Tightly integrated, centrally managed and intelligently deployed. In essence, a fleet. After Trafalgar, there being no foreseeable prospect of an invasion of Britain, the forces gathered for its execution had been idle. There would therefore be a large number available of those chaloupes or prames, escorts for the invasion barges, small but powerful enough to stand against anything less than a frigate. An ‘admiral’ in command of a sizeable detachment could, with information supplied, send them dodging about the Caribbean, like assassins, quickly extracting them from the scene of the crime before detection and sending them on to the next. Yes. It made sense.
‘My dear fellow, it does cross my mind that there is an explanation for what we are seeing. Consider this.’
Kydd looked up from his writing and, point by point, Renzi laid out his reasoning.
‘Why, that’s not impossible, I’d say. We had a tidy fight of it against some off Calais in dear old Teazer, if you remember.’ Kydd looked thoughtful. ‘It would need an organising brain of the first rank, and reliable captains who know their duty and can navigate. But if your idea’s right, there’s one thing you need to show.’
‘Their central base.’
‘Just so. Your admiral needs somewhere to maintain his fleet, victual and water, all the usual, as well as have a port to hold all his captures. Which to be legal have to be condemned as good prize in a French court sitting wherever that may be. To be honest with you, I can’t think of such a one.’
It was the weakest part of the idea – but who was to say it was impossible, if no one had yet undertaken a search for such a secret base?
‘Nicholas, you’ve a right noble headpiece and this is what I’m going to do. We’re going to Dacres together and you shall put it to him yourself.’
The commander-in-chief of the Jamaica Squadron heard him out politely and sat back to consider. ‘A pretty theory, Renzi. Much to commend it.’ He pondered further. ‘I like the bit about Bonaparte employing his surplus invasion escorts. And the French have some very able officers, very able. The whole thing’s not impossible.’
He fiddled with a paperknife, then carefully placed it down and said abruptly, ‘But I can’t move on it.’
‘Sir?’
‘No evidence. No evidence at all. Surely we’d have heard something. A sighting of a chaloupe or similar. Very distinctive in the Caribbean, I’d have thought.’
Renzi waited.
‘And always we come back to this question of his base. He’s not only to supply his ships but has to keep up communications. We’d certainly look to have intercepted at least one dispatch cutter but we haven’t. We’d then find where it was headed and therefore the base.’
‘Sir, if we ferreted about in earnest, made good search of-’ Kydd began.
‘No. Not possible. Every ship we have must keep to the sea-lanes, if only to discourage the beggars.’
With sudden weariness, he added, ‘I’ve no idea what’s out there doing this damage to our interests but it’s causing me much grief. If you come across the slightest piece of evidence in support, do let me know – or if you can construe where your secret base is, I’ll get the nearest ship to look in on it. Otherwise there’s not much more I can do.’
‘Sir,’ Renzi asked quietly, ‘with your permission, may I consult the patrol briefs and casualty reports? To see if there’s some kind of pattern?’
‘Very well. See Wilikins, my confidential clerk. He’ll dig ’em out for you. Now, Mr Kydd, when did you say you’d be ready to sail?’
‘Mr Renzi, is it? Then how can I be of service to you, sir?’
He was a dry individual but had a warmth and willingness that reached out to Renzi. ‘Why, Mr Wilikins, that’s so kind in you. Would you be so good as to lay out for me the fleet’s patrol reports of this last month and a Caribbean chart? I have a need to consult the one in relation to the other.’
‘Of course. Er, may I know what it is that you’re investigating? I have knowledge of the archives we hold to some detail,’ he added modestly.
‘Thank you, no. It’s a conjecture only, not worthy of interrupting your day, sir.’
‘Why, that’s no imposition, Mr Renzi. Just between you and me, in our usual round there’s little to divert an active mind. I’d be glad to help.’
It was tempting: this was a man who knew the station intimately and could no doubt contribute detail that would otherwise take him weeks to unearth. And as the admiral’s confidential secretary he would surely be reliable.
‘Then I accept, with thanks. Now, Mr Wilikins, what I’m about to tell you must be in the nature of a confidence. Pray do not speak of this to others.’ If rumours of a French fleet of predators got abroad, they would terrify Jamaica.
There was a pained look, but the man agreed.
‘Very well. You’re no doubt aware that we’ve suffered losses among our trade much above the usual.’
‘I am – Admiral Dacres speaks of little else,’ he said, with feeling.
‘In this matter I have a notion, a possibility only, of how such might have been achieved.’
‘Therefore it must of a surety be pursued, sir.’
‘Then do hear what I say now, Mr Wilikins. Your views will be valued.’
Renzi laid out his arguments for a secret fleet controlled by a master hand, an organisational genius able to provide supply and havens for his assets and a port of size able to contain his captures, until now undiscovered.
The clerk suddenly sat down, pale behind his neat spectacles. ‘Why, sir, that is quite an idea, some might say a flight of fancy.’
‘Nevertheless, it is one answer in logic to our dilemma.’
‘Yet a hard thing to prove, sir. What, may I ask, do you plan to do, should you take it further?’
‘Which I shall certainly do, Mr Wilikins. The admiral does not intend to move on this without he has evidence. If I can deduce the whereabouts of this base and it is shown to him, the theory turns to fact. He will then be able to strike at the heart of the operation and bring it to a close.’
‘I see. This will take some pains, I’m sure. How will you proceed?’
‘The time and place of each capture to be plotted, then related in terms of distance to each conceivable candidate locality in turn. You see, to achieve his successes he must have a network of information concerning the sailing of each victim. If we calculate the time necessary to alert and get response, and place it next to this, it will disqualify some and push others to prominence. We will find it on the basis of mathematical elimination, never fear.’
‘A daunting task,’ Wilikins murmured.
‘The stakes are great, sir.’
‘Most certainly, Mr Renzi! The idea is novel but has its features. Let us begin.’
‘Very good. Now, where to start – Haiti?’
They began with St Nicholas Mole, an old French port going back to the 1600s and well known in the past as a nest of corsairs, but immediately ran into difficulties. The casualty reports they were working to had in nearly every instance the actual position of capture only loosely defined. That a ship had sailed on this date, bound for a given port, had simply not arrived on schedule, the bracket of dates producing an unworkable margin of error.
‘Unfortunate. We shall have to think our way to another solution, Mr Wilikins,’ Renzi muttered.
A variation, perhaps, with the range of uncertainty represented by a line, a strip of paper, which could be overlaid one over the other for a visual match?
By evening they had gone over the permutations of only four of the possible harbours and there were many more to cover. The willing clerk offered to work on, but Renzi needed time to think and took his leave.
The next day he redoubled his efforts but, by the end of the afternoon, could see that he was not going to arrive at a computed solution. But what else was there?