Second to None

5. A Contest

LIEUTENANT Leigh Galbraith strode across the quarterdeck and reported, “The watch is aft, sir!” Like his unerring steps over and past ringbolts and other obstacles, it was part of an unchanging routine at sea. He even touched his hat to the shadowy shape of Lieutenant Massie, whom he was about to relieve.

It was still quite dark, but when his eyes eventually became accustomed he would see the approach of dawn in the fading stars, the hardening of the horizon. Massie stifled a yawn.

“West-by-south, sir.” He stared up at the pale outlines of the sails, filling only occasionally with the wind across the starboard quarter.

Galbraith glanced at the helmsmen, eyes flickering in the shaded light from the compass. Other shapes were moving into position: the morning watch, when the ship would come alive again.

Galbraith looked at the tiny glow from the cabin skylight. Was the captain awake, or was it a ploy to keep the watch on its toes?

He thought of Captain Bolitho’s return from his meeting with the vice-admiral. Galbraith had no idea what had been said, but the captain had come back on board barely able to conceal his anger.

Galbraith tried to dismiss it. At first light they would sight and resume contact with another frigate, Matchless of forty-two guns. She had been in the Mediterranean for three years attached to one squadron or another, and would therefore be very familiar with shipping movements and the lurking danger of pirates. Corsairs.

Matchless was commanded by a senior post-captain named Emlyn Bouverie, a man who came from a proud naval family, and was thought likely for promotion to flag rank in the near future. Galbraith did not know him, but those who did apparently heartily disliked him. Not a tyrant or martinet like some he had known, but a perfectionist, who was quick to reprimand or punish anyone who fell below his own high standards.

He said, “You are relieved, sir.” He lifted the canvas hood from the master’s chart table and peered at the log with the aid of a tiny lantern. They would sight land before noon, according to Cristie. He had never known him to be wrong.

He steadied the light with care. The coast of North Africa: to most sailors a place of mystery and strange superstitions, and best avoided.

He studied Cristie’s fine handwriting. 6TH June, 1815. What would this day bring?

Captain Bolitho had called his officers and those of senior warrant rank together in his cabin. Galbraith straightened his back and glanced at the skylight again. Remembering it.

The captain had described the mission. A visit to Algiers, to investigate. Their intentions were peaceful, but guns’ crews would exercise twice a day all the same. It was said that Algiers was protected by some six hundred guns. It would not be much of a contest if the worst happened.

The captain had looked at their faces and had said, “There was a French frigate named La Fortune in the Western Mediterranean before Napoleon’s surrender. Others too, and it is known that the Dey of Algiers and the Bey of Tunis have offered sanctuary to such men-of-war in exchange for their services. The prisons are still filled with Christians, people snatched from passing vessels, and held on no more serious charge than their religious beliefs. Torture, slavery, and open acts of aggression against merchantmen sailing under our protection-the list is endless. With our ‘allies’…” he had made no effort to conceal his contempt “… we had a chance to put paid to this piracy once and for all. Now with Napoleon at the head of his armies again, the Dey in particular may use our predicament to gain even more control of these waters, and beyond.”

Somebody, Galbraith had thought Captain Bosanquet of the Royal Marines, had asked about the sailor they had rescued and later buried at sea.

Captain Bolitho had answered shortly, “Probably one of many.” And again something like bitterness had crept into his voice.

“Which is why Captain Bouverie intends to make a peaceful approach. Vice-Admiral Bethune’s squadron is hard pressed as it is. He sees no alternative.”

Bouverie was the senior captain, as he reminded them often enough by hoisting signals at every opportunity. Galbraith half smiled. He would make a good admiral one day.

The master’s mate of the watch said softly, “Cabin light’s out, sir.”

“Thank you, Mr Woodthorpe. I am glad you are awake!” He saw the man’s teeth in the dimness.

How would it be this time? He thought of the moment when they had shared wine together; it had shown him another side of Adam Bolitho. He had even touched on his early days at sea as a midshipman, and had spoken of his uncle, his first captain. Opening out, demonstrating a warmth which Galbraith had not suspected.

After his visit to the flagship, he had shut that same door. At first Galbraith thought that he had expected some priority, a preference because of his famous surname, and had resented Bouverie’s slower, more cautious approach. But Adam Bolitho was a postcaptain of some fame, and had not come by it easily. He would be used to Bouveries in the navy’s tight world.

