'We are here to destroy that tower, and I want it done so effectively that no signals can be passed until the tower is rebuilt - a week or so's work - unless they are taken by horseback from Port Vendres to the next station to the north of here, which has no name, only a number, twenty-seven. That's thirty miles' riding or more over rough and rocky tracks. Horses and horsemen are likely to be rare; donkeys are the usual transport here.

'You might wonder why I want to knock down this one particular tower when there are so many others. Well, it's so flat where number twenty-seven is built that it would be easy to repair it. Number twenty-nine, at Port Vendres, will be too strong for us: the port is well defended, and even if we managed to destroy the tower, the French would build a new one very quickly because there's a shipyard there, which means wood, nails, shipwrights, carpenters and tools.

'But here in Collioure ...' he gestured round him. 'You can see it is a small fishing bay with a small anchorage. I imagine that boat being repaired over there exhausts the port's carpentry resources.'

He paused a moment because Jackson obviously had a question. Ramage raised his eyebrows and waited.

'Excuse me asking, sir, and I don't want you to think we in the Passe Partout aren't enjoying it, but why knock down a tower at this end of the Mediterranean? Foix is much closer to Toulon, where the orders start from.'

'Ah, that's a good question. Anyone know the answer - or wants to have a guess?'

They all shook their heads and Ramage said: 'Jackson was near when he said Toulon is the source of orders. We want to cut the semaphore now to stop signals, or at least slow them down, somewhere between Toulon and the action!'

'What action?' Southwickexclaimed. 'Action seems scarce round here - at least, until we knock down that tower.'

'We're trying to stop the action', Ramage explained. 'Within a day or so, the Spanish naval authorities at somewhere like Cartagena are going to get word from a fishing boat or a coastal vessel that a French convoy of six ships is sailing westward. They'll know that any convoy that far west can only be intended for Cartagena: there'd be no point in sending it to Almeria or Málaga because, militarily Spain stops at Cartagena. Yet the reports will say the convoy is well to the westward of Cartagena and still steering west.

'So obviously the Spanish admiral at Cartagena will makea signal to the French admiral at Toulon, using the semaphore, asking him what it is all about, because almost certainly he would be the person to send off such a convoyand the only one who could explain why it is passing (haspassed, I hope) Cartagena.

'The semaphores rattle and crash, and the admiral in Toulon reads the signal, realizes he has not sent off any convoy to the westward, and sends back a signal to Cartagena ordering the convoy to be intercepted.

'The admiral in Cartagena sends two or three frigates to sea and they chase poor old Aitken and the rest of them, and they end up dead or prisoners.'

'Unless', Southwick said with one of his cheerful sniffs, 'the admiral in Cartagena can neither send nor receive a signal by semaphore for two or three days, by which time Aitken will be rounding Europa Point.'

'Exactly', Ramage said. 'I'm gambling that the Spanish admiral is too lazy or too nervous of the French to send out frigates without orders. He may not have any - that's more than likely - and expects the admiral at Toulon to order ships out from Alicante or Barcelona. It will take time for him to discover that Collioure's tower is out of action. Messengers on horseback will need a day to take a message from Port Vendres to station twenty-seven, and with luck semaphore replies will by then be held up by darkness between here and Toulon. With the French and Spanish benighted, Aitken has an excellent chance.'

'Everyone in that convoy will owe us a lot', the Marine corporal said happily, sucking his teeth at the prospect.

'We'll see about that', Ramage said, 'but in the meantime this is what we do, starting at sunset. First, we need half a dozen pairs of handcuffs ...'

The convoy was making good time and Aitken was pleased that his noon sight put them about twenty miles south of Cabo de Gata while dead reckoning had them forty miles short of it. Here, off the southeastern tip of Spain, Europa Point was a clear run of a little under two hundred miles to the westward. In fact they would have to sail more than that 'through the water' to overcome the eastgoing current constantly flowing into the Mediterranean from the Atlantic, but Aitken knew that it was more important that Cartagena, the last of the big naval ports, was now well behind them.

Almeria, just west of Cabo de Gata, was more of a commercial port, unlikely to hold any ships of war. From there to Europa Point and the safety of Gibraltar was only Málaga, again a commercial and not a naval port.

It was a miracle that the convoy had sailed so far without meeting a French ship of war that, as a matter of routine, would ask why the convoy was without an escort and, because it was so far west, whither it was bound. Until the last few hours, Aitken could always (using Orsini as his 'voice') claim to be bound for Cartagena, and accept the scorn of a French frigate captain at being so bad a navigator to get so far south. Now he was too far into the channel between Spain and the Barbary coast to use that story.

He was well satisfied with the way his ships were being handled. He had divided the six of them into two columns of three and knowing the difficulty of sailing at night in the wake of a ship showing only a dim stern lantern, he led the larboard column with the bosun following him in the Rosette schooner and Rennick bringing up the rear in the Matilda. The starboard column was led by Kenton and the Golondrina, followed by Orsini in the Caroline brig, and then Martin with the Bergère. This left Orsini conveniently placed should his French or Spanish be needed - but also kept him safely between Kenton and Martin in case his station-keeping was erratic.

Aitken was surprised that the Calypso had not joined them. Not that Mr Ramage had said he would, but both he and Southwick would soon get exhausted standing watch and watch about, and they were deprived of most of their good petty officers. It was typical of the captain's fairness that he had made sure the six ships of the convoy were well manned, although if they did not get through or anything happened to the Calypso, Their Lordships would put Mr Ramage on the beach for the rest of his life. Still, there - Aitken's thoughts were interrupted by a hail from the foremast-head.

'Deck there! The Bergère has just hoisted a signal, sir.'

Aitken picked up his glass and took his copy of the French signals from the binnacle box drawer.

Orsini had written a translation beside each of them and Aitken read the two hoists of flags without difficulty. The first said, 'Strange sail in sight' and the second gave the direction, 'In the northeast quadrant'.

'Acknowledge that signal', Aitken told the bosun's mate and shouted to the lookout aloft: 'Keep your eyes open; there'll be more signals soon.'

Aitken's first reaction as a naval officer had been to detach one of his ships to investigate, and when he realized it he grinned to himself. Habits were hard to break. For the last two days he had been the master of a French merchant ship and, as senior of the other French masters, the commodore of the convoy. And an unescorted convoy, unless attacked by a squadron of Algerine pirates - the only danger along this coast - maintained its course, particularly with a good southerly wind and fine weather, minding its own business.