Copyright & Information

Ramage’s Trial

First published in 1984

Copyright: Kay Pope; House of Stratus 1984-2010

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

The right of Dudley Pope to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.

This edition published in 2010 by House of Stratus, an imprint of

Stratus Books Ltd., Lisandra House, Fore Street, Looe,

Cornwall, PL13 1AD, UK.

Typeset by House of Stratus.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library and the Library of Congress.

This is a fictional work and all characters are drawn from the author’s imagination.

Any resemblance or similarities to persons either living or dead are entirely coincidental.

www.houseofstratus.com

About the Author

Dudley Bernard Egerton Pope was born in Ashford, Kent on 29 December 1925. When at the tender age of fourteen World War II broke out and Dudley attempted to join the Home Guard by concealing his age. At sixteen, once again using a ruse, he joined the merchant navy a year early, signing papers as a cadet with the Silver Line. They sailed between Liverpool and West Africa, carrying groundnut oil.

Before long, his ship was torpedoed in the Atlantic and a few survivors, including Dudley, spent two weeks in a lifeboat prior to being rescued. His injuries were severe and because of them he was invalided out of the merchant service and refused entry into the Royal Navy when officially called up for active service aged eighteen.

Turning to journalism, he set about ‘getting on with the rest of his life’, as the Naval Review Board had advised him. He graduated to being Naval and Defence correspondent with the London Evening News in 1944. The call of the sea, however, was never far away and by the late 1940’s he had managed to acquire his first boat. In it, he took part in cross-channel races and also sailed off to Denmark, where he created something of a stir, his being one of the first yachts to visit the country since the war.

In 1953 he met Kay, whom he married in 1954, and together they formed a lifelong partnership in pursuit of scholarly adventure on the sea. From 1959 they were based in Porto Santo Stefano in Italy for a few years, wintering on land and living aboard during the summer. They traded up boats wherever possible, so as to provide more living space, and Kay Pope states:

‘In September 1963, we returned to England where we had bought the 53 foot cutter Golden Dragon and moved on board where she lay on the east coast. In July 1965, we cruised down the coasts of Spain and Portugal, to Gibraltar, and then to the Canary Islands. Early November of the same year we then sailed across the Atlantic to Barbados and Grenada, where we stayed three years.

Our daughter, Victoria was 4 months old when we left the UK and 10 months when we arrived in Barbados. In April 1968, we moved on board ‘Ramage’ in St Thomas, US Virgin Islands and lost our mainmast off St Croix, when attempting to return to Grenada.’

The couple spent the next nine years cruising between the British Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico, before going to Antigua in 1977 and finally St.Martin in 1979.

The sea was clearly in Pope’s blood, his family having originated in Padstow, Cornwall and later owning a shipyard in Plymouth. His great-grandfather had actually preceded him to the West Indies when in 1823, after a spell in Canada, he went to St.Vincent as a Methodist missionary, before returning to the family business in Devon.

In later life, Dudley Pope was forced to move ashore because of vertigo and other difficulties caused by injuries sustained during the war. He died in St.Martin in 1997, where Kay now lives. Their daughter, Victoria, has in turn inherited a love of the sea and lives on a sloop, as well as practising her fatherșs initial profession of journalism.

As an experienced seaman, talented journalist and historian, it was a natural progression for Pope to write authoritative accounts of naval battles and his first book, Flag 4: The Battle of Coastal Forces in the Mediterranean, was published in 1954. This was followed in 1956 by the Battle of the River Plate, which remains the most accurate and meticulously researched account of this first turning point for Britain in World War II. Many more followed, including the biography of Sir Henry Morgan, (Harry Morgan’s Way) which has one won wide acclaim as being both scholarly and thoroughly readable. It portrays the history of Britain’s early Caribbean settlement and describes the Buccaneer’s bases and refuges, the way they lived, their ships and the raids they made on the coast of central America and the Spain Main, including the sack of Panama.

Recognising Pope’s talent and eye for detail, C.S. Forrester (the creator of the Hornblower Series) encouraged him to try his hand at fiction. The result, in 1965, was the appearance of the first of the Ramage novels, followed by a further seventeen culminating with Ramage and the Dido which was published in 1989. These follow the career and exploits of a young naval officer, Nicholas Ramage, who was clearly named after Pope’s yacht. He also published the ‘Ned Yorke’ series of novels, which commences as would be expected in the Caribbean, in the seventeenth century, but culminates in ‘Convoy’ and ‘Decoy’ with a Ned Yorke of the same family many generations on fighting the Battle of the Atlantic.

All of Dudley Pope’s works are renowned for their level of detail and accuracy, as well as managing to bring to the modern reader an authentic feeling of the atmosphere of the times in which they are set.

Some of the many compliments paid by reviewers of Dudley Pope’s work:

‘Expert knowledge of naval history’- Guardian

“An author who really knows Nelson’s navy” - Observer

‘The best of Hornblower’s successors’ - Sunday Times

‘All the verve and expertise of Forrester’ - Observer

Dedication

For the Ballengers - with thanks

Chapter One

Southwick walked slowly across the quarterdeck to where Ramage stood trying to find some shade from a small awning which, having done so much service in the Tropics, now comprised more patches than original cloth and in places was so threadbare from sun and wind that it provided only a little more shade than a piece of muslin.

