Ramage's Challenge (7 page)

So, picking up where you interrupted yourself at the thought of “proceeding,” consider first just how you will “proceed” along the dusty track to Pitigliano with your merry men. And, of course, when you get there, what you do about finding and rescuing the British hostages. Let us (for the moment) not bother with getting back to the coast with them; there will be time enough to consider that when you find (to your astonishment) that the plan so far has worked. Ah, yes, he thought, I must remember to start that section of my report to the Admiralty with the Board's favourite word, “whereas.” Indeed, after the traditional “I have the honour to report,” he would slip in a “whereas” to introduce his reference to the orders he had received.

Ahem. He coughed in a little mime for his own benefit. We are getting ahead of ourselves; at the moment the Italian mainland is a good hundred miles away from the
Calypso,
and Pitigliano is another thirty miles inland …

Did the French carry the important prisoners in carts or coaches, or did they have to march? And if march (which was most likely), was it all the way from France? Or were these the Britons caught when the war began again while visiting southern France, and the Grand Tour cities of Italy? That was more probable. Marching along those dusty roads … still, it might have been winter, when they would be ankle-deep in mud. They probably spent the night in barns, sleeping on straw. Just as unpleasant for the French guards, of course, if that was any comfort. He pictured a column of men, possibly in chains, trudging along a muddy road, with French guards, unshaven and just as muddy, trying to count them from time to time, and cursing them and telling them to hurry … And he also pictured men like Stafford and Southwick and Hill and Kenton and Martin, up to all sorts of tricks to make the life of the guards more miserable. With that picture in his mind, he bent over the map once again. It was now obvious how to do it—wasn't it?

F
OR ONCE Ramage was thankful that his clerk was an unimaginative man: when Ramage hastily transferred from the
Murex
to the
Calypso
after the escape from Brest, he had stuffed all his documents into a canvas bag and forgotten them.

Now, when he wanted to examine some of those documents again (they included excellent original French passes with only the names faked), he assumed they had been thrown away until he casually mentioned them to the clerk, who disappeared without comment to return a few minutes later from his tiny cabin-cum-office with the greyish-blue sheets, several of them headed by the French national government seal. Six sets of documents, used for the escape of the four Frenchmen (who were now members of the
Calypso
's crew), for himself, and for Sarah.

Like rescuing Gianna, that wild rush in Brest seemed a lifetime ago. The only proof that it had ever happened was the sight of the four Frenchmen carrying out their duties on board the
Calypso—
and yes, these documents he now held in his hand. No Sarah, no
Murex.
But do not start thinking about all that now, he warned himself. Examine the documents, and think how you can get hold of some more sheets of this crudely made paper, so favoured by French authority.

There were three types of documents. He was not so interested in the wording as in the seals of the various ministries at the top of each page. The first paper was a
passeport,
issued by the local Committee of Public Safety. He remembered Gilbert (who had obtained them so that they could go into Brest from the Count of Rennes' château, where they were trapped) explaining that there were, in fact, two kinds of
passeport—
one for foreigners, and another for French citizens visiting another town. A
passeport
for a Frenchman allowed the holder to travel back and forth from his own town or village to a named town. Visiting a third town required yet another
passeport.
Anyway, at the top of the first page were the arms of the French Republic and underneath was a printed form, the various blank spaces filled in with a pen.

The next document (intended for Sarah) bore the coat of arms of the province of Brittany and certified that she had been born in Falaise, in Normandy, but on marriage had removed to Brittany. More important, it was signed by the
préfet
of Brittany.

The third document was headed with the printed words
“Liberté Egalité,”
and centred between the two words was an oval with an anchor symbol in the centre and “Rep.Fran.Marin” round the inside. Yes, he had remembered correctly the stationery of the Ministry of Marine and Colonies. Although the document itself and the signatures were genuine, the rest of the details were false—it was a discharge from the Navy of France.

Unfortunately, he had no document issued by the French War Ministry; but he decided that of the Ministry of Marine (with a sufficiently bullying manner when presenting it) would be enough.

