The Devil to Pay (John Pearce series)

by David Donachie

  ‘Is there something amiss?’ came the eventual enquiry.

  ‘John, while I am glad you are come aboard, I do have a concern.’

  That was stiffly put, which meant the reply had to be likewise. ‘Which is, sir?’

  ‘Is there any need for that,’ Digby responded, now irritated. ‘We know each other quite well enough to dispense with honorifics in private.’

  Pearce nodded. ‘Your request, Henry?’

  ‘First a toast to the success of our mission.’

  That could not be challenged but it did nothing for the tension Pearce was experiencing; he was sure something unpleasant would follow. ‘These men have served with you before and may well still see you as the man to look to. I cannot fathom why they were shipped aboard wholesale, warrants included, but the fact that you too are present hints at your involvement and creates a potential problem.’

  ‘They may look to me instead of obeying you?’

  ‘Precisely. I need you to go out of your way to prevent that happening.’

  ‘Then rest assured the first one to make that mistake will face my unbridled wrath, I promise.’

  ‘Good. Now tell me of those I may trust and those who may cause me trouble.’

  That slog across southern Italy had not been all waste; Pearce had been able to identify the probable Jeremiahs for they were men who never ceased to complain and they had had no lower deck in which to hide their negations. Now he marked his friend’s card with the aid of the muster list, suggesting a few adjustments to break up the watches in a way that would diminish their influence.

  ‘The warrants are excellent and you can rely on them added to which I will have an ear to the ground for any rumbles of discontent, not that I can see why that would occur.’

  ‘The Pelicans?’ Pearce nodded and Digby smiled, showing he did not resent the connection. ‘I think I must ask you to unburden yourself of that fine coat you are wearing and change into working gear. There is much to do.’

  ‘One thing, Michael O’Hagan acted as my servant aboard Larcher. I would be obliged if he could do so again.’

  ‘Of course,’ Digby replied with a look of astonishment, ‘though I can scarce think of anyone less suitable.’

  ‘That, Henry, is what makes him perfect.’

  The sound of a gun boomed across the anchorage, which had Matthew Dorling knock and enter. The look to Pearce was automatic and quickly diverted by a snap of the head in the direction of Digby.

  ‘Flag has raised our number, sir, with a signal to proceed to sea.’

  ‘Very well, Mr Dorling. Mr Pearce, all hands to weigh, if you please.’

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  There was no aiming at concealment when Henry Digby opened his orders, this as they passed the channel separating the islands of Corsica and Sardinia. Mr Dorling had been asked only to set a course to the south even if there was no anticipation of a change from Naples being the first port of call. But it did no harm to then advise a destination at another time; it added to mystique of command.

  His instructions had come in a bulky oilskin pouch and consisted of his caution-filled orders as well as a sealed communication addressed to Mehmet Pasha. Another tied bundle contained letters addressed to Sir William Hamilton. For a moment he contemplated calling Pearce in to show him the Mehmet letter then put it aside. Much as he saw him as a colleague he was also his inferior officer and it was, to the captain’s mind as he pondered on it, a sound notion to keep in place that distinction.

  In the short period they had been at sea Digby could find nothing about which to complain; quite the reverse. HMS Flirt was a true plum, a brig that sailed easy and fast, especially with a crew informal to converse with and superbly competent. They were so well worked up that orders only had to be issued in a normal talking voice to be swiftly obeyed. Called to change sails the topmen were adept aloft, the waisters just as quick to man the falls and with a vessel that handled so well any change of course had been a joy to watch.

  Clearing for action went as smoothly as could be expected on a vessel new to the men knocking out bulkheads and storing furniture but that would improve with repetition. He had had the guns run in and out in dumb show and seen that the crews, their messes worked out by his second in command, were excellent in terms of both speed and safety, so much so that they were set to training the less than delighted marines. Fresh from San Fiorenzo Bay, food and water was fresh and more important Pearce had made it very obvious by his somewhat exaggerated deference who was in command.

