'Well, as I say, Captain, problems of rank and exigencies of the Service. I'm not helped by m'parliamentary duties either, b'God. Makes m'life in the public service a most arduous task I do assure ye.
'This leads me to a question, m'dear fella. How much food and water have ye?'
'About two months' provisions I suppose, but if you're relieving me I don't see…'
Edgecumbe held up his hand.
'Ah, there's the rub, m'dear fella. I'm not you see…' Edgecumbe interrupted.
'More wine? At least,' he said slowly in a harder voice, an edge of malice in it, '…at least I don't intend to.' Hope swallowed.
'Are you trying to tell me something unpalatable, Sir James?'
Edgecumbe relaxed and smiled again. 'Yes m'dear Captain. I would deem it a great favour if you would relieve me of a rather odious and fruitless task. In fact m'dear fella,' he lowered his voice confidentially, 'I have to be in Parliament shortly to support the Naval vote and one or two other measures. In these times every patriot should do his utmost. Don't you agree Captain. And I'm best serving my country, and you brave fellas, by strengthening the navy.' He dropped the sham and the note of menace was again detectable. 'It wouldn't do either of us any good if I missed it, now would it?' Hope did not like the inflections in Edgecumbe's speech.
He had the feeling he was being boxed into a corner.
'I trust Sir James that you will do your utmost to ensure that ships like Foudroyant, Emerald and Royal George are properly dry-docked…' Edgecumbe waved his hands inconsequentially.
'Those are mere details, Captain Hope, there are competent authorities in the dockyards to deal with such matters…'
Hope bit off an acidic reply as, from nowhere, the servant of Sir James appeared with a new bottle of claret. Edgecumbe avoided Hope's eyes and sorted through some papers. He looked up with a smile and held out a sealed envelope.
'Life's full of coincidences, eh Captain? This,' he tapped the envelope, 'is a draft, I believe, on Tavistock's Banking House. Had a bit of luck with prizes I hear, well, well, my wife's a daughter of old Tavistock. He's a mean old devil but I expect he'll honour an Admiralty draft for £4,000.'
Hope swallowed the contents of his glass. He swore mentally. Righteous indignation was no weapon to use against this sort of thing. He wondered how many people had connived to get this little scene to run its prescribed course? So that he, Henry Hope, should do something unpleasant on behalf of Sir James in order that the latter should occupy his seat in Parliament. Or worse, perhaps Sir James had other reasons for not carrying out his orders. Hope felt sick and swallowed another glass of claret.
'I presume you have my change of orders in writing, Sir James,' Hope asked suspiciously although he already knew he would be compelled to accept the inevitable.
'Of course! Did you suspect that I was acting unofficially, m'dear sir?' Edgecumbe's eyebrows were raised in outrage.
'Not at all, Sir James,' replied Hope with perfect honesty. 'Only there are occasions when one doubts the wisdom of their Lordships…'
Edgecumbe looked up sharply. Hope found the suspicion of treason vastly amusing. Edgecumbe held out another envelope.
'Your orders, Captain Hope,' he said with asperity.
'And the odious and fruitless task, Sir James?'
'Ah!' breathed Edgecumbe, reaching for a strong box that had all the while been lurking by his chair.
In the cockpit the single lantern swayed with Cyclops's violent motion. Its guttering flame cast fitful and fantastic shadows that made reading difficult. Drinkwater had waited until it was Morris's watch on deck. He had a vague feeling that if he attempted to read Elizabeth's letter in his presence it would somehow sully his image of her. For, although Morris had made no attempt to reassert himself as Drinkwater's superior, Nathaniel knew instinctively that Morris was playing a waiting game, covertly watching his fellow midshipman, probing for an opening that he could exploit. Reading Elizabeth's letter in his presence would almost certainly afford him some such opportunity.
Drinkwater opened the little package. Inside was a second packet and a letter. The letter was dated a few days after his departure from Falmouth.
My Dear Nathaniel,
Lieutenant Collingwood had just come to say that he believes his frigate will be meeting Cyclops early in the New Year. He came to settle the account for your (sic) funeral and when father said that it should be borne by your own ship he said he would reimburse himself when he met your Captain.
Drinkwater bit his lip, annoyed that he had not thought of that himself. He read on,
All of which is a poor way of wishing you well. I hope you like the enclosure, father tells me you sea officers are inordinately vain of your first commands. It was done the morning after your first visit, but I did not think it good enough to give you before.
We have news that we shall move to Portsmouth in April and I pray that you will visit us there. Please God that you are unscathed by battle or disease, for I fear your Service uses men barbarously as poor Lieutenant Collingwood's cough testifies.
The weather had turned now and we expect a miserable winter. Father says prayers regularly now for the Navy. Now I must conclude in haste for L. Collingwood is just leaving.
God bless you,
Ever yours,
Elizabeth.
Drinkwater read the letter four times before opening the packet.
Inside, set in a small frame was a tiny water colour. It showed a sheet of water set round by green shores and the grey bastion of a castle. In the foreground was a ship, a little dark schooner with British over Yankee colours.
'Algonquin,' he muttered aloud, holding the picture to the lantern. 'Algonquin off St Mawes…'
He tucked the picture safely in the bottom of his sea-chest, scrambled into his hammock and re-read Elizabeth's letter.
Elizabeth wished him safe and well. Perhaps Elizabeth loved him.
He lay basking in the inner warmth the news gave him. A kind of bursting laughter exploded somewhere inside his chest. A feeling of superhuman triumph and tenderness welled up within him, so that he chuckled softly to himself as Cyclops creaked to windward in the gale.
The month of January 1781 was one of almost continuous bad weather in the North Atlantic. The 'families' of depressions that tracked obliquely across that great expanse of water dashed a French fleet to pieces on the rock-girt coasts of the Channel Islands. Two thousand French soldiers had embarked to capture the islands but hundreds perished as their troopships were smashed to bits. Eight hundred who got ashore at St Helier almost succeeded in taking the town until twenty-six year old Major Pearson led a desperate bayonet charge in which the French were routed but the young man lost his life.
But it was not only the French fleet that had suffered. Earlier, in October of 1780, Rodney's West Indies Fleet had been virtually destroyed in a hurricane. Most of Hotham's squadron had been dismasted and six ships lost. Although Sir Samuel Hood was even then proceeding to Rodney's aid, things were going ill for British arms. The situation in North America, handled in a dilatory fashion by Lord North and Lord George Germaine, had become critical. None of the principals were to know it at the time but the combination of the Franco-American armies around an obscure peninsula on the James River in Virginia was to prove decisive. As Lord Cornwallis fought his way through the swamps and barrens of Carolina with a pathetically small army, Nathaniel Greene opposing him, 'fought and ran, fought and ran again', slowly exhausting the British who staggered from one Pyrrhic victory after another in ever diminishing numbers.