Ramage's Prize (18 page)

As he returned the telescope to Southwick, Ramage remembered Stevens' unhurried, unsurprised behaviour when the lookout hailed. Was he a completely unimaginative man who naturally acted slowly in an emergency? Was that why privateers had twice before captured his ship? Surely not—even the slowest-witted of men must have learned a lesson by now.

Ramage was puzzled, and because he was puzzled he was uncertain what to do. That black-hulled privateer and its crew of a hundred French cut-throats could represent certain capture for everyone in the
Arabella
and possibly death for some. The
Arabella
's choice of escape or capture depended on Stevens' whim, not on the orders given by the Captain of the French privateer: it depended on how soon the packet bore up and escaped to the north.

Yet the capture of the
Arabella
might somehow reveal why many (if not all) of the previous packets had been captured. That was the only reason why the
Arabella
was graced with the presence of Lieutenant Ramage. The devil take it, he told himself angrily, I've talked over the possibility enough times with Yorke and Southwick in the past few weeks. Talked, yes, and there's the rub: it's the old story of looking in the cold light of dawn at an idea born in the warm and mellow glow of a late evening's conversation.

Very well, the
Arabella
might be captured. The privateer might be able to get up to her before night came down. Even if she did not, she might outguess the
Arabella
and find her in the darkness. “Might” should have been the key word, but the way Stevens was behaving it could be a certainty.

Ramage glanced down at Stevens, trying to guess what was passing through the man's mind, and saw he was talking to the mate. Suddenly Much waved towards the privateer and made an angry gesture at the starboard side four-pounders, his head jerking like a pigeon's from the violence of his words. Even from a distance it was clear to Ramage that Stevens' features were strained and his whole body tense, as though gripped by pain.

Then he saw the Surgeon walking aft towards the two men. A mediator—or an ally for one of them? Much saw him coming and repeated the gestures, only this time talking to Farrell, who stopped a couple of paces away as though the mate was threatening him. For a few moments the men seemed silenced by the violence of Much's words; then all three began talking at once, their hands waving wildly. Although the wind carried away their words, their quarrel was obviously a bitter one.

“Like hucksters haggling in the market,” Yorke commented.

“What's the Surgeon doing there?” Ramage murmured, thinking aloud.

“It's like watching a play without hearing the actors. My guess is that Mr Much wants to bear up, but fight if it becomes necessary; the gallant Captain can't make up his mind; and the noble sawbones wants to surrender without ceremony.”

“Aye,” Southwick growled, “that's my reading of it.”

“It's about what one would expect,” Ramage commented. “I wonder who … Come on, it's time we joined the party: we're losing a quarter of a mile to leeward every couple of minutes …”

With that he climbed down the ratlines and, walking towards Stevens, reminded himself that the packet Captain knew nothing of the real reason why he was on board. Stevens had no inkling that the chance that brought the privateer in sight had made Ramage the key figure in a secret investigation ordered by the Cabinet. As far as Stevens and his officers were concerned, Ramage was just another anxious passenger, and for the moment he must remember to play that role.

All three men stopped talking as they saw Ramage approaching.

“Ah,” Stevens said, a reassuring smile trying to struggle across his face but getting lost round his mouth. “Well, Mr Ramage, a pity one of your frigates isn't up to windward, eh?”

“The laurels are all for you to win,” Ramage said cheerfully. “I'm sure you'd begrudge having to share them!”

The smile vanished completely. “Well, Lieutenant, she's a big ship …”

“Yes, but smaller than the
Arabella,
I fancy.”

“Oh no! Why, she's pierced for eighteen guns!”

“Rubbish!” Much snapped. “Might be pierced for ten and carrying eight.”

Stevens swung round angrily to face the mate. “I'll thank you to hold your tongue, Mr Much. Just remember I'm the owner of this ship as well as the commander.”

“Aye, I'm aware of that,” Much said bitterly, “and I rue the day I ever signed on with you again.”

The Surgeon took a step nearer. “Steady, Much, steady; I've warned you of the risk of getting too excited; overheating the blood can be fatal.” He turned to Ramage. “You mustn't take too much notice of him, Mr Ramage: he's overwrought. He refuses my offers of medication.”

