Ramage & the Rebels (30 page)

Ramage folded the letter and went to give it back to the Governor; then he unfolded it again, read the signature, and said to Aitken: “Make a note of the name ‘Adolphe Brune, chief of the privateers.'” He spelled out the names and then returned the letter to van Someren.

“I trust that decides you,” the Governor said.

“You have about a hundred men, trained troops?”

“Yes, mostly artillerymen.”

“And there are a thousand republicans?” Ramage guessed the figure, curious to see van Someren's reaction.

“Not as many as that. We estimate about five hundred at the most. The privateers were all short of men—we guess at a total of three hundred and fifty. There were about one hundred republicans when all this began, but they may have been joined by others, the inevitable—how do you call them?—opportunists. About fifty, we think.”

“All short of weapons and powder, though?”

Van Someren shook his head. “Unfortunately they have plenty, because each privateer has weapons—muskets, pistols, cutlasses—for at least fifty men, so they can arm five hundred. Before I brought my troops in, patrols were reporting capturing men holding positions with three loaded muskets in reserve beside each of them.”

“How many men are left in the privateers?”

Even as he asked the question Ramage realized that he had made a bad mistake: he had taken no steps to prevent someone from the privateers getting on shore to ride off into the hills and report to Brune that a British frigate had just come into the harbour and her Captain was at Government House.

“One or two men in each vessel,” and then, perhaps reading Ramage's thoughts, van Someren added: “I left sentries concealed who will seize anyone landing to carry the news of your arrival to the rebels.”

Ramage wished he had a pen or pencil to twiddle. Sitting here with his elbows on the table and one hand resting on the other was comfortable but it seemed to stifle coherent thought. Ideas must come through active hands. Clasped hands reminded him of contented parsons and portly priests mumbling things by rote or making embarrassingly obvious remarks in portentous voices. The true artists in this form of activity, he thought sourly, became bishops, and the lords spiritual never found themselves sitting in the residences of governors of enemy islands trying to think what to do next.

“You are satisfied?” van Someren demanded, his voice slowly becoming almost querulous from anxiety as he realized that this English officer seemed far from delighted at the prospect of having the richest Dutch island in the Caribbean surrendered to him.

The Dutchman watched carefully. This Lord Ramage sat quite still, like a cat waiting for a mouse. He did not move his hands—nor crack the joints of his knuckles like Lausser. It was impossible to guess what he was thinking: his eyes gave nothing away, sunk beneath bushy eyebrows. He had tapped the table with his left hand when he wanted his Lieutenant to make a written note of something but van Someren saw it was always a figure or a name, never a phrase. Obviously he was not a diplomatist because he was concerned only with facts, not phrases.

Whether or not this Lord Ramage eventually accepted the surrender—and it seemed far from sure at the moment—van Someren knew that it was fortunate for Curaçao that he was commanding the frigate that suddenly appeared off the port. Had that French frigate come in, she would have provided more than enough men for the rebels to swing the balance: she would have made sure the rebels were left in control of Amsterdam. Which would in turn mean his own arrest and execution. By a miracle, this Ramage had captured her. In fact, having the
Calypso
anchored in the port almost made up for the fact that the
Delft
was so long overdue. Thank goodness he was not bothered daily by demands from Maria for news about the
Delft.
The frigate was due almost exactly six weeks ago, and that was all he knew. Either she is delayed in the Netherlands or she is delayed by storms or calms. Or she has been captured or sunk.

Now Lord Ramage is watching me. Those brown eyes do not miss much. And he is rubbing one of two scars on his forehead, as though a mosquito bite has started itching. The Lieutenant suddenly glances sideways at him, van Someren noticed, as though this rubbing of the scar is significant.

“Would you just repeat briefly, Your Excellency, exactly what you are proposing. Slowly, because I want Mr Aitken to write it down, so that we have a record for my Admiral.”