“This current is stronger than I’d allowed for,” the master said. “I’d be glad if you’d make up your mind in the next few hours, sir, because it might save us a hard beat against both wind and current…”

Ramage nodded agreeably because in fact he had at last decided. The choice had been simple – they had sailed northwest along the South American coast from French Guiana, shepherding their two prizes captured off Devil’s Island, and he had to decide whether to make for Barbados or Antigua.

Barbados, being further out in the Atlantic, a sentry box guarding the Windward and Leeward Islands running north and south like a fence dividing the Caribbean from the Atlantic, meant they had to turn a point or two to starboard and hope that the flagship of the admiral commanding “His Majesty’s ships and vessels upon the Windward Island station” was anchored in Carlisle Bay.

With luck the admiral would be very short of frigates and only too glad to buy in the two prizes to add to his force – no commander-in-chief ever had enough frigates, and two unexpected prizes coming up from the south would be like a quart of fresh water to a parched man.

The admiral might let the Calypso sail at once for England – he should, since she was sailing under another admiral’s orders. However, many convoys assembled at Barbados for the long haul across the Atlantic to England, and what admiral could resist ordering an extra homeward-bound frigate to join the escort? Ramage guessed that, even worse, few if any admirals could resist putting Captain Ramage in command of a convoy and escort, which would mean a long and tedious voyage home.

Antigua, the alternative choice, was likely to have the other admiral there, the one commanding the King’s ships on the Leeward Islands station. Whoever he was at the moment – Ramage seemed to recall that it was Hervey – would be in a very bad temper because he probably had his flagship in English Harbour, which with its mosquitoes, unpleasant and windless anchorage, and notoriously corrupt dockyard staff, made most officers rage against it. One of the most vocal had of course been Rear-Admiral Nelson (when a captain), whom Ramage once remembered getting very angry over the corruption of the Antigua merchants who were busy trading with the Americans in clear defiance of the Navigation Acts.

Ramage recalled the long days and nights spent in English Harbour refitting the Calypso after capturing her from the French and the constant rows with the master shipwright, master attendant, boatswain and (worst of all) the “storekeeping and naval officer”, each of whom regarded the King’s stores as personal investments upon which they could draw, selling cordage, canvas (and probably even spars) to merchant ships, illegally and at grossly inflated prices.

Men who were likely to know reckoned that the dockyard minions vied with local businessmen for the size of their profits – with the advantage that they took no risk (the King’s stores being delivered there in the King’s ships) and faced no competition: a merchant ship with blown-out sails was forced to buy more canvas; those with sprung masts or yards rarely carried any spares and the master might visit the dockyard with a sorry story but he had to have hard cash in his purse.

After all the strain of the past few weeks, which had started when he had been forced to leave his new bride on board one of the King’s ships off Brest as the Treaty of Amiens collapsed and war started once again, Ramage decided he could not face the heat, stink and corruption of English Harbour.

He turned to Southwick. “Make it Barbados,” he said.

The master, his white hair streaming in the wind like a freshly dried mop, gave a knowing grin. “I’d already put my money on it, sir, and took the liberty of keeping up to windward. Is it all right if I pass the word to the ship’s company, sir? Most of them hate Antigua, too, but they like Barbados, even if it does mean a convoy for us.”

He waved towards the two prize frigates following the Calypso, one on each quarter. “It’s been a profitable voyage for the lads – I reckon they’re a fair way to becoming the wealthiest seamen in the Navy. You don’t often come home with less than a couple of prizes!”

“That makes you one of the Navy’s wealthiest masters!” Ramage said, teasingly.

“Reckon I am,” Southwick said cheerfully, “and all of it safe in the Funds.”

Ramage’s curiosity overcame his usual tact. Southwick had served with him from the day he was given his first command (it seemed so many years ago that a very young Lieutenant Ramage was given seemingly impossible orders by Commodore Nelson, and by a glorious stroke of luck had managed to carry them out successfully). Now he and Southwick shared the bond that comes from having death beckon them many times. “Who inherits the Southwick riches?”

Southwick looked so embarrassed that Ramage could have bitten his tongue. “My sister (as you know, she’s my only living relative, and she’s been a spinster all her life), well, she’s provided for, so she’ll never need again, and then what’s left will be a sort of thank you.” With that the master excused himself, saying he had some more work to do on the chart.

The three seamen sitting at the table were chatting and teasing each other with the easy familiarity that comes from often-shared dangers. The tall, sandy-haired man who had a natural authority ran his fingers through his thinning hair. “So it’s Barbados,” he commented. “I guessed the captain wouldn’t choose Antigua, after the trouble we had refitting this ship there.”

“Nor me neither, Jacko,” said Stafford, the Cockney in the trio. “Not after the way those dockyard people behaved. Reckon they’re rich men now, on the Calypso alone. Nasty lot, they are; they’ve turned on their own people.”

“But the Calypso’s just one of dozens of ships,” said the plump, black-haired man whose accent betrayed his Italian origins. “They all get cheated.”

