The Dark Secret of Josephine

THE DARK SECRET OF JOSEPHINE

The Parisian intrigue as a result of which Napoleon received his first great command—that of the Army of Italy—and the devilish scheming of a pirates' "moll' queening it among outlaws of the Spanish Main, may seem worlds apart. Yet in this story of Roger Brook—Mr. Pitt's most daring and resourceful secret agent—they are knit together by a mysterious episode in the early life of the Empress Josephine.

She was born in Martinique. Mention is made in her own memoirs of her mulatto foster-sister Lucette, and Lucette's brother who later black­mailed her in Paris. They also give an account of her love affair with William de Kay. But how far did it go? It is certainly a fact that her first (or was he her second?) husband, the Vicomte de Beauharnais, endeavoured to rid himself of her on a charge of bigamy.

It was in far from happy circumstances that Roger first heard of Josephine. He had sailed for the West Indies on pleasure bent, with a party that included three lovely ladies; but in those days the blue Waters of the Caribbean were infested with sea-rovers and, as contemporary accounts record, many a terrible scene of torture, rape and murder was enacted among its palm-fringed islands.

The "Sugar Isles" were then in the throes of negro slave revolts—resulting from the French Revolution—and the particulars of these are, of course, taken from authoritative histories. So, too, are the glimpses of Paris in 1795, of Napoleon's early life, and of the street fighting on 13th Vendemiaire.

Once again Dennis Wheatley gives us his fascinating blend of full-blooded romance, swift action and breathless suspense against a back­ground of actual fact; a form of story-telling in which he is the world's acknowledged master.

THE DARK SECRET OF JOSEPHINE

by

DENNIS WHEATLEY

DEDICATION

For

CECIL BLATCH Whose wise counsel and friendship have meant so much to me since I came to live at Lymington, and for

CECILIA, with my love to you both.

made amd printed in great britain by morrison and gibb limited; london and edinburgh

chapter I

NOW ROBESPIERRE IS DEAD?

The two men had breakfasted together off Dover soles, beefsteaks weighing a pound each, and cold-house peaches; then as it was a fine August morning, they had taken the decanter of port, out into the garden.

The host was William Pitt the younger, Prime Minister to King George III; the place, his country home, Holwood House near Hayes in Kent; the guest, Mr. Roger Brook, his most successful secret agent; the year, 1794.

Although only thirty-five, Mr. Pitt had already guided the destinies of Britain for eleven years. During them he had spared himself nothing in a mighty effort which had brought the nation back from near-bankruptcy to a marvellous prosperity, and for the past eighteen months he had had the added responsibility of directing an unsought war, to wage which the country was hopelessly ill-prepared; so it was not to be wondered at that he looked far older than his age.

The fair hair that swept back from his high forehead was now turn­ing grey, and below it his narrow face was deeply lined; The penetrating power of his glance alone indicated his swift mind, and his firm mouth his determination to continue shouldering the endless burdens of the high office which he arrogantly believed he had been born to occupy. A chronic shyness made him aloof in manner, and as with the years he had gone less and less into society he had become the more self-opinionated and dictatorial. He had the mental fastidiousness of a scholar and an aristocrat, but this did not extend to his clothes and the grey suit he was wearing gave him a drab appearance.

By contrast his companion, sheathed in a bright blue coat with gilt buttons, a flowered waistcoat and impeccable fawn riding breeches, appeared an exquisite of the first order; but Roger Brook had always had a fondness for gay attire. At twenty-six he was a fine figure of a man, with slim hips and broad shoulders. His well-proportioned head, prominent nose and firm chin proclaimed his forceful personality. Yet at the moment he looked as though he should have been in bed under the care of a doctor instead of discussing affairs of State with his' master.

That he, too, even when in normal health, gave the impression of being older than his years was due to his having run away from home at the age of fifteen, rather than follow his father, Rear Admiral Brook, in the Navy, and the hazardous life he had since led. Danger, and the necessity for secrecy, had hardened his naturally sensitive mouth, although it still betrayed his love of laughter and good living; while his bright blue eyes, with their thick brown lashes that had been the envy of many a woman, showed shrewdness as well as mirth. But now those eyes were pouched, and his cheeks sunken, owing to innumerable sleepless nights; for he had only recently escaped from the horrors of the French Revolution, through which he had lived for many months, never knowing from one day to another when he might be betrayed, arrested and sent to the guillotine.

Although Roger reported to his master only at long intervals, he was regarded by him more as a friend than an employee, and had come to know his habits well. Being aware that the impecunious but incorruptible statesman could not afford a private secretary, and had such a strong aversion to writing letters that he left the greater part of his correspondence unanswered, he had sent no request for an interview. Instead he had risen early and ridden the sixteen miles across country, south of London from his home in Richmond Park; over Wimbledon Common, through orchards, market gardens and the pretty villages of Tooting, Streatham and Bromley. On previous visits to Holwood he had found that Mr. Pitt kept no secrets from such men as his cousin, Lord Granville, who had the Foreign Office,; his colleague, Harry Dundas, or William Wilberforce, Bishop Tomline and the few other intimates whom he entertained in his country home; so he had felt sure that he would be invited to make his report over breakfast, but it had chanced that the great man was alone that morning, and Roger had had his ear without interruption.

Stretching out a long, bony arm Mr. Pitt lifted the decanter across the iron garden table towards his guest, and remarked: 'The nightmare scenes of which you tell me are scarce believable. Yet that four men should have been needed daily to clean the conduit from the guillotine to the sewer, lest the blood clot in and choke it, provides a practical yard-stick to the enormities committed by these fiends. Thanks be to God that at last they are overthrown, and France can look forward to a restoration of sane government."

When Roger had filled his glass he shot an uneasy glance above its rim. This was not the first occasion on which he had felt it his duty to endeavour to check the Prime Minister's habitual but often; ill-founded optimism, and he said with marked deliberation:

"It would be rash to count the Terror fully ended, Sir."

"Oh come!" Mr. Pitt shrugged his narrow shoulders. "You have just confirmed yourself what others had already told me, of the popu­lace going wild with joy at the sight of Robespierre being carted to execution."

"Tis true; and all but a handful of the French are now so sickened of the Revolution that they curse the day it started. The state of dread and misery to which all honest folk had been reduced before the recent crisis had to be witnessed to be believed. With everyone! In Paris going in fear of their lives it's not to be wondered at that the fall of the principal tyrant led to an outburst of rejoicing. Yet, even so. ..."

With an impatient gesture Roger's master cut him short. ‘No government can suppress a whole people indefinitely, and it is evident that an explosion was due to take place. Now that the great majority have so clearly signified their antagonism to the excesses committed in the past, no new set of masters will be tolerated unless they conform to the general wish for a return to the protection of life, liberty and property by properly constituted courts of law."

"I grant you that would be the case here, Sir; but, believe me. it does not apply in France. There the people have no means of removing power from the hands of those who have usurped it, except by a counter-revolution; and all the men capable of organizing a coup d'etat are now either dead, in exile or in prison."

"You are wrong in that!" Mr. Pitt spoke cheerfully, and took a quick swig at his port "The events of Thermidor were in themselves a counter-revolution."

Roger shook his head. "If you think that, you have been mis­informed. They were no moves against the political principles by which France has been misgoverned since the Jacobins got the upper hand. It was a purely domestic upheaval in which a group of un­scrupulous demagogues succeeded in seizing the leadership from others of their own party. Those who are gone and those who remain have all subscribed to the extremist policy of the Mountain, and with others of the same kidney have been jockeying among themselves for power for many months past. It began with an intricate three-cornered fight. The Hebertists were the first to succumb. They were the brains behind the sans-culottes, and with their fall the mob became a headless monster. One might have hoped then for better things, but the Terror continued unabated. In April the Dantonists followed them to the scaffold. That may have appeared a setback for more moderate councils, but I assure you that had they triumphed they would have continued to slaughter everyone who attempted to oppose their plundering the nation like a gang of robbers and turning Paris into one vast brothel. There remained the triumvirate of Robespierre, Couthon and St Just None of these so-called 'incorruptibles' was as venal as Danton or as vile as Hubert, yet they used the guillotine more ruthlessly than either. They had to, in order to keep themselves in power. Now they too are gone, but only to be replaced by others all of whom are steeped in innocent blood up to the elbows."

For a moment Mr. Pitt continued to gaze placidly across the close-cropped sunlit lawn, then he said with an air of reasonableness: "Mr. Brook, the extraordinary position you achieved for yourself enabled you to follow the inner workings of the Revolution so closely that I count you the first authority in England upon it. Yet I believe you to be wrong in your assessment of the future. The necessity you were under to escape from France via Switzerland, followed by your long journey home via the Rhine and the Low Countries, has placed you out of touch with events. You can know little of what has occurred m Paris since you left it towards the end of July, whereas I have had many more recent advices; among them that a strong reaction to the Terror has definitely set in, and that no less than ninety-five of Robespierre's associates have followed him to the scaffold."

"That is excellent news." Roger smiled; but added the caution: "Yet its true import depends on who they were. Should they have been only the Incorruptibles’ personal hangers-on it means little. If, on the other hand, Billaud-Varennes, Collot d'Herbois, Fouché, Barere, Vadier, Carrier, Fouquier-Tinville, Freron and Tallien were among them, then there are real grounds for your optimism."

"Fouquier-Tinville has been impeached; but in this connection I recall no other of the names you mention."

"In that case, Sir, it would be wrong of me to encourage your hopes. When I left, Billaud and Collot had, by opposing Robespierre, retained their seats on the all-powerful Committee of Public Safety. The one superintended the massacres at the prisons in September '92, during which the Princess de Lamballe with scores of other ladies, priests, and nobles were brutally butchered; the other, jointly with Fouché, organized the mitraillades at Lyons, whereby many hundreds of Liberals were destroyed en-masse with grape-shot Tallien, while proconsul at Bordeaux, decimated the upper and middle classes of that city; and last winter, after Admiral Lord Hood was forced to abandon Toulon, Freron turned that port into a blood bath. Carrier, as you must know, has become forever infamous for his mass drown­ings of men, women and children in the Loire. It is said that during four months of his tyranny at Nantes he has slain not less than fifteen thousand people. While such monsters still have the direction of affairs, what possibility can there be of a return to the humanities?"

A frown creased the Prime Minister's lofty brow, and he said a shade petulantly: "I find your assessment of the situation most dis­appointing, Mr. Brook; particularly as you played no small part yourself in bringing about the downfall of Robespierre. For that all praise is due to you; but you would have risked your head to better purpose had you chosen as your co-conspirators men whose qualities would have made them less likely to follow the policies of their predecessors after the blow had been struck."

Roger would have been angry had he not known how little his great master understood the involved development of the Revolution. Having with one of his riding gloves, swatted a wasp that was dis­playing interest in his port, he replied with commendable patience: "When I last waited upon you. Sir, at Walmer Castle, it was agreed that I should do what I could to weaken the regime in France by setting her rulers against one another. But this was no case of pitting a few game terriers against a pack of giant rats. I had to deal with a single hydra-headed monster, and all I could do was to induce its heads to attack each other."

"Very well, then. Tell me now more of the men you picked on to serve your ends. What sort of a fellow is this Barras, who has suddenly become so prominent?"

"He is a ci-devant Count who has seen military service in India. Last winter as a general at the siege of Toulon he showed considerable ability, and it was there I met him. I chose him because he is ambitious, fearless and a good leader; but he is the most dissolute and un­scrupulous man one could come upon in a long day's march."

"And Dubois-Crance?'

"Although a civilian, he too has played a prominent part in directing the revolutionary armies, and instilling some degree of discipline into them. It is to that he probably owes his life, as he is one of the few moderates with a first-class brain who has survived the Terror. His value lay in his ability to rouse the cowardly deputies of the Plain from their lethargy, so that they would support the attack that was to be made on Robespierre in the Convention."

"He sounds a promising man; but need you have approached an avowed terrorist, like Tallien?"

"It was essential to include one of the original mob-leaders. Only so could the base of the movement be made broad enough to insure against the sans-culottes rising in defence of the Robespierrists. I chose Tallien for the role because the beautiful aristocrat whom he is said to have married lay in prison under sentence of death, and in joining us lay his one hope of saving her."

"What of the others who were later drawn in by the three of your own choice?"

"Unfortunately those who proved most valuable as allies in the plot were all men I would gladly have seen dead. Among them were the despicable Abbé Sieyes, the terrorist Freron, and my own most dangerous enemy Joseph Fouché, who adds to his other crimes the role of the Revolution's high-priest of atheism. The only bond they had in common was the knowledge that if they did not swiftly strike at Robespierre he would have all their heads in the basket before they were a month older. But mutual fear spurred them to sink their differences and pull him down."

"And you think this godless, blood-stained crew will be able to maintain themselves in power?"

"There being no opposition worthy of the name, I can see nothing to prevent a number of them doing so. They will, of course, fight among themselves, and some of their heads will fall; but between them they now control the two great Comites, the National Guard, the Army and the vast secret police organization built up during the Terror; so those among them who survive will be able to rule in the same arbitrary fashion as their predecessors."

'That they might be able to I will grant you, but that they intend to do so I regard as unlikely," the Prime Minister remarked with a sudden display of his dictatorial manner. "You are not up to date with the news, Mr. Brook, or you would realize that in the past month the French Government has shown a definite change of heart. The iniquitous Law of the 22nd Prairial has been repealed, the Revolu­tionary Tribunal has been reorganized to give it some semblance of a court of justice, and hundreds of prisoners have been released from the Paris jails."

With a disarming smile Roger replied: "I am most pleased to learn of it, but not at all surprised. I felt confident that once the fanatics had been brought to book a marked decrease in senseless savagery would follow. The new masters are no set of fools, and one could count on their pandering to the reaction so far as they felt that they could win cheap popularity at no risk to themselves. But it would be a great mistake to regard these measures of clemency as a sign of weakness."

"I said nothing of weakness. I spoke of a change of heart. I am informed that in Paris there is already wide-spread talk of a return to the Constitution of '91, and a restoration of the Monarchy."

"I pray you, Sir, put no credence in such rumours."

"Why?" Mr. Pitt refilled his glass and gave the decanter a quick push in Roger's direction. "You say that these people are no fools. Now, then, is the chance for them to show real statesmanship. With the temper of the nation so clearly known they might take the tide at flood and execute a complete volte-face. Did they call off the war and invite the army of the Princes to enter Paris they would be rewarded with fortunes, honours and the gratitude of their fellow countrymen. Consider how much they have to gain by such a move."

"On the contrary, Sir, they would have all to lose. Every one of them voted for the death of Louis XVI. To them more than most applies the saying 'Put not thy trust in Princes'. Were I in their shoes I would regard signing a pact with their Highnesses, his brothers, as putting my hand to my own death warrant."

"Your travels have made you cynical, Mr. Brook."

"Nay, Sir; but ‘a wee bit canny', as my dear mother would have said."

"An excellent quality for one whose life has depended on his dis­cretion, as yours must often have done. Yet it is a mistake to allow the caution you would exercise yourself to blind you to the possibility that others may take big risks to win great rewards."

Distinctly nettled, Roger retorted with an angry flash in his blue eyes: "There have, Sir, been many occasions when I have done so in your interests. Nevertheless I would serve you ill did I not caution you now against succumbing to delusions that events in France will take the happy turn you so obviously expect."

Having given vent to this outburst, he began to wonder if, in his anxiety to counter the Prime Minister's optimism, he had not somewhat over-stated his case. Before leaving Paris he had himself felt certain that the Terror had passed its peak, and it was possible that he had underestimated the strength and swiftness with which reaction would set in. Yet, as he recalled the many fierce, uncouth, suspicious, brutal men who had played so large a part in making the Revolution, and still occupied key posts in its administration, he remained convinced that they would go to any lengths rather than enter into a compromise with the emigres.

After a moment Mr. Pitt had the grace to say: "I intended no reflection on your courage. No one could have shown more audacity than yourself in your numerous attempts to rescue members of the Royal Family; and it was hard indeed that misfortune should have dogged you to the very last, when you actually believed that you had secured the little King of France."

Roger gave a bitter laugh. "Fate can rarely have played a man a more scurvy trick than that, for I shall never now be able to collect the hundred thousand pounds you promised me for the safe delivery of his person."

For a little they fell silent and the quiet of the garden was broken only by the drowsy hum of bees among the flowers in the nearby borders; then the Prime Minister said thoughtfully: "You say that the child who is still in the Temple had been walled-up for six months, and that during that time his food was passed to him through a grill which prevented even his jailers seeing him. It is not to be wondered at that when you broke your way in you found him living like an animal, in an indescribable state of filth, scrofulous and ulcerated from neglect, and so ill that he could do no more than mutter a few almost incoherent words. Yet it seems to me that such conditions would have changed any child beyond normal recognition. Are you convinced beyond any shadow of doubt that he was not Marie Antoinette's son?"

"Certain of it, Sir. This child was at least two years older, and I had known the Dauphin well. Barras and Fouché saw him shortly after I did, and both were equally convinced that some other child had been substituted for the little Capet"

"And you think the substitution was made by Simon on the orders of Chaumette or Hebert, at the time of the walling up, in January ?"

"Yes; and since all three of them are dead mere are no possible means of tracing the victim of their intrigue."

"Victim, in its full sense, may not be the appropriate word. The poor child may still be a captive in some Parisian cellar, or hidden on a lonely farm."

Roger had never previously lied to his master, but he did so now. He knew Louis XVII to be dead. How and where the boy had died was a secret that he had no intention of ever telling anyone, and the knowledge of it could be of no value to Mr. Pitt; so he said:

"Should that be so, and there is a counter-revolution in a few years' time, the people now acting as his jailers may pretend that they kept turn hidden for his own safety, and produce him in the hope of receiving a great reward. But I greatly doubt it. When I last saw the boy his mind had been so brutalized and bemused by Simon that he had already almost forgotten that he was born a Prince; and it is most unlikely that whoever took him from the Temple would have disclosed his identity to his new guardians, for to do so would have been to risk their using him for their own ends. My own belief is that the sadist Hubert murdered him rather than allow Robespierre to get possession of so valuable a card. Otherwise, when he and Chaumette were brought to trial in March, why did not one or other of them offer to produce the priceless hostage they held in exchange for their own lives? In any case, the wretched child had been reduced to a state which made him hopelessly unfitted to succeed; so the wisest course would be to leave him out of all future calculations and account him dead."

Mr. Pitt refilled his glass from the half-empty decanter, and mur­mured: "Mayhap you're right; but 'tis a tragedy that bodes ill for the future of France."

"Why so, Sir?"

"Because we must now regard his uncle, that pig-headed fool the Comte de Provence, as Louis XVIII. Had you succeeded in bringing the boy here we might have been able to make something of him, and sent him back well grounded in our democratic ideas to play the part of a good Constitutional Monarch. As things are now, when de Provence ascends the throne, so full is he of antiquated prejudices, he will endeavour to set the clock back a hundred years, and rob his people of the long overdue liberties they won for themselves in the early days of the Revolution. Then we shall be faced with the dilemma whether to continue our support of him as France's legitimate ruler, - or stand by while the people revolt again, and perhaps once more become a menace to order and security throughout Europe."

