Beneath the Aurora

by Richard Woodman

  ‘Yes,’ replied Huke doubtfully. ‘Carry on, will you, Mr Birkbeck.’

  Huke walked aft himself and stood next to Drinkwater. After a moment Drinkwater said, without turning his head, ‘That man Hopkins, have you had him aboard long?’

  ‘No, sir. Pressed him out of that merchantman I mentioned.’

  ‘Ah, yes, I recall . . .’

  Huke waited for more, but Drinkwater continued to stare astern.

  ‘I cannot imagine what has happened to Quilhampton,’ he said with a faint air of abstraction.

  ‘Sir, d’you mind if I ask . . . ?’

  ‘No, Mr Huke, I don’t mind you asking.’ Drinkwater swung round and looked at his first lieutenant. ‘But perhaps you’ll answer my question first. How many more men that you pressed from that same merchantman are Yankees?’

  It was far from a comforting thought, and it would not leave Drinkwater alone throughout that worrying day. Huke had hurried off and returned after a few moments with the assurance that, although most of the men out of the merchantmen had American accents, when challenged, all had claimed to have been of loyalist descent.

  ‘Very fine and dandy, if it’s true, which I doubt.’

  ‘But why should it not be true? If they had been Americans, they would not have submitted without protesting at being pressed.’

  ‘Indeed. But that doesn’t prove they are what they say they are. Did they submit to being placed on board docilely?’

  ‘No, of course not, sir, but they said they were owed money, that they had not received their wages or slops and they were dressed in filthy rags. I ordered them fitted out.’ Huke’s explanation petered out, then, as if summoning himself, he added, ‘Sir, if I might say so, I think you are concerning yourself over-much. You had little sleep last night.’ Huke stopped as the spark of anger kindled in Drinkwater’s eye.

  ‘Damn it, sir . . . !’

  ‘I mean no impertinence, Captain Drinkwater.’ Huke stood his ground. Several thoughts flashed through Drinkwater’s mind. He was tired, it was true, but all was far from well and he felt he had touched something. The man Hopkins had been deliberately evasive. Not merely unwilling to answer the captain’s questions, but suspecting something when asked, persistently, if he had sailed with Drinkwater before. Moreover, no Londoner would be content not to refer to his natal quarter of the capital.

  If Drinkwater was right, doubts had been sowed in Hopkins’s mind as much as in Drinkwater’s, and he might move again, and soon. The reflections calmed Drinkwater.

  ‘You are right, Tom, forgive me.’ He smiled and Huke reciprocated.

  ‘Of course, sir.’

  ‘Just humour an old fool and keep a damned close eye, as unobtrusively as possible, on that man. Make a particular note of his cronies.’

  ‘Very well, sir, I’ll see to that.’

  ‘I think I shall take a nap then. Be so good as to see the t’gallants set and have me called at six bells in the afternoon watch.’

  ‘Of course, sir.’

  ‘And round up Walsh, Birkbeck, Templeton and, what did you say the Bones’s name was?’

  ‘Kennedy.’

  ‘Him and a couple of the midshipmen, to join me at dinner. I’ll tell Frampton to have a pig killed.’

  ‘I’ll do that, sir.’

  ‘Very good of you, Tom.’

  The wind held steady from the south-east, but continued to fall away during the afternoon so that as the officers assembled for dinner, Andromeda slipped easily through the water.

  Circulating among them, Drinkwater sought to draw his guests in turn. Walsh proved as talkative a fellow as the first lieutenant had suggested, battering Drinkwater with a torrent of inconsequences he quite failed to understand so that Walsh followed when he stepped forward to meet the two midshipmen, one of whom was no more than a child.

  ‘You are Mr Fisher, are you not?’ Drinkwater quizzed, as the boy nervously entered the cabin in the company of a much taller, out-at-elbows young man Drinkwater recognized as Pearce.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ the boy squeaked. ‘My name is Richard Fisher.’

  ‘How old are you, Mr Fisher?’

  ‘Eleven, sir.’

  ‘That is very young, is it not? And how long have you been aboard this ship?’

  ‘Three months, sir.’

