A Tradition of Victory (32 page)

One man gasped aloud as a bird shot from cover almost between his feet and vanished croaking into the darkness.

Searle exclaimed hoarsely, “Bloody hell!”

“Still!”
Browne pressed his back against the rough stones and waited for a challenge or a shot.

Then he moved deliberately away from the wall and peered up at the square Norman tower which he could just determine against the sky. There was a faint glow from a narrow, slitted window. He tried to control his racing thoughts and remember what he had learned about semaphore stations. In England they were usually manned by an officer, one other of warrant rank, and two or three seamen. With the prison so close, it was likely some of them lodged there during the night. If so …

Browne joined Searle and whispered, “Test the door.”

Jones, the gunner’s mate, grasped the heavy ring which formed the handle and turned it carefully. It squeaked but did not budge.

“Locked, sir.”

Searle beckoned to another of his men. “Moubray, ready with the grapnel!”

Browne held his breath as the grapnel flew through the air and bounced off the wall to fall back amongst them.

But the second time it held firm, and Browne saw the next man swarm up the line and disappear, as if the old church had swallowed him alive.

Searle said between his teeth, “Good man. Used to be a felon in Lime House ’til the press picked him up.”

The door handle squeaked again and this time it swung inwards to reveal the small seaman standing there with a grin splitting his face.

“Come inside! Bit warmer ’ere!”

“Hold your noise, damn you!” Searle peered into the shadows.

“S’all right, sir. No bother.” The seaman opened the shutter of a lantern and held it across some spiralling stone stairs. A body in uniform lay spreadeagled where he had fallen, his eyes like pebbles in the light.

Browne swallowed hard. The man’s throat had been cut and there was blood everywhere.

The seaman said calmly, “Only one ’ere, sir, ’e was. Easy as robbin’ a blind baby, sir.”

Searle sheathed his hanger. “You would know, Cooper.”

He walked to the stairs. “Harding and Jones, prepare your fuses.” He looked at Browne and smiled tightly. “Let us go and secure our prize, eh?”

Bolitho awoke with a start, his fingers gripping the arms of one of Inch’s comfortable bergères in which he had been dozing on and off since nightfall.

He could tell immediately that the ship’s movements were more lively and forceful, and he heard the sluice of water beneath the counter as
Odin
heeled over to the wind.

Apart from a solitary shuttered lantern, the stern cabin was in darkness, so that through the heavily streaked window the waves looked angry and near.

The companion-way door opened and Bolitio saw Allday’s shadow against the screen.

“What’s happening?” So he had been unable to sleep too.

“Wind’s veered, sir.”

“More than before?”

“Aye. Nor’-east, or as makes no difference.” He sounded glum.

Bolitho grappled with the news. He had anticipated that the wind might shift. But as far round as the north-east was unthink-able. With only a few hours of darkness left to hide their stealthy

approach, they would be slowed down to a mere crawl. It might mean an attack in broad daylight, with every enemy ship for miles around roused and ready to hit back.

“Fetch my clothes.” Bolitho stood up and felt the deck sway over as if to mock him and his plans.

Allday said, “I’ve already told Ozzard. I heard you tossing and turning, sir. That chair’s no place for a good sleep.”

Bolitho waited for Allday to open the lantern shutters very slightly. The whole ship was in darkness, the galley fire doused.

It would put the final touch of disaster if the rear-admiral allowed lights to show from the cabin.

He smelt coffee and saw Ozzard’s small shape moving towards him.

Ozzard murmured, “Took the liberty of making this before they put out the fires, sir. Kept it wrapped in a blanket.”

Bolitho sipped the coffee gratefully, his mind still busy with alternatives. There could be no turning back, even if he wanted to. Browne would be there by now, or lying dead with his party of volunteers.

He knew he would not break off the attack whatever happened, even though his open-worded instructions to use his discretion left him room to manœuvre up to the last minute.

Perhaps his move to
Odin
had just been an excuse after all. To protect Herrick, but also to prevent his arguments from changing his mind.

Bolitho slipped his arms into his coat and strode to the door.

He could not wait a moment longer.

