Ramage was brought back to the present with a jerk as both Yorke and Southwick shouted at him, pointing down at the afterdeck, where he saw Stevens standing with a hand cupped behind his ear as if to hear the answer to a question.

"He just asked what you make of her," Yorke said sarcastically. "Apparently thinks it might be Westminster Abbey on the horizon."

Ramage handed the telescope to Southwick and cupped his hands.

"Carries no more than a dozen guns. About six miles away."

"What nationality?"

Ramage turned to Yorke in startled disbelief. "Is he joking?" When Yorke shook his head Ramage shouted: "She's a French privateer schooner on an intercepting course: you'd better turn northward a bit sharpish, Mr Stevens, or she'll be on you within the hour!"

"Are you sure, Mr Ramage?"

Was Stevens a fool or a knave? The most stupid seaman in the Post Office Packet Service - indeed, the youngest cabin boy - knew that such a schooner hard on the wind steering an intercepting course in this part of the Atlantic could only be an enemy privateer.

"I am absolutely certain, and so are Mr Yorke and Mr Southwick. It's time you bore up, Mr Stevens; you've lost a mile to leeward already!"

"Can't act hastily," Stevens called back fretfully. "We'd soon be at the North Pole if I bore up every time we sighted a strange sail."

Southwick nudged Ramage and growled: "First sail we've seen for weeks! You give the order, sir: the Tritons will make sure it's carried out."

Ramage took the telescope again without answering. The privateer was hull-up over the horizon now - an indication of how fast the two ships were converging. She was long, low, black with white masts, and sailing fast; well-heeled to the west wind but pointing high. Almost continuous sheets of spray were flying up from her stem and sweeping aft over the fore-deck. She looked sleek and graceful, her sails well cut and well trimmed. Her captain was obviously expecting the packet to turn north and was making sure his helmsmen did not lose an inch to leeward.

As he returned the telescope to Southwick, Ramage remembered Stevens' unhurried, unsurprised behaviour when the lookout hailed. Was he a completely unimaginative man who naturally acted slowly in an emergency? Was that why privateers had twice before captured his ship? Surely not - even the slowest-witted of men must have learned a lesson by now.

Ramage was puzzled, and because he was puzzled he was uncertain what to do. That black-hulled privateer and its crew of a hundred French cut-throats could represent certain capture for everyone in the Arabella and possibly death for some. The Arabella's choice of escape or capture depended on Stevens' whim, not on the orders given by the captain of the French privateer: it depended on how soon the packet bore up and escaped to the north.

Yet the capture of the Arabella might somehow reveal why many (if not all) of the previous packets had been captured. That was the only reason why the Arabella was graced with the presence of Lieutenant Ramage. The devil take it, he told himself angrily, I've talked over the possibility enough times with Yorke and Southwick in the past few weeks. Talked, yes, and there's the rub: it's the old story of looking in the cold light of dawn at an idea born in the warm and mellow glow of a late evening's conversation.

Very well, the Arabella might be captured. The privateer might be able to get up to her before night came down. Even if she did not, she might outguess the Arabella and find her in the darkness. "Might" should have been the key word, but the way Stevens was behaving it could be a certainty.

Ramage glanced down at Stevens, trying to guess what was passing through the man's mind, and saw he was talking to the Mate. Suddenly Much waved towards the privateer and made an angry gesture at the starboard side 4-pounders, his head jerking like a pigeon's from the violence of his words. Even from a distance it was clear to Ramage that Stevens' features were strained and his whole body tense, as though gripped by pain.

Then he saw the Surgeon walking aft towards the two men. A mediator - or an ally for one of them? Much saw him coming and repeated the gestures, only this time talking to Farrell, who stopped a couple of paces away as though the Mate was threatening him. For a few moments the men seemed silenced by the violence of Much's words; then all three began talking at once, their hands waving wildly. Although the wind carried away their words, their quarrel was obviously a bitter one.

"Like hucksters haggling in the market," Yorke commented.

"What's the Surgeon doing there?" Ramage murmured, thinking aloud.

"It's like watching a play without hearing the actors. My guess is that Mr Much wants to bear up, but fight if it becomes necessary; the gallant Captain can't make up his mind; and the noble sawbones wants to surrender without ceremony."

"Aye," Southwick growled, "that's my reading of it."

"It's about what one would expect," Ramage commented. "I wonder who ... Come on, it's time we joined the party: we're losing a quarter of a mile to leeward every couple of minutes ..."

With that he climbed down the ratlines and, walking towards Stevens, reminded himself that the packet captain knew nothing of the real reason why he was on board. Stevens had no inkling that the chance that brought the privateer in sight had made Ramage the key figure in a secret investigation ordered by the Cabinet. As far as Stevens and his officers were concerned, Ramage was just another anxious passenger, and for the moment he must remember to play that role.

All three men stopped talking as they saw Ramage approaching.

"Ah," Stevens said, a reassuring smile trying to struggle across his face but getting lost round his mouth. "Well, Mr Ramage, a pity one of your frigates isn't up to windward, eh?"

"The laurels are all for you to win," Ramage said cheerfully. "I'm sure you'd begrudge having to share them!"

The smile vanished completely. "Well, Lieutenant, she's a big ship..."

"Yes, but smaller than the Arabella, I fancy."

"Oh no! Why, she's pierced for eighteen guns!"

"Rubbish!" Much snapped. "Might be pierced for ten and carrying eight."

Stevens swung round angrily to face the Mate. "I'll thank you to hold your tongue, Mr Much. Just remember I'm the owner of this ship as well as the commander."

"Aye, I'm aware of that," Much said bitterly, "and I rue the day I ever signed on with you again."

The Surgeon took a step nearer. "Steady, Much, steady; I've warned you of the risk of getting too excited; overheating the blood can be fatal." He turned to Ramage. "You mustn't take too much notice of him, Mr Ramage: he's overwrought. He refuses my offers of medication."

"You hold your tongue," Much said with a quietness belying his tone. "It's caused too much trouble already."

Ramage waited, trying to discern in the bickering phrases the original causes of what were obviously long-standing and bitter differences which had come to a sudden climax when the privateer hove in sight. Was Much in fact overwrought, and Farrell and Stevens trying to calm him down? Was it some mania that had set Much apart from the rest of the Arabella's officers and crew? Although Farrell was a poor specimen when seated at a chessboard, he might well be a good doctor. Ramage was angry with himself for having been on board so long without knowing the answers. He felt a gentle pressure from Yorke's elbow.

"Well, Captain, can we offer ourselves as a gun's crew?" Yorke asked with polite enthusiasm. "Or would you prefer us to have musketoons? You'll outsail that fellow, of course, once you bear up to the north" - he waved airily towards the privateer - "but we might as well be prepared."