Ramage's Devil r-13

by Dudley Pope

  Eventually Southwick said: 'We should close the coast a little more to the north, sir. Then we know we'll be clear of that bank of rocks and can stretch down to the anchorage. Unless you want to wait for a pilot.'

  'Yes, we'll heave-to and wait for the pilot, if he's not there waiting for us.'

  'But... well, sir, won't the pilot realize that... ?'

  Southwick did not bother to complete the question.

  'If we don't pick him up, he'll come over to us after we've anchored.'

  'Yes, I see, sir,' Southwick said and did not understand at all. To him, the prospect of anchoring the two frigates close in under three French islands which were probably bristling with batteries was something that did not bear thinking about.

  The Calypso hove-to just long enough for the frigate's cutter to be hoisted out and rowed to La Robuste to collect Paolo, Jackson and the four Frenchmen, and bring them on board. Gilbert and his men had been puzzled and nervous from the moment that Wagstaffe, after reading the instructions delivered by the boat's coxswain, had ordered them away.

  They were brought up to Ramage on the quarterdeck and he smiled the moment he saw their long, nervous faces. He led them aft to the taffrail and, speaking quickly in French, gave them their instructions. They talked among themselves, embarrassed, for a couple of minutes and then Auguste nodded reluctantly.

  'Me, sir. They've chosen me.'

  'Very well,' Ramage said. 'I'm sure you'll do it well. Go down to the great cabin. Silkin is there. Gilbert, you go with him, as translator.'

  With the cutter now towing astern - the shallower water brought calmer seas so there was no need to hoist it in again - the Calypso steered for the western end of Île Royale, followed by LaRobuste. Seen from this angle, against the flat land of the shore, the island seemed like the end of a lozenge, crowding Île St Joseph, which was much smaller and only ninety feet high. The resulting channel was wide but the water brown, obviously shallow. Here and there short branches of wood floated on the sea but did not drift, merely moving up and down. Southwick pointed out several to Ramage, who tapped the old man on the shoulder. 'You're lucky to have your navigation confirmed like that - the local fishermen have put their pots down round the bank, and those bits of bough are their buoys. The only trouble is you don't know if the pots are for lobsters and therefore close to rocks, or fish, in which case they'll be further away.'

  'All the same to me, sir,' Southwick declared cheerfully. 'I don't want to take us within a mile of that bank! And these islands - I wouldn't want to stay here a week, let alone a year. If I was a Frenchman I'd take care I didn't fall foul of Bonaparte and get sent out here.'

  'If you were a Frenchman you might not have the choice. The Count of Rennes just wanted to be left in peace.'

  Southwick sniffed in agreement, recognizing that in two sentences the captain had summed it all up.

  'At least we beat L'Espoir,' he said, gesturing at the empty anchorage. 'Tell me, sir, did you expect to?'

  'Hopes were fighting fears. When it was dark I didn't expect to, but if it was a nice sunny day with a fresh wind - well, I hoped.'

  'And now, sir?'

  Ramage purposely misunderstood the question. 'We heave-to and wait for the pilot off the western end of the island, then we'll anchor a cable further seaward than he says. Four fathoms, soft mud, single anchor. I told Wagstaffe in the orders I sent across to anchor as far inshore of us as he dared, so the gap between the two ships is at least a cable, preferably two.'

  Southwick was puzzled. 'I hope young Wagstaffe doesn't run on the mud. Soft mud and a lee shore. Think of the suction on that hull...'

  Laughing at the thought, Ramage said casually: 'We can always use the boats to lay out an anchor or two for him; then all hands to man the capstan. With the fiddler standing on top to set them trotting, we'd soon have him off!'

  Southwick looked like a bishop to whom the suffragan's wife had just made a very improper suggestion, but Ramage saw no point in explaining everything in detail because there was a good chance he would have to abandon the plan. Which plan? There were two now and he was muddling himself. Well, he meant the one he had just explained to Gilbert and his men, the one which had occurred to him only a couple of hours ago. Call that the first plan, even though it was the last to arrive in his head. The second plan, which followed only if the first was successful, was the original idea, the one that had come like a wind shadow, and it was surrounded with ifs as thick as a blackthorn hedge intended to keep boys out of an apple orchard. The second plan did not even begin until L'Espoir hove in sight. Providing the first worked, and providing L'Espoir hove in sight, then there would be plenty of time to tell Southwick all about the second.

