Ramage and the Guillotine

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

In anticipation of the arrival of the fake letter from the Port Captain at Boulogne asking him to return for more talks, Ramage's slow recovery began on Thursday morning. When the landlord arrived with breakfast he was delighted to find Ramage sitting up at the table, pretending a shakiness he did not feel and claiming to be on the mend. By Thursday evening the landlord's wife, as she laid the table for the evening meal, was claiming a victory for her family recipe, encouraged by Louis.

On Friday afternoon the landlord was knocking on their door and announcing as though he was the town crier that a special messenger had brought a letter from Boulogne for the Signor, and was waiting.

Ramage went to the door, took the letter with a flourish, told the landlord to come in and wait, walked back to the table and sat down importantly. After breaking the seal he began reading, and sniffed with annoyance. 'Mama mia . . . accidente!'

Louis jumped up from Stafford's bed as if in alarm. 'Is something wrong, Signor?'

'Wrong?' Ramage banged the letter down on the table. 'That twice-damned Port Captain at Boulogne - who would think I spent two whole weeks with him, discussing everything from the price of workmen to providing saws and adzes? Now he wants me to go back for more talks. "Urgent," he says; "very urgent," and that is why he is sending a special messenger after me. Well,' Ramage said wrathfully, noticing the landlord was obviously very impressed by what he was hearing, 'the Port Captain is lucky that I got no farther than Amiens; if I'd reached Paris I'd be damned if I'd travel back all that way. Even now, I'm not so sure that -'

'Oh, please,' Louis wheedled. 'For the good of the Republic, Signor ... we need the help of men such as yourself: why, by using the methods you employ in your shipyard in Genoa -well, I heard the Port Captain's adjutant saying he reckoned it would halve the time they're taking at Boulogne and Calais to build the barges.'

'It would indeed,' Ramage said, obviously undecided. 'But they expect me to bring my men up here and put them to work for a pittance. Charity - that's what the Port Captain expects. Hardly becomes the First Consul and the new Republic, I must say.' He gave a contemptuous sniff. 'If you want to build an invasion flotilla, then you need money, materials and men. Talk and promises never planked a ship -'

'Well, they've sent a special messenger after you, Signor,' Louis said. 'That shows the importance they attach to you, doesn't it, Jobert?'

'Oh yes, indeed,' the landlord said hurriedly. 'I knew it atonce - that is why I rushed up here the moment the messenger arrived.'

'Very well, I'll be guided by you,' Ramage said in a voice that showed he was mollified. ‘I shall be well enough to travel by - well, no earlier than Sunday.'

'Shall I tell the messenger, Signor?' When Jobert scurried down the passage Ramage said anxiously to Louis: 'What about the travel documents - there was only this.' He held up the single sheet of paper.

'I expect the messenger has special instructions not to hand over the travel documents until he is sure you are going to Boulogne,' the Frenchman said lightly. 'Such documents would be worth a hundred gold livres to spies and other enemies of the Republic!'

'Quite so, quite so,' Ramage murmured. 'One can't be too careful.'

A few minutes later Jobert returned, holding a small packet. 'I signed a receipt for this, Signor,' he said in the sort of awed voice he might have used to confess that he had sold his soul to the Devil. 'The messenger is returning to Boulogne with the good news.'

'Thank you, landlord, thank you: it is a great inconvenience to everyone.'

'Oh no, Signor, an inconvenience to you, without doubt; but for us it is a pleasure that you will be staying until Sunday.' He intercepted a glance from Louis and excused himself.

Once the door had shut and they heard the man going down the stairs, Ramage handed the packet to Louis. 'You'd better check this over.'

The Frenchman opened it and took out several sheets of paper. He read them through and nodded. 'All correct - and I can vouch for them being absolutely genuine. The documents, anyway; I don't know about the three men named in them!'

Ramage slept badly that Friday night. Stafford and Louis had drunk a lot of wine at supper, and while the Frenchman had not turned a hair the Cockney went to bed tipsy and snored with a violence that reminded Ramage of a small boy running a stick along iron railings. The snoring and an imagination running riot left Ramage tossing and turning in his bed, going over in his mind every possible danger and difficulty they would face before they boarded the Marie and sailed for Folkestone. Nor was sleep helped by the fact that in his imagination the room was now turning into a prison cell; he had been trapped in it for a week and the walls and ceiling seemed to be closing in. Even in the darkness he felt that they were squeezing him like a clothes press.

