An Eye of the Fleet

The latter, however, had re-established something of his former ascendancy in the cockpit. Drinkwater's absence had helped, but a few new appointees to the frigate in the form of very young midshipmen had given Augustus Morris more victims. There was, though, one new member of the mess whom Drinkwater was quick to realise was a potential ally. Midshipman Cranston, a silent man of about thirty, had little liking for Morris's bombast or bullying. A former seaman, Cranston had fought his way up from the lower deck by sheer ability. He was clever and tough, and utterly unscrupulous. Drinkwater liked him instantly. He also liked another, though much younger addition to the mess. Mr White was a pale, diminutive boy of thirteen. White was the obvious choice for victimisation by Morris.

In the course of the succeeding weeks the now overpopulated cockpit, whose members varied in age and pursuits was to become a bedlam of noise and quarrels.

Towards the end of November Captain Hope expressed himself ready once more to cruise against the enemy and the frigate left Plymouth beating west and south to resume her station. The weather was now uniformly foul. Depression succeeded depression and a cycle was established of misery below decks and unremitted labour above. The outbreaks of petty thieving, fighting, insubordination and drunkenness that were the natural consequences of the environment broke out again. When a man was flogged for petty theft Drinkwater wondered if it was the same man who had been instrumental in the retaking of the Algonquin. At all events he no longer baulked at such a spectacle, inured now to it, though he knew other methods existed to keep men at unpleasant labour. But they had no part here, in the overcrowded decks of Cyclops and he felt no anger with Captain Hope for maintaining discipline with the iron hand that enabled the Royal Navy to sustain its ceaseless vigilance.

To the ship's company of Cyclops it was the dull, monotonous routine of normality. A fight with the enemy would have come as a blessed relief to both officers and men.

Captain Hope appeared on deck as little as possible, nursing a grievance that he had not yet received his share of the prize money for the capture of the Santa Teresa. Lieutenant Devaux showed signs of strain from similar motives, his usual bantering tones giving way to an uncharacteristic harassment of his subordinate lieutenants, especially Mr Skelton, a young and inexperienced substitute for the late Lieutenant Price.

Old Blackmore, the sailing master, observed all and said little. He found these peevish King's Officers, deprived of their twopence prize money and behaving like old maids, distasteful ship-mates. Bred in a hard school he expected to be uncomfortable at sea and was rarely disappointed.

Mr Surgeon Appleby, ever the philosopher, shook his head sadly over his blackstrap. He ruminated on the condition of the ship to anyone who cared to listen.

'You see, gentlemen, about you the natural fruits of man's own particular genius: Corruption.' He enunciated the word with a professional relish as if sniffing an amputated stump, seeking gangrene. 'Corruption is a process arrived at after a period of growing and maturation. Medically speaking it occurs after death, whether in the case of an apple which had fallen from the bough and no longer receives sustenance from the tree, or, in the case of the human body which corrupts irrevocably after the heart has ceased to function. In both cases the span of time may be seen as a complete cycle.

'But in the case of spiritual corruption, I assure you, the process is faster and independent of the heart. Observe our noble ship's company. A pride of lions in battle…' Appleby paused to fortify his monologue with blackstrap. '…They are corrupted by the foetid atmosphere of a frigate.

'Sit down, Mr Drinkwater, sit down and remember this when you are an Admiral. As a consequence all manner of evils appear; drunkenness, quarrelling, insubordination, sodomy, theft, and worst of all, for it is a crime against God and not merely man, discontent. And what nurtures that discontent?'

'Why prize money!'

'What damned prize money, Bones?' interrupted Lieutenant Keene.

'Exactly my friend. What prize money? You won it. You were awarded it, but where the deuce is it? Why, lining the pockets of Milor' Sandwich and his Tory toadies. Someone is growing fat on merely the interest. God's blood they too are as corrupted as this stinking ship. I tell you, gentlemen, this will rebound upon them one day. One day it will not only be the damned Yankees that defy their Lordships but Tom Bowline and Jack Rattlin…'

'Aye and Harry Appleby!' shouted a voice.

A bored laugh drifted round the gloom of the gunroom. Cyclops plunged into a sea and expletives exploded in short, exasperated grunts from several voices.

'Who'd be a god-damned sailor?'

To Drinkwater these weeks were less painful than to most. It is true he dreamed of Elizabeth but his love did not oppress him. Rather it sustained him. Blackmore was delighted that he had acquired his certificate from Calvert and tutored him in some of the more abstruse mysteries of celestial navigation. He also struck up a firm friendship with Lieutenant Wheeler of the Marines. Whenever the weather moderated sufficiently to allow it Wheeler and Drinkwater engaged in fencing practice. The frequent sight of his 'enemy' thus engaged was a painful reminder of his humiliation to Morris; and the longer Drinkwater seemed immune from Morris the more the latter wished to revenge himself upon the younger man. Morris began to form his earlier alliances with like-minded men amongst the least desirable elements of Cyclops's company.

Only this time there was more purpose to the cabal. Morris was degenerating into a psychopathic creature to whom reality was blurred, and in whom hatred burned with a flame as potent as love.

Christmas and New Year came and went almost unnoticed as they can only at sea. It was a dull day in the middle of January before any event occurred to break the monotony of life aboard the frigate.

'Sail Ho!'

'Where away?'

'Lee beam, sir!' Lieutenant Skelton sprung into the mizen rigging and levelled his glass. Jumping down he turned to Drinkwater. 'Mr Drinkwater!'

'M'compliments to the Captain and there's a sail to starboard, might be a frigate.'

Drinkwater went below. Hope was asleep, dozing in his cot when the midshipman's knock woke him. He hurried on deck.

'Call all hands, Mr Skelton, and bear away to investigate.'

A topsail was clearly visible now, white as a gull's wing against a squall, for a grey overcast obscured what sun there was. Occasionally a fleeting glimpse of a pale lemon orb appeared which Blackmore patiently strove to capture in the horizon glass of his quadrant. The two ships closed rapidly and after an hour came up with one another.

Recognition signals revealed the other to be friendly and she turned out to be Galatea. The newcomer hove to under Cyclops's lee and a string of bright bunting appeared at her foremasthead.

'Signal, sir,' said Drinkwater flicking the pages of the codebook, 'Repair on board.'

Hope bridled. 'Who does Edgecumbe think he is, damn him!'

Devaux suppressed a smile as Wheeler muttered sotto voce: 'A Tory Member of Parliament, perhaps…'

After a little delay, just long enough for it to be impertinent, Hope snapped, 'Very well, acknowledge!'

'Your gig, sir?' asked the solicitous Devaux.

'Don't smirk, sir!' rasped Hope irritably.

'Beg pardon, sir,' replied Devaux still smiling.

'Huh!' Hope turned away furious. Edgecumbe was a damned, worthless time-server half Hope's age. Hope had as much time as lieutenant to his credit as Edgecumbe had time at sea.

'Gig's ready, sir.'

Drinkwater laid the gig alongside Galatea. He watched his captain's spindly legs disappear to a twittering of pipes. A face looked down at him.

'Moornin' lad.' It was Lieutenant Collingwood.

'Morning sir.'

'I see you have clean ducks on today,' the officer smiled before bursting into a violent and debilitating fit of