Ramage's Signal Page 18

  He opened a drawer and looked for the list of French and Spanish ships drawn up by Orsini. Fifteen ships in all, and the Passe Partout by far the smallest, so crossing out her original crew made little difference. Fourteen ships, then. Slowly he added up the masters, officers and seamen, sometimes pausing to make sure of one of Orsini’s hurriedly written figures. Yes, the fourteen ships had at least two hundred men by the time you added in the extras, because Orsini had noted down only the men he had actually seen (and one could be sure there were always several more below), plus the forty or so from the garrison of the semaphore station and the Passe Partout already on board the Calypso.

  He would need fifty men to guard two hundred and fifty or so prisoners, and none of these could be topmen or idlers. That also meant fifty fewer available as prize crews. No, he had been right the first time; right when he had sent the signal from Foix. He could understand why Aitken, Kenton and Southwick were puzzled.

  He put the parallel rulers down on the chart with the top edge passing through Southwick’s noon position and then moved them crabwise across to the destination. If only this wind direction would hold. It was increasing nicely—not enough to scare the timid masters into premature reefing and furling, but giving signs of settling in for the night.

  Ramage was vaguely conscious of boots clattering down the companion-way, and a few moments later the sentry knocked on the door and called: “Mr Southwick, sir.”

  “Send him in,” Ramage answered, removing the weights and letting the chart roll up. He put the parallel rulers away, and while Southwick acknowledged his gesture and sat down on the settee, Ramage closed the log.

  “Well, Mr Southwick?” Ramage knew the old Master had come down just for a chat, but he always had an excuse and Ramage waited to see what it was.

  Southwick fished a piece of paper from his pocket. “The log, sir, I’m afraid it’s not up to date: the expenditure of powder and shot was not entered. I have the figures here.”

  Ramage took the paper. “Nor was the departure in a French tartane of the Captain, acting Third Lieutenant, Midshipman and five seamen, and the Captain’s subsequent return.”

  Southwick grinned and admitted: “I wasn’t sure how you wanted to deal with that, sir. It so happens, if you’ll look just below the reference to the shortage of salt beef in that cask, there is space enough to enter the departure, and the Captain’s return would be the last entry, after this one about expenditure of powder and shot.”

  “You’d better enter it all,” Ramage said. “Their Lordships may raise their eyebrows at my brief absence, but it was in a good cause!”

  Southwick scratched his head in a gesture Ramage knew so well that he could guess what the old man was going to say.

  “Beats me how you knew that privateer schooner, the Magpie, was going to turn out to be sailed by Algerines.”

  “I didn’t,” Ramage said, surprised.

  “Then why did you go in the Passe Partout, sir?”

  “I didn’t have time to tell Martin how to negotiate with a British privateer—it meant persuading them to let several prizes sail away.”

  “Martin could have gone on board and torn up the letter of marque,” Southwick said grimly.

  “That wouldn’t have helped. There are not many British ships of war to inspect it, and if the French catch a British privateer I doubt that they care much about letters of marque.”

  “But you could have let Aitken go off in the Passe Partout,” the Master persisted.

  “I could, but he learned more by being left in command of the Calypso. He handled her very well.”

  Southwick nodded. “Especially the way he sank the Magpie. But he worries too much.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Well, when you hoisted number sixteen, he was afraid he wouldn’t be able to tack up to you in time.”

  “So was I,” Ramage said grimly. “In fact, if the Magpie hadn’t had her masts go by the board …”

  “But she did: I was telling Aitken that you’d do something, and you did.”

  Ramage sighed at the thought of the thin line by which his life was at times suspended: a thin line of faith that he could perform miracles. “Don’t depend on it. We were lucky this time, but if those Algerines had been sailing the ship for another couple of months it would have been a different story.”

  “Yes, sir,” Southwick said comfortably, “and we are all thankful they weren’t. How long before you’ll give young Orsini command of the Passe Partout?”

  “I was going to leave Martin with him tonight, to hold his hand if necessary in the dark, and launch him off on his own tomorrow.”

