Relentless Pursuit

Selected Historical Fiction Published by McBooks Press

BY
A
LEXANDER
K
ENT
The Complete Midshipman Bolitho
Stand Into Danger
In Gallant Company
Sloop of War
To Glory We Steer
Command a King's Ship
Passage to Mutiny
With All Despatch
Form Line of Battle!
Enemy in Sight!
The Flag Captain
Signal–Close Action!
The Inshore Squadron
A Tradition of Victory
Success to the Brave
Colours Aloft!
Honour This Day
The Only Victor
Beyond the Reef
The Darkening Sea
For My Country's Freedom
Cross of St George
Sword of Honour
Second to None
Relentless Pursuit
Man of War

BY
P
HILIP
M
C
C
UTCHAN
Halfhyde at the Bight of Benin
Halfhyde's Island
Halfhyde and the Guns of Arrest
Halfhyde to the Narrows
Halfhyde for the Queen
Halfhyde Ordered South
Halfhyde on Zanatu

BY
R.F. D
ELDERFIELD
Too Few for Drums
Seven Men of Gascony

BY
J
AMES
L. N
ELSON
The Only Life That Mattered

BY
D
EWEY
L
AMBDIN
The French Admiral
The Gun Ketch
Jester's Fortune
What Lies Buried

BY
J
ULIAN
S
TOCKWIN
Mutiny
Quarterdeck
Tenacious
Command

BY
J
AN
N
EEDLE
A Fine Boy for Killing
The Wicked Trade
The Spithead Nymph

BY
D
UDLEY
P
OPE
Ramage
Ramage & The Drumbeat
Ramage & The Freebooters
Governor Ramage R.N.
Ramage's Prize
Ramage & The Guillotine
Ramage's Diamond
Ramage's Mutiny
Ramage & The Rebels
The Ramage Touch
Ramage's Signal
Ramage & The Renegades
Ramage's Devil
Ramage's Trial
Ramage's Challenge
Ramage at Trafalgar
Ramage & The Saracens
Ramage & The Dido

BY
F
REDERICK
M
ARRYAT
Frank Mildmay
OR
   The Naval Officer
Mr Midshipman Easy
Newton Forster
OR
   The Merchant Service
Snarleyyow
OR
   The Dog Fiend
The Privateersman

BY
V.A. S
TUART
Victors and Lords
The Sepoy Mutiny
Massacre at Cawnpore
The Cannons of Lucknow
The Heroic Garrison
The Valiant Sailors
The Brave Captains
Hazard's Command
Hazard of Huntress
Hazard in Circassia
Victory at Sebastopol
Guns to the Far East
Escape from Hell

BY
J
AMES
D
UFFY
Sand of the Arena

BY
J
OHN
B
IGGINS
A Sailor of Austria
The Emperor's Coloured Coat
The Two-Headed Eagle

BY
A
LEXANDER
F
ULLERTON
Storm Force to Narvik
Last Lift from Crete
All the Drowning Seas
A Share of Honour
The Torch Bearers
The Gatecrashers

BY
C.N. P
ARKINSON
The Guernseyman
Devil to Pay
The Fireship
Touch and Go
So Near So Far
Dead Reckoning
The Life and Times of Horatio Hornblower

BY
N
ICHOLAS
N
ICASTRO
The Eighteenth Captain
Between Two Fires

BY
D
OUGLAS
R
EEMAN
Badge of Glory
First to Land
The Horizon
Dust on the Sea
Knife Edge
Twelve Seconds to Live
Battlecruiser
The White Guns
A Prayer for the Ship
For Valour

BY
D
AVID
D
ONACHIE
The Devil's Own Luck
The Dying Trade
A Hanging Matter
An Element of Chance
The Scent of Betrayal
A Game of Bones
On a Making Tide
Tested by Fate
Breaking the Line

BY
B
ROOS
C
AMPBELL
No Quarter
The War of Knives

The sheets were frozen hard, and they cut the naked hand;

The decks were like a slide, where a seaman scarce could stand . . .

But all I could think of in the darkness and the cold

Was just that I was leaving home and my folks were growing old.

1
N
O TURNING BACK

P
LYMOUTH
, always one of England's most important and strategically situated seaports, seemed strangely quiet, subdued. Even Plymouth Sound, notorious for its fast tides and unexpectedly fierce squalls, was almost still but for some cruising catspaws from a light offshore breeze.

But it was cold, the air bitter like a knife edge, and only a few small local craft seemed willing to contest it.

It was mid-December, six months to the day since the news had broken of the victory at Waterloo, and the final surrender of the Corsican tyrant who had held power for so long. Boys had grown to manhood in the course of that same conflict, plough hands and stable lads alike had been transformed into sailors and soldiers.

Now it was over, and seaports like Plymouth which had given so much and so many were still numbed by the reality of peace and its aftermath.

Even when the noon gun shattered the silence and rolled its echoes from the Hoe to the old battery at Penlee Point, only a few gulls rose screaming from the water,
the spirits of dead Jacks,
the sailors called them. Maybe they felt it too.

