10. Code Of Conduct
'CAPTAIN'S comin', sir!'
Denis O'Beirne straightened his hack and wiped his hands on a piece of rag. A seaman lay on the sickbay table, his naked limbs like wax in the spiralling lantern light. He could have been dead, but a faint heartbeat and the flickering eyelids said otherwise.
'Move him presently.' O'Beirne looked at the bandaged stump and sighed inwardly. Another onearmed survivor to end up on a waterfront somewhere. But at least he was alive. He seemed to realise what his assistant had said and turned to see Captain Bolitho in the doorway, his body at a steep angle as Unrivalled leaned her shoulder into the sea, the wind strong and steady across her quarter.
'You wanted me?' I Ic glanced around the sickbay with its bottles and swabs, its smell of suffering and death. Above all, the stronger aroma of rum. The navy's cure, to kill pain, to offer hope even when there was none. He hated this place and all like it. It was stupid, but he had long since given up fighting it.
O'Beirne took it in with practised eyes. Strain, anger perhaps.
'There is someone asking to speak with you, sir. One of Paradox's men, her boatswain.' He paused briefly to examine his hands. 'He has not long, I fear.'
Some last spark of resistance or disbelief; a dying declaration was not unknown among sailors. What would I say?
'Very well.' He regarded the surgeon more closely. Outwardly he showed no sign of exhaustion, although he had been working here or aboard the prize, Intrepido, since the brief action had ceased. Seven Sisters also carried a surgeon. O'Beirne's comment, of a sort, said it all.
Adam followed his large figure into the darker interior of the orlop, which seemed to be full of wounded or injured men. Some lay still, recovering or quietly dying, it was impossible to tell. Others were propped up against the ship's timbers, their eyes moving, following the swaying lanterns, or just staring into the shadows. Stunned by the realisation that they had survived, and as yet only half-aware of the injuries O'Beirne's small, strong fingers had explored and dealt with. And here too was the stench of rum.
Three had died, and had been buried after dark, their second night at sea after leaving the anchorage, with the wrecked and burned-out Paradox a lingering reminder; each corpse was double-shotted to carry it swiftly into the depths. There were always sharks following patiently, but sailors believed the dead were safer at night.
O'Beirne murmured, 'His name is Polglaze. It was grapeshot. There was nothing more I could do.'
Adam gripped his arm, sensing his sadness, so rare in a manof-war, where a surgeon often had to face sights far worse than in the height of battle.
He knelt beside the dying man who, like the others, was propped against one of the frigate's massive frames; he could hear his breathing, the rattle in his throat. He was bleeding to death.
Adam felt the steeper roll of the hull. The wind had found them, too late for this man and others like him.
'You came, zur.' The eyes settled on his face, reflecting the light from the nearby lantern, and fixed on the tarnished gold lace and gilt buttons. Something he understood. Not a young man, but powerfully built, or had been. When he reached out to take Adam's hand it was unable to grasp him.
Adam said, 'Polglaze. A fine Cornish name, am I right?'
The man struggled to sit up and perhaps lean forward, but the pain halted him like another piece of grape.
His grip strengthened almost imperceptibly. 'St Keverne, Cap'n.'
'You can't get much further south than that. A wild coast when it wants to be, eh?' I Ic wanted to leave. He was not helping. This man who had been born not so far from Penzance was beyond aid now.
But the boatswain named Polglaze might even have smiled as he muttered, ' Fes a wild shore right enough. The Manacles claimed more'n a few vessels when I were a lad there!'
O'Beirne said softly, 'I think that's time enough.'
Adam half-turned, wondering which one of them he meant.
He felt the man's hard hand tighten around his, as if all his remaining strength was there, and the need which was keeping him alive.
He said quietly, 'I'll be here. Be certain of it.'
He listened to the uneven breathing. Wanting it to stop, to end his suffering. He had done enough; this hard, rough hand said it all. The countless leagues sailed, ropes fought and handled, sea, wind, and now this.
He could hear Tyacke's words. Bitter, scathing. And, for what?
Polglaze said suddenly, 'I wanted to tell you about Paradox, Cap'n. How it was, what they did. A fine little craft she was.'
Adam tried not to swallow or move. Did he know what had happened in the end? The rising pall of smoke.
'It was all planned, see, the boats was put down, and some of our best men sent aboard.' His voice seemed stronger. Reliving it. 'Our Mr Hastilow was ready, too. He'd done it often enough, see.
He broke into a fit of coughing. A hand came from the shadows with a cloth to dab his mouth. There was blood on it when it withdrew.
Polglaze groaned and then said, 'We was too far off, an' the wind too hard on 'em. I thought mebbee we should have waited 'til the others came. An' then the lieutenant orders a change of tack. I dunno why, exactly.'
Adam recalled Cristie's surprise. The wrong bearing. And the schooner's ragged sailors, their obvious hostility. But as a company they were as one. Polglaze could not even remember the lieutenant's name. He had replaced the luckless Finlay, but he was not one of them. Now he never would.
Polglaze gave a great sigh. 'An' then we struck. Nobody's fault, we was just obeyin' orders.' He sighed again, but the grip was just as strong. 'We never carried a senior officer afore, see?'
Adam bowed his head to hear other, unformed words. Turnbull must have ordered the change of tack, and the new lieutenant would obey; he did not know that coast like the others.
Polglaze was looking at him intently. 'The winter'll be lettin' go in Cornwall now, I reckon?' His head fell forward and he was dead.
O'Beirne stooped to prise the fingers from Adam's hand.
'Yes, it will.' Adam stood, his hair brushing a deckhead beam, the cool timber quietening him, sustaining him, although his mind was still blurred with anger and with sorrow.
He said, 'Thank you for fetching me. It was something he needed to tell me, to share, in his own fashion.' He knew O'Beirne's men were lurking in the shadows, ready to carry the dead boatswain to the sailmaker. For his last voyage, as one captain had described it.
And one day perhaps, in the tiny village of St Keverne, where the land looked out over those treacherous rocks, the Manacles, if there was still anyone who cared, the man named Polglaze would be remembered, he hoped for his courage and his loyalty.
He turned to leave, to face Galbraith's unspoken questions.
But he paused and looked down again.
You were murdered.
O'Beirne watched him go. I Ic had not caught what the captain had just murmured, but he had seen the dark eyes in the lantern's glow, and believed he knew him well enough to guess.
He recalled the sights which had confronted him upon his visit to the slaver Intrepido. Spanish, but she could have been under any flag. Only a brig, yet she had carried over six hundred slaves crammed into her holds, packed so tightly that they could barely breathe. In a hold filled with women, like Albatroz, one had already died and others were in a terrible state, corpse and dying chained together amongst the ordure.
He signalled to his men. Sailors like the dead boatswain endured much on this godforsaken coast. They obeyed orders. He thought of Adam Bolitho's face. Sometimes it was not enough.
At nightfall, that same captain read the familiar lines from his prayer hook, and they buried his fellow Cornishman with full honours.
The last voyage.
Leigh Galbraith walked to the entry port, wincing as he left the shadow of one of the awnings. Freetown was unchanged, except that it seemed even hotter, as if all the air had been sucked out of that wide harbour, up as far
