Ebb Tide (9 page)

Within a few days, Drinkwater reflected, Callowell had made enemies of Appleby the surgeon, Lieutenant Wheeler of the marines and poor Lieutenant Wallace, and it was borne in upon Drinkwater how fine an influence Devaux had been on the frigate as a whole. He was greatly missed and, Drinkwater felt certain, he himself would not have been turned so precipitately out of the gunroom had Devaux remained aboard.

Smetherley's arrival had also, in Callowell's phrase, 'cleaned out the midshipmites' cockpit'. Only White and Drinkwater remained of the original midshipmen, and they were now joined by four young kill-devils to whose families Smetherley owed some obligation or who had solicited his favour. Both White and Drinkwater viewed this invasion with disquiet. It was clear that the four all knew each other, and while seasickness had demoralized them for the first few days, it was obvious from their slovenly indiscipline, their abuse of Jacob the messman, and their noise that they were going to prove troublesome. Had they remained a week longer at anchor at Spithead, Drinkwater knew that White would have been able to leave the frigate, for he was daily in expectation of the order, but within a few days of the foundering of the
Royal George, Cyclops
had sailed for Sheerness. Rodney's defeat of De Grasse had revenged Graves's disgrace off the Virginia Capes, though it did not restore the Thirteen Colonies, and even as they tossed in the fury of the northern gale, Lord Howe and the Grand Fleet were relieving Gibraltar for the third and final time. As the unpopular conflict spluttered to its close,
Cyclops
had to maintain her vigil to see that neither Dutch nor French cruisers stole a march on the exhausted British nor tipped the delicate balance of negotiations in the peace talks that all seemed certain were about to bring matters to a conclusion. Perhaps, Drinkwater thought as he resolutely composed himself to grab a few hours' sleep, the war would at last be truly over. Providence had saved him from plunging to his death with all those other poor souls trapped aboard the
Royal George;
it must surely have preserved him for some purpose, and what purpose could there possibly be other than to allow him to return to Elizabeth?

Lieutenants Callowell and Wallace stood on the weather quarterdeck staring to windward. Callowell, his feet well spread and both hands gripping the rail against the heel of the frigate, was speaking to Wallace, his cloak beating about him in a sinister manner — like a bat's wings, Drinkwater thought, approaching them. He touched his hat to the two officers as he made his way aft to the taffrail to heave the log which the two quartermasters were preparing. It was almost eight bells, the end of the morning watch, and Drinkwater was tired and hungry. He nodded to the two petty officers, and the log-ship went over the side, drawing the knotted line off the spinning reel while Drinkwater regarded old Bower's watch.

'Now!' he called, and the line was nipped. 'Five knots?'

'And a half.'

'Very good. And how much leeway d'you reckon?' Drinkwater shouted above the roar of the gale, cocking an eye at the older quartermaster. The man had served as mate in a merchantman and knew his business.

"Bout eight degrees, I'd say.' Drinkwater and the second quartermaster nodded their assent.

'Very well. We'll make it so. You may hand the log.' And leaving them to wind in the hemp line, Drinkwater walked forward to move the pegs on the traverse board. The glass was turned, eight bells were struck and the forenoon took over from the morning watch. On deck men in sodden tarpaulins were stamping about, eager to be dismissed below, and those just emerged from the foetid berth-deck huddled in miserable groups in what shelter they could find, trying to delay the inevitable moment of a sousing for as long as possible. The petty officers made their reports and Drinkwater went aft to where Wallace and Callowell were still in conversation, staring out over the grey waste to windward.

'Beg pardon, sir ...' Drinkwater shouted. The two officers looked over their shoulders, Callowell raising an interrogative eyebrow, though it was Wallace who was about to be relieved.

'Starboard watch mustered on deck. Permission for the larbow-lines to go below, sir.'

Callowell looked at Drinkwater. From Wallace's look of embarrassment, Drinkwater knew trouble was brewing. He repeated his report and Callowell said in a voice raised above the wind, 'Mr Drinkwater, we are waiting...' 'Sir?'

'Waiting, damn you ...' 'I'm sorry, Mr Callowell, but...'

