The Flag of Freedom (28 page)

But now what were they to do? She leaned out of the window and looked down. There was a sheer drop to the rocks below. It was probably not the 200 feet Miriam had said it was, but it was far enough. She withdrew her head and looked around the room to see if there was any sign of a rope. There was not. Even if there had been, she doubted she would have enough strength in her arms to climb down it, even after all the swimming she had done. And certainly Louisa did not.

It must be a trap. Suddenly it seemed certain. That was why Miriam had told her story about the hunter and his dog. It was not a warning; it was an excuse. Even as the certainty grew, there was a small exclamation from Louisa. Caterina turned sharply and her heart leaped into her throat as she saw the dark figure framed in one of the windows. He was dressed entirely in black with a cloth wrapped around his head and face so that only his eyes were revealed, and they were almost as black as the night. Even as Caterina wondered how he could have got there, he dropped lightly into the room and she saw the rope dangling from above.

Louisa gave another cry and moved towards the door, but the figure was upon her in an instant, seizing her by the shoulders with one hand and placing the other over her mouth. Caterina took a step towards her, but then something made her turn towards the window again, and she saw an identical figure, poised on the sill. He leaped noiselessly into the room and raised an urgent hand to his lips. As Caterina paused, more paralysed by fear than by his instruction, he shrugged a pack off his shoulders and tugged what appeared to be a bundle of clothing from it. He threw it at Caterina's feet and said something in a language she did not understand. Then he made a gesture as of pulling something over his head.

Caterina picked up the bundle. It consisted of a black shift or smock, a pair of loose-fitting pantaloons and a length of cloth that was clearly meant to be wound around her head like a turban. The other man had let go of Louisa and removed something similar from his own pack. Then they both turned their backs and stood there with folded arms, facing towards the window through which they had entered.

Caterina felt hysterical laughter bubbling in her throat. She suppressed it urgently and quickly exchanged her clothes for the ones on the floor. Louisa, after a moment's hesitation, did the same. Then Caterina announced with a discreet cough that they were ready.

The two men moved swiftly towards them and began to fit them out with some kind of a harness which went over their shoulders and buckled at the waist. Then they pulled in the two ropes from the window and tied each of them to a ring in the leather.

They chose Caterina as the first to go, but she shook her head and pointed to Louisa. She did not want to risk leaving her behind. Poor Louisa looked terrified, but she allowed herself to be lifted over the windowsill and gently lowered down towards the distant sea. It seemed to take a very long time. Then one of the men nodded to Caterina.

She, too, was helped over the sill. She clung to the edge as she squirmed round to face the wall. She stared for a moment into the eyes of her rescuer – or assassin. Their expression was impenetrable. Then, with a great effort of will, she let go. And slowly, inch by inch, she was lowered down the wall. She used her hands and her feet to keep her face from grazing the stones, almost as if she was crawling down it. After a few moments, it began to feel exhilarating. She felt like laughing out loud. She even found the courage to look down. She could see the rocks, gleaming faintly in the moonlight, and the white line of surf beneath her feet. And so she descended, in a series of gentle jerks, until finally her feet touched solid rock.

She felt strong hands grasping her by the waist and unbuck ling the harness. And as she stepped free, she saw the boat. A small rowing boat with several more men, attired in the same black garb – and Louisa seated among them. Taking care not to slip on the slimy rocks, Caterina moved towards it.

A man detached himself from the shadows and extended his hand towards her. He did not wear a turban like the others, but he was hooded and his face was in shadow. Caterina took his hand and allowed him to help her aboard the boat where she joined Louisa in the stern. The two men who had rescued them were already swarming down
the ropes – much quicker than they had lowered Caterina and Louisa – and as soon as the women were aboard, the crew cast off and began to pull for the open sea.

Caterina turned to the man who had helped her into the boat.

‘Grazie,'
she murmured in the Venetian dialect.
‘Grazie mille.'

To her surprise he answered her in almost the same tongue, but with a heavy and familiar accent.

‘It is my pleasure, Signora.'

‘Do I know you?' she asked sharply. It was quite clear to her now, that this was not Peter Lisle.

‘We met only once,' he said. ‘And I regret that the circum stances were not favourable to furthering our acquaintance.'

Then he raised his head to the moonlight and she saw him clearly for the first time. It was then she recognised the handsome but unwelcome features of the man who had been Bonaparte's leading intelligence agent in Venice, Monsieur Xavier Naudé.

‘R
un out your guns!'

For all of his fifteen years in the service, this had presaged the sound that Nathan most loved to hear, at least aboard a ship-of-war – the sound of between ten and twenty heavy cannon being hauled up to the open gun ports. He had heard it likened to the deep-throated growling of a cage-full of wild beasts.

A romantic conceit no doubt, but far preferable to the comparison that now came to mind.

For unlike cannon, which were mounted on proper wheeled trucks of oak and iron, the
Swallow
's brand-new carronades were bedded to a fancy wooden slide with a groove down the middle to direct the recoil, and the sound they made as they were slid into position reminded him of a piece of chalk rasped across a blackboard at Charterhouse School in London, where he had spent two unhappy years
studying the Classics and other subjects that appeared to be of no particular use to him, before his mother had been persuaded to let him join the Navy.

