Man of War

by Alexander Kent

  “The captain’s horse.” He thought of the girl in the wine-red habit. It was a strange time to go out riding, with his aunt and his young cousin to welcome him home.

  Napier said softly, “He’s badly troubled. Losing the ship . . .”

  Jago was watching him curiously. “Not all he’s bothered about from what I’ve heard, my lad.” He grinned. “Sorry. Before too long now I’ll have to call you ‘mister,’ ’ow about that, eh?” Napier did not respond to his raillery. “But we’ll work somethin’ out, if you does as I tells you!”

  Napier looked at him.

  “I want to do the right thing, you see . . .” and Jago knew it was serious. The danger, his wound, which should have cost him a leg—would have with most seagoing sawbones he had known— were nothing compared with this next challenge.

  He put one hand on the boy’s shoulder, and said, “Keep yer nose clean, an’ do right by the lads who will have to look up to you, God ’elp ’em.” He shook him gently and added, “You’ll be on the quarterdeck afore you knows it!”

  They heard boots on the cobbles and Adam Bolitho paused to look at them, walking toward the restive horse.

  The groom called, “Keep an eye open on them roads, Cap’n Adam, zur. War or no war, there still be footpads about!”

  Adam showed his teeth in a smile, but Napier recognized the anger in his eyes.

  To Napier he said, “Feel like testing Jupiter, David? Tomorrow, perhaps? I thought I might ride over to Fallowfield, see John Allday and his family.”

  “I could ride Jupiter now, sir.” But he knew that the captain was not hearing him; his mind was elsewhere.

  Then he was up and mounted, an old boatcloak flapping like a banner in the wet breeze. He swung round and looked up at a window, Napier could not see which one, and shouted, “I shall be back in time—tell the kitchen!” Then he was away, the hooves striking sparks from the worn cobbles.

  Jeb Trinnick had joined them, soundlessly for a big man with a limp. When he saw Jago’s pipe he pulled a pouch from beneath his leather apron.

  “Try some o’ this. Got it off a Dutchie trader last week. Seems fair enough.”

  Jago brightened. Another bridge crossed.

  “That’s matey of you!”

  Napier asked, “Is the captain going far?” He wiped some droplets of rain from his face, like tears. Like that day, all those months ago, when he had seen him with that beautiful woman, driving a smart little pony and trap.

  He heard Jeb Trinnick say dourly, “If I’m any judge he’ll be makin’ for the Old Glebe House.” He nodded, the single eye gauging the trail of smoke rising from Jago’s pipe. “Evil it is, or was. My youngest brother used to live over Truro way, afore he went over the side after Camperdown. Full o’ spirits, he said. Even the Church was glad to rid itself of the place to the first buyer it could get. Old Sir Montagu, that was.”

  Jago puffed out more smoke. “Good baccy, Jeb.”

  Somehow, Napier knew it was because of that same woman; he remembered the captain’s face when he’d read the little note she had sent out to Unrivalled before they had sailed to join the admiral.

  Jeb Trinnick made up his mind. “All the same, I’ll send one of my lads after ’im.” He grinned. “Just to be on the safe side!”

  Napier watched him limp into the shadows. A man who could deal with everything that came his way. He felt despair closing around him once again. Better to be like Trinnick, or Jago. Not to care . . .

  Suddenly he heard the snap of Jago’s delicate-looking pipe, which he had carried so carefully and filled for the first time with Trinnick’s Dutch tobacco. It lay in fragments on the ground, rain splashing over it, dousing the smoking ash.

  It mattered to Jago too, more than he would ever allow himself to show. He had hardened himself against it, perhaps because of other captains he had served. Looked up to, admired, hated; and one he had described as second only to God.

  But this one mattered. And to David Napier, who was all but fifteen years old, it was a lifeline.

  The courier arrived at the old grey house near noon, a week almost to the hour since Unrivalled had dropped anchor in Plymouth.

  Ferguson had been in the stable yard, watching Napier riding the pony Jupiter slowly but confidently, back and forth, “gaining an understanding,” as Grace had put it.

