Ramage's Devil (36 page)

Southwick was puzzled. “I hope young Wagstaffe doesn't run on the mud. Soft mud and a lee shore. Think of the suction on that hull …”

Laughing at the thought, Ramage said casually: “We can always use the boats to lay out an anchor or two for him; then all hands to man the capstan. With the fiddler standing on top to set them trotting, we'd soon have him off!”

Southwick looked like a bishop to whom the suffragan's wife had just made a very improper suggestion, but Ramage saw no point in explaining everything in detail because there was a good chance he would have to abandon the plan. Which plan? There were two now and he was muddling himself. Well, he meant the one he had just explained to Gilbert and his men, the one which had occurred to him only a couple of hours ago. Call that the first plan, even though it was the last to arrive in his head. The second plan, which followed only if the first was successful, was the original idea, the one that had come like a wind shadow, and it was surrounded with ifs as thick as a blackthorn hedge intended to keep boys out of an apple orchard. The second plan did not even begin until
L'Espoir
hove in sight. Providing the first worked, and providing
L'Espoir
hove in sight, then there would be plenty of time to tell Southwick all about the second.

“Deck there, mainmasthead here!”

“Deck here,” Aitken bellowed up, not bothering with the speaking-trumpet.

“There's a strange little craft ahead of us, sir: through the glass it looks like a canoe with a sail on a sprit. Four men in it.”

“Very well, keep reporting it,” Aitken said and turned back to Ramage. “That'll be your pilot, sir,” he said with a first lieutenant's usual lofty disdain for local pilots.

“Heave-to to leeward of them so they can drop down to us. Now, our colours are stowed. Mr Southwick, tell the men no one is to speak English while the pilot boat is near. Nor is any bosun's mate to use his call. There's no need for the pilot to mistake us for an English frigate …”

“Mistake us?” Southwick repeated the phrase and then took his hat off, scratched his head, and ran his hand through his hair before jamming his hat back on. He took up the speaking-trumpet and bellowed the length of the ship. Without much apparent effort his voice carried Ramage's order to every man.

“Now stand by to back the foretopsail, Mr Aitken,” Ramage said and could have bitten his tongue. Aitken knew what to do, and giving him unnecessary orders must be irritating.

Now he could see the pilot boat with the naked eye. Yes, it was a large dugout canoe, with a stubby mast and, like a canted boom, a sprit stuck out diagonally, holding out the square sail. And it was an old sail obviously sewn up from odd pieces of cloth. But for all that the canoe was skimming along, and through the glass he could now see there were three blacks actually handling the boat while a white man tried to sit in a dignified manner. But, judging from the urgency with which one of the others scooped water over the side using a calabash shell as a bailer, he must be sitting in a few inches of water.

The movement of the pilot canoe so intrigued him that Ramage did not notice that the
Calypso
was turning head to wind to heave-to until her bow swung and the canoe and Île Royale suddenly shifted from the larboard bow to amidships on the starboard side.

Ramage walked over to the skylight above his cabin and called down in French. He listened to the reply, laughed and looked round for Louis and Albert, who were still waiting by the taffrail.

“Wait for Gilbert and Auguste at the top of the gangway,” he said in French. “You really understand what I want you to do?”

“Indeed we do, sir,” Louis said. “We are proud to be able to do it!”

Ramage nodded and grinned. One Englishman was usually reckoned to be equal to three Frenchmen, but not these Frenchmen. What had changed them? Gilbert and his three friends probably held their own political views as strongly as a Revolutionary sailor in Bonaparte's navy. Was it leadership? He shrugged because he had no idea: it was so, and for the moment that was all that mattered.

The pilot canoe was only a hundred yards off, and he walked back to the skylight and warned Gilbert and Auguste, but there was no reply and a moment later he saw them joining Louis and Albert at the gangway.

Ramage took off his coat and untied his stock, bundling both up with his hat and stuffing them under one of the guns.

“Mr Aitken … Mr Southwick …” he pointed at what he was doing, and each man hurriedly removed his hat, coat and stock.

