It was a lie; he could feel his life draining away like sand in an hourglass, and even the unwavering eyes knew it.
He was using all his strength. The eyes moved suddenly to the shrouds and running rigging overhead.
Who was he? What did he remember? What was his ship? It was no use. He heard Bellairs say, “There were four others, sir. All burned. Tied together. He must have been the last one left alive…” He could not continue. Adam felt the man’s hand tighten very slightly in his. He watched his mouth, saw it forming a word, a name.
O’Beirne said, “Fortune, sir.”
Someone else said, “Probably a trader. They was English anyway, poor devils!”
But the hand was moving again. Agitated. Desperate.
Adam leaned closer, until his face was only inches from the dying man’s. He could smell his agony, his despair, but he did not release his hand.
“Tell me, what is it?”
Then, with great care, he lowered the hand to the deck. The sand had run out. It was as if only one thing had kept him alive, long enough. For what? Revenge?
He rose and stood for a few moments looking down at the dead man. An unknown sailor. Then he looked around at their intent faces. Troubled, curious, some openly distressed. It was perhaps the closest he had been to them since he had taken command.
He said, “Not ‘fortune.’ He got it out, though.” The man’s eyes were still open, as if he were alive, and listening. “It was La Fortune. A Frenchman who sank his ship.”
Jago said, “Shall I have him put over, sir?”
He was still on his knees, and glanced at Adam’s hand as it rested briefly on his shoulder.
“No. We shall bury him during the last dog watch. It is the least we can do.”
He saw Bellairs, deathly pale despite his sunburn, and said, “That was well done, Mr Bellairs. I shall enter it in your report. It will do you no harm.”
Bellairs tried to smile but his mouth would not move.
“That man, sir-”
But the deck was empty, and the sailmaker’s crew would soon be stitching up the nameless sailor for his last journey on earth.
“I intend to find out. And when I do, I shall see that he does not leave us unavenged!”
The sun stood high in a clear sky, so that the reflected glare from the anchorage was almost a physical presence. Unrivalled, with all sails clewed up except topsails and jib, seemed to be gliding towards the sprawled panorama of battlements and sand-coloured buildings, her stem hardly causing a ripple.
Adam Bolitho raised a telescope and examined the other vessels anchored nearby. Montrose, the forty-two gun frigate which Sir Graham Bethune had chosen for his flagship, was surrounded by boats and lighters. She had left Gibraltar two days ahead of Unrivalled, but from the activity of storing and watering ship it seemed she had arrived in Malta only today, more evidence of their own fast passage despite the contrary winds.
Adam was still not sure what he thought of Bethune’s decision to sail separately. In company they might have exercised together, anything to break the day-to-day routine.
He did not know the vice-admiral very well, although what he had seen of him he had liked, and had trusted. He had been a frigate captain himself, and a successful one, and in Adam’s book that rated very high. Against that, he had spent several years employed ashore, latterly at the Admiralty. Something I could never do. It might make an officer over cautious, more aware of the risks and the perils of responsibility in a sea command. He had even heard Forbes, Montrose’s captain, question the need for such caution. It was unlike the man to criticise his admiral, but they had all had too much to drink.
He moved the glass further and saw three other frigates anchored in line, flags barely moving, windsails rigged to provide a suggestion of air in the crowded quarters between decks.
Not a large force, something else which would weigh heavily on Bethune’s mind. With Napoleon at large on the French mainland again, no one could predict the direction the conflict might take. The French might drive north to the Channel ports, and seize ships and men to attack and delay vital supplies for Wellington ’s armies. And what of the old enemies? There would still be some who were prepared and eager to renew their allegiance to the arrogant Corsican.
“Guard-boat, sir!”
Adam shifted the glass, and beyond the motionless launch saw other buildings which appeared to merge with the wall of the nearest battery.
Catherine had been here. For a few days, before she had been forced to take passage back to England.
The last time, the last place she had seen his uncle. He tried to turn aside from the thought. The last time they had been lovers.
Cristie called, “Ready, sir!”
Adam walked to the rail and stared along the length of his command. The anchor swaying slightly to the small movement, ready to let go, men at halliards and braces, petty officers staring aft to the quarterdeck. To their captain. He saw Galbraith on the opposite side, a speaking-trumpet in his hands, but his eyes were on Wynter, the third lieutenant, who was up forward with the anchor party. Galbraith had intended to take charge himself, and Adam had been surprised by this discovery, more so because he had not noticed it earlier. A strong, capable officer, but he could not or would not delegate, as in the matter of Bellairs and the wreckage, the pathetic corpses, the screaming gulls.
He said, “Carry on, Mr Galbraith!”
“Lee braces, there! Hands wear ship!”
“Tops’l sheets! Tops’l clew lines!”
Galbraith’s voice pursued the seamen as they hauled and stamped in unison on the sun-dried planking, waiting to belay each snaking line of cordage.
“Helm a’lee!”
Adam stood very still, watching the land pass slowly across the bowsprit and the proud figurehead.
“Let go!” Galbraith nodded curtly and the great anchor hit the water, flinging spray over the bustling seamen.
The Jack broke from the bows almost immediately, and he saw Midshipman Bellairs turn to smile at one of his signals party. But he had not forgotten the man they had plucked from the sea, only to surrender him again. Adam had seen the boy when they had cleared lower deck for the ceremony. Even the wind had dropped.
It had been strangely moving for new hands and old Jacks alike. Most of them had seen men they knew, and had shared their meagre resources with in one messdeck or another, pitched outboard like so much rubbish after a battle. But for some reason the burial of this unknown sailor had been different.
He had known Galbraith was watching him as he had read from the worn and salt-stained prayer book. He smiled. His aunt Nancy had given it to him before he had joined Hyperion.
Take good care of it, Adam. It will take good care of you.
It was the only thing he still possessed from that day, a lifetime ago.
He looked up now at the monkey-like figures of seamen securing sails, and freeing the boat tackles. How long this time? What orders? His mind refused to submit. And what of a ship named La Fortune?
The dying man might have been mistaken, his reeling mind betraying him, clinging perhaps to a memory which, like him, was now dead.
But suppose? There had been many French ships at sea when Napoleon had abdicated. The two frigates which had engaged Frobisher on the day of his uncle’s death had not come from nowhere.
“Orders, sir?”
“Post sentries, Mr Galbraith. I don’t want any unlawful visitors. And have a boat prepared for the purser-he’ll need to go ashore to look for fruit.”
Even a man-of-war invited attention when she lay at anchor. With gunports left open to afford some relief to men off watch, there was easy access for dealers and women, too, given half a chance. He smiled again, privately. Especially a man-of-war.
A boatswain’s mate called, “Guard-boat coming alongside, sir!”
Galbraith seemed to come abruptly out of his habitual reserve.
“Letters from home, maybe, sir? We might learn what’s happening!”