It was deeper than that. Driving him, like some unstoppable force. Something personal.

Like the brigantine, which might or might not be following Unrivalled. Twice on this passage they had sighted an unknown sail. The lookouts had not been certain; even the impressive Sullivan could not swear to it. But Captain Bolitho had no such doubts. When he had signalled Bouverie for permission to break company and give chase, the request had been denied with a curt negative.

Galbraith had heard him exclaim, “This is a ship of war! I’m no grocery captain, damn his eyes!”

Galbraith recognised the light step now, and heard his passing comment to the master’s mate. Then he saw the open shirt, rippling in the soft wind, and remembered the savage scar he had seen above his ribs when he had found him shaving in his cabin. He was lucky to be alive.

Bolitho had seen his eyes, and said, “They made a good job of it!” And had grinned, and only for a second or so Galbraith had seen the youth override the experience and the memories.

A good job. Galbraith had heard the surgeon mention that when Adam Bolitho had been captured, more dead than alive, he had been operated on by the American ship’s surgeon, who had in fact been French.

“Good morning, Mr Galbraith. Everything is as it was, I see?” He was looking up at the topsails. “I could make her fly if I got the word!”

Pride? It was stronger than that. It was more like love.

He moved to the compass box and nodded to the helmsmen, and their eyes followed him further still, to the canvas-covered table.

“We shall exercise the main battery during the forenoon, Mr Galbraith.”

Galbraith smiled. That would go round the ship like a fast fuse. But it had to be said that the gun crews were improving.

“And call the hands a quarter-hour earlier. I expect a smart ship today. And I want our people properly fed, not making do with muck!”

Another side. Captain Bolitho had already disrated the cook for wasting food and careless preparation. Many captains would not have cared.

He was holding the same little lamp, but did not seem to be looking at the chart, and Galbraith heard him say quietly, “June sixth. I had all but forgot!”

“May I share it, sir?”

For a moment he thought he had gone too far. But Adam merely looked at him, his face hidden in shadow.

“I was thinking of some wild roses, and a lady.” He turned away, as if afraid of what he might disclose. “On my birthday.” Then, abruptly, “The wind! By God, the wind! ”

It was as though the ship had sensed his change of mood. Blocks and halliards rattled, and then above their heads the maintopsail boomed like a drum.

Adam said, “Belay my last order! Call all hands directly!” He gripped Galbraith’s arm as if to emphasise the importance of what he was saying. “We shall sight land today! Don’t you see, if we are being followed it’s their last chance to outreach us!”

Galbraith knew it was pointless to question his sudden excitement. At first light they should be changing tack to take station on Matchless again. There was not a shred of evidence that the occasional sightings of a far-off sail were significant, or connected in any way. But the impetuous grip on his arm seemed to cast all doubt to the rising wind.

He swung round. “Pipe all hands, Mr Woodthorpe! And send for the master, fast as you can!”

He turned back to the indistinct outline. “Captain Bouverie may not approve, sir.”

Adam Bolitho said quietly, “But Captain Bouverie is not yet in sight, is he?”

Men rushed out of the shadows, some still dazed by sleep, staring around at the flapping canvas and straining rigging until order and discipline took command.

The master, feet bare, stumped across the sloping deck, muttering, “Is there no peace?” Then he saw the captain. “New course, sir?”

“We will wear ship, Mr Cristie! As close to the wind as she’ll come!”

Calls shrilled and men scrambled aloft, the perils of working in darkness no longer a threat now to most of them. Blocks squealed, and someone stumbled over a snaking line, which was slithering across the damp planking as if it were truly alive.

But she was answering, from the instant that the big double wheel was hauled over.

Galbraith gripped a backstay and felt the deck tilting still further. In the darkness everything was wilder, louder, as if the ship were responding to her captain’s recklessness. He dashed spray from his face and saw pale stars spiralling around the masthead pendant. It was all but dawn. He looked towards the captain. Suppose the sea was empty? And there was no other vessel? He thought of Bouverie, what might happen, and knew, without understanding why, that this was a contest.

Unrivalled completed her turn, water rushing down the lee scuppers as the sails refilled on the opposite tack, the jib cracking loudly, as close to the wind as she could hold.

Cristie shouted, “Steady as she goes, sir! East-by-south!”

