Ramage's Prize (44 page)

For the tenth time that night he took out his watch: an hour past midnight. He wished he was standing a watch, but both Yorke and Southwick had been insistent that the risk was too great. A sudden squall or an unexpected emergency needing shouted commands would immediately reveal to the mutineers that he was alive.

Yet even the idea of pretending to be dead had misfired: the mutineers had not relaxed into a false sense of security after finding they were (apparently, anyway) dealing not with the ruthless Lieutenant Ramage but with a passenger about whom they knew nothing. They hadn't made one mistake, blast them.

Yorke reckoned their leader—after they lost Harris—had been the first spokesman, the man who agreed to be a hostage, but Ramage now doubted that. Someone down there on the messdeck was shrewd and cool. Was it Our Ned? The mate's son had the brains, and probably the cunning. It made sense: Harris and the bosun led the kidnapping party; Our Ned stayed behind ready to secure and guard them. Or maybe Our Ned had been with Harris, one of the men who somehow bundled Gianna forward in the darkness without Southwick or any of the Tritons spotting them. Perhaps the three mutineers who were on watch did something to divert the Master's attention at the critical moment.

That was more like it: Our Ned and one or two others took Gianna; Harris and the bosun were supposed to lead the merciless Lieutenant Ramage on deck at pistol point, or—at last he was feeling sleepy, and the details blurred. Thankfully he stood up and walked aft to the cot, trying not to rouse himself. He pulled off his coat, loosened the stock, kicked off his shoes and lowered himself into the cot. Almost immediately he drifted into a deep sleep.

He began dreaming wild dreams of what he wished would happen. That in the dim light of the lantern a shadowy Gianna was bending over him, whispering urgently. In the dream he could neither understand her words nor say anything in reply. He wanted desperately to tell her he loved her, and if anything happened to her he did not want to go on living, but the words would not come.

A sudden slap on his face woke him with a convulsive jerk, his head ringing.

“
Mama mia,
will you never wake up?”

He lay in the cot rubbing his eyes, trying to focus them on the shadowy figure.

“Nicholas,” the figure said crossly, “I've escaped! While you've been sleeping like a pig, I've been getting myself free!”

He leapt from the cot in a completely reflex movement, grabbed the two pistols from the settee and cocked them; then, watching the door swinging to and fro on its hinges with the ship's roll and expecting mutineers to burst in any moment, he snapped, “What happened?”

Gianna, startled by his unexpected leap, said furiously, “You aren't at all pleased to see me!”

“Of course I am!” he hissed. “What happened to the damned sentry?” He went to the door to find a seaman standing there with a musket. “What the hell are you grinning at?” he demanded angrily. “Pass the word for Mr Southwick—and Mr Yorke, too!”

“Oh, Nicholas,” Gianna complained. “What's wrong with you?”

“Oh shut up, woman!”

She slapped his face so hard his eyes watered.

“Senta,”
she said angrily. “Our Ned and the two ship's boys are waiting out there in the corridor. Don't let your clumsy sailors shoot them!”

Ramage had to hold both pistols in one hand as he used the other to wipe his watering eyes. Two slaps in two minutes, he thought irrelevantly, were not his idea of a happy reunion.

“All right, now tell me what happened,” he said with as much patience as he could muster. “I want to make sure those blasted mutineers up forward are secured: they'll go crazy when they find you've gone.”

“It's all taken care of,” Gianna said with a chilly dignity spoiled at the last moment by an uncontrollable giggle. “Stafford and Rossi are guarding the top of the hatch with those big muskets. Musketoons. They were the sentries. I whispered to them as we crept up the ladder.”

“We?”

“Oh, you don't
listen.
We—Our Ned, the two boys and me.”

At that moment Yorke hurried into the cabin, saw Gianna, said, “My God!” weakly, and sank into a chair. He was followed by Southwick holding a pistol. The Master stopped suddenly as if he had walked into a wall.

Gianna went up to him and kissed his cheek. “Have you missed me, Mr Souswick? No one else seems very pleased to see me. Nicholas told me to shut up and Mr Yorke just said ‘My God' and flopped into the chair.”