  'Deck there, mainmasthead here!'

  'Deck here,' Aitken bellowed up, not bothering with the speaking trumpet.

  'There's a strange little craft ahead of us, sir: through the glass it looks like a canoe with a sail on a sprit. Four men in it.'

  'Very well, keep reporting it,' Aitken said and turned back to Ramage. 'That'll be your pilot, sir,' he said with a first lieutenant's usual lofty disdain for local pilots.

  'Heave-to to leeward of them so they can drop down to us. Now, our colours are stowed. Mr Southwick, tell the men no one is to speak English while the pilot boat is near. Nor is any bosun's mate to use his call. There's no need for the pilot to mistake us for an English frigate ...'

  'Mistake us?' Southwick repeated the phrase and then took his hat off, scratched his head, and ran his hand through his hair before jamming his hat back on. He took up the speaking trumpet and bellowed the length of the ship. Without much apparent effort his voice carried Ramage's order to every man.

  'Now stand by to back the foretopsail, Mr Aitken,' Ramage said and could have bitten his tongue. Aitken knew what to do, and giving him unnecessary orders must be irritating.

  Now he could see the pilot boat with the naked eye. Yes, it was a large dugout canoe, with a stubby mast and, like a canted boom, a sprit stuck out diagonally, holding out the square sail. And it was an old sail obviously sewn up from odd pieces of cloth. But for all that the canoe was skimming along, and through the glass he could now see there were three blacks actually handling the boat while a white man tried to sit in a dignified manner. But, judging from the urgency with which one of the others scooped water over the side using a calabash shell as a bailer, he must be sitting in a few inches of water.

  The movement of the pilot canoe so intrigued him that Ramage did not notice that the Calypso was turning head to wind to heave-to until her bow swung and the canoe and Île Royale suddenly shifted from the larboard bow to amidships on the starboard side.

  Ramage walked over to the skylight above his cabin and called down in French. He listened to the reply, laughed and looked round for Louis and Albert, who were still waiting by the taffrail.

  'Wait for Gilbert and Auguste at the top of the gangway,' he told them in French. 'You really understand what I want you to do?'

  'Indeed we do, sir,' Louis said. 'We are proud to be able to do it!'

  Ramage nodded and grinned. One Englishman was usually reckoned to be equal to three Frenchmen, but not these Frenchmen. What had changed them? Gilbert and his three friends probably held their own political views as strongly as a Revolutionary sailor in Bonaparte's Navy. Was it leadership? He shrugged because he had no idea: it was so, and for the moment that was all that mattered.

  The pilot canoe was only a hundred yards off, and he walked back to the skylight and warned Gilbert and Auguste, but there was no reply and a moment later he saw them joining Louis and Albert at the gangway.

  Ramage took off his coat and untied his stock, bundling both up with his hat and stuffing them under one of the guns.

  'Mr Aitken ... Mr Southwick ...' he pointed at what he was doing, and each man hurriedly removed his hat, coat and stock.

  Now the master, his white hair caught by the wind, could pass for - well, a rural dean, an amiable grocer, a tenant
farmer who was now leaving the heavy work to his sons ...

  'You still don't look like a Republican, sir,' Southwick said doubtfully. 'Perhaps the hair? Too tidy?'

  Ramage ran his fingers through it. 'You have the advantage of me, I must admit,' he said wryly.

  'The breeches and silk stockings, sir?' Southwick said, his voice still doubtful. 'Don't forget those whatever they're called, the sans cullars.'

  'Sans-culottes. No, don't worry, we don't need to dance on top of the hammock nettings!'

  With that Ramage left Aitken and Southwick on the quarterdeck and went down to the entryport where Auguste stood watching the canoe, which was now beginning to round up to come alongside, one of the men casting off the sheet and stifling the sail by standing up and clasping it to him as he reached for the mast. The other two blacks picked up paddles and began paddling the canoe the last few feet in the calm water provided by the Calypso's bulk.