  On deck the Marine Officer Grey was exercising his men in musket drill and the command drifted into the cabin. With the distance from there to the deck being a few steps up a companionway it seemed fitting for Digby to invite Pearce to join him at two bells in the last dogwatch for some cheese on toast in his cabin. Prior to arrival he put the orders in the secure padlocked coffer that was provided as a container for all the ships papers as well as the funds he held as the commanding officer.

  ‘We are bound for Naples first, John.’

  ‘Are we?’ Pearce replied.

  In responding he affected surprise, which he certainly did not need to do. Toomey had mentioned Naples and probably provided the main lever by which he had accepted the mission, the only wonder he had being why Digby had waited so long to pass on the information.

  ‘And then we are off to the Adriatic. Do you know anything of the Gulf of Ambracia?’

  ‘The purser in Britannia was a bit of an antiquarian. When I mentioned it he claimed it to be the very sight of the Battle of Actium, where Octavius defeated Mark Anthony in the Civil Wars.’

  ‘I know who fought the battle, John,’ he said, a finger on the requisite chart.

  That reply being somewhat terse took Pearce back and he was obliged to recall that although they had sailed and fought together he and Digby were very different people. Though he would not claim to be without pride, John Pearce saw it as an encumbrance to be very rarely invoked, while Digby was a man somewhat sensitive about being condescended to. He had come into the navy, unlike so many of his contemporaries, from a relatively privileged background, his father a well-placed divine and with a Baron Digby for a cousin.

  That should have made him less of a delicate soul, instead it seemed to feed on what Pearce could only put down to a sneaking air of inferiority which seems to characterise the man; perhaps his elevated relation had lorded it in the family firmament. Then added to that was their very different outlooks on life and more vitally career.

  If he had lately come to give some value to his rank it was not from ambition but necessity and on their previous voyage together he had made no attempt to disguise his disdain for the idea of a naval career. Digby was a man committed to making his way in his chosen profession; he was also deeply religious and that was a subject, like the Thirty Nine Articles of the Protestant Faith best avoided, given when Pearce pointed out the absurdities of Christian dogma and obscurantist prejudice it did nothing to endear him.

  ‘I’m wondering if Admiral Hotham sees it was a future anchorage.’

  Pondering briefly on that Pearce shook his head. ‘What purpose would it serve?’

  ‘Look at the charts, John, it is a secure bay and sits just to the north of the route to the Levant and we both know how busy that is.’

  ‘True, but there’s no enemy fleet to oppose us in the Adriatic as far as I know. The main task is to contain Toulon.’

  ‘I said the future did I not?’

  ‘You may well be correct,’ Pearce replied, with as much conviction as he could muster, given he reckoned the notion to be far-fetched, more Digby trying to elevate his mission. But then he had to disguise a thought that intrigued him; was there something in the orders, verbal of written, which had prompted the suggestion?

  ‘Did Sir William hint at such a thing to you?’

  The sharp reply of ‘No,’ was a way of saying what passed between the admiral and I is not for you to know, immediately followed by a smile to take
the sting out of the word. That did not settle the Pearce curiosity, it exacerbated it, and so he adopted an air of indifference.

  ‘I ask only because the instructions I received, admittedly from Toomey, not Hotham, seemed, when I thought on them, somewhat imprecise.’

  The conversation was interrupted by Digby’s steward arriving with the cheese on toast and a bottle of wine. The laying out had the two officers sitting in silence but Digby took it up as soon as he was gone.

  ‘Imprecise? How so?’

  ‘Our Pasha in flirting with the French—’

  ‘So they send a flirt to remonstrate,’ Digby cut in, clearly very pleased with his pun.

  ‘Droll, Henry.’

