Command a King's Ship Page 4

  The three midshipmen seemed fairly average. Penn was the youngest, and had come aboard three days after his twelfth birthday. Keen and Armitage were both seventeen, but whereas the former showed the same elegant carelessness as Lieutenant Davy, Armitage appeared to be forever looking over his shoulder. A mother's boy. Four days after he had reported aboard with his gleaming new uniform and polished dirk his mother had in fact come to Portsmouth to visit him. Her husband was a man of some influence, and she had swept into the dockyard in a beautiful carriage like some visiting duchess.

  Bolitho had greeted her briefly and allowed her to meet Armitage in the seclusion of the wardroom. If she had seen the actual quarters where her child was to serve his months at sea she would probably have collapsed.

  He had had to send Herrick in the end to interrupt the embraces and the mother's plaintive sobs with a feeble excuse about Armitage being required for duty. Duty; he could hardly move abous the ship without falling headlong over a block or a ringbolt.

  Giles Bellairs, the debonair captain of marines, was more like a caricature than a real person. Incredibly smart, shoulders always rigidly squared, he looked as if he had had his uniforms moulded around his limbs like wax. He spoke in short, clipped sentences, and barely extended much beyond matters of hunting, wildfowling and, of course, drill. His marines were his whole life, although he hardly ever seemed to utter much in the way of orders. His massive sergeant, Coaker, took care of the close contact with the marines, and Bellairs contented himself with an occasional `Carry on, Sar'nt Coaker!' or `I say, Sar'nt, that fellah's like a bundle of old rags, what?' He was one of the few people in Bolitho's experience who could get completely drunk without any outward change of expression.

  Triphook, the purser, appeared very competent, if grudging with his rations. He had taken a lot of care to ensure that the victualling yard had not filled the lower hold with rotten casks, to be discovered too late to take action. That in itself was rare.

  Bolitho's thoughts came back to the surgeon. He had been aboard for two weeks. Had he been able to get a replacement he would have done so. Whitmarsh was a drunkard in the worst sense. Sober he had a quiet, even gentle manner. Drunk, which was often, he seemed to come apart like an old sail in a sudden squall.

  He tightened his jaw. Whitmarsh would mend his ways. Or else....

  Feet scraped across the planks overhead and Herrick said, `There's a few below decks tonight who'll be wondering if they've done a'right by signing on.' He chuckled. `Too late now.'

  Bolitho stared astern at the black, swirling water, hearing the urgent tide banging and squeaking around the rudder.

  `Aye. It's a long step from land to sea. Far more so than most people realise.' He returned his glass to the rack. `I think I shall turn in now. It will be a long day tomorrow.'

  Herrick stood up and nodded. `I'll bid you goodnight, sir.'

  He knew full well that Bolitho would stay awake for hours yet. Pacing and planning, searching for last-minute faults, possible mistakes in the arrangement of watch-bills and delegation of duties. Bolitho would know he was aware of this fact, too.

  The door closed and Bolitho walked right aft to lean his hands on the centre sill. He could feel the woodwork vibrating under his palms, the hull trembling all around him in time to the squeak of stays, the clatter and slap of halliards and blocks.

  Who would watch them go? Would anyone care? One more ship slipping down channel like hundreds before her.

  There was a nervous tap at the door, and Noddall, the cabin servant, pattered into the lantern light. A small man, with the pointed face of an anxious rodent. He even held his hands in front of him like two nervous paws.

  'Yer supper, sir. You've not touched it.' He started to gather up the plates. `Won't do, sir. It won't do.'

  Bolitho smiled as Noddall scampered away to his pantry. He was so absorbed in his own little world it seemed as if he had not even noticed there was a change of command.

  He threw his new cloak across his shoulders and left the cabin. On the pitch-dark quarterdeck he groped his way aft to the taffrail and stared towards the land. Countless lights and hidden houses. He turned and looked along his ship, the wind blowing his hair across his face, the chill making him hold his breath. The riding light reflected on the taut shrouds like pale gold, and right forward he saw a smaller lantern, where the lonely anchor watch kept a wary eye on the cable.