"It will be a long time before you are called on to add that problem to your other worries," Roger said with a shrug.

"On the contrary," came the swift reply, "I foresee myself having to do so within a year from now."

With a somewhat rueful smile, Roger enquired: "Am I to take it, then, that you still believe me wrong in my assessment of the way things will go in Paris?"

"No. Your appreciations have always been so well founded that you have sadly reduced the hopes I had of being able to make a peace with the new government. But there are other means by which the French nation may be brought to reason, and I had m mind the advance of the Allied armies."

"Strap me!" exclaimed Roger, drawing up his long legs with a jerk. "Do you then believe, Sir, that within a measurable time they are capable of achieving a conclusive victory?"

"I shall be much surprised if they do not 'Tis true that we have suffered a considerable setback owing to the victory the French gained at Fleurus towards the end of June; but the daily increasing strength of the Coalition should soon do far more than make good that misfortune. In return for handsome subsidies, which owing to good management Britain can afford to pay, both Austria and Prussia are putting new contingents in the field, and our measures for raising many more troops in this country are at last taking effect"

"When I saw you at Walmer in February you spoke of raising eight new regiments this autumn. Is it to them that you refer, Sir?"

"It is," Mr. Pitt replied with a self-satisfied nod.

Mentally Roger groaned. Aloud he said: "Then you must forgive me if I doubt the ability of such a reinforcement, plus some hired Germans, to turn the scale against the levies raised this year by the French. The indefatigable Carnot, whom I believe history will rank as the greatest War Minister France has ever had, set himself to raise fourteen armies, and he is well on the way to succeeding."

"Fourteen rabbles, Mr. Brook! Fourteen rabbles! I'll warrant you that any of them would show their heels at the very sight of a battalion of His Majesty's Foot Guards."

"I'll not argue that. But I would be mightily interested to hear on what you base your hopes of a victorious campaign. In '92 and ‘93 the road to Paris was on numerous occasions left open, yet the Allies failed to take it. There is no particular reason to suppose that such opportunities will recur, and the Republican troops are in far better trim that they were then."

The Prime Minister airily waved a long graceful hand. "I agree that good opportunities were lost; but that was due to divided councils among the allied Generals, and now they are much more at one. As for the improvement in the French troops which you suggest has taken place, that will be more than offset by the handicap they are bound to suffer from incompetent leadership."

"I fear I am at a loss in seeking grounds for your last statement, Sir."

"Why, Danton at least had the sense to realize that armies cannot be handled by sans-culottes, and while he was War Minister continued to employ experienced commanders. Ask yourself what has become of them?"

"Lafayette and Dumouriez came over to the Allies. The Due de Biron, Luckner, Custine, Houchard, and the Vicomte de Beauharnais were sent one after the other to the guillotine."

"Precisely! The Robespierrists knew nothing whatever of military affairs. Any General who served them had only to suffer one reverse to be recalled, accused of treachery and executed. The French have decapitated their own army. That is why its defeat should now prove easy, and Christmas see the Allies in Paris."

With an uneasy glance, Roger said: "You appear to have taken no account, Sir, of the ability which has been displayed by the young Generals who are products of the Revolution. Pichegru, Hoche and Jourdan, the present commanders of the armies on the Rhine, the Moselle and in Flanders, have all shown a natural flair for directing operations. The last, since his victory at Fleurus, has already wrested from us all the difficult country cut up by the Lys and the Scheldt."

"What does that signify while we still hold the fortresses of Landrecies, Quesnoy and Valenciennes? By his rash advance he has thrust his head into a noose. Prince Coburg and His Highness of York will be monstrous unlucky should they fail to trap him there. Besides, France cannot much longer afford to support a war. Her finances are in chaos, her people starving and her coasts blockaded."

"'Tis true that the past five years of upheaval have entirely wrecked the former administrative machinery of the country; but, believe me, Sir, Cambon, Cambaceres, Dubois-Crance and others have made good that handicap by brilliant improvisation."

"Mr. Brook, an understanding of finance is not among your many talents. You may take it from me that the total destruction of a fiscal system that it took many centuries to build up must lead to bankruptcy. Wars cannot be fought without money, and a drying up of supplies must soon cripple the French armies to such a degree that they will fall an easy prey to the Allies."

Roger forbore to comment further. His private opinion was that his master knew even less about military affairs than had the Robespierrists, and that while they had at least had the sense to give a free hand to the brilliant Carnot, he was becoming a menace to his own most cherished hopes by putting a distorted interpretation on facts whenever they did not fit in with his own opinions.

Having emptied his last glass of port, Mr. Pitt enquired casually: "When do you plan to return to France?"

With equal casualness, Roger let fall the bomb-shell that he had come determined to deliver with his report that morning: "I had not thought of doing so, Sir."

"What say you?" exclaimed his master with a startled look.

"I was loath to return when I did in February, and now I am definitely set against it. In the past two years I have spent less than three months with ray wife; and that is far too little for a couple who have some fondness for one another."

No woman had ever played a part in the life of the austere Prime Minister, so it was difficult for him to appreciate how other men could allow the attractions of feminine society to distract them, even temporarily, from the nation's affairs. With marked coldness he spoke his mind.

"If I remember aright you gave two of the best years of your life to honeymooning in Italy and afterwards idly dancing attendance on your wife; so even if your work has since taken you from her for long periods, she has no great grounds for complaint. Officers in our ships and more distant garrisons frequently do not see their families for six years at a stretch; so I pray you do not detract from my good opinion of you by allowing the calls of-domesticity to ring louder in your ears than those of duty."

"'Us not that alone, Sir; but also the strain I have been under these many months past. You can have little conception what life was like in Paris this spring and summer. The elimination of the nobility, the priests and the well-to-do had long since been achieved, and the Terror was turned against anyone and everyone who cherished the mildest belief in the liberties the Revolution had been initiated to bring. The Committee of Public Safety had its spies everywhere and acted with fanatical ruthlessness. Each night hundreds of surprise domiciliary visits were paid, and the discovery of a fire-arm or a letter from a relative who had fled abroad was enough to land a whole family in jail. Each morning the letter-box of the mfamous Public Prosecutor, Fouquier-Tinville, was stuffed with scores of denunciations, and nine out of ten of those anonymous accusations became a death-warrant for the person named. For a single indiscreet expression, or open grumbling in the bread queues, people were seized upon and condemned to death. Even the sans-cuhttes had become cowed and no longer dared to question the will of the camarilla that held the whole nation enslaved. I was unable to prevent the death of one I dearly loved, and had to stand by while others died for whom I had considerable affection. Every hour of every day was like living through a nightmare, and I'll have no more of it.

Mr. Pitt nodded, and his voice took on a more sympathetic tone: "That is another matter. Such conditions would in time undermine the fortitude of any man, and when I first saw you this morning I thought you looking far from well. 'Tis clear you need a period of relaxation."

To this belated recognition of his unhappy state, Roger replied with a bitter smile: "Sir, I am sick in mind and body, and need far more than that to make me my. own man again."

"Oh come! Tis not too late in the year for you to take a holiday by the sea. The coast of Kent can be delightful in September. Allow me to give instructions for you and your wife to be installed at Walmer Castle. I know no better place for restoring a man's peace of mind. Then when you feel equal to it you could move on to Bath or Brighton and participate for a while in the gaieties of the autumn season. By November I vow you will be spoiling to take up once more the in­valuable work you have been doing for me."

"I thank you, Sir; but no. Whatever you may believe, I am con­vinced that for. a long time to come Paris will remain a city ruled by fear, violence and arbitrary arrest. While serving you there I have made deadly enemies; and there are others there who know the double part I played. Were I betrayed, my record is such that despite any lessening of the Terror I would lose my head, and I have a whim to keep it on my shoulders. That I should have lived through the worst and got away is not due to one, but a whole series of miracles. I would be mad to tempt Providence further.''

"Mr. Brook, I appreciate all you say, yet I would still ask you to consider my side of the matter. I have many other agents in France who send me useful intelligence, but none like yourself. They can do no more than hover on the outskirts of events, whereas you have made your way into the councils of those who initiate them. God forbid that I should send any man to his death; but having, as you say yourself, lived through the worst, I have even greater confidence in your ability to er . . . keep that handsome head on your shoulders in the less dangerous circumstances now emerging. I will not ask you for a decision now. Let us postpone the issue. But I pray you reflect on what I have said, and come to see me again when you have recovered from the nervous exhaustion which at present afflicts you."

"Nay, Sir. There would be no point in that. In '92 I agreed to go again to France because I was at that time in desperate need of money. Now, thank God, I am better found; so can afford to risk your dis­pleasure. Until your own prognostications are fulfilled, and France once more becomes a country fitted for a human being to live in, I am resolved not to return to it"

The corners of the Prime Minister's thin mouth drew down, and he asked sternly: "Am I to understand that you refuse to continue to serve me?"

"By no means, Sir. My youth and good constitution should set me up again by Christmas. In the new year I hope you will find another mission for me."

"Ah! Now you speak more in the vein to which I am accustomed from you. Should the autumn campaign go as I expect, by early spring the conditions you require may be fulfilled. You could be of inestim­able value to me in Paris while I negotiate peace and a restoration."

"No, no!" Roger exclaimed in exasperation. "I thought I had made myself plain. I'll not set foot on French soil until the restoration is an accomplished fact But there are other countries. In '66 you sent me to aid my Lord Malmesbury in Holland. In '87 I served you at the Courts of Denmark, Sweden and Russia. In '89 and '90 I carried out missions for Queen Marie Antoinette at the courts of Tuscany and Naples. In '91 you made me your envoy extraordinary to Madrid. I have useful acquaintances in all these places. Send me to any of them, to America, or to one of the German courts. I care not; but I have earned the right to ask that it should be to some city in which I can live like a civilized human being, and not a hunted, half-starved dog."

Slowly shaking his head from side to side, Mr. Pitt replied: "Now that Austria, Prussia, the Rhine Provinces, Holland, Spain, Sardinia and Naples are all joined with us in a grand alliance to crush the French, our diplomats furnish me with all the information I require of the happenings at their courts; and our relations with all the neutral countries are fully satisfactory. France is my problem, and among the minds that direct her policy you have made for yourself a niche that no other man can fill. Twould be a criminal waste to send you elsewhere." Then, standing up, he added with a kindly smile: "Think no more of this now. When you are restored to health I feel sure you will regard the matter differently. Near Christmas time. I will get in touch with you; so be good enough to keep me informed of your whereabouts."

Roger, too, had risen to his feet. His mouth set for a moment in a firm, hard line, then he said:

"It would be useless, Sir. Since you refuse me reasonable employ­ment I have now made up my mind to accept an invitation I received but yesterday. By Christmas I'll be in the West Indies, and should I find the sugar islands as pleasant as they are portrayed I intend to stay there."

chapter II

THE SILKEN CORD

As Roger rode away from Holwood House his feelings were very mixed. The nerve-racking existence he had led through the Terror would have satiated most men's zest for adventure for the rest of their lives; but it was the horror of it, together with the sordid condi­tions in which he had been compelled to live, more than the ever-present danger, that had so sickened him of his work in Paris. Previous to the rising crescendo of butchery that had taken place during his last mission to France, he had greatly enjoyed himself, both there and in the numerous other countries to which he had been sent. Meeting sovereigns, statesmen, generals and diplomats in court and camp, intriguing to secure information of value, and even at times succeeding in influencing events in favour of his country, had become the breath of life to him. He had, therefore, had no intention of severing his connection with Mr. Pitt, and would never have done so but for his master's uncompromising refusal to send him anywhere other than back to France.

On the other hand, the idea of dropping all cares for many months, while making a voyage to the West Indies, had been very tempting. The invitation had come quite unexpectedly and, as things had turned out, could not have done so at a more appropriate moment. He had been home only two nights, and the day before, his oldest friend, Georgina, now Countess of St. Ermins, had driven out to Richmond to pay a surprise visit to his wife, Amanda. The St. Ermins were in London in August only because the Earl had been suffering from such acute insomnia that Georgina had decided that he must consult a mental specialist The doctor's recommendation had been a long sea voyage, and as St Ermins had estates in Jamaica, it had been decided that they should go out there for the winter and later, perhaps, visit North America. Georgina had not known that Roger was back from France, and on finding him at home, but in such poor health, she had at once declared that he and Amanda must accompany her and her husband on their voyage.

As the four of them were such close friends no prospect could have been more delightful and Amanda had instantly pressed Roger to accept for them; but he had told her he feared that Mr. Pitt would have projects for his future which would put such a prolonged absence from Europe quite out of the question. Now, angry as he was with the Prime Minister for having forced his hand, he was glad of it for Amanda's sake; and, after he had ridden a mile, he decided that he was really glad for his own as well.

During the past two years Amanda had spent much of her time staying with relatives; so she had made no serious inroads into the payments for his services that the Foreign Office had remitted to his ank, and he had succeeded in getting out of France the bulk of the considerable sums he had received while acting as a high official of the Revolutionary Government. On a rough calculation he reckoned that he must now have at least £10,000 in investments lodged with Messrs. Hoare's, and although both he and Amanda were extravagant by nature, that was ample to keep them in comfort for a long time to come. When he returned from America it would be quite soon enough to look round for some remunerative employment.

At a fast trot he passed through-Bromley and its adjacent village of Beckenham. Beyond it he left the main road by a lane that shortly brought him to the hamlet of Penge Green. Thence he rode through orchards towards Norwood, the three mile wide stretch of which now confronted him.

Ten minutes later, as he entered the wood, his thoughts had turned to Charles St. Ermins and his malady. Georgina had made no secret of its cause. Her husband was one of those gallant gentlemen who, under Sir Percy Blakeney, had formed a League to rescue French families from the Terror. At times, in order to carry out their plans for saving one set of people they had to stand by while appalling atrocities were inflicted on others. It was such sights which were now preying on the young nobleman's mind, and one in particular.

In Robespierre's native town of Arras, his friend Le Bon had shocked even hardened revolutionaries by his barbarities. On one occasion, having caught an emigre officer who had returned, he had had him strapped face upward to the plank of the guillotine; then, while the wretched man lay staring up at the heavily weighted triangular knife which was to come swishing down upon his throat, the terrorist bad stood there for twenty minutes reading out to him from the latest news-sheet a long report of a Republican victory. To the victim, while waiting for the knife, to fall, each moment must have seemed an hour, and St Ermins, who had been present disguised as a National Guard, now dreamed each night that he was the victim; so that he woke hysterical with the agony the other must have suffered.

Roger, too, was afflicted by harrowing memories, but they plagued him mostly whenever his thoughts happened to drift in the daytime. The death of the little King was one, and another a scene that he had not actually witnessed but which, as he had seen so many similar to it, frequently sprang unbidden to his imagination with sickening vividness. During one of his brief absences from Paris his first love, Athenais de Rochambeau, had been guillotined. In his mind's eye he could-see the executioner's assistant performing his awful function of throwing her decapitated trunk into the cart, men thrusting her beautiful head between her legs.

Each time this horrifying vision arose he found it terribly hard to banish it, and he wondered now if he and St Ermins had a softer streak in them than most other men; but he rather doubted it Both of them had given ample evidence of normal courage; so it seemed that the sight of atrocities committed in cold blood were particularly liable later to play havoc with a man's nerves. That he and Charles were both seeking to escape from much the same thing now struck him as a fortunate coincidence, and he felt that the doctor who had advised the Earl must be a sound man. The peaceful routine of life aboard ship, followed by unmeasured time in which to laze in the sunshine of palm-fringed islands, was just the thing to banish the nightmares that beset them.

Emerging from the leafy glades of Nor Wood he passed Round Hod Hill, then rode a few hundred yards down a turning to the left until he came to the Horn Inn. There, he gave his horse half an hour's rest while drinking a couple of glasses of Malaga at a wooden table outside the inn, from which there was a lovely view over the gardens and country houses that lay in the valley to the west.

From the Horn he returned to the road leading down the south side of Streatham Common, but he was still on the high ground when, to his annoyance, just outside the gates to the Duke of Bedford's mansion, his horse cast a shoe. The occurrence necessitated his reducing his pace to a walk for the next mile, down to the main road and north along it up the hill into Streatham village; but on the apex of the fork roads there stood a forge, where he was able to order his mount to be re-shod.

As the smith and both his assistants were already busy he had to wait a while; so he sat down outside on the mounting block and idly watched the passing traffic It was mainly composed of country carts taking farm produce into London, and the carriages of local gentry, but twice smart equipages clattered through, most probably on their way down to Brighthelmstone, or Brighton as the newly fashionable little watering-place was now beginning to be called.

Mentally he contrasted the busy, prosperous scene with the hopeless lethargy and Squalid poverty which was now universal in villages of a similar size in France, and that set him thinking again of Athenais. He was roused from his gloomy thoughts by the smith calling to him that his horse was ready, but just at that moment a familiar figure caught his eye.

It was Mr. Pitt coming up the hill in his phaeton. Despite the slope its horses were being driven at a spanking trot, and the few other vehicles in sight quickly pulled aside to give it passage. On the back seat the Prime Minister sat, as was his wont, stiff as a ramrod and looking neither to right nor to left. He was utterly indifferent to either the applause or abuse of crowds, and of such a haughty disposition that even when taking his seat in the House he never deigned to glance at his closest supporters. Roger came to his feet and swept off his hat in a graceful bow, but his gesture received no acknowledgment. The beautifully-sprung carriage hardly slackened speed as it rounded the end of the smithy, then took the road past St. Leonard's Church towards Tooting.

Clapping his hat back on his head Roger stared after it with an angry frown. He did not give a hoot about the attitude of god-like superiority that Mr. Pitt chose to assume in public; but he did intensely resent the treatment he had received that morning. Brooding now upon the lack of appreciation and generosity which he felt his old master had shown him, he paid the smith a shilling, mounted his horse and set off after the carriage.

Cantering across Tooting Common he came up to within a hundred yards of it, but on reaching the village it went on along Garrett Lane, from which Roger deduced that the Prime Minister was going, via Roehampton, to see the King at Kew, whereas his own way lay to the west through Wimbledon. Another hour's ride brought him to the Robin Hood Gate of Richmond Park, and by half-past three he reached his home, Thatched House Lodge.

It was a charming little mansion near the south end of the Park, with a lovely view of the Surrey Hills. An earlier building on the site had been used as a hunting-box by Charles I, and it was still a Crown property; but Mr. Pitt, in a more handsome mood than he had just displayed, had given Roger a life tenancy of it four years earlier for the special services he had rendered during the early stages of the Revolution.

Having handed his horse over to the faithful Dan, his black-bearded ex-smuggler servant, Roger went from the stables into the house by its back entrance. The kitchen door was open, and glancing through it as he passed he was much surprised to see that his wife was there directing the operations not only of the cook but also their two maids, and that every available space was occupied with meats in preparation, vege­tables, pies and basins. As he paused in the doorway, Amanda looked up, and exclaimed:

24

"Thank goodness you're back! There are a dozen things I want you to help with."

He raised an eyebrow. "What is all this to-do? Tis true that I need feeding up, but we'll not be able to eat a tithe of these things for dinner."

Amanda was a tall girl with a fine figure, slightly frizzy auburn hair and the beautiful skin that often goes with it She had good teeth and her mouth was so formed that it was always a little open, as though she was about to smile. Now it opened in a laugh, as she replied:

"We have guests coming, and to stay."

