Ramage And The Rebels

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Back on board the Calypso Ramage returned Wagstaffe's salute and commented on the springs now on the anchor cable. With only three hours of daylight left, there was a lot to be done. The Calypso's other three boats had been hoisted out and now floated astern of the frigate, the ducklings behind the mother.

The officers were all within sight of the gangway: obviously they had expected a surge of activity the moment the captain and the first lieutenant returned from Government House. Ramage decided it was too hot for them all to go down to his cabin and pointed towards the binnacle.

Briefly and quickly Ramage gave each of them his instructions. Rennick was to divide his Marines among the Calypso's four boats. Wagstaffe was to command one, Baker another, Kenton the third, and Ramage himself the fourth. This had resulted in protests from both Southwick and Aitken, but Ramage had silenced both of them by asking if they spoke French. When they admitted what he knew well, that they did not, he had shrugged his shoulders, as if that was the reason why they had not been chosen.

In fact Ramage had decided to lead the little expedition simply because he was bored; there was no chance of any action, but the walk to and from Government House had been the first escape from the Calypso's quarterdeck for weeks, and his cabin was beginning to feel like a cell. None of the other officers had been off the ship, but they had each other's company in the gunroom while the captain lived in almost monastic seclusion.

Ramage took out his watch. 'We start in fifteen minutes. Mr Kenton, will you pass the word for my coxswain?'

With that he went down to his cabin and, with Silkin's help, changed into an old uniform. Jackson arrived before he had finished and, told what was about to happen, began methodically to load the pair of pistols which were kept in the case in the bottom drawer of Ramage's desk. They were a matched pair, beautifully balanced, a present from Gianna and bought the day he had been made post. In fact the visit with Gianna to the gunsmith in Bond Street had been his first foray in his new uniform, when the single epaulet showing he was a post captain with less than three years' seniority seemed to weigh a ton and pull his shoulder down.

First Jackson snapped them to make sure each flint gave a strong spark; then he opened the chamois - leather bag of lead shot, looking like dull grey marbles, and selected two that had no dents or flaws. Then he opened the box of wads, small circles of felt the diameter of the bore of the guns, took out four, and reached for the two powder horns. From the larger he poured a measure down the barrel of one pistol - a lever on the spout of the horn measured the exact amount - and, with a rammer, pushed home a wad, then a shot, and then a second wad. He then took the smaller horn and poured some of the fine powder it contained into the pan and shut it He then repeated the process with the second gun.

He looked at the two guns critically. They were beautifully made and no doubt very accurate but, he wondered, bow would they stand up to the kind of harsh use that was usually the pistol's lot in a ship of wan fired and then often hurled at an enemy's head, dropped on the deck, used as a club? The regular Sea Service pistol had the grace of a hammer compared with these, but it could also stand up to being used as a hammer, a bung starter or a wedge driver. Accuracy as such was not really important; it was rare that a man with a pistol fired at a target more than twenty feet away, in fact, Jackson realized, he could not remember ever aiming at a target even that distant fighting on board a ship was a close - range business, often little more than jamming the muzzle of a pistol in an enemy's ribs and squeezing die trigger.

As Ramage came into the cabin, having changed, Jackson held out the pistols, which Ramage took and slid the belt clips into the waistband of his breeches. Jackson saw that he now wore a cutlass belt over his shoulder the usual sword, used for ceremonial occasions and which he had worn on shore for his visit to the Dutch Governor, must be back on its rack on the bulkhead. It was a good job that the Marchesa, who had also bought that, did not know . . .

'Do you think well have any trouble, sir?'

Ramage shrugged his shoulders. 'I doubt it.'

The lads hope we will,' Jackson commented, and when Ramage raised his eyebrows questioningly he added: 'After what that Spanish privateer did to those people, the lads won't be giving quarter to privateersmen . . .'

These are French, though,' Ramage said, more because he was interested to hear Jackson's reaction than by way of defending privateersmen.

They're as bad. Any man that goes privateering is no better than a thief and a murderer, sir. Why, they say most of the privateersmen are on shore, attacking the Dutch and burning their villages. They'd loot this place as soon as look at it. . .'

Ramage knew only too well that Jackson, in his unique position as the captain's coxswain and respected by the ship's company, was well placed to relay information to the men, information that was in effect official but not announced by the captain on the quarterdeck.

The chief of these privateers, a man called Brune, has already warned the Governor that they'll burn down this town and murder the people unless he surrenders it to them.'

'Brune, eh?' Jackson repeated. 'Means "brown", doesn't it, sir? Must be a nasty sort of man to want to burn down his ally's capital . . .'

Ramage led the way out of the cabin, knowing that the information would pass through the ship like a gust of wind, and was soon walking along the gangway to the entry port, where Aitken and Southwick were waiting.

'Your gig's ready, sir,' Aitken reported, 'and the rest of the boats are holding on astern, each with the number of seamen and Marines you specified.'

