He reached the quarterdeck and strode aft to the poop.
This was so very different. Unreal. The ship thrusting into a sea without stars or horizon. Figures pushing past, voices hushed, breathing like old men, groping at cordage and cold metal, often urged on by hard hands and whispered threats.
'This way, sir.' Bowles, the cabin servant, loomed from nowhere and plucked at his sleeve.
Troubridge groped his way into the cabin and peered around. Two twelve pounders shared this space where the captain's private quarters had been. The screens were gone; the place where they had talked together, shared a drink or spoken occasionally of home, was now just an extension of the hull. He thought of the portrait he had seen here, the living face he had seen when he and Bolitho had burst into that tawdry studio in London. The lovely body chained and helpless, awaiting her fate. He saw Bowles move toward him and guessed he had spoken her name aloud. Andromeda.
Would Bolitho be thinking of her at this very moment? Wondering, groping for hope, when all he had before him was duty and obedience?
Bowles said in a matter-of-fact tone, 'I'm going down to the sick bay shortly, sir. Make me self useful, maybe. Anythin' I can fetch you afore I shove off?'
Troubridge shook his head. If he took a drink now, he might not be able to stop.
Aloud he said, 'It's not like going into action at all, is it?'
Bowles seemed to relax. He had his measure. It always helped.
'I 'eard Mr. Fraser tellin' some one of a battle 'e was in a while back, with the Dons it was that time, when it took all day to close with the enemy. Imagine, all day, the Spanish tops' is crawling up an' over the sea like they was enjoyin' it! '
Another shape came out of the darkness. 'Sir Graham, John! ' He heard a gulp, and, 'Sorry, sir, didn't see you 'ere! '
It helped to rally Troubridge more than the unseen speaker would ever know.
Bethune strode past, ducking beneath the deck head beams, his voice sharp, impatient.
'I've just sent for the captain.'
Bowles said, 'He's on the lower gun deck, Sir Graham. I sent word…'
Bethune said something under his breath as the deck swayed over, through an invisible trough. Troubridge heard glass clink against the admiral's buttons, and thought he could smell cognac.
He said, 'The wind's holding, Sir Graham. At this rate we should make our landfall as estimated.'
Bethune snapped, 'When I want advice I shall ask for it, Flags! And when I want the captain I do not expect to have to go searching for him! '
Troubridge listened to spray pattering across the skylight. Perhaps the wind was getting up, or changing? That would throw all their careful plans into disarray.
He imagined the anchorage, as it was marked on the chart, as it was described by the sailing master and, of all people, George Crawford the surgeon, who had visited San Jose in his first ship. It was little enough, but sailors had survived on less.
Troubridge was calm again. It had given him time. This was a mood in which he had never seen Bethune before. A hardness which defied his normally easy nature.
Bethune was saying curtly, 'I'm not sure about Audacity, and Captain Munro. It is asking rather a lot of him. Young, impetuous…' He turned as voices came from the quarterdeck.
Troubridge remembered the room at the Admiralty, the paintings of ships in battle. A time when Bethune had been young, and probably impetuous himself.
Bethune said, 'Ah, Adam, just a word about a few points. In the chart room, I think.'
Composed and apparently relaxed, another change.
Troubridge touched the curved hanger at his side.
He was suddenly reminded of Bethune's previous flag lieutenant. They had hardly spoken but for the formalities of handing over the appointment. Angry, resentful; looking back it was hard to determine. He had been too startled by his own unexpected advance up the ladder.
But the outgoing flag lieutenant had noticed the well-shaped and balanced hanger, which had been a gift from Troubridge's father when he had been commissioned, it seemed a lifetime ago. Long forgotten and dismissed from his mind, his parting remark now rang clearly in Troubridge's memory.
'You'll not need that while you serve Sir Graham Bethune, my young friend! I doubt you'll draw close enough to a real enemy! '
He hesitated, the muffled shipboard noises and occasional shadowy movements very stark and real. Something unknown and different was gnawing at him. He recognized it as fear.
The chart room seemed to be filled with people, under unshuttered lights almost blinding after the stuffy darkness. Eraser the sailing master and Harper, his senior mate, Vincent the signals midshipman, stiff-faced with concentration as he scribbled some notes, probably for the first lieutenant. Two boatswain's mates and Tarrant, the third lieutenant, who appeared to be cleaning a telescope.
They all faded away as Bethune leaned both hands on the table and stared at the uppermost chart. Fraser watched impassively. Nobody, not even an admiral, could fault his tidy calculations and clearly printed notes.
'Show me.'
Eraser's big brass dividers touched the chart and the neat, converging lines of their course. The points of the dividers stopped above the nearest line of latitude. ' San Jose, Sir Graham.' His eyes flickered briefly to Bethune's profile, but gave nothing away. 'Two hours if the wind holds.'
Troubridge found that he was gripping the hanger and pressing it against his hip as if to steady himself. Two hours, the sailing master had said. The little frigate Audacity would begin her mock attack. He wanted to say something, to wipe his eyes in the stinging glare.
Two hours. On the chart the land still looked many miles distant.
Some one said, 'Captain's coming, sir.'
Troubridge realized for the first time that Bethune's personal servant was also present, in a corner by the chart rack, his eyes shaded by his hat, his mouth a tight line. A man who showed little emotion at any time. Efficient, discreet, probably closer to Bethune than any of them.
Shutters squeaked and then closed again. Troubridge saw the captain framed against the door and the after guard musket rack, now empty. He had known Bolitho for so short a time, only since Bethune had requested his appointment as his flag captain. Commanded would be nearer the truth.
There was never any doubt about it. He had heard one of the old clerks remark, 'It's not what you know in Admiralty, it's who you know! ' Troubridge looked at Bolitho now. A face he would always remember. Dark eyes, sometimes withdrawn, sometimes hostile, but without the arrogance he had seen and found in many. He recalled Bethune's comment about Audacity's young captain: 'impetuous'. Perhaps that, too, but not one to sacrifice the men he commanded, and led.
He started as Bethune remarked, 'When you are with us, Flags, I want to clarify a few final points.'
Some one chuckled, and Adam Bolitho smiled directly at him, and said, 'Waiting is often the worst part, and that is all but over.' He looked at the chart as if his mind was momentarily somewhere else. 'I recall reading an account of the opening engagement at Trafalgar. A young lieutenant wrote of it to his parents: here began the din of war.' They watched his hand as it touched the chart by Eraser's dividers. 'So let us begin…'
Dugald Eraser thought afterwards it was something he would record in his log.
Even though most of Audacity's seamen and marines had been standing to throughout the night, or snatching brief moments to doze at their stations, the crash of her bow-chaser came as a shock. Some ran to the shrouds or climbed the gangways above the tethered guns as if expecting to see something; others, the more experienced hands, glanced at their companions as if to confirm what they already knew.
It was not just another exercise or drill; the plan outlined by the captain through his officers was real. It was now.
A few gulls, early scavengers which had glided down to meet the ship, wheeled angrily away, their screams following the echo of the first shot. They had doubtless flown out from the land. They were that close.
A gun captain pressed his hands on the breech of his twelve-pounder and muttered, 'That's right, tell the whole bloody world what we're about! '
The air was warm, his shirt clinging to his skin, but the gun was like ice. He heard somebody laugh nearby and
