Ramage's Trial (38 page)

Shirley continued looking down at the black and white squares painted on the deck canvas, but both Goddard and Jenkins looked at Aitken as though he was a barrel of powder which a fast-burning fuse had only a couple of inches to go.

Goddard smiled reassuringly but his thick lips betrayed his nervousness at this unexpected turn. “My dear Aitken, you must sign the minutes. The regulations, you know.”

“That's not my understanding of them, if you'll forgive me, sir. I may be wrong,” he added sorrowfully, and Ramage almost laughed aloud as he saw a flicker of hope cross Goddard's face. “Aye, I might be wrong, and for that matter so might you, sir. But of course that's why we have the deputy judge advocate, and why he's paid extra per diem while the court is sitting, to act as our legal adviser. Would you be good enough, sir, to have him consult the court-martial statutes?”

“Look here, Aitken, you'll save everyone a great deal of trouble if you just sign the minutes. It won't do your chances of promotion any good if you get a reputation for fussing about…”

Ramage was staggered at the barefaced threat and suddenly regretted having been responsible for getting Aitken in this, position, and yet curiously thankful that because of the prize money Aitken had earned under his command, he could resign his commission this moment and walk on shore wealthier, in all probability, than any of the twelve captains sitting round the table.

Captain Swinford said unexpectedly but firmly: “I think that the lieutenant has every right to hear what the court-martial statutes have to say on the matter. In all my years, I haven't come across the point before.”

Captain Royce, sitting next to him, said: “Personally, I'm quite clear on the point. If the witness isn't satisfied with the minutes, he does not have to sign 'em.”

Swinford said: “I must say, if a witness is expected to sign the minutes as ‘a true record' of his evidence, then it seems only right that if they aren't ‘a true record' he shouldn't sign 'em.”

Goddard rapped the table. “Clear the court,” he ordered.

“Sir,” Jenkins said meekly, standing up, “the witness and the prisoner are involved in this argument, and if you clear the court, they will be removed from…”

“Oh very well,” Goddard said petulantly, “why don't you cite some references?”

“I have several here, sir.”

“Well, damnation, why didn't you mention it? What do they say?”

“They are clear on the point, sir,” Jenkins said. “Quite clear.”

“There you are,” Goddard told Swinford and Royce. “Now I hope you will stop interfering. Sign and leave the court,” he told Aitken.

“But sir,” Jenkins wailed, “the statutes are clear upon the point that a witness should sign the minutes only if he is satisfied they correctly record his evidence.”

Goddard sat with his eyes shut. Clearly, as far as Ramage was concerned, the rear-admiral was trying to recall the earlier part of Aitken's evidence because, of course, if Aitken refused to sign the minutes then none of his evidence would be admissible. Was there anything in that evidence that Shirley wanted? After a minute or two, Ramage decided that Goddard could not clearly remember. This was confirmed by Goddard's next words: “Very well, Lieutenant, if you do not sign the minutes you had better remember my words, and remember that the court can recall you as a witness any time it wishes.”

Jenkins glanced down at his list and turned to the Marine sentry at the door. “Call Mr Southwick, master of the
Calypso
.”

Southwick was another of the men warned by both the defence and the prosecution that they would be required as witnesses, and he marched in to the great cabin looking unexpectedly smart, sword by his side, hat tucked under his left arm, freshly shaven, and only his hair the usual unruly white mop which had for many years defied brush and comb and responded only to a fresh wind.

Ramage suddenly realized that although he met Southwick many times a day (and had been doing so for several years) he rarely “saw” him in the sense of assessing his character from his appearance. In fact, watching him now as Jenkins administered the oath, Ramage felt he was looking at a stranger he had known well for years, admittedly a truly absurd contradiction. But Southwick obviously stood four-square, a bluff and kindly man, every inch of him a seaman; a man who spoke his mind and whose honesty no other honest man could possibly doubt. That assessment, Ramage thought wryly, ruled out Goddard, who clearly measured every man by his own standards, thus ensuring he lived in a world apparently peopled only by scoundrels.