On deck the air was alive with the chorus of canvas and clattering blocks. Figures loomed and faded in the shadows, while around the double wheel, like survivors on a tiny reef, the master and his mates, helmsmen and midshipman-of-the-watch stood in a tight, shapeless group.

Inch’s lanky figure bustled to meet him.

“Good morning, sir.” Inch was no actor and could not conceal his surprise. “Is something wrong?”

Bolitho took his arm and together they moved to the rail. He said, “It’s the wind.”

Inch stared at him. “The master thinks it will veer still more, sir.

“I see.”
Thinks
. Old Ben Grubb would have
known,
as if God were on his side.

Streamers of spindrift twisted through the drumming shrouds, and almost lost abeam, but still on station, Bolitho saw
Phalarope.

A ghost ship indeed.

Bolitho bit his lip, then said shortly, “Chartroom.” Followed by Inch and the sailing-master, Bolitho strode into the shuttered space beneath the poop and stared hard at the chart. He could almost feel Inch waiting for a decision, just as he could sense the urgency. Like sand running through a glass. Nothing to slow or stop it.

He said, “We’ll not delay any longer. Call all hands and clear for action right away.” He waited for Inch to relay his order to a boatswain’s mate outside the chartroom door. “You estimate that we are some ten miles to the south-west of the headland?”

He saw the sailing-master nod soundlessly and got a brief impression of an anxious but competent face. He suddenly remembered. The man had been the senior master’s mate at Copenhagen when the old master had been cut down. New and, until now, untried.

Inch craned forward to watch Bolitho move the brass dividers over the chart.

“The French squadron is anchored off the point, just north of the Loire Estuary.” Bolitho was thinking aloud. “It would take hours for us to beat against the wind along the original course.

We must pass the French squadron before full daylight and head into the bay where the invasion fleet is anchored.” He looked at the master. “Well?”

Inch said encouragingly, “Come along, Mr M’Ewan.”

The master moistened his lips then said firmly, “We can claw inshore now, sir, then come about and steer nor’-west, close-hauled, into the bay. Provided the wind don’t back on us, for if that happens we’ll be in irons an’ no mistake, sir.”

Inch opened his mouth as if to protest but closed it when he saw Bolitho nod his head.

“I agree. It will cut the approach by an hour, and with any luck we will slip past the French men-of-war with a mile to spare.” He looked at Inch. “You were going to add something?”

“The wind is not only hard for
us,
sir.” Inch shrugged helplessly. “The rest of the squadron will be delayed accordingly.”

“I know.”

He heard the muffled pounding of feet, the bang and squeak of screens being removed and obstacles being lowered hastily to the orlop. A ship-of-war. Open from bow to stern, deck above deck, gun above gun, where men lived, hoped, slept and trained.

Now was the testing time for them all.

The first lieutenant yelled, “Cleared for action, sir!”

Inch examined his watch and bobbed. “Nine minutes, Mr Graham, that is a good time.”

Bolitho turned away to hide his sudden sadness. Neale had done the same.

He said, “If we delay, we could be destroyed piecemeal.

Whether Commodore Herrick arrives in time to support us or not, we must be able to get amongst those invasion craft.” He looked Inch squarely in the eyes. “It is all that matters.”

Surprisingly, Inch beamed. “I know, sir. And
Odin
is the ship for the task.”

Bolitho smiled. Safe, trusting Inch would never question anything he said.

The chartroom door opened and Midshipman Stirling squeezed inside. Even in the poor lantern light he looked red-eyed and weary.

He said, “I—I apologize for being late, sir.”

Bolitho glanced at Inch. “I have forgotten how to sleep that soundly!”

Inch made to leave. “I’ll make the night signal to
Phalarope,
sir. I hope she’s still there at daybreak!”

Bolitho leaned on the chart and stared at the neat figures and bearings. It was a risk. But then it had never been otherwise.

Even now it could all go against them before they had a chance to stand inshore. A solitary fisherman might be risking the weather and the wrath of French guard-boats to put out and earn his keep. He might just see the shielded flare which was now being shown to
Phalarope.

He said, “Damnation on doubt. It kills more good sailors than any round shot!”

Stirling glanced round quickly. Inch and the master had gone.

