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  Ten minutes later the guns had been sponged out and secured, the magazine locked, rammers and sponges lashed, tubs emptied and stowed and men were busy washing away the sand which had already dried on the deck from the hot sun. Ramage thought of the other orders which he could give to test the ship’s effectiveness in battle – rigging out boarding nets, hoisting grapnels to the yardarms ready to run alongside an enemy ship and hook them in the rigging so they could board, making the men shift guns from one position to another – but he was satisfied. The men were working with a will and the officers were wide awake. Later there would be extra questions for the officers, and he already knew what they would be.

  Finally the Juno’s decks were clean, the brasswork shone, ropes were coiled neatly, leather buckets were back on their hooks. The time had come to begin his inspection, accompanied by Aitken and Southwick, with young Benson following, armed with a pencil and notebook ready to write down any faults that Ramage might find. It took two hours, and by the time he had finished Ramage was hot and weary: below decks the heat was stifling, even though ventilators and wind sails were rigged. The ship was making six knots but the Trade winds were blowing at a little more than fifteen, giving a breeze of only nine knots across the deck: not enough to make a decent cooling draught through the ship.

  Ramage had to admit that the general condition of the Juno was a credit to Aitken, even if not to the Portsmouth dockyard. Paint bubbles on beams and planking had set Ramage digging with a knife that revealed patches of rot; many beams and some futtocks should have been doubled before the ship left Spithead for the West Indies. Benson scribbled hastily as Ramage made his comments, and Aitken had been shamefaced at some of them. Most of the axes stowed ready for wreck-clearing or any other emergency were not only blunt but had their blades pitted and scarred where at some time or other they had bitten into metal. More than half the tomahawks and cutlasses which would be wielded by a boarding party would not, as Ramage had commented acidly, have cut into a ripe paw-paw, and while the heads of boarding pikes were neatly black-enamelled most were so blunt they would hardly drive through a rip sail, let alone a thick-skinned Frenchman.

  Finally, back on the quarterdeck, Ramage had taken Benson’s notebook, glanced at it and given it back to the boy. ‘Can you read your own writing?’ he asked incredulously, and when the midshipman, his face crimson, said he could, Ramage ordered him to go down to the midshipmen’s berth and make a fair copy.

  The first lieutenant waited anxiously, wondering what orders would follow. Ramage looked at his watch. ‘Well, carry on, Mr Aitken. It’s half past eleven – clear decks and up spirits, and make sure the men get their dinner promptly at noon: I don’t doubt but they have a good appetite.’

  ‘And this afternoon, sir?’ Aitken asked timidly.

  Ramage laughed drily. ‘We’ll let Mr Southwick write in his log, “Ship’s company employed ATSR”,’ he said referring to the time-honoured abbreviation for ‘As the service required’. Then he added: ‘I want to hear that grindstone at work: axes, tomahawks, pikes and cutlasses. Check them all. And have Mr Johnson check every musket and pistol…’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Ramage was sitting at his desk, trying to finish all the forms the Rear-Admiral would require when they arrived in Barbados, when Southwick came down with the noon position written on a piece of paper. He pointed to the longitude. ‘We’re making our westing. If this wind holds, we should make a fast passage.’

  Ramage glanced at the figures as he gestured to the Master to sit down. The old man put his hat on the cabin sole and wriggled himself comfortable, a movement that Ramage knew from long experience meant he wanted to have a serious talk about something.

  Ramage looked at him quizzically. ‘How do you think our “Monday morning” went?’

  ‘Better than I expected, sir,’ Southwick said frankly. ‘A lot better than I thought possible when we dropped the Lizard astern.’

  ‘You and Aitken have worked hard,’ Ramage said.

  Southwick shook his head. ‘’Twasn’t Aitken and ’twasn’t me, sir. The credit is yours.’

  ‘Mine?’ Ramage was obviously startled.

  ‘Yours and those dozen scalawags of ours. I must admit I never appreciated them fully when we were in the Triton but they turned the trick here. What with you wielding the stick and carrot from the quarterdeck and those fellows sermonizing on the lower deck like some of Mr Wesley’s preachers, the ship’s company – well, they’re a deal different from the crowd I first clapped eyes on when I boarded at Spithead!’