Next morning at breakfast he told the landlord that he felt so much better that he was going for a walk; both he and his foreman needed some fresh air. The landlord hastened to suggest that the Cathedral square with its trees was a good place for a promenade. But the café, he said tactfully: he hoped the Signor would not visit it again ...

The day was sunny and under a cloudless sky the city of Amiens looked shabby but a little more cheerful. It would take many coats of paint on shops and houses, and the people would have to be wearing less darned clothes and at least one in a dozen needed to be smiling before Ramage would rate it more cheerful than the day he had arrived. The two of them walked until noon, when Ramage led the way back to their room-feeling considerably better: within eight or nine hours he should be reading Admiral Bruix's dispatch; in twenty or so they should all be rattling along the road to Boulogne. Beyond that he dared not think.

He was getting increasingly superstitious. Was it the effect of this damned room, was he losing his nerve? The knowledge that there was a guillotine in the north-western corner of the Cathedral square in the shade of a row of plane trees was depressing. The heavy blade was missing (presumably the executioner kept it at home, well greased against rusting) but it was still easy to see how it worked. Stafford had an unhealthy curiosity about the way the victim was 'turned off', and because Ramage would not let him betray his interest as they walked past, he checked after lunch with Louis.

The Frenchman was neither squeamish nor superstitious about ‘The Widow', pointing out that it was the régime that had killed his family, not a piece of machinery. He was proud of its sheer efficiency, pointing out that it was quicker and surer than the hangman's noose used in England, far less crude and brutal than the garotte used in Spain, and more certain than the headsman's axe previously used in France. It was not uncommon for a man to be alive ten minutes after being 'turned off' on the gallows, he told Stafford, while the garotte suffocated a man very slowly. With 'The Widow' it was over in a flash.

When Stafford began to argue the point, saying that at Newgate prison they now had a special hinged platform on which the condemned man stood, Louis silenced him with a wave of the hand. 'The noose or the axe depends on the skill of the individual executioner. If the drop is too short from the gallows, the victim strangles slowly; if it is too long, the noose just about wrenches his head off. If the axeman makes the slightest mistake, the axe can land across a man's shoulders or slice off the top of his skull, as you might cut the top off a boiled egg.'

'What you really mean is, the axeman might be drunk and miss his aim,' Stafford said contemptuously.

'Yes, drunk, nervous - or just tired.'

‘Tired?' Stafford exclaimed, 'Well, he oughter get a good night's sleep first!'

Louis said patiently, 'Mon ami, you don't understand. This morning you walked past the guillotine near the Cathedral, and I expect you thought of a man - or a woman - being executed there, with perhaps a crowd gathered round the platform.' Stafford nodded and the Frenchman continued: 'Well, try and picture the whole of that square filled with an excited, screaming mob of Revolutionaries - thousands of them, all yelling for blood. Imagine tumbrils - like hay carts - coming into the square one after another and packed full of terrified men and women, young and old, with their hands tied behind their backs and all condemned to death. Imagine the mob yelling insults and threats, throwing stones and rotten fruit at the condemned, many of whom are praying loudly, or weeping, or shrieking with fear.

'Imagine the gendarmes climbing up into the tumbrils as they come to a stop near the guillotine and pushing these people out. Because their hands are bound they lose their balance and fall, and from up on the guillotine platform, the bourreau - theexecutioner - is shouting at his assistants to hurry up as they lash the next victim's ankles together . . .

‘Two hundred people have been executed by that guillotine in one day, Stafford, all the work of one bourreau. If he still used an axe, I think he'd have been tired after the first fifty. He'd be excited, and with all that crowd, no doubt he'd be drunk. With the guillotine, it hardly matters if he is drunk ...'

‘Two hundred?' Stafford repeated unbelievingly.

'Only two hundred, because Amiens is a small city. In Paris it was nothing for a single guillotine to execute five hundred in a day. What slows down the rate is getting the decapitated bodies out of the way ...'

'Why is it called a guillotine?' Ramage found himself asking, fascinated by Louis's narrative. 'Did a M. Guillotine invent it?'

