The Italian mainland, now flattening in the great plain and marsh that led to Rome, was sliding past as though the Calypso was a bird flying south to a warmer climate. The Torre di Buranaccio, where he had first met Gianna, had already dropped below the horizon on the larboard quarter; soon he would be able to see the hill towns of Montalto di Castro and then Tarquinia, standing behind their walls beside the via Aurelia like massive sentries from the days of the Caesars guarding the long road to Rome.
Ramage started as Southwick gave a cross between a bark and a chuckle as he put down his quadrant.
"We've gained a little . . . perhaps a quarter of a ship's length."
"We're not exactly ready to range alongside and board her in the smoke," Ramage said irritably. "The wind hasn't freshened; it's easing if anything."
"Aye, sir," Southwick agreed soberly. "We both have the same sail set, but if that French captain doesn't want to turn and fight, it could take us a couple of days to catch him."
"Obviously he doesn't want to fight," Ramage snapped. "Can't say I blame him: he just saw one of his squadron blow up almost alongside him, and the second ship is probably wrecked."
"But we're still even, sir, ship against ship," Southwick pointed out reasonably.
"Ship against ship," Ramage said sarcastically, "doesn't mean very much unless they're in range of each other."
Southwick knew his captain's temper was getting short because of the frustration of having the Furet out of reach and range ahead of him. He was not a man with enough patience to sail in another ship's wake for very long.
"We need something to surprise him," Southwick said complacently, being himself quite prepared to take a couple of days, gaining inch by inch, providing he could eventually get alongside, or at least within range. "He must have had a surprise when that mortar shell burst in his wake! Still, we need something else."
"Yes, we need Martin sitting on the end of the jibboom playing tunes with his flute," Ramage snarled. "A male siren on the rocks. Or perhaps you'd like to go and make nasty faces at him?"
"Wind might drop, sir," Southwick said. "He might run into a calm patch while we still have a breeze - that'd gain us a few ship's lengths."
"And it might just as easily work the other way, with the wind dropping from astern, so we lose it first and he gains the distance."
"True, sir, very true," Southwick said hastily, recognizing warning symptoms. First the Captain would rub the upper and older of the two scars on his right eyebrow vigorously; then the skin of his nose would seem to get taut and bloodless, as though it was shrinking; then he would have trouble pronouncing the letter "r", turning it into a "w". After this, Southwick knew well, although he had seen it happen only a few times, and usually in frustrating circumstances like these, God help the poor fellow who fell across the Captain's hawse. It was likely to be himself this time, he realized, and wished Aitken would come aft: the more live bait the better . . .
Ramage picked up his telescope and spent the next three or four minutes examining the Furet. Southwick measured the angle of the mizenmast once again and noted the angle and the time on the slate. The small island of Giannutri was fading away on the starboard quarter and already Argentario was beginning to shrink over the horizon astern as though shrivelling in the heat of the sun.
Finally Ramage put down the telescope and walked right aft to the stern-chase ports. Southwick was startled to see him kneeling down and, hands gripping the sides of the port, hang out, staring down at the Calypso's wake. He stayed there for several minutes, hauled himself back in again, picked up his hat, which he had left to one side of the port, and jammed it on his head.
"I want five hundred shot brought up on deck from the shot locker," he told Southwick abruptly. "See to it immediately."
The master promptly passed the order to the bosun's mates, and at once dozens of men left the guns and streamed below.
It might work, Ramage thought. He could, of course, start twenty or thirty tons of water from the casks and pump it over the side, so that the ship, lightened by that much weight, might be able to gain a few yards. If he still lost the race, however, he would run out of water weeks before the period his orders lasted, and he would have to go back to Gibraltar with his tail between his legs, defeated by thirst, not the enemy. He could equally well hoist a few guns over the side - each of the 12-pounders weighed a ton - but for every ton he gained he was weakened by a gun, and it still might not do the trick if the Frenchman copied him. There were dozens of other ways of lightening a ship; the trouble was that every one of them also weakened her fighting ability.
Now the men were coming up from below, each clutching four or five 12-pounder roundshot in their arms.
"It might work," Southwick admitted. "It did for the bomb ketches on the way down to Argentario. But - forgive me asking, sir," he added warily, "what makes you think we're not properly trimmed now?"
The question was a fair one because the ship's trim was the master's responsibility and as provisions and water were consumed he had to make sure that the casks, sacks and barrels were taken from parts of the ship that ensured she remained floating level, to the marks set down by her designer.
"We may well be properly trimmed," Ramage said, "but from the day we captured the ship we've never had anything official to go on, only the references in the French logs noting her draught forward and aft whenever the French master could be bothered to have a look and note it down."
"But she always seems to sail well enough," Southwick protested, feeling that his professional skill was being criticized.
"Yes, she always seems to sail well enough against another British frigate of roughly the same size, but this is the first time we've sailed her against an identical French frigate."
"We don't seem to be doing too badly either," Southwick grumbled. "She hasn't gained a yard on us . . ."
"And we haven't gained a yard on her, either," Ramage said grimly.
"No, sir, but we've spent a season in the Tropics; we've a lot more barnacles than she has, I'm sure."
"I'm not," Ramage said shortly. "The French dockyards are overworked and have next to no materials."
"But what are you going to do now, sir?" Southwick asked anxiously, gesturing at the crowd of seamen now gathering round the mainmast with their arms full of roundshot.
Ramage pointed to a telescope. "Look at the Furet. She's griping. They're having to use the rudder every few moments to keep her on course. You can see the white feathers of water it pulls up, like a hen scratching in the dust."
"But so are we, sir," Southwick said defensively. "A ship always yaws when running like this, and the stunsails are out to starboard. 'Taint as though we're running dead before the wind so we have stunsails set both sides."
"Go on, look," Ramage said firmly. "She's not yawing, she's griping. She's down by the bow. Every time her rudder goes over it stirs up the water like an egg whisk."
He waited until Southwick had the telescope to his eye, and then added: "Now you can see . . . Aft she's floating a foot or more too high; the blade of the rudder isn't deep enough. Instead of turning the ship, it's slowing her up, like a paddle held out sideways. Not much, but it must add up to half a knot. And we're doing the same - I guessed as much and that's why I had a look."
Southwick, still staring through the telescope, muttered in near-disbelief: "There . . . there . . . there . . . and there . . . and there . . ."
At the same time Ramage watched the men at the Calypso's wheel. They turned the wheel a few spokes and let it run back as though they were working in unison with the men at the Furet's wheel.