Now the master, his white hair caught by the wind, could pass for—well, a rural dean, an amiable grocer, a tenant farmer who was now leaving the heavy work to his sons …

“You still don't look like a Republican, sir,” Southwick said doubtfully. “Perhaps the hair? Too tidy?”

Ramage ran his fingers through it. “You have the advantage of me, I must admit,” he said wryly.

“The breeches and silk stockings, sir?” Southwick said, his voice still doubtful. “Don't forget those whatever they're called, the
sans cullars.
”

“
Sans-culottes.
No, don't worry, we don't need to dance on top of the hammock nettings!”

With that Ramage left Aitken and Southwick on the quarterdeck and went down to the entry port where Auguste stood watching the canoe, which was now beginning to round up to come alongside, one of the men casting off the sheet and stifling the sail by standing up and clasping it to him as he reached for the mast. The other two blacks picked up paddles and began paddling the canoe the last few feet in the calm water provided by the
Calypso
's bulk.

Ramage gestured to Auguste, who took the telescope Ramage held out to him. Tucking it under one arm and straightening his shoulders, the Frenchman said with a grin: “I shall find it hard to be an ordinary seaman again, sir.”

Ramage stood to one side beside a gun while Auguste went back to the entry port and Gilbert, Louis and Albert stood close to him.

There was a faint hail and Albert hurried forward with the coil of rope he was holding. From the top of the hammock nettings he threw an end down to the canoe and one of the blacks seized it. The canoe was almost level with the entry port when the pilot began to stand up.

Auguste leaned over slightly to shout down at him. “
M'sieu,
listen carefully. This frigate and the one astern have come from Brest, and a third is due any day—we lost company with her.”

“Very well, Captain,” the pilot answered. “There is plenty of room in the anchorage. You bring us many prisoners, eh?”

“We bring you possible sickness and death,” Auguste said sadly. “Brest has
la peste.
We lost five men from it the day after sailing. The other frigate”—he gestured astern—”lost nine. I dare not think what has happened with the third frigate: I suspect we lost sight of her because she had so much sickness …”

“The plague? Brest a plague port? Nine—no, fourteen—dead? Quarantine! You must stay at anchor! No one to come ashore. Six weeks from the last case. Cast off!” he snapped at the seaman, who let go of the rope as though it was a poisonous snake.

As the canoe drifted away the pilot stood up and shouted: “I will report to the governor, but six weeks you stay—”

Auguste and Gilbert screamed back at him: it was an injustice, it was mocking their misery, it would leave them short of medical supplies and provisions …

Louis and Albert joined in. There was no wine and very little water left. Now they would get the black vomit, as well as having the plague, and anyway what authority had the pilot to give such orders?

“I'll show you!” the white-faced pilot screeched back as the canoe drifted away. “No one is to come near the shore: you stay on board. Tell the second frigate and the third when she comes in because I am not coming out again for six weeks. I know the governor will order sentries to shoot at anyone approaching the shore. That's an order; I have the authority!”

“Assassin, cuckold, pederast, Royalist traitor!” Auguste bawled and stood aside to give the others a chance while he thought up more insults.

“You wait until the Minister of Marine hears of it!” Gilbert bellowed. “Then you'll be a prisoner here, not the pilot!”

The pilot knew he was far enough away to be at a disadvantage shouting against the wind, but he took a deep breath. “Perhaps—if you live long enough to get a message to Brest. But you'll all leave your bones on the beach over there …”

“Your mother was a careless whore!” Auguste yelled and then shook his head. “A waste,” he grumbled, “he's too far away.” He handed the telescope back to Ramage. “Was that satisfactory, sir?”

A grinning Ramage patted him on the back. “Perfect. As I watched you all it was obvious the
Calypso
had at least four captains!”

“Sir,” Aitken called anxiously, “we're running out of sea room!”

“Bear away and anchor when you're ready!” Ramage shouted and hurried back to the quarterdeck, passing Southwick on his way to the fo'c's'le. By now the pilot was a quarter of the way to a jetty which was just coming into view on the south side of Île Royale.

