Alexander Kent - THE INSHORE SQUADRON

Bolitho snatched up his hat and looked at Allday. 'God, you take your time, man!'

Allday wiped his razor methodically. 'Time was when admirals had patience, sir.'

Bolitho smiled at him and hurried on deck, the breath knocked instantly from his body by the keen wind.

Figures bustled about on every hand, and when Bolitho took a glass from the rack he saw the sprawling island of Gotland to starboard, blurred and humped in the dim light, like a sleeping sea-monster. It was said to be a strange place, with its fortified city and tales of raids and counter-raids going back over hundreds of years. It was not difficult to picture the Viking long-ships sweeping towards that inhospitable coast, he thought.

Neale crossed the deck and touched his hat.

'Permission to clear for action, sir? The people have been fed, but the benefit of a hot meal will soon fade if they are not kept busy.'

`Carry on, if you please. You command here. I am a passenger.'

Neale walked away, hiding a smile.

`Mr Pickthorn! Beat to quarters and clear for action!' He turned and held Bolitho's gaze, cutting back the years. 'And I want two minutes lopped off the time, d'you hear?'

The sun probed through the drifting flurries of snow and touched the taut sails with the colour of pewter. Everything shone, even the sailors' hair as they ran to obey the urgent tattoo of drums had droplets of melting ice as if they had been dragged up from the sea-bed.

Pascoe strode past buckling on his curved hanger and calling the names of the Benbow's men. Bolitho noticed that when he called one in particular, a new hand named Babbage, he paused and studied him gravely, separating him from the crowd with a quick scrutiny.

A candidate for promotion, or someone to be warned for carelessness? Bolitho caught his nephew's eye and nodded to him.

`Well, you have a frigate, Adam. How does it feel?'

Pascoe smiled broadly. 'Like the wind, sir!'

The first lieutenant, puffing with exertion and red from the keen air, called, 'Ship cleared for action, sir!'

Neale dosed his watch with a snap. 'Smartly done, Mr Pickthorn.'

Then he turned and touched his hat to Bolitho. 'We are yours to lead, sir.'

Browne watched the preparations and then the sudden stillness along the gundeck and said half to himself, `But to where, I wonder?'

Bolitho moved the telescope carefully along the grey shoreline. If only the snow would go altogether. Yet in his heart he knew it was their only ally, their one guard against detection.

Figures moved restlessly around and past him. The occasional clink of metal or the scrape of a handspike intruded into the telescope's small, circular world to distract him.

He tried to recall everything he had studied on the chart and in Neale's notes. A headland should be standing out somewhere on the lee bow, and around it would lie the ships.

Bolitho bit his lip to contain his racing thoughts and anxieties. Maybe, could, might, perhaps, they were useless to him now.

He heard Neale say, `Shall I run up the colours, sir?'

'Please do: I suggest you hoist an ensign to the fore and main also. If our captured merchantmen are over yonder, they'll need all the convincing we can offer.'

He glanced up at the mizzen truck where his own flag had been broken when he had transferred from the Benbow. It might make the French, and anyone else who would otherwise try to attack them, imagine that other ships were on their way in support. Even very junior admirals were not expected to stray about in frigates.

Bolitho asked, `How is- the wind?'

The master replied instantly, `Shifted a point, sir. Nor'westerly.'

Bolitho nodded, too absorbed in his thoughts to notice how an edge had come to his voice.

`Let her fall off three points, if you will. We'll weather the headland as close as we can.'

The sailing master said, `Well, I dunno, sir…' Then he saw the look in Neale's eye and cut his protest short.

The big wheel creaked over, three helmsmen, legs wide apart to keep their balance on the icy deck planking, watching sails and compass like hawks.

Eventually the master said, `East by north, sir.'

Bolitho ignored the seamen as they ran to retrim the yards and braces, the heavy tramp of the afterguard as they followed suit. Neale had learned a lot. Stripped to topsails, forecourse and jib, Styx was responding well, leaning forward under her icehard canvas as if eager on her own account to do battle.

He looked at the gun crews, huddled together for comfort but ready. The sand on the deck around the long twelvepounders to prevent the men from slipping already changing to liquid gold.

How bright the marines' coats looked in the strange light. With snow gathering on their hats they could have been a child's toys at Christmas time.

He saw Pascoe by the forward guns, one hand resting on his hanger, his slim outline swaying easily with the regular plunge of the stem. He was talking to another junior lieutenant, probably discussing their chances. It was often like that. Trying to appear calm, to remain sane when your heart was gripped in a vice and you -imagined every seaman near you could hear its frantic pounding.

`Land on the lee bow, sir!' A slight pause. `Almost dead ahead!'

Neale called sharply, `Leadsman in the chains, Mr Pickthorn. Begin sounding in fifteen minutes.'

If he was afraid of his command running aground he concealed it very well, Bolitho thought.

Bolitho steadied his glass once more. The land looked very close. An illusion, he knew, but if the wind veered suddenly, or they lost it entirely, they would be hard put to claw away.

Neale said, `Take in the forecourse.' He moved closer to Bolitho. `May I bring her up a point, sir?'

Bolitho lowered the glass and looked at him. 'Very well.'

He stared up at the bright flags at each masthead and gaff. He could feel the snowflakes melting on his eyes, moistening his lips. It helped to steady him.

The big forecourse was already booming and flapping reluctantly up to its yard, the seamen spread out above it fisting and kicking the frozen canvas like apes gone mad. Slivers of ice fell through the nets above the gun crews like fragments of broken glass, and Bolitho saw a petty officer stoop to retrieve a piece before jamming it into his mouth.

Another familiar sign. The mouth like dust, when you craved for beer, water, anything.

If only the people in England could see them, he thought grimly. These same sort of men throughout the fleet lived in squalor but fought with dignity and incredible courage. Sweepings from jails some of them perhaps, ill-used ashore and afloat, but they were all that stood between Napoleon or anyone else who became an enemy. He almost smiled as he recalled something his father had once said. ' England must love enemies, Richard. We make so many of them!'

The first lieutenant called, 'Permission to load, sir?'

Neale glanced at Bolitho then replied, `Yes. But not doubleshotted, Mr Pickthorn. With the breeches almost frozen solid, I fear it would do more damage to us than the Frenchies!'

Bolitho gripped his hands together behind him. So confident in him, they even had a mental picture of their enemy firmly fixed. If the bay was empty, that trust would fade just as swiftly.

The leadsman's thick arm was revolving in a slow circle, then he released the lead and line and craned over to watch it splash down beyond the bows.

'By the mark ten!'

Bolitho 'sensed the master shifting restlessly by the wheel, imagining the craggy bottom gliding beneath the coppered hull. The lead splashed down again.

'An' a quarter less ten!'

Bolitho clamped his jaws together. They had to get as near as possible. He saw the great slab of land rising above the bowsprit and jib-boom, filled with menace.