There was thus no evidence on paper of any involvement by the pair who had cooked up the shameful plan and Holloway, as was common on a flagship, a quite junior post-captain, was not going to risk the wrath of a vice admiral in order to support a lieutenant of whom he very likely had a very low opinion. The conclusion was stark: brute behaviour would not serve. In order to achieve his object and get back to Naples subtlety must be employed.
Easy to deduce but not that in execution. Lacking a court to try him, and that had to be a civil one, Hotham seemed proof against anything Pearce could chuck at him. He had high-level partisan support and an institution, the King’s Navy, that would rally round to protect him even if in person many disliked him. Lord Hood, too, would do all in his power to ensure the service was not brought into disrepute.
The key had to be Toomey. Pearce reckoned Hotham was the type who would sacrifice anyone to protect himself. Did that leave his chief clerk exposed? It mattered not if he was, as long as he thought he might be. Pearce recalled the soft words the Irishman had used to seduce him into accompanying Digby, the almost throwaway mention of despatches for Naples.
How foolish he had been not to spot that ploy and the implication, to not fully realise his relationship to Emily Barclay had been key to drawing him in. There was, too, the crew he had commanded aboard the armed cutter, now without a ship. He had requested they be transferred as a body and that had been acceded to, unprecedented as a step in a service wont to treat the lower deck as chattels.
Toomey must have been central to the whole enterprise, while the supposition reached, that he had dictated the reply Toby Burns sent to London, might well put him in commission of a deliberate crime. Pearce, after much thought and not a few imagined irate conversations reckoned that to be his best line of attack. The mere fact that he had survived an attempt to be rid of him would, on its own, serve to induce disquiet.
‘Mr Pearce, sir.’ Turning he saw a dwarf midshipman lifting his hat. ‘The captain wishes me to inform you that we are going to practise clearing for action and that a position on the poop might best serve as a place of safety.’
‘Meaning the position least likely to allow me to be a nuisance?’
The lad grinned in response to the demeanour of cheerful acceptance displayed before him. ‘Weren’t put like that, sir.’
He was up the companionway in a flash to take up a position between the mizzenmast and the poop fore rail, for Nelson had come on deck and already had his watch in his hand. The officers were all assembled, which was to be expected given such an order would only be issued when a known threat was in the offing. Even the hands were alert to the need and happy to rehearse that which might make them more effective in a real battle.
Pearce had no idea how often other navies practised their drills but the Royal Navy, unless they were at anchor, never ceased to do so on a daily basis. From sword drill to battle drill it was a common occurrence and the one that gave British warships the advantage they always enjoyed against an enemy; they simply did that which was necessary at a greater lick than their enemies.
‘Clear for action,’ was the quiet command from Nelson to his premier.
To say Agamemnon came alive was an understatement. The continuous drum roll began, nets being rigged immediately to protect the heads of those on deck from falling debris, while felt ‘fearnought’ screens were rigged and hammered home across the companionways that led to the lower deck.
Below, wooden bulkheads and canvas screens would be disappearing as all the furniture was struck into the holds, to leave the gun decks clear from bow to stern, this while the gun ports yawed open, the cannon behind them being loosed and drawn in below the mess tables that had hastily been triced up to the overhead beams.
The galley fire being doused sent a column of thick steam up the chimney, this as the fighting decks were being sanded and water buckets, as well as swabs and tourniquets, were laid in precise locations. The hands working the cannon were now shirtless. A musket, splinter or case shot wound was made a thousand times more difficult to treat if they took a wad of dirty cloth into the skin.
The gunners, with silk bands round their heads, would be hauling in the heavy cannon to load and then run them out, with the gunners’ mates fixing flintlocks and powder monkeys distributing cartridges of gunpowder to the gun captains. A steady stream of messages came to tell the captain that each division was in place and ready, that the carpenter and his mates were below to plug any leaks, the last to report the surgeon who had taken up his station on the orlop deck with his saws and knives.
‘Six and a half minutes, gentlemen,’ Nelson announced when the last of the reports came in and that had him examining his watch again. ‘We have mislaid thirty seconds somewhere, which I would see recovered on our next drill. I wish you to consider that such a thing might take place under the eye of an admiral and with a French fleet in sight. It would not be fitting that we should grant another vessel any advantage, even one of our own.’
What ensued was apologetic murmurs; his officers felt they had let him down.
‘Well, let us pretty the old girl up.’
If the pace of return to normality was slower, HMS Agamemnon was back to a proper state in very short order.
Both Emily and Ralph Barclay were at a loss as to how to greet each other, more like a couple first introduced in a parental match than a pair married. As much to do with time spent apart as their differences, neither wished to be the first to speak and when her husband did so it was not to refer to Emily but to object to the presence of Michael O’Hagan, stood by the door to the salon, his eyes fixed on a point above his onetime captain’s head.
‘I refuse to be embarrassed before a creature from the lower deck. While Lady Hamilton is here at your request, and I respect that, I have some concern for my dignity, Emily.’
‘I am obliged to reply that he is my friend and besides, his being here is an insurance against any acts of violence.’
‘You think I would resort to that?’
