Aston was thankful that he knew his wife was at home in Lincolnshire, looking after his mother and tending the half-acre of land with occasional help from her young nephew. The boy was an idle youngster, but since Rebecca had cut off his meals for a day or two, then cuffed him once when he was insolent, he had mended his ways a bit. In fact Rebecca had been so provoked by him that once she turned him out of the house so that he had nowhere to sleep. He had gone off and told the parson a tall story and without even bothering to ask Rebecca, whom he had known since christening her twenty years before, the parson gave the boy a whack across the shins with his walking stick, made him sleep the night in the parsonage stables and sent him home again next morning with orders to beg Rebecca's pardon.
That sort of parson was good for a village, but all too many of them seemed to reckon that only the squire and his lady were likely to go to Heaven and the rest of the folk were not worth bothering about, damned because they were poor. Well, luckily the local parson was a good old chap because the fact of the matter was (and not even Rebecca knew much about it: she would go telling her mother, then it would be all over the village), thanks to Mr Ramage and the number of prizes they had taken, he had quite a bit of money now. And head money too, for all the prisoners taken. So when the war ended and he had all his prize money together, he was going to make old Swan an offer for Lower Farm. Eighty-four acres and good land. The tithe ran at seven pounds eleven shillings a year, but that field behind the wood was hard to get to and was just right to let out to grazing, leaving exactly seventy acres to farm and the rent would pay the tithe.
He had talked to Mr Ramage about it, and Mr Ramage reckoned Swan's price was about right and also reckoned letting that field for grazing would be a good idea. In fact he had suggested it. The captain said that one of the secrets of good farming was being able to get to all your land all the year round. Having a big field cut off by thick snow or thick mud meant you might as well not own it for many months.
Aston admitted he would never have seen it in that light, but it was true. Mr Ramage also said he would have his man of law go over all the papers with Swan when the time came and make sure everything was in order. That was Mr Ramage for you. Aston knew of other men that Mr Ramage had helped, and he never talked about it, or behaved any differently towards the men: he never expected more than a good day's work. What a landlord he would make!
Ramage, was inspecting the columns of ships, looking at each one through the glass, not from any particular interest but because he knew that for the next few weeks there would not be many more tranquil sunsets. In fact in the next few days he would have all the storm canvas stretched out on deck to be patched where necessary and to make sure the stitching holding the bolt ropes to the canvas was still in good condition. It was curious how the stitching of a sail or awning always rotted long before the cloth itself.
The poor old Calypso needed a new suit of sails, and the present ones should be struck below as spares. The trouble was that she was back at Chatham being paid off when the war started again after the Treaty of Amiens, and she had been hurriedly commissioned - which meant getting the yards across with new rigging, but the old sails were bent on again. The Calypso was merely one of many ships of war being commissioned in a rush, and Ramage had not been there to use cunning or influence to get new sails.
Nor was Captain Ramage himself much better off! One of his first calls in London would be on his tailor. Twenty guineas, probably more, for a full dress coat and epaulette (it was an economy being a post-captain with less than three years' seniority because he had to wear an epaulette on only one shoulder). Ten guineas for an undress coat. Five guineas for the gold-laced hat. Breeches, silk stockings, shirts, stocks, handkerchiefs . . . Silkin, his steward, had a long list which included table linen as well which needed replacing. Well, he did not complain about that: it was very irritating sitting down at a meal alone and restraining oneself, between courses, from poking the tines of a fork into a fraying patch. Silkin did his best to darn the patches, but new ones appeared every time the cloths were laundered.
He remembered Alexis's irritation, while they were having dinner on board the Emerald, when she noticed a tiny worn patch in the table cloth: she had frowned at the steward and glanced at it, and that was all. That was one of the advantages of being in a well-run merchant ship, which used fewer men for the same job than one of the King's ships, but the men probably worked harder because they were paid more and could be paid off at the end of a voyage if their work was unsatisfactory. They could also be picked up by a press-gang before the end of a voyage, too! Anyway, one frown from Alexis might be more effective than an outburst of anger from a post-captain!
He swung the telescope from L'Espoir to La Robuste and then to the Jason. All three ships were in good order, and for the moment none of the merchant ships showed any sign of dropping astern, although the sun had slipped well below the horizon. He had forgotten to look for the green flash. He had seen it hundreds of times in various latitudes, but it always amused him to watch for it, knowing that one blink at the crucial moment meant missing that bright green wink which lasted only a fraction of a second.
Young Kenton was standing over on the larboard side of the quarterdeck, having just taken over the deck from Martin. Ramage decided to go down to his cabin. Usually he did not like reading by candlelight in low latitudes because the flame made the cabin too hot, but they were now far enough north for it not to matter. More important, he had just found that the four volumes of letters edited by John Fenn and which he had bought three or four years ago and left in the bookcase, read more like novels than anything else.
Fenn (Sir John Fenn, he seemed to remember: was he not given a knighthood for his labours?) certainly gave the volumes a title which was accurate but hardly inspiring - Original Letters written During the Reigns of Henry VI, Edward IV, Richard III and Henry VII, by Various Persons of Rank and Consequence, and by Members of the Paston Family. To read the letters, as far as Ramage was concerned, was to be one of the Paston family of Norfolk at the time of the Wars of the Roses. Their neighbour was Sir John Fastolf, a soldier who fought at Agincourt (was that not in 1415?), and was changed by Shakespeare from a brave soldier in real life to the bawdy and drunken (but humorous) coward in some of his plays, the name changed slightly from Fastolf to Falstaff, a change too slight, Ramage thought, to avoid a Mr Shakespeare of today being called out by Sir John or one of his friends.
Still, Shakespeare's plays and the Paston family letters were (thanks to John Fenn) a joy to read. In fact he would be hard put to finish the final volume of the Paston letters before the Lizard hove in sight.
Gilbert looked puzzled as he tried to translate what was obviously a joke by Stafford. The trouble was that Gilbert's English had been learned in the eastern part of Kent, where country folk talked broadly and in a slow drawl, whereas the Cockney, Stafford, talked quickly, clipping words like a miserly tailor.
" 'Penten' - I do not understand it."
Stafford, sprawled along the form beside the table, the bread barge in front of him, was roaring with laughter, and Jackson tapped him on the arm. "That was all too quick for me, so how'd you reckon . Gilbert is going to understand?"