Under false colours

Admiralty, London

26 November 1809

Lt. Col. Hamilton,

Governor,

Helgoland.

Sir,

I am in Receipt of your Letter of the 2d. Ultimo. The Officer You have Apprehended aboard the Galliwasp, barque, Jno. Littlewood, Master, is in the Employ of my Department on a Special Service. It is not Necessary to make known his Name to you, but you will know him by the following Characteristics, Viz: Engrained Powder Burns about one Eye; an Ancient Scar from a Sword Cut on the Cheek and a Severe Wounding of the Right Shoulder causing it to be much Lower than the Left.

You will greatly Oblige me by affording Him your utmost Hospitality and free congress with Mr Nicholas. This Officer knows my Mind and His Directions may be assumed as Congruent with my own.

I have the honour to be, sir, & Co

Dungarth.

It was the most perfect carte blanche Drinkwater could have wished for, not to say the most perfect humiliation for poor Hamilton.

Drinkwater laid the letter down on Hamilton's desk and their eyes met.

'It is perhaps as well that his Lordship's letter arrived no earlier, Colonel,' Drinkwater said.

'How so ...?' Hamilton frowned.

'I was in damnably low spirits and had nothing of much sense to communicate. Now, Colonel, I have a proposition to make that will advance the service of our country ...'

'A glass gentlemen,' Nicholas interposed. 'Schnapps, Captain Drinkwater.' Then he added, 'From Hamburg.'

CHAPTER 9 Santa Claus

December 1809-January 1810

Staring astern from the taffrail of Galliwasp Drinkwater watched Helgoland dip beneath the western horizon. He wondered if he would ever see it again and the thought brought in its train the multiple regrets and self-recriminations that had become a part of him in recent years. He had written to Elizabeth and the task, long postponed, had wrenched him from his deep and complex involvement with his secret mission. Nicholas would post the letter if he had not returned in two months. It told Elizabeth everything. He had left her the burden of writing to Quilhampton's fiancee and Frey's family, giving her a form of words to use.

It was no use looking back, he thought resolutely, and smacked the oak rail with the flat of his hand. He turned forward. Gilham's Ocean was wallowing sluggishly on their larboard beam, her bottom foul with grass despite the efforts to scrape it clean. Galliwasp ghosted along under topsails, keeping station on her slower sister in the light, westerly wind. Drinkwater looked up to judge the wind from the big American ensign. The stars and bars flaunted lazily above his head.

'There's Neuwerk on the starboard bow, Captain,' Littlewood pointed with his glass, then handed it to Drinkwater.

Behind the yellow scar of the Scharhorn sand which was visible at this low state of the tide, the flat surface of the island of Neuwerk was dominated by the great stone tower erected upon it.

Drinkwater studied it with interest as the young flood tide carried them into the mouth of the River Elbe. The island was to be, as it were, the sleeve from which he intended playing his ace. He handed the telescope back to Littlewood.

'Let us hope it is not long before we see it on the other bow,' Drinkwater said with assumed cheerfulness. He wished they had left Helgoland a day earlier, before the arrival of the depressing news. It cast a cloud over the enterprise, though Drinkwater, Nicholas and Hamilton had kept the intelligence to themselves.

In the period of waiting for Galliwasp and the other vessels to be made ready, their crews sounded and appointed and the secret messages sent to Liepmann in Hamburg, Drinkwater had been daily closeted with Hamilton and Nicholas.

On the occasion when Drinkwater had first broached the idea with Hamilton and the Governor had grasped the olive-branch thus held out to him, Nicholas had judiciously kept Hamilton's glass full of schnapps. Between them Nicholas and Drinkwater had boxed the Colonel into a corner from which his naturally cautious nature could not extricate him. In some measure a degree of bellicosity had been engendered by the arrival of Combatant and her cargo of cannon, and Drinkwater had insisted that the seamen of all the ships help to land and site them. This thoughtfulness on Drinkwater's part earned him Hamilton's grudging gratitude, for he himself had shown too great a prejudice against the merchant shipmasters and trading-post agents to rely on any willing co-operation from them. For his own part, Drinkwater's act was not disinterested. Requesting such assistance was a ready means of measuring his command over the odd collection of merchant seamen and naval volunteers that he would shortly lead into the enemy heartland. The fact that after months of inactivity something was afoot proved a powerful influence.

As a mark of their improved relationship Hamilton, Nicholas and Drinkwater got into the habit of dining together, partly to keep up Hamilton's enthusiasm and partly to discuss the progress of the preparations.

Over the dessert wine one evening Hamilton became expansive and Drinkwater learned of Helgoland's real importance as a 'listening post' on the doorstep of the French Empire.

'Hamburg has always been important,' Hamilton said. 'We nabbed Napper Tandy there after the Irish Rebellion. The place was full of United Irishmen for years.'

'They say Lord Edward Fitzgerald's wife is still resident there,' added Nicholas.

'She's supposed to be French, ain't she?' asked Drinkwater, 'though I believe her sister's married to Sir Thomas Foley. I recall him at Copenhagen.'

'Were you in Nelson's action, Captain Drinkwater, or Gambier's?'

'Nelson's, Colonel, just before the last peace.'

'It was after Gambier's scrap that we took this place from the Danes.'

'Yes. I was bound for the Pacific by then.'

'And after that Colin Mackenzie carried into effect a master­stroke,' added Nicholas.

'Ah, yes, you mentioned some such affair, a Father Robinson ...'

'Robertson. A Jesuit who was sent from here via Hamburg to contact the Spanish forces Napoleon had isolated as a garrison on the island of Zealand — for Napoleon occupied Denmark as soon as we had seized the Danish fleet, all the while inveighing against British perfidy!'

'That would be about the time of the Spanish revolt, then?'

'Quite so. The object was to inform the Spaniards of their countrymen's uprising against the French and, if possible, repatriate them.' Nicholas refilled his glass, then went on. 'Robertson posed as a cigar and chocolate salesman and made contact with their commander, the Marquis of Romana. As a result the entire corps was withdrawn aboard the squadron of Rear-Admiral Keats then cruising in the offing.'

Almost all, Ned, a few of the poor devils were unable to escape. They say squadrons of riderless horses were left charging up and down the beach in perfect formation!' Hamilton amplified.

'What of Robertson?' Drinkwater asked.

'I believe he got back to England eventually. He was multilingual, don't you know, a remarkable fellow ...'