Afterwards, Galbraith thought it was the only time he had ever heard the master either impressed or surprised.

“Make fast! Belay! ”

Men ran to obey each command; to any landsman it would appear a single, confused tangle of canvas and straining cordage.

Adam Bolitho gripped the rail and said, “Now she flies! Feel her!”

Galbraith turned, but shook his head and did not speak. The captain was quite alone with his ship.

“Hands aloft, Mr Lomax! Get the t’gallants on her and put more men on the main course! They’re like a pack of old women today!”

Lieutenant George Avery stood beneath the mizzen-mast, where the marines of the afterguard had been mustered for nearly an hour. He had heard a few whispered curses when the galley fire had been doused before some of the watchkeepers had managed to snatch a quick meal.

He felt out of place aboard Matchless, alien. Everything worked smoothly enough, as might be expected in a frigate which had been in commission for over three years. But he had sensed a lack of the companionship he himself had come to recognise and accept. Every move, each change of tack or direction, seemed to flow from one man. No chain of command as Avery knew it, but a single man.

He could see him now, feet apart, hand on his hip, a square figure in the strengthening daylight. He considered the word; it described Captain Emlyn Bouverie exactly. Even when the ship heeled to a change of tack, Bouverie remained like a rock. His hands were square too, strong and hard, like the man.

Bouverie said, “Attend the lookouts, Mr Foster, you should know my orders by now!” His voice always carried without any apparent effort, and Avery had never seen him deign to use a speaking-trumpet, even in the one patch of wind they had encountered after leaving Malta.

He heard a lieutenant yelling out names, and thought he knew why. Soon now Unrivalled would be sighted, provided Adam Bolitho had kept on station as instructed. He recalled the meeting aboard the flagship. Bouverie had vetoed the suggestion that Avery should sail with Unrivalled instead of “the senior officer’s ship,” and Bethune had concurred. Looking back, Avery still wondered if it was because he had truly agreed, or if he had simply needed to demonstrate that no favouritism would be shown Sir Richard Bolitho’s nephew.

He gazed aloft as the topgallant sails broke free from their yards and filled to the wind, the topmen spread out on either side, all aware of their captain’s standards.

Pride, jealousy? It was difficult to have one without the other. Matchless had been in these waters for more than three years, and despite her coppered hull was heavy with weed and marine growths. Unrivalled had been forced to shorten sail several times during the day to remain on station, while at night they must be almost hove-to. He could imagine Adam Bolitho’s frustration and impatience. And yet I hardly know him. That was the strangest part. Like handing over the locket. When I wanted it for myself.

He realised that Bouverie had joined him by the mizzen. He could move swiftly when it suited him.

“Bored, Mr Avery? This may seem a mite tame after your last appointment!”

Avery said, “I feel like a passenger, sir.”

“Well spoken! But I cannot disrupt the running of my command with a wrong note, eh?”

He laughed. In fact, Bouverie laughed frequently, but it rarely reached his eyes.

“All secure, sir!” Somebody scuttled past; nobody walked in Matchless.

Bouverie nodded. “I’ve read the notes and observations on your last visit to Algiers. Could be useful.” He broke off and shouted, “Take that man’s name, Mr Munro! I’ll have no damned laggards this day!”

That man. After three years in commission, a captain should have known the name of every soul aboard.

Again, the ambush of memory. How Richard Bolitho had impressed upon his officers the importance of remembering men’s names. It is often all they can call their own.

He turned, startled, as Bouverie said, “You must miss the admiral,” as if he had been reading his thoughts.

“I do indeed, sir.”

“I never met him. Although I too was at Copenhagen, in Amazon, Captain Riou. My first stint as a lieutenant. A real blooding, I can tell you!” He laughed again, but nobody turned from his duties to watch or listen. Not in Matchless.

Bouverie’s arm jerked out once more. “Another pull on the weather forebrace and belay! Far too slow! ”

He changed, just as suddenly. “Did you have much to do with Lady Somervell? Turn a man’s heart to water with a glance, I’m told. A true beauty-caused more than a few ripples in her time!”

“A woman of courage also, sir.”

Bouverie was studying him in the gloom. Avery could feel it, like the stare of a prosecuting officer at a court martial. As he could feel his own rising resentment.

Bouverie swayed back on his heels. “If you say so. I’d have thought-” He broke off and almost lost his balance. “What the hell was that?”