'Mr Callowell is waiting for the courtesy of a "good morning",' Wallace said hurriedly.

Drinkwater had thought himself absolved from such an absurdity by the violence of the weather, the fact that he and Wallace had been on deck since four o'clock in the morning, and the salute he had given the two officers as he made his way aft to heave the log. He was about to swallow his pride, aware that to provoke Callowell with any form of justification was a waste of time, when Callowell denied him this small amelioration.

'As first lieutenant of this frigate, I expect my midshipmen to demonstrate the respect due to the senior officer below the commander. You, sir, can disabuse yourself of any advantages your late acting rank gave you, or any that might have been conferred by your friendship with the last first lieutenant or the late Captain Hope. The fresh air of the foretopmasthead will do you the world of good, will it not, Mr Wallace?'

Wallace mumbled uncomfortably, but Callowell was not yet satisfied. 'But you shall first heave the log again and be pleased to use the glass, not your damned watch. She makes six knots.'

It was growing dark when Drinkwater was brought down from the masthead. The topgallant masts had been struck and he had lashed himself into the shelter available, passing the afternoon in a miserable, semi-conscious state, wracked by cold, cramps and hunger. He had been incapable of descending the mast unaided, and Tregembo and another seaman had sent him down on a gantline.

'There, zur,' the Cornishman had muttered, 'that bastard'll get a boarding-pike in his arse if ever we zees action.'

'Poor bugger can't hear you,' his companion said.

'Maybe not,' Tregembo said philosophically, 'but when he wakes up, he'll agree with me.'

On deck the pain of returning circulation woke Drinkwater to a full and agonizing consciousness that was too self-centred to admit even a single thought of revenge. He gasped with the pain, involuntary tears starting from his eyes, as poor White brought orders that were to further prolong his distress. From this state of half-recovery, Callowell demanded his immediate presence on the quarterdeck where, Drinkwater was told, it was time for him to stand his next watch. Had not Drinkwater been able to rely upon the loyal White to smuggle him victuals on deck and had he not eaten them equally unobserved, his collapse from cold and hunger would have proved fatal. As it was, he endured the ordeal.

Drinkwater was not the only victim of Callowell's harsh malice. Before the gale finally abated, several floggings of undue severity had been ordered out to the hands for trivial offences. Several of these would normally have been summarily dealt with by the frigate's regulating system, minor punishments being meted out by the boatswain and his mates. Devaux, had he even bothered to notice them, would have disdained to act. Callowell, on the other hand, possessed a knack of always observing these small incidents so that it seemed his presence actually caused them, and men shrank from him. The first lieutenant appeared indifferent to this shunning. Appleby named him
Ubique
Callowell, to the amusement of Wheeler, but it was Appleby who first warned of serious discontent among the hands. His position as surgeon enabled him to divine more of the frigate's undercurrents than any gunroom officer and, as his business chiefly occupied him below decks, he was particularly sensitive to the moods of the people. In fact Callowell's behaviour only exacerbated a deteriorating situation. The ship's company had largely been aboard
Cyclops
since October 1779 and in all that time had not enjoyed a single day of liberty ashore. Nor had these long-suffering men been paid their wages. They had, however, had women aboard and had revelled in the excesses of unbridled lust, a pleasure paid for by their share of prize money but now requiring Appleby's mercurial specific against the lues. Some prize money, however, remained, and this excited an envious greed among those intemperate spendthrifts who were now paying painfully for past pleasures.

To compound matters, before leaving Spithead
Cyclops
had been obliged to pass twenty men to the
Bedford,
men under sailing orders, and had made up the deficiency from a draft embarked at the Nore where her new captain joined before she sailed to her cruising ground on the Broad Fourteens. The new crew members were duly taken aboard from the
Conquistador,
guardship at the Nore, the majority being 'Lord Mayor's men', those who made up the deficiencies in the parish quotas by the simple expedient of being released from the confinement ordered by the petty sessions.

Among the men from
Conquistador
were some skilled petty felons, men who owed neither His Britannic Majesty's Royal Navy in general nor their shipmates in the frigate
Cyclops
in particular any shred of loyal forbearance. Even before they had weighed from the anchorage off Sheerness, thieving had broken out on the berth-deck, but it was after the abatement of the gale that these men revealed the full extent of the two unsought contributions they had brought aboard.