From here great fleets and powerful squadrons had weighed anchor, and had headed out to every part of the world where England's enemies were at large, and famous names, the Nile, Copenhagen, Trafalgar, had filled the hearts and minds, particularly of those who did not have to fight, and had no loved ones facing the merciless broadsides which took the lives of volunteers and pressed men without discrimination.

At the end of the war the fleet had been at its strongest, with
240
ships of the line, some
317
frigates and countless other smaller vessels, ready and able to perform whatever task their lordships of Admiralty might dictate.

There were ships here now, plenty of them. It was a Sunday, but in those other times it would have made no difference when the noon gun was fired. There had been signals to be exchanged, chronometers to be checked: the daily routine continued.

But today many of those same ships were like ghosts, some with upper yards sent down and boats removed for storage ashore, and in some cases the scars of a last, desperate sea fight still unre-paired, as if their companies had been spirited away. Ships already laid up in ordinary, some waiting to be hulked or used for storing unwanted equipment; a few would become floating prisons. And some, perhaps, would live on to fight again.

Only one small craft moved with any apparent purpose and direction. It was a gig, oars rising and falling precisely and unhurriedly, the crew smartly turned out in tarred hats and matching blue jackets, a coxswain with one hand on the tiller bar, a midshipman beside him, eyes on the passage among the silent ships, the phantom fleet.

And in the sternsheets, boatcloak thrown back over his shoulders to reveal his gleaming epaulettes, was the captain, who needed no reminding of the significance of this day.

Captain Adam Bolitho did not glance at the passing ships, but it was a moment he would never forget. He would know the names of some, even of many of them. Silent and deserted now, their gun ports empty like staring eyes, but he would hear the cries and the wild cheering, still audible amidst the darker memories of war at sea.

The seaports were full of reminders, men crippled and blinded and others left to beg on the streets. And there would be many more now, thrown on the beach while the fleet was cut to the bone, their courage and sacrifice forgotten. Adam gripped the old sword beneath his cloak until his fingers throbbed. Emotion, pride, anger, it was all there on this bitter, cleansing day.

He turned and looked up as the gig passed through the shadow of an anchored seventy-four, an old two-decker like
Hyperion.
Against the bleak, cloudless sky he saw a solitary figure standing on a gangway to watch the gig as they pulled past.

Then very slowly he raised his hat, and held it above his head in salute until the jutting stern hid him from view. A watchman? Someone still finding refuge in the world which had rejected him? Or just another ghost?

He heard the midshipman clear his throat. He was new; they had met for the first time when the gig had picked him up at the Queen's Stairs. Another young hopeful, nervous with his captain in his care.

Adam had seen the wary glance from Luke Jago, his coxswain. He would allow nothing to go wrong. No matter what he thought or said, he would know what this day meant to his captain. Just as Jago would have known where and when to collect him without a signal having been made, or any instructions given.

He felt the tiller move slightly and looked along the boat, over the heads of the oarsmen, their breath hanging in the cold air like steam. Like that first day, just over a year ago, in this same place. He stared at his ship.

When I took command.

He had been away from the ship for two weeks and had barely had time to think over and remember that past year. The sea fights, the triumphs and the pain, official visits and others no less important, to him at least. And all the while he had looked forward to this moment.
Coming back.
Like being made whole again.

It was something like a shock, nevertheless. The ship had been moved during his absence and now lay at her cable, well clear of all the other vessels, and even her appearance came as a surprise. The familiar buff paint around her hull had been replaced by white, so that her strakes and black gun ports along either side made an even sharper, chequered pattern, clean and fresh against the stained and deserted hulks nearby.

His Britannic Majesty's frigate
Unrivalled
of
46
guns was one of the first to wear the new peacetime colours. She was also the first ship of her name on the Navy List.

He stood up in the boat as the hull rose above the tossed oars. And he was her first captain.

It was enough. There was nothing else.

The bowman had hooked on, and the side party would be waiting, faces, new or old, ready to receive him.

What had I expected? That they would take her from me?

He glanced at the midshipman, but the youth's name would not come.

“That was well done.”

The boy blushed, and Jago remarked, “Mr Martyns is learning fast, sir.”

Adam nodded. It was Jago's way. He would remember next time.

The calls squealed and he heard the slap of muskets as the Royal Marine guard presented arms in salute.

It was all as he had expected. The ensign curling against the cold sky, the seamen, faces still tanned from
Unrivalled
's service in the Mediterranean. The smell of fresh paint, like that other December day a year ago.

He saw none of it.

Being back was enough.

Lieutenant Leigh Galbraith strode in from beneath
Unrivalled
's poop and ran his eyes over the main deck. Everything was in order. He had made certain that nothing had been left to chance. Today the captain was returning; his own period of temporary command would soon be over.

