Heart of Oak

9. Articles of War

The chart room door closed, and Julyan the master touched his hat in apology.

"I'm a bit adrift, sir. "He peered over his shoulder. "I had to be certain of a couple of things. But they know where I am."

Adam said, "Find a place for yourself. I'll not keep you long."

Three lieutenants and Guthrie the boatswain left little room beyond the table, with its array of charts and reference books.

"We should make a landfall today, later in the dog watches, if the wind stays kind to us. "He tapped the open log. "And these observations prove to be accurate. "

He saw Julyan smile, and felt the tension dissipate. "I have made a rough plan of the anchorage and the approaches, from what little information we have of them."

He saw Squire nod. He would have had plenty of hazardous moments during his surveying voyages. A lead-and-line and a lot of luck, as one old hand had described it.

Adam looked at each of them in turn. "We shall remain in company with Nautilus until she is received without unrest or opposition, as is anticipated. We will take no unnecessary risks."

In company. But the other frigate had been scarcely in sight when the masthead lookouts had first reported her at daybreak.

A shift of wind overnight, or had her captain spread more sail deliberately? But what would be the point? If there had been an unexpected breach of the peace, it would already be too late for argument without a real show of force.

He heard the squeal of gun trucks, the occasional shouts of command as some of the forward eighteen-pounders began another painstaking drill. Maddock had already told him he had cut two minutes off the time it took his crews to clear for action. Not much, some would say, but it could be the margin between opening fire or being dismasted.

Only a few days since they had weighed at Gibraltar, and some three hundred miles. They had done well, even if they did damn his eyes every time they manhandled a gun up to its port.

Be prepared. The next ship they sighted might already be at war: an enemy. How would you know? He had seen the telescopes trained on them from Nautilus, and not only during the gun drill. Curiosity, or perhaps they too were coming to terms with the new alliance. Something decreed by those who had never experienced the numbing horror of a broadside or the steel of an enemy at close quarters.

He knew that Vincent was staring at him, but looked away as their eyes met.

"Study the plan. You will see some fortifications on the north-east side. Not like Algiers, or some we've encountered."

He tapped the diagram, and recalled Jago and Morgan spreading these sketches on the table for him.

He looked at Squire. "I want the second cutter lowered when we make our final approach. You will be in charge. Crew to be armed, with rations for two days in case of trouble. And remember, James. No heroics."

Squire nodded but made no comment.

He turned to Guthrie, who seemed unusually subdued, perhaps a little overwhelmed because he was being consulted with the others.

"Your best lookouts, and the most experienced leadsmen in the chains. Arms will be issued, but not on display. Am I making sense?"

Guthrie beamed. "I'll watch every mother's son, sir. Leave it to me!"

Julyan punched his massive arm. "Watch all of ‘em!"

Adam waited, and then said, "Tell your people what you think fit. We might know more at first light tomorrow. Any questions?"

"The fortifications on the plan, sir? "It was Gascoigne, the lieutenant of Royal Marines, quiet and oddly unobtrusive despite his scarlet tunic. "If there is resistance, should we expect a battery of some description?"

Adam looked past him at the old-fashioned octant hanging near the door. It belonged to Julyan, and was probably the first instrument he had ever owned or used. With men like these… . He answered, almost abruptly, "The ship comes first. The Royals would be landed."

That was all. It was enough.

Adam looked directly at Vincent. There was no more time.

He was the first lieutenant. If anything should happen…

"Do you wish to add anything, Mark?"

Vincent faced him. The challenge was still there.

"As you said, sir. The ship comes first."

The chart room quivered, and even the instruments on the table seemed to tremble as the guns were run up to their ports together, like a single weapon. There was a burst of cheering, immediately quelled by the voice of authority: Maddock himself.

Vincent said, "I was wondering, sir, "and glanced at the others. "What sort of man is the French captain?"

Perhaps it had been uppermost in all their thoughts.

Capitaine Luc Marchand had been present at two of the meetings Adam had attended in Gibraltar. Others had made the brief introductions, but he and Marchand had progressed no further than an exchange of polite smiles: Commodore Arthur Carrick had made certain of that, with behaviour verging on hostility.

Marchand was about Adam's age, perhaps a year or so older, strong-featured, with a ready, disarming smile and clear greyish-blue eyes. A face that would appeal to any woman.

The flag lieutenant had been more informative once the commodore was out of his way.

Adam touched the charts, and his own rough plan laid across them.

"Marchand is an experienced captain, supposedly due for promotion when the war ended. No stranger to English ships.

He was serving in Swiftsure after she was taken from us, and again at Trafalgar, "he grinned, "when we recaptured her."

Julyan nodded. "I remember Swiftsure. Third-rate. Put up quite a fight against us. "He spoke almost proudly.

