"I eat 'em for breakfast," Sir Henry said. "Majors-general I keep for dinner. Lieutenants-general I have served cold for supper."
Number four gun on the starboard side grunted again. "That gun captain is either very lucky or very good," Sir Henry commented.
"Very good, sir. He's served with me since I had my first command."
"While you were, er, attending to the general, your master (what's his name - Southwick?) was telling me he was on board the Kathleen when that Spanish three-decker rammed her and rolled her over. Must have been an alarming sight, her bearing down on you."
"We had a rather limited view, sir," Ramage said, "but other ships later gave us flattering descriptions. By the way, sir, our story is that we rammed the Spaniard, not the other way round!"
"Well, a mouse in the stable can panic a stallion, so you may be right. Oh - just look at that!"
Ramage glanced across at the frigate just in time to see the two boom boats disintegrate. The angle at which they had been lying on the booms (compared with the single boat which had hung horizontally in the quarter davits) meant that Jackson was firing down on to them, and obviously one round of grapeshot had spread just sufficiently, like an enormous flail, to hit the larboard side of one and the starboard side of the other, ripping them open like a pair of bananas in the hands of a hungry ape.
"I'll have the spring on the cable taken in, if you please Mr Aitken," Ramage said. "The men can stand down from general quarters. Then Mr Aitken, we'll see about getting under way."
CHAPTER TWENTY
Ramage sat at his desk listening to the two men report. The lantern swinging from its hook in the deckhead threw dancing shadows which emphasized their features: Rossi with his round face, full and generous lips, straight black hair and large, expressive eyes could only be an Italian: his hands gestured as eloquently as he spoke and seemed part of the words. Orsini's face was narrower, the shadows exaggerating his high cheekbones. In this light, Ramage thought, he looked like a youth painted by one of the better Renaissance artists. For the moment, Orsini was content to let Rossi tell the story in his Genovese accent.
"We landed on the rocks below Forte della Stella without trouble, and then climbed the cliff. The goats, they must have a hard life. We frightened a mother and her youngsters - or, rather," he admitted with a grin, "they frightened us because they suddenly bolted from a ledge just above and showered us with stones."
"The hostages," Ramage said impatiently. "Tell me the details later."
"Oh, they are in there, in Forte della Stella. We were in position by sunset, and soon after we saw the French guards shut the doors, two big wooden doors studded with boltheads to blunt axe blades. There is also a small door, big enough for one man, fitted into one of the big doors."
"A wicket gate." Ramage said in English.
"Yes, a wicked gate. That was opened just before it was dark, and a sentry came and stood outside. Musket, no sword. He stands to one side - the left as you face the gate - and leans against it. He's probably learned how to sleep standing up."
"Learned it from a sailor, I expect," Ramage said drily.
"Yes," Rossi grinned. "And we saw one sentry walking round the battlements."
Although he had already made up his own mind, Ramage asked Orsini: "Do you also think the hostages are there?"
Orsini nodded. "Yes, sir."
"Why?" Ramage asked bluntly.
"Well, there are no guns on the battlements, sir - we were careful to check all round the fortress. Why keep a garrison at Forte della Stella unless to handle cannon to cover the entrance to Port' Ercole? To prevent enemy ships approaching?"
No guns? Now Ramage was certain. He was already half convinced when Rossi told him of one sentry at the main gate and another up on the battlements: that was unusual enough at a French fortress in such an isolated place and would be justified only if they were artillerymen guarding against enemy ships trying to sneak past to attack Port' Ercole. But with no guns perched up on the battlements, then there had to be another reason for the garrison and for the sentries.
There must be something special to guard inside the fortress, and that would not be Bonaparte's favourite canteen of cutlery. What could it be, apart from hostages?
Ramage could think of nothing else that would not be kept more safely in a castle or fortress scores of miles inland, not on the edge of the sea. Except that the Orsini Palace was just that, a comfortable palace but hard to defend, while Forte della Stella was simply a fortress and (like Castello on Giglio) relatively impregnable.
He looked at his watch. Eleven o'clock. A garrison of how many men? What duty was each sentry doing - four hours on and eight off? Or two on and four off? Anyway, two sentries on duty represented six men, not allowing for sickness. And guards for the prisoners. Say at least a dozen men, with a corporal, a sergeant, a cook, a lieutenant and a captain. Probably a groom or two for the horses. Nineteen - so say a minimum of twenty officers and men. After all, they were guarding hostages, not defending the fortress.
How many hostages? And where were they kept? Did they have a guard with them all the time - guards who, at the first sign of a rescue attempt, would treat them immediately as hostages, threatening to kill them unless the would-be rescuers withdrew?
"There was this contadino," Orsini said casually. "He helped."
"What contadino, and helped what?" Ramage demanded impatiently.
"Well, sir, as we left we saw a man making his way along a track about two hundred yards inland from the fortress. He was not worrying about being seen from the fortress - although in fact he was hidden most of the time by sage and thyme and juniper bushes. We wouldn't have seen him except that we were keeping a sharp lookout."
"Come on!" Ramage said, still holding his watch.
Rossi said: "I walked along the track so that I met him face to face. He was surprised to see me, of course, but as I was obviously an Italian he was not particularly alarmed.
"He had just come from Port' Ercole and was on his way to Sbarcatella - that's the small cape at the southern end of this bay and south-west of Isolotto."
Clearly Rossi was going to tell the story at his own speed, and Ramage realized that anyway it was difficult for some men to grasp the most important point in an incident: to them they had to begin at the beginning and carry on to the end.
"Well," Rossi continued, "this man has a small boat down there and some lobster pots, and he was going to row out and lift the pots."
"To whom does he sell the lobsters?"
"I was just coming to that, sir," Rossi said. "He used to sell them to the garrison at the fort, but it seems that after the first month they halved the price they would pay, so now he sells them in the village. He was very angry with the French. This only happened three weeks ago."
"So he started selling lobsters to the garrison seven weeks ago?"
"I was just coming to that," Rossi said again, finally adding, "sir", but carefully timing the gap. "According to this man the fort was standing empty until eight weeks ago. He remembers the date because it was a particular feast day and the French soldiers marching through the port interrupted a procession, which made the local people angry.
"Anyway, they went through the port and up the track leading from La Rocca, above the port, and on to the fort."
"Just soldiers?" Ramage interrupted.
"Just soldiers. About thirty of them, marching in four columns," Rossi said, hard put to keep the pride from his voice that the contadino could remember that. "Two officers, who were riding mules."