Ramage & the Saracens (19 page)

“Well,” declared Hill, “we're going to have to wait and see. But thanks for the warning: it seems the innocent young English naval officer is in great danger from both the
cicisbeo
and the husband, and he has to beware the mother if the girl is a spinster.”

T
HE
Calypso
had been at anchor in Naples Bay for three days before the flagship hoisted her pendant number and the signal for captain. Both cutters were swinging at the boat boom, and as soon as he had changed to a fresh stock and buckled on his sword, Ramage set off.

From the time the
Intrepid
and
Phoenix
had arrived in Naples Bay with the
Calypso
in company, Ramage had heard nothing from Arbuthnot. Orsini had reported seeing Arbuthnot being rowed over to the flagship soon after they had anchored, and the admiral had sent for him once. Otherwise, until now, Ramage had been left to himself.

Now what was the matter? He thought it seemed a long time had passed for the admiral to want to rake over the Capraia affair. But it was hard to be sure: Admiral Rudd had not given him the impression of being a very stable sort of man: the more Ramage thought about it, the more likely it seemed that the admiral could have spent three days brooding, working himself up into a temper, and now he was going to unleash it.

What could have caused it, though? The loss of head-money, the fact that the French frigate had appeared on the scene, that the
Calypso
had not gone off in chase? No, the question of the
Calypso
going off in chase was Arbuthnot's decision; he had been the senior officer and Ramage could not have gone off without Arbuthnot's permission even if he had wanted to. So what was bothering the admiral? Ramage shrugged his shoulders: it was impossible to guess, and anyway there was very little point in trying: he would know for sure in ten minutes' time.

Jackson brought the cutter alongside the flagship, hooked on and waited for Ramage to board. He was met at the entry port by the flagship's first lieutenant who, Ramage had to admit, ran a smart ship: there had been sideboys holding out handropes, and the handropes were well scrubbed. The deck was almost white from vigorous holystoning, and the brasswork's shine showed that many men had been busy polishing with brick dust.

“The admiral will see you in his cabin, sir,” the first lieutenant said with the superciliousness that first lieutenants of flagships inevitably adopted to post captains at the lower end of the Post List. However, Ramage had met this too often to be intimidated.

“If you lead the way down,” he said, at once putting the first lieutenant in the position which could have been occupied by a midshipman, and leaving him with no chance of a direct refusal.

Ramage found Rear-Admiral Rudd seated at his desk, and he acknowledged the admiral's gesture to sit in the chair in front of him.

“So now we have got over the farce of Capraia,” the admiral observed sourly. “You might have anticipated that a French frigate would pick up those survivors.”

The comment was so absurd, Ramage found it easy not to answer: any admiral who tried to blame a subordinate in such a crude way deserved sympathy: he must be very unsure of himself.

Admiral Rudd shifted in his chair and said suddenly: “You know about the Algerines?”

Ramage nodded. “I captured one of their ships once,” he said.

“They are still present; in fact they are increasing. We have just had an official complaint from the King of the Two Sicilies, and we have to do something about it. They have suddenly started swarming over the ports along the coast of southern Sicily—kidnapping for their galleys and looting and raping. They are also taking fishing boats and apparently adding them to their own fleet.”

“Do we know roughly what ships they have?” Ramage asked.

“All small stuff. Nothing like a frigate. Galleys, fishing boats crowded with men, that sort of thing. As far as I can make out a dozen or so of them attack a particular port one day—they don't bother to wait for nightfall to do their work—and then vanish for a few days, then they attack somewhere else.”

Ramage thought for a minute and then asked: “Is there any pattern to these attacks, sir, or are they random?”

“No, they're not random: I was just going to tell you. Apparently they work their way along the coast, attacking one port and then, a few days later, they arrive off the next. They've nothing to fear from the Sicilians so they needn't bother about surprise.”

“What about the Sicilian Army?”

