He could see the coloured bunting scattered over the deck by the flag lockers. Signals to be made and answered, once Frobisher was in sight. He could see some of the others now, the bigger Prince Rupert, sails apparently limp and useless, and a frigate just off her starboard quarter. That would be Montrose, although she was well off station.
He felt the mast shiver, shrouds murmuring as the wind pressed into the topsails again. Unrivalled was standing well up to windward, while nearer the coast the whole squadron might become becalmed.
He stared beyond the larboard bow again, but the coast was still little more than a shapeless blur. There could be a mist, too.
He turned his head as a cloud of sea birds took off suddenly from the water and circled angrily over the ship. The spirits of dead Jacks, they said. Surely, he thought, they could find something better to come back as?
He laughed and began to whistle softly to himself. Whistling was forbidden on board a man-of-war, because it could be mistaken for the pipe of a boatswain’s call. They said. It was more likely because some old admiral in the past had said as much.
That was another part of it. The freedom. Up here, you were your own man. Experience taught you the shades and colours of the sea that governed your life. The depths and the shoals, the sandbars and the deeps. Like when young Captain Bolitho had taken her right through that narrow strait… Even Sullivan had felt uneasy about that.
He peered down again and saw one of the midshipmen training his telescope, adjusting it for a new day. And he remembered the captain’s surprise, that time when he had proved his skill as a lookout.
He glanced at his arm, the tattoos of ships and places he could scarcely remember. They all swore that they hated it, but what else was there? Perhaps when Unrivalled eventually paid off… He shook his head, dismissing it. How many times had he said that?
He looked up again and the whistle died on his lips. For only a moment longer he held on to the view, the wheeling gulls, the pale deck far below, the men who were his companions from choice or otherwise.
He held one hand to his mouth, surprised that he had been caught out.
“Deck thar! Sail on th’ starboard bow!”
He was too old a hand to consider pride. He was, after all, a good lookout.
19. “Trust Me…”
JOSHUA CRISTIE, the master, watched his captain stride from the chart to the compass box, and said, “Wind’s still holdin’ steady from the nor’-east, sir.”
Adam Bolitho stared at the great span of hardening canvas, the masthead pendant reaching out towards the bow like a lance.
He said, “Make to Flag. Sail in sight to the west.” He paused long enough to see Midshipman Cousens and his signals party bending double to fasten the flags into order for hoisting, and caught sight of Bellairs turning from the rail, his eyes anxious, as if he were concerned that someone else was carrying out what had been his duty before his examination for lieutenant.
He forgot them as he raised a telescope and levelled it on the flagship. The other ships were badly scattered, and Frobisher’s yards seemed to be a mass of signals as Rhodes tried to muster his command.
It was not long before Cousens shouted, “Acknowledged, sir!” But it felt like an age. Then Cousens called again, “Disregard, Remain on station.”
Adam turned away. “God damn him!”
Galbraith joined him. “Shall I send Bellairs aloft, sir? Sullivan’s a good hand, but…”
Adam looked at him. “There is a ship, right enough, and we both know which one she is!”
He swung round again as a rocket exploded like a small star against the dusty shoreline. The bomb vessel was moving into position between the flagship and the old fortifications. Rhodes ’ show of strength. Adam knew that anger was blunting his judgment, but he could not help it. If Algiers had any doubts before, they would be gone now.
Even if it was the Dutch frigate, one such ship could do little against Rhodes ’ array of force.
He thought of the response to his signal. Like a slap in the face, which would soon be known to every man here today. It was cheap. And it was dangerous.
He saw Napier standing by the companion hatch and said, “Here, take my coat and hat.” He saw Galbraith open his mouth as if to protest, then close it again. Perhaps he was embarrassed to see his own captain making a fool of himself, or maybe he felt it as a slight on his ability that he had not been consulted.
If I am wrong, my friend, it is better for you to know nothing.
Jago was here too, but took his sword and tucked it under his arm without comment.
Adam strode to the shrouds, where he turned and looked back at Galbraith.
“Trust me.” That was all.
Then he was climbing the ratlines, his boots slipping on the taut cordage, his hands and arms grazed by rigging he did not even feel. As he drew level with the maintop the marines stared at him with surprise, then some of them grinned, and one even gave a cheeky wave. Perhaps the man whose brother was a corporal in the flagship.
On and on, higher and higher, until his heart was pounding at his ribs like a fist.
He took Sullivan’s hard hand for the last heave up on to the crosstrees, and gasped, “Where away?”
Sullivan pointed without hesitation, and might even have smiled as Adam dragged out the small telescope which could easily be slung over one shoulder.
The light was still poor, high though he was above the tilting deck, but the other ship was a frigate right enough. Standing away, with all plain sail set and filling to the fresh north-easterly.
He swung the glass to larboard and studied the scattered ships. The two liners were on course again, Frobisher in the lead, with Matchless and Montrose standing well away on either quarter. And, far away, her masts and topsails shimmering in haze, was Halcyon, the admiral’s “eyes,” leading the squadron.
Then he saw the bomb vessel Atlas and found time to pity her commander as he sweated to work his ship into a position from which he could fire. From here it was all a sand-coloured blur, with only the slow-moving ships making sense. Adam had been aboard a bomb vessel during the campaign against the Americans, and Atlas seemed little improved. Bluff-bowed, and very heavily constructed for her hundred feet in length; bombs were always hard to handle. Apart from two immensely heavy mortars, they also carried a formidable armament of twenty-four pounder carronades as well as small weapons to fight off boarders. But the mortars were their reason for being. Each was thirteen inches in diameter and fired a massive shot, which, because of its high trajectory, would fall directly on top of its target before exploding.
Adam felt his own ship riding over again to the wind. They could keep their bomb vessels…
Sullivan said, almost patiently, “I reckon that when the light clears a bit we’ll see the other ship, sir.”
Adam allowed the glass to fall on to its sling and stared at him.
“I saw the frigate. Surely there’s no other.”
Sullivan gazed beyond his shoulder. “She’s there, sir. A big ’un.” He looked directly into his eyes. Not the captain, but a visitor to his world. “But I reckon you already knew that, sir?”
Adam gazed down at the deck. The upturned faces. Waiting…
“There could only be one. The merchantman that left Malta when Atlas sailed. Aranmore.”
Sullivan nodded slowly. “Might well be, sir.”
Adam reached across and touched his leg. “A prize indeed.”
He knew Sullivan was leaning over to watch him descend. Even the marines in the fighting-top remained quiet and unsmiling as he clambered down past the barricade and its swivel-gun, the daisy-cutter, as the sailors called them. Perhaps they saw it in his face, even as he felt it like a tightening grip around his heart.
Galbraith hurried to meet him, barely able to drag his eyes away from the tar-stained shirt and the blood soaking through one knee of his breeches.