  The courier was known to Ferguson, as he was to many sea officers who lived around Falmouth. Ferguson had reached out to sign for the canvas envelope, but the courier had said almost curtly, “Not this one. Captain Bolitho himself, or I shall have to wait until he returns.”

  Ferguson heard his wife call, “Tell the captain, Mary!” She’d stay with him ’til they all knew. She never changed; nor would she.

  The courier relaxed and climbed down from his mud-spattered horse. All the way from Plymouth, and before that; how far had that envelope travelled? Ferguson wondered.

  The wheels had probably started to turn when a guardship or keen-eyed coastguard had reported Unrivalled beating her way up-Channel. A sight of home.

  Grace Ferguson said, “You’ve time for a glass, or a hot posset afore you leave?”

  The courier shook his head. “No, ma’am, but thank you. I’ve another call yet. Old Cap’n Masterman’s place at Penryn. Bad news, I’m afraid. His son is reported missing. His ship foundered on a reef, I’m told.”

  Ferguson turned, hearing the step on the cobbles. It was a familiar enough story in Cornwall.

  Adam Bolitho took it in at a glance: the courier standing with his mount, Young Matthew who had been supervising Napier with the pony, Ferguson and Grace the housekeeper, and Yovell who had stopped in his tracks by the gate to the rose garden. Catherine’s roses, or soon would be again.

  Like badly rehearsed players, but joined by something which none of them properly understood.

  The courier had produced a small writing tablet from beneath his stained cloak, the pen already dipped. What Lowenna must have used that day when she had been there to see Unrivalled weigh and stand out to sea.

  He thought of the Old Glebe House, how it had looked that night when he had ridden over to see it. How the horse had whinnied and shied, perhaps because of the stench of sodden ashes and charred timbers. Or because of something more sinister. The burned-out windows, stark and empty against the racing clouds, of the room where she had kept her harp, next to the roofless studio where he had first seen her chained to the imaginary rock. The sacrifice . . .

  He had gone back again in daylight. It had been even worse. He had wanted to go alone but Nancy had accompanied him, had insisted, as if she needed to share it.

  The main part of the house was too unsafe to explore. Ashes, blackened glass from those tall windows he remembered so vividly, broken beams jutting like savage teeth. A few charred canvases. Impossible to tell if they had been empty or partially finished when the fire had raged into the studio.

  Or being repaired. Like the one of Catherine, which she herself had commissioned to hang beside Sir Richard’s portrait, in “their room” as most of the household still called it. Dressed in a seaman’s smock and little else, what she had been wearing in the open boat when she and her Richard had been shipwrecked. Allday, when he could be persuaded to speak of it, had painted his own picture of Catherine and Bolitho, who had won the heart of the country when they had endured the open boat which might have ended everything. Her courage, her example, a woman amongst desperate men in fear of their lives, had left an indelible impression on Sir Richard’s old coxswain. “She even got me to sing a ballad or two!” He had laughed about it, proudly.

  He had never known Nancy to hide her thoughts from him. She had suddenly faced him in the overgrown drive, the blackened building and chapel a grim backdrop, with the sea beyond. Always waiting. Perhaps a new horizon.

  “It was Mary, the upstairs maid, who found it, Adam.” She always added a title, like a label, to any member of the household, in case he should forget between visits. Like the lesson which h
ad been handed down to him over the years, when speaking of his sailors—the people, as Richard Bolitho called them. Remember their names, Adam, and use them. A name is sometimes all they can call their own.

  Mary had run screaming to the kitchen. The portrait of Catherine had been slashed, again and again. Only the face had been left intact. As if that someone had wanted the world to know who it was.

  Sir Gregory Montagu had not been optimistic, but he had taken the damaged canvas to his studio. Now they would never know.

  Adam had thought about it ever since. There’d been Gypsies in the area, more of them than usual, but it was not their way of things. Food, money, something to sell; those were different. He had hated himself for even considering Belinda’s daughter Elizabeth. She would see Catherine as the enemy, the marriage wrecker, but she had been visiting a friend over the border in Devon at the time.