Bolitho was speaking to
him.

He asked unsurely, “Could the French prevent our entering the bay, sir?”

Bolitho looked down at him, unaware he had voiced his anxiety aloud.

“They can try, Mr Stirling, they can
try.
” He clapped the boy on the shoulder. “Come and walk with me. I need to have the feel of this ship.”

Stirling glowed with pride. Even the fact that Bolitho had unwittingly gripped his injured arm did not tarnish the moment.

Allday, a new cutlass jutting from his belt, watched them pass, and found he could smile in spite of his troubled thoughts.

The boy and his hero. And why not? They would need all their heroes this day.

“Wind’s holding steady, sir!”

Bolitho joined Inch at the quarterdeck rail and peered along the ship’s pale outline. Beyond the forecastle, reeling now as the yards were hauled further round until they were almost fore and aft, he could see nothing. He had purposefully stayed on deck so that his eyes would be accustomed to any change in the light, be ready to detect the first join between sea and sky. And the land.

The deck plunged ponderously in the offshore currents, and Bolitho heard the marines on the poop packing the hammocks even more tightly in the nettings for their protection, and to rest their muskets while they sought out their targets.

Figures moved occasionally below the gangways where every gun stood loaded and ready. Others clambered aloft to make last adjustments to chain-slings and nets, to hoist one more sack of canister to the swivels in the tops, or to splice another fraying line.

Bolitho watched and heard it all. What he did not see he could picture in his mind. Like all those other times, the remorse-less grip on the stomach like steel fingers, the last-moment fear that he had overlooked something.

The ship was answering well, he thought. Inch had proved to be an excellent captain, and it was hard to believe that Bolitho had once thought it unlikely he would even rise above lieutenant.

Bolitho tried to shut his mind to it. The young lieutenant named Travers, now somewhere on the lower gun-deck, waiting with all the other men for the ports to open on their red-painted hell and the guns to begin to roar. He was hoping to get married.

And Inch, who was striding about the quarterdeck, his coat-tails flapping, his cocked hat at a jaunty angle, as he chatted to his first lieutenant and sailing-master. He had a wife named Hannah and A

two children who lived in Weymouth. What of them if Inch were to fall today? And why should he show such pride and pleasure at being ordered to a battle which could end in total defeat?

And Belinda. He moved restlessly to the nettings, unaware that Stirling was keeping near him like a shadow. He must not think of her now.

He heard a man say quietly, “There’s th’ old
Phalarope,
Jim.

Rather any other bugger than that ’un for company!” He seemed to sense Bolitho’s nearness and fell silent.

Bolitho stared at the ghostlike outline as
Phalarope
lifted and plunged abeam. Like
Odin,
she had her sails close-hauled to make a pale pyramid while the hull still lay in darkness.

Two ships and some eight hundred officers, seamen and marines whom he alone would commit to battle.

He looked down at the midshipman. “How would you like to serve in a frigate?”

Stirling puckered his mouth and considered it. “More than anything, sir.”

“You should speak with my nephew, he—” Bolitho broke off as Stirling’s eyes lit up momentarily like small coals.

Then, what seemed like an eternity later, came the dull boom of an explosion. Like the short-lived glow in the sky, that too was soon lost to the ceaseless murmur of sea and wind.

“What the hell was that?” Inch strode across the deck as if he expected to discover an answer.

Bolitho said quietly, “The charges have been blown, Captain Inch.”

“But, but …” Inch stared at him through the darkness. “They are surely too early?”

Bolitho turned away. Too early or too late, Browne must have had his reasons.

He felt Allday move up beside him and raised an arm to allow him to clip a sword to his belt.

“It’s the best I could do, sir. Bit heavier than you’re used to.”

He gestured into the darkness. “Mr Browne?”

“Aye. He said he could do it. I wish to God there had been another way.”

Allday sighed. “He knows what he’s about, sir.” He nodded firmly. “Like the time you an’ he rode off to fight that duel, remember?”

“I remember.”

Midshipman Stirling said, “It looks brighter, sir.”

Bolitho smiled. “So it does.” He turned his back on the midshipman and said softly, “Allday, there is something I must say.”