He held up a page to the light. Very poor-quality paper, it had a sad greyness that, with a black border, would serve for sending a letter of condolence to a defrocked cleric. Yet would a guard or the commandant of a prison expect documents always to be written or printed on the same quality paper? Surely a few ministries must have decent notepaper. This stuff was the best that the papermakers could produce (or all that the Republic would pay for) after years of blockade by the Royal Navy. Now during that eighteen months of peace, surely some ministries had managed to get better paper. Anyway, that would be a good enough explanation, particularly if given in the sort of hectoring voice which implied that anyone doubting it was not
au courant
with the present situation in Paris.

Now he must talk to Gilbert, who had obtained these documents in France. Presumably the French system, with
barrières
every few miles along most roads and at the approaches to all towns, would not be used in Italy, if only because it would need thousands of men. Nevertheless the French Army of Italy was one of occupation … sentries, paid spies, cavalry patrols—all would be needed.

Ramage called the marine sentry to pass the word for Gilbert. A couple of minutes later he told the marine to send for Midshipman Orsini as well. It was now two or three years since Paolo had escaped from Volterra and made his way to England by way of Naples, but he might remember some French regulations, which could help prevent mistakes.

How much to tell them? It would be asking a lot of Gilbert not to relate to the rest of his mess (Jackson, Stafford, Rossi, and the other three Frenchmen) why the captain had sent for him. Orsini would keep his mouth shut because, apart from anything else, it concerned his own country, and he would not want to risk any slips. Which led to the decision whether or not to take him.

Paolo might by now be the new ruler of Volterra—that was the first consideration. If Gianna was dead, he would certainly be by right of succession, even though Volterra was, at the moment, occupied by the Army of France.

If Paolo was captured and identified by the French, his throat would be cut—having murdered Gianna, the French would be delighted to dispose of the Marchesa's nephew and successor. Yet one must consider that Paolo knew all this countryside like the back of his hand. Italian was, of course, his native tongue, but being an educated young man, his French was fluent and his English marred by only a very slight accent.

So, Ramage thought, by not taking him I lose a guide, a young man speaking French and Italian, and perhaps more important, one who
looks
French or Italian: sallow skin, jet-black hair; a narrow face, which anyone who had travelled would at once identify as Italian or Spanish. A
Mediterranean
face, in fact.

What would Gianna have expected? Suddenly he could see her face and hear her voice. For a moment she seemed to be in the cabin with him, a memory or a ghost, but most certainly Gianna, and at her most decisive. “Paolo has been in action with you a dozen times. More, in fact. A French round shot could have knocked his head off at any time. One is, my dear Nicholas, just as dead from a round shot as a dagger thrust—or the musket balls of a French firing squad. And, dear Nicholas, can you bear the reproachful look in the boy's eyes when you tell him you are not taking him?”

Gianna's voice was so firm, so determined, so
real
in his imagination that the sentry's knock bringing him back to reality made him blink, still expecting her to be there.

“Send them in!” he called, and waved Paolo and Gilbert to sit down. Paolo sat in what had become known as “Southwick's chair” and Gilbert perched on the edge of the settee, combining the discomfort of a servant sitting in his master's presence (a hangover from the château) with the nervousness of a seaman unexpectedly summoned to the captain's presence.

Ramage then realized that with the
Calypso
just off the Italian coast, even if both Paolo and Gilbert bellowed the Admiralty's secret orders through speaking-trumpets, there was no enemy close enough to hear them.

He spoke first to Paolo. “You remember Pitigliano?”

Paolo looked startled, and then said, “Near Orvieto—a hill town?”

Ramage nodded and turned to Gilbert. “The road running along the coast here and down to Rome is the Via Aurelia— you've heard of it?”

“Only because it's one of the great roads down which Julius Caesar marched. One of them crosses the Rubicon, doesn't it, sir?”

“That's it—I hardly expected you to know about the Rubicon, though.”

“I don't, sir,” Gilbert admitted. “Just the phrase.”

