them.
'Why, in th' uniform t' be expected of the officer-in-charge o' the naval detachment in the assault on Port Mahon,' Kydd said loftily.
'Naval detachment?' the man said, puzzled.
'Yes. I mean t' press half a hundred of y'r men, if y' please.' A quick glance told him that at fifty men each on the dozen or so guns there were more than five hundred in all, probably contributed evenly by each ship in the squadron including his own: they could spare a tenth of their number.
'Press my men!' the lieutenant stared in amazement and began to laugh. At Kydd's glare his mirth tailed away.
'We must secure th' dockyard, board all ships in harbour and attend t' any prisoners,' Kydd said, in a hard voice. 'I don't think fifty men overmuch f'r the task, d' you?'
He looked past the officer at the weary men coiling down the drag-lines, pulling off encamping kit and flexing tired muscles. He strode over to them, leaving the lieutenant to hurry along behind. 'I say, this is out of order, sir! You may not—'
'If I have t' ask th' colonel he'll make it a hundred,' Kydd snapped, without looking back. He had spotted Dobbie from Tenacious.
The stocky seaman's face creased with pleasure as Kydd went up to him. 'Sir! Never thought ter see yez again, goin' ashore with them dagoes.'
'Dobbie—I want fifty good men f'r particular service in Mahon. Seamen I must have, knows the difference between a buntline and a bobstay an' can be relied on in a fight.'
'Aye aye, sir.'
'Have 'em mustered here for me in an hour.'
There was one further matter he had to attend to. There was every prospect of his meeting the enemy on the morrow and the quartermaster had offered him the loan of a heavy sabre or a token small-sword, but neither appealed. He went to an arms chest on the limber of one gun and helped himself to a cutlass; this would be of use only in close quarters fighting, but a defensive action was all that he expected for the seamen. It was not the fine sword he had now grown used to, but the heft and balance of the plain black weapon was familiar and pleasing, and he slipped the scabbard into its frog, settling it comfortably on his belt.
Later that night, after he had seen to his men, Kydd dined with the officers in their mess-tent. It was both strange and comforting. The singular appearance of the red check tartan of a regiment of Highlanders, with their arcane mess rituals and free-flowing whisky, was another world to the ordered uniformity of a naval wardroom. But the loyal toast was sturdily proposed and the same warmth of brotherhood reached out to Kydd. 'Give ye joy of y'r victory, sir,' Kydd acknowledged to the army captain sitting to his side.
The officer raised an eyebrow. 'You think so?'
'Why, yes! I know nothing of y'r military affairs but t' land and take a town seems t' me to be a fine thing for such numbers.'
The captain examined his whisky, holding it to the light so the glass twinkled prettily. 'It was fine done the landing, I'll grant— but the general must have had inside intelligence to change the place of landing at such notice. Quite took the dons on the hop.'
Kydd glowed, but now was not the time to claim recognition.
'But then I don't envy Quesada—an impossible task, I'd say.'
'Quesada?'
'Their commander. One can feel pity for the man. His soldiery has rotted from too much garrison duty and they're near useless. And reinforcements? All he got before you fellows cleared the seas of 'em was a couple of battalions of Swiss.'
'The Swiss?' Kydd was hazily aware of the tangled complexity of allegiances in Europe but had not heard they were at war with Switzerland.
'Yes, German-Swiss mercenaries. Austrians took 'em prisoner, then sold them to the Spanish for two thaler a head. Not my idea of a bargain. When we landed at Addaya they were opposing us. Then your frigate let fly a broadside or two and in twenty minutes they broke and ran.'
'Still runnin'?' Kydd chuckled.
'In fact, no. We took a hundred deserters and told 'em that if they could bring in their friends we'd see them right in the matter of employment. Gen'l Stuart is thinking of forming up a foreign corps of some sort, and now we have the lot—a thousand and more.'
Kydd agreed. With rabble like that Quesada could do nothing to stop the English. Then he remembered, with sudden apprehension: 'Did ye see the Spanish fleet at all? If we're beat at sea ...'
'The fleet? I'm not sure about that. I did catch a sight of the Spanish, but they weren't your big fellows, only one line of guns.' Frigates, realised Kydd, with jubilation.
'And last I saw of 'em was the gallant commodore haring off over the horizon, tally-ho, after them with all flags flying.'
Kydd grinned. 'So
'He has. Without command of the sea of any kind he can't get supplies or reinforcements, nothing. And he'll never get the Minorcans to fight for him.'
'So ye'd say we've won?' Kydd said cautiously.
'By no means. Quesada is off with the bulk of his troops to Ciudadela—their major town with city walls and fortifications. A siege will be a tedious thing with no certainty at the end of it. And tomorrow we march on Mahon, which is even more heavily fortified. While we hold the country, Quesada will hold the towns—and we can't wait for