  ‘Ah, quite the old hand, eh? You commanded the gig when I came on board.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  The similarity of names reminded Drinkwater of his own son Richard who had once implored to be taken to sea. Drinkwater had not even entered him on a ship’s books, so little did he want to encourage the lad. Now the youthful Dickon increasingly managed the modest Suffolk estate with its two farms and had forgotten his idea of following his father’s footsteps into the Royal Navy.

  ‘There’s one born every minute,’ Walsh remarked, and Drinkwater let the rubicund marine officer scoop up the younkers and bore them with tales of derring-do when the war and he had been young.

  Drinkwater raised an eyebrow at Huke, who gave a slow, tolerant smile and shrugged.

  ‘When will we close Utsira, Mr Birkbeck?’ Drinkwater asked conversationally. ‘I have somewhat neglected matters today.’

  ‘You had a bad night of it, sir,’ said Birkbeck indulgently, ‘but I got a squint at the sun and reckon, all being well, noon tomorrow.’

  ‘I think we may be able to take stellar observations at twilight tomorrow morning,’ Drinkwater said.

  Frampton, the captain’s steward, went round and refilled the glasses, Fisher’s included, and the air rapidly filled with chatter. Drinkwater looked round with a sense of some satisfaction. It was only a small portion of the complement of the wardroom, of course, but they seemed good enough fellows. He caught Frampton’s eye.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Five minutes.’

  ‘Aye, aye, sir.’

  ‘And no more wine for Mr Fisher.’

  ‘Aye, aye, sir.’

  Drinkwater turned to Huke. ‘Damn fool,’ he muttered, then, ‘Would you introduce me to the surgeon, Tom?’

  Huke performed the introduction. ‘Mr Kennedy, sir.’ The curt half-bows performed, Drinkwater said, ‘Glad to make your acquaintance,’ and to the company at large, ‘I’m sorry, gentlemen, not to have made your acquaintance earlier, but the somewhat irregular circumstances of my joining and the haste of our departure combined with last night’s blow to make the matter rather difficult. I hope this evening will set matters to rights.’

  ‘I’m sure, sir,’ said Jameson, the third lieutenant, in his thick Scotch burr. ‘ ’Twas an infernal night; ha’e ye ever known its like afore, sir?’

  ‘Well, yes,’ Drinkwater said, and told briefly of the typhoon and the storm off Helgoland before turning to the surgeon. ‘You have not been long at sea, I understand, Mr Kennedy, how did you cope with the motion?’

  ‘Somewhat miserably I fear, sir. When the physician is indisposed, there is little hope for the sick.’

  ‘You are better now?’

  ‘As a matter of fact, sir, I’m ravenous.’

  The remark coincided with Frampton’s arrival with the meat. The delicious smell of succulent roast pork filled the cabin, killing the conversation as all swung in happy anticipation to the table. The joint, the fresh vegetables, potatoes, gravy and apple sauce suggested a meal ashore, rather than one aboard a man-of-war upon an urgent cruise.

  ‘Please take your seats, gentlemen.’

  The rumble of talk resumed, joining the scraping of chairs as the officers sat and flicked their napkins into their laps. Then they fell silent, leaving only Walsh to remark to Fisher, ‘You had better ask the captain, young fella.’

  ‘What had you better ask me, Mr Fisher?’

  ‘Why, sir, where we are going?’

  Surprise at the youthful indiscretion was clear on all their faces, though it amused Drinkwater. ‘What makes you think we are going anywhere particular, Mr Fisher?’

  Midshipman Fisher was flushing with the rea
lization that he was the cynosure of all eyes. ‘Well, s . . . s . . . sir,’ he stammered, ‘I s . . . supposed we might be, sir.’

  ‘Go on, sir,’ said Drinkwater, breaking the expectation by beginning to carve.

  ‘Well, sir, we were quietly at anchor with Captain Pardoe away in Parliament and then, sir, here you are and off we go!’

  He was in his stride by the end of it and the officers laughed indulgently as Frampton went round filling their glasses.

  ‘Well, Mr Fisher has a point, gentlemen,’ Drinkwater said as he finished passing the platters of sliced meat down the table. ‘We are engaged on a particular service, as some of you may know. As to what it is, it is difficult at this juncture to be absolutely certain, so shall we say we are engaged on a reconnaissance?’ He handed a plate to Huke and looked at Fisher. ‘Well now, Mr Fisher, do you know the course?’

