Success to the Brave (3 page)

Achates
was a well-found ship, and from what he had already discovered held a record second to none. Perhaps Admiral Sheaffe's choice had been the right one after all. A small sixty-four instead of a proud squadron which might intimidate the Americans and the French alike.

He said, “I have already sent word to Captain Duncan at Plymouth. He will sail direct to San Felipe in his
Sparrowhawk
without delay.”

It was easy to picture Duncan's bluff red face as he read his orders. He too would be glad to get away before his frigate was paid off into oblivion. Duncan had also been with Bolitho's squadron. It was like knowing Keen in some ways, he thought. They were extensions of his own mind and ideas.

That was something which he still found hard to accept. No longer did he have to wait for the written word from his flag-officer. No more did he need to fret over the uncertainty or unfairness of his place in affairs. Now the decision as to when and how to act was his. So too the final responsibility.

He added, “Duncan's presence at San Felipe may lessen the shock for the inhabitants there. I doubt if the governor will see it in the same way as Parliament.”

Ozzard tiptoed across the cabin and waited for Bolitho to notice his mole-like figure. Even his hands dangled at his waist like paws.

He said, “Beg pardon, Captain, but the first lieutenant has sent his respects and requires me to tell you that the wind has shifted, though very slight.”

Keen looked at Bolitho and grinned. “I told him to inform me, sir. It's still not much of a wind, but enough to break out the anchor. With your permission, sir?”

Bolitho nodded. It was infectious. It had not changed after all.

“Yovell, put my despatches in the yard-boat alongside.”

He saw his clerk hold the letter he had written to Belinda with special care. She would be reading it as
Achates
passed the Lizard on her way to the Atlantic rollers, he thought.

He heard Keen's voice through the open skylight, the trill of calls and slap of bare feet over the dried planks as the seamen ran to their stations.

Bolitho made himself sit in his chair and sip the coffee. Keen would have enough to deal with as he sailed his ship clear of the land for the first time without having him there as well.

How many times had he stood at the quarterdeck rail, his heart bounding with hope and excitement, searching his soul in case he had forgotten something when it was already too late?

Tackles squeaked and cordage squealed through countless blocks, and very faintly, far away it sounded, Bolitho heard the plaintive notes of a violin while the shantyman added his weight to the men on the capstan bars.

Yovell came back breathing hard.

“All despatches ashore, zur.” His round Devonian dialect seemed to match his handwriting on the many copies of signals and despatches he had penned for Bolitho in the past two years.

Keen returned, his hat tucked beneath one arm.

“The anchor is hove short, sir. I wonder if you would care to join me on deck? It would do well for the people to see you are with them.”

Bolitho smiled. “Thank you, Val.”

Keen hesitated and glanced at Pascoe.

“There is one thing I do not understand, sir. The courier delivered a letter for the flag-lieutenant. He only just reached the ship in time.”

Bolitho looked at his nephew. It was the moment, and it had almost been postponed because of the need to get under way while the feeble wind lasted.

He saw Yovell beaming at him and was suddenly fearful that he had done the wrong thing.

He said, “I shall come on deck directly, Captain Keen.”

Bolitho took the sealed letter and glanced quickly at it to make certain it was the right one. Then he snatched his hat from Ozzard and walked with Keen to the door.

Keen was saying, “I expect it was a careless mistake, sir.”

Bolitho pressed the letter into his nephew's hand.

“I shall be on deck if you need me.”

Entirely mystified, Keen accompanied him beneath the shadows of the poop deck and past the great double wheel where the helmsmen and quartermaster waited, tensed, for the anchor to break loose from the ground.

The ship was alive with seamen and marines. The topmen were already high aloft on the upper yards, spread out like monkeys as they handled the loosely braided sails. The braces were manned, and as the pawls of the capstan clanked round to the tune of the fiddle, petty officers and master's mates watched their divisions like hawks, very aware of the flag at the fore.

Allday was on deck by one of the quarterdeck twelve-pounders when he realized that Ozzard had neglected to clip on Bolitho's sword for him. With a silent curse he darted aft and bustled past the marine sentry into the great cabin.

With a start he saw Pascoe was still there, an open document hanging from one hand.

Like Yovell, who had written most of the letters, Allday knew what the document contained. He had been deeply moved that he was one of the very few who did.

“All right, sir?”

When the youthful lieutenant turned to face him, Allday was shocked to see there were tears on his cheeks.

“Easy, sir! He wanted you to be pleased!”

“Pleased?”

