'A magnificent sight is it not? May I congratulate you on being made post, sir.'
'Thank you… I er, forgive me, your face is familiar…'
'Quilliam, sir, John Quilliam. We met before Copenhagen…'
'On board Amazon … I recollect it now. You are still awaiting your step?'
'Yes. But resigned to my fate. To be first lieutenant of Victory is a better berth than many. Come, sir, his Lordship will see you at once and does not like to be kept waiting.'
Drinkwater followed Quilliam across Victory's immaculate quarterdeck, beneath the row of fire-buckets with their royal cipher and into the lobby outside Lord Nelson's cabin. A minute later he was making his report to the Commander-in-Chief and delivering Sir John Knight's documents to him. The little admiral greeted him cordially. The wide, mobile mouth smiled enthusiastically, though the skin of his face seemed transparent with fatigue. But the single eye glittered with that intensity that Drinkwater had noted before Copenhagen.
'And you say it is still Villeneuve that commands at Cadiz, Captain?'
'I have learned nothing positive to the contrary, my Lord, but you well know the state of news.'
'Indeed I do.' Nelson paused and reflected a moment. 'Captain Drinkwater, I am obliged to you. I am reorganising my fleet. Rear-Admiral Louis is here, in the Canopus and I am attaching you to his squadron which is to leave to victual in Gibraltar. I know that you have come from there and I wish that you should station your frigate to the eastward of The Rock. I apprehend that Salcedo may break out from Cartegena and I am in my usual desperation for want of frigates.'
The order came like a blow to Drinkwater and his face must have shown something of his disappointment. 'My dear Drinkwater, I have no other means of keeping the fleet complete in provisions and water, but by this means. You may return with Louis but I cannot afford to have him cut off from my main body.'
Drinkwater subdued his disappointment. 'I understand perfectly, my Lord,' he said.
Nelson came round the table to escort Drinkwater to the door with his customary civility and in a gesture that made intimates of all his subordinates.
'We shall have a battle, Drinkwater. I know it. I feel it. And we shall all do our duty to the greater glory of our King and Country!'
And Drinkwater was unaccountably moved by the sincere conviction of this vehement little speech.
Drinkwater looked astern. The sails of Rear-Admiral Louis's squadron were purple against the sunset. Drinkwater wondered if Lord Walmsley had transferred from the Leopard with the rear-admiral. He did not greatly care. What he felt most strongly was a sense of anti-climax, and he felt it was common throughout all of Louis's squadron. He crossed the deck and looked at the log.
Thursday 3rd October 1805.6 p.m. Bore up from the Straits of Gibraltar in company Canopus, Rear-Ad. Louis, Queen, Spencer, Zealous and Tigre. Wind westerly strong breeze. At sunset handed t'gallants.
'Very well, Mr Fraser, call me if you are in any doubt whatsoever.'
'Aye, aye, sir.' From his tone Fraser sounded depressed too.
Chapter Sixteen
Tarifa
3-14 October 1805
'It's a ship's launch, sir.'
'I believe you to be right, Mr Hill. Very well, back the mizen topsail until she comes up.'
The knot of curious officers waited impatiently. For over a week Antigone had cruised east of Gibraltar, half hoping and half fearing that Salcedo would try and effect a juncture with Villeneuve. The only thing that could satisfy them would be orders to return to Cadiz. Was that what the launch brought them?
'There's a lieutenant aboard, sir,' observed Fraser. 'Aye, and a wee midshipman.'
The launch lowered its mainsail and rounded under Antigone's stern. A moment later a young lieutenant scrambled over the rail and touched his hat to Drinkwater.
'Captain Drinkwater?'
'Yes. You have brought us orders?'
The officer held out a sealed packet which Drinkwater took and retired with to his cabin. In a fever of impatience he opened the packet. A covering letter from Louis instructed him to comply with the enclosed orders and wished him every success in his 'new appointment'. Mystified, he tore open Nelson's letter.
