The Straits of Tsushima: An action-packed historical military adventure (Marcus Baxter Naval Thrillers Book 1)

by Tim Chant

  Juneau looked him up and down critically, then nodded and straightened his pocket square. “You pass muster,” he said. “Shall we?”

  The Imperial Russian Navy maintained similar hours to that of Britain, and Tangier’s early afternoon sun beat down on them as they emerged on deck. Sweat prickled Baxter’s face and hands and he felt his colour rise, but the heat was not the only reason.

  Countess Ekaterina was joining the dinner party. The further they got from Mother Russia, the less the Juneaus seemed to care about keeping up appearances. She was in a dress that befitted a lady of her station, involving a great deal of white lace, and her hair was in the latest style. Her eyes were bright with merriment and a smile curved her generous mouth.

  “Mr Baxter,” she greeted him. “And how are you today?” It was the first time she had spoken to him in English, slightly accented but otherwise flawless.

  Beyond her, the white and tan buildings of Tangier rose, as though they had been carelessly piled, up the slopes above the crowded anchorage. The whole 2nd Pacific Squadron was assembled here, having travelled independently, and the harbour was crowded with steel behemoths. Smaller ships — cruisers and destroyers — fitted in where they could. Boats from the various ships darted about and jostled as officers and crew visited friends and colleagues, their cox’ns bellowing imprecations at the small skiffs of local traders swarming the squadron. He found his attention captivated by this odd, dangerous Russian aristocrat, though.

  She started to look slightly disconcerted, and he realised he had been staring rather than speaking. “I am very well, considering my situation, thank you, Countess,” he said after a brief cough to cover his embarrassment.

  “You have been having quite an adventure!” she declared. “And now dinner on the flagship.”

  Further pleasantries were forestalled by the arrival of Captain Gorchakov. He looked ill at ease, stiff in his starched white uniform, and glared balefully at Baxter. He didn’t speak to any of the other guests, instead went straight over the side, saluted on his way by a full side party.

  “Good to see some things don’t vary between nations,” he commented, then stopped in surprise as the countess made her way to the ladder. Juneau winced as she tucked her skirts closer about her legs and went over the side, running down the ladder nimble as a boy.

  “She refuses a, how do you call it? A bosun’s chair,” Juneau whispered to Baxter. “How she does it in that ridiculous dress is beyond me…”

  Gorchakov’s launch bobbed across the gentle swell in the harbour. Baxter noted that the oarsmen were all neatly turned out and rowed with precision. Most captains liked a certain precision in their boat crews, but there was something about the exact attention to detail compared to how the ship was run that told him a lot about Gorchakov.

  The water the boat slid through was oily and grimy, both fresh detritus from the newly arrived ships and older deposits floating on the surface. It was the same in any port in the world, but the incredible dry heat made the crossing a dreadful experience. The countess sat neatly in the stern with a perfumed handkerchief held to her nose against the vile smell that rose from the water, undisturbed by the still air that lay like a hot blanket over the city.

  Baxter forced his attention away from her as she and her husband engaged in light conversation with the captain. He turned his gaze instead to the floating steel castle they were approaching. The Borodinos, it was clear, were formidable ships. Nothing expressed this more than the massive 12-inch guns, the real ship killers, twin-mounted in a turret fore and aft; the rest of the artillery in turrets and barbettes on her sides merely added to the abiding sense of menace.

  She sat low in the murky water, though, overburdened with supplies — coal above all. He had heard rumours that the sort of luxuries demanded by the Imperial Navy officer corps meant the ships were usually overloaded; he’d not credited them until the last few weeks aboard a Russian ship.

  He looked up from the nearby vessel, taking in the dazzling white ramparts of the old city on the cliffs above, the gleam of the great mosque rising above them. Looking back to the gaggle of Russian ships, old and new, he could see a cruiser flying the White Ensign. Close, but still too far away across the foul water.

  Mercifully, a few more strokes brought them into the Suvorov’s shadow, blocking the tantalising view of the Royal Navy cruiser.

