The Victory (43 page)

Lucy put down her knife and watched in silence as Weston
broke the seal and unfolded the stiff paper. He read, his face
expressionless, and then put the paper aside and took a sip of
coffee to moisten his mouth before looking at Lucy.'

‘
I am to sail at once,' he said, and saw the breath leave her
in a rush. 'I have to take the despatch bag to the Brest
squadron, and then rejoin the fleet off Cadiz under Nelson's
orders.’

Lucy took a piece of toast and buttered it carefully. 'When
will you leave?’

He got up and went to the window, flung it up to lean out
and test the air. It was raining steadily, but the sky was
ragged, and there was a fair amount of wind. Still studying
her toast, Lucy heard the sharp clatter of the rain as the gusts
blew it sideways to glance off the window pane, and smelled the damp coolness of the air he had let in. There was a rattle
and thump as the window was closed again, and Weston came
back to sit down opposite her and drain his coffee cup.

‘
I must leave at once,' he said. ‘I shall have to go to the ship
and make the final preparations, and we'll sail with the tide.
It turns about one o'clock today.’

She nodded, calmly eating toast, her eyes on her plate,
making no demands on him, knowing she must not get in his
way. He looked at her with enormous love. 'You're the perfect
naval wife,' he said. He got up. ‘I'd better go and gather my
belongings. Don't disturb yourself. Finish your breakfast.'

‘
I'll drive with you to the dockyard,' she said, and stood up
too, and reached for the bell-pull by the chimney, and he
caught her halfway and kissed her thoroughly, before hasten
ing into the bedchamber.

The rain was not heavy, but persistent, and they drove to
the dockyard in a closed carriage. Everything was glistening
and wet, cobbles and slate roofs shining blue with it, trees
dripping, gutters gurgling, the horses' ears and loins darken
ing slowly from gold to auburn as their coats soaked through.

‘
Don't get out,' Weston said when they pulled up. 'We'll
say goodbye in here.’

She lifted warm lips, her hands cupping his face briefly. ‘Goodbye, Weston,' she said evenly.

‘Goodbye, my darling. Only a few more months.' A swift
hug, and then he jumped out, clapping on his hat and tugging
his cloak round him against the rain. Bates followed him with
the luggage and Jeffrey's basket, and still Lucy's calm held.
Then as they turned to walk away, she was suddenly out of
the carriage and calling him in a panic.

‘Weston!’

He turned back in time to receive her full against his chest,
and her face, turned up into the rain, flinching as the cold
drops touched her eyes, was pale with urgency.

‘Darling!' he said, half enquiry, half protest.

Her lips worked as she fought with the unfamiliar words. 'I
love you,' she whispered.

He grinned triumphantly. She had said it at last, the one
thing she had never been able to say — such a small,
enormous, important thing. But there was no time for discus
sion. He kissed her once, hard, on the lips, and then pushed
her determinedly back into the coach, and walked away,
turning at the gate to wave a hand before they disappeared.

Lucy stayed there long after they had gone, staring at the empty gateway, her mouth still tingling with
_.
the imprint of
his lips. The front curls of her hair dripped water, soaked
even in that brief exposure. It had suddenly seemed vitally
important that he should not go away without her telling him;
and now that she had told him, everything would be all right.
The familiar spreading feeling of emptiness, of not knowing
what to do to fill the day, seeped into her; but beneath it, like
solid ground under mist, was the knowledge that this would be their last parting, and that when he came back next time,
it would be for good.

*

On the calm, sunny afternoon of 28 September, Nelson's
small squadron joined the Cadiz fleet.
Nemesis
was with him, having caught him up just off Lisbon, and Weston was able to
witness at first hand how the ordinary sailors loved and
believed in the one-armed admiral, for every ship they passed
was lined with cheering, waving jacks, who were certain that
they could now expect an end to their long vigil on the seas.

There was much to-ing and fro-ing amongst the fleet over
the next few days. Collingwood, tired out, and weighted with
responsibility, had not encouraged visiting between ships, but
Nelson, rested after his shore leave and cheered by the faith
the First Lord had shewn in him, was eager to meet and dine
with all his officers, to get to know those who had not served
with him before, and to discuss tactics. Signals officers were
busy all day long, and boats bobbed across the sparkling
water between the ships, carrying messages, gossip, gifts, and
officers bent on social intercourse.

Going up the side of some of the ships was a hazardous business, for they were hung with cradles and sticky with paint, as eager hands redecorated the hulls to match those which had been serving with Nelson in the Mediterranean
fleet: black, with broad yellow bands along the sides at the
level of the gunports, but with the port-covers themselves
black, so that when they were closed, the ships had a chequer-
board appearance. If there were to be a battle, it would be
easier in the thick of it to pick out friend from foe if they were
all painted alike.