Pascoe took a few paces towards the side and back again. As if he did not understand what was happening.

“And
you
knew about it, Allday?”

“Aye, sir. After a fashion.”

Allday had seen and done many things, and Bolitho had said more than once that with education he might have achieved a lot more than a sailor's life. But he did not need to be able to read what was written on the envelope. No wonder Captain Keen had been all aback, he thought.

The letter was addressed to
Adam Bolitho, Esq., Flag-Lieutenant on board His Britannic Majesty's Ship
Achates.

Adam stared at the writing, his eyes too blurred with emotion to read much further. The lawyer's impressive wax seals, the rights to the Bolitho property in Falmouth. He could not go on.

Allday took his elbow and guided him to the bench seat below the stern windows.

“I'll fetch you a wet, sir. After that we'll take the old sword on deck together.” He saw him nod and added quietly, “After all, sir, you're a
real
Bolitho now. Like
him.
”

From another world a voice yelled, “
Anchor's aweigh,
sir!”

The stamp of feet and the harsh cries of the petty officers seemed to be held at bay.

Allday poured a glass of brandy and carried it to the lieutenant he had known since he had come aboard Bolitho's
Hyperion
as a fourteen-year-old midshipman.

“Here, sir.”

Adam said quietly, “You asked me if I was pleased. There are no words for the way I feel. He didn't have to . . .”

Allday wished he could have a drink too. “It's what he wanted. What he's always wanted.”

The deck tilted as the ship continued to pay off to the wind's thrust in her topsails and jib.

Allday took down the worn old sword from the rack and turned it over in his hands. They had nearly lost it for good last time. He looked at the young lieutenant, the image of the man on deck. It would be his one day.

Lieutenant Adam Bolitho wiped his face with his cuff and said, “Let's be about it then, eh, Allday?” But the bravado would not hold. He gripped the coxswain's massive arm and exclaimed, “I'm glad you were here just now.”

Allday grinned as he followed him from the cabin.

Pleased? He was pleased right enough. Otherwise, lieutenant or not, he'd have put the young rascal across his knee and beaten some sense into him.

Adam walked out into the sunlight. He did not see the curious stares, nor did he hear a muttered curse as a hurrying seaman almost fell to the deck as he tripped on the flag-lieutenant's foot. He took the sword from Allday and held it against Bolitho's side as he made to clip it into place.

Bolitho watched him and was glad. “Thank you, Adam.”

The lieutenant nodded and tried to speak.

Bolitho took his arm and turned him towards the rolling shoreline as it glided abeam, moving away as the ship headed into deeper water.

“Later, Adam. There'll be plenty of time.”

The first lieutenant raised his speaking-trumpet and squinted up through the black rigging.

“Loose t'gan's'ls!”

He glanced at the group by the windward side. The youthful vice-admiral with his flag-lieutenant on deck to see if the ship was good enough, more than likely.

Allday saw the glance and hid a grin.

You've got a lot to learn, matey, an' that's no error.

3
M
AN OF ACTION

F
OR A FULL
week after weighing anchor
Achates
was the victim of feeble and perverse winds. There was barely an hour when all hands were spared the tasks of trimming the sails in order to avoid losing steerage-way or being forced back over their previous course.

The deadly monotony was having its effect on the ship's company. After all the haste and excitement of getting away from the land, the sudden torpor had resulted in more than one flogging at the gratings because of frayed tempers and bursts of insubordination.

Bolitho had watched Keen's face after one of the floggings. Some captains would have cared nothing for the routine of punishment, but Keen was different. It was typical of Bolitho that it never occurred to him that Keen had gained his experience under his command.

Keen had remarked, “The worst part of it is I can understand their feelings. Some have not set foot ashore since returning from the Indies. Now they're off again. Grateful to be spared the poverty of being without work, but resentful at what is little better than pressed service.”

The start of the second week brought a freshening wind from the north-east, and with spray bursting beneath her weathered figurehead it had brought life to the ship once more.

The masthead lookouts had sighted only a few sails on the blurred horizon, and these had changed tack and headed away immediately. Home-bound ships, out of touch for many months with the events in Europe, would take no chances when sighting a man-of-war. War might have broken out again for all they knew. Some masters might still not know that an armistice had even been signed.

It was as if the ship had the ocean to herself. Keen took the opportunity to get to know his command and for his men to recognize his standards. Sail and gun drill, musket practice for the marines, experienced lieutenants and warrant officers replaced by new and often barely trained counterparts. Keen may have gained their respect, but was roundly cursed at the start of each testing exercise.