Someone shouted, “Gunfire, sir!”

Bouverie swallowed hard. “Clod!” He strode to the opposite side. “Mr Lomax! Where away?”

Avery licked his lips, tasting the brine. A single shot. It could only mean one thing, a signal to heave-to. He stared at the horizon until his eyes throbbed. Every morning since leaving Malta it had been like this. As soon as Unrivalled was sighted Bouverie would make a signal, as if he was always trying to catch them out. Without looking he knew that the first signal of the day was already bent on, ready to soar up to the yard, when most ships would have been content to remain in close company. He shivered, from more than the rising wind, recalling Adam Bolitho’s impatience at the meeting when doubts had been voiced about the brigantine. Only some ridiculous obsession, something to command attention, to impress. Not any more.

He heard the first lieutenant say, “Unrivalled must be off her station, sir!”

“I know that, God damn it! We are to alter course when…”

He turned towards Avery. “Well, what do you think? Or do ‘passengers’ have no opinions?”

Avery felt very calm.

“I believe Unrivalled has found something useful, sir.”

“Oh, very diplomatic, sir! And what of Captain Adam Bolitho? Does he truly believe he is above obeying orders, and beyond the discipline that binds the rest of us?”

An inner voice warned him, take care. Another insisted, you have nothing more to lose.

He said, “I was with Sir Richard Bolitho at Algiers, sir. Things have changed since then. If we attempt to enter without permission…” He glanced round, seeing the first touch of gold spill over the horizon. The moment he had always loved. But that, too, was past. “This ship will be destroyed. Your ship, sir, will be blasted apart before you can come about. I have seen the anchorage, and the citadel, and some of the fanatics who control those guns.”

“I have faced worse!”

Avery relaxed. He had always been able to recognise bluster.

“Then you will know the consequences, sir.”

Bouverie stared at him. “God damn you for your impertinence!” Then, surprisingly, he grinned. “But bravely said, for all that!” He looked at the clearing sky as a voice yelled, “Sail on the starboard quarter!” The merest pause. “Two sail, sir!”

Bouverie nodded slowly. “A prize, then.”

The first lieutenant climbed down from the shrouds with a telescope.

“She’s a brigantine, sir.”

Avery looked at his hands. They were quite still, and warm in the first frail sunlight. They felt as if they were shaking.

Bouverie was saying, “No, not that signal, Mr Adams.” He took a glass from the signals midshipman and steadied it with care. He was studying Unrivalled’s topsails, like pink shells in the clear light, although the sun had not yet revealed itself.

“When she is on station again, make Captain repair on board.”

Avery turned away. How many times would Adam Bolitho read that signal with different eyes from other men? When his uncle had called him to his flagship to tell him of the death of Zenoria Keen. We Happy Few… It had been their secret.

Bouverie said, “Breakfast, I think. Then we shall hear what our gallant Captain Bolitho has to say.” The good humour seemed even more volatile than his usual mood. “I hope it pleases me!”

But, out of habit or memory, Avery was watching the signals party bending on the flags.

Bouverie sat squarely in a broad leather chair, hands gripping the arms as if to restrain himself.

He said, “Now, Captain Bolitho. In your own words, of course. Share your discoveries with me, eh?” He glanced towards his table where Avery was sitting with a leather satchel and some charts, while beside him the ship’s clerk was poised with his quill at the ready. “For both our sakes, I think some record of this conversation should be kept. Sir Graham Bethune will expect it.”

Adam Bolitho walked to the stern windows and stared at his own ship, her sheer lines and shining hull distorted in the weathered glass. Hard to believe that it had all happened so quickly, and yet it was exactly as he had imagined when he had ordered Unrivalled’s change of course. They had all thought him mad. They were probably right.

He could recall the calm, professional eye of old Stranace, the ship’s gunner, when he had explained what he required. Stranace was more used to the deadly quiet of the magazine and powder store, but like most of his breed he had never forgotten his trade, or how to lay and train an eighteen-pounder.

It must have taken the brigantine’s people completely by surprise. Day in, day out, following the two frigates, knowing almost to the minute when they would reduce sail for the night, then to see one of the quarry suddenly looming out of the last, lingering darkness with every sail set, on a converging tack with no room for manoeuvre and no time to run…

One shot, the first Unrivalled had fired in anger.