Aitken's voice was polite, as became a first lieutenant reporting to his captain, but the tone made it clear that the Scot was not overly keen on staying behind while Ramage went off, even though the expedition seemed little more than routine.

Southwick, telescope under one arm, said lugubriously: 'I've been watching those privateers for an hour or two. There's something odd about 'em, but I'm damned if I know what it is.'

They might be like us, brandy in - the water casks.'

Southwick grimaced: he had not been allowed to forget the purser's concern, nor had he yet devised a satisfactory way of disposing of it.

Ramage settled himself in the sternsheets, careful that the butts of the pistols did not jab his ribs, and the gig cast off. Jackson steered the boat at the head of a small armada: immediately astern was the launch with twenty - four boarders and commanded by Wagstaffe, then the pinnace with sixteen under Baker and finally the cutter with another sixteen under Kenton, who was enjoying his first command in what he hoped would be an action.

In Ramage's gig Rennick sat stiffly on a thwart with his Marines, and, although his head did not move, his eyes missed nothing: any sign of movement on board the privateers, a grease stain on a Marine's tunic, a button missing, a musket butt whose woodwork showed a scratch which had not been carefully stained and then waxed.

As the gig leapt forward, the rowers' faces soon glistening and then running with perspiration, Ramage watched the sides of the channel and the privateers with all the concentration of a hungry poacher uncertain whether the gamekeeper really was ill in bed. Small rowing boats from which two or three men had been fishing suddenly scurried for the shore as they saw the boarders leaving the Calypso; men who had been working on the quays or walking along the paths lining the banks farther down stopped to watch, the more prudent of them then disappearing. A woman snatched up a small child and ran back towards Punda; a soldier on the Otrabanda side stood still, obviously uncertain what to do. Shutters slammed shut across many windows of houses facing the channel and sent gulls squawking off in alarm.

Then, as the gig approached, Ramage watched the privateers. The ten were anchored in pairs, the Trade wind swinging them diagonally across the channel. Presumably each pair was secured together to make it easier for the maintenance parties: half a dozen men could just as easily look after two privateers rafted up alongside each other as one. The first pair soon obscured his view of the rest, but they were all big vessels. The nearest was the largest and smartest - a schooner perhaps a little smaller than La Creole. He counted the ports - she was pierced for ten guns, and a couple of bowchasers. Were they carronades, intended to sweep the victim's deck with grapeshot as she approached? Black hull, buff masts, white topmasts. Booms Mack, which was strange. All the paint was dull and neglected, yet the sun reflecting from some of the rigging showed that it had been recently tarred.

The second privateer, beyond, was ketch - rigged, her hull painted green, the dark - green of slave ships, the colour of mangrove leaves so that they could hide in the narrow inlets, their hulls blending with the bushes lining the banks. Her lower masts were buff and her topmasts white, so anyone looking for them would be unlikely to spot them against the white of clouds. Ramage once remembered explaining all that to an Army officer, who expected the topmasts to be blue, to match the sky, not realizing that in the Tropics, and particularly on the Guinea coast, there was nearly always broken cloud scudding along. Yes, with that sweeping sheer and low freeboard the ketch was probably a former slaver now finding that in wartime privateering was more profitable.

He felt sure that the nearest privateer, the schooner, belonged to Brune; the leader, or most senior of the privateers, would choose the best berth. In an emergency, the schooner would be the first out of the harbour because she was the nearest to the entrance. And when Brune was on board but felt lie an evening in one of Amsterdam's brothels or cafes his boat had the shortest distance to row. ''

There I A definite movement behind that bowchaser, which was a carronade. And a blur of blue behind the first gun, die washed - out blue that French seamen always favoured. Ramage stood up, drawing his cutlass and waving it a couple of times to attract the attention of the boats astern before pointing to left and right. Even without looking astern he knew that Wagstaffe had started to turn the launch to larboard and Baker would swing the pinnace out to starboard, while Kenton moved over to larboard a few yards with the cutter to be between Ramage and Wagstaffe. The four boats, in line abreast, now made a series of individual targets and as, they took up their positions the men rowed even harder at the oars.

Suddenly the schooner's carronade and first two guns were run out, their barrels jabbing from the ports like black, accusing fingers. Ramage, feeling that the gig was rowing right into the muzzle of the carronade, suddenly stood up again and, using the speaking trumpet that he had brought with him, shouted in French: 'If you fire, we will give no quarter!'

For more than a minute nothing happened and Ramage reckoned that the threat, the sight of four boats laden with boarders, and the harbour entrance blocked by a British frigate, was going to be enough to make the men in the privateers surrender. But the carronade gave an obscene red wink; suddenly yellow, oily smoke spurted out and with a noise like ripping calico the sea fifteen yards away to starboard erupted as if a hundred great fish had broken the surface in a gigantic leap to escape a marauding shark.