He watched from the quarterdeck rail as the twelve gun crews went through the motions of loading and firing. ‘Going through the motions' was all they were able to do most days, for they had been here almost a month now, in the tranquil waters of the Bay of Tripoli, and if he had used powder and shot every time they worked the guns, he would soon have exhausted their meagre supplies.

Even so, Nathan insisted on some form of practice every day, if only to remind the crew they were aboard a ship-of-war and not a pleasure cruiser. And for all his prejudice against them, he had to admit the carronades had some advantage over cannon. They were about a third of the weight, calibre for calibre, and needed about half the amount of powder and half as many men to fire them. Nathan had apportioned their crews along more or less nationalistic lines. The Russians had four guns under the direct command of Lieutenant Belli; the Americans the next four; and the Sicilians the four that were left. After a month or so of practice they could fire three broadsides in less than five minutes, even using live ammunition. But of course, he had no means of knowing how they would perform in battle.

Not that it seemed likely that they would ever be called upon to do so. During all the time they had been off the shores of Tripoli, not a single vessel of the Pasha's fleet had ventured out of the harbour. And even if they had, Imlay had given strict instructions that they were not to be attacked or given the slightest provocation. Not while he
still had hopes of succeeding with his negotiations.

He and Cathcart had spent the last few nights ashore and Nathan could only hope that they had made some progress. It was now mid-June and apart from the shortage of powder and shot, he was also worried about running out of food and drink. Cathcart had obtained a quantity of wine from some unknown source ashore and Imlay had said there would be no problem in securing food, albeit at inflated prices, but Nathan thought it would be unwise to count on it. He had enough for another two weeks before he would have to start rationing. And a shortage of supplies was not his only problem.

As if to remind him, here was Qualtrough asking if the Captain would allow the ‘Mohammetans' up on deck, now the gunnery practice was finished. With some reluctance Nathan gave his permission, and braced himself for another confron tation with Prince Ahmed and his peripatetic court-in-exile.

Nathan had no idea what Imlay had told the Pashazade when he had persuaded him to leave his secure refuge in Algiers, but he had probably not mentioned that he would be kicking his heels aboard a sloop-of-war for the next few weeks off the coast of his erstwhile homeland.

Most of his followers had left on unexplained missions ashore, presumably to take soundings among the populace and prepare the way for his triumphant return. Nathan would have thought the Pasha-zade would have been keen to join them, but for all his obvious frustration he chose to remain aboard the
Swallow
with his diminishing entourage, in stubborn occupation of the Captain's quarters, emerging only to take the air and gaze in a melancholy fashion
towards the distant shore, or to listen with a doleful air of reproach whilst one of his advisers berated Nathan, or such of his officers as had the misfortune to be on duty, with his complaints. The Pasha-zade himself rarely spoke, at least not while he was on deck. This could be arrogance but it seemed more like shyness or lack of confidence to Nathan. The fellow might be a member of a warrior caste, but you would never have guessed from the look of him. Imlay called him Ahmed the Terrible – presumably in a spirit of irony.

There were only two of Ahmed's advisers left, along with his dragoman, two servants, two bodyguards, and his personal physician, Omar al-Saayid, who was the only one of the bunch Nathan had any time for, not only because he spoke fluent French and had more charm than the rest put together, but because he had volunteered to be of assistance to the ship's surgeon. It was more than welcome, since Mr Kite had been showing increasing signs of panic since leaving Gibraltar – though nothing like the panic he induced in his patients. Unfortunately Dr Saayid spoke no English, but then as this was a deficiency shared by the majority of the crew, it hardly seemed to matter. Certainly he seemed to have no problem diagnosing their complaints, and thus far no one had died of his remedies.

The complaint today was about the rats – apparently several had been seen on the Pasha-zade's table. Nathan dealt with this with as much patience as he could contrive. He advised against leaving any food lying around. It always attracted rats, he said. Also midshipmen, which was worse. You could leave poison out, but the rats were usually too clever to eat it and the midshipmen thrived on
it. In the end you just had to put up with them. They were among the inconveniences of living aboard a ship-of-war, but nothing like as inconvenient as being obliged to command the said ship whilst occupying a cabin the size of a cupboard, immediately adjoining the cabin of an extremely large Russian who snored like a grampus.

If the dragoman understood any of this, which was doubtful, he showed no signs of having done so. Nathan politely touched his hat and returned to the rail to resume his observations of the distant shore, only for his attention to be directed to a small boat approaching from the direction of that shore under a lateen sail. It did not appear to be one of the tartans which supplied them with freshly-caught fish most days of the week, and Nathan raised the glass to his eye in hope that it might be bringing Imlay and Cathcart back from their mission ashore.

It was not. But there were two figures in the stern wearing the dress of rich Levantine merchants or dignitaries, and there was something else about them that engaged his further attention, something vaguely familiar. One of them was a black man and his face was in shadow, but even though he was seated Nathan could see that he was a considerable size. He focused on the other man – and to his surprise and delight, found himself looking upon the unmistakable features of Spiridion Foresti, former British Consul to the Seven Isles, who had sailed with him on the
Unicorn
and helped him to take the
Jean-Bart
from the French.

And unless he was very much mistaken, the man sitting beside him was the former gunner's mate of the
Unicorn
, George Banjo.