Adam had watched the splash, the succession of jagged fins of spray as the ball had skipped across the water no more than a boat’s length from her bows. He had touched the gunner’s shoulder; it had felt like iron itself. No words were needed. It was a perfect shot, and the brigantine, now seen to be named Rosario, had hove-to, her sails in confusion in the wind which had changed everything.

He heard the quill scratching across the paper and realised he had been describing it. He looked again and saw the brigantine’s outline, more like a blurred shadow than reality. Unrivalled had put down two boats, and they had done well, he thought, with the lively sea, and their movements hampered by their weapons. Jago had been with him. Amused, but deadly when one of Rosario ’s crew had raised a pistol as the boarders had flung their grapnels and swarmed aboard. He had not even seen Jago move, his blade rising and falling with the speed of light. Then the scream, and the severed hand like a glove on the deck.

Lieutenant Wynter had been in the second boat, and with his own party had put the crew under guard. After Jago’s example there was no further resistance.

Rosario was Portuguese but had been chartered repeatedly, at one time by the English squadron at Gibraltar. The master, a dirty, unshaven little man, seemed to speak no English, although he produced some charts to prove his lawful occasions. The charts, like Rosario, were almost too filthy to examine. As Cristie later remarked, “By guess an’ by God, that’s how these heathen navigate!”

A sense of failure then; he had sensed it in the restlessness of the boarding party, the apparent confidence of Rosario ’s master.

Until Wynter, perhaps the least experienced officer in the ship, had commented on the brigantine’s armament, six swivel-guns mounted aft and near the hold. And the smell…

Adam had ordered the hatches to be broached. Only one cargo had a stench like that, and they found the chains and the manacles where slaves could be packed out of sight, to exist, if they could, in terror and their own filth until they were shipped to a suitable market. There had been blood on one set of irons, and Adam guessed that the wretched prisoner had been pitched overboard.

He had seen Wynter’s eyes widening with shocked surprise when he had said coldly, “A slaver then. Worthless to me. Fetch a halter and run this bugger up to the main-yard, as an example to others!”

Wynter’s expression had changed to admiring comprehension when the vessel’s master had thrown himself at Adam’s feet, pleading and sobbing in rough but completely adequate English.

“I thought he might remember!”

Confident and less gentle, they had continued their search. There was a safe, and the gibbering master was even able to produce a key.

Adam turned now as Avery opened the satchel.

“ Rosario had no papers as such. That alone makes her a prize.” He smiled faintly. “For the moment.”

Avery laid out the contents of the satchel. A bill of lading, Spanish. A delivery of oil to some garrison, Portuguese. A log book, crudely marked with dates and what could be estimated positions. Some shadowed Unrivalled.

Bouverie said abruptly, “Many such men are paid to spy and inform their masters of ship movements, theirs and ours.” He gave the characteristic nod. “But I’ll give you this, Bolitho. You did not imagine it!”

Adam felt the sudden surge of excitement. The first time since… He said, “And there is a letter. I do not speak French, but I recognise it well enough.”

Avery was holding it. “For the captain of the frigate La Fortune.” He gave a grave smile. “I learned my French the hard way. As their prisoner.”

Bouverie rubbed his chin. “So she is in Algiers. Under a great battery, you say.”

Adam said, “The bait in the trap, sir. They will not expect us to ignore it.”

It was as if some invisible bonds had been cut. Bouverie almost sprang out of the chair.

“Out of the question! Even if we hold Rosamund-”

Avery heard himself correcting gently, “Rosario, sir,” and cursed himself. Always the good flag lieutenant…

Adam persisted, “No, sir, we use her. To spring the trap. They know we are trailing our cloaks, and they will be expecting the brigantine. I am sure she is a regular visitor there.”

He was aware of the tawny eyes on him, Avery watching but not seeing him. As if he were somewhere else… He was suddenly deeply moved. With my uncle.

“ Rosario appears to be an agile vessel, sir. It would seem only fair if we were to ‘chase’ her into Algiers?”

Bouverie swallowed. “A cutting-out expedition? I’m not at all certain-” Then he nodded again, vigorously. “It might work, it’s daring enough. Foolhardy, some will say.”

Adam returned to the stern windows. One of the Rosario ’s crew had told him that they had often carried female slaves, some very young girls. The master had delighted in abusing them.

He thought of Zenoria, her back laid open by a whip. Keen had rescued her, and she had married him. Not out of love. Out of gratitude.