Adam waited, then said, "Does that help?"

Vincent shrugged. "I doubt he'll ever forget the past."

The door squeaked open a few inches and a pair of eyes sought Julyan. Nothing was said, but the master seized his hat and swore under his breath.

"Seems they need me on deck, sir!"

He would not leave without good reason, but Adam sensed that he was relieved to have been called away.

He said, "A good time to end our discussion. You may carry on with your duties."

Vincent remained by the table as the others departed.

"I understand that there is a seaman listed for punishment? I read your report before this meeting. Asleep on watch and insubordinate. Tell me about it."

Overhead, the gun trucks began to move again. Closer this time: Maddock was about to exercise his next division.

Vincent said, "His name is Dimmock. Foretop, long serviceЦ over twenty years. Never had any trouble with him before. "He paused as though surprised by his own words, as if they were some excuse or admission. "We were hard-pressed for trained, experienced hands when we were commissioning.

Landsmen and young boys were the first to come forward. "He added with something like defiance, "I trusted him."

Adam listened to the drill, the creak of tackle, an ironic cheer as something miscarried. Like another world.

"Dimmock. "He spoke the name, but no face came to his mind. "He was never rated for promotion. "It meant nothing; there were many like him in the King's service. The old hands, content or resigned, and the hard men who steered their own course, if they were offered the chance.

Vincent said suddenly, "A stand-over could be ordered, sir."

Adam recalled Thomas Herrick, his uncle's oldest and most loyal friend; could hear his words. Discipline is a duty, not a convenience.

"It happened during your watch and you feel responsible, as he was a man you trusted. But it could have been at any time, with some one else left to take action. "Vincent seemed about to protest. "He had been drinking beforehand, I gather."

"He was not drunk, sir."

It was common enough through the fleet. The only crime was being caught. And Vincent was an experienced officer; he did not need to be told. The old Jacks could even joke about getting a checked shirt at the gangway. Few ever remembered the reason. But afterwards, the blame always lay with the captain.

He raised his eyes from the charts.

"You gain nothing by delaying it. Tomorrow forenoon, all hands to witness punishment. Inform the surgeon, will you?"

"Right away, sir. "He half turned as if to listen. "The gun drill has stopped. I hope it's achieving results!"

Adam watched him leave and heard him call a greeting to some one as he passed, as if uninvolved. Like those first days.

Still a stranger.

Several hours later, at the end of the first dog watch, as predicted, the masthead lookout sighted land. On deck every telescope was trained across water like blue glass, ruffled occasionally by an uncertain wind. The French Nautilus seemed to hold the last of the sun on her topsails and rigging, her hull almost hidden in shadow.

A fine landfall. Even Julyan could not hide his satisfaction.

But as he watched the captain walk to the quarterdeck rail and press both hands against it, he wondered what he was thinking.

Planning for some future command with no admiral breathing down his neck to torment? Meredith, one of his master's mates, was calling to him and he turned to give his full attention. But not before he made a careful observation. The quarterdeck was busy with hands on watch, and others waiting to man the braces and change tack.

And in the midst of it at the quarterdeck rail, their captain, who wanted for nothing, was completely alone.

Midshipman John Deacon laid his dirk and folded crossbelt on top of his chest and relocked it. He glanced at the others.

"A formality, so do it."

David Napier thought about it. It was every midshipman's dream and nightmare, even if he managed to conceal it. That first real step, the King's commission… But the examination before a selected Board came first. Deacon already spoke like a lieutenant, without even knowing it.

He saw the messman murmuring instructions in the ear of his young assistant, a boy. As I was. Gesturing to the canvas that concealed cleaning gear and the bucket, in case their youngest midshipman might need it. Walker had been luckier of late, but wind and sea had been more considerate.

He sat down at the mess table opposite Simon Huxley.

"What are you studying at this early hour?"

Huxley frowned at him, then seemed less defensive. "I made some notes about this place we've been plotting on the chart through every watch, thanks to our Mr. Julyan. "He smiled, and it made him a different person. "Aboubakr seems to have changed hands many times in the last fifty years alone. Slavers, missionaries, pirates, and invaders under a whole fistful of flags. So who's next, I wonder?"

Napier remembered the first hint of land, then the darker outline, hills and deeper shadows linking where there had been only the edge of the sea.

"I heard them say it's a good anchorage. That's what gave it value. Prosperity, too."

Huxley murmured, "For some, anyway."

Deacon had joined them.

"We shall show ourselves and pay our respects. "He slapped his palm on the table. "Then back to Gibraltar for new orders."

Then he turned and said unexpectedly, "Captain Bolitho sponsored you, David. When the day comes for you to face up to the Inquisition, his name and reputation should carry some weight. "Napier considered it, surprised by this revelation.

