The Devil's Own Luck (23 page)

“What I want to do is this. Simply to create in your mind some room to consider that my brother is innocent. That I can only do by casting doubt on what is said to exist already. I want you to find out who raised the alarm.”

“You are very sure that it wasn’t them.” The first shred of doubt showed on his face.

“As sure as I can be.”

“May I be permitted to ask why?”

“Because they were not there when my brother was arrested. I asked Pender to point them out to me. Believe me, Mr Craddock, the face of everyone there is etched on my brain. They were not, and I find it hard to believe that having called for help, they were not there to see the culprit apprehended. Imagine, Mr Craddock, witnessing such a deed, and not there to claim the credit?”

Craddock was still looking at Harry, trying to get the import of what he was being told, when the loud knock at the door disturbed them.

“Come in.”

The door opened. The midshipman called Denbigh was there. Surprised to see Harry, he just stared at him, then seemed to recall why he had come.

“Mr Platt’s compliments, sir, but he fears that the weather is set to worsen and he would request your presence on deck.”

“Inform Mr Platt that I shall be with him shortly.”

“Aye, aye, sir.”

Denbigh shut the door behind him. Harry cursed the interruption, feeling that he had been as close as he was likely to get to enlisting Craddock’s help. Now the man’s mind would be on other things.

“The glass has been falling steadily all morning,” said Craddock.

“I noticed,” said Harry.

“Mr Ludlow,” said Craddock, standing up and putting on his hat. “I need time to consider what you have told me. First I must attend to the needs of the ship. I’m sure you understand.”

The interview was over. Harry walked out into the deserted wardroom followed by Craddock.

“Dear me.” Craddock looked around the empty room. “I shall be last on deck, I fear.”

“A privilege of rank, sir,” said Harry. “Long may you enjoy it.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

THE WEATHER
was changing rapidly. Dark clouds covered the western sky and the remaining sunlight had a brassy quality. The sea was getting up as the wind increased. Harry swayed easily on the poop as he watched the crew reducing the area of canvas on the masts.

“Looks like we are in for a blow, Mr Prentice!” shouted Harry cheerfully to the young mid.

Prentice looked rather alarmed for a moment, but Harry’s apparent calm seemed to reassure him.

How many storms at sea had Prentice seen? Harry had rather taken to the boy. Carter, it transpired, did have a down on him, since he had been forced to accept the youngster aboard ship after much pleading by Prentice’s parents. Not that the wishes of parents would have moved a captain like Carter. But they had enlisted the aid of Admiral Hood, through a relative, to plead their son’s case. That was too powerful an appeal to be ignored. Prentice had come aboard practically in the wake of Hood’s letter, and to a frosty reception.

In conversation Harry had learned how keen the boy had been to get to sea. Like a lot of his fellows he was enchanted by the tales of heroism and wealth that sailors tended to spread while ashore. As they had already discussed, the lad was less impressed with the reality. And there was worse to come. Now, just a week out of port, the water and biscuit were fresh. How would he cope with water covered in green slime, knowing that he must drink it to wash down the tasteless hard tack? The other mids would tell him horror stories about the size of the weevils he would have to tap out of his biscuit, but even they would not be able to exaggerate the taste of rancid butter, and the odour of cheese so high that the bilges smelled like a boudoir in comparison.

But just as Harry remembered his own shock, he knew that Prentice would become accustomed to all of it. Three months from now he would be trapping and fattening rats with the best of them, and if he was skilful in that department he would be selling them to his messmates at a shilling on the barrel. Squalor, smells, and rotten food diminished with familiarity. There were other dangers but Prentice looked sharp enough to avoid any familiarity with the older midshipmen. It was to be hoped his father had seen to his education in that department, for he was a handsome boy, and he would not want for undesirable offers.

In a happier ship, Prentice would be skylarking in the rigging with the other young gentlemen, and well on the way to enjoying his life at sea. He struck Harry as just the kind of youngster he would have wanted aboard, if he’d ever commanded a man-of-war. The boy had certainly adopted the eating habits of his messmates, which was to consume everything put before them as quickly as possible, before looking around to see if there were any scraps left on another plate. Harry himself had one abiding image of his life as a midshipman. He could remember always being hungry.

