"Deck there! Sail-ho, on the larboard quarter! " Ramage and Southwick reached the rail at the same time and put telescopes to their eyes. They could see nothing: the distant ship was below the curvature of the earth but just visible to the lookout perched high up in the mainmast.
Ramage turned to the quartermaster: "Pass the word for my coxswain."
A hail forward brought Jackson running aft to the quarterdeck, where Ramage handed him a telescope taken from the binnacle drawer. "Get aloft and see what you make of her."
Three minutes later, after Jackson had spent a long time balancing himself against the reverse-pendulum movement of the masts as the Calypso rolled, he hailed: "Deck there. She looks like a schooner. She's steering up to the nor'-east on the same course as us. Could be a Jonathan, sir."
Ramage turned to Southwick: "Bear away and run down to her."
A ninety-mile line of scattered and tiny islands, reefs and cays ran parallel to the Main and up to sixty miles north of it. A prudent master leaving La Guaira, Barcelona and Cumana would steer north-west to pass safely to the westward; but if he left Santa Cruz he would instead sail out to the north-east, making sure that the west-going current did not sweep him down to the Testigos, the islands marking the eastern end of the line. He would, Ramage knew, steer for Grenada until, sixty miles or so out from the Main, he could risk bearing away for his destination, but even then he would keep a sharp lookout. Many of the shoals west of Testigos barely showed above water; some of the cays were only a few feet high.
Ramage took off his hat and mopped his face and neck: the heat seemed solid; the breeze filled the sails but seemed to ignore the men on deck. Above him the great yards creaked as they were braced round; the men at the wheel hauled on the spokes as Southwick gave them a course which should intercept the ship they still could not see from the deck.
Southwick put a speaking trumpet to his lips and hailed Jackson: "Masthead there! How is the sail bearing from us now?"
"Two points on our larboard bow, sir."
The master nodded to himself. The schooner with her fore-and-aft rig would be fast on the wind.
The hailing had brought Aitken on deck, blinking in the harsh sunlight, and as soon as Southwick had told him of the sighting the First Lieutenant said to Ramage: "Could she have come from Santa Cruz, sir?"
"She could, and be clawing up to clear the Testigos."
"She might have some more Jocastas on board."
The idea obviously had not occurred to Ramage, and his eyes narrowed. "I'm more concerned with finding out what's happening in Santa Cruz than providing fodder for courts martial."
"Quite, sir, " Aitken understood his Captain well enough not to be offended by the remark: he too imagined vividly the thunder of the Invincible's gun and the hanging figures emerging from the smoke.
Ramage had the telescope to his eye. "I can just make out her mastheads. Have a boat ready for lowering, Mr Aitken. You'll be boarding her. Take six Marines. Mr Southwick, we'll beat to quarters in fifteen minutes' time."
Half an hour later the Calypso was hove-to a hundred yards to windward of the schooner, which had hoisted the American flag, and Ramage watched through his telescope as Aitken and her master talked on deck. After a few minutes the two men went below. The Marines were standing where Aitken had obviously placed them, so the American must be cooperating.
On board the Calypso the guns were run out, the water which had been splashed across the deck was drying quickly on the hot wood of the planking, and the grains of sand sprinkled over it to give the men a good foothold became myriads of tiny mirrors reflecting the sunlight.
The sea had the dark blue, almost mauve, of the tropical ocean; the sky, with the sun high, was a harsher blue, hinting at infinite distance which would be revealed when darkness once again brought back the stars. And all the time the sun beat down on the ship, making the deck planking uncomfortably hot and heating metal until it was unpleasant to touch. But there was enough breeze now to keep the men cool, once they had finished the heavy work of loading and running out the guns.
Ramage walked the width of the quarterdeck swearing to himself that he would not look across at the schooner again until he had made five traverses. Impatience was a tiring and pointless fault, but one he found it very hard to eradicate. One of the few advantages of being made post was that you could indulge yourself more frequently . . . But now Aitken was dealing with the Jonathan, pumping him dry of information about Santa Cruz, with luck.
The William and Henrietta of Boston. Shipowners along the east coast of America were no more imaginative than their counterparts across the other side of the Atlantic. Who was William, and was Henrietta his wife? Or had someone named the ship after his father and mother? He did not give a jot, but speculating about such nonsense passed a few more minutes and by then he had made six traverses of the deck, so he could look again.
He put the glass to his eye. Aitken was on deck again, and folding something and putting it in the canvas pouch he had used to protect the list of known Jocastas from spray. The Marines had not moved and now Aitken was signalling over the side to the boat.
No mutineers! It was as much the wish not to find mutineers as the hope of discovering the latest information about Santa Cruz that was making him impatient for Aitken's return. He did not want to be a member of another court martial trying one of Wallis's victims. Victims was an odd way to think of murderers and mutineers but it was more of a judgment - a diagnosis, Bowen would call it - than an expression of sympathy.
Now the Calypso's boat was clear of the schooner. The William and Henrietta was a graceful vessel, a sweeping sheer lifting to a high bow. She was painted a dark blue with a broad white strake, an unusual colour for an American merchantman: they were usually black or green. Then the headsails, which had been backed, were sheeted home and for a minute or two the William and Henrietta's bow paid off before she gathered way.
Another neutral ship stopped and boarded; another routine dozen-word entry in the log, one of hundreds made every year by ships of the Royal Navy. While Ramage's thoughts roamed, Aitken arrived to stand before him, grinning cheerfully. Startled, Ramage glanced round to see that the boat was already hooked on and ready to be hoisted on board.
Aitken unloaded the pouch. "No mutineers on board, sir, but the master was friendly enough: he left Santa Cruz early yesterday morning and he's bound for St Augustine, in Florida. Cargo of hides - phew, and do they stink! "
Ramage waited with growing impatience. The Captain had to be cool, unruffled, patient, the fountain of wisdom . . . which meant that the Captain could not at this moment tell Aitken to stop rambling and report on Santa Cruz.
"Hides, eh?" he said casually. "Of course, they have a lot of cattle along this coast. Poor quality hides, if I remember correctly: some kind of fly that attacks the skin and causes sores."
"Maybe so, sir, " Aitken said, "but the master tells me they fetch a good price in America."
"Indeed? What other news from our American friend?"
"Nothing, sir. He says he always finds a west-going current of between one and two knots from here all the way up to the lee of Grenada, which is what we'd reckoned anyway."
"Quite."
"And the Jocasta, sir: she's still there and has her yards crossed and sails bent on, but apparently there's barely a hundred seamen on board her now. She was full of troops when he arrived, but they were suddenly taken off and marched inland with some of the town garrison. He reckoned more than five hundred of them altogether. There was a lot of talk of trouble up in the hills at a place called - " he paused and took a piece of paper from his pocket " - called Caripe. I don't know if that's the way to pronounce it. Anyway, there are hundreds of Indians living up in the mountains who are always making trouble for the Spaniards, and they've just massacred the garrison at this place, Caripe. The only troops available to send after 'em were those on board the Jocasta and some of the garrison."