The Ramage Touch (6 page)

He shivered because that part of his personal future was uncertain; possibly insoluble. Anyway, for the moment he was within yards of his second home.

Second? Where was his first? Presumably England in general and Cornwall in particular. Yet if he was honest with himself – and being anchored like this in the lee of Punta Ala, having just nosed round Elba, was as good a time as any to be that – he was slowly becoming a man without a real home.

St Kew, the village forming the family estate in Cornwall, had been owned by the Ramages for five or six centuries, but for many generations the successive heads of the family had spent more time abroad than at home, usually on the King’s business. His own father used to be away at sea for three or four years at a stretch, latterly as the commander-in-chief on various distant stations. Now Admiral the Earl of Blazey spent all his time in retirement at St Kew, happily being the squire, and also the Lord-Lieutenant of Cornwall and Custos Rotulorum.

Meanwhile his son stayed at sea, still one of the youngest and nearly the most junior of the captains on the post list. He had not seen the latest Navy List, but presumably a few more lieutenants had recently made the leap to the post list, and because a captain’s seniority dated from the time of his appointment, there would now be some names below his, so that they pushed him higher (
slightly
higher, and very slowly!). The two most important things speeding your move up the ladder of seniority were captains going off at the top of the list on promotion to admirals, some dying, and more lieutenants being ‘made post’ below you.

Ramage suddenly felt guilty about Paolo, whom he could see going quietly from gun to gun, checking that all was well. He had a cutlass in a belt over his shoulder, and his dirk at his belt, a weapon he loved to use as a
main-gauche
. The boy must be fourteen years old now, and it was a couple of years since he had finally managed to get away from Volterra, escape through Naples and then reach a British ship of war. The voyage to England to join his aunt had decided the boy that he wanted to serve in the Royal Navy. Ramage could recall the arguments only too well: Gianna had simply announced that Paolo would serve with Nicholas. Because Captain Ramage was allowed to take up to six ‘young gentlemen’ to sea with him as midshipmen, it was simple, she said; Paulo would be one of the six. Except, of course, that Captain Ramage did not like having too many midshipmen on board, and certainly did not want to be responsible for the safety in battle of the young nephew of the woman he loved.

Still, it was useless talking to either aunt or nephew about danger; both had already faced death several times and, as far as he could make out, and he had watched Gianna on a couple of occasions, they greeted it with an airy wave of the hand. So the boy had gone to sea and it seemed to work; Paolo had already been in three or four actions against the French where the only thing that saved his life was the quickness of his own cutlass or the dirk, and once Thomas Jackson had saved him from a French sword.

His use of the dirk as a
main-gauche
had started many of the seamen practising it – probably inspired by Will Stafford who, first hearing the phrase and not realizing it was French for ‘left hand’, had asked: ‘What
is
a mango?’ thinking, no doubt, that it was another variety of the fruit. After that Ramage had often seen seamen, a long piece of wood in the right hand as a cutlass and a short piece in the left representing the dagger, practising fencing, each trying to use the cutlass to swing his opponent round and leave his right side open, so that a dagger held in the left hand could be plunged in. The
main-gauche
was generally regarded by the British as not the sort of thing a gentleman would use. However, the Italian fencing master who had begun teaching young Paolo just as soon as he had learned to walk without staggering, was obviously a more practical man who considered that if relations had become so bad that men fought with swords, the object was to kill the adversary and stay alive oneself, and a
main-gauche
could often be an ace of trumps.

Ramage had been so wrapped up in his own thoughts when he first saw the Italian mainland once again the previous day, a distant blue-grey hint on the horizon, that he had not given a moment’s thought to Paolo, who was seeing his homeland for the first time in several years and with the knowledge that it was still occupied by the enemy. Even the most optimistic of men could not guess when the French army would be driven out of Italy. Bonaparte occupied Europe from the North Sea to the Mediterranean, and, apart from occasional defeats at sea, seemed invincible. Paolo had borrowed a telescope, looked for two or three minutes, commented to Alberto Rossi that he had never previously seen Tuscany from seaward, and handed back the telescope. Unfeeling, self-controlled or indifferent? Ramage did not know.