“Mr Prentice,” said Harry, with a slight twinge of guilt.

“Sir.”

“I cannot help noticing how the mids do not lark about. When I was a lad we were forever in hot water for the noise we made.” “It is discouraged,” said Prentice. “By the captain?”

“In our berth, sir. Both the gunner and the senior mids have made it plain, though I noticed at Spithead it seems common enough in other vessels.”

“Certainly in every ship I’ve sailed in. Did they say why?”

“Most emphatically, sir. I was informed not to draw attention to myself in any way. And it was represented to me that there was no quicker method than that.”

“Does the name Larkin signify?”

Prentice looked slightly alarmed. He opened his mouth to speak, but before he could, Denbigh’s voice cut in.

“Have you no duties to attend to, Mr Prentice?”

Without another word, Prentice dashed off. Denbigh gave Harry that cold stare again, before turning away.

Craddock was now on deck, doing what he had done hundreds of times in many seas: making the ship secure. The topgallants were being struck down. Extra ropes were bowsed tight over the ship’s boats, slung above the waist. Men were checking the lashings on the great guns. One of those guns (two tons in weight if you included the carriage) loose on deck in a storm could wreak havoc. The guns below were even heavier, rising to nearly three tons on the gundeck. Harry looked out over the windward side, the freshening breeze whipping his hair. He heard the orders given that brought the
Magnanime
round to sail as close as possible into the approaching storm. With a lee shore to larboard, Craddock was gaining as much sea room as possible. Perhaps it was just a squall that would pass over quickly. But at this time of year, and in these waters, it was just as likely to be a full south-westerly gale which could last for several days. To the east lay the rocky shoreline of northern Spain and Portugal, the graveyard for many an unprepared ship.

The pumps were clanking away, sending spurts of water over the side. The
Magnanime
was dry and weatherly but in a storm she could ship a great deal of water over her decks, some of which would find its way into the bilges. And in a heaving, pitching ship, some water was bound to make its way through the seams. Harry could see the men on deck and in the rigging going about their duties quietly and efficiently. Carter was lucky. Unhappy ship she might be, but the
Magnanime
had been in commission at the outbreak of war. All the hands were volunteers. He had at least been able to man his ship with proper seamen. Those coming after him would not be so fortunate, and a fair proportion of their crews would be landsmen.

Not that Carter was a bad seaman himself. He was a fine navigator and Harry guessed that in his disputes with the master, the grumbles of which were loudly proclaimed in the wardroom, Carter was as likely to have got the course and position correct, while the master had been some way off in his reckoning. And Carter trusted Craddock to do his job too. His absence from the deck proved that.

Craddock had everything in hand, with men working efficiently all over the deck, when the cry from the mast-head froze them in a dumb show. Two sails, fine on the starboard bow, as yet unidentified. The news brought Carter out of his cabin, telescope in hand, though it was far too soon to see them clearly from near sea level.

Harry, itching to go aloft himself, looked with envy as Mangold was sent to see what he could make of them. Men returned to their assigned duties on deck, but with a detached quality to their work. All eyes were pulled to look over the starboard bulwarks, to where the storm clouds gathered. Harry could imagine their thoughts. They would be praying for a pair of fat merchantmen, laden with wealth and only too keen to surrender without a fight to a ship the size of theirs.

“Seventy-fours,” shouted Mangold from the tops. “Can’t see their colours, sir.”

Craddock looked to Carter for an order. Carter said nothing, merely walking to the windward side and raising his glass to look out over the side. He stood for a while doing nothing then turned and spoke. “I think we best wait until we have identified them,” he said at last.