Victory
Off Cadiz
10th October 1805
My Dear Drinkwater
I am sensible of the very great services rendered by you before Copenhagen and the knowledge that you were exposed to, and suffered from, the subsequent attack on Boulogne. It is your name that I call to mind at this time. Poor Sir Robert Calder has been called home to stand trial for his actions in fuly last. I cannot find it in me to send him in a frigate and am depriving the fleet of the Prince of Wales to do honour to him. Brown of the Ajax and Letchmere of the Thunderer are also to go home as witnesses and it is imperative I have experienced captains in these ships. Leave your first lieutenant in command. Louis has instructions to transfer a lieutenant from one of his ships. You may bring one of your own, together with two midshipmen, but no more. These orders will come by the Entreprenante cutter, but she has orders to return immediately. Therefore hire a barca longa and join Thunderer without delay.
Nelson and Brontë
'God bless my soul!' He was to transfer immediately into a seventy-four! 'How damnably providential!' he muttered, then recalled himself. He would be compelled to leave most of his effects…
'Mullender!' He began bawling orders. 'Rogers! Pass word for the first lieutenant!' He sat down and wrote out a temporary commission for Rogers, interrupting his writing to shout additional wants to his steward. Then he shouted for Tregembo and sent him off with a bewildering series of orders without an explanation.
Rogers knocked and entered.
'Come in, Sam. I am writing out your orders. You are to take command. This lieutenant is staying with you. I am transferring to Thunderer. You may send over my traps when you rejoin the fleet… Hey! Tregembo! Pass word for my coxswain, damn it! Ah, Tregembo, there you are. Tell Mr Q and Midshipmen Frey and Gillespy to pack their dunnage… oh, yes, and you too… Sam, set course immediately for Gibraltar. Take that damned launch in tow… Come, Sam, bustle! Bustle!' He shooed the first lieutenant out of the cabin. Rogers's mouth gaped, but Drinkwater took little notice. He was trying to think of all the essential things he would need, amazed at what he seemed to have accumulated in eighteen months' residence.
'Mullender! God damn it, where is the fellow?'
He would take Frey because he was useful, and Gillespy out of pity. He could not leave the child to endure Rogers's rough tongue. James Quilhampton he would have to take. If he did not he doubted if Quilhampton, like Tregembo, would ever forgive him the omission.
Antigone hove to off Europa Point and Drinkwater and his party transferred to the launch. The midshipman in command of the boat hoisted the lugsails and set his course for Gibraltar. Drinkwater looked back to see the hands swarming aloft.
'God bless my soul!' he said again. The cheer carried to him over the water and he stood up and doffed his hat. An hour later, still much moved by the sudden change in his circumstances, he stood before Louis.
'Sorry to lose you, Drinkwater, but I wish you well. I am fearful that my ships will miss the battle and I told Lord Nelson so, but…' the admiral shrugged his shoulders. 'No matter. I have hired a local lugger to take you down the coast. It is all that is available but the passage will not be long and you will not wish to delay for something more comfortable, eh?'
'Indeed not, sir. I am obliged to you for your consideration.'
By that evening, in a fresh westerly breeze, the barca longa was beating out of Gibraltar Bay. Below, in what passed for a cabin, Drinkwater prepared to sleep in company with Quilhampton and his two midshipmen.
'We must make the best of it, gentlemen,' he said, but he need not have worried. The events of the day had tired him and, shorn for a time of the responsibilities of command, he fell into a deep sleep.
He was awakened by a sharp noise and a
sudden shouting. Against the side of the lugger something heavy bumped.
'By God!' he shouted, throwing his legs clear of the bunk, 'there's something alongside!' In the darkness he heard Quilhampton wake. 'For God's sake, James, there's something wrong!' The unmistakable sound of a scuffle was going on overhead and suddenly it fell quiet. Drinkwater had tightened the belt of his breeches and had picked up a pistol when the hatch from the deck above was thrown back and the grey light of dawn flooded the mean space.
A moustachioed face peered down at them from behind the barrel of a gun. 'Arriba!'
Drinkwater lowered his pistol; there was no point in courting death. He scrambled on deck where a swarthy Spaniard twisted the flintlock from his grasp. They were becalmed off the town of Tarifa and the Guarda Costa lugger that had put off from the mole lay alongside, her commander and crew in possession of the deck of the barca longa. A glance forward revealed Tregembo still struggling beneath three Spaniards. 'Belay that, Tregembo!'
'Buenos Dias, Capitán.' A smirking officer greeted his emergence on deck, while behind him Quilhampton and Frey struggled over the hatch-coaming swearing. The master of the barca longa was secured by two Spanish seamen and had obviously revealed the nature of his passengers. For a second Drinkwater suspected treachery, but the Gibraltarian shrugged.