Not all the business of those early days was so genial, for
part of Nelson's orders from Barham had been to require
Admiral Calder to return to England to face a court-martial
for his failure to defeat the combined fleet off Cape Finisterre
in July. Haworth and Weston discussed it when they met
about the
Victory,
where both had been bidden to dine, while
they waited for the arrival of the more senior captains.

‘
Nelson didn't like above half having to tell Calder,'
Weston said. 'He maintains the criticism is all a lot of
nonsense.'

‘
Well, so it is,' Haworth replied, leaning on the taffrail on
the weather side of the quarterdeck and watching the
approach of another captain's barge. 'How can the laymen of the newspapers know whether he did everything he could or
not?'

‘Harvey of the
Agamemnon
and Durham of the
Defiance
evidently think he didn't,' Weston observed. 'They've refused
to go back to England with him to give evidence.'

‘
Yes, but Durham's got a grudge against Calder, for not
giving him the credit in his report for being the first to spot the Combined. I can't believe it will come to anything.’

Weston shook his head. 'Guilty or innocent, I don't
suppose Calder's career will ever recover. But Nelson's done
his best for him, at any rate. The Admiralty ordered him to
send Calder home in
Dreadnought,
so that she could be
docked. You know she's badly overdue. But Blackwood told
me this morning that Nelson said it would look like a condem
nation to part Calder from his own ship, so he's sending him
home in the
Prince of Wales
after all.'

‘And Collingwood keeps poor old
Dreadnought?’

Weston grinned. 'I've heard Nelson's going to ask Collingw
ood to transfer his flag to the
Royal Sovereign.
I wish him joy of it! Coll won't want to give up his crew, after he's spent
years training 'em to the peak of perfection, even for the
fastest of the three-deckers.'

‘
The joys of command, eh, Weston?' Haworth laughed.
‘Who'd be an admiral?'

‘
Not me, at all events. Oh, look, you see who's over there?
It's Digby of the
Africa!
You'll be able to ask him how she
sails, now she's been rebuilt. Aren't you green with jealousy,
Haworth, seeing the man who's run off with your girl?'

‘
Digby's a very good sort of fellow,' Haworth said serenely.
'I'm sure she couldn't be in better hands. And how could I be
jealous, since I've got the best seventy-four in the service?'

‘
Fighting talk from a fighting captain,' Weston remarked.
‘Ah, here's Scott with that whipper-in look in his eye. I think
we're being summoned. Nelson gives famous dinners, I'm
told.'

‘
He does, and it isn't only the excellence of his cook, either.
You wait and see.’

*

’Gentlemen,' said Nelson, and waited for the talk to die down.
The candlelight glowed on the snowy linen, the shining silver
and sparkling crystal, the tawny-gold and blood-red of port
and brandy, the brown faces and bleached hair of the officers
around the long table. Glasses were set down, hands came to
rest, and all eyes turned attentively to the small, shock
headed, green-patch-eyed admiral at the head of the table.

‘
Gentlemen, the enemy are still in port. I had hoped that
famine or plague or even courage might make them come
forth, but there they sit, forty sail of them, and we can't get at them.' A growl went round the table in response to the words.
‘Something must be done immediately to provoke or lure
them into a battle, before the winter gales set in. Once they
are out, gentlemen, I think we all know what we have to do.’

He looked around the table, gathering the nods from these
firm-faced, responsible men. Here was the difference,
Haworth thought, between the English fleet and the French:
every captain here could be, and was, trusted to act on his
own initiative. But the Corsican general expected his orders,
impossible or not, to be obeyed to the letter, and woe betide
even the admiral who adapted them to circumstance.

‘
It is not merely a splendid victory our country wants —
honourable to the parties concerned but otherwise useless,'
Nelson went on. 'It is the complete annihilation of the enemy
fleet, so that Bonaparte can never again threaten our shores.’

A murmur of agreement and some tapping of knives
against glasses.

‘
I am able to tell you all that intelligence has reached me,
from our informants in Paris, that Boney has sent new orders
to our friend Villeneuve. Since the invasion of England has
had to be cancelled for the moment' — laughter rippled
round the table — 'it seems he has ordered the combined fleet
to sail for the Mediterranean and land reinforcements at
Naples. I propose therefore to withdraw the fleet to a distance
of fifty miles to the west from Cadiz, out of sight of the
enemy, leaving only the frigates inshore to report on the
enemy's movements.’