The Only Victor

by Alexander Kent

  Allday entered the room and said, “There’s a young gentleman who wishes to see you, Sir Richard. He is Mr Miles Vincent.”

  “Very well. I will receive him now.” Catherine was down at the estate office with Ferguson. Bolitho was still amazed by the way she had sorted out facts and figures, and with Ferguson’s ready help had prepared her own ploughing and planting suggestions for the coming year. She had even been making comparisons with local grain sales set against those in the North and as far as Scotland. He had expected that Ferguson might have resented her vigorous ideas for the estate, but like the property itself she seemed to have given him new heart for the future.

  He crossed to a window and looked towards the road, now hidden by thick bushes. Eventually they would leave here and face up to the world outside Falmouth. To London, to places where people would turn and stare. Where others might hide their envy behind false smiles.

  The door opened and closed and he turned to see Felicity’s younger son standing in the dusty sunshine. His dress was simple, a plain blue coat and a frilled white shirt, but he gave the immediate impression of incredible neatness. Except for a certain solemnity for one so young, he might have been like Adam when he had been his age.

  “Please sit down.” Bolitho took his hand. “We were sorry to learn of your father’s untimely death. It must have been hard on the family.”

  “Indeed yes, Sir Richard.” He arranged himself in the chair, his hands folded in his lap.

  Bolitho thought, like a youth about to ask his father for his daughter’s hand. Shy, but determined nonetheless. You would have known him for a Bolitho anywhere. He was nineteen years old, and had the same grey eyes, and hair almost as dark as his own. Behind this outer shyness was the barely concealed confidence which must be inevitable in any sea officer, no matter how junior.

  “I understand that you intend to seek a King’s commission. That being so I can foresee no difficulty. Volunteers for the berth of midshipman, even those forced by proud parents, are plentiful enough. Others with experience such as your own are very thin on the ground.” It was meant to relax him, to draw him out. It could not be easy to sit down with a vice-admiral whose exploits at sea and ashore were food for gossip on all levels. Bolitho had no way of knowing what Felicity might have said, so he had expected Miles Vincent to be on edge.

  He had not anticipated the youth’s reaction. He exclaimed, “I am most confused, Sir Richard! I was acting-lieutenant in the H.E.I.C., fully qualified in matters of seamanship and standing a watch. It was only a matter of time before I was advanced. Did you mean that I would be reduced to holding a warrant as a mere midshipman?”

  The shyness was gone; instead, he looked closer to righteous indignation.

  Bolitho replied, “Be easy now. You will know, as well if not better than I, that holding a rank in one of John Company’s ships is a far cry from the King’s service. The pay and conditions are far superior, the ships are not manned by the sweepings of the jails or the press gangs, and they are only called on to fight to defend their own cargoes . . . when I was a captain there was many a time I would have seized a few of their prime seamen for my own.” He paused. “In the King’s ships we are expected to do battle with the enemy, no matter what guise or force he comes in. My people do not serve for the money or the profit which any experienced man can make in the Company’s vessels, nor do they for the most part fight for their King and country!” He saw Vincent’s eyes widen and continued, “That surprises you? Then let me explain. They fight for each other, for their ship, which must be their home until they are released from a harsh and demanding service.”

  The youth stammered, “You—make it very clear, Sir Richard.”

  Bolitho smiled to himself. The nervous suitor was back again.

  He said, “So if you are still of the same mind I will certainly sponsor your request to a captain who requires young gentlemen. I feel certain that one like yourself, with the qualities you have mentioned, will be promoted to lieutenant in a matter of months, perhaps less. The Fleet needs officers as never before. But if they cannot lead or encourage the people they are intended to command, I for one have no time for them.”

  “If I may say, Sir Richard, your own gallant examples are much talked of.”

  He sprang to his feet as Catherine walked in through a garden door.

