CHAPTER ELEVEN
Colours could now be distinguished, although the sun dipping to the west was already beginning to throw shadows across the near side of the mountains, giving shape and design to apparently smooth peaks. There was some grass on the lower slopes, not many trees and those were evergreens stunted by constant exposure to the trade winds. Although he had only seen paintings of it, Ramage could understand Southwick's reference to the sugarloaf hill being like the famous one overlooking Rio de Janeiro.
'A tiny Antigua,' Aitken said. 'It has that same dried up and wasted look in places, like a deserted Highland hill farm.'
'I'm glad I'm not going to command the garrison,' Ramage said, 'although it seems a good spot for young subalterns dodging gambling debts and the furious fathers of jilted brides!'
He caught sight of small waves breaking on the nearest shore and noted that they showed the Calypso was now less than two miles away. Curious how one had these little mental pictures to help estimate distance when anything was close. At two miles one could see a small building on the beach; at a mile the colour of its roof was distinguishable. A man standing on the beach could be picked out at 700 yards and if he was walking one could spot him at half a mile.
'Pass this southernmost headland about a mile off,' Ramage instructed Southwick. 'That should keep us clear of any reefs. As soon as we round it we'll then stretch along the leeward side of the island under topsails and hope to find an anchorage for the night.'
Aitken came up holding a slate. 'If the highest peak is fifteen hundred feet, sir, I calculate the island is almost exactly two and a half miles long.'
Ramage nodded: the figure coincided with his rough and ready measurement some minutes ago, when he divided the height of the peak into the length of the island and got an answer of nine.
Now the men were at sheets and braces and the quartermaster kept an eye on Southwick, waiting for the order that would begin the Calypso's turn round the narrow southeastern corner of the island. It was, Ramage had to admit, an island with little to recommend it. Rocky - every inch of coast he had seen so far was backed by jagged cliffs - it had patches of green, indicating grass, but the trees were little more than overgrown shrubs. Something of the coast of southern Tuscany, something of the Leeward and Virgin Islands, but nothing of the lushness of Grenada or Martinique. This was not surprising, because it was only just inside the Tropics, receiving the full force of the Atlantic winds and very little rain.
It was a long, narrow island: as the Calypso sailed diagonally across the end he could see it was less than a mile wide. Ah, now the western side was beginning to open up and almost at once Southwick began bellowing a stream of orders to wear ship: for several hours the Calypso had been on the larboard tack, the wind coming steadily over the larboard quarter. Now she was coming round to starboard almost eight points, nearly ninety degrees, to steer - Ramage walked over to the binnacle and looked down at the weather-side compass - northwest.
The creak of yards being braced up, the thump and slam of sails filling again, the grunts of dozens of men hauling on sheets and braces, the cries of bosun's mates, the curses of the quartermaster as the two men at the wheel swung it over too far, making the Calypso bear up a point or two and bringing a glower from the master.
Ramage was relieved to see that although the weather coast was sheer and inhospitable, the lee coast had half a dozen prominent headlands poking seaward into the distance.
Aitken gestured towards them. 'There should be some good bays between them, sir,' he said. Ramage nodded, for a moment puzzled, but as the Calypso surged ahead on the new tack he shook his head as if to clear his thoughts: he had been at sea too long and was imagining things.
'Deck there - foremast here!'
'Foremast - deck!' Southwick answered.
'I saw a small boat beyond the headland, sir! Red it was,' Jackson shouted. 'Then it went behind the cliff.'
Ramage said quickly: 'Just acknowledge: I saw it, too!'
'Very well, keep a sharp lookout!' Southwick said in the usual response to a routine hail.
'What's an open boat doing here, sir?' the master exclaimed.
'From a Brazilian fishing boat, perhaps. Or maybe there is asettlement here after all.'
Even as he said it, Ramage realized the problems mustered behind that one brief glimpse of a boat. A settlement meant people lived here; presumably they, or the country to which they belonged, claimed possession of Trinidade. Most probably it was Portugal, but it could be Spain.
It was a point not covered in his orders; the Admiralty had assumed the island was uninhabited. Yet... Lord St Vincent had, verbally, given what would undoubtedly be the Admiralty's view: ownership of the Ilha da Trinidade was not covered in the Treaty, so Britain could claim it. Any settlers would have to leave; he would take them back whence they came - Brazil, probably.
Aitken said matter-of-factly: 'Probably just fishermen: their vessel anchored in a bay while they get water, and their jolly boat is rowing round looking for lobster to make a nice supper!'
That would be it. Ramage felt sheepish and was thankful he had kept his mouth shut: once again his imagination had outdistanced his reasoning. A fishing boat from Bahia - it was so obvious! At that moment Jackson yelled excitedly.
'Deck there - there's a ship anchored in that first bay!'
