The plan was to sail up the coast and put Enrique ashore at Alicante, which was a fishing village halfway between Cartagena and Valencia. There was a well-travelled route to Madrid from there directly Northwest which Enrique could take by horse, to get him into the city in two days.
It was close to three hundred and eighty sea miles and should only take a day and a half if the weather gods were kind. But they weren’t, the barometer dropped when they were just off the coast of the Gulf of Almeria and a storm hit from the North. The gale force wind spinning around the concentrated depression first blew west shooting them along their course then swung more to the North giving them no option but to run before it towards the North African coast.
They had, maybe, ninety sea miles of sea room before they would come up on a lee shore so Marty steered as much East as he could to try to gain a bit more. Enrique was as sick as a man can be without dying. Shelby had him down in the sick bay and was trying to feed him fluids, but the poor man just couldn’t deal with the crazy corkscrew like motion the Formidiable was making.
They ran out of sea room and ended up anchored off the coast of Algeria in a bay near Oran, pinned down by the North-north-easterly wind. They had to sit it out for two days. That gave Enrique time to recover somewhat before the next trial.
The wind eventually swung to the West and they were able to sail out of the bay. The seas were still up, and they headed North with the sea on their beam towards Cartagena. Enrique got sick again and he sat in the sickbay with Shelby and his loblolly boy, Henry Ford, the ship had started rolling badly as soon as they had set sail again.
“You really would feel better up on deck you know.” Shelby told him.
“That may be, but I would be a mass of bruises. How do the men in the crew stay on their feet when the ship is rolling like this? Captain Martin looks like his feet are nailed to the deck no matter what it does.”
“He has been at sea since he was twelve years old, he has more trouble walking on dry land,” Shelby laughed
“Is his wife as beautiful as they say?” Enrique asked to keep the conversation going.
“Probably more. She has an inner light and energy that shine through as well as being physically beautiful.”
“They must make a striking couple!”
“That they do.”
“And he is a Baron?”
“Well, technically she was a Baroness when they got married and he got his title that way, but he is also a Knight and he got that all on his own,” Shelby explained.
Just then, the rolling lessened noticeably as they felt the ship turn.
“Mr. Enrique?” Midshipman Williams enquired sticking his head through the door.
“Captain’s compliments sir, but we will be putting you ashore in about an hour.”
“Si! Tell him I will be ready!”
It was dusk as the Formidiable hove to and a boat was brought up and manned. Marty shook hands with Enrique and bade him a safe journey. Once he was ashore, he didn’t look back but walked quickly up the beach and disappeared behind the dunes.
“Time to go home,” Marty said to Ackermann as they set the foresails to pulling and moved away.
It was hard to make progress with long tacks to make headway against the westerly wind. It was during a southerly leg that the squall hit. The lookout caught sight of it when it was only one hundred yards away and he barely shouted a warning before it slammed into the ship from the starboard side dead in line with the mizzen mast.
The subsequent chain of events unfolded at phenomenal speed. The back of the ship was driven around by the force of the wind and the quartermaster and his mate were thrown from the wheel as it was ripped out of their hands. Marty, who had the watch, was also thrown from his feet. He was just getting up when he saw that the mizzen gaff sail boom had ripped loose and was falling towards the quartermaster who was struggling back to his feet. He didn’t think, just launched himself across the deck to push him clear.
Then it all went dark.
There were several moments during which he felt like he was waking up, only to hear a gentle voice murmuring and a sweet liquid pass his lips. Then it all went comfortably black again.
He finally woke up in a bed and the first think he noticed was it was very quiet, the second thing was he had a hell of a headache. Caroline’s face appeared and she said something to somebody behind her and then her lips moved as if she was saying something to him.
He couldn’t hear a thing!
Caroline looked down at the man she loved more than life itself. He looked confused then frightened and she said,
“It’s alright, my love, you are at home, you will be fine.”
His look turned from fear and confusion to concern and he said in an odd voice,
“I can’t hear you! I can’t hear a thing!”
The door opened and Shelby came in, he sat on the bed and checked Marty’s eyes and pulse. Then he gently felt around his head, which Marty realised was bandaged.
“Get me a slate and some chalk please,” he said to Caroline.
Once she left, he looked at Marty and winked, pointed to his head and mimed hitting it then made a motion with his hands as if they were being pushed apart. Lastly, he pointed to his ears and stuck his fingers in them.
Marty couldn’t suppress a laugh as the normally serious physician looked ridiculous. But he thought he got the gist of what was being said.
He had been hit on the head, something had swollen up and that had blocked his ears.
Caroline arrived with the slate and chalk.
“How is your head?” Shelby wrote.
“It hurts like hell,” Marty said.
“You were hit by the boom that fell onto the quarterdeck,” Shelby wrote after wiping the slate clean.
Marty frowned and replied,
“I don’t remember anything after leaving Almeria
“Bad wind. Squall, boom fell, hit you on head,” Shelby wrote.
“Is the ship alright?” Marty asked.
