Enemy in Sight! (19 page)

The commodore glanced up from the charts, his eyes shin- ing in the reflected glare thrown through the shattered stern windows.

Bolitho said flatly, “You sent for me, sir?”

“A conference.” Pelham-Martin looked round the littered cabin. “This is a bad business.”

Somewhere below decks a man screamed, the sound suddenly terminated as if a great door had been slammed shut.

Bolitho asked, “What do you intend to do?”

The commodore stared at him. “When the others arrive I will make my . . .”

He swung round as the door opened and a master's mate said, “Beg pardon, sir, but the cap'n is askin' for you.

Pelham-Martin seemed to realise Bolitho was watching him and said heavily, “Winstanley fell as we came clear. He is down on the orlop.” He shrugged, the movement painful and despair- ing. “I am afraid he is done for.” Then he gestured to the others. “Apart from the lieutenant on watch, these are the only officers not killed or wounded.”

Bolitho replied, “I would like to see Winstanley.” He walked to the door and then paused, realising that Pelham-Martin had not moved. “Will you come, sir?”

The commodore looked at the charts and ran his fingers over them vaguely. “Later perhaps.”

Bolitho gestured to the two officers. “Wait outside.”

The marine captain made as if to protest and then saw Bolitho's eyes.

When the door was closed behind them Bolitho said quietly, “I think you
should
come, sir.” He could feel the bitter anger welling inside him like fire. “It is the least you can do now.”

Pelham-Martin stepped back from the table as if he had been struck. “How dare you speak to me in that tone?”

“I dare, sir, because of what you have done!” Bolitho heard his words and could not control them. Nor did he want to any more. “Yours is the honour of commanding these ships and these men. It is also your responsibility. Yet you threw both away, with no more thought than a blind fool!”

“I am warning you, Bolitho!” Pelham-Martin's hands were open- ing and closing like two crabs. “I will have you court-martialled! I will not rest until your name shares the ignominy of your brother!” He paled as Bolitho took a step towards him and added thickly, “It was a trap, I did not expect . . .”

Bolitho gripped his hands behind him, feeling the com- modore's words in his mind, knowing they were the man's last desperate defence.

He said, “There may be a court martial, sir. We both know
whose
it will be.” He saw it strike home and added slowly, “I do not care one way or the other. But I will not stand by and see our people shamed and our cause dishonoured. Not by you, or anyone else who thinks more of his own personal advancement than his duty!”

Without another word he threw open the door and hurried along the sundrenched quarterdeck. At any moment he expected Pelham-Martin to call for the captain of marines and place him under arrest, and if it had happened he did not know how his own fury and contempt would use him.

He did not remember finding his way down to the orlop, and his mind only recorded vague scenes of men working at repairs, faces and bodies still blackened with powder smoke, eyes staring and wild from fatigue and worse.

The orlop was in darkness but for the swinging deckhead lanterns, all of which were clustered above the central spectacle of agony and horror. Around the curved sides of the hull the wait- ing wounded twisted and sobbed, their faces or broken limbs catching a brief pattern of lamplight before the ship swung again and plunged them into merciful darkness once more.

Captain Winstanley lay propped against one of the stout timbers, one eye covered with a thick dressing, the centre of which gleamed bright red like an additional unwinking stare. He was naked to the waist and his lower body was covered with a square of canvas. Beside it lay his curved hanger which he had been car- rying during the action.

Bolitho dropped on one knee, seeing the sweat pouring from Winstanley's broad chest, the slow, heavy breathing which told its own story.

Gently he took the other captain's hand. The fingers were like ice. “I am here, Winstanley.” He saw the remaining eye turn towards him, and then the recognition, as slow as the man's breathing.

The fingers moved slightly. “It was you I wanted.” He closed his eye and screwed up his face in sudden agony. Then he added faintly, “I—I was going to tell Pelham-Martin . . . was going to tell him . . .” The eye swivelled away and towards a thin man in a long bloodied apron. The
Indomitable'
s surgeon nodded briefly and walked back towards the lanterns, where his assistants were dragging a limp body from his butcher's table.

Winstanley's mouth tried to smile. “Mr Tree is impatient, Bolitho. He is wasting time on me.” He lolled his head to stare around the orlop. “Let him see to these poor fellows. I am done for.” Then his fingers tightened over Bolitho's hand like a steel trap. “Don't let him leave my ship to carry his disgrace! In the name of Christ, don't let it happen!” The eye was fixed on Bolitho's face, willing him to answer.

Nearby a young midshipman shrunk back against the ship's side, his eyes wide with terror as the assistant surgeon said curtly, “This one next. His arm will have to come off. The boy rolled on to his side, weeping and struggling as the surgeon's mates loomed from the shadows.

