The Flag Captain

“I will go and attend to the new course, sir.”

“Yes.” Broughton watched him distantly. “I shall be glad when we are at Djafou. I am heartily sick of interference.”

Bolitho hurried back to the quarterdeck, feeling the heat striking his shoulders like embers from a fire.

As he glanced quickly aloft at the masthead pendant and then at the compass he said sharply, “Call all hands, Mr Keverne. We

will wear ship directly. Then you may get the t’gallants on her.”

He heard the squeal of pipes, the immediate rush of feet as the seamen poured up into the sunlight, pausing only to peer aft to see the cause for the sudden excitement.

Astern, the Valorous was already making more sail, her acknowledgement to Broughton’s signal vanishing from her yard as her forecourse billowed free and then filled to the wind. The signal would please her captain, Bolitho thought. Furneaux had never really appreciated his station astern of the line. This sudden order would show the others exactly where he stood in Broughton’s eyes.

He forgot them as Midshipman Tothill called, “Restless has acknowledged, sir.” He glanced despairingly at Calvert’s back, who was peering at the signal book as if it was in Arabic.

Bolitho smiled. “Very well. Mr Partridge, we will see how she likes the feel of the wind again.”

He looked at the men below the gangways and mustered at the foot of each mast. “Carry on, Mr Keverne.”

“Hands aloft! Loose t’gallants!”

Keverne waited until the rush of barebacked seamen had reached the upper yards, their bodies black against the sky, like monkeys.

“Man the braces!”

He glanced round as Partridge dropped his hand and the helmsmen threw themselves on their spokes and began to heave the wheel over.

“Let go and haul!” Keverne’s voice was metallic and unreal through his trumpet. “Heave, you idle lot of old women!”

Creaking and groaning the great yards began to swing round, the hull plunging deeply in the swell as it swayed ponderously out of the line. Overhead the sails flapped about in momentary confusion, whilst above the noise Bolitho could hear the captains of the tops urging their men on with threats and curses. The top-

gallant sails were already whipping out from their yards, hardening into firm, tanned rectangles as the canvas took the strain, tugging at blocks and rigging alike and trying always to pluck an unwary topman from his perch and hurl him to the deck far below.

“Steer sou’ east by south.”

Bolitho braced his legs, feeling the deck vibrate through his shoes as the sails pushed the ship forward and down across the lip of another deep trough. Spray burst jubilantly above the figurehead and pattered across the men working busily at the headsail sheets. He watched the topmen racing each other to the deck, their bare feet thudding on the planking as once more they awaited orders.

Standing almost before the wind, the ship was already gathering way, the deck swaying easily from side to side instead of fixed at one set angle when close hauled.

Bolitho looked aloft, thinking of how she would appear to the Restless. The sloop was being made to beat into the teeth of the wind, and Broughton’s change of heart would save her and everyone else a good deal of time. Bolitho knew that Broughton’s reasons were probably different, that he really wished to get rid of Draffen, if only for a short while.

But, for a few moments he could feel content. The Euryalus was behaving magnificently, and he toyed with the idea of having Keverne set the royals as well. But that one extra layer of canvas might just be visible to some hostile craft as yet unseen below the horizon.

He turned as Draffen came on deck and said, “You wished to see her sail, sir.” He watched Draffen’s eyes hurrying about the taut, drumming shrouds, the hardbellied sails, appreciating everything he saw, if not understanding all of it.

He said, “She’s a lady, Bolitho. It makes all this trouble worthwhile.”

Bolitho noticed he was wearing a plain green coat and loose breeches. Under his coat he also saw the glint of metal. Draffen was obviously used to carrying a pistol, and seemed the sort of man who would be well able to take care of himself.

He was shading his eyes as he tried to understand what the Restless was trying to do as she reeled once again across the wind, her sails flapping and almost aback before she swung away on her new tack.

Bolitho crossed to the starboard side and looked for the squadron. Euryalus’s sudden increase of speed had left them bunched together and seemingly entangled, their silhouettes overlapping so that they looked like a single, ill-designed monster.

He called, “Mr Keverne, we’ll shorten sail in thirty minutes. Restless can lie under our lee until Sir Hugo is aboard.”

Later, while the Euryalus lay hove-to, her hull rolling sicken-ingly in a beam swell and her sails banging and useless in noisy torment, Broughton came on deck to watch as Draffen was rowed across in the sloop’s jolly boat.

He said, “Well, that is that.” He sounded satisfied.

Bolitho saw Draffen pause in his climb up the sloop’s side and turn to wave his hand.

He said, “I would like to tack to the nor’ east, sir. It will save time later when we run down and rejoin the squadron.”

Broughton turned his back on the sloop as her topsails filled to the wind and she started to pay off away from her massive consort. “Very well.” Broughton eyed him searchingly. “I suppose you cannot bear the thought of resuming your place in the line so soon after this brief freedom?” He smiled. “Well, it will do Furneaux no harm to exercise his power a little longer.”

Bolitho walked over to Keverne who was still watching the sloop. “We will steer nor’ east, Mr Keverne, lay her on the larboard tack. So call all hands again, and then they can have their meal. I imagine the activity might have given them a new

appetite.” He saw the villainous-looking chief cook, a bearded giant with one eye, peering up from the main hatchway. “Although I hate to think what he puts into it sometimes.”

He crossed to the weather side as once again the seamen swarmed up the ratlines and out along the yards. Broughton understood him better than he realised. Independence and initiative, his father had once told him, were the two most precious things to every captain. Now, commanding a flagship, and tied to the squadron’s apron strings, he knew well enough what he had meant.

He thought suddenly of the house at Falmouth. The two portraits opposite the window. He was strangely moved to find he could think of them without grief or bitterness. It was almost like having someone there waiting for his return home.

Keverne was back again, his face expressionless. “This afternoon there will be two hands for punishment, sir.”

“What?” Bolitho stared at him and then nodded. “Very well.”

The moment of peace had passed. But as he walked to the quarterdeck rail he found himself praying that it might return.

At six o’clock that same day Bolitho sat behind his desk looking through the stern windows, his mind busy with the affairs of his command. Trute, the cabin servant, placed a pot of fresh coffee by his elbow and padded away without a word. He had grown to accept the captain’s strange moods, his apparent need to be alone, even to pour his own coffee. Like his desire to have the desk facing aft, and whenever possible to dine off it instead of his beautiful table in the adjoining cabin. Trute had served three captains, and never met his sort before. The others had all expected to be waited on hand and foot, and at all times of day or night. Equally they had been swift and harsh when showing their displeasure. He had decided that although he liked Bolitho as a considerate and fair master, he had felt more comfortable with his previous captains.

At least it had been possible to know exactly what they were thinking for most of the time.

Bolitho sipped the scalding black coffee and wondered when it, like many other items, would become a luxury.