The Valiant Sailors

by V. A. Stuart

  “Certainly. There’s an envelope for them somewhere, I believe. Ah … thank you, Mr Fox.”

  Gravely Martin Fox replaced the papers in their envelope and offered it to Smithson, who tucked it self-importantly beneath his scarlet-clad arm. “And now the letter, sir, if you please.”

  “Letter? There is no letter that I am aware of, Mr Smithson,” Fox said.

  “But there was a letter,” Smithson began. “I informed the Captain that there was, I …” he bit back the words he had intended to say and reddened again, looking down at the ash as Fox stirred it gently with his foot.

  “Would you care to have your men in to make a search for it?” Phillip invited dryly but, recognizing defeat, Smithson shook his head.

  “No, sir, thank you. May I be permitted to escort you to the Captain’s quarters now, gentlemen?”

  Phillip led the way from his cabin, the Marines coming smartly to attention at the sight of him. On deck he could hear Laidlaw’s voice shouting an order and, as he mounted the companion ladder leading to the upper deck, he saw Anthony Cochrane at its head, obviously waiting for him. They drew level and Cochrane said, his voice low but with a flash of his old, exuberant spirit, “The Captain is back on board, sir. But he has taken ill … it was necessary to rig a bo’sun’s chair to hoist him to the entry port, as we did once before, sir, if you remember.”

  “I remember,” Phillip assured him. “Where is the Captain now?”

  “In his cabin, sir. I’ve passed the word for the Surgeon and, needless to tell you, I’m keeping my fingers crossed, in the hope that history may repeat itself. But …” Cochrane’s smile faded, as he glimpsed the escorting Marines. “Mr Hazard, are you under arrest, sir? Laidlaw said—”

  “No.” Phillip shook his head. “The Captain requires me to report to him but there is no need for concern, Mr Cochrane. With the evidence available, I do not think I have anything to fear.”

  “Are you sure, sir?” Cochrane asked wearily. “He has your brother with him and …” he broke off, as Lieutenant Smithson reached the head of the companionway, with Martin Fox behind him. “For the Lord’s sake, be careful, sir,” he added softly and then, in obedience to Phillip’s gesture, stood back to allow the little procession to pass him.

  At the door of the Captain’s day cabin, Smithson said, a note of unaccustomed authority in his voice, “Permit me to make my report to the Captain before he sees you, Mr Hazard.” Without waiting for Phillip’s assent, he thrust past him, knocked on the door, and went inside, closing the door behind him. Martin Fox swore under his breath. “Insufferable young puppy! But no doubt those were his instructions.”

  Phillip was silent, busy with his own not very pleasant thoughts. Cochrane had mentioned that Graham was with the Captain and, whilst this came as no surprise to him, he wondered uneasily what his brother’s presence portended. Some form of moral blackmail, perhaps. North was not above bringing pressure to bear on him, with Graham as the scapegoat and … the door of the cabin burst open suddenly and Smithson thrust a pale and frightened face through it into the passageway.

  “Mr Hazard, could you come, sir, please,” he begged and now, instead of authority, his voice held panic. “It’s the Captain … he’s very ill, sir, he … he cannot speak. I don’t know what to do or … or what’s wrong with him. I … his steward is with him and he seems to think that it’s the cholera.” He choked, his lower lip trembling, and added, a catch in his voice, “The Surgeon ought to be called, sir.”

  “Word has been passed for the Surgeon,” Phillip told him curtly. “Control yourself, Mr Smithson … and you may dismiss your men. They won’t be needed any more but you had better wait, I think.” He went into the cabin and through it to the sleeping cabin beyond, Fox hurrying after him.

  Captain North lay on his cot, his normally florid face greyish-white and his body twisted in the all too familiar agonised writhing of a cholera attack. Phillip had seen too many cases of late not to recognize the disease for what it was. Graham, bending over the swaying cot and attempting to spoon brandy between the tightly clenched teeth, looked up to meet his gaze with a wry grimace.

  “It’s an acute infection, Phillip. He won’t last long.”

  The steward, Phillip thought, the steward who had died, had also suffered an acute attack and he had served the Captain’s meals, poured his wine, and attended his person … it was not hard to guess how North had contracted the disease.

