Kydd nodded, stepped up to the wheel and firmly grasped the spokes.

“Like this, mate,” Doud said.

Kydd saw that the hand on Doud’s inboard side was on an upper spoke while the outer hand was down on a lower spoke. He shifted his position and watched carefully. To his surprise the wheel felt alive – the little vibrations and jerks transmitted to him were a direct communication from the ship herself. He clasped the spokes tighter, watching Doud for his cues. He noticed that Doud’s chief interest seemed to be not the compass, but somewhere up aloft.

“That’s ’cos I’m watching the weather leech o’ the main course – it’ll start to shake if I goes too high into the wind. You gets a much quicker notice from the sails if you’re off course, much better’n the compass.”

It was very much a skilled job, much more so than Kydd had realized. It appeared that orders to the helm could take a bewildering number of forms – just to alter course away might be “hard a-starboard,” “bear up,” “helm a-weather” or “up helm,” each with its shades of meaning. But what Kydd found hardest was the simple sea convention that to starboard the helm would make the ship turn to port. It wasn’t until Doud mentioned that all helm orders had come unchanged down the years from the time when tillers were used to steer ships that he was able to make the mental adjustment.

“Right, mate, about time you took the barky yourself.”

Nervous, but thrilled, Kydd took over, Doud right behind him.

“Steady, mate! She’s carrying two spokes of weather helm – that means from the midships spoke, the one with the brass tip, you need two o’ the spokes a-weather.”

The wheel, as high as himself, felt huge at first, but to his great relief there was no sudden swing of the ship. The feel of the helm was a firm pressure to one direction, which he held steadily against, sensing the rush and vibration of the ship through the water coming straight to him. His confidence increased.

He peered down at the compass in the binnacle in front. The card hung lazily, the lubber’s line at south-sou’-west by a point west – he had spent a whole dog-watch boxing the compass to prepare for this moment. Then he squinted up at the main course, uncertain what the quartermaster meant when he growled, “Keep your luff!”

Doud helped from behind, with an “Up helm a spoke!” or “Ease her!”

Kydd looked forward, at the sweet curve of the deck under the sails going right forward to where the bows came together at the distant bowsprit, the whole dipping and rising majestically as it obediently followed his course ahead. Under his hands was a living thing, responding to his touch, his coaxing. He sensed that the slight quartering swell needed meeting with the helm as approaching waves varied their pressure on the rudder. Odd flaws and inconsistencies in the wind, which he hadn’t noticed before, now needed careful handling. A tiny flutter on the edge of the sail – up with the helm a couple of spokes and the flutter eased and disappeared. A lurch to leeward and over with the helm a-lee and back again – too much, the leech of the course started its restless flutter again; Kydd spun the wheel back – a bigger lurch, and bigger correction.

“Doud!” snapped the quartermaster.

Half gratefully, half reluctantly,Kydd surrendered the wheel to Doud, who killed the oscillation. “Nip over to the lee side, mate,” Doud invited, and Kydd spent the remainder of the trick as lee helmsman, absorbing the art and reflecting on the wonder of it all.

CHAPTER 10

The early morning sun was warming to the skin, and dappled the fo’c’sle with the bright crisscross shadows of the rigging. The bow crunched into the Atlantic rollers, sending spray outward in a rainbow, the long swell lazy and serene.

Kydd bent to his task: cross-legged he plied his needle skillfully, adding a fancy white edging to a seaman’s short blue jacket. He was good at his stitching, and sailors brought him work, which he would perform for favors. It was a Thursday make-and-mend afternoon and many were taking the opportunity to relax in the sun. Etiquette was scrupulously observed. In such restricted quarters each had his personal space as he sat on deck, and unless he wanted otherwise he was treated as though he was invisible.

A shadow fell across Kydd and he looked up. “Nicholas! What cheer, mate?” he said, in surprise. It was not Renzi’s way to seek out company, for he preferred a quiet conversation with Kydd alone.

Renzi smiled and struck a pose.

Is she not beautiful! her graceful bow

Triumphant rising o’er enamored tides,

That, glittering in the noonday sun, now

Just leap and die along her polished sides!

“Just so, shipmate!” Kydd replied happily. He was envious of Renzi’s easy familiarity with words but enjoyed their display.

“Do you take a tuck in my waistcoat, I would be infinitely obliged,” Renzi said, and squatted next to Kydd. He was struck by how much his friend had changed in just a few brief months. There was development and definition in his chest and arms, which sat well with his increasingly sea-darkened complexion, and his shining black hair was held back in a small queue. His experiences had toughened and shaped him, and his brown eyes now looked out with humor and self-assurance.

“Give you joy of your rating, sir,” Renzi said formally.

“Why, it’s to Ordinary Seaman, is all,” Kydd said.

Renzi perceived the evident pleasure. “In Guildford they would not recognize you, Tom,” he said, “what with the cut o’ the jib of a seaman.”

“Not that I’ve ever a chance of gettin’ to the old town,” Kydd replied, finishing the seam with a flourish of his capable brown fingers and biting off the thread.

Renzi hesitated, then pulled something from his pocket. Looking around, he pressed it on Kydd. “It’s only a book, my friend, but in my time I’ve taken great comfort from its pages.”

Kydd accepted it, flattered that Renzi thought he was a reading man. It was a slim volume printed with a tiny typeface – poetry by someone called Wordsworth.

“The man is a revolutionary – in the literary way, I mean,” Renzi said. “You will sense the freedom and vitality. His verses are a paean to the sublime assertion of the individual; he brings… But, then, you’ll see all this for yourself, Tom,” he concluded lamely.

Kydd looked at his friend, touched by his thought. He fiddled in his waistcoat. “And I have something f’r you,” he said, bringing out a screw of paper, which he handed over.

Carefully Renzi undid the paper. Inside was a good six ounces of small dark whorls, thin disks of the most fragrant tobacco he had ever encountered. “My friend, this is magnificent!”

Kydd was well pleased at the unfeigned delight. He had learned how to make a prick of tobacco from one of the gunner’s mates with whom he had shared a watch in one of the hanging magazines. A wad of good strong tobacco leaves was spread on flannel. Sprinkled with rum, it was rolled up and tied to a deckhead cleat with spun yarn, rotated tightly along its length and left for a week or so. The resulting hard plug was then cut with a razor-sharp knife into thin disks of shag.

Appreciatively, Renzi drew out his clay pipe and rubbed himself a fill. Soon a powerful fragrance was on the wind and Renzi settled back against the carronade slide with a comfortable sigh.

Kydd picked up the waistcoat. Renzi’s body had responded to seaboard life by becoming whipcord thin, and the garment would certainly need another tuck. He threaded the needle. “So much for the Mongseers!” Kydd grimaced. “Never a sign of ’em, and we trail our coats off their ports f’r weeks!”

Renzi’s eyes were closed. “I wonder what’s happening in Paris,” he mused. “The mob will be baying for blood – but whose? The Jacobins ride the tiger – Robespierre needs victories if he is to prevail.” It was not easy to live in this total isolation, without a newspaper, journal or even a rumor when to his certain knowledge the world was in flames.