'Eet is not my fault, Captain… the wind… eet go,' he said.
'That's a damned fine excuse.' Drinkwater expelled his breath in a long sigh of resignation. Any form of resistance was clearly too late.
'Wh… what is the matter?' Little Gillespy's voice piped as he came on deck behind Frey, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. The Spanish officer pointed at him, looked at Drinkwater and burst out laughing, exchanging a remark with his men that was obviously obscene.
'We are prisoners, Mr Gillespy,' said Drinkwater bitterly. 'That is what is the matter.'
'Preesoners,' said the Coast Guard officer, testing the word for its aptness, 'si, Capitán, preesoners,' and he burst out laughing again.
Had he not had Quilhampton and Tregembo with him and felt the necessity of bearing their ill-luck with some degree of fortitude in front of the two midshipmen, Drinkwater afterwards thought he might have gone mad that day. As it was he scarcely recollected anything about the ignominious march through the town beyond a memory of curious dark eyes and high walls with overhanging foliage. Even the strange smells were forgotten in the stench of the prison in which the five men were unceremoniously thrown. It was a large stone-flagged room, lined with decomposed straw. A bucket stood, half-full, in a corner and the straw moved from the progress through it of numerous rats. Drinkwater assumed it must be the Bridewell of the local Alcaid, emptied for its new inmates.
Conversation between the men was constrained by their respective ranks as much as their circumstances. Tregembo, with customary resource, commenced the murder of the rats while James Quilhampton, knowing the agony through which Drinkwater was going, proved his worth by reassuring the two midshipmen, especially Gillespy, that things would undoubtedly turn out all right.
'There will be a battle soon and Nelson will have hundreds of Spaniards to exchange us for,' he kept saying. 'Now, Mr Gillespy, do you know how many Spanish seamen you are worth, eh? At the present exchange rate you are worth three. What d'you think of that, eh? Three seamen for each of you reefers, four for me as a junior lieutenant, one for Tregembo and fifteen for the captain. So all Nelson has to do is take twenty-six Dagoes and we're free men!'
It went on all day, utterly exhausting Quilhampton, while Drinkwater paced up and down, for they drew back for him, clearing a space as though the cell was a quarterdeck and the free winds of the Atlantic blew over its stinking flagstones. Once or twice he stopped, abstracted, his fists clenched behind his back, his head cocked like one listening, though in reality from his mangled shoulder. They would fall silent then, until he cursed under his breath and went on pacing furiously up and down.
Towards evening, as darkness closed in, the heavy bolts of the door were drawn back and a skin of bitter wine and a few hunks of dark bread were passed in on a wooden platter. But that was all. Darkness fell and the place seemed to stink more than ever. Drinkwater remained standing, wedged into a corner, unable to compose his mind in sleep. But he must have slept, for he woke cramped, as another platter of bread and more raw wine appeared. They broke their fast in silence and an hour later the bolts were drawn back again. The Coast Guard officer beckoned Drinkwater to follow and led him along a passage, up a flight of stone steps and through a heavy wooden door. A strip of carpet along another passage suggested they had left the prison. The officer threw open a further door and Drinkwater entered a large, white-walled room. A window opened onto a courtyard in which he could hear a fountain playing. Leaves of some shrub lifted in the wind. On the opposite wall, over a fireplace, a fan of arms spread out. A table occupied the centre of the room, round which were set several chairs. Two were occupied. In one sat a tall dragoon officer, his dark face slashed by drooping moustaches, his legs encased in high boots. His heavy blue coat was faced with sky-blue and he wore yellow leather gloves. A heavy, curved sabre hung on its long slings beside his chair. He watched Drinkwater through a blue haze of tobacco smoke from the cigar he was smoking.
The other man was older, about sixty, Drinkwater judged, and presumably the Alcaid or the Alcalde. The Coast Guard officer made some form of introduction and the older man rose, his brown eyes not unkind. He spoke crude English with a heavy accent.
'Good day, Capitán. I am Don Joaquín Alejo Méliton Pérez, Alcalde of Tarifa. Here', he indicated the still-seated cavalry officer, 'is Don Juan Gonzalez De Urias of His Most Catholic Majesty's Almansa Dragoons. Please to take a seat.'
