To the volunteers it must seem a far cry from the recruiting posters, and to the men from the prison hulks it might now appear to be a bad exchange of circumstances. Even those hiding from crimes committed ashore would find room for doubt and resentment. The crimes would have faded with the fear of arrest and trial. But the heat and thirst, and the daily grind of disciplined duty were only too real.
He saw Raymond biting his lip, his eyes following the footsteps as if he was seeing through the deckhead itself. If anything, he and his wife were moving further apart by being confined in the ship. It was a strange relationship.
He thought back over the past days and one particular incident. He had been in his small makeshift cabin in the chart space, and Allday had been changing the bandage on his arm for him. She had entered the cabin without knocking, in fact, neither of them had heard her approach. She had stood by the open port, quite relaxed, and had watched him without saying a word. Bolitho had been stripped to the waist, and as he reached for a fresh shirt she had said softly, 'I see you bear yet another scar, Captain.'
Bolitho's hand had gone to his side, suddenly conscious of the ragged mark where a pistol ball had missed his ribs by a thread. He had seen it exactly, as he was seeing it now. The privateer's tilting deck, the American lieutenant running towards him, taking aim. The crash of a shot. The sharp, stabbing agony. Oblivion.
Allday had said rudely, 'The captain's dressing! Ships' ways are different from those ashore, it seems!'
But she had stood firm, her lips slightly parted, while she watched him. But how could she have understood what he was thinking? That the ball had been fired by one of his own brother's officers. A traitor. A wanted renegade, now dead and forgotten by most.
But not by me.
He shook himself out of his brooding thoughts. Nothing mattered now but the work in hand. Water. All that he needed to take them to Madras. Beyond that was another challenge. It could wait.
He said, 'That is all, gentlemen.' He realised he had spoken more abruptly than intended and added, 'We have a fine ship. One of the most efficient and modern devices created by man. We can give a good account of ourselves to any vessel but a ship of the line.' He paused as Herrick smiled at him, bridging the gap between them as he, too, remembered. 'Except for rare, and not to be encouraged, occasions! But without water to drink we are like stumbling old men, with neither the means nor the will to face another day. Remember what I have said. Be vigilant. For the moment that is all I ask of you.'
They filed out of the cabin, leaving him with Puigserver and Raymond. Raymond looked hopefully at the Spaniard, but when he made no attempt to take his usual walk on deck he, too, left the cabin.
Bolitho sat down and watched the moonlight as it played across the Undine's bubbling wake.
'What is the matter with him, Senor?' It was strange how easy it was to talk to him.
Just over a year back he had been an enemy. One Bolitho would have killed in battle had he not called for quarter. He smiled to himself. Or the other way round. He was a powerful man, that was certain, and much of his counsel he kept to himself. But Bolitho trusted him. The ship's company, for the most part, had also accepted him as their own. Like Allday, who had long given up trying to pronounce his name, they called him Mister Pigsliver. But they said it with something near to affection.
Puigserver regarded him with quiet amusement.
'My dear Capitan, he is like a watchdog. He fears for his wife, what she will do, rather than what others will do to her!' He chuckled, the sound rising from his belly. 'She, I think, is beginning to enjoy the game, knowing that every man aboard sees her in a different eye. She stands proudly, a tigress in our midst.'
'You seem to know a great deal about her, Senor.'
The smile broadened. 'You know your ships, Capitan. Unlike me, I fear you still have much to learn about women, eh?'
Bolitho made to protest and then changed his mind. The memory was still too painful to leave room for a denial.
6. Attack Overland
'Well, Thomas, what d'you make of it at close quarters?' Bolitho's voice was hushed, as with the others around him he stared towards the shore.
They had made a careful approach since dawn, seeing the land gaining shape and substance, and then as the sun had found them again, they had watched the colour, the endless panorama of green.
With two experienced leadsmenin the chains, and under minimum canvas, Undine had felt her way towards the land. It had looked like an untouched world, with jungle so thick it seemed impossible for anything to move freely away from the sea.
Herrick replied quietly, 'The master seems satisfied, sir.' He trained his telescope over the hammock nettings. 'As he described it. A round headland to the north. And that strangelooking hill about a mile inland.'
Bolitho stepped on:to a bollard and peered down over the nettings. Undine had finally dropped anchor some four cables offshore to give her sea-room and a safe depth at all times. Nevertheless, it looked very shallow, and he could even see the great shadow of Undine's coppered hull on the bottom. Pale sand. Like that on the various small, crescent-shaped beaches they had seen on their cautious approach.
Long trailers of strange weed, writhing to the current far below the ship as if in a tired sort of dance. But to larboard, as the ship swung to her cable he saw other shapes, browns and greens, like stains in the water. Reefs. Mudge was right to be so careful. Not that anyone would need reminding after Nervion's fate.
Alongside, the first boats had already been swayed out, and Shellabeer, the boatswain, was gesticulating with his fists at some Spanish seamen who were baling one of them. It would do the frail hulls good to be afloat again, Bolitho thought.
He said absently, 'I shall go with the boats, and you will keep a good watch in case of trouble.'
He could almost feel Herrick's unspoken protest, but added, 'If anything goes wrong ashore it might help some of our people if they see I'm sharing it with them.' He turned and clapped Herrick's shoulder. 'Besides which, I feel like stretching my legs. It is my prerogative.'
On the gun deck Davy was striding back and forth inspecting the men mustered for the boats, checking weapons and the tackle for hoisting and lowering water casks when the work was begun.
Overhead the sky was very pale, as if the sun had boiled the colour from it and had spread it instead across the glittering stretch of sea between ship and shore.
Bolitho marvelled at the stillness. Just an occasional necklace of white surf along the nearest beach and at the foot of the headland. It was as if it was holding its breath, and he could imagine a thousand eyes watching the anchored frigate from amongst the trees.
There were loud thumps as the swivel guns were lowered into the bows of launch and cutter, and more shouted orders while the bell-mouthed musketoons found their proper mountings in gig and pinnace. The jolly boat was to remain with the ship. It was too small for the great casks, and might be needed in an emergency.
He rubbed his chin and stared at the land. Emergency. It appeared safe enough. All the way along the coast, as they had slipped past one bay or inlet after another, and all of which had seemed identical to everyone but Mudge, he had waited for some sign, a hint of danger. But not a boat drawn up on the sand, not a wisp of smoke from a fire, not even a bird had broken the stillness.
'Boats ready, sir!' Shellabeer tilted his swarthy face in the glare.
Bolitho walked to the rail and looked down at the gun deck. The seamen seemed altered yet again. Perhaps because of their cutlasses, the way they glanced at each other, their torment of thirst momentarily put aside. Most of them were very different from the men who had first joined the ship. Their bared, backs were well browned, with only an occasional scar of sunburn to mark the foolish or the unwary.