"That was wrong of me. But every day now I ask myself… if I shall be… ready."

Another shadow moved across the table: Charles Hotham, usually a bright spirit in the gunroom, and popular on deck with most of the hands despite glaring mistakes during gun drill and work aloft. Guthrie the boatswain had been heard to forcefully comment, "Better for all of us if you'd followed the Church instead of Neptune, Mister "Otham, sir!"

He said in an undertone, "How long now?"

Napier patted his arm. What they were all thinking.

Avoiding it.

"I was the one who found him, you see? I wanted to settle it somehow, but he.

"All hands, clear lower deck! Hands lay aft to witness punishment!"

Huxley said kindly, "You did your best."

Deacon was already at the door, clearly recovered from his moment of self-doubt.

"Lively, now! It's not the end of the world!"

The upper deck was already crowded. It was rare to see both watches and all the special dutymen gathered at once. Some stood together, messmates, or because they shared a hazardous perch aloft strung out along the yards, making or shortening sail when a firm grip and a timely shout could save a limb or a life. Some of the forenoon watch were in the shrouds or ratlines, framed against the sea or sky as if trapped in a giant web. Others were grouped between the eighteen-pounders, those stripped to the waist showing scarred, tanned or sunburned skin commensurate with their service.

The Royal Marines were lined across the quarterdeck, in full uniform, facing forward, swaying in unison as Onward ploughed unhurriedly through reflected glare and infrequent bursts of spray.

Vincent, the first lieutenant, stood on the larboard side of the quarterdeck by the gangway, one hand shading his eyes as he received reports from each division and section. It was still early, but like the marines he wore full uniform, and was beginning to sweat in the heat.

Despite all those present it seemed unusually quiet, only the sounds of cordage and canvas, the creak of timber or spar, breaking the stillness.

The midshipmen were crowded together by one of the quarterdeck carronades, opposite the gangway where a grating had been rigged upright. Close by, but separated by years and experience, the warrant officers had already assembled. The backbone in every man-of-war: no ship would sail, fight, or even survive without them. Tobias Julyan, as sailing master, had grown to know them in the long months since Onward's commissioning. In their faces now he saw resignation, even impatience, as might be expected from men who had seen almost every aspect of a sailor's life.

From where he stood Julyan could hear the occasional creak of the wheel, beyond some of the hands on watch, and saw the helmsman in his mind's eye, a good man, not the sort to let his attention stray from the compass.

He looked at the rigged grating and felt his mouth go dry, and glanced at the midshipmen. Youngsters, full of hope. They looked to him now. That other memory should have died, with so many others. But at times like these…

Over twenty years ago. He had been as young as the seaman at the wheel. Some of the older hands still yarned about the Great Mutiny in the fleet at the More and Spithead. France was poised to invade, and the horror of the guillotine and the fear of revolution was stark and very real.

Reason had triumphed eventually, and guilt been admitted by both factions, quarterdeck and forecastle. Julyan remembered one captain who had ordered a man flogged because he was slow to obey an order: showing disrespect to an officer, he had claimed. And there had been others… maybe there had always been others… who would treat a pressed man like scum, even though he had been torn bodily from the arms of his family or lover and dragged aboard.

One mutineer had been sentenced to four hundred lashes, and to be flogged through the fleet. Julyan could see it now.

Hear it. The procession of boats, crewed by witnesses from each vessel at anchor that day, pausing at each rated ship while a proportion of the punishment was awarded alongside.

Four hundred lashes. How could that thing have survived? Some movement made him turn his head and he saw that one of the midshipmen had crouched down behind the carronade. The youngest, who was always being sick. He had heard them joking about it. Even if the ship was in dry dock! The youngster next to him had leaned over and put his hand on the boy's heaving shoulder. It was Napier, the one who had survived Audacity. Sponsored by the Captain. Somehow it was seemly…

"Attention on the upper deck!"

Like a little parade. Rowlatt, the master-at-arms, and the ship's corporal, with the prisoner lurching between them. Two boatswain's mates, one carrying the tell-tale red baize bag which contained the cat. Lastly Murray, the surgeon, to ensure that the prisoner did not lose consciousness.

The surgeons must have been deaf and blind that other, terrible day.

High above them some one called out: a topman needing assistance from his mate. Nobody looked up.

Adam Bolitho walked to the quarterdeck rail, his coat heavy in the heat and already clinging to his shoulders. Would he never become hardened to the demands and the doubts? He was no longer that young and often unsure commander in his first ship, the one he had evoked for Lowenna during their last waterfront stroll in Falmouth. Would she believe him if she could see him now? Vincent was making his report, but his back was to the sun, his face in shadow and impossible to read.

Adam looked the length of the ship, at the upturned faces and the figures in the shrouds, silhouetted against the sea and sky. Some were still strangers, others emerged from obscurity with names and voices, a living force.