The crash of the gun firing was deafening but a moment later, as if from a great distance, Ramage heard Stafford's voice, a mixture of awe and scorn: The capting'd flog us if we aimed that bad I'

'And hell flog you anyway unless you put your back into that oar,' Jackson snarled. They shouldn't miss with the next round.'

The Frog wiv the grapeshot'll drop it on 'is foot and waste time cussing.'

Ramage saw that the second and third guns, 6 - pounders, were trained more to larboard, at the launch and the cutter.

'Quick,' Ramage snapped at Rennick, 'have your men fire at the ports!'

He cursed himself for not doing it sooner. The chances of a musket ball hitting Frenchmen were slight - any Marine who could fire through a port from a fast - moving boat would be a king among sharpshooters - but the thud of musket balls into woodwork might spoil the enemy gunners' concentration. The gig's oarsmen's ears would soon be ringing as the muskets fired over their heads, but it was the only chance of saving the men in the other boats.

Rennick snapped an order that could be heard in all the boats and in a moment the Marines were standing, one knee on the thwarts. Ramage could hear a succession of dicks as the men cocked the locks and then, within a couple more seconds, all had fired and some were coughing as the smoke drifted back and caught their throats.

Forty yards to go: Ramage could see dried salt forming a grey band two or three feet broad above the privateer's water - line and the black paint had the mauvish tinge that came from too much sun, salt - and age. The seams of the hull planking were opening up with the heat of the sun constantly on one side.

The bow!' he called to Jackson. 'Stand by, men; well board over her bow: up the bobstay, anchor cable, anchor stock - men with broad shoulders give the little chaps a leg - up!'

The Marines were frantically ramming home fresh shot as they reloaded their muskets, and now most of them were priming. 'One more volley through the ports, sir?' Rennick asked. They've all got pistols.'

And why not, Ramage thought they were dose enough now that at least a few shot should get through the ports, and discharged muskets 'could be left in the boat because, as Rennick had just pointed out, each Marine had a pistol, like the seamen.

'Very well, but aim with care!'

Again mere was what seemed a ragged volley which in fact showed that each man was firing carefully, aiming for the narrow gap between gun and bulwark. There was more space at the top, but they were now so dose that the barrel of the gun helped protect the French gunners.

Suddenly there was an enormous crash, a thump of invisible pressure, and smoke filled the boat, followed by a distant shriek and confused shouting. The sun darkened and then lightened, and Ramage felt his lungs burning as he breathed in gun smoke. But his men were still rowing; the oars were still squeaking in the rowlocks and they came out into the sunlight again.

He glanced round to larboard, guessing what he would see. The second gun had fired and the cutter was now just a swirl in the water with splintered planking and oars floating away. Heads were bobbing about in the wreckage - several heads. Wagstaffe and the launch were still rowing fast but farther away now because, Ramage was glad to note, the second lieutenant was making for the schooner's stern, which also took him out of the arc of fire of the first gun. With Ramage's men boarding over the bow and Wagstaffe's over the transom, with luck Baker would board amidships, providing Ramage's men could silence that carronade.

Ramage twisted his cutlass belt round so that the blade hung down his back and would not trip him; he pushed the pistols more firmly into his waistband and jammed his hat firmly on his head.

Twenty yards, ten, five - and then the gig was under the privateer's bow, the oars were backing water to stop the boat, and there was a wild scramble as men began climbing, Ramage grabbed the thick, rusty lower fluke of the spare anchor and kicked upwards. The top edge of the planking, doubled for a couple of feet below the sheer line, made a narrow ledge for his feet so that he was held horizontally. He paused for a moment and saw that one swing up with his legs would enable him to catch his feet in the bottom edge of the port for the bowchase gun, the carronade that had missed the gig but which by now must have been reloaded and ready to fire.

He tensed his muscles and heaved upwards, and a moment later was standing spreadeagled across the port, off balance and leaning inboard with his belly against the wide muzzle of the gun. At the breech, four feet away, he saw a blur of movement: a man to one side cocked the flintlock; a second man, behind and beyond the recoil of the gun, began to take the strain on a lanyard - the trigger line which fired the gun. Within a moment the carronade would fire and blow him in half - the men were apparently aiming for Baker and the pinnace at the very moment that Ramage appeared at the port. He tugged for one of his pistols. It came clear of the waistband and his thumb cocked it as one of the Frenchmen screamed a warning to the others and lashed out at Ramage with a handspike, a six - foot - long steel - tipped lever used to move the other guns and which would have crushed Ramage's head if the tip had not caught the side of the face of another man in the French gun's crew. Ramage, still seeing it all as a blur, aimed along the lanyard towards the man at the end and fired; then regaining his balance he wriggled sideways round the barrel and in through the port just as the man with the lanyard - the gun captain, in fact - collapsed within a foot of the man hit by the handspike.

