Authors: Alexander Kent
God alone knew, the Kentish roads were deserted enough, perhaps too much so for highwaymen, footpads and the like.
Bolitho stretched and felt the ache in his bones. It was his constant dread that the fever might somehow return despite all that the surgeons had told him. He thought of the two years it had taken him to fight his way back to health, and finding the strength to relive it once again. Faces swam in misty memory, his sister Nancy, even her pompous husband the squire, “The King of Cornwall” as he had been dubbed locally.
And Ferguson's wife who was the housekeeper in the great grey home below Pendennis Castle where so many Bolithos had begun life, and had left to follow the sea. Some had never returned. But above all Bolitho remembered his coxswain, Allday. He had never seemed to sleep, had been constantly close by, to help in the struggle against fever, to fetch and carry, and too often, Bolitho suspected, to accept his delirious bursts of anger.
Allday. Like an oak, a rock. Over the ten years since he had been brought aboard by the press gang in Cornwall their relationship had strengthened. Allday's deep understanding of the sea, his impudence when need be, had been like an anchor for Bolitho. A friend? That was too frail a description.
He could hear him now, talking with Old Matthew Corker the coachman, while Young Matthew occasionally joined in with his piping tones from the rear box. The boy was only fourteen, and the old coachman's grandson. He was the apple of his eye, and he had brought him up from a baby after his father had been lost at sea in one of the famous Falmouth packet-ships. Old Matthew had always hoped that the boy would eventually follow in his footsteps. He was getting on in years, and Bolitho knew he had missed the right road on several occasions on the long haul from Falmouth, where weeks ago this journey had had its beginning. The old man was more used to the local harbours and villages around Falmouth, and as he had followed the road to London, pausing at inn after inn to change horses and pick up fresh post-boys to ride them, he must have wondered when he would eventually step down from his box.
The coach had been Bolitho's idea. The thought of being taken ill on some part of the journey, perhaps on a crowded mail coach, had haunted him. This carriage was old, and had been built for his father. Well sprung, with the motion more like a boat on these roads than a vehicle, it was painted dark green, with the Bolitho crest on either door. The motto too,
For My Country's Freedom,
picked out in gold scrollwork beneath.
He thought of that motion now as the carriage rolled past the endless bank of shining trees and fields. In his pocket were his written orders, the wording so familiar to him, and yet, in these circumstances, so barren.
To proceed to the Nore
. The great River Medway, the towns which marked the miles to the Royal Dockyard at Chatham, and then on to the open sea.
To command what? As far as he could discover he was under the local control of a Commodore Ralph Hoblyn. His name at least was familiar, and he had served with distinction in the Americas before being badly wounded at the decisive battle of the Chesapeake in '
81
. Another misfit perhaps?
Ferguson yawned and then collected his wits.
“Must be close to Rochester, sir?”
Bolitho pulled his watch from his breeches and felt his jaw stiffen as he flicked open the guard. She had given him the watch to replace one lost in battle. Viola Raymond. He had tried to recapture her in his thoughts a million times. To hear her laugh, see the light dance in her eyes because of something he had said. Dear, lovely Viola. Sometimes in the night he would awake, sweating, calling her name, feeling her slip from his arms as she had on that terrible day in the open boat. She above all, who had shared the misery of what had appeared a hopeless passage under relentless sunlight, deprived of food and water with some of the men half-mad in their suffering. She had somehow sustained all of them, wearing his coat, bringing grins to their scorched faces and cracked lips. The Captain's Lady, they called her.
Then, on that final day, when Bolitho knew they had found
Tempest
again, she died without even a murmur. In the nightmares which had followed, one scene always stood out stark and terrible above all else. Allday, holding her slim body, and with a boat's anchor tied about her waist, lowering her into the sea. Her figure, white in the dark water, fading and fading, then nothing. But for Allday, he would have gone mad. He was still unable to think of her without pain.
He stared at the watch in his palm, the engraved inscription which he knew by heart.
“Conquered, on a couch alone I lie
Once in dream's conceit you came to me
All dreams outstripped, if only thou wert nighâ”
Bolitho said, “We shall see the Medway directly.”
Something in the dullness of his voice made Ferguson watch him uneasily. The same dark, intelligent features, the eyes which could laugh or show compassion; and yet something was lost. Perhaps forever.
Old Matthew called out to the leading post-boy and the carriage came slowly to a halt where the road met with the gradient of a shallow hill.
Old Matthew disliked using post-boys when he had handled four horses, even six at a time, from the age of eighteen in the Bolitho service. But it was a long journey back to Falmouth, to the last inn where he would recover his own two pairs of chestnut horses, which he was said to love more than his wife.
Bolitho heard Allday mutter, “Not here, matey. I can manage without
his
blessing!”
The carriage moved forward again, the horses scraping their shoes on the damp ground and shaking their harness like sleigh bells.
Bolitho lowered a window and saw the reason for his cox-swain's agitation.
They were at a dreary crossroads; a stone which read,
To London, thirty miles
shared the deserted place with a gibbet which swung slightly in the wet breeze.
A tattered, eyeless thing hung in irons. It was hard to believe it might have once lived and loved like other men. A felon, a common thief, now denied even the dignity of burial.
Bolitho climbed down from the carriage and stamped his feet to restore the circulation. He could smell salt from here, and beyond a ragged procession of trees he saw the great curving outline of the river. It looked flat and unmoving, more like pewter than water hurrying to join the sea.
