over at him and shook his head very slightly in warning.

Indomitable was hove-to, her seamen obviously glad of something to break the monotony of work and drill.

Wakeful’s gig came alongside, rolling steeply in the undertow.

Bolitho walked to the rail and stared down, saw the passenger rise from the sternsheets and reach for the guide-rope, disdain-ing the assistance of a lieutenant, and ignoring the dangling chair as Bolitho had known he would.

Coming to judge the Reaper’s mutineers. How could it be that they should meet like this, on a small pencilled cross on Isaac York’s chart? And whose hand would have made this choice, unless it were guided by malice, and perhaps personal envy?

He made himself watch as the figure climbing the side missed a stair and almost fell. But he was climbing again, each movement an effort. As it would be for any man with only one arm.

The colour-sergeant growled, “Royal Marines . . . Ready! ” more to cover his own surprise at the time it was taking the visitor to appear at the entry port than out of necessity.

The cocked hat and then the rear-admiral’s epaulettes appeared finally in the port, and Bolitho strode forward to meet him.

“Guard of honour! Present arms! ” The din of the drill, the squeal of calls and the strident rattle of drums drowned out his spoken welcome.

They faced one another, the visitor with his hat raised in his left hand, his hair quite grey against the deep blue of the ocean behind him. But his eyes were the same, a more intense blue even than Tyacke’s.

The noise faded, and Bolitho exclaimed, “Thomas! You, of all people!”

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Rear-Admiral Thomas Herrick replaced his hat and took the proffered hand. “Sir Richard.” Then he smiled, and for those few seconds Bolitho saw the face of his oldest friend.

Tyacke stood nearby, watching impassively; he knew most of the story, and the rest he could fathom for himself.

He waited to be presented. But he saw only an executioner.

Herrick hesitated inside the great cabin as if, for a moment, he was uncertain why he had come. He glanced around, acknowledging Ozzard with his tray, remembering him. As usual on such occasions, Ozzard revealed neither surprise nor curiosity, no matter what he might be thinking.

Bolitho said, “Here, Thomas. Try this chair.” Herrick lowered himself with a grunt into the high-backed bergère and thrust out his legs. He said, “This is more like it.” Bolitho said, “Did you find Wakeful a mite small?” Herrick smiled slightly. “No, not at all. But her captain, Hyde—a bright young fellow with an even brighter future, I shouldn’t wonder—he wanted to entertain me. Humour me. I don’t need it. Never did.”

Bolitho studied him. Herrick was a year or so younger than himself, but he looked old, tired, and not only because of his grey hair and the deep lines of strain around his mouth. They would be the result of his amputated arm. It had been a close thing.

Ozzard padded nearer and waited.

Bolitho said, “A drink, perhaps.” There was a thud on deck.

“Your gear is being brought aboard.” Herrick looked at his legs, stained and wet from his climb up the ship’s tumblehome. “I can’t order you to take me to Halifax.”

“It is a pleasure, Thomas. There is so much I need to hear.” Herrick looked across at Ozzard. “Some ginger beer, if you have any?”

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Herrick sighed. “I saw that rascal Allday when I came aboard.

He doesn’t change much.”

“He’s a proud father now, Thomas. A little girl. In truth, he shouldn’t be here.”

Herrick took the tall glass. “None of us should.” He examined Bolitho as he sat in another chair. “You look well. I’m glad.” Then, almost angrily, “You know why I’m here? The whole damned fleet seems to!”

“The mutiny. Reaper was retaken. It was all in my report.”

“I can’t discuss it. Not until I’ve carried out my own investigation.”

“And then?”

Herrick shrugged, and winced. His pain was very evident. The steep climb up Indomitable’s side would have done him no good.

“Court of inquiry. The rest you know. We’ve seen enough mutinies in our time, eh?”

“I know. Adam captured Reaper, by the way.”

“So I hear.” He nodded. “He’d need no urging.” Calls shrilled overhead and feet thudded across the planking.

Tyacke was under sail, changing tack now that the way was clear.

Bolitho said, “I must read my despatches. I’ll not be long.”

“I can tell you some of it. We heard just before we weighed anchor. Wellington has won a great victory over the French at Vitoria, their last main stronghold in Spain, I understand. They are in retreat.” His face was closed, distant. “All these years we’ve prayed and waited for this, clung to it when all else seemed lost.” He held out the empty glass. “And now it’s happened, I can’t feel anything, anything at all.”

