A private revenge

'It's no use ... there's nothing here ...'

The heat was filling the air with a weight of its own. The men were sodden with their own sweat and Frey's shirt clung to him like the dress of a Parisian courtesan. The effects of the early breakfast and the Spanish aguardiente with which the boat's crew had broken their fast were wearing off.

'Give way ...'

'Look, sir!'

Belchambers's order, partially obeyed but ignored by two men who had seen the same thing, caused a moment's confusion.

'What is it?' Frey asked sharply, starting round.

'There, sir. Under that branch ...'

Frey and Belchambers stared in the indicated direction. It was almost submerged. Just the upper curve of it, with the notch cut for a sculling oar, showed vermilion above the murky water. It might have been a dead bough but it was the scarlet transom of the red cutter, its stern painted for easy identification at a distance. It was no more than ten yards from them, sunk beneath the overhanging branches of a mangrove bush.

'We'll need kegs to refloat it ... this bottom's so damned soft ...' said Frey, probing with a boat-hook.

'Might work a spar underneath, sir, and jack 'er up on this 'ere root, like ...'

'Damned good idea, Carey,' remarked Belchambers eagerly, 'let's try with the boat-mast, Frey ...'

'Mister Frey, if you don't mind,' said Frey archly. 'Very well ...'

'Hey, sir ... look!'

They could see the tip of a pair of thole pins just breaking the surface a few yards further into the swamp.

'It's the launch!' Frey and Belchambers chorused simultaneously.

'But why, sir?'

Fraser waved his hands, pacing about the cabin, unable to keep the seat Drinkwater had provided for him. Quilhampton and Mount sat watching, while Drinkwater stood silhouetted against the stern windows, staring moodily at the green curtain of jungle that stretched across their field of view. Ballantyne was supervising the rigging of a spring upon the anchor cable, sounds of which came from beyond the bulkhead.

Drinkwater appeared to ignore Fraser's question. Mount, still smarting from his own idiocy, sat silent. Quilhampton knew better than to speak. He guessed something of what Drinkwater was thinking; he had been aboard Hellebore.

'I don't understand why this man Morris ...' Fraser began again, jerking his hands like a hatter with the shakes. But it was not mercurial poisoning that motivated the first lieutenant, it was the incomprehension of an unimaginative man. This time Drinkwater responded. Turning from the windows, he cut Fraser short.

'I don't understand precisely why this man Morris chooses to act the way he does, Mr Fraser.' He lowered his voice which was strained with a tension that Quilhampton knew to be fear for the life of old Tregembo. 'Sit down, sit down ... you see, gentlemen, I have cause now to believe that this man Morris quite deliberately engineered the separation of Patrician from her station on the night of the storm of thunder and lightning. In short I have been fooled — mightily fooled.' Drinkwater paused, inwardly seething.

'Oh yes,' he went on, looking round at their astonished faces, 'believe me, he is quite capable of such an act, for I knew him many years ago. We were midshipmen together. There is no need for details, except to tell you that we formed a mutual dislike; he affected a grievance against me for some imagined advantage I possessed over him. I was, it is true, briefly preferred before him ...'

Drinkwater broke off. It was impossible to tell these men who stared at him with wrapt attention that Morris had, in his twisted and perverse way, declared a desire for the young Drinkwater. The thought was repulsive to him even now.

But he had to tell them something of the man's character, if only to prepare them for what they were up against.

'He was, is, also a sodomite, a sodomite of a particularly cruel disposition. Mr Q may recall his conduct aboard Hellebore, for we had the misfortune to meet again in ninety-nine. Morris corrupted a midshipman who was later drowned.'

The sceptical Fraser turned to look at Quilhampton who gave a corroborative nod.

'Prior, however, to this, while still aboard Cyclops, Morris was involved in a cabal of similarly inclined men. One of them was later tossed overboard. Tregembo was involved in this rough justice. I don't know whether Morris knew that, I suspect not, but Tregembo knew enough about Morris and was loyal enough to me to have risked his life ...'

Drinkwater paused and drew a hand across his perspiring brow. 'Perhaps Morris simply took him to man a pair of oars ... I don't know ...'

'You say Morris took him, sir,' said Fraser, 'suppose Tregembo took Morris.'

'That is possible, sir,' added Quilhampton hurriedly, 'Tregembo might well have done that. He came to me once, sir, weeks ago ...' he faltered.

'Go on,' snapped Drinkwater, 'you interest me.'

'Well, sir, he came to me,' Quilhampton frowned, trying to recall the circumstances, 'asking if I had recognised Morris when he came aboard at Whampoa. I said yes, and Tregembo reminded me of the character he had assumed aboard the Hellebore. Then he told me something about your earlier association ...'

'Aboard Cyclops?'

'Exactly. He seemed to want to enlist me in some way.'

'Enlist you?'

'Yes. He said he knew Morris would — what was the word? Spavin you.' Quilhampton paused and looked down. 'I'm afraid I told him the whole thing was nonsense. Rather let him down, sir.'

'Was there anything else?' Drinkwater quizzed.

'No, sir, only that I believe words to have passed between Tregembo and Morris. Perhaps Tregembo chose last night to act, to protect you.'

'It makes a kind of sense,' said Mount, speaking for the first time, an edge of sarcasm in his voice, 'but it begs a lot of questions.'

'What questions?' Quilhampton asked defensively.

'Why Tregembo should choose last night; why, if he contemplated some violent act, he had to make off in a boat which he could hardly have handled alone; and why he should cut all the others adrift. It makes no sense for Tregembo to run off into the jungle denying us our boats.'

'But it is exactly what Tregembo would do, Mount, don't you see?' argued Quilhampton. 'Precisely to prevent us from following ...'

'That's too fantastical,' Mount said dismissively, the pragmatic soldier routing the quixotic young lieutenant. They fell silent.

'Is it too fantastical, gentlemen,' said Drinkwater slowly, 'to suggest that Morris separated Patrician from the convoy out of more than mere malice aforethought towards me? Is it too fantastical to suggest that ...'

Drinkwater paused at the knock on the door. 'Enter! Ah, Mr Ballantyne, I trust the spring is now clapped on the cable?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Very well. Please take a seat. I am theorising, please bear with me.' Drinkwater continued. 'As I say, is it not possible that Morris knew of our progress? He was a seaman, remember, and could, knowing our position, detach us from the convoy when he wished.'

'You mean he knew the convoy was to be attacked?' asked an incredulous Fraser.

'I mean he caused it to be attacked.'

'Well done, lads.'

Frey grinned appreciatively at the gasping men. Two hours of furious activity had refloated the red cutter. By dint of hard levering they had got her stem on a mangrove root and, by placing the barge's bottom boards underfoot, managed with much awkwardness, to find a footing themselves sufficient to work the boat so that its entire gunwhale was lapping the surface of the viscid water.

By jamming a thole pin into the empty bung-hole, they had been able to bale and now she floated, not quite empty and low in the water, astern of the barge. Sodden and mud-besplattered, the men tumbled back into the barge and got out their oars.