Bazely nodded. “This I c’n understand o’ ye, Tom.”
Kydd found himself recounting his brush with mutiny in his first ship as a young seaman but stopped short of telling all of the fearsome days at the Nore when as a master’s mate he had sided with the mutineers.
Bazely listened with sympathy.
With exaggerated politeness born of alcohol, Kydd turned to him. “I’m t’ thank you for your concerns, Bazely. As I’m qui’ capable o’ dealing with this’n.”
“O’ course ye are, old trout.”
Befuddled with drink, Kydd felt the anger coming back. It was so bloody unfair. That scuttish reporter had had no right …
The evening wore on until it didn’t matter any more.
Kydd woke blearily to a disorienting jolting and swaying. It seemed he was in a coach. Opposite sat Tysoe, with a blank expression. Next to him a plain woman was wearing a look of extreme disapproval, her yeoman farmer husband sitting beside him, trying to keep as far away as possible from him.
With a parched mouth and throbbing head Kydd tried to make sense of it all. Tysoe and Bazely must have bundled him aboard the coach to Yarmouth; he was on his way to take command of Tyger-his punishment ship. The other passengers must think him a rake or worse, but at least he wasn’t in uniform.
He shied at the thought of stepping aboard in his condition, and rising emotion took him again at the low ploy of the Admiralty, the image of the craggy but malevolent Earl St Vincent thrusting before him.
To go from hero of the hour to this in so short a time was hard to bear and he gulped back his feelings as they entered the outskirts of Yarmouth.
They were dropped at a mean inn and Kydd collapsed wearily in his room.
His head still swam but it didn’t stop the thoughts that stampeded unchecked.
One in particular grew. Why not quit while he was still on top? As far as both the public and the navy were concerned he was still a fresh-returned hero, victor of battles and a name to conjure with. If he put to sea in a fragile, mutinous ship and lost to the French, he would never be forgiven by those who had celebrated him before.
It was an attractive course: he wouldn’t get another command, but the public would assume he’d left the sea to rest on his laurels, like many had done before him, and Sir Thomas Kydd would find an admired and respected place in society where he would be valued for his experience and achievements.
All this could be thrown away if he meekly took what the Admiralty was dishing out and it went badly.
A maudlin rush of memories came. His translation from foremast hand to King’s officer-he’d made the conscious decision to take the harder route, not to be a tarpaulin officer but learn to be a gentleman, enter society on their terms, not his, and it had paid off handsomely. It had been a hard lesson and dear Renzi had been crucial to both the deciding and the accomplishing, so here he was, a figure in the quality and a hero to boot.
Cruel self-doubt mocked. A hero? Was he really … one like Nelson?
At Curacao he’d been consumed in the mad onrush of events and could not have acted differently if he’d tried. And back at Camperdown, where he’d been singled out for the quarterdeck by his courage, there he’d done only his duty, harshly driven by previous events, the great mutiny at the Nore.
Other times: in Tenacious at the Nile? He’d taken away the ship’s boat in deep pity for the men struggling for their lives in the water. It was only common logic that they themselves would not be in peril so close to L’Orient’s gigantic explosion-the wreckage would go up and over them.
It was early dawn when he woke. He threw off his bedclothes and went to the pitcher to slake his thirst.
Tysoe noiselessly appeared with his robe.
“Thank ye,” he croaked. “I’m not playing their game, Tysoe. Pack the gear, we’re leaving.”
The man stood unmoving, his face sagging.
It goaded Kydd. “Didn’t you hear me?” he raged. “I said I’m not going through with it. Be damned to that parcel o’ stinkin’ shicers but I’m not falling for it.”
Tysoe’s expression turned to one of devastation.
“Get out! Be buggered t’ your wry looks! Get out, damn ye!” Kydd roared.
Hesitating, the man gave a dignified short bow and withdrew.
In a paroxysm of fury, Kydd seized the pitcher and smashed it to the floor.
Breathing deeply, he crossed the room, threw open the window and stood there, letting the fresh morning air do its work.
There was a fine view of the sea with the first tentative rays of light tinting it, the sun’s orb just beginning its lift to full daybreak. And inside the sandbar a gaggle of ships at anchor, prettily silhouetted against the dawn-King’s ships.
Could he turn his back on this?
Yes, he could-and would!
He spotted one anchored apart from the others, like a cast-out leper. It had to be Tyger. Waiting for one who could cure a mortal sickness. Could he just leave her to her fate? Damn right he could!
About to close the curtains on the sight he stopped, remembering what he had seen in Tysoe’s face. To him Kydd’s decision was nothing less than a betrayaclass="underline" his master was diminished, a coward-no longer one to admire, to serve with pride and respect. Kydd had let down the only person still with him from his early days as an officer. He’d been found wanting-and it hurt.
He balled his fists as a deeper realisation boiled to the surface. If he retired from the navy his public would be mollified, the Admiralty would be robbed of his humbling-but he would have to live with the surrender for the rest of his life.
He couldn’t do it. It wasn’t in his nature to run-and, by God, he wasn’t going to do so now!
“Tysoe! Where are you, man?” He found him in the other room, listlessly filling the trunk. “What’s this, laying out m’ shore-side gear? I said to pack, we’re leaving, and that is, I’m to board and take command o’ Tyger frigate this day-but not in those ill-looking rags!”
CHAPTER 8
KYDD THREW ON A BOAT-CLOAK and took coach for the naval base. It was only a short distance, near where the Yare river met the sea, an unassuming building with blue ensign aloft. The establishment was the smallest Kydd had encountered, with a modest stores capability and accommodation for the senior naval officer who had charge of a local force of sloops and brigs guarding the coast.
A single marine sentry snapped to attention at Kydd’s sudden appearance.
He didn’t care how he was received for there was only one objective in his sights: to fight and win in this unfair contest. Nothing else mattered.
Captain Burke rose to greet him with a look of polite enquiry.
“Captain Sir Thomas Kydd, to take command of Tyger frigate.” He handed over his warrant.
“Ah. We’ve had word of you, Sir Thomas.”
Burke was of the same rank as he. In the normal course of events, Kydd could expect to know only the company of lowly sloop captains, mere commanders. He felt the tug of temptation to unburden, but his mood was too bleak.
“I intend to assume command and put to sea with the least possible delay,” he rapped. “What is Tyger’s condition, pray?”
The man’s expression was guarded. “You’ll know she’s been in mutiny, and that only very recently?”
“I do. That’s in the past-I desire only to proceed to sea with all dispatch, sir.” Kydd’s instinct was to reach open water, then let sea air and ship routines do their work.
“Very well. She was near completing stores when it … that is to say, the mutiny happened, some eight days ago. In all other respects she’s ready.”
Like the majority of mutinies this one had broken out just as the ship was preparing to leave-very few happened on the high seas. And as was the way with mutiny, it had been met with instant justice: corpses at the yardarm only days after.