“What do you expect?” Rudd asked sourly. “They are doing nothing and His Majesty has a dozen reasons for their inactivity. He says the ports are often separated by cliffs, and it is almost impossible for troops to move along the coast. That's why he has come to us.”

“It seems reasonable enough,” Ramage admitted. “But catching two dozen fishing boats is like trying to catch a shoal of herrings with a single hook.”

“I don't see why,” Rudd said uncompromisingly. “Anyway, I can't spare any of my brigs or sloops: you're the only person I can send.”

“Very well, sir: I'll do my best.”

Rudd held up a small packet. “Here are your orders. And don't forget the King of the Two Sicilies and the British government are involved in all this. The British minister is particularly concerned that we root out the scoundrels.”

Ramage took the packet. “Will that be all, sir?”

“Yes, but make sure you understand that this isn't just a jaunt chasing pirates: with the king involved this becomes a major operation. If I had anyone else to send,” Rudd said bluntly, “I would. I am not very satisfied with your behaviour so far under my command. You seem far too lighthearted.”

“I'm sorry, sir: I do assure you I take my duties very seriously,” Ramage said, wishing he could make a comment about his opinion of the attitude of the flag-officer under whom he was serving. After a polite farewell he left the cabin and went back to the cutter.

Seated at his desk back on board the
Calypso
Ramage broke the seal on his orders and unfolded the single sheet of paper. After the usual formalities they told him that the Algerine pirates had so far raided Marsala and Mazara at the western end of the island of Sicily, and appeared to be making their way eastward. In view of representations from the court of the King of the Two Sicilies, Ramage was requested and required to take the ship under his command and destroy the pirates.

And that was it. One thing about Rear-Admiral Rudd, Ramage thought ruefully, he does not waste any words. Even more surprising, the orders were straightforward and unambiguous; there were no hidden threats concerning the penalty for failure.

Before calling his clerk to have the orders copied into the orders book, Ramage sent for Aitken and Southwick: it was his habit to discuss orders with them, not because he had any doubts but because he had long since accepted that he was mortal, and if he was killed then it would be up to Aitken as first lieutenant, and therefore second-in-command, and Southwick, as the ship's wise old man, to complete his orders. They would have more chance of doing that successfully if they knew how he had been thinking.

Southwick settled himself in the armchair as Aitken first read the orders and then handed them over to the master. Southwick read them and gave a contented sniff. “It isn't often one reads orders that don't have a lot of concealed threats in ‘em,” he said. “But it isn't often that one of the king's ships is sent off chasing pirates. What have they got—an old frigate or some such?”

“No, it's not going to be that easy,” Ramage said. “The admiral told me that they have a couple of dozen fishing boats—either local Sicilian craft they've captured with lateen sails and carrying twenty or thirty men, or vessels they've come over in from the Barbary Coast.”

“Chasing two dozen vessels with one frigate isn't going to be easy,” grumbled Aitken. “Those damned things are fast and they go to windward like a ferret out of the bag. They're shallow draft, too, so they can run up on a beach. Half the time they'll be out of gunshot of us if we have to cruise round in deep enough water.”

“Come now,” Ramage chided, “you're letting the thought of a couple of dozen Algerines beat you before we've set sail!”

“Maybe so,” Southwick said gloomily, “but you mark my words: it'll be like trying to catch eels with slippery hands.”

“How shall we start finding out where they're operating, sir?” Aitken asked.

Ramage thought for a minute or two. “Well, we can either go round the north coast and catch them up, or we can go round the south coast and meet them as they work their way eastward.”

“Northabout,” Southwick said firmly. “It'll be easier following them—we shall know where they are. If we go southabout we'll never know when we are going to run into them—or maybe run past them.”

Ramage nodded: Southwick had put into words his own thoughts. He took the orders and folded the paper along the original creases. A single sheet of paper, but it brought a shipload of problems.