Seeing his face darken she came over to him, pushed him firmly back and closed the kitchen door behind her.

"M'dear," he expostulated, "you must know that I am in no mood for company."

"Now Roger," she chided him gently, "you must be sensible. Nearly all day yesterday you sat looking a picture of misery in the garden. You brightened a little while Georgjna was here, and I know you did your best to respond each time I tried to cheer you; but drunkenness has never been a vice of yours and you punished the port after dinner so heavily that you spoilt our evening."

He gave a rueful smile. "I'm truly sorry for that, and for my general moroseness. Tis no fault of yours, and I beg you to be patient with me."

"I will, my sweet; but to contend with your unhappy state is too much for me alone. I'd soon become as miserable as yourself and contemplate throwing myself out of a window. Help to make you your own cheerful self again I had to have; so soon after you left this morning I had Dan drive me in the gig to London. Georgina at once said yes to my appeal that she and Charles should come to stay for a while, and as they are lying in Bedford Square at her father's, I asked him to come out with them for dinner. Georgina, too, will try to collect dear Droopy Ned; so that this evening your best friends may begin the re-enlivening of your mind with a proper party."

Leaning forward, he kissed her, and said: "It was a sweet thought my pet and maybe you're right that the necessity to play host will take me out of myself. In any case I'm glad the St. Ermins are to stay, as it will give us ample opportunity to discuss going with them to Jamaica."

"Roger!" Her eyes widened with delight. "And you had led me to believe there was no hope of that! Oh, never again will I say aught against Mr. Pitt after his generosity in releasing you for long enough to make this voyage."

"Providing it be only to myself, you may now say what you will about him and I'll not contradict you; for he no longer is my master."

"What! Do you mean that you have quarrelled with him?"

"Not that; but he treated me most scurvily. I have, of course, been paid for what I've done, but no more than I would have received had I been working in comfort and some degree of security. Even so, I asked him for nothing, except that in the new year he should give me a mission to some place where life would be endurable. I had a right to expect that, but he refused it, and did not even offer me a continuance of my salary until I recovered my health. I told him flatly that I'd go no more to France, and that has put an end to matters between us."

"Then he has cut off his nose to spite his face," said Amanda quickly. "I've long felt his ruthless exploitation of others for his own selfish ends to be intolerable. He will never be able to replace you, and when he finds that out it should be just the lesson that he needs to make him a trifle more human in his dealings."

Roger shrugged. "Do not deceive yourself, m'dear. Were I the last servant he had, he would never admit to himself that he had been in error to dispense with me. But we must give him his due. He exploits people only from the highest motives; never for his own ends, out for the nation's, and 'tis that which has formed the basis of my attachment to him."

Amanda's face showed concern, as she asked: "Are you greatly distressed by this breach that has occurred?"

"I could be," he admitted, "but I have determined not to be. Tis a matter that I can put out of my mind more readily than some others, and while riding home I vowed I'd let the future take care of itself."

She nodded, and he added with a sudden smile: "In fact I will go further. From now on I mean to do my utmost to think of nothing but your dear self enjoying with me the sunshine of the Indies."

"Oh Roger, how happy you make me!" she cried, throwing her arms round his neck. For a few moments they remained tightly embraced, then she went back into the kitchen and he hurried away to get wines up from the cellar.

An hour later their guests arrived: Georgina, whose dark rich beauty and tempestuous vitality made her an admirable foil for the magnolia-skinned, quiet-natured Amanda; Charles, a youngish brown-faced man of slight build, whose features, apart from his small Roman nose, had a distinct resemblance to those of his great great grand­father, Charles II; Colonel Thursby, Georgina's father, who by his fine brain had made a great fortune out of the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution, and whom Roger had regarded from boyhood almost as a second father to himself. Droopy Ned, too, was with them, as they had learned that he was staying at Sion House with the Northumberland's; so they had come by way of Isleworth to pick him up there. His proper style was Lord Edward Fitz-Deverel, and he owed his nickname to a chronic stoop brought about by his being short-sighted. He was a fop of the first order, but under his elegant posturing concealed an extremely shrewd mind which he devoted largely to antiquarian interests, and he had been Roger's close friend since their school-days.

Amanda delighted the St. Ermins by telling them at once of the decision to accompany them to Jamaica, then Roger took the whole party across the lawn to the summer-house, and there refreshed them after their journey with a Moselle Wine Cup that he had just made.

As the ice tinkled in the tall glasses they plied him with a hail of questions about the state of things in France, and he replied by giving them a broad outline of what he had said to Mr. Pitt.

"You think, then," said Colonel Thursby, "that despite the over­throw of Robespierre there is little hope of our making an accommoda­tion with the French?"

"None whatever," Roger declared. "Even if the Thermidorians, who have newly seized the whip in Paris, wished for peace, they dare not make it. In France there are now a million men under arms. Peace would mean the disbandment of those serving on the frontiers and they would return to the cities as a vast armed rabble. No govern­ment could hope to prevent the excesses they would commit, soon reducing the whole country to a state of anarchy. Mr. Pitt's hopes of peace brought about by a change of heart are as chimerical as those he places in a speedy allied victory. Of that I am convinced."

"Does he then visualize the Austrians and His Boneheadedness of York marching upon Paris this autumn?" Georgina enquired.

"He does; and that despite the hopeless incompetence they have so far displayed."

"Tis not so much incompetence as neither the Austrians nor the Prussians having their hearts in the war," Droopy Ned remarked. "Both are looking over their shoulders on account of the projected partitioning of Poland, and holding back forces lest Catherine of Russia attempts to seize more than her agreed share."

St. Ermins nodded. "That is the rub; and 'tis aggravated by their divided councils. Each General is placing the interests of the allied cause second to the particular interests of his own government, and using his troops to besiege coveted cities instead of pooling them in one grand manoeuvre to crush the French."

"Both are contributory factors to our ill-success," Roger agreed. "But the root of the trouble lies in Mr. Pitt's mismanagement."

"Hark at that now!" Georgina exclaimed with a laugh. "Whoever would have thought to hear Roger make so disparaging a remark about his master. Time was when he never tired of preaching to us of Billy Pitt's greatness."

Realizing that his words had given an impression he was far from intending, Roger retorted swiftly: "You misunderstand me. He is great. His obstinacy and conceit are at times infuriating, but he has qualities that make him the greatest man in England; and on occasion one catches a glimpse of his true nature, which is most lovable. I meant only that he knows nothing of military matters, and so is entirely at sea when considering the steps we should take to defeat our enemies."

"Tis true." Droopy nodded his forward-thrust head up and down. "Billy Pitt's genius in the fields of finance, diplomacy and reform is indisputable; but he has an inborn hatred of war and lacks all understanding of it."

Colonel Thursby smiled at Roger. 'Tell us what you would do, were you in the Prime Minister's shoes?"

"Since England pays the piper she has a right to call the tune, Sir.

Mr. Pitt should bang our allies' heads together and make them concentrate their forces with us in a determined drive for Paris."

"On that we are agreed, although it might prove more difficult than it sounds. What else?"

"Recall His Highness of York, and replace him with a more capable commander."

"I doubt if His Majesty would consent to that. York is his favourite son, and of that boorish bunch the best. At least he is an honest man."

"'Twould be no precedent were the command of our army given to one who is not a Royal Prince; and this country does not lack for honest soldiers who are highly competent at their business."

Roger had been about to add numerous other measures he would have taken, but at that moment Dan came out to announce that dinner was served; so they all trooped into the house. As was usual at that period, only two courses and a remove were served, but each course consisted of half a dozen different dishes and they helped themselves lavishly to fish, meat, poultry and game according to their fancy, and washed each item down with copious draughts of Via de Grave, Rhenish, Claret or Florence Wine.

As the meal progressed, Georgina gaily outlined her plans. They were to sail in a West Indiaman from Bristol in the first week of October, and hoped to reach Jamaica early in December. The St Ermins's plantations were on the north side of the island near St. Ann's Bay and they had a large house there which was occupied by a distant cousin who managed the estates. They intended to make it .: their headquarters, but would spend much of their time in Kingston where a considerable society made life most agreeable during the winter season.

Droopy Ned, who was a diehard Tory, took occasion to remark to Roger: "At least you cannot complain of the conduct of the war in the West Indies. In the past year Admiral Sir John Jervis and General Sir Charles Grey have between them stripped the French of practically every possession they had there."

"But I do!" Roger countered. "Tis Mr. Pitt's dispersal of our forces that distresses me beyond all else. Could we but once overcome the French in their own country all else would follow from that. Had Sir Charles Grey's force been sent instead to Toulon, we might have held it Had they been sent to Flanders so great a reinforcement could have turned the tide for us there. Still better, had they been thrown into Brittany while the Vendeean revolt was at its height, the Revolutionary Government must have collapsed from their inability to support yet another front."

"My lord Moira's force was charged with that," put in St. Ermins.

"So I gather. And that is another instance of gross mismanagement, for it remained sitting idle in the Channel Islands throughout the whole winter from lack of definite instructions. But I was speaking of theJndies, and 'tis there our best troops have been thrown away."

"Oh come!" protested Colonel Thursby. "The Sugar Islands are of immense value, and only by securing those lately belonging to the French could we hope to pay the cost of the war. Billy Pitt showed the sound sense that has made him what he is by seizing them while he had the chance."

"I wonder whom he will make Governor of Martinique," St. Ermins hazarded. "Whoever gets that appointment will have a plum."

Colonel Thursby nodded, 'undeed he will. The work of such posts is mainly done by underlings trained in colonial administration, while the Governor takes all the perquisites. I'd estimate the governor­ship of such a highly cultivated island to be worth at least five thousand a year."

"Is there not still fighting there, though?" Amanda asked. "One hears that the French islands have been much affected by the Revolution, and that in most of them the slaves are in open revolt."

"That is so in Saint-Domingue," the Colonel agreed. "There the French Royalists invited us in to save their lives and properties, and a full-scale campaign is in progress against the blacks incited by terrorists sent from Paris. In the other islands, our own included, there have been similar troubles, but on a much lesser scale, and no matter for serious concern."

"By the time of our arrival there should be nought to worry about," St. Ermins added. "For now, since my lord Howe's victory on 'the glorious 1st of June' the ocean is ours, and the French will no longer be able to send support to the revolted slaves."

Roger looked across at him with a grim smile. "I wonder, Charles, if you realize what that victory cost us. To my mind it was the equivalent of a major defeat."

A chorus of excited protest greeted his pronouncement, but he silenced it with a gesture. "Do not mistake me. I am well aware that his lordship's five-day chase and eventual bringing to battle of the French fleet were in the true tradition of British tenacity and courage. I am told, too, that although near seventy the grand old man scarcely left the deck of his flagship during all that time. It is the result of the action I presume to criticize, and my sojourn in France having enabled me to see the other side of the picture as well as ours, I feel I am better placed than yourselves to form a judgment."

Pausing, he took a drink of wine, then went on. "This spring France was in a most desperate plight. Robespierre and his colleagues knew that unless they could feed starving Paris through the summer sheer desperation would drive the masses to revolt, murder them and call for immediate peace. In consequence they purchased a vast quantity of grain in the Americas and chartered every available bottom they could lease to bring it over. Had it failed to arrive they would have been finished, and Admiral Villaret-Joyeuse was charged to get the convoy through whatever the cost to his fleet. My lord Howe was, of course, charged to intercept it and could have done so. With his superior forces he might have contained or even ignored Villaret-Joyeuse. Instead he allowed himself to be lured away from the French ports, and although in the battle he severely crippled the French fleet, his own was so crippled afterwards that his ships were incapable of getting back in time to intercept the grain convoy. It arrived intact and the corn it brought was sufficient to tide France over to the present harvest; thus the Terrorist government was given a new lease of life and our chance to end the war was lost."

For a moment there was silence round the table, then Colonel Thursby said. "Your account of this affair confirms my own impres­sion that the war at sea is being ill-directed. Great sailor as my lord Howe may be, he is now too old to continue in active service, and too set in his ideas. It has always been his policy to spare his ships as much as possible, and preserve them from the wear and hazards inseparable from remaining at sea for long periods during winter. Tis that which has so far rendered our blockade of the French coast largely ineffective. As a commercial man I am very conscious of the great rewards that a full enforcement of the blockade might bring, but to reap them demands a new system of close patrols and unremitting watch."

"The Navy is well enough," Georgjna chimed in after her father, "but for the sleep-befuddled head upon its shoulders. What's needed is Mr. Pitt's removal of his brother, my lord Chatham, from the Admiralty. Daily a half-dozen of our finest sea-dogs are there at eight in the morning clamouring for orders, but his lordship declares it barbarous to be called on to leave his bed before nine, and comes to the Board at ten still yawning his empty head off."

"Thou art right, my love," St. Ermins supported her. "And 'twas a thousand pities that when His Grace of Portland formed the new Coalition with Mr. Pitt, he did not insist upon someone more capable being given the Admiralty."

Droopy Ned could not resist remarking with just a trace of malice, "Your leader, Charles, was so concerned with grabbing the lion's share of patronage for himself that he could think of nought else."

St. Ermins only laughed and retorted: "We Whigs were overdue for some of the spoils of office, and those secured by His Grace are but a part of the monopoly enjoyed by Henry Dundas under the Tory administration."

"Maybe, my lord; but Dundas is shrewd, immensely capable and has an insatiable appetite for work, whereas the Duke is a very mediocre man, and owes his new office entirely to the influence he wields as a political figure-head."

Having so recently returned from France, Roger knew little about the changes in the Cabinet which had taken place in the preceding month, so at his request his friends enlightened him.

In the early years of the Revolution the sympathies of nearly everyone in Britain, and particularly the Whig party, had been with the French nobles and professional men of liberal views, who had endeavoured to force King Louis into granting a Constitution, and abolishing the many abuses to which the lower classes had been subject since the Middle Ages. But as the Revolution began to degener­ate into class warfare, mob rule, and nation-wide attacks on religion, property and life, the upper and middle classes of England had gradually become more and more opposed to the new regime.

Charles Fox had, from the beginning, championed the revolu­tionaries and continued to do so even after war against France had been declared, using his brilliant oratory with complete unscrupulous-ness to embarrass the Government at every opportunity; but Edmund Burke, his friend and colleague of long standing in the Whig opposi­tion, differed violently from him on that subject and had made known his views in 'Reflections on the Revolution'. This publication had had an enormous circulation, and as it set forth very clearly how the triumph of the Jacobins would result in all Europe falling into a state of atheism and anarchy, it had not only convinced great numbers of waverers among the middle-classes but deprived Fox of the support of the majority of his own party.

With the discrediting of Fox it had soon become apparent that all the sounder Whigs were as much in favour of a vigorous prosecution of the war as were the Tories; so Pitt, with a view to strengthening his administration, had agreed with their leader, Portland, to form a Coalition. Early in July the Duke had been given the Home Office, William Windham had been made Secretary of War, and the Earls Fitzwilliam and Spencer became Lord President and Lord Privy Seal. At the Admiralty Pitt had kept his elder brother, and at the Foreign Office, his cousin, Lord Grenville, while his indefatigable man-of-all-work, Dundas, had been allowed to retain the India and Colonial Offices and as compensation for giving up the Home Secretaryship had been made what amounted to Minister of Defence.

These changes had required the most delicate negotiations, as on the one hand Pitt was determined not to sacrifice the more valuable of his old colleagues and, on the other, the powerful Whig nobility was out to grab all it could get The Viceroyalty of Ireland and several other valuable posts were still bones of contention, and as Roger listened to the accounts of the intrigues which had been taking place it was borne in upon him that his ex-master had been having an extremely worrying time; so after a while, he remarked:

"What you tell me may well account for the lack of consideration Mr. Pitt showed me this morning in refusing me a new mission to my liking. 'Tis obvious that so many cares have temporarily blunted his sensibilities; but with all due respect to you, Charles, I am inclined to wonder if this taking in of your Whig friends will make things any easier for him in the long run.

"I think it will," replied St Fjmins, "for once these domestic matters are settled he will meet with little opposition in either House, and so be freed to give a much greater share of his mind to the war."

Colonel Thursby nodded. "There is something in that, but it will not free him from his worst embarrassment. I refer to the troubles that our English Jacobins have been stirring up in all the centres of industry. 'Tis true that they will now be able to voice their disloyal sentiments in Parliament only through Fox and a handful of irresponsible radicals, but such bodies as the London Corresponding Society and the Methodists are becoming a menace to the State. Had not those four days of burning, pillaging and murder while the mob wrought its evil will in London during the Gordon riots proved a danger signal to honest artisans, we might well have already had a revolution here. Yet* even so, the numbers of those malcontents increase daily, and they abuse the freedom we, in this country, enjoy both to preach sedition openly and publish pamphlets by the thousand advocating that Britain should become a republic. Their activities must be a matter of grave concern to government, yet short of instituting tyrannous methods of repression which would be abnoxious to us all, there seems no way to check them."

Roger was now beginning to feel that he had been unfair in expecting Mr. Pitt to take a realistic view of the war when he evidently had so many matters on his mind that it must be near impossible for even the finest brain to see them all in their proper perspective. As he was about to say so, the clopping of horses' hoofs approaching at a swift trot caused a sudden silence round the table. A moment later they came to a halt outside the front gate. Roger glanced quickly at Amanda, but she shook her head to show that she had no idea whom then-visitor might be. Then Dan came hurrying in. His dark eyes were bright with excitement as he exclaimed with his broad Hampshire accent:

"I could scarcely believe me eyes, Master! But 'tis the great Billy Pitt himself be outside askin' for 'e."

Quickly excusing himself, Roger hurried from the room and out of the house down the short garden path. There, sure enough, sitting bolt upright on the back seat of his carriage, as though he had not moved a muscle since Roger had last seen him, was the Prime Minister. But now to Roger's bow he replied by a slight inclination of the head; then, holding out a large envelope towards him, he said briskly:

"Mr. Brook, I am come from Kew, where I spoke with His Majesty upon our affairs in the West Indies. Since you are set upon going there I suggested that you should carry this document with you. His Majesty desired me to express to you his hope that the voyage will restore you to health; and with that hope may I couple my own, that new interests in the tropics will soon erase from your mind the distressing experiences you met with while in France."

Taking the envelope Roger bowed again, and replied: "I am much indebted to you, Sir, for conveying to me His Majesty's most gracious message, and for your own good wishes. Naturally I shall be honoured to act as His Majesty's courier, and still more so if you will now step inside and join us in a glass of wine."

The Prime Minister's lined face lit up in one of his rare smiles, but he shook his head. "I thank you, no. I have urgent affairs requiring my attention at Holwood; so you must excuse me." Then he pulled the string attached to the little finger of his coachman, and a moment later the carriage was bowling away down the road.

It was just after seven o'clock, and in the deepening twilight the superscription on the big envelope had not stood out clearly enough for Roger to read it at the first glance. Now, as he held it up, he saw with some surprise that it was addressed to himself. Hurrying into the lighted hall, he tore it open and ran his eye swiftly over the thick parchment it contained. When he had read only a few lines he gave a gasp of amazement. It was a Royal Commission appointing him Governor of the newly-won island of Martinique.