‘Past behaviour indicates the risk does exist.’
‘I have wronged you, I know, but allow me to plead that I was a man ill prepared for the life I needed to live.’
The excuses were trotted out, the very same he had related to the Hamiltons; life at sea was no preparation for domesticity, the service hard for a fellow not much above a boy, only getting more so as he progressed. If repetition made it easier to get the words out Ralph Barclay lacked the manner to make it sound truly convincing.
‘What I am saying, Emily, is this. I have erred in my treatment of you in the past but I will bend every effort to do better in the future.’
‘Do you really think we have that?’
‘You are my wife until, in the words of the service, death do us part. I am obliged by my vows to provide for you, care for you and cherish you and it is that that I wish you to accept will now be my mode of behaviour.’
Barclay looked at Michael O’Hagan and scowled, which was more in character than his less than sincere supplications. ‘There are matters I would blush to discuss with you in private, Emily, let alone …’
He could not bring himself to refer to O’Hagan by name or rank and even Emma Hamilton got a despairing look.
‘If you refer to the brute treatment you meted out to me in the cabin we shared aboard HMS Brilliant, Husband, then your behaviour is not much of a mystery.’
Dark-skinned it was hard to see the face flush but suffused with blood it was. ‘You have discussed intimate details of our relations with that fellow!’
‘For someone raised in the service you show a disturbing lack of knowledge of the obvious fact that there are no secrets aboard ship. Do you think our relationship, or rather the way it deteriorated, was not remarked upon by your crew?’
‘I would have dared any man to refer to it.’
‘What is it about the navy that it supposes it can flog opinion?’
‘I will not try to justify the practice to you si
nce you so obviously abhor it, but I will say that the navy would be at a loss to be effective without it. Anyway, that is beside the point. I have come to Naples, and have done so at some risk to my prospects, to try and effect a reconciliation. I am not fool enough to think such a thing does not come with strings attached, which I assume relate to the way I will behave in future. You will have conditions and I assume you have agreed to meet with me to lay those out. I ask that you do so now.’
‘While I am bound to wonder if you can change, for mere words will scarce serve to reassure me.’
‘What do I have but words and my own sincere desire?’
‘Is it to protect what you call your prospects, Husband?’
‘I will not deny it has a bearing. No man enjoys being subjected to behind-the-hand denigration and nor will a troubled private life be entirely lacking in any consideration of future employment. But that is, I assure you, secondary so I reiterate, madam, lay out your terms and let me see if I can meet them.’
‘I will not embarrass you by open explanation,’ Emily said, coming close for the first time.
Emma Hamilton, watching closely, saw Ralph Barclay’s nostrils twitch as he picked up the scent of Emily’s body. His reaction was all-consuming to her, for she knew what was being demanded of him, the points raised between the two women in the coach, imparted in low tones to not include the Irishman stood on the back.
They were laid out in the knowledge that he was now a wealthy man and could afford a style of life that would never have pertained when they were first wed. The looks such conditions received were instructive and it was a good game to try and guess which brought the most awkward response: a slight nod, a seriously deep frown or a look of surprise that what was being asked for should be part of the arrangement.
But it was the final requirement that was most eagerly awaited. Emily had to tell her husband she was carrying another man’s child, one he would be required to acknowledge as his own, to be raised without equivocation in that manner. In consideration of the hurt that might cause immediately, and the continuing anguish to come, she would do her best to provide him with a child or children of his own.
The shock induced by what had to be the first admission was enough to induce a degree of sympathy even for a man Emma Hamilton held in scant regard. The eyes opened wide, the eyebrows nearly hit the hairline and Ralph Barclay took on the appearance of a man who had just seen a ghost. He might have been aware of being cuckolded, if not he was a fool, but this revelation was of a very different order of magnitude.
His head dropped and a hand went to his eyes. Unable to see Emily’s face it was natural to wonder if that might display a degree of compassion, for she had no doubt of the seriousness of what she wanted. When his head came up she was still talking to him quietly, no doubt reiterating her own promises.
The push was violent enough to have Michael O’Hagan quickly move forward, his first task to catch Emily Barclay and ensure she did not fall. Once she was steady he closed the gap between himself and a furious post-captain, a man whose face was suffused with deep and angry passion.
‘Don’t come near me, you Irish shit.’
‘Sure that would be no way to calm things now, sir, would it?’
The passionless tone in which Michael said that seemed to enrage Barclay even more.
‘Remember your place. Lay a hand on me and I see you swing.’
‘I’ll lay no hand on you lest you seek to lay one on your wife.’
‘Wife!’
The shout was so loud it must have been heard throughout the Palazzo Sessa, which rendered Emma grateful that the Chevalier was at the Royal Palace to confer with Sir John Acton. She had no desire to involve her husband in this.
‘Sir, I beg you, control your passions.’
‘You dare to ask me that, when you—?’ Emma flushed herself but Ralph Barclay was not looking at her. His glare was directed at Emily now stood head bowed as if ashamed. ‘You make a fine pair of whores.’
‘Captain Barclay, I demand you recall who I am.’
