As the seamen sat on forms round the bare, grease-stained table eating a breakfast of hard bread and highly spiced blood sausage, Ramage found himself listening to Stafford's cheerful chattering. A lad trained as a locksmith in Bridewell Lane and by chance swept up by a press gang and sent to sea was now sitting in a Spanish inn, armed with an American Protection, and just as at home as if the inn had been next door to his father's shop. Yet had he signed the indentures or stayed at home the day - night, more likely - that the press gang was out, he might well have died of old age without going farther than Vauxhall Gardens, a mere five miles from his birthplace...

Well, Ramage thought as he bit savagely at the stale bread, at least Admiral Don Josef de Cordoba will have better bread to eat when he arrives, and there'll probably be plenty of bustle near the Castillo de Despenna Perros as the house is being prepared.

Seeing Jackson had finished eating, he decided to take the American with him when he went to inspect Don Josef's house. He asked the men what they had learned about the zebec's rig and, satisfied they had studied it well, told them they could spend the day wandering round the town.

Don Josef's house was an imposing building; one that befitted an admiral commanding such a large fleet. Painted white, with a flat roof, it was entirely surrounded by a covered walk formed of graceful arches, like a cloister, and standing in a couple of acres of gently sloping land, most of which was covered with trees and flowering shrubs. Even the gardener's shed was made of stone, but, Ramage noted thankfully, unlike most large Spanish houses, it was surrounded by a low hedge, not a high wall.

From what he and Jackson could see in an apparently casual stroll past the house, the preparations for Don Josef's arrival had hardly begun. Most of the windows had the green shutters closed, and except for a gardener hoeing round a double row of shrubs lining the road up to the front door, there was no one else in sight.

For four days Ramage and Jackson took a stroll past the house, and apart from the gardener slowly moving from one shrub to another, there was little to indicate that new residents were due. But on the fifth morning, a dull overcast day with a bite in the wind, showing the snow in the high mountains inland wanted to remind them of its presence, Ramage and Jackson found the great iron gates flung back, the wide, double front doors gaping, all the shutters latched back and the windows open, and signs of movement inside the house.

The gardener was still hoeing and had progressed to the shrubs just inside the gate. As the two men passed he looked up and painfully straightened his back. A shrug of his shoulders and a quick glance at the sky indicated his disapproval of whatever was going on, and Ramage called, 'Looks as if you've finished the weeding just in time!'

The old man carefully propped his hoe against the shrub and walked over to them. Ramage guessed he must be nearer eighty than seventy: his eyes were such a light brown it seemed they had faded with the years, and although the face was lined it was contented, as if a lifetime sowing seeds, nurturing them, reaping their harvest of food or beauty and then, their life over, cutting them down and planting them again, had taught him a philosophy rarely understood by other men.

'Yes, both rows finished, and now I have to trim them into shape - the sap has stopped rising now,' he explained. 'You must never trim them when the sap is rising.'

'Is that so?'

'Yes, never when the sap is rising. In the winter they sleep, and when they sleep they do not bleed their sap.'

'Does the owner of the big house like a fine garden?'

'Don Ricardo? Yes, both he and his wife love it, but they rarely come: they spend most of their days in Madrid, or wherever the Court is.'

'But now they pay you a visit?'

'Oh no - Don Ricardo has lent his house to someone: an admiral, they tell me. I don't think an admiral will worry much about a garden - he'll be used to the sea. But perhaps,' he said hopefully, almost wistfully, 'perhaps he'll find the garden a change from always looking at the waves ...'

Ramage only just stopped from commenting that Spanish admirals seemed to spend more time in Madrid than at sea, and said, 'Everyone seems to be bustling at the house: the admiral is due soon?'

'In a few days. Julio - the major-domo - has just heard the admiral is sending down some of his own furniture and silver from Madrid and it has made him angry: he regards it as a criticism of Don Ricardo. But a man likes to have his own things round him - I told Julio that, but he just blasphemes.'

'It seems a lot of trouble, sending furniture from Madrid at this time of the year. After all, there's rain and snow in the mountains and it could get spoiled.'

'Yes, that's what Julio said. Anyway, the carts are at Murcia already, so they'll arrive tomorrow and we shall see. Well, now I must start over there - I don't know where all the weeds come from.'

Ramage bid him good-bye and as they walked on past the house explained to Jackson, who commented, 'Must be fine to be rich. I wonder what he's sending down - more than his favourite armchair sir, that's for certain.'

Yes... sending down his own silver Ramage could understand, but furniture! Suddenly he had a picture of an admiral sitting at his desk, reading official - and secret - letters and writing them. He'd spend much of the day at a desk with a secretary, and clerks would be there to make dozens of copies of every order to the captains of all his ships. And Don Josef de Cordoba would assume, probably quite correctly, that his friend Don Ricardo would be unlikely to have a sufficiently large desk; a desk with drawers which could be locked...

The two great carts with wide wheels which were carrying Don Josef's furniture rumbled and squeaked their way along the last couple of miles of rutted and dusty road into Cartagena with Ramage and Stafford sitting with the driver of the first one and Jackson on the second. Without any prompting from Ramage, Stafford picked up the tin mug, half filled it yet again with brandy, and handed it to the Spanish driver with a knowing wink.

The Spaniard was already sufficiently drunk to pause for a moment before taking it; then Ramage realized the poor fellow was hard put to distinguish which of the three or four he saw was the actual mug. Finally, with a desperate lunge, he grasped it and with an appreciative grunt bent his head back and poured it down his throat. His head continued going backwards until it was hard up against the side of the cart; then, with a contented belch he fell asleep still grasping the mug.

'Wish we could pump out bilges as easily as that,' Stafford said, awed by the man's capacity.

Ramage glanced back at the second cart and Jackson saluted twice - the signal that his driver was also too drunk to know which tack he was on. Ramage nudged the Cockney.

'Carry on, Stafford. Take your time, but don't forget if I slap the canvas, stay inside until I call.'

'Aye aye, sir.'

With that Stafford quietly jumped off the cart, waited until the tail end drew level, and scrambled on board again, climbing under the canvas canopy. Ramage kept a good lookout ahead and behind, but the road was empty. In two or three minutes Stafford was out again, walking beside the cart. 'Not in this one, sir. I'll try Jacko's.'

Ramage nodded. So far it had been all too easy: a dawn start from the inn and after only five miles they had met the two carts coming towards them from Murcia. The drivers were only too glad to give them a lift; only too glad to accept a mug of brandy and soon unable to refuse more. Now Stafford, with several pieces of soap in his pocket, was searching for the desk and, Ramage prayed, would find the keys in the drawers. The only thing that could possibly go wrong was that the admiral had decided to make do with one of Don Ricardo's tables...