  ‘Perhaps they feel the need to flatter him?’ Digby responded with a wry grin, Pearce nodding at the self-mockery

  ‘If you want to flatter such a fellow or, for that matter, remind him of where his best interests lay, you send a senior officer and several warships. That happened with the Bey of Tunis, where Commodore Linzee was the representative with a second rate and Agamemnon. Some might see a pair of mere lieutenant as an insult.’

  ‘The admiral obviously feels someone of our rank to be sufficient.’

  ‘Meaning this Mehmet Pasha is not so important.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ Digby responded, not happily so.

  ‘Naples, you say?’ Digby nodded at the change of subject while he chewed. ‘Will we dally there long?’

  ‘Touch no more, deliver some despatches to the ambassador then be on our way.’

  ‘I wonder, Henry, if you would allow me to take charge of delivery?’

  If John Pearce held himself to be fairly adept at dissimulation he was with someone who perhaps knew him too well to be fooled. The consumption of food was abruptly put aside, as was Digby’s fork.

  ‘If you ask that, John, then you must have a reason.’

  ‘It was to Naples I went with the crew of Larcher and Sir William Hamilton who facilitated our transport back to the fleet.’

  ‘For which I am sure the navy is grateful.’ It was the turn of John Pearce to look askance then; was Digby taking the rise out of him? ‘Would there perhaps be another reason, such as a certain person I came across in Leghorn?’

  ‘Yes,’ Pearce replied, wondering how he had made that leap.

  There was a long silence as Digby went back to his food and wine, in which the poser of the question said nothing either, until finally his host looked up. His expression told Pearce he was about to be addressed by the ship’s captain and not any form of companion.

  ‘I must decline to indulge you. You cannot be unaware that I disapprove of such a liaison, which goes against the very tenets I hold dear, namely the sacrament of marriage, inviolable to my mind.’

  ‘Even if it be to a brute like Barclay.’

  ‘The tone of that question, John, is inappropriate. You’re talking of a highly respected and very senior post captain.’

  ‘Respected?’

  ‘Not loved I will grant you.’

  Digby was trying to be emollient but it was wasted on a man who had only one aim and Pearce did little to soften his tone. ‘What I find inappropriate is your feeling that you can judge the emotions of others in a matter of the heart. That surely is the sole concern of those involved.’

  ‘Are you telling me that Captain Barclay is not involved, does it not occur to you that he has engineered that he come out to the Mediterranean because his knows his wife is here? Whether he knows she is with you … well that is another matter.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So he is intent on rescuing his marriage.’

  ‘In which he will fail and I tell you, though I will not explain, he has forfeited any right to his wife’s affections.’

  ‘John, I am sorry, I cannot in all conscience be a party to this affair and therefore I cannot allow you ashore at Naples in order that you might meet with Mrs Barclay.’

  In case Barclay finds out and checks your prized career. Pearce, harbouring such a thought, was about to tell Digby that, in such a case he might as well up his helm and head back to San Fiorenzo Bay but he managed to hold his tongue. They were two days’ sailing from Naples, time to work on his man and, if it came to the crunch he would go ashore and damn the navy. Then let Digby sail back to Hotham and admit his failure to complete his mission.

  ‘I am, of course, on watch,’ he said, standing up to crouch under the deck beams. ‘And Grey, by the sound of it, has finished exercising his men. Thank you for the food and wine but perhaps it is best if I be about my duties.’

  ‘If you so wish,’ came the chilly response.

  Back on deck, stood behind the binnacle, Pearce was distracted by the crew, many of whom had gathered in the prow by the bowsprit as they had at one time of Larcher, albeit they were now wrapped in kerseymere against the less than warm weather. There they were bavarding away in the same manner as they had previously done of Larcher and snatches of their chatter and joshing floated back to him; they were content, he was not.

  With only two officers Pearce has suggested that Mr Dorling would stand a watch if asked, so they could get some proper sleep and it was he who relieved Pearce at four bells, which sent Pearce below to snatch six hours of rest. When he came on deck again at four in the morning it was to replace Digby, who was yet to get to the point of rating someone a midshipman so they could do the duty.