  Ramage gestured to Auguste, who took the telescope Ramage held out to him. Tucking it under one arm and straightening his shoulders, the Frenchman said with a grin: 'I shall find it hard to be an ordinary seaman again, sir.'

  Ramage stood to one side beside a gun while Auguste went back to the entryport and Gilbert, Louis and Albert stood close to him.

  There was a faint hail and Albert hurried forward with the coil of rope he was holding. From the top of the hammock nettings he threw an end down to the canoe and one of the blacks seized it. The canoe was almost level with the entryport when the pilot began to stand up.

  Auguste leaned over slightly to shout down at him. 'M'sieu, listen carefully. This frigate and the one astern have come from Brest, and a third is due any day - we lost company with her.'

  'Very well, captain,' the pilot answered. 'There is plenty of room in the anchorage. You bring us many prisoners, eh?'

  'We bring you possible sickness and death,' Auguste said sadly. 'Brest has la peste. We lost five men from it the day after sailing. The other frigate' - he gestured astern - 'lost nine. I dare not think what has happened with the third frigate: I suspect we lost sight of her because she had so much sickness...'

  'The plague? Brest a plague port? Nine - no, fourteen - dead? Quarantine! You must stay at anchor! No one to come on shore. Six weeks from the last case. Here, cast off!' he snapped at the seaman, who let go of the rope as though it was a poisonous snake.

  As the canoe drifted away the pilot stood up and shouted: 'I will report to the governor, but six weeks you stay -'

  Auguste and Gilbert screamed back at him: it was an injustice, it was mocking their misery, it would leave them short of medical supplies and provisions ...

  Louis and Albert joined in. There was no wine and very little water left. Now they would get the black vomit, as well as having the plague, and anyway what authority had the pilot to give such orders?

  'I'll show you!' the white-faced pilot screeched back as the canoe drifted away. 'No one is to come near the shore: you stay on board. Tell the second frigate and the third when she comes in because I am not coming out again for six weeks. I know the governor will order sentries to shoot at anyone approaching the shore. That's an order; I have the authority!'

  'Assassin, cuckold, pederast, Royalist traitor!' Auguste bawled and stood aside to give the others a chance while he thought up more insults.

  'You wait until the Minister of Marine hears of it!' Gilbert bellowed. 'Then you'll be a prisoner here, not the pilot!'

  The pilot knew he was far enough away to be at a disadvantage shouting against the wind, but he took a deep breath. 'Perhaps - if you live long enough to get a message to Brest. But you'll all leave your bones on the beach over there ...'

  'Your mother was a careless whore!' Auguste yelled and then shook his head. 'It's a waste,' he grumbled, 'he's too far away.' He handed the telescope back to Ramage. 'Was that satisfactory, sir?'

  A grinning Ramage patted him on the back. 'Perfect. As I watched you all it was obvious the Calypso had at least four captains!'

  'Sir,' Aitken called anxiously, 'we're running out of sea room!'

  'Bear away and anchor when you're ready!' Ramage shouted and hurried back to the quarterdeck, passing Southwick on his way to the fo'c'sle. By now the pilot was a quarter of the way to a jetty which was just coming into view on the south side of Île Royale.

  As he climbed the steps Ramage was thankful his idea had effectively ensured that no one would be coming out to the anchored ships, but he wished the pilot had not taken fright so quickly: Auguste had not been able to ask the pilot to remain in his canoe but lead the way to the anchorage.

  Aitken shouted to a seaman standing in the chains, ready with the lead: 'Give me a cast!' Then he gave orders to brace up the yard and trim the foretopsail sheets so that the Calypso turned for the last few hundred yards to the anchorage.

  The leadsman reported. 'Six fathoms, soft mud.'

  Ramage had already explained to Aitken the importance of the Calypso anchoring in the right place, so that La Robuste could position herself, and he kept both topsails shivering so that the Calypso had little more than steerage way.

  Ramage watched the luffs of the sails and kept an eye on the quartermaster, who would signal the moment the Calypso was going too slowly for the rudder to bite. He glanced astern and noted that Wagstaffe was handling his ship perfectly.