  Ramage rubbed his jaw reflectively. ‘Well, all that’s past now. I wonder what the Admiral has in store for us at Barbados.’

  ‘Convoy work,’ Southwick said gloomily, ‘I can feel it in my bones. Taking a dozen merchantmen from Barbados to Grenada and waiting a week while they drum up business, and then take the mules on to St Vincent and St Lucia, and the same there, and an even more infuriating sail up to Antigua with them dropping astern at night and French privateers scurrying out of Martinique to snap ’em up. Mules,’ he repeated crossly, ‘there isn’t a master of a merchant ship that isn’t a mule!’

  ‘It may not be as bad as all that,’ Ramage said mildly. There was no harm in confiding in the Master. In many ways theirs was a strange relationship; one which had begun years earlier in the Mediterranean when Ramage took over his first command, the Kathleen cutter. He had been given her, he imagined, because Commodore Nelson had taken a liking to him. He had been lucky, as a very green lieutenant with his first command, that Southwick arrived as the Kathleen’s master. Southwick was old enough to be his father and was probably one of the finest seamen in the Navy. He could handle the toughest ship’s company, treating them like a benevolent father or the Devil’s drill sergeant, as the occasion required. Apart from his skill as a Master, though, what had endeared him to Ramage was the way the old man, without ever once overstepping the invisible line separating the captain of the ship from the master (who was only a warrant, not a commission officer), had never let him make a mistake. At times there had been an almost imperceptible shake of the head, at others a cough, occasionally one of the famous sniffs. More important perhaps, was the knowledge that the old Master was on board, a cyclopaedia of knowledge, always at hand, and whom Ramage had never seen ruffled, whether at the prospect of having the tiny cutter rammed by a Spanish line-of-battleship – for that was how the Kathleen had been lost – or by a hurricane, which had sent the Triton brig’s masts by the board.

  ‘I’m carrying orders from the First Lord to Rear-Admiral Davis for some special operation,’ he said.

  ‘I guessed as much,’ Southwick said. ‘But is the Juno named in them?’

  Ramage shook his head. ‘I don’t think so. When His Lordship gave me my orders, they were simply “to make the best of my way”’ – he parroted the traditional phrase – ‘to Barbados, place myself under Admiral Davis’ command, and deliver the usual budget of papers. His Lordship did just mention that there was a special operation forthcoming…’

  ‘Aye, but if he didn’t name the Juno then it won’t be for us, sir,’ Southwick’s voice was even gloomier. ‘The Admiral has probably asked for more frigates – admirals never do have enough o’ them. His Lordship decided to give you the Juno, since you’ve just been made post, and send her out to Admiral Davis. If there’s any special operation you can be sure the Admiral has his favourites; he won’t give plums to a stranger – you don’t know him, do you, sir?’

  Ramage shook his head. Southwick was right and only echoed his own opinion. The Juno was just another frigate bringing out orders and mail for the Windward and Leeward Islands station; it would be convoy work through the islands. The favoured few captains would be away patrolling the areas off the Spanish Main where there was a chance of finding enemy ships and taking prizes; those out of favour would be with the convoys. An admiral could make a young frigate captain rich in this way (and himself, too, since he shared in the prize money), and o
ne could not blame him if he favoured the captains who had served with him a long time.

  That was one of the advantages of becoming an admiral and commanding a station like Jamaica or the Windwards: in time you could promote the young lieutenants you liked or trusted. The simple reason was that the West Indies was an unhealthy spot. A frigate’s first lieutenant died of yellow fever – whereupon the admiral promoted the third lieutenant of his flagship and sent him over. A captain died and the admiral exercised his privilege of making a lieutenant post in the dead man’s place – often the first lieutenant of his flagship – knowing that the Admiralty would confirm the appointment.

