Ramage and the Freebooters (r-3) by Dudley Pope

Author:Dudley Pope [Pope, Dudley]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: adv_history, adv_maritime

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Southwick listened gloomily as Ramage finally told him about the Admiral's orders and then exclaimed indignantly: 'A needle in a haystack sort of job! How does he expect us to do it when a couple of frigates failed?'

Ramage shrugged his shoulders and said without conviction, 'We draw less—we can get into places a frigate can't.'

Southwick shook his head. 'No, sir: I know these islands pretty well and there's deep enough water wherever they'd need to go. Leastways, they can get in close enough to see. No, I reckon I know what's happened.'

Ramage, idly watching Grenada looming up in the distance, said: 'Out with it, then!'

'Well, with all these schooners vanishing, the planters must be screaming over produce rotting on the quayside and freight rates rocketing, and the owners because insurance rates will be astronomical. And you can almost hear the underwriters in London yelping out as they pay for claim after claim. Wouldn't surprise me if they're refusing to write any more policies. Don't blame 'em either. If neither schooner-owners nor planters get insurance ...'

And Southwick was right: the planters had enormous influence in Parliament, and so had the underwriters. Long ago Admiral Robinson would have had peremptory orders from the Admiralty to dispose of the privateers. Now----- 'You know what I think, sir?'

And Ramage was sure he did—that was why he'd kept the orders to himself for two days—but there was no harm in hearing Southwick's conclusions now.

'I reckon it's happened like this, sir. As soon as the Admiralty started chasing the Commander-in-Chief, he sent off a couple of frigates, but in two months they haven't caught a single privateer. Now, the Admiral knows he's going to get a real rubbing down as soon as word goes back to London that three months or more later the situation's as bad as ever, and he wants to protect himself and his two captains...'

Ramage nodded—he'd thought that, realizing the Admiral was not only shrewder than he'd given him credit for but considerably more ruthless.

'... And he knows your stock's pretty high after the Cape St Vincent action, sir. So just as he's wondering how to tell the Admiralty he can't smoke out the privateers but at the same time shield himself and two of his captains, along comes the Triton to join his command.

'So you get the job. If you fail—too bad. If you succeed— well, as far as he's concerned you're welcome to what little credit there is. And it won't be much—why, the Jamaica frigates are doing this sort of thing every day along the coast of Hispaniola.'

Ramage nodded, reflecting how Chubb and Dace must be laughing. Ten minutes' embarrassment while a lieutenant asked them questions was a small price to pay to get rid of any responsibility.

Two hours later the Triton was running fast along the south coast of Grenada, helped by a couple of knots of current streaming into the southern end of the Caribbean from the Atlantic.

The island was a pyramid, the high mountains in

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