If Craddock was disappointed, he showed no sign of it. Harry could see the logic in Carter’s thinking. In these waters, given their course, it was a fair chance that they were hostile. In calmer seas, without the possibility of an approaching storm, Carter would probably have cleared for an action right away. But to undo all the precautions that had been undertaken to secure the ship for a rough sea would be foolish, and possibly dangerous, if the seventy-fours turned out to be friendly.

“French, sir,” screamed Mangold. “They’re hoisting more sail.”

Carter still paced up and down. He did have a difficult choice to make. How long before the storm was upon them? He had to assume that the French would fight if they could, just as no one aboard expected him to turn away from a superior force. Harry did not envy him, for the safety of the ship was paramount. Few captains would choose to face a storm cleared for action, with guns cast off and the multitude of things necessary for a battle at sea lying around the deck. And the French had the weather gauge, giving them the right to accept or decline battle in their own time.

“They’re coming on, sir.” Mangold must have been, like everybody, in an agony of suspense, lest they turn away. At least he was in a position to influence the debate.

“Can you see their decks yet, Mr Mangold?” shouted Carter.

“No, sir.”

“Then let me know the minute you can. The very minute, you hear!”

“Aye, aye, sir.”

With that Carter tucked his telescope under his arm and, again, he began to pace up and down the quarterdeck. You had to approve of the display of calm. For most men’s minds would have turned from the prospect of wealth and comfort. Now, with odds of two to one, they would be thinking of survival and possible glory. Mangold called down to the deck, identifying the enemy as the
Achille
and the
Jemmapes.

The
Magnanime
ploughed on, her bowsprit now dipping into the rising seas as the swell increased, all the time her course converging with the enemy, bringing them closer. All the excuses were there for Carter to decline immediate battle. The odds, the weather, the direction of the wind, now moving round into the west, and the possibility that if he turned tail, he might well lead them towards a superior force. And even as a superior force, the French might in the end decline battle. The choice would be theirs right to the point where the ships engaged.

Carter would not decline battle. Harry instinctively knew that there would be no room in the captain’s mind for such a thought. The man was no coward, and all his life he could wait for a chance like this, and it would never come again.

He would fight them if they showed a desire to engage, weather permitting. He would seek to stay with them if it did not, ready to take them on when the weather moderated. The odds meant glory and honours if he was successful. Possible death or capture if he failed. But still glory, in a battle it would be no shame to lose. Harry would have done the same in Carter’s place.

“They’re clearing for action, sir.” Mangold could now see their decks.

“Then we shall do likewise. Beat to quarters, Mr Craddock. Note the time, Mr Denbigh.”

The marine drummer, who had been standing with his sticks raised, immediately started to beat the tattoo on his drum that sent men racing to their various duties. Bulkheads would come down, furniture would be shifted. Breakables would be packed and sent down into the hold. Guns would be cast off and powder bags filled in the magazines. More shot was being fetched from below, to be stacked alongside the guns. Netting would be rigged to catch falling blocks and spars.

The wardroom would soon cease to exist. From Harry’s cabin right to the front of the upper deck would be a clear space. Home most of the time, it would become a fighting platform, painted red so that spilt blood would not show. Two decks below, in the cockpit, Outhwaite would be putting the midshipmen’s sea-chests together to form a table and laying out his instruments, ready to go to work on men whose blood had stained that red-painted deck. A swig of neat rum, a leather strap in the mouth, and lashings to hold you still. Then the surgeon would go to work, ignoring the curses and screams from his patients. Harry shuddered at the thought. He’d seen a cockpit during a battle. It was as close to a living hell as any man was likely to witness.

“Mr Ludlow, sir,” said Pender, who had come up unnoticed. “I took the liberty of fetching these.” His servant held out a pair of pistols.

“Thank you. But I shan’t need those for some time yet.” This would be Pender’s first battle. The man showed no fear, still prepared to smile. They walked off the poop and down to where Craddock stood. On another ship he would have addressed the captain, but he could not bring himself to address Carter.

He steadied himself on the pitching deck. “I am at your service, Mr Craddock. Please feel free to employ me in any capacity you wish.”

Craddock lifted his hat to acknowledge the offer.