had come to capture. This coastline was riddled with creeks and inlets, bays and the mouths of many rivers, large and small. You could hide a ship of the line here provided you did not mind her going high and dry at low water.
But the land was there, lying across the choppy water like a great black slab. Eventually it would reveal itself. Into coves and trees, hills and undergrowth, where only Indians and animals had ever trod. Around it, and sometimes across it, the two armies manoeuvred, scouted and occasionally clashed in fierce battles of musket and bayonet, hunting-knife and sword.
Whatever the miseries endured by seamen, their life was far the best, Bolitho decided. You carried your home with you. It was up to you what you made of it.
'Boat approaching, sir!'
It was Balleine, a hand cupped round his ear, reminding Bolitho of the last moments before they had boarded this same schooner.
For a moment Sparke did not move or speak, and Bolitho imagined he had not heard.
Then he said softly, 'Pass the word. Be ready for treachery.' As Balleine loped away along the deck Sparke said, 'I hear it.'
It was a regular splash of oars, the efforts noisy against a powerful current.
Bolitho said, 'Small boat, sir.' `Yes.'
The boat appeared with startling suddenness, being swirled towards the schooner's bows like a piece of driftwood. A stout fishing dory with about five men aboard.
Then just as quickly it was gone, steered or carried on the current, it was as if they had all imagined it.
Frowd said, 'Not likely to be fishing, sir. Not this time o' day.'
Surprisingly, Sparke was almost jovial as he said, They are just testing us. Seeing what we are about. A King's ship would have given them a dose of canister or grape to send them on their way, as would a smuggler. I've no doubt they've been passing here every night and day for a week or more. Just to be on the safe side.' His teeth showed in his shadowy face. `I'll give them something to remember all their lives!'
The word went along the deck once more and the seamen relaxed slightly, their bodies numbed by the rain and the raw cold.
Overhead the clouds moved swiftly, parting occasionally to allow the colours of dawn to intrude. Grey and blue water, the lush dark green of the land, white crests and the snakelike swirls of an inshore current. They could have been anchored anywhere, but Bolitho knew from his past two years' service that beyond the nearest cape, sheltered by the bay and the entrance to the Delaware River, were towns and settlements, farms and isolated families who had enough to worry about without a war in their midst.
Bolitho's excitement at being at sea again in the calling which had been followed by all his ancestors had soon become soured by his experiences. Many of those he had had to fight had been men like himself, from the West Country, or from Kent, from Newcastle and the Border towns, or from Scotland and Wales. They had chosen this new country, risked much to forge a new life. Because of others in high places, of deep loyalties and deeper mistrusts, the break had come as swiftly as the fall of an axe.
The new Revolutionary government had challenged the King, that should have been enough. But when he thought about it honestly, Bolitho often wished that the men he fought, and those he had seen die, had not called out in the same tongue, and often the same dialect, as himself.
Some gulls circled warily around the schooner's spiralling masts, then allowed themselves to be carried by the wind to more profitable pickings inland.
Sparke said, 'Change the look-outs, and keep one looking to seaward.'
In the strengthening light he looked thinner, his shirt and breeches pressed against his lean body by the rain, shining like snakeskin.
A shaft of watery sunlight probed through the clouds, the first Bolitho had seen for many days.
The telescopes would be watching soon.
He asked, 'Shall I have the mains'l hoisted, sir?'
'Yes.' Sparke fidgeted with his sword-hilt.
The seamen hauled and panted at the rain-swollen halliards until, loosely set-, the sail shook and flapped from its boom, the red patch bright in the weak sunlight.
The schooner swung with it, tugging at the cable, coming alive like a horse testing bit and bridle.
'Boat to starboard, sir!'
Bolitho waited, seeing what looked like the same dory pulling strongly from the shore. It was unlikely that anyone would know or recognize any of the Faith f ul's company, otherwise the recognition patch would be superfluous. Just the sight of the schooner would be enough. Bolitho knew from his childhood how the Cornish smugglers came and went on the tide, within yards of the waiting excisemen, with no more signal than a whistle.
But someone knew. Somewhere between Washington's army and growing fleet of privateers were the link-men, the ones who fixed a rendezvous here, hanged an informer there.
He looked at Stockdale as he strode to the bulwark, and was impressed. Stockdale gestured forward, and two seamen swung a loaded swivel towards the boat, while he shouted in his hoarse voice, 'Stand off there!'
Moffitt stepped up beside him and cupped his hands. 'What d'yqu want of us?'
The boat rocked on the choppy water, the oarsmen crouched over with the rain bouncing on their shoulders. The man at the tiller shouted back, 'That Cap'n Tracy?'
Stockdale shrugged. 'Mebbe.'
Sparke said, 'They're not sure, look at the bloody fools!'
Bolitho turned his back on the shore. He could almost feel the hidden telescopes searching along the deck, examining them all one at a time.
'Where you from?' The boat idled slowly nearer.
Moffitt glanced at Sparke, who gave a curt nod. He shouted, 'There's a British man-o'-war to seaward! I'll not wait much longer! Have you no guts, man?'
Frowd said, 'That's done it. Here they come.'
The open mention of the British sloop, and Moffitt's colonial accent, seemed to have carried more weight than the scarlet patch.
The dory grated alongside and a seaman caught the line thrown up by one of the oarsmen.
Stockdale stood looking down at the boat, and then said in an offhand manner which Bolitho had not heard before, 'Tell the one in charge to step aboard. I'm not satisfied.'
He turned towards his officers and Bolitho gave a quick nod.
Sparke hissed, 'Keep him away from the nine-pounder, whatever happens.' He gestured to Balleine. 'Start opening the hold.'
Bolitho watched the man climb up from the boat, trying to picture the Faith ful's deck through his eyes. If anything went wrong now, all they would have to show for their plans would be five corpses and a dory.
The man who stood on the swaying deck was solidly built but agile for his age. He had thick grey hair and a matching beard, and his clothing was roughly stitched, like that of a woodsman.
He faced Stockdale calmly. 'I am Elias Haskett.' He took another half pace. 'You are not the Tracy I remember.' It was not a challenge but a statement.
Moffitt said, 'This is Cap'n Stockdale. We took over the Faithful under Cap'n Tracy's orders.' He smiled, letting it sink in. 'He went in command of a fine brig. Like his brother.'
The man named Elias Haskett seemed convinced. 'We've been expecting you. It ain't easy. The redcoats have been pushing their pickets across the territory, and that ship you told of has been up and down the coast for weeks, like a nervous rabbit.'
He glanced at the others nearby, his eyes resting momentarily on Sparke.
Moffitt said, 'Mostly new hands. British deserters. You know how it goes, man.'
'I do.' Haskett became businesslike. 'Good cargo for us?'
Balleine and a few hands had removed the covers from the hold, and Haskett strode to the coaming to peer below.
Bolitho watched the pattern of men changing again, just as they had practised and rehearsed. The first part was done, or so it appeared. Now he saw Rowhurst, the gunner's mate, stroll casually to join Haskett, his hand
