Once they were inside the first of the pines, as though they had penetrated the outer wall of a maze, Ramage called: "Right, stop here." The three stood panting, all of them surprised at the way the muscles in their shins pulled, showing how little actual walking they did in the Calypso.
"From what I could see from the cutter, the mainland is only fifty yards or so along this way," Ramage said, pointing to the north-east. "Then we have a few hundred yards to walk along the via Aurelia and we should find Orbetello on our right. The causeway to Porto Ercole will be farther along, also on the right."
Martin said: "Where do you expect to find the French army officers, sir?"
Ramage felt a sudden irritation that the fourth lieutenant should now casually ask a question which he had himself been trying to answer for most of the afternoon and all the evening. Paolo had obviously considered it too. "Boh!" he said, in that Italian expression which has a thousand meanings. Ramage was interested to hear what young Paolo had to say: he was Italian and he was shrewd and far more likely to understand the Latin mind than Ramage.
"Well, Orsini, where will I find 'em?"
"Orbetello," Orsini said promptly. "The town is fortified and will have inns. French officers do not like tents. I doubt if Porto Ercole has more than a tavern. Probably only a cantina, where the soldiery can get drunk and buy wine in jugs. The officers will stay in Orbetello until it is time to board the frigates. With their women, no doubt," he added bitterly, knowing that the women were likely to be Italian and therefore, in his straightforward code of conduct, traitors. "The troops will be in tents near the main road."
Just as Ramage thought he heard the squeaking of sand, a twig snapped loudly. The three of them stood silently, Martin expecting French soldiers while Ramage and Orsini listened for the grunting and snuffling of a wild boar. Instead they heard Rossi whispering hoarsely: "Shall we give a hail, Jacko? Just a -"
"No!" Ramage's voice cut through the darkness, and he almost laughed aloud as the sound of more breaking twigs showed that both Rossi and Jackson were startled enough to take at least one step backwards.
He nearly laughed, but it would have been a humourless laugh. The night turned cold as he considered that, instead of three gipsies, of whom one was a dumb half-wit and the others spoke perfect Italian, he was now in effect at the head of a boarding party: five men would not be able to move where three gipsies could walk openly, drawing attention to themselves with a flute and collecting money and listening to gossip.
"Jackson, Rossi, come over here. Quietly." He heard a few more twigs breaking, some muffled cursing from Rossi, and then silence. Then Jackson whispered, and Ramage could picture his shamefaced look.
"Where are you, sir?"
"Here," Ramage said quietly.
A few more twigs snapped and Ramage thought he could hear the carpet of pine bristles creaking, but he was determined not to make it easy for two men who had not only disobeyed orders but simply ignored their duty, which was to return to the Calypso in the cutter.
"Here," Ramage repeated sarcastically. "You sound like a herd of water-buffalo."
Then the two men were facing him in the darkness and Ramage could just distinguish the plump Rossi from the lean Jackson. "Well?" he said to Jackson with deliberate cruelty, "decided to 'run' after all these years, eh? And you, Rossi?"
The sudden accusation of desertion left Jackson speechless. There were only three ways of leaving one of the King's ships in wartime, and they were marked down in the muster book with one of three abbreviations - "D", for discharged to another ship which was usually named; "D.D.", for discharged dead, normally noted down without any explanation although the cause of death could range from yellow fever to a fatal fall from one of the yards; or "R", for "run", or deserted, and the penalty for which was anything from several hundred lashes with a cat-o'-nine-tails to being hanged. In wartime the Navy was always so short of men that deserters were rarely hanged if they were caught.
Rossi, waiting impatiently for Jackson to explain but finding him staying silent, said hurriedly: "We came to help you, sir. You see, we -"
"Help?" Ramage interrupted angrily. "If I thought I needed you I'd have given you orders. What am I supposed to do now you're here? Hold your hands as though you were two little boys caught stealing grapes?"
"Well, sir," Jackson muttered, finally realizing that what had seemed a good idea on board Calypso was completely impractical now they had actually landed, "we thought you needed some protection, and with Rossi to do any talking . . ."
"Protection!" Ramage exclaimed. "You come blundering through the trees making enough noise to rouse the whole French army, and then have the infernal impudence to suggest that you are going to protect me?"
Even as he spoke he could feel the mosquitoes whining round his ears and settling on his face and neck. He shook his head and realized that his hair, hanging loose, acted as an effective fly whisk - for a few moments, anyway. What was he to do with these two idiots? The whole gipsy business, which was by far the best role for him, would be endangered if these two were within hailing distance. Since he could not send them back to the ship - the Calypso and the two bombs were anchored much too far out to hear a hail - they must stay somewhere out of the way.
He thought for a few moments. Rossi was shrewd; there was little doubt that he had a criminal past, and this was his own country. Jackson was American, and if he had brought his Protection with him he could always try to persuade the French to release him because he was, strictly speaking, a neutral, and could claim he had been pressed by the British and forced to serve. Rossi might manage to find out something from the people drinking in the cantina in Porto Ecole.
The alternative was to leave the pair of them hiding in the pine forest, trying to find fresh water to drink and something to eat. Given that they had landed at all, they would be more useful listening in a cantina - not that either of them spoke French - than cowering among the junipers.
"Listen," he said, trying to keep the anger from his voice, "you both go to Porto Ercole as fast as you can. Pretend you're seamen looking for a berth. Rossi, you do the talking. Think of a story in case French patrols stop the pair of you. Your ship arrived in Leghorn. The captain sent you both on shore to do some errands but while you were away the ship sailed. And you're owed a year's pay. Calculate how much. You've been making your way down to Civita Vecchia, hoping to find a ship there. You came over to Porto Ercole because you saw some French ships coming in and you hoped there was a convoy forming - something on those lines. Mind the French don't press you into their service.
"Now, listen closely. In Porto Ercole, go to one of the bars and listen. I know neither of you speak French but you, Rossi, must arrange something with an Italian who does. Jackson, you'd better pretend to be drunk. What I'm trying to find out is where the troops boarding these frigates are really heading for. They might be going to Crete for ordinary garrison duty; but they could be going there to join a much larger army which will go on to attack somewhere like Egypt, just as the French did recently.
"Bear two things in mind," he emphasized. "I don't want to hear a lot of barrack room gossip, so I want to know the rank of any man who says anything interesting, and you must not show undue interest so that the French get suspicious. Tease them and tell them Crete - if that's where they say they are going - is full of poisonous snakes, or mermaids, or the wine tastes like twice-boiled pine needles."