The Darkening Sea

1. Landfall

The meandering track that ran around the wide curve of Falmouth Bay was just wide enough to allow passage to horse and rider, and only slightly less dangerous than the footpath which was somewhere beneath it. To the stranger or the foolhardy either could be hazardous.

On this particular dawn the coast appeared abandoned, its sounds confined to the cries of seabirds, the occasional lively trill of an early robin, and the repetitive call of a cuckoo which never seemed to get any closer. In places some of the cliff had fallen away, so that where the track ran closer to the edge it was possible to hear the boom of the sea against the jagged rocks below. Rarely still, it was never to be taken for granted.

There was a damp chill in the air but this was late June, and within hours the horizon would be hard and clear, the sea glittering with a million mirrors. The horse and rider rose slowly above a steep slope and paused like a piece of statuary or, like this bewitched coast, a vision which might suddenly vanish.

Lady Catherine Somervell tried to relax her body as she stared back above the drifting mist. They must have thought her mad at the big grey house below Pendennis Castle, like the stable boy who had snatched up a lantern when she had startled him out of sleep. He had mumbled something about calling the head groom or the coachman, but she had refused. As he had saddled Tamara, the powerful mare Richard Bolitho had found for her, she had felt the same sense of urgency, and a conviction which her rational mind could not dismiss.

She had dressed herself in the big room, their room, with the same driving desperation. Her long dark hair was only loosely pinned about her ears, and she wore her thick riding skirt and one of Richard's old sea-going coats, which she often used on her cliff walks.

She had felt the gorse and bushes dragging at her skirt as Tamara had moved purposefully along the track; had tasted the sea. The enemy as Bolitho had once called it, his voice so bitter in one of those rare, private moments.

She stroked the horse's neck to reassure herself. A fast packet had brought news to Falmouth from the Caribbean. The English fleet and a considerable force of soldiers and marines had attacked Martinique, the main base for French naval operations there. The French had surrendered, and most of their activities in the Caribbean and on the Main had ceased.

Catherine had watched the faces of the people in the square when the news had been read out by a dragoon officer. Most of them would be unaware of the importance of Martinique, a thorn in Britain 's side for so many years, or even know where it was. There was little enthusiasm and no cheers either, for this was 1809, and four years had passed since the death of Nelson, the nation's darling, and the battle of Trafalgar which must have seemed to many the final stage of this endless war.

And with the packet had come a letter from Richard. He had written in great haste, with no time for details. The fighting was over and he was quitting his flagship, the ninety-four gun Black Prince, and was under orders to return to England with all haste. It did not seem possible even now. He had been absent for little more than nine months. She had steeled herself for a much longer period, two years or even three. She had existed only for his letters, and had thrown herself into helping Bryan Ferguson, Bolitho's one-armed steward. With every young man pressed into the fleet, unless they were lucky enough to hold a protection, it was difficult to keep the farm and estate working. There were several crippled men who had once served with Bolitho, men he now cared for much as he had tried to do at sea. Many landowners would have thrown them on the beach, as Richard called it, left them to beg from those they had fought to protect.

But all that mattered now was that he was coming home. First to Falmouth. She shivered as if it were winter. The rest could wait until he was here, in her arms.

She had read his short letter so many times, trying to guess why he had been required to hand over his command to another flag officer. Valentine Keen had also been replaced, and perhaps was intended for promotion. She thought of Keen's young wife and felt a touch of envy. She was with child; it must be due, born even. But Keen's well-meaning family had taken Zenoria to one of their fine houses in Hampshire. She had been the only girl Catherine had found it easy to talk with. Love, suffering, courage they had both experienced their extremes in the past.

There had been a very unexpected visitor after she had received Richard's letter. Stephen Jenour, his flag lieutenant and the newly appointed commander of a smart brig, Orcadia, had come to see her while his command was taking on stores in Carrick Roads: a different Jenour, not merely because of what he had endured in the open boat after the wreck of the Golden Plover, but matured also by a sense of loss. His own command, taken at Richard Bolitho's insistence after returning to England with their captured French prize, had also removed him from daily contact with the superior he respected, loved even, more than any other yet encountered in the course of his young life.

