Bolitho said, "I could not get to the house in time. Otherwise I would…"
Herrick tilted the goblet until it was empty. "Lady Bolitho told me all about those damned Dons who worked around the house. She would have sent them packing! " He looked at Bolitho and asked abruptly, "Was it all taken care of?"
"Yes. Your sister was there. A lot of Dulcie's friends too."
Herrick said in a small voice, "I wasn't even there to see her buried. Alone…" The one word echoed around the cabin until he said, "Your lady tried her best…"
Bolitho said quietly, "Dulcie was not alone. Catherine stayed with her, attended to her every need until she was mercifully released from her suffering. It took courage, for there was no little danger to her."
Herrick walked to the table and lifted the brandy, then waved it vaguely towards the sea.
"Just her? With my Dulcie! "
"Aye. She'd not even allow your housekeeper in close contact."
Herrick rubbed his eyes as if they were hurting him. "I suppose you think that gives you the opportunity to redeem her in my opinion."
Bolitho kept his voice level. "I am not here to score points from your grief. I am well reminded when you came to me with terrible news. I grieve for you, Thomas, for I know what it is to lose love-just as I understand how it feels to discover it."
Herrick sat down heavily and refilled his goblet, his features set in tight concentration, as if every thought was an effort.
Then he said in a thick voice, "So you've got your woman, and I've lost everything. Dulcie gave me strength, she made me feel somebody A long, long step from the son of a poor clerk to rearadmiral, eh?" When Bolitho said nothing he leaned over the table and shouted, "But you wouldn't understand! I saw it in young Adam when he came aboard-it's all there in him too, like they speak of it in the news-sheets. The Bolitho charm-isn't that so?"
"I shall leave now, Thomas." His despair was so destructive it was too terrible to watch. Later Herrick would regret his outburst, his words so bitter that it had sounded like something he had been nursing all down the years. A warmth gone sour; envy where there had once been the strongest bond of true friendship. "Use your time in England to think and relive the good things you found together-and when next we meet-"
Herrick lurched to his feet and almost fell. For an instant his eyes seemed to clear again and he blurted out, "Your injury? Is it improved now?" Somehow through the mist of distress and loss he must have recalled when Bolitho had almost fallen on this same vessel.
Then he said, "Lady Catherine's husband is dead, I hear?" It was a challenge, like an accusation. "Convenient-"
"Not so, Thomas. One day you might understand." Bolitho turned and recovered his hat and cloak as the door opened a few inches, and Captain Gossage peered in at them.
"I was about to inform the rearadmiral that the wind is rising, Sir Richard." His glance moved quickly to Herrick who was slumped down again in his chair, his eyes trying to focus, but without success.
Gossage said swiftly, with what he thought was discretion, "I will call the guard, Sir Richard, and have you seen over the side."
Bolitho looked gravely at his friend and answered, "No, call my barge." He hesitated by the screen door and lowered his voice, so that the marine sentry should not hear.
"Then attend your admiral. There sits a brave man, but badly wounded now-no less than by the enemy's fire." He nodded curtly. "I bid you good-day, Captain Gossage."
He found Jenour waiting for him on deck and saw a messenger running from Gossage to recall the barge to the chains.
Jenour had rarely seen him look so grim, so sad at the same time. But he was not so inexperienced in Bolitho's ways to ask what had occurred during his visit, or mention the glaring fact that RearAdmiral Herrick was not on deck to show the proper respect at Bolitho's departure.
Instead he said brightly, "I heard the sailing-master confide that yonder lies the Dutch coast-but we are losing it fast in another squall." He fell silent as Bolitho looked at him for the first time.
Bolitho touched his eye with his fingers, and felt it sting like a cruel reminder. Then he asked, "Is the barge alongside, Stephen?"
As Jenour left him he thought he heard him murmur, "Dear God, I would that it were Cornwall."
The captain of marines yelled, "Guard of Honour, present arms! "
The rest was lost as Bolitho swung himself out and down to the pitching barge, as if the sea had reclaimed him.
Lieutenant Stephen Jenour tucked his hat beneath his arm and entered Bolitho's day cabin. Outside on the open deck the air was still very cold, but a lull in the blustery wind had smoothed out the North Sea 's short, steep waves and remained with them. The presence of some watery sunlight gave an illusion of warmth in the crowded messes, and here in the great cabin.
Bolitho was leaning over a chart, his hands spread across it as if to encompass the squadron's limits. He looked tired, Jenour thought, but calmer than the moment he had left his friend aboard Benbow. He could only guess at what had come between them but knew it had affected Bolitho deeply.
Beyond the tall stern windows he could see two of the squadron's seventy-fours, the Glorious and the old Sunderland. The latter was so elderly that many aboard Black Prince had thought her either hulked or sunk in battle. There were few campaigns she had missed; she would be, Jenour thought, about the same age as Hyperion.
With Benbow returned to England there were five ships of the line awaiting Black Prince's signals, and two others, the Tenacious and the Valkyrie, were undergoing repairs in England. Jenour had thought it strange that RearAdmiral Herrick had detached two of his depleted strength without waiting to hear Bolitho's views on the subject. But he had kept his thoughts to himself. He had learned to recognise most, if not all of Bolitho's moods and sensitivities, and knew that he was occasionally only partly in his flagship, while the rest of the time he was in spirit with Catherine in England.
He realised that Bolitho had raised his eyes from the chart, and was watching him patiently. Jenour flushed, something he still did far too often-much to his own annoyance.
"The captains are assembled on board, Sir Richard. Only Zest's commander is absent and on his patrol area."
Bolitho nodded. Two weeks since he had parted from Herrick, with too much time to think back over their exchange. Now, for the first time, because of the improved weather conditions, he had drawn the bulk of his squadron together in the hard glare which made the sea look like beaten silver. It was the first time, also, that his captains had managed to reach the flagship.
"What about our courier brig?"
Jenour flushed still further. How could Bolitho have known that the brig had been reported by Glorious's masthead lookout? He had been here in his quarters since a dawn stroll, not on his private sternwalk, but on the quarterdeck in full view of everyone.
Bolitho saw his confusion and smiled. "I heard the signal being repeated on deck, Stephen. A sternwalk has its uses-the sound carries quite well." He added wryly, "Even the things that people say, when they are being somewhat indiscreet! "
He tried not to hope that the little brig, named Mistral, was bringing a letter from Catherine. It was too soon, and anyway she would be very busy. He laid out each careful excuse to hold his disappointment at bay.
He said, "Signal her commander to report on board when the time comes."
He thought of the captains who were waiting to meet him. Not one of them a friend; but all were experienced. That would suffice. After Thomas Herrick… his mind thrust it away feeling the same hurt and sense of betrayal. There had been a time when, as a captain himself, he had fretted about meeting a new ship's company Now he knew from experience that usually they were far more worried than he.