Bolitho knew from hard experience there was nothing more likely to breed discontent in a ship's close confines than too much leisure.

He was having a breakfast of thinly sliced fat pork when Keen asked to see him.

Bolitho gestured to a chair. “Coffee, Val?”

Keen sat down and said, “I believe we are being stalked by another vessel, sir.”

Bolitho put down his knife. Keen had never been one to exaggerate or imagine things.

“How so?”

“Two days ago my best lookout sighted a sail. Well up to wind'rd. I thought little of it at the time. She might have been a merchantman on the same tack as
Achates.
”

He sensed Bolitho's curiosity and added simply, “I did not wish to alarm anyone. But yesterday you will recall I was hove to while we exercised the starboard twelve-pounders on some drift-wood. That sail was still there, and the moment I came about the stranger followed suit and stood clear.” He waited for Bolitho's reaction and said grimly, “She's there now.”

The door opened and Adam entered the cabin with a chart beneath his arm.

Bolitho smiled at him. They had said little of his gesture towards his nephew since the day the ship had weighed anchor in the Beaulieu River. Yet there was a new closeness between them. Something which went beyond words.

He remembered Belinda's encouragement and insistence that he acted as he had. She had known from the beginning how Bolitho felt about his nephew, what they had been through.

He could almost hear her saying, “When our child is born I do not want Adam to feel shut out, excluded. Do it for
me,
as well as for Adam.”

“Have
you
seen the ship, Adam?”

“Aye, sir. I went aloft at first light today. I believe she's a frigate. I took the signals telescope with me. There was a lot of haze, but I judge her rig to be that of a big fifth-rater. She's too agile for an Indiaman or some westbound trader.”

Keen said glumly, “And if that vessel holds to wind'rd I'll never be able to beat up to him.”

Bolitho shook his head. “It would lose valuable time too.”

But the news was unsettling all the same. If she was a ship-of-war she represented a menace no matter what his orders dictated. But whose and for what purpose?

His mission was supposed to be secret, but Bolitho knew ships as well as he understood the men who served them. Keen had been surprised at Adam's official change of name, but it had gone through the ship in seconds. A piece of really important information could spread through a shipyard, a town, even across the English Channel in no time at all.

“Keep me informed. If the wind changes in our favour we shall investigate. If not . . .” He shrugged. “We'll have to wait for him to show his intentions.”

Later, as Bolitho took his regular stroll up and down the weather-side of the quarterdeck, he found himself wondering about his mission and how the people of San Felipe would accept their new position. He thought too of the ship which was obviously stalking
Achates
with the persistence of a hunter after deer.

French most likely. Ready to support their own viewpoint if required, even at the point of a gun.

Up and down, his feet avoiding ring-bolts and tackles without conscious effort.

Some of the faces among the watchkeepers and the afterguard had become as familiar as those in previous ships. Bolitho hated the invisible wall which cut him off from closer contact. Even Keen as captain was free to talk with his men if the mood took him. More than once Bolitho stared up at his flag and tried to accept the enforced loneliness it had brought him.

He paused by the compass and glanced at it even though it had barely altered for days. He could feel the helmsmen avoiding his eye, and Knocker, the sailing-master, becoming suddenly absorbed in the midshipman-of-the-watch's report.

Hallowes, the fourth lieutenant, had the watch, and even he was bent over the quarterdeck rail with exaggerated attention as he watched the eighteen-pounders at drill.

A boatswain's mate strode along the lee gangway and something about him made Bolitho look at him more closely.

The man hesitated, swallowed hard, and then came towards him.

Bolitho asked, “Do I know you?” Then the man's name seemed to paint itself in his mind, “Christy, isn't it?”

The man nodded and beamed hugely, “Aye, 'tis that, sir. Maintopman in the old
Lysander,
I was. With you at the Nile, sir.”

“I remember. You were nearly lost that day when they shot the t'gallant mast away.” He nodded as the memory closed round them shutting out all else.

The boatswain's mate said, “Were a sore hard fight, sir. The worst I seen, ever.”

Bolitho smiled and continued with his walk.

The man named Christy hurried away shaking his head.
He remembered him.
Out of all these men.

Quantock, the first lieutenant, who was doing his morning rounds with Rooke, the boatswain, and Grace, the carpenter, paused and beckoned to him.

“Knew your name, did he?”

Christy knuckled his forehead, “Aye, sir. He did that.”

Quantock snapped, “Well, don't stand there like a moonstruck farm boy, there's work to be done!”

