When Buckingham rolled off him and lay still, John did not move, transfixed by a profound pleasure that felt almost holy. He felt that he had drawn near to something very like the love of God, which can shake a man to his very core, which comes like a flame in the night and burns a man into something new so that the world is never the same for him again.

Buckingham slept but John lay awake, holding his joy.

In the morning they were easy with each other, as old friends, as brothers-in-arms, as companions. Buckingham had thrown off some of his melancholy, he went to visit his injured officers and checked the stores with the ship’s purveyor, he said his prayers with the priest. In the companionway a weary-looking man asked to speak with him and Buckingham gave him his charming smile.

‘My captain was killed before me, drowned off the causeway in the retreat,’ the man said.

‘I am sorry for it,’ Buckingham replied. ‘We have all lost friends.’

‘I am a lieutenant, I was due for promotion. Am I captain now?’

Buckingham’s face lost its colour and its smile. He turned away in disgust. ‘Dead men’s shoes.’

‘But am I? I have a wife and a child, and I need the wages and the pension if I fall …’

‘Don’t trouble me with this,’ Buckingham said with sudden anger. ‘What am I? Some beggar to be hounded about?’

‘You’re the Lord High Admiral,’ the man said reasonably. ‘And I am seeking you to confirm my promotion.’

‘Damn you to hell!’ Buckingham shouted. ‘There are four thousand good men dead. Shall you have all their pay too?’ He flung himself away.

‘That’s not just,’ the man persisted doggedly.

John looked at him more carefully. ‘You are the man who held me on the causeway!’ he exclaimed.

‘Lieutenant Felton. Should be captain. You pulled me out of the sea. Thank you.’

‘I’m John Tradescant’

The man looked at him more closely. ‘The duke’s man?’

John felt a swift pulse of pride that he was the duke’s man in every sense. The duke’s man to his very core.

‘Tell him I should be a captain. He owes it to me.’

‘He’s much troubled now,’ John said. ‘I will tell him later.’

‘I have served him faithfully, I have faced shot and illness in his service. Am I not to be rewarded?’

‘I’ll put it to him later,’ John said. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Lieutenant Felton,’ the man repeated. ‘I am not a greedy man. I just want justice for myself and for us all.’

‘I’ll ask him when he’s calm again,’ John said.

‘I wish that I could refuse to do my duty when my temper is against it,’ Felton said, looking after the admiral.