As he tugged his second pistol free he sensed rather than saw men rushing past him: his own men from the gig who, coming over the bow, had not found so fast a route on board. The rest of the carronade's crew had vanished - fled aft, presumably, when they saw the Calypsos coming over the bow. But as Ramage looked back out of the port to see where the other boats were, he realized that the fighting had stopped: the privateer's crew were dead or had surrendered.

Then in the sea a few yards away he saw the expanding circle of splintered wood, the remains of the cutter with men clinging to the wreckage. Wagstaffe had obeyed his orders and not stopped with the launch, but now a boat could go back and pick up survivors. Jackson was standing in front of him, grinning cheerfully. 'All surrendered, three wounded, and this chap here - ' he pointed to the man hit by the handspike - 'and one dead, the one you shot, sir.'

'And our casualties?'

'None on board here, sir, but the cutter . . .'

'Yes, get back and pick up the survivors; I can see several men holding on to wreckage.'

Then Wagstaffe was reporting and then Baker, and after making sure the prisoners were being guarded, Ramage led them in a dash to the second privateer alongside, but there was no one on board. There were still eight more privateers to be secured, and after returning to the schooner and leaving instructions for securing the prisoners, he ordered the men back into the boats. As an afterthought he ordered one of the guards to lower the French flag, and the man paused a moment and said: ''Sfunny thing, sir: she's flying French colours, but she's got a Spanish name on her transom: I noticed it as I climbed on board.'

'What name?'

'Can't rightly pronounce it, sir, but summat like Newstra lady of Antigua. I know it was "Antigua" 'cos I thought of English Harbour.'

"Was it Nuestra Senora de Antigua!' The tone of Ramage's voice and his correct pronunciation made the seaman stare at him. 'Cor, sir - then this is the privateer what murdered all them in the Tranquil!' Ramage nodded. A French privateer with a Spanish name and probably commanded by Adolphe Brune, who had described himself as 'chief of the privateers' in the letter to van Someren demanding Amsterdam's surrender. If Brune survives mis affair in Curacao, Ramage vowed, hell end up dangling on a noose from one of the gibbets on the Palisades at Port Royal.

By five o'clock that evening the gig, launch and pinnace were back alongside the Calypso, secured to the boat boom. More than sixty French prisoners from the ten privateers - more than ten times the number Ramage had expected - had been ferried on shore and locked up in the town jail. Because Amsterdam was a large port and accustomed to acting as the forcible host to crowds of drunken and rioting seamen, the jail was a large stone building, and the Governor assured Ramage that the jailers were quite capable of dealing with up to a hundred prisoners without the cells seeming crowded.

The capture of the rest of the privateers without a shot being fired had been luck: Ramage realized that none of the Frenchmen in the remaining eight had seen the shot smashing the cutter to pieces; the whole action had been hidden by the sheer bulk of Brune's schooner and the ketch. They had heard a carronade and a 6 - pounder each fire once, apparently without effect on the British, and the nearest of them had heard a single pistol shot, and then the French flag had come down at the run on board the Nuestra Senora. That had been enough to make each of them surrender immediately one of the Calypso's boats came alongside.

Now the ten privateers were still at anchor in Amsterdam, but on board each one were two Dutch soldiers who had simple orders: if any French came into sight on the quays and looked as though they might board, they were to light the slow matches leading.to the magazines and escape in the rowing boats which had been commandeered from local fishermen. The fishermen had made no protest at losing their boats temporarily; they had lost their appetite for fishing.

Bowen was still busy patching up the wounded. Three of the cutter's crew had been badly cut and bruised by splinters but were in no danger; two were missing and obviously killed and one man, with no mark on him, was just cold and trembling, unable to walk or talk. Kenton was once again his lively self but swearing he would always wear shoes, not knee - length boots, on any further boat operations. If he had to swim again, he declared, he could kick off shoes, but his boots had acted like ballast An otherwise sympathetic Aitken had agreed with the problem of boots but warned Kenton against kicking off the shoes, pointing out that: 'Ye never know but y' might have to walk a long way back to the ship.' His Scots accent made 'ship' sound like 'sheep', and Kenton had gone off muttering that he was a sailor, not a shepherd.

Southwick and Aitken had watched the action through their telescopes and seen Ramage momentarily draped over the muzzle of the carronade and knew it must be on the verge of firing. The master hid his feelings with the comment to Ramage that Then I remembered you were wearing your oldest uniform and had left behind the new sword the Marchesa gave you, so only the pistols would be lost' For a moment Aitken had been shocked, then he had seen Ramage's grin and had joined in with: 'Aye, I thought for a minute or two I'd be moving up a deck. I find my present cabin both small and hot in this weather .. .'

