by Pope, Dudley
‘That’s as comfortable as I can manage,’ he said apologetically.
‘I am all right,’ she said. ‘I think you have suffered much more than I.’
She reached up with her left hand and touched his brow, and he realized he was soaking wet with perspiration. She turned to Jackson, and said, ‘Thank you, too.’
Now he needed time to think.
‘Give me the charts and lantern, Jackson; then get the compass and take the tiller. Continue steering due west for the time being.’
Ramage leaned back against the gunwale, lantern in one hand and charts in the other. His body felt shaky; his mind was full of a great black bruise; in fact the sea, the land, his whole life, was one black bruise…
The essentials, he told himself; concentrate on the essentials. If he could not get the Marchesa to a doctor within a few hours, the wound would go gangrenous; and gangrene in the shoulder meant death.
He had brought death to her cousin, Pitti. Had he brought – or rather, was he bringing – death to this girl? It seemed a long time ago – although it was only a couple of nights – that he’d read Sir John’s orders. If only he’d returned to Bastia and raised the alarm, so that another frigate could have gone to pick them up…
Anyway, what for the moment could be salvaged? The Marchesa’s safety was now his immediate concern. That solved the problem of his next move, and he unrolled the chart.
He needed a place where he could find – temporarily kidnap, if necessary – a doctor; and it had to be somewhere with a small bay or cove close by, so that he could hide the boat and get the girl on shore.
The neatly drawn chart stared up at him: the carefully inked outline of the islands stood out almost in relief, and the handwriting of the Sibella’s late master – for it was his chart – showed the ports available. Port’ Ercole was the nearest – he could see roughly where it was, almost in line with the peak of Monte Argentario. But the chart showed it was too rock-bound to be sure of finding a suitable place for hiding.
But following the coast of Argentario as it trended round in an almost complete circle from Port’ Ercole, he saw a large bay only two or three miles short of the port of Santo Stefano: a bay called Cala Grande, with several little inlets and, more important, the cliffs almost sheer on all three sides.
Cala Grande – the Large Bay. Behind it, he noticed, were two small mountain peaks, Spadino and Spaccabellezze. How did they get their names? ‘Little Sword’ and ‘Beautiful Cleft’. Like the cleft between her breasts, perhaps.
My God, he thought to himself, why can’t I ever concentrate? He measured the distance. The men would have to put their backs into rowing. He rolled up the chart and put down the lantern. The sudden movements made the seamen glance up from their oars.
‘Men,’ he said. ‘We are putting in to a bay about a dozen miles ahead, so that I can get a doctor for the lady. We’ve got to get there by dawn so that we can hide the boat.’
‘How is the lady, sir?’
The man with the shot wound in the wrist was asking. Ramage was annoyed with himself for not telling them: after all, they had given the shirts off their backs for her – apart from risking their lives in the rescue.
‘The Marchesa is about as well as we can hope. She has a shot in her shoulder, but I can’t get the ball out. That’s why we need a doctor…’
There were murmurs of sympathy: they knew much better than she how an untreated shot wound could end.
A man suddenly stood up in the bow. He had no oar and Ramage almost groaned: Pisano again.
‘I demand…’
‘Parla Italiano,’ snapped Ramage, not wanting the seamen to know whatever it was that Pisano intended demanding.
The man lapsed into Italian. ‘I demand we continue to the rendezvous.’
‘Why?’
‘Because it is too dangerous to go to Santo Stefano: the French are in occupation.’
‘We are not going to Santo Stefano.’
‘But you just said–’
‘I said we were going to a bay, and that I was going to get a doctor from Santo Stefano.’
‘It is madness!’ shouted Pisano. ‘We will all be captured.’
Ramage said icily: ‘I must make your position clear. In this boat you are under my orders, so control yourself. If you have anything to say, say it in a conversational tone: you are alarming the sailors–’
‘I–’
‘–and making a fool of yourself by squealing like a sow in farrow.’