“Can't blame ‘em, ma'am,” a confused Southwick mumbled. “Bit of a shock, you know. A very nice shock,” he added hurriedly, “but you vanished in the middle of the night and now you've—”

“Vanished in the middle of the night again, only this time from that horrible place forward!”

Ramage said suddenly, “Where are Our Ned and the boys?”

“With the sentry,” Southwick said. “The minute I saw Our Ned I got worried about you, sir. The sentry has him covered.”

“Very well,” Ramage said. “You'd better get back on deck.”

“Jackson went to rouse Much,” Southwick said. “He'll be all right. But I'd better get more men covering that forehatch.”

“Don't worry,” Ramage said heavily, “the Marchesa has already arranged that.”

He took her arm and led her to the settee. “Sit down and tell us what happened. You're not cold?” he asked anxiously. “We're not singing songs of joy simply because—well,” he said lamely, “it's such a shock; we hadn't much hope of saving your life …”

She looked up at Ramage wide-eyed and smiling. “You haven't kissed me yet!”

As he bent to kiss her he said shakily, “I'm having trouble getting things in the right order. You still seem part of a dream.”

Gianna brushed back her hair, arranged her skirt and said, “Let's have Our Ned and the boys in here. It's their story more than mine. I'd never have escaped without their help.”

“No, tell us your story first,” Ramage said firmly. “We can hear what they have to say afterwards.”

“Oh, don't be so irritating, Nicholas. I don't know what Our Ned was thinking. I've only whispered to him.”

Reluctantly Ramage nodded to Southwick, who went to the door and called Our Ned.

Unshaven, his thin face haggard from weariness and his usually furtive eyes now constantly flickering from side to side to reveal nervousness, Our Ned looked like an unsuccessful poacher just hauled before a magistrate with a ferret still in his pocket.

“Evenin', gentlemen.”

Ramage nodded. “The Marchesa says you helped her escape. I want to thank you.” He held out his hand and Our Ned stared at it for a moment, then grasped it in a surge of embarrassment.

“We all helped each other, sir,” he muttered.

Turning to Gianna, Ramage said, “Now—at long last—please tell us what happened.”

“Our Ned had better start,” she said, smiling impishly. “He can probably tell you how it began.”

“Can you?” Ramage asked. “Will you, rather?”

“Aye, sir. I'll incrimulate meself, or whatever you call it, but I'll have to take me chance on it. Where shall I begin?”

“From the time I took command of the ship?” Ramage suggested. “I can guess what happened before that.”

“Yes, well, sir, we packetsmen got scared when you read your Commission and found we were under naval discipline, like we was pressed. The Tritons told us what the Articles of War said, and we guessed you knew all about ventures, and Captain Stevens surrendering the
Arabella
for the insurance money.

“Well, sir, Harris reckoned you were taking us home to have us all court-martialled and hanged. You might still be, for all I know …” He paused and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “That's why I said about incrimulating myself.

“Anyway, Harris got this idea of seizing the ship and taking her to Coruña and handing her over to the Spanish. He reckoned we'd escape being hanged, get a big reward from the Dons, and would have plenty of money to live on after the war ends. The bosun said Harris was right and we all agreed.

“There weren't enough of us to seize the
Arabella
openly, as you might say, so Harris suggested we took the Marchesa and you as hostages: seize the lady and get her for'ard, and take you up on deck and threaten to shoot you unless Mr Southwick and the Tritons did as we said. The Marchesa was to be a sort of insurance in case Mr Southwick wouldn't cooperate.”

He wiped his mouth again. “Well, I didn't want the Marchesa touched. I agreed with what Harris was saying about going to Coruña, mind you; just that it was wrong to lay hands on a foreign lady who had nothing to do with the Post Office or the Navy. Harris and me had a bit of a falling out over it, and he and the bosun decided I couldn't be trusted. The two boys—they was scared and whimpering, so Harris and the rest of them kept us out of it. Out of the planning, I mean: made us stay the other end of the messdeck while they talked.

