Secrets of the Fearless

by Elizabeth Laird

  The sickbay was towards the bows of the ship. Hammocks were slung over the guns which took up most of the space even here, but the gun ports were open, allowing light and fresh air to penetrate round the sick men.

  It took John a little while to find Kit, as his hammock was half hidden behind a bulkhead, away from the rest. Kit’s eyes were shut and his face deathly pale, but he heard John approach and looked up at him.

  ‘Have they done it yet? Taken the ball out, I mean?’ said John.

  ‘Yes.’ Kit smiled weakly. ‘Last night. It wasn’t so bad. They gave me a lot of rum. Drunk as a lord, I must have been. I fainted anyway, so I didn’t feel it.’

  ‘Did they say . . . what did they . . .’

  John came to an awkward halt.

  ‘Oh, it’s good,’ Kit said, understanding him. ‘No vital organ was touched. I’ll be right as right as soon as the weakness passes and the healing goes on.’

  John wanted to laugh aloud as a weight seemed to roll off him.

  ‘I thought we’d got rid of you at last,’ he said, grinning cheerfully. ‘Thought I’d have all your things to call my own.’

  Anxiety sparked in Kit’s eyes.

  ‘You didn’t . . .’

  ‘No, you great looby. I didn’t look in your precious bag.’

  Kit shifted, trying to raise himself, but winced with the pain and sank back.

  ‘John, there is something I must tell you.’

  ‘Tell me? What?’

  Kit took a breath, but then said nothing.

  ‘You can trust me,’ John said, affronted. ‘I can keep a secret.’

  ‘I know, but . . .’ Kit’s face was filled with indecision. ‘Oh yes, you are right, I know I can trust you. And it cannot be hidden any longer. Listen, John, you may not wish to continue being my friend when you know what—’

  ‘A visitor, I see,’ said a disapproving voice. John turned to see Mr Catskill, the red-faced surgeon, ducking his head under a low beam as he approached with Mr Erskine just behind him. John tugged his forelock respectfully.

  ‘Go away, boy,’ Mr Catskill said, with a mighty frown. ‘I don’t permit loafers here. This is a sickbay, not a theatrical spectacle.’

  Mr Erskine coughed discreetly.

  ‘Mr Catskill, I would not wish to countermand your medical rules, but in this instance, especially in the light of the matter we have just been discussing, I would prefer John Barr to stay.’

  The surgeon’s brows snapped even closer together.

  ‘It’s damned irregular, Mr Erskine.’

  ‘Quite so,’ said Mr Erskine tactfully. ‘The responsibility will be mine.’

  The surgeon continued to stare at him.

  ‘You have asked me and my orderly to keep this revelation a close secret. Tell the boy what we know and the whole ship will be privy to it before tonight.’

  ‘I believe not,’ said Mr Erskine coolly. ‘Now, Mr Catskill, if you please.’

  The surgeon went off, shaking his head.

  John looked down at Kit, whose face had flushed a dull red. He looked back at Mr Erskine and was surprised to see an amused smile lift the good side of Mr Erskine’s ravaged face.

  ‘Well now, Kit, how are you faring?’ Mr Erskine was saying. ‘A nasty wound in the shoulder, I believe.’

  ‘Yes, but there is no danger. I will soon be well,’ said Kit, trying again to lift himself.

  Mr Erskine put a restraining hand on his good shoulder.

  ‘Lie still. You did well, I hear, in the battle. You put yourself constantly in danger in the line of duty.’

  ‘Not as much as Nat,’ said Kit. ‘He saved my life, Mr Erskine.’

  ‘I know. It was an act of remarkable courage.’ Mr Erskine leaned one blue-sleeved arm comfortably on the barrel of the nearby gun and assumed a conversational tone. ‘Now, Kit, there is a problem that has been teasing me, and I’m sure you can help me to solve it.’

  Kit seemed to relax a little, but a wary look had returned to his eyes.

  ‘If I can, sir.’

  ‘You told me that your father was the Marquis de Vaumas?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘You may remember, Kit, at the time of our last conversation, that your father’s name seemed familiar to me?’

  ‘I . . . I didn’t notice, sir.’

