The Bomb Vessel nd-4

by Ричард Вудмен

  'Quite a night, sir,' Rogers came up. He had lost his hat and his hair was plastered upon his head.

  'Quite a night, Sam.'

  'We've set all the fore and aft canvas we can, she seems to sail quite well.'

  'She'll do,' said Drinkwater tersely, 'If she weathers the point, she'll do very well.'

  'Old Willerton's been over the side on the end of the foretack.'

  'What the devil for?'

  'To see if his "leddy" is still there.'

  'Well is it?' asked Drinkwater with sudden superstitious anxiety.

  'Yes,' Rogers laughed and Drinkwater felt a sense of relief, then chid himself for a fool.

  'Pipe "Up spirits", Sam, the poor devils deserve it.'

  Virago did weather the point and dawn found her hands wet, cold and red-eyed, anxiously staring astern and out on either beam. Of the fifty-eight ships that had anchored in Vinga Bay only thirty-eight were now in company. They beat slowly to windward, occasionally running perilously close together as they tacked, grey shapes tossing in heavy grey seas on which was something new, something to add greater danger to their plight: ice floes.

  Many of the absent ships were the smaller members of the fleet, particularly the gun-brigs, but most of the bombs were still in company and the Anne Reed made up under Virago's larboard quarter. Once they had an offing they bore away to the southward.

  The wind shifted a little next day then, at one bell in the first watch, it backed south westerly and freshened again. Two hours later Virago followed the more weatherly ships into the anchorage of Skalderviken in the shelter of the Koll. Drinkwater collapsed across his cot only to be woken at four next morning. The wind had increased to storm force. Even in the lee of the land Virago pitched her bluffbow into the steep seas and flung the spray over her bow to be whipped aft, catching the unwary on the face and inducing the agonising wind-ache as it evaporated. Rain and sleet compounded the discomfort and Drinkwater succeeded in veering a second cable onto his one remaining anchor. At daylight, instead of rigging out a new bowsprit, the tired men were aloft striking the topgallant masts, lowering the heavy lower yards in their jeers and lashing them across the rails.

  Then, having exhausted themselves in self-preservation, the wind eased. It continued to drop during the afternoon and just after midnight the night-signal to weigh was made from St George. Nelson, anxious to prosecute the war in spite of, or perhaps because of, the disappearance of Parker, was thwarted before the fleet could move. The wind again freshened and the laboriously hove in cables were veered away again.

  Nelson repeated the signal to weigh at seven in the morning and this time the weather obliged. An hour and a half later the remnants of the British squadrons in the Baltic beat out of Skalderviken and then bore away towards the Sound and Copenhagen.

  By noon the gale had eased. London rejoined, together with some of the other ships. The flagship had been ashore on an uncharted shoal off Varberg castle and the Russell had had a similar experience attempting to tow off the gun-brig Tickler. Both had escaped.

  Less fortunate was the gun-brig Blazer which also ran ashore at Varberg and was captured by the Swedes.

  The fleet was hove to when Parker rejoined to await the results of Vansittart's embassy. Just before dark the Blanche was sighted making up from the south. The news that she brought was eagerly awaited by men who had had a bellyful of shilly-shallying.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Councils of Timidity

  24-28 March 1801

  There are many levels at which a man can worry and Drinkwater was no exception. Over-riding every moment of his life, waking and sleeping, was concern for his ship and its performance within so large a fleet. Beneath this constant preoccupation lay a growing conviction that the expedition had been left too late. In the two days since Blanche rejoined the fleet a number of alarming rumours had circulated. It was learned that Vansittart's terms had been rejected by Count Bernstorff and the Danish government. Both Vansittart and Drummond, the accredited British envoy to the Danish court, had been given their passports and told to leave. Britons resident in Denmark had been advised to quit the country while the Swedish navy, already possessing its first British prize, the Blazer, was making belligerent preparations at Carlscrona. Worse still, the Russians were reported cutting through the ice at Revel.

