The Only Victor

by Alexander Kent

  Bolitho plucked at the front of his shirt, one of the elegant selection Catherine had bought for him in London while he had been with Their Lordships.

  He had always hated the capital, its false society, its privileged citizens who damned the war because of its inconvenience to them, without a thought for the men who daily gave their lives to protect their liberty. Like—He thrust Belinda from his mind, and felt the locket which Catherine had given him. Small, silver, with a perfect miniature of her inside, her dark eyes, the throat bared as he had known and loved it. In a compartment at the back was a compressed lock of her hair. That was new, but he could only guess how long she had owned the locket, or who had given it to her. Certainly not her first husband, a soldier of fortune who had died in a brawl in Spain. Perhaps it had been a gift from her second, Luis Pareja, who had died trying to help defend a merchantman taken by Bolitho and then attacked by Barbary pirates.

  Luis had been twice her age, but in his own way he had loved her. He had been a Spanish merchant, and the miniature had all the delicacy and finesse he would have appreciated.

  So she had come into Bolitho’s life; and then, after a brief affair, she had gone. Misunderstanding, a misguided attempt to preserve his reputation—Bolitho had often cursed himself for allowing it to happen. For letting their tangled lives come between them.

  And then, just two years ago when Hyperion had sailed into English Harbour, they had found one another again. Bolitho leaving behind a marriage which had soured, and Catherine married, for the third time, to the Viscount Somervell, a treacherous and decadent man who, on learning of her renewed passion for Bolitho, had attempted to have her dishonoured and thrown into a debtor’s prison, from which Bolitho had saved her.

  He heard her voice now as clearly as if she were standing here on this rapidly drying deck. “Keep this around your neck, darling Richard. I shall take it off again only when you are lying by my side as my lover.”

  He felt the engraving on the back of the locket. Like the small wisp of hair, it was new, something she had caused to be done in London while he had been at the Admiralty.

  So simply said, as if she were speaking to him even as he recalled it.

  May Fate always guide you. May love always protect you.

  He walked to the nettings, and shaded his eyes to watch some gulls. It made him tremble merely to think of her, how they had loved in Antigua and in Cornwall for so short a time together.

  He moved his head slightly, holding his breath. The sun was strong but not yet high enough to—He hesitated, then looked hard at the horizon’s glittering line.

  Nothing happened. The mist did not edge out like some evil disease to mock his left eye. Nothing.

  Allday was looking aft and saw Bolitho’s expression, and felt like praying. It was like seeing the face of a man on the scaffold when given a last-minute reprieve.

  “Deck there!” Every face looked up. “Sail on the starboard quarter!”

  Poland called sharply, “Mr Williams, I’d be obliged if you would take a glass aloft!”

  The first lieutenant seized a telescope from the midshipman on watch and hurried to the main shrouds. He looked surprised: Bolitho guessed it was at his captain’s unusual courtesy, rather than the task.

  Truculent’s sails were barely filling, and yet the stranger’s top-gallants seemed to be speeding down on a converging tack at a tremendous rate.

  He had seen it many times. The same stretch of ocean, with one ship all but becalmed, and another with every stitch of canvas filled to the brim.

  Poland glanced at Bolitho, his features expressionless. But his fingers were opening and closing at his sides, betraying his agitation.

  “Shall I clear for action, Sir Richard?”

  Bolitho raised a telescope and levelled it across the quarter. A strange bearing. Perhaps not one of the local squadron after all.

  “We will bide our time, Captain Poland. I have no doubt you can be ready to run out in ten minutes, if need be?”

  Poland flushed. “I—that is, Sir Richard—” He nodded firmly. “Indeed, in less!”

  Bolitho moved the glass carefully, but could only make out the mastheads of the newcomer; saw the bearing alter slightly as they drew into line to swoop down on Truculent.

  Lieutenant Williams called from the mainmast crosstrees, “Frigate, sir!”

  Bolitho watched tiny specks of colour rising to break the other ship’s silhouette as she hoisted a signal.