Bolitho watched him with an indefinable sadness. They had seen and done so much together: blazing sun and screaming gales, blockade and patrols off countless shores, ships lost, good men killed, and more still would die before the last trumpet sounded.

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He nodded to Ozzard and took the refilled glass. “The scraps.

Visiting dockyards, inspecting coastal defences, anything no one else wanted to do. I was even offered a two-year contract as gov-ernor of the new sailors’ hospital. Two years. It was all they could find.”

“And what of this investigation, Thomas?”

“Do you remember John Cotgrave? He was the Judge Advo-cate at my court martial. He sits at the top of the legal tree where the Admiralty’s concerned. It was his idea.” Bolitho waited, only the taste of cognac on his tongue to remind him that he had taken a drink. There was no bitterness in Herrick’s tone, not even resignation. It was as if he had lost everything, and believed in nothing, least of all the life he had once loved so dearly.

“They want no long drawn-out drama, no fuss. All they want is a verdict to show that justice is upheld.” He gave the thin smile again. “Has a familiar tune, don’t you think?” He looked towards the stern windows, and the sea beyond.

“As for me, I sold the house in Kent. It was too big, anyway. It was so empty, so desolate without . . .” He hesitated. “Without Dulcie.”

“What will you do, Thomas?”

“After this? I shall quit the navy. I don’t want to be another relic, an old salt-horse who doesn’t want to hear when he is sur-plus to Their Lordships’ requirements!” There was a tap at the door, and as the sentry had remained silent Bolitho knew that it was Tyacke.

He entered the cabin and said, “On our new course, Sir Richard. Taciturn and Doon will remain with the convoy as you ordered. The wind’s freshening, but it’ll suit me.” Herrick said, “You sound pleased with her, Captain Tyacke.” Tyacke stood beneath one of the lanterns.

“She’s the fastest sailer I’ve ever known, sir.” He turned the 226

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scarred side of his face towards him, perhaps deliberately. “I hope you will be comfortable on board, sir.” Bolitho said, “Will you sup with us this evening, James?” Tyacke looked at him, and his eyes spoke for him.

“I must ask your forgiveness, sir, but I have some extra duties to attend to. At some other time, I would be honoured.” The door closed, and Herrick said, “When I’ve left the ship, he means.” Bolitho began to protest. “I do understand. A ship, a King’s ship no less, has mutinied against rightful authority. At any time in war it is a crime beyond comparison, and now when we face a new enemy, with the additional temptation of better pay and more humane treatment, it is all the more dangerous. I will doubtless hear that the uprising was caused by a captain’s brutality . . . sadism . . . I have seen it all before, in my early days as a lieutenant.”

He was speaking of Phalarope, without mentioning her name, although it was as if he had shouted it aloud.

“Some will say that the choice of captain was faulty, that it was favouritism, or the need to remove him from his previous appointment—that too is not uncommon. So what do we say?

That because of these ‘mistakes’ it was a just solution to dip the colours to an enemy, to mutiny, and to cause the death of that captain, be he saint or damned sinner? There can be no excuse.

There never was.” He leaned forward and glanced around the shadowed cabin, but Ozzard had vanished. They were alone. “I am your friend, although at times I have not shown it. But I know you of old, Richard, and could guess what you might do, even if you have not yet considered it. You would risk everything, throw it all away on a point of honour and, may I say it, decency. You would speak up for those mutineers, no matter what it cost. I tell you now, Richard, it would cost you everything. They would destroy you. They would not merely be victims of their own CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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folly—they would be martyrs. Bloody saints, if some had their way!”

He paused: he seemed wearied suddenly. “But you do have many friends. What you have done and have tried to do will not be forgotten. Even that damned upstart Bethune confided that he feared for your reputation. So much envy, so much deceit.” Bolitho walked past the big chair and laid his hand for a moment on the stooped shoulder.

“Thank you for telling me, Thomas. I want a victory, I crave it, and I know what this has cost you.” He saw his reflection in the salt-smeared glass as the ship fell off another point or so. “I know how you feel.” He sensed the wariness. “How I would feel if anything happened to separate me from Catherine. But duty is one thing, Thomas . . . it has guided my feet since I first went to sea at the age of twelve . . . and justice is something else.” He walked around, and saw the same stubborn, closed face, the determination which had first brought them together in Phalarope. “In battle I hate to see men die for no purpose, when they have no say and no choice at all in the matter. And I’ll not turn my back on other men who have been wronged, driven to despair, and already condemned by others who are equally guilty, but not charged.”