Then, with Southwick's assurance that he had no wish to spend the evening on shore and Bowen declaring he would not leave his patients, Ramage and his officers went below to prepare themselves for dinner with the Governor. Ramage was worn out, but he could think of no possible excuse to avoid at least an hour or two at Government House. After going below to chat with the wounded men - and finding them cheerful but chagrined, complaining bitterly that before they could 'get a swing' at the French they found themselves swimming - he went to his cabin, let Silkin pull off his boots (Kenton's vow about shoes made sense: apart from anything else the hot decks and walking had swollen his feet so much that pulling off his boots needed as much effort - or so it seemed - as pulling off his feet), and then sat back for ten minutes, trying to relax.

Relaxing, everyone told him, was a very fine thing. Relax for ten minutes, banish all worrisome thoughts from your head, and at the end of it you were as refreshed as a flower garden after a summer shower. It probably worked for some people but it depended on relaxing in the first place. If you could not relax, then you felt (and probably looked) like a flower garden after a long drought His feet throbbed as though someone was pounding them with dubs; his eyes were sore from the day's scorching sun; his hands were not visibly trembling but like his knees they gave that impression. If he tried to rest his mind for a moment - the first stage, as it were, to relaxing - he felt the muzzle of that carronade pressing against his belly, the iron barrel warm to his hands from the heat of the sun, and hunched there, unbalanced and frightened, he could smell the garlic, the Stockholm tar, the bilges and the sheer stink of unwashed French seamen. Then once again he heard, almost felt, mat sharp metallic click of the gun's second captain cocking the lock, and he could see the gun captain's eyes staring at him, startled and momentarily paralysed by his sudden appearance at the port. The bloodshot eyes were close together, and seemed slightly out of focus, and afterwards he had noticed that the corpse reeked of wine. Drink had slowed the Frenchman's reactions by - well, perhaps only a couple of seconds, but just long enough for Ramage to cock and fire his pistol; one of the two pistols given him by Gianna and which she had thought plain, preferring a far more ornate pair.

Well, he had not been blown in half by an enemy carronade; young Kenton had not had his head knocked off by the 6 - pounder shot that smashed up the cutter. There was, therefore, no more point in thinking about it. Think instead of - well, the privateers were captured, which would please old Foxey - Foote. The Admiral's orders did not actually say the privateers in Curacao were to be captured; from memory the orders were in fact rather vague about what was to be done. Anyway, all ten of them were captured and could be sunk, burned1'or blown up if necessary in minutes.

The French prisoners had sworn that those ten were the only ones using the Dutch islands of Aruba, Curacao and Bonaire as a temporary base, so any new arrivals would be ships that came in by chance. Ramage had been interested to discover that they had not been expecting La Perle, so her captain's story was probably true.

Suddenly he sat upright in the chair, then stood up and went over to his desk, unlocking a drawer and taking out his orders from Admiral Foxe-Foote. Yes, they were vague about exactly what he was to do about the privateers based on Curacao, but they were quite clear on one point which had just occurred to him with the suddenness of a sword thrust: as soon as he had dealt with them he was to return to Port Royal. So, if Foxey - Foote was liverish when the Calypso finally returned, he could sermonize and wax wrathful because Ramage had paused to take the surrender of an island. Islands, after all, yielded no prize money, nothing from which a commander-in-chief could take his eighths. Ten privateers, on the other hand, undamaged and requiring only the sails hoisting up from below and bending on ...

Maria van Someren. He put his orders back in the drawer and turned the key, and then returned to the armchair. There was nothing restful about Maria van Someren. She was no blushing young girl overcome with the vapours if she saw a naval officer casting an eye over her body, nor was she one of those brazen young women who made up for dull and vacant minds and vapid personalities by wearing daringly cut dresses out of which a reasonable man could expect a bosom to pop any moment and which, temporarily, took his mind off the mental drabness of the owner.

No, like Gianna she preferred the company of men to being caught up in a crowd of women chattering about the merits of a newly - discovered dressmaker, hinting at the behaviour of some absent wife (or her husband) or (with a brisk flapping of fans) remarking how hot it was for the time of year. Or, Ramage suddenly realized, he assumed she did: he had seen her once for a few minutes, and already he thought he knew her. Instead, of course, he was creating a person in the image of the kind of woman he bleed. He had seen her once, he would see her again this evening, and then it was unlikely he would ever see her again. The disappointment was physical rather than mental; he felt it in his loins. He would see Gianna naked, hold her body closely, share her bed - at least, he could have reasonable hopes of all that - but he would always wonder about Maria van Someren: was she one of those women who clasped her hands across her breasts, shut her eyes, breathed shallowly and went rigid, like a day - old corpse? Or was she - well, his mind was in enough turmoil to stop speculating further.

Many a man had metaphorically or literally lost his head because of the curve of a bosom but, he asked himself, have we anything to lose by dining at Government House tonight? The Calypso was safe enough; Southwick was quite capable of turning her on the springs and firing into the town - and likewise dealing with the unlikely prospect of a ship unexpectedly sailing in after dark. The privateers were safe enough under their Dutch guards - safe inasmuch as they could not fall into enemy hands. And since Ramage had to discuss the military situation with the Governor before doing anything about the rebels, the Calypso's officers might just as well be present and have a good dinner afterwards.