Rossi, known to most of his shipmates as Rosey, in fact came from Genoa and was a volunteer in the Royal Navy, although since Bonaparte had later turned Genoa into the capital of the Ligurian Republic, the French might now claim that Rossi was a traitor to the French cause. Ramage had always assumed Rossi’s original departure from Genoa was connected more with disagreement over the law rather than any personal disagreement with Bonaparte’s politics. Not that it mattered; he was a fine seaman with uncomplicated loyalty: he was loyal to his friends (who were serving in his ship) and particularly Jackson and Stafford. He reserved for Captain Ramage what a priest (if Rossi had ever talked to one, which was doubtful) would call idolatry. Ramage’s fluent Italian – he could mimic most of the regional accents – and deep love and knowledge of Italy made him Rossi’s liege lord, if such things still existed.

“Still,” Stafford said cheerfully, “the Calypso’s made us rich too. And the Triton brig before her, and then the Kathleen cutter.”

“Ah,” Jackson interjected, “they’ve made us rich because we’ve risked our necks: we’ve used them to kill Frenchmen and capture their ships. If there’s no risk, there’s no profit; I’ve learned that much. But what did the storekeeper at English Harbour ever do to justify making a penny out of us? Or the boatswain, or the master shipwright, and all the rest of that sticky-fingered crowd of time-servers who are always lurking around there? Still, yellow jack or blackwater fever might yet take ’em off before they get home to spend their loot. It’s an unhealthy spot, Antigua. Especially English Harbour, which has a fine cemetery ready for ’em. Come to think of it, some of the early ones must be there already!”

“The survivors should all be put in the Clink,” Stafford said emphatically.

“The Clink?” asked a puzzled Rossi. “Where’s that? We’ve never been there – have we?”

“You and I haven’t,” Jackson commented, “but I couldn’t be sure about Staff. Go on, you tell him, Staff.”

“I don’t know what Jacko is being so clever about. The Clink – well, it’s the prison in Southwark. Leastways, any prison’s called a clink by the villains: comes from the clinking of their leg irons. But the original Clink was at Southwark – in London, on the south side of the river – where the vagabonds couldn’t be arrested. A sort of…”

“Sanctuary,” Jackson supplied.

“Yus, that’s it: a sanker wherry. Dunno whether it was legal or if them as was going to do the arrestin’ was just scared of goin’ in there.”

“I’ll remember that,” Rossi said.

“’Ere, now listen,” Stafford said hurriedly. “The sanker wherry bit was long ago. ’Undreds of years, maybe. Today, that Clink is a clink, like all the other clinks: just a prison.”

“I’ll remember,” Rossi assured the Cockney. “If I go to London it is to collect my prize money and I’ll stay at an inn, not a clink.”

“They don’t always give you the choice,” Stafford said darkly and shook a warning finger. “And watch out for them women; very light-fingered, some of them.”

“We have them in Genoa, too,” Rossi said reassuringly. “What do you reckon we’ll share out for the two French frigates, Jacko?”

“Depends,” Jackson said. “If the admiral in Barbados is short of frigates (he probably will be) he might pay a good price. Though of course his price has to be approved by the Admiralty. The Navy Board, rather. But they’re good ships: no rot; no action damage; sails, spars and cordage in good condition – for Frenchies, anyway. Maybe he’ll pay £10 a ton for each hull, so that’ll be about £7,000 apiece, plus sails, cordage and stores. Hmm…about £10,000. That’ll be some £2,500 shared out among us seamen. Doubled, of course, ’cos there are two ships.”

Rossi was faster than Stafford in working out an individual share, which in any case varied with the man’s rank. He nodded contentedly, and said: “If this war ever ends, and if we all live to see that day, I shall go back to Genoa a rich man. I may even become a latifondista: ha, that would be a joke!”

Stafford tried to repeat the word but said sympathetically: “It’s somefing you get from rich livin’? Perhaps mercury’ll cure it, since it helps the venereals. Seems unlucky if you get it, having fought so hard for your money.”

Rossi laughed and waved a reassuring hand. “No, Staff, is not a disease, a latifondista. Is a big landowner who lives somewhere else on the rents. He has tenants on his land.”

“Oh, so it’s all right being one, then?”

“If you can afford it, yes. Maybe I’ll be able to live a rich life in London knowing my tenants are working hard in, say, Piedmont, which is near Genoa.”

Jackson saw that Stafford was still puzzled and explained: “‘Landed gentry’ – that’s what he’ll be. Like the Duke of Shinbone living in Whitehall although his money comes from a big estate up in North Britain.”

Stafford’s eyes lit up. “Say, Jacko, if Rosey can live in London on his prize money like the Duke of Shinbone, what about me? I’d make a good Duke of Hambone, and I’d buy an estate nearer to London than North Britain. Somewhere down in Cornwall, say.”

“So you can watch the pretty ships sail out of Plymouth, eh?” Jackson said sarcastically. “And all your pretty daughters can stand on the Hoe with their chaperones and wave the sailors goodbye!”

“It’d suit me,” Stafford said happily, “s’long as the sailors don’t get too close.”

“Why so?” Rossi asked.

“I wouldn’t trust those dam’ sailors wiv my daughters,” Stafford declared. “I know what they’re like with pretty girls!”

Jackson shook his head. “No dukes and latifondisti for me. Just a nice comfortable coaching inn; I just fancy myself as ‘mine host’.”