Running into the dining-room he held it high above his head and, with an excited shout, announced its contents. The girls embraced him; the men cheered, wrung his hand and slapped him on the back. While they were still crowding about him Dan produced champagne, and in the pink slightly effervescent wine of those times, they drained their crystal goblets to the health of His Excellency the Governor.

An hour or so later, when Amanda and Georgina had retired to the drawing-room, Roger went down to the cellar to get up more wine. In his absence his three men friends expressed their personal views on his appointment.

All of them agreed that, since this rich Governorship could have bought the support of some great landowner who controlled two or three seats in Parliament, and Roger was entirely without political influence, the gift of it to him was most generous.

Colonel Thursby added that, all the same, the Prime Minister's gesture showed his sound sense as well as generosity, as Roger was level-headed, firm, and high principled; and having lived in France for so long he was far better fitted than most men to bring tranquillity to an island that had until a few months ago been a French colony.

But the shrewd Droopy Ned saw even further, and poking his narrow head forward, he said with a sly smile: "I think you overlook one thing. Roger is the most gifted confidential agent who has served the Crown for many a long day, and Billy Pitt sets too high a value on him to lose him. This morning, having become temporarily sickened of his work, Roger freed himself from it, but tonight he is no longer free. By the gift of this Governorship he has been tied by a silken cord, and can be recalled at will. I will wager a thousand guineas that within a year Roger will once more be serving his master on the Continent."

chapter III

WESTWARD HO!

During the next few weeks Roger was very fully occupied. Having written to thank the Prime Minister, he next wrote to Henry Dundas, as Minister for the Colonies, to ask for an interview at which he might receive specific instructions regarding his Governorship. The business-like Dundas replied by return, inviting him to dine at his house at Wimbledon on the following Thursday, and suggesting that he should come early so that they could discuss affairs before the meal.

Roger both liked Dundas and had a great respect for his ability. The minister was then in his early fifties, a big raw-boned red-faced man who still spoke with the broad Scottish accent he had acquired in boyhood. He was notoriously foul-mouthed and drank like a trooper, but his potations had no effect upon his splendid constitution, and he had an extraordinary capability for despatching mountains of work with swift efficiency. India was only one of his responsibilities but he knew more about it than any other man in Parliament, and the genial good-humour, that Mr. Pitt so sadly lacked, made him an invaluable manager of their party. By invariably giving every post that fell vacant within his patronage to fellow countrymen, he ensured all the members from north of the Tweed loyally following him into the lobby, and his influence had become so great there that he was known as Harry the Ninth of Scotland.

Within five minutes of Roger's arrival Dundas was pouring him a glass of shrub in his study, and saying with a jovial laugh: "Ye've come ta see how much ye can get out o' me; an' dina ye pretend otherwise."

"I'll not," Roger smiled. He knew that, Martinique being a new post, no salary would yet have been fixed for it, and added cheerfully: "What say you to three thousand a year?"

Dundas sat back and roared with laughter. "Strap me! The impudence of it! Dost take me for the Inca of Peru? Nay, five hundred is nearer the mark, though t'was eight I had in mind."

Roger's face fell, and he protested: "Damme, Sir! I have been drawing twelve hundred from the Foreign Office."

"Aye, an' ye've earnt every nickel of it," Dundas nodded, suddenly serious; for he was as well informed as Mr. Pitt of the work that Roger had been doing. "There'll not be any blood-soaked guillotine awaiting ye in Martinique, though; but a fine idle life with puncheons o' rum to drink an' a plenty o' coffee-coloured beauties ta tumble in th' cane brakes."

"All the same, Sir, a thousand is nought but a pittance for the Governor of an Island."

"Weel; on account o' yer past sairvices I'll try tae get tha Treasury tae gi' ye twelve hundred."

"My expenses will be all of that," said Roger glumly. "Could you not ask for fifteen?"

"Nay." Dundas shook his head. "Twelve hundred I'll ask for, an' not a bawbee more. But listen, lad. Were ye not half a Scot an' desairved the post into the bargain, I'd ha' found a way tae ha' excused meself from confirming the appointment. As things are I'm glad for ye an' will instruct your innocence. Ye ha' but ta use the shrewd sense your MacElfic mother gied ye, tae line those fine breeks o' yours wi' West Indian gold."

"I had heard there were perks," Roger admitted, "but I can hardly suppose that they would amount to any really considerable sum."

"Why, mon, the patronage o' tha whole island will be yours! Ye'll need only a canny agent tae tip ye the wink wha' applicants for post can afford tae pay. Harbours, prisons, mails, barracks, customs; permits for this an' that: licences tae ships' victuallers, army sutlers an' privateers; all should bring grist tae your mill. Nair forget that many a mickle makes a muckle. Let not e'en the smallest fry get oot of ye something fer nothing an' ye'll return as rich as a nabob. Sie' practices are forbidden here, but providin' ye make no appointments that might prove detrimental tae th' ould country, they are winked at in tha islands; so ye've nought tae fret about."

Somewhat reassured by this, Roger pressed the question of money no further, and for a while they discussed the policy to be adopted towards the French planters; then their talk became more general and turned to the new Coalition. Dundas was by no means happy about it, as he believed that the Duke of Portland had deliberately put a misconstruction on the Prime Minister's offer in an attempt to rob him of his entire patronage. This was no question of making money from the sale of posts, but he maintained that it was impossible to keep a political party together unless one had plenty of places in one's gift So, rather than remain to watch Pitt's following fall to pieces, he had refused to take office in the new Cabinet. Pitt bad been so distressed at the prospect of losing his old colleague that he had dealt sharply with the Duke, and gone to the length of getting the King to write Dundas a personal letter saying that his services were indispensable. But the affair had left an unpleasant taste and did not bode well for the Whigs and Tories settling down together contentedly.

At four o'clock a coach arrived bringing three other guests for dinner. All of them were intimates of the small Pitt-Dundas circle and two of them, Pepper Arden and George Rose, Roger had met before. The first was a rather bumptious hanger-on of mediocre talents whose ill-directed loyalty, coupled with an almost noseless face that gave him a most comical appearance, at times made him the butt of the House. The second, with able and industrious devotion, handled the spade-work at the Treasury of the Prime Minister's brilliant financial administration; and within a few minutes of his arrival Dundas had jollied him into agreeing that Roger's salary should be twelve hundred a year.

Henry Addington was the third in their party.. He was a tall well-favoured man with charming manners and had been at Lincoln's Inn when Pitt was practising as a barrister there. It was Pitt who had drawn him into politics and had used his influence to get him elected as Speaker of the House in '89; but at this first meeting Roger thought him so modest and unambitious that he would have been greatly surprised had he been granted a glimpse of the future and from it learned that his new acquaintance was to become Prime Minister.

At dinner they ate and drank with the usual unrestrained gusto of the times, and as there were no ladies present Dundas kept them merry with an apparently inexhaustible fund of bawdy stories. Afterwards the talk became more serious, turning inevitably to politics and, in due course, to the progress of the French Revolution. To these close friends Dundas made no secret qf Roger's activities in France and he was asked to give an account of Robespierre's fall and execution, then of other outstanding scenes that he had witnessed during the Terror. It was Addington who said:

"It is clear, Mr. Brook, that you must be a man of great courage to have continued with your mission in circumstances of acute danger for so long; so I mean no offence by suggesting that there must have been many occasions when you feared for your life. It would much interest me to hear of that on which your apprehensions were the gravest"

Roger thought for a moment, then replied: "The fear of betrayal was a constant anxiety, but I think, Sir, I felt more actual terror on the field of battle than during any of my dealings with the revolu­tionaries. Last winter I was sent as one of the Citizen Reprisentants en Mission to the army besieging Toulon. Fort Mulgrave was the key point of the defence, and having learnt the date that a major attack was to be launched against it, I was most anxious to get warning to my lord Hood of the intentions of the French. As it was impossible for me to leave Headquarters clandestinely, I decided that my best course would be to get myself captured. To the north of the Fort there was a small redoubt containing a masked battery. I suggested to General Dugommier that its destruction the night before the main assault would greatly facilitate the capture of the Fort, and offered to lead an attack upon it. He agreed, and my intention was, of course, to get separated from my men in the darkness, surrender to the first British soldier I met, get taken to my lord Hood, then have him exchange me for a prisoner of equivalent rank; so that I could return and continue with my secret work without the French suspecting that it was I who had given away their plans. But my own plan went sadly awry."

Having taken a swig of port, Roger went on: "Most unfortunately for me, when the details of my project were discussed in Council, a scruffy little officer named Buonaparte intervened. He was Corsican, of about my own age; and although only a captain of artillery who had recently been jumped up to temporary Lieutenant Colonel, he insisted on poking his finger into every pie. This moody down-at-heel fellow maintained that although the capture of the redoubt was sound in principle, to attempt it the night before the main assault would result in setting the whole front ablaze prematurely. He per­suaded his seniors that it must be carried out only a few hours before the assault, when it would be too late for the British to bring up reinforcements from the warships in the harbour. Of course it was impossible for me to back down; so owing to this interfering Corsican, I was compelled to lead an attack against the battery in full daylight and I don't think I've ever been so frightened in my life."

The others laughed, and Rose enquired. "Did you capture the battery?"

Roger gave a rueful smile. "I don't even know, for no sooner had I reached it than a gunner stunned me with his ramrod. But if the little Buonaparte had deliberately planned my undoing he could not have done so better. Not only did I fail to get my information to Lord Hood; it transpired that the battery was manned by our Spanish allies. When I came to I found myself a prisoner in a Spanish man-of-war, and they took me to Majorca. As I could not reveal my true identity, I had the very devil of a job getting out of their clutches, and was unable to resume my proper work again for above two months."

There was more friendly laughter, the port circulated again and the talk went on. It was two in the morning before Roger mounted his horse and, swaying somewhat in the saddle, made his way home.

His next business was to kiss hands on appointment, and for this formality Dundas took him to a levee at St. James's Palace., King George was then fifty-six, a portly red-faced man of no great mental attainments, but a fund of sound common sense and dogged deter­mination. Unlike his German forebears, he put what he believed to be the interests of Britain first in everything. He had a passionate conviction that the well-being of the State was bound up with the breaking Of the stranglehold that the powerful Whig nobility had obtained over it, and for the first twenty-five years of his reign had fought them relentlessly. At last, by the bold step of nominating young Billy Pitt at the age of twenty-four to be his Prime Minister, he had succeeded in his aim, and together through many difficulties they had brought the nation to a great prosperity. Five years earlier he had for some months been out of his mind, and his recovery had been hailed throughout England with such heart-felt rejoicing that it was clear beyond doubt that his honesty, simple way of life, and delight in growing bigger turnips than any other farmer in his kingdom had, through the years, gradually made him an object of great affection to his people.

Roger, during his missions, had become quite well acquainted with several foreign sovereigns, but no occasion had previously arisen calling for his presentation to his own King; so he was pleasantly surprised when the Monarch said to him:

"You should have come to see us before, Mr. Brook; you should have come before. Seven years in our service we're told, and many a dangerous undertaking carried out with success. Our thanks are overdue. And now you go to Martinique, eh? What'll you plant there? Sugar-cane, of course. Not long ago we met on the road a rich equipage with six outriders, all most gorgeous clad. 'Who's that?' we asked our gentleman-in-waiting. 'Is it some foreign Prince or new Ambassador?* *Nay, Sire,' he told us. "Tis a merchant just returned from the sugar Isles.' 'Why Bless me!' we said. 'Can there be all that sugar?' 'Twas true enough though. But yams now, yams; or sweet potato as some call them. Could we but induce the planters to grow them in quantity, they would serve admirably to feed the slaves. Then we'd have no need to send out vast quantities of salted herrings each year for that purpose. Bear yams in mind, Mr. Brook; bear yams in mind."

"I will indeed, Sire," Roger promised; and having drawn a quick breath the King hurried on:

"When do you set out? With the first convoy of the season, no doubt. But that's not for some weeks yet; so you'll be seeing your father before you sail. Carry him our greeting, Mr. Brook. We hold him in high esteem. A good honest man. A fine sailor too. Yes, carry him our greeting and tell him what we said."

Roger bowed. "I should be most happy, Sire, to convey your gracious message to him; but it happens that he is at present on service in the Mediterranean."

"Ha! Ha!" The King gave a high-pitched happy little laugh and, with his protuberant blue eyes suddenly merry, poked Roger sharply in the ribs. "Beaten at your own game, Mr. Brook! Beaten at your own game. Our intelligence is better than yours. Your good father was at Windsor but two days back to tell us of the taking of Corsica.

It was our pleasure to make him a Knight for his part in it; so now he is Admiral Sir Chris. Admiral Sir Chris. Admiral Sir Chris; that sounds well, does it not? Do you know Corsica? Your father says the island is near covered with chestnut trees, and the finest he has ever seen. The peasants make a flour from the nuts, which is most nutritious, thereby enjoying a staple food at little or no expense. Have you ever met with it?"

"I have never been to Corsica, Sire; but a similar flour is made in Tuscany, and there I found it very palatable." Before the King could start off again, Roger added swiftly: "And, Your Majesty, may I say how delighted I am to hear of this honour you have done my father. I shall lose not a moment in seeking him out to offer my congratulations."

"Do that; do that." The King nodded a little wistfully, thinking of his own boorish, ungrateful and neglectful sons. "I count your father lucky in you, Mr. Brook; yes, very lucky. You are a young man of promise. Tell the settlers in Martinique that now they are our subjects we shall have their interests at heart. And forget not the yams, Mr. Brook; forget not the yams."

The King then turned to speak to someone else and Roger bowed himself away. As his father must have passed through London, he was much surprised that he had not gone out to Richmond to see Amanda and enquire if there was any news of himself; but as soon as the levee was over he hurried to the Admiralty, and there learned the reason. Before Admiral Brook landed at Portsmouth, the crew of the ship which had brought him from Gibraltar had handed him a petition of grievances, and after he had submitted it to their Lordships they had requested him to investigate certain of the complaints before taking leave.

By the night coach Roger sent an express to Portsmouth congratu­lating his father and outlining his own plans. Two days later he received a reply in which the Admiral said that he had completed his report to their Lordships and was about to start for home: he then asked that Roger and Amanda should manage at least a short visit to him before sailing for the Indies. In consequence, on the following Monday they set out for Lymington.

Roger's old home, Grove Place, lay only a quarter of a mile to the south of the High Street of the ancient Borough. It had originated as a farm-house with red-tile walls, built about 1660; but that part of it had been turned into kitchen quarters when, a hundred years later, the main square block had been added, and in 1787 Rear Admiral Brook had spent a part of his prize money earned in the West Indies on adding two further rooms and a spacious central hall with a charming semi-circular staircase. It was now, therefore, no great mansion, but a very comfortable house with six lofty well-proportioned rooms and about twenty smaller ones. Behind it, on the slope up to the town, it had an acre of walled garden, and to its south front lay several acres of meadows, across which, from the tall windows of the house, there was a fine view of the Soleat and the western end of the Isle of Wight.

The busy little harbour was only ten minutes' walk away; in the summer there was always sailing to be had, and in the autumn shooting on neighbouring estates. During spring the New Forest, which lay inland behind the town, offered a thousand lovely spots for picnics, and in winter the stag was hunted there. In such surroundings, other things being propitious, it was impossible not to be happy, and Roger had greatly enjoyed both his childhood there and the visits he had made since setting out into the world.

His father, a bulky, red-faced jovial man, welcomed them with his usual heartiness and declared again and again how glad he was to see Roger safely out of France. The double celebration of the father's knighthood and the son's governorship called for the best wine in the cellar, and no one was more happy than old Ben, the house-man, to get it up for such an occasion.

The Admiral insisted upon hearing both about Roger's last months in Paris and their projected journey to the West Indies, before they could get a word out of him about his own affairs; but Amanda made the two men bring their port into the drawing-room after dinner; then she demanded to know how her father-in-law had earned his K.B.

"M'dear, I did not," he responded gruffly. "That is, unless you can count near forty years of readiness to do my duty on all occasions sufficient warrant for the honour. To be honest, it was a stroke of luck. The common practice is for despatches to be sent home by an officer of captain's rank who has distinguished himself; but their Lordships' order had been received for me to transfer my flag to Harwich; so my lord Hood would have it that I should carry them. That meant my conveying the latest news to His Majesty in person, and in honouring me his real intent was to express his gratification with the Service as a whole."

"Come, Sir;" Roger laughed. "He told me himself that you had played a part in capturing Corsica."

"Tis quite untrue!" his father protested. "The main fleet had no hand in that. Its business was to lie between the French ports and the island, in order to prevent interference with our operations against the latter. As Rear Admiral, my task was the unspectacular one of acting for Lord Hood on the many occasions when Victory left us, so that he might run close in and by his inspiring presence lend fresh vigour to our men's attacks."

"But tell us, please," Amanda urged, "how the island was taken."

"At the outset it looked a simple enough undertaking. The patriot leader, Pasquale de Paoli, already controlled the greater part of the island, and the French held only three strong places in the north. But, in the event, it proved a hard nut to crack. We'd have had it sooner, though, had not the revolutionary troops put up an unexpectedly stout resistance, and our own army failed in a most lamentable manner to give us. adequate support. At times the lack of spirit shown by the latter almost drove our sailor-men into a frenzy.

"The affair opened in mid-January by His Majesty's Commis­sioner, Sir Gilbert Elliot, and Lt.-Colonel John Moore of the 51st being put ashore to formulate a plan with Paoli. The veteran patriot agreed to employ his partisans in keeping the French from reinforc­ing San Fiorenzo overland while we attacked it from the sea. Early in February troops were landed on a beach adjacent to the town, but they were slow about it, and it was our jack-tars who showed them how to man-handle guns brought off from the ships up on to the heights so that they could fire down into the fortress. 'Twas a gruelling business hoisting such weighty pieces with blocks and tackle up precipitous cliffs, but once the batteries were in position the game was as good as won. On the 16th an assault was made by moonlight on the principal redoubt, and I am told that Colonel Moore led it with commendable gallantry; but 'twas about the only episode creditable to the army until near the conclusion of the campaign.

"Next day the French abandoned San Fiorenzo and my lord Hood at once urged the setting about of the reduction of Bastia. But General Dundas, who was the chief soldier there, acted in a most poltroon-like fashion. He pleaded that his numbers were insufficient for the task, and refused all further co-operation until he received reinforcements from Gibraltar. My lord was so angry that, although he had no authority to do so, he used his great prestige to order the General home. By mid-March, feigning illness to save his face, he had gone, but his successor, General D'Aubant, proved no better, and would not move a man or gun across the mountainous ridge that separated San Fiorenzo from Bastia. Our great Adrniral then declared that he'd take the place on his own.

"For the purpose he detached Captain Nelson in Agamemnon and two frigates. There followed one of the finest exploits in all our naval history. Horace, or Horatio, Nelson, as he now prefers to be called, although only thirty-five, and despite the loss of seven years between the wars spent on the beach, is become one of our finest captains. He is quite a little fellow and of frail build, but for zeal, intelligence and courage he has no equal, unless it be my lord Hood himself. In this affair he played the part of a Marine, landed his lower deck guns and inspired his men to Herculean efforts in dragging them up seemingly unscalable heights to bombard Bastia. Against him were pitted five thousand resolute French, but he acted as though his own thousand men were ten thousand, and for six weeks attacked the enemy with unflagging ardour. On May the 18th his efforts were, rewarded by their asking for terms. That stirred the army to activity, and to the chagrin of us all it arrived without having fired a shot on the 23rd just in time to accept the town's surrender.