They had talked until the shadows were deep in the room and the candles had been guttering. He had told her of the battle in his own words, as Bolitho had requested. But as he had spoken she had heard only Richard, the men who had fought and died, the huzzas and the suffering, victory and despair.

What would Richard be thinking on his way home? Of his Happy Few, his band of brothers? There were even fewer now with Jenour gone.

She nudged the horse and Tamara moved forward again, her ears twitching towards the sea, the continuous murmur against the rocks. The tide was on the make. She smiled. She had been listening too long to Richard and his friends, and the fishermen who brought their catch up to Flushing or into Falmouth itself.

Always the sea was there. Waiting.

She strained her eyes towards it now but there was still too much mist, and not enough light to see the headland.

She thought of her ride here. The countryside stirring itself, the smell of freshly baked bread, of foxgloves and the wild roses in the hedgerows. She had seen few people about but had sensed their presence: very little was missed by these folk whose families had known the Bolithos from generation to generation, and the men who had gone year after year to die in forgotten campaigns or great sea-battles. Like the portraits on the walls in the old house, watching her when she had gone up alone to bed, measuring her still.

At least Richard would have had his beloved nephew Adam with whom to share the days at sea. He had finished his letter by revealing that he would be sailing independently in Adam's own command. She allowed her mind to stray once more to Zenoria, and then to Zenoria and Adam. Was it merely imagination, or that warning instinct which had been born out of her own early years?

She reined the horse around, her fingers groping for the small carriage pistol she always carried. She had not even seen or heard them. Relief surged through her as she saw the dull glint of their buttons. They were coast guards

One of them exclaimed, "Why, Lady Somervell! You gave us a start! Toby here thought some gennelmen were runnin' a cargo up from the beach! "

Catherine tried to smile. "I am sorry, Tom. I should have known better."

The light was already strengthening, as if to dispel her hopes, lay bare her foolishness.

Tom the coast guard watched her thoughtfully. The admiral's lady, the one who was the talk of London according to some. But she had called him by his name. As if he mattered.

He said carefully, "May I ask what you be doing up 'ere at this hour, m'lady? Could be dangerous."

She faced him directly, and afterwards he was to remember this moment, her fine dark eyes, her high cheekbones, her utter conviction as she said, "Sir Richard is coming home. In the Anemone."

"I knows that, m'lady. We had word from the navy."

"Today, " she said. "This morning." Her eyes seemed to blur and she turned away.

Tom said kindly, "There be no way o' knowing, m'lady. Wind, weather, tides…"

He broke off as she slipped from the saddle, her stained boots striking the track as one. "What is it?"

She stared out at the bay as it began to open up, the light spilling above the headland like glass.

"Do you have a telescope, please?" Desperation put an edge to her voice.

The two coast guards dismounted and Tom lifted his glass from a long leather case behind his saddle.

Catherine did not even see them. "Be easy, Tamara! " She rested the long telescope on the saddle, still warm from her own body. Gulls were swooping around a tiny boat far out towards the point. It seemed much clearer than before, and pink on the sea's face she saw the first sunlight.

Tom's companion had also extended his telescope, and after a few minutes he said, There be a ship out there, Tom, by God so there be! Beggin' your pardon, m'lady! "

She had not heard him. She watched the sails, misty and unreal like shells, the darker line of the slender hull beneath.

"What is she, Toby? Can you see her rig?"

The man sounded stunned. "Frigate. No doubt o' that. Seen too many o' they in an' out o' Carrick Roads over th' years! "

"Still, could be anyone. Ride down to the harbour an' see if you can discover anythin'…"

They both turned as she said quietly, "It is he."

She had extended the telescope to its full length. She waited for the horse to quieten so that she could stare without blinking. Then she said, "I can see her figurehead in the sunshine." She handed back the glass, her eyes suddenly blind. "Anemone…" She saw it in her mind's eye as she had seen it in reality, before the ship had tacked into shadow again: the full-breasted girl with the raised trumpet, her gilt paint so clear in the reflected glare. She repeated as if to herself, "Anemone… daughter of the wind."