Herrick remained very calm. “I am not surprised.” He made to rise. “Do we still sup this evening?” Bolitho smiled: it came without effort this time. They were not enemies; the past could not die. “I had hoped for that, Thomas.

Make full use of these quarters.” He picked up the despatches, and added, “I promise you that nobody will attempt to entertain you!”

Outside the cabin he found Allday loitering by an open gunport. He had simply happened to be there, in case.

He asked, “How was it, Sir Richard? Bad?” 228

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Bolitho smiled. “He has not changed much, old friend.” Allday said, “Then it is bad.” Bolitho knew that Tyacke and Avery would be waiting, united even more strongly because of something which was beyond their control.

Allday said harshly, “They’ll hang for it. I’ll shed no tears for

’em. I hates their kind. Vermin. ” Bolitho looked at him, moved by his anger. Allday had been a pressed man, taken the same day as Bryan Ferguson. So what had instilled in them both such an abiding sense of loyalty, and such courage?

It was no help to understand that Herrick knew the answer.

So did Tyacke. Trust.

13 “let them N ever forget” JOHN URQUHART, Valkyrie’s first lieutenant, paused in the entry port to recover his breath while he stared across at the captured American frigate Success. The wind was rising very slightly, but enough to make her plunge and stagger while the small prize crew fought to keep her under command.

He regarded the orderly, almost placid scene on the quarterdeck of this ship, in which he had served for four years, noting the curious but respectful eyes of the midshipmen, reminding him, if it were necessary, of his own crumpled and untidy appearance; then he glanced up at the sky, pale blue, washed-out and, like the ocean, almost misty in the unwavering sunshine.

He saw Adam Bolitho speaking with Ritchie, the sailing-master. Ritchie had been badly wounded in the first clash with the USS Unity, when the admiral had been almost blinded by CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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flying splinters, and the previous captain’s nerve had broken. A day he would never forget. Neither would Ritchie, cut down by metal fragments: it was a wonder he had lived. Always a strong, tireless sailing-master of the old school, he was still trying not to show his pain and refusing to recognize his terrible limp, as if in the end it would somehow cure itself.

Urquhart touched his hat to the quarterdeck. There were countless men like Ritchie on the streets of any seaport in England.

Adam Bolitho smiled. “Hard pull, was it?” Urquhart nodded. Three days since they had quit Halifax, with only about five hundred miles to log for it. With the perverse winds and the prospect of storms, it was not the time of year for anyone to be complacent, least of all the captain. But while Urquhart had been away from Valkyrie aboard the battered prize, the captain seemed to have changed in some way, and was quite cheerful.

Urquhart said, “I’ve had the pumps going watch by watch, sir.

She’s built well enough, like most French ships, but the rot is something else. The old Indom gave her more than her share, I’d say.

Adam said, “We’ll let Success fall off a point or so. That should ease the strain.” He stared abeam at the sea’s face, set in a moving pattern of blue and pale green; it had an almost milky appearance, broken now and then by a lingering blast of wind, a north-easterly, which could make every sail strain and thunder like a roll of drums. The sea here looked almost shallow, and the drifting gulf weed intensified the effect. He smiled. But there were three thousand fathoms beneath the keel hereabouts, or so they said, although no one could know.

He watched the other frigate’s sails lifting and puffing in the same passing squall. “We’ll take her in tow tomorrow, Mr Urquhart. It may slow us even more, but at least we’ll stay in company.” He saw Urquhart’s eyes move beyond his shoulder and 230

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heard the flag lieutenant’s brisk footsteps on the deck. De Courcey had kept out of his way, and had in fact probably been instructed to do so by Keen. But would he learn anything on this passage?

His future seemed already assured.

De Courcey touched his hat, with a cool glance at Urquhart’s dishevelled appearance. “Is all well?” He looked at Adam. “Isn’t it taking longer than expected, sir?” Adam gestured across the nettings. “Yonder lies the enemy, Mr de Courcey. America. In fact, Mr Ritchie insists that we are due east of Chesapeake Bay itself. I have to believe him, of course.” Urquhart saw the sailing-master’s quick, conspiratorial grin. It was more than that. It was pleasure that the captain could now joke with him. They had all known that Captain Adam Bolitho was one of the most successful frigate captains in the fleet, and the nephew of England’s most respected, and loved, sailor, but it had been impossible to know him as a man. Urquhart also saw and was amused by the flag lieutenant’s sudden alarm as he peered abeam, as if he expected to actually see the coastline.

Adam said, “Two hundred miles, Mr de Courcey.” He glanced up as the masthead pendant cracked out like a long whip.