"Calvi was then the only stronghold left to the French, and it justified the term, as its situation made it appear even more impregnable than Bastia. By then General D'Aubant had been replaced by General the Honourable Charles Stuart, who proved of a far finer mettle; but he was sadly handicapped by great numbers of his troops going down with fever; so once again it fell to Captain Nelson and his gallant men to haul the guns up to the heights. It was there, too, that he had the great misfortune to be struck in the face by stones thrown up on the bursting of a shell, and 'tis feared he will lose the sight of an eye. Yet so fine a man is he that he refused to go sick even for a day, and saw the business through to the end. It was near two months of bitter conflict before the job was done, but on August the 10th the garrison marched out; and Sir Gilbert Elliot, who had given great help and encouragement in every operation, formally took possession of the island in the name of His Majesty."

"It was Sir Gilbert's younger brother, Hugh, who played so fine a part in helping King Gustavus out of his difficulties while I was in Sweden," Roger remarked; but Amanda forestalled the possibility of his beginning to reminisce by asking for further particulars about the Corsican campaign.

The Admiral responded, and, before they collected their candles to go up to bed, had drawn a fair picture for them of the patriot leader Paoli; of his barbarous Corsican partisans, who had been of little assistance but, like human vultures, had plundered the French and British dead mdiscriminately; of what they termed the 'Lion' sun, which in summer made campaigning there more arduous than in Africa; of the fantastic crags, the great chestnut forests, and the off-shore marshes from which came the fevers that had decimated the British troops; and of the amazing devotion to duty displayed by the English jack-tars, although a high proportion of them had been brought in by the press-gangs.

He also spoke with considerable uneasiness of his recent enquiry into complaints from the lower deck, and felt there was good cause for them. Hardened as he was himself from many years of sea service to living in great discomfort, he regarded the conditions of the ordinary seamen as appalling, and the fact that men maimed in the King's service should be turned off without pensions to beg their bread for the rest of their lives angered him extremely. That their Lordships of the Admiralty should show little inclination to better matters he thought both reprehensible and short-sighted; for he feared, and as it transpired correctly, that unless reasonable reforms were soon instituted the seamen might be goaded into open mutiny.

The five days that Roger and Amanda spent at 'Grove' went all too quickly. It was the shortest visit they had ever paid, but the many arrangements they still had to make necessitated their hurrying back to Richmond. Dan, and Amanda's personal maid, little sloe-eyed Nell, were going with them; but their cook's husband was a respectable man employed in a local livery stable, so it was decided that he should move in and the couple be left in charge.

As a Governor's wife, Amanda felt that she ought to take out some young woman who could help her with her social duties and act as her companion; and for this they had selected her young .cousin, Clarissa Marsham. Clarissa was eighteen and an orphan. Since she lived in very straitened circumstances with a great aunt whose main preoccupation was the salvation of her soul, she had jumped at this chance to go out into the world as an unofficial lady-m-waiting, and was already at Richmond helping with the packing up of the more valuable contents of the house.

Previously Roger had met Clarissa only as a gawky, pop-eyed, high-nosed young bridesmaid at his wedding, to attend which she had temporarily been excused from attendance at an academy for young ladies; but on seeing her again he fully approved his wife's choice. In the past four years Clarissa's figure had filled out to per­fection and her features had assumed most pleasing proportions. Her bright blue eyes no longer looked like pebbles and now held a merry glint, while the arch of her nose gave her face a provocative arrogance which was happily tempered by her anxiety to please. Pale gold hair and a milk-and-roses complexion added to her attrac­tions ; and Roger found himself parting quite cheerfully with a hundred guineas to provide her with clothes to take out although he had originally intended to give her only fifty.

During the latter part of September the whole household was in a turmoil, with dressmakers coming and going; plate, china, linen, books and the many other articles that might not be easy to procure being packed; boxes and bales being corded; insurance schedules being checked; and arrangements being made on behalf of the couple who were to caretake in the house for what was expected to prove a period of several years.

At last, on the 27th, the travellers set out; but only to London where they spent the night at the St. Ermins's town house in Berkeley Square. Then on the 28th the whole party, which in addition to Georgina and Charles included her maid Jenny, his man Tom, and their French chef—who rejoiced in the name of Monsieur Pirouet— left London for Bristol in four heavily loaded coaches. By evening they reached Newbury and lay that night at the White Hart Inn. Next day they covered a somewhat shorter stage, arriving in the afternoon at Normanrood in Wiltshire, the seat of Droopy Ned's father, the Marquis of Ames bury; as Droopy was in residence and had asked them to break their journey there.

The Lord Edward was considered a most eccentric fellow by the county; not so much on account of his hobbies, which were collecting antique jewellery, the study of ancient religions, and experimenting on himself with Eastern drugs, but because he abhorred blood sports. He was, however, a very keen fisherman and it was the reaches of the River Avon, which ran through his father's estate, that lured him to the country for a few weeks every spring, and a passion for eating mulberries fresh off the ancient trees that brought him to Normanrood again each September. Yet even there he continued to dress as fastidiously as ever; and when he minced out beneath the portico of the great mansion to receive his guests he was satin-clad, scented and curled as though about to attend a rout in the Pump Room at Bath.

After a merry evening, when they were all about to go to bed, Droopy kept Roger back and, telling him he wanted a private word with nun, took him up to his own book-lined sanctum. From a cabinet he produced a flagon of one of the rare liqueurs made in a foreign monastery, that Justerini's imported specially for him, and having filled two tall slender glasses with the amber elixir, he said:

"You know, Roger, how glad I am for you in this fine appoint­ment, and the last thing I would wish to do is to detract from your pleasurable anticipation of it; but I would not be your true friend did I not feel some concern at your going to the West Indies."

Having now not a care in the world, and an admirable dinner inside him, Roger replied with lazy cheerfulness: "Why so, Ned? The only thing to mar my joy of it is the thought that I am likely to see even less of you for some years to come than while undertaking missions to the Continent."

Droopy shook his long forward-thrust, bird-like head. "'Tis not that I had in mind; but your health, and that of all who go with you."

Roger shrugged. "The very prospect of the change has made me feel like my old self already. As you make mention of the others though, perhaps you are thinking of the diseases that are said to afflict white people in those parts."

"I was; and of the yellow fever in particular."

"My father spoke of that. As you may remember, he was for most of the years we were at school together on the West India station; and he tells me that he lost quite a number of his ship's company by it."

"In those days it was an occasional risk encountered only when ships were in port; but you will be living permanently ashore, and I am wondering if you realize what a terrible scourge it has become?"

"I have heard little about such distant places during my time in France, though I did hear a rumour recently that fever was handi­capping our operations there, just as it did in Corsica."

"Roger, this should go no further, as for obvious reasons the Government wishes it kept quiet; but during the past year we have lost upwards of ten thousand troops killed off by Yellow Jack in those accursed islands."

"Ten thousand!" Roger exclaimed aghast. "But 'tis an army; and those the very men who might have won the war for us had they been thrown into Brittany last spring, or sent to support Lord Hood while we still held Toulon. Are you quite sure of this?"

"Certain!" Droopy nodded his head vigorously. "And they are still dying like flies. Therefore I urge you to take every possible precaution against contracting this deadly infection."

"I will indeed, if you can but tell me what I should do."

Droopy took a sip of his liqueur, then replied: "Unfortunately little is yet known about this dreaded disease. The doctors say that it is borne on the miasmas that in the evenings rise from the swamps that lie along the low parts of the coasts; but I have a different theory. It is at least possible that it is carried by the mosquitoes which infest such places, and that is my own belief In any case I would advise that on reaching Bristol you should buy a quantity of fine muslin to make nets under which to sleep. If it does nothing else it will protect you from the annoyance of their stings. Then as to treatment, a tea made from an infusion of the Cinchona bark has proved most efficacious; but prevention is better than cure, and if all of you will take a cup regularly each morning it may protect you from infection. I would like you to give me your promise, Roger, that you will do so."

"That sounds most sensible. You have my promise and I will see to it that the others adopt a similar routine. Is there aught else that you can suggest?"

"I fear not; though I will give you a drug to take should you be seriously attacked. It will reduce anyone who takes it to unconscious­ness for many hours, and you must exercise great care in the handling of it as an overdose would prove fatal; but it will give the body a better chance to fight the fever."

"I'd be most grateful for it, and not let it out of my own charge."

"There is one other thing. It is a known fact that the disease never strikes more than a mile away from land. It is that which makes me believe it due to insect stings rather than miasmas; for the latter can be blown far out by off-shore winds, whereas the former are incapable of flying more than a short distance. Therefore, if on arriving in Martinique you find an epidemic raging, as I fear you may, use your overriding authority as Governor to clear the troops out of the barracks, and send them to cruise at sea in any ships available. Even those already sick may then recover through escaping a second infection."

With the promised drug packed in his valise, and Droopy's valuable advice well in mind, Roger took his seat in the leading coach the following morning. Then the cavalcade drove away from the stately pile of Normanrood while their kind, short-sighted host waved after them for as long as his pale-blue eyes could discern the dust thrown up by their horses. That afternoon they reached Bristol and put up at the Negro's Head.

Bristol had for long been the second city in the kingdom, but it was on the point of losing its place to Liverpool. The latter had pioneered the wet dock system and could now offer better facilities for a quick turn-round than any other port. The canal system, out of which Colonel Thursby had made a large part of his fortune, brought to it far more cheaply than could road transport the products of the now thriving industries of Lancashire and the Midlands; and, in addition, its shipowners had captured the great bulk of the enormously, profitable slave trade. In consequence Bristol had now to rely mainly on its specialized trade with the West Indies, its great sugar refineries, and its long-established shipbuilding industry.

Like other great commercial centres, the revolution in France had had a most unsettling effect on its working population, and the propaganda of the so-called British Jacobins was making many converts to the doctrines of Communism. The landlord at the Negro's Head told Roger's party on their arrival that the yards were now at a standstill owing to a shipwrights' strike, but they were relieved to learn that this would not prevent their sailing.

Next morning, October the 1st, they made their final purchases, while the servants accompanied their baggage to the dock to see it safely stowed on board. After an early dinner at their inn they drove out to the Cumberland Basin, where their ship—the Circe, Captain Cummins—was awaiting only the arrival of her passengers to take advantage of a favourable wind, and sail.

With the evening tide, Circe dropped down the river. In the big after cabin they drank with the Captain to a happy voyage; but long before they landed in the West Indies Roger would have given all he possessed to have exchanged the dangers that beset them, in this ill-fated ship, for another spell of risking his head in Paris during the height of the Terror.

chapter IV

TROUBLE ABOARD

At that date there were over fourteen thousand merchantmen sailing the seas under the British flag. The majority of them were between three and five hundred tons burden. The East India Company alone owned a few giants ranging from a thousand to fourteen hundred.

But 'The Company' was a thing apart. Its monopoly of trade with India, Ceylon, Burma and China had made it fabulously rich, and its Board of Governors had used its resources wisely to build up a service worthy of their vast private Empire. Youths were enrolled as Cadets only after careful selection, and it was considered every bit as suitable for the younger sons of the nobility to enter the Company's service as to go into the Navy or study for the Bar. Its officers wore a handsome uniform; to achieve each step in promotion they had to have served for a specified number of voyages, which ensured a reasonable degree of efficiency to hold their ranks. All of them enjoyed the privilege of an agreed amount of cargo space, which enabled them to carry on highly profitable private trading, and the allocations of space to captains was so considerable that it was not unusual for them to net ten thousand pounds, to split with their backers, out of a single voyage. Officers of the Royal Navy frequently transferred to the Company; its ships were well found in every particular, its seamen were efficient and by special decree immune from the unwelcome attentions of the press-gangs.

Very different was the status of all other ships of the mercantile marine. Strangely enough, to qualify for service as an A.B. in them, a stiff examination in practical seamanship had to be passed; but the bulk of their crews was a rabble largely composed of ex-jailbirds or men fleeing the country to escape arrest; and their officers were almost invariably tough customers who had served for many years before the mast No examination had to be passed to become a mate or master. It was sufficient for an ambitious A.B. to learn the three R's and a smattering of navigation, then a recommendation from his superiors to the owners was enough to get him a junior berth aft from which in time he might work up to become a Captain. In fact, it was a saying applicable to the retirement of most Merchant Captains that 'he had gone in at the hawse pipe and come out by the cabin window'. Yet, only too often when such men at last became masters, and answerable to no one during ocean voyages of many weeks, they took to the bottle and lost their ships, their crews and themselves owing to a combination of drunkenness and incompetence.

Captain Cummins of Circe was no better and no worse than many others of his type. He was a rough hard-bitten seaman of fifty odd, who could cope with log, lead and latitude, and for the rest trusted to his long experience of every type of weather. When seas were running high he conscientiously stayed on deck, sometimes for days on end; in periods of calm he often remained in his cabin, also for days on end, moody and half comatose from copious potations of neat rum. His breath was like a furnace, he packed the punch of a mule, his language could be more foul than that of any of his crew, and he maintained discipline among them with ferocious brutality.

Fortunately for his passengers they were called on to do no more than pass the time of day with him. In "The Company's' ships nouveau riche merchants paid as much as a hundred pounds for the privilege of eating at the Captain's table throughout the voyage, but in West Indiamen the much more limited accommodation afforded space only for one large table in the after cabin, and the Captain fed in his own.

The Circe was a ship of four hundred and thirty tons, and like most of her class the one big cabin aft was, apart from the decks, the only place in which her passengers could congregate. Their possession of it was exclusive, but it had to be used for all purposes; so at each meal there were two sittings, the servants feeding at the earlier and the quality at the later so that they might finger over their wine if they so desired. Adjacent to the big cabin were twelve smaller ones, the majority of which had double berths, but St. Ermins had made a deal with the owners for the whole of the passenger accommodation; so there was ample room for their baggage in the spare cabins. The passengers' quarters were well equipped, having port-holes designed for protection from tropical heat. Below them, in the big after cabin, there was a long semi-circular sofa, and mirrors fitted into mahogany wainscoting adorned the walls. In one of the spare cabins a cask had been up-ended and secured to serve as a sea-water bath, and they had brought their own linen. So once they had accustomed themselves to habitual stooping, to avoid knocking their heads on the low beams of the ceilings, they were by no means uncomfortable.

There was, of course, no question of sailing direct to the West Indies. Even in peace time privateers of all nations, not by the score but by the hundred, swarmed in both European and American waters, and owing to the war with France they were now more numerous than ever. In consequence, except for specially fast ships, such as the Mail Packets, and others termed 'runners', a system of convoys had long been organized.

As the chances of a propitious passage were largely dependent on favourable winds the sailing of convoys was governed by the seasons, and the first winter departure habitually left home waters early in October. Owing to major war commitments the naval protection afforded was decidedly scanty; and usually consisted of no more than two eighteen-gun sloops, which were charged with shepherding any­thing from sixty to a hundred and twenty indifferently handled and slow-moving merchantmen safely across the Atlantic.

Convoys for the West Indies assembled at Cork, and from first to last several weeks generally elapsed before they were fully mustered. Charles St. Ermins being aware of this had deliberately delayed the departure of his party until it was fairly certain that the bulk of the convoy would have put in an appearance, and that it would be waiting only a fair wind to sail. His timing proved good, as Circe dropped anchor off Cork on October the 3rd, and was delayed there no more than three days. During them the party went ashore and enjoyed the bounteous hospitality of Irish acquaintances who lived in the vicinity. Then on the 6th, with her crew lustily singing sea-shanties, the Circe weighed anchor, hoisted her sails and, in the company of some seventy-five ships, headed for the open ocean.

But, yet again, there was no question of sailing direct to the West Indies. Long experience had shown that, given normal conditions, the quickest passage could be made by a ship buffeting her way down to Madeira, then picking up the North-East Trade Winds which ensured a swift and easy crossing of the Atlantic on a curve running from about 35° North to within 15° of the Equator.

On sailing from Cork the convoy set a course south by west, so as to clear Cape Finisterre by a hundred miles; and for the first four days out it enjoyed reasonably good weather. During that time, owing to the very limited area of the Circe's decks, the passengers got to know most of her crew by sight and all her officers to nod to. She had a crew of forty-two, three mates, a purser, a supercargo and a doctor. Her cargo was mainly shoddy clothes and salt meat, as it was customary for the planters to make presents of these to their negro slaves at Christmas.

With a view to protecting British commerce from foreign com­petition, numerous laws had been passed, making it illegal for British goods to be exported, or Colonial produce shipped anywhere or re-imported from Britain, in any but British ships, and for a British ship to be manned by any but British subjects. But the breaking away of the North American Colonies, and the heavy demand caused by the war for trained seamen to man naval vessels that had, in the years of peace, been laid up in dry dock, had brought about certain relaxa­tions; notably that the Colonies might trade direct with the newly . independent States, and that the crews of merchant vessels might include a proportion of foreign seamen.

Owing to this comparatively recent departure, the First Mate of the Circe was a stolid Dutchman, and the Purser a lanky Swede, three of the crew were Baits and eight others who had been picked up at Porto Rico on a previous voyage were more or less of Spanish origin.

The Second and Third mates, Jennings and Baird, were ruffians hardly distinguishable from the crew; Wells, the Supercargo, who was carried only to act for the owners of cargo when the ship reached her destination, was a pimply youth suffering from tuberculosis who had undertaken the voyage for his health. Alone among them, the Doctor, a pleasant young Scot named Fergusson, had any pretence to more than a smattering of education.

With all sail set the convoy buffeted its way south. Few of the ships in it were as large as Circe, and although the majority were ship-rigged most of them were only two-masters, and there was a number of schooners and snows among them. On every side for miles around the October sun caught their white canvas against the blue-green of the ocean, making as fine a sea spectacle as one could wish for.

On their first Sunday at sea the Captain took Divine Service; Charles and Roger read the Lessons and all the passengers attended, but not all the ship's company. It was natural that the Porto Ricans, being Catholics, should absent themselves from a Church of England ceremony, but eight or ten British members of the crew refused to come aft for it and later held a prayer meeting of their own up on the fo'c'sle.

The meeting was led by one of the quartermasters, named Ephraim Bloggs. He was about thirty years of age and a splendidly built fellow with a shock of short curly black hair. It was obvious too that he was a man of strong personality and much superior to the average run of seamen.

As Roger watched the little group from the distance, he was some­what perturbed by this schism, which in one sense divided the allegi­ance of the crew. It was not that he was a bigoted supporter of the Church of England, but because he knew that the so-called British Jacobins found their strongest adherents among Dissenters and often used their meetings to spread revolutionary doctrines.

When he mentioned this to Captain Cummins, the Captain said that he too regarded such meetings as most undesirable; but, as religious tolerance was always observed under the British flag, it was beyond his powers to put a stop to them. He added that Bloggs had been brought up as a blacksmith, and rumour had it that he had fled the country some years before on account of having half-murdered the squire of his village in a fit of ungovernable rage. He had already displayed the violence of his temper in a quarrel with the bos'n and been put in irons for insubordination; but, that apart, he was an excellent seaman, and no quartermaster could be more reliable when doing his trick at the wheel.