She leaned her face against the horse. "Thank God. You came back to me."

Vice-Admiral Sir Richard Bolitho awoke from a disturbed sleep and stared up at the darkness of the small sleeping-cabin, his mind responding instantly to the sounds and movements around him. His sailor's instinct told him that like the cabin the sea was still dark outside this lithe, graceful hull: a command for which any young officer would give his right arm. He listened to the dull thud of the tiller head as it matched the rudder's strength against the sea and the wind's thrust in the sails, heard the sluice of water alongside as the frigate Anemone leaned over on a new tack to a different motion. Gone were the great soaring thrusts of the Western Ocean, through hard sunshine and lashing rain in equal portions. Here the seas were short and steep as the ship ploughed her way nearer to the land. Three weeks from the Caribbean. Adam had driven his Anemone like the thoroughbred she was.

Bolitho clambered from the swaying cot and steadied himself with one hand on a deck head beam until he was accustomed to the lively movements. A frigate: no man could want more. He recalled the ones he had commanded as a youthful captain, younger even than Adam. The ships so different, yet still familiar. Only the faces, the men themselves seemed blurred, if not forgotten.

He felt his heart beat faster as he thought of the nearness of land. After miles of ocean without even sighting another ship, they were almost home. Today they would anchor in Falmouth, and after a brief pause for fresh water Adam would sail again for Portsmouth, from which place he would send the brief details of their return to the new telegraph that linked the senior naval port with the Admiralty in London.

They had sighted the Lizard at dusk the previous evening before losing it again in a sea mist. Bolitho recalled how he and Allday had watched it on another occasion. It had been first light then too, and he had whispered her name, longing for her, as he was now.

Overnight Old Partridge, Anemone's sailing master, had changed tack so that in the darkness, close-hauled and under reefed topsails, they had given the dreaded Manacles a wide berth.

Bolitho knew he could not sleep and toyed with the idea of going on deck, but he was also aware that his presence there might distract the watch keepers It had been hard enough for them to get used to a vice-admiral in their midst, and a famous one at that. He gave a grim smile. Notorious, anyway.

He had watched and listened to the way the frigate's cramped company of some two hundred and twenty officers, seamen and marines had worked as a team, quick to respond to storm and screaming gales like the seasoned hands they had become. Adam could be proud of what he and his young wardroom had achieved, with the backing of some excellent warrant officers like Old Partridge. Adam was probably dreading the arrival in Portsmouth, where it was more than likely some of his best hands would be transferred to other vessels that were short of men. Like poor Jenour, Bolitho thought. So eager to do well in the navy, and yet because of his loyalty and friendship, unwilling to leave his admiral and take charge of the French prize, and a captured enemy flag officer for good measure. He thought too of the good-byes when he had left the Black Prince for the last time. Julyan the sailing master who had worn Bolitho's hat to deceive the enemy when they had closed for battle with the French flagship after Copenhagen; Old Fitzjames the gunner who could lay and fire a thirty-two pounder as easily as a Royal Marine could aim his musket; Bourchier, major of marines, and so many others who would never see anything again. Men who had died, often horribly, not for King and Country as the Gazette would proclaim, but for each other. For their ship.

The keel bit into a deep swell and Bolitho opened the screen door to Anemone's stern cabin. So much more spacious than older frigates, he thought; so unlike Phalarope, the first he had commanded. But even here in the captain's private domain the guns were tethered securely behind their sealed ports. The furniture, the small touches of civilized living, could all be rushed below decks, the screens and doors torn down to open this place, this ship, from bow to stern with the long eighteen-pounders on either side. A ship of war.

He thought suddenly of Keen. Perhaps his departure had been the greatest wrench of all. Promotion, and well-deserved, awaited him: to commodore or even to rear-admiral. It would be as big a change of circumstances as it had once been for Bolitho himself.

One night when he had been dining with Adam, while the ship drove blindly on into an Atlantic squall with every shroud and halliard screaming like an insane orchestra, he had mentioned Keen's promotion and the differences it would bring to Zenoria. Catherine had written to him of the impending birth, and he had guessed that she had wanted Zenoria with her at Falmouth. What would become of the child, he wondered. The navy like his father? Keen's record and success as both captain and natural leader would give any boy a good beginning.