Urquhart wondered if he missed the sight of a rear-admiral’s flag at the mizzen truck, or was he savouring this independence, limited though it would be?

The previous day, the lookouts had sighted two small sails to the south-west. They had been unable to leave the damaged Success to give chase, so the strangers might have been anything, coasters willing to risk the British patrols if only to earn their keep, or enemy scouts. If the captain was troubled by it, he was disguising it well.

De Courcey said suddenly, “Only two hundred miles, sir? I thought we were heading closer to the Bermudas.” Adam smiled and touched his arm lightly, something else Urquhart had not seen him do before.

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“The nor’-easterlies are friendly, Mr de Courcey, but to whom, I wonder?” He turned to Urquhart, excluding the others, his face calm, assured. “We’ll pass a tow at first light. After that . . .” He did not continue.

Urquhart watched him walk away to speak with the sailing-master again. So certain. But how could he be? Why should he be? He considered the previous two captains, the intolerant and sarcastic Trevenen, who had broken in the face of real danger, and had vanished overboard without trace, and Captain Peter Dawes, the acting-commodore, who had been unable to think beyond promotion. Any fault would reflect badly on a first lieutenant, and Urquhart had intended never to fully trust a captain again, for his own sake. No one else would care what became of him.

De Courcey remarked, “I wonder what he truly thinks?” When Urquhart remained silent, he went on, “Works all of us like a man possessed, and then when he has a spare minute, he sits down aft, teaching that boy servant of his to write!” He laughed shortly.

“If that is what he is really doing!” Urquhart said quietly, “It is rumoured that Captain Bolitho is very skilled with both blade and pistol, Mr de Courcey. I suggest you do nothing to foster or encourage scandal. It could be the end of you, in more ways than one.” Adam came back, his face in a small frown. “May I ask you to take a meal with me, John? I doubt if Success’s fare is any sounder than her timbers!”

Urquhart smiled without reservation. “I would be grateful, sir.

But are you certain?” He looked up at the pendant, then at the real strength the two helmsmen were using against the kick of the wheel.

“Yes, I am sure of it. They need the wind, the advantage of it. For us to fight with only the land at our backs, first light will be soon enough.” He looked at him keenly. “If I’m wrong, we shall be no worse off.”

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For only a second, Urquhart saw the face he had just evoked for de Courcey. He could well imagine those same eyes, calm and unblinking along the barrel of a pistol in some quiet clearing at dawn, or testing the edge of his favourite sword. And quite suddenly, he was glad of it.

Adam said, almost casually, “When this is over and we are back about our rightful affairs, I intend to put you forward for promotion.”

Urquhart was taken aback. “But, sir—I don’t think—I am satisfied to serve you . . .” He got no further.

Adam said, “That’s enough,” and shook his arm a little for emphasis. “Never say that, John. Never even think it.” He looked up at the sky and the quivering belly of the maintopsail. “My uncle once described his first command as the greatest gift. But it is much more than that.” His eyes hardened. “Which is why I mistrust those who betray such a privilege.” Then he seemed to shake off the mood. “At noon, then. Today is Friday, is it not?” He smiled, and Urquhart wondered why there was no woman in his life. “Tonight the toast will be, a willing foe and enough sea room. A perfect sentiment!” That evening the wind rose again, and backed to north-east-by-north. Urquhart was pulled once more to the Success, and was drenched in spray before he was halfway across.

Somehow, he did not care. The stage was set. And he was ready.

Captain Adam Bolitho walked across the black and white checkered deck covering and stared through the tall stern windows. The wind had eased a good deal overnight, but still made its presence felt in short, fierce gusts, dashing the spray high over the ship until it pattered from the dripping sails like rain.

He saw the murky outline of the other frigate, her shape distorted by the caked salt on the glass, her bearing so extreme that she appeared out of control, adrift.

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It had been hard work to pass the tow across at first light, requiring tough, experienced seamanship, or as Evan Jones, the boatswain, had remarked, “All brute force and bloody ignorance!” But they had done it. Now, yawing drunkenly to each gust of wind, the Success fought her tow like a beast being led to slaughter.

He heard eight bells chime from the forecastle and made himself leave the windows. He glanced around the big cabin. Keen’s quarters: he had almost expected to see him here at the table where he had placed his own chart within easy reach, so that Ritchie or the lieutenants should not be able to watch his concern as one more hour passed. He leaned on the table, the American coastline under one palm. He had seen his uncle do this, holding the sea in his hands, translating ideas into action.

In so many ways we are very alike. But in others . . .