It was on the following day, and their fifth out of Cork, that a series of squalls forced the convoy to take in much of its canvas, and as the men hauled on the ropes their gay sea-shanties gave place to more doleful ones.

They were now in the latitude of the Bay of Biscay, and the weather worsened rapidly. By evening visibility was down to half a mile and they were running with naked masts before the storm. Georgina and Nell had retired with bouts of queasiness from the unaccustomed motion on the first evening out, but had soon recovered from it. Now both of them, and Amanda and Jenny as well, were prostrate from sea-sickness. Young Clarissa was the only one of the women who remained unaffected. Charles, too, proved a good sailor, but Roger had his work cut out not to succumb. He was not a particularly bad sailor, but lacked his usual confidence in himself when at sea, and from previous experience had a dread of bad weather.

During the night it blew great guns. Long before dawn Roger had given in and lay feebly cursing as he battled with nausea in his narrow cot. The awful rolling and pitching of the vessel apart, Monsieur Pirouet could not have cooked breakfast had he been offered a fortune. Tom was in no condition to serve it, or Charles to eat it; so Clarissa found herself the only candidate for the meal.

Dan, having spent so large a part of his life at sea, could stand up to any weather; so he knocked up a hearty breakfast for her in the passengers' galley, then stood by catching the various pieces of crockery before they could slide off the table, and watching her with admiration while she ate.

Afterwards she reeled from one cabin to another, doing what she could for the rest of the party, then insisted on going on deck; so Dan took her up to the poop and, from fear she might be swept overboard, belayed her to the mizen mast with a rope's end. It was as well that he did, as the deck was heaving from one terrifying angle to another, and every few moments a sea washed over it. Drenched to the skin, her fair hair streaming in the wind, she remained there all the morning, and later told her friends that never in her life had she more enjoyed an experience.

For the three days that followed, the others lay prone in their cabins. Young Dr. Fergusson, Clarissa and Dan did what they could for them, but there was little that could be done. Each time the ship rushed up a mountain-side of water they held their breaths, then as it plunged into a seemingly bottomless valley they felt as though they were leaving their insides behind. Their groans were smothered by the thunder of the storm, the sheeting rain, and the ankle-deep water that slapped and hissed about the floors of their cabins. The wind screamed through the rigging, the timbers groaned; at times the ship, caught by a cross wave, shuddered as though she was about to fall apart, while every hour or two there came a resounding crash as some spar snapped and fell, or a boat was stove in. They were in constant fear that each new crisis would prove the last, and their terrors were multiplied from the knowledge that, so exhausted were they from constant retching, should the ship begin to founder they would be incapable of making any effort to save themselves.

Although they did not know it, their apprehensions were well justified, as the tempest was driving the ship towards the coast of Portugal and had it continued unabated for a few more hours she must have been smashed to pieces on the rocks. On the fourth after­noon, by the grace of God, the weather eased, visibility became sufficient for the Captain to see the coast, and by setting the foresail they were able to veer away from it.

The convoy had been so completely dispersed that only one of Circe's companions was now in sight: a brig that had lost both her top and top-gallant masts. Circe was in little better case as only her foremast remained intact; nearly all her upper yards were gone and the decks were still a tangle of top hamper that had been hacked away in a series of emergencies. One of her crew had been swept overboard, another killed by a falling spar, and two more severely injured. Both captains decided to put into Lisbon, and their ships limped down to the port, arriving there to the relief of all on October the 15th.

Two other ships of the convoy were already there and three more made the port during the next twenty-four hours; but four of the five were so severely damaged that major repairs would prevent them from leaving for some time, and neither of the escort ships was among them. However, a Portuguese man-of-war was due to leave with a small convoy for Madeira on the 20th and Captain Cummins decided to make every effort to get Circe into condition to accompany it. Extra labour was engaged and from dawn to dusk for the next four days the ship was a pandemonium of hammering, sawing, clanking and shouting as new gear was rigged.

To escape the din,, although hardly yet recovered, the passengers went ashore and the October sunshine soon revived their spirits. Forty years earlier Lisbon had suffered the worst earthquake of modern times. The greater part of the city had been thrown to the ground, the whole of the harbour and all the shipping in it had been totally engulfed and 40,000 people had perished in the space of a few hours. But the Portuguese had tackled this terrible calamity with great courage, and from the rubble a fine new capital had soon arisen which contained many beautiful buildings.

The travellers were filled with admiration as they strolled across Rolling-Stone Square, and on the third day they made an excursion to Cintra where they thoroughly enjoyed a meal eaten on a vine-covered terrace and washed down with new-made wine. Their joy in this brief respite from the confined quarters of the Circe was only marred by the news which kept coming in of other ships of their convoy which had been wrecked on the coast. At least nine had been pounded to pieces on the rocks and it was certain that others had foundered in the terrible storm; so they felt that they had been very lucky to escape with nothing worse than the considerable damage the sea water had done to their clothes and other belongings.

On the 20th the Circe, and one schooner that had arrived in the Tagus shortly after her, set sail with the Portuguese convoy. The weather was now fair, but the winds, as was to be expected at this season, were still contrary. Again the ships tacked in long sweeps from side to side, rarely making more than two miles an hour in the direction of their destination. Then, on the fourth day out from Lisbon, trouble started on board the Circe. A deputation of the crew led by Ephraim Bloggs came aft to protest about the badness of the food.

As Roger later found out, the complaint was fully justified; but the passengers knew nothing about it until they saw Bloggs strung up to a grating, and learned that he was about to be given fifty lashes with the cat. According to Captain Cummins, when the deputation had been told that nothing could be done Bloggs had had to be restrained by the other men from attacking him; so an example must be made by disciplining him severely.

Fifty with the cat meant four hundred and fifty cuts and such a flogging might cause death unless a man had a very fine physique. The women were appalled at the ferocity of the sentence, and Charles and Roger agreed that its severity would have been justified only if Bloggs had actually knocked the Captain down; but the latter's word was law on board his ship, and when he had refused to listen to their pleas that he should reduce the number of lashes there was nothing they could do to prevent matters going forward.

Amanda, Clarissa and the two maids hurried to their cabins, but Georgina stood her ground. Charles touched her on the arm and said: "M'dear, this is no place for you. I pray you join the others."

She shook her head. "Nay, Charles; I intend to remain, and have a reason for so doing." Her knuckles showed white from the force with which she gripped the poop-rail and she turned her face away so that her glance was averted from the horrid scene below her; but otherwise she never moved a muscle, even when after the nineteenth stroke Bloggs began to scream and call on God to help him. At the thirty-fourth stroke he fainted, and Captain Cummins, evidently feeling that he had sufficiently exerted his authority, called to the bos'n to have him cut down.

As his lacerated body slumped on the deck, Georgina's voice rang out sharp and clear. "Have that man carried to the empty cabin next that of my woman!"

The group of seamen about Bloggs looked up at her in astonish­ment, then towards the Captain for a confirmation of her order. He turned upon her, his coarse face reddening slightly, and exclaimed : "My lady, 'tis not fitting that one of the hands should occupy an after cabin. He'll do well enough in the fo'c'sle, when the doctor's had a look at him."

"You heard what I said!" she snapped. "See to it that I am obeyed!"

"Madam!" he protested angrily. "This is no affair of yours, and . . ."

"Don't Madam me!" Her half gipsy blood was on fire and her black eyes blazing as she cut him short, then flung at him: "I am set on this and mean to have my way. Cross me, and when I return to England I'll see to it that your owners put you on the beach forthwith."

It was a very awkward situation. Roger was in full sympathy with Georgina's generous impulse but, all the same, he thought it most regrettable that by this public quarrel she should risk humiliation or, if she won her point, undermine the Captain's authority. Fortunately Charles stepped into the breach and in his quiet good-humoured voice said to the irate Cummins:

"Her ladyship intends no criticism of your handling of the ship's affairs, Sir: but her susceptibilities have naturally been much affected by this unhappy scene; and there is reason behind her contention. None of us questions your right to punish as seems fit to you; but you must agree that there is no warrant for withholding merciful ministrations from a sufferer after the punishment has been inflicted. . Need I say more to ensure your acceding to her ladyship's wishes?"

Captain Cummins accepted the olive branch. The words that con­veyed it were soft-spoken enough, but he had noted a certain hardness in the young Earl's brown eyes, and in those days an Earl was still a power to be reckoned with. Shrugging his broad shoulders he signed to the men to cany the unconscious Bloggs to the cabin next to Jenny's.

Without a glance at the Captain, Georgina went down to the cabin, had Jenny boil water, tucked up her own voluminous skirts, and washed the still seeping blood from Bloggs's lacerated back with a very mild solution of salt, then made him as comfortable as possible there and left Jenny in charge. Two days later he was about again, apparently little the worse for his awful thrashing, and in the meantime Jenny had learnt quite a lot about him.

She said that he declared himself his own worst enemy from the violence of his temper; and that although it was true that he had been forced to run away to sea on account of having half-killed his squire, the gentleman had .brought his beating on himself by turning a poor old invalid woman out of her cottage. He could both read and write, was a follower of the Methodist persuasion and, a rare thing in those days, had forsworn the liquor. His account of conditions before the mast was truly heartrending and, as a convinced disciple of Tom Paine, he had dedicated himself to the course of securing the 'rights of man' for the underdog, even if in the last event that meant resorting to force.

Georgina retailed this to the others with some misgivings; as although she and Charles regarded themselves as responsible for the well-being of their dependants, they both held to the tradition that the lower orders should be content to remain in the station to which God had called them. Roger heard it with considerably more concern, as it bore out the forebodings he had felt about the Dissenters' meetings which Bloggs held on Sundays.

His uneasiness was increased by the fact that on the Sunday follow­ing Bloggs's flogging, five more of the crew failed to attend the Church of England service but joined the Dissenters; and after prayers were over the dozen-odd men continued their meeting squatting on the deck, smoking their clay pipes and talking in low voices.

He had no grounds for supposing that Bloggs was preaching mutiny but he could make a very good guess at the kind of talk that went on at these discussions, and he had practical experience of the sort of horrors which might result from a general acceptance of Bloggs's doctrines. Only too often he had seen well-intentioned men undermine authority among the illiterate masses, then be swept aside by unscrupulous ruffians who led frenzied mobs to commit the most brutal excesses; so he decided to take an early opportunity of having a talk with Bloggs.

It came that afternoon when the burly quartermaster did his next trick at the wheel. Sauntering up, Roger dropped into conversation with him and, after a few casual remarks, began to ask about the conditions of the crew.

The subject was one on which Bloggs had plenty to say. He described the year-old salt pork, bullet-hard peas, grey-coloured duff and weevily biscuits that they had to live on as 'enough to turn a man's stomach', and their quarters as 'scarce fit for animals'. Roger had already noticed that as soon as the ship reached a warmer latitude nearly all the men spent the nights on deck, and now Bloggs told him that they did so only to escape the bugs, fleas and rats that infested their airless foul-smelling den which had neither light nor warmth, or even space enough for all the off-duty watch to stretch out in comfort at one time. In the tropics it was customary for them to sleep near naked, but from the start of the voyage to its finish they never took off all their clothes, and their only faculties for washing were in a bucket of sea water that had been hauled up from over the side.

In Circe and many ships like her, Bloggs said, the crew's lot was made still harder by unnecessarily harsh treatment, as some Captains allowed, and even encouraged, the mates and bos'n to belabour the men with ropes' ends when hauling on tackle, although in the long run it did not make them work any better. They were expected to take blows and abuse without protest, and the least sign of resent­ment was sufficient to get them clapped into irons. At times a man was picked on for some very minor slackness and given twenty-four hours in the hole just to ginger up his mates; and during the present voyage the only days on which there had not been one or more men in irons, for slight offences, were those of the tempest.

The wages of an ordinary seaman were three pounds a month, and with the object of preventing them from deserting they were not paid until their ship returned to her home port. Despite that, many of them preferred to forgo their earnings on the outward voyage rather than remain in a bad ship or under a tyrannous captain; and there were so many of both that nearly a third of all the seamen who went out to the West Indies deserted ship when they got there. Some of them took a chance on signing on for a return passage in another vessel, but the great majority elected to join the lawless thousands already there, as beach-combers, smugglers of contraband to the Spanish mainland, or in privateers which were often little better than pirates.

Obviously matters were even worse than Roger had supposed and he made no attempt to defend the shipowners, who through meanness or neglect were fundamentally responsible; but he did put it to Bloggs, as tactfully as he was able that, however strong the men's grounds for complaint might be, no good could come of encouraging them to hold meetings, at which their natural tendency would be to exaggerate their grievances and in time become obsessed with them.

At this Bloggs, who had previously been most communicative, suddenly became abrupt and surly in his manner. Evidently he now suspected that Roger was acting as a stool-pigeon for the Captain, and endeavouring to trap him into an admission that he was fomenting unrest among his shipmates. He muttered with a touch of truculence that the only meetings he knew of were those held on Sundays, that every man had a right to worship God in his own way, and that if a few poor mariners chose to join together in prayer that was no concern of their betters.

Hoping to restore the conversation to a friendly footing, Roger talked for a while about religion and his own tolerant attitude towards it, but either Bloggs was no theologian or thoroughly alarmed, as he refrained from comment, and replied to questions only by mono­syllables; so Roger had to abandon the attempt to wean him from his potentially-dangerous activities.

On the evening of her tenth day out from Lisbon, the Circe reached Madeira. Captain Cummins had hoped to find there the bulk of the convoy with which they had left Cork, but in that he was disappointed. Between the 19th and the 27th both escorts and nearly sixty merchant vessels had come straggling in, but no more having arrived during the past two days the senior naval officer had assumed the remainder to be either lost or refitting in other ports; so, only that morning, he had given the order for the voyage to be resumed.

For any but fast ships to cross the Atlantic without escort was to run a grave risk of capture by a privateer on nearing the other side, but both Circe and the British schooner that had accompanied her from Lisbon had a fair turn of speed; so after consultation their Captains decided that as the convoy was only a day's sail ahead of them, rather than delay for a month awaiting the coming of the next, they would take a chance on being able to catch their own up. In consequence, the passengers had only a few hours ashore in the little port of Funchal on the morning of the 30th, while fresh water, vege­tables, fruit and two pipes of Madeira wine were taken aboard; then anchor was weighed again and sail set for the long run to the Indies.

Now that they were down in the lower thirties conditions were very different. The weather was clement, the air balmy, and instead of progressing laboriously by cross-winds they bowled merrily along under full sail propelled by the North-East Trades. The Iiot weather caused the girls to take to their muslins, and canvas awnings had to be rigged to shade the decks from the blazing sun. Any regrets the passengers had had earlier about making the voyage were now forgotten in the pleasure of long days spent in idle chatter, playing games, reading, and watching schools of porpoises and flying-fish or an occasional whale.

Captain Cummins now emerged from his cabin only at infrequent intervals. When he did he was always morose and often the worse for liquor; but that may to some degree have been excused by the fact that he had become a prey to considerable anxiety. Circe and the schooner should have overhauled the slow-moving convoy within three days of leaving Madeira, but they had failed to sight it. This meant that they and it were sailing on slightly divergent courses; so by the fourth, or fifth day at the latest, must have passed it, and now had very little chance at all of picking it up. In consequence the Circe would have to run the gauntlet through privateer-infested seas when she entered the Caribbean. As her armament consisted only of a nine pounder in the bow and a long eighteen-pounder stern-chaser these would prove quite inadequate protection against a well-armed rover; so should she fall in with one she would not have much hope of escaping capture unless she could show a clean pair of heels.

In spite of the brutish Captain's rare appearances on deck the men were kept hard' at it, the majority of the duty watch being slung over the ship s sides in cradles to give her fresh coats of black and yellow paint as she ran smoothly down the trades. There was no let-up in punishments either—as unless there was always a man or two in irons the Captain cursed the mates, accusing them of failing to maintain a sufficiently rigorous discipline—and there were two more floggings.

Another member of the company who was far from happy was Monsieur Pirouet. As he cooked for the passengers in his stifling little galley he thought longingly of the spacious kitchens at Whiteknights Park, St. Ennins's noble seat in Northamptonshire, and at Stillwaters, Georgina's own great private mansion near Ripley, and even of his domain in Berkeley Square, where he had ruled over a pastry-cook, a vegetable chef and six kitchen-maids. But what troubled this culinary artist even more was the greatly curtailed menus he was compelled to submit to his mistress. Before leaving London he had despatched two wagons in advance loaded with meat, fish, game, poultry and many other things, all packed in crushed ice liberally sprinkled with freezing salt; and on arriving at Bristol he had seen to it that all these were stowed well away from the decks where they would not be affected by the heat. Yet, despite all his precautions, now that nearly two months had elapsed since they had left London, many of the items that remained started to go bad almost as soon as they were unpacked and exposed to the torrid heat. He still produced miracles of omelettes and souffles from his crates of eggs and could always fall back on his hams and smoked salmon, but was nearly reduced to tears by the lack of variety in the dishes he could send to table, and Georgina had her work cut out to console him.

November the 13th was declared a gala, as on that day they crossed the Tropic of Cancer. West Indiamen did not go as far south as the Equator, where Neptune and his consort would have come on board; so instead it was customary for the traditional ceremonies of crossing the line to be carried out during a visit from Mr. and Mrs. Cancer.

All work was called off, a large spare sail was rigged to form a bath amidships and filled with water, then two of the crew were lowered over the side to reappear on deck in fancy dress representing the powers of the deep. Everyone aboard who had not previously crossed the tropic was mustered to be initiated into this seafarers' mystery, and a far from happy little crowd they looked, as they had good reason to expect rough handling. But the women were naturally exempted, as also were Roger and Charles, for in those days it was considered almost a crime to treat a person of quality with lack of respect, and to duck a noble Earl was quite unthinkable. Instead, they and their ladies were invited by the ship's cook, who was acting as Master of Ceremonies, to take seats on the dais erected to overlook the bath, at either side of the thrones which had been set up there for Mr. and Mrs. Cancer.

It was then they realized that none of them had seen Clarissa since breakfast, and Charles suggested that perhaps she had shut herself in her cabin rather than witness the rough horse-play that was expected. But that proved far from the case, as a moment later she emerged from beneath the poop, and at the sight of her they all gasped with astonishment.

As the coining gala had been a topic of conversation for some days past, young Clarissa had decided to enter into the spirit of the thing and give them a surprise. Swearing Nell and Jenny to secrecy, she had got the two maids to make for her a large fish's tail out of an old dress that was spangled with sequins. Her legs were now encased in it, and her bare shoulders cloaked only with her lovely fair-gold hair which had been brushed out to its fullest extent. To carry her two poles had been lashed to a chair so that it formed a sedan, and in this Tom and Dan bore her triumphantly up to the dais.

Amanda was extremely angry at this prank as, although there was nothing actually indecent about Clarissa's get-up, she thought it most unseemly that her young cousin should invite ribald comments from the seamen by appearing in such a garb. But to send her back to her cabin was clearly out of the question, for at the first sight of the lovely mermaid the whole ship rang with lusty cheers of appreciation from the crew, and she was at once invited to take the part of Mrs. Cancer, as far surpassing the sailor who had been selected for that role.

