Ramage & the Renegades (27 page)

Wagstaffe was walking towards him. He saluted and said: “I waited because I saw one of the surveyors was describing his work.”

“Yes, I've heard about the potato patch. Tell me about the prisoners.”

“Well, you can't see from here, sir, but just south-east from where we landed that line of hills goes round in a tight circle to make a sort of amphitheatre. All the prisoners are camped in the bottom with the guards round the top looking down on them. Both guards and prisoners have rigged up scraps of canvas to make awnings. The prisoners cook over a fireplace made up of rocks.”

“What are the chances of escaping?”

“None, sir: the only way out is over the rim, which means climbing up the side of the hills. There are only a few bushes and rocks. We counted about forty guards.”

Ramage nodded, thankful that the details he had so far did not rule out the sketchy plan beginning to take shape in his mind. “By the way,” he told Wagstaffe, “you'll have to make do tomorrow without Stafford and Rossi, and any other good swimmers.”

Soon after dawn next morning the sentry called that Aitken was at the door of Ramage's cabin and a moment later the First Lieutenant arrived holding a sheet of paper.

“The list of swimmers you asked for, sir. I started with the twenty men you gave prizes to in Gibraltar. I didn't expect the five-times-round-the-
Calypso
race to have results a year later! If you remember, sir, Rennick won, Martin was second, Rossi third, Orsini and Jackson tied for fourth position and the gunner nearly drowned!”

“And five guineas cost me six,” Ramage said.

Aitken grinned at the memory. “Ah yes, the judge's interpretation of ‘the first five positions,' and nothing being laid down about ties.”

“Yes, Judge Aitken and his interpretation of Scottish law! Well, what sort of list do we have?”

“The totals are quite good, sir. Twenty-three are powerful swimmers, fourteen more are good for a steady mile, another eight are fine for a fast half-mile but no good over a long distance, while sixty-eight are weak but can swim. In fact all but fifteen of the ship's company can swim. Of the supernumeraries, one draughtsman, Garret, and the four masons can't swim at all. Wilkins is a powerful swimmer—I've seen him, and when I spoke to him this morning he asked if you'd consider him for—well, whatever you have in mind.”

“Oh, just another swimming competition,” Ramage said innocently. “I thought we could practise on the larboard side.”

“Yes, we'll be out of sight of the privateersmen and the prizes, so the women hostages won't be offended at the sight of dozens of naked seamen splashing about.”

“Exactly,” Ramage said. “I want a boarding net slung over the side, so the men can hold on to it when they want a rest. And three or four Marines with muskets, in case of sharks.”

“Aye aye, sir,” Aitken said, thankful that the first moves were being taken against the privateersmen.

“And Aitken,” Ramage said quietly, “don't look so cheerful. I'd just as soon have everyone looking miserable. It shows with a good telescope, you know, and we'd better assume those scoundrels Tomás and Hart are keeping an eye on us. A cheerful man has a jaunty walk. Those scoundrels think that none of the Calypsos have anything to be jaunty about—the officers, anyway.”

“I understand, sir,” Aitken said. “I can get very miserable at the mere thought of our problems, let alone solving them.”

“That's the spirit,” Ramage said. “Looking sad may keep us alive—and those passengers too.”

He folded Aitken's list of swimmers and put it in his pocket, after taking out another folded sheet of paper which he smoothed out on top of his desk and gestured to Aitken to come across and look at.

The First Lieutenant was puzzled by what he saw. “A raft, sir, or one of those South Sea things? A proa, isn't that the word?”

“A cross between the two. Two stout pieces of wood form the floats, and light planks join them and make a sort of deck. And an eyebolt at each end—one for towing, the other for steering.”

“Ah, yes sir,” Aitken said, obviously puzzled not by the raft but by its purpose. “About—” he looked at the dimensions which Ramage had scribbled in “—five feet long and two and a half feet wide.”

“I want two, each with eyebolts,” Ramage said.

“Indeed, with eyebolts,” the Scotsman echoed and then looked up. He smiled and said: “Maybe I could better explain to the carpenter what's needed if I understood its purpose, sir.”

“I'm sure you would,” Ramage said and explained it.

