A private revenge

'Sir? Sir? Can you hear me, sir? Are you all right, sir?'

'Elizabeth ... ?'

'It's Frey, sir ... Frey ... It's all over, sir ...'

And he opened his eyes to see silver coins falling from the sky.

CHAPTER 22 Penang

March 1809

It was ironic that he should have been saved by the boy Budrudeen. In that final confrontation with Morris the boy might have saved his master instead, but mutilation and degradation had, in the end, turned him against his persecutor. The shot was probably the only act Budrudeen had performed uncoerced in his short life. It was, too, a refutation of Morris's appalling creed.

The boy had not survived long, expiring soon after they brought his abused body back to Patrician in the flotilla of boats pulled by exhausted oarsmen. The losses they had sustained had been fearful and they had burnt the kampong as an act of corporate vengeance while the Dyaks melted into the jungle. And yet they returned with an air of triumph, for they had discovered a hoard of silver, much of it picked up on the hillside by men induced to be honest on the promise of legitimate reward, though there were undoubtedly private sums hidden about Patrician. Over forty thousand pounds worth, by the best calculations, the proceeds of years of depradations against the merchant trade in the South China Sea. Some of this booty had been held near the powder magazine below the istana and so had been blown spectacularly into the air.

But even this justification, satisfactory though it seemed to the profit-mesmerised survivors, failed to gratify Drinkwater. He was seized by the most profound doubts about his conduct, plunged into the blackest of depressions as Patrician, under the easy sail manageable by her depleted company, rounded Tumasek Island and headed north-west into the Strait of Malacca.

'All men murder their own innocence, sir,' said Derrick as he sat, pen poised, awaiting the captain's dictation. Drinkwater looked at the Quaker; it was the first time Derrick had called him 'sir'.

'Why do you say that?' he asked guiltily, as though caught in a culpable act.

'It is part of the human condition.'

'That is damned cold comfort.'

'The truth is rarely comfortable, especially when it touches ourselves.'

Drinkwater opened his mouth to damn the canting and sanctimonious prattler, but acknowledged the other as an equal. 'Does your creed prohibit you rendering assistance?'

'My creed tells me to be guided by the inner spirit ...'

'I had no time for such deep considerations,' said Drinkwater with a hint of returning spirit. 'A course of events initiated and guided by an amoral hand will find little to inhibit it. The most outrageous evil can be perpetrated with bewildering ease, especially if directed by a cool mind ...' And Morris had possessed that, he thought morosely. He stared fixedly at Derrick who lowered his eyes to the paper.

'It has not been my lot, sir, to come face to face with such things.'

The ghost of a smile crept across Drinkwater's mouth. 'No; you have been fortunate,' he hesitated, 'or wise ...'

Had he had innocence left to murder? Yet something had died in him as he slashed Morris in his frenzy, and the realisation robbed him of all sense of having avenged Tregembo.

'Perhaps that is why the Almighty reserved the right to vengeance,' said Derrick with disarming prescience.

'Damn it, don't preach at me,' snapped Drinkwater, 'bend your attention to my report,' and he began to dictate.

'Penang, sir.'

Quilhampton was smiling as Drinkwater came on deck and they exchanged salutes. The high-peaked island was still distant, still remote and blue. Beyond it and stretching away on the starboard beam lay the line of the Malay coast.

'We shall be at anchor by noon, sir.'

'Yes.'

'How is the wound, sir?'

'The wound is nothing, James. Lallo's curettage removed the morbid tissue and there is no inflamation. I assure you I am quite well. It is not yet time for you to step into my shoes.'

'Sir, I never ...'

'No, of course you didn't. You are certainly more cheerful than you have been, no, hear me out. It was a bloody business, James, not an affair of much honour. To be candid I did not expect to survive it and, damn me,' considered you owed me obligation enough to attend to Elizabeth and the children ...'

'Sir, of course ...'

'Well, sir, enough said about the matter then. I apprehend,' went on Drinkwater, diverting the conversation with an obvious hand, 'you will be disappointed again today.'

'Why so, sir?'

'Your high spirits are evidence of expectations, ain't they?'

'Er, well, I, er ...'

'You will receive no word from Mistress MacEwan, James, because, despite the foolish inventions of your imaginations, no one in England knows where we are, beyond the fact that we were last ordered to the Pacific'

'But we are homeward bound, sir, are we not?'

Drinkwater turned, lifted his glass and scrutinised the island as it loomed over the horizon.

'God and Admiral Sir Ed'd Pellew permitting.'

'Captain Drinkwater, pray take a seat ... a glass, sir?'

Your servant, Sir Ed'd.'

'I collect we've met before, sir?'

'In ninety-four, sir, a night action on the French coast with the flying squadron. I was in Kestrel ...'

'Ah, yes, the cutter ... a gallant scrap, eh?'

'Indeed, sir.'

'May I present Captain Frederick Torrington of the Polyphemus, the latest teak frigate from the Parsee yard at Bombay.'

Drinkwater recalled the elegant, over-painted thirty-six-gun cruiser his boat had passed pulling to the flagship.

'Sir. A fine-looking ship, a credit to the Service ...'

Drinkwater nodded to the thin-lipped boy who wore the single epaulette of a junior post-captain, then turned again to the pock-marked, balding admiral whose tall frame still seemed to possess the energy of a young man.

'Sir, my report ...' he handed over the papers. 'May I enquire, Sir Ed'd, if those two ships in the roads are from Canton or Calcutta?'

'You refer to the Indiaman and the Country-wallah?' drawled Torrington.

'I do, yes ...' Drinkwater was aware of an amused glance passing between Pellew and Torrington.

'Why do you ask, Captain Drinkwater?'

'The Indiaman seemed familiar, sir ...'

'She should do, sir, she was part of your convoy.' It was Torrington who spoke, the tone of his voice impertinent, even insolent.

'Is she Guilford?'

'Yes ... I took her ...'

'Torrington had the good fortune, Captain Drinkwater, to be sent on a cruise by myself ...'

'Hoisted Dutch colours and lay to in the Gaspar Strait. Took those two fellows two days later ... damndest piece of luck. Taken by pirates don't you know; got 'em back without a shot being fired.'

'Damndest luck, sir. I congratulate you. Captain Callan is in health?'

'Positively so, sir, absolument ...'

'Leadenhall Street will be most gratified, Captain Torrington. I had despaired of ever finding them again.'

'Nil desperandum, Captain Drinkwater.'

'It is difficult to avoid it sometimes, sir,' said Drinkwater ruefully, 'but doubtless the experience will affect you one day ...'

Pellew coughed, a trifle pointedly. 'I expect Captain Torrington will be rewarded by the Court of Directors with a present of plate,' he said.