Authors: David Donachie
Sailing across a grey and windy Adriatic there was constant glancing aloft with the hope that the lookout would spot those two French Levanters, for it was held that not even a swab like Digby could avoid a chase if they came in sight. The man himself could not miss the change in mood, which had him eventually, once they had come in sight of the Illyrian coast, call for Pearce to join him at once in his cabin. It was the ‘at once’, which presaged trouble and when he entered there was no invitation to sit.
‘Mr Pearce, I am minded to think you are turning the crew against my lawful authority.’
‘While I would reply that nothing I could do would exceed your own ability to bring that about.’
‘That, sir, is insubordinate. I am minded to remove you—’
‘How is your French, Mr Digby?’
‘I was just about to add that the mission makes my desire to do so impossible, but once it is complete, then I may be minded to act. That, I need hardly point out, gives you time to amend your behaviour.’
‘You know, Henry—’
The interruption was a shout. ‘Do not address me so, sir. We are no longer on such terms and I would remind you of our respective positions.’
‘Aye aye, sir,’ Pearce replied with such obvious sarcasm in his tone that Digby flushed deep in those full cheeks, so much so that Pearce thought he might have a seizure. ‘If I may continue. No act of mine has undermined you, it is entirely your own doing.’
‘I am following orders.’
‘Instructions which should never have been issued and certainly would not have been by any other admiral in the navy, most of whom are more interested in the money in their coffers than anything else. To return to the fleet with two deep laden French merchantmen would see us welcomed with open arms and that even if this Mehmet fellow has raised the tricolour. Do not accuse me of greed when there are flag officers at large who think only of their eighth.’
‘I was expressly forbidden to deviate in search of a prize. Sir William fears that French action in the Adriatic will pull him away from Toulon, no doubt their primary aim in seeking to make an ally of Mehmet Pasha. It was made plain to me the mission was of the highest importance and that nothing should be allowed to interfere with its completion.’
‘It was not described so to me,’ Pearce responded, looking perplexed. ‘It was pronounced as precautionary, not even a shot across the bows, more of a gentle admonition to mind his manners.’
‘Then you must not have been appraised of all the facts.’
‘Who would you appraise of all the facts,’ Pearce demanded, ‘the man undertaking the talking or the fellow carrying him there?’
‘I do not follow your drift.’
Digby made to continue speaking but Pearce held up a hand and, after a pause. ‘You received a letter from London sent to you by a lawyer called Lucknor, did you not?’
‘You having asked confirms what I suspected, it was on your behalf.’ When Pearce nodded Digby added. ‘Why have you not enquired before?’
‘Before Naples you might have reacted in a way I would not want. When you did and subsequently the occasion to pose the question has not arisen.’
‘Do you not want to know what I said?’
Pearce looked him in the eye; he had to hide the fact that he already knew. ‘I assume you told the truth.’
‘I did, but made no mention of Mr Farmiloe and his presence with the press gang.’
‘You did not need to, he would have got a letter too, as well as Toby Burns.’
‘What is going on?’
There was a temptation to tell him everything; the existence of the court martial copy, his intention to use it to blackmail Barclay into seeking an annulment of his marriage or, if not that, the exceedingly different and expensive notion of a divorce. Of how a refusal could lead
to him being hauled up for perjury and how that might impact on the likes of Hotham. As he thought on that some of the certainties that had got him this far began to dissolve but there was one way to shore that up.
‘Did the admiral mention you being in receipt of a letter from a lawyer?’
‘No.’
That was good, but still the inconsistencies between what Digby was saying and the way Toomey had spoken to him nagged. ‘You say Hotham told you the mission was important.’
‘Not important, vital.’
‘Would you relate to me his exact words?’
‘Certainly not.’
‘I was getting ready to offer an olive branch but that would now be superfluous. I will however advise you, given it is Sunday tomorrow and the crew will assemble for divine service, to promise them that should any opportunities arise on the way home, they will not be passed up.’
‘I am more concerned at what you will do.’
‘Why? It will be nothing except to obey orders and speaking of which, I was told we would be delivering a letter from the admiral to Mehmet Pasha.’ A sharp nod. ‘Do you know what it says?’
‘I assume it to be a warning that if he does not mend his ways he will pay a very high cost.’
‘Hotham’s clerk told me that our task was to give him a gentle reminder and that was to be the tone of the letter.’