'Not exactly. A few years before the Revolution a member of the Assembly called Dr Guillotin (there was no final "e") proposed a resolution that a way of executing people should be found which was swift and avoided the risk of mistakes by an executioner. His motives were of the highest. The College of Surgeons were consulted about the swiftest and most painless method, and the decapitating machine with a falling blade was designed. When it was adopted for executions it was named after Dr Guillotin, who still lives in Paris. I heard he had a quarrel with Citizen Robespierre and was imprisoned during the Revolution, though I believe he has been set free by now.'

"Ow does it work?' Stafford asked, and Ramage knew he shared the Cockney's fascination, although it was unlikely Stafford shared his fears.

'Well, you saw how it looks: a vertical frame in which the blade falls is built at the end of a bench on which the victim lies, his head protruding over the end so that the neck is exactly below the blade.

'The neck rests in a shaped piece like the lower half of a pair of stocks, and there's an upper piece that is clamped down when the victim is in position. Some guillotines have a fixed bench so that the condemned person - who of course is bound - has to be lifted on to it. The newest ones have a bascule which pivots on an axle like a seesaw between vertical and horizontal.

'The guillotine blade (which is very heavy) has a diagonal cutting edge and is hoisted up by the bourreau - the executioner - who hauls on a rope. The rope is attached to the upper side of the blade, goes up through a pulley at the top of the frame, and comes down to a cleat at the side. There's a basket to catch the head, and a long basket to one side of the bascule for the body.

'Now, this is what happens at an execution: the bourreau’s assistants - they are called valets - seize the man. His wrists are tied behind his back, and his ankles are secured. The bascule is swung up vertically and the man is pushed against it. It is just the right length, so that he is looking over the top edge at the frame and blade.

'The valets push his shoulders so that he swings over with the bascule like someone lying on a seesaw, and is now horizontal, his neck resting in the shaped piece. The upper piece is clamped in position as though he has his head in the stocks, and the valets jump back out of the way in case they get their fingers nipped by the blade.

'The bourreau, who has already hoisted up the blade, flips the rope off the cleat and the blade falls so quickly the eye can hardly follow it. There is a thud, the head falls in the basket, and it is all over. The body is pushed sideways into the other basket and the bourreau hoists the blade again. It is kept well honed, although towards the end of a busy day it gets blunt and -'

‘That's enough, Louis,' Ramage interrupted. 'My neck feels sore already, and if Stafford can't picture it by now he never will.'

'You must admit it's interesting, sir,' Stafford said. 'You ever seen anyone get turned orf at Newgate?'

'No. I know it is regarded as great entertainment, but somehow I...’

'Oh, it's not too bad,' Stafford said enthusiastically. 'It's worse when you know the condemned man. Saw a cousin o' mine turned orf, once. Stood there a couple o' hours I did, waiting. Then as they fetched him out, St Sepulchre's church bell began tolling, the parson began saying the funeral service, an' that was that. Born to be cropped, my cousin was.'

'Cropped?' Louis asked, puzzled at the word.

'Yus, "Knocked down fer a crop." That's when the judge says the cramp words.'

The Frenchman shook his head, mystified, and Ramage looked puzzled. 'It's slang, yes, but what does it mean?'

'Mean yer don't know, sir?' Stafford said disbelievingly, 'Well, the cramp words is what the judge says when he knocks - when he sentences yer ter death. An' sentencing a man to death is - well, it's putting the noose round the neck and cropping 'im on collar day.'

'Collar day?' Louis exclaimed. 'Mon Dieu, what English is this?'

‘The noose fits like a collar,' Stafford explained crossly. 'Honest, Louis, yer don't speak English very good, really.'

'I do my best,' the Frenchman said wryly.

When Jobert and his wife brought up their supper promptly at seven o'clock there was still no sign of the lieutenant-de-vaisseau. Louis came in while the food was being served and as he sat down he said casually to the landlord: ‘I hope the lieutenant won't be too late tonight; we have a card tournament arranged.'

'Ah, we do not know what has delayed him. His other friend - the one you were playing cards with on Monday night - called in a few minutes ago. He said he did not want to miss another exciting evening.'