  She stared from Bolitho to the stiff-backed figure in blue and commented, “You must be Miles.” She tossed a wide-brimmed straw hat onto a chest and kissed Bolitho lightly on the cheek. “It is such a lovely day, Richard, we must walk along the cliff this evening.” She shot him a questioning glance as the youth sprang forward to hold a chair for her. “Thank you, young sir.”

  Vincent was gazing at the portraits, which marked each section of the staircase like silent onlookers.

  “All great sailors, Sir Richard. I would wish nothing more than to be like them.” He glanced at Catherine, his features expressionless. “To add honour to the name of Bolitho!”

  With the same precise care he made his excuses and left the house and Bolitho remarked, “A pretty speech anyway.” He looked at her and then knelt beside her chair.

  “What is it, dearest Kate? Tell me.”

  She touched his face with sudden tenderness. “That young man. His face, those eyes . . . he is so much a part of your family background. Like all the other mysteries I cannot share.”

  Bolitho took her hand and tried to make light of it. “His manners are faultless, but they train them well in the H.E.I.C., so that their young officers may flirt with the ladies of quality and lovesick maidens who take passage to distant parts!” It was not working. “I want to share everything with you, dearest Kate, and share you with nobody.”

  Catherine placed her palm on his face and smiled. “You always know, Richard. It is like a bond stronger even than marriage, because it is of our making and choice.” Her dark eyes searched his face feature by feature. “I will be all that you want me to be. Lover, companion, friend—” She laughed and threw back her head. “Or the lady for whom young officers carry chairs. What did you make of him?”

  “What has Felicity made of him, would be a fairer question!” He took her arm. “Come—the cliff walk. I never tire of it. You can tell me about your plans for the estate as we go.”

  Allday closed the door as they walked out into the garden and down towards the small gate.

  He tried not to think about the girl at the inn. What had he expected? How could he have hoped to marry her and still serve Bolitho at sea? The questions were still unanswered when he found Ozzard making his way to the kitchen, where he sometimes helped Mrs Ferguson with her duties.

  “Did you see the lad who came about joining the service?”

  Ozzard frowned. “He’s a dark one, I shouldn’t wonder. Why did he quit the East India Company—that’s what I’d like to know before I gave him any authority!”

  Allday sighed. It had been good to see Bolitho and his lady walking together, but it only added to his own sense of being unwanted, with nothing useful to do until the next orders came. Even that prospect gave him no satisfaction.

  He said half to himself, “If only she’d waited.”

  Ozzard turned on him with unexpected fury. “Wait? They never bloody well wait, any of ’em, and the sooner you get that through your skull the better— matey!”

  Allday stared after him with astonishment. Usually there was none milder. So he wasn’t the only one with troubles after all.

  It was, many proclaimed, one of the best summers anyone could remember. The crops, like the lambing, had done well, and even the coastal fishermen were not heard to complain. But for the absence of young men around the farms and in the streets of Falmouth, they might have been at peace.

  The news of the war was sparse and, apart from some reports of French men-of-war being sighted near Biscay, and then only in small numbers, it was as if the whole enemy fleet had been swallowed up. Bolitho sometimes thought of the French frigate which had
been sheltering at Good Hope, or the coded letters they had found aboard the slaver Albacora. Was it part of an overall plan, or were these ship movements and occasional attempts to breach the tightly-stretched English blockade merely at the whim of their local commanders?

  He had spoken infrequently of his thoughts to Catherine because she was preparing herself in her own way for the inevitable. When it came on the last day of August she said quietly, “It is a part of your life which I cannot share; no woman can. But whatever it is, Richard, wherever duty takes you, I shall be with you.”

  They had been riding along the cliffs and unlike other times they had said very little, had been content with each other’s nearness. They had found the little cove again, where they had made love so passionately and had cast all inhibitions to the sea-breezes. This time they had dismounted but remained on the cliff, holding the horses’ heads, then touching hands in silence. It was as if they had both known. As Catherine had sensed the nearness of his ship when it had sailed on to Portsmouth.

  When they had entered the stable-yard Bolitho had seen Allday waiting by the door.