Through the haze of distant rain he saw the old town of Rochester, the ruins of some ancient fortification near the water's edge. A town which, like many others around this part of Kent, lived off the navy and its great dockyard and victualling jetties. In times of war the townspeople listened at their locked doors when darkness fell, for fear of the hated press gangs which roamed the streets in search of men for the fleet. To begin with they combed the inns and lodging houses for prime seamen, but as the toll of war mounted, and every King's ship cried out for still more hands, the press gangs had to be content with anyone they could find. Ploughmen and boys, tailors and saddle-makers, none was spared.
Many a ship would be forced to put to sea with only a third of her company trained seamen. The remainder, punched, threatened, and chased by boatswain's mates with their “starters,” learned the hard way. Many were killed or injured in the process long before their captain had to face an enemy. Falls from aloft in a screaming gale, bones broken by waves surging inboard to sweep a man against a tethered cannon, and those who merely vanished, lost overboard with nobody able to help, or even to hear them go.
And now, with the clouds of war rising above the Channel, the press gangs were out again. This time they were seeking deserters and unemployed seamen. The press would never be popular, but as yet there was no other way. England needed ships; the ships needed men. The equation had not altered in a hundred years.
Bolitho looked up and felt a shaft of watery sunlight touch his cheek.
A captain of his own ship.
Once an impossible dream, the greatest step anyone could make from wardroom to the privacy of the great cabin. But to gain it and then have it taken away was even harder to accept.
His new command consisted of three topsail cutters, fast, highly manoeuvrable craft similar to those used by the Revenue Service. One was completing a refit in the dockyard, and the others doubtless awaited his arrival with curiosity or displeasure, and probably wondered why their world was to be invaded by a post-captain.
Bolitho had studied all the available reports with care, hoping to discover some glimmer of purpose which might make this appointment bearable. But it seemed as if in south-east England, and the Isle of Thanet in particular, the cat and the dog lived side by side. The revenue cutters hunted for smugglers, and the press gangs searched for unwilling recruits and deserters. The lawbreakers, the smugglers who in many cases seemed better equipped and armed than their opposite numbers, seemed to do much as they pleased.
Bolitho remounted the coach and saw Allday watching him, his pigtail poking over the collar of his coxswain's blue jacket.
Their eyes met. “Back again, Cap'n. Frigate or no, 'tis still the sea. Where we belong.”
Bolitho smiled up at him. “I shall hold to that, old friend.”
Allday settled down again and watched the horses lean forward to take the strain.
He had seen the tightening of Bolitho's jaw. Like those other times when the deck had been raked with the enemy's iron, and men had fallen on every side. And when he had forced himself to accept that his lady had gone, fathoms deep, to a peace he had been too late to offer her. And like the times when they had ventured from the old grey house, for those first pitiful walks together after the fever had released its grip. A few yards at first, and the next day, then the next, until Bolitho had thrust him away, pleading with him to let him go the rest of the way unaided. Once he had fallen in sight of the headland where the sea surged endlessly amongst the rocks. He had cried out brokenly, “She would have liked it here, old friend!”
And together they had won the battle. The hardest one Allday had ever shared.
Now he was back, and God help anyone who tried to stand against him. Allday touched the heavy cutlass beneath his seat.
They'll have to take me first, and that's no error.
But they had not even driven into the outskirts of Rochester before trouble showed itself.
Bolitho had his orders spread on his knees as the carriage gathered speed down another hill when he heard Allday exclaim, “On the road, by Godâlooks like a riot! Better turn back, Old Matthew!”
The coachman was yelling at the post-boys, and Bolitho thought he heard Allday groping for a loaded piece from the weapons box.
“Stay!”
Bolitho swung out of the door and held on to the handrail. The carriage was almost broadside across the road, the horses steaming and agitated by the baying sound of voices.
Bolitho drew a small telescope from his coat and levelled it on the road. There was a surging crowd of people, some waving their arms and sticks, others laughing and drinking from flasks. Two of them were mounted. They were all men.
Allday laid a short, heavy-muzzled blunderbuss on the carriage roof and covered it with a piece of canvas from his seat.
He said harshly, “I don't like it, Cap'n. Looks like a hanging mob.”
Ferguson was examining his small pistol and said, “I agree, sir. We should pull back. There must be a hundred of them heading this way.” He did not sound frightened. The Saintes had taught him to overcome fear. It was more like concern.
Bolitho held the small telescope steady. It was much easier with the carriage halted.
In the centre of the yelling crowd two figures, each with a halter tied around his neck, were being dragged along, their hands pinioned, their feet bare and bloodied on the rough road. One was naked to the waist, the other had had his shirt almost ripped from his back.
Ferguson said, “One of the mounted men, sir. He looks well dressed.”
Bolitho had already noted that. A heavy, bearded man with a fine hat and a cloak lined with scarlet. If anything he was inciting the mob, his words lost in distance.
Allday said, “Maybe they've caught a pair of thieves, Cap'n.” He glanced back up the hill as if still expecting to see the gibbet with its ragged skeleton.
Bolitho snapped, “Drive on!” He looked at Allday and saw his anxiety. “Those two thieves are wearing sea-officers' breeches.”
Ferguson protested, “But, sir! That may be nothing to do with it!”
Bolitho looked steadily at Old Matthew. “When you are ready.”
The carriage rolled on to the road again. Even above the rattle of wheels and hooves Bolitho could hear the rising din of angry voices as they bore down on the procession.
“Whoa, there!” Old Matthew's voice was harsh with anger. “Yew stand away from those horses, yew buggers!” Then the carriage halted.
Bolitho stepped down on to the road, aware of the sudden silence, the staring faces, many flushed with drink, others gaping as if he had just appeared from hell.
He could feel Ferguson watching from the carriage window, his pistol just out of sight. Allday too, measuring the distance to jump to the ground. By then it might be too late.