The Only Victor (21 page)

Herrick glanced warily at the two captains as if to ensure they were well out of earshot. “You too, Sir Richard.” He smiled awkwardly.
“Richard.”

“That is better.” Bolitho watched his old friend's uncertainty. So it was still as before. Because of Catherine. He had refused to come to terms with it, could not bring himself to understand how it had happened between them. Bolitho said, “I have been given
Black Prince
I shall hoist my flag as soon as she is fitted-out, whenever that might be. You know the dockyards and their strange customs!”

Herrick was not to be drawn. He studied Bolitho's face and asked quietly, “Your eye—how is it?” He shook his head and Bolitho saw something of the man he had always known and trusted. “No, I have told no one. But I still think—”

Bolitho said, “What are you doing?”

Herrick's chin was sunk in his neckcloth, something which had become a habit when he was grappling with a problem.

“I still have
Benbow
.” He forced a smile. “New flag lieutenant though. Got rid of that fellow with the Frenchie name, De Broux . . . too soft for my taste!”

Bolitho felt strangely sad. Just a few years since
Benbow
had flown his flag and Herrick had been the captain. Ships, if they could think, must wonder sometimes about the men and the fates which controlled them.

Herrick pulled out his watch. “I must present myself to Lord Godschale.” He spoke the name with dislike. Bolitho could well imagine how Herrick felt about the admiral.

As an afterthought Herrick said, “I am to command a squadron in the North Sea patrols.” He gave a genuine smile. “Adam's new command
Anemone
is my only frigate! Some things never change, but I am well pleased to have him with me.”

Somewhere a clock chimed and Herrick said quickly, “You know me—I hate not to be punctual.”

Bolitho watched his struggle, but when it burst out it was not what he had been expecting.

“Your new flagship. She is completing at Chatham?” He hurried on as if the thing which troubled him could not be contained. “When you visit the ship, and I have been your subordinate too many times in the past not to know your habits, would you find time to call upon my Dulcie?”

Bolitho asked gently, “What is it, Thomas?”

“I am not sure and that is the God's truth. But she has been so tired of late. She works too hard with her charities and the like, and will not rest when I am away at sea. I keep telling her, but you know how they are. I suppose she's lonely. If we had been blessed with children, even the one like you and Lady Belinda—” He broke off, confused by his own revelation. “It is the way of the world, I suppose.”

Bolitho touched his sleeve. “I shall call on her. Catherine keeps trying to drag me to a surgeon, so we may discover someone who might help Dulcie.”

Herrick's blue eyes seemed to harden. “I am sorry. I was not thinking. Perhaps I was too fouled by my own worries and forgot for a moment.” He looked along the room. “Maybe it would be better if you did not pay Dulcie a visit.”

Bolitho stared at him. “Is this barrier still between us, Thomas?”

Herrick regarded him wretchedly. “It is not of my making.” He was going. “I wish you well, Richard. Nothing can take my admiration away. Not ever.”

“Admiration?”
Bolitho looked after him and then called, “Is that all it has become, Thomas? God damn it, man, are we so
ordinary?
”

The two captains were on their feet as Herrick strode past them, their eyes darting between the flag-officers as if they could scarcely believe what they were witnessing.

Then Bolitho found himself outside the Admiralty's imposing façade, shivering in spite of the sunshine and strolling people.

“Be off with you, you wretch!”

Bolitho glanced up, still breathing hard, and saw a young man, accompanied by two girls, shaking his fist at a crouching figure by the roadside. The contrast was so vivid it made his head swim . . . the elegantly dressed young blade with his giggling friends, and the stooping figure in a tattered red coat who was holding out a tin cup.

“Belay that!”
Bolitho saw them turn with surprise while several passers-by paused to see what would happen. Ignoring them all, Bolitho strode to the man in the shabby red coat.

The beggar said brokenly, “I wasn't doin' no 'arm, sir!”

Someone shouted, “Shouldn't be allowed to hang about here!”

Bolitho asked quietly, “What was your regiment?”

The man peered up at him as if he had misheard. He had only one arm, and his body was badly twisted. He looked ancient, but Bolitho guessed he was younger than himself.

“Thirty-First Foot, sir.” He stared defiantly at the onlookers. “The old Huntingdonshire Regiment. We was doin' service as marines.” His sudden pride seemed to fade as he added, “I was with Lord Howe when I got this lot.”

Bolitho turned on his heel and looked at the young man for several seconds.

“I will not ask the same of you, sir, for I can see plainly enough what
you
are!”

The youth had gone pale. “You have no right—”

“Oh, but I do. There is at this very moment a lieutenant of the Tower Hill press gang approaching. A word,
just one word
from me, and you will learn for yourself what it is like to fight for your King and country!”

He was angry with himself for using such a cheap lie. No press gang ever ventured into an area of quality and wealth. But the young man vanished, leaving even his companions to stare after him with surprise and humiliation at being abandoned.

Bolitho thrust a handful of coins into the cup. “God be with you.
Never think that what you did was in vain.
” He saw the man staring at the golden guineas with astonishment, and knew what he was saying was really for his own benefit. “Your courage, like your memories, must sustain you.”

He swung away, his eyes smarting, and then saw the carriage pulling towards him. She pushed open the door before the coachman could jump down and said, “I saw what you did.” She touched his mouth with her fingers. “You looked so troubled . . . did something happen in there to harm you?”

He patted her arm as the carriage clattered back into the aimless traffic. “It harms us all, it would appear. I thought I understood people. Now I am not so sure.” He looked at her and smiled. “I am only certain of you!”

Catherine slid her arm through his and looked out of the carriage window. She had seen Herrick stride up the Admiralty steps. The rest, and Bolitho's angry confrontation with the young dandy, needed no explanation.