His wife made a disapproving noise and Louis raised his eyebrows questioningly. 'Gambling,' she sniffed. 'Such a waste of good time!'

'The citizens must choose how they divert themselves,' the landlord said reprovingly. 'They work hard for the Republic, and they deserve some relaxation.'

The woman muttered something Ramage and Louis could not catch, but her husband turned to them apologetically. 'My daughter - she is upset. She has not seen much of the lieutenant on his last two visits. I keep telling them that it is not often we have citizens in the hotel with whom the lieutenant can relax, but...'

Louis was quick to make profuse apologies to the woman. This is our last night here,' he concluded sadly.

She sniffed. 'You have not settled your account yet, Citizen,' she said acidly.

'Mon Dieu!' Louis muttered, and helped himself to more soup.

As soon as they had finished eating and Jobert had cleared the table, Louis followed him downstairs to settle the bill. He returned fifteen minutes later, cursing the landlord for a thief.

'There is a special charge for the "medicine",' he said angrily. 'And they've charged for a full meal every time you and Stafford had a plate of broth. The "medicine" is . . .'

'But you paid?' Ramage interrupted anxiously. "We don't want -'

'Don't worry, I made just the amount of fuss a French landlord would expect another Frenchman to make, and I made him reduce the bill by twenty per cent. He would have been suspicious if I'd paid the full amount!'

'No sign of the lieutenant?'

'No, the landlord is quite worried and his daughter in tears. He has never been as late as this. The girl is sure he has been thrown from his horse and is lying dead in a ditch.'

Ramage took out his watch. 'Just before nine o'clock. 1 hope she's not right!'

‘Tonight of all nights,' Louis said grimly. 'I thought everything had been going too well.' He rubbed his bristly chin in a characteristic gesture. 'Of course it could be the fault of Admiral Bruix . . .'

Ramage said nothing. From the time they had told the landlord that they would be returning to Boulogne on Sunday morning, he had known that the one thing that could wreck all their plans was the Admiral being late with the report. He might not finish it until late Saturday evening, and the lieutenant would get orders to ride direct to Paris without stopping - a hard ride but not impossible. The Admiral might not finish it until Sunday, and even then the lieutenant could still arrive in Paris in time to deliver it to the Minister on Monday.

Come to think of it - and he cursed himself for not paying more attention to the point - there was really nothing in Bruix's earlier letter that promised the Minister that the report would be sent off from Boulogne on Saturday. It was all his own assumption - that because the weekly dispatch to the Minister was always sent off on a Saturday, the special report would be treated in the same way. Yet the fact that it was a special report could mean that it would be dealt with specially: sent off to Paris as soon as it was ready, rather than have it dispatched in the regular way.

All this damned waiting, being cooped up in this room for a week, that damnable medicine, too, most likely for nothing. The more he thought about it, the more certain he became. He glanced up at Louis and knew the same thoughts were crossing the Frenchman's mind.

'If we can think of a reason to tell the landlord for staying longer, are those travel papers all right?'

'Yes, only the date that they were issued is written down, and they are for a single journey from Amiens to Boulogne. There is no final date, but they are valid for one month.'

‘I'll have to have a relapse. Hmm, no,' he finally decided, this was an occasion when he would take advantage of being an officer. 'I think Stafford will have a relapse. With a couple more blankets on his bed, he'll pass for feverish.'

The Cockney looked up at hearing his name, a puzzled grin on his face.

'I was telling Louis that if the lieutenant doesn't come tonight, we'll have to stay here until he does. We'll need a reason - and you look a bit feverish.'

'Aye aye, sir,' Stafford said cheerfully, and then his face fell. 'It don't mean more of that medicine, do it?'

'I won't hear a word against it - Louis says they've charged us three times the price of brandy for it.'

'Ah, 'tis too expensive for the likes of me,' Stafford said quickly. 'I'll make do with broth.' He looked keenly at Ramage and recognized the worried look. 'Is it dangerous, staying on 'ere, sir? I mean, would you rarver go somewhere else and 'ide? Louis is bound to know a safe 'ouse. I can 'eave this case an' bring you the satchel.'

'Heave this case?'

Had Stafford been a girl, Ramage would have said he suddenly looked coy as he said; 'I always tell a clerk ter put down "locksmith", sir, but - well, a'fore the press gang took me up I sort o' worked in Bridewell Lane on me own account, like.'