  “I’ll pack up his quadrant, tables and glass: he didn’t have time to take them with him.”

  “It seems unfair to Martin,” Ramage said, having second thoughts.

  Southwick’s eyes twinkled as he said casually, “I don’t expect she’ll be the only prize we’ll take. I’d have thought that a tartane rated a midshipman’s command, not a lieutenant’s!”

  “It sounds to me as though you are trying to exercise patronage on behalf of the Marchesa.”

  Southwick gave a bellow of laughter. “That’s about it! Anyway, I’d like to be. She’d have enjoyed watching the Magpie business.”

  “From the Calypso.”

  “No, sir, from the Passe Partout,” Southwick corrected him with mock severity. “You haven’t seen her for so long you’ve forgotten what she’s like when there’s a whiff of action in the air.”

  Ramage hadn’t forgotten, but it had been so long since he had seen her that now memories brought pain rather than pleasure.

  Southwick pointed at the chart which was still lying curled up on Ramage’s desk. “If this wind holds, we should sight land before noon the day after tomorrow, sir.”

  “That’s some ‘if.’ When does the wind stay in the same direction for more than a few hours in this part of the world?”

  “When it’s blowing a mistral or Levanter,” Southwick reminded him.

  Next day the Passe Partout came close to the Calypso and one of the frigate’s boats took off Martin and brought Paolo on board the Calypso to receive his orders and collect his navigational equipment. Before he was taken back to the tartane Ramage sent for him and gave him his official orders. They were brief and written in the stylized form laid down by the Admiralty.

  By Nicholas Ramage, Captain and commanding officer of His Majesty’s frigate Calypso

  To Paolo Orsini, Midshipman, hereby appointed to the Passe Partout, prize to the Calypso frigate.

  By virtue of the power and authority to me given, I do hereby constitute and appoint you midshipman in command of the tartane Passe Partout, prize to His Majesty’s frigate Calypso, willing and requiring you forthwith to go on board, and take upon you the charge and command of her accordingly; strictly charging and commanding all the petty officers and company … to behave themselves jointly and severally … And you likewise to observe and execute as well the General Printed Instructions, and such orders and directions you shall from time to time receive from your captain … hereof nor you nor any of you may fail, as you will answer the contrary at your Peril; and for so doing this shall be your warrant.

  The document was then dated, Ramage’s seal impressed on it, and his signature added, and for the first time in his life Paolo commanded a ship and was responsible for the behaviour of every man on board.

  When the Captain gave it to him, Paolo read it and found no difficulty in understanding the neat handwriting of the Captain’s clerk, but was intimidated by the wording. He read the last paragraph yet again, this time aloud—”hereof nor you nor any of you may fail, as you will answer to the contrary at your Peril …”

  He looked at Ramage, not realizing that this was standard wording. “But, sir, this last part …” It seemed very unreasonable of the Captain to be so hard on him—presumably because

  … Well, he was not sure quite why.

  “‘At your Peril,’ eh? Th
at frightens you, I expect.”

  “Yes, sir; after all …”

  “Well, you are in good company, my lad; every naval officer given command of anything has that in his orders. Commanders-in-chief, commodores, captains, lieutenants—even midshipmen in command of captured tartanes.”

  “You mean, sir, your orders say the same?”

  “The same and a lot more.”

  At that moment Paolo understood why the commanding officer was always such a remote figure; why the attitude of the seamen, for instance, had been different where Martin was concerned on board the Passe Partout: they were more reserved, keeping a distance between them. Now, Paolo realized, he had—however temporarily—crossed the line separating carefree midshipmen skylarking on board without any papers or passing any examinations from officers who must not fail without “answering to the contrary.”

  He saw Ramage was watching him.

  “Nothing has changed,” Ramage said quietly. “Always do what you think is right, be just, don’t give an order you would not carry out yourself and you won’t fail. And once you’ve made up your mind, do it. Hesitation and indecision loses battles—and reputations.”

  “Like you did not hesitate when you jumped on board the Passe Partout,” Paolo said eagerly.