He straightened his back and looked up at the skylight as somebody laughed. Urquhart had kept his word. Others might suspect his intentions, but nobody knew. And they could still laugh. It was said that when Trevenen had been in command, any sound had been offensive to him. Laughter would be like insubordination or worse.

He thought of the book of poems which Keen had given him, here in this very cabin, with, he believed, few memories of the girl who had owned it, and not knowing the pain it had aroused.

And here, he had seen the miniature that Gilia St Clair had intended another to keep and cherish.

More voices came down from the quarterdeck and for a moment he thought he heard a lookout. But it was only another working party, splicing, stitching, repairing: a sailor’s lot.

The door opened and the boy John Whitmarsh stood looking in at him.

Adam asked, “What is it?”

The boy said, “You’ve not touched your breakfast, Cap’n.

Coffee’s cold, too.”

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Adam sat in one of Keen’s chairs and said, “No matter.”

“I can fetch some fresh coffee, sir.” He looked at the chart and said gravely, “Cape Breton to . . .” He hesitated, his lips moving as he studied the heavy print at the top of the chart. “To Delaware Bay.” He turned and stared at him, his eyes shining. “I read it, sir! Just like you said I would!”

Adam walked into the other cabin, unable to watch the boy’s excitement and pleasure. “Come here, John Whitmarsh.” He opened his chest and withdrew a parcel. “D’ you know the date of today?”

The boy shook his head. “It be Saturday, sir.” Adam held out the parcel. “July twenty-first. I could not very well forget it. It was the day I was posted.” He tried to smile. “It was also listed in Anemone’s log as the date when you were volunteered. Your birthday.” The boy was still staring at him, and he said roughly, “Here, take it. It’s yours.” The boy opened the parcel as if it were dangerous to touch, then gasped as he saw the finely made dirk and polished scabbard. “For me, sir?”

“Yes. Wear it. You’re thirteen now. Not an easy passage, eh?” John Whitmarsh was still staring at it. “Mine.” It was all he said, or could say.

Adam swung round and saw the second lieutenant, William Dyer, staring in from the passageway.

Dyer seemed to be a reliable officer and Urquhart had spoken well of him, but it was too good a piece of gossip to miss. What he had just witnessed would soon be all over the wardroom. The captain giving gifts to a cabin boy. Losing his grip.

Adam quietly said, “Well, Mr Dyer?” They could think what they damned well pleased. He had known few acts of kindness when he himself had been that age. He could scarcely remember his mother, except for her constant love, and even now he did not CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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understand how she could have given herself like a common whore in order to support her son, whose father had not known of his existence.

Dyer said, “The master sends his respects, sir, and he is anxious about our present course. We will have to change tack shortly for the next leg—a hard enough task, even without that great drag on the tow-line.”

Adam said, “The master thinks that, does he? And what do you think?”

Dyer flushed. “I thought it better coming from me, sir. In Mr Urquhart’s place, I felt it was my duty to bring his unease to your notice myself.”

Adam walked back to the chart. “You did well.” Had Urquhart seen the folly of his idea? For folly was what it would be. “You deserve an answer. So does Mr Ritchie.” Dyer gaped as Adam swung round and shouted, “The skylight, John Whitmarsh! Open the skylight!” The boy climbed on a chair to reach it, his new dirk still clutched in one hand.

Adam heard the wind gusting against the hull and imagined it ruffling the sea’s face, like a breeze on a field of standing corn.

The cry came again. “Two sail to th’ nor’-east!” Adam said sharply, “That is the answer, Mr Dyer. The enemy was not asleep, it seems.” To the boy he said, “Fetch my sword, if you please. We shall both be properly presented today.” Then he laughed aloud, as if it were some secret joke. “July 21st, 1813! It will be another day to remember!” Dyer exclaimed, “The enemy, sir? How can it be certain?”

“You doubt me?”

“But, but . . . if they intend to attack us they will hold the wind-gage. All the advantages will be theirs!” He did not seem able to stop. “Without the tow we might stand a chance . . .” 236

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Adam saw the boy returning with his captain’s hanger. “All in good time, Mr Dyer. Tell Mr Warren to hoist Flag Seven for Success to recognize. Then pipe all hands aft. I wish to address them.” Dyer asked in a small voice, “Will we fight, sir?” Adam looked around the cabin, perhaps for the last time. He forced himself to wait, to feel doubt, or worse, a fear he had not known before Anemone had been lost.

He said, “Be assured, Mr Dyer, we shall win this day.” But Dyer had already hurried away.