'At night, you mean,' Ramage said helpfully.

'That's right, sir.' He grinned when he realized that Ramage was pulling his leg. 'We can keep a watch on the 'tenant's window each night. When we see a light we know 'e's 'ere. When the light goes out we know 'e's gorn fer 'is grub, an' our Will is up the drainpipe and darn again with the satchel a'fore you can say Jack Ketch.'

Ramage envied the Cockney's nonchalance. 'Heave the case,' he reminded him.

Stafford's jaw dropped for a moment, and then he grinned again. 'Our slang, sir. "Heave" is - well, you'd call it burgle. A "case" is -' he thought hard for a moment, 'well, it's the place wot gets burgled. Like the Italian word,'

'Casa? But that means "house",'

'Exackly,' Stafford said triumphantly. 'Yer see . . .'

His voice tailed off as all three men's eyes went to the door.

There were heavy footsteps coming up the stairs. Two men . . . the landlord was speaking, although it was impossible to distinguish his words. They reached the corridor, and still the landlord was talking. He sounded anxious. Another guest who was doubtful about the quality of the rooms? Then the coarse laugh of the lieutenant.

Louis sighed with relief and sat down at the table.

After Louis had gone downstairs to join the lieutenant, Ramage decided to write the first part of his report to Lord Nelson, so wording it that he could then copy the facts and figures from Admiral Bruix's letter without delay. Louis's concern the previous Monday night about having incriminating papers in the room had been justified, though Ramage was more than worried that he was himself becoming obsessed about it.

As previously arranged, Louis came back into the room after an hour, ostensibly because he had forgotten his purse but actually to tell Ramage that supper was over and they were just settling down to play cards, and Ramage had to fight with his own impatience and nervousness to let five minutes pass before nodding to Stafford.

As the Cockney left the room Ramage's heart began to thud. The game begins . . . like going into action and waiting for the first enemy gun to fire and drive away the fear. The long wait was nearly over: in the next few minutes he would know if he had the answers to every question the Admiralty could think of, not just those covered by his orders. If he succeeded, the First Lord got a bonus. If he failed - even thinking about it was making his breathing shallow and chilly perspiration was trickling down his spine. His stomach seemed full of a cold liquid churning round. It was not often he could sit quietly in a chair observing his own fear. It was far worse than being on his own quarterdeck while he was taking the ship into action. At sea there were tactics to decide (and sometimes hastily changed at the last moment), sails to be trimmed, orders to be given: with so much to do there was no time to think of fear as such; it crept in, like a misty rain which soaks clothes and chills bodies, unless he was busy. Fear did not get a chance to take a grip on him on a quarterdeck, and the busier he was the more likely it was that someone who did not understand fear would say he was brave. The real test - and one Ramage wouldn't pass - was sitting in a chair and waiting for things to happen over which he had no control. Stafford had gone to get the satchel; he had orders to open it, and then open the seal of a dispatch. The only trouble was that Ramage had no control over whether or not the dispatch was in the satchel . . .

Ramage was watching the door so intently that when it wung open suddenly he gave such a start that he bit his tongue. Cursing to himself, he licked a finger to see if he had drawn blood and, after Stafford walked in and tossed the satchel on the table in a gesture which nearly blew out the candle, Ramage decided that he was too tense to watch him open the seal - providing the Admiral's letter was there.

I'll watch him sort the letters, then I'll take my jacket off slowly and hang it up, he told himself; anything to avoid watching the hot spatula sliding under the paper and knowing we've lost everything if Stafford heats the metal a fraction too much. Not everything, of course; with this last dispatch it did not really matter so much. The melted seal would not be discovered until the satchel was opened in Paris on Monday morning: but it was still better if the French never discovered that the satchel had been opened . . .

Stafford selected the right picklock, gave a few wiggles and the flap of the satchel sprang open. Same satchel but someone had been polishing it: the deep scratch below the lock was still there but stained by the polish.