Van Someren was almost thankful because for the Captain's own sake he ought to have something in writing to show his senior officer—indeed, he would have been much wiser to have demanded a document from the Dutch. Yet, van Someren realized, if surrender terms are agreed and signed, Ramage will have no use for such a document. He thought how satisfying that his English was coming back to him. Talking English and French to Maria when she was a young girl had done wonders for her command of both languages, and he had to admit it had been good for him, too. Now, to choose the words, words for naval officers, not diplomatists …

“As Governor of Curaçao, I wish to surrender this island, with all its people, fortifications, troops, stores, vessels and armaments, to His Britannic Majesty—” he paused when Aitken raised a hand for him to go more slowly—”in return for His Britannic Majesty's guarantee of protection of the island and its people.”

“A straight exchange,” Ramage said. “We get the island, you get defended against these republicans. These rebels, rather.”

One has to smile at such bluntness. A diplomatist would have taken five minutes to say the same thing. “Yes, reduced to its simplest terms, that is so.”

“And, Your Excellency, you give your word of honour that the situation in the island is as you have described it?”

“You ask a great deal! I cannot possibly give you my word of honour about that because I have had to rely on the reports of patrols, and they have now been called in. In all honesty I cannot say what the island's position is at this moment. I can give you my word—and I do—that what I have told you is truly the position as I understand it.”

One had to be honest with this young man. He was not guileless; far from it. But obviously he had no time for all the tact, vagaries and deceptions normally used by diplomatists: if he accepted the surrender of the island, clearly he wanted to know exactly what obligations it brought him.

“You want a guarantee that the island and its people will be defended by the British?”

“Yes.”

In face of such a simple question one could give only a simple answer and the question and the answer were critical: this Lord Ramage might lack (or spurn) the approach of the diplomatist, but he had a sharp enough mind to distil what really mattered.

And now he is shaking his head. His Lieutenant has put down his pen and Lausser gives a muffled sigh which is quite unnecessary and tactless: there is no point in revealing disappointment to this young man. Disappointment! Hardly the word to use when a man shaking his head means your eventual execution, and God knows what treatment of your wife and daughter

… But one must smile. One must remain cheerful. One must bluff, too.

“The prospect of reporting to your commander-in-chief that you have captured the island of Curaçao does not appeal to you,

my Lord? I would have thought that it would be—how do you say, ‘a feather in your cap.'”

“The
idea
appeals to me, Your Excellency, but you ask for a guarantee that the British defend the island. I am the person who—for the time being, and that is the only time that really matters—has to give that guarantee.”

“But I can see no difficulty …”

“Your Excellency—” the voice was crisp now, van Someren noted—”I have about two hundred seamen and forty Marines. How can I possibly
guarantee
to defend you with such a small force?”

“There are my own troops as well! Together they make a strong force.”

Again he shook his head. “You assume that because I have two hundred and forty men I can land them all like a few companies of infantry. But only the Marines have any training as soldiers. The seamen have been barefooted for months, and if they put on boots or shoes I'm afraid their feet would be blistered within an hour. And I need to keep fifty men on board.”

“Very well, if you don't want to fight …”

Again those eyes. It was an insulting thing to say, and not really meant: the words were only a measure of the disappointment at realizing that the
Calypso
would be sailing out of Amsterdam within—well, a few hours.

“Your Excellency, you should not assume that because we captured a French frigate yesterday without firing a shot we did not want to fight.”

“Accept my apologies, please.” It was the only way, and one wanted this young man's respect. “But is there no way you can help us? Have I not shown you that the French are now as much our enemies as yours?”

“I may be able to help Your Excellency, but not on your terms.”

What is he offering? Is he a sly fellow after all? Have I misjudged him? No, it is not possible. Anyway, words cost nothing except time. They can always be denied or twisted.

“But I have not insisted on any terms!”

“You offer to surrender, Your Excellency, on one condition. Perhaps I should have said ‘condition,' not ‘terms.'”

“Please explain more fully.” There might be some hope yet.