‘Fear not, I know you only too well and the stench of your reputation does not inspire me. As for you, madam, for I will no longer refer to you by your given name, you have shamed your family and what is more important you have shamed me. Raise another man’s bastard, what do you take me for?’
‘It is necessary you know the truth.’
‘I should have known it before I ever allowed myself to be seduced into marrying you.’
That brought up Emily’s head and instead of looking abashed, which her previous spoken words had indicated, her green eyes were flashing and now it was her voice that would carry beyond the closed door, this as he moved to one side of Michael O’Hagan.
‘You seduced, sir! Never. You went about acquiring me as your wife with the same lack of honesty that is your abiding trait by implying a threat to my parents that they would be rendered homeless.’
‘Which they will be forthwith, I assure you. As for you, the gutter will serve for I will deny you bed and board. As for your bastard, I will take it from you, as is my right, and dump it in the first workhouse I encounter. With luck, disease and deprivation will serve to wash clean the stain you have put upon my good name.’
‘Which is one of the things you singularly lack, sir, along with kindness, compassion and any notion of how a real man should behave.’
The spittle flew then. ‘Don’t tell me who you consider to be a real man, I can guess, though I will no more name him than you. God grant that I should get him at a grating a second time.’
‘Your answer to all your faults, cruelty.’
Barclay was looking at O’Hagan, his eyes full of hate. ‘You! I will certainly flog you should the chance present itself – that is, if I don’t grant you a rope.’
It was the wrong thing to say to such a man. Michael stepped forward at a speed Barclay had not anticipated and grabbed him by his stock, to physically lift him from the floor, the Irishman’s threat softly issued but more deadly for that.
‘I’ll break your neck if you try and long before any hand can stay mine.’
The man he was holding was having trouble breathing, for Michael had twisted the stock into a tourniquet. With an elbow in Barclay’s chest and a forearm on his ribs the captain’s feet were dancing in thin air.
‘Put him down, Michael,’ Emma Hamilton, ‘for his corpse in our residence would be hard to explain.’
‘For you, milady,’ came the reply as, let go, Ralph Barclay fell to the floor from where, after a short series of inhalations to recover his breath he looked up at his assailant.
‘Touch a King’s Officer, would you, cur? Now you will most certainly swing.’
‘Did you see him touched, Emily? It is my impression he slipped.’
‘Not far enough for me, Lady Hamilton. The only fit place for such a creature to slip into is the public latrine.’
‘Sir, I request you vacate my house, forthwith, while I assure you a report of your insulting remarks made to me will be reported to my husband and by him to those in authority. As for any alleged assault, it will be denied that it ever occurred.’
Ralph Barclay looked from one face to another and worked hard to compose his features into indifference, but it was to Emma Hamilton he responded.
‘Insulted? You? For that I would anticipate the gratitude of decent society even if I am as obvious a dupe as your husband.’
Then he picked up his hat from a small table where it had been laid, and for all his attempts at evenness as he addressed Emily, the strain in his voice was obvious.
‘As for you, I never wish to see you again. I will have your bastard, make no mistake, for the only thing I now wish to give to you is a future full of grief.’
The hat was jammed on and, forced to walk round O’Hagan, he made his way out. Emily waited till his footsteps faded on the marble floors before she allowed herself a tear.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The journey between Le
ghorn and San Fiorenzo Bay was not one of long duration if the wind was fair, which meant that HMS Agamemnon was taking its anchor station before the sun went down, not that Nelson could hang about. It was a requirement of any captain that he report to the flag officer immediately on joining, even if he had only been absent for a period of days, and there was a pennant with Agamemnon’s number at the masthead of the flagship. With Nelson went his logs and reports on both the vessel’s condition as well as her stores and water.
It often seemed to John Pearce that the King’s Navy ran on the use of the quill more than guns or cutlasses. Everything was recorded: course, speed, what sails had been set to achieve that and any sightings made on the journey, however trivial. Food in the barrel used by the cook, each with its own unique identification, as well as peas and duff had to be set down as having been used and its condition, as well as the precise level of wastage or condemnation for being unfit to consume.
Minutely recorded were the quantities of small beer and rum allotted to the crew. The master kept his logs, the purser a set of his own, while the warrant officers reported on their areas of responsibility on an equally regular basis. The gunner was required to account for his powder, shot and slow match, both used and in hand, the carpenter for the state of the hull and decks as well as his level of timber held in reserve.
Canvas had to be accounted for as did masts and spars, cordage especially, since it was at the mercy of wind, weather and poor usage and difficult to quantify. It was also valuable; there were ever masters of merchant vessels eager to buy it, even if it had an identifying red thread running through it to say it came from the royal rope works. A coat of tar soon disguised that and few naval officers had ever been had up for selling it.
If a hand was to be shifted or promoted that had to be noted so that his pay warrants were for the correct grade, added to the names and punishments issued to transgressors, from stopping grog, stapling to the deck or a flogging, the number of strokes administered included. The ship’s surgeon, if they had one, was obliged to list the names and ailments of those he treated, the venereals especially, since he was allowed to charge for the service of treating that particular affliction. He was a busy man after a stay in port.
The Perils of Command Page 13
