Alexander Kent - Cross of St George

Adam halted on the forecastle deck and rested one foot on a crouching carronade, the “smasher,” as the Jacks called them. Opposite them lay the captured Success, and although her side and upper works still bore the scars of Indomitable’s iron, her masts were set up, with men working on the yards to secure each new sail. They had done well to achieve so much in so short a time. And beyond her, the beautiful Chesapeake, and Reaper swinging, untroubled, to her cable. Did ships know or care who handled, or betrayed, or loved them?

Urquhart said, “If the weather stays friendly, we’ll not have much trouble, sir.”

Adam leaned over the rail, past one great catted anchor to the imposing gilded figurehead: one of Odin’s faithful servants, a stern-faced maiden in breastplate and horned helmet, one hand raised as if to welcome her dead hero to Valhalla. It was not beautiful. He tried to thrust the thought aside. Not like Anemone. But through the smoke and the din of war, it would certainly impress an enemy.

“I want you to take charge of Success. You will have a prize crew, but only enough hands to work the ship. Her fighting ability has not yet been determined.”

He watched the lieutenant’s face, strong, intelligent, but still wary of his captain. Not afraid, but unsure.

“Now hear me, Mr Urquhart, and keep what I ask of you to yourself. If I hear one word from elsewhere it will lie at your door, understood?”

Urquhart nodded, his eyes very calm. “You can rely on that.”

Adam touched his arm. “I rely on you. ”

He thought suddenly of the miniature of Gilia St Clair. Her smile, which Keen had appropriated as his own.

“Now, this is what you must do.”

But even as he spoke, his mind still clung to it. Perhaps Keen was right. After the battle, losing his ship and the agony of imprisonment, there was always a chance of becoming crippled by caution.

When he had finished explaining what he required, Urquhart said, “May I ask you, sir, have you never feared being killed?”

Adam smiled a little, and turned his back on the figurehead.

“No.” He saw John Whitmarsh walking along the deck beside one of the new midshipmen, who was about his own age. They both seemed to sense his eyes upon them and paused to peer up into the sun at the shadows on the forecastle. The midshipman touched his hat; Whitmarsh raised one hand in a gesture which was not quite a wave.

Urquhart remarked, “You certainly have a way with youngsters, sir.”

Adam looked at him, the smile gone. “Your question, John. It is true to say that I have… died… many times. Does that suit?”

It was probably the closest they had ever been.

LIEUTENANT George Avery leaned back in his chair and put one foot on his sea-chest as if to test the ship’s movement. In the opposite corner of the small, screened cabin Allday sat on another chest, his big hands clasped together, frowning, as he tried to remember exactly what Avery had read to him.

Avery could see it as if he had left England only yesterday, and not the five months ago it was in fact. The inn at Fallowfield by the Helford River, the long walks in the countryside, untroubled by conversation with people who only spoke because they were cooped up with you in a man-of-war. Good food, time to think. To remember…

He thought now of his own letter, and wondered why he had told the admiral about her. More surprising still, that Bolitho had seemed genuinely pleased about it, although doubtless he thought his flag lieutenant was hoping for too much. A kiss and a promise. He could not imagine what Bolitho might have said if he had told him all that had happened on that single night in London. The mystery, the wildness, and the peace, when they had lain together, exhausted. For his own part, stunned that it could have been real.

His thoughts came back to Allday, and he said, “So there you are. Your little Kate is doing well. I must buy her something before we leave Halifax.”

Allday did not look up. “So small, she was. No bigger than a rabbit. Now she’s walking, you say?”

“Unis says.” He smiled. “And I’ll lay odds that she fell over a few times before she got her proper sea-legs.”

Allday shook his head. “I would have liked to see it, them first steps. I never seen anything like that afore.” He seemed troubled, rather than happy. “I should’ve been there.”

Avery was moved by what he saw. Perhaps it would be useless to point out that Bolitho had offered to leave him ashore, secure in his own home, after years of honourable service. It would be an insult. He recalled Catherine’s obvious relief that Allday was staying with her man. Maybe she sensed that his “oak” had never been more needed.

Avery listened to the regular groan of timbers as Indomitable thrust through a criss-cross of Atlantic rollers. They should have made contact with the Halifax-bound convoy yesterday, but even the friendly Trades could not always be relied upon. This was a war of supply and demand, and it was always the navy who supplied. No wonder men were driven to despair by separation and hardships which few landsmen could ever appreciate.

He heard the clatter of dishes from the wardroom, somebody laughing too loudly at some bawdy joke already heard too often. He glanced at the white screen. And beyond there, right aft, the admiral would be thinking and planning, no doubt with the scholarly Yovell waiting to record and copy instructions and orders for each of the captains, from flagship to brig, from schooner to bomb ketch. Faces he had come to know, men he had come to understand. All except the one who would be uppermost in his mind, the dead captain of Reaper. Bolitho would regard the mutiny as something personal, and the captain’s tyranny a flaw that should have been removed before it was too late.

Justice, discipline, revenge. It could not be ignored.

And what of Keen, perhaps the last of the original Happy Few? Was his new interest in Gilia St Clair merely a passing thing? Avery thought of the woman in his arms, his need of her. He was no one to judge Keen.

He looked up as familiar footsteps moved across the quarterdeck. Tyacke, visiting the watch keepers before darkness closed around them and their two consorts. If the convoy failed to appear at first light, what then? They were some five hundred miles from the nearest land. A decision would have to be made. But not by me. Nor even by Tyacke. It would fall, as always, to that same man in his cabin aft. The admiral.

He had not mentioned the letter to Tyacke: Tyacke would probably know. But Avery respected his privacy, and had come to like him greatly, more than he would have believed possible after their first stormy confrontation at Plymouth more than two years ago. Tyacke had never received a letter from anyone. Did he ever look for one, ever dare to hope for such a precious link with home?

He handed Unis’s letter to Allday, and hoped that he had read it in the manner he had intended. Allday, a man who could recognize any hoist of signals by their colours or their timing, whom he had watched patiently instructing some hapless landman or baffled midshipman in the art of splicing and rope-work, who could carve a ship model so fine that even the most critical Jack would nod admiringly, could not read. Nor could he write. It seemed cruel, unfair.

There was a tap on the door and Ozzard looked in. “Sir Richard’s compliments, sir. Would you care to lay aft for a glass?” He purposefully ignored Allday.

Avery nodded. He had been expecting the invitation, and hoping that it would come.

Ozzard added sharply, “You too, of course. If you’re not too busy.”

Avery watched. Another precious fragment: Ozzard’s rudeness matched only by Allday’s awakening grin. He could have killed the little man with his elbow. They knew each other’s strength, weakness too, in all likelihood. Maybe they even knew his.