Julian Stockwin - Seaflower

JULIAN STOCKWIN

Seaflower

CORONET BOOKS Hodder & Stoughton

Copyright © 2003 by Julian Stockwin

First published in Great Britain in 2003 by Hodder and Stoughton This edition published in 2004 by Hodder and Stoughton A division of Hodder Headline

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All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

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'To the wind that blows a ship that goes and the lass that loves a sailor*

Sea Toast

Chapter I

The low thud of a court-martial gun echoed over Portsmouth in the calm early-summer morning, the grim sound telling the world of the naval drama about to take place. Its ominous portent also stilled the conversation on the fore lower-deck of the old receiving ship lying further into the harbour. There, Thomas Kydd's pigtail was being reclubbed by his closest friend and shipmate, Nicholas Renzi.

'I wish in m' bowels it were you,' Kydd said, in a low voice. He was dressed in odd-fitting but clean seaman's gear. Like Renzi, he was a shipwrecked mariner and his clothes were borrowed. A court-martial would try the sole surviving officer, and Kydd, who had been on watch at the helm at the time, was a principal witness.

There was a muffled hail at the fore hatchway. Kydd made a hasty farewell, and clattered up the broad ladder to muster at the ship's side. The larboard cutter bobbed alongside to embark the apprehensive witnesses. In the curious way of the Navy, Kydd joined diffidently with the petty officers, even though with the death of his ship his acting rate had been removed and therefore he was borne on the books of the receiving ship as an able seaman. His testimony, however, would be given as a petty officer, his rate at the time.

The pleasant boat trip to the dockyard was not appreciated by Kydd, who gulped at the thought of crusty, gold-laced admirals and captains glaring at him as he gave his evidence, which might well be challenged by other hostile officers.

In fact recently it had not in any way been a pleasant time for Kydd and Renzi. Their return as shipwrecked sailors to the land of their birth had been met with virtual imprisonment in a receiving ship; at a time of increasingly solemn news from the war it was a grave problem for the authorities how to announce the loss of the famous frigate Artemis. Their response had been to keep the survivors from the public until a course of action had been decided after the court-martial, with the result that both Kydd and Renzi had not been able to return home after their long voyage. As far as could be known, their loved ones had had no news of them since the previous year, and that from Macao, their last touching at civilisation.

The cutter headed for the smart new stone buildings of the dockyard. The last half of the century had seen a massive expansion of capability in the foremost royal dockyard of the country, and it was a spectacle in its own right, the greatest industrial endeavour in the land. As they neared the shore, Kydd nervously took in the single Union Flag hanging from the signal tower. This was the evidence for all eyes of the reality of a court-martial to be held here, ashore, by the Port Admiral. The court would normally meet in the Great Cabin of the flagship, but the anchorage at Spithead was virtually empty, Admiral Howe's fleet somewhere in the Atlantic looking for the French.

The marine sentries at the landing place stood at ease — there were no officers in the boat needing a salute, only an odd-looking lot of seamen in ill-fitting sailor rig. There were few words among the men, who obediently followed a lieutenant into an anteroom to await their call. Pointedly, a pair of marines took up position at the entrance.

It seemed an interminable time to Kydd, as he sat on the wooden chair, his hat awkwardly in his hand. The voyage across the vast expanse of the Pacific and the early responsibility of promotion thrust on him had considerably matured him, and anyone who glanced at his tanned, open face, thick dark hair and powerful build could never have mistaken him for anything other than what he was, a prime seaman. His past as a perruquier in Guildford town was now unimaginably distant.

'Abraham Smith,' called a black-coated clerk at the door. The carpenter's mate stood and limped off, his face set. Kydd remembered his work on the foredeck of Artemis in the stormy darkness. Men here owed their lives to the raft he had fashioned from wreckage and launched in the cold dawn light.

The clerk returned. 'Tobias Stirk.' The big gunner got to his feet, then paused deliberately and looked back at Kydd. His grave expression did not vary, but his slow wink caused Kydd to smile. Then he thought of the trial, and his heart thudded.

"Thomas Kydd.'

Kydd followed the clerk, emerging into a busy room where he was handed over to another. Expecting at any moment to appear before the great court, Kydd was confused to be led upstairs to a much smaller room, bare but for a large table. At a chair on the opposite side was a senior official wearing a grave expression, who motioned him to sit down. A junior clerk entered and took up position at a smaller table.

'Thomas Paine Kydd?'

Kydd nodded, too nervous to speak.

'My name is Gardiner. We are here to determine the facts pertaining to the loss of His Majesty's Frigate Artemis? the lawyer announced, with practised ease. 'Your deposition of evidence will be taken here, and examined to see if it has relevance to the case soon before the court.'

Perhaps he would not have to appear in court at all. He might be released and allowed home — but then reason told him that his contribution was a vital piece of evidence. He and Renzi had discussed their respective positions. Renzi was a self-exile with a well-born past, serving 'sentence' for a family crime, and had a more worldly view. Kydd had a stubborn belief in the rightness of truth, and would not shift his position by an inch. The result of his stand would be inevitable.

'Were you, Kydd, on watch on the night of the thirteenth of April, 1794?' Gardiner began mildly, shuffling papers, as the junior scratched away with his quill off to the side.

'Aye, sir, quartermaster o' the starb'd watch, at the helm.' The man would probably think it impertinent of him were he to volunteer that, as quartermaster, he would never have deigned to touch the wheel — that was the job of the helmsman. He had been in overall charge of the helm as a watch-station under the officer-of-the-watch, and as such was probably the single most valuable witness to what had really happened that night