  'Five fathoms ... five fathoms ...' the leadsman's chant was monotonous but clear. He heaved the lead forward so that it dropped into the water and hit the bottom just as the mainchains passed over it. A quick up-and-down tug on the line confirmed that the lead was actually on the bottom, and by the feel of the piece of leather or cloth in his hand, marking the depths, he sang out the fathoms and feet.

  The Calypso was now moving crabwise to the unmarked spot where Ramage intended to anchor, and Southwick's upraised arm showed that all was ready on the fo'c'sle. The anchor, stowed high up and parallel with the deck when on passage, had been lowered almost to the water. Ramage's eyes swept the luffs, saw the men at the wheel, and said: 'Down with the helm!'

  Had he left it too late? Was the Calypso now going too slowly for the rudder to work effectively, or had the quartermaster (very sensibly) given the warning a few seconds early? In fact they could lower the anchor and, as soon as it held, the cable would swing the frigate round head to wind. Effective, but not very seamanlike, and the cable going under the hull was likely to wrench off copper sheathing.

  But the Calypso's bow was coming round ... one point, two, three ... speeding up now ... six, seven, eight ... fourteen, fifteen, sixteen ... And with the wheel amidships and the foretopsail once again aback, because the yard had not been hauled round to compensate for the turn, the Calypso slowed.

  Ramage walked to a gunport and looked over the side. The water was muddy and several pieces of palm fronds and odd branches were floating. But they stayed in the same place: the Calypso was stopped. Then they began moving towards the bow ... the frigate was beginning to move astern.

  Ramage signalled to Southwick and heard first the splash of the anchor and then the thunder of the cable running through the hawse. And yes, the usual smell of burning as the cable, finally dry after being stowed for weeks in the cable tier, scorched itself and the wood of the hawsehole as it raced out.

  A quick order to the topmen had the main and mizentopsails furled, but he waited for the signal from Southwick which would indicate that the foretopsail now thrusting the Calypso astern had dug in the anchor.

  He returned to watching the rubbish. Finally the palm fronds and broken branches slowed down and then stayed alongside. He watched a rock on Île Royale which was lined up with a headland on Île du Diable. The two remained lined up. If the rock had moved out of line that would have been proof that the anchor was dragging and the palm fronds were drifting in a current moving at the same speed as the frigate.

  Ramage then jumped up on to the breech of a gun to watch La Robuste anchoring. She ended up positioned perfectly, and as her anchor hit
the water, Ramage saw that the pilot's canoe had just arrived at the jetty.

  'They're in a hurry,' Aitken commented.

  'I'm not surprised: the pilot has never had such a startling report to make the governor,' Ramage said.

  'Now what do we do?'

  'We hoist out all the boats and wait,' Ramage said. 'Wait and practise.'

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Sergeant Ferris was, usually, a patient man. He had a rule that he would explain something three times to a Marine or seaman he regarded as intelligent and four times to a fool. But no one valuing his pride, sanity or eardrums would dare cause a fifth. If he had any sense he would do what Marine Hart was doing.

  Hart made up in bulk and loudness of voice what he lacked in intelligence, and this resulted in him being, at six feet two inches tall and sixteen stone, the largest of the Calypso's Marines with a bellow that sounded like a bull with spring fever.

  Ferris, now commanding the Marine detachment in La Robuste, was thankful that Hart was an amiable man. This was due less to his nature than the fact that it was almost impossible to insult him. When he accidentally trod on someone's foot and was promptly called a 'bloody great big oaf', Hart would grin and say proudly: 'Ah, I am big, ain't I?' Hart had been a Marine for more than a year before he discovered to his surprise that an oaf was neither a special sort of promise nor a swear word.

  'Let's have one more go, men,' Ferris said, although he knew the twenty Marines in his party understood that he was using 'men' instead of 'Hart' because the man was liable to sulk if he thought he was being singled out. Hart, who was also lefthanded, was not difficult or dangerous when he sulked but it was, as Mr Renwick once remarked, like having a stunned elephant lying at the foot of the stairs.

  'The idea is this. We have one hundred and sixty Marines and seamen, an' that's dragging in every man that can wield a cutlash or fire a pistol.'