Once the frigate was clear of the Baie de Foix, Ramage told Aitken: 'Have the poop lanterns lit', and a few minutes later was cursing the sooty smell that the gentle northwesterly breeze would keep drifting forward across the quarterdeck.
Southwick came bustling up, his work on the fo'c'sle completed. 'It's the same as being the first out of church, sir; you avoid meeting all the people you don't like.'
'I can't picture you in or out of a church.'
'True, but my sister always makes me go to both matins and evensong when I am on leave.'
'I should think so', Ramage said. 'She has a well-developed sense of duty.'
'She's more concerned with showing her brother off to the neighbours', Southwick grumbled. 'I don't get the impression she worries too much about my immortal soul.'
'Well, someone ought to, because I have the feeling' - Ramage waved astern towards the merchant ships now setting sail - 'that it's going to be strained for the next few days.'
'Escorting a convoy with one ship is like leading a flock of sheep without a dog', Southwick said crossly. 'No one to chase up the laggards.'
'Cheer up', Ramage teased him. 'It could be worse.'
'I doubt it. I've never escorted a convoy of British ships where at least half the masters weren't mules. But a mixture of French and Spanish - can you imagine it, sir?'
'I can, only too vividly', Ramage admitted. 'And the Dons don't trust the French anyway, and the French are alreadyangry that the escorts - they were expecting more than a frigate - did not arrive.'
'I know what I'd like to do', Southwick muttered.
'What's that?'
'Board the biggest two, send 'em to Gibraltar as prizes, and sink the rest.'
'So would I', Ramage said quietly, 'but the prizes would never get there. They'd be recaptured by the French or Spanish in a few hours, and we'd end up losing a couple of good prize crews.'
'I suppose so, sir', Southwick said grudgingly, puzzled because he knew the order sent to each of the ships was to make for a place in the opposite direction to Gibraltar, and that the Calypso was going to lead them there. And a discreet inquiry of Aitken showed that the captain had not given a hint to the first lieutenant either about what he intended to do with these mules. Look at them, he told himself, they've only just left the bay, and have the Calypso's three lights to make for, as clear as a lighthouse, and they're already spreading out across ten points of the horizon.
CHAPTER TEN
Will Stafford had worked it all out without any difficulty, he told Jackson and Rossi. The captain had very cunningly ordered the convoy to come to the bay; now he was going to lead it to Gibraltar, lowering the French colours as the Calypso hauled her wind to make up for Europa Point.
The three men, off watch, were sitting on the fo'c'sle gossiping and enjoying the mellow Mediterranean night, finding it too hot with the light following wind to go below.
Jackson, pointing at the Pole Star, said mildly: 'We're steering about southeast. That means Sardinia, Sicily, Egypt or the Morea. It doesn't mean Gibraltar, which happens to be in the opposite direction.'
'We're just getting a good offing before we turn into the Gut', Stafford said airily. 'We don't want to get caught in a Levanter with Spain to leeward. These mules couldn't claw off a carpet, let alone a dead lee shore.'
'They've been clawing off lee shores for years', Jackson commented. 'You don't live long in the Mediterranean otherwise.'
'Italy', Rossi said, as though announcing its discovery. 'The captain is sailing back to Italy.'
'On this course it could be - the southern part, anyway', Jackson agreed. 'But why Italy?'
'He has friends there - I know', Rossi said darkly.
'The Marchesa's living in England, Volterra's occupied, we've just finished making the Calypso very unpopular round Elba, so I can tell you the captain has no friends there - I know!' Jackson said.
'Why did Mr Orsini go to all the ships when they arrived then?'
'Because he speaks fluent French', Jackson said.
'And Italian', Rossi said triumphantly.
'And Spanish!' said Stafford, not to be outdone.
'So he could talk with the Spanish captains as well as the French', Jackson said. 'If he spoke a word of Italian tonight, it was to swear when he banged his shin on a thwart.'
'How do you know he banged his shin on a thwart?' demanded Rossi. 'You weren't in the boat.'
'My oath', Stafford grumbled, 'you really are 'ard work, Rossi my old sparrer.'
'Sparrer? Who is he?'
'Sparrow', Jackson said. 'Stafford's English is not very good. The bird. Little brown things, you see thousands of them everywhere.'
