from the battle returning. 'You were slow, Thomas! You waited too long before each decision. You know as well as I that in a broadside battle you’ve no time for reflections!'
Herrick watched his rising anger with apparent calm. 'Do you think I don’trealise that? 'He shrugged, the movement helpless or despairing. 'When I lost Impulsive last year I began to feel doubts. About my strength, my nerve, if you like.' He looked away. 'I sailed Lysander into that bay because I had to, something drew me there, like times in the past when I just knew it must be done. You sent no signal, but deep inside me I felt you were there, waiting, expecting me to come. Perhaps I felt as you did about Adam Pascoe. It went deeper than logic.'
Bolitho asked quietly, 'And four days ago?'
Herrick faced him again. 'I watched those two ships. Hour by hour I watched them drawing nearer. Imagined their people at quarters, peering along their gun muzzles at me. And when you decided to attack them single- handed, and we had the second one right across our bows, I could barely speak or move. I heard my voice passing orders. But beyond it I was like stone. Something dead.' He wiped his forehead with one hand. The skin was damp with sweat. 'I can't do it. That battle last year decided it for me.'
Bolitho stood up and walked slowly to the windows. He recalled Herrick's excitement at the Admiralty when he had been appointed flag captain. A pleasure rising to match his own. They had not questioned the dangers or pitfalls of their mission. And neither of them had once considered his own ability to manage it.
He said, 'You are too tired to think properly.'
'Please, sir.' Herrick's voice was hoarse. 'Don’t show pity, or humiliate me with understanding! You know what this is costing me, in God's name spare me further shame!'
Feet clattered in the passageway and Bolitho said, 'Leave me, I’d like to think.' He tried to find the words, despising himself for causing him such pain. 'Your value is too great for me to abuse it. '
The door opened slightly and Midshipman Saxby poked his head into the cabin.
'Captain, sir?' He smiled nervously as he saw Bolitho and showed the gap in his front teeth. 'Mr. Gilchrist's respects, and could you come on deck?'
When Herrick remained silent, Bolitho asked, 'Is something wrong?'
Saxby swallowed. 'N-no, sir. The first lieutenant wishes to turn up the hands to witness punishment.'
Herrick came out of his thoughts and said harshly, 'I am coming, Mr. Saxby.' He glanced at Bolitho. 'I am sorry, sir.' Bolitho looked for a long while at the closed door. It had been like watching Herrick's eyes peering from a strange mask. A prisoner. What had he said? Something dead.
He turned as Ozzard padded silently into the cabin from the other door. Overhead and beyond the bulkhead he heard the stamp of booted feet as Leroux's men tramped aft, the more subdued movements of the company assembling to witness punishment.
Ozzard asked mildly, 'Can I do anything, sir?'
Bolitho looked up at the skylight, hearing a dull thud as the grating was rigged for the man to be seized up and flogged. 'Yes. Close that skylight!' He frowned. 'I did not mean to shout at you. '
He strode to the opposite side, Damn Gilchrist and his punishments. What was he trying or prove, and to whom?
Ozzard said warily, 'Your clerk's outside, sir.' 'Fetch him.'
Moffitt re-entered the cabin and blinked in the reflected sunlight.
He said, 'I’ve finished the first part, sir, and I thought-' 'Wait.' Bolitho had raised his voice, as if to drown the sound of the lash across a man's naked back. 'I wish you to write a letter.'
Overhead, the drum rolled and stopped, and the flat crack of the cat on bare skin intruded once again.
'Ready, sir?'
Moffitt, like Ozzard who was humming quietly in the sleeping cabin, was unmoved by the slow, drawn-out ritual of punishment. While he…
Bolitho snapped, 'Address it to Captain Charles Farquhar, of His Brittanic Majesty's Ship Osiris.'
He rested his forehead against the sun-warmed glass and looked down at the frothing water below the counter. How inviting it was, Cool. Cleansing.
Behind him he heard Moffitt's nib scratching across the paper. It never faltered to the roll of the drum, the crack of the lash.
Farquhar would have a good reason for being off station. Of that he was certain.
'sir?'
He bunched his fists tight against his thighs until the pain.steadied him.
'Upon receipt of this order you will make all arrangements to proceed on board Lysander, flagship, the transfer to be effected immediately. 'He hesitated again, fighting his will. 'And there take on the duties and appointments of flag captain.'
This time the nib did falter.
He continued, 'Your present post will be assumed by Captain Thomas Herrick. '
He walked to the table and looked over Moffitt's narrow shoulder. 'I will want two copies directly.' He reached out and took the pen. He felt Moffitt staring at it, as if defying it to move. Almost savagely he wrote, 'Given under my hand, aboard His Majesty's Ship Lysander. Signed, Richard Bolitho, Commodore. '
It was done.
With the hands dismissed from witnessing punishment, and the approaching ships confirmed as Osiris and Nicator, Thomas Herrick returned to the cabin to make his report.