One thickish packet and - one, two . . . seven . . . nine . . . fourteen . . . fifteen other letters. Only the packet is addressed to the Minister; the rest are for various departments in the Ministry. Stafford is already heating the spatula with a cheery grin as he pulls the packet in front of him, seal uppermost, and runs a hand through his hair. In Stafford it was confidence; in others it might have been mistaken for bravado. The spatula blade was discolouring with the heat and collecting soot . . . Stafford testing it on the back of his hand and put it back in the flame, leaving a smear of soot on the skin of his hand. A full minute passed before he tried it again then, after a quick movement to wipe the soot on his trousers, he slid the spatula under the packet.

Ramage looked away but he knew he could not stand up and take off his jacket with the nonchalance he had intended. He must stay sitting there; Stafford might want him to hold something. He kept his eyes off the seal and looked at the candle but that was no good - when he looked away there were candle flames all over the place. Back to the seal with the wax turning shiny as the heat gets to it. Is this how a rabbit feels when a ferret is staring at it? Now Stafford is flicking the spatula away and the packet is open, and the look on his face means that everything has gone well.

'There y'are, sir.'

Ramage unfolded it carefully and found five pages. Paragraphs of neat writing and many figures. He reached for the paper, unscrewed the top of the inkwell, but did not bother to check the tip of the quill because it had been all right half an hour ago.

Bruix's report began with all the polite preliminaries: the French might have fought a Revolution but they still clung to the sort of archaic phrases beloved by the Admiralty. And here, Citizen Minister, is the situation of the Invasion Flotilla at the time of writing . . . Ah, how nice of Bruix! 'I have given first the type of vessel and, for convenience of reference, its capacity. Then I have listed the total number ordered by the First Consul, followed by the number actually launched, commissioned, awaiting commissioning or under construction, and finally the deficit at the time of writing.

The vessels noted as "awaiting commissioning",' Bruix continued, 'are those which have been launched but which cannot be completed because we lack masts, sails, rigging and guns. You can see how many vessels are under construction, and although there has not been time to distinguish the precise stage each has reached, I have indicated how many are more than half completed.'

Ramage skimmed through and finally read the last few paragraphs of the dispatch in which Bruix acknowledged the Minister's last letter. The shipyards had been told that they would be paid as soon as funds arrived from Paris, but he regretted having to report that it had proved impossible to prevent a number of workmen ('especially skilled shipwrights and carpenters, who can command high wages by working in the cities making and repairing furniture') from running away, Guards were on duty at the shipyards, but the men were billeted in private homes and it was impossible to keep a watch on them day and night. A proclamation had been read to all the men warning them that they risked conscription.

Bruix took this opportunity of listing once again the deficiency in guns so that the Minister should have, in one dispatch, all the facts at his disposal. In view of the Minister's reference to providing funds for the shipyards and wages, Bruix said, he forebore from repeating the actual requirements to settle all accounts and wages to date.

Ramage sighed. Now to copy the facts and figures. He turned back to the first page and began writing:

'Flotille de grande espèce

'Barges carrying 4,320 men and intended to sail in two divisions. Each barge to carry 50 cavalry, 25 infantry, 3 officers and 2 non-combatants, and a cargo of 27 muskets, 20 bayonets, 200 tools, 1200 cartridges, 1500 rations of biscuit, 500 of oats and 500 of bran, 50 horses, 60 saddles and 6 sheep.

'Ordered - 54. Launched - 23. Of these there were sufficient masts, spars, cordage and sails to complete and commission only 11. Under construction — 5 (all less than half completed). Deficit - 26.

'Sloops, forming the Second Flotilla, each with a pinnace in company, and carrying a total for the Second Flotilla of 35,964. Each sloop to carry 3 officers of a company, 91 officers and men, 2 officers of a battalion staff, 1 officer of the general staff, 3 gunners, 3 wagoners, 8 surgeons. The cargo to comprise 27 muskets, 20 bayonets, 27 pioneers' tools, 1,200 flints, 12,000 cartridges, 1,200 rations of biscuit, 150 pints of brandy and 4 sheep.

'Ordered - 324. Launched - 109. Of these, only 69 could be commissioned. Under construction - 15 (of which four are more than half completed). Deficit - 200.

'Gunboats, to form the Third Flotilla, each with a pinnace in company and carrying 130 men for a total of 56,160 (including 3,456 surgeons). Each gunboat to be armed with one 24-pounder gun and also to carry 1 piece of field artillery and the same cargo as sloops, plus 2 horses, 10 bushels of oats and bran, and 200 rounds of shot.

