They reached the comparatively cool air between decks and walked aft to where the marine sentry stood between the two doors of Trevenen's and his own quarters. A blank, ordinary face, a bayonetted musket at his side, his eyes looking straight past them.
Inside the cabin Ozzard was ready and waiting. Hock for the vice-admiral, rum for his coxswain.
Bolitho sat on the bench seat and stared at the creaming water bubbling up from the rudder.
"What is the matter with them, old friend?"
Allday held up the tankard and blinked in the sunlight. "I seen an old dog once, the way it cowered when its drunken master raised a stick to it." His voice was faraway, reliving it. "Then one day it went for him. That bugger never laid a hand on him again! " He swallowed a mouthful of rum and added reflectively, "An' there's more'n one dog in this ship! "
Captain Adam Bolitho came on deck and glanced first at the compass and then at the set of each individual sail. Anemone was making full use of a fine north-westerly wind that had whipped the blue-grey water into a million cruising white horses, and now filled the sails to the hardness of white metal.
The deck was a scene of busy activity, for although it was not long after dawn the hands were washing down the main deck on the lee side where seas occasionally dashed through the open gun ports to gurgle around their bare legs before surging into the scuppers. On the quarterdeck other seamen were busy with the heavy holystones, cleaning and smoothing the pale planking before the sun gained height and softened the seams to make such work impossible.
To the new men Adam probably did not look much like a successful frigate captain. Hatless and without even his faded sea-going coat, his dark hair flying in the wind, he might appear more like a pirate.
It had taken longer than he had anticipated to clear Spithead and put a small press-gang ashore. They returned with only three men, none of whom had ever been to sea. Off Portsmouth Point he had been more fortunate, when quite by chance Anemone had run down on a topsail cutter under the command of a notorious lieutenant who controlled the press-gangs there. The lieutenant had been so resourceful that he often followed home-bound merchant ships making for the Solent or Southampton Water. He had long ago discovered that the meaner ship masters often paid off all but the minimum of hands required, to save themselves money. Once paid off and the lieutenant usually watched the proceedings through a huge signals telescope the cutter would swoop alongside and the luckless sailors, some almost within sight of home, were snatched up by the press and taken to the guard ship
Adam had obtained twelve hands, all seamen: still not enough, but it had eased the lot of his lieutenants and warrant officers. The delay had taken him off course, however, and when he had reached Gibraltar he discovered that his uncle and the other frigate had already sailed.
The first lieutenant approached him and touched his forehead.
"Sou' west by south, sir. Steady as she goes."
Adam thought of his sealed orders, which he would eventually deliver to his uncle. Over six thousand miles, with a call at Freetown on the west coast of the African continent. It could have been to the moon: one small ship, his ship, free to act as she pleased and without anyone to say otherwise.
Lieutenant Martin watched him anxiously. The captain had never been an easy one to serve when things went wrong. But his predecessor Sargeant, who had been sent to his own command, had managed very well despite his youth. He had stood between captain and company as any first lieutenant should, and out of it had come a friendship which Martin accepted was not yet his privilege to be offered.
He said, "I was wondering, sir… shall we set the stuns' is when the people have had their breakfast?"
Adam glanced up at the tapering studding-sail booms, which were lashed beneath the yards. Once extended, with the extra sails giving even more power to the ship, Anemone might gain a few more knots.
He noticed the greasy smell of cooking from the galley funnel and was suddenly aware of the uncertainty of his second-in-command. To Martin's astonishment he clapped him on the arm and smiled. "I am bad company, Aubrey. Stand by me, for I am in irons at the moment."
Martin's face flooded with relief but he was sensible enough not to ask the reason for his captain's despair.
Adam remarked, "I am in no hurry to catch up with the others, and that is the truth of it."
"But your uncle, sir?"
Adam showed his teeth in a grin. "He is still the flag officer, and I never allow myself to forget it." He swung round as the sailing master appeared from the companion hatch. "Ah, Mr. Partridge, I have a task for you."
The old master grunted. "I be ready, sir."
"If you lay a course to Madeira, allowing for the wind holding, what time will we anchor at Funchal?"
Partridge did not even blink. "Why, sir, I thought it was to be a tiresome difficult question! " He beamed at his captain, who was less than half his age, although nobody was quite sure how old Partridge himself was.
He said, The masthead should be sighting land presently, sir. I'll go and work on the chart."
He shambled away and Adam shook his head in admiration.
"What a man. If I ordered him to take us to the Barrier Reef he would not flinch."
The first lieutenant, who had seen nothing in the sailing orders or Admiralty Instructions about calling at Madeira, asked, "May I ask why that place, sir?"
Adam walked to the quarterdeck rail and watched the two helmsmen at the big double wheel. At times like these he could forget that his company was still short of hands, and all the other problems of command. But for the girl who haunted his thoughts he might even be happy.
He said, " Madeira is an oasis, Aubrey, a water-hole for brave merchant captains as well as the predators like us. Where vessels of all flags pause to do repairs, to take on stores, to replenish their wine. Also, there are usually a few seasoned sailors who because of one mistake or tother have been left behind by their ships! " He grinned, and was a boy again. "So send the watch below to their breakfast, the smell of which has already turned my stomach. After that, we will alter course for Funchal, the last land we shall touch until Sierra Leone." They both looked up as the hail came down from the mainmast. "Deck there! Land on the larboard bow! "
Old Partridge reappeared, containing his satisfaction. "There, sir, what did I say?"
His lieutenant ventured, "Suppose the authorities there object to our search for men?"
Adam smiled. "We shall ask, for volunteers naturally! "
They both laughed and some of the seamen glanced at each other as the pipe came for the watch below to dismiss to their messes.
As Adam strode to the companion-way the old master grunted, "That's more like it, Mr. Martin. It's put the sparkle back in his eye. Better for us too! "
"What has been troubling him, do you think?"
Old Partridge puffed out his weathered cheeks and answered scornfully, "A woman, o' course! Officers should know about them things! "
In his cabin where his servant waited to serve him breakfast, Adam thought suddenly of his uncle, and the great love he had envied so much. Bolitho had been in Madeira and had taken a fan and some lace to Catherine. Perhaps if he himself went ashore he might find a piece of silver, some jewellery maybe… He swung to the stern windows so that the servant should not see his face. She would never wear it, nor would she take it from him. After her stinging rebuff he was a madman even to consider it.
From somewhere in the length of his command someone was playing a lively jig on a fiddle, and another was keeping him company on a whistle. They would be crossing the equator soon after Freetown, when King Neptune and his court would be welcomed aboard, and the uninitiated would be roughly handled in a ceremony that had been held in every King's ship for as long as anybody could remember.