  They went aboard with the same pomp and ceremony as had seen them off from the Yaroslavich, though with considerably more ease as the new battleship had much lower sides. An elegantly attired officer was there to receive them. Gorchakov was stiffly formal, but Juneau greeted the man as an old friend.

  “Mr Baxter, may I present the Chief of Staff to the Admiral, Constantine de Kolong. Captain, Mr Baxter, our … ah … British guest.”

  Constantine de Kolong gave him a formal bow, but not too formal. Baxter nodded affably and adopted a comfortable posture, hands in the pockets of his frock coat. As far as he could see, the only way through this was to maintain the pretence of a merchant sailor completely out of his depth.

  Juneau gave him a hard look, quite obviously seeing what he was doing. He shrugged very slightly. You’ve put me in this position, cully, the gesture said, and the Russian officer smiled slightly as they were led below to the admiral’s state rooms.

  Rozhestvensky, Zinovy P., Vice-Admiral. Much had been written about the man, little of it complimentary in the British press at least. None of it could prepare him for the reality. The Russian Vice-Admiral was big — not as big as Baxter — but carried himself in a way that made him seem larger than life. Dark, intense eyes peered out above a jutting but neat beard — many Russian officers seemed to sport facial hair.

  “My time is short and I have much to do,” Rozhestvensky declared after formal introductions had been made, gesturing them to seats around a table already laid with a variety of dishes. He spoke English, no doubt picked up during his time in Britain in the last century learning gunnery. “Tell me, Mr Baxter, what did you hope to achieve by attacking one of my cruisers?” he continued as they took their seats. “Is killing a particular friend of the Tsar considered such a coup by your intelligence services?”

  An uncomfortable silence fell over the assemblage. Constantine de Kolong, the ADC, had a long-suffering expression on his face that told Baxter this kind of outburst was not unusual.

  Baxter took his time responding, using the cover of being served some indifferent, unknown fish. Rozhestvensky did not like that, and he could see the man stiffening with impatience. “Well, sir,” he said at last. “As I have already told your officers here, I’m no spy and I certainly had no intention of attacking anyone close to your Royal family. I didn’t even know until this moment that there was one aboard. I was merely out for a pleasure cruise when your cruiser set about me.”

  About half of that was true — he’d not had the slightest indication from either Arbuthnott or anyone on the Yaroslavich that there was a Royal favourite aboard. Perhaps one of the younger officers, the midshipmen learning their trade?

  Gorchakov said something in French to Rozhestvensky, speaking low and fast enough that Baxter couldn’t catch it. Rozhestvensky cut him short with a sharp chop of his hand — what would have been considered unacceptable in the RN, even from an admiral of the fleet — and the dour captain subsided, directing a murderous look in Baxter’s direction.

  “And the Royal Navy uniform found in the wreckage? Your crew abandoning ship, aside from the boy captured with you?”

  “As to the first, sir, I can only imagine the chap I bought the yacht from had accidentally left it behind.” Baxter knew he had to tread carefully here. Gorchakov was angry enough with him already, and he did not want to exacerbate that by accusing the man of fabricating evidence. He just wasn’t much of a liar, particularly when put on the spot like this.

  And particularly when a beautiful countess was watching him very carefully indeed. Was she his supposed target? He carefully put his cutlery down.
He’d rather be facing fire or fighting off pirates in the South China sea than dealing with this. “As to the latter — what can I say? Don’t hire Scotchmen to foredeck gorilla, they’ll run for it at the first sign of trouble.”

  Constantine de Kolong laughed nervously, obviously desperate to defuse the tension in the room. Juneau and the countess joined in.

  “The same could be said for your Royal Navy in general.” Rozhestvensky’s flat voice cut across the forced mirth.

  “I understand you took a different tone when Beresford’s cruisers were sailing circles around you,” Baxter snapped back before he could stop himself. He knew he’d regret it, knew he shouldn’t even be standing up for the organisation that cashiered and blackballed him, but dammit… He kept his expression defiant as he looked around the table. “I do think, though, that you were quite right to send Captain Klado on his way at Riga,” he offered, realising he should probably do something to dig himself out of his hole. The Army dug holes and defended them, not the Navy.