  It felt different, he decided. No sentries on each gangway to watch for a sneak attack or a mass attempt at desertion. No nets to delay a sudden rush of enemy boarders. He touched a quarterdeck six-pounder with one hand. It felt like wet ice. But for how long, he wondered?

  The master's mate of the watch prowled past, and then sheered away as he saw his captain by the rail.

  `All's well, zur!' he called.

  `Thank you.'

  Bolitho did not know the man's name. Not yet. In the next hundred days he would know more than their names, he thought. As they would about him.

  With a sigh he returned to his cabin, his hair plastered to his head, his cheeks tingling from the cold. There was no sign of Noddall, but the cot was ready for him, and there was something hot in a mug nearby.

  A minute after his head was or. the pillow he was fast asleep.

  The next day dawned as grey as the one before, but overnight the rain had stopped, and the wind held firm from the southeast.

  All forenoon the work went on without relaxation, the petty officers checking and re-checking their lists of names, putting them to faces, making sure seasoned hands were spaced among the untried and untrained.

  Bolitho dictated a final report to his clerk, a dried-up man named Pope, and then signed it in readiness for the last boat. He found time to speak with his officers, and seek out Mr. Tapril, the gunner, in his magazine to discuss moving some of the spare gun parts and tackle further aft and help adjust the vessel's trim until she had consumed some of her own stores to compensate for it.

  He was changing into his seagoing coat, with its faded lace and dull buttons, when Herrick entered the cabin and reported he had brought fifteen new man from the hulks.

  `What was it like?'

  Herrick sighed. `It was a sort of hell, sir. I could have got treble the number, a whole company of 'em, if I'd been able to bring their women and wives, too.'

  Bolitho paused as he tied his neckcloth. `Women? In the hulks?'

  `Aye, sir.' I-Ierrick shuddered. `I hope I never see the like again.'

  `Very well. Sign them on, but don't give them anything to do just yet. I doubt they've the strength to lift a marlin spike after being penned up like that.'

  A midshipman appeared in the open door.

  `Mr. Davy's respect, sir.' His eyes darted around the cabin,

  missing nothing. `And the anchor's hove short.'

  `Thank you.' Bolitho smiled. `Next time stay awhile, Mr.

  Penn, and have a better look.'

  The boy vanished, and Bolitho looked steadily at Herrick. `Well, Thomas?'

  Herrick nodded firmly. `Aye, sir. I'm ready. It's been a long wait.'

  They climbed up to the quarterdeck together, and while Herrick moved to the forward rail with his speaking trumpet, Bolitho stood aft, a little apart from the others who were gathered restlessly at their stations.

  Clink, clink, clink, the capstan was turning more slowly now, the men's backs bent almost double as the hull pulled heavilyy on the anchor.

  Bolitho looked at the master's untidy shape beside the double wheel. He had four helmsmen. He was taking no chances, it seemed. With the helm, or his new captain's skill.

  `Get the ship under way, if you please.' He saw Herrick's trumpet moving. `Once clear of this local shipping we will lay her on the larboard tack and steer sou'-west by west.'

  Old Mudge nodded heavily, one eye hidden beyond the headland of a nose.

  `Aye, aye, sir.'

  Herrick yelled, `Stand by on the capstan!' He shaded his eyes to peer up at the masthead pendant. `Lo
ose heads'ls!'

  The answering flap and clatter of released canvas made several new men peer round, confused and startled. A petty officer thrust a line into a man's hand and bellowed, ''Old it, you bugger! Don't stand there like a bloody woman!'

  Bolitho saw a bosun's mate right forward astride the bowsprit, one arm circling above his head as the cable grew stiffer and more vertical beneath the gilded water-nymph.

  `Hands aloft! Loose tops'ls!'