  Ramage winced at such a recent memory. “That’s not a very good example, but just do your best. And remember, your men have to do their best as well.”

  He motioned Paolo to put the order in his pocket. “Now, we should be arriving at our destination tomorrow afternoon if the wind holds. For various reasons I don’t want the whole convoy arriving at the same time, so from sunset tonight don’t chase up the laggards. Let them lag. Ideally, I’d like half a dozen ships to arrive in the first hour or so, three or four an hour later, and the last of them at dusk …”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  “And there’s one more thing. You can keep Stafford and Rossi, but I need Jackson back. You can pick a good man to replace him. Now, listen carefully; this is what you will do when the convoy arrives.”

  Paolo listened for four minutes, nodded, was reprimanded for not saying “Aye aye, sir” to acknowledge the orders, and then left the cabin and climbed down to the waiting boat in a haze of excitement: he commanded a ship-of-war and had a document to prove it. Suddenly he found the prospect and responsibility did not frighten him. At least, not very much.

  The Calypso’s lookouts first sighted land lying low on the horizon to the east two hours before noon, but apart from there being cliffs along the coast no one, apart from Southwick, was sure that they were on course for their destination.

  The advantage of the destination lying on a coast that ran north-west and south-east was that a noon sight gave the latitude, which ran almost at right angles through the coastline. If the latitude from the sight was greater than the latitude of the destination, they had to turn south, if less then north.

  With fifteen ships following the Calypso, Southwick knew that his navigation was important, but as the sun climbed higher towards its zenith in a cloudless sky the Master only grinned when Ramage and Aitken teased him.

  The effect of the Passe Partout lying out on one wing of the convoy and not swooping down to make a laggard set more sail to catch up was very apparent. The Sarazine was still the closest to the Calypso, but she was now a good two miles astern, with the Spanish Golondrina abeam. After those two ships, the other thirteen were spread out to the westward so that four of them had almost dropped below the horizon, all but their topgallants hidden below the curvature of the earth.

  The Passe Partout, recognizable because of her lateen sail and in the far distance looking even more like a shark’s fin, now seemed as much of a straggler as any other merchant ship in the convoy, although Ramage guessed that Orsini was keeping his men busy with the hundred and one jobs that needed doing—checking over, cutting into proper lengths and drying slowmatch, cutting more wads for the swivels; filling more cartridges—and Ramage knew that meant sewing more flannel cartridges, because one of the items Orsini had taken with him was flannel. Orsini, Rossi, and Stafford would carefully check for wear on the vangs holding the big lateen yard and the sheets and the downhauls at the lower end of the yard. The sail had been lowered for an hour yesterday, so all the holes from the Magpie’s musket balls would have been repaired.

  Baxter and Johnson, Ramage was prepared to bet, were scrubbing out the after cabin, the master’s, which Orsini was proposing to use as his own as he had to be close to the man at the tiller in case of an emergency. The fo’c’s’le, too, was suffering from several months of too many seamen being careless with scraps of food. Orsini would be hoping for a captain’s inspection of the Passe Partout when they arrived but, Ramage thought ironically, he had never yet tried to give one of those big lateen sails a harbour furl—and it was unlikely the French would have any of the neat canvas gaskets, in effect straps, to which Orsini was accustomed; more likely one of the vangs would be wound round and round the yard in a spiral to furl the sail in a long bundle.

  It would be interesting to see if Martin’s Medway and Thames background had rubbed off on Orsini. Among the Thames barges, whose long sprits were Britain’s nearest to the lateen yards of tartanes or xebecs, the vangs—the heavy ropes which controlled the upper end of the sprits and stopped them slamming about in heavy weather—were almost invariably referred to by bargemen as “wangs,” just as seamen pronounced “tackle” as “taickle.” Martin would almost certainly have called them “wangs” and it would be interesting to see if Orsini had assumed that was the proper English pronunciation. Palan de retenue in French, oste della mezzana in Italian, burdas de mezana in Spanish. They made “vang” seem a very bald and ugly word; still, in a gale of wind, he would sooner shout “vang” through a speaking-trumpet.