Ramage glanced at Paolo. “Go on, you explain it!”

Paolo grinned broadly because, second only to the sea and naval tactics, his interest was (as Ramage knew) the complex history of the Roman Empire. “Crossing the Rubicon—well, in English it means reaching a line where you have to make an important decision one way or the other. If you stay your side, you're safe; if you cross, you're committing yourself to something drastic.”

“Go on,” Ramage urged, “let's have the details. Why is it called the Rubicon, this line of yours?”

“It's a small river running into the Adriatic between Ravenna and Rimini, where the Via Emilia and Via Flaminia meet. Not deep or fast. But we have to go back to 59
B.C.
when Julius Caesar was neither famous nor feared. He was simply a famous man's nephew with little experience as a soldier. He was governor of an area of what is now northern Italy and southern France. The Helvetii, in what is now Switzerland, were causing trouble, so he went up to Geneva to deal with them.

“But he knew fame and fortune in the Roman Empire came only to victorious generals, so Caesar carried on north to defeat the Gauls (the French of today), the Germans, and the Belgae— three hundred thousand barbarians living in northern Gaul (the Netherlands of today). He beat them and went on to cross the Channel and conquer Britain.

“By the time he was ready to return to Italy—after fighting many more battles—he was famous, and his nine legions were devoted to him. (They were not paid by the government. Their leader, in this case Caesar, let them plunder, so a successful general always had loyal troops!)

“Left in Rome all this time,” Paolo continued—and Ramage saw that the youth had slipped back more than eighteen centuries, so that he was a centurion marching at the head of his hundred men, part of the six hundred who made up a cohort, ten of which, six thousand men, made up a legion—”was Pompey, a great general who had conquered Spain but had done no fighting for a dozen years.

“Obviously the two of them had to be rivals; rivals in a competition with the Roman Empire the prize. Well, Caesar was coming back from Gaul with nine legions of men who had been victorious everywhere. Pompey had ten legions—but unfortunately for him, seven were away in Spain.

“By January 49
B.C.
, Caesar and his legions had reached the northern bank of the Rubicon in the march back to Italy. The southern side of the river was Pompey's territory. The question facing Caesar was, should he cross the Rubicon and attack, or should he stay where he was. Obviously, the stakes were enormous. Well, he did cross—and Pompey retreated right down the coast to Brindisium—Brindisi—and fled across the Adriatic. Within ten weeks of crossing the Rubicon, Caesar ruled the Roman Empire. So,
mon cher
Gilbert, when you have to make a great decision, you've reached the banks of the Rubicon; when you make it and carry it out, you've crossed … such a muddy river it is, too.”

Gilbert nodded and, turning to Ramage, asked quietly, “Have we reached a Rubicon, sir?”

“We're approaching it,” Ramage said, “but for the moment we're concerned with the Via Aurelia, and in particular a small stretch where it passes Monte Argentario, which looks from the sea like a small and mountainous island, but which is linked to the mainland by a couple of causeways.”

Paolo had looked up sharply. “Monte Argentario, sir?”

“You remember it, then, even though it's not now part of the Roman Empire! Yes, Port' Ercole at the southern end is where we had our little affair with the bomb ketches, but now we use Argentario only as a landmark—the northern end, this time. More precisely, where that northern causeway meets the Via Aurelia.”

“Surely that's where the road to Pitigliano branches off, sir?”

“Exactly. And about thirty miles along that road is Pitigliano.”

“It's a rotten road, from memory. Not much more than a track, sir. Marsiliana is about a third of the way, Manciano about two-thirds, and then you reach Pitigliano, with Monte Labbro and Monte Amiata over on your left. Why—may I ask why—are we interested in Pitigliano, sir? It's so far inland—for a cutting-out expedition, anyway!”

“Their Lordships don't think so,” Ramage said dryly. “I have their orders here.” He tapped a drawer. “We march, not row,” he said grimly. “Thirty miles there and thirty miles back, only we'll have company when we return.”