The lad rubbed his nose with a grubby fist and gazed at the captain with something like wonder.

Bolitho added, “You’ll see England again. Never you fear!” He turned away quickly lest the boy should see the uncertainty in his eye.

By the wheel old Proby intoned, “South-west by south. Full and by, quartermaster.”

Then, as if to cut short the agony of sailing, he walked to the lee rail and spat into the sea.

3

BEEF FOR THE PURSER

TWENTY days after weighing anchor the frigate Phalarope crossed the thirtieth parallel and heeled sickeningly to a blustering northwest gale. Falmouth lay three thousand miles astern, but the wind with all its tricks and cunning cruelties stayed resolutely with the ship.

As one bell struck briefly from the forecastle and the dull copper sun moved towards the horizon the frigate ploughed across each successive bank of white-crested rollers with neither care nor concern for the men who served her day by day, hour by hour. No sooner was one watch dismissed below than the boatswain’s mates would run from hatch to hatch, their calls twittering, their voices hoarse in the thunder of canvas and the never ending hiss of spray.

“All hands! All hands! Shorten sail!”

Later, stiff and dazed from their dizzy climb aloft, the seamen would creep below, their bodies aching, their fingers stiff and bleeding from their fight with the rebellious canvas.

Now, the men off watch crouched in the semi-darkness of the berth deck groping for handholds and listening to the crash of water against the hull even as they tried to finish their evening meal. From the deck beams the swinging lanterns threw strange shadows across their bowed heads, picking out individual faces and actions like scenes from a partially cleaned oil painting.

Below the sealed hatches the air was thick with smells. That of bilge water mixing with sweat and the sour odour of seasickness, and the whole area was filled with sound as the ship fought her own battle with the Atlantic. The steady crash of waves followed by the jubilant surge of water along the deck above, the continuous groaning of timbers and the humming of taut stays, all defied the men to sleep and relax even for a moment.

John Allday sat astride one of the long, scrubbed benches and gnawed carefully at a tough piece of salt beef. Between his strong teeth it felt like leather, but he made himself eat it, and closed his mind to the rancid cask from which it had come. The deep cut on his cheek where Brock’s cane had found its mark had healed in an ugly scar, and as his jaws moved steadily on the meat he could feel the skin tightening painfully where blown salt and cold winds had drawn the edges together like crude stitching.

Across the table, and watching him with an unwinking stare, sat Pochin, a giant seaman with shoulders like a cliff. He said at last, “You’ve settled in right enough, mate.” He smiled bleakly. “All that squit when you was pressed came to nothin’!”