'They fight for what they believe. They are like us in many ways.' He thought of his uncle. 'It is like fighting people of your own blood.'
'I shall have to take your word for that, Captain.' He smiled, but there was no warmth in it. Then he continued, 'And what are our chances of success, would you say?'
Adam saw Urquhart watching him, hating this casual interrogation in the presence of the others.
He answered, 'It can be done, sir. Others have said as much. But without ships and the necessary military strength, it has not been possible.' He paused. 'Now we have both. It would be a gesture, rather than a victory. Some might describe it as revenge for the American attack on York.'
Deighton raised a hand. 'And what do you say?'
Adam heard someone laugh, one of his men. One of those he had almost left behind, abandoned.
'I say I do not care, sir. Tomorrow we may be at peace.' He glanced around at the others, sensing that he had their understanding. 'But while we are still at war we must strike them as hard as we can. So that it will be remembered, and, with it, the many who have died for it. Too many.'
Deighton laid his hands flat on the table. Then we are agreed.'
His servant entered the cabin as if to a signal, with a tray of glasses.
The commodore stood up, and the others followed suit.
'I give you a sentiment, gentlemen. To the squadron.' His eyes rested on Adam again. 'And to victory.'
One glass each, and the servant had departed as silently as he had entered.
Deighton smiled. 'Your orders will arrive tomorrow. In the afternoon we shall weigh and take station as I direct.' The smile was fading. 'That is all, gentlemen.'
Adam was on the quarterdeck to see each captain into his gig. The last to leave was Borradaile, as he had known it would be.
Adam said quietly, 'Well, my friend? What are your feelings?'
Borradaile looked at him and made some attempt to adjust his ill-fitting uniform before going down to his waiting boat.
'I was thinking just now, sir, while I watched and listened.' His deep, hollow eyes were hidden in shadow, ageless, a man of the sea. 'So like your uncle, I was thinking. So very like that fine, caring sailor.' He almost smiled. 'But all eyes open for storms. I was thinking that too, sir.'
He shambled to the entry port, outwardly oblivious to the calls and ceremonial of his departure.
Adam found himself more moved by the simplicity and honesty of Borradaile's remarks than he had thought possible. Perhaps after Deighton's hints and suggestive asides, it had been what he most needed. He stared across the anchorage. Four frigates and a brig. At least they would be doing something again, instead of playing watchdog to helpless transports.
He saw the marines falling out and hurrying below to their messes, their barracks, as they insisted on calling them. Washington, then. But he could find no excitement in the prospect. Was that, too. gone for ever?
Whatever the outcome, the blame would lie with the man in command. The margin would be a narrow one: success or utter disaster. Then he thought of his uncle. That fine, caring sailor. It had made him seem closer. He smiled. And that was what he had needed.
Adam Bolitho stood loosely by the quarterdeck rail and stared along the full extent of his command, beyond the taut rigging and the jib sails to the empty sea ahead. It was angled now, and quite steady, as if Valkyrie were riding a sloping bank of dark blue, eye-searing water.
Below the larboard gangway the ritual of punishment was drawing to a close; it was something which Adam had learned to accept without flinching. Three weeks had passed since the newly formed squadron had left Halifax, and to the masthead lookouts the other frigates would still be in sight, ready to run down and investigate any suspicious vessel, or to respond to the commodore's signals.
Three weeks of drills and yet more drills, the mess decks humid in the unwavering heat, and tempers fraying. It was not unusual in any ship of Valkyrie's size.
He glanced down as the boatswain's mate paused and ran his fingers through the lash, to separate each of its nine tails, then the drum rolled again and the lash came down with a crack across the naked back.
Bidmead, the master-at-arms, chanted, 'Thirty-six, sir.'
There was something like a sigh from the ship's company, who had been piped aft to witness punishment. The victim's back was a mass of torn and bleeding flesh. But as his wrists were cut free from the upended grating he stepped clear and stood unaided, only his heaving chest revealing the pain he had suffered.
It had been a severe punishment, but Spurway was one of the ship's hard men, a troublemaker who had been flogged many times, and had boasted, and proved, that he could take it without a whimper.
Adam hated the ritual for many reasons. In a ship like this one, there were always accidents, falls, cuts and bruises as men, some inexperienced, were driven to work aloft in pitch darkness when the pipe came to shorten or make sail. For trained hands like Spurway to be excused work because of a flogging was nothing but waste. Nor would it deter others like him. But discipline was vital, and Spurway had struck a petty officer who had sworn at him for malingering.
At his back, he could sense the line of marines across the poop, a captain's final authority if all else failed.
He saw Minchin, the surgeon, peering up at him, his face as red as raw meat.
Take him below. And don't be too soft with him.'
Minchin squinted into the sun, and grinned. 'He would have been better off in the army, sir. They'd have hanged him!' He strolled away, a man isolated from all the others.
Dyer touched his hat. 'Permission to fall out the hands, sir?'
'Yes.' Adam stared past the lieutenant's shoulder at the small courier schooner which had met with them soon after dawn to pass across a satchel of despatches for the commodore.
He watched the schooner's sails turning slowly end on in the haze, like pink shells. Free, he thought, her commanding officer able to move at will as he sought out his next rendezvous.
He looked at the gangway. The grating was gone, and two seamen were swilling away the remaining blood.
He said, 'Have a word with Mr. Midshipman Fynmore. He hopes to sit for lieutenant soon. He should have prevented the trouble with Spurway.'
Dyer said, 'He's very young, sir.'
Adam faced him. 'He was there. He was in charge. Tell him!'
He turned as his servant John Whitmarsh hurried from the poop.
'What is it?' Although, in truth, he was glad of the interruption. He had been over sharp with the first lieutenant. But he, too, should have known.
Whitmarsh said, 'The commodore sends his compliments, zur. Would you join him aft.'
Adam smiled. 'Directly.' Perhaps the schooner had brought final orders for the proposed attack. So much time seemed to have passed since Deighton had announced it in his cabin that it had lost all sense of urgency.
He walked into the poop's cool shadow and saw two seamen glance at him, and as quickly look away. No one in the ship liked the man who had been punished, but a flogging was a flogging, and they would never take sides against one of their own.
He paused before entering the great cabin.
Rather like us, he thought.
Deighton was at his table, leaning on his hands while he studied an opened chart and a file of carefully written instructions.
'Ah, good here you are.' He had raised his head, but remained in silhouette against the glistening panorama of the sea. 'Punishment carried out, eh? Just what the brutes deserve. No one respects a gentle hand, no matter how well intended.' He gestured to a chair and added, 'I thought you were against flogging, on principle.'
Adam sat down. 'I am, sir. But until some other means of punishment is suggested by their lordships or the King's regulations, I shall flog any man who tries to undermine the discipline in this or any other ship.'
'I am glad to know it, sir.' Deighton tapped the chart. 'It is all here in the admiral's despatches. The attack will take place in two weeks' time. I would like you to read the instructions as soon as possible. I have every faith in the strategy proposed, of course, but you might wish to challenge something.'
'Yes, sir.' Strange to hear someone other than his uncle or Keen referred to as 'the admiral'. It was like wearing a blindfold, not knowing the mind behind it, except by reputation. Bolitho had always known the