  “I’ll go and hurry Surgeon Frazer,” Martin Fox volunteered. “He’s not a pretty sight, is he, like this?” He shuddered, as he turned away. “My God, though … it’s a ghastly way for any man to die!”

  Phillip was silent. He stood looking down into the twitching, unconscious face of the man who, for so long, had exercised the power of life and death aboard the ship he commanded. Seeing death written plainly on that face now, he was aware neither of triumph nor relief but only—strangely—of pity. The tyrant, stripped of his power to tyrannise, was no longer an awesome but a pathetic figure and the sadistic bully, robbed of his strength and of the trappings of authority, was just another man. And, as Fox had remarked a few moments before, it was a ghastly way for any man to die. Others had died like this, it was true … thousands of others, seamen and soldiers, on shore, on board the line-of-battle ships, the frigates, and the overcrowded transports and hospital ships. They had died on the battlefield of the Alma, on the march, beside the bivouac fires, and even in far-off Varna, before the war had properly begun for them, before they had fired a shot. They were dying now, as North was dying, young men and old, cowards and heroes, men who had dreamed of military glory, boys who had wanted only to live and yet … Phillip gave vent to a regretful sigh. Motioning Graham to stand aside, he took the brandy flask from his brother’s unresisting hand.

  “Let me … it’s the least I can do for him, after all.”

  Graham flashed him a curious glance. “Spare your pity, Phillip,” he advised. “He was out to ruin us both, you know … and he’d have shown us precious little pity. You were to be charged with inciting the ship’s company to mutiny and I with having treasonable dealings with the enemy … and I, until he brought me to trial, was to be employed as his personal steward. He had already given me a taste of what that would entail and I confess I did not relish it.”

  Phillip, an arm behind the Captain’s shoulders, raised him a little and succeeded in spooning a few drops of the brandy into his mouth. “Why did you come back?” he asked bluntly.

  “Because,” Graham returned, with equal bluntness, “the enemy expected me to have treasonable dealings with them. Believe this or not but … I was offered command of a frigate in the Baltic!”

  “I thought that was what you wanted?” Phillip challenged bitterly and regretted his bitterness an instant later, when he glimpsed the expression on his brother’s face. “I’m sorry, Graham. That was unjust.”

  “No,” Graham denied. “I confess I was tempted … seriously tempted. But my father wrote to me … after all these years, Phillip, the Old Man actually wrote to me. He wrote to Odessa and, by some miracle, the letter reached me in Petersburg. And he was pleased—actually pleased—because I’d chosen to serve as an A.B. in the British Navy! He said he ’welcomed my patriotic and self-sacrificing decision’ and somehow, in the light of those proud paternal words, I could hardly go back on my patriotic decision, could I?” He smiled without amusement, catching Phillip’s eye. “So I refused my captors’ offer of the frigate and they dispatched me to Odessa once more—overland, an endless and exhausting journey—to await repatriation. I was fortunately just in time to meet the Fury when she entered the port, escorting a shipload of Russian wounded from the Alma. Poor devils! Barely half of them survived … they were in a simply appalling state, Phillip, their wounds dressed with hay or straw, when they were dressed at all. The Governor was horrified by what he termed an example of British barbarity and, I confess, I did not blame him.”

  “Our own men were little better p
rovided for in the hospital ships which took them to the Bosphorus,” Phillip told him. “We had few dressings, few medical supplies of any kind, far too few surgeons, and no ambulances. But …” he hesitated, wanting to ask about Prince Narishkin. “There was a Russian officer on board that transport whom I …” The Captain was seized by another violent convulsion and he broke off, setting down the brandy and gently lowering the unconscious man into a recumbent position. “Bear a hand here, Graham, will you? I’m afraid he may fall out of his cot, if he struggles like this.”

  “The Surgeon has come,” Graham said and Phillip expelled his breath tensely, thankful to yield his place at North’s side to the new arrival.

  Surgeon Fraser’s examination was brief. He administered a draught of some concoction from a bottle he had brought with him and then, leaving his assistant to apply hot flannels to the patient’s chest and abdomen, he drew Phillip aside.