  But it was the inactivity of their own admiral that most worried the British. Every hour the Commander-in-Chief waited, robbed them of surprise, and every hour the fleet lay idle increased the gossip and rumour that spread from passing boat to gunroom to lower deck. Vansittart had given Parker formal instructions to commence hostilities in one breath and warned him of the formidable preparations made at Copenhagen in another. Drummond endorsed the determination of the Danes and promised the hesitant Parker a bloody nose. After the first conference aboard London, at which Nelson was present, Parker had excluded his second-in-command and Rear Admiral Graves from further consultation. Instead he interviewed the pilots from the Hull Trinity' House who were as apprehensive as the admiral and informed Parker that they were familiar with the navigation of The Sound alone, and could undertake no responsibility for the navigation of the Great Belt. Nelson, who saw the Russians as the greatest threat, thought that defeat of the Tsar would automatically destroy the Baltic Alliance, wished to take a detachment of the fleet by the Great Belt and strike directly at Revel. He had made his recommendations in writing and Dommett, the captain of the fleet, had emerged from Parker's cabin, his face a mask of agony, to reveal to the assembled officers on the London's quarterdeck that Parker had struck out every single suggestion made by Vice-Admiral Nelson.

  It was a story that had gone round the fleet like wildfire and, together with the rumour circulated from Blanche about Danish preparations, added to the feeling that they were too late.

  Lieutenant Drinkwater was a prey to all these and other worries as he stood upon Virago's poop on the freezing morning of March 26th. He was staring through his glass at a large boat flying the red flag of Denmark together with a white flag of truce, as it pulled through the fifty-two British ships anchored off Nakke Head at the entrance to The Sound.

  Meanwhile in London's great cabin, a confident young aide-decamp with a message from Governor Strieker at Elsinore told Parker that if his guns were no better than his pen he had better return to England. There were two hundred heavy cannon at Cronbourg Castle, together with a garrison of three thousand men and Parker, used to the clear waters of the West Indies, was apprehensive of dark nights and fields of ice. Parker's hesitation was obvious to the young Danish officer and the worried countenances of London's officers, as they waited in the cold, led him to conclude they shared their admiral's apprehensions.

  Drinkwater began to pace Virago's poop as the watch idled round the deck, needlessly coiling ropes and unenthusiastically chipping the scale off a box of shot set on the after mortar hatch. A low mumble came from them and exactly reflected the mood of the entire fleet.

  Two days earlier, after conferring with Parker, Vansittart and Drummond had been sent home in the lugger Kite. Drinkwater had taken advantage of the departure of the lugger to send a letter to Lord Dungarth and the subject of that letter was the fundamental worry that underlay every thought of every waking hour. Since the interview with Jex, Drinkwater had striven to work out a solution to the problem of Edward. Sweating at the thought of his guilt, of the reception of his first letter to Dungarth sent by Lady Parker, and of Jex's knowledge, he had spent hours formulating a plan, considering every turn of events and of how each circumstance would be regarded by others. Now the constant delays denied him the opportunity to land Edward. The last few days had had a nightmare quality enhanced by the bad weather, the freezing cold and the continual nagging worries over the fleet itself.

  For the first time in months he had a nightmare, the terrifying spectre of a white clad woman who reared over his supine body to the clanking of chains. With the illogical certainty of dreams she seemed to rise
higher and higher above him, yet never diminished in size, while her Medusa head became the smiling face of someone he knew. He woke shivering yet soaked in sweat, his heart beating violently. Compelled by some subconscious urge he had risen in his night-shirt and struck a light to the cabin lantern and spread out the roll of canvas from the bottom of his sea-chest. Already the paint was cracking but, in the light of the lantern, it did not detract from the face that looked back at him: the face in his dream. The portrait was larger than the two now hanging on the forward bulkhead. It showed a young woman with auburn hair piled upon her head. Pearls were entwined in the coiffure that was at once negligent and contrived. Her creamy shoulders were bare and her breasts were just visible behind a wisp of gauze. The grey eyes looked directly out of the canvas and Drinkwater shivered, not from cold, but with the sensation of someone walking upon his grave. The lovely Hortense Montholon had been brought off a French beach in the last days of peace. For months she had masqueraded as an émigrée, sending information from England to her lover Edouard Santhonax in Paris. She had been returned to France by Lord Dungarth and married Santhonax on his escape following the battle of Camperdown.