“Ship fine, no other casualties.” Shelby assured him after cleaning the slate again,
“You saved the quartermaster.”
Marty shook his head, gently, he didn’t remember any of it.
“How long?” he asked as he realised he must have been out for quite a while.
“Four days sailing and two days here.”
“Six days?” then….
“OUCH!” as pain shot through his head as he tried to sit up.
They left him to sleep. A little while later the door was pushed open and Blaez slid silently in. He gently climbed on the bed and lay beside Marty so he could lay his head on his chest. He was still there when Caroline looked in to check on him later.
Shelby had told her when they had gotten him home that the blow on the head from the boom had caused a swelling of the brain. He had drugged Marty to keep him unconscious for the trip home and the two days after, as from experience, and everything he had read, total rest was the best cure. They had fed him water through a tube down his throat; he thought six days was enough.
Now, Marty was hungry, but they only allowed him thin chicken soup to start with and he was ordered to stay in bed. Over the next four days they gradually increased the number of solids in his food. Blaez hardly left his side and it was a great relief when he was finally allowed to sit in a chair in the drawing room and look out over the bay at his ships.
His first visitor was the quartermaster whose life he had saved, Tim Green, a tough Londoner.
Tim was ushered into the drawing room by Caroline and stood looking worriedly at his Captain. The bandages had been removed but you could still see the scab on Marty’s scalp where the boom had hit him.
“Hello, Green, you look well.” Marty greeted him.
“All because of you Sir, I wants to thank ye for saving my life,” he replied.
Marty had become slightly adept at lip reading and got the gist of what he was saying, although he could only hear a dull mum
ble.
“You are welcome,” he replied with a grin. “I wasn’t quick enough to get myself out of the way though. Tell me what has been happening on my ship while I have been gone.”
Tim started to tell him as he stood there but Marty made him pull up a chair and when he couldn’t follow his description of the damage got him to draw it on the slate.
Eventually he tired, and Caroline put a stop to the chat with the promise that someone would visit every day to keep him informed of what was going on.
It took another month for his hearing to return and even then, he still had ringing in his ears. Shelby advised him to put wax in his ears and to bind a bandana around them when the guns were firing. He didn’t need to damage them anymore than they were.
Even better, his forced inactivity meant he got to know the twins and they chose their names together. Edwin George Arthur and Constance Willow Mary. The wet nurses took over the feeding and he and Caroline got back to being how they had been in bed, which improved his wellbeing immensely.
Over the winter things were quiet in as much that he didn’t receive any orders for specific missions, instead the flotilla trained and honed their amphibious landing skills on the West side of the Rock at Sandy Bay.
Starved of entertainment in the winter months the locals started turning up to watch. The audience grew as the word spread and people decided this new form of entertainment was better than just sitting and watching rain run down the gutters. Inevitably, elements of the army started coming down in groups and shouted insults and advice in equal measure.
la Pierre’s reaction was simple, he saw an opportunity to exercise his snatch squads. These were specialist teams who were there to infiltrate enemy territory and kidnap individuals who they were interested in ‘talking’ to. They had used them in the exercise on Malta and now they were busy developing the idea and the techniques involved.
He would point out individuals who were regular spectators and amongst the most vocal, task the teams to snatch them from their barracks at night and deliver them to headquarters, where they were put through a mock interrogation.
That led to some complaints, especially when a lieutenant of artillery was snatched mid-dalliance with his mistress and unceremoniously bundled in his nightshirt through the town. It wasn’t the fact that he had his hands tied and a hood over his head, more than the fact that his night shirt only came down to his waist and his ‘equipment’ was on show to all and sundry, that upset the worthy.
After that Marty reverted to making wagers with the Army commanders that his men could infiltrate their bases and capture an agreed item or person. . This had two effects; first, it improved security everywhere because they didn’t know when or where they would make an attempt, and second, Marty’s teams got to be as sharp as they could be.
Chapter 19: Omega and Alpha
Marty was in his office on the first of March nursing a slight hangover from his birthday party the night before and watching the rain lash down the windows when there was a knock on the door. A very wet, very young ensign stepped in and saluted.
“Captain Stockley, I have a dispatch for you,” he said and held out a packet wrapped in oiled canvas.
Marty took it curiously and went to his desk to open it. He unwrapped the canvas and saw a letter inside with his own seal.
He felt an empty pit in his stomach as he opened it to see it was dated just two weeks before.
Dear Martin,
I’m writing becus mum has taken a turn for the worse. The winter has been specially wet and cold and she has suddenly got much older. If you can get home as soon as you can, it wood be good as we don’t know how long she have got.
We had a visit from Captain Turner, and he said he would get this letter to you as fast as possible.
Your lovin sister, Helen
He thanked the ensign and sent him on his way with a silver guinea.
“Ryan! Get the Eagle ready to sail,” he yelled into the office that Ryan and James shared and bolted out of the door heading to the house.