He looked down at the prisoner for the first time.

"John Dimmock, you are accused of neglect of duty, that you were asleep on watch. "He sounded hoarse, and wanted to clear his throat. Some of the silent onlookers would not be able to hear him. "… and that you showed contempt to a superior officer."

Dimmock was staring up at him intently, his eyes red rimmed as if from heavy drinking. Smuggled rum from messmates, despite the risk of discovery.

"Have you anything to say?"

Dimmock seemed to straighten his back. "Nuthin'!"

The master-at-arms gripping his wrist hissed, "Nothin', sir!"

Adam stepped back slightly and said, "Carry on."

Behind him he heard some one take a deep breath. It was Luke Jago. Always the same, every time he saw or heard the ritual of punishment. Jago had been flogged in error. The officer responsible had been court-martialled and dismissed the service in disgrace, and Jago had received a written apology from an admiral and a sum of cash which had amounted to a year's pay.

But he would carry the scars of the cat to his grave.

"Seized up, sir!"

Adam felt the Articles of War pressing against his side, against the old sword. Jago's way of telling him. Of sharing it.

He removed his hat, and knew others were following his example. Dimmock was stripped to the waist and pinioned against the grating. There was a tattoo of some kind on his right shoulder, faded now and probably acquired when he had been a much younger man, as was the habit of landmen and raw recruits, as an act of bravado or when awash with too much rum. It was usually regretted afterwards.

Adam took the Articles of War from Jago and spread the final page: Article number thirty-six. He had heard it read aloud often enough, and could remember reading these same words for the first time.

"All crimes not capital, committed by any person or persons in the Fleet…" Once he felt the deck tilt more steeply, with the responding slap of canvas. The wind was dropping, or had shifted slightly due to the nearness of land. But his voice remained level, unhurried. "… shall be punished according to the Laws and Customs of such cases used at sea. "He closed the folder. "One dozen lashes."

One of the boatswain's mates had pulled the cat-o'-ninetails from its bag and shook it so that the tails fell free, but his eyes were on the captain, not the prisoner.

Adam replaced his hat.

"Do your duty."

The man's arm swung out to its full extent and the cat struck Dimmock's bare back with a sickening crack.

"One. "The master-at-arms had begun to count, his voice matter-of-fact.

Jago had been watching a strange, dark-winged seabird he did not recognize as it swooped past the foretop, but felt his eyes drawn relentlessly to the gangway and the figure tied to the grating. Under a spell, unable to escape, like the prisoner.

He could feel it like that day, the force of the blows driving the breath from his lungs, his body unable to move or to yield against the grating. And then the pain. Like nothing you could believe or describe.

"Two."

There was blood now, the force of the lash opening the flesh as if by the claws of a beast. Jago could recall the blood nearly choking him. He had bitten through his lip or tongue. The surgeon had stopped the flogging to examine him, but only briefly, and the ordeal had continued. He remembered his own half-mad sense of triumph when the last blow had fallen across his torn and blackened body. Hatred had saved him then, and for countless days afterwards.

"Three."

Jago saw the captain's fingers on the hilt of his sword. His hand was tanned, but the knuckles were white from the force of his grip. Jago had known captains who would order two or three dozen lashes merely for spitting on the deck.

"Four."

The boatswain's mate faltered, the cat swinging in mid-air and blood spattering his arm, while Rowlatt twisted round, mouth open and ready for the next count.

An explosion, like distant thunder, echoing and re-echoing across the unbroken water. But sharper, and drowned by the shouts and confusion as men stared outboard or at each other, then, inevitably, to the figure in blue with one hand on his sword.

Adam leaned over the rail and tried to see beyond the starboard bow, but the headsails made it impossible. Nautilus should be in sight. Otherwise…

He saw Vincent striding to join him, his face alive with questions.

Adam said, "Marchand's emergency signal. Pipe the hands aloft and get the courses on her. The wind's dropping, so let's use what we have!"

He heard a groan from the gangway. It helped to focus his thoughts.

"Cut down the prisoner and have him taken below."

The master-at-arms called, "What about the punishment, sir? "Confused, even indignant. "Less than half, sir!"

Adam stared up at the masthead pendant. Not much. But enough. As if he were telling the ship, or himself.

"Send some good eyes aloft, Mr. Vincent. The best you can muster. Give him a glass, mine if it saves time. "He knew he was speaking too fast, and why. He looked at Rowlatt, who was still standing by the blood-splashed grating. "Ended! We have work to do."

Jago saw his face as he made his way to the companion.

Preparing himself for whatever lay ahead. But Jago had known him longer than any one else aboard, and was gripped by what he had just witnessed. Like Dimmock the prisoner, the Captain had been cut free.