Or the law, or the City perhaps? Keen's family came of far wealthier stock than the usual inhabitants of any midshipman's berth in some overcrowded liner.

Adam had not commented immediately. He had been listening to the slap of feet on deck, the sudden bawl of commands as the helm had gone over yet again.

"If I had to begin all over again, Uncle, I'd not ask for a finer tutor."

He had hesitated, just for an instant the thin, half-starved midshipman who had walked all the way from Penzance to search for his unknown uncle, with only Bolitho's name scrawled on a piece of paper. "Nor a better friend…"

Bolitho had intended to make light of it, but knew that this was far too important to the youthful captain who had been sitting across the table from him. It was something very private, like that other secret which was rarely out of Bolitho's thoughts. They had shared so much, but the time to share that had not yet come.

Then Adam had said quietly, "Captain Keen is a very lucky man."

Adam had insisted that the sleeping cabin should be for his guest, while he had been content to take his rest in the stern cabin. That caused Bolitho to recall another incident on this passage, which for the most part had been uneventful. On the day after the ship's company had spread the lighter canvas for the final run in toward the Western Approaches he had found Adam sitting in the stern cabin at his table, an empty goblet in his fingers.

Bolitho had seen his distress, the disgust he obviously felt for himself, and had asked, "What ails you, Adam? Tell me what you will I shall do all I can."

Adam had looked up at him and replied, "It is my birthday today, Uncle." He had said it in such a steady, level tone that only Bolitho would have known he had been drinking, and not merely the one goblet. It was something Adam would have punished any of his officers for. He loved this ship, the command he had always wanted.

"I know." Bolitho had sat down, afraid that the sight of his vice-admiral's gold lace would drop a barrier between them.

"I am twenty-nine." He had glanced around the cabin, his eyes suddenly wistful.

"Beyond Anemone, I have nothing." He had swung round as his cabin servant had entered. "What the hell do you want, man?"

That too had been unusual, and it had helped to bring him to his senses.

"I am sorry. That was unforgivable when you cannot answer me back for my intolerance." The servant backed away, hurt and confused.

Then there was another interruption, when the second lieutenant had entered and informed his captain that it was all but time to call both watches and change tack.

Adam had acknowledged him with equal formality. "I shall come up directly, Mr. Martin." As the door had closed he had reached for his hat, and hesitated before adding, "On my birthday last year I was kissed by a lady."

Bolitho had asked, "Do I know her?"

Adam had already been listening to the trill of calls, the stampede of feet across the deck. "I think not, Uncle. I don't think anyone does." Then he had gone.

Bolitho made up his mind, and disdaining a boat cloak he found his way to the quarterdeck.

The smells, the creak of spars and timbers, the stress and strain of all the miles of standing and running rigging it made him feel very young again. He seemed to hear the admiral's response to his plea for a ship, any ship, when the war had broken out with Revolutionary France.

Still weakened by the fever which had cut him down in the Great South Sea, and with every officer clamouring for re-employment or a command, he had almost begged.

I am a frigate captain…

The admiral's cold answer, "Were a frigate captain, Bolitho, " had wounded him for a long, long time.

He smiled, the strain dropping away from his face. Instead of a frigate they had given him Hyperion. "The Old Hyperion', about which they still yarned and even sang in the taverns and wherever sailors gathered.

He heard voices and thought he could smell coffee. That would be his mole-like servant Ozzard. Ozzard never seemed surprised by anything, although it was hard to read the man's thoughts. Was he glad to be going home? Or did he even care?

He stepped on to the wet planking and glanced at the dark figures around him. The midshipman of the watch was already whispering to the sailing master that their illustrious passenger was up and about.

Adam stood with Peter Sargeant, his senior lieutenant. Sargeant was probably already ear-marked for his own command, Bolitho thought. Adam would miss him if that happened.

Ozzard moved from the shadows with his coffee pot and presented him with a steaming mug. "All fresh, Sir Richard, but almost the end of it."