“I cannot
guarantee
to defend the island. I can accept the island's surrender and hope that my commander-in-chief will agree to send troops and ships for its defence. But four weeks or more would pass before they arrive, even if my Admiral agrees, and that would be much too late. The next four days are the critical ones for you. If you can survive the next four days you will be safe for more than four weeks.”

“But we can't.”

“No, I don't think you can, Your Excellency.”

“And you refuse to help us?”

“As things stand, I can't. At the moment you are our enemy—you forget we are here under a flag of truce. If I helped you, I would be guilty of treason, of helping the enemy.”

And of course he is quite right; this Ramage has not let himself be dazzled by the idea of taking the surrender of an island. “So, my Lord, we reach stalemate?”

He is shaking his head; quite a definite movement. But has he an alternative proposal after all? His Lieutenant is looking round at him, obviously surprised. Lausser is sitting rigidly in his chair. “What do you propose, then?” The words sound strangled, but Ramage seems not to notice.

“That you surrender without conditions, Your Excellency.”

“But, my Lord, you cannot expect me—why, you could sign the instrument and just sail away, leaving us to be slaughtered by these rebels.”

“I could.” And now he looks me straight in the eye. “But then all I would have would be a worthless sheet of paper, not an island, so do you think I would?”

“No, I do not.” In all honesty one has to admit that. “But why do you reject my condition?”

“Your Excellency, I have told you. I can't sign a document guaranteeing you something which cannot be guaranteed. Some men would sign a document guaranteeing to make the sun rise in the west. I am not one of them.”

“What do you suggest we do?” And here at last, in the sixty-third year of my life, I, Gottlieb van Someren, Governor of Curaçao, once honoured with several titles which had been held by many forebears but now officially addressed as “Citizen,” am asking a young British frigate captain what he suggests I do with the island I govern. The ironies of wars and revolution—and of Nature's delays too: where is the
Delft?

“You have only one choice, Your Excellency. I think you know what it is.”

“I prefer to hear it from you.”

“Surrender the island without any condition, and put yourself under the protection of His Britannic Majesty. I repeat the last part—'put yourself under the protection of His Britannic Majesty.' You get no guarantee about anything.”

“How will that help me or my people?”

Now he gives a boyish grin; not an artful or sly grin, but one of satisfaction.

“All it does is help me to help you. At this moment I can't help you in any way—indeed, it is doubtful if I should even be talking with you—because you are ‘the enemy.' If you surrender and put yourself under British protection, you become my ally. And with a clear conscience I can do all I can to help you. But I could not sign any
guarantee
with a clear conscience. Shall we now compose a brief ‘instrument of surrender' and the four of us sign it?”

The English Lieutenant's eyes light up. With his name on a document in which the British accept the surrender of Curaçao, he knows his name goes down in history. And so does mine, but for the opposite reason. “Yes, let us begin with a rough draft …”

Aitken looked at the sheet of paper which Major Lausser had slid across the table towards him. It was a large sheet which had been folded in half to make four sides, and three of them were covered with the neat, copper-plate handwriting of the Governor's clerk, who had painstakingly copied the draft agreed by the Captain and the Governor.

Aitken wiped the quill on a piece of cloth and dipped it in the ink. This was a fine thing, his name on a document (an “instrument of surrender” was its proper name, apparently) by which the Captain took the surrender of this whole island. Why, running before a fair wind it took the
Calypso
five or six hours to sail from one end to another. At least 400 square miles, perhaps more. The Captain insisted he read it right through and say aloud, for them all to hear, that he understood it. Then, and only then, was he to sign it as one of the two representatives of His Britannic Majesty.

It would be printed in the
London Gazette,
that was certain. The
Gazette
would refer to the surrender, print the wording of the instrument, and give his name as well. A document of state, signed by him. But he wanted to read more slowly, even if the foreign gentlemen were showing signs of impatience, because he knew his hand was trembling, and he did not want to write a shaky signature.