“All that truckling to the rich gentry,” Stafford complained. “‘Fetch some more port, my good man!’”

“Won’t worry me because I’ll be truckling them a big bill as well. And if they aren’t the likes of Mr Ramage, then we shan’t have any rooms available.”

“We?” Stafford asked derisively. “So the Jonathan will take himself a wife, eh? Some poor and innocent English girl will get herself lured by your sweet American promises…”

“I’ll keep ’em, that’s for sure,” Jackson said, and Rossi recognized another lonely man who had come to terms with the unpleasant fact that he would never settle down in the land of his birth. That, Rossi knew well by now, was the penalty of travelling. A man crossed distant horizons and sometimes found beyond them lands which were greener or more welcoming…where it was easier to find a good job, a comfortable home, a sympathetic wife…Where one did not have to lock the door and secure the windows, nor risk arrest by secret police who spirited a man away so his family never saw him again. England, Rossi had long since decided, did not have as much sun as Genoa, but it bred the likes of Mr Ramage, and every man was born with as much freedom as he needed. And anyway he now had enough prize money to stay well clear of the clink…

The Calypso seemed to be sliding into Carlisle Bay like a skater on ice: the light wind scattered wavelets across the half-moon bay. Looking over the side, Ramage was once again delighted by the deep blue of the sea gradually shading into the faintest of blues and greens as it shallowed and was edged here and there by coral reefs. He had spent enough time in the Tropics to be able to judge the depth of water by the colour – what seemed barely a fathom, hardly enough to float a jolly-boat rowed by half a dozen men, was often deep enough to let a ship of the line swim without risk. Still, when approaching an anchored flagship it was wise to have a man in the chains heaving the lead and singing out the depths in the monotonous voice that it was all too easy not to notice.

The gunner was standing by ready to fire the salute to the admiral (a rear-admiral received thirteen guns, but if he was also a commander-in-chief he received seventeen). Paolo Orsini, midshipman and rapidly growing into a lean and handsome youth, as well as being a fine seaman, was standing by with his telescope, ready to read off immediately first the flag which would reveal the exact rank of the flag officer and then the hoist of flags by which the flagship told the Calypso where to anchor.

The place indicated by a bearing and distance was usually where any reasonably competent captain would in any case anchor his ship, but admirals (or more likely those around him) liked to exercise the brief authority granted them by pointing out the obvious.

“Red ensign with a white ball,” Orsini reported and added, unnecessarily, “the commander-in-chief is a rear-admiral of the red.” A few minutes later he followed that with: “Flagship about to hoist a signal, sir,” having caught sight of a couple of seamen handling coloured bunting and preparing to hoist away at a signal halyard.

Ramage glanced forward to the fo’c’sle where Southwick was waiting with a couple of dozen seamen, like a shepherd standing on a hillock with his flock, ready to let go an anchor at the given signal.

More men were standing by, preparing to trim the yards and braces; others were at the shrouds, ready to swarm aloft to furl the Calypso’s topsail. The fore and main course were already furled, and Ramage was taking the ship in under topsails. With the wind as light as this it was a slow job, but as far as Ramage was concerned few admirals worth their salt were impressed by young frigate captains tearing into crowded anchorages under a press of sail, anchoring and furling with a flourish. Too many admirals had seen too many anchored ships hit by new arrivals to offer any encouragement, and signalling a ship where to anchor certainly slowed down the gamblers and calmed show-offs.

Paolo read out the signal giving a bearing and distance, and by eye, without having to bend over the azimuth compass, Ramage saw that he had guessed correctly and the Calypso was already heading for the position, with her two prizes astern like two swans obediently following the cob.

Ramage lifted the speaking trumpet to his lips after giving an order to the quartermaster, who swiftly passed it on to the two men at the wheel. Slowly the frigate turned into the wind; another order saw the maintopsail furled, followed by the mizentopsail. As she headed into the wind it pressed on the forward side of the Calypso’s foretopsail, pushing it against the mast like a hand on a man’s chest and slowly brought the ship to a stop. Ramage then bent over the compass, checking the bearings given in the flagship’s signal. He noted the distance, and waited for the Calypso to gather sternway. He walked to the ship’s side and looked down at the water. A tangled strand of floating seaweed which had been floating past now slowly stopped alongside and then began to move ahead. Or, Ramage corrected himself for the thousandth time in his career, the ship had begun to move astern. He gave another order to the quartermaster because now the rudder’s effect was being reversed and, looking ahead to make sure that Southwick was watching him, he lifted his right arm vertically.

Seamen let go the anchor. The splash of its thirty-seven hundredweight, almost two tons, hitting the water was followed by the cable (it was hemp, seventeen inches in circumference, as thick as a man’s lower thigh) which snaked over the side, leaving a haze of smoke at the hawse as its friction scorched the wood. Southwick watched from the bulwark and as it slowed and stopped for a few moments gave the signal for the men to snub it round the bitts. The Calypso, pushed astern by her backed topsail, which was being braced round to keep it square to the wind, then kept a steady strain on the cable, and Southwick gave the order to veer more. Finally he signalled to Ramage that the Calypso was safely anchored. The holding ground in Carlisle Bay was good, but in many islands weed on the bottom, or sunken palm fronds, made anchors drag.