Ramage grabbed the only telescope and before he could lift it Jackson was shouting again: 'Merchant ship . . . British colours ... a John Company ship.'
Southwick said: 'Her water's gone bad and she's come here to fill casks!'
'Deck there! I can just make out the stern of another merchant ship, French colours ...'
By now Ramage could see the first ship. Yes, John Company, flying faded but distinctive red and white 'gridiron' colours of the Honourable East India Company, the Union flag in one canton, with horizontal stripes. And now he could make out the stern of the French ship as the headland appeared to slide to starboard with the Calypso's approach, beginning to give a glimpse of the rest of the bay. She was almost as big as the John Company ship and her sails neatly furled, too. A quarterboat was hoisted in the davits and there was another boat streaming astern on its painter.
Ramage found himself listening to the monotonous chant of the depths coming from the leadsman busy in the chains, and picturing the shape of the sea bed. It was shallowing only gradually and the old adage of high cliffs and deep water seemed true. But there could be no rocks or reefs at this end, since these ships had sailed in.
'We'll probably anchor to seaward of those ships,' Ramage snapped, and Southwick hurriedly grabbed the speaking-trumpet and quickly gave orders to clew up the main and forecourses. Almost immediately and as if by magic, because the appropriate ropes were hauled from the deck, the Calypso's two largest sails lost their curves and were hauled up to the yards like window curtains lifted by an impatient busybody.
At once the frigate began to slow down. Earlier, the bow wave curling back from the stem had sounded like water pouring through a sluice gate; now it chuckled happily and at the same time, as the ship reached the sheltered water in the lee of the island, she stopped the gentle pitch and roll. Instead, sailing upright under topsails only and with a soldier's wind, the Calypso was like a cheerful fishwife losing her boisterous gait.
'Foremast here, sir - there's a third ship -'
'Mainmast here - and a fourth!' Orsini yelled, not troubling to hide his excitement.
As they came into view round the headland Ramage examined them carefully through the telescope. 'The third one's British, I can make out her colours. She's in good order; sails neatly furled - too neatly, it seems to me! And the fourth is . . . yes, Dutch. I thought for a moment she was French; the wind plays tricks with her colours.'
'Four ships at anchor in a place like this? What the devils gone wrong?' a puzzled Southwick asked, preparing to give orders to clew up the foretopsail.
'Could be water,' Ramage said. 'If they all called at the Cape and took water from the same place and it later went bad...' Then he shook his head. 'No, it couldn't be that; French and Dutch ships wouldn't call at the Cape - coming from India or Batavia they wouldn't know about the Treaty.'
Aitken said: 'Should I send the men to general quarters, sir?'
Ramage smiled at the Scot's reluctance to abandon wartime routines. 'There are a couple of British ships anchored peacefully in the bay, Mr Aitken!'
'Aye, sir, but it's like walking into a glen twenty miles from the nearest village and finding a dozen men camped there - it gives you a shock and makes you suspicious.'
'Yes, because they're unshaven and you don't know who they are, but these ships have their colours flying.' Ramage looked at the four ships again. 'New colours, too, most of them!'
Southwick sniffed - clearly he disapproved of the whole thing - and inquired patiently: 'Where do you want us to anchor, sir?'
Now the Calypso was almost past the headland and Ramage saw a deep bay was opening up surrounded by cliffs, the northern end formed by a less prominent bluff. The four ships -
'Foremast lookout here, sir - there's a fifth ship, almost hidden by the third and fourth, French flag.'
'Very well. Any -'
'Sixth, sir!' Jackson interrupted from aloft. 'She's close in to the cliffs. Smaller, looks fast, twelve guns. Might be a privateer, from her appearance. Ah, I can just see her colours. British, sir.'
Five merchant ships and a possible privateer, all peacefully anchored. Aformer privateer, Ramage corrected himself.
Well, obviously Trinidade had plenty of fresh water, and equally obviously the Admiralty might know nothing of the island, but it was well known to merchant ships regularly sailing to the Cape, India and Batavia . . . Probably, Ramage thought, if the Admiralty had written to the Honourable East India Company and asked them for details, a delighted John Company would have sent a chart with the watering places marked.
'Mainmast, sir,' Orsini called down. 'The small boat we first sighted - she's going alongside the one we think is a privateer.'
Suddenly Ramage found himself feeling cheerful: with five merchant ships in the anchorage, there would be some entertaining. The John Company ship would have passengers, and John Company masters, well paid, lived well and were often interesting men. The second British ship looked interesting. The Dutch ship was big enough to be one of the Dutch East India Company's fleet. And the Frenchmen, he thought, might not yet know of the peace treaty . . . no, they must, he realized, otherwise they would not be in here peacefully at anchor with British ships. They must all know - but how? The only way the British would know would be for a frigate to have reached the Cape with dispatches. That could have happened. But Dutch and French? Well, they could have met other Dutch and French ships, outward bound.