Christy made his way aft. Why was the first lieutenant in a temper? He thought of that awful day at the Nile, the thunder of the broadsides, and of Bolitho walking amidst the smoke and carnage with that old sword gripped in his hand. And his face as they had cheered him when the enemy had finally struck their colours.

Quantock checked his list, the unending task of every good first lieutenant. The ship had had a refit but the work was always piling up. Sails to be renewed and patched, boats repaired, pumps and tackles overhauled.

He was angry with himself for his sudden hostility towards the boatswain's mate. Christy was a good seaman, and a volunteer as well.

Quantock stole a glance to the weather-side where the vice-admiral was walking up and down. What was so special about him anyway?

The boatswain, a great crag of a man with a lined and battered face, waited patiently for his superior to continue with the morning rounds. He had been irritated by the lieutenant's unwar-ranted attack on one of
his
assistants.

Rooke, Big Harry as he was respectfully known, guessed the reason for Quantock's temper. He was a good first lieutenant, if you happened to be the captain, that was. But he was hard with the people, unrelenting in matters of discipline.

Captain Glazebrook, who had died after a long bout of fever, had been too ill to see what was happening. Quantock probably thought
he
should be promoted, even be given command of
Old Katie.
Rooke did not like the first lieutenant, and the thought of him being in command of this ship was like blasphemy.

Quantock said sharply, “
Standards,
we must maintain them. I'll not allow anything to interfere with the efficient running of this ship!”

Rooke saw the new captain crossing the deck from the companion. He might have warned another lieutenant but Quantock's outburst was still annoying him.

“And further—”

“Mr Quantock.” Keen waited for the lieutenant to join him where he could not be heard by the men on watch. “I admire your high standards. I would, however, prefer that you voiced your views to me in future, not the ship's company en masse.”

Bolitho had seen most of it and guessed the rest.

Did his flag at the masthead really make that much difference? Even Keen seemed on edge, regretting perhaps this appointment which was leading nowhere.

No, it was not that. It was uncertainty. An emptiness which the coming of peace had brought. They were used to action, expected it even.

“Deck there! Sail on th' weather-bow!”

Keen looked up and then turned questioningly to Bolitho. Their companion was still there, lurking just below the horizon like an assassin.

Perhaps they would get all the action they wanted even though the ink was barely dry on the peace agreement.

Bolitho continued his pacing with renewed energy, as if he wanted to tire himself out.

He was imagining things, he decided angrily.
He
was the one who craved excitement, if only to take his mind off the relentless passing of time.

Achates
would still be making for Boston when Belinda gave birth. It was like being trapped. Helpless.

Bolitho saw Adam at the forward end of the gun-deck talking with Hawtayne, the young marine lieutenant.

I am as bad as Admiral Sheaffe.

I am envious. Not of success but of youth.

He was so lucky to have Belinda. He was after all ten years older than she. And now that she needed him he was marooned out here like a castaway on a rock.

Why you?
He could still hear her voice when she had spoken out in the darkness. Why him indeed?

He stopped and allowed his body to sway with the ship as she rode contemptuously across a long Atlantic trough.

Perhaps it was a kind of madness which had never left him. Being taken prisoner by the French, the escape, the lives it had cost in that final battle with Remond's Flying Squadron had been too much and too soon after being badly wounded.

The pain stabbed through his wound again as if to taunt him. He tried to remember her soft touch in the night, when she had soothed the pain of the scar with her love.

But the picture would not form.

He called, “Captain Keen, we shall douse all lights and change tack tonight. As soon as it is dark alter course to the nor'-west. By dawn I want to see that strange sail where we can run down on it.”

Keen opened his mouth as if to protest but instead touched his hat. Then he said, “I'll get every stitch on her, sir.”

Bolitho strode into the poop's shadow and made his way aft to his quarters.

He had acted hastily, even childishly, some would say.

Achates
was a solitary ship, and yet his responsibility was as great as if he commanded a squadron or even a fleet.

Those around him had not asked to be here. Keen, Quantock, the embittered first lieutenant, even the boatswain's mate named Christy who had been so grateful that he had remembered him, they all deserved better from the man who commanded them.

But there was a difference. To Keen the ship and her company came before all else, and the mission was secondary.

To Bolitho
Achates
had to remain a symbol and, if necessary, a weapon to enforce his wishes.

It was probably the first time he had considered what his new responsibility entailed, and the realization steadied him.

Allday padded into the cabin and replaced the old sword on its rack. Cleaning it made little difference but it gave him an excuse to come and go as he pleased.