‘I see your ploy, Pearce. You are seeking to get out of me what Admiral Hotham said by trickery.’
‘Believe me, I am not. What you have let fall so far means
that what I was told and what you were told are totally at odds.’ Digby said nothing. ‘You do not find that strange?’
‘I have only your word that what you say is true.’
‘I would not lie to you any more than you would lie to my fellow Lucknor.’
‘For which you only have my word,’ Digby replied, with something approaching a sneer that implied
touché
.
‘Not true, Henry, I know exactly what you said for I was sent word by Lucknor about your reply and that of Toby Burns.’
‘Do you not look in the mirror and despair of your devious nature?’
‘I am beginning to wonder if I might be a mere tyro in that department.’
Silent for several seconds and deep in thought, with his captain looking at him in a quizzical manner, when he spoke it was with no great assurance of tone. ‘I need to go to my quarters and fetch something. I then need to relate a lengthy tale to you, which also means that I would like permission to sit down.’
‘I am tempted to go and check the level of rum in the casks, John,’ Digby said, unaware that by merely using the Christian name he had utterly altered the mood of their exchange. ‘I fear I will find it much diminished.’
‘In all my calculations I discounted Toby Burns.’
‘As I recall him he is not a difficult person to overlook.’
The story had taken a long time, punctuated by the regular ringing of the bell to denote the passage of time and it had ranged from Sheerness, through events in Brittany, which Digby knew something about, to Barclay’s court martial, which he had realised at the time, or when he heard the verdict, was a farce. That he had not reacted by loud denunciation Pearce had accepted and understood; he would be throwing in his career away for he did not need telling that Hotham had arranged matters; had he not been sent away as well?
‘I blame myself for not paying much attention to what was said to me when I asked about Burns.’
‘Like how in the name of the devil did he ever get to pass that examination?’
‘Precisely,’ Pearce responded, ‘but I claim I was distracted by the fact my boat was ready and those set to row me over waiting.’
‘No one in the fleet doubts that it was arranged and there was little surprise given, if it is unusual, it is not unknown. I would not say I followed the career of Burns but he seemed from what I know to have turned up in some odd places. He was with Nelson on a couple of occasions and wherever that fellow it is bound to be hot work.’
‘Now I ask you to look at this,’ Pearce said, passing over the letter Lucknor had sent him. ‘I will say nothing until you have read it.’
Given it was fairly lengthy another bell rang as Digby read, which told John Pearce he was due on watch in half an hour until the reading had finished and he could say, ‘Well?’
‘There’s no truth in it that I do know, not if the gossip that ran through the fleet has any credence.’
‘Anything else?’
‘Well I know Burns and this seems to me to be a mite above his ability with words, somewhat adult in fact. Mind he tended to stammer when he talked, through fear I hasten to add, not naturally.’
‘That is precisely the question raised by my attorney and he does not know Burns from David Garrick.’
‘And so would not recognise his hand, John.’
The response was a slow nod. ‘Say Burns received Lucknor’s letter and realised he was in the soup.’
‘Did your man threaten him?’
‘Not as far as I know, but he is serving as a mid in the flagship and he panics. There’s no Uncle Ralph to bleat to …’
‘So he goes to Hotham?’
‘Who will realise right off that this could go in directions he cannot control. Now I am beginning to wonder if he knows I have a copy of the transcript of Barclay’s court martial. Lord, are all my assumptions tumbling?’
‘Leading to what?
‘Henry, there are five people aboard HMS
Flirt
who now the truth of what happened in the Liberties that night, which means they know of the lies Barclay told at his court martial. The whole crew of
Larcher
is transferred as a body and the crew of
Flirt
shipped out. Usual?’
‘Nearly unprecedented.’
‘A crew that includes three of my very good friends, to a ship on which you have the command. A trio that had depositions taken which never saw the light of day. Then I am given a mission to join you in what I am told is something of marginal account. You—’
The hand came up to stop him; Digby did not need to be told. ‘I find this very hard to credit, John. You are saying that a senior officer has set up a conspiracy that will put in peril the whole crew of this ship in a bid to lay to rest a personal matter?’
‘I can think of no other explanation, can you? Will you now tell me what Hotham said?’
There was still reluctance; it went against the grain but finally he opened up and the description of the mission was at total odds to that with which John Pearce had been
privy. Each statement of Hotham was matched against one by Toomey and they jarred.
‘But why are they not the same?’