“
You
hold your tongue,” Much said with a quietness belying his tone. “It's caused too much trouble already.”

Ramage waited, trying to discern in the bickering phrases the original causes of what were obviously long-standing and bitter differences which had come to a sudden climax when the privateer hove in sight.
Was
Much in fact overwrought, and Farrell and Stevens trying to calm him down?
Was
it some mania that had set Much apart from the rest of the
Arabella
's officers and crew? Although Farrell was a poor specimen when seated at a chessboard, he might well be a good doctor. Ramage was angry with himself for having been on board so long without knowing the answers. He felt a gentle pressure from Yorke's elbow.

“Well, Captain, can we offer ourselves as a gun's crew?” Yorke asked with polite enthusiasm. “Or would you prefer us to have musketoons? You'll outsail that fellow, of course, once you bear up to the north”—he waved airily towards the privateer—”but we might as well be prepared.”

It was smoothly done and Ramage was grateful: Stevens had been told once again that the
Lady Arabella
should now be stretching off to the north, leaving the privateer down to leeward, and that his passengers took it for granted that in the unlikely event of the packet being overtaken they would fight.

“Most civil of you to offer, Mr Yorke,” Stevens said quickly, “but I hope it won't come to that. I know Mr Ramage is also anxious that we should bear up, and although it won't help us much I was about to do so when I had to calm down Mr Much. Well, we mustn't waste any more time,” he added, like a schoolmaster regaining control of an unruly class, “we'll turn north—see to it, Mr Much.”

Even before Stevens had finished speaking the mate was shouting the orders that sent men running to sheets and braces, ready to trim the sails as the brig altered course.

Ramage turned away with a feeling of relief: it had taken too long for Stevens to decide to turn north—they were at least a mile nearer the privateer by now, a valuable mile lost when yards might count by nightfall—but at least the damned man was at last doing something.

Suddenly the whole horizon lifted and sank again as the
Arabella
heeled: the helmsmen had put the wheel over and aloft blocks squealed as the yards were braced round and the sheets hardened in to trim the sails with the wind just on the beam.

Slowly the privateer seemed to slide aft along the horizon as the
Arabella
turned, finally ending up just forward of the beam, steering an almost parallel course four or five miles to leeward. Almost parallel, Ramage thought grimly. Almost, but not quite: parallel lines never meet. But because the privateer could sail closer to the wind than the
Arabella,
the ship's courses were converging slightly. As he would explain later to Gianna, continuing the coach-and-highwayman analogy, the highwayman's road was four or five miles away on the right, converging gradually on the coach's road, but with luck they would not meet until after nightfall.

As he stood with Southwick's telescope watching the privateer's narrow hull, the unrelieved black glistening wetly and the foot of every sail dark from the spray, Ramage felt the worry over Stevens' behaviour slowly ebbing away. In its place the excitement and tension of action was gradually seeping in, like a fire slowly warming a room. He lowered the telescope to find Yorke standing beside him.

“Happier now?” the young shipowner asked.

“Hardly happier. Less unhappy, perhaps.”

“How so?”

“I'd be happy if I was in the
Triton
brig so I could run down and capture that chap!”

“There's no satisfying you. Just be happy that Stevens eventually did what you wanted.”

“Did what
he
should have done from the start,” Ramage said impatiently. He glanced round to make sure no one else was within earshot and then said with a quietness that did not hide the bitterness in his voice. “I hope I never get orders like these again. It's ridiculous—I have to chase up Stevens to do the obvious thing so that the
Arabella
isn't captured, but it's beginning to look as if capture is the only chance I'll have of carrying out my orders. If I succeed in one thing I fail in the other.”

“All very sad,” Yorke said lightly, “but I can't see Their Lordships—of the Admiralty or the Post Office—thanking you for helping one of His Majesty's packet brigs get captured!”

When Ramage continued looking glumly at the distant privateer Yorke added, a more serious note in his voice, “Don't despair of capture too soon: when you've a spare moment, cast an eye aloft. Southwick's prowling round the binnacle as though he'd like to strangle the helmsmen.”