He raised his arms so that the boy could clip on his sword, as his coxswain, George Starr, had used to do: Starr, who had been hanged for what he had done aboard Anemone after her flag had come down. Without knowing that he spoke aloud, he repeated,

“We shall win this day.”

He glanced once more at the open skylight, and smiled. A very close thing. Then he walked out of the cabin, the boy following his shadow without hesitation.

Midshipman Francis Lovie lowered his telescope and wiped his streaming face with the back of his hand.

“Flag Seven, sir!”

Urquhart eyed him grimly. It had come as he expected, but it was still a shock. The captain’s private signal.

He took the telescope from Lovie’s hands and trained it towards the other ship. His ship. Where he had been trusted, even liked by some when he had stood between Valkyrie’s company and a tyrant of a captain. As it must have been in Reaper, and in too many other ships. Adam Bolitho’s words seemed to intrude through all his doubts and uncertainties. I mistrust those who betray such a privilege. He watched the familiar figures leap into the lens, men he knew so well: Lieutenant Dyer, and beside him the most junior lieutenant, Charles Gulliver, not long ago a midshipman like the one who was sharing this dangerous task with him. Lovie CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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was seventeen, and Urquhart liked to believe that he himself had played his part in making him what he was. Lovie was ready to sit his examination for lieutenant.

He moved the glass slightly, feeling the warm spray on his mouth and hair. Ritchie was there, listening intently with his master’s mates close by, Barlow, the new lieutenant of marines, his face as scarlet as his tunic in the misty sunlight. Beyond them the mass of sailors, some of whom he knew and trusted, and others whom he accepted would never change, the hard men who saw all authority as a deadly enemy. But fight? Yes, they would do that well enough.

And there was the captain, his back towards him, his shoulders shining and wet as if he did not care, did not feel anything beyond his instinct, which had not failed him.

Lovie asked, “What will the captain tell them, sir?” Urquhart did not look at him. “What I will tell you, Mr Lovie.

We will stand by the tow, and break it when we are so ordered.” Lovie watched his profile. Urquhart was the only first lieutenant he had ever known, and secretly he hoped that he himself would be as good, if he ever got the chance.

He said, “The fuse you laid, sir. You’ve known all this time.” Urquhart watched the image in the glass. Men cheering: but for the wind they would have heard the sound from here.

“Guessed would be closer to the truth. I thought it was a last resort to prevent the prize being retaken.” He lowered the glass and regarded him intently. “And then, suddenly I understood.

Captain Bolitho knew, and had already decided what he must do.” Lovie frowned. “But there’s two of them, sir. Suppose . . .” Urquhart smiled. “Aye, suppose—that one word, which never appears in despatches.” He recalled Adam Bolitho’s face when he had first come aboard and had read himself in: a sensitive, guarded face, which betrayed little of what it must have cost him to lose a ship, be a prisoner of war, and endure the ritual of a 238

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court martial. When, very rarely, he allowed himself to relax, as he had yesterday when they had shared a meal, Urquhart had glimpsed the man behind the mask. In some ways, still a prisoner. Of something, or someone.

Urquhart said, “You stand fast and watch the tow. Call me immediately if anything happens.” He was about to add something humourous, but changed his mind abruptly and headed for the companion-way. Knowledge came like a blow in the face, something he could not forget or ignore. Lovie was standing where he had left him, perhaps dreaming of the day when he, too, would wear a lieutenant’s rank.

Urquhart clattered down the ladder and stood for a few minutes in the shadows to compose himself. It was not the first time this had happened, and he had heard others, more experienced, speak of it. But in his heart he knew that Midshipman Lovie would not be alive by the end of the day.

A gunner’s mate was watching him, a slow-match moving in his fist like a solitary evil eye.

“All ready, Jago?” It was something to say. The gunner’s mate was a true seaman, which was why he had picked him in the first place. Trevenen had had him flogged for some trivial offence and Urquhart had clashed with the captain about it. The rift had cost him dearly; he knew that now. Even Dawes had never mentioned the possibility of promotion to him. But his efforts had earned him Jago’s trust, and something far stronger, although he would carry the scars of that unjustified flogging to the grave.

Jago grinned. “Just give the word, sir!” No question, no doubts. Perhaps it was better to be like that.

He looked up the ladder, to a patch of pale blue sky. “The boats will be warped alongside. The rest is up to us.” He walked on through the ship, where many men had once worked and lived, hoped too. Men who spoke the same language, CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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but whose common heritage had become like an unbroken reef between nations at war.