He crashed through the door and Caroline looked up from her embroidery in surprise. He thrust the now soggy paper into her hands and ran up to their rooms.
He was throwing clothes into a sea chest when Caroline walked in and sat on the bed.
“When will the ship be ready?” she asked
“What?” Marty said, still emptying a drawer.
“When will the ship be ready?” she repeated.
Marty stopped and looked a little sheepish. “Several hours,” he replied holding a pair of drawers.
“And when is the earliest it can sail?”
“Tomorrow morning.”
“Right, well send a message to . . ?”
“Ryan.”
“Ryan and tell him that we will all be going back to England tomorrow morning. I am sure he will want to set the ship up in the right way to make us all comfortable.” Sanity restored, Caroline mobilised the household and got the bare minimum packed.
Ryan had men working all night to convert part of the Eagles cargo space into cabins to accommodate the family, servants, wet nurses etc. It wasn’t the easiest or tidiest of constructions, but canvas and a lick of paint hides a lot and they were all in and ready to go when the tide turned.
They sailed straight into Poole and as the wind was favourable out of the Southeast, they took the barge under sail up to Wareham, hired a couple of coaches and were in Church Knowle less than two hours later.
They were met at the door by his sisters, Jane and Helen, and went straight to his mother’s room. He was shocked to see how old she looked. Her skin was almost translucent and grey, her eyes were closed, and her breathing laboured. She opened her eyes as they entered.
“I knew you would come,” she said in a soft voice, “my Marty would never let me leave without saying goodbye.”
“Don’t be daft, mum, you aint goin’ nowhere,” Marty told her, grief making his Dorset accent come out.
“Hello, mum,” Caroline said, stepping to the foot of the bed. She held the twins in her arms.
Annie smiled when she saw them. “Twins! They run in the family you know. Great-grandpa Absalom had two sets.”
“Do you want to hold them?” Caroline asked.
“Prop me up, boy,” Annie instructed Marty with a burst of energy and Marty helped her sit up so they could pile more pillows behind her.
Caroline passed Constance to Marty so he could help Annie hold her in one arm while she helped on the other side. They were asleep but then one at a time they woke up and looked up at their grandma.
“They be alike as two peas in a pod!” she exclaimed.
Then Beth and James decided they wanted in on the party as well, and climbed on the bed,
“Well that be just fine,” she said, looking around at them all.
It was the last time they saw her alive. She died quietly in her sleep that night. She had had her last wish to see her Marty and his children once more and went with a smile on her face. They were woken to the news by Blaez howling mournfully outside her window. Marty wanted to join him but kept his grief in a ball in his chest.
Annie May Stockley was buried in St. Peters church two days later and almost everybody who had ever known her turned up to say goodbye. The vicar asked whether one of her children would give a eulogy. It would normally be given by the oldest, but they all decided Marty should be the one. He stood in front of her coffin,
“My mum was the kindest person I knew; she never had a bad word to say about anyone.”
There was a general rumble of agreement through the congregation.
“She looked after us kids and did her best to make sure we all went to school and learned to read and do our numbers. She wanted us to have a better life than her and Dad and it was my greatest joy to be able to help her realise that.”
He took a deep breath to steady himself, this was far harder than talking to a crew from a quarterdeck.
“When Miss Turner and he
r brother, Captain Turner, came to get me the day I went into the Navy, she said to me, ‘No matter what is asked of you or what you come up against, remember as long as you be brave and do your best no one can doubt you.’ That was the best advice anybody ever gave me and I hope I lived up to her expectations.
“She had to live through the deaths of my eldest brother, Thomas, and my Dad, but she only despaired because of what that did to my brothers and sisters.”
He paused again then squared his shoulders.
“She was our rock, our foundation, our strength and our inspiration, and will be forever in our hearts.”
He had tears running down his face as he ended, turned to the open coffin and kissed his mother goodbye.
The wake would be remembered for many years, as they sent her off proper, in the Dorset way.
That evening anyone walking by the cemetery would have seen a figure, with a dog by his side, kneeling by the freshly closed grave. The dog had his head pressed into the man’s chest and gently licked the tears away as they ran down his chin.
Marty, Caroline and the children stayed in Church Knowle for another week before leaving to re-embark on the Eagle and sail around the coast to their company berth in India dock. They had sent messages ahead so there were enough coaches waiting to transport them, Ryan and the servants to the London house.
Marty sent a note to Admiral Hood informing him he was in London and why. He was expecting Hood to contact him but was amazed when out of the blue the Prince Regent plus entourage descended on the house.
“My dear Marty!” the Prince greeted him as he hurriedly straightened his coat. “My deepest condolences on the death of your dear mother!” he continued, giving him a hug and then holding him at arm’s length while he looked deeply into his eyes in sympathy. “I met her at your wedding you know. She was a lovely forthright woman; told me I should lose weight!” he laughed sadly.
Caroline glided into the room and curtsied, the Prince went over kissed her hands and told her she was looking magnificent.
Vendetta: The Dorset Boy - Book 6 Page 20