As soon as Jenkins was back in his chair, Shirley gave him several slips of paper. The man
glided
, Ramage realized. Again he had the picture of a sad-faced monk in long robes gliding gloomily along a cloister, head down, hands clasped behind his back – or even clutching a rosary to his breast. Quiet, remote from daily life, little understood by laymen who tried (and failed) to relate remoteness to holiness, and in turn understanding little of laymen.

Jenkins read the first question establishing that Southwick had been master of the
Calypso
on the relevant day and then, holding one of Shirley's slips of paper, asked: “What was your role in the encounter between the
Jason
and the
Calypso
?”

Ramage pictured Shirley sitting in the
Jason
's great cabin, thinking hard and then scribbling away, thinking again and reaching for another slip of paper. He could not have thought of a more suitable question (from Southwick's point of view) to ask the master.

“Knotting and splicing rigging cut by the
Jason
's broadside,” he said matter-of-factly, in the same tone of voice that one prosperous farmer might use to discuss with another the improving price of wheat.

Goddard turned to look at Southwick. “I can't believe that you personally would be knotting and splicing rigging?”

“Masters of ships don't, sir,” Southwick said politely. “You were expected to understand that I was supervising the work.”

Ramage saw a cunning glint in Goddard's eyes: he had an ace concealed somewhere. “We can only take notice of what you say, not what you expect us to understand, so strike that answer out, Jenkins,” he said. “I think in fact Captain Shirley wishes to withdraw that question.”

Shirley nodded once without looking up, and Jenkins ostentatiously screwed up the piece of paper and put it to one side. He took up the next slip. Without reading it out he looked at Shirley and, when the captain did not glance up, walked over to him and whispered something. Ramage saw Shirley nod and Jenkins gave him the slip of paper and returned to his chair. That, Ramage guessed, was another question where Southwick's blunt answer could embarrass the prosecution. He watched as Jenkins picked up the next page.

“When you were on board the
Jason
, did Captain Shirley make any threatening gesture towards you, or employ any threatening words?”

“No, he seemed to be sleepwalking.”

Goddard tapped the table with his signet ring. “The witness' answer to the question is ‘No'.”

Captain Swinford said quickly without reference to Goddard: “Mr Southwick, why do you use the word ‘sleepwalking'?”

Southwick grinned. “You remember when I was serving with you in the
Canopus
, sir, back in – must be '92? We had that first lieutenant who from time to time would appear on the quarterdeck in his nightshirt, and a midshipman had to be told off to lead him back to his cabin without waking him? Well, he looked like that.”

Goddard said sarcastically: “Reminiscing over old times is quite fascinating, but this is hardly the time for it. The reference to sleepwalking was struck from the minutes so your question, Captain Swinford, apart from not being asked through me as president of the court, is quite out of order.”

“He was killed at Camperdown, sir,” Southwick said, as though Goddard did not exist. “Had he lived, he'd have gone far.”

“Quite,” Swinford agreed, also ignoring Goddard. “That was why I'd picked him as my first lieutenant.”

“Have you any more questions to ask this witness, Captain Shirley?” Goddard asked ominously.

Again Shirley did not look up. He shook his head almost imperceptibly, and after Ramage said he had no questions, Jenkins cautioned Southwick to listen while the minutes of his evidence were read aloud to him.

“Aye, that won't take long,” commented Southwick. Then he walked down to the end of the table to where Jenkins sat, signed his name with a flourish and, giving Jenkins a broad smile as he thanked him for the trouble he had taken, put the quill back in the inkwell with just enough force to make sure the quill split slightly and ruined the point.

As Southwick walked out of the cabin – because he was to be called again, next time as a defence witness, he had to leave the court and join Aitken – Goddard said: “Your next witness, Captain Shirley.”

