Baltic Mission (34 page)

‘And you, my Lord, were you then moved by the gravity of history to send word, by Horne of the
Pegasus
?'

Dungarth barked a short laugh. ‘You turn my metaphor against me. Yes, and no. Perhaps I was and perhaps not . . . I cannot truly tell you.'

‘What then will be the destination of this Secret Expeditionary Force – not Rügen, surely?'

‘Oh, Lord, no! Not now we know what Napoleon intends. Our most immediate worry is the Danish navy. The French are on the point of occupying the country and the Danish fleet is in an advanced state of readiness.'

‘I thought that we had finished that business before, at Copenhagen.'

‘Would that we had, but time does not stand still. If the Danes cannot be coerced into surrendering their fleet in return for a subsidy, we shall have to execute a
coup de main
and take it into our safekeeping.'

Drinkwater frowned. ‘You mean to cut out the entire Danish fleet?'

‘Yes.'

‘God's bones! What a savage master this war is become.'

‘Like fire, Nathaniel,' Dungarth replied with a nod, ‘and like fire, it must be fought with fire.'

‘Lord Dungarth has made me privy to the circumstances in which you were compelled to leave your command, Captain Drinkwater.'

Mr Barrow, the Admiralty's Second Secretary, smiled, his pedantic mouth precise in the exact allowance of condescension he permitted an officer of Drinkwater's seniority. He placed his hand palm downwards on the little pile of documents that Drinkwater had submitted. ‘I would have thought it your first duty to report to their Lordships but, in view of the importance of the information you have brought, these matters will be overlooked.'

Drinkwater's mouth was dry. After the congratulations of Canning and Dungarth, Barrow's attitude was rather hard to accept. He counselled himself to silence.

‘It is also important, I might almost say of
paramount
importance, that the sources of this information are not divulged. I think
you
understand this, Captain. War with Russia is now certain and our
agents in that country are in great peril. The matter is therefore a secret of state. You do understand, do you not?'

‘I do.'

‘Your absence from your ship therefore did not take place,' said Barrow, proceeding like a Domine leading a class through a Euclidean theorem. ‘You will surrender your log books and destroy any personal journals. The death of your first lieutenant is really most convenient.' The thin smile appeared again on Mr Barrow's face. ‘I leave an explanation of Lord Walmsley's death for the benefit of his father entirely in your hands, Captain Drinkwater. Lord Dungarth says you have a ready wit in these matters.'

Drinkwater felt a rising tide of anger within him at Barrow's condescension and his self-control slipped further at Barrow's next remark.

‘The over-riding importance of secrecy does not permit you much licence. Your people . . .'

‘Will gossip, Mr Barrow,' Drinkwater put in sharply, exasperated by Barrow's bland assumption that a man-of-war might be sealed off like some packet of secret orders.

‘It is unlikely that your men will have much opportunity to gossip.' Barrow paused to make his effect more telling. ‘As for your officers, they are to remain under your command . . .'

‘Until death discharges them?' Drinkwater snapped, the sinister and inhuman implication of Barrow's intentions striking him fully.

‘Or peace, Captain, or peace. Do not let us be too pessimistic,' Barrow continued smoothly. ‘In the meantime I shall see what's to be done about a new lieutenant.' Barrow began to gather up the papers and tie a pink tape around them.

‘And the shattered state of my ship, sir, have you considered that?'

‘Of course! There are orders for you being prepared in the copy-room. You will turn your ship's company over directly into the
Patrician
, a razeed sixty-four and a particularly fine sailer. She is at Chatham and wants only men . . . your men.'

‘And myself, sir?' he asked, numbed by this news but thinking of his wife and Tregembo and the simple desire of a man to go home. ‘Am I also affected by this
proscription?
'

Barrow looked up. ‘I think it best that you are on shore as little as possible, Captain Drinkwater. The increasing desertions of men are most often noticeable where the commanding officer sleeps out of his ship. You know the regulations.'

Drinkwater stood and gripped the back of his chair in an effort at
self-control. ‘I had believed that I and my ship's company had earned a measure of respite, having rendered the State a signal service, Mr Barrow. Some of my men have not stepped ashore since the last Peace, God damn it!'

Barrow stared at him and Drinkwater saw with a certain degree of satisfaction that he had at last provoked the man. ‘There is no doubt that your service has been most satisfactory, Captain Drinkwater. I thought I had been at some pains to make that clear to you,' Barrow said frigidly, ‘but there is no respite for any of us. Every effort will continue to be made . . .'

‘I do not think I need to be taught my business, Mr Barrow!'

The two men glared at each other. Barrow's ruthless ability was an admired fact; he was an accomplished administrator with a task of great complexity, but he had little appreciation of a captain's predicament. Duty was obvious, while Drinkwater's sense of obligation to his crew was a tiresome liberality. Nothing of this conflict seemed clear to Barrow.

‘No, I am sure I do not, Captain,' Barrow conceded. Then he added, ‘But do not forget to forward your logs – privately, you understand.'

Drinkwater stared for a moment at the little heap of Admiralty papers that were now being neatly bundled up in pink tape. How fatuous his conversation with Lord Dungarth now seemed. As Barrow's fingers formed a bow in the pink tape the act was symbolic of dismissal. Tired, angry and disgusted, Drinkwater made for the door.

‘One thing more, Captain Drinkwater.'

Drinkwater turned on the threshold.

‘The matter of the eighty thousand sterling you conveyed to the Baltic. Unfortunately His Majesty King Gustavus saw fit to impound it for his own use. It never reached the Tsar. Unhappily you will be deprived of your customary percentage . . .' Drinkwater recalled his promise to his men, but Barrow had not yet finished with him.