Winstanley gasped, “Be brave lad! Be brave!” But his words went unheard.

Bolitho turned away, sickened. He was thinking of Pascoe, of what might have happened if he had obeyed Pelham-Martin's signal to close around this ship and await complete destruction.

He said, “I have a plan, Winstanley.” He shut his ears to the sudden shrill scream at his back. It was like a tortured woman. “I will do what I can for your ship.” He tried to smile. “For all of us.”

Bolitho felt someone brush his shoulder and looked up to see the surgeon and his assistants standing beside him.

Winstanley said quietly, “It seems I cannot be moved, Bolitho.” The surgeon muttered impatiently, “I am sorry, Captain Bolitho, you will have to leave now.”

Bolitho recoiled as the canvas was dragged aside. Even the attempt at bandaging could not hide the horror of Winstanley's leg and thigh.

He said tightly, “I'll not wait, Winstanley. I will visit you later to explain my plan, eh?”

The other man nodded and let his hand drop beside him. He knew as well as Bolitho there would be no other meeting on earth. And something in the single eye seemed to pass a message of thanks as Bolitho stepped back into the shadows. Thanks for a promise of a plan that even he did not truly understand. Thanks for not staying to watch his final misery and degradation under the knife, which even now gleamed beneath the lowhung lanterns.

On the quarterdeck the sun was hotter and brighter than ever, but the sickness in Bolitho's stomach remained, leaving him cold, like Winstanley's hand.

Some of the seamen watched him pass, their expressions guarded but in some ways defenceless. They had been fond of their captain, and he had served them well, whereas Bolitho was a stranger.

In the stern cabin he found Fitzmaurice and Mulder waiting with the commodore, their faces towards the door, as if they had all been watching it for some time.

Bolitho said quietly, “I am ready, sir.”

Pelham-Martin looked around their faces. “Then I think we shall discuss . . .”

He glanced up as Fitzmaurice said harshly, “Lequiller's other ships are on the high sea somewhere while we stand here talk- ing! We cannot leave Las Mercedes without destroying those we have just fought.” He watched the commodore without emotion. “Yet if we attack again we face the same treatment now that the balance has shifted against us.”

The commodore dabbed his forehead automatically. “We
tried,
gentlemen. No one can say we did not do our best.”

Bolitho tugged at his neckcloth. The words, the heat of the cabin were making his head swim.

He said, “There is still a way in which we might surprise the enemy.” He watched narrowly as Pelham-Martin's features endeav- oured to cover his inner confusion. “Time is not on our side and this plan, any plan may prove better than total failure.”

The others were watching him, but he did not drop his eyes from the commodore's face. It was like a line stretched between them, and one sign of faltering or uncertainty could finish every- thing.

As if from far away he heard Pelham-Martin say, “Very well. Then be so good as to explain it.” As he lowered himself into a chair his hands were shaking badly, but there was no hiding the hatred in his eyes.

Bolitho saw the expression and rejected it. He was thinking of Winstanley down there on the orlop. Amongst his men, and suffering the agonising torment of the surgeon's saw.

10 CODE OF
C
ONDUCT

T
HE
H
YPERION
'
S
lieutenants and senior warrant officers stood shoulder to shoulder around Bolitho's desk, their faces set in var- ious attitudes of concentration as they watched their captain's chart and listened to the quiet insistence of his voice.

Beyond the stern windows the sea was in total darkness, and while the ship still tugged at her anchor the deck and gangways were alive with busy feet and the creak of tackles as a boat was hoisted outboard to the accompaniment of orders and muffled curses.

Bolitho sat down on the bench seat so that he could see the faces below the lanterns, to try to estimate how much or how lit- tle they understood and accepted his plan.

When he had described it earlier before Pelham-Martin and the other captains he had been surprised just how clearly the words had come to him. His anger and contempt, as well as his sorrow for Winstanley, had perhaps made his mind extra clear, so that the plan, vague and hazy when he had climbed from the mis- ery of the
Indomitable'
s orlop, had unfolded in time with his words, had hardened into possibility with each passing second.

He said, “We will take four cutters. Two will be ours and the others will come from
Hermes.
Captain Fitzmaurice will be sup- plying the bulk of the landing party, as his ship is best supplied with men at present. The importance of timing and discipline are paramount, gentlemen. Also I shall expect every man and each boat to be checked before we leave. Just enough beef and bis- cuit and no more. Fresh water barricoes for the same period of time, but no extra allowance for accident or mistiming.” He looked at each face in turn. “It is going to be a very hard task, and to complete it with any hope of success we must travel light, no mat- ter what the discomfort.”

Captain Dawson said gruffly, “I'd be happier if you were tak- ing my marines, sir.”