‘You! You–’ Pisano was lost for words for a moment. ‘–You coward, you poltroon – how dare you talk to me like that! Assassin! It’s your fault Gianna lies there wounded! And you deserted my cousin Pitti over there’ – he gave a histrionic sweep with his arm and almost overbalanced – ‘you, you who are supposed to rescue us!’
Ramage sat back. Perhaps if he let the man get it off his chest it would put an end to the tirade – for the time being at least.
‘What’s he on about, sir?’ asked Jackson.
‘Oh, he’s upset about the Marchesa, and the other chap.’
‘It’s upsetting the men, sir,’ Jackson said as Pisano continued shouting.
And it was: the man rowing just abaft where Pisano stood in the bow suddenly lost his stroke, so the blade of his oar struck that of the man in front of him.
‘Pisano!’ snapped Ramage, ‘be quiet! That’s an order. Otherwise I’ll have you bound and gagged.’
‘You wouldn’t dare!’
‘If you don’t sit down at once I shall order the two men nearest you to tie you to the seat.’
The hard note in Ramage’s voice warned Pisano it was no idle threat. He sat down abruptly just as the Marchesa, in a weak voice, called out: ‘Luigi – please!’
She was trying to sit up, but Ramage reached out in time to stop her, his hand in the darkness accidentally pressing down on one of her breasts. He said in Italian: ‘Madam – don’t distress yourself. I let him talk in the hope his tongue would tire. But we can’t waste any more time.’
She did not answer; and Ramage leaned back against the gunwale. If he’d been in Florence when he told Pisano he was squealing like a sow having piglets, the man would plan swift revenge. For a shallow fop like Pisano, the only thing that mattered in life was that he shouldn’t make a brutta figura. Pisano’s type could never understand honour in the normal sense: he would break an oath without compunction; cheat, lie and deceive without giving it a thought. In fact these things were part of his code; the code by which he and his kind lived their lives, so that anyone doing the same to him would not upset him unduly, since he would have been expecting it. But let anyone laugh because he tripped over a loose carpet, let someone even hint that he was not a real man, not the finest horseman, the most courteous fellow that ever entered a drawing-room, the most accomplished lover in Tuscany: let anyone cast a slur on his vulgar virility: then that person had a mortal, albeit cowardly, enemy. Someone like Pisano would never make an open challenge unless he had an overwhelming advantage: no, it would be a case of a few whispered words to a man with a dagger. Pisano’s honour would be satisfied the moment he paid cash to the hired assassin reporting that he had completed the task.
Ramage noticed the outline of the boat and men was getting clearer. The oarsmen in the darkness looked like tombstones constantly bowing to him; but now their silhouettes were turning from black to dark grey, and the stars were growing dimmer. The false dawn, Nature’s daily deceit. They had been rowing without rest for nearly three hours.
Once they reached Cala Grande, the port of Santo Stefano would be separated from them overland by the short and thick peninsula of Punta Lividonia. With luck, he’d be able to find a track from the cliffs above Cala Grande leading across the high ridge of rock forming the neck of the peninsula direct to the town – probably between the twin peaks of Spaccabellezze and Spadino.
Grey, grey, grey…the men were grey; the girl on her altar of bottom boards was grey; the waves surging
past the boat in small toppling pyramids were grey and steely, cold and menacing to the eye. The wind was increasing slightly from the south and the boat was pitching gently like a see-saw as each wave coming up behind lifted for a few moments first the stern and then the bow as it swept forward.
Chapter Ten
The seamen hauled the gig up the narrow beach at Cala Grande. Without waiting for orders from Ramage, two of them found a way to the top of the cliff and were soon hurling down bundles of light brushwood and dry grass which the others hurriedly made into a rough bed, using the grass as a mattress.
At a signal from Ramage, they lifted the Marchesa from the boat using the bottom boards as a stretcher. They handled her with a gentleness which a stranger would not have credited: Ramage saw that each man showed a curious mixture of a proud but timid father holding his baby for the first time, and a well-trained seaman picking up a smoking grenade that might explode any moment.