  Bolitho relaxed slightly as the nimble-footed topmen swarmed up the ratlines on either beam. No sense in rushing it this first time. The watching eyes ashore could think what they liked. He'd get no thanks for letting her drive ashore.

  `Man the braces!'

  Herrick was hanging over the rail, his trumpet moving from side to side like a coachman's blunderbuss.

  `Lively there! Mr. Shellabeer, get those damned idlers aft on the double, I say!'

  Shellabeer was the boatswain, a swarthy, taciturn man who looked more like a Spaniard than a Devonian.

  Bolitho leaned back, his hands on his hips, watching the swift figures dashing out on the vibrating yards like monkeys. It made him feel sick to watch their indifference to such heights.

  First one, then the next great topsail billowed and banged loosely in confusion, while the seamen on the yards clung on, calling to each other, or jeering at their opposite numbers on the other masts.

  `Anchor's aweigh, sir!'

  Like a thing released from chains the frigate swung dizzily across the steep troughs, men falling and slithering at the braces as they fought to haul the great yards round, to cup the wind and master it.

  `Lee braces there! Heave away!' Herrick was hoarse.

  Bolitho gritted his teeth and forced himself to remain quite still as she plunged further and further astride the wind. Here and there a bosun's mate struck out with his rope starter or pushed a man bodily to brace or halliard.

  Then with a booming roar like thunder the sails filled and hardened to the wind's steady thrust, the deck canting over and holding steady as the helmsmen threw themselves on their spokes. -

  He made himself take a glass from Midshipman Keen and trained it across the starboard quarter, keeping his face impassive, even though he was almost shaking with excitement and relief.

  The sail drill was very bad, the placing of trained men too sketchy for comfort, but they were away! Free of the land.

  He saw a few people on the Point watching them heel over on the larboard tack, the top of a shining carriage just below the wall. Perhaps it was Armitage's mother, weeping as she watched her offspring being taken from her.

  The master shouted gruffly, 'Sou'-west by west, sir! Full an' bye !'

  When Bolitho turned to answer him he saw that the master was nodding with something like approval.

  `Thank you, Mr. Mudge. We will get the courses on her directly.'

  He walked forward to join Herrick at the rail, his body angled steeply to the deck. Some of the confusion was being cleared, with men picking their way amidst loose coils of rope like survivors from a battle.

  Herrick looked at him sadly. `It was terrible, sir.'

  `I agree, Mr. Herrick.' He could not restrain a smile. `But it will improve, eh?'

  By late afternoon Undine had beaten clear of the Isle of Wight and was standing well out in the Channel.

  By evening only her reefed topsails were visible, and soon even they had disappeared.

  On the morning of the fourteenth day after weighing anchor at Spithead Bolitho was in his cabin sipping a mug of coffee and pondering for the countless time on what he had achieved.

  The previous evening they had sighted the dull hump of Teneriffe sprawled like a cloud across the horizon, and he had decided to heave-to and avoid the hazards of a night approach. Fourteen days. It felt an eternity. They had been plagued by foul weather for much of that time. Flicking over the pages of his personal log he could see the countless, frustrating entries. Headwinds, occasional but fierce gales, and the constant need to shorten sail, to reef down and ride it out as best they could. The dreaded Bay of Biscay had been kind to them, that at least was a mercy. Otherwise, with almost half the ship's company too seasick to venture aloft, or too terrified to scramble out along the dizzily pitching yards without physical violence being used on them, it was likely Undine might have reached no further.

  Bolitho appreciated what it must be like for many of his men. Shrieking winds, overcrowded conditions in a creaking, rolling hull where their food, if they could face it, often ended up in a mess of bilge water and vomit. It produced a kind of numbness, like that given to a man left abandoned in the sea. For a while he strikes out bravely, swimming he knows not where, until he is too exhausted, too dazed to care. He is without authority or any sort of guidance. It is his turning point.