Adam crossed to his side, his dark hair ruffling in the damp wind.

"Rosemullion Head on the larboard bow, Sir Richard." The formality was not lost on either of them. "Mr. Partridge assures me we shall be off Pendennis Point by four bells of the forenoon watch."

Bolitho nodded and sipped the scalding coffee, recalling the shop to which Catherine had taken him in London 's St. James's Street. She had bought fine coffee and good wines, cheeses, and other small luxuries he would never have troubled about. He watched the sunlight breaking across the rocky coast and the rolling green hills beyond. Home.

"That was a fast passage, Captain. A pity you cannot take time to come to the house."

Adam did not look at him. "I shall cherish that in my mind, sir."

The first lieutenant touched his hat. "I shall hoist our number when we are within range, sir." He was speaking to his captain, but Bolitho knew it was directed at himself.

He said quietly, "I think she will already know, Mr. Sargeant."

He saw Allday's powerful shape by one of the gangways. As if he could feel his gaze like something physical the big coxswain turned and glanced up at him, his tanned face breaking into a lazy grin.

We are here, old friend. Like all those other times. Still together.

"Stand by to wear ship! Man the braces! Hands aloft an' loose t'gallants! "

Bolitho stood by the rail. Anemone would make a perfect picture as she altered course.

For a perfect landfall.

Captain Adam Bolitho stood at the weather side of the quarterdeck, arms folded, content to leave the final approach to his first lieutenant. He watched the crouching walls and tower of Pendennis Castle as it seemed to swing very slowly through the black crisscross of tarred rigging as if snared in a net.

Many glasses would be trained from the old castle, which with the fort and battery on the opposite headland had guarded the harbour entrance for centuries. Beyond Pendennis and hidden in the green hillside was the old grey Bolitho house with all its memories, of its sons who had left this very port never to return.

He tried not to think of the night when Zenoria had found him drinking brandy, his eyes burning with tears for his uncle who had been reported lost in the transport Golden Plover. Was that only last year?

Bolitho had told him Zenoria was with child. He had dared not consider that it might be his. Only Catherine had been near to discovering the truth, and Bolitho's concern for Adam himself had almost made him confess what he had done. But if he feared the consequences, Adam feared what the truth might do to his uncle far more.

He saw Allday's massive bulk by the larboard guns, lost in his own thoughts; wondering perhaps about the woman he had saved from robbery and worse and who now owned the little inn, the Stag over at Fallowfield. Home is the sailor.

Old Partridge's voice intruded.

"Let 'er fall off a point! "

"Nor' by East, sir! Steady she goes! "

The picture of the land shifted again as the frigate pointed her long tapering jib-boom towards the entrance and Carrick Roads.

A fine ship's company. It had taken patience and a few knocks, but Adam was proud of them. His blood still ran like ice-water when he recalled how Anemone had been lured into the range of a shore battery firing heated shot by a vessel carrying French soldiers. It had been as near as that. He glanced along the clean length of the maindeck where the men now waited at the braces and halliards for the run up to the anchorage. Heated shot would have turned his beloved Anemone into a pillar of fire: the sun-dried sails and tarred rigging, the stores of powder and shot would have been gone in minutes. His jaw tightened as he recalled how they had gone about to pull out of range, but not before he had poured a devastating broadside into the enemy's bait and given her the terrible end intended for his own ship.

He remembered too how Captain Valentine Keen had been ordered to return home in this same ship, but then at the last moment had sailed in a larger frigate accompanying the captured French admiral, Baratte. It had been a near thing. Bolitho had never revealed his innermost thoughts about

Herrick's failure to support him in that engagement when he had so needed help against great odds.

Adam gripped the quarterdeck rail until the pain steadied him. God damn him to hell. Herrick's betrayal must have hurt Bolitho so deeply that he could not talk about it.

After all he had done for him as he has done for me.

His mind returned warily to Zenoria. Did she hate him for what had happened?

Would Keen ever discover the truth?

It would be sweet revenge if I ever have to quit the navy as my father once did, if only to protect those I love.

The first lieutenant murmured, "The admiral's coming up, sir."