Ramage had purposely not interfered, realizing their genuine concern for her. He also sensed there was no hint of lewd curiosity – although that would have been natural enough since most of them had not seen a woman for many months. Nor did it enter his head that they might be doing it for his sake as much as hers.
The seamen completely ignored Pisano as they went about their work; in fact they avoided him as though he was a leper. The Italian, unused to such treatment, reacted curiously, since in his estimation seamen were on the same level as peasants. He tried to start a conversation with Smith, no doubt realizing he was in effect third in command of the party. Although Pisano’s English had a heavy accent, he spoke clearly; but Smith merely shook his head politely and said, ‘Non savvy, Mr Jaw-me-down,’ and Pisano had nodded, not realizing he was being answered in a mixture of sailor’s pidgin English and slang, as though he was a Negro who was also loud-mouthed. When he asked another sailor for a drink of water, the man just looked him up and down and continued his work.
‘Why do they not answer me?’ Pisano asked Ramage.
‘They are not obliged to do so.’
Looking at his watch, Ramage saw it was 8.30 a.m.: high time he and Jackson were on their way to the town. He glanced along the beach, where two of the seamen were sweeping the sand, using the branch of a bush to smooth out footprints and the deep furrow left by the keel of the boat.
Already the air was hot, warning of a scorching day. Seaward he could see the island of Giglio a dozen miles away, a low, triple hump. The sun sparkled off the sea, and haze hung low on the horizon, faintly purple, blurring the line where sea and sky joined.
The rest of the men were sitting on the sand near the boat munching the bread and sipping the water that Jackson had just issued to them. Ramage called to Jackson and Smith. As soon as they stood before him he said: ‘Listen carefully, you two: Jackson, you’ll come with me to the village, and Smith, you’ll be in charge here. If the Italian gentleman wishes to stay with the boat he’ll be under your care’ – he chose his words carefully – ‘just as if he’s one of the crew. You understand me, Smith?’
‘Aye aye, sir.’
‘The lady, Smith, is to be protected at all costs. I expect we’ll be away two or three hours; but if we aren’t back by sunset we shan’t be back at all. In that case you’ll launch the boat as soon as it is dark and take the lady to the rendezvous off Giglio. Report what’s happened as soon as you get on board the frigate. You know the urgency… Can you read a chart?’
‘Sort of, sir.’
‘Well, here it is: study it while I’m gone. If you don’t meet the frigate, go on to Bastia. You understand? Carry on, then.’
As soon as Smith had gone back to the boat, out of earshot, Jackson said, ‘Sir, would you like me to make absolutely sure that he…’
‘Yes, but be discreet: I don’t want them to fetch him a clout with the flat edge of a cutlass just because he sneezes.’
As soon as Ramage saw no one was within earshot of the girl, he went over and knelt down beside her. She was awake: her face was pale and her eyes bright, and he saw she had been trying to tidy her hair with her left hand.
‘Madam,’ he said quietly, and she at once put out a hand towards him. He was too surprised to do anything for a moment, then he took it in his, and she whispered: ‘Where is my cousin?’
‘Some distance away.’
‘Lieutenant, I want to ask you a question. My other cousin, Pitti: you went back to him on the beach, did you not?’
The question was so unexpected that he stiffened, and the hand squeezed his, as if trying to tell him something she could not, or would not, put into words.
‘Madam, I don’t want to go over all that again; not now, anyway.’
‘But you did?’ she insisted. When he made no reply she said impulsively, ‘I know you did.’
Oh, to hell with it. ‘You didn’t see me: how can you know?’
‘I just know: I am a woman. He was dead?’
Again he did not answer, but was puzzled by his own silence. What was stopping him? Suddenly he knew it was just pride – he was angry that anyone should doubt him. As soon as he realized that, he decided to tell her the whole story, but just as he was trying to think how to begin, she whispered, ‘You need not answer. But Lieutenant…’
‘Yes…?’
Her voice was very soft; he had to lean over to hear.