While the ship's fiddler scraped away vigorously, and the men roared out the chorus of "What shall we do with a drunken sailor?" the neophytes were 'baptized' by having a cross marked in ink* on their foreheads, had their faces lathered with a huge brush, were shaved with a wooden razor two feet long, given a beating with ropes' ends and finally thrown into the canvas pool. The poor little Supercargo was given a terrible time and only rescued at the plea of the Mermaid Queen, but the initiation of Monsieur Pirouet proved the high-spot of the day. He showed such intense resentment at having to submit to the ceremony that he received a worse baiting than any of the others and his furious struggles to escape only provoked general mirth. At length Clarissa managed to beg him off further indignities, but not before his beautifully waxed moustache had been ruined; and for several days afterwards even Georgina could not induce him to utter a word.

It was on November the 19th that another storm blew up and, by ill-luck, one the severity of which was quite exceptional in those latitudes for that time of year, as the hurricane season was in the summer. Again the Circe's masts were stripped of canvas and her hatches battened down, while the wind tore at die rigging and heavy seas thudded on her decks. However, the ship's situation was at no time as critical as it had been during the two worst days of the tempest she had met with off the northern tip of Spain, and her passengers now having been for seven weeks at sea were far better conditioned to stand up to the violent motion. Georgina, Nell and Roger went down with short bouts of sickness, but the others suffered only dis­comfort, and Clarissa once more thoroughly enjoyed herself. The storm parted them from the schooner which had been their companion all the way from Madeira, and they now missed her familiar presence; but the most annoying thing about it was that for the best part of three days the Circe had to run before the storm, which drove her to the north-westward and over five hundred miles out of her course.

This was particularly infuriating. for Roger, because had the wind continued fair for a further two days they should have sighted Martinique. On his appointment as Governor of the island, their - original plan had been modified to the extent that his party was to be dropped off there while Charles's went on to Jamaica; and, if it proved practical, they would exchange visits after Christmas. This would have made no difference to Circe's schedule, as the normal course for ships sailing to Jamaica was to pass between Martinique and St. Lucia. It was this which had caused the islands to the south and north of that Channel to be named the Windwards and the Leewards respectively; and after leaving them to left and right Jamaica-bound ships completed their voyages by a five-day cruise inside the semi-circle that they formed.

But now Circe had been carried up to a point some distance north of the Virgin Islands; and Captain Cummins said that, since any attempt to thread a way between the innumerable rocky islets dotted about them would be fraught with grave danger, he must pass outside Porto Rico, then tack down the channel between that island and Santo Domingo. Roger therefore had no option now but to go on to Jamaica and take a ship back to Martinique from there, which would mean a delay of at least a fortnight before he could nope to assume his Governorship.

On the second day after the storm abated they made a landfall on Porto Rico, and all that afternoon ran along within sight of the big island's north coast. As its dense forests ran right up to the tops of its mountains it appeared to be uninhabited, but they were near enough to make out groups of tall palms dotted along its shores and the line of white surf creaming on its golden beaches. At this first glimpse of the green and azure playground they had come so far to enjoy the passengers were thrilled, but they were given something much less pleasant to think about early next morning.

As dawn broke Porto Rico was still in sight and Circe was about to round the western end of the island. The channel between it and the eastern end of Santo Domingo was some eighty miles in width, but another ship lay almost directly in her path. The other was a three-masted barque painted from bulwarks to waterline a greenish-yellow colour and would have made her almost unnoticeable had she been lying up in a cove with her sails furled against one of the islands for background. It was this unusual colour which immediately aroused the suspicions of Circe's First Mate. Having bawled an order to "about ship", he ran down to fetch the Captain.

By the time Captain Cummins, bleary-eyed and clutching about him a revoltingly soiled chamber-robe, reached the poop, the barque was already crowding on more sail and standing out towards them. Within a matter of minutes all hands were on deck, anxiously staring astern, though the early morning haze prevented them from getting a very clear view of the craft which looked as though she was bent on pursuit

Roused by the shouting, the passengers soon learned the disquieting news, and hurriedly pulling on their clothes came out to join the

Captain on the poop. By then there could be no mistaking the strangely coloured barque's intent to come up with them; but she was still some two miles distant and the Circe, now heading north-west to clear the invisible point of Santo Domingo, was scudding along on a good brisk breeze.

That morning, November the 24th, no breakfast was cooked or eaten; for everyone in the Circe too much depended on whether she could outdistance her pursuer for any other matter to be given a thought. Both ships set staysails, stunsails and flying jibs, and heeled far over in the water under every inch of canvas they could carry. As the morning advanced the sun blazed down from a cloudless sky, and with visibility now perfect it became evident that the gap between the two ships was slowly closing. For sailing powers they were fairly evenly matched, but the Circe was heavy laden and the barque in ballast, which made all the difference.

At eleven o'clock the barque called on her quarry to halt by firing her forward gun. The shot fell a hundred yards short, but at intervals of ten minutes others followed, and the fourth crashed into the Circe's stern.

Amanda was standing beside Roger. Her grip on his arm tightened a little as she asked anxiously: "What is likely to happen if they capture us?"

"Nothing very terrible," he replied: and while he wished to reassure her he believed that he was giving her a reasonable forecast, as he went on: "It will be deucedly inconvenient and damnably expensive, but it is unlikely they will do us any injury. Should we have to surrender they will put a prize crew on board and sail Circe to their home port. If she's French that will almost certainly be in Guadeloupe, as the recapture of that island last spring again gave France a base in the West Indies. But she may be American, and if so we would be carried much farther from our destination. In either case I fear it would be months before we reached Martinique, as privateers sell the ships they capture and demand ransoms for passengers and crew. But they operate on licence from their governments, so are under an obligation to treat their captives honourably as prisoners-of-war."

On Circe's being hit, Captain Cummins had ordered her ensign to be run up and the women to go below; then he had a round fired from her stern-chaser in reply. It failed to reach its mark, but now she had shown her intention to resist her attacker also snowed her colours. To the astonishment of the little group on the Circe's poop they proved to be a white flag embroidered with the golden Fleur-de-lys of Royalist France.

Charles lowered the spy-glass through which he had been looking, and remarked: "How very strange. The French Monarchy has been dead these two years past Should she catch us there is no port to which she could take us without being caught herself, and by her bitterest enemies, the Republicans."

Roger's face had suddenly taken on a strained look, as he replied: "Then she cannot be a privateer. Her Captain must be a free-lance— some Frenchman ruined by the revolution who has become a lawless rover, and is out to plunder, sink and kill. God help us if we fall into his hands. This means we have no option but to fight him to the last"

chapter v

"FOR THOSE IN PERIL ON THE SEA"

Very anxiously now Roger and Charles discussed the evil fate which, in the shape of a graceful white-winged ship, had come out of the morning to menace them.

As the barque tacked in pursuit it could be seen that she had eight guns on either side, in addition to the long-gun in her bow and two carronades mounted on her poop. She was still at extreme range, so could not yet use her main armament; but should she succeed in closing sufficiently to do so it was clear that the Circe would be hope­lessly outgunned. Even if they fought on, the enemy's cannon would cause such havoc among their masts and sailing gear that they would be hove-to and become vulnerable to boarding. So, unless some unexpected turn of events occurred, their chance of escaping seemed slender; and to be captured by a pirate was a terrifying thing to contemplate.

Half a century earlier buccaneers had still sailed the waters of the Spanish Main with comparative immunity, but the navies of England, France, Holland and Spain had since combined to put them down, or regularize their depredations by converting them into licensed privateers; so their numbers had greatly decreased and to have fallen in with one was a piece of exceptional ill-fortune.

To be taken by a privateer would have been bad enough, as that would have meant being robbed of all but the clothes they stood up in, then having to kick their heels, perhaps for months, in far from comfortable quarters while they arranged to buy their freedom with heavy drafts on London. But to fall into the hands of a sea-rover who owed allegiance to no government might prove infinitely worse.

Such pirate captains were, almost without exception, debased and illiterate men who treated their captives with ruthless savagery. The fact that they were outlaws debarred them from all communication with the civilized world; so they had no means of securing ransoms for their prisoners. Instead they either killed the men or marooned them on some desolate islet, and having raped their choice among the women gave them over to become the common property of the crew until death during some drunken scrimmage, or from disease, released them from their hideous bondage.

It was the thought of their wives, young Clarissa, and Jenny and Nell being handed on from one filthy ruffian to another which made the palms of Charles's hands go damp and Roger conscious of a horrid empty feeling in the pit of his stomach; although each endeavoured to reassure the other.

They argued that as the barque carried the flag of Royalist France the odds were all on her Captain being a man of gentle birth. If so, however criminal the life to which he had taken, his natural instinct would be to treat the women chivalrously; and, as one who had been

brought up to put faith in the word of one gentleman given to another, he might be persuaded to put them all ashore on their promise to arrange for a large sum to be made available at some port where he could collect it without danger.

Yet these optimistic speculations were offset by grave misgivings, as they were aware that there were definite limits to the authority wielded by pirate captains. Their crews were the scum of the seven seas, desperate and vicious men, banded together in free association, and willing to obey their leaders only so long as doing so seemed likely to serve their own ends. Discipline could be maintained aboard such ships only by a captain shooting out of hand any man who challenged his authority, and provided the bulk of the crew thought the action for the common good, that was the end of the matter; but if a majority got the idea that their captain was either falling off as a leader, or cheating them out of their full share of plunder, it was they who murdered him.

Governing the sharing out of plunder, and the enjoyment of captured women, they had rules well established by tradition, and the disturbing thought was the unlikelihood that they would be willing to forgo them. From that, it followed that even if this French Royalist sea-rover's instinct was to protect his prisoners, there seemed little chance that he would give his men just grounds for combining against him by doing so, if that entailed the risk of stirring up a mutiny which might prove beyond his powers to suppress.

Grimly, although they did not say so to one another, the two friends faced the fact that unless Circe could hold her lead until nightfall, then throw off her pursuer during the hours of darkness, both her passengers and crew would all be wishing that they had been quietly drowned some weeks back off the coast of Portugal.

Meanwhile both ships had exchanged another shot, neither of which scored a hit; but now the Frenchman fired a sixth. It landed plumb on the poop not a yard from the mizenmast before bouncing overboard, and was a clear enough indication that she was gradually creeping up on them.

Its arrival coincided with the striking of eight-bells; so although the whole crew was standing by, the watch was automatically changed. The Dutch First Mate took over from the Second, who had been on duty for the past four hours, and Ephraim Bloggs relieved the man at the wheel.

The north-east corner of Santo Domingo could now be made out distinctly as a dark irregular patch on the horizon, some twenty-five miles away. At the speed they were making Captain Cummins estimated that they should round it about three o'clock, and he said that when they did the wind, for a time at least, would be more favourable to him; but Roger now doubted if they could get that far before the Frenchman had come up close enough to fire a broadside and disable them.

Frantically he cast about in his mind for a means of saving the women. He was willing enough to play his part in fighting the ship, but no uncertainties troubled his well-balanced mind about where his first loyalty lay. As a passenger he was under no obligation to stand by Captain Cummins to the end, and he decided that he must abandon him if that would give a better chance to get his own party away. Taking Charles aside, he said to him in a low voice:

"Unless the Frenchman has the luck to shoot away one of our masts, we still have an hour or two in which to make preparations against the worst."

Charles gave him a desperately worried look. "I take it you have in mind the provisioning of some hiding-place for our ladies and their maids. I greatly doubt though if they could remain undiscovered till a chance arises for them to get ashore. Any prize crew that is put aboard will ransack the ship from stem to stern m search of valuables."

"That apart"; Roger replied, "I fear that a number of our own crew are untrustworthy and may go over to the pirates. In any case some of them will give it away that there are women aboard, and under threats betray their hiding-place. No; unless you have a better plan, mine is that we should remain aboard as long as there seems a chance that Circe's resistance may prove successful; but should ~ capture seem inevitable we will get the women into one of the boats and make off in it."

"Anything would be better than surrender; but I doubt your idea being practical. To lower a boat full of people while the ship is still under weigh sounds a damnably difficult proceeding."

"She won't be. Gunfire will have reduced her speed, and Cummins be on the point of surrender, or if he decides to fight it out they'll be about to board us. In either case we'll be as good as hove-to. The Frenchman may send off a boat to chase us, but there's a fair chance that he'll be too fully occupied. Anyway we should be able to secure a good lead. The sea is calm and in an hour's time we'll be within fifteen miles of the coast. It will be a stiff pull but with you and I, Dan, Tom, and Pirouet, we should be able to reach it."

Charles's brown face brightened. "I believe you're right. What do you wish me to do?"

"Go down and warn the girls. Tell them to pack small cases. Nothing heavy. No more than each of them can carry—just their valuables and greatest necessities. I'll inform the men of our intention. The gig is the lightest boat, so we'll take that. While everyone has their eyes fixed on the pirate, Dan will have no difficulty in giving her a quick look over without attracting attention. He'll see to it that there's water in her, and make sure that her gear is in running order so that we'll be able to get her out speedily."

As they were about to turn towards the poop ladder they saw again the bright flash of the Frenchman's bow gun. It was followed by a puff of white smoke and, a moment later, the dull boom of the charge. The report was still echoing across the water when the shot crashed into one of the Circe's after cabins. A piercing scream came from below.

Scrambling down the ladder Roger and Charles ran aft along the passage under the poop fearful of what they would find. To their relief their wives were safe, but they were greatly distressed at the scene they came upon in the big after cabin. Poor little Nell lay with her head in Amanda's lap. The round shot had come through one of the cabin windows and had taken her arm off near the shoulder. For a yard around the place was spattered with her blood, and it was impossible to staunch the bleeding from so great a wound. Within five minutes she was dead.

Roger had already told them all that they must not use the big cabin because it would be dangerous; but it emerged that she had gone in there to fetch something and, by ill chance, the shot had crashed through the window just at that moment. Now, having covered her up, he hurried the others into the store-room amidships, where they would be protected on all sides by bulkheads. Leaving Charles to tell them of his plan, he went to his own cabin, hastily stuffed a few things into his pockets, collected his sword and pistols, and went in search of Dan.

When he came out on deck again the Frenchman was perceptibly nearer, and had landed another round, shattering one of the starboard mizen chains. Each time Circe came into the wind to alter tack she fired back, and now she scored her first hit. A cheer went up from the men who were manning the gun, and striding over to the bos'n who was acting as layer, Roger cried:

"Well done! If you .can hit her often enough she may abandon the chase. I'll give five pounds for every shot that finds a mark, and a hundred if you can bring down one of her masts."

With another cheer the gun crew set about reloading, and hurrying across to Cummins, Roger asked:

"What do you think of our prospects, Captain?"

The Captain glumly shook his head. "They're none too good, Sir. Unless we can dismast her she'll come up with us before we make the point. Then a couple of broadsides will likely carry away enough of our gear to bring us to; so she'll be able to board us."

"You mean to fight though?"

"There's nought else for it. Were she a privateer I'd surrender; but pirates are very different cattle. They'll not risk letting us go, so as we could later get a ship o' war sent from Jamaica to hunt them out. If we're taken, they'll hang you gentlemen an' me and my officers from the yard arm, or worse. Better by half to do our damnedest to drive them off, or die fighting if need be."

Roger nodded agreement, and having satisfied himself that there would be no premature surrender, went in search of Dan. On finding his faithful henchman, he quickly outlined his idea for getting the women away in the gig during the height of the fight if the Circe's crew looked like being worsted. The ex-smuggler agreed that it could be done and they settled the details. He was to look over the gig, then keep Tom and Pirouet near him, and once the Circe was boarded keep an eye on Roger. If Roger took out his handkerchief and waved it, they were all to run to the gig and set about lowering her while St. Ermins fetched up the women.

Another round shot coming over caused them to duck their heads, then jump for cover from the splinters as it smashed through a hatch­way farther forward. Exchanging a sheepish grin, they resumed their conversation and Roger gave Dan further instructions that he wished carried out should he be killed during the action, or if it proved impos­sible to get the gig away. Dan did not at all relish these but he had been in too many tight corners with Roger to question his judgment, so he reluctantly agreed to obey them.

It was now getting on for half-past one. At every change of tack Shots were being exchanged and both ships had scored further hits. The Circe's after cabin had had four balls through it and part of her poop deck-house smashed in, but she had landed two rounds in the Frenchman's fo'c'sle and shot away the tip of her jib-boom, forcing her to haul in her flying jib. Yet, this loss of sailing power was so comparatively slight that she was still gaining upon them. Three balls had just struck when she suddenly turned into the wind and fired her first broadside.

The guns had obviously been aimed high, in the hope of bringing down one of Circe's masts. With a whistling scream the eight balls hurtled overhead. Three of them passed harmlessly, three more tore rents in the sails, and two only cut pieces of rigging. No serious harm had been done and a little time must elapse before the enemy could get into position to fire another broadside; but that might have more serious results; so Captain Cummins decided that, rather than wait until wreckage might impede movements on the decks, arms should now be served out, and he gave the key of the armoury to the Second Mate.

A few minutes later, muskets, pistols, cutlasses and boarding-pikes were being passed from hand to hand until every man of the crew had a fire-arm and some other weapon. Those on the poop received theirs last, and Bloggs was given a pistol and a cutlass. As he thrust the pistol into his belt his gaze travelled slowly over the little groups of men down on the deck, then he gave a swift glance at Captain Cummins, who was standing at the after rail with his back turned, and let go the wheel.

Instantly it and the ship swung round. Her sails emptied, billowed out and flapped with the noise of guns, then hung slack.

With a savage oath the Captain turned, strode towards him, and bellowed: "The wheel, Quartermaster! The wheel! What in thunder are you about?"

But Bloggs had turned his back to the wheel, and it was evident now that he had been waiting only for the moment when he and his fellow malcontents should be armed. Lifting his cutlass he shouted defiantly: "Haul down your flag, tyrant! Me an' my mates ain't going to be killed for the likes of you.

At the sound of their raised voices all eyes were turned upon them. Down on the deck, as though at a pre-arranged signal, Bloggs's friends drew their weapons and ran towards the Mates. Up on the poop, one of the gun-crew suddenly turned and, whirling his ramrod on high, struck down the bos'n.

The Captain, his eyes suffused with rage, pulled out his pistol, but Bloggs was quicker. With a mighty swipe of his cutlass he clove Cummins from forehead to chin. His face pouring blood, the Captain slumped to the deck. The cutlass, stuck fast in the terrible wound, dragged Bloggs down half on top of him. Putting his foot on the dying man's chest he strove to drag it free.

Roger and Charles had been standing near the gun. Both whipped out their swords. Charles ran his through the man who had struck down the bos'n; as the blade slid home below the mutineer's ribs his eyes bulged in their sockets, he gave an awful groan, doubled up and staggered away clasping his stomach.

Another of the gun-crew came at. Roger with a boarding pike. It was the favourite weapon among seamen and very awkward to counter with a rapier. The man was small but very agile and, jumping from side to side, thrust with his pike at Roger's face. Roger managed to beat aside the strokes but one of them caught him in the forearm, ripping open the sleeve of his coat and drawing blood. The wound was not serious and he used it to carry out an old trick.

