Ричард Вудмен - Baltic Mission

'How interesting,' went on Wilson with the smooth urbanity of the perfect diplomat, 'I have not had much opportunity to study the Russian tongue of your muzhiks, but if I am not mistaken, your name is the Russian word for ...'

'Island,' snapped Ostroff suddenly and it was not the abruptness of the interruption that surprised Wilson but the fact that where he had been about to employ the French noun, Ostroff had chosen to head him off with a sideways glance at Kalitkin and the use of a definition in plain English.

As the two men strolled with an affected nonchalance away from the recumbent Kalitkin and his bivouac, the Count lounged back on his sheepskin. 'Spies,' he muttered to himself, 'spies, the pair of them ...' and he stared up at the stars shining through the rents in the clouds, aware that their motion had become suddenly irregular.

His Britannic Majesty's 36-gun, 18-pounder frigate Antigone, commanded by Captain Nathaniel Drinkwater, lay at anchor off the Swedish fortress of Varberg wrapped in a dense and clammy fog. Her decks were dark with the moisture of it; damp had condensed on the dull black barrels of her cannon, giving them an unnatural sheen, and her rigging was festooned with millions upon millions of tiny droplets like the autumn dew upon spiders' webs. Wraiths of fog streamed slowly across her deck, robbing the scarlet coats of her marine sentries of their brilliance and dulling all sounds.

The duty midshipman leant against the quarterdeck rail with one foot upon the slide of a carronade and contemplated the dark oily water and the ice-floes that bumped and scraped alongside. Fifty yards out from the ship's side he could see nothing and the view from the deck was too familiar to engage his slightest interest.

Not that the slowly swirling ice-floes were worthy of study in themselves, for they were fast melting and puny by comparison with those he had seen in the Greenland Sea, but they were hypnotic and drew all active thought from the brain of the idle young man. They set him to dreaming aimlessly and endeavouring to pass the time as pleasantly as possible without the tiresome need to exert himself. For the past forty minutes Midshipman Lord Walmsley had been the senior officer upon the upper deck and in that capacity he saw no reason to exert himself. The sentries were at their posts, the duty watch fussing about routine tasks, and he was perfectly content to leave them to the supervision of the petty officers and their mates. Besides, Walmsley had been cheated of the prospect of an early repast and the trivial sense of grievance only reinforced his inertia. In the absence of the captain ashore, the first lieutenant, Mr. Samuel Rogers, had repaired to the gunroom for a meal he felt he was more entitled to than the midshipman.

Lord Walmsley did not seriously dispute the justice of the contention, for to do so would have involved far more effort than he was capable of. So he let the silly sense of grievance paralyse him and dreamed of a distant milkmaid whose willing concupiscence had long since initiated him to the irresponsible joys of a privileged manhood.

Inertia was endemic aboard the Antigone that morning. Captain Drinkwater had zealously pushed his frigate from the Nore through a succession of gales and into the breaking ice of the Baltic to reach Varberg as soon as he could. The whole of Antigone's company was exhausted, and they had lost a man overboard off the Naze of Norway: a sacrifice to the elements which seemed determined to punish them for every league they stole to windward in a searing succession of freezing easterly gales. It was, therefore, scarcely surprising that once the anchor had bitten into the sea-bed off the coast of Sweden and the captain departed in his barge, the mood on board Antigone should have been one of euphoria. As if confirming the frigate's company in their own merit, the elements had softened, the wind dropped, and within an hour of Captain Drinkwater's departure the fog had closed down on them, wrapping them in a chill, damp cocoon.

'Well now, d'you intend to spend the entire day in that supine way, laddie?'

Walmsley straightened up and turned. Mr. Fraser, the frigate's second lieutenant, crossed the deck to stand beside him.

'I was merely ascertaining whether I could hear the captain's barge returning, Mr. Fraser, by removing my ears from the sounds of the deck and leaning over the side.'

Fraser raised a sandy eyebrow. 'Your lordship is a plausible liar and should have his ears removed from the sounds of the deck to the masthead. A spell of sky-parlour would cure your impudence... but cut along and have something to eat... and send young Frey up in your place,' he added, calling after the retreating midshipman. The Scotsman began a leisurely pacing of the deck, noting the other duty-men and sentries at their places. A few minutes later Midshipman Frey joined him.

'Ah, Mr. Frey,' remarked Fraser in his distinctive burr, 'you well know how my flinty Calvinist soul abhors idleness. Be so kind as to pipe the red cutter away and row a guard around the ship.'

'Aye, aye, sir.'

Fraser regarded the activity that this order initiated with a certain amount of satisfaction. His mild enjoyment was marred by the unnecessary appearance of Rogers, the first lieutenant. Fraser had just left Rogers at table, his big fist clamped proprietorially around the neck of the gunroom decanter as though it was his personal property. Rogers's face was flushed with the quantity of alcohol he had consumed.

'What the devil's all this fuss and palaver, Fraser?'

"T'is nothing, Mr. Rogers. I'm merely hoisting out a boat to row guard about the ship while this fog persists ...'

'You take a deal too much upon yourself ...'

'I think the captain would have ...'

'Damn you, Fraser. D'you threaten me?'

Fraser suppressed mounting anger with difficulty. 'Reflect, sir,' he said with frigid formality, 'we have a considerable sum in specie under guard below and I think the captain would object to its loss in his absence ...'

'Oh, you do, do you? And who the hell's going to take it? The Swedes are friendly and the Danes are neutral. There isn't an enemy within a hundred leagues of us.'

'We don't know there isn't an enemy a hundred yards away, damn it; and as long as I'm officer o' the deck there'll be a guard pulled round the ship!' Fraser had lost his restraint now and both officers stood face to face in full view of the men at the davit falls. Fraser turned away, flushed and angry. 'Lower away there, God damn you, and lively with it!'

Rogers stood stock-still. His befuddled mind recognised the sense in Fraser's argument. He was aware that he should have sent off a boat as soon as the fog settled that forenoon. Knowledge of his own failure only fuelled his wrath, already at a high pitch due to the amount of wine he had drunk. And his mind was clear enough to realise that Fraser had committed the unforgivable in losing his temper and answering a senior insolently. 'Come here, Fraser!' Rogers roared. Fraser, supervising the lowering of the cutter, turned. 'D'you address me, sir?' he asked coldly.

'You know damn well I do! Come here!'

Fraser crossed the deck again slowly, grasping the significance of Rogers's new attack. Once again the two officers were face to face.

'Gentlemen, gentlemen, this is no time for such discordant tomfoolery ...'

Rogers's colour mounted still further as he spun round on the newcomer who, called by the sudden interest stirring between decks, now arrived on the quarterdeck.

'You keep out of this, Hill,' snarled Rogers at the sailing master.

'No, sir, I will not.' He lowered his voice. 'And you are making damnable fools of yourselves. For God's sake stop at once!' Hill's warning ended on an urgent hiss.