'Right, Mr Southwick, we get under way two hours be­fore dawn.'

 With the ship under-officered - he was short of a lieutenant and a second master - all the work would fall on Southwick, the young Master's Mate, Appleby, and himself.

'You'd better get some sleep,' he told Southwick.

 For the next ten minutes Ramage studied the chart, converting it into a mental picture of the contours of the coast and the sea bed. He was cursing the sparseness of the soundings when he heard someone coming down the companionway and a moment later, after knocking on the door, Jackson came in carrying a letter and two parcels.

'Boat’s just come out with these, sir, addressed to you. A shore boat, sir.'

‘Very well, put them on the bunk.'

 As soon as Jackson left, Ramage picked up the longer parcel, guessing its contents from the shape. He tore off the wrappings and indeed it was a sword. He unsheathed it and the blade was blue in the lantern light, except for its cutting edge, which glinted cold to the eye, the steel sharpened and then polished. The blade itself was extravagantly engraved - but solid and well balanced; the basket handle was finely carved, but strong. It was a magnificent fighting sword; not an expensive, lightweight piece of elegance for ceremonial use.

 In the other parcel he was surprised to find a brass-bound mahogany case of pistols. As soon as he opened it he recognized a pair of duelling pistols which he had last seen only that afternoon, on a rack in Sir Gilbert's study: they had  looked such a fine pair that he had commented on them. They were deadly accurate, although the hair-trigger meant they were not ideally suited to the rough-and-tumble of board­ing an enemy ship; but they were as perfect an example of the gunmaker's art as anyone could wish for. The case was com­plete with a powder horn, extra flints, mould for casting shot, and cleaning brushes.

 Ramage then opened the letter. It said simply: 'Please accept these three stalwarts who will, I hope, prove as reliable to you in an emergency as you have to - yours truly, Gilbert Elliot.'

He called to the sentry, 'Pass the word for my cox'n.'

When Jackson came down, Ramage gave him the case.

 'Check these over, please: fine powder, good flints, and ready for me in the morning, loaded.'

'Phew!' Jackson exclaimed. 'They're a rare pair of barkers!'

 Ramage thought that now was as good a time as any to talk with the American.

 'Jackson - thank you for what you did over the trial: you took a tremendous risk.'

The American looked embarrassed and said nothing.

'But tell me, what evidence did you think you had that wouldn't be given by the Bosun and Carpenter's Mate?'

'Only the part while we were in the boat, sir.'

'But that was all spoken in Italian.'

Jackson looked puzzled.

 'Well, sir, about going to the peasant's hut, and the Tower business, and how you carried the Marchesa, and how the other chap came to be killed - that sort of thing.'

Ramage glanced up quickly.

'How the other chap came to be killed?'

"Why yes, sir: you know, Count Pretty.'

'Pitti.'

'Count Pitti, then.'

'What do you know about that?'

'Only that he was shot in the head.'

"How do you know he was shot in the head?'

Jackson flushed, as if angry because he thought his word  was being doubted, but for the moment Ramage was too eager for the man's reply to explain the question.

 'Well, sir - you know when you carried the Marchesa and frightened the horsemen?'

'Yes.'

'Then a few minutes later you called me to come back to the boat?'

'Yes, yes - go on, man!'

'Well, as I ran along the top of the dunes, I dodged in and out of the bushes: there were still some Frenchmen dashing around, and I didn't want to bump into them.

 'I just came to an open patch between the two lots of bushes when I saw a man lying on the sand, face downwards. I turned him over and saw his face was blown off. I guessed it must have been Count Pretty.'

'Oh Christ,' Ramage groaned.

'Why, sir, have I said the wrong thing?'

 'No - no, on the contrary. It's just a pity Commodore Nelson didn't arrive a few minutes later - after you'd told that to the court.'

 'But what difference would it have made?' Jackson was completely puzzled.

'I mentioned I was being accused of cowardice, didn't I..’

'Yes, sir.'

 Well, the accusation was that I pushed off in the boat and deliberately left Count Pitti behind wounded. It was even said that as we rowed away someone heard him calling for help.'

'But didn't you come up and find him after putting the Marchesa in the boat, sir? I saw footprints in the sand from the boat to the body and back: I thought they were yours.'

 'They were, but no one saw me go back. Nor was there any­one - as far as I knew - who could corroborate that I found him with his face blown off.'

'Except me, sir.'

 ‘Yes, except you. But I didn't know you knew - and,' Ram­age gave a bitter laugh, 'you didn't know I didn't know you knew!'

 'Trouble was, sir, you were all talking in Italian. I knew you were having a row with that other chap, but none of us knew what it was about... Still, I can square that when the court sits again.'

 'Maybe - but I'm afraid the court might not believe you now: they might think we made the story up.'

They could, sir; but they've only got to ask the rest of the lads in the gig. They can vouch that I told them what I'd seen soon after I got in the boat: before the lady collapsed.'

 'Well, we'll have to see. You'd better take the pistols and check them. And tell the steward to get me some supper.'

 'Man the - er, windlass,' Ramage told the Bosun's Mate, and at once the shrill, warbling note of his call pierced the ship, sounding eerie in the darkness.

 Ramage was tired; his eyelids felt gummed up, and he cursed himself for not making an inspection of the ship the previous evening: handling a small fore-and-aft-rigged cutter was a vastly different proposition from a square-rigged frigate: apart from the sails, the little Kathleen had a tiller instead of a wheel and a windlass instead of a capstan: he'd nearly made a fool of himself with almost his first order, just managing to change 'capstan' to 'windlass' in time.

 The foc's'lemen and the ship's half dozen Marines ran to the foredeck and a couple of them disappeared below: they would stow the cable as it went down into the cable tier.

 There was plenty of wind; too much but for the fact that the sea would be calm close in, where the mountainous coast formed a lee. He'd have to watch out for the tremendous gusts funnelling along the occasional valleys which ran down at right-angles to the sea: that was how many a ship lost her topmasts....

Despite her ripe sails, he saw the Kathleen had a solid enough mast, thicker than a man's waist and made of selected Baltic spruce - well, no doubt the Admiralty contractors swore it was selected. The long boom, just above him as he stood on the quarter-deck, projected several feet beyond the taffrail, like a gundog's tail. The heavy mainsail was neatly furled along its full length, secured by gaskets, and the gaff lashed down on top.

 Jib and foresail were in tidy bundles at the foot of their respective stays: the big jib on the end of the bowsprit - which stuck out horizontally beyond the bow for forty feet, like a giant fishing rod - and the foresail at the stemhead itself.

 'At short stay, sir,' Southwick shouted from the fo'c'sle. The anchor cable was now stretching down to the sea bed at the same angle as the f orestay.

'Right - keep heaving.'

 Now to hoist the mainsail. Jackson passed the speaking trumpet, and Ramage bellowed, 'Afterguard and idlers lay aft!'

A group of seamen ran towards him.