  A favoured young junior officer, a fourth lieutenant, say, coming out to the West Indies in an admiral’s flagship would be very unlucky if he was not the captain of a frigate by the time the admiral was replaced two or three years later. He would need only average luck to make several hundred pounds in prize money, and Ramage could think of half a dozen young captains who had served under Sir Hyde Parker at Jamaica (though Sir Hyde was among the more notorious admirals who played the game of favourites) whose frigates had never escorted a convoy; they had spent their time patrolling, cruising – call it what you will, it meant searching for the enemy, which in turn meant prize money. And each of those captains now had several thousand pounds safely in the Funds, apart from the early promotion which meant that their names were high on the Navy List.

  So far as Rear-Admiral Davis was concerned, Captain Ramage and the Juno would be another junior captain and another frigate. Perhaps that was what Lord St Vincent had intended in giving him the command. Certainly he had had his share of excitement in the past few years, enough of his dispatches published in the Gazette, and he was probably being unreasonable in expecting it to continue. Perhaps, he thought wryly, His Lordship intended Captain Ramage to settle down a bit…

  ‘Is all your paperwork ready for the Admiral?’ he asked Southwick.

  ‘Nearly, sir. I’ll have it ready by tomorrow.’

  ‘You’d better check up on the gunner, carpenter and bos’n.’

  Southwick picked up his hat. ‘I’ll do that now; they can fill in their forms while you are seeing the lieutenants.’ He paused and scratched his head, ‘I – er, well, I was quite impressed this morning, sir; I don’t think we have much to worry about, whether it is convoys or hurricanes.’

  Ramage grinned and the Master left the cabin. It was typical of the old man’s sense of fairness and concern for the ship that he put in a good word for the four young officers who were, technically, his superiors – though it would be a very unwise junior lieutenant that ran foul of a master, and most first lieutenants trod delicately.

  Late that night, as he filled in his Journal, Ramage reviewed the day. He had deliberately made no comment to the lieutenants, so that when he mustered the men aft just before sunset they had no idea of their captain’s verdict on the morning’s activities. From the looks on all their faces and the shuffling, they had obviously condemned themselves – that much was very clear. Gathered round the scuttlebutt getting their mugs of water, under the watchful eye of a Marine sentry, sweeping the decks in pairs, stitching an old awning – clearly they had talked among themselves and decided that the morning had been a disaster; that the captain had mustered them aft simply to tell them that the rest of the voyage to Barbados was going to be a prolonged punishment.

  Hard put to it to keep a straight face, Ramage had clasped his hands behind his back, scowled, and walked along the ranks of the men, looking them up and down. Half of them looked as though they were about to jump over the side, preferring to take their chance with Neptune and the sharks. Despite the harrowing morning, the men were neatly turned out: queues had been retied, hats were worn square, shirts tugged hard to hide creases.

  He had then walked back to stand aft, facing them, and told them quite bluntly they had all done well; far better than he had expected when he had mustered them aft off the Lizard. That had produced smiles, and his comment that he no longer despaired of eventually making seamen of them had put a delighted grin under every hat. And he had everyone’s attention when he pointed out that although what they had done this morning had been exercises, the time might come any day or night when they would be doing it to save their lives.

  So with the men going off to their supper chattering cheerfully and obviously vastly relieved, he had then had Aitken, Wagstaffe, Baker and Lacey down to the great cabin for the inquest. They had arrived as nervous as poachers hauled before the magistrate, and Ramage called his steward to fetch glasses. He had talked to them about nothing in particular for fifteen or twenty minutes as they sipped their sherry. All four had waited to see what Ramage would drink, and promptly followed suit, the only difference being that they failed to notice that Ramage did not touch his drink. Only Southwick and Bowen knew that Ramage never drank anything at sea.

  Finally Aitken had made a weak joke about Monday mornings, and Ramage had laughed more heartily than the quality of the joke warranted, and made a joke himself. Slowly the four youngsters relaxed slightly. Ramage was startled to find himself regarding them as youngsters, although Aitken was his own age, Wagstaffe and Baker a year younger and only Lacey really qualified, being just twenty-one years old.