In fact Paulo, almost overwhelmed with nostalgia, had been nearly in tears, but was imitating the Captain in hiding his feelings. Beyond that blue-grey blur the boy had pictured the many towers of the city of Volterra, tall, slim rectangles, and round it the cone-shaped hills with tiny towns perched on top, the dark green of the cypress trees covering the countryside, lining tracks and sheltering houses from the winds, and looking just like the broad blades of spears stuck hilt-first into the ground.

He recalled his own room in the palace and the armoury with the splendid collection of pistols – including some of the finest examples ever made in Pistoia, only a few miles away and the town which had given the world the word ‘pistol’. It was when he commented on this recently to the Captain that Paolo had learned that the English word ‘bayonet’ probably came from the French town of Bayonne, where the short swords fixed on to muskets had first been made. The Captain had known about ‘pistol’ and ‘bayonet’ but could not tell him where the word ‘dirk’ came from, except to mutter something about Scotsmen.

Shortly after dawn Ramage was back on the quarterdeck watching the curious outline of the two French ships emerging more sharply as daylight spread across the bay. They were not Mediterranean vessels; he was sure of that. They seemed to be typical galliots of the French Channel ports – except that the mainmasts were set so far aft, and the stays from the mainmast to the stemhead, bowsprit and jib boom seemed fewer than usual but comparatively massive. Odd-looking vessels, obviously, built for a special purpose, but for what?

He looked carefully, beginning at the bow. A comparatively short bowsprit and a long jib boom, three headsails lying in heaps at the foot of the stays, and he could just make out the upper curve of the drum of the windlass. It was a normal windlass and not a capstan, and to be expected. What was that? It looked like the rim of something canted at an angle. The muzzle of an enormous gun? A mortar perhaps? His eyes ran aft past the mainmast and there, just forward of the mizen, was another. These weird vessels were bomb ketches!

What on earth were bomb ketches doing here, along the Italian coast? They were not properly designed bomb ketches, specially built in one of the naval yards, but merchant ship hulls which had been adapted – strengthened to take the weight of the mortars and their enormous recoil, the mainmast stepped farther aft, and the rigging simplified so that no shrouds, halyards, sheets and stays went across the fields of fire or, equally important, were close enough to the muzzle flash to catch fire.

Southwick, freshly shaved, hat four-square on his head with wisps of white hair sticking out like hay beneath a nesting hen, his face settled in a cheerful grin, walked up to Ramage as he stood at the binnacle and said: ‘A couple of Dunkirkers, eh?’

‘I don’t know about Dunkirk,’ Ramage said, ‘but built fairly close. Notice anything else?’

Southwick took off his hat and scratched his head, a typical gesture, like someone tidying the head of a mop. His forehead wrinkled as he concentrated on looking at the ship to starboard. He took Ramage’s proffered telescope and adjusted the focus. ‘Ah,’ he said finally. A few moments later he repeated it. ‘Ah. Two mortars.’ He walked to the larboard side to look at the other ship and came back almost immediately.

‘Bomb ketches. Or a couple of galliots turned into bomb ketches. I wonder where they’re bound? What do the French want to pound to pieces along this coast? I thought they’d occupied most of it already.’

Ramage shrugged. ‘We’ll soon find out.’ He tapped the French signal book lying on the top of the binnacle. ‘We’ll hoist the signal for the commanding officers to report to me on board here. They can tell us.’

Southwick was already looking round for seamen to collect the correct French flags from the special locker when Ramage held up a restraining hand. ‘We’ll wait an hour or two for them to recover. They’ve no suspicions – they might even be alarmed at receiving orders too early!’

‘Where do you think they’re bound, sir?’ Southwick persisted.

‘Probably not Italy at all. They might be on their way to the eastern end of the Mediterranean on some wild scheme of Bonaparte’s. Don’t forget he tried to capture Egypt; in fact he’d still be there but for the Battle of Aboukir Bay.’

Southwick pretended to shudder. ‘Don’t mention the name, sir; when I think we missed that action…’

‘We’ll have to make do with what we’ve got. The Battle of Punta Ala – or do you prefer the Battle of Punta Hidalgo, that’s this point close to us.’

‘Ala,’ Southwick said firmly. ‘Hidalgo sounds foreign. It’s not an Italian word, is it, sir? Seems more Spanish to me. Haven’t I heard it in connection with horses, or estates or something like that?’