Bolitho smiled. “You will have your chance later.” He cocked his head to listen as more thuds and shouts announced the arrival of boats alongside. The rest of his landing party must be here already.

He said quickly, “The
Hermes'
first lieutenant will be my sec- ond in command. That is only fair as his ship is supplying the major part of the force.” He saw Inch nod, accepting the sense of the argument, but no doubt realising at the same time that his own prospect of advancement or sudden death had retreated accordingly. Bolitho added, “Mr Lang will go with us as the other officer.”

Lang was the third lieutenant, and had been slightly wounded during the battle at St. Kruis. His wound had healed well enough, but he had seemingly been left with badly stretched nerves, so that his round, open face was now almost permanently set in a puzzled frown.

He bobbed his head. “Thank you, sir.” He was still frowning.

Stepkyne said abruptly, “As second lieutenant I think it is
my
right to take part, sir.”

Bolitho had been expecting the protest, and could hardly blame him for making it. Promotion was hard to win at any time, and for a man like him it was doubly difficult.

He said, “This ship is under strength, Mr Stepkyne. You are very experienced and cannot be spared.”

“It is my
right,
sir!” Stepkyne seemed oblivious to those around him.

Bolitho pushed Stepkyne's problems to the back of his mind. “There is more at stake here than your promotion or my funeral! And I would remind you that what you tend to regard as a right is in fact a privilege. So let that be an end to it!”

The cabin door opened and Captain Fitzmaurice walked into the lamplight, his first lieutenant at his heels.

He held up his hand. “Forgive the intrusion, Bolitho. I thought I would speak with you before you leave.” He nodded curtly to the others. “This is Mr Quince, my senior.”

Quince was a tall, lean lieutenant with a hard mouth and extremely bright eyes. Bolitho had already learned from Fitz- maurice that Quince was ripe for advancement and more than capable should the chance come his way.

Bolitho said, “For the benefit of our guests, gentlemen, I will go over it briefly once again.” He straightened the chart across his desk. “The landing party will consist of four cutters and eighty officers and seamen. They will be tightly packed, but to use more boats would deprive the squadron of the ability to provide a diver- sion elsewhere.”

It was not merely for Fitzmaurice's entertainment that he was repeating his instructions. It took time for words to set in men's minds, to translate into probability or solid fact. As he glanced quickly at the men around him he knew he had been right. They were looking at the chart, but the eyes were more relaxed, more thoughtful, as each saw the scene from his own point of view.

“As you have seen, the mouth of the river which protects the rear of Las Mercedes is about a mile wide. You may also have observed it is little more than a swamp, filled with rushes and sandbars, and for that reason is not suitable for large craft. Deeper inland it gets much worse, which is why our four boats must be as light as possible.” He let his words sink in. “The land- ing party has to cover thirty miles in three days. Little enough when walking across Bodmin Moor to visit your mistress.” Several smiled, in spite of his words. “But the swamp is uncharted and dangerous. Some might say it is impassable.
But
we will do it.”

Fitzmaurice cleared his throat. “Three days. Not much time.”

Bolitho smiled gravely. “Tomorrow the squadron is making a mock attack on Las Mercedes. The French will be expecting us to do something, and unless some sort of action is mounted they will guess what we are about. The sloop
Dasher
is patrolling the entrance of the bay this moment, so Lequiller's men will see we mean to try again.”

He looked at Captain Dawson. “The rest of the squadron's boats will be used to mount a mock landing below the headland. Every ship will send her marines, and you will take charge over- all.” Some of Dawson's earlier resentment melted as he added, “Make a good display, but do not risk losing men to no purpose. They will earn their keep later.”

He faced the others again. “This diversion will of course be terminated, but by that time the landing party will be well inside the swamp. But in three days from dawn tomorrow the squadron will attack in earnest, gentlemen, so you can see the vital impor- tance of the thirty miles we must travel before we can pave the way to success.

Inch asked, “If you cannot reach there in time, sir, what will happen?”

Bolitho looked at him thoughtfully. “You will have to decide, Mr Inch. For if that happens,
Hyperion
will have a new captain, eh?”

Inch stared at him, his jaw hanging open. Now, maybe for the first time, he understood why Bolitho was leaving him behind.

Bolitho added sharply, “Carry on, gentlemen. From our own people I will want a good gunner's mate and a bosun's mate. Also two midshipmen, but
not
Gascoigne.”

Inch asked vaguely, “May I ask why, sir?”

“You may. Mr Gascoigne is the senior midshipman and well versed in signals. You will have more need of him here when you close the enemy.”

He watched them file from the cabin and then said, “Well, Mr Quince, I hope you have chosen your people carefully?”

Quince showed his teeth in a slow grin. “Aye, sir. All trained men. I picked them myself.” The grin widened. “I told them it would take a very brave man to be a coward under
your
com- mand, sir.”

