Honour This Day

her fine features and compelling eyes were still unclear. He must have been half-crazy with despair to stare at the sun. The surgeon in London had declared it to be his worst enemy.

He said, 'I hoped I would see you. I have thought of you a great deal. More than I should; less than you deserve.'-

She flicked open her fan and moved it in the wind like a bird's wing.

'I shall be leaving here quite soon. Perhaps we ought never to have met. We must both try -'

He reached out and took her wrist, not caring who might see, conscious only that he was about to lose even her, when he had lost everything else.

'I cannot try! It is hell to love another man's wife, but that is the truth, in God's name it is!'

She did not pull away, but her wrist was rigid in his grasp.

She answered without hesitation, 'Hell? You can never know what that is unless you are a woman in love with another woman's husband!' Her voice threw caution aside. 'I told you, I would have died for you once. Now, because you seem to thmk your chosen life is in ruins you can turn again to me! Don't you know what you're doing to me, damn you? Yes, I married Lacey because we needed one another, but not in a fashion you would ever understand! I cannot have a child, but then you probably know that too. Whereas your wife has given you a daughter I believe, so where's the rub, eh?' She tore her arm away, her dark eyes flashing as loose strands of hair broke from under the mantilla. 'I shall never forget you, Richard, God help me, but I pray that we never meet again, lest we destroy even that one moment of joy I held so dear!'

She turned and almost ran through the door.

Bolitho walked into the adjoining building and received his hat from a footman without even noticing. He saw Parns walking towards him and would have passed without a word had the lieutenant not touched his hat and said, 'I have been supervising the last of the treasure-chests, Sir Richard. I can still barely believe what we went through to get them!'

Bolitho looked at him vaguely. 'Yes. I shall note your excellent behaviour in my report to their lordships.' Even that sounded hollow. The aftermath. Letters to Murray's mother and Dalmame's widow, arrangements for prize- money to be paid to the dependents of those others killed or discharged. His despatch would at least guarantee that.

Parris eyed him worriedly. 'I did not speak to you for praise, Sir Richard. Is something wrong?'

Bolitho shook his head, and felt the wind in his face, just as he could still sense her wrist under his fingers. In hell's name, what had he expected?

'No. Why should there be? It will be known as a noble sacrifice, I am given to understand, so be grateful that you serve and do not command!'

He walked away and Parris turned and saw Allday striding out into the angry sunlight.

'Sir Richard will require the barge, Cox'n.'

Allday shook his head. 'No, he'll walk a piece. When he's wore himself out, then he'll want the barge.'

Parris nodded, understanding perhaps for the first time. 'I envy the both of you.'

Allday walked slowly to the balustrade that overlooked the main anchorage. The sea was getting up right enough. He bit on an apple he had obtained from the commodore's cook. Bloody good job. Blow some of the bitterness clean out of sight.

He saw his barge standing off from the jetty to avoid scraping the paintwork as lively catspaws spattered the stone stairs with spray. Bolitho was all aback, just when he had believed things were getting better. Bloody women. He had said as much to Ozzard when they had returned in triumph with the treasure-ship. Ozzard had made one of his defensive remarks and Allday, too tired and angry to care, had exclaimed, 'What the hell do you know? You've never been married!' Strange how it had upset the little man. Allday had decided he would give him one of his precious bone carvings to make up for it. He tossed the apple core into the sun-dried grass and turned to leave. Then he saw her, standing on the terrace, watching him with those eyes of hers. That look could make a man turn to water.

She met his gaze and said, 'Do you remember me? You are Mr Allday.'

Allday replied carefully, 'Why, o' course I remember you, Ma'am. Nobody could forget what you done for the Captain, as he was then.'

She ignored the unspoken suggestion in his voice. 'I need your help. Will you trust me?'

Allday felt his defences slipping. She was asking him to trust her. The wife of the high and mighty Inspector General, a man who needed watching if half what he had heard was true. But she had paid out her line first. She was the one who was taking all the risks.

He grinned slowly. A sailor's woman. 'I will.'

She moved towards him, and Allday saw the quick movement of her breasts beneath the fine gown. Not so cool and calm as she wanted to appear, he thought.

'Vice-Admiral Bolitho is not himself.' She hesitated; perhaps she had already gone too far. She had seen the grin fade, the instant hostility in the big man's eyes.

'I – I wish to help him, you see -' She dropped her gaze. 'In God's name, Mr Allday, must I beg of you?'

Allday said, 'I'm sorry, Ma'am. We've had a lot of enemies over the years, see.' He weighed it up. What was the worst thing that could happen? He said abruptly, 'He was nearly blinded.' He felt like ice despite the searing wind, but now he could not stop. 'He thinks he's losing the use of his left eye.'

She stared at him, the picture leaping into her mind like a stark dream. He had been staring at the sky or the sea when she had found him. Bolitho had looked so defeated, so lost that she had wanted to run to him and take him in her arms, forget security, life itself if only she could comfort and keep him a few moments more. She recalled his voice, the way he had looked at her without seeming to see her.

She heard herself whisper, 'Oh, dear God!'

Allday said, 'Remember, I've told you nothin', Ma'am. I'm often in hot water as it is without you adding more coals to it.' He hesitated, moved by her distress, her sudden loss of poise before him, a common seaman. 'But if you can help -' he broke off and touched his hat quickly. He whispered hoarsely, 'I sees yer husband hull-down on th' horizon, Ma'am. I'll be off now!'

She stared after him, a great, loping figure in flapping blue jacket and nankeen breeches, one scarred and hurt so badly she could see it on his homely features. But a man so gentle that she wanted to cry for him, for all of them.

But her husband did not come to her; she saw him walking along the terrace with the lieutenant called Parris.

When she looked down the sloping pathway which led to the harbour she saw Allday turn and lift his hat to her.

Just a small gesture, and yet she knew that he had accepted her as a friend.

The deckhead lanterns in Hyperion's great cabin spiralled wildly, throwing insane shadows across the checkered deck covering and across the tightly lashed nine-pounders on either side.

Bolitho sipped a glass of hock, and watched while Yovell finished yet another letter and pushed it across the table for him to sign. Like actors on a stage, he thought, as Ozzard busied himself refilling glasses, and Allday entered and left the cabin like a player who had been given no lines to learn.

Captain Haven stood by the stern windows, now half-shuttered as the wind, made more fearsome by the darkness, broke the crests from the inshore waves, and flung spray over the anchored ships.

Bolitho felt the whole ship trembling as she tilted to her cable, and remembered the feeling of disbelief when Dacie had severed the Spaniard's mooring.

Haven concluded, 'That is everything I can determine, Sir Richard. The purser is satisfied with his storing, and all but one working party has been withdrawn from the shore.' He was speaking carefully, like a pupil repeating a hard-learned lesson to his teacher. 'I have been able to replace the three boats too, although they will need some work done on them.'

An observation, a reminder that it had been his admiral who had abandoned them. Haven was careful not to display his true feelings.

'Who is in charge of the last party?'

Haven looked at his list. 'The first lieutenant, Sir Richard.'

Always the title now, after their last clash. Bolitho swilled the hock around his glass. So be it then. Haven was a fool and must know that his admiral, any flag officer for that matter, could make or destroy his career. Or was it