  Allday looked first at Catherine, then at him. “Th’ courier’s been an’ gone, Sir Richard.”

  Perhaps he too had been expecting it. He might even have been willing it to come. To be at sea again, serving the one who meant more to him than any other living soul. Doing what he had given his life to.

  Now, with the late afternoon sunshine casting almost horizontal beams across the big room, the house seemed strangely silent as Bolitho slit open the heavy, red-sealed envelope with the Admiralty fouled anchor in its corner.

  She stood with her back to him, her straw hat dangling from her hand, watching the garden, trying to remain calm perhaps, with the taste of the salt air on her lips. Like dried tears.

  He laid down the letter and said, “Apparently I am being given a squadron.” He watched her turn towards him as he added, “Eventually. Also a new flagship.”

  She crossed the room in quick strides, her hat falling unheeded to the floor. “Does that mean we are not to be parted yet?” She waited for him to hold her. “Just tell me that is so!”

  Bolitho smiled. “I must go to London.” He tightened his hold, feeling the warmth of her body against his own. “We shall go together, if that is what you want.”

  She nodded. “I understand what you mean. What to expect from some quarters.” She saw the pain in his grey eyes and touched his face. “I knew your thoughts just now about your next flag-ship. She will not be your old Hyperion. But she is safe from those who would dishonour her by turning her into a hulk after all her years of service.”

  He stroked her hair. “You read me like a book, Kate. I was thinking that. The new ship is named Black Prince and is completing fitting-out at the Royal Dockyard, Chatham. I will take you there, too . . . I don’t want to lose you for a moment!”

  She seated herself near the great fireplace, now empty, but with the dark stains of countless winter evenings on the stonework. While Bolitho moved about the room she watched him, saying nothing which might distract him or interrupt his thoughts. This was the other man whom she cherished so dearly, so possessively. Once he paused in his restless pacing and looked at her, but she knew he had not seen her.

  He said suddenly, “I shall ask for a good flag captain. I will insist.”

  She smiled sadly. “You are thinking of Valentine Keen?”

  He walked over to her and took her hands. “Once more, you are right. He is not yet called into service again; and it is not like Val not to have announced the day chosen for their marriage. Strange, too, that Zenoria has not written to you.” He shook his head, his mind made up. “No, I would not request that he continues as my flag captain. Neither of them would thank me for that!” He squeezed her hands. “Like me, Val was late in finding the right woman with whom to share his life.”

  She looked up at him, seeing the light in his eyes. “When we are in London will you promise to see that surgeon? For me, if for no other reason.”

  He smiled. It was what he had asked of Tyacke. “If time allows.” He let out a sigh. “We have to leave for London in two days. How I loathe that journey . . . the only one in the world which gets longer every time!”

  She stood up and looked around the quiet room. “Such memories. Without these past weeks I do not think I could have faced this news. But now it is home to me. It will always be waiting.” She faced him and added, “And do not fret over Val and his Zenoria. It is not long since they came together. They will want time to arrange matters, and then they will tell us.”

  She dragged him to the window and exclaimed, “And if time allows—” She saw him grin as she attempted to mimic his words, “I shall show you some different sights in London so that you will not feel so gloomy each time you visit the Lords of Admiralty.”

  They walked out into the garden and to the wall where the small gate opened on the path to the stile and the cliff. Where she had come to meet him on that first night.

  She said eventually, “And you must not worry about me while you are gone. I would never stand between you and your ships. You are mine, so I am part of them too.”

  Ozzard watched them from an upstairs window where he had been polishing some pewter dishes for Mrs Ferguson. He did not turn as Allday entered the room but remarked, “We’re off again then?”

  Allday nodded and massaged his chest as the old ache returned. “Aye. ’Tis London first though.” He chuckled. “Just happened to hear it.”

  Ozzard began to polish a dish he had already shone to perfection. He looked troubled, but Allday knew better than to disturb his thoughts. Instead he said, “She’s the Black Prince, brand-new second-rate of ninety-four guns. Bit larger than we’ve got used to, eh? Like a palace, an’ that’s no error!”

