Alexander Kent - The Only Victor

Luis had been twice her age, but in his own way he had loved her. He had been a Spanish merchant, and the miniature had all the delicacy and finesse he would have appreciated.

So she had come into Bolitho's life; and then, after a brief affair, she had gone. Misunderstanding, a misguided attempt to preserve his reputation-Bolitho had often cursed himself for allowing it to happen. For letting their tangled lives come between them.

And then, just two years ago when Hyperion had sailed into EnglishHarbour, they had found one another again. Bolitho leaving behind a marriage which had soured, and Catherine married, for the third time, to the Viscount Somervell, a treacherous and decadent man who, on learning of her renewed passion for Bolitho, had attempted to have her dishonoured and thrown into a debtor's prison, from which Bolitho had saved her.

He heard her voice now as clearly as if she were standing here on this rapidly drying deck. "Keep this around your neck, darling Richard. I shall take it off again only when you are lying by my side as my lover."

He felt the engraving on the back of the locket. Like the small wisp of hair, it was new, something she had caused to be done in London while he had been at the Admiralty.

So simply said, as if she were speaking to him even as he recalled it.

May Fate always guide you. May love always protect you.

He walked to the nettings, and shaded his eyes to watch some gulls. It made him tremble merely to think of her, how they had loved in Antigua and in Cornwall for so short a time together.

He moved his head slightly, holding his breath. The sun was strong but not yet high enough to-He hesitated, then looked hard at the horizon's glittering line.

Nothing happened. The mist did not edge out like some evil disease to mock his left eye. Nothing.

Allday was looking aft and saw Bolitho's expression, and felt like praying. It was like seeing the face of a man on the scaffold when given a last-minute reprieve.

"Deck there! " Every face looked up. "Sail on the starboard quarter! "

Poland called sharply, "Mr Williams, I'd be obliged if you would take a glass aloft! "

The first lieutenant seized a telescope from the midshipman on watch and hurried to the main shrouds. He looked surprised: Bolitho guessed it was at his captain's unusual courtesy, rather than the task.

Truculent 's sails were barely filling, and yet the stranger's topgallants seemed to be speeding down on a converging tack at a tremendous rate.

He had seen it many times. The same stretch of ocean, with one ship all but becalmed, and another with every stitch of canvas filled to the brim.

Poland glanced at Bolitho, his features expressionless. But his fingers were opening and closing at his sides, betraying his agitation.

"Shall I clear for action, Sir Richard?"

Bolitho raised a telescope and levelled it across the quarter. A strange bearing. Perhaps not one of the local squadron after all.

"We will bide our time, Captain Poland. I have no doubt you can be ready to run out in ten minutes, if need be?"

Poland flushed. "I-that is, Sir Richard-" He nodded firmly. "Indeed, in less! "

Bolitho moved the glass carefully, but could only make out the mastheads of the newcomer; saw the bearing alter slightly as they drew into line to swoop down on Truculent.

Lieutenant Williams called from the mainmast crosstrees, "Frigate, sir! "

Bolitho watched tiny specks of colour rising to break the other ship's silhouette as she hoisted a signal.

Williams called down the recognition and Poland could barely prevent himself from tearing the signals book from the midshipman's fingers. "Well! "

The boy stammered, "She's the Zest, sir, forty-four. Captain Varian."

Poland muttered, "Oh yes, I know who he is. Make our number-lively now! "

Bolitho lowered the glass and watched. Two faces. The midshipman's confused, perhaps frightened. One moment he had been watching the first hump of land as it eased up from the sea-mist, and the next he had probably seen it all vanish, the prospect of an unexpected enemy, death even, suddenly laid before him.

The other was Poland 's. Whoever Varian was he was no friend, and was doubtless much senior, to command a forty-four.

Lieutenant Munro was in the shrouds, his legs wrapped around the ratlines, heedless of the fresh tar on his white breeches, and even thoughts of breakfast forgotten.

"Signal, sir! Captain repair on board! "

Bolitho saw the crestfallen look on Poland 's face. After his remarkable passage from England without loss or injury to any man aboard, it was like a slap in the face.

"Mr Jenour, lay aft if you please." Bolitho saw the flag lieutenant's mouth quiver as though in anticipation. "I believe you have my flag in your care?"

Jenour could not contain a grin this time. "Aye, aye, sir! " He almost ran from the quarterdeck.

Bolitho watched the other frigate's great pyramid of sails lifting and plunging over the sparkling water. Maybe it was childish, but he did not care.

"Captain Poland, for convenience's sake, yours is no longer a private ship." He saw doubt alter to understanding on Poland 's tense features. "So please make to Zest, and spell it out with care, The privilege is yours."

Poland turned as Bolitho's flag broke at the foremast truck, and then gestured urgently to the signals party as bunting spilled across the deck in feverish confusion.

Jenour joined Munro as he clambered back to the deck.

"That is what you wanted to know. There is the real man. He'd not stand by and see any of his people slighted! " Not even Poland, he almost added.

Bolitho saw sunlight reflecting from several telescopes on the other frigate. Zest's captain would not know anything about Bolitho's mission, nor would anyone else.

He tightened his jaw and said gently, "Well, they know now."

"MAY I ASSURE YOU, Sir Richard, that no disrespect was intended…"

Bolitho walked to the cabin stern windows, half listening to the clatter of blocks and the surge of water alongside as Truculent rolled, hove-to in the swell. This would need to be quick. As predicted by Poland 's sailing-master, the wind would soon return. He could not see the other frigate, and guessed that she was standing slightly downwind of her smaller consort.

He turned and sat on the bench seat, gesturing to a chair. "Some coffee, Captain Varian?" He heard Ozzard's quiet footsteps and guessed that the little man was already preparing it. It gave Bolitho time to study his visitor.

Captain Charles Varian was a direct contrast to Poland. Very tall and broad-shouldered, self-confident: probably the landsman's idea of a frigate captain.

Varian said, "I was eager for news, Sir Richard. And seeing this ship, well-" He spread his big hands and gave what was intended as a disarming smile.

Bolitho watched him steadily. "It did not occur to you that a ship from the Channel Squadron might not have time to waste in idle gossip? You could have closed to hailing distance, surely."

Ozzard pattered in with his coffee pot and peered unseeingly at the stranger.

Varian nodded. "I was not thinking. And you, Sir Richard -of all people, to be out here when you must be needed elsewhere…" The smile remained, but his eyes were strangely opaque. Not a man to cross, Bolitho decided. By a subordinate, anyway.

"You will need to return to your command directly Captain. But first I would appreciate your assessment of the situation here." He sipped the hot coffee. What was the matter with him? He was on edge, as he had been since… After all, he had done it himself as a young commander. So many leagues from home, and then the sight of a friendly ship.

He continued, "I have come with new orders."