Marsala—he had only been there once: a town which looked as though it should be in Africa. And, of course, the home of the strong, sweet wine. And the port's name as far as the Algerines were concerned was the Port of God, Marsah el Allah. Saracen, Algerine, Barbary—they were all pirates and had been for centuries, whether they came from the Levant in the east or Algiers in the west. A pity they had sacked Marsala—had they set fire to the place? From what little he knew of the Algerines, they tended to kidnap, rob and rape; they rarely burned down a town, for the simple reason that they planned to return a year or two later and repeat their raid.

And curiously enough, they were as anxious to capture human beings as anything: men to man their galleys—slaves chained to the oars did not live long—and women to put in their brothels. The trade in human beings was what made Algerine raids so sickening. The Italians called them
Saraceni,
Saracens, and there were few towns along the coast of the Tyrrhenian Sea which had not been raided half a dozen times in the last hundred years or so. The forts which dotted the coast were used mostly to keep a watch for the
Saraceni.
There were few Tuscan coastal towns that he knew of which did not have some legend about the
Saraceni.

There was the story of
La Bella Marsiliana.
Marsilia was a little town just north of Monte Argentario and according to legend the Saracens raided the town. Among the women they carried off was one of great beauty and charm, and when she was brought back to the Saracen headquarters, a prince fell in love with her and married her, and they lived happily ever after.

But the story of
La Bella Marsiliana
must be a rare one as far as the women were concerned; most of them probably spent the rest of their active lives in brothels, killed off when they were too old to be useful.

No, the Saracens, or Algerines, call them what you will, were barbarians who regarded everyone else as infidels, unbelievers to be enslaved or put to the sword. They were not the sort of people, Ramage thought, to be taken prisoner.

British warships would be welcome at Marsala, Ramage reflected: once the Spanish ports had been closed years earlier so that British ships could not call in for wine for the men's daily ration, one of the favourite replacements had been the wine of Marsala.

The
Calypso
passed Trapani, with its high striated cliffs, and the great grey castle, centuries old, peered down from the summit of Monte San Giuliano, where it sat foursquare in the village of Eryx almost surrounded by pine forests.

Over to starboard were the Aegadean Islands of Levanzo, Favignana and Marettimo, sitting a few miles offshore like giant teeth set in the sea. Ramage thought about calling at the islands to see if they had been raided, but they were almost uninhabited, the haunt of tunny fishermen.

The lookouts had reported a few tartanes, probably carrying salt from the salt ponds round to Trapani itself. Then, beyond the point, the frigate headed south to round Punto Scario and then turned in to Marsala. Ramage had an old history of Sicily in his cabin and he had looked up Marsala. Like most places in Sicily it was ancient, originally Phoenician, and when Rome was busy with Carthage, it became a busy port. The most extraordinary thing that he read was how often the port had been blocked by rocks being rolled into the entrance. The Romans had done it once; then the Venetians had shut it off at the time of the Battle of Lepanto, to make sure that the
Saraceni
—this time Turks—should not use it. But, according to the book, Marsala had begun to thrive thirty years ago when a couple of Englishmen started to export the local wine to England. The sweet wine, like a heavy sherry, immediately became popular. It was curious how the Royal Navy's demands influenced the fortunes of places: in the West Indies, rum was king because the Navy wanted it to issue to the men, and for ships serving this side of the Atlantic, Spain had supplied much of the wine that replaced the rum, until Spain threw in her lot with France, when Italian wines—and particularly Marsala—came into favour.

So that was how prosperity came to a little port on the southwest corner of Sicily—because its grapes produced a particular wine. At least, not just Marsala itself produced the grapes, the countryside around shared the harvest.

And why, Ramage wondered, was the cathedral of Marsala dedicated to St Thomas à Becket, whose glory surely was to be found at Canterbury?

Southwick walked across to him and said: “At Marsala we have to watch out for Il Marrobbio.”

“Do we indeed, and what is that?”

“Well, it has three names, depending on which part of Sicily you happen to be in: Marrobbio, Carrobbio and Marrubio. It's a series of waves which can spring up at any time, usually when the weather is calm. The waves are two or three feet high, and they come in surges at intervals ranging from ten minutes to half an hour.