  “There is very little I can do for him, Mr Hazard,” he said, his voice level and quite devoid of expression. “Save to relieve his pain as much as it is possible to relieve it. He is too far gone and the infection too acute for there to be a hope of saving him. I give him, at the most, two hours.”

  “Two hours, Doctor?” Phillip echoed dully.

  The Surgeon nodded. “You can do no good by remaining here. Leave him to us.”

  “If you say so. But—”

  Fraser laid a plump hand on his arm. “We shall do everything we can. He’ll suffer less than some of the poor fellows he turned from their hammocks for a practice alarm in Karona Bay, when the ship was at anchor in the midst of the Bay. And less than your brother there was made to suffer, when he had him flogged, Mr Hazard. I suggest, sir, that you put the past behind you because, in less than two hours’ time, you will be in command of this ship.”

  “In temporary command, Doctor,” Phillip amended.

  “Long enough, let us hope, for you to put right the harm your predecessor did,” the Surgeon told him. “My statement was amongst those our young and over-conscientious Lieutenant of Marines was holding, with the intention of delivering them to the Captain, when I passed him on my way here. I told him to read them, I trust with your approval, in the belief that, if he did so, he would have a better understanding of the circumstances which cause hitherto reliable officers to rebel against their commanders … even in the British Navy. It’s a lesson he needs to learn, I think.”

  Phillip supposed that it was. He took his leave of the Surgeon and, as Fraser returned to his patient, he glanced enquiringly at Graham. “Are you coming?” he asked. “There is nothing more for either of us to do here.”

  To his surprise, his brother shook his head. “I am the Captain’s steward, Phillip. Not the most honourable appointment, perhaps, but, until he relieves me of my duties, I’ll carry them out, if you don’t mind. Trojan’s new commander may have other ideas as to my suitability, of course.” He smiled, this time warmly and without cynicism. “It’s to be hoped he has but … good luck to you, Phillip, in whatever the future may hold for you.”

  “I shall need it,” Phillip returned soberly. “My God, I shall need it, Graham!”

  Graham’s smile widened. “You were, I believe, about to ask me a question concerning one of the officers aboard that transport the Fury brought to Odessa. Perhaps this letter will answer your question more fully than I can.” He took an envelope from his pocket and laid it in Phillip’s outstretched hand. “I was charged to give it to you. I expect you know by whom.”

  “Yes, I know.”

  “The Prince Narishkin survived,” Graham said. “And had no complaint of his treatment at the hands of the barbaric British. But the letter will tell you about it.”

  Phillip did not read the letter until he was alone in the privacy of his own cabin. It was very short.

  “I thank you,” Mademoiselle Sophie had written, “for restoring my husband to me, which is a debt I can never repay. But I shall not forget what I owe you and one day, perhaps, when this terrible war is over, I may be able to tell you of the joy and happiness your kind action has brought me …”

  He was reading the brief missive for the third time when Surgeon Fraser came to inform him of the Captain’s death.

  CHAPTER TEN

  The day following Captain North’s death, Phillip was summoned aboard Agamemnon and, at Admiral Lyons’s invitation, he gave an account of the events which had preceded his commander’s fatal collapse. He held back nothing and, when he had done, the Admiral said distastefully, “This is an unpleasant story, Phillip, and one, I think, that is best forgotten by all who have been concerned in it. I intend to forget everything you have told me when you leave this cabin and I suggest that you should endeavour to do the same. Those statements you have shown me should be destroyed.”

  “Yes, sir. I’ll be happy to destroy them, sir.”

  “I imagine you will be … although you yourself emerge with nothing but credit from the unfortunate affair. In view of this—and since there is no officer of post-rank available here to relieve you—I shall place you in temporary command of Trojan. You must understand, however, that the Commander-in-Chief may decide otherwise when we leave Balaclava to rejoin the Fleet.”

  “Yes, sir,” Phillip acknowledged gratefully. “I understand.”

  “Good.” Admiral Lyons smiled, eyeing him kindly. “Then go back to your command and do your best to rebuild the morale of your officers and men. In a day or so, I shall send Captain Mends to inspect your ship and, if his report is favourable, I shall recommend to Admiral Dundas that you remain in temporary command. If and when you are replaced, I’ll be glad to re-appoint you to this ship.”