  Drinkwater had acquired the portrait by his capture of the French frigate Antigone in the Red Sea. She had been commanded by the same Santhonax and, though he had escaped yet again, Drinkwater had kept the canvas. It had lain in the bottom of his sea-chest, cut from its wooden stretcher and hidden from his wife, for it was unlikely that Elizabeth would understand its fascination. But to Drinkwater it symbolised something more than the likeness of a beautiful woman. The face of Hortense Santhonax was the face of the enemy, not the face of the tow-haired Danes but a manifestation of the force now consuming the whole continent of Europe.

  He could not see it objectively yet, but the liberal allure of the French Revolution had long faded. Even those staunch republicans, the Americans, had disassociated themselves from the lawless disregard for order with which the French pursued their foreign policies or instructed their ragged, irresistible and rapacious armies. He remembered something Dungarth had said the night they landed Hortense upon the beach at Criel: 'Nine parts of humanity is motivated by a combination of self-interest and apathy. Only the tenth part hungers for power, and it is this which a prudent people guards itself against. In France the tenth part has the upper hand.' As he stood shivering in the dawn Drinkwater glimpsed the future in a flash. This rupture with Denmark, whatever its sinister motivations from the steppes, was a single symptom of a greater cancer, a cancer that fed upon a doctrinaire philosophy with a spurious validity. He was engaged in a mighty struggle between moderation and excess, and his spartan life had filled him with a horror of excess.

  A wild knocking at his door caused him to roll the portrait up. 'What is it?'

  'The admiral's made the signal to prepare to weigh, sir.' It was Quilhampton's voice. 'Wind is fresh westerly, sir, and it's eight bells in the middle watch.'

  'Very well, call all hands, I'll be up directly.'

  The day that followed had been a disaster. In a rising wind which caused problems to the smaller vessels in weighing their anchors, the fleet had got under way at daylight. Led by the 74-gun Edgar with her yellow topsides, they beat to the westward, along the north coast of the flat, featureless, coast of Zeeland. Edgar's captain, George Murray, had recently surveyed the Great Belt and it was by this passage that Sir Hyde Parker had finally decided to pass into the Baltic. The Commander-in-Chief did not hold his determination very long. In the wake of Edgar, slightly inshore of the main battle fleet, the smaller ships tacked wearily to windward. Ahead of Virago were the seven bombs, astern of her the other tenders. At eleven o'clock while Drinkwater consulted his chart, listened to the monotonous chant of the leadsman and occasionally referred to the old, worn notebook left him years earlier as part of Blackmore's bequest, the Zebra struck the Zeeland's Reef.

  Alarmed by the lookout's shout, Drinkwater watched Zebra's fore topgallant go by the board and ordered Virago tacked at once. Soon after, Edgar had flown Virago's pennant with the order to assist Zebra and he had sent away his boats with two spare spars to lash across their gunwhales in order to carry out her anchor.

  He had watched Rogers pull away over the choppy grey sea and been forced to kick his own heels in idleness until, just before dark, the combined efforts of the bomb ships' boats succeeded in getting Zebra off the reef.

  While Drinkwater had spent the afternoon at anchor, Parker had been told an even more alarming piece of news. Someone in the flagship had informed the Commander-in-Chief that greater risks would have to be run by taking the fleet through the Great Belt. Alarmed by this and the accident to Zebra, Parker countermanded his orders and the fleet was ordered to return to its anchorage off Nakke Head. Virago, escorting the Zebra, had once again dropped her anchor at midnight, and now, in the chilly sunshine of the following morning, Drinkwater looked across to where Mr Quilhampton and a party from Virago were helping the Zebra's people get up a new fore topgallant mast.

  On his own fo'c's'le Mr Matchett was putting the finishing touches to the gammoning of their own refitted bowsprit. Over the rest of Virago the mood of listless despair hung like a cloud.

  At last Drinkwater saw the Danish boat leave London's side and though during the afternoon reports came down to him where he dozed in his cabin, that Murray, Nelson, Graves and other officers were all visiting the flagship, nothing else happened.

  Drinkwater woke from his sleep at about four o'clock. He could not afterwards explain it, but his mind was resolved over the problem of Edward. He would brook no further delay. He passed word for Quilhampton and Rogers.