'Ordered - 432. Launched - 73. Of these, only 19 have been commissioned. Still under construction—14 (of which 12 are more than half completed). Deficit - 345.

'Caiques, forming the Fourth Flotilla. To carry a total of 2,160 men with 216,000 cartridges, 21,600 rations of biscuit, 1,080 rations of brandy and 108 sheep.

'Required - 540. Requisitioned, commandeered or captured - 127. (Note: only 63 of these have arrived at Boulogne, Calais, Étaples, St Valery or Wimereux. Another 11 have reached Le Havre and Cherbourg. The remaining 53 are in various ports between Antwerp and St Jean de Luz awaiting safe convoy.) Deficit - 413.

'Corvettes, forming the Fifth Flotilla, each carrying 40 men for a total of 3,240. These to carry the same cargo as gunboats but no artillery or ammunition.

'Ordered - 81. Launched - 10. (Note: 27 old corvettes have been refitted but none is less than 25 years old.) Deficit - 44,

'Fishing boats, forming the Sixth Flotilla, and to carry 2,160 horses and riders, with a double supply of horses and riders.

'Required - 108. Requisitioned, commandeered or captured - 108.

'Fishing boats of six different types to form the Transport Flotilla, and intended to carry 3 million cartridges, 1,208 horses, 3,560 officers and men, 1,760 canteen women, and a considerable quantity of other military stores too numerous to list here.

'Required - 464. Requisitioned, commandeered or captured: 276. Deficit - 188.

'Another Flotilla comprising 100 to 150 large, armed fishing boats have yet to be found,' Bruix wrote. "These are intended to carry 200 horses, 1,000 men, 10,000 rations of biscuit, 10,000 rations each of brandy, oats and bran, and 200 sheep.'

From the preceding figures, Bruix noted, it will be seen the number of men that the vessels ordered or required can carry, 110,324, is less than the required strength of the Army of Invasion (working on a total of 113,474, comprising 76,798 infantrymen, 11,640 cavalry, 3,780 artillerymen, 3,780 wagoners and 17,476 non-combatants), but it is anticipated that each vessel will be able to carry an extra dozen or so men.

'The search still goes on in all ports from Antwerp to St Jean de Luz,' the Admiral added, 'for 300 merchant ships of less than seven feet draught and each of which can carry 100 men. Although there had been some success in finding a number, several of these have since been captured by British cruisers and privateers while making for Boulogne.'

Bruix concluded with what Ramage read as a plea to Forfait to make it clear to the First Consul that he had done the best he could with the money, men and materials available, and he continued to doubt the wisdom of trying to make seaworthy those craft built for similar projects in the 1760s: they required a disproportionate amount of men and materials -particularly men, since only skilled shipwrights could be used for that type of work.

Ramage drew a line and then signed his name. Then he put down the pen and screwed the top on the inkwell. He gave a sigh of relief and looked at his watch. It had taken twenty-five minutes. 'Here, you'd better seal this and take it to Louis's room. 1 hope he remembered to get a fresh loaf!'

'He did, sir, an' he told me he'd slit it ready for up to six sheets of paper. You've only used -' Stafford flicked through the pages, 'three. I'll seal them first.' He folded them and ran his thumb nail along the creases to flatten them. Picking up a stick of red wax he glanced at Ramage's signet ring. 'Want ter use the seal, sir?'

Ramage shook his head. 'Too risky - if that was intercepted and I was caught...'

As soon as the blobs of wax sealed Ramage's letter, Stafford left the room in his usual silent manner, returning to say that it was secure in the loaf.

'Want ter glance at any of these, sir?' He gestured towards the remaining letters.

'No - we've done enough for tonight. Just seal up the Admiral's dispatch and get that satchel back under the lieutenant's bed, so we can get to sleep!'

The job was nearly done. Almost unbelievably, they had succeeded. It remained only for Stafford to reheat the spatula and fix the seal, put all the correspondence back in the satchel, and return it. Ramage decided to lie on his bed to savour the feeling of relief: Stafford needed no help, and Ramage was beginning to feel weak from relaxation of tension and almost unbelievably tired.

