Ramage pulled out the brass eyepiece tube of his telescope, slid it back a fraction of an inch so that the focusing mark was against the end of the larger tube, and looked ahead, where by now he could see an occasional fleck of a sail as the Calypso rose on a swell wave. The other ship was not quite on an opposite course because the masts were not in line: she was steering to pass along the Calypso's starboard side and, at a guess, pass perhaps a mile off.
No new private signals or challenges had been issued as a result of the Treaty; the only flags now to be routinely hoisted, apart from the colours, were the three from the numerary code giving the Calypso's number in the List of the Navy. And they would be hoisted only to another British ship of war. Ramage saw that Orsini had the flags ready.
Ramage felt curiously naked and unprepared: never before had he sailed towards a ship of the line - he was fairly sure that was what she was - with no more preparation needed than making sure three flags were bent on to a halyard. He knew from the aimless way they were walking round the quarterdeck that Southwick and Aitken were having similar feelings.
'Deck there - Jackson here, sir.'
Martin glanced at Ramage, who nodded to emphasize that the youngster was officer of the deck.
'Deck here - what d'you see?'
'Ship of the line, sir; British, may be the Invincible, and probably a private ship.'
A private ship: Jackson could not make out an admiral's flag. With luck, the ship being so near home, she would pass with just a cheery signal, instead of heaving to and her captain ordering Ramage to report on board with his orders, and generally making the most of many years of seniority but knowing that, with Ramage sailing under Admiralty orders, he could not interfere in any way.
'Fetch Jackson down,' Ramage murmured to Martin. The reason was mundane enough - the binnacle drawer had opened and slid out a couple of days ago and both telescopes in it had landed on the deck and cracked their object glasses. There were now only three working telescopes left on board - Ramage's own, the second that Martin had been using but had sent aloft with Jackson, and the third being used by Aitken.
When the American was down on deck again he said to Ramage: 'She's been at sea a long time, sir; I had one last look as I came down and she and us lifted to waves together so I could see her hull as she rolled. Plenty of copper sheathing missing and her bottom green with weed. Topsides need work on them and her sails have more patches than original cloth.'
'Probably coming home from India, and only had time to call at the Cape for water.'
That remark, directed at Southwick, brought a knowing nod. 'She won't want to delay us, then!'
There was nothing more irritating than having to heave to and launch a boat at the whim of a captain whose name was higher on the post list - particularly when the boats had been well secured for a long voyage.
The two ships were approaching quickly: Ramage guessed that the Invincible - if that was who she was - must be making ten knots, with a soldier's wind, and the Calypso a good seven. He looked again with his glass. Yes, he could make out the patched sails now and, as both ships rose on swell waves, saw what Jackson meant about the weed. She must be three or four miles away. Her masts were coming in line now - she was altering course to close with the Calypso. Perhaps she intended just asking for news. Ramage suddenly realized that if he had to board her he could take Robert Smith, landman, with him. The report to the Admiralty about the 'chaplain' was already written; the letter needed only dating and sealing.
There was something very impressive about a ship of the line running dead before the wind: ahead of her the waves swept on in regular formation while she, her sails straining in elegant curves, seemed to curtsey as her stern lifted to a swell wave, her stem sliced up a sparkling bow wave and the whole ship seemed to rise with a massive eagerness until, the swell wave passing under her, she slowed and the whole process began again with the next wave.
And she was hoisting a lot of flags!
'Hoist our pendant numbers,' Ramage snapped, 'and stand by to answer some signals!'
Orsini now had Martin's telescope because he was responsible for signals.
'Well?' Ramage asked impatiently.
'I - I'm not sure, sir. Do we have the old signal book, sir?'
'Of course not. Why?'
'I think she's making an old challenge!'
'Rubbish! You'll say she's hoisted the private signal in a moment!'
'I think she has, sir,' Orsini turned to Ramage. 'My memory is not good, sir, but I'm sure that's one of the challenges for last July, and one of the sequence of private signals also for July. If she -'
Aitken interrupted, a note of urgency in his voice: 'Sir, if you don't have the latest challenges and private signals, you use - in wartime - the ones for the same day but two months earlier!'
'We don't have the replies,' Ramage said, thinking aloud. 'All the books were returned to the Admiralty when the Treaty was signed.'
Suddenly he felt chilled and swung his telescope to his eye again.
The Invincible was furling her royals and courses; in a few moments she would be sailing under topsails alone, the canvas for fighting. At that moment the Invincible's starboard side, which he could see most clearly, had changed: the curving black tumblehome with its single white strake, greyed with dried salt, now had two gashes running parallel above and below the white strake: two dull red gashes where her gunports had suddenly been opened. And now, like ragged black fingers, her guns were being run out.
'She doesn't know the war is over!' Ramage exclaimed.
'And as far as she's concerned, we're a French frigate flying false colours and not answering the challenge,' Aitken said.
'Senta,' Orsini murmured, 'siamo amici;listen, we are friends.'
For a moment Ramage stared at the approaching ship. Impressive, terrifying, majestic, irresistible . . . she was all of these things; he had the same view of her that a frog in a pond would have of an approaching swan. The Calypso's magazine was still locked, the portlids still down, Bowen's surgical instruments stored in their chest - there was no war on, and the Invincible was British. In the Invincible, though, all her guns - 32-pounders on the lowerdeck, 24-pounders on the maindeck, and 12-pounders and carronades on the upperdeck - were loaded and run out; the locks were fitted, the gun captains would be holding the trigger lanyards, crouched beyond the reach of the recoil, and the second captains would be waiting the word to cock the locks; the Invincible's decks would be wet and covered with sand to prevent men slipping and soak up any spilled powder. The captain at this very moment must be preparing to luff up or bear away to bring one or other broadside to bear. And he must be surprised that the captain of the apparent French frigate had a strong enough nerve to trust his bluff with the false colours. One broadside from the Invincible, well aimed (as it must be, in such a comparatively calm sea, and the first broadside was usually the decisive one), would destroy the Calypso.
How, then, to prevent the Invincible from firing it?
Surprise... surprise... surprise... The word, which he had so often dinned into his officers, echoed like a flat note repeated on a pianoforte. How on earth did one surprise a 74-gun ship which was bearing down from to windward of an unprepared frigate, guns loaded and run out?
She was now barely half a mile away: as she rolled he could see black rectangles below the waterline where twenty or thirty sheets of copper sheathing were missing; the boats stowed on the booms were newly painted. The stitching of a seam was just beginning to go in the foretopsail; in ten minutes they would have to furl the sail for repairs - but ten minutes would be too late for the Calypso as she stretched along on the starboard tack. In a few minutes there would be roundshot as well as wind coming over the starboard side.