‘One wonders, if it had reached Alexander as intended, whether he might not have remained faithful to the alliance. Good day, Captain.'

Half choking with anger Drinkwater stepped out into the corridor.

Admiral Gambier's fleet of over three hundred men-of-war and transports lay at anchor off the village of Vedboek. To the west of the anchored ships, amid the low wooded hills and red-roofed villages of the island of Zealand, an expeditionary force of the British Army and King's German Legion advanced on the Danish capital of Copenhagen. Field howitzers were already bombarding the city's defences and the thunder of the cannonade, the whistling of the arcing shells and the violent concussions of the exploding carcasses could be heard miles away.

In accordance with his instructions the army commander, Lord Cathcart, had demanded the surrender of the Danish fleet in exchange for an annual payment to be made for as long as was necessary. The Danes had refused the terms, voluntarily submitting their capital to bombardment rather than their honour with their ships.

When darkness fell the night was bright with the traces of shell-fire, and over Copenhagen the dense pall of smoke rose into the sky, its billowing under-belly orange with reflected flame.

A few days later the rape of the Danish fleet was completed, and Admiral Gambier sailed homewards with his prizes.

The means by which the British Government learned of the secret articles of the Treaty of Tilsit remains a mystery to this day. Whilst historians may speculate upon probabilities, the novelist enjoys the greater freedom of exploring possibilities. Nevertheless I have tried not to abuse this privilege and have spun my yarn with the few known facts.

The most likely contender for the role of the spy beneath the raft is Colin Alexander Mackenzie, a known British agent who had seen service in the Russian army and was a good linguist. A century after the event his family revealed his close connection with the incident (
English Historical Review
, Vol. XVII, p. 110, 1902). Although this is inconclusive, Canning's steadfast refusal to name his source does suggest a vulnerable individual who remained at large in a suddenly hostile Russia. But Mackenzie was known to the Tsar, and dined with Alexander when he entertained Talleyrand. He may, therefore, have been too conspicuous to have been the actual eavesdropper, though he knew all about it. Circumstantial evidence of his possible arrival in London is not confirmed, but is put
after
16 July, when Canning wrote his instructions to Gambier and Cathcart for the attack on Copenhagen. Talleyrand himself may have supplied some information, for his betrayal of Napoleon dates from Tilsit, and he occupied the Foreign Ministry of France throughout the transition from Napoleonic to Bourbon rule in 1815, when the French copy of the treaty is alleged to have disappeared. However, he was not under the raft, nor were any of the other Britons known to have been in Russia at the time, such as Lords Leveson-Gower and Hutchinson, Robert Wilson or Dr Wylie, who were kept at a discreet distance.

The intrigues of the Russian court will never be known, but there are several contenders for the role of, at least, accomplice. The Vorontzoff family have been closely connected with the secret, even cited as providing the spy. Leaked information may also have come
from Bennigsen, and the British Foreign Office is said to have papers alleging his part in a plot to kill Alexander.

The most intriguingly ‘useful' fact is the existence of a letter quoted by Dr Holland Rose, dated 26 June from Memel, from an anonymous officer in the Russian service.

The speed with which the intelligence arrived in London could have been achieved by land or sea. It was a hot summer, ‘the labourers fainting in the fields', with little wind and an anti-cyclone over the North Sea. My preference for the frigate
Antigone
is obvious, but lent credence by Richard Deacon's remark in his
History of the British Secret Service
that much information was gathered by cruisers of the Royal Navy. Government secrecy, of course, ensured that
Antigone
's log book cannot now be found in the Public Record Office!

Much of the credibility of the story rests on the exact nature of the ‘raft'. Lariboissière's engineers certainly had a hand in its adaptation and there are hints of the employment of local labourers. The anonymous Russian officer, quoted by Holland Rose, calls the thing a
pont volant
, suggesting the use of an existing ‘flying bridge' such as are believed to have been used for moving cattle across the lower reaches of the river. It is this supposition I have favoured in view of the period of concealment and the details claimed by the Mackenzie family.

The free movement of strangers among the military is affirmed by Savary, Duke of Rovigo: ‘this meeting attracted visitors to Tilsit from a hundred leagues round.' The opening exchange between Napoleon and Alexander is too widely quoted to tamper with. For, as Napoleon's secretary Bourienne points out, the meeting at Tilsit was ‘one of the culminating points of modern history . . . the waters of the Nieman reflected the image of Napoleon at the height of his glory'. Who that reflected image concealed in the water below is here revealed as the mysterious ‘Ostroff'.

Wilson's presence at Eylau, the seizure by Gustavus of the Tsar's subsidy and the loss of the arms shipment are all verifiable and the Danes have not yet forgiven us the seizure of their fleet in 1807. Morality has never been a conspicuous feature of war, and, as Fortescue says, ‘it was Denmark's misfortune to lie between the hammer and the anvil' while, on Britain's part, ‘the law of self-preservation [was] cogent'. Even as the British struck, Marshal Bernadotte received Napoleon's orders to invade Denmark. Finally, Fouché, Napoleon's Chief of Police, says in his memoirs, ‘The success of the attack on Copenhagen was the first thing that deranged the secret article of the Treaty of Tilsit, by virtue of which the fleet of
Denmark was to be put at the disposal of France . . . I had never seen Napoleon in such a transport of rage.'

The circumstances under which Edward Drinkwater found himself in Russia are more fully explained in
The Bomb Vessel
.