Ramage and the Renegades

'Your leg and arm?' she asked quickly, as though to dispose of them at once, although to her they were important questions she was afraid he would brush aside.

'Still giving me twinges, but otherwise fine: you saw me climbing up the side.'

'Yes, and your leg gave way twice.'

'I didn't notice it. Sarah -'

Suddenly everything was quiet but for the drumming in his ears; drumming from the pumping of his heart. She moved slightly, so that she was standing with her back to the rest of the passengers and obscuring his face. She said nothing, her eyebrows slightly raised.

When he hesitated she said quietly: 'You look as if you're seeking the answer to the riddle of the universe.'

'I am, to my universe.' This was not the way he had wanted the conversation to go: he wanted to ask the question casually, instead of making it a single issue of vast importance.

'Captain Ramage's universe must be enormous.' She was smiling, but he knew she was trying to lessen the tension which had suddenly sprung up between them.

'Nicholas's is very small,' he said and ploughed on. 'That uniform - whose is it?'

She blinked and then her eyes were wide open with surprise. 'What uniform?'

'The military uniform you lent me the day ...'

'Oh yes! The day you were using a stock as a loincloth! Most dashing you looked, but you needed something, well, more substantial, before you met people like Mrs Donaldson!'

'You haven't answered my question,' he reminded her.

'But Nicholas, it's such a silly question! What on earth does it matter?'

'It matters to me,' he said stubbornly.

As soon as she realized he was serious she said quietly: 'Does it really matter to you all that much? It was just a uniform which fitted you.'

'Yes, it matters. I must know.'

Suddenly she began to go pale and instinctively she touched his arm. 'You think it is my husband's?'

'Yes. What else can I think?'

She shook her head slowly, as though trying to make herself understand something.

'You are jealous of him?'

'Of course.' The Calypso looked a fine sight over on the starboard quarter but seemed remote from him.

'Why? Why should you be jealous of him?'

He sighed and was just about to turn away and return to the other people: it was the husband's uniform, she loved the man, and she had not the faintest idea that she was loved by the captain of the Calypso frigate.

'It is of no consequence now, ma'am,' he said stiffly, and then forced a smile. 'We must rejoin the others.'

'No, wait. It is of consequence why you should be jealous of him.'

'Flattering for you, ma'am, but hardly of consequence to a married woman.'

'Answer me!' Her voice was low and her fingers grasped his arm.

There was nothing to lose: a few minutes' embarrassment and he could leave the ship and return to the Calypso after taking a bowl of soup, claiming his arm was paining him.

'I have fallen in love with you. So naturally I am jealous of your husband.'

She held his eyes. 'Listen carefully, Nicholas,' she said softly. 'My father went out to India three years ago as the Governor General of Bengal, and he took his family with him. He found he disagreed with much the Honourable East India Company is doing, so he resigned, and we are all returning to England. All but one of us.'

Now it was his turn to be puzzled. 'All but one? Your husband?' Yes, of course, he had died out there.

'All but the owner of the uniforms. He has resigned his commission with the Company - he was my father's ADC - because he wants to remain out there for another year or two. His uniforms are in the trunks; although for the life of me I don't know why they were not burned before we sailed.'

'Let's join the others,' Ramage said miserably.

'But you still don't know who owns the uniforms!'

'I can guess, though why you didn't stay with him, I don't know.'

'My brother is a pompous bore,' she said.

'Let's join the - your brother?'

She was laughing as she nodded. 'Why are you in such a rush to join the others?' she asked innocently. 'Does my company bore you?'