Ramage shouted down to the gunner: “Begin the salute!”

The first gun on the starboard side spurted smoke and its sharp crack – being unshotted there was no boom – echoing and reechoing across the bay sent the sleepy-looking pelicans into the air after their usual ungainly run across the surface of the water, and it set the black-headed gulls wheeling and screaming in protest at the interruption in their hunt for the fish scraps left by the pelicans.

Ramage could imagine the gunner muttering the time-honoured phrases used to time the salute – words which when spoken reasonably quickly took five seconds: “If I wasn’t a gunner I wouldn’t be here…Number two gun fire!” And repeating the phrase to himself reminded him yet again that he must replace the gunner: the man was useless, running a mile faster than take a ha’porth of responsibility and completely unsuited to the Calypso. But changing a gunner was a tedious business: it was not a question of applying to the commander-in-chief, as one would to change an unsatisfactory lieutenant. No, a gunner was appointed by the Board of Ordnance, which of course was part of the Army. Guns and gunnery in the King’s ships was the Army’s affair – at least by tradition. Gunners were examined and given their warrants by the Board of Ordnance, which also arranged for the casting of guns and shot and provided the powder. Thus changing a gunner (or such an application by a ship’s captain) was likely to be seen by the Army as a criticism, and the application would end up in the pigeon-hole reserved by the clerks for the paper to smother in dust.

Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen…and that was it: the commander-in-chief of His Majesty’s ships and vessels upon the Windward Island station had received the salute due to him by a ship visiting his station from some distant part.

Southwick joined Ramage at the fore end of the quarterdeck and commented: “I can almost see the sun reflecting on the telescope lenses! They must be wondering how the devil we collected those two!” He gestured to the two prizes now anchoring astern.

“Yes, any moment the flagship will hoist the signal for me to go over to report. But I want you to start getting our men back on board here from the prizes as soon as they have anchored. Just leave a dozen behind in each one.”

Southwick nodded: no explanation was needed because everywhere in the world any one of the King’s ships was short of men, but here in the West Indies, where sickness was the enemy, not the French, many of the frigates and smaller ships were being sailed with half their official complement of men. Since sickness, mostly the black vomit, did not distinguish between officers and men, promotion could be rapid for both lieutenants and captains – but equally the appointments could be brief, and one of the most prosperous men in Barbados was the mason carving names and dates on marble headstones in the cemetery (the wording was carefully copied out and sent home to relatives).

“Boat leaving the flagship with a lieutenant on board, sir,” Paolo Orsini reported. “Heading our way.”

“The admiral smells his share of prize money,” Southwick muttered as Ramage went below to his cabin to change his uniform and put on his sword. A brief but comprehensive “Report of Proceedings” waited on his desk: it lacked only the name of the admiral, which he had yet to discover.

Ten minutes later a young lieutenant arrived on board and was brought down to the cabin, where he introduced himself as Lieutenant Newick. He told Ramage that the admiral wished him to make his report as soon as possible. “The two prizes,” he said hesitantly. “We had no idea that there were two such French frigates in the area, although we guessed we might see you.”

“Oh – why was that?” asked a puzzled Ramage. What could have brought him to the commander-in-chief’s notice?

The lieutenant looked embarrassed. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have mentioned it, sir. There’s a letter from the Admiralty waiting for you, and the admiral had one at the same time. Came out in the last Post Office packet that arrived a week ago.”

“Let’s go,” Ramage said. He could think of no reason why Their Lordships should be writing to him, but despite the heat of the tropical sun coming down through the Calypso’s deck, he felt a sudden chill. The unexpected was usually unwelcome: so far he had learned that much about life.

Chapter Two

Rear-Admiral Edwin Tewtin greeted Ramage at the entryport of his flagship the Queen with what Ramage later described to Southwick as well controlled amiability lightly cloaked with a curiosity which was clearly as painful to ignore as a nagging toothache.

After all the formalities of a little-known rear-admiral (commanding one of the Royal Navy’s smallest stations) finding himself greeting one of the most famous of the Navy’s young frigate captains had been completed – with a pardonable amount of wariness on either side – Tewtin led the way down to his cabin and waved Ramage to the comfortable chair, sitting down opposite him while Lieutenant Newick perched nervously to one side in a straight-backed seat.

Ramage saw at once that Tewtin had probably not (so far, anyway) done well from prize money: the furniture in the great cabin verged on being spartan; the curtains bunched on either side of the sternlights would have been appropriate in one of the public rooms of a small but busy coaching inn; the rows of wine glasses nesting in a rack on the bulkhead above the sideboard could have come from the bar parlour, and the buckles on the admiral’s shoes were made of pinchbeck, not gold.

None of which, Ramage told himself, necessarily made Rear-Admiral Tewtin any less efficient as a flag officer, and might indeed indicate heavy expenses at home – many a man had been ruined through inheriting a large estate without the money to run it, or acquiring a wife whose style outranged his purse.

Although Ramage waited a minute or two, expecting Tewtin to hand over the Admiralty letter, the man made no move, and his desk was bare. He looked up at Ramage and asked: “You have a written report of your proceedings?”