As the rising sun neared the horizon in the east, Ramage went up to the quarterdeck and watched the island turn from a vague grey blur into a heavily-shadowed shape that Wilkins would no doubt call an exercise in the use of black. A sudden movement by the taffrail made Ramage swing round, to be startled by the sight of Wilkins himself perched on the breech of a carronade, legs astride the barrel, a pad in one hand and a stick of charcoal in the other.

“Good morning to you, Captain,” the artist said breezily. “Sorry I made you jump. I hope you don't mind me making free with your quarterdeck, but these fat carronades are more comfortable than the twelve-pounders.”

“Go wherever you wish. What are you doing now?”

“A study for a dawn painting of the island, with the prizes in the foreground. Curious how you can really only see the shape of hilly or mountainous land when the sun is low, rising or setting.”

“Yes, a high sun washes out the shapes,” Ramage said.

“Ah, ‘washes out'—the exact phrase. You've noticed it, then?”

Ramage gave a short laugh. “Not living in a house means I've seen nearly every dawn and sunset for the past few years, most of them in the Mediterranean, or the West Indies, so I've watched shadows spreading across flat islands and mountainous islands, across the Pyrenees and the Atlas mountains, the Sierras of Spain and the Spanish Main. And at the end of it, Wilkins, I've a confession to make.”

“A confession?” The startled artist swung round, lifting a leg so that both feet were on the top of the carriage.

“Yes, they total more than a thousand wasted dawns, because I am no artist and I haven't been able to record even the dullest of them.”

“Except in your memory,” Wilkins said. “Don't envy me,” he added, almost a bitter note in his voice.

“But I do. Not just landscapes, but your portraits as well.”

“Well, perhaps a dozen portraits, but no landscapes. With portraits rarely does the sitter, and never his relatives or friends (but particularly his wife) see him through the artist's eyes, or brush. The more worthwhile the landscape, the less popular it is. How many ‘patrons of the arts' have ever seen dawn breaking from seaward of a West Indian island, or a Tuscan hill town as the first sun of the day washes it with pink? Or the sun setting through the Strait, with your Atlas mountains on the African side and Gibraltar or the High Sierras on the other? Wonderful sights, beautiful enough to make an artist weep for sheer joy—and weep, too, because no visitor to an exhibition of his work, no patron with the money to buy it, is going to believe what he sees on the canvas. ‘Very imaginative,' the patron will say, keeping a firm hand on the strings of his purse. And he will move along the line and buy some miserable daub showing a wet sun setting over the damp Norfolk Broads—a sun looking as though it had been drowned a few times before setting through all that cloud.”

Fascinated at this glimpse of the world of objects, subjects and patrons seen through the eyes of a painter, Ramage said: “If you can capture Trinidade on canvas just after dawn, noon and sunset, I'll be the first to buy them!”

“That's good of you,” Wilkins said politely, “but it's not the point I'm making. You've seen it: you know what it's like. I'm grumbling about the people who don't know and refuse to let the painter show them. You probably know the early Florentine painters were laughed at because no one in the north could believe that the light they painted actually existed in Tuscany. Finally, enough people visited Tuscany and saw for themselves, and the Florentines were accepted. But that was a long time ago, and I assure you that Tuscany is still the southern limit of people's credulity!”

“When we get back to London we'll hold an exhibition, showing all your paintings of this expedition—like the paintings of Captain Cook's voyages.”

Wilkins slid off the gun and stood in front of Ramage, the sun's rays giving him a ruddy complexion which did not disguise the serious look in his face.

“Do you really think we'll ever see London again, Captain?”

The sudden question startled Ramage. “Yes, why ever not?”

Wilkins gestured towards the
Lynx
and the anchored prizes. “Those fellows seem to hold all the aces.”

Ramage's harsh laugh was not one intended to reassure Wilkins; it came quite naturally as his memory flickered back over the past few years, when a variety of men had seemed to hold enough aces, yet …

“I'm not a gambler, Wilkins; none of the
Calypso
's officers is. But we've all learned one thing—three aces can be taken by the two of trumps!”

“So we have a two of trumps?”

“I didn't say that; just that we need to find only the two or three if we want to see London again, not necessarily an ace.”

Wilkins laughed, a cheerful laugh which also revealed the relief he felt. “Tell me, Captain, all those actions of yours described in I don't know how many
London Gazettes:
how many of those were games won with a two of trumps and how many with an ace?”