"Thank you, Mr. Sargeant." He was bound to lose him when they reached Portsmouth, and some other valuable men as well. He saw the lieutenant watching him and added quietly, "I have been hard on you, Peter, over the past months." He touched his sleeve as Bolitho would have done. "A captain's life is not all luxury, as you will one day discover! "

They turned and touched their hats as Bolitho walked into the sunlight. He was dressed in his best frock coat, with the glittering silver stars on either epaulette. The vice-admiral again: the image the public, and for that matter most of the navy, cherished and recognised. Not the man in the flapping shirt and shabby old sea-going coat. This was the hero, the youngest vice-admiral on the Navy List. Envied by some, hated by others, the talk and the topic of gossip in the coffee houses and at every smart London reception. The man who had risked everything for the woman he loved: reputation, security. Adam could not begin to measure it.

Bolitho was carrying his cocked hat as if to hold at bay the last trappings of authority, so that his hair was dishevelled by the wind. It was still as black as Adam's own, except for the one rebellious lock above his right eye where a cutlass had almost ended his life. The lock over the scar was greyish white, as if he had been branded.

Lieutenant Sargeant watched them together. It had been a revelation to him when, like the rest of the wardroom, he had overcome his nervousness at the prospect of having a man so famous and so admired by the navy in general amongst them, sharing the intimate life of a fifth-rate, and he had been able to observe his admiral at close quarters. Admiral and captain might have been brothers, so strong was the family resemblance. Sargeant had heard many remark on this. And the warmth of their regard for one another had put the wardroom at ease. Bolitho had gone around the ship, 'feeling his way' as his burly coxswain had described it, but never interfering. Sargeant was aware of Bolitho's reputation as one of the navy's foremost frigate captains, and knew in some way he must have been sharing Adam's joy in Anemone.

Adam said gently, "I shall miss you, Uncle." His voice was almost lost in the squeal of blocks and the rush of hands to the cathead, ready to let go one of the great anchors. He too was holding on to this moment, willing to share it with nobody.

"I wish you could come to the house, Adam." He studied Adam's profile as his eyes moved aloft and then to the helmsmen, from the masthead pendant streaming out like a lance to the slope of Anemone's deck as the wheel and rudder took command.

Adam smiled, and it made him look like a boy again. "I cannot. We must take on fresh water and depart with all despatch. Please convey my warmest greetings to Lady Catherine." He hesitated. "And any who care for me."

Bolitho glanced over and saw Allday watching him, his head on one side like a shaggy, questioning dog.

He said, "I shall take the gig, Allday. I'll send it back for you and Yovell, and any gear we may have overlooked."

Allday, who hated to leave his side, did not blink. He understood. Bolitho wanted to meet her alone.

"Ready to come about, sir! "

With her courses already brailed up and under reefed topsails, Anemone curtsied around in the freshening breeze. It was the sort of weather she had always relished.

"Let go! "

A great burst of spray shot above the beak head as the anchor plummeted down for the first time since the sun and beaches of the Caribbean. Men, starved of loved ones, homes and perhaps children they had barely known, stared around at the green slopes of Cornwall, the tiny pale dots of sheep on the hillsides. There were few who would be allowed ashore even when they reached Portsmouth, and already there were scarlet-coated marines on the gangways and in the bows, ready to fire on anyone foolish enough to try to swim to the shore.

Afterwards he thought it was like a dream sequence. Bolitho heard the trill of a call as the gig was hoisted out and lowered alongside, its crew very smart in checkered shirts and tarred hats. Adam had learned well. A man-of-war was always judged first by her boats and their crews.

"Man the side! "

The Royal Marines fell in by the entry port, a sergeant taking the place of their officer, who had died of his wounds and now lay fathoms deep in that other ocean.

Boatswain's mates moistened their calls with their lips, eyes moving occasionally to the man who was about to leave them, the man who had not only talked with them in the dog watches but also had listened, as if he had really needed to know them, the ordinary men who must follow him even to the cannon's mouth if so ordered. Some had been perplexed by the experience. They had been expecting to find the legend. Instead they had discovered a human being.