  Williams called down the recognition and Poland could barely prevent himself from tearing the signals book from the midshipman’s fingers. “Well!”

  The boy stammered, “She’s the Zest, sir, forty-four. Captain Varian.”

  Poland muttered, “Oh yes, I know who he is. Make our number—lively now!”

  Bolitho lowered the glass and watched. Two faces. The midshipman’s confused, perhaps frightened. One moment he had been watching the first hump of land as it eased up from the sea-mist, and the next he had probably seen it all vanish, the prospect of an unexpected enemy, death even, suddenly laid before him.

  The other was Poland’s. Whoever Varian was he was no friend, and was doubtless much senior, to command a forty-four.

  Lieutenant Munro was in the shrouds, his legs wrapped around the ratlines, heedless of the fresh tar on his white breeches, and even thoughts of breakfast forgotten.

  “Signal, sir! Captain repair on board!”

  Bolitho saw the crestfallen look on Poland’s face. After his remarkable passage from England without loss or injury to any man aboard, it was like a slap in the face.

  “Mr Jenour, lay aft if you please.” Bolitho saw the flag lieutenant’s mouth quiver as though in anticipation. “I believe you have my flag in your care?”

  Jenour could not contain a grin this time. “Aye, aye, sir!” He almost ran from the quarterdeck.

  Bolitho watched the other frigate’s great pyramid of sails lifting and plunging over the sparkling water. Maybe it was childish, but he did not care.

  “Captain Poland, for convenience’s sake, yours is no longer a private ship.” He saw doubt alter to understanding on Poland’s tense features. “So please make to Zest, and spell it out with care, The privilege is yours.”

  Poland turned as Bolitho’s flag broke at the foremast truck, and then gestured urgently to the signals party as bunting spilled across the deck in feverish confusion.

  Jenour joined Munro as he clambered back to the deck.

  “That is what you wanted to know. There is the real man. He’d not stand by and see any of his people slighted!” Not even Poland, he almost added.

  Bolitho saw sunlight reflecting from several telescopes on the other frigate. Zest’s captain would not know anything about Bolitho’s mission, nor would anyone else.

  He tightened his jaw and said gently, “Well, they know now.”

  2 REMEMBER NELSON

  “MAY I ASSURE YOU, Sir Richard, that no disrespect was intended . . .”

  Bolitho walked to the cabin stern windows, half listening to the clatter of blocks and the surge of water alongside as Truculent rolled, hove-to in the swell. This would need to be quick. As predicted by Poland’s sailing-master, the wind would soon return. He could not see the other frigate, and guessed that she was standing slightly downwind of her smaller consort.

  He turned and sat on the bench seat, gesturing to a chair. “Some coffee, Captain Varian?” He heard Ozzard’s quiet footsteps and guessed that the little man was already preparing it. It gave Bolitho time to study his visitor.

  Captain Charles Varian was a direct contrast to Poland. Very tall and broad-shouldered, self-confident: probably the landsman’s idea of a frigate captain.

  Varian said, “I was eager for news, Sir Richard. And seeing this ship, well—” He spread his big hands and gave what was intended as a disarming smile.

  Bolitho watched him steadily. “It did not occur to you that a ship from the Channel Squadron might not have time to waste in idle gossi
p? You could have closed to hailing distance, surely.”

  Ozzard pattered in with his coffee pot and peered unseeingly at the stranger.

  Varian nodded. “I was not thinking. And you, Sir Richard —of all people, to be out here when you must be needed elsewhere . . .” The smile remained, but his eyes were strangely opaque. Not a man to cross, Bolitho decided. By a subordinate, anyway.

  “You will need to return to your command directly, Captain. But first I would appreciate your assessment of the situation here.” He sipped the hot coffee. What was the matter with him? He was on edge, as he had been since . . . After all, he had done it himself as a young commander. So many leagues from home, and then the sight of a friendly ship.

  He continued, “I have come with new orders.”