  ‘I could not at first recall the precise circumstances of how and when I had the pleasure of meeting your father, but it gradually came back to me. Your father was in London shortly before the revolution in Paris. I believe it was at the time of his marriage to your mother. We attended a card party together and conversed for some time.’

  ‘Did you, sir?’

  ‘I was saddened when I heard how he had died, so bravely and so young. His death seemed even more tragic as his wife was expecting a baby. After he died, she gave birth to his first and only child. A daughter. The daughter’s name was, I believe, Catherine.’

  John was looking from Mr Erskine to Kit and back again, trying to grasp what Mr Erskine was saying.

  ‘You never told me you had a sister, Kit,’ he said.

  Mr Erskine shook his head.

  ‘There was no question of a brother or a sister, was there, Kit?’ he went on. ‘Your parents had only one child. A girl. You.’

  ‘No,’ began Kit. ‘You are mistaken, sir. I . . .’

  Mr Erskine frowned.

  ‘No more lies, please. You have deceived all of us for a long time – how, I cannot imagine. But you cannot deceive Mr Catskill, who, while operating on your shoulder, uncovered . . . that is . . .’

  He looked disconcerted for once, and Kit blushed scarlet.

  John’s head seemed to spin.

  ‘But that’s impossible, Mr Erskine. Kit isn’t a girl. He’s a . . .’

  But the words died on his lips. He saw in an instant of complete revelation that Mr Erskine was speaking the truth. Kit was a girl! He knew it at once and absolutely.

  A hundred small things which had puzzled him in the past crowded through his mind. He had often wondered why it was that Kit had remained so small and slight while the other boys were growing tall, broadening out and developing magnificent new muscles on their arms and shoulders. He had never understood, either, why Kit had always been so modest, turning away from the others when he undressed, creeping to the lavatories only at the quietest moments. He had always hung back, too, when the others had wrestled, slipping quietly away to avoid a challenge, not seeming to care for Tom’s taunts and jeers.

  He even walks like a girl, John thought, the revelation filling him with disgust. He moves like one.

  It was almost worse than losing his friend in battle. This discovery was not only a loss. It was a betrayal too.

  ‘Why?’ he burst out angrily. ‘Why did you do it – pretend to be a boy? Why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘I tried to just now,’ Kit said pleadingly. ‘I’ve wanted to so many times. I couldn’t. This secret, it is like a terrible burden. You would have had to carry it too. You would have treated me differently if you’d known. It would have been even more dangerous – for both of us.’ He turned to Mr Erskine. ‘Is it . . . a very serious crime, Mr Erskine, to be a girl?’ Kit said anxiously. ‘Will I be flogged, or just put in irons?’

  ‘Neither,’ Mr Erskine said, ‘but you will be required to tell the whole truth, and explain yourself to the captain as soon as you are strong enough to leave Mr Catskill’s care. For the time being, you will stay here and you will not talk to anyone. And you, John, you will keep this matter to yourself. Do you understand? No word of this must pass your lips. Now, I believe we have trespassed on the patience of our good surgeon for long enough. Get back to your quarters. As for you, mademoiselle, I wish you a speedy recovery.’

  PART THREE

  JUNE 1808

  LANDFALL IN FRANCE

  Chapter Nineteen

  In the following days, Tom and Davey hardly dared say a word to John, and even Jabez treated him warily. John, was so sore and angry that h
e snapped like an enraged dog at anyone who came near him. Davey didn’t seem to take much notice, but Tom was so provoked that he and John ended by having a fight, punching and wrestling and rolling about on the floor. Luckily Mr Tawse was not there to see them, or punishment would have been swift and severe.

  The fight did John good, relieving some of his rawness, and as Tom bore no grudges they were just as good friends afterwards.

  John felt Kit’s absence keenly. Time after time, when he’d been unhappy, Kit’s play-acting had made him laugh himself out of his misery. At other times, Kit’s quiet subtle sympathy had braced him through the worst of bad days. They’d shared their food and belongings, lightened each other’s work, laughed at, liked and disliked the same people on the ship.

  And it was all lies. All deception! he kept telling himself. I’ll never trust anyone else, as long as I live.

  He didn’t attempt to visit Kit again.

  ‘’Ow’s the invalid, then, John? I’m sure you’ll have sent to enquire,’ Jabez asked him affably when nearly a week had passed.