  'Ah, Mr Rogers, I wish you to have the long boat made ready an hour before daylight with a barrel of biscuit in it, together with water barricoes, mast and sail. I want a crew told off tonight, say six men, with Tregembo as leading hand. Mr Quilhampton will command the boat and I shall accompany it. In the unlikely event of our being absent when the signal is made to weigh, you are to take charge. I will give you that order in writing when I leave.'

  'Very good, sir, may I ask…?'

  'No, you may not.'

  Rogers looked offended and turned on his heel. Drinkwater called him back.

  'I do not want any of your irreverent speculation on this matter, Sam. Be pleased to remember that.'

  'Aye aye, sir.' Drinkwater raised his eyebrows and stared significantly at Quilhampton.

  'The same goes for you, Mr Q.'

  'Yes sir.'

  'Very well. Now pass word for the volunteer Waters to come aft and do you, Mr Q, mount a guard on my cabin and see we are not disturbed.'

  Rogers opened his mouth to protest, thought better of it, and strode from the cabin. Drinkwater waited for Edward to appear, occupying the time by rummaging in a canvas bag he had had brought into the cabin by an inquisitive Mr Jex.

  A knock at the door was followed by Mr Quilhampton's head. 'Waters is here now, sir.'

  'Very well, show him in.'

  Edward entered the cabin and stood awkwardly, looking around with a curious sheepishness. It suddenly struck Drinkwater that a month or two more might have made Edward into a seaman. Already he was lean and fit and had not been long enough on salt beef for it to have made much difference to him. But it was his attitude that most struck Drinkwater. Four months ago they had met as equals, now Edward had all the inherent awkwardness of one who felt socially inferior. The realisation embarrassed Drinkwater.

  'How are you?' he asked too brusquely for Edward to perceive any change in their bizarre relationship.

  'Well enough… sir.'

  'How have you been treated?'

  'The same as all your seamen,' Edward replied with a trace of bitterness, 'I have no complaints.'

  Drinkwater bit off a tart rebuke and poured two glasses of blackstrap. He handed one to Edward then went to the door. 'Mr Q, I want a bowl of hot water from the galley upon the instant.'

  'A bowl of hot water, sir?' He caught the
gleam in Drinkwater's eye. 'Er, yes sir.'

  'Sit down Ned, sit, down.' Drinkwater closed the door. 'Your circumstances are about to change. Whether 'tis for the better I cannot say, but listen carefully to what I tell you.' He paused to collect his thoughts.

  'Jex, the purser, has tumbled you. He saw a cursed newspaper report about the murder and also saw you in the Blue Fox, at Chatham. You knew of this?'

  Edward nodded. 'I did not know how he had found out, but he approached me…'

  'You did not…?'

  'Confess? Good God no! I merely acted dumb, as any seaman does in the presence of an officer.' The ghost of a smile crossed Edward's face. 'What did you do about Mr Jex?' The anxiety was now plain.

  Drinkwater sighed. 'Bluffed, Ned, bluffed. Denied you were my brother, said the name of the suspected murderer was a coincidence then gave him to understand that there might be something of a mystery surrounding the whole-affair, but that it was not his concern… come in!'

  A heavy silence hung in the cabin as Quilhampton ushered in the messman with the bowl of water. Both rating and mate could scarcely disguise their curiosity. It would be all over Virago in a matter of moments that Waters, the landsman volunteer, was taking wine with Virago's commander. But Nathaniel no longer cared. Perhaps some apparent unconcern would lend credibility to what he proposed. Edward did not seem to have noticed, but waited only for the intruders to leave before bursting out:

  'What the hell d'you mean you told him there was something of a mystery…'

  'God damn it, Ned, I've lied for you, risked my career, abused my position of command and maybe jeopardised my whole life for brotherly bloody affection! D'you not think a flat denial would only have increased Jex's inquisitiveness. Mr Jex is not to be counted among my most loyal officers, he is seeking to avenge a grudge. But he is not stupid enough to risk his suspicions against the Articles of War, nor bright enough not to be a little confused by what I have told him. Perhaps he will work it all through and conclude I have deceived him; if that is the case his malice will be thereby increased. But by that time you will be gone.'