Bolitho turned towards them and raised his hat. Allday saw his sudden distress as a probing shaft of sunlight lanced down through the shrouds and neatly furled sails to touch his injured eye.

It was always a bad moment, and Allday had to restrain himself from stepping up to help him over the side where the gig swayed to its lines, a midshipman standing in the stern-sheets to receive their passenger.

Bolitho nodded to them, and turned his face away. "I wish you all good fortune. I am proud to have been in your midst."

Vague impressions now, the cloud of pipe clay above the bayonetted muskets as the guard presented arms, the piercing twitter of calls, the fleeting anxiety on Allday's rugged features as he reached the gig in safety. He saw Adam by the rail, his hand half-raised, while behind him his lieutenants and warrant officers sought to be the first to take his attention. A man-of-war at sea or in harbour was never at rest, and already boats were putting off from the harbour wall to conduct, if they could, every kind of business from the sale of tobacco and fruit to the services of women of the town, if a captain would permit them on board.

"Give way all! " The midshipman's voice was a squeak. Bolitho shaded his eyes to see the people on the nearest jetty. Faintly, above the scream of gulls circling some incoming fishing boats, he heard the church clock strike the half-hour. Old Partridge had been right about the time of their arrival. Anemone must have anchored exactly at four bells as he had predicted.

More uniforms at the top of the stone stairs, and an old man with a wooden leg who was grinning as if Bolitho were his own son.

Bolitho said, "Morning, Ned." He was an old boatswain's mate who had once served with him. What ship? How many years ago?

The man piped after him, "Did 'ee give they Frenchies a quiltin', zur?"

But Bolitho had hurried away. He had seen her watching him from the narrow lane that led eventually to the house by a less public route.

She stood quite still, only one hand moving as it stroked the horse's neck, her eyes never leaving his face.

He had known she would be here, just as she had been drawn from her bed to be the first, the only one to greet him.

He was home.

Bolitho paused with his arm around Catherine's shoulder, one hand touching her skin. The tall glass doors leading from the library were wide open, and the air was heavy with the fragrance of roses. She glanced at his profile, the white lock of hair etched against his sunburn. She had called it distinguished, to comfort him, although she knew he hated it, as if it were some trick to constantly remind him of the difference in years between them.

She said quietly, "I have always loved roses. When you took me to see your sister's garden I knew we should have more of them."

He caressed her shoulder, still barely able to believe that he was here, that he had come ashore only an hour ago. All the weeks and the months remembering their time together, her courage and endurance before and after the loss of the Golden Plover, when he himself had doubted that they would survive the misery and suffering of an open boat, with the sharks never far away,

A small housemaid hurried past with some linen and looked at Bolitho with astonishment.

"Why, welcome home, Sir Richard! Tes a real joy to see you! "

He smiled. "I relish being here, my girl." He saw the servant dart a quick glance at Catherine who was still wearing the old coat, and the riding skirt splashed with dew and marked by the dust of the cliff track.

He asked quietly, "Have they treated you well, Kate?"

"They have been more than kind. Bryan Ferguson has been a tower of strength."

"He told me just now when you were sending for coffee that you have put him to shame in the estate office." He squeezed her. "I am so proud of you."

She looked across the sloping garden to the low wall and beyond, where the sea's edge shone above the hillside like water in a dam.

"The letters that were waiting for you…" She faced him, her fine eyes suddenly anxious. "Richard there will be time for us?"

He said, "They will not even know I am back until Adam sends his despatch on the telegraph from Portsmouth. But nothing has been explained about my recall nor will it be, I suspect, until I visit the Admiralty."

He searched her face, trying to dispel her fear that they would soon be parted like the last time. "One thing is certain: Lord Godschale has quit the Admiralty. We shall doubtless have an explanation for that before long! "

She seemed satisfied, and with her hand through his arm they walked out into the garden. It was very hot, and the wind seemed to have fallen away to a mere breeze. He wondered if Adam would be able to claw his way out of the harbour.

He asked, "What news of Miles Vincent? You wrote to me that he had been pressed by the Ipswich."