Ramage bent down to open the canvas pouch he had leaned against the side of the chair, but Tewtin said: “I’ll read that later. Just tell me what brings you here with two French frigates as prizes.”

And now, Ramage thought to himself, choose your words carefully. He had written orders from the commander-in-chief of the Channel Fleet, Admiral Clinton, for the operation he had just carried out, and these concluded that the Calypso should then return to England and report direct to the Admiralty (leaving Admiral Clinton happily distant in the event of failure). There was nothing to prevent Rear-Admiral Tewtin holding on to the two prizes (indeed, Ramage hoped he would, after he had bought them in).

“It’s a bit of a long story, sir,” Ramage said apologetically.

“Well, keep it short: you’re here now; where did you start from?” Tewtin smirked at Newick, as if to indicate that famous young captains were really rather silly fellows who needed a guiding hand from admirals like Tewtin.

“At a friend’s château near Brest, where I was spending my honeymoon, sir.”

The smirk left Tewtin’s face, but now he was clearly puzzled: was Ramage teasing him, or…“Honeymoon? Did you finally marry that Italian woman?”

“You mean the Marchesa di Volterra, sir?” His voice was just cold enough to point out Tewtin’s lapse.

“Yes, I think that was her name.”

“No,” Ramage said shortly. “At the signing of the Treaty she returned to the Kingdom of Volterra – of which she is the ruler.”

“But…well, Bonaparte must have had her arrested when the war started again.”

“Probably. I have her nephew serving with me. She was not to be persuaded to stay in England.”

Now Tewtin realized he had blundered but he could see no way out. “Er, you did say you were on your honeymoon? Who was the lucky woman?”

“Yes, sir – I married the daughter of the Marquis of Rockley.”

The embarrassed smirk vanished from Tewtin’s face as though a barber had wiped off shaving soap: he realized that with a few ill-chosen remarks he might have antagonized the son of the Earl of Blazey (who was still an admiral of the white although retired), referred to an Italian woman as though she was a tart (and now found out she in fact ruled an Italian state) and then discovered that this young puppy Ramage had married the daughter of a marquis (who had been the most powerful man in India and presumably had enormous influence with the present government in London).

It would be hard, Tewtin thought ruefully, for a rear-admiral near the bottom of the flag list who had been lucky enough to get this job (and it was luck; he admitted that) to drop so many bricks in so short a time – less than five minutes. Anyway, the last had hit the deck; now he would handle Ramage carefully.

“May I congratulate you?” Tewtin said. “‘All the world loves a lover’, eh? You were describing your honeymoon.”

“Hardly that, sir,” Ramage said tightly. “I said I was staying near Brest on my honeymoon.”

“Of course, of course. At a friend’s château when the war started again, I think you said.”

Ramage nodded. “Yes sir. Bonaparte’s police arrested my friend, but my wife and I managed to escape. At the same time, the ship’s company of one of our brigs mutinied and ran into Brest with her–”

“Yes, yes, I’ve heard from Their Lordships about that.”

“Good,” Ramage said, “that shortens my story. So when we reported to the Channel Fleet–”

Tewtin held up a hand. “Wait! Their Lordships simply warned me that the men had carried the ship in and sent me a list of their names.”

Ramage deliberately gave a gentle sigh, hoping Tewtin would take the hint. “You asked me to start at the beginning and keep my story brief, sir, but there are some details I have to give to make sense of it.”

“I do understand, my boy; go on,” Tewtin said encouragingly.

“After my wife and I escaped from the château we had to think of a way of getting back to England, and also see if we could rescue our host–”

“Your duty was to return to England and report at once to the Admiralty,” Tewtin said heavily, like a bishop admonishing an errant deacon.

“Of course, sir, but we had no transport, and our host was a friend–”

“Friend!” Tewtin almost exploded, slapping the arm of his chair for emphasis. “Surely you put your duty to your King before your social obligations to a friend – a Frenchman, I presume!”

“–a friend of the Prince of Wales,” Ramage finished his sentence.

“You don’t mean that you were staying with…”

“The Count of Rennes is an old friend of my family, and of course apart from being a leader of the French Royalists who fled to England, he is a close friend of the Prince.”

Tewtin hauled a large handkerchief from his pocket as though, Ramage thought, he was letting fall the Queen’s foretopsail. The admiral mopped his brow, rubbed the sides of his nose vigorously to give himself time to think, then found he had wiped the whole of his face and brow without thinking of anything: the crash of falling bricks was leaving him stunned. “Do go on,” he urged Ramage.

“Well, sir, at the same time that we found the Count had been put on board a French frigate with many other Royalist prisoners to be transported to Devil’s Island, my wife and I and some French fishermen (Royalists, of course) managed to recapture the Murex brig that had mutinied after the villains had been taken off by the French, and sailed in time to meet the Channel Fleet, which was just arriving off Brest to resume the blockade.”

Tewtin had many questions to ask but managed to restrict himself to nodding approvingly. A nod was safe, he realized.

“By chance my own frigate, the Calypso, was in the Fleet and I was put in command again.” Ramage saw no reason to elaborate on how that came about. “Anyway, as soon as Admiral Clinton heard that a French frigate was already on its way to Devil’s Island with the Count and many other Royalists, I was sent in pursuit, my wife returning to England in the Murex brig.”

