With All Despatch

choice which had brought Kempthorne into the King's navy. Chalk and cheese, he thought. It was hard to see him having much in common with Queely. Bolitho had never seen so many well-used books outside of a library. From them he had gathered that Queely was interested in many subjects, as widely ranged as tropical medicine and astronomy, Eastern religions and medieval poetry. A withdrawn, self-contained man. It would be useful to know more about him.

Bolitho looked at the boy over the top of his tankard. 'Feeling a mite better, Matthew?'

The boy gulped and gripped the table as the sea surged along the hull and brought an angry exchange between the watchkeepers around the tiller.

'Easier, sir.' He watched Bolitho drinking the coffee with despair. 'I-I'm trying-' He turned and fled from the cabin.

Bolitho sighed and then slipped into his old, seagoing coat. For a few moments he fingered a faded sleeve and its tarnished buttons. Remembering it around her sun-blistered shoulders, her beautiful body lolling against him in the sternsheets. And then…

He almost fell as the hull rolled again and did not even notice the pain as his head jarred against the deckhead. He stared round wildly, the anguish sweeping over and through him like a terrible wave.

Will it never leave me?

He saw Queely angled in the doorframe, his eyes watching warily.

Bolitho looked away. 'Yes?' He may have called out aloud. But Viola would never hear him. The picture haunted him, of Allday lowering her over the boat's gunwale while the others stared, unbelieving, their burned faces stricken as if each and every man had found and then lost something in her. And now Allday was gone.

Queely said, 'Land in sight, sir.'

They clambered up the ladder, the steps running with the spray which cascaded through the companionway each time Wakeful dipped her bowsprit.

Bolitho gripped a stanchion and waited for his eyes to accept the grey half-light. The sky was almost clear. It held the promise of another fine day.

The watch on deck moved about with practised familiarity, their bodies leaning over to the cutter's swooping rolls and plunges, some wearing rough tarpaulin coats, others stripped to the waist, their bare backs shining like statuary in the flying spray. The 'hard men' of Wakeful's company. Every ship had them.

Bolitho wondered briefly what they thought about the Four Brothers. They had had no contact with Telemachus until yesterday, but he knew from experience that the navy created its own means of transmitting information: fact and rumour alike seemed to travel faster than a hoist from any flagship.

'Do you have a good lookout aloft?'

Queely watched his back, his hooked nose jutting forward like a bird of prey.

'Aye, sir.' It sounded like of course.

'Have a glass sent aloft, if you please.' Bolitho ignored Queely's angry glance at his first lieutenant and lifted a telescope from its rack beside the compass box.

As he wiped the lens with a handkerchief already damp in the spray, he said, 'I want to know if anything unusual is abroad this morning.'

He did not need to explain, but it gave him time to think.

He waited for a line of broken waves to sweep past the larboard beam, then braced his legs and levelled the glass beyond the shrouds. A shadow at first, then rising with the hull, hardening into an undulating wedge of land. He wiped his mouth and handed the telescope to Kempthorne.

France.

So near. The old enemy. Unchanged in the poor light and yet being torn apart by the Terror's bloody aftermath.

He heard the master say in a loud whisper, 'We'm gettin' a bit close.'

Queely raised his speaking trumpet and peered up at the lookout. 'D'you see anything? Wake up, man!'

He sounded impatient; he probably thought it a waste to send a good telescope aloft where it might be damaged.

'Nuthin', sir!'

Queely looked at Bolitho. 'I'd not expect much shipping here, sir. The Frogs maintain their inshore patrols all the way from the Dutch frontier, right down to Le Havre. Most ships' masters think it prudent to avoid arousing their attention.'

Bolitho walked to the bulwark and thought of Delaval, and the Four Brothers' dead captain. The smuggling gangs seemed to come and go no matter whose ships were on patrol.

Queely explained, 'The Frenchies have a stop, search and detain policy, sir. Several ships have been reported missing, and you'll get no information from Paris.' He shook his head. 'I'd not live there for a King's ransom.'

Bolitho eyed him calmly. 'Then we must ensure it cannot happen here, eh, Mr Queely?'

'With respect, sir, unless we get more ships, the smugglers will ignore us too. The fleet is cut to virtually a handful of vessels, and now that they see a richer living in the Trade, able-bodied seamen are becoming a rare commodity.'

Bolitho walked past the vibrating tiller bar and saw there were three men clinging to it, a master's mate nearby with his eyes moving from the mainsail's quivering peak to the compass and back again.

'That is why our three cutters must work together.' Bolitho saw Young Matthew run to the lee bulwark and lean over it to vomit although his stomach had been emptied long ago. A passing seaman grinned, seized his belt and said, 'Watch your step, nipper, it's a long fathom down there!'

Bolitho looked past him but was thinking of Telemachus. 'You are all unique, and because of the trust and loyalty shared by your people you are an example to others.'

Queely watched him then said, 'You were examining the log, sir?'

'Is that a question?' Bolitho felt the spray soaking into his shirt, but kept his eyes on the far-off ridge of land. 'Whenever I have been given the honour of command I have examined the punishment book first. It always gives me a fair idea of my predecessor's behaviour, and that of his company. You should be grateful that your command is free of unrest and its inevitable repression.'

Queely nodded uncertainly. 'Aye, sir, I suppose so.'

Bolitho did not look at him. He knew his comment was not quite what Queely had expected.

Some of the hands working at the halliards were chattering to each other when Queely shouted, 'Belay that!' He held up his hand. 'Listen, damn you!'

Bolitho clenched his hands together behind his back. Sharp hammer-like explosions. Small artillery, but firing in earnest.

'Where away?'

The master called, 'Astern, starboard quarter, sir.' The others stared at him but he faced them defiantly. 'No doubt in my mind, sir.'

Bolitho nodded. 'Nor mine.'

Queely hastened to the compass. 'What must I do, sir?'

Bolitho turned his head to listen as another series of shots echoed across the water.

'Bring her about.' He joined Queely beside the compass. 'In this wind you can run free to the south-west.' It was like thinking aloud. It was also like Telemachus all over again. The doubt, hesitation, opposition, even though nobody had raised a single protest.

Queely glanced at him. 'That will surely take us into French waters, sir.'

Bolitho looked at the straining mainsail, the way the long boom seemed to tear above the water with a mind of its own.

'Maybe. We shall see.' He met his eyes and added, 'It would seem that someone is abroad this morning after all?'

Queely tightened his jaw then snapped, 'All hands, Mr Kempthorne! Stand by to come about.' He glared at the