Yorke looked doubtful. "Don't risk it without the mutineers agreeing," he advised.
"Why?"
"Because these men don't know the Spanish coast. They've picked on Coruña because they've heard of it. If you go in somewhere else they might suspect a trick."
"Go and talk to them," Ramage said impatiently. "Point out Camarinas is nearer and - hellfire, what difference does it make to them? It's Spanish - they get what they want and we're made prisoner!"
Yorke got up. "I'll try it," he said, leaving the cabin. "I'll tell 'em about the blockade, eh?"
"Yes, warn them we're certain to be intercepted and boarded. A squadron of seventy-fours, frigate patrols - even Spanish ships."
"You stay here," Yorke said. "You make me nervous, crouching behind that damned gun, listening to every word I say."
But when he returned to the cabin five minutes later Ramage knew as he came through the door that he had failed to persuade them.
"They won't hear of it. Coruña or Ferrol, or else..."
"You explained about the blockade?"
"Of course I did," Yorke said impatiently. "They say it's up to me to keep frigates away. They said I did it once less than an hour ago, and I can do it again."
"But why not Camarinas?"
Yorke shook his head wearily. "They've a good enough reason, and I suppose we should have thought of it. They say how are they to know I won't take the Arabella into a Portuguese port and tell them it's Spanish. They know Cabo Finisterra isn't far north of the border between Portugal and Spain."
"How will they know it is Coruña or Ferrol, then?"
"I asked them that. Apparently one of the men has been to both: says he'll recognize them at once."
Ramage sprawled on the settee, drained of all energy and hope. "So we've no choice," he said, almost to himself. "We have to try the second plan."
"It puts the very devil of a responsibility on the Marchesa," Yorke protested.
"Of course it does," Ramage said harshly, "and if she'd gone home in the other packet as I asked her this would never have happened."
He buried his head in his hands. "I suppose I don't really mean it like that."
"It's true, but you tried to persuade her," Yorke said sympathetically. "It's helping no one to blame yourself, though. It's happened, and we've got to sort it out."
Ramage sat up straight in the chair and rubbed his eyes with his knuckles. "I'll give Rossi his orders. He can give Gianna her new instructions this afternoon. We'll time it for breakfast tomorrow - when the food is passed down the hatch. It'll mean a couple of the mutineers are at the foot of the ladder, and we have a good reason why a couple of our fellows are at the top."
Yorke nodded slowly. "It's going to be a damned long night."
"If only they'd got me as a hostage, instead of Gianna," Ramage said miserably.
"Don't be absurd," Yorke snapped. "It wasn't your fault the frigate business failed. I'd never have thought of anything as ingenious. Better they'd taken me, or Bowen, or Wilson. Or all three of us. Stop blaming yourself, for God's sake!"
He paused for a moment and then said savagely, "I blame myself for one thing, though."
When Ramage raised his eyebrows, Yorke said, "Harris thought of all this. I should have ignored you and shot him dead as he stood here. I'll regret that for the rest of my days."
That evening Ramage sat at his desk and wrote up his journal. He had never before filled it in with so much detail. Although he knew there was a chance it would never be sent on to the Admiralty, just putting all the events on paper helped pass the time.
As he described how he - as the future commanding officer of the Lady Arabella - met the Marchesa di Volterra at the British Embassy in Lisbon, and how she had subsequently taken passage for England in the packet brig, he thought bitterly how the bare words, true as they were, bore no resemblance to what actually happened. Not, he admitted, that he was anxious to try to explain it in detail! But fortunately captains' journals were by tradition written in a sparse, impersonal style. Courses, speeds, distances, positions, wind strengths and direction when at sea; when in port a notation of official visitors and official visits made, weather, anchorage position, the way the ship's company was employed...
For the tenth time that night he took out his watch: an hour past midnight. He wished he was standing a watch, but both Yorke and Southwick had been insistent that the risk was too great. A sudden squall or an unexpected emergency needing shouted commands would immediately reveal to the mutineers that he was alive.
Yet even the idea of pretending to be dead had misfired: the mutineers had not relaxed into a false sense of security after finding they were (apparently, anyway) dealing not with the ruthless Lieutenant Ramage but with a passenger about whom they knew nothing. They hadn't made one mistake, blast them. Yorke reckoned their leader - after they lost Harris - had been the first spokesman, the man who agreed to be a hostage, but Ramage now doubted that. Someone down there on the mess-deck was shrewd and cool. Was it Our Ned? The Mate's son had the brains, and probably the cunning. It made sense: Harris and the Bosun led the kidnapping party; Our Ned stayed behind ready to secure and guard them. Or maybe Our Ned had been with Harris, one of the men who somehow bundled Gianna forward in the darkness without Southwick or any of the Tritons spotting them. Perhaps the three mutineers who were on watch did something to divert the Master's attention at the critical moment.
That was more like it: Our Ned and one or two others took Gianna; Harris and the Bosun were supposed to lead the merciless Lieutenant Ramage on deck at pistol point, or - at last he was feeling sleepy, and the details blurred. Thankfully he stood up and walked aft to the cot, trying not to rouse himself. He pulled off his coat, loosened the stock, kicked off his shoes and lowered himself into the cot. Almost immediately he drifted into a deep sleep.
He began dreaming wild dreams of what he wished would happen. That in the dim light of the lantern a shadowy Gianna was bending over him, whispering urgently. In the dream he could neither understand her words nor say anything in reply. He wanted desperately to tell her he loved her, and if anything happened to her he did not want to go on living, but the words would not come.
A sudden slap on his face woke him with a convulsive jerk, his head ringing.
"Mama mia, will you never wake up?"
He lay in the cot rubbing his eyes, trying to focus them on the shadowy figure.
"Nicholas," the figure said crossly, "I've escaped! While you've been sleeping like a pig, I've been getting myself free!"
He leapt from the cot in a completely reflex movement, grabbed the two pistols from the settee and cocked them; then, watching the door swinging to and fro on its hinges with the ship's roll and expecting mutineers to burst in any moment, he snapped, "What happened?"
Gianna, startled by his unexpected leap, said furiously. "You aren't at all pleased to see me!"
"Of course I am!" he hissed. "What happened to the damned sentry?" He went to the door to find a seaman standing there with a musket. "What the hell are you grinning at?" he demanded angrily. "Pass the word for Mr Southwick - and Mr Yorke, too!"
"Oh, Nicholas," Gianna was complaining. "What's wrong with you?"
"Oh shut up, woman!"