  John shrugged.

  ‘I don’t know, Mr Barton. Mr Catskill doesn’t like visitors.’

  ‘John and Kit, they’ve quarrelled,’ remarked Davey suddenly, with a flash of unexpected perception.

  ‘We have not! What do you know about anything anyway?’ flared John. Then he stalked away to take refuge with Mr Stannard and his gun crew, who were readying themselves for the next drill.

  The Fearless had resumed the blockade of the French coast. She was towing the Courageux until a British frigate came to take the stricken French ship to England. There she would be refitted, and start a new life under British colours, while the French crew would be sent to languish in British prisons. In the meantime, most of the Fearless’s marines were on board the Courageux, keeping her sailors under close guard. M. Dupré, the Courageux’s captain, though also a prisoner, had been given comfortable quarters on board the Fearless, and was being courteously entertained by Captain Bannerman. The two of them, who a few days earlier had been trying to blow each others’ ships out of the water, could now be seen walking the quarterdeck each morning, labouring to maintain a polite conversation.

  Kit left the sickbay when ten days had passed. Tom and Davey greeted the slight figure with loud whoops of welcome.

  ‘Thought you was going to die, Kit,’ Davey said cheerfully. ‘Thought old Frenchy had done for you.’

  ‘Show us the scar, then, Kit,’ said Tom, reaching out to pull Kit’s shirt away from his shoulder.

  Kit flinched, blushed and pulled away.

  ‘You will not see anything. There is still a bandage.’

  John had turned away and was staring out to sea through an open gun port, his shoulders hunched. Kit looked across at him, started to say something, thought better of it and went to open her chest.

  ‘Eh, Kit lad, ’tis good to zee you back again,’ said Jabez, who had approached with an armful of muskets to be cleaned. ‘Still a bit peaky, ain’t you? Time you growed and filled out a bit, like them other lads. Nice bit o’ salt pork there is for dinner today. We’ll cut you off a good big hunk. Feeding up, that’s what you do need.’

  Before he could say more, a seaman poked his head round the canvas screen.

  ‘John Barr and Kit Smith to report to Mr Erskine on the quarterdeck. I don’t know what you done, lads, but ’e wants you up there sharpish.’

  John’s stomach lurched. A summons to the quarterdeck would fill anyone with dread. He hastily tugged his jacket down, then spat on his hands and smoothed his thick unruly hair. He hurried off, his expression set, not wishing to speak to Kit. Kit hurried after him and laid a hand on John’s arm. John roughly shook it off.

  ‘John, listen,’ Kit said desperately, ‘please. You must listen. I’m sorry, I . . .’

  ‘Nothing to be sorry about,’ John said curtly. ‘You made your decision that you wouldn’t trust me. I’ve made mine that I can’t trust you.’

  He ran on, taking the next companionway in a couple of leaps. Glancing back, he saw that Kit was struggling to follow, but being still weak from her wound, was pale and sweating with the effort, holding an arm close to the wounded shoulder, which was clearly still painful.

  John felt a small stab of sympathy and guilt, but shook it off and hurried on.

  It was a fine, fresh morning. The Fearless was beating a tack into the wind, hampered by the drag of the Courageux in tow behind her, but still making good headway. The sun was already hot. It sparkled on the black polished guns that lined the open quarterdeck, and whitened to an even paler sheen the bare scrubbed boards underfoot. It was spacious up here, quiet, uncluttered and open, so unlike the cramped, stinking, obstacle-strewn quarters below that John couldn’t help squaring his shoulders and breathing in deeply, in spite of his anxiety.

  Captain Bannerman, with Mr Erskine beside him, was peering through his telescope at the coast of France, but he heard the boys approach and snapped his telescope shut.

  ‘Come here, you pair of rascals,’ he boomed, and John couldn’t tell whether his tone was jovial or angry. ‘Into the cabin with you!’

  It was the second time that John had been in the Fearless’s great cabin, but its luxury and elegance still almost overwhelmed him. His eyes flew at once to the figure of the French captain, a tall man wearing a strange uniform, who was staring out of the window with his hands clasped behind his back.

  The captain and first lieutenant sat down at the table.