Urquhart listened to the creak of the tiller, and the lonely clank of a single pump.

It was almost done. The ship was already dead.

Ritchie called, “Course is south south-east, sir. Steady as she goes.” Adam walked a few paces to the rail and back again. It seemed strangely still and quiet after the tapping drums had beaten Valkyrie’s seamen and marines to quarters. He had felt the sudden unnerving excitement, and after that, the cheering. It had been unexpected, and overwhelming. These men were still strangers for the most part, because he had kept them so, but their huzzas had been infectious, and he had seen Ritchie for-getting himself so far as to shake hands with George Minchin, the surgeon, who had made a rare appearance on deck to listen to the captain speaking. Minchin was a butcher of the old orlop tradition, but in spite of his brutal trade and his dependence on rum, he had saved more lives than he had lost, and had won the praise of the great surgeon, Sir Piers Blachford, when he had been aboard Hyperion.

Lieutenant Dyer said, “The enemy are on the same bearing, sir.”

Adam had seen them briefly, two frigates, the same ones or others unknown to him. Perhaps it did not matter. But he knew that it did.

He glanced astern and pictured the two ships as he had last seen them. Their captains would have marked Valkyrie’s every change of course, no matter how small. They would expect them to cast off the tow: any captain would, unless he wanted to sacrifice his ship without a fight.

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Urquhart and his prize crew, or be forced to leave them, if only to save his own command.

Run? He beckoned to the signals midshipman. “Mr Warren!

Get aloft with your glass and tell me what you see.” He turned, and watched de Courcey walking stiffly to the lee side as if to study some marines, who were climbing to the maintop with more ammunition for the swivel there. He had removed his epaulette and the twist of gold lace that proclaimed him to be an admiral’s flag lieutenant, perhaps in the hope of offering a less tempting target if the enemy drew close enough.

Adam heard the midshipman yell, “The rear ship wears a broad-pendant, sir!”

He breathed out slowly. A commodore then, like Nathan Beer

. . . He dismissed the thought. No, not at all like the impressive Beer. He must forget him. It was not merely foolish to show admiration for an enemy, it was also dangerous. If this was the man his uncle suspected, there could be no admiration. Out of personal hatred, he had already tried to avenge himself on Sir Richard Bolitho by any means he could invent, and Adam was almost convinced that it was the same mind which had planned to use him as bait to tempt his uncle into a rescue attempt. He often thought of that bare but strangely beautiful room, where he had been interrogated by the American captain, Brice. Perhaps Brice would recall that meeting when he received news of his son’s death.

Hatred was the key, if it was in fact Rory Aherne, whose father had been hanged for treason in Ireland. An incident long forgotten in the confusion and pain of many years of war, but he had not forgotten: nor would he forgive. Perhaps it had given this unknown Aherne a purpose, and allowed him to achieve a measure of fame which might otherwise have escaped him. A renegade, a privateer, who had found a place in America’s young but aggressive navy. Some might sing his praises for a while, CROSS OF S T GEORGE

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but renegades were never fully trusted. Like John Paul Jones, the Scot who had found glory and respect in battles against England.

Nevertheless, he had never been offered another command, famous or not.

He frowned . Like my father . . .

There was a dull bang, which echoed around the ship as if the sound were trapped in a cave. The solitary ball ripped abeam of the Success before splashing down in a cloud of spray.

Somebody said, “Bow-chaser.”

Dyer remarked, “First shot.”

Adam took out his watch and opened the guard, remembering the dim shop, the ticking clocks, the silvery chorus of chimes.

He did not glance at the mermaid, trying not to think of her or hear her voice. Not now. She would understand, and forgive him.

He said, “Note it in the log, Mr Ritchie. The date and the time. I fear that only you will know the place!” Ritchie grinned, as Adam had known he would. Was it so easy to make men smile, even in the face of death?

He closed the watch with a snap and returned it to his pocket.

“Leading ship is changing tack, sir. I think she intends to close with the prize!”

The lieutenant sounded surprised. Baffled. Adam had tried to explain, when the lower deck had been cleared and the hands piped aft. All night long the two American frigates had beaten and clawed their way into the teeth of the wind. All night long: determined, confident that they would take and hold the wind-gage, so that Valkyrie could either stand and fight against the odds, or become the quarry in a stern-chase, to be pounded into submission at long range or finally driven aground.

They had not cheered out of any sense of duty: they had seen and done too much already to need to prove themselves. Perhaps they had cheered simply because he had told them, and they knew, just this once, what they were doing, and why.