‘Lieutenant…my cousin Pisano is also a proud man…’
he thought. Too proud to risk his skin for his cousin Pitti; but no matter.
‘…I think he spoke in haste last night.’
‘Quite. I gathered that.’
‘With us,’ she said gently, ‘our men care only for una bella figura, while the English care only for their honour. Yet you men are all equally as touchy about it, whatever name you call it by.’
Again she squeezed his hand softly, as if aware an invisible wall was building up between them.
‘For my sake,’ she said, ‘if for no other reason, be patient with him and with me. And’ – her lower lip was trembling – ‘and I am sorry for the trouble and danger I have caused you and your men.’
‘We have our duty to do,’ he said coldly.
She let go of his hand. Although it had been his voice, a vicious stranger inside him had spilled those six words without warning and without reason, while he wanted desperately to hold her in his arms and comfort her: to say he understood about Pisano; that he’d push over mountains, swim the Atlantic, lift the world on his shoulder for her sake.
He said, almost shyly: ‘I am sorry: let us forget it. May I tidy your hair?’
She looked at him, wide-eyed with surprise, then said in sudden alarm, ‘Is it too untidy?’
‘No; but you left your maid behind…’
She snatched at the olive branch.
‘Yes, wretched girl: she was pregnant. I left her in Volterra. It was as well I did; the ruthless Lieutenant Ramage would not allow me to bring such a luxury.’
‘There was no need: I can do your hair.’
‘Half a dozen times a day?’ she asked mockingly. ‘Anyway, there are other things a maid does for her mistress.’
Ramage felt himself blushing.
‘You’ll find a comb in the pocket of my cape,’ she said.
He tapped the grains of sand from the teeth of the comb, took out the pins holding her hair in place, and began combing. Yes, it was wasting time – valuable time; but in an hour he would be walking in the same streets as enemy soldiers who would shoot him as a spy if they caught him, since he would not be in uniform. Should he tell her how he was going to disguise himself? No, not now: not to spoil these few moments.
‘This is the first time a man has ever combed my hair…’
‘And the first time I’ve ever combed a lady’s hair.’
They both laughed, and he glanced towards the men, suddenly feeling sheepish at the thought of the ribald remarks they were probably making, but they were taking no notice.
‘I’m not the only barber in busin
ess on this beach.’
‘Oh?’
‘No – some of the seamen are tying each other’s queues.’
‘”Queues”? What are they?’
‘Pigtails. Sailors call them queues. Very proud of them, too.’
Finally her hair was combed enough: it was black as a raven’s wing feathers and curly, and he wanted to run his fingers through it; ruffle it and make her laugh and then tidy it again. Instead he began putting the pins back in, fumbling as he tried to arrange it as it was before.
‘Tie it in a “queue” instead, Lieutenant.’
‘All right, but keep still; I’ll tie it to one side. We’ll start a new fashion.’
‘Your hair needs combing too, Lieutenant. It’s all prickly at the back!’
‘Prickly?’ He put a hand to the back of his scalp and found the hair still tangled with dried blood and several matted ends stood up like a cockerel’s comb.
‘Why does it stick up like that?’
‘I cut my head: the blood has dried.’
‘How did you cut it?’
‘It happened when the French attacked my ship.’
‘The French did it? You were wounded?’
‘Only slightly,’ he said, putting the comb back in the cape and conscious of the watch ticking away in his pocket. ‘Well, Madam – once again you’re the most beautiful young woman at the ball. Now you must excuse me – I have a disagreeable task before I go off to the village.’
‘Disagreeable?’
‘Yes, but it won’t take long. I’ll soon be back with a doctor.’
He wanted to kiss her mouth; but instead he kissed her hand with an exaggerated flourish. ‘A presto…’
He walked over to Pisano, who was sitting against a rock a few yards from the men.
‘Come with me,’ he said curtly.
Pisano followed Ramage beyond a group of large boulders. When they were out of sight of the seamen, Ramage said: ‘I am now going to the village. In view of your remarks earlier today, you may prefer to stay on the mainland, instead of continuing the voyage.’