  He realized that he had signed for the envelope and that the courier was climbing into his saddle again.

  He knew that Yovell and Ferguson had followed him into the house, wanting to help, yet keeping their distance.

  He entered the study and picked up the knife that lay beside Elizabeth’s sketch of the mermaid, thinking of the watch which had once stopped a musket ball, and the little mermaid engraved on its case. Just a shell now, and he knew that the boy, Napier, still carried it like a talisman.

  For a moment longer the knife hesitated, the seal and Admiralty stamp blurred in the thin sunlight. The knife had belonged to Captain James Bolitho. Sir Gregory Montagu had been here then, asked to paint an empty sleeve on the portrait over the stairs, after Captain James had lost an arm in India. Perhaps he was watching the last Bolitho from that portrait now, the son of the man who had betrayed his father’s trust. And his country.

  He heard the envelope fall to the floor, although it must have opened itself; he did not remember returning the knife to the desk.

  The beautiful handwriting, so familiar and precise in its terms. And without heart.

  Addressed to Adam Bolitho, Esq. On receipt of these orders, will proceed with all despatch . . . His eyes hurried on. But no ship’s name or title leaped out at him like a voice, like a picture. Like that first command, the little brig Firefly. Or Anemone. He tried again. Or Unrivalled . . .

  To place yourself at the convenience and service of Sir Graham Bethune, Knight of the Bath, Vice-Admiral of the Blue, and to await further instructions. There was more, and a smaller note with details of travel, lodgings, and other matters which seemed meaningless.

  Yovell was the first to speak.

  “Is it good, sir?”

  Ferguson was pouring something into a glass. His hand was shaking. Something else I should have noticed.

  “The Admiralty, Daniel. Their Lordships wish to see me. It is a command, not a request.” He added with sudden bitterness, “Nor a ship!”

  The heavy document had fallen beside its envelope. Despite his girth, Yovell picked it up and said quickly, “Do you see, sir? There is writing on the reverse.”

  Adam took it. A captain without a ship. God alone knew there were so many like him. No ship.

  He stared at the writing, but saw only the face. Vice-Admiral Bethune. He had met him several times, lastly at Malta. Bethune had begun his service as a young midshipman in the little sloop-of-war Sparrow, Sir Richard Bolitho’s first command. A man easy to like, and to follow, and, in his day, the youngest vice-admiral since Nelson. Once a frigate captain himself, then promotion, and lastly the Admiralty.

  I am sending you a letter very shortly; it concerns some proposals which were brought to my notice. You will treat all instructions with utmost secrecy. On that, I am depending. Then his signature. Adam turned the sheet to the light. Bethune had written, almost like an afterthought, Trust me.

  He replaced the glass on the desk. Claret or cognac? It could have been anything.

  Yovell said, “London, sir.” He shook his head and smiled sadly. “Sir Richard never cared for the place. Not until . . .”

  Adam walked past him, but briefly touched his plump arm. “Until, Daniel. What a span that one word covers.”

  He left the study and found himself staring into another log fire. Unseen hands always seemed to keep them blazing.

  “I shall need Young Matthew for the first leg to Plymouth. After that . . .” He moved to the fire and held out his hands. “It will all be laid down in the instructions.” A long, tiring, and uncomfortable journey. And at the end of it? It might be nothing. Or perhaps he would merely be required to describe Unrivalled’s part in the attack and final victory at Algiers. “I shall need more kit than usual. I must tell Napier . . .”

  He broke off abruptly. Napier would not be going to London. Bethune’s innocent enough note had been added for a reason. He looked directly at the round-shouldered figure of Yovell across the hall. “Send word to the tailor for me, will you?” He saw Napier watching him from the passage which led to the kitchen. He knew. His eyes said it all.

  Adam thought of Bethune again. It was all he had.

  Trust me.

  Vice-Admiral Sir Graham Bethune moved some papers on his broad desk and stared at the ornate clock on the opposite wall, with its wind indicator and simpering cherubs.