As he climbed the steps Ramage was thankful his idea had effectively ensured that no one would be coming out to the anchored ships, but he wished the pilot had not taken fright so quickly: Auguste had not been able to ask the pilot to remain in his canoe but lead the way to the anchorage.

Aitken shouted to a seaman standing in the chains, ready with the lead: “Give me a cast!” Then he gave orders to brace up the yard and trim the foretopsail sheets so that the
Calypso
turned for the last few hundred yards to the anchorage.

The leadsman reported, “Six fathoms, soft mud.”

Ramage had already explained to Aitken the importance of the
Calypso
anchoring in the right place, so that
La Robuste
could position herself, and he kept both topsails shivering so that the
Calypso
had little more than steerage-way.

Ramage watched the luffs of the sails and kept an eye on the quartermaster, who would signal the moment the
Calypso
was going too slowly for the rudder to bite. He glanced astern and noted that Wagstaffe was handling his ship perfectly.

“Five fathoms … five fathoms …” the leadsman's chant was monotonous but clear. He heaved the lead forward so that it dropped into the water and hit the bottom just as the main chains passed over it. A quick up-and-down tug on the line confirmed that the lead was actually on the bottom, and by the feel of the piece of leather or cloth in his hand, marking the depths, he sang out the fathoms and feet.

The
Calypso
was now moving crabwise to the unmarked spot where Ramage intended to anchor, and Southwick's upraised arm showed that all was ready on the fo'c's'le. The anchor, stowed high up and parallel with the deck when on passage, had been lowered almost to the water. Ramage's eyes swept the luffs, saw the men at the wheel, and he said: “Down with the helm!”

Had he left it too late? Was the
Calypso
now going too slowly for the rudder to work effectively, or had the quartermaster (very sensibly) given the warning a few seconds early? In fact they could lower the anchor and, as soon as it held, the cable would swing the frigate round head to wind. Effective, but not very seamanlike, and the cable going under the hull was likely to wrench off copper sheathing.

But the
Calypso
's bow was coming round … one point, two, three … speeding up now … six, seven, eight … fourteen, fifteen, sixteen … And with the wheel amidships and the foretopsail once again aback, because the yard had not been hauled round to compensate for the turn, the
Calypso
slowed.

Ramage walked to a gun port and looked over the side. The water was muddy and several pieces of palm fronds and odd branches were floating. But they stayed in the same place: the
Calypso
was stopped. Then they began moving towards the bow … the frigate was beginning to move astern.

Ramage signalled to Southwick and heard first the splash of the anchor and then the thunder of the cable running through the hawse. And yes, the usual smell of burning as the cable, finally dry after being stowed for weeks in the cable tier, scorched itself and the wood of the hawse-hole as it raced out.

A quick order to the topmen had the main and mizen-topsails furled, but he waited for the signal from Southwick which would indicate that the foretopsail now thrusting the
Calypso
astern had dug in the anchor.

He returned to watching the rubbish. Finally the palm fronds and broken branches slowed down and then stayed alongside. He watched a rock on Île Royale which was lined up with a headland on Île du Diable. The two remained lined up. If the rock had moved out of line that would have been proof that the anchor was dragging and the palm fronds were drifting in a current moving at the same speed as the frigate.

Ramage then jumped up on to the breech of a gun to watch
La Robuste
anchoring. She ended up positioned perfectly, and as her anchor hit the water, Ramage saw that the pilot's canoe had just arrived at the jetty.

“They're in a hurry,” Aitken commented.

“I'm not surprised: the pilot has never had such a startling report to make to the governor,” Ramage said.

“Now what do we do?”

“We hoist out all the boats and wait,” Ramage said. “Wait and practise.”

S
ERGEANT FERRIS was, usually, a patient man. He had a rule that he would explain something three times to a Marine or seaman he regarded as intelligent and four times to a fool. But no one valuing his pride, sanity or eardrums would dare cause a fifth. If he had any sense he would do what Marine Hart was doing.