“I found out later the plan was that with all the Tritons on watch, Harris and the bosun went aft, knocked out the sentry and seized you, sir, and a couple of the other lads took the Marchesa. The two packetsmen at the wheel were to keep a sharp eye open and when the third one on watch—he was to keep an eye on the companion-way—reckoned the lads were ready to bring the Marchesa up, he'd give a signal and the helmsmen would get off course. Harris reckoned that'd keep Mr Southwick busy cussing and distract the Tritons on watch and they could sneak her forward. She was to be gagged, of course.”

“And I was, too!” Gianna said crossly.

“Yes, Ma'am. Well, off they went, and the next thing I heard was a shot, and a minute later the two men bundled the Marchesa down the hatch. After that, we heard you'd been killed, sir,” he said, turning to Ramage, “and that Harris was dead too and the bosun badly wounded. I got a shock just now when the Marchesa came into the cabin and I heard your voice.”

Gianna explained, “I didn't tell him that Rossi said yesterday you were safe.”

“Now we get to the incrimulating bit, sir. With Harris dead, the bosun wounded, the three men who'd been on watch made prisoner, and one man gone as hostage, there weren't many of us left on the messdeck, so everyone had to take it in turns to guard the Marchesa.

“Things were looking bad, sir, and the lads were scared. I was afraid they'd do me in if they decided they couldn't trust me, so I helped them. Then the frigate was sighted. We knew if she was French we were safe, but when she turned out to be one of ours we knew we'd be caught. One of the lads said we'd hang and swore he'd kill the Marchesa first.”

“He was
horrible,
” Gianna shuddered. “He meant it.”

Our Ned nodded in agreement. “When they told Mr Yorke they'd kill her if the frigate came close I—well, I ain't trying to save my neck, sir, but murdering a lady in cold blood was more than I can stomach—”

“What did you do?” Ramage asked.

“I argued with them, sir, but it didn't do no good. Then the frigate didn't board us anyway. Then Mr Yorke came along and said about Coruña being blockaded, and us not being able to get in without being intercepted. Seemed to me we couldn't avoid a frigate catching us and that meant the Marchesa would be murdered and we'd still be taken prisoner.

“I tried to persuade them to agree to Mr Yorke's proposal for a smaller port that wasn't blockaded, but they wouldn't have none of it; they'd set their hearts on Coruña. One of ‘em had been there and said he could recognize it. Well, that was a sort of turning point for me. I thought about it all over again and decided I wanted none of it—murdering the Marchesa or handing the ship over to the Dons. So when it was my spell to guard the Marchesa tonight I waited until the man I relieved was asleep and freed her, and we all crept out.”

Gianna was shaking her head as he concluded. “Nicholas—it was much more dangerous for him than that. And the boys—they were terrified, but Our Ned reassured them—all in a whisper so the rest of the men didn't wake up, and then they were really brave.”

“How did you get the key to the leg-irons holding the Marchesa?” Yorke asked the seaman.

“It was kept on a hook, sir.”

Ramage held the man's arm. “Will the mutineers bear out your story that you didn't help?”

Our Ned grimaced. “They'll kill me if they get the chance.”

“They won't,” Ramage said. “Don't worry about a court martial. If you've told the truth you'll be safe enough, I guarantee that. This night's work more than makes up for the past. Now, we'll have those two boys in here and thank them; then you'd all better get some sleep.”

He turned to Southwick. “We'll leave sentries on the forehatch for the rest of the night. We don't want any more bloodshed. By the way,” he said to Our Ned, “Harris isn't dead: he's in irons, along with the bosun, who was only slightly wounded.”

Our Ned's jaw dropped. “Phew, I hope you've got some good men guarding him, sir!”

“Don't worry, Maxton has turned him into a lamb.”

Our Ned shuddered and for a moment his eyes remained fixed, as if staring at some terrifying picture. “Yes,” he muttered, “Maxton could do that …”

Gianna stood up and put her arms round Ramage. “Darling, I'm glad we didn't have to try out your other plan!” She added soberly, “I don't think it would have worked. I was going to try it, but that crazy man Our Ned told you about—I think he would have killed me, and you'd have never known.”

Our Ned looked puzzled, and Ramage was curious to know if the man agreed with Gianna.

“When Rossi spoke to the Marchesa this afternoon—yesterday afternoon, I mean—he told her to pretend she had gone off her head and start screaming. I hoped that—”