Tewtin, thinking that was the end of Ramage’s story, nodded and said: “But you picked up a couple of prizes, anyway. I’m sure the Count will survive, although he’s in a very horrible place at this moment.”

“Oh, he’ll survive, sir,” Ramage said reassuringly, a tight smile on his face. “Just a touch of fever.”

“What is?” asked a puzzled Tewtin. “Fever?”

“The Count, sir. He is on board the Calypso but developed a bout of fever a couple of days ago.”

Tewtin jumped to his feet. “Good God, man! Bring him over to the flagship! He must be my guest. Here–” he waved at Lieutenant Newick, “have this cabin prepared for him. Warn Captain Woods that I shall be moving into his quarters–”

“Sir,” Ramage said quietly, “I don’t think the Count will move from the Calypso. Apart from anything else, his main concern is to get to England as quickly as possible.”

“I don’t want any argument from you about this,” Tewtin said firmly. “He will be my guest, and that’s that. Have him sent over in a boat – no, I’ll send over my barge. That will be more comfortable for a sick man.”

“Sir, please leave the Count where he is: he anticipated your kindness,” Ramage said tactfully, “and was most emphatic that he should stay in the Calypso.” Suddenly Ramage thought of another excuse. “He prefers to talk French: in fact, he is so weakened by the fever that he has great difficulty in speaking English. Do you have a fluent French speaker…?”

“Well, as long as you have faith in your surgeon,” Tewtin said grudgingly. “But I would be most distressed if the Prince of Wales…most distressed,” he repeated, without elaborating.

Ramage thought of his men on board the prizes and then decided not to mention them. Southwick would be retrieving the men as soon as the prizes had been cleared by the quarantine authorities. It would be better to leave Rear-Admiral Tewtin to sleep on the thought that he had two extra frigates if he wanted them, and to reflect on why he should not delay a friend of the Prince of Wales.

“I have a number of other Royalists on board, sir,” Ramage said and, noting the gleam in Tewtin’s eye, hurriedly added: “They are very frightened that Bonaparte will take reprisals against their families in France, so they are very anxious that their names be kept secret. You will appreciate that they do not want to be invited to any receptions. In fact, I rather fear the Count will expect to hear our sailing date when I return on board.”

“But you have to water and provision, surely?” Tewtin said. “And the prizes – buying them in: I have to have them surveyed and valued…it all takes time.”

“Indeed, sir,” Ramage said soothingly, knowing that having Tewtin on board to meet the Count in a day or so would work wonders: it would give the admiral something to tell his wife about in his next letter home.

Tewtin suddenly snapped his fingers and shook his head, as though irritated with himself. “There’s a letter for you from the Admiralty – from Lord St Vincent, I believe.” He waved a hand at Newick. “Fetch it – you should have reminded me.”

Again Ramage felt the strange chill. It was not a change in orders, telling him to take the Calypso or the Count to, say, Jamaica instead of England, because Their Lordships had no idea that Jean-Jacques had been rescued. There were (he finally forced himself to face the fact) no letters waiting for him from Sarah when he had expected a couple of dozen at least: she would have written every day, even if only writing letters like a diary, but she would have posted several. Lord St Vincent would certainly have sent a message telling her that a Post Office packet left for Barbados on regular dates and would carry any letters she had ready.

“Sir,” Newick said, and Ramage realized he had been repeating the word several times as he held out a packet with the familiar Admiralty seal.

“Thank you,” Ramage said automatically and picked up the canvas pouch. He dropped the packet into the pouch and took out his report of proceedings, handing it to Tewtin.

The rear-admiral saw it was a lengthy document and realized it was bound to take several pages to reduce to writing the story which Ramage had paraphrased.

“Very well, my boy, I will read this and we’ll have the prizes surveyed and valued as soon as possible. You’ll soon be on your way,” he added jovially. “You to return to your new wife; the Count to call on the Prince of Wales. Although I haven’t read your report yet, it does seem to me you have done an outstanding job. Off you go, then, and do assure the Count he would be very welcome and I will get passages for the other French Royalists in the next convoy for England.”

The Queen’s boat taking Ramage back to the Calypso seemed to go so slowly that to him the seamen might have been ancients rowing through molasses. He climbed on board, nodded to Aitken who, as first lieutenant, was waiting at the entryport to greet him, and went straight down to his cabin. The canvas pouch seemed to be weighing a hundredweight by now; Lord St Vincent’s letter appeared in his imagination as a harbinger of some nameless evil he could not imagine.

He tossed the pouch on his desk and sat down at the chair. Steady, he told himself, it’s only a packet. Probably just a private letter from St Vincent with a message for the Count from the Prince of Wales, or perhaps some advice on how to deal with it all (the Earl would have to assume that Ramage had been successful). And judging from the thickness of the packet, there were fresh orders, too. Nor would that be unusual. He had been sent across the Atlantic on the orders of Admiral Clinton, commanding the Channel Fleet, but it had all been a highly irregular proceeding because of the emergency. With the Prince of Wales now involved, it would be quite normal for the Admiralty to take control again. Which is what the letter must be about. And, he asked himself, what was he getting so depressed about? Just break the seal and read the stylized wording, hallowed by tradition…He reached for the paper-knife and slid it under the seal. Slowly he unfolded the cover. Inside was one sealed letter marked “Personal and Private”, and another which was clearly orders.