  Rozhestvensky continued to stare at him for a second, though there was the slightest hint of a smile on his face. Gorchakov, however, appeared almost incandescent.

  “So glad you approve,” Rozhestvensky said mildly. “A shame your government is being less accommodating.”

  Baxter, wisely, kept his mouth shut at that point, and the dinner proceeded in a sullen silence.

  CHAPTER 7

  Gorchakov’s retribution for Baxter’s speaking out of turn had been swift and merciless. Juneau had appeared entirely apologetic as he broke the news to Baxter not long after they’d returned to the cruiser.

  “He is, you see, very much in agreement with Captain Klado. Which is why he lobbied so hard for his ship to be included in the squadron.”

  “Though I imagine having a particular friend of the Tsar aboard was a contributing factor.”

  Juneau dismissed that with a wave of his hand. “A very minor member of the court, in reality. But I am afraid Captain Gorchakov has declared that you are not to be excused coaling duty, along with the crew and the junior officers. Despite your status as our guest — the captain feels you must work for your keep.”

  Baxter had, perhaps, had a little too much of the fine wine being served at the dinner, and he was more than tired of this charade. “I think you mean prisoner,” he snapped coldly. “And we know how prisoners are treated in Imperial Russia!”

  Juneau’s expression hardened. “Just as we have heard of the conditions in your Dartmoor!”

  The two men stood glaring at each other across the small expanse of Baxter’s cabin. Vasily stirred uneasily.

  Baxter blew out his breath, turned to let Vasily ease the frock coat from his shoulders. “I’m not averse to physical labour, Mr Juneau,” he said, keeping his tone as level as he could. He had one friend aboard, and he’d be a fool to lose him. “Being a merchant navy officer and all.” He could not resist that one barb.

  Juneau smiled. “Were it up to me, my dear Baxter, I would set you and young Master Dunbar at your liberty. Unfortunately, Admiral Rozhestvensky sees value in keeping you at hand.”

  “I had thought he had seen the error in Captain Gorchakov’s judgement, and was persuaded I’m no spy.”

  “I believe, from what little I could hear of his conference with the captain and dear Constantine de Kolong, he is quite persuaded that there is no way even British Intelligence would recruit you.” This was said with a disarming smile, taking any sting from the words. “He does, however, feel that releasing you now — after we have dragged you both to Africa no less — would perhaps not be the best timing. He would, I think, rather put you at liberty when it would best serve his purposes rather than serve to inflame tensions between our countries further.”

  “I’m pretty sure no one at home would give a rat’s arse about Tommy and me being your ‘guests’,” Baxter grumbled, then shrugged. “Well, if I’m to help coal, I’d best get into some working clothes.”

  Coaling. The black fever. The boilers of every ship, from the big battle line units to the destroyers that darted around them, had an insatiable appetite for coal. It had to be hauled in sacks on the bent backs of sweating bluejackets and collier crews, either directly from collier to the bunkers or loaded into boats at one end and hauled up the side at the other.

  But the British government, allied with Japan, had made it clear that it expected neutral countries to obey law and convention and not permit the Russian squadron to linger in harbour or conduct anything but emergency work. Which meant the fleet coaled at sea for the most part, hovering nervously just outside ports that might once have been friendly, from an intricate network of Hamburg-Amerika colliers. Each ship took on as much as she could stow, far more than was safe. Once the bunkers were filled, sacks and loose lumps were deposited wherever there was space — on the decks, between the light guns, in the crew quarters and officer’s cabins.

  They were a week from Tangiers, the departure from that port conducted with the sort of incompetence he had come to expect from the squadron, culminating with one of the big battleships fouling her screws in the city’s underwater telegraph cable and severing it. The squadron had divided then, the oldest battleships with an escort of light cruisers and the destroyers heading for the Suez Canal. The bulk of the armada was going the long way, round Cape Horn.