  He had walked to the Admiralty, across the park for some of the way, declining the offer of a carriage or, as was sometimes his habit, riding his own horse. It was not conceit, but a sense of purpose which carried him through each day.

  He stood up, surprised that the exercise had not calmed his nerves. It was absurd; he had nothing to worry about.

  He walked across the room and paused to study the painting of a frigate in action. It was his own, pitted against two big Spanish frigates. Bad odds even for a daring young captain, as he had been then. He had nevertheless run one of them aground and taken the other. Unconsciously, his hand touched the gold lace on his sleeve. Flag rank had followed almost immediately, and then the Admiralty. Routine, lengthy meetings, conferences with his superiors and sometimes the First Lord; he had even been called to elaborate upon various plans and operations to the Prince Regent.

  And it had suited him, like the uniform, and the respect which went with it.

  It had been wet in the park, but there had been all the usual horsemen and women about. He often expected to see Catherine there, riding herself, or in the carriage with the Sillitoe crest emblazoned on it. Like that last, arranged meeting. He bit his lip. The final one.

  He stood by a window and looked down at the jostling carriages, carriers’ carts, and horses, always alive, moving.

  It was a life he had grown used to, accepted, and one he lived with a zeal which often surprised his contemporaries. He took care of himself; although he enjoyed good wine with the company to match it, he was always careful not to slide into overindulgence. He had seen too many senior officers deteriorate and age before their time. It was sometimes impossible to imagine them, sword in hand, walking their own decks while death whined and stung all around them. He moved to the desk again, the restlessness stronger than before.

  And what of me?

  Some chose to ignore it, imagined perhaps that rank and seniority were everlasting. He touched the folder uppermost on the desk. And upon his mind.

  At the close of the previous year the Navy List had carried two hundred admirals, and eight hundred and fifty captains. Commanders and mere lieutenants added up to another five thousand. The great fleet and all the squadrons, even those commanded by highly successful or famous officers, had been cut to the bone. Whole forests had been felled to build those ships, and now every anchorage and waterway had its sad reminders.

  And what of me?

  There was not an admiral left under the age of sixty, so that all promotion was at a standstill. A captain, if he was lucky enough still to be employed, could remain thirty years in that rank without moving.

  He grimaced. Or survive on half-pay, shadowy figures who walked the seafront, watching. Remembering. Dreading.


  He thought of his wife. Lady Bethune. It was hard now to think of her any other way. “You can retire when you wish it, Graham. You’re not a pauper. You can see more of the children.” Their two “children” were adults, and they met like pleasant strangers. His wife was in control. Like the night at that reception when she had smiled while Catherine Somervell had been humiliated. The night Catherine might have been raped, even killed, but for the intervention of Sillitoe and some of his men.

  Bethune still relived it, again and again. He had entertained her here in this opulent room in the seat of Admiralty. The youngest vice-admiral on the Navy List since Nelson. And might remain so if things got even worse.

  And she, the woman who had outraged society when she and Sir Richard Bolitho had lived openly together.

  He looked at the chair where she’d sat, remembering her scent of jasmine. Her eyes when she smiled. Laughed, then . . .

  Maybe he could obtain an appointment in one of the dockyards, like Valentine Keen. He had also served under Richard as a midshipman; now his flag flew over the Nore. But a navy without ships was no inspiration. The old, eternal enemies were uneasy allies now, in name anyway.

  Like the anti-slavery campaign, which many had believed over after Exmouth’s victory at Algiers.

  He walked past the chair and tried again to shut it, and her, from his mind. Sillitoe was her protector, although many hinted that they were lovers also. He, too, had made a fool of himself when he had expressed his feelings and his fears for her.

  He recalled the meetings he had had with the First Lord.

  “Slavery will not just go away because of an Act of Parliament, Graham. Too many fortunes have been made from it, and survive on it still . . . Their Lordships and I have considered it deeply and often. A new command, entrusted with a difficult and possibly dangerous task. A show of force, enough to make plain our determination, but fluid enough not to antagonize or disrupt our ‘allies’ in this matter.