'Thank you, señor.'
'I too have been prisoner. Of you English. When you are defending Gibraltar under General Elliott.'
'Don Perez, I protest, my effects… my clothes…' he grasped his soiled shirt for emphasis, but the old man raised his hand.
'All your clothes and equipments are safe. I ask you here this morning to tell me your name. Don Juan is here coming from Cadiz. He is to take back your name and the ship that you are capitán from… This you must tell me, please.'
The Alcalde picked up a quill and dipped it expectantly in an ink-pot.
'I am Captain Nathaniel Drinkwater, Don Pérez, of His Britannic Majesty's frigate Antigone ...'
At this the hitherto silent De Urias leaned forward. Drinkwater heard the name Antigone several times. The two men looked at him with apparently renewed interest.
'Please, you say your name, one time more.'
'Drink-water…'
'Eh?' The Alcalde looked up, frowned and mimed the act of lifting a glass and sipping from it, 'Agua,'
Drinkwater nodded. 'Drink-water.'
'Absurdo!' laughed the cavalry officer, pulling the piece of paper from the Alcalde, then taking his quill and offering them to Drinkwater who wrote the information in capital letters and passed it back.
Don Juan De Urias stared at the letters and pronounced them, looked up at Drinkwater, then thrust himself to his feet. The two men exchanged a few words and the officer turned to go. As he left the room the Coast Guard officer returned and motioned Drinkwater to follow him once again.
He was returned to the cell and it was clear that much speculation had been in progress during his absence.
'Beg pardon, sir,' said Quilhampton, 'but could you tell us if…'
'Nothing has happened, gentlemen, beyond an assurance that our clothes are safe and that Cadiz is being informed of our presence here.'
Drinkwater saw Quilhampton's eyes light up. 'Perhaps, sir, that means our release is the nearer…'
It was an artificially induced hope that Quilhampton himself knew to be foolish, but the morale of the others should not be allowed to drop.
'Perhaps, Mr Q, perhaps…'
They languished in the cell for a further two days and then they were suddenly taken out into a stab
le yard and offered water and the contents of their chests with which to prepare themselves for a journey, the Alcalde explained. When they had finished they were more presentable. Drinkwater felt much better and had retrieved his journal from the chest. The Alcalde returned, accompanied by Don Juan De Urias.
'Don Juan has come', the Alcalde explained, 'to take you to Cadiz. You are known to our ally, Capitán.'
Drinkwater frowned. Had the French summoned him to Cadiz?
'Who knows me, señor?'
Perez addressed a question to De Urias who pulled from the breast of his coat a paper. He unfolded it and held it out to Drinkwater. It was in Spanish but at the bottom the signature was in a different hand.
'Santhonax!'
PART THREE
Battle
'Now, gentlemen, let us do something today which the world may talk of hereafter.'
VICE-ADMIRAL COLLINGWOOD TO HIS OFFICERS, HMS Royal Sovereign, forenoon, 21st October 1805
'The enemy… will endeavour to envelop our rear, to break through our line and to direct his ships in groups upon such of ours as he shall have cut off, so as to surround them and defeat them.'
VICE-ADMIRAL VILLENEUVE TO HIS CAPTAINS, Standing Orders given on board the Bucentaure, Toulon Road, 21st December 1804
Chapter Seventeen
Santhonax
14 October 1805
Lieutenant Don Juan Gonzalez de Urias of His Most Catholic Majesty's Dragoons of Almansa flicked the stub of a cigar elegantly away with his yellow kid gloves and beckoned two of his troopers. Without a word he indicated the sea-chests of the British and the men lifted them and took them under an archway. Motioning his prisoners to follow, he led them through the arch to the street where a large black carriage awaited them. Dragoons with cocked carbines flanked the door of the carriage and behind them Drinkwater caught sight of the curious faces of children and a wildly barking dog. The five Britons clambered into the coach, Drinkwater last, in conformance with traditional naval etiquette. Tregembo was muttering continual apologies, feeling awkward and out of place at being in such intimate contact with 'gentlemen'. Drinkwater was compelled to tell him to hold his tongue. Behind them the door slammed shut and the carriage jerked forward. On either side, their gleaming sabres drawn, a score of De Urias's dragoons formed their escort.
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