But it had not gone away, and his practical mind could not accept it.
He turned from the nettings and said, "I've made a note in the log, Mr. Tollemache. When the morning watch is aft, you can set the fore course We may sight local shipping at first light, and I shall want enough agility to avoid it."
He felt the lieutenant staring after him as he made his way to the poop. Outside his cabin he looked aft to where the sentry stood in a pool of light, as if he had never moved. There was a faint glow beneath the screen door. Could Bolitho not sleep, either?
With his cabin door closed behind him, he unshuttered the lanterns and looked at the cot beyond the screen, and then at the cupboard where he kept his brandy, one of the bottles which Catherine Somervell had sent aboard for him, as she had before in Indomitable. Who else would have thought of it? Would have cared?
Eventually he sat down, his head in his hands, his ears only half-aware of the shipboard sounds, the unending chorus in any living vessel.
Then he straightened his back and pulled some writing paper from a drawer. Surprisingly he felt quite calm, unnervingly so. Like the moment of decision, before going into battle, or at the first sight of the enemy's masts and sails spanning the horizon. An awareness, simply because there was no choice, perhaps never had been.
How long he sat there, the pen gripped in his hand, he could not remember.
And then, as if driven by another force, he began to write.
Dear Marion… When Lieutenant Kellett strode aft to muster the morning watch, Tyacke was still writing.
Then, at dawn, he went on deck and examined the log. He was the captain again.
Eight bells had just chimed from the forecastle belfry when Richard Bolitho came on deck, and crossed to the weather side while Frobisher settled down on the final leg of her approach. His mouth was still tingling to the coffee Ozzard had prepared while Allday had been shaving him. Something which had become a routine, as much a part of the ship's own procedure.
He shaded his eyes and stared along the length of the upper deck. Malta seemed so small, so insignificant on any chart, and yet from here it reached out on either bow as if snared in the tarred shrouds and standing rigging, a sprawling mass of sandstone. They were still too far away to distinguish houses and fortifications, or the batteries which guarded the anchorage, and made Malta the most formidable obstacle to any hostile fleet or squadron which might attempt to slip through the strait between Sicily and the coast of North Africa.
This was an island fought over, occupied and reoccupied, it was said as far back as 800 BC, when the Phoenicians had arrived. Sicilians, Arabs, all had left their mark upon architecture, religion and trade.
He felt a trickle of sweat run down his spine; his fresh shirt would be like a rag within the hour, and he envied the bare-backed seamen, skins already sunburned, as they dashed up and down the ratlines in response to the shouted orders from the quarterdeck.
Some of the unemployed men stared at passing craft, brightly coloured fishing boats with bat-like sails. Most of them had an eye painted on the bow, the eye of Osiris, believed to enable the boat to see where it was going and so avoid danger. A few of the occupants waved as the black and buff seventy-four passed, but not many. Men-of-war, large and small, had become commonplace to these people throughout a war they had never truly understood.
Bolitho moved slightly into the shade of the mizzen topsail, and winced as a reflected shaft of sunlight pricked his injured eye. He saw Tyacke speaking to Tregidgo, the sailing master. They were probably satisfied with their calculations, and their arrival at the estimated time. The master was competent, Tyacke had told him, an old hand, four years in Frobisher and ten as a master before that. Tyacke had also said that he was not an easy man to know.
Bolitho had spoken to him only once, a fellow Cornishman, but with entirely different beginnings. Tregidgo had been the first of his family to go to sea; the others were all tin miners, Cousin Jacks, as they were called in Cornwall. He had not waited to be taken by a press gang, but had walked into Redruth and volunteered. It must have been a hard climb to his present rank, Bolitho thought.
He saw Allday moving around the boat tier, his face set in a frown of concentration. The barge had been painted green at his instruction, but it was impossible to know if Allday was pleased with it.
Lieutenant A very joined him. "My first visit here, sir."
Bolitho said, "I doubt if you'll find much time to explore."
They looked up as more men clambered out along the topsail yards, like monkeys against the pale sky.
Bolitho had seen the date in the ship's log: the sixth of June, 1814. Adam's birthday. He thought of the war he had left behind in those disputed American waters, the risks and dangers to Adam; afraid that his despair and bitterness at Zenoria's death might make him reckless, and too eager for a fight with the enemy which had destroyed the only other thing he had loved, the frigate Anemone. He knew what it was like, how grief could blunt even the most experienced captain's judgement; he had suffered it himself, at a time when he believed he had nothing to live for. A death wish, someone had called it.
If only Adam were here. Another in his position would use his influence as admiral to arrange such a transfer, but it would be seen as favouritism, and Adam would decline for that very reason.
Tyacke said. Take in your courses, Mr. Kellett, and have the marines mustered aft."
He never seemed to raise his voice, but they were coming to know their captain, and aspire to his standards, even if they could not understand why he drove himself so hard.
Allday had come aft. but was careful to keep his distance. Thinking, perhaps, of the child who would be even more grown up when he eventually reached home again.
Bolitho bit his lip. June. His own daughter. Elizabeth, would be twelve years old this month.
I do not know her.
More shouted commands, and the way going off the ship as she moved steadily towards the land and the gleaming expanse of anchorage. The gunner was on deck speaking with Gage, the fourth lieutenant, making sure that each gun would fire exactly on time when the salutes began. A few men looked towards the quarterdeck where the admiral and his aide stood side by side, apparently beyond the reach of doubt, or any ordinary concerns.
Bolitho smiled to himself, and Avery saw the smile and found comfort in it, without knowing why.
There was a Spanish frigate anchored nearby, some of her company mustered on deck to dip her ensign in respect as the ship with the admiral's flag moved abeam.
Bolitho tried to accept it. They were enemies no longer. He thought of Catherine's words, when they had first met. It was as though she had just spoken them aloud. Men are made for war, and you are no exception. But it was not a reminder. It was a warning.
7. No Choice at All
Adam Bolitho stood by the entrance of Valkyrie's great cabin and watched in silence as Rear-Admiral Valentine Keen strode to the stern windows, his hair almost brushing the deck head beams. It was impossible to know what he was thinking, but Adam sensed that he no longer regarded this as his flagship.
Valkyrie had anchored at Halifax in the early morning, and with scarcely a word Captain Henry Deighton had gone ashore to report to Keen. It had not been an easy passage, either to the Bermudas or on the return. Deighton had questioned Adam relentlessly about almost everything, from the various patrol areas to recognition signals; Adam had expected that, after their bad beginning. Deighton had hardly spoken to any of the officers, and had confined himself to this. Keen's cabin, for his meals and to write endless reports, for whose benefit was still unclear.