Pretending to have been disabled, he stepped back and let his sword arm drop. With a cry of triumph his attacker ran in on him. At the critical second he dropped on one knee and turned his sword upwards as though in a salute. The pike passed harmlessly over his shoulder, while the point of the sword pierced the sailor below the chin. With a violent thrust Roger forced the blade home. The man's scream was choked in his throat by a rush of blood. He dropped his pike, went over backwards and lay squirming on the deck.

Meanwhile, the First Mate had pulled out his pistol and fired at Bloggs. Just in time the Quartermaster caught sight of him and ducked. The bullet whistled through Bloggs's curly black hair. Giving his head a shake, he abandoned his efforts to free his cutlass from the Captain's skull, and sprang away. The Mate clubbed his pistol and ran at him to strike him down, but Bloggs seized his wrist and they closed in a desperate wrestle. The Dutchman weighed fourteen stone, and was a tough, powerfully built man, but the ex-blacksmith was as strong or stronger. Swaying this way and that, they strove for mastery.

Charles had been about to come to Roger's help, but as the man with the pike went down, he turned and took a step forward, intending to run to the assistance of the Mate. By ill luck he trod in a pool of blood, slipped, and measured his length on the deck. Quickly, he picked himself up, but it was then too late.

Bloggs had succeeded in breaking the Dutchman's hold. Stooping suddenly, he seized him under one knee and by the cravat, then heaving him up bodily, he staggered to the ship's side and threw him overboard.

Roger, too, had seen the Mate's desperate situation. As Bloggs swung the unfortunate man off his feet, he sprang over Charles's prostrate body and ran towards them. The boom of a second broad­side sounded from the Frenchman, and at that moment it took effect. One of the shots struck the mizenmast full and true about twelve feet up. There was a frightful sound of rending timber. The upper part of the mast heeled over to port. Yards, spars, sails, rigging and blocks came crashing down smothering the poop and everyone on it beneath them. Roger was hit on the head by a piece of tackle and pitched forward unconscious.

chapter VII

CAPTURED BY PIRATES

When Roger regained consciousness he found himself in the after cabin. All sound of fighting had ceased and there were only the usual noises of the ship's gear straining against the wind as she ploughed her way smoothly through the sea. For a moment he wondered where he was, then the sight of the shattered mirrors and splashes of Nell's blood on the silk covering of the settee where he lay brought everything back to him.

Amanda was sitting beside him, and he took in the fact that she was crying. As he raised his bandaged head her sobs gave place to a sigh of relief, and quickly laying a gentle hand on his chest she urged him to lie still.

His head ached abominably, but he forced himself to keep his eyes open. By turning it slightly he saw that Georgina was sitting slumped over the table, her dark head resting on her arms, and that Jenny, also weeping, was endeavouring to comfort her with an arm thrown round her shoulders. Clarissa was not in his field of vision but moved into it shortly after Amanda spoke, to stare down at him. Her eyes were unnaturally bright and her small face drawn, but she smiled faintly.

"What happened," Roger asked in a husky voice.

Putting her hand behind his head Amanda raised it a little and held a cup of wine to his lips so that he could take a few sips, then she said:

"Tis a mercy you were not killed, my love. You were struck on the head by a spar when the mizenmast came down. But you must not talk. It's bad for you. Close your eyes now and try to go to sleep."

"I must know what happened," he insisted.

It was Clarissa who answered. "We know only what we have been told. 'Tis said that Bloggs killed Captain Cummins and led a mutiny. The ship ceased to go forward before the mast was shot away and it seems, thinking our case was hopeless, most of the crew had already decided to surrender rather than fight. When the pirates boarded us they met with no resistance, and we are now captives. After they had cleared the debris from the poop they brought you down here, but... but Charles. . . " Her young voice faltered to a stop and she looked away.

Roger sat up with a jerk. A blinding pain shot through his head. With a groan, he shut his eyes, then gasped: "You . . . you do not mean .. .?"

Clarissa nodded. "They say he was struck down by the mast and when found was already dead."

Amanda rounded on her angrily. "Need you have disclosed our loss while Roger is in so precarious a state? 'Tis wicked to disturb his mind when above all things it needs rest"

"Reproach her not!" Roger exclaimed as he sank back. "There are times when it is best to know the worst, and this is one of them. .What else is there to tell?"

Feeling that he would demand an answer, Amanda took up the tale. "The pirate is said to be a French nobleman named de Senlac. He has put a prize crew on board under a fearsome-looking individual— one Joao de Mondego. It seems that Bloggs's friends and the Porto Ricans all went over to the enemy. They have been left on board, while the four Balts and those of our own crew who remained loyal have been taken as prisoners to the barque. When they had hacked clear the fallen mast our remaining sails were trimmed again. We rounded the corner of Santo Domingo an hour back and are now proceeding along the island's north coast There! That is all we know. And now I pray you try not to think more than you can help of our predicament; for 'tis likely you are concussed, and may become subject to brain fever unless you can court successfully the soothing influence of sleep."

"What of Dan?" Roger asked. "And young Tom, and Monsieur Pirouet?"

"All three were taken aboard the Frenchman, with Doctor Fergusson, the Second Mate, and the loyal members of the crew."

"Tom and Dan had a quarrel," Clarissa put in. "Tom told me about it before he was taken away. Our flag had fallen with the mizen gear, but caught high up so was still flying well above the deck. Dan climbed up, cut it down and threw it into the sea. Tom was taken with a great rage that Dan should perform so treacherous an act and fought with him, but got the worst of it"

"Be silent, girl," Amanda snapped. "Have you not the sense to realize that this betrayal by our trusted servant will so distress Roger as to further excite his mind. Ill news will always keep, and additional woes the very last things that should be thrust upon him at this moment."

Clarissa stuck out her small pointed chin aggressively. "Your pardon, cousin* but I disagree. Wounded as Roger is, upon his leader­ship, and ability to plan for us now, rests our sole hope of preservation. Tis but proper that he should be made aware without delay of all particulars; so that he can formulate his policy accordingly."

"She is right" Roger murmured. "My wound is painful but I doubt its being dangerous, and at least it has resulted in my being allowed to remain with you. Bad as things are we must not lose heart but try to devise some means of either placating or tricking our captors."

He strove to get into his voice a note of optimism, although his heart could not have been heavier. Clarissa's touching faith in his capabilities only added to his misery. He had not a notion that might even alleviate their situation, was still too hampered by pain to think clearly, and greatly doubted if he would be given any chance at all to influence such decisions as might be taken about their future.

Closing his eyes, so that Amanda might not see the tears that welled up into them, he thought of Charles. Young, handsome, rich, titled, debonair, no man could have been more favoured by the gods, yet in one awful moment he had been snatched from those who loved him. His wit and kindness, quick perception and gentle nature had made him the most delightful of companions, and they would all miss him terribly. Roger's heart bled for Georgma. Her passionate half-gipsy blood had caused her to love many men, but for Charles she had had in addition something of a mother's fondness and had found with him a mental contentment that she had never known before, so his loss must prove for her a cruel affliction.

Every few moments a stab of pain shot through Roger's head, rendering all his efforts to concentrate abortive; so he was forced to give up, and lay for a while in a semi-stupor. He was roused from it by Amanda's uttering an exclamation. Opening his eyes, he saw that she was staring with a frightened expression towards the cabin door. Raising himself a little he saw that in it stood the fearsome figure of a Carib Indian whose hook-nosed face seemed to protrude from his chest.

A moment later he realized that the Indian was a hunch-back, and Amanda saw that her fears were groundless, for from his long ape-like arms there dangled a brush in one hand and a dustpan in the other. He had evidently been sent to tidy up the cabin and had found the things in Tom's closet. Having given them a not unfriendly grin he set about his task, swept up the broken glass, removed a wrecked chair and tied back the torn curtains. Then he signed to Jenny to pull Georgina away from the table.

As Jenny half lifted her mistress in her arms Roger saw that Georgina's lovely face had an unnaturally blank expression, and he feared that the shock of Charles's death had unhinged her mind. Without a murmur, she allowed herself to be led away and made comfortable in a chair on the far side of the cabin.

The hunch-back left them for a few minutes, to return carrying a big basket piled high with tropical fruits, then he went to investigate the larder. Fetching from it half a ham, a round of curried beef, a big wedge of cheese, a cake, biscuits and several bottles of wine, he set them out on the table, but did not bother to lay it with plates, cutlery or glasses, before going away again.

Five minutes later the pirate who had been put on board as the captain of the prize crew came in, accompanied by a woman. At the first glance Roger saw that Amanda's description of Joao de Mondego as a fearsome-looking individual was no exaggeration. He was very tall and at some time must have been severely burnt, as his face was almost fleshless and the scarred skin was drawn so tightly across the bones that it had the terrifying appearance of a living skull. He was dressed in buff breeches and a gold-laced coat that must have once belonged to a gentleman of the last generation. Two pistols and a knife were thrust through his broad leather, silver-studded belt, and in his hand he carried a naked cutlass.

The woman, on the other hand, was strikingly handsome. She was a splendidly-built mulatto with fine dark eyes, and an abundance of lustrous black hair that fell about her shoulders in carefully-curled ringlets. Her coffee-coloured skin was without a blemish, her nose was large but not flattened, and her partly negroid ancestry showed only in her full, ripe mouth.

She was wearing gold-tasselled, patent-leather Hessian boots, a knee-length mustard-coloured skirt, and a scarlet blouse which was so tight that it accentuated the shape of her full breasts almost to the point of indecency. In a black silk sash round her waist she carried a silver-mounted pistol and an ivory-handled riding switch. Roger judged her to be about thirty, but, having coloured blood, she might have been considerably younger.

Both of them surveyed the prisoners in silence for a moment, then the man said in guttural French: "Come, Lucette; let us eat." Upon which they sat down at the table and set to. Using only their fingers and sheath knives they crammed the food into their mouths and washed it down with copious draughts of wine straight from the bottles.

For a quarter of an hour they gorged themselves without exchanging a word. At length Joao gave a great belch and sat back; then his companion got lazily to her feet and, fixing her big sloe-like eyes on Amanda, said in an educated voice, using the lisping French commonly spoken by Creoles:

"You are the tallest, so your clothes will fit me best. Where are they?"

Amanda told her the situation of her cabin, and with lithe grace she lounged Out through the door. There was silence for a moment, then Clarissa, also using French, asked the pirate:

"What do you intend to do with us?"

A slow grin spread over Joao de Mondego’s skull-like face and he replied with a heavy accent due to his Portuguese origin. "You'll see in good time, my pretty. There's no call to be frightened, though. Provided you're a sensible wench no harm will come to you."

His words were reassuring, but the implication that lay behind them was far from being so. Again a tense silence fell, while he continued to eye her speculatively between swigs at the bottle of claret that was before him.

He had just finished it when the mulatto he had called Lucette came in again. She was still wearing the same clothes but now had on over her scarlet shirt a brocade jacket of Amanda's. Showing her fine white teeth in a full-lipped smile, she said:

"Your things fit me very well, Madame. I shall find a good use for them." Then she asked: "Which of you is the Countess?"

Georgina did not even look up, but Amanda waved a hand in her' direction, and the mulatto walked over to her. For a moment Lucette stood looking down on the grief-stricken figure, then she said smoothly: "I think your ear-rings would suit me, lady. Be good enough to hand them over."

It seemed as though Georgina had not even heard her, as she made no move to obey; her eyes remained blank and her face expres­sionless. Lucette's brows drew together in a frown and she exclaimed: "You sulky bitch, you need a lesson." Then, thrusting out a hand, she seized one of the diamond drops and tore it from Georgina's ear. With a cry of pain Georgina suddenly came to life. Her eyes blazing, she threw up an arm, thrust the mulatto away and sprang to her feet. Roger, too, jerked himself erect. His head was swimming and his legs unsteady, but he lurched forward, crying in angry protest:

"Can you not see that the Countess is unwell. She is suffering from the shock of her husband's death. Have the decency to treat her grief with respect."

For an answer Lucette turned, took a step towards him and struck him in the face with her clenched fist. The blow caught him on the left eye. A pall of blackness suddenly eclipsed his vision. Against it he saw stars and whirling circles, then his weak knees gave under him and he fell back in Amanda's arms.

Never had he felt so angry and humiliated. He could have sobbed with rage at the lack of strength which rendered him impotent to defend those he loved, even from a woman. As it was he could only let Amanda lower him back on to the settee, and sit there with his aching head buried in his hands.

It was another cry which brought his head swiftly up again, but this time it did not come from Georgina. Realizing the futility of resistance, she had given up her other ear-ring, and the mulatto was standing opposite one of the cracked mirrors fixing the diamonds in her ears.

The short sharp scream had been uttered by Clarissa. Swaggering over to her, Joao had grasped her round the waist, and with one horny hand beneath her chin was forcing her head back so that he could kiss her. Amanda had jumped up and rushing at him seized his arm in an endeavour to drag him away from her young cousin; but lifting his heavy boot he gave her a kick on the thigh that sent her reeling.

Just as he did so, Clarissa seized the opportunity to jerk her head free. Next moment her teeth bit viciously into the pirate's wrist.

With an oath he tore his hand away and lifted it to strike her, but help came to her from an unexpected quarter. At Clarissa's cry Lucette swung round from the mirror. Quietly drawing her silver-mounted pistol from her sash, she pointed it at Joao and shouted at him:

"Stop that! You know our customs, and I am here to see that all of you keep to them."

With a shrug he let Clarissa go, and muttered surlily: "Don't be a fool, Lucette. I meant only to buss the wench. There's no harm in that."

"You'll buss no one without my permission," she snapped back. "You're mine as long as I have a use for you. Now get up on deck and relieve Pedro the Carib, so that he can have his victuals."

"Who's Captain here?" he blustered.

"You are, by favour of my good standing with M. le Vicomte," she retorted. "But cross me and when we get ashore I'll have him fling you to his pet crocodiles."

Joao's glance dropped before her angry stare. Sucking the blood from his bitten wrist he turned on Clarissa, and snarled: "You shall pay for this, my beauty. Ah, and before you're a night older." Then he gave a jaunty flip to his old-fashioned tricorne hat, picked up his cutlass and swaggered out of the cabin.

As soon as he had disappeared, Lucette said to Amanda: "I've a mind to see on you some of the things I'll be wearing. Go to your cabin and put on your best ball-dress."

Amanda was crying from the brutal kick that Joao had given her, and replied tearfully: "I am in no state to dress up for you. I pray you excuse me."

Lucette promptly pulled out her ivory-handled switch. Striking Amanda a vicious blow across the shoulders, she cried: "Do as I bid you, woman. The sooner you learn that you are now a slave the better."

With a burst of sobs Amanda stood up and limped across the cabin. Roger attempted to follow her, but his legs doubled under him again, and he fell back with a groan. Lucette gave him a contemptuous look, and said:

"They tell me you were on your way to become Governor of Martinique. A lovely island and I know it well, for I was born there. But you'll never reach it; M. le Vicomte has no friendship for Englishmen, and I do not doubt he'll send you to feed the fishes."

At that moment Pedro the Carib came in. He was a swarthy half-caste with lank black hair. Perched at a jaunty angle on it was one of the broad-brimmed straw hats that many sailors favoured when in the tropics. His breeches were of leather and he was naked to the waist except for two heavy necklaces made of pieces of eight. They were not like ordinary corns, but simply an ounce weight of silver which had been poured molten on to an iron bench, then, when it had partially cooled, stamped with the arms of Spain, and an 8, signifying its value in pesetas. It was a common practice for seamen to bore holes in them and carry them in this manner round their necks, as it made their loss by robbery less likely, and it was easy to take off one or more in payment for liquor or a woman.

Pedro barely gave the captives a glance from the slits which half concealed his reddish evil eyes, but picked up a bottle, let a third of its contents gurgle down his throat, then grabbed the remains of the ham and began to gnaw it like a dog.

While he ate. Lucette rifled the lockers round the cabin, showing a childish delight in anything she came upon that particularly interested her. Then Amanda rejoined them, now wearing a low-cut dress of peach-coloured brocade that had a drawn-back overskirt of chiffon sprinkled with small gold stars. She had regained her composure and stood stony-faced in the middle of the cabin while Lucette sauntered lazily round her like a huge graceful coffee-coloured cat.

"The mode will flatter me," was her comment. "But go take it off now. I do not wish that it is spoiled, and when we celebrate our victory this evening it is certain that you will be the subject of some rough games, for one cannot deny the men their pleasure."

Amanda closed her eyes, and half-fainting at the thoughts the mulatto's words had conjured up, staggered from the cabin.

When Pedro had finished his guzzling, Lucette said to him in a tone that brooked no reply: "Now I intend to sleep for a while in the cabin of the Countess. Go up to the poop and remain there. Keep an eye on Joao. Should he make one sign to come down here, you are to wake me up; for I'll not have him cheat the rest of you in the matter of the women."

He gave her a crooked grin, nodded and slouched away; then, after a final glance at the captives, she too left them.

Roger looked across at Georgina. For some time past she had been sobbing as though her heart would break; but he was glad of it, for it seemed a certain indication that Lucette's brutal treatment of her had brought her back to normal, and he had feared that her mind might have become deranged. The faithful Jenny, pale-faced but tight-lipped, was still beside her. Clarissa sat hunched in an elbow chair, her golden hair tumbled from her struggle with Joao, but dry-eyed and staring without expression through one of the cabin windows.

When Amanda came back she gave Roger a faint smile, and brought him some wine to drink before sitting down beside him. As he thanked her he thought that she looked ten years older than she had that morning, but there was nothing he could do and nothing that he could say to comfort her. His head still felt as though it were splitting, his eye had swollen up and was rapidly becoming black and blue, the place where the pike had laid open his right forearm now felt as though it were on fire, and the whole of his left side, with which he had hit the deck on being struck down, ached dully. He could only take one of her hands in his and put his other arm round her shoulders. Never before had he felt so utterly helpless and hopeless.

Gradually Georgina's weeping eased to a low sobbing and for a timeless interval they all sat silent in the depths of dejection. At length, as twilight began to fall, Amanda gently released herself from Roger's arms, stood up, and said:

"Come! Even if there is no longer anyone to summon us to supper we ought to eat something. In God is now our only hope; but I hold that He helps those who help themselves, and it would be flying in His face not to try to keep up our strength."

"Well said, my sweet," Roger murmured, and although he still felt groggy, he found that he could now walk to the table without assistance. Georgina stubbornly refused to join them, protesting that even a morsel of food would choke her; but she made Jenny take a place after helping Clarissa to fetch some plates, cutlery and glasses.

In a grim, brooding silence they forced themselves to swallow some of the remains left by their captors and to drink a few mouthfuls of wine. Most of the fruits brought aboard by the pirates were strange to them, and in other circumstances they would have sampled them all with interest, but, robbed of appetite by their fearful apprehensions, they hardly noticed what they ate; and they were still seated round the table in semi-darkness when the door was thrust open and the hunch-back came in.

He spoke in some uncouth jargon of mingled Spanish and Carib, but the significance of his gesture was plain. He had been sent to order them out on deck.