At the moment Ramage finally stood up from the armchair, Silkin knocked on the door and came into the cabin, freshly - ironed shirt, stock and stockings over his arm and polished shoes in his hand. Ramage, always irrationally irritated by Silkin's ability to keep out of sight until the moment he was wanted, began stripping off his clothes and walked through to his sleeping cabin where he knew the handbasin would be precisely two - thirds full of water, with soap, shaving brush, razor freshly stropped, and towel neatly laid out.

Relax indeed! Those captains who were court - martialled for 'not doing their utmost' against the enemy, admirals criticized after a battle for not pursuing a beaten enemy, junior officers not promoted because they lacked initiative - they were the men who could and did relax.

He soaped his body and then rinsed it He twirled the shaving brush in the soap dish and lathered his face. He paused and rubbed the lather deeper into the skin with his fingers before resuming with the brush. Finally he picked up the razor. He had no need to test the blade; Silkin was not intelligent enough to do something wrong, like forget to put out the shaving brush, or not hone the razor, so that the captain could spend a couple of minutes being angry, and then brighten up for the rest of the day. Instead, with nothing to grumble at, he became angry with himself for being so ill - tempered, and this discontent sometimes lasted for hours. If the ship's company understood all this, Ramage thought to himself, they'd cut Silkin's throat and feed him in small pieces to the gulls.

A mirror hung on the bulkhead, although Silkin knew well enough that Ramage always shaved without a mirror, a habit picked up as a lieutenant when frequently there was not enough light in a tiny cabin. Ramage rinsed the razor, wiped the blade and then closed it Shaving was a relaxing activity.

One glance at the mirror to make sure no flecks of lather remained in the ears or nostrils (he was always irritated when he saw it in other men) and he turned to the clothes, laid out neatly on the top of his cot, and began dressing.

Pulling on silk clothing after a leisurely wash and shave . .. he was thankful he had enough money to afford it, though officers who wore silk shirts in the Tropics instead of the linen on which he insisted for himself were silly fellows: a hot evening meant that the silk stuck to the body like a coating of glue.

Finally he tied his stock and Silkin was ready with his frock coat, shoes, sword and hat, and the news that he had passed the word to the first lieutenant that the captain would be ready in five minutes. One of the advantages of being the captain was that you were never kept waiting; by tradition the senior officer was the last in and first out of a boat Governor van Someren was in a cheerful mood, anxious to hear from Ramage the details of the capture of the privateers. He had sympathized with Aitken that the first lieutenant had to stay on board during the operation, listened carefully when Ramage had Wagstaffe explain how he and his men had boarded over the stern of the Nuestra Senora, and been startled when Kenton gave a hilarious description of the cutter disintegrating. '

Van Someren called over his wife and daughter and made Kenton repeat the story, and they laughed until Maria discovered men had been killed and wounded. Then she turned to Ramage and asked how they could laugh over such a tragic episode.

The question was completely unexpected and Ramage took a few moments to realize that she had misunderstood both Kenton and the attitude of all the Britons. 'We are not laughing at the tragedy. We are laughing because at one moment Mr Kenton is sitting on a thwart - on a seat - in the boat, and the next moment he is sitting in the sea.'

'Yes - but some of his men were smashed to pieces. Why do you laugh at that?'

'We were not laughing at that; we knew them all very well.'

Then that is far worse,' Maria persisted, tears beginning in her eyes. 'You are so ruthless. Dead men cannot fight and cannot be of any more use to you, so you laugh, but they have mothers and wives and sweethearts who will weep for them.'

"We are not laughing at them, ma'am,' Kenton said, obviously very upset at her accusation. 'We - well, as the captain said, we were laughing at me!'

'But all round you in the sea was the blood of the dead and wounded . . .'

Ramage wanted to end the conversation: this kind of reasoning brought back memories which for years he had struggled to drive away: of friends, of men he liked, and even men he disliked, who had died round him in battle, lingeringly or instantly, bloodily or unmarked, silently or screaming in agony.

'Madam,' he said, making little effort to keep a chill out of his voice, 'we laugh to avoid weeping. Today some of our men were killed. We knew them and we grieve, but inwardly. We don't wail and tear our hair. Tomorrow fifty might be killed, and a hundred the day after. Are we to weep for every one of them? Are we to weep because fifty of us might be killed on the third day? I might be dead tomorrow, Kenton and Baker the day after, and then Aitken. If we thought too much about it we would never sleep, we'd never be able to look at each other without bursting into tears. But we have a war to fight so each of us hopes he is immortal, laughs when he can and mourns in his own way when he must.'

Maria was angry now, the hint of tears gone and the skin of her face tautening to give her a beauty which was absent when her features were in repose. 'It is all very well for you to speak thus,' she snapped, 'but you are the captain! These young men risk their lives while you just give them their orders, and stay safely in your own ship.'