The thieving was bad enough, but far worse was the gaol fever. The outbreak of typhus, a disease harboured in the parasites inhabiting these men's filthy garments, caused Appleby much labour and anxiety. The surgeon found the purser unwilling to issue slop-clothing until Callowell approved it and this the first lieutenant declined to do. Thus both thieving and disease permeated the ship, causing infinite distress and disorder among the men. The knowledge of a deadly infection striking indiscriminately only fuelled the pathetic desperation with which the miserable hands sought other diversions. With silver florins unspent upon the berth-deck, every form of card-sharping, knavery, pilfering and coercion flourished. Nor was this moral disintegration the sole province of the newly drafted men; on the contrary they were but the catalyst. Men who had been messmates, even friends, when confronted with sudden personal losses, turned on their equals to redeem them. As if this witches' cauldron were not enough, there were among the drafted men two devil-may-care light dragoons sentenced by a court martial to be dismissed from their regiment and sent as common seamen into the Royal Navy. They had received a flogging and had come to
Cyclops
with the notion that, since service in the navy was of a punitive nature, it was little deserving of respect. In their former corps, the 7th Queen's Own Light Dragoons, both men had been non-commissioned officers and they resented the treatment meted out to them by the boatswain's mates and, in particular, the midshipmen.

In the choice of his new midshipmen, Captain Smetherley had been unfortunate. Of the four who had come in his train, all were ignorant and incompetent, while the example of Callowell encouraged a viciousness sometimes natural in young men. Despite their youth they were usually more drunk than sober and they had discovered a means of amusing themselves by bullying and taunting the men until, answered back, they ordered the boatswain's mates to start the alleged offenders.

Such was the sorry state of affairs aboard
Cyclops,
and it augured ill after the fair and relatively humane regime of Hope and Devaux. The effect of the gale only exacerbated the deterioration in morale. What occurred in a few short days might have taken longer in a better climate or a pleasanter season, but it came as no surprise to those who regarded the new regime with distaste when trouble arose.

Two days after the gale had blown itself out and patches of watery sunshine and blue skies had replaced the grey wrack that had streamed above the very mast trucks, a sail was made out to the northward. The change in the weather had brought most of the officers on to the quarterdeck and the mood lightened still further as this news broke the monotony of their existence. The ship was standing to the northward, close-hauled on the larboard tack and carrying sails to the topgallants.

'Royals, sir?' Callowell asked Smetherley as he came on deck.

'As you see fit, Mr Callowell,' Smetherley said, falling to pacing the weather planking, hands clasped behind his back. Callowell turned to bawl his orders.
Cyclops
set her kites flying, the yards being run up when required and the sheets rove through the topgallant yardarms by the upper topmen. The pipes shrilled and the seamen leapt aloft, poking fun at the fumbling landsmen who were preparing to heave the halliards.

'A glass at the foremasthead, sir?' prompted Callowell.

'If you please, Mr Callowell,' assented Captain Smetherley with urbane assurance. Callowell turned to find Midshipman Baskerville at his elbow.

'Take a glass aloft and see what you make of him,' Callowell growled, and the midshipman passed Drinkwater with a smirk. He was the most loathsome of the captain's toadies, the leader of the quartet, related by blood to Smetherley and therefore unassailable. To Baskerville, Drinkwater was a passed-over nonentity, and while he was cautious of White, for he recognized him as one of his own, he did not scruple to use a high and usually insolent tone with Drinkwater. As Baskerville hauled himself into the foremast rigging, Drinkwater walked over to the lee rail where Blackmore was peering through his battered perspective glass, trying to gain a glimpse of the strange sail.

'Can you make him out yet, Mr Blackmore?'

'Not yet, but I'm thinking he'll be British, and sailing without convoy. Out of Hamburg at this season.' Blackmore was apt to be inscrutable at such moments and Drinkwater recollected that he had commanded a Baltic trader until ruined by war and knew the North Sea trade better than any other man on board. As the two men waited for the sail to be visible from the deck, neither witnessed the incident that provoked the coming trouble.