A master's mate said, "Guard boat, sir!"
Bolitho walked to the side and saw the smart pinnace with a midshipman and a captain of marines in the stern sheets coming about to lead them in; the marine stood to raise his hat in salute. He had always enjoyed the moment of entering harbour, no matter where it might be, but his heart refused to rise to it. He thought suddenly of Keen; he would be married by now, and a port admiral in his own right. He wondered who else would have been at the wedding. Bethune, perhaps even Thomas Herrick. He bit his lip. No, not Thomas. He had never healed the rift between himself and Keen.
She would be good for Val. Strong enough to stand up to his overbearing father, woman enough to help him forget.
"Guard boat is comin' alongside, sir!" The master's mate sounded shocked at such a breach of procedure.
Kellett shouted, They have a message for the admiral! Lively there, Mr. Armytage! Your people are all like old women this morning!"
"Stand by for entering harbour! Hands aloft, Mr. Gilpin!"
Bolitho raised his arm to the guard boat as the oars backed water, and swung the stem towards the sand-coloured fortifications once again.
Tyacke said, "Carry on, Mr. Kellett."
Armytage arrived on the quarterdeck, still flushing from Kellett's rebuke and the grins from various seamen. It was his first commission as a lieutenant.
He saw Avery and hurried across, a small package, wrapped in oilcloth, in his hand.
Bolitho said, "Here, Mr. Armytage!"
He felt the others watching him, as if unable to move while the ship and her tall shadow carried them forward, some invisible force in command.
Thank you, Mr. Armytage." He unfolded the oilcloth carefully, his head turned very slightly to correct the imbalance of his vision. Then the paper; for a moment he held it in his hands. A carefully pressed rose, velvet-red, as he had seen them so many times. Again he read the card, the writing he knew so well. I am here. We are together.
Avery's voice broke in anxiously. "Is something amiss, Sir Richard? Can I…"
Bolitho could not look at him, remembering yesterday's verdict from Lefroy. He answered quietly, "A miracle, George. They do happen after all."
They stood side by side on a small balcony which looked down over a cobbled courtyard and an arched entrance from the street. There was a fountain in the centre of the courtyard, but. like the cobbles, un cared for, and full of weeds browned by the Maltese sun. There were servants, unobtrusive and unseen, their presence marked by fresh fruit and wine in the room behind them.
Even the island's sounds were distant and muffled, someone singing, or perhaps chanting in a strange, quavering voice, and the regular clang of a chapel bell.
She turned slightly inside his arm, which had never left her waist since they had stepped on to the balcony. She felt his fingers tighten, as if he still could not believe it, as if he was afraid to release her, and like a dream it would all be lost.
She said, "I wanted to go to the jetty and watch you come ashore. To meet you and hold you. I wanted it so much. Instead……"
They both glanced down as an old dog turned over, panting in the sunshine before dragging itself into the retreating shadows.
He tightened his hold around her waist, thinking of the haste with which he had cut short his immediate duties to come ashore, to this quiet street, to her.
She had told him about Sillitoe, how he had arranged this passage, how even this house belonged to one of his friends or associates, someone who owed him favours. He had felt no resentment or jealousy. It was as if he had known.
As he had slipped out of his heavy coat she had told him the rest of the story, or most of it. How Sillitoe had come with his men to her aid, and had saved her.
Then Bolitho had held her for the first time, pressing her face to his, stroking her hair, his words muffled until he had lifted her chin in his fingers and had said without emotion, "I would have killed him. I will kill him."
She had kissed him, and had whispered, "Sillitoe is a law unto himself.
He will deal with it."
"He is in love with you, Kate." She had flinched at the familiar use of the name. "Who would not be?"
"I am in love with you."
He thought of the piles of despatches which had been brought by the last courier from England. Once so important; he had barely scanned them, and had left Tyacke to sift through them.
She turned again in his arms and looked directly into his face.
"I would have done anything to be here with you. When the ship sailed into the harbour and your Frobisher was not at anchor, I thought I would die." She moved against him. "And then you came. My admiral of England." She struggled with the words. "Will you be able to stay? Saladin is returning in a matter of days. If only……"
He kissed her face and her throat, and felt the pain draining away like sand. "It is more than I dared to hope for."
She led him into the room and closed the shutters. "They know you are here?"
He nodded, and she said softly, Then they will know what we are doing." He reached out for her, but she twisted away from him. "Pour some wine. I must do things." She smiled, and pushed some hair from her face. "Oh, Richard, I love thee so!" Then, like the dream, she was gone.
Bolitho thought of Avery and Allday, who had accompanied him ashore. Each unwilling to abandon him in a strange port, and yet both so determined not to display their anxieties.
And she was here. It was not another dream, wherein she was torn away from him. He felt again the anger and shock as he recalled her careful description of the attack, and what
Oliphant had intended. It was as if Oliphant represented all those nightmare figures, the rivals and lovers which were always a part of his fears.
And she had shown a courage which he could only imagine; it was not even something he could compare with the shipwreck, or their first embattled meeting aboard the Navarra.
She called through the door, "What of tomorrow?"
"I must meet the garrison commander, and receive some officials."
"Afterwards?"
He felt the sudden excitement. "I shall be meeting a very beautiful girl."
She came into the room very quietly, her feet bare, her body clothed from neck to ankles in a fine, white gown.
She put her arms around his neck and held him tightly.
"A girl? If only I still were." She gasped as he cupped her shoulders and ran his hands down her spine.
She said softly, "And I missed your birthday. It was all done in such a hurry. Perhaps I shall buy something here in Malta."
She stood quite still, her arms at her sides as he found the gold cord and pulled it towards him. The gown was so thin that, in falling, it scarcely made a sound, and she watched him, her lips suddenly moist and parted in the filtered sunlight, as he held her against him before lifting her, and carrying her to the bed.
Her fingers were like claws in the sheets as he kissed her nakedness, her mouth and her throat, each breast, with a lingering pressure which made her cry out as if in pain as her nipples hardened in his lips. Once she had dreaded that this reunion would only bring back the disgust and the terror of that night. But it was as if she had no memory, and no control at all; she felt her body writhing as he came to her and she drew him down, touching and caressing, taking him into her, as if it was for the first time.
He kissed her, deeply, and tasted what might have been tears. But their need of one another drove all reserve, all memory, into the shadows. She arched her back so that he could lift her, to join them even more closely; they were one.
She turned her head from side to side, her hair spreading across the disordered sheets, her face damp as if from fever.
"I can't wait, Richard… I can't wait… it's been so long
The rest was lost as they fell, entwined like broken statuary, and there was nothing, only the sound of their urgent breathing.