Ramage smiled in agreement and gave a slight bow which, he hoped, would end the conversation, but Aitken's Scots voice said quietly: 'I haven't served with His Lordship long, ma'am, but he's been wounded twice to my knowledge - look at the scars over his right eye - and has done things that make men like me tremble even to think about And,' he added, giving the words the broadness that only the Scottish accent allowed, 'today he was nearer death than any of us who lived.' Maria stared at Aitken, obviously disbelieving him. 'You defend your captain - as indeed you should.'

'Aye, madam, because he won't be bothered to defend himself against what - if you'll forgive my presumption - is a very ill - informed attack. I'm a simple naval officer not used to Governors' palaces, so I'm wrong in speaking out like this, but I canna stand here and listen to you talking about the captain staying behind and giving orders.'

'But he does!' Maria snapped. 'Mr Wagstaffe has just told us how he boarded the French schooner over the stem.'

Rennick grunted in protest and Wagstaffe had none of Aitken's shyness. 'Madam,' he said sharply, 'the first person to board that schooner was the captain. He climbed through a gun port at the bow. You probably don't know what a gun port is but you know the fortresses here. It was as if he climbed the wall and went through one of the embrasures so that he was standing right in front of the muzzle of a gun which was just about to fire.'

'It didn't though,' she said bitterly. 'He's alive but the other men are dead.'

The gun did not fire because Mr Ramage had time to kill the gunner the moment before it fired.' 'So four men died today, not three!' she exclaimed. Before anyone had time to react, Kenton, his cheeks flaming with anger, took a step towards her and said angrily: 'Yes, and nearly five - Mr Ramage. Would that have satisfied you, ma'am? The French' may be your allies but they're our enemies. They killed three of our men today, not Mr Ramage.' He stopped and Ramage was just about to order his officers to change the subject when Wagstaffe said: 'Madam - that schooner has a Spanish name, the Nuestra Senora de Antigua. You are sorry that Mr Ramage shot one of her seamen, but I can tell you that every man on board the Calypso would volunteer - aye, would be proud - to hang every Frenchman that normally serves in her. Hang them, or cut their throats. Some of them - and that includes me - would like to kill them even more slowly. Especially her captain - 1 could take a week to kill him: Maria stared at Wagstaffe contemptuously. 'So you are a - a hired assassin; that's what you've just admitted!'

Wagstaffe turned to Ramage, a questioning look in his eye. 'Can I tell her what I saw, sir?'

Ramage hesitated and glanced at van Someren, who was deliberately staying out of the argument, but before he could answer a white - faced and angry Wagstaffe turned back to the girl and described how the Calypso had found the Tranquil. He then told how they had found everyone on board had been murdered, including the women passengers.

'What has that to do with the Nuestra Senora de Antigua and Captain Brune?' she demanded, obviously horrified by the story.

'She was the privateer, he was the captain,' Wagstaffe said quietly. "Captain Brune had all those people killed, unnecessarily and in cold blood. Now he threatens to burn down Amsterdam, your town. He,' Wagstaffe added with biting sarcasm and giving a slight bow, 'has been your country's ally for nearly ten years.'

Maria half turned to Ramage and collapsed at his feet In the second before she fainted Ramage saw in her eyes such agony of mind that he found it hard to forgive himself for not having stopped the conversation many minutes earlier. He was the first to kneel beside the girl and half - turn her so she faced upwards. Her father did not move, and when Ramage glanced up to see if he was going to give any instructions he saw that the Governor's face was rigid and that he had held up a hand to stop his wife going to the girl.

'She has fainted,' he said, 'which seems a fitting end to insulting every one of my guests. I can only apologize and say that I do not agree with a word she said and hope you'll forgive her - she is a young girl who has led a sheltered life.'

His wife nodded in agreement. Apart from an occasional glance down at her daughter - a glance combining irritation, exasperation, disdain and concern in equal proportions, each competing for a leading position but none winning - she seemed to consider that the kneeling Ramage was all the attention the girl needed, and none of the other officers moved.

She recovered slowly and finally her eyes opened and focused on Ramage and as she recognized him he found he could not fathom her thoughts. Hate, contempt, distaste, horror? One of them, surely, but the blue, eyes closed again before he could be sure.

He felt a tap on the shoulder and looked up to find her father standing beside him. 'Well put her on the settee. It will soon pass.'

By the time she was sitting down and obeying Ramage's instructions to breathe deeply, the colour was coming back to her face and her hands were exploring her hair, in case some strands had escaped. Aitken had walked the three lieutenants to a large painting on the wall which showed a group of people skating on a frozen lake, and now the four lieutenants, perspiring from both the tropical heat and the situation, examined the ice and the surrounding snow with great concentration.

