And Kendall’s painstaking work was paying off.
Quickly picking up the seamarks again, they made good speed but there was a perceptible change now. To starboard the sky was definitely lightening.
It was a race to the finish.
When it came it was almost an anticlimax.
The craggy cliffs loomed to larboard and there was no alarm. Even as the grey chill break-of-day spread there was still no sudden activity on the land.
The sight of an anonymous frigate scudding by in the innocent dawn had taken them completely by surprise. When well past, forlorn shots rang out but it was too late. Now they were free: ahead was open sea-and Constantinople!
Kydd leaned on his elbow in his cot while the surgeon pressed on him an evil-tasting concoction, apparently a sovereign remedy for headache. After a few hours’ sleep he was on the mend although his head still pounded-but he had to face that the critical time lay ahead.
They had achieved a miracle by surprise and daring but it would be all for nothing if he failed at his main task: to force the Turks to deliver up his friend.
In the rush of technical and professional preparation for the passage, he had not had time to give it much thought but now he must.
He groaned and pushed aside Tysoe’s well-meant gruel.
Even supposing he could brazenly arrive under flag of truce and demand to speak with their sultan or whomever, what argument could he bring to bear?
A wave of nausea threatened to undo Peyton’s good work.
“Leave me,” he gasped, but it was too late.
The surgeon wordlessly cleaned it up and left, prescribing more rest.
Kydd lay back in despair.
By the afternoon he could sit up without queasiness but his headache still thumped pitilessly.
They were hours away only …
Incredibly, quite soon, it came to him what he would say.
It would be: the Turks, quite unwittingly, had made a serious blunder.
It had been brought to the ear of the puissant and dread King of England that his cousin the sultan was shamefully detaining the person of the noble and worthy Lord Farndon, closely related to the royal family.
Certainly an oversight-nevertheless, if the wholly innocent aristocrat was not delivered up safely to the captain of the frigate detailed to bring him home, the King would feel it upon his honour to strip the rest of the world of his very own Royal Navy and send it-all 467 battleships-to Constantinople to effect his release.
No doubt the sultan would be pleased to comply once the mistake was known and that would be an end of the matter.
Yes!
“Mr Dillon, the carpenter and the gunner to attend on me,” he ordered firmly.
Shortly, there took place an extraordinary meeting.
The result was perfect: two boards, covered with red baize and bound like a book. On the outside of the “cover” was fastened a gun tompion from the saluting cannon, in the form of a King George crown, suitably gilded, licked with scarlet and green and satisfyingly heavy.
On the inside was a vellum, executed in meticulous script by Dillon and detailing the King’s solemn concerns. It was liberally adorned with seals and ciphers, each of which had a tail of gold lace or tassel sacrificed from Kydd’s own dress uniform.
Curzon arrived and announced, “The coast o’ Turkey, nor’-west eight miles.”
It was a question, of course.
“Stand off and on until after dark, if you please. We want to arrive before dawn.”
There was little danger of being sighted. The blockade was biting and there was no point in anything being at sea when they had nowhere to go, and with their navy otherwise engaged …
After midnight they approached the peninsula. It slumbered in darkness but at its end city lights pointed the way.
Ghosting along under staysails and jib, the frigate would be near invisible from the shore; the moon hung low in the east. It didn’t take long to reach the tip-Seraglio Point. It was a great relief to see the anchorage deserted for it confirmed that all Turkish ships were away and they could flaunt their impudence without interference.
Instead of anchoring in the long outer stretch of water they came to at the series of buoys reserved for the Ottoman Navy and picked up moorings on the first. The inboard part of the mooring cable was not belayed, but seized together with light line. If there was the slightest trouble, the boatswain at the ready could, in a slice of his knife, set them free.
At first light there was the astonishing sight for the beleaguered city of a Royal Navy frigate calmly at a buoy, the largest ensign of the King’s Navy at her mizzen and a white flag firmly at the fore-masthead.
Kydd smiled grimly at the thought of what must be happening ashore.
They should be opening fire with everything they had-but it would pass belief that this bold frigate, appearing from nowhere to take up rest, was challenging their defences. Why was it here? It must have a purpose, and better for all if they find out before anything happened that they might regret later.
Sure enough, the galley of Kaptan Pasha left for L’Aurore without delay.
As soon as he had clambered aboard, Kydd detected the man’s consternation.
The dragoman bowed hastily. “Kaptan, he want to know, why you here?”
It seemed there were to be no subtle preliminaries so without a word Kydd pressed on with the main act.
He clapped his hands imperiously. From the main-hatch a pair of seamen bore a sea-chest draped with a Union flag. Everyone on deck snapped to attention.
They brought it forward and placed it by the main-mast.
Curzon stepped up, ceremoniously opened it, drew out the contents and held them aloft for all to see.
Kydd roared a command and at once everyone bowed deeply to it.
“Kaptan Pasha. This is from the King of England himself and it is to be placed in the hands of the sultan instantly.”
“My master, he say, what it contain?”
Kydd stared at him in apparent disbelief.
“This is a communication from one great sovereign to another and he asks what it says? I’m shocked that such a high official of the Sublime Porte is so ignorant of the ways of the immortals. Do convey it to the sultan without delay, at peril of his displeasure.”
CHAPTER 14
“AND … THERE! In check, mon ami. Another three moves, I think?”
His opponent played to his image, Lord Farndon was bored with it all-with himself, the four blank and noisome walls of his cell and Sebastiani, who was taking their chess game far too seriously.
They had squares of paper with inked pictures of the pieces on them and a scrawled board on the filthy little table. Sebastiani seemed to take a ferocious pleasure in marshalling his forces in detail to crowd in on Renzi before bringing about an elaborate and inevitable defeat.
And when it became too dim to see, there was nothing for it but to lie back on the rank-smelling beds and exchange life experiences.
At least it was entertainment of a sort: Renzi took satisfaction in conjuring up a pampered world of society balls, tricky situations at Court, errant footmen and charming foolishness for Sebastiani, who, to his surprise, was always naively agog for more.
In return, the French general brought out wearisome campaign anecdotes, interspersed with hesitations as he reviewed what he was going to say, that it did not offer intelligence of use to an Englishman.
Nevertheless Renzi was keenly interested, for Sebastiani’s service included Egypt where he himself had been on the opposing and winning side. His cellmate had been at the Court of the Holy Roman Empire in its last days, being wounded and promoted at the battle of Austerlitz.
Then it was the unutterable tedium of the night, broken only in the morning by the clanking arrival of the guard, when another day would begin.
This day they had set up their “board” early for the general seemed to have a fierce need to break his record of six straight victories.
Another three moves? The noble lord could see it, but who cared?