Alexander Kent - The Flag Captain

He said, “Well, that is that.” He sounded satisfied.

Bolitho saw Draffen pause in his climb up the sloop’s side and turn to wave his hand.

He said, “I would like to tack to the nor’ east, sir. It will save time later when we run down and rejoin the squadron.”

Broughton turned his back on the sloop as her topsails filled to the wind and she started to pay off away from her massive consort. “Very well.” Broughton eyed him searchingly. “I suppose you cannot bear the thought of resuming your place in the line so soon after this brief freedom?” He smiled. “Well, it will do Furneaux no harm to exercise his power a little longer.”

Bolitho walked over to Keverne who was still watching the sloop. “We will steer nor’ east, Mr Keverne, lay her on the larboard tack. So call all hands again, and then they can have their meal. I imagine the activity might have given them a new

appetite.” He saw the villainous-looking chief cook, a bearded giant with one eye, peering up from the main hatchway. “Although I hate to think what he puts into it sometimes.”

He crossed to the weather side as once again the seamen swarmed up the ratlines and out along the yards. Broughton understood him better than he realised. Independence and initiative, his father had once told him, were the two most precious things to every captain. Now, commanding a flagship, and tied to the squadron’s apron strings, he knew well enough what he had meant.

He thought suddenly of the house at Falmouth. The two portraits opposite the window. He was strangely moved to find he could think of them without grief or bitterness. It was almost like having someone there waiting for his return home.

Keverne was back again, his face expressionless. “This afternoon there will be two hands for punishment, sir.”

“What?” Bolitho stared at him and then nodded. “Very well.”

The moment of peace had passed. But as he walked to the quarterdeck rail he found himself praying that it might return.

At six o’clock that same day Bolitho sat behind his desk looking through the stern windows, his mind busy with the affairs of his command. Trute, the cabin servant, placed a pot of fresh coffee by his elbow and padded away without a word. He had grown to accept the captain’s strange moods, his apparent need to be alone, even to pour his own coffee. Like his desire to have the desk facing aft, and whenever possible to dine off it instead of his beautiful table in the adjoining cabin. Trute had served three captains, and never met his sort before. The others had all expected to be waited on hand and foot, and at all times of day or night. Equally they had been swift and harsh when showing their displeasure. He had decided that although he liked Bolitho as a considerate and fair master, he had felt more comfortable with his previous captains.

At least it had been possible to know exactly what they were thinking for most of the time.

Bolitho sipped the scalding black coffee and wondered when it, like many other items, would become a luxury. It was never possible to feel confident, to know that a ship was not overreaching her margin of safety when it came to food and water.

He heard four bells chime out, the clatter of feet somewhere below as a warrant officer, probably caught dozing, dashed to perform his duties for the last dog watch.

It had been a busy afternoon for Bolitho, mainly because he had been trying to catch up with matters concerning his own ship rather than attending to those of the whole squadron. There had seemed an endless procession waiting to catch his ear.

Grubb, the carpenter, grey haired and always pessimistic about the enemy of all ships-rot. Not that he had found any in his daily molelike excursions in the bowels of the hull, places which had never seen, would never see, any light but that of a lantern. It was as if he wanted Bolitho to know of his tireless efforts on his behalf. And it all took time.

He had given several minutes to Clode, the cooper, concerning the purser’s earlier complaint about the state of some of the water casks. But then Nathan Buddle, the purser, quite often voiced complaints, provided they did not directly concern his own department. He was a thin, furtive-looking man, with skin like parchment, who wore an almost permanent hunted expression which Bolitho suspected hid things which did not concern rotten casks. In fairness, he had found nothing wrong with Buddle’s daily accounts, but like all his trade, the purser had to be constantly watched.

And as Keverne had reported earlier, two men were brought aft for punishment, watched as usual on such occasions by all unemployed members of the ship’s company.

Bolitho hated such spectacles, just as he knew them to be

inevitable. It always seemed to take such a long time. The gratings to be rigged, the culprits to be stripped and seized up, and his own voice reading the Articles of War above the din of wind and canvas.

The actual punishment excited little interest amongst the spectators.

The first man, awarded twelve lashes, had been caught stealing from one of his messmates. The opinion was probably that he was getting off lightly, compared with what his fellow seamen had intended and would certainly have carried out but for the timely intervention of the ship’s corporal. Bolitho had heard of cases when men who stole from their messmates had been thrown overboard at night, while one had actually been found minus the hand used for his crime. In the teeming, defenceless world of shipboard life few had much sympathy for a thief.

The second seaman had received twenty-four lashes for neglect of duty and insolence. Both latter charges had been laid by Sawle, the ship’s junior lieutenant. Bolitho blamed himself for this particular case. He had promoted Sawle to lieutenant some six months earlier, but had he not been so involved with the squadron’s affairs under the ailing Admiral Thelwall, he knew now he would have thought twice about it. Sawle had shown the makings of a good officer, but it had been mostly on the surface. He was a sulky-looking youth of eighteen, and Bolitho had told Keverne to ensure his tendency to bully subordinates did not get out of hand. Maybe Keverne had done his best, or perhaps he considered Sawle’s attitudes unimportant provided he carried out his other duties to his satisfaction.

Either way, the seaman’s bloodied back was a grim reminder to Bolitho of the constant need to supervise Sawle in the future. He was one of his officers and therefore his authority had to be upheld. Nevertheless, if Meheux, the cheerful, round-faced second lieutenant, or Weigall, the third, had been in Sawle’s place

the incident would have got no further. Meheux was popular because of his raw, north country humour. His well-founded boast that he could reef or splice as efficiently as any seaman would have prevented anything worse than a contest, man to man. Weigall, who had the build, and unfortunately the intelligence also, of a prizefighter, would have laid the culprit low with one of his massive fists and forgotten the incident completely. Weigall was not unpopular with the men of his division, but for the most part they avoided him. He was in charge of the middle gundeck, and had unfortunately been rendered very deaf during an engagement with a blockade runner. Sometimes he imagined his men were talking about him behind his back, and would have them doing extra drills in the twinkling of an eye.

Bolitho leaned back in his chair and watched the Euryalus ’s wake bubbling astern as the wind pushed her over, holding her steady while she thrust onward to the north-east.

He poured some more coffee and grimaced. It would soon be time to wear ship and spread more sail for the uncomplicated run before the wind to find the squadron again. This one afternoon and evening of comparative freedom had given him time to think and reconsider, to examine those closest to him, yet as ever separated by rank and station. Broughton had left him entirely alone, and Calvert had implied that he was for the most part going over his charts and re-reading his sealed orders as if to find something previously missed.