Honour This Day

They faced each other like enemies. Then Bolitho said, 'I need her, and I pray that she may always need me. Now let that be an end to it, man!'

Hernck took several deep breaths and refilled both glasses.

'I shall never agree ' He fixed Bolitho with the bright blue eyes he had always remembered. 'But I'll not let it put my duty at risk.'

Bolitho sat down again 'Duty, Thomas? Don't speak to me of that. I've had a bellyful of late.' He made up his mind. 'This combined squadron is our responsibility. I am not usurping your leadership and that you must know. I don't share their lordships' attitude on the French, that is if they indeed have one. Pierre Villeneuve is a man of great intelligence, he is not one to go by the book of fighting instructions. He needs to be cautious on the one hand, for if he fails in his ultimate mission to clear the Channel for invasion, then he must die at the guillotine.'

Hernck muttered, 'Barbarians¹'

Bolitho smiled. 'We must explore every possibility and keep our ships together except for the patrols. When the time comes, it will be a hard sail to find and support Nelson and brave Colling-wood.' He put down his glass very slowly. 'You see, I do not believe that the French will wait until next year. They have run the course.' He looked through the sun's glare towards the anchored ships. 'So have we.'

Herrick felt safer on familiar ground. 'Who do you have as flag captain?'

Bolitho watched him and said dryly, 'Captain Keen. There is none better. Now that you are promoted beyond my reach, Thomas.'

Herrick did not hide his dismay. 'So we are all drawn together?'

Bolitho nodded. 'Remember Lieutenant Browne – how he called us We Happy Few?'

Herrick frowned. 'I don't need reminding.'

'Well, think on it, Thomas, my friend, there are even fewer of us now!'

Bolitho stood up and reached for his hat. 'I must return to Hyperion. Perhaps later -' He left it unsaid. Then he placed the packet of letters for Herrick on the table.

'From England, Thomas. There will be more news, I expect.' Their eyes met and Bolitho ended quietly, 'I wanted you to hear it from me, as a friend, rather than assault your ears with more gossip from the sewers.'

Herrick protested, 'I did not mean to hurt you. It is for you that I care.'

Bolitho shrugged. 'We will fight the war together, Thomas. It seems that will have to suffice.'

They stood side-by-side at the entry port while Allday manoeuvred the barge alongside once again. Allday had never been caught out before and would be fuming about it.

Like everyone else he must have expected him to remain longer with his oldest friend.

Bolitho walked towards the entry port as the marine guard presented their muskets to the salute, the bayonets shining like ice in the glare.

He caught his shoe in a ring-bolt, and would have fallen but for a lieutenant who thrust out his arm to save him.

'Thank you, sir!'

He saw Herrick standing at him with sudden anxiety, the major of marines swaying beside the guard with his sword still rigid in his gloved hand.

Herrick exclaimed, 'Are you well, Sir Richard?'

Bolitho looked at the nearest ship and gritted his teeth as the mist partly covered his eye. A close thing. He had been so gripped with emotion and disappointment at this visit that he had allowed his guard to fall. As in a sword- fight, it only took a second.

He replied, 'Well enough, thank you.'

They looked at one another. 'It shall not happen again.'

Some seamen had climbed into the shrouds and began to cheer as the barge pulled strongly from the shadow and into the sunlight. Allday swung the tiller bar and glanced quickly at Bolitho's squared shoulders, the familiar ribbon which drew his hair back above the collar. Allday could remember it no other way.

He listened to the cheers, carried on by another of the seventy-fours close by.

Fools, he thought savagely. What the hell did they know? They had seen nothing, knew even less.

But he had watched, and had felt it even from the barge. Two friends with nothing to say, nothing to span the gap which had yawned between them like a moat around a fortress.

He saw the stroke oarsman watching Bolitho instead of his loom and glared at him until he paled under his stare.

Allday swore that he would never take anyone at face value again. For or against me, that'll be my measure of a man.

Bolitho twisted round suddenly and shaded his eyes to look at him.

'It's all right, Allday.' He saw his words sink in. 'So be easy.'

Allday forgot his watching bargemen and grinned awkwardly. Bolitho had read his thoughts even with his back turned.

Allday said, 'I was rememberin', Sir Richard.'

'I know that. But at the moment I am too full to speak on it.'

The barge glided to the main chains and Bolitho glanced up at the waiting side-party.

He hesitated. 'I sometimes think we may hope for too much, old friend.'

Then he was gone, and the shrill of calls announced his arrival on deck.

Allday shook his head and muttered, 'I never seen him like this afore.'

'What's that, Cox'n?'

Allday swung round, his eyes blazing. 'And youl Watch your stroke in future, or I'll have the hide off ye!'

He forgot the bargemen and stared hard at the towering tumblehome of the ship's side. Close to, you could see the gouged scars of battle beneath the smart buff and black paintwork.

Like us, he thought, suddenly troubled. Waiting for the last fight. When it came, you would need all the friends you could find.

15. A Time For Action

Bolitho leaned on one elbow and put his signature on yet another despatch for the Admiralty. In the great cabin the air was heavy and humid, and even with gunports and skylight open, he felt the sweat running down his spine. He had discarded his coat, and his shirt was open almost to his waist, but it made little difference.

He stared at the date on the next despatch which Yovell pushed discreetly before him. September; over three months since he had said his farewell to Catherine and returned to Gibraltar. He looked towards the open stern windows. To this. Hardly a ripple today, and the sea shone like glass, almost too painful to watch.

It seemed far longer. The endless days of beating up and down in the teeth of a raw Levantine, or lying becalmed without even a whisper of a breeze to fill the sails.

It could not go on. It was like sitting on a powder-keg and worse. Or was it all in his mind, a tension born of his own uncertainties? Fresh water was getting low again, and that might soon provoke trouble on the crowded messdecks.

Of the enemy there was no sign. Hyperion and her consorts lay to the west of Sardinia, while Herrick and his depleted squadron maintained their endless patrol from the Strait of Sicily to as far north as Naples Bay.

The other occupant of the cabin gave a polite cough. Bolitho glanced up and smiled. 'Routine, Sir Piers, but it will not take much longer.'

Sir Piers Blachford settled down in his chair and stretched out his long legs. To the officers in the squadron his arrival in the last courier-brig had been seen as another responsibility, a civilian sent to probe and investigate, a resented intruder.