She frowned. "Roxby wrote to the port admiral when he discovered what had happened. The admiral was going to send a despatch to Ipswich 's captain to explain the mistake…" She looked at him with surprise as Bolitho said, "Being pressed into the service he abused with his cruelty and arrogance might do him good! That petty little tyrant needs a lesson, and feeling the justice of the lower deck instead of the gunroom might reap some reward, but I doubt it! "

She paused to shade her eyes. "I am sorry Adam could not accompany you here."

The mood left her and she twisted round in his arms and gave him her radiant smile.

"But I lie! I wanted to share you with no one. Oh, dearest of men you came as I knew you would, and you look so well! "

They walked on in silence until she asked quietly, "How is your eye?"

He tried to dismiss it. "Nothing changes, Kate. And sometimes it reminds me of everything we have done… that we are so much luckier than those brave ones who will never know a woman's embrace, or smell a new dawn in the hills of Cornwall."

"I hear people in the yard, Richard." Her sudden frown faded as she heard Allday's deep laugh.

Bolitho smiled. "My oak. He stayed behind with Yovell to supervise the landing of some chests, and that splendid wine cooler you gave to me. I would not lose it like the other one." He spoke calmly but his eyes were faraway.

"It was a brave fight, Kate. We lost some good men that day." Again the tired shrug. "But for Captain Rathcullen's initiative I fear things would have gone very much against us."

She nodded, remembering the intensity on young Stephen Jenour's face when he had visited her, as Richard had requested he should.

"And Thomas Herrick failed you again, in spite of all the danger, and what you had once been to one another…"

He stared at the sea and felt his left eye smart slightly. "Yes.

But we won, and now they say that but for our victory our main forces would have had to fall back from Martinique."

"But for you, Richard! You must never forget what you have done for your navy, your country."

He lowered his head and gently kissed her neck. "My tiger."

"Be certain of it! "

Ferguson 's wife Grace, the housekeeper, came out to them and stood beaming with a tray of coffee. "I believed you would like it out here, m'lady."

She said, "Yes, that was thoughtful. The house seems extra busy today."

She reached out suddenly and gripped his hand. "Too many people, Richard. Demanding to see you, to ask for things, to wish you well. It is difficult to be alone even in our own house." Then she looked at him, a pulse beating quickly in her neck. "I have ached for you, wanted you in every way you dare to use me." She shook her head so that some of her loosely pinned hair fell across her face. "Is that so wicked?"

He took her hand tightly. "There is a small cove."

She raised her eyes to his.

"Our special place?" She studied him until her breathing became steadier. "Now?"

Ferguson found his wife by the stone table in the garden. She was looking at the coffee, which was untouched.

He said, "I heard horses…" He saw her expression and sat down at the table. "Pity to waste it." He reached out with his one arm and squeezed his wife's waist. It was hard to remember her as the thin, sickly girl she had been when Bolitho's press gang had caught him and Allday with some others.

"They've gone to find one another again." She touched his hair, her thoughts, like his, drifting, remembering.

Even down in the town they looked at her ladyship differently now. Once she had been the whore Sir Richard Bolitho had abandoned his wife for, who would turn any man's head with her beauty and her proud defiance. There would always be dislike and contempt from some, but the awe at what she had done and endured aboard the ill-fated Golden Plover and the squalor and the fight for survival she had shared with the others in that open boat had changed almost everything.

It was said that she had cut down one of the mutineers with her own Spanish comb when Bolitho's plan to retake the vessel had misfired.

Some women had tried to imagine what it would be like to share a small boat with the good and the bad, the desperate and the lustful when everything else seemed lost. The men watched her pass and imagined themselves alone with the vice-admiral's woman.

Grace Ferguson came out of her dreaming with a start. "It'll be lamb for tonight, Bryan." She was in charge once more. "And some of that Frenchie wine they both seem to like."

He looked at her with amusement. " Champagne, they call it, my dear."

As she made to hurry away to begin her preparations she paused and hugged him.

"I'll tell you one thing. They can be no happier than we've been in spite of all th' devils that plagued us!"

Ferguson stared after her. Even now, she could still surprise him.