  Ramage glanced at his watch and looked round for Southwick. The Master was waiting with his quadrant in his hand. There was no need for a midshipman standing by with a watch or minute glass; the sun would “hang” for many seconds as it reached the highest point in its meridian passage and Southwick adjusted his quadrant to measure the altitude. They were in roughly the same latitude as Ibiza and between Valencia and Alicante, he thought inconsequentially; thirty degrees north of the area in which he preferred to serve, the Caribbean.

  The Tricolour streamed out in the wind: at least the breeze had stayed steady since dawn after easing down for the night. Easing down just enough, Ramage admitted, to let the convoy straggle to its heart’s content. Now Southwick was, for once, becoming impatient waiting for local noon, for the moment when the sun reached its zenith and its bearing was due south.

  Southwick walked over to the starboard side of the quarter-deck and held the telescope of the quadrant to his eye, making sure that no shrouds, rigging, lanyards or blocks obscured his view. He flipped down a shade, looked at the sun through it, and flipped down a second. Then he set the arm against a figure on the ivory scale.

  Ramage winked as Southwick glanced across to see if this act of supreme confidence had been noticed. Southwick was in fact doing it backwards: he was in effect saying he knew already the precise latitude in which the Calypso and the convoy were sailing, and in that latitude at noon on this day in the year the altitude of the sun should be a certain number of degrees and minutes measured by his quadrant. By putting the altitude on the quadrant he should (if he was correct) put the telescope of the quadrant to his eye and, as the sun hovered at the zenith in the course of its meridian passage at noon, he should see it reflected in the mirror and apparently sitting on the horizon like a bright red plate balanced vertically on a shelf.

  Ramage watched to see if the Master’s left hand reached up to make a slight (and probably surreptitious) adjustment—an indication that the Calypso was north or south of Southwick’s reckoning. He counted three minutes and saw Southwick smile to himself as he lowered the quadrant and walked to the slate which was on top of the binnacle box.

  “San Pietro and Sant’
Antioco islands are dead ahead on this course, distant about ten miles, sir,” Southwick reported. “Thirty-nine degrees and two minutes of latitude.”

  “Very well, Mr Southwick.” He looked round for Kenton who was the officer of the deck. “I’ll trouble you, Mr Kenton, to let fall the t’gallants, and once they’re drawing we’ll have a cast of the log. Keep an eye on the convoy and pass the word for Mr Aitken and Mr Rennick to come to my cabin.” He gestured to Southwick to follow and went down the companion-way.

  He had a large-scale chart open on his desk, and Southwick was placing the stone paperweights, by the time the sentry’s call announced the arrival of Aitken and Rennick.

  Aitken immediately looked at the chart as if hoping to see pencilled lines that would reveal the Captain’s plans. Instead he saw a fifty-mile stretch of coast running north-west and southeast down to form Capo Teulada and Capo Spartivento at the south-western corner of the island of Sardinia.

  Forming, Aitken realized, one of the great corners of the Mediterranean. Once a ship sailed into the Mediterranean past Europa Point and left Gibraltar astern, Capo Teulada and then Capo Spartivento, forming the southern tip of Sardinia, and Capo Passero at the south end of Sicily, had to be rounded before turning up into the Adriatic or the Aegean, or passing on south of Crete—he could not remember the name of that cape—for those places with magical names: Sidon, Tyre, Acre and the Biblical villages and towns, none of which seemed to be on the coast, as though the early Christians were wary of the sea, despite St Peter being a fisherman.

  The four men stood round the desk looking at the chart, and Ramage put his finger down at a point about halfway along the coast.

  “There’s the Golfo di Palmas,” he said to Aitken and Rennick, “and Southwick assures me it lies just ahead. That island protecting it to the north is Sant’ Antioco and the smaller one north of that is San Pietro. The Golfo di Palmas is reckoned one of the best anchorages in this part of the Mediterranean: ships can find shelter because even a south wind doesn’t kick up too much of a sea.”