'Why does he call me a sparrer, then? Rossignol, perhaps. I sing not so good as the nightcap -'
'Nightingale', Jackson corrected him.
'- as the nightingale, then, but as for this sparrer -'
'Look, t'aint nothing ter do with singing', Stafford said. 'It's - well, where I come from to call someone 'My old cock sparrer' is like, well, 'mate', or 'chum'.'
'Perhaps, but this cock sparrer I do not like', Rossi said firmly. They shit all over you. I know. Even in Milan Cathedral during the Blessing.'
'All right, all right, I'm sorry', Stafford said. 'But why are we going to Italy?'
'I didn't say we were definitely going', Rossi said impatiently. 'I just hope we are.'
'Why?'
'This bloddy Spanish blackstrap, that's why', Rossi said crossly. 'The only true red wine is from Toscana - Tuscany, you call it. This Spanish vinegar the purser was given in Gibraltar - even Napolitani wouldn't drink it, and they're not particular if it is free.'
'Mention it to the captain', Jackson teased.
'Mama mia, you know how much he drinks.'
Jackson looked astern. 'Well, the convoy is forming up astern of us, so the course is southeast for the night anyway.'
'Very strange', Stafford said. 'You must admit that, Jacko; it's very strange.'
'I admit that', Jackson said readily enough, 'but it's 'very strange' things on Mr Ramage's part that's put a pile of prize money in your pocket. How much are you worth now?'
'A few 'undred guineas', Stafford admitted. 'Enough to buy a nice quiet inn whenever I feel the urge to 'run' or the war ends.'
'Don't 'run'', Jackson advised. They'd piek you up in a couple of days, and the soldiers would relieve you of your guineas, too.'
'I was only jokin', but I got enough put away for a nice wife and a nice old age. In fac' I was thinking only the other day, the pressgang did me a good turn.'
'Yes, you certainly wouldn't have made a tenth of that burgling.'
'Burgling?' Stafford was horrifïed. 'I was a locksmith.'
'Yes, we know', Rossi said ironically. 'Always working by night.'
'Shut up!' hissed Jackson. 'What's that noise?'
It was not a single noise but a continuous one, starting off with an eerie creaking and groaning aloft which quickly merged into a crackling like the snapping of dried sticks and reached a climax with a bang like a gunshot. The three men looking aloft and aft, up at the foremast, saw the foreyard break into halves and come crashing down to the deck, leaving the topsail on the yard above ripped to pieces and beginning to flog in the wind.
Both Rossi and Stafford began to run aft but Jackson shouted to them to stop. In the few seconds it had taken to happen he had realized that as the two halves of the great yard - the second largest in the ship, seventy feet long and a foot and a half in diameter - hit the deck there had been no screams of pain, so it was unlikely that any injured men were trapped. And there was still more wreckage to fall - blocks the size of small church bells, perhaps the stunsail booms were still up there, caught in the rigging and yet to fall ... As he waited his fears were confirmed; heavy objectsthudded down on to the deck like falling roundshot, blocks slid off the ropes or ripped tackles, great sections of the torn foresail, which had been furled on the yard, fell like bales of straw, still bound by gaskets and tangled in clewlines and buntlines.
Then he saw men coming from aft with lanterns, advancing cautiously. 'Right lads, now we can go, but watch for anything else coming down.'
Aitken and Southwick had been standing with Ramage on the quarterdeck when the yard broke; both had begun to run forward, both had been halted by Ramage for the same reason Jackson had stopped the two seamen.
Once lanterns had been hurriedly lit, Ramage stayed at the quarterdeck rail as the first lieutenant and master went forward to begin with a search for injured men. Ramage knew only too well what had happened; all that mattered was first that no men had been hurt and second that the yard could be repaired. The carpenter was a good man and no doubt he and his mates could fish the two halves together again, because although the Calypso had spare topsail yards and topgallant yards stowed along the booms beside the boats, she did not have spare fore and main yards. He picked up the speaking trumpet and called for the bosun.
The man came running up the quarterdeck ladder as though answering a routine hail.
'Get the spare topsail sent up on deck from the sailroom, and a pair of slings. Leave the new foresail for the time being. I want that topsail hoisted up and bent on first. From the look of it there won't be much to save from the old one.'
'No, sir. Pity the sheets didn't part ...'