Shirley stood up. “Mr Southwick was my last witness, sir. The prosecution's case is concluded.”

“Very well. Mr Ramage, are you ready to present your defence?”

Yes, he was ready; but was there any point in making a defence? Goddard had blocked nearly all the answers referring to the
Jason
firing a broadside into the
Calypso
; he had blocked any hint that Captain Shirley might be mad. He had done all this very skilfully; anyone (particularly Their Lordships at the Admiralty) reading the minutes could not guess what had been struck out; indeed, might never suspect that even a comma was missing.

Yet upon those two facts, the
Jason
's broadside and Shirley's madness, rested Ramage's entire defence: they were the two reasons why he took the step – which put his life in legal jeopardy – of removing a captain from his command.

How the devil then, could he defend himself against these charges, brought by Shirley himself, if the president of the court ruled out of order any reference to the broadside or madness? Oh yes, Ramage knew he could go to the commander-in-chief and complain, but the commander-in-chief (and the Admiralty too for that matter) would never accept his word against Rear-Admiral Goddard's, not because they particularly favoured Goddard but because the whole edifice on which the Navy was built depended on strict obedience to one's superior, whether an able seaman jumping when the bosun said jump or a lieutenant doing promptly what the captain said, or the captain carrying out his admiral's orders, or the admiral carrying out the Board of Admiralty's orders – and, finally, the Admiralty carrying out orders from its superior, which was the government of the day in the shape of His Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for the Foreign Department. Who, come to think of it, received his instructions from the Cabinet or the prime minister.

If any one of those men or bodies refused to obey, then the whole edifice would collapse or give a tiny shiver, depending on the level of the disobedience. The link between the Cabinet issuing orders to the Secretary of State and an ordinary seaman being harried by a surly bosun's mate might seem tenuous, but it was there and, Ramage had to agree, everyone from the prime minister to the bosun's mate was concerned with upholding authority.

The only problem arose when some unusual circumstance did not fit into the intricate structure of obedience which had been built up over the centuries. The structure had been modified by various Acts of Parliament from time to time; it was the best that men could contrive – up to now, anyway. As far as the Navy was concerned, it had one defect which either no one had noticed or (more likely) no one in authority would admit existed, yet that defect although small could eventually threaten the whole structure.

It was this defect, or flaw, which had trapped Ramage, and it was, quite simply, that there was no way that a captain of a ship of war could lawfully be removed from his command at sea by his officers if he went mad, lapsed into alcoholism, broke his back and could not leave his bunk or in some other way became unfit to command
unless
the surgeon was prepared to give his opinion in writing that the captain was unfit to command. Few surgeons would risk the consequences, and anyway the
Jason
's surgeon was dead by the time his opinion was wanted. So the defect or flaw in the Admiralty's command structure became a gaping hole in the case of the
Jason
on that July day.

Still, there was only one question now remaining in Ramage's mind, and that was why none of the
Jason
's officers or seamen would admit that she had fired a broadside at the
Calypso
. Goddard would block the question which, he recalled, led to another: why would none of the officers discuss the reason or even admit they were locked in the gunroom when the Calypsos boarded? Which brought a third question: why would none of the officers discuss the possibility of Shirley being mad with the very captain who was rescuing them from a madman?

So why the hell prolong the trial and give Goddard any more satisfaction? It was not Shirley's fault – he was mad and not responsible for his actions. The captains forming the court did not realize what they faced and could not be told enough – except by the very evidence that Goddard had prevented being given.

Come to think of it, those captains (like Ramage himself) must wonder why the
Jason
's officers stayed stubbornly silent if they honestly thought Shirley was really mad. Yet that silence alone could be enough reason for them finding Captain Ramage guilty as charged…

How and why had he become involved in all this, he asked himself bitterly. Why had he removed Shirley from his command – because he would be back commanding the
Jason
as soon as the trial was over. Why had he freed the
Jason
's lieutenants – because now not one of them would speak a word even to help their rescuer.