Van Someren pointed to a door Ramage had not previously noticed. To the balcony,' he said. 'Perhaps you would be kind enough to take Maria outside, for some fresh air.'

Outside it was cool; darkness had fallen but there was still a gentle breeze from the south - east A few hundred yards away the sea slapped lazily on the beach and over Waterfort the stars of Orion's Belt waited for the Southern Cross to appear.

As Ramage shut the door she walked over to the elaborate tracery of the balcony rail and standing with her back to it faced Ramage as he came towards her. She was silhouetted against the millions of stars that can only be seen from the Tropics, and as Ramage approached, she held out her hands. He walked into her arms and as he held her closely he was pleased that she followed the French fashion: the thin cloth of her dress hid her body from the eye but did nothing to conceal it from the touch.

'I am sorry,' she whispered. 'I did not understand. Your officers - they seem so young . . .'

They are,' Ramage said wryly. 'Aitken is almost my age.'

'But to me - ' she took his right hand. This afternoon, only a few hours ago, this hand killed a man.'

'If it had not, that man would have blown me in half - here,' he said roughly, pressing her hand against his stomach. That's where the muzzle of his gun was.'

She shuddered and traced the shape of his hand with her fingers. 'All this killing - it never ends.'

There's been very little of it out here,' Ramage said. His voice was low but harsh; he remembered only too well the guillotine he had seen in every town square during one brief foray into France; he knew only too well what The Terror' had done to anyone disagreeing with the Revolution. The islands have escaped up to now. You have no idea of the battles being fought in Europe.'

'Jules tells me,' she said.

'Jules?'

'My - last year my father announced my engagement to the first lieutenant of the Delft frigate. He is due here. My father hoped his men would dispose of the rebels.' 'Why has he been delayed?' 'I don't know. No explanation has come from the Netherlands.' Ramage could not see her features clearly in the darkness, but she did not sound like an infatuated young woman grieving over her future husband's absence, and 'my father announced my engagement' was a curious phrase. She kissed him again and then traced his features with her fingers, as though trying to learn his face by touch. 'Lord Ramage,' she murmured. 'And you are not yet married? So handsome, so brave - and, if you are a lord, no doubt so rich,' she added in a gently bantering voice which asked questions which Ramage had no intention of answering. The Navy leaves me no time to do anything but go to sea.' 'Ah - but you are in port now.' 'And you see what happens 1'

They moved apart as they heard the door handle rasping, and then the Governor bustled out, followed by the lieutenants. 'How are you now, my dear?' he asked the girl, and when she assured him she was recovered he said: 'I think your mother would like to see you: some trouble with the kitchen staff I think.'

As soon as she left he said to Ramage: 'Perhaps we should discuss plans before dinner, then we can enjoy our food without distraction.'

When Ramage agreed the Governor said: 'Should we talk here? We run no risk of servants hearing too much, and I imagine you want your officers present'

For the next fifteen minutes van Someren told them all he knew of the rebels' activities, how far they had advanced, and how long - unless something was done quickly - before the rebels reached Amsterdam. At the end of the recital he asked Ramage: 'So what do you propose doing?' Thinking about it at dinner, Your Excellency.' 'But you must have some idea, surely?' Ramage shrugged his shoulders, and then realized that van Someren could not see him in the darkness. There are many things we could try to do. But the fact is I have about one hundred and fifty seamen and forty Marines to deal with perhaps five hundred men who know the island well.'

This I know, but surely . . .'

'I'm sorry, Your Excellency."

'But - well, I must insist I am the Governor of the island and I have surrendered it to you. I insist that you defend Amsterdam, and I insist on knowing - knowing now - how you propose to do it.'

Ramage did not feel particularly angry; in fact he more than understood the Governor's concern. But like his daughter earlier, van Someren was talking without considering the facts.

'I think, Your Excellency, that we ought to go down to dinner.'

'Captain Ramage,' van Someren said sharply, 'I insist on knowing.' Clearly he was not going to move from the balcony, and the mosquitoes were beginning to trouble Ramage.

'Your Excellency,' Ramage said quietly, 'yesterday you surrendered this island to me. We signed all the necessary documents. Since then I have continued to address you as "Your Excellency"; you have been treated as though you were the Governor . . .'

Would he need to say more? Van Someren was quick to answer: 'But I am the Governor!'

'Forgive me,' Ramage said almost dreamily, 'how can you, a Dutch subject, a citizen of the Batavian Republic, be the Governor of an island which, since yesterday afternoon, belonged to Britain?'

Van Someren was silent for several seconds and Ramage heard two or three of the lieutenants shuffle their feet as they realized the significance of what their captain had said but were far from sure what van Someren was going to do.

'Again, I must apologize,' the Dutchman said. 'You are of course quite correct. You are, I suppose, the new governor - and naval and military commander.'

'More important for the moment,' Ramage said dryly, 'I am your guest for dinner, and I'm sure we all have a good appetite.'