  Varian’s inscrutable expression sharpened immediately.

  He said, “You will know, Sir Richard, that most of the force intended for retaking Cape Town from the Dutch is already here. They are anchored to the north-west, near Saldanha Bay. Sir David Baird commands the army, and Commodore Popham the escorting squadron and transports. I have been told that the landings will begin very shortly.” He hesitated, suddenly uncertain under Bolitho’s level gaze.

  “You are with the supporting squadron.” It was a statement, and Varian shrugged while he moved his cup across the table.

  “That is so, Sir Richard. I am still awaiting some additional vessels to rendezvous as planned.” When Bolitho said nothing he hastened on, “I had been patrolling in the vicinity of Good Hope and then your topsails were sighted. I thought a straggler had finally arrived.”

  Bolitho asked quietly, “What of your senior officer— Commodore Warren? I am surprised that he would release his biggest fifth-rate at a time when he might need your full support.”

  He had a vague picture of Commodore Warren in his mind, like a faded portrait. He had known him briefly during the ill-fated attempt by the French Royalists to land and retake Toulon from the Revolutionary army. Bolitho had been a captain then like Varian, and his ship had been Hyperion. He had not seen Warren since. But the navy was a family and he had heard of him serving on various stations in the West Indies and the Spanish Main.

  Varian said abruptly, “The Commodore is unwell, Sir Richard. In my opinion he should never have been given—”

  Bolitho said, “As the senior captain you have assumed overall charge of the supporting squadron; is that it?”

  “I have made a full report, Sir Richard.”

  “Which I shall read in due course.” Bolitho moved his hand consciously away from his eyelid and added, “It is my intention to hasten the attack on Cape Town. Time is of the essence. Which is why this fast passage was of the utmost importance.” He saw the shot go home but continued, “So we will return to the squadron in company. I intend to see Commodore Warren without delay.”

  He stood up and walked to the quarter windows to watch the crests beginning to ruffle like crisp lace in the wind. The ship was rising to it. Eager to move again.

  Varian tried to recompose himself. “The other vessels, Sir Richard?”

  Bolitho said, “There are none. There will be none. As it is I am authorised to despatch several of the ships here directly to England.”

  “Has something happened, sir?”

  He said quietly, “Last October our fleet under Lord Nelson defeated the enemy off Cape Trafalgar.”

  Varian swallowed hard. “We did not know, Sir Richard!” For once he seemed at a loss. “A victory! By God, that is great news.”

  Bolitho shrugged. “Brave Nelson is dead. So the victory is a hollow one.”

  There was a tap at the door and Poland stepped into the cabin. The two captains glanced at one another and nodded like old acquaintances, but Bolitho sensed they were completely divided as if by the bars of a smithy’s furnace.

  “The wind is freshening from the nor’-west, Sir Richard.” Poland did not look again at the other man. “Zest’s gig is still hooked on to the chains.”

  Bolitho held out his hand. “I shall see you again, Captain Varian.” He relented slightly. “The blockade continues around all enemy ports. It is vital. And though heartened by our victory at Trafalgar, our own forces are weakened by it nonetheless.”

  The door closed behind them and Bolitho heard the shrill of calls as Varian was piped over the side into his gig.

  He moved restlessly about the cabin, remembering one of the meetings he had had with Admiral Sir Owen Godschale at the Admiralty. The last one, in fact, when he had outlined the need for urgency. The Combined Fleets of France and Spain had been thoroughly beaten, but the war was not won. Already it had been reported that at least three small French squadrons had broken through the tightly-stretched blockade, and had seemingly vanished into the Atlantic. Was this to be Napoleon’s new strategy? To raid ports and isolated islands, to prey upon supply ships and trade routes, to give the British squadrons no rest while they, the French, gathered another fleet?

  He could almost smile at Godschale’s contemptuous dismissal of the enemy’s strength. One group which had outwitted the blockading squadron off Brest had been under the veteran Vice Amiral Leissègues, and his flagship was the 120 -gun first-rate Impérial. Hardly small.