A quick glance round the ship confirmed Yorke's warning—and jolted Ramage into realizing he had been so absorbed in his own problems that his seaman's ears had stopped functioning: instead of the sails being tautly flattened curves, every seam straining with the pressure of the wind, they looked like heavy curtains hanging over a draughty window, the luffs fluttering.

“What the devil is Much up to?”

“He's been exiled to the fo'c's'le,” Yorke said heavily. “The Captain has the conn.”

“But … just look …”

“That's what I mean: don't despair too soon!”

“And for all that, we must be sagging off a point or more!”

“More, I suspect,” Yorke said sourly.

“Have you or Southwick said anything to Stevens?”

“No. Much was just getting the sheets hardened in when Stevens began an argument with him. I couldn't hear what was said, but then Much was sent forward.”

“What orders did Stevens give the helmsmen?”

“Didn't say a word while I was there: just left them to it. Much had told ‘em to steer north, but when he went forward they just let her sag off. They don't seem to give a damn.”

“Do we start seamanship lessons for Stevens?” Ramage growled.

“You're just a passenger, Mr Ramage,” Yorke said with mock sarcasm. “‘We don't want any of these smart Navy gentlemen interfering with the Post Office Packet Service!'”

“I can hear him saying it,” Ramage said miserably.

“What are you going to do?”

“Join Southwick and just stare at the compass: see if Stevens can take a hint. Come on!”

He walked over to the low, wooden box that was the binnacle and, standing to one side, looked at the compass. The lubber's line representing the ship's bow was on north-by-east and the card was still swinging towards north-north-east.

Ramage turned slightly and looked directly at the two helmsmen, one standing each side of the wheel.

“She's a bit heavy on the helm, eh?” he asked sympathetically.

“Aye, she is that!” one of the men grunted. “Very tiring, sir.”

Stevens had been standing aft by the taffrail and now walked up to Ramage, but before he could speak Ramage said, “These men are tired, Captain; perhaps they could be relieved?”

Stevens stared at the two men, who avoided his eyes and gave a half-hearted heave at the spokes of the wheel.

“Are you tired?” he demanded.

“Ain't complainin',” the nearest man said. “The gennelman was axing if she's ‘eavy on the ‘elm.”

“Very kind of the Lieutenant to inquire,” Stevens said heavily, “and I know you men appreciate it. But”—he turned to Ramage—”‘tis a strict rule in any ship I command that no one talks to the men at the wheel.”

“So I see,” Ramage said sharply. “I'd expect someone to tell them to get back on course.”

“They are on course,” Stevens said smoothly.

Ramage looked down at the compass.

“They're steering north-by-east.”

“Well?”

“They should be steering north.”

“By whose orders, pray?”

“Yours, I should hope!”

“When I want your advice I'll ask for it, Mr Ramage,” Stevens said acidly. “Until then I'll continue as my own navigator.”

With that he walked back to the taffrail and stood facing aft, as if absorbed by the sight of the
Arabella
's wake.

Ramage eyed the two helmsmen, who had an almost triumphant look in their eyes. Perhaps they were just pleased at seeing their Captain snub a naval officer. He turned to Southwick and said casually, “It'd be interesting to see what sort of course they steer, eh?” The Master nodded, and Yorke followed Ramage as he walked back to the starboard side.

Yorke had lost his flippant manner; his left hand was rubbing his chin as though tugging at a goatee beard.

“When I look at that damned privateer I hear the prison gates at Verdun creaking open.”

“Stop looking, then,” Ramage said unsympathetically, putting the telescope to his eye. He counted five gun ports. Four-pounders? Probably, for a schooner that size, and double-fortified too, so they can be packed with grape or canister shot without fear of bursting. But a count of guns, the
Lady Arabella
's single broadside against the French schooner's, hardly gives a true picture: Johnny Frenchman's strength lies in the horde of a hundred or so privateersmen who, at this very moment, are arming themselves with pistols, cutlasses, tomahawks and pikes, and waiting eagerly for the moment their schooner crashes longside the
Arabella
so they can swarm on board and overwhelm these Falmouth men.