“My dear Ramage,” [the letter began (a glance at the signature showed it was from the First Lord),] “regard this letter as relaying a rumour, not necessarily fact, but I feel it my duty to keep you informed about such a delicate matter. As you know, Admiral Clinton sent back to England the Murex brig which you so skilfully cut out of Brest, and she was bringing home Lady Ramage and the former captain of the Calypso.”

And that, Ramage noted, was a very discreet way of describing that drunken scoundrel, and he could imagine the Earl then wondering how to describe Sarah. The First Lord knew Ramage did not use his title in the service, but Sarah was titled both as the daughter of the Marquis and as the wife of an earl’s son who bore one of his father’s titles.

Ramage suddenly jerked himself out of the reverie: Earl St Vincent, a man who could make sword steel look like putty, was not a man who ordinarily relayed rumours.

“The Murex brig was due in Spithead two weeks ago. She has not yet arrived. The weather has been good with a brisk southwester blowing – and a messenger was sent to Plymouth with orders that I should be notified the moment she arrives. All the other southern ports have been similarly instructed.

“Thus it is my unpleasant duty to inform you that at the time the messenger leaves for Falmouth with this letter in tonight’s pouch, we have no news. I have talked with your father and with the Marquis, and while both agree with me that there are many possible reasons why the Murex should not have arrived, ranging from dismasting to taking a prize and having to shepherd her in, we all felt that you should be informed, which I have now done, and remain your obedient servant, St Vincent.”

Sarah was, at best, a prisoner of the French. At worst she had been killed or drowned when the brig was captured or sunk by bad weather or a French ship of war or privateer. A brief honeymoon and, because of some mutinous scoundrels and a drunken young post-captain, she was dead. Killed because she had been witless enough to fall in love with Nicholas Ramage.

The cabin darkened and shrank round him: his body tightened as an uncontrollable spasm drove out every thought except the one that he had dreaded – Sarah was dead. He was alone, and had lost the love he had begun to despair of ever finding. Yes, he had earlier loved Gianna, but that had eventually only served as a yardstick by which he could measure the depth of his love for Sarah. He began to curse the injustice of it: many couples had twenty, thirty and even more years of marriage before one or other of them went over the standing part of the foresheet. But he and Sarah had been together, as man and wife, for how long – a month? They had known each other for a few months. The stark, blinding unfairness of it all. Why Sarah? Why hadn’t a roundshot cut him in half instead? This thought calmed him down. Lord St Vincent was not saying that she was dead: only that she was dead or a prisoner, and given the usual ratio of casualties in an action, the odds were ninety-eight to one that she had been taken prisoner.

How a crowd of French privateersmen would treat a woman prisoner sent another muscle-tightening spasm of rage through his body, but to have her alive…Then he felt himself calming slightly: it was impossible to imagine Sarah dead. Yet surely all lovers must feel their partners were immortal: bereavement was what happened to other couples.

He suddenly realized that for two or three minutes there had been a steady knocking at his door, and the Marine sentry’s call was now being reinforced by the agitated calls of Aitken and Southwick.

“Come in!” he called and the door flung open, Aitken almost sprawling as he rushed through, crouched so that his head did not hit the beams. He stared at Ramage sitting at the desk but jerked as Southwick, head down, bumped into him.

Aitken was quick to recover. “Sorry, sir, but you didn’t answer.”

“I was thinking,” Ramage said lamely, “but come in and shut the door.” He saw both men were pale under their tans, and although Aitken might be satisfied with the explanation, Southwick certainly was not: the old master had served with him so long that his role had slowly changed to – well, what? A benevolent grandfather dependent on his grandson’s largesse? Anyway, the old man was now standing over him, a puzzled look creasing his face. “Are you sure everything is all right, sir?”

Ramage thought for a moment. If he did not tell them now, he would have to keep the news to himself all the way to England, like a man nursing a guilty secret, so now was the time. He held up the First Lord’s letter. “If you can’t read the signature, it’s from Lord St Vincent.”

Southwick sighed, as though he knew from long experience that letters from such heights never carried welcome news, and sat down, giving the page a shake to straighten it out. As he read, Aitken said quietly, by way of explanation: “When you came back from the Queen, sir, your face was white as a sheet. You seemed to be trembling. We thought you’d been struck by one of these sudden fluxes.”

Ramage shook his head and nodded towards the letter that Southwick had just finished reading. The old man’s features were frozen as he handed the letter back to Ramage without a word. Ramage gave it to Aitken, who took the precaution of sitting on the settee first: he had seen the effect on Southwick. He read it through twice, folded it and gave it back to Ramage without comment, but the skin now seemed too tight on his face.

Then Ramage remembered Jean-Jacques. The Count had been entranced by Sarah. And the four Frenchmen, Gilbert, Louis, Auguste and Albert, who had come to serve in the Calypso after helping to capture the Murex brig: they regarded Sarah as a woman among women for the part she had played.

He was bewildered; he pulled himself together enough to realize that. But the news of Sarah had torn a piece of himself away: the part that had feelings, that told him what to do…