  ‘North-east, sir?’

  ‘And what do you suppose lies to the nor’ east of Leith Road, eh?’

  ‘Norway, sir?’

  ‘Indeed, Mr Fisher, Norway. In the next few days we shall take a look into a fiord or two and see what we can find . . .’

  ‘In the way of an enemy, sir?’ asked Fisher, pot-valiant.

  ‘Possibly, Mr Fisher. Mr Walsh, do see that Mr Fisher has enough potatoes.’

  ‘Oh, yes sir, of course.’

  ‘Tae stop his gob,’ Jameson muttered.

  The general babble recommenced with indulgent grins bestowed on the blushing midshipman. After the pork, a duff appeared and when the cloth had been drawn and the loyal toast drunk, Walsh lit a cheroot and hogged the decanter.

  ‘A fair wind, if you please, Walsh,’ prompted Huke, and the evening passed into a pleasant blur.

  When it was over Drinkwater invited Huke to take a turn on deck to clear their heads. It was not quite dark. Thin tendrils of high cloud partially veiled some of the stars, but a dull red glow hung in the northern sky.

  ‘It looks like a misplaced sunset,’ Huke remarked, puzzled.

  ‘Aurora borealis,’ Drinkwater said, and they paused to stare at it for a moment. The crimson glow seemed to pulse gently, increasing in brilliance, then dying again, like coals that are almost extinguished. ‘It can take on the most incredible forms,’ Drinkwater remarked, and they began walking again.

  Andromeda ghosted through the water, for the wind had gone down with the sun.

  ‘I wish to God we knew the whereabouts of the Kestrel.’

  ‘Yes. Perhaps he’ll head back to Leith, the wind’s been fair.’

  ‘Sir?’ A figure loomed in the darkness. It was not Mosse, the officer of the watch.

  ‘Is that you, Mr Kennedy?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I’m afraid I’ve some rather bad news.’

  ‘Then keep your voice down, man,’ hissed Huke.

  ‘We’ve a case of typhus aboard,’ Kennedy whispered.

  CHAPTER 7

  October 1813

  Utsira

  At dawn next morning the frigate was stirred to life by the marine drummer beating the ship’s company to quarters. It was a grey morning, with a translucent veil of high altitude cloud spread across the sky, robbing them of the stellar observations Drinkwater and Birkbeck had hoped to secure. The horizon had not yet hardened before the stars, like distant lamps, had faded. Extinguished, Drinkwater mused to himself as he came on deck and took stock, by overly frugal angels.

  The ship’s company knew nothing of this disappointment. The watch on deck cast about in confusion at the sudden appearance of the captain, marine officer and first lieutenant and the rattle of the drummer’s snare, for there was no obvious enemy in the offing. The watches below tumbled up, chivvied by thundering hearts and starters, and equally confused for, as they ran to their actions stations, the mystified petty officers knew only that the men were to be stopped from clearing for action and casting off the guns’ breechings. Instead, they were to fall in in their messes, and the transmission of this unorthodox procedure caused further confusion. This took a few extra moments and in turn provided an adequate time-lapse to breed rumour.

  There were two of these speculations forming and they spread by muttered word of mouth faster than a spark along a quick-match. How these incomplete utterances sped round the ship, how one utterly defeated the other so that, by the time the divisional officers each sent their midshipmen aft to report their men mustered, the victorious buzz had convinced thirteen score of men, is a mystery understood only by those who have experienced it.

  One theory was that their proximity to the enemy coast was such that standing to in the light of dawn was a precautionary measure. It gained ground among the more experienced, but it swiftly withered when the second overwhelmed it. They had been called to account, it was asserted, for the cutting adrift of the cannon. The absence of punishment at the time had been commented upon. Neither Huke’s reputation nor Drinkwater’s lack of it seemed to square with inaction on the part of authority, and therefore this postponed corporate muster seemed a logical consequence. Nor did anything that happened in the next few extraordinary moments persuade the ship’s company of His Britannic Majesty’s frigate Andromeda that they were wrong.

  Flanked by Huke and Walsh, Drinkwater stalked the groups of men, taking a sinister interest in several, moving close to them so that the more perceptive and less terrified said afterwards that the captain had ‘sniffed them like a dog at a bitch’s arse’.