  The load of coal they had taken on in Tangiers had been bad enough, but none of them had been ready for the slog in the broad, pleasant bay of Dakar. They were tied up alongside the collier, a stream of filthy sacks and barrows of loose coal coming over the antiquated cruiser’s high sides that lowered perceptibly as she took on more and more. The bluejackets and the junior officers threw themselves into the task with uncomplaining energy and, certainly at the beginning, with gusto. Shore leave, once coaling was completed, had been promised, and a bounty of fifteen hundred roubles had been offered to the fastest ship to take on its allotted load from the cavernous holds of the colliers. Baxter often heard the hands talking excitedly about it. To them, it was a fabulous sum of money, even when split across the cruiser’s crew.

  “How little they understand,” he muttered to himself as he took a sack, the hessian coarse in his hands, and turned, rolling it onto his back and carrying it the length of the deck to be deposited on the filthy pile growing by a fore hatch. There wasn’t a part of him that wasn’t coated with grime, a mix of sweat and black dust, and every muscle and joint in his body ached. The blisters on his hands would turn back into callouses soon enough, but right now they stung like hell.

  He straightened, arched his back to work out some of the aches. He wasn’t unaccustomed to hard physical labour — no man who worked a merchant vessel would be — but this was punishing work, particularly in the stifling heat. There was such a cloud of coal dust around the ship that the sun was a half-seen disc of orange high above, but what little relief that provided from the heat meant nothing compared to breathing the noxious fumes and particles. He took the handkerchief from around his mouth and nose so he could spit a mouthful of black saliva over the side. The French port of Dakar was an inviting spread of cool white houses and palm-lined beaches, but there would be no shore leave here. Word had gone around the fleet that the port admiral had already demanded the warlike fleet respect France’s neutrality and move on. Everyone had, at least, been entertained by their admiral’s supposed response that he would take on coal unless Dakar’s shore batteries prevented it. It was plain to all that the peaceful, quiet port maintained no such defences.

  “Water, Mr Baxter?”

  He turned, embarrassed to have been caught in the act of spitting. The countess stood before him with the same slight, knowing smile that often curved her mouth. She was dressed in a version of the common sailor’s uniform with a simple peasant’s skirt, smudged with just enough coal dust evident that it did not appear contrived. She carried a water bucket and pail, which she offered to him. He found his mouth was too dry to speak, but wasn’t sure if it was just bec
ause of the heat and dust. He took the pail of tepid water with a grateful nod and drank deeply.

  It was a stroke of genius, he reflected as he looked at her — the bluejackets who could see her were all grinning, bobbing their heads in delight that this fine lady had chosen to dress herself like them. Not for the first time, he wondered what her game was. Her husband would not have put her up to this. “Thank you, madame,” he mumbled as he returned the scoop. “Most kind of you to be doing this.”

  “This is nothing, Mr Baxter, compared to the labours being undertaken by the crew. And you, of course.”

  “What don’t they understand, Mr B?” a voice piped from beside her. He looked down, slightly startled, into Tommy Dunbar’s open and now tanned face. It had been a little while since he’d seen the lad, who’d been adopted by the countess. Tommy beamed up at him now, looking pleased as punch in a small version of a Russian sailor’s uniform.

  It took him a moment to remember what it was he’d said just now — he hadn’t realised he was being overheard. “That the offer of a paltry reward for breaking their backs is hardly fair recompense for the labour they do,” he growled, before he could stop himself.

  “Why, Mr Baxter, you sound like a revolutionary.” The knowing smile had disappeared from Ekaterina Juneau’s face.

  He forced a grin, knowing what a dangerous word that was amongst Russians — or anyone else, for that matter. The bluejackets, as far as he could tell, had about five words of English between them, but there were officers involved in the coaling.

  “Just instructing Tommy in the sort of subversive thought he should avoid at all costs.”

  “Well recovered, Mr Baxter.” She laughed with her usual full-throated gusto, then gave him a quizzical look. “You are an odd fellow.”

  He offered her a small bow. “I’ve been called worse.”

  He could see some of the crew looking uncomfortable, and the officers starting to look unhappy and perhaps slightly resentful, and realised the conversation was stalling further work and drawing attention to himself. He was suddenly acutely conscious of his grimy state, a sensation new to him. He bobbed his head in unconscious imitation of the sailors, trying not to look embarrassed. “Well, best get back to it, miss.”