She answered softly, “Then let us make the most of it.”

Tom Ozzard paused to lean against a stone balustrade to find his bearings, and was surprised he was not out of breath. The little man had been walking for hours, sometimes barely conscious of his whereabouts but at the back of his mind very aware of his eventual destination.

Along the Thames embankment, then crisscrossing through dingy side-streets where the shabby eaves almost touched overhead as if to shut out the daylight. Around him at every turn was the London he remembered as if it were yesterday. Teeming with life and street cries, the air rank with horse dung and sewers. On one corner was a man bawling out his wares, fresh oysters in a barrel, where several seamen were trying their taste and washing them down with rough ale. Ozzard had seen the river several times on his walk. From London Bridge to the Isle of Dogs it was crammed with merchantmen, their masts and yards swaying together on the tide like a leafless forest.

In the noisy inns along the river sailors jostled the painted whores and flung away their pay on beer and geneva, not knowing when or if they might ever return once their ships had weighed. None of them seemed at all perturbed by the grisly, rotting remains of some pirates which dangled in chains at Execution Dock.

Ozzard caught his breath; his feet had brought him to the very street as if he had had no part in it.

He found that his breathing was sharper as he hesitated before forcing his legs to carry him along the cobbled roadway. It was like a part of his many nightmares. Even the light, dusky orange as evening closed in on the wharves and warehouses of London's dockland; it was said that there were more thieves and cut-throats in this part of London than in all the rest of the country. This was or had been a respectable street on Wapping Wall. Small, neat houses owned or rented by shopkeepers and clerks, agents from the victualling yards and honest chandlers.

A shaft of low sunshine reflected from the top window of his old house. He caught his breath. As if it was filled with blood.

Ozzard stared around wildly, his heart thumping as if to tear itself free from his slight body. It was madness; he was mad. He should never have come, there might still be folk here who remembered him. But when Bolitho had come to London he had accompanied him in another carriage. Allday, Yovell and himself. Each so different, and yet each one a part of the other.

Hardly daring to move, he turned his head to look at the shop directly opposite the row of neat houses.

On that horrific day when he had run from his home, heedless of the blood on his hands, he had paused only to stare at this same shop. Then it had been titled,
Tom Ozzard, Scrivener.
Now he had enlarged the premises and had added
& Son
to his name.

He thought of the time when the surgeon Sir Piers Blachford had spoken out about this same scrivener, and had remarked that it was the only time he had heard the name Ozzard. He had nearly collapsed.
Why did I come?

“You lookin' fer somethin', matey?”

Ozzard shook his head. “No. Thank you.” He turned away to conceal his face.

“Suit yerself.” The unknown man lurched away towards a tavern which Ozzard knew lay behind the shops. Knew, because he had paused there for a glass of ginger beer on his way home. The lawyer who had employed him as his senior clerk had sent him off early to show his appreciation for all the extra work he had done.
If only he had not stopped for a drink.
Even as the hazy idea formed in his mind he knew he was deluding himself. She must have been laughing at him for months. Waiting for him to go to his office near Billingsgate, then for her lover to come to her. Surely others in the street must have known or guessed what was happening? Why hadn't someone told him?

He leaned against a wall and felt the vomit rising in his throat.

So young and beautiful. She had been lying in her lover's arms when he had walked in unsuspectingly from the street. It had been a sunny day, full of promise, just as today had started out.

The screams began again, rising to a piercing screech as the axe had smashed down on their nakedness. Again, again, and again, until the room had been like some of the sights he had seen since he had met with Richard Bolitho.

He did not hear the heavy tramp of feet and the clink of weapons until a voice shouted, “You there! Stand and be examined!”

He could barely stop himself shaking as he turned and saw the press gang poised on the corner he had just come around. Not like the ones you saw in fishing villages or naval seaports. These men were armed to the teeth as they hunted for likely recruits in an area which was crammed with sailors, nearly all of whom would have the right papers, the “Protection” to keep them free of the navy.

A massive gunner's mate, a cudgel hanging from his wrist, a cutlass thrust carelessly through his belt, said, “Wot's this then?” He peered at Ozzard's blue coat with the bright gilt buttons, the buckled shoes beloved by sailors whenever they had funds enough to buy them. “You're no sailor, I'll be damn sure o' that!” He put a hand on Ozzard's shoulder and swung him round to face his grinning party of seamen. “What say you, lads?”

Ozzard said shakily, “I—I
do
serve—”

“Stand aside!” A lieutenant pushed through his men and regarded Ozzard curiously. “Speak up, fellow! The Fleet needs more hands.” He ran his eye over Ozzard's frail person. “What ship, if serve you do?”

“I—I am servant to Sir Richard Bolitho.” He found he was able to look up at the lieutenant without flinching. “Vice-Admiral of the Red. He is presently in London.”

The lieutenant asked, “
Hyperion
—was she your last ship?” All his impatience had gone. As Ozzard nodded he said, “Be off with you, man. This is no place for honest people after dark.”

The gunner's mate glanced at his lieutenant as if for consent, then pressed some coins into Ozzard's fist.

“'Ere, go an' get a good wet. Reckon you've bloody earned it after wot you must 'er seen an' done!”

Ozzard blinked and nearly broke down. A
wet.
What Allday would have said. His whole being wanted to scream at them. Didn't they see the name on the shop front? What would they have said had he told them how he had run most of the way to Tower Hill to seek out a recruiting party? In those days there was always one hanging around near the taverns and the theatre. Ready to ply some drunken fool with rum before they signed him on in a daze of patriotic fervour. How would they have behaved if he'd described what he had left behind in that quiet little house? He made himself look at it. The window was no longer in the sun.