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He strode to the shrouds and climbed into the ratlines, his legs soaked with spray as he levelled his telescope at a point beyond Urquhart’s temporary command.

There she was. A big frigate, thirty-eight guns at least, French-built like Success. Before the glass misted over, he saw hurrying figures massing along the enemy’s gangway. Success was under tow, her guns still secured and unmaned. The whole of Halifax had probably heard about it, and there were many other ears only too ready to listen.

He returned to the deck. “Make the signal, Mr Warren. Cast off! ”

He could see the upper yards of the enemy frigate criss-crossing with those of Success, but knew that they were not yet close, let alone alongside. There were a few shots: marksmen in the tops testing the range, seeking a kill like hounds after a wounded stag.

Success seemed to suddenly grow in size and length as the tow broke free and she yawed around, her few sails in wild disorder to the wind.

Adam clenched his fists against his thighs. Come on. Come on.

It was taking too long. They would be up to her in minutes, but still might sheer away if they suspected anything.

Warren said hoarsely, “One boat pulling away, sir!” Adam nodded, his eyes stinging but unable to blink. Urquhart’s boat would be next, and soon. Or not at all.

More shots, and he saw the gleam of sunlight on steel as the boarders prepared to hack their way aboard the drifting prize. He tried to shut it from his thoughts. He shouted, “Stand by to come about, Mr Ritchie! Mr Monteith, more hands on the weather braces there!” He saw the gun captains crouched low and ready, while they waited for the next order.

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enemy’s yards were being hauled round, to lessen the impact when the two hulls ground together.

Adam saw the boat pulling away from both ships, fear giving them the strength and the purpose.

Somebody said quietly, “The first lieutenant’s left it too late.” He snapped, “Hold your bloody noise, damn you!” and barely recognized his own voice.

Ritchie saw it first: all the years at sea in many different conditions, matching his eye against sun and star, wind and current.

A man who, even without a sextant, could probably find his way back to Plymouth.

“Smoke, sir!” He glared round at his mates. “By Jesus, he done it! ”

The explosion was like a fiery wind, so great that despite the thousands of fathoms of sea beneath them, it felt as if they had run aground on solid rock.

Then the flames, leaping from hatches and through fiery holes that opened in the decks like craters, the wind exploring and driving them until her sails became blackened rags and her rigging was spitting sparks. The fires spread rapidly to the American grappled alongside, where jubilant figures had been cheering and waving their weapons only seconds before.

Adam raised his fist.

“For you, George Starr, and you, John Bankart. Let them never forget! ”

“There’s the other boat now, sir!” Dyer sounded shocked by what he was seeing, the very savagery of it.

Ritchie called, “Standing by, sir!” Adam raised the telescope, and then said, “Belay that, Mr Ritchie.”

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flames which had almost consumed them. Beside Urquhart lay the midshipman, Lovie, staring at the smoke and the sky, and seeing neither.

To those around him Adam said, “We’ll pick them up first—

we have the time we need. I’ll not lose John Urquhart now.” The two frigates were completely ablaze, and appeared to be leaning toward one another in a final embrace. Success’s bilge had been blown out in the first explosion, and, grappled to her attacker, she was taking the American with her to the bottom.

A few men were splashing about in the water; others floated away, already dead or dying from their burns. From a corner of his eye Adam saw Urquhart’s small boat drifting clear of Valkyrie’s side. It was empty: only the midshipman’s coat with its white patches lay in the sternsheets to mark the price of courage.

He hardened himself to it, and tried to exclude the sounds of ships breaking up, guns tearing adrift and thundering through the flames and choking smoke, where even now a few demented souls would be stumbling and falling, calling for help when there was none to respond.

Midshipman Warren called, “The other ship’s standing away, sir!” Adam looked at him and saw the tears on his cheeks. All this horror, but he was able to think only of his friend, Lovie.

Ritchie cleared his throat. “Give chase, sir?” Adam looked at the upturned faces. “I think not, Mr Ritchie.

Back the mizzen tops’l while we recover the other boat.” He could not see the American ship with the commodore’s broad-pendant: it was lost in the smoke, or the painful obscurity of his own vision.

“Two down, one to go. I think we can rest on a promise.” He saw Urquhart coming slowly toward him. Two members of a gun’s crew stood to touch his arm as he passed. He paused only to say something to Adam’s servant, Whitmarsh, who, despite orders, had been on deck throughout. He would be remembering, too. Perhaps this was also vengeance for him.

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Adam stretched out his hand. “I am relieved that you did not leave it too late.”