‘He’s mortified to confess that a banquet of the usual form will not be possible in the circumstances.’
Kydd bowed again, then discovered that a modest reception in the evening for his officers was to be expected.
‘I should be honoured to attend, sir,’ he said graciously. The Russian nodded, then disappeared into the residence.
Foresti turned to Kydd. ‘Captain, I think you and I should talk together. Your ship?’
Foresti sat in a frigid silence as they were rowed out to L’Aurore but clearly knew enough of naval etiquette to allow Kydd to leave the boat first to be piped aboard before he himself was escorted in.
In Kydd’s great cabin Foresti ignored the grand appointments and waved aside Tysoe’s offer of refreshments. He looked pointedly at Renzi.
‘My confidential secretary of some years, Mr Renzi,’ Kydd said firmly. ‘His learning and linguistic accomplishments have been remarked at the highest level in England.’
‘Renzi? You have the Italian?’
‘Si, abbastanza bene.’
‘And your Greek?’
‘In the Ionians,’ Foresti remarked acidly, ‘your classical parlance is as donkey dung, sir.’ He looked intently at Kydd. ‘I come to beg that you will tread very lightly about your business in the Levant. All is not as it seems, and should you lose the confidence of the peoples . . .’
‘Sir. You are known to us and I’m persuaded we are to be guided by your wisdom and sagacity,’ Renzi said carefully. ‘Is there perhaps something we should be particularly aware of that will help us in our dealings?’
Foresti gave a tight smile. ‘The captain here will understand that merchant ships have a colourful notion of bearing fair documentation. False papers are more to be expected in every case. Neutral bottoms are where you will find your irregular cargoes – but all this is well known to your profession.
‘What is important for you to understand is that you sons of Nelson believe you have driven the French from the Mediterranean. Nothing is more wrong. They are everywhere, currying favours, intriguing against rulers who treat with the English, preparing for the time when they will return victoriously.’
He drew out a blue handkerchief and blew into it. ‘Their agents are pointing to the success Bonaparte commands in Europe, that in only a short while England will be no more and that it would be well for the wise to be on the winning side.
‘Your allies? Sultan Selim in Constantinople has no control over his satraps, who govern their petty kingdoms in corruption and tyranny. Ali Pasha rules in the Morea – they call him “the butcher of Yannina” but the Russians and the French hasten to do him homage, as does your good Lord Nelson himself. And the Turkish Navy may be at sea, but it favours the French and will never fight for you.
‘The Russians? Mocenigo, I happen to know, is in secret communication with the French and is entirely untrustworthy. The grand Tsar pronounces one thing and does another; their dearest wish is to possess a port that is free from ice the year around and for this they are prepared to fish in troubled waters.’
Kydd’s face gave nothing away. ‘Then what in your opinion is the greatest peril?’
Foresti paused for a moment. ‘That depends. For us it must be the thirteen thousand French troops in Italy at Otranto, eight thousand at this moment marching to join them, sixty miles only across the strait from where we sit. They are waiting for when Napoleon launches his assault on England and they will be released to seize back the Ionians and—’
‘Thank you, sir. You have made our position plain,’ Kydd said, bringing the conversation to a close. ‘We shall indeed step warily in these parts. Now, is there anything we can do for you, at all?’
Foresti sighed and indicated that his services as prize agent were always to be had and the safe custody of dispatches to Nelson on their departure would leave him more than satisfied.
‘Then I shall see you to the boat,’ Kydd said, rising, and added, ‘Sir, being as you are British consul, you may be saluted with eleven guns on going ashore, if you so desire.’
‘Save your powder, Captain. And remember – trust not a soul.’
‘Sir, may I name my officers . . .’ Noise and laughter filled the reception room. It was large and very hot with a vast fire at the end tended by ornately uniformed Cossacks; around the room ladies, dressed in a style not seen in London for an age, mingled in the greatest good humour.
Footmen in colourful sashes and headgear offered fine-cut glasses of a strange Russian potion called vodka. Kydd’s nervousness at representing his country formally melted away, his senses heightened by the rhythms from a trio of players energetically strumming on peculiar triangular instruments and the utterly alien odours wafting about.
‘Ze Ritter Kommodor Greig!’ Kydd turned to meet a powerfully built man, with a genial smile, who bowed with a click of the heels. This was the flag-officer of the Russian Ionian Squadron and Kydd hastened to return the compliment.
‘My name interests you?’ the man said teasingly. In politeness Kydd had not questioned why the senior Russian commander had perfect English and affected a Scottish name.
‘Er, yes.’
‘My father Samuil Karlovich, our most distinguished admiral under the Tsarina Catherine, came from Inverkeithing. A Royal Navy lieutenant in the service of the Tsar. We have many such to ornament our navy, sir.’
‘And we likewise, er, Kommodor. I had the honour to meet Captain Krusenstern as served at sea with us before he set forth to sail around the world in our Leander and Thames as was. Have you word at all?’
The talk eddied happily about him as the vodka was tossed back in the Russian way, and nearby he heard Howlett making hesitant talk with an impeccably dressed and decorated civilian. ‘Er, I’ve heard your Greeks can be an unruly parcel to rule. How do you—’
‘Ioannis Capodistrias. I’m Ionian but count myself Greek, sir, in this island which is nominally Turk, garrisoned by Russia and lately occupied by France. In the article of ruling therefore we naturally compromise on the laws and usages of Venice, which we do all accept.’
Kydd hid a smile and glanced to the aristocratic Curzon, languidly at home in surroundings such as these – ‘Yes, well, you have a new Tsar, I understand. Alexander? All hail to His Imperial Majesty, of course, and I’m privileged to claim your Count Nikita Panin as one of my closer friends. He and I—’
‘The graf Nikita Petrovich Panin, who was one of the assassins of His Imperial Majesty’s father, the Tsar Paul?’
‘Oh! Er, I had no idea—’
‘And who, nevertheless, is now Chancellor of the Russian Empire?’
Kydd looked about to see how Renzi was coping but couldn’t catch sight of him in the animated throng. He leaned forward politely to hear the laboured English of yet another young officer about to make acquaintance of one of the legendary Nelson’s captains.
Renzi was enthralled to be hearing about the life of a Dnieper Cossack in passionate French from a heavily bearded cavalryman and did not want to be distracted.
‘Sir, this is of the utmost importance!’ a man behind him whispered again, plucking at his sleeve. ‘You must hear me.’
The burly officer seemed not to notice and rumbled on, a faraway look in his eyes. Renzi threw an angry glare at the little man in thick spectacles but it did not deter him. Renzi rounded on him and demanded to know what it was that could not wait.
‘Sir – in private, if you understand,’ the man said, shifting uncomfortably.
Renzi weighed the loss of the intriguing conversation against the possibility that some problem was affecting their presence. ‘Very well, sir. One moment . . .’ He made his apologies to the officer and reluctantly followed the man out into the garden.