  This indelicacy was not so very far from the truth and some of those subject to this personal attention were sent sheepishly aft to a waiting Kennedy, watched by the others. From time to time a muttering rose with a mutinous undertone of protest which either Huke or the divisional officer swiftly silenced. When Drinkwater’s curious, shifty inspection was complete he returned to the quarterdeck.

  ‘Very well, Mr Huke. The duty watch is to rig the washdeck pumps and the Hales’s ventilators. The gunner’s party is to prepare powder for burning ’tween decks. The carpenter is to take three hundredweight of sand to the galley and the cook is to have it heated. The purser is to issue one bar of soap to every mess. The watch below is to turn up and be hosed down. After every man has been washed, he is to shift his linen and put on clean clothes. If a single man has on an item he is wearing now, I shall cover him with my cloak and flog him!’

  Drinkwater gave his bizarre orders in a loud voice, and those mustered below in the gun deck who failed to hear him soon learned of his intentions. Nor was a single man under the impression that a shred of solicitude attached to Drinkwater’s offer of his ‘cloak’. All knew the term a euphemism for the ration of lashes permitted a post-captain under the Thirty-Sixth Article of War which he might give without reference to any higher authority. By the time Drinkwater had finished, every man jack knew that what the watch below had to endure, the duty watch would also submit to, that the ship would be scrubbed from orlop to main deck, that the ports would be opened, that a mechanically induced draught via Dr Stephen Hales’s patent ventilator would join the natural air flowing reluctantly through the ship, and that hot sand and burning gunpowder would dry and purify the air between decks.

  In the ensuing period the deck of the Andromeda assumed the grotesque appearance of a bacchanalia. Had an enemy chanced upon them at that time, it was afterwards remarked, they would have caught the Andromeda’s company with more than their defences down. The spurting jets of water plashed upon the naked limbs and bodies of each mess in turn, and the initial misery and humiliation of those first chosen gave way to a whooping glee as group succeeded group and the naked increased and soon outnumbered the clothed.

  As each division underwent this strange, humiliating metamorphosis, their officers came aft, grinning at the men’s discomfiture, grouping on the quarterdeck to be driven, as their own reserved participation in this spree, to comments of impropriety.

  ‘My word,’ rattled a red-faced Walsh, ‘young Hughes is rigged like a donkey!’

  An acutely embarrassed Midshipman Fisher stared wide-
eyed at a small, deformed and excessively hairy man who giggled insanely and was commonly thought to be mad.

  ‘And look at Taylor . . .’

  ‘Good God, what a scar . . .’

  Having been stripped and drenched, the ship’s fiddler was set upon a forecastle carronade breech to strike up a lively jig, which prompted the most excitable to dance and skylark with even more vigour than the cold sea-water.

  When the greater proportion of the watch below cavorted in damp nudity, Drinkwater sprang a second and greater surprise upon the ship.

  ‘Frampton!’ he called, and the steward, stark naked, his hands held in front of his chill-shrivelled genitals, approached the officers. Drinkwater turned to the crescent of watching officers.

  ‘Well, gentlemen, rank has its obligations as well as its privileges. I do not know whether it was Epictetus or Marcus Aurelius who claimed the essence of command to be example, but if this performance is to be of any benefit, then we must take part . . .’

  Drinkwater stared round at the officers on whom the light of comprehension broke somewhat slowly. He began to take off his coat and held it out to the dripping and shivering Frampton who reluctantly relinquished his protective stance. Several of the officers began to move away, while the midshipmen continued to stare goggle-eyed at their commander. Drinkwater removed his neck linen, stock and shirt, kicked off his shoes and, putting his right foot on a quarterdeck carronade truck, rolled down a stocking.

  ‘Not here, surely, sir?’ queried an incredulous Walsh.

  ‘Why not, Mr Walsh, here is as good a place as any, for we must not only take part, but be seen to take part.’ Drinkwater unbuttoned his breeches.

  ‘What is the point, sir?’

  ‘The point, Walsh,’ offered Kennedy, fast following the Captain’s example, ‘is prophylaxis, the prevention of disease.’

  ‘What disease?’

  ‘Don’t bandy it about, Walsh, but ship fever, camp fever, low, slow, putrid and petechial fever, call it what you will, but do not lay yourself open to its infection . . .’