  ‘What’s all this I hear?’ thundered the captain suddenly, the loudness of his voice making John jump. ‘A masquerade on my ship? A deception under our very noses? The truth, if you please. All of it.’

  ‘Wh – what do you wish to know, sir?’ stammered Kit, who was ashen-faced and trembling.

  Mr Erskine coughed discreetly, caught the captain’s eye and nodded towards Captain Dupré.

  ‘Ah, yes.’ Captain Bannerman drummed his fingers thoughtfully on the table. ‘Captain Dupré will no doubt find this unusual business interesting. However, boys – that is, both of you – there are certain matters which we discussed earlier to which we will not refer. Do I make myself clear?’

  ‘Aye aye, sir,’ Kit and John said together.

  ‘Now.’ The Captain was glaring at Kit. ‘Your story. And you had better convince us that you are telling the truth.’

  Kit swallowed, swayed and grasped the back of the chair in front of her for support.

  ‘My father,’ she began, ‘was, as I believe I told you, sir, the Marquis de Vaumas. When the revolutionaries began to arrest all the aristocrats, he was caught and taken to Paris.’ She stopped and glanced fearfully at the rigid back of Captain Dupré, who did not appear to have noticed that anyone else was in the room. ‘He was executed there six months before I was born. My mother, being English, felt safer. She managed to hide from the mobs, and she was never caught. She stayed in the country to give birth to me, but a month later she caught a fever. I think my father’s death affected her very greatly. She died.’

  ‘So you never knew either of your parents?’ said Mr Erskine.

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Who cared for you?’

  ‘My mother’s English nurse, Betsy. It was dangerous for her. If it had been known that she was looking after the child of an aristo—’

  ‘Yes, yes, we understand all that,’ said Captain Bannerman impatiently.

  ‘My father’s brother took the title of marquis when my father died,’ Kit went on. ‘He and my grandmother ran away to Switzerland, where they were safe from the revolutionaries.’

  ‘Why didn’t they take you with them?’

  A brief smile lit Kit’s face, and faded almost at once.

  ‘I think they believed I would not survive. My uncle was very sorry when I did. The estates, the land, the chateaux, all of it – well, it was inherited by me, sir. He felt it should all belong to him.’

  Captain Dupré had turned, and now he spoke for the first tim
e.

  ‘En effet, Mlle de Jalignac is from her birth a very great heiress,’ he said. ‘That is, she would have been, if the honest citizens of revolutionary France had not redistributed her property.’

  John couldn’t tell from his tone if he approved of the citizens or not.

  ‘I do not think I have any property left to me now,’ Kit said. ‘The mob invaded our chateau and took everything of value when my father was arrested. My uncle is my guardian. He was supposed to look after my affairs for me, but I believe, that is, I am certain, that he has been . . . well, robbing me all this time.’

  ‘Where is this chateau? Where is your family’s property?’ asked Mr Erskine.

  ‘Near Bordeaux, sir. Very near to where we are now.’

  She swayed slightly as she spoke and briefly shut her eyes. John saw that she was paler than ever, and feared she was about to faint. In spite of his resentment, he couldn’t help putting out a hand to steady her.

  ‘Mr Erskine!’ trumpeted the captain. ‘Why are you keeping this young person on her feet? A chair, if you please!’

  Kit slid into the chair Mr Erskine drew out for her. He poured a glass of wine from the carafe on the table and she sipped it gratefully. With each small action, the boy that John had known, the boy that Kit had so brilliantly acted, shrank before his eyes and a new person, a girl, began to take shape and form. There was no real difference in her outward appearance. The girl, Catherine, still wore the old Kit’s rough canvas trousers and short blue jacket, but they looked odd now to John, as if all this time she had been wearing a theatrical costume.

  John’s anger was beginning to subside and he found he was waiting eagerly for the next part of Kit’s story.

  ‘So you grew up in France, in the care of this Betsy, your English nurse?’ Mr Erskine prompted her. ‘That will explain, perhaps, why you speak English so well.’

  Kit nodded, and took another sip of wine.

  ‘Only until I was eight years old. By then the revolution was at an end and Napoleon had taken power in France. My grandmother and uncle returned from Switzerland. They visited the family chateau, but it was too ruined for their liking. In any case, they disliked the countryside. They preferred to live in Paris, where my uncle, that is . . .’