‘I would not be here if the mission had been outlined as one full of risk.’
‘Which tells me they don’t know you at all!’
‘I’ll take that a compliment but I think they might have feared I’d smell a rat.’
‘And I?’
‘While you had to be persuaded of the necessity to ensure you carried it through. A little blackening of the Pearce name was thrown in with that order not to detour from your heading.’
‘Yet we were diverted to Naples.’
The look on the face of John Pearce showed he got to the point of that just ahead of Digby. ‘They know Emily is there.’
‘Hotham asked me about her. Wanted to know who the lady was who caused so much mayhem in Leghorn. I lied, of which I not proud and said I did not know.’
‘What mayhem?’
‘Don’t josh me, John, that Lipton fellow and his bullocks. A mob of midshipmen and tars gives them a severe ducking the day after your duel and you pretend not to know of it. Lipton complained to the admiral and he very decently agreed to forget my part as your second.’
‘Henry, I have no idea what you are talking about,’ Pearce insisted, there being no chance he was going to admit to what had happened with Lipton and his bullocks, it being less than edifying for his sense of self-respect. ‘I admit some of those officers insulted Emily but if they
suffered subsequently it cannot be laid at my door.’
‘Then who?’
‘Does it matter now? It just underlines what we have been speculating on. It seems our admiral knows a great deal more about things that we can guess at.’
‘You do realise this presents a dilemma?’
‘Only if I am right and Hotham has deliberately sent us into danger.’
‘And how do we establish that? It is all very well speculating but I cannot act on that. I have my orders.’
Tempted to scoff at what he saw as Digby being bone headed, Pearce held his tongue, this as the eighth bell of the forenoon watch rang out to call him to his duty. ‘I shall think upon it and so shall you. There must be a way to establish, if not the truth, something that informs us of what we are really being required to do.’
Nothing of much value came to mind as Pearce cogitated throughout the watch. Off the starboard beam lay the shoreline of old Illyria, which before that had been ancient Greece. They were in waters replete with history of battles, victories and losses with the whole of what had once been Attica then Romania now under the heel of the Turks. A quick check of the charts told Pearce they would raise the Gulf of Ambracia the next day and that would require Digby to decide how to proceed.
‘John, I require you to come below. On the wheel there give out if anything occurs that requires an officer on deck.’
‘Aye, aye, sir,’ he replied as the blue coats disappeared, before saying to a nearby mate. ‘It’s John again, happen matters are looking up.’
In the cabin Pearce was immediately invited to sit and Digby looked at him for some time before he spoke. ‘You will not require that I tell you how troubled my thinking has been, John.’
‘No more than mine.’
Digby picked up a dropped a sheaf of papers on the desk. ‘My orders, which are very specific. You may read them if you wish.’
‘I can guess what they contain.’
‘They contain no room for deviation and if I do not fulfil them that will be nothing less than a complete dereliction of duty, for which I could be court martialled.’
‘I know it is not easy.’
‘Easy, it is damned impossible, John, and before you tell me we have good grounds for suspicion might I remind you of who I will obliged to explain myself if we return without the answer Hotham purports to seek? No less than the man himself.’
Pearce shook his head and to cover the silence that followed he leant across and picked up the orders, not with any intention of reading them but to give time for Digby to move on to the next obvious point. ‘And if we do proceed we have no idea of what we might face.’
‘A Turkish Pasha right on the periphery of the Ottoman domains.’
‘You reached a similar conclusion to me. At such a distance the touch of Constantinople must be light indeed.’
In putting the orders down Pearce saw the still sealed letter with the wax impression of the British Crown, Digby following his eye. ‘Hotham’s letter to Mehmet.’
Pearce picked it up and weighed it as if it were a gold
ingot before looking at the superscription; there was Hotham’s name and rank plus the address in French to the Pasha.
‘I wonder what it says.’
‘That we will only find out when our fellow opens it and perhaps not even then.’
Pearce emitted a humourless laugh. ‘It might be an invitation to string us up from the nearest yardarm.’
‘That is not funny, John.’
‘I don’t think I intended it to be.’
‘From what I can gather Hotham knows no more than we do about our man.’
‘He does, this is the second time an envoy has been sent.’ Given the look on Digby’s face he was obliged to add that he had checked with Hood’s under clerk. ‘You were not told? It was presented to me as a bit of a misadventure, in which there was some misunderstanding, which means that there is some kind of record of what took place.’