The mark of Satan, she had called it.

He heard himself say, “Time is short, sir. We cannot delay.”

“The authority for such an act, which might provoke another outbreak of war…”

“Is yours, sir.”

Why should it matter? Bouverie would not be the first or the last officer to await a decision from a higher authority. But it did matter. It had to.

He said, “I can take Rosario. I am short-handed, but we could share the burden between us. Then so would the laurels be equally divided.”

He saw the shot go home. Like one of old Stranace’s.

“We’ll do it. I’ll send you some good hands within the hour.” Bouverie was thinking fast, like a flood-gate bursting open. “Will you take the Rosario ’s master with you, in case?…”

Adam picked up his hat and saw blood on his sleeve. Jago’s cutlass.

“I shall take him. Later, I shall see him hang.” He looked at Avery. “By the authority vested in me!”

Adam Bolitho lowered his telescope and moved into the shadow of the brigantine’s foresail. There would be hundreds of eyes watching from the shore. One mistake would be enough to betray them.

Bang.

He saw a waterspout burst from the sea. Close. But was it near enough to deceive their audience?

He had seen Matchless leaning over as she had changed tack for her final approach, and he had seen the citadel, all and more than Avery had described. It looked as if it had been there for centuries, since time began. Avery had told him about a secret, cave-like entrance to which they had been taken in a large galley. You could lose an army trying to storm such a place. Or a fleet.

He glanced at the Rosario ’s master. Once aboard and in command of his own vessel again, he seemed to have grown in stature, as if all the pathetic pleading and whimpering for his life had been forgotten. Slumped by the bulwark, Jago sat with both legs out-thrust, his eyes never leaving the man’s face.

Nothing was certain. The master had intended to hoist some sort of recognition signal as they had tacked closer to the protective headland. Adam had said, “No. They will know Rosario. They will not expect a signal when she is being chased by an enemy!”

Somebody had even laughed.

He turned to look at the swivel-guns, all loaded and primed. And the hatch covers. He could imagine the extra seamen and marines crammed in the holds, listening to the occasional bang of Matchless’s bow-chaser, sweating it out. Captain Bosanquet was down there with them, apparently more concerned with the state of his uniform in the filthy hold than the prospect of being dead within the next hour.

He stepped into the shadow again and held his breath, and carefully raised his glass and trained it on the citadel, and the main wall which Avery had remembered so clearly. A movement. He watched, hardly daring to blink. Guns, an entire line of them, thrusting their muzzles through the embrasures, the menace undiminished by distance. He could almost hear their iron trucks squeaking over the worn stone.

He felt the hull shiver. Whatever else he was, Rosario ’s master knew these waters well. They were in the shallows now, heading for the anchorage. Avery was right. He felt almost light-headed. Right. The great guns would not depress enough to endanger the brigantine. Like the batteries he had seen at Halifax, carefully sited on the mainland and on a small island in the harbour, so that no enemy ship could slip past them undetected.

But here there was no island.

He saw the first gun fire and recoil, smoke writhing above the old walls like a ragged spectre. Then, one by one, the others followed. The sound seemed to be all around them, like an unending echo. Probably bronzed guns. They were just as deadly to a wooden hull.

He thought of Unrivalled outside, somewhere around the headland and still out of sight. Galbraith and Cristie, and all the others who despite his own attempts to remain detached were no longer strangers to him.

Could he never accept it? Like the moment when Galbraith had picked men for the Rosario ’s raiding party. It had been difficult for him; almost everybody, even the green hands, had volunteered. Madness, then. What would Galbraith be thinking now? Feeling pride at having been left in command? Or seeing a chance of permanent promotion if things went badly wrong?

A seaman called, “One o’ them galleys headin’ this way, sir! Starboard bow!”

Matchless was firing again, a broadside this time; it was impossible to tell where the shots were falling. There were more local vessels in evidence. Lateen sails and elderly schooners, with dhows etched against the water like bats.

He felt his mouth go dry as splashes burst around Matchless’s bows. Close. Too damned close. He bit his lip and scrambled to the opposite side.

When he lifted his head again, it was all he could do to stop himself from shouting aloud.

Directly across the larboard bow, and framed against the citadel’s high walls, was the frigate. He tried to take it in, to hold it in his mind, like all those other times. The range and the bearing, the point of embrace. To see the frigate lying at her anchor, brailed-up sails filling and emptying in the offshore wind the only suggestion of movement, was unnerving. Unreal.