‘Gentleman. Just a gentleman. Perhaps you’re thinking of a gentleman riding round his estate on a horse.’

‘Why should there be a Punta “Hidalgo” here, then?’ Southwick asked, gesturing towards the headland to seaward of them, which had Punta Ala beyond to the westward.

‘Not so long ago the Spanish owned all this. Most of these castles and watch-towers along the coast were built by the Spanish, by Philip II. Just down the coast here, at Santo Stefano, there’s one of his splendid fortresses which is named after him, the Fortezza di Filippo Secondo.’

‘But what did the Spanish want with all this land in Italy?’

‘The Spanish want land wherever they can get it! Anyway, the Grand Duke of Tuscany is a Habsburg. He’s a weak man who just buckled under to Bonaparte. Don’t mention his name to the Marchesa! Her mother reckoned that every Habsburg should be hanged with a thin rope from a tall tree.’

Ramage picked up the French signal book and began flicking over the pages. He had a personal rule never to trust his memory, so he looked through the signals again. There was only one that could be applied, ‘
All captains to report immediately to the flagship
.’ The
Calypso
, even while pretending to be French, was certainly no flagship; but obviously her captain was by far the senior officer present – at most the galliots would be commanded by lieutenants and if the one that had emerged briefly during the night was anything to go by, they were former mates or even bosuns of coasting craft pressed into the Navy to serve the new Republic.

Ramage held up the book and pointed out the flags to Southwick. ‘You’re right; I suppose we might as well hoist them now. The captains will be wakened eventually and they’ll get nervous because they won’t know how long the signal’s been up.’

Southwick sniffed, a quiet but contemptuous sniff which in one brief indrawn breath revealed his opinion of the French Ministry of Marine, French naval officers in general, and commanders of galliots in particular. ‘When do we let them know we’re British, sir? I mean, do you want all the officers to wear trousers and shirts, not uniforms?’

‘Yes, then they need not stay out of sight of the ships. Marines had better dress as seamen. I could send Renwick over now with his men, but we might just as well make it a bloodless capture. Renwick won’t thank us, but we’re more likely to find out what we want from the French officers this way, because the alternative is being put back on board their ships and having one of our broadsides follow them.’

Leaving instructions that he was to be called the moment there was any sign of movement on board either ship, Ramage went below to shave, change into a shirt and nankin trousers, and have his breakfast. One thing that could be said in the Mediterranean’s favour was that, as in the West Indies, it was easy to get fruit and vegetables – in the summer, anyway.

Ramage had just finished shaving, in cold water because the galley fire was out, and was tying his stock when Southwick called down the skylight: ‘Couple of fellows moving about on deck in the galliot to starboard, sir. They haven’t noticed the signal.’

His steward was handing Ramage his shoes (the fourth best pair with silver buckles) when Southwick reported a man relieving himself over the side of the other ship to larboard without, apparently, even noticing the
Calypso
. Ramage had just finished his breakfast and was dawdling over a cup of green tea when Southwick called down that there were now half a dozen men on board the vessel to starboard and they had just noticed the signal.

‘I hope you’re not in uniform,’ Ramage said, irritated that he had not finished his tea.

‘Pusser’s shirt and trousers, sir,’ Southwick answered. ‘I look as though I’ve just been elected by a Revolutionary committee. Ah, that looks like the master, or captain. Yes, he’s gesturing to have the boat lowered. Seems to be in a fine fury. The boat in the transom davits seems to be the only one they have. Yes, he’s run down to his cabin – back he comes with his hat. And rubbing his face with a wet cloth. Hah! Sword in one hand, wet cloth in the other, and his headache thudding, too, I’ll be bound. Phew, they let the boat drop with a run – marvel it hasn’t stove in some planks. The captain heard it and he’s fairly dancing round with rage. In fact he’s just hit a man with the flat of his sword. Now the rope ladder’s been let fall…he’ll be on his way, in a few minutes.’

Some ten minutes later Southwick whispered a hoarse warning through the skylight and then the sentry gave a double knock and pushed the door open. A slim man with a wrinkled, tanned face and wearing a faded blue shirt and well-patched white trousers, a broad leather cutlass belt diagonally across his shoulders, walked nervously into the cabin, looking left and right like a bird fearing a trap.