  “Thank you very much indeed, sir.” Phillip was momentarily bereft of words. “I … I’m deeply indebted to you, sir, for all the kindness you have shown me and—”

  Sir Edmund brushed aside his thanks. “Between ourselves, Phillip,” he went on, a gleam of excitement in his fine grey eyes, “I am expecting orders to rejoin the battle squadron off the Katcha within the next three or four days. Lord Raglan, when I talked to him yesterday, informed me that he was writing to Admiral Dundas to request the co-operation of the Fleet and that General Canrobert was making a similar request to Admiral Hamelin. His Lordship feels as I do, that an attack on Sebastopol by sea will greatly facilitate his own and the French Army’s assault by land. The land-based gun batteries are all expected to be ready to open fire by the sixteenth or seventeenth. If they can put out of action the forts which bar the Armies’ way into the city and if we, at the same time, can contrive to knock out the harbour defences … then Sebastopol should fall to us without, it is to be hoped, too heavy a loss of life.”

  “That would be wonderful, sir,” Phillip agreed, catching his excitement. “If it succeeds.”

  “I see no reason why it should fail,” the Admiral said. “For our part, we shall be pitting wooden ships against stone-built fortresses, it is true, and our reserves of ammunition have been depleted, as a result of having to supply the guns on shore. But we proved in the past, at Algiers and Acre, that engaging at close range, with a heavy concentration of gun power on our broadsides, could be extremely effective against sea-forts. And this is where our steam squadron will prove their usefulness, Phillip. I hope to persuade Admiral Dundas to send in his sail-of-the-line, each lashed alongside one of our steamers which, having towed her into a position from whence she can open effective fire on the forts, will remain there in readiness to haul her off, with the least possible delay, when the action is over. You see…” He explained his tactical plan for the operation, detailing the positions of the various ships in precise terms so that Phillip, when he returned to Trojan, was as enthusiastically optimistic concerning the chances of its success as the Admiral himself.

  Three days later, Captain Mends inspected Trojan and expressed himself satisfied with the efficiency of the ship and her crew. On 15th October Admiral Lyons received his long awaited orders to rejoin the British Fleet and Agamemno
n steamed majestically out of Balaclava Harbour, cheered by the Marine artillerymen on the heights above the harbour entrance. The rest of the steam squadron still in harbour— including Trojan—were ordered to follow her with all possible dispatch and, by the morning of 16th, all were at anchor off the mouth of the Katcha.

  Excitement ran high and rumours were legion as the British and French Admirals conferred aboard Mogador. The French Commander-in-Chief was said to be opposed to Admiral Lyons’s plan of attack and was believed to have suggested an alternative, to which neither Bruat, his own second-in-command, nor Lyons would agree. Phillip waited, with what patience he could muster and learned from Tom Johnson, who paid a hurried call on him during the afternoon, that Admiral Dundas had eventually and with great reluctance agreed to the French demands.

  “Sir Edmund made it clear that the Admiral had very little choice—the French would have refused to join in the attack at all, if he had not acceded to their wishes,” Johnson explained. “So … we are to go in at noon tomorrow, instead of at six-thirty, when the land-based guns are to open the bombardment. The French, in order that they may support their Army, are to form a line on the south side of the harbour, from Streletska Bay towards the centre of the entrance, where the Russian ships-of-the-line were sunk. Our own Fleet is to sweep round to the southward and come up in succession, so as to form on the French van and prolong the line to the north as far as it will reach … but in such a direction that the distance between our ships and the forts will not be less than eighteen hundred yards.” He shrugged disgustedly. “Britannia has apparently been allocated a position where she will be exposed to the fire of several batteries, with all save her lower deck guns out-ranged. And Agamemnon’s main target, Fort Constantine, is protected by an extensive shoal so that, if we are to approach within effective range, as the Admiral wishes, we shall have to send a small steamer ahead of us, to take soundings and pilot us in! The Circassia is to be charged with this unenviable task. Ah, well, you’ll be summoned to a Captain’s conference soon, I expect, so that you will hear it all at first hand. But I can tell, you now, Phillip … our Admiral is close to despair at the turn events have taken.”