Bolitho 12 - Signal Close Action by Alexander Kent

Author:Alexander Kent
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2010-04-19T04:00:00+00:00

11 The Letter

'WILL that be all for now, sir?' Moffitt, the clerk, regarded Bolitho gloomily, his weedy frame angled to the deck.

'Yes. Thank you.' Bolitho leaned back in his chair and loosened his neckcloth. 'Tell Ozzard to light some lanterns.' He looked astern through the great windows at the fiery orange sunset.

One more dragging day. It was two weeks since he had committed his ships to the passage south, and to all intents they had the sea to themselves. Day after day, using the light winds to steer south-east along the Italian coastline, and then tacking around to the westward to follow the hazy shores of Sicily lying about thirty miles off the larboard bow. And apart from a few Arab craft with their strange lateen rig, they had been unable to make contact with another living soul. They had sighted some isolated sails, but they had made off before the slow-moving seventy-fours could draw near enough to examine them.

Bolitho stared at the empty desk, wondering why he bothered to dictate another empty day's report for Moffitt's benefit. It was unlikely to carry much weight, unless as additional evidence at his own court martial.

He wondered what the Buzzard was doing, and if she had had any luck in finding information about the vanished Frenchmen. Or if, once free of his commodore's eye, and his needs blurred by distance, Javal had gone off to seek gains of his own, He knew he was being unfair to Javal, just as he understood that it was his own desperation which was causing 1t.

He stood up and strode to the door. It had been his custom for as long as he could remember to find peace, if not answers to his doubts, while watching sunsets. He ran quickly up the ladder and on to the poop deck, allowing the north-westerly to play through his shirt, to ease away the heat and staleness of the day. He walked to the weather side and gripped the nettings, watching the vast spread Of. copper and gold strengthening as It hardened along the horizon. It was very beautiful, even awesome, and he was not surprised to find he was still moved by it. He had watched the sun's parting display from every sort of deck, from the chill wastes of the Atlantic to the scorching magnificence of the GreatSouthSea.

Bolitho saw Nicatot's fore topsail flapping and then refilling as she changed course slightly astern of Osiris. How untroubled the three ships must appear. If there had been anyone to .see them pass. Nothing to reveal the teeming life within their rounded hulls, or the work of repairing storm damage which even now was still going on. Changing watches, sail and gun drill, eating and sleeping. It was their world. His world. And yet, even after a full day of it, probably a twin of the one before, and the next beyond it, these men could still find time to escape from each other in their own way. Bone carving,

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