‘And Hotham would have it.’
‘This all becomes more bizarre by the hour.’
Pearce waved the letter again. ‘It may be referred to in here.’
‘Which means if we read it, then it cannot be delivered and if it is nothing more than what it is supposed to be, where does that leave us?’
‘Not necessarily,’ Pearce replied standing to crouch, his look one of deep thought. ‘If I may be allowed a moment.’
‘Leave the letter, John.’
‘Of course,’ he replied, tossing it over, which had Digby examining it, as if by doing so he could see through to the written on side.
Out on the lower deck Pearce sought out Charlie Taverner and dragged him away from his duty of acquiring the dinner for his mess, taking him up onto the deck and the forepeak.
‘Charlie, have you ever opened a sealed letter?’
There was a moment when Charlie adopted the air of a man being accused and clamming up, a legacy of a less than lawful life, but it was John Pearce to whom he must respond. ‘Weren’t my skill, but I know how it’s done.’
‘Tell me.’
‘Well you takes a hot blade and you slip it slow twixt seal and paper, but the trick is never to let the heat mark the letter.’
‘And how do you avoid that?’
‘By using another bit of paper, one that you can singe. Parchment be best.’
‘Would you feel confident of doing it?’
‘What are we about, John?’
‘Doing right, Charlie.’
That got a grin from handsome Charlie and a tip of his hat. ‘Can’t be part of that, mate, it would ruin my repute as the best sharp in the Strand.’
‘I’m serious.’
That wiped the grin off and had a hand on the Taverner chin. ‘Best to practise on what don’t matter.’
‘Good thinking. Have your dinner and come to my berth when you’re done. And, Charlie, not a word to anyone.’
‘Weren’t necessary to say that John.’
‘I mean it, not even Rufus and Michael.’
The aim, related to a dubious Henry Digby, was finally agreed with one caveat; Pearce had to be sure of success.
When it came to a sharp blade there was none more so than a razor and to make sure his was at its best Pearce stropped it for an age. He had also arranged for Matthew Dorling to take over his watch, which the master did with seeming willingness and when he spoke Pearce found out why.
‘Never did thank you for shifting us whole, Mr Pearce, and here’s me got a bigger ship as easy as kiss my hand.’
‘I don’t think I thanked you either for not dishing me.’
‘Couldn’t see you go down, your honour.’
‘Even if I deserved it. We should never have left Palermo in that condition.’
Dorling grinned. ‘Might still be there.’
‘Which would have made you a happy man, seeing that you had found yourself a warm bit of flesh for comfort.’
‘Didn’t want to be outdone did I, your honour?’
It was clear from the slightly quizzical look that Dorling had that he had no idea how that sally would be taken; it could be seen as highly insubordinate.
‘Well said,’ was the reply he got.
Charlie came as required and to the look from Pearce he replied that no one had any notion of why he was entering the berth and nor would they know why the screen was immediately pulled closed behind him.
‘They’ll be peering.’
‘Let them.’
‘And taking wagers as to what I is about.’
Pearce had a set of sealed blank letters on his sea chest and an open lantern too, the flame of which Pearce put the blade of his razor, which after a while began to send out a slight smell of burning metal.
‘Happed they’ll think I’m payin’ for my errors at the stake,’ joked Charlie.
He was on his knees with a blank sheet of parchment that had come from Digby’s private letter case and it was immediately obvious that he was struggling, with melted wax going everywhere.
‘You were right about practice.’
‘Not the sort of thing you learn in the Fleet. Breaking into houses yes, and passing off tin as gold, but this is clerkish crime.’
‘Let’s try another.’
‘Won’t do much for your razor.’
‘If I am right and we fail I won’t need my razor.’
That got Pearce a sharp look from Charlie, who was so busy with that he singed himself, emitting a yelp, which had Pearce begin to chuckle. ‘I wonder what they’ll think when they hear that, your nosy mates.’
‘Don’t even make a jest of it.’
The next attempt was better and then Pearce decided to have a try, on the grounds that he could not ask Charlie to take responsibility for the one that needed to be opened and read. That had to be him or Digby and he knew Henry would not do it; no doubt seeing is as a sin. If Charlie had been cack-handed he seemed no better and it was only after half a dozen false starts that he began to get it anything like right. The floor around them was full of messy waxwork and discarded parchment, a lot of it burnt at the edges, bits that had to be stamped on to kill the flames.