He frowned as the hard light reflected from the water. He had been pulled around the ship as soon as the hands had been piped to work, and had still been surprised by her appearance. The white paint took some getting used to, almost frivolous compared with the moored hulks nearby, and only the experienced eye could discern the new timbers which had repaired damage suffered in their savage exchange with the frigate
Triton
only months ago. Some of the repairs had been carried out at Gibraltar and the rest here at Plymouth, where
Unrivalled
's life had begun. Where Galbraith himself had been given another chance. He was lucky and he knew it. And with the whole fleet being cut down, halved, some said, he should count his blessings and leave the bitterness to others less fortunate.

Galbraith was
31,
and he had spent nineteen years of his life in the navy. He knew and had wanted nothing else, except a command of his own. And that he had been granted. His previous captain had given him the highest recommendation, and his reward had been the little brig
Vixen.
Not a fifth-rate like
Unrivalled,
but his own, and the first step to the coveted post rank.

He saw Partridge the boatswain, big fists on his hips as he explained forcefully what work he needed done in the foretop. Thank God for men like Partridge, he thought. The backbone of any man-of-war, they were the true professionals, Partridge, Stranace the gunner, probably the oldest man aboard, and Joshua Cristie the sailing master, the best Galbraith had known. A man who never wasted words, but when he spoke it was with authority and a complete understanding of the tides, stars and winds which were his world.

As the frigate's first lieutenant, Galbraith was most aware of and concerned with the shortages. They were more than fifty men under strength, despite their presence in this naval harbour. He smiled grimly. Or perhaps because of it.

Apart from those they had lost, killed or badly wounded in the last battle, some had been paid off or had gone to other ships. But a few of the old hands had remained, even some of the hard men like Campbell, who had paid for his insolence and contempt for authority with several floggings in this commission alone. He seemed to find some brutal satisfaction in displaying his scarred back, which looked as if it had been clawed by some savage beast. A dangerous man, and yet he had been one of the first to volunteer for the attack on the corsair's chebecks when they had pulled alongside with enough explosives to kill every one of them. Campbell had been a tower of strength, but he would sneer openly at anyone who suggested he had acted out of a sense of duty or discipline.

There were others like Campbell. Men who claimed to hate everything the navy represented, and more especially the officers who upheld it.

So why did they stay, when they now had the chance to quit?

Galbraith saw Luxmore, the captain of the Royal Marine detachment, speaking with one of his sergeants. Whatever went on around them, no matter how cramped the ship, they somehow remained a separate entity. Even their quarters were called “the barracks.” Luxmore had seen plenty of fighting, and he had a good rapport with his marines. Maybe that was enough. Galbraith looked away. Or was he congratulating himself on his advanced promotion? The debonair Captain Bosanquet had been killed that day.
Like me, then.
Thankful to have survived, and to have a ship, because of fear of the unknown.

He saw the boy Napier, the cabin servant, pausing to stare at the land. He probably knew the captain's thoughts better than anyone. Fourteen years old, serious and hard-working, and obviously devoted to Captain Adam Bolitho. An unusual relationship, he thought. Bolitho was not always the easiest man to understand, and had sometimes apologised for his own intolerance. As if something or somebody was driving him, forcing him on.

And yet with Napier he always seemed to have time to explain, to describe, to elaborate.
The only way he'll learn,
he once said. As if he saw something of his own youth in him. That must have been stormy enough, from what Galbraith had heard, and had seen for himself. Like that last engagement, when Bolitho had given chase to the enemy frigate captained by the renegade Spaniard, Martinez. He had deliberately misinterpreted their admiral's signal to remain on station and leave the pursuit to a smaller frigate which had been outgunned and outsailed from the start, and they had saved the merchantman
Aranmore,
which had been carrying important passengers. He glanced at the companion ladder and remembered Bolitho holding the woman's hand, kissing it. They could have been quite alone.

Galbraith began to pace the deck, his hands clasped behind him. Was it that as well? Had she reminded him yet again of the girl he had hoped to marry, and had lost when he had put his brief command first?

He thought too of Bolitho's reluctance to become close to anyone in his new command. He had lost a frigate,
Anemone,
fighting a more powerful American ship, had been taken prisoner and had escaped. It was as if he had found it impossible since then to reach out, to accept, and to trust.

And there was yet another side to the man, a stark contrast. Cristie had told Galbraith about the day when he had openly disagreed with his captain. For Cristie it was a thing almost unheard of. Galbraith's raiding party had been amongst little-known islands, and the master had advised that it was unsafe to take
Unrivalled
through a channel which was virtually uncharted, and which might rip out the ship's keel.
A captain's total responsibility . . .

Cristie had confided after the successful recovery of the raiding party, “Fair mad he was.
I'll roast in hell before I leave Galbraith to die in their hands,
he said. I don't go much for praying, but I tell you, I nearly did that time!”

And when they had stood together in the church at Falmouth, the first time
Unrivalled
had dropped anchor there. The church full of people, the streets also, and total silence for the man who had died at sea, the captain's famous uncle, Sir Richard Bolitho.