  They were four completely different types of men. Aitken was tall with auburn hair and a thin, almost gaunt face. His skin would never tan; already his face was burned red by the sun and his nose was peeling. He spoke quietly with a calm Highland burr, his grey eyes missing nothing. Wagstaffe, a Londoner, was short and stocky with large brown eyes that gave his face a deceptively innocent expression. He spoke briskly, thought quickly and, like Aitken, was respected by the ship’s company. Baker came from Bungay, in Suffolk, and had the East Anglian quietness that could be mistaken for slyness. The smallest of the four lieutenants, he moved with the smoothness of a cat, as though sent on board the Juno as a deliberate contrast to Lacey, who was thin and loose-limbed and once provoked the comment from Southwick that he looked as if each of his joints could be tightened up another half turn. He too was quietly spoken, and there was no mistaking that he hailed from Somerset.

  Although Ramage sat on the settee with Aitken at the other end and the other three grouped round in comfortable chairs, their eyes kept straying to the desk, where a glass weight held down a piece of paper. Aitken must have told them that on it were written the times of the morning’s evolutions.

  Although they had relaxed slightly as they sipped their sherries, they were still too tense, as if they knew that the ship’s magazine was below them and were afraid the captain might explode it. Finally Ramage guessed that any further attempt to ease the tension was a waste of time and, as far as the lieutenants were concerned, probably only prolonged the agony.

  So he had commented in a conversational tone on the morning’s times and then asked Wagstaffe the first question. The second lieutenant had carefully put down his glass – Ramage thought for a moment he was trying to gain time, then saw that he wanted to have his hands free to gesture. The question had been totally unexpected and Ramage noticed the other three furrow their brows, obviously trying to think what they might be asked. Wagstaffe had done well, and so had Baker. Lacey knew the answer to the question but was almost too nervous to give it. And Aitken had not been deceived that Ramage had reached the fourth lieutenant without asking the first lieutenant a question.

  When Ramage had asked him to explain what mistakes if any the others made, Aitken had described them with the coolness and fairness of a judge summing up before a jury. On several points Ramage interrupted only to point out that there were often two or three different ways of doing things, and at the end Aitken made a point that Ramage had borne in mind from the start – that actually faced with, for example, a bowsprit and jibboom torn away, it was easier to remember everything that had to be done because you could see it, whereas sitting in the great cabin you could only imagine it. Ramage had agreed – and then pointed out that each
and every one of the operations they had been discussing might have to be carried out on a pitch-dark night, probably with a gale blowing off a lee shore, since only bad weather or battle damage were likely to cause the mishaps…

  But he was satisfied with their answers and told them so, and as he bade them goodnight he had repeated the phrase he had used to Aitken earlier: ‘It’s the unexpected that sinks ships.’ From the look on their faces he guessed that the first lieutenant had already quoted it, probably with some embellishments of his own.

  So now, Ramage told himself as he shut the Journal and put it away in a drawer, the Juno was as prepared as he could make her for anything that Admiral Davis or the French had in store. It would probably be convoy work, but despite Southwick’s gloomy attitude, it could provide some excitement. The Windward Islands at the southern end of the chain were effectively split from the Leeward Islands to the north by the French in Martinique and Guadeloupe. At Martinique the harbour of Fort Royal – anchorage rather, since Fort Royal itself was on one side of an enormous, wedge-shaped bay – was large enough for a whole fleet, with plenty of room for them to swing. Guadeloupe, shaped like a ragged butterfly pinned to a board, was one of those islands with dozens of small bays protected by reefs, and designed by a spiteful Nature as a perfect haven for privateers.

  For a minute or two he listened to the seas hissing past the Juno’s hull as the rudder pintles grumbled in the gudgeons. Although he had been up long before dawn he did not feel sleepy. With the Juno making some two hundred miles a day, they would soon be in Barbados, anchoring under the watchful eye of the Admiral. There was little at the moment to raise his wrath: not one man on the sick list, thanks to Bowen, who must be one of the finest surgeons in the Service; not one man killed or injured in an accident; not one sail blown out, though that was due more to the eagle eye of Southwick, who saw to it that sails were sent down for repairs in good time: most of the sails in the Juno’s outfit were as ripe as pears, the canvas so old that the sailmaker swore incessantly as he tried to make stitches hold when sewing in new cloths or cringles.