Ebb tide

The company cheered yet again and some staggered to their feet. They gulped their wine and thumped the table, calling for more.

'Silence! Silence!'

Hisses were taken up and some sort of order was re-established. 'It has been brought to my notice by the purser,' continued Wheeler, 'as Christian a gennelman as ever sat on a purser's stool mark you, that we are down to our last case of wine, which is... which is... which is what, m'dear fella?'

'Madeira.'

'Madeira, gennelmen, madeira...'

Wheeler collapsed into his chair amidst more cheers. The vacuum was filled by the last bottles being set out and the ponderous figure of Appleby rising to his feet. An attempt was made to shout him down. 'No speeches from the surgeon!'

'You're a guest! Sit down!'

But Appleby stood his ground. 'I shall not make a speech, gentle-men ...' His voice was drowned in further cheers, but he remained standing when they died away. 'I shall simply ask you to raise your glasses to fallen comrades ...'

A hush fell on the company and a scraping of chairs indicated a lugubrious assent to Appleby's sentiment. A shamefaced mumbling emanated from bowed heads as they recalled those who had started the commission and had not survived it — Hope, Blackmore and many others.

'And now...', resumed Appleby, and the mood lightened immediately.

'No speeches, damn your eyes!'

'Appleby, you farting old windbag, sit down!'

'And now,' Appleby went on, 'I ask you to raise your glasses in another toast...'

'For God's sake, Appleby, we've drunk to everything under heaven except your mother and father!'

'Gentlemen, gentlemen!' roared the surgeon, 'We have forgotten the most important after His Majesty's health ...' Silence, apart from White's brutish snoring under the table, again permeated the cabin. 'I prithee charge your glasses ... Now, gentlemen, I ask you to drink to this one-eyed frigate, gentlemen, this Cyclopean eye-of-the-fleet. Just as you are closing both of your limpid orbs in stupor, she is closing her noble eye on war. Gentlemen, be upstanding and drink to the ship! I give you "An eye of the fleet, His Britannic Majesty's frigate Cyclops!"'

There were punning shouts of 'Aye, aye!', much nudging of neighbours' ribs and more loud cheers which finally subsided into gurgling, dyspeptic mumblings and an involuntary fart from Wheeler. Suddenly the cabin door flew open and Sergeant Hagan entered wearing full dress uniform. Wheeler looked up blearily as the sergeant's boots crashed irreverently upon the deck and his right hand executed an extravagant salute circumscribed only by the deck beams above.

'Sah!'

'Eh? Whassa matter, ser'nt?' Wheeler struggled upright in his chair, affronted by the intrusion and vaguely aware that the sergeant's presence in parade dress augured some disagreeable occurrence elsewhere. Wheeler fixed the man with what he took to be a baleful stare, the vague disquiet of a summons to duty intruding upon his bemused brain.

'I have the honour to escort the officers' cheese, sah!' Hagan replied, looking straight into his commanding officer's single focused eye.

'Cheesh, ser'nt? Whadya mean cheesh?'

'Mr Dale's orders, sah!'

'Dale? You mean the carpenter?' Wheeler shook his head in incomprehension. 'You don't make yourself clear, ser'nt.'

'Permission to bring in the officers' cheese, sah!' Hagan persisted patiently in pursuance of his instructions, holding himself at rigid attention throughout this inane exchange.

Wheeler looked round the company and asked, 'We've had cheesh, haven't we, gennelmen? I'm certain we had cheesh ...'

But his query went unheeded, for there were more table thumpings and cries of 'Cheese! Cheese! We want cheese!'

Wheeler shook his head, shrugged and slumped back in his chair, waving his assent. 'Very well, Ser'nt Hagan. Please escort in the cheese!'

'Sah!' acknowledged Hagan and drew smartly aside. Two of the carpenter's mates entered bearing a salver on which reposed the cheese, daintily covered by a white damask napkin. At the lower end of the table, midshipmen drew apart to allow the worthy tarpaulins to deposit their load. They were grinning as they withdrew and Wheeler's numbed brain was beginning to sense a breach of propriety. He rose very unsteadily, leaning heavily upon the table. 'Sergeant!'

'Sah?'

'Whass that?' Wheeler nodded at the napkin-covered lump.

'The officers' cheese, sah!' repeated Hagan in the reasonable tone one uses to children, and executing another smart salute he retreated from the cabin, closing the door behind him.

Wheeler's misgivings were not shared by his fellow-diners who had just discovered that the remaining stock of wine amounted to at least one glass each. The demands for cheese were revived and with a flourish Drinkwater leaned forward and whipped off the napkin.

'God bless my soul!'

'Stap me vittals!'

'Rot me cods!'

'God's bones!'

'It's the festering main truck!'

'The what?'

'It's the god-damned truck from the mainmasthead!'

And there, amid the wreckage of what had passed for a banquet, sat the cap of the mainmast, pierced and fitted with its two sheaves for the flag halliards.

'Well, of all the confounded nerve ...'

'I'm damned if I understand ...' Wheeler passed a hand over his furrowed brow. Next to him Wallace had begun a slow dégringolade beneath the table.

'Hang on for your cheese, Wallace,' someone said.

'Dale's right,' Drinkwater said, 'I remember not believing him when he swore he had told me the truth back in seventy-nine.'

'Whadya mean?' Wheeler asked.

A chorus of slurred voices demanded an explanation. 'Mr Dale made it out of pusser's cheese,' Drinkwater explained. 'He carved it out of a cheese which had been supplied for the hands to eat... it's cheese, d'you see? Cheese; it really is cheese!'

'Well I'm damned.' Wheeler sat back in his chair, looking fixedly at the object before him. 'Well, I'll be damned ...' and with that he slid slowly downwards, to join the company assembling beneath the table.

'Well, Nathaniel,' Appleby said, raising his glass and holding it up to the stumps of the candles in the candelabra, 'there are only a few of us worthy of remaining above the salt, it seems. Your health, sir.'

'And yours, Mr Appleby, and yours.'

'You don't care for any cheese, I take it?'

'Thank you, no.'

The next morning the marines turned out in order of route. Pulled ashore in the launch, bound for their billets at Chatham barracks, they left to ribald farewells from the high-spirited boats' crews. Wheeler departed with them, his pale face evidence of an aching head. Before he went down into the boat, he shook his fellow-officers' hands in farewell. To Drinkwater he said, 'Good luck, young shaver. Always remember what I have taught you: never flinch when you parry and always riposte.'

During the forenoon other officers left. Midshipman Baskerville and his gang were seen off without regret, but White, hung-over and emotional, took his departure with a catch in his voice.

'Damn it, Nat,' he said, wringing Drinkwater's hand, 'I'm deuced glad to be leaving, but sorry that we must part. You shall come and see us, eh? There's good shooting in Norfolk and there's always a bed at the Hall.'

'Of course, Chalky. We shall remain friends and I shall write as soon as I have determined what to do. You won't forget to deliver Blackmore's dunnage?'

'No, no. His house lies almost upon my direct route. I shall lodge at Colchester and make the detour to Harwich without undue delay'

'Please pass my condolences to his widow. You have my letter.'