  Bolitho recognised all the signs well enough, and knew it was the same sort of challenge for him. Give in to his own underStanding and sympathy, listen too much to excuses from his hard-worked lieutenants and warrant officers, and he would never regain control, or be able to rally his company when the real pressure came.

  He knew that many cursed him behind his back, prayed for him to fall dead or vanish overboard in the night. He saw their glances, sensed their resentment as he pushed them through each day, each hour of every one of those days. Sail drill, and more drill against Herrick's watch, while he himself made sure all engaged knew he was following their efforts. He made the men on Undine's three masts race each other in their struggle to shorten or make more sail, until finally he drove them even harder to work not in competition but as a gasping, silently cursing team.

  Now, as he sat with the mug in his hands he found some grudging satisfaction in what they had done. What they had achieved together, willingly or otherwise. When Undine dropped her anchor in the roads of Santa Cruz today, the watching Spaniards would see a semblance of order and discipline, of efficiency which they had come to know and fear in times of war.

  But if he had driven his company to the limit he had not spared himself either. And he was feeling it, despite the inviting rays of early sunshine which made reflections dance across the low deckhead. Barely a watch had passed without his going on deck to lend his presence. Lieutenant Davy had little experience of handling a ship in foul weather, but would learn, given time. Soames was too prone to lose patience when faced with a disaster on deck. He would knock some luckless seaman aside and leap into his place yelling, `You're useless! I'd rather do it myself!' Only Herrick rode out the storm of Bolitho's persistent demands, and Bolitho felt sorry that his friend had been made to carry the brunt of the work. It was too easy to punish men, when in fact it was an officer's fault for losing his own head, or not being able to find the right words in the teeth of a raging gale. Herrick stood firmly between wardroom and lower deck, and twixt captain and company.

  There had even been two floggings, something which he had hoped to avoid. Each case had been within the private world of the lower deck. The first a simple one of stealing from another sailor's small hoard of money. The second, far more serious, had been a savage knife-fight which had ended in a man having his face opened from ear to jaw. It was still not certain if he would live.

  A real grudge fight, a momentary spark of anger caused by fatigue and constant work, he did not really know. In a welltrained ship of war it was likely he would never have heard about either case. The justice of the lower deck was far more drastic and instant when their own world was threatened by a thief or one too fond of his knife.

  Bolitho despised captains who used authority without consideration for the misery it might entail, who meted out savage punishment without getting to the root of the trouble and thereby avoiding it. Herrick knew how he felt. When Bolitho had first met him he had been the junior lieutenant in his ship. A ship where the previous captain had been so severe, so unthinkingly brutal with his punishments that the seeds of mutiny had been well and truly laid.

  Herrick knew better than most about su
ch things, and yet he had intervened personally to persuade Bolitho to avoid the floggings. It was their first real disagreement, and Bolitho had hated to see the sudden hurt in Herrick's eyes.

  Bolitho had said, `This is a new company. It takes time to weld people together so that each can rely on his companion under all circumstances. Many are entirely ignorant of the Navy's ways and its demands. They hate to see "others" getting away with crimes they themselves avoid. At this stage we cannot allow them to split into separate groups. Old hands and the new recruits, professional criminals and the weak ones who have no protection but to ally themselves with some other faction.'

  Herrick had persisted, `But in peacetime, sir, maybe it takes all the longer.'

  `We can't afford the luxury of finding out.' He had hardened his voice. `You know how I feel. It is not easy.'

  The thief had taken his punishment without a whimper, a dozen lashes at the gratings while Undine had cruised along beneath a clearing sky, some gulls throwing their shadows round and round across the tense drama below.

  As he had read from the Articles of War, Bolitho had looked along his command at the watching men in shrouds and rigging, the sharp red lines of Bellairs' marines, Herrick and all the rest. The second culprit had been a brute of a man called Sullivan. He had volunteered to a recruiting party outside Portsmouth, and had all the looks of a hardened criminal_ But he had served in a King's ship before and should have been an asset.