  But Ozzard was far away. In that street along the old Wap-ping Wall where he had blundered from his little house on that hideous day.

  He could hear her pleading and screams; and afterwards, when he had hacked his young wife and her lover to death until he had lost all strength in his arm, the terrible silence.

  It had been haunting him ever since, revived by a casual comment made by the senior surgeon who had been in Hyperion during her last fight. When the old ship had started to go down, Ozzard had wanted to go with her, to stay with Bolitho’s things in the hold, where he always went when the ship, any of their ships, had been in action.

  But it was not to be. He let out a long sigh.

  All he said was, “It’s London, then.”

  10 THE WAY OF THE WORLD

  ADMIRAL the Lord Godschale was doing his best to show cordiality, to forget the coolness between himself and Bolitho when they had last met.

  “It is time we had a good talk, Sir Richard. We in admiralty can too often become dry old sticks, missing out on greater deeds which officers like you seem to attract.”

  Bolitho stood beside one of the tall windows and looked down at the sunlit roadway and the park beyond. Did London never rest, he wondered? Carriages and smart phaetons bustled hither and thither, wheels seemingly inches apart as their coachmen tried to outdo one another’s skill. Horsemen and a few mounted ladies made splashes of colour against the humbler vehicles, carriers’ carts and small waggons drawn by donkeys.

  Jostling people, some pausing to gossip in the warm September sunshine, and a few officers from the nearby barracks, cutting a dash as they strolled through the park and trying to catch the eye of any likely young lady.

  Bolitho said, “We are only as good as our men.” Godschale meant nothing of the sort. He was well pleased with his appointment and the power it gave him, and very likely believed that no ship or her captain would amount to anything without his guiding hand from afar.

  Bolitho studied him as he poured two tall glasses of madeira. It was strange to realise that they once served together, when they had both been frigate captains during the American Revolution. They had even been posted on the same day. There was n
ot much to show of that dashing young captain now, he thought. Tall, powerfully built and still handsome, despite a certain florid complexion which had not been gained on an open deck in the face of a gale. But behind the well-groomed sleekness there was steel too, and Bolitho could still recall how they had parted the previous year when Godschale had attempted to manœuvre him away from Catherine and back to Lady Belinda.

  Bolitho did not believe that Godschale had any hand in the terrible plan to falsify evidence which put Catherine in the filthy Waites prison. Sometimes she had awakened at his side, even after all the months which had passed since he had rescued her, and had cried out as if she had been trying to fight off her jailers.

  No, Godschale was a lot of things but he would have no stomach for a plan which might cast him down from his throne. If he had a weakness it was conceit, an actual belief in his own shrewdness. He had probably been used by Catherine’s husband, convinced, as Belinda had been, that it was the only solution.

  Bolitho gritted his teeth. He had no idea where Viscount Somervell was now, although he had heard rumours that he was on another mission for His Majesty in North America. He tried not to think about it, knowing that if ever they came face-to-face again he would call him out. Somervell was a duellist of repute, but usually with a pistol. Bolitho touched the old sword at his side. Perhaps someone else would cheat him of the chance.

  Godschale handed him a glass and raised his eyebrows, “Remembering, eh?” He sipped at his madeira. “To great days, Sir Richard!” He eyed him curiously. “To happier ones also.”

  Bolitho sat down, his sword resting across one leg. “The French squadrons which slipped through the blockade—you recall, m’lord? Before I sailed for Good Hope. Were they taken?”

  Godschale smiled grimly. He saw the sudden interest, the keenness in Bolitho’s eyes, and felt in safer waters. He was well aware that Viscount Somervell’s wife was here in London, flaunting her relationship as if to provoke more hostility and rouse criticism. With Nelson it had been embarrassing enough; at least that affair had been allowed to rest. Nobody seemed to know where Emma Hamilton was now, or what had happened since his death at Trafalgar.