The Baltic Prize

Chapter 6

‘The last, Sir Thomas,’ said Dillon, with a frown, bringing out the final piece of the morning’s paperwork. ‘And I ask pardon that I must trouble you with such a trifle.’

He handed it across. It was a short letter, painfully written in a child-like hand, dated that same day from HMS Brunswick, Yarmouth Roads, one of the 74-gun ships-of-the-line lying with the fleet.

Kydd glanced at the signature and rank. His eyebrows shot up in astonishment. A volunteer first class, addressing the captain of another ship? They were the lowest form of life, essentially apprentice midshipmen, performing menial tasks.

‘As I know your views on young gentlemen in a ship-of-war,’ Dillon added smoothly, ‘yet I believe deserving of a form of reply.’

Kydd scanned it quickly. ‘So the rascal wants to remove into Tyger. I’m not having it, of course.’

‘We only have two midshipmen aboard, sir, and-’

‘I’ve nothing to say against the beggars as who should stay,’ Kydd rumbled, ‘but a crack frigate is not the place to be learning your trade. Better a ship o’ size where you’re under eye when you make your mistakes.’

‘Some would say the navy demands that all should share in the training up of its future officers.’

Kydd tossed the paper in with the others. ‘That’s as may be. We’ve a reefer in each watch, and that’s enough for me.’

‘Sir, you may have omitted to notice that the youngster comes recommended by a naval school and we may presume therefore he has his nauticals.’

There was a moment of dawning suspicion before Kydd snatched up the letter again and read more slowly. One Christopher Rowan was modestly offering to present a recommendation by his captain-headmaster, Mr B. Partington of the Guildford Naval Academy, in respect of any naval service to which he might see fit to apply. The Kydd School!

Tyger’s captain glanced up suspiciously, but Dillon was absent-mindedly sorting the completed papers, seeming unaware of the Kydd family connection.

‘Ah. Well, that could make a difference,’ he harrumphed. The lad would have got a decent grounding in bends and hitches, knot-work and the sea lingo from the school, and even a solid foundation of the three Rs, more than some he’d known. The stout boatswain Perrott could be relied on not to suffer any charge of his to go out into a stern sea world without the requisites of a good moral compass and a fearless spirit.

He felt himself weakening. ‘We’ve no room for another volunteer,’ he said doubtfully.

‘Sir, I rather thought you’d rate him midshipman. A spare of the breed while he learns?’

‘Um, possibly.’ It was quite within his power to do so, but with one strict proviso. ‘Only if he’s put in his sea time. Regulations – three years afore I can rate him so.’

‘And if he hasn’t?’

‘Then it’s hard luck for him.’ He leaned back with a sigh. ‘Have the duty boat’s crew go to Brunswick and bring the youngster here. I’ll talk to him.’

Ship visiting while at anchor was a sailor’s privilege and that a lowly volunteer was indulging would not be an obstacle.

Well within the hour, the mate-of-the-watch delivered Kydd’s visitor.

‘So. You’ve a mind to desert your ship, younker.’

The boy stood rigid, his eyes to the front, cap held before him. ‘Sir, that’s … Yes, sir.’ He was slightly built, fair hair and hazel eyes, a delicacy of manner unusual in one of his age – and a presence that, for some reason, reached out to Kydd.

‘How old are you?’

‘Th-thirteen, sir.’

‘And how long have you served at sea?’

Those eyes – something about …

‘Two years. That is, nearly three.’

The powers-that-be wouldn’t argue over a few months in these desperate times. ‘All in Brunswick?’

‘Sir.’

‘And you want a more exciting time in a frigate?’

‘Sir, it’s … it’s that I want to serve under you!’ The eyes pleaded so pitifully with him, tearing at Kydd’s detachment.

‘Ah, this is a fighting frigate,’ Kydd frowned, ‘as may be expected to see a mort of action.’

‘Yes, sir,’ cried the youngster. ‘I know! Mr Perrott told us what it’s like, how you won all your hero battles against the foe and-’

‘Belay all that,’ Kydd snapped, at the same time embarrassed and touched.

Then it came to him: those eyes – they were Persephone’s.

He fumbled for something to say. ‘Um, why did you go to sea?’

‘Oh, sir, it was that night after the Dutch battle when Admiral Onslow made his speech at our town hall and called you up to stand beside him as a hero too!’

‘Then you joined the school.’

‘I begged Papa to let me go, but he said as how the sea was not for proper gentlemen, so I asked him if he really thought Lord Nelson not a gentleman and he got cross with me.’

‘But sent you.’

‘He told me if I desired it so, he would send me, but only if I should promise that if it really was to be my profession I would be diligent and faithful to learn, and would apply myself to it with all my heart.’

‘I see.’

‘And then we heard of the battle of the Nile, that you were in it, and Bos’un Perrott cleared lower deck and told the whole school as how you’d gone from being a sailor boy all the way to a King’s officer, and then when you came to the school and spoke to us all about duty and courage I – I wanted to be like you, sir!’ he blurted.

Kydd melted. A feeling almost of fatherliness came over him, touching him to the core and surprising him with its intensity. In a warm rush he knew then that he wanted to grant the boy his wish – for reasons he was still coming to terms with.

It was quickly followed by guilt. What right had he to thrust this child before enemy guns, to fight aloft in a gale, go out on a hard-fought cutting-out expedition?

Equally swiftly came the reply: that the youngster had made choice of the sea, and if he did not take him, others would.

‘Very well. I’ve a mind to speak to Captain Graves with a view to shifting your berth to Tyger. Not as a volunteer but rated midshipman. How would you like that?’

‘S-sir, th-thank you! I won’t let you down, sir, I’ll-’ the lad stammered, the hands on his cap working.

‘Then so be it.’ He allowed his expression to lower to a fierce glare. ‘You’ll be rated acting midshipman only. If at the end of the year you’ve shown yourself unworthy of my trust, then you’ll suffer disrating and be put out of the ship. Tyger is at the first rank of the service and no place for the weak or indolent. Do you understand me?’

‘Aye aye, s-sir.’

‘But if you do measure up you’ll have your warrant as midshipman as a full member of Tyger’s crew.’

The eyes were wide as the lad acknowledged.

‘And while I think of it, I’d advise keeping mum about your service at the naval school. There’ll be those who’d take it on the wrong tack as how you’re now in this ship.’

‘Sir.’

‘We sail within days. Do hold yourself ready to step ashore and get yourself in rig for I won’t have you aboard without you’re togged out properly. That’s a midshipman’s chest, full uniform and dirk. Yes?’

‘Sir!’

In a kinder tone, Kydd added, ‘You’ll probably need something to get those rascally tailors to work. Here, five guineas – no, seven. Against your pay, of course,’ he said, in mock severity. ‘Back to your ship now and await my word.’