Ramage and the Freebooters

'My apologies, your Excellency, but there's some urgency in all this!'

'Oh indeed?' Sir Jason said coldly. 'I must admit I'm not used to people bursting into Government House, especially without an appointment.'

Nettled, Ramage snapped rudely: 'Fedon was not so punctilious.'

'Don't be insolent, Ramage: I shall report this to the Admiral.'

Ramage was far too angry—with himself more than the Governor—to care what was reported, although he admitted Sir Jason was justified in being surprised at his hurried arrival. But (had he not been a colonial governor) that alone should have warned him of an emergency.

'What you report, and to whom, is your affair, your Excellency. I have come to warn you that you're probably employing someone who's also a spy, and the schooner that sailed last night is likely to be in the hands of the privateers within the next few hours.'

'But—but this is preposterous! Do something, man! You must stop it being captured! Why, I shall------'

'If I could fly through the upper regions with the speed of a bird, I could possibly save her. Since I can't, she'll be captured... sir.'

'And what's this outrageous nonsense about me employing a spy? That's tantamount to accusing me of being a traitor and-----'

'I said "You are probably employing someone who is also a spy", your Excellency: I don't suggest you know this person's a spy.'

'Well, thank you for that qualification,' Sir Jason growled. 'What am I supposed to do about it?"

'Nothing, unless you wish,' Ramage said quickly, seizing his opportunity. 'I'd prefer to deal with it myself—with your permission, of course.'

The, Governor had clearly lost control of the situation and was only too willing to agree, though still anxiously clinging to the outward trapping of authority. 'Very well, you have my permission; but I hold you responsible.'

Ramage couldn't be bothered to ask for what he was being held responsible. Instead he said: 'Where is Miss de Giraud?'

'In her room—she has a migraine, though I can't see what she has to do with all this.'

'Very welclass="underline" I wish to be taken to her room at once. I have to talk to her alone, though if your Excellency wishes to accompany me and make sure this meets with her ap proval...?'

'Dammit!' expostulated Sir Jason, 'this is most irregular! Prying into the private quarters of my staff? I simply------'

'The consequences of your refusing, sir, are much graver than you can possibly guess.'

Ramage had tried to sound pontifical and was pleased with the result 'Oh very well, come along then. I don't approve, though. I'm acting under protest—remember that, Ramage.'

'I'll remember, sir,' Ramage said, taking little care to keep the ambiguity out of his voice.

She was sitting in a wicker armchair when they entered the room and wearing a severely-cut lime-green dress, her face pale. Ramage watched her closely as she looked up at Sir Jason, who stammered out an embarrassed, vague explanation for their visit. She was holding what looked like a religious book and her hand was trembling. Her eyes were slightly red, as though very recently she had been crying, and Ramage wondered the reason.

'Of course I have no objection to his Lordship asking me questions, Sir Jason,' she said easily. 'I'm flattered that he's interested in any answers I could give. So far he has only asked me to dance with him.'

Her smile was genuine but Ramage suspected it took more effort than it should and Sir Jason, who had obviously expected to find her indignant, stood nonplussed.

'Perhaps you could spare me ten minutes in your study later, Sir Jason?' Ramage asked.

'Oh yes, by all means. Oh indeed, any time.'

He backed out of the room and shut the door. Ramage walked over to the window and looked out. A tiny humming-bird hovered almost motionless before the bell-shaped blossom of a golden alamanda, the sun catching its dark green plumage.

Ramage could hear Sir Jason's footsteps receding down the corridor, and he waited two or three minutes, still watching the humming-bird and irrelevantly noting he'd never really appreciated the beauty of the blossom.

Slowly he turned and faced her, deliberately keeping his back to the light so that his face was in shadow.

'You came in a hurry, Nicholas. I heard you swearing from half-way up the hill. You shouldn't make horses gallop in this heat—it's cruel. Is there some sudden emergency?'

'No,' Ramage said casually. 'But it's sometimes useful to let people think you usually ride slowly. Then they're more likely to be surprised when you suddenly gallop.'

She smiled and shook her head. 'I'm afraid the significance of that profound remark is beyond the comprehension of a mere woman!'

Ramage smiled back reassuringly, hating his necessary hypocrisy.

'The Governor says you have a migraine. Isn't a darkened room she treatment for that?'

'Yes, but don't tell the Governor; otherwise he won't believe my excuse for not working today. The truth is I found last night's ball rather exhausting. Obviously you didn't 1'

Although there was a wealth of meaning in the last two sentences there was neither coyness nor modesty; just a plain statement. For a moment Ramage was uncertain if she was genuinely and naturally resuming their strange and briefly passionate relationship where it had left off only a few hours earlier. But the hand holding the book was still trembling—why didn't she have the sense to put it in her lap?—and her upper lip and brow were now covered with fine beads of perspiration, yet the room was cool.

'Exhausting? No, not at all. Enlightening, though.'

She glanced up suddenly, looking him straight in the eye. Although there was no embarrassment, Ramage thought he detected fear. Yet he wasn't sure because she was unlike any woman he'd ever met. To her, he suspected, the normal usages of polite conversation, the white lies and gentle hypocrisies of society, were foreign or abhorrent. Or maybe she was just brazen; a consummate actress. It was one or the other; there was no middle path.

She said quietly, 'Nicholas, say what you have to say, because remarks like that are wounding, and you're watching me like a tiger.'

For a moment her eyes seemed to—he turned back to the window, deeply puzzled. 'Wounding,' she'd said. He gripped the sill and stared at the blossom without seeing it. The anger and bitterness which had exploded inside him like a volcano in Colonel Wilson's office had suddenly gone. On the one hand he was thankful because now he was thinking more dearly; but on the other hand he realized it was making his task harder.

Although certain his suspicions were well-grounded, he now wondered if it was as straightforward as he'd thought. He sensed some powerful, complicated reason behind it all; something as weird as voodoo and equally inexplicable.

Or was that what he hoped? Was that what he wanted to be told because he'd fallen in love with her? He brushed the idea away impatiently: of course he had! Of course that's what he'd hoped to hear! That's why he'd been so angry. Why, he thought bitterly, he'd behaved like a cuckolded husband confronting the unfaithful wife. And he wasn't even married.

He glared at his knuckles, which were white from his grip on the window sill. Admitting it all to himself seemed to make it easier: at least he now admitted he'd fallen in love with her, and warned himself of the danger that private emotions would interfere—were interfering, up to this moment—with his duties.

And still were: mere was no point in glossing over it What did he do now? How was he going to get from her the secret of the drums? Bully her, reduce her to tears, frighten her into revealing everything she knew and had done? Or did he try—well almost seduce her, using her feeling for him (if she had any: he was sure she had—but she might be a superb actress) to get the information he wanted?

He turned to find her weeping silently, sobs baking her whole body. He took a step to hold her, then drew back. Trying to push his emotions to one side he told himself coldly that first he needed to know if she was genuine or just acting a part. And he needed to know for two reasons— because he was in Grenada on the King's business, and because—well, because he'd fallen in love with her.