  The French might even have their eye on Cape Town. It was impossible to guess at the havoc they could create there. They could sever the routes to India and the East Indies as surely as the blade of an axe.

  He remembered the studied coolness between Godschale and himself. The admiral had been a contemporary of his; they had even been posted together on the same date. There was no other similarity.

  Bolitho was suddenly conscious of the distance between himself and Catherine. Godschale, like so many others, had tried to keep them apart, may even have plotted with Belinda to have Catherine dishonoured and lost in lies. But Bolitho doubted that. The admiral was too fond of his own power and comfort to risk a scandal. Or was he? It was openly said that Godschale’s next step was to the House of Lords. There might be others there who would wish to destroy them through Godschale.

  Catherine’s words rang in his ears. Don’t you see what they are doing to us?

  Perhaps this mission to the Cape was merely a beginning. To keep him employed without respite, knowing that he would never resign, no matter what they did.

  He crossed to the rack and touched the old family sword, dull by contrast with the fine presentation blade below it. Other Bolithos had worn it, proved it, and sometimes had fallen with it still gripped in a dead hand. He could not see any of them giving up without a fight. The thought gave him comfort, and when Allday came into the cabin he saw him smiling, the first time for a long while.

  Allday said, “The whole squadron will know about Lord Nelson by now, Sir Richard. It’ll take the heart out of some.” He gestured towards the nearest gunport as if he could already see the African mainland. “Not worth dyin’ for, they’ll say. Not like standing ’twixt the mounseers and England, clearin’ the way like we did!”

  Bolitho was moved beyond his own anxieties and said, “With old oaks like you about, they’ll soon take heed!”

  Allday gave his slow grin. “I’ll wager two o’ the cap’ns will have some grief afore long as well.”

  Bolitho eyed him severely. “You damned fox! What do you know of it?”

  “At present, not much, Sir Richard. But I does know that Cap’n Poland was once the other gentleman’s first lieutenant.”

  Bolitho shook his head. Without Allday he would have nobody to share his feelings or fears. Others looked to him only for leadership—they wanted nothing more.

  Allday took down the sword and wrapped it in his special cloth.

  “But it’s what I always says, Sir Richard, and every true Jack knows it.” He gave another grin. “It’s aft the most honour may be, but forrard you finds the better men. An’ that’s no error!”

  After Allday had gone Bolitho seated himself at the table and opened his personal log. Inside it was the lette
r he had started when England’s mist and drizzle had faded astern, and the long passage had begun.

  When she would read it, or if it even reached her, he would not know until she was in his arms. Her skin against his, her tears and her joy mingled with his own.

  He leaned over the letter while he touched the locket through his new shirt.

  Another dawn, dearest Kate, and how I long for thee . . .

  He was still writing when the ship changed tack yet again, and from the high masthead came the cry that the assembled ships had been sighted.

  Bolitho went on deck at noon, and felt the sun strike his face and shoulders like fire; his shoes stuck to the deck-seams as he strode to the hammock-nettings with a telescope from the rack.

  Mountains, red and pink in the harsh, misty glare, and over all the sun, which was like burnished silver, strong enough to drain all colour from the sky around it.

  He shifted the glass slightly, his legs braced as the lazy offshore swell lifted the keel and rolled noisily down either beam. Table Mountain, a paler wedge, but still shrouded in haze and mystery like some giant’s altar.

  There were the ships. His eyes moved professionally across the mixed collection. The elderly sixty-four Themis, which he knew was Commodore Warren’s ship. Warren was ill. How ill? He had not enquired further of Varian. It would show his hand, or display uncertainty when he must soon need these unknown men to trust him without question.

  Another frigate, some schooners and two large supply vessels. The cream of the attacking force would be as Varian had described, to the north-west where the ships could anchor well offshore, whereas here there was only one natural bank shallow enough to ride at their cables. Beyond the hundred-fathom line the sea’s bed fell away to infinity, a black oblivion where nothing moved.