“You'd better ask Southwick, he watches the games more closely than I. But I don't remember any aces—or court cards—at all. We always seem to get dealt fives or under!”

Ramage saw the soundings and survey teams assembling on the main-deck and went down to give instructions to Martin.

“Don't be obvious about it, but each day I want you to take three or four soundings and get a rough idea of the depths between us and the
Lynx.
You'll soon have that reef on the western side of the bay charted, but make sure you cover the eastern side, too.”

Martin grinned and he said: “Aye aye, sir; it'd be easier to tack than wear to get out of the bay!”

“Indeed?” Ramage said, his face expressionless.

He found Wagstaffe with Kenton cursing the tardiness of Williams, one of the surveyors.

“Once you can look down on the
Lynx,
I want you to give someone the glass—perhaps you had better do it yourself; it'll be a welcome change from tramping up and down the hills—and watch the
Lynx
for a few hours. See what you can tell me about the state of discipline, condition of her sails and rigging, check her armament and see if she can mount swivels, and try to see exactly how many men she has on board. Tomorrow I want to know exactly how many men are guarding the prisoners. And, of course, note the boats leaving or arriving at the
Lynx.
”

Wagstaffe saluted. “Surveying is a very boring job; I seem to end up holding these striped poles and measuring angles. By the way, sir, once the draughtsmen really get to work, we're going to have to give names to the bays, headlands and peaks. I mention it, sir, in case you want to state your preferences.”

Ramage was still absorbing Wagstaffe's tact when Southwick came bustling up, holding a slate. “You want the same watch on the prizes, sir?”

“Yes. Not a boat visited any one of them yesterday.”

“No reason why one should, come to think of it, sir; each ship must have plenty of water and provisions. Any trouble with hostages, and the privateersmen would be going over to the
Lynx.
”

“Ah, what eyes and brains lost to the Revenue Service,” Ramage teased.

Southwick sniffed contemptuously. “My big mistake, sir, was not joining the
smugglers
when I was a boy. I'd be retired now with a big mansion, a stable of horses, two carriages …”

Aitken came up and saluted. “The swimmers, sir. They're ready for inspection, and the carpenter and his mates have nearly finished the first raft. Would you care to look at it before they put the last nails on the decking and start on the second?”

The raft looked in fact like a large toboggan with wide and deep runners. On the front of what would be the section on which a person would sit to slide on snow was an eyebolt, with another at the back.

“I want a couple of fathoms of line on each eyebolt, and secure line along the sides, so that men can hold on.”

“How many men, sir?”

Ramage shrugged his shoulders. He looked at the raft and said: “She won't take more than six holding on each side, plus one forward and one astern. That'll make fourteen, and should be enough. Put a batten each side on the decking, Carpenter, here and there, so that something put on top won't roll off.”

He left the raft and walked along the line of men drawn up on the larboard gangway. They represented the
Calypso
's best swimmers, and he jumped on to the breech of a gun. “Gather round,” he said. “This is what you'll be training to do in the next few days.”

Four days later, as he listened to the splashing of a couple of dozen men swimming beside the ship, out of sight of the privateersmen, Ramage sat at his desk staring at several sheets of paper held down by a large polished pebble.

His life at the moment seemed divided into halves. One was Gianna, the other was the problem of the
Lynx
and her prizes.

Since leaving the house in Palace Street and joining the
Calypso
at Chatham, he had tried to avoid thinking of her. He realized now that he had in fact tried deliberately to destroy every memory of her, particularly of their first meeting, in the darkness and mystery of the Torre di Buranaccio, and the desperation he felt holding her in an open boat knowing she had a musket ball in her shoulder and fearing she would die before he could find a surgeon … So many memories, some of danger, some of peace. When she came out to Lisbon to see him and the way she had the ambassador, Hookham Frere, dancing a jig in an effort to please her, and quiet days at St Kew when they had walked together over the Cornish moors or rode as far as Roughtor and Brown Willie, the distant peaks which looked as though they had been dropped by a giant … When her eyes glinted and she became imperious, the Marchesa breaking through, revealing a childhood spent in the palace at Volterra with dozens of servants and an early adulthood surrounded by ministers, the ruler of her own state, Volterra. He remembered the walled city of Volterra with its dozens of towers, tall, very narrow rectangles rising high like tree trunks.