He cleared his throat. “Ready about! Warn all hands, Mr Wynter!”

He groped for the short, curved fighting sword and loosened it. He could hear Jago’s voice in his thoughts. “Take the old one, sir. The sword!”

And his own reply. Like somebody else. “When I’ve earned it!”

The Rosario ’s ragged seamen were hauling on halliards and braces, their bare feet gripping the deck like claws, without feeling.

It only needed one of them to shout, to signal. He found his fingers clenched on the hilt of the hanger. They must not be taken. There would be no quarter. No pity.

He moved around the mast and watched the helmsman putting down the wheel, one of Unrivalled’s topmen at his side, a dirk in his fist.

“Matchless ’as gone about, sir!” The man breathed out noisily. “They’re best off out o’ this little lot!”

Adam stared at the frigate. Old but well maintained, her name, La Fortune, in faded gilt lettering across her counter. Thirty guns at a guess. A giant to the local craft on which she preyed in the name of France. There were faces along her gangway and poop, but no muzzles were run out. Adam felt his body trembling. Why should they be? Those great guns had seen off the impudent intruder. He could hear some of them cheering, laughing. Not too many of them, however; the rest were probably ashore, evidence of their security here.

Rosario ’s master jumped away from the helmsman and cupped his hands, staring wild-eyed as the frigate’s masts towered over them. The dirk drove into his side and he fell without even a murmur.

Even at the end he must have realised that nothing Adam could do would match the horror his new masters would have unleashed on those who betrayed them.

It was already too late. With the helm hard over and the distance falling away, Rosario’s bowsprit mounted the frigate’s quarter like a tusk and splintered into fragments, cordage and flapping canvas shielding Wynter’s boarding party as they swarmed up and over the side.

Adam drew his hanger and waved it.

“At ’em, lads!” Hatches were bursting open and men ran, half blinded by the sunlight, carried forward by their companions, reason already forgotten.

Adam grasped a dangling line and dragged himself over the frigate’s rail, slipping and almost falling between the two hulls.

An unknown voice rasped, “Don’t leave us now, sir!” And laughed, a terrible sound. Matched only by the scarlet-coated marines, somehow holding formation, bayonets like ice in the sun’s glare, Captain Bosanquet shouting, “Together, Marines! Together!”

Adam noticed that his face was the colour of his fine tunic.

A horn or trumpet had added its mournful call to the din of shouting, the clash of steel, the screams of men being hacked down.

The boarding party needed no urging. Beyond the smoke and the scattering sailing craft was open water. The sea. All they had. All that mattered.

Adam stopped in his tracks as a young lieutenant blocked his way. He was probably the only officer left aboard.

“Surrender!” It had never left him. Not at moments like this. “Surrender, damn your eyes!”

The lieutenant lowered his sword but drew a pistol from inside his coat. He was actually grinning, grinning while he took aim, already beyond reach.

Jago lunged forward but halted beside Adam as the French officer coughed and staggered against the gangway. There was a boarding-axe embedded in his back.

Adam stared up at the masthead pendant. The wind was still with them.

“Hands aloft! Loose tops’ls!”

How could they hope to do it? To cut out a ship from a protected harbour?

“Cut the cable!” He wiped his mouth and tasted blood on his hand, but could recall no contest. Men were surrendering, others were being thrown over the side, dead or alive it did not matter.

La Fortune was free of the ground, her hull already moving as the first topsails and a jib steadied her against the thrust of wind, the demands of her rudder.

Guns were firing, but La Fortune moved on, untouched by the battery which could not be brought to bear.

He saw the Rosario drifting away, an oared galley already attempting to grapple her.

Wynter was shouting, “She’s answering, sir!” Not so blank and self-contained now, but wild-eyed, dangerous. His father the member of Parliament would scarcely have recognised him.

Jago said, “Lost three men, sir. Another’ll go afore long.”

He winced as iron hammered against the hull, grape or canister from Rosario ’s swivels, and licked his parched lips. A Froggie ship. There would be wine on board. He turned to mention it to the captain.

Adam was watching a Royal Marine hoist a White Ensign to the frigate’s gaff. Without surprise that they had done it. That they had survived.

But he said, “For you, Uncle! For you!”