Ramage and the Renegades

'What was the flag of truce all about?' Southwick asked.

Ramage looked at Aitken, who shook his head. 'I think they thought we might have known what they were doing,'

Ramage said. 'The sight of one of the King's ships sailing into the bay must have startled them. But as we didn't have our portlids up and guns run out, they were puzzled too. By coming out under flag of truce, perhaps they thought they were safeguarding their own necks.'

'I couldn't understand the Spanish parts, sir,' Aitken said, 'but why did Hart take so much trouble to translate for that black while ignoring the other two?'

'The black is the leader,' Ramage said. 'He's the deep one; ten times the brains of Hart.'

Southwick gave a deep sniff and Ramage guessed that he was impressed by the black's shrewdness. 'What was his name? Thomas?'

'The Spanish version. Hart speaks reasonably good Spanish and good French.'

'Comes from the West Country,' Southwick commented. 'Bristol, I reckon.'

'Probably, because he said the Lynx hailed from there,' Aitken said. 'Mind you, it's a fake name, I'll be bound.'

Ramage let the two men gossip for a few more minutes because, having just had a shock when they did not expect it, they needed some idle talk to let their thoughts settle. Then the questions would come poking up, like fish in a stream looking for flies. Finally Aitken coughed and both Southwick and Ramage looked at him.

'When that fellow Hart said that their prize crews had orders to kill the passengers if the ships were in danger, sir, what did he mean?'

Ramage's face hardened and his brown eyes seemed more sunken than ever, his high cheekbones becoming more pronounced and his narrow nose more beaklike.

'We were being warned. Hart was telling us that they have armed men in each merchant ship, guarding the passengers, who are in fact hostages. He said the officers and men are on shore "in a camp". That means there are a dozen or more hostages in each vessel, and if we make any attempt to recapture any of the ships or attack the Lynx, they'll simply massacre the hostages.'

'Stalemate,' Southwick said crossly.

'I wish it was,' Ramage said. 'At the moment the privateers hold the pistol at our heads. We can do nothing. That devil Tomás has probably given orders that if we so much as wave a musket, all the hostages get their throats cut. Remember, a privateer carries a large number of men solely to provide crews for the prizes. I doubt if the Lynx needs even one man from an original crew to sail a ship, so the officers and men could be thrown over the side. I've no idea if they'll bother to ransom the hostages - they might think it too much effort and risk for too little profit.

'They'll sell each ship and cargo for cash to unscrupulous owners anxious to increase their fleets. Paint out the old name, line in a new, hoist fresh colours and no one will ever guess that's a ship which apparently vanished while the war was on.'

Southwick nodded admiringly. 'Privateers in wartime and pirates in peace. More profitable in peacetime - they're not at the mercy of the Admiralty court judge's valuation of a prize: they get the full market value with no deductions for agents, court fees and bribes. And, being pirates, they can disregard a ship's colours - look at the ones they've got out there: French, Dutch and British. No Spanish, though; perhaps this fellow Tomás draws the line at that!'

Ramage shook his head. 'That man has no loyalty to anything. There are no Spanish simply because there are so few Spanish ships at sea. Wait until the Lynx's sister ship comes in - she may have picked up a Don.'

'Well, what are we going to do?' Southwick asked angrily. 'We can't just look at these devils knowing that the ships are prisons for the passengers.'

'We can send the men to quarters and weigh and sink the Lynx. Mind you, you wouldn't have the bars in the capstan or the portlids raised before every hostage would be dead,' Ramage said quietly.

Aitken said: 'What do you propose, sir?'

'Let's wait a few days and just watch. We'll put the surveyors on shore each day, and you can send off Martin and Orsini in boats to take soundings and start that chart. Get the privateersmen accustomed to seeing our boats bustling about - but keep away from the prizes. Not obviously; just don't let any boat pass within hail.'

Southwick sniffed doubtfully, because he was not a man to play a waiting game, and the privateer had provoked him. 'How long do we wait, sir?'

"Wait" is not the correct word. We "observe" - like one of Aitken's poachers hiding in a clump of trees for a day or two before shooting one of the laird's deer. I want a detailed watch kept on the ships day and night: one man for each ship. Note what boats come and go, men leaving and arriving, stores, what work is done, the guards and where they are and how often they're changed, what the passengers do and how many... I want some good men who can write given this job. Jackson and people like that.'

'Bowen gets bored, sir,' Southwick commented. 'Just the sort of thing he'd like doing.'

'Very well, but they must keep out of sight: I don't want the privateersmen to realize we are keeping a special watch on them. But of course they might try to board us!'

'Do you think they'll try?' Aitken sounded hopeful.

'It probably depends on whether or not brother Tomás believed my play-acting. He'll have about a hundred men in the Lynx, and he can guard the hostages with twenty-five. Would he risk trying to capture a frigate with seventy-five men...'

'You would,' Southwick said.

'Only if I had no choice! But I don't think Tomás feels trapped: I'm sure he believes having the hostages is enough insurance.'

'Plus having a sleepy and vague captain commanding the frigate,' Southwick said. 'Your performance would have convinced me - and I speak English! The way you tried to avoid any responsibility: Hart was delighted with that! Little does he know how many times First Lords and admirals have lost their tempers and accused you of taking too much responsibility!'

'Being sleepy and vague gave me a little time to think,' Ramage admitted. 'I was sitting here expecting the pompous master of one of the John Company ships to invite me to dinner to make conversation with his tedious passengers. Instead Aitken brings in a quartet of the most improbable scoundrels with a story that almost beggars the imagination!'

Aitken grinned and stood up. 'If you'll excuse me, sir. I think I'll go and arrange the first watch of lookouts: I'd like to take each man and "introduce" him to his ship. We had better start a log for each ship, so that in a day or so we will know how many are on board, who are prisoners and who guards.'

Ramage opened a drawer of his desk and took out a polished mahogany case. As he opened it, Southwick grinned. 'The Marchesa would like to see you getting those pistols out and loading them, sir: it's a long time since she bought them for you.'

'The day I was made post,' Ramage recalled, 'we went to Bond Street with my father. In fact I remember the Admiraland I waiting in the gunsmith while the Marchesa was in another shop buying lace. Then she came in and bought pistols!'

'Impasse.' Ramage crossed out the words and wrote 'checkmate'. Then he ran a line through 'mate': it was certainly 'check' as far as Tomás and Jebediah Hart were concerned, but not checkmate: Ramage guessed he still had a move - if only he could see what it was.

The privateersmen - curious how he avoided thinking of them as pirates: perhaps because it seemed absurd in these modern times to realize that pirates still existed - had five ships and nearly fifty passengers as hostages. Neither Hart nor Tomás had threatened the safety of the ships' companies, who would number about two hundred and fifty.