"A massacre now," Ramage said. "But maybe not in a few years' time. The French fighting troops being used elsewhere, and the garrison troops grown soft and slack by inactivity ... Curious place, Italy: it rots the weak and inspires the strong."
The familiar thumping footsteps warned them Wilson was approaching. "Morning, Captain," he said almost shyly, as though unsure how he should treat Ramage in his new role. "Just going to take my exercise. Wondered if the Marchesa might care to join me. Permission to ask her, as it were?"
Ramage stared at him blankly for a moment, and then grinned. "Of course. She probably heard you," he said with gentle irony, since the soldier's confidential whisper was probably audible on the foredeck.
Gianna gathered up the folds of the boatcloak. "How thoughtful of you, Captain Wilson: I was feeling cold and the exercise will do us good."
"A mile before dinner, Ma'am," Wilson said as he fell in step beside her. "Have to you know; it's the porter. Drink too much of it and it makes..."
Yorke winked at Ramage. "Seems half a lifetime ago we first heard him say that. I say," he said suddenly, "how long is it really?"
Ramage shrugged his shoulders. "Seven or eight weeks, I suppose, but it isn't the sort of time you can measure with a calendar."
"I wonder what's happened to Stevens and Farrell?"
"I was thinking about them last night. Probably in a French prison by now. I expect the Rossignol put them on board her next prize."
Yorke gave a bitter laugh. "While we were prisoners in Lisbon, the French may have exchanged the pair of them by now..."
"I've thought of that too," Ramage said firmly, "and in case your imagination is sluggish this morning, I've thought of them making an official protest against me to the Inspector of Packets, and I've tried to guess what Lord Auckland says to the First Lord of the Admiralty when he reads their version."
"Stranger things have happened," Yorke commented. "But the Rossignol may have been caught by one of our frigates, and a British roundshot may have knocked both their heads off."
Southwick came up. "With your permission, sir, I'd like to get on with that survey of the stern. If I could have Much to help me, too."
"Carry on," Ramage said. "Make it detailed!"
The Arabella was making good time: the village of Estoril had dropped out of sight behind Punta de Salmodo, and the Citadel at Cascais, with Fort Santa Marta on the point, would soon be hidden by Cabo Raso as he headed the packet north for the long slog almost the length of the Peninsula. For once the wind was being helpful, veering as the Arabella rounded each headland so that it stayed just abaft the beam.
By mid-afternoon Much took the conn to allow Southwick an opportunity to give Ramage his written survey. As the Master sat down in the Captain's cabin, groaning and complaining of aching muscles after crawling round down below and reaching into almost inaccessible places to test the hardness of the wood, he was shaking his head. He held out several sheets of paper. "My written report, sir."
Ramage took it. "Just tell me the worst of it."
Southwick sniffed. "If we were in England, the dockyard people wouldn't have let us sail. The sternson knee, wing transom knee on the starboard side, several cant frames and the deck transom are all spongy. The sternpost - where I could get at it - was soft. Like cheese in some places. It's all in the report, sir," he said miserably. "Unsettles me to talk about it, specially since we can't do anything about it."
Ramage reached over and patted the old Master's knee."Cheer up; if it was action damage you wouldn't let it worry you!"
"That's true," he admitted cautiously. "But roundshot just breaks the wood up: you can see the extent of the damage. Rot - it's insidious: you can't measure how far it goes or how much the ship's weakened."
"As long as she'll get us to Falmouth..."
"Aye - well, as long as the sternpost holds, the rudder will hang on. Just remember we can't fire the stern-chasers - not that we're likely to forget that."
"Forget about the rot, then," Ramage said cheerfully. "I've just remembered I forgot to clear Customs in Lisbon. That damned Agent will think that's far more serious!"
Immediately after the mid-day meal, Ramage told Gianna to stay in her cabin and had the whole ship's company mustered aft. As he looked around at the men he could see that the resentment was there all right: the packetsmen's sullen stance was emphasized by the cheerful bearing of the former Tritons.
"The decks look a little better," he said harshly, "but in the time you've taken you could have sanded half an inch off the planks. Well, now you have a meal inside you, we'll have some exercises at the guns - I trust you packetsmen can remember the drill. Just to refresh your memories, you'll be shown how it should be done."
He took the key of the magazine from his pocket, and his watch.
"I want the packetsmen over there, by the mainmast: the former Tritons stand fast."
As soon as the ship's company was divided into two groups, Ramage called for the two ship's boys. "Do you two lads know what powder monkeys are?"
Crimson with shyness and embarrassment, the two boys said they did.
"Very well, you're going to have to take those charges and run twice as fast as you ever thought possible. Mr Much!" The Mate stepped forward and Ramage handed him the key to the magazine. "Will you stand by to take over below?"
Ramage turned to the former Tritons. "Jackson, Rossi, Stafford and Maxton. You will be the crew of number one gun on the starboard side. You're captain, Jackson; Stafford you'd better be second captain. Rossi, you are sponger and Maxton rammer. But leave the gun secure and you four men and the boys stand fast. The rest of you Tritons hoist up the tubs, fill them with water and get the decks wetted and sanded."
Quickly two small, low tubs were brought up from below, put one each side of the gun, and filled with water. Half a dozen buckets of water were swilled across the deck round the gun and between it and the hatch from which the boys would emerge with the powder charges, so there would be no chance of stray grains of gunpowder igniting as the wide wooden wheels of the carriage spun back with the recoil. A man then hurried across sprinkling sand so that feet should not slip on the wet planking.
With the gun still secured to the ship's side, the tackles were tight and seized so that it could not move no matter how much the ship rolled in heavy weather. The sponge - in effect a large mop fitted to a short wooden handle - and the rammer, a similar handle with a round wooden plug at one end only slightly smaller than the bore of the gun, were still lashed along the bulwark. Two handspikes - long wooden levers with wedge-shaped iron tips, used for levering the gun round to train it - were lashed near them.
Half a dozen roundshot nested like black oranges in semicircular depressions cut in a piece of timber bolted to the bulwark on each side of the gunport. Ramage had inspected the shot earlier. They had been painted within the past few months, but he had wondered idly when they had last been passed through a shot gauge to check whether several coats of paint over small bulges of rust meant they were no longer spherical, so they would jam in the bore of the gun or, when fired, would not fly true. There was no shot gauge on board, so he could do nothing about it.
He looked at his watch and held up a hand. Much and Jackson watched him closely. Suddenly he snapped, "Load and run out number one gun, starboard side. Roundshot!"
It was not an order from the drill books - such as they were - but it was a good exercise. Much, after almost diving down the hatch, followed by the two boys, would now be unlocking the magazine and unrolling the fire-screens, the rolls of heavy material which hung down like curtains to ensure that neither flash nor flame could enter the magazine to ignite the powder stored inside.