Fitzmaurice coughed politely. He was obviously unused to his subordinate's sudden flash of humour. “Wait on deck, Mr Quince.”

Alone with Bolitho, Captain Fitzmaurice got down to his true reason for coming aboard. “You have heard, I suppose, that Winstanley died of his wounds?” He shrugged. “The surgeon no doubt speeded his end, but his loss is hard to accept nevertheless.”

“He was a good captain.” Bolitho watched Fitzmaurice's weary features, conscious of the sounds beyond the sealed door, the urgency and need for final appraisal of his sketchy plan. But some- thing in Fitzmaurice's tone told him there was more to come.

“Our commodore has written his orders for the landing, Bolitho. I expect you have read them as carefully as I?”

He nodded. “They are much as I would expect.”

“Winstanley is dead.
You
are now the senior captain. Whatever you do ashore is your responsiblity.” He seemed suddenly tired of trying to phrase his words diplomatically. “In his orders Pelham- Martin has stated that he will make an attack in three days' time in support of your action ashore.” He spread his hands angrily. “That one word
support
alters the whole meaning of the written orders! I know it is wrong for me to speak my mind like this, but I cannot stand by and allow you to take the weight of all respon- sibility. You are supporting the commodore, and not the other way round.”

Bolitho studied him gravely. Fitzmaurice had never struck him as a man of much imagination beyond the limits of duty. He was moved by this sudden concern and understanding, and knew what it must have cost him to make his feelings known. He did not after all know Bolitho, and there were many who might have used Fitzmaurice's display of concern to further their own stand- ing with the commodore. By even hinting at Pelham-Martin's deceit he was leaving himself open to grave charges of conspir- acy and insubordination.

He replied, “Thank you for speaking so openly. I will not for- get it. But I believe we must think only of the task ahead. Of what it means, and the disastrous consequences of failure.”

Fitzmaurice eyed him admiringly. “So you realised what was implied without my saying it?” He smiled. “It is a strange service which we follow. If we fail we stand the blame alone. If we suc- ceed there are always those elsewhere who take the credit.”

Bolitho thrust out his hand. “I hope we remember that, if ever
we
reach flag rank.”

Fitzmaurice followed him on to the darkened quarterdeck. “I doubt it in my own case. I have often found that the attraction of arriving at some prized destination has overshadowed the effort of reaching it.”

Allday spoke from the darkness. “Your sword, Captain.”

Bolitho tightened the belt, letting his eyes become accustomed to the gloom and sensing the watching faces all around him.

Allday said quietly, “I didn't bring the white flag this time, Captain.” His teeth gleamed in his face. “I hope I've done right?”

Bolitho looked away. “If anything should happen to me, what would become of you? No captain in sound mind would tolerate your insolence as I do!”

Inch strode aft, his head thrust out as he searched for Bolitho amongst the silent figures.

“Boats ready alongside!” He faltered. “Good luck, sir, and God speed.”

Bolitho nodded. Suddenly he realised the weight of his mis- sion. He was not merely leaving the ship, but heading for a place which was little more than a vague sketch on his chart. Another world, a different continent, with heaven knows what at the end of it all.

He said, “Take good care, Inch.”

Inch looked up at the black tracery of rigging swaying gen- tly against the bright stars. “I'll keep good care of her, sir.”

Bolitho walked slowly to the ladder. “I know that. But I meant of
yourself.
”

Then he ran down the ladder to the entry port, brushing past anonymous shapes and watching faces, and very aware of the great silence over the whole ship.

Stepkyne touched his hat, his voice flat and expressionless. “All in the boats, sir. I have detailed Midshipmen Carlyon and Pascoe for the duties required. They being the most junior and least needed to work the ship.”

Bolitho kept his voice low. “You were most considerate, Mr Stepkyne.”

Without another word he followed Allday's broad shoulders down into the nearest cutter. He should have been more careful and less concerned with his own part in all this. Stepkyne had chosen the only way he knew to show his resentment at being left behind. The one way in which Bolitho was unable to over- ride his choice, without showing favouritism.

He settled himself in the sternsheets. “Cast off. Allday, we will lead.” He raised his voice as the lines were freed from the other boats. “Mr Quince, you will follow at the rear and ensure the rest maintain regular distances apart.”

The oars dropped into their rowlocks, and at Allday's com- mand dipped and pulled steeply into the choppy wavelets.

In the bows Bolitho could just make out the shape of Shambler, an experienced bosun's mate, crouching with a hand lead and line in readiness to feel the way into the first part of the choked river. The cutter felt heavy and sluggish in the current and between the men's legs he could see the gleam of piled weapons and the sparse rations for the journey.