boat first, if you please.' He saw the boy's mind wrestling with this early complication in his new career and then said, 'Carry on, Allday.'
He hardly heard the twitter of pipes or the harsh bark of commands, and only when the gig had moved clear of the frigate's hull and the oars sent her skimming across the unbroken water did he permit himself another glance at his new ship.
Allday followed his stare and said quietly, 'Well there she is, Captain. The old Hyperion.'
As the little gig pulled steadily over the blue water Bolitho concentrated his full attention on the anchored Hyperion. Allday had perhaps made his comment without thought, yet his words seemed to jar another chord in Bolitho's mind as if to rule out this further meeting as mere coincidence.
Hyperion was an old ship, for it was twenty-one years since her keel had first tasted salt water, and Bolitho's rational mind told him that it was inevitable he should see her from time to time as his service carried him from one part of the world to the next. Yet whenever his mind and body had been tried to the limit it now seemed as if this old ship of the line had somehow been close by. At the bloody battles of the Chesapeake, and again at the Saintes, when his own beloved frigate had almost been pounded into submission, he had seen her blunt bows thrusting through the thickest of the smoke, her sides flashing with gunfire and sails pockmarked with holes as she fought to hold her place in the line.
He narrowed his grey eyes as the sunlight lanced up from the water and threw a pattern of dancing reflections across the ship's tall side. He knew that she had been in steady commission now for over three years and had returned home from the West Indies with high hopes for a quick pay-off and welLearned rest both for herself and her company.
But while Hyperion had sailed serenely on her peacetime affairs in the Caribbean sunlight and Bolitho had fought wretchedly against a consuming fever in his house at Falmouth, the clouds of war had gathered once more across Europe. The bloody revolution which had seized France from coast to coast had at first been viewed from nervous excitement from across the English Channel, a human reaction of people who watch an old enemy weakened from within without cost to themselves, but as the fury spread and the stories filtered back to England of a new, even more powerful nation emerging from the din of execution squads and mob carnage, those who had known danger and fear in the past accepted the inevitability of yet another war.
Followed by an anxious and protesting Allday, Bolitho had left his bed and had made his way to London. He had always detested the false gaiety of the town, with its sprawling, dirty streets and the contrasting splendour of its great houses, but he had made up his mind that if necessary he would bend his knee and plead for a new ship.
After weeks of fretting and fruitless interviews he had been given the task of recruiting unwilling inhabitants of the Medway towns to fill the ships which were at last being called into commission.
To the senior powers of the Admiralty whose immediate duty it was to expand and equip a depleted fleet Bolitho was a clever choice for the work of recruitment. His exploits as a young frigate captain were still well remembered, and when war came his was the kind of leadership which might win men from the land for the uncertainties and hardhips of a life at sea. Unfortunately Bolitho did not view his appointment with the same enthusiasm. It was somehow characteristic of his make-up that he saw it as a lack of confidence and trust by his superiors whom he suspected of thinking the worst about his recent illness. A sick captain could be a danger. Not just to himself and his ship, but to the vital chain of command, Which once weakened could bring disaster and defeat.
The following January England had reeled from the news that the King of ' France had been beheaded by his own people, and before their minds could adjust to the shock the new French National Convention declared war. It was as if the fury of the whole French nation had shaken the country from the course of reason. Even Spain and Holland, old allies from the past,. had received the same declaration, and now, like England, stood awaiting the first real onslaught.
And so the old Hyperion had sailed again with hardly a pause in harbour. To Brest and the inevitable lot of the Chan, nel Squadron to blockade and watch over the French ships sheltering beneath the guns of the shore batteries.
Bolitho had continued with his task, his despair at not being given an aimediate command only helping to play fresh havoc with hi aealth.
Then as winter gave way to spring he had received his orders to pror.,,ed to Spithead and take passage for Gibraltar. As he sat in the stem of the gig he could feel the heavy envelope in his breast pocket, the authority to control and command this ship which now towered above him and reduced all else to insignificance.
Already he could hear the twitter of pipes, the stampede of bare feet and the clatter of muskets as she prepared to receive him. He wondered briefly how long they had awaited his ap. pearance, whether or not his arrival would be greeted with pleasure or misgivings.
It was one thing to take command from another captain who was leaving for promotion or retirement, quite another to step into a dead man's shoes.
The gig rounded the high bows and Bolitho stared up at the bright overhanging figurehead. Like the rest of the paintwork the figurehead's gilt looked fresh and clean, which was one small sign of a well-run ship. Hyperion the Sun God carried an out-thrust trident and was crowned with the rising sun itself. Only a pair of staring blue eyes broke the sheen of gold, and Bolitho found time to wonder how many of the King's enemies had seen that gilt face through the smoke and had died minutes later.
He looked round as he heard something like a gasp and saw the thin midshipman staring up at the towering masts and furled sails. His face seemed full of dread, and the hand which gripped the boat's gunwale was stiff like a claw.
Bolitho asked quietly, 'How old are you, Mr. Seton?'
The boy tore his eyes from the ship and muttered, `S-Sixteen, sir.'
Bolitho nodded gravely. 'Well, I was about your age when I joined a ship very like this one. That was the year Hyperion was built.' He gave a wry smile. `And as you see, Mr. Seton, we are both still here!'
He saw the emotions chasing each other across the midshipman's pale face and was glad he had omitted to add that the occasion he had described had been his second ship. At that time, and from the age of twelve, he had been constantly at sea. He wondered why Seton's father had left it so late before sending him into the Navy.
He straightened his back as the boat shot forward towards the entry port and a voice rang out, 'Boat ahoy?'
Allday cupped his hands and yelled, 'Hyperion!'
If doubt there had been, there was none now. Every man aboard would know that the straight-backed figure in the goldlaced hat was his new master, the man who, next to God, held complete sway over every life in his ship. One who could flog or hang, just as he could equally reward and recognise the faults or efforts of everybody under his hand.
As the oars were tossed and the bowman hooked on to the main chains it took all of Bolitho's self-control to hold himself motionless in the sternsheets. Strangely, it was the seasick, midshipman who broke the spell. He made to scramble towards the side, but Allday growled, 'Not yet, my young gentleman!' He pulled him back to his seat and added, 'Seniors are last in the boat but first out, got it?'
Bolitho stared at each of them and then forgot them. Pulling his sword against his thigh, for once he had witnessed a new captain falling headlong backwards into his barge, he climbed stiffly up through the carved and gilded entry port.
As he removed his hat he was almost overwhelmed by the immediate response which seemed to come from every side, from above and below his bared head. The greeting which had started with the shrill scream of pipes as his face had appeared over the side, burst into a wild crescendo of noise which at first his mind had difficulty in sorting out. The drums and fifes of a small marine band, the slap and snap of muskets being brought to the present and the swish of swords completing the general salute.
He felt hemmed in by the scarlet ranks of marines, the blue and white of assembled officers, and, above all, the packed faces and pigtailed heads of the men who had been hurriedly called from their duties throughout the ship.
He should have been ready, but in his heart he knew he had been so long in frigates that this sudden upsurge of figures had caught him entirely off guard. As his mind accepted this and his eye moved quickly over the nearest rank of shining guns, the freshly holystoned planking and the taut web of rigging and shrouds, he became aware, perhaps for the first time, of his new responsibility.