The bed creaked, and as he stretched out he realized just how weary he was. Stafford was humming quietly to himself and Ramage watched the shadow of the Cockney's head dancing across the ceiling.

'That's it, me beauty,' Stafford muttered and blew vigorously. 'Ah - just as good as the horiginal. In yer go.' Ramage was reminded of a poacher talking to his ferret. There was a click as he turned the lock on the satchel. 'Right, that's that, sir; I'll be off darn the corridor.'

Ramage murmured contentedly. Drowsily he wondered if Louis was winning at cards. Tomorrow morning, in a few hours' time, all three of them would be in a carriage rattling along the road to Boulogne, with the report preceding them, safe from interception should they be captured. Jackson and Rossi would be waiting at Boulogne with the Marie and Dyson. Curious that a scoundrel like Dyson should eventually do something that made up for all his past crimes. Dare he tell Lord Nelson all about him, so that Dyson would not go through the rest of his life a wanted man? Plenty of time to think about that later; now it was good to sleep knowing that the work was done, and it only remained to escape . . .

A woman's shrill scream went through him like a dagger. She screamed again and again in desperate fear; then he heard her running along the corridor and down the stairs, still screaming as she went. The landlord's daughter?

He leapt out of bed and grabbed Stafford's spatula, the stick of wax and the remaining bundle of picklocks. Where could he hide them? The screaming had stopped but he could hear thumping below, as though men were coming up the stairs. Stafford had not come back and it was difficult to know what had happened.

Hurriedly he tossed the picklocks, wax and spatula up on top of the canopy over the bed, then dragged off his clothes and pulled on his nightshirt, blew out the candle and hurried to the door, waiting a few seconds before opening it as the: first of the men ran past.

It was the lieutenant with a lantern, followed by Louis and then the landlord.

'What's happening?' Ramage asked sleepily and with suitable nervousness.

'Burglars!' the landlord said, using Raimage's appearance to leave the other two men to run into the lieutenant's room. 'My daughter found them and raised the alarm!'

'What was she doing up here?'

'She had written a billet doux for the lieutenant and crept up to put it under his pillow, I think. Then she saw all these men. Half a dozen or more, she says ...'

Ramage murmured sympathetic noises as he listened. A few moments later the lieutenant strode out, chest puffed with importance. 'There is no one there - and the dispatches are safe -' he waved the satchel he was holding. 'The window is wide open - the villains escaped. Landlord! Fetch the gendarmes - we must start a search for them. Six men!'

The landlord scurried down the stairs.

'Did you see anything, M'sieur?' the lieutenant asked Ramage.

'Nothing - I heard screaming. It woke me up.?

Louis said, 'M'sieur still looks half asleep, for all that!'

Ramage took the hint. He rubbed his eyes. 'I am, too. Did they get away with anything valuable?'

'Nothing that I can see,' the lieutenant said complacently. He held up the satchel. ‘This is all that matters. That is still firmly locked, as you can see -' he tugged at the flap. 'The only keys that will open it are in Boulogne and in Paris. The Admiral's dispatches to the Minister of Marine.'

'Do you think the burglars were after that?' Louis asked innocently.

The lieutenant shook his head vigorously. 'Not a chance. Who could know that I carry dispatches? And anyway, the satchel is always concealed. I rely on your discretion, gentlemen,' he said confidentially.

'Just common thieves,' Louis said. ‘They probably looked through the window and saw we were playing cards. Why,' he exclaimed, 'they'd have seen me, too! Here, lend me your lantern, I must see if I've been robbed!'

Louis fiddled with the key for a few moments - Ramage remembered he had left the door unlocked and obviously wanted to conceal the fact from the lieutenant - swung the door open and went inside.

'Everything is all right,' he said when he emerged. 'They must have decided to search your room first. They recognized you as a man of substance,' he added slyly.

'You are winning at cards,' the lieutenant grumbled. 'Second time running. A month's pay you've taken off me so far -'

He broke off. Strange voices were coming up the stairs and Ramage saw two gendarmes, each with a lantern. They clumped along the corridor and stopped.

'Which of you is the Italian, di Stefano?'

Ramage stepped forward, puzzled.

'Get dressed,' one of the gendarmes snapped, 'you are under arrest,'