Dudley Pope - Ramage and the drum beat

Antonio stuck an arm out sideways. 'But don't their guns point out at right angles, like ours? Surely they can't shoot straight ahead or behind?'

'Yes, they're broadside guns, and we could keep out of their arc of fire. But they could use their bow and stern chasers.'

Antonio looked puzzled.

'Most ships have two special ports aft and two forward. You just haul round a couple of broadside guns and aim 'em through the ports,' he explained, gesturing aft. 'That's what those two ports are for.'

'But can't we risk being shot at by just two guns?' Antonio persisted. 'After all, they'll be rolling, and without sails they can't swing the ship round to aim a broadside, can they?'

'No, but even if she had no guns, how can we possibly capture two hundred and fifty men who'd strongly object to us boarding the ship, let alone take them prisoner?'

'Well, if they haven't any guns,' interrupted Gianna triumphantly, 'why can't we just keep shooting at them until they surrender?'

'I didn't say they haven't any guns,' Ramage said, fighting to conceal his exasperation. 'I simply said "If they hadn't" - but they have.'

'Oh well, it's a pity. We should cut a fine figure towing that big ship into Gibraltar.'

'If you can imagine a little donkey pulling a large cart loaded with blocks of Carrara marble all the way over the Alps, that's about how we'd be towing that. She displaces - if you put her on the scales you'd find she weighs about 1,300 tons against our 160 tons.'

'Less the weight of her masts!' Antonio exclaimed.

'Masts, spars, bowsprit, jibboom, rigging, blocks, sails and boats. Yes,' Ramage conceded ironically, 'you can deduct about a hundred tons - a little less than the weight of the Kathleen.

Southwick called. 'You can just see her now, sir.'

Ramage spotted the small black shape just beginning to rise over the curvature of the earth as the Kathleen approached, and pointed her out to Gianna. The frigate was about eleven miles away. He glanced astern at the cutter's wake; she was making between five and six knots, so it would be nearly two hours before they'd be within gunshot. Close enough, rather, to make out her name.

He wondered afterwards why he corrected himself and why he went below and changed from his best uniform into an older one that bright sun, salt spray and his steward's constant spongings and brushings had reduced to the pleasantly faded blue that he preferred to the original colour.

Ramage's cabin for the time being was Southwick's, who in turn had taken over that of the next senior, John Appleby, the master's mate. He had just finished changing when Gianna called from her cabin. Her face was serious as she motioned him to shut the door and, not knowing what she was going to say, Ramage first told the sentry to station himself a few feet away, out of earshot.

Sitting at the little desk, the chair swung round to face him, she reached up with her right hand and traced the scar over his brow. 'Nico...?'

'Marchesa...?'

'My Lord...?'

They both laughed with embarrassment over her difficulty in starting whatever she wanted to discuss, and he said: 'Clench your hands, shut your eyes, and say it!'

'It isn't my business, Nico, but...'

'But...?'

'... but is it wise to leave this Spanish ship with—'

'Without letting you leap on board, capture her single-handed and hoist the flag of Volterra?'

'Be serious, Nico! I mean, couldn't people say you ran away - that you refused to try to capture her?'

'Some may, and probably will. Others will say it'd be madness even to attempt anything against a ship eight times the size of the Kathleen. Others - and they'd include Admiral Sir John Jervis and Commodore Nelson - would say I'm already disobeying orders even by going close enough to identify her. You realize the Commodore ordered me to take you and Antonio to Gibraltar as quickly as possible by the safest possible route? That means whatever we meet I have to run away, not fight.'

'Yes, but Antonio's afraid that since neither Sir John nor the Commodore are at Gibraltar, one of your father's enemies might be there to make trouble, as they did at Bastia. After all, who knows what might have happened there if the Commodore hadn't arrived in the middle of that mockery of a court martial?'

Since he'd been thinking of all this long before Jackson identified the ship as Spanish, Ramage knew Gianna's fears were well founded. It was difficult being in the Service as the only son of John Uglow Ramage, tenth Earl of Blazey, Admiral of the White, Cornish landowner, man of honour and bravery - and also, after Admiral Byng, the most celebrated political scapegoat of the century; a man whose honour and career, and almost his life, had been snatched away from him by the Government to use as props to keep itself in office. Yes, it was difficult and at times seemed impossible; but...

'What are you thinking, Nico?'

For a few moments he'd forgotten she was there. 'Just something my mother once said - that I had the same fault as my father.'

'What is that?' she asked quickly, revealing a sudden fear.

'That neither of us will bother with an easy problem - someone has to say it's impossible before we make any effort.'

'I'd have thought that's halfway between a fault and a virtue.'

He kissed her and led the way up on deck, walking to a carronade away from the rest of the men. While he stood with one foot on the slide facing outboard she leaned back against the bulwark, the sunlight on her hair making it glint blue-black like a raven's feathers, and as she turned to look at the strange ship Ramage wished he was a painter to capture on canvas the splendid, patrician profile outlined against the almost harsh blue of the sea and sky. The small, slightly hooked nose and high cheekbones, the large brown eyes and delicate ears revealed by the swept-back hair gave her features the classicism of a Roman bust but belied the warm, generous lips.

Deliberately he turned away and looked round the cutter. It was in his power to have this deck swept by enemy shot, their impact gouging out swathes of great splinters and sending them scything through the air, slicing off limbs and stabbing men. Within a couple of hours, at a word from him, the newly scrubbed decks he'd just inspected could be daubed with the blood of these men now standing round laughing and joking, no doubt repeating every witty jeer they'd ever heard against the seamanship, courage and sexual prowess of the Spaniards.

Gianna said softly, 'Can you hear what the men are saying?'

'I wasn't listening.'

'Listen now then.'

Ramage did not know whether to tell them in anger to be silent, shake them by the hand with pride, or to stop listening in shame. Every man was speculating about the prize money they'd receive when they towed the frigate into Gibraltar. For them it was a foregone conclusion, Ramage realized bitterly, that their captain would capture the ship, but none seemed to realize it'd require magic to make the Spanish ship surrender...

'You see?' she said.

Southwick came up rubbing his hands and mustering a laugh so bloodthirsty that Ramage thought the villain in a melodrama at a Haymarket theatre would have been proud of it. Gone was the Master's look of a country parson; despite the chubby face and mop of flowing white hair, the prospect of battle had transformed his appearance from a benign curer of souls to a dedicated and ruthless curer of skins; his face was flushed, his hair seemed to bristle, and his eyes were bloodshot.

'I thought it'd be a good idea to start the men rousing out one of the thirteen-inch cables, sir,' he said briskly. 'It'll take a bit of time, and though the eight-inch'd be easier because it's not so heavy, I thought it might part and still leave us with having to use the thirteen-inch.'