Alexander Kent - Stand into Danger

Spillane, the surgeon’s new helper, appeared on the lee gangway and threw a parcel over the side.

Bolitho felt sick. What was it? An arm or a leg? It could have been his.

He heard Slade, the master’s mate, yelling abuse at some unfortunate seaman. The Destiny’s recovery of the launch and the thankful shouts of the exhausted crew when she had eventually discovered them had apparently done nothing to make Slade any gentler.

In due course the dead men were buried, while the living stood with bared heads as the captain read a few words from his prayer book.

Then, after a hasty meal and a welcome tot of brandy, the hands turned to again, and the air was filled with the noise of saws and hammers, with strong smells of paint, and tar for the seams, to mark their progress.

Dumaresq came on deck at the end of the afternoon-watch and for several minutes looked at his ship and then at the clearing sky which told him more than any instrument.

He said to Bolitho, who was once more officer of the watch, “Look at our people working. Ashore they are branded as hawbucks and no-good drunkards. But give ’em a piece of rope or a span of timber an’ you’ll see what they can do.”

He spoke with such feeling that Bolitho ventured to ask, “Do you think another war is coming, sir?”

For an instant he thought he had gone too far. Dumaresq turned quickly on his thick legs, his eyes hard as he said, “You have been speaking with that damned sawbones, eh?”

Then he gave a deep chuckle. “There is no need to answer. You have not yet learned deceit.” He moved to the opposite side for his usual stroll, then added, “War? I am depending on it!”

Before darkness closed in to hide one ship from another, Palliser sent word to say he was ready to proceed and would repair the less important damage in the days on passage for Rio.

Slade had gone across to the Heloise to take charge of the prize crew, and Palliser returned in the quarter-boat even as nightfall joined the sky to the horizon like a curtain.

Bolitho marvelled at the way Palliser kept going. He showed no sign of tiredness, and did not spare himself as he bustled about the ship using a lantern to examine every repair and shouting for the culprit if he discovered something which he considered to be shoddy workmanship.

Thankfully Bolitho climbed into his cot, his coat on the deck where it had fallen. Around him Destiny shivered and groaned as she rode a quarter sea without effort, as if she too was grateful for a rest.

It was the same throughout the hull. Bulkley sat in his sick-bay drawing on a long clay pipe and sharing some of his brandy with Codd, the purser.

Outside, barely visible on the orlop deck, the remaining sick and wounded slept or whimpered quietly in the darkness.

In the cabin Dumaresq was at his table writing busily in his personal diary, without a coat, and with his shirt open to the waist. Occasionally he glanced at the screen door as if to pierce it and see the length of his command, his world. And sometimes he looked up at the deckhead as Gulliver’s footsteps told him that the master was still brooding over the collision, fearful the blame might be laid at his door.

Throughout the main-deck, where there was barely room to stand upright, the bulk of the ship’s company swung in their hammocks to Destiny’s regular plunging motion. Like lines of neat pods, waiting to give birth in an instant if the wind so ordered or the drums beat to quarters.

Some men, unable to sleep or working their watch on deck, still thought of the short, bitter fight, of moments when they had known fear. Of familiar faces which had been wiped away, or of the prize money the handsome brigantine might bring them.

Tossing in his cot in the sick-bay, Midshipman Jury went over the attack yet again. Of his desperate need to help Bolitho as the lieutenant’s hanger had been hurled away, of the sudden agony across his stomach like a hot iron. He thought of his dead father whom he could scarcely remember and hoped he would have been proud of what he had done.

And Destiny carried them all. From the grim-faced Palliser who sat opposite Colpoys in the deserted wardroom, the cards mocking him from the table, to the servant, Poad, snoring in his hammock, they were all at her mercy as her figurehead reached out for the horizon which never drew any nearer.

Two weeks after seizing the brigantine, Destiny crossed the Equator on her way south. Even the master seemed pleased with their progress and the distance covered. A convenient wind and milder, warmer air did much to raise the men’s spirits and keep them free of illness.

Crossing the line was a new experience for over a third of the ship’s company. Boisterous horse-play and skylarking which accompanied the ceremony were encouraged by a four days’ allowance of wine and spirits for everybody.

With Little, the gunner’s mate, making a formidable Neptune in a painted crown and a beard of spunyarn, accompanied by his bashful queen in the shape of one of the ship’s boys, all the newcomers to his kingdom were soundly ducked and abused.

Afterwards, Dumaresq joined his officers in the wardroom and stated his satisfaction with the ship’s performance and swift passage. They had left the Heloise far astern, with some of her damage still being repaired. Dumaresq was obviously in no mood to delay his own landfall, and had ordered Slade to meet him off Rio with all the haste he could manage.

On most days Destiny pushed her way along under all plain sail, and would have made a fine sight had there been any other vessel to share their ocean. Working high above the decks, or employed in regular sail and gun drill, the new hands began to fit into the routine, and Bolitho saw the pallid skins of those who had come from the debtors’ jails or worse taking on a deeper hue as the sun grew stronger with each passing day.

Another of the men who had been wounded in the fight had died, bringing the total to eight. Watched night and day by one of Colpoys’ marines, the Heloise’s master continued to regain his strength, and Bolitho imagined Dumaresq was set on keeping him alive if only to see him hang for piracy.

Midshipman Jury had been allowed to return to duty, but was confined to working on deck or standing his watch aft. Strangely enough, their brief moment of shared danger and courage seemed to hold him and Bolitho apart, and, although they met several times every day, Bolitho could sense a certain discomfort between them.

Maybe the captain had been right. Perhaps Jury’s heroworship, as he had termed it, had created an embarrassment rather than a bond.

Little Merrett, on the other hand, seemed to have gained more confidence than anyone would have thought possible. It was as if he had expected to be killed, and that now he was convinced nothing worse could ever happen to him. He ran up the shrouds with the other midshipmen, and during the dog-watches his shrill voice was often heard in some contest or argument with his companions.

One evening, as the ship ghosted along under her courses and topsails and Bolitho took over the first watch for Lieutenant Rhodes, he saw Jury watching the other midshipmen skylarking in the fighting tops, probably wishing he was up there with them.

Bolitho waited for the helmsman to call, “Steady as she goes, sir! Sou’-sou’-west!” Then he crossed to the midshipman’s side and asked, “How is the wound?”

Jury looked at him and smiled. “It no longer hurts, sir. I am lucky.” His fingers strayed to his leather cross-belt and touched the scar on the gilt plate. “Were they really pirates?”

Bolitho shrugged. “I believe they were intent on following us, spies perhaps, but in the eyes of the law they will be seen as pirates.”

He had thought a great deal about it since that terrible night. He suspected Dumaresq and Palliser knew a lot more than they were telling, that the captured brigantine was deeply involved with Destiny’s secret mission and her brief stay at Funchal.