  The exchange of greetings was rigidly formal, very unlike that which had gone before, Pearce lifting his hat, listening to the latest information on course and speed before his captain disappeared. On a night of mixed cloud and stars it was to the latter that Pearce went for diversion. He sent for his sextant and went to work on polishing his lunar observations, as HMS Flirt ploughed on through a decent swell, the wind coming in nicely over her quarter, all quiet until the men were roused out prior to dawn.

  The crew picked up the change in no time; all it took was for both to be on deck as daylight arrived to see there were none of the smiles that had attended the previous morning and the pair came under scrutiny throughout the rest of the voyage. The journey to Naples was not of long duration and once they raised the dome of the Cathedral of Ischia, the highest point in that island, the mood was set if the weather was not: they sailed passed the island through heavy rainfall. That did not change when Pearce asked to see his captain.

  ‘I am intent on going ashore, sir.’

  Digby winced slightly at the honorific address, ‘And if I continue to forbid it?’

  ‘Then you have a choice, to continue the mission given to me with my presence or deliver your despatches to Ambassador Hamilton then return to the fleet without me, for I will no longer continue to serve in this vessel, which is my right.’

  There was real pain in the way Digby replied. ‘This is blackmail, John.’

  ‘And I am sorry for it but I left the lady to whom I have pledged myself here in Naples and I will see her come what may.’

  ‘I could have you slung in the cable tier.’

  As an attempt at a threat it failed, made worse when Pearce responded with what – and Digby could not know this – was pure bluff.

  ‘At which point you might find out to whom the crew will be loyal. I saved the lives of these men and brought them to safety. I said I would seek to keep them whole as a crew and I did. I would not want to be the one to test whom they will follow.’

  There was no doubting what was going through Digby’s mind apart from an imagined flogging; disgrace or if not that such a check on his career that he would be lucky to end up on a transport and not in command of it either. Pearce was feeling like a scrub and taking no pleasure in putting his one-time companion in such a position.

  ‘It is not normal,’ he added, ‘to seek to prevent officers from going ashore if the possibilities permit. And even if you outline the reason I wonder whether that would be seen as sufficient to abort the embassy proposed by Admiral Hotham.’

  ‘It means that much to you?’ Digby asked i
n a soft voice.

  ‘It does and I must tell you Emily Raynesford, as she now prefers to be addressed, that being her maiden name, is at present a guest of Ambassador Hamilton.’

  ‘Then so be it, Mr Pearce,’ came the reply, after a very long pause for thought and a chin resting on the chest. ‘You may deliver the correspondence for I will not have my prospects damaged by such an affair. But know this, I expect you to return to ship within the day and to sail on with me to the Adriatic.’

  ‘Which I shall do.’

  ‘But I will never forgive you for this and if you ever thought of me as kindly disposed towards you do not make the same mistake again.’

  ‘Permission to take along my servant?’

  Digby just nodded.

  They had not been long out of the cutter and on the quay looking for a conveyance, when Michael posed his question. ‘Will you be after telling me what is afoot John-boy?’

  ‘What’s makes you think there is anything?’

  ‘Jesus you could cut the air with a knife these last two days.’

  ‘Digby and I have had a slight difference.’

  ‘Slight you say, by Jesus, well that’s not how the rest on the barky see it.’

  ‘Michael, I don’t care what they do and do not see!’

  If he had hoped to silence the Irishman by his sharp response it fell flat. ‘Spoken in a manner that tells me you are not proud of yourself.’

  ‘How do you conclude that?’ Pearce demanded as they clambered into a hack big enough for them both.

  ‘Save us, do I not know you and can I not see with my own eyes that two fine fellows who were laughing on deck not long past won’t now look each other in the eye. Sure now, searching your face I reckon that the cause rests with you and seeing where we are headed I am not fool enough to be lost as to guess why.’