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 the centre surrounded by concentric rings of ever-lower hills until, at the coast, they ended in cliffs rarely more than fifty feet high.

Like great black fingers, many peninsulas stuck out along the south coast, the trade winds raising a heavy swell which battered the headlands incessantly, undercutting the rock until great pieces toppled into the sea. Between each headland was a long narrow stretch of calm water, often extending inland for a mile or more, and ending in mangrove swamps.

Pointing out two of them to Southwick, Ramage said:

'Look—that's Chemin Bay, between Westerhall Point and Point of Fort Jeudy. You'd never believe there's a lagoon leading off to one side at the far end big enough to take three frigates at anchor. And just to the west is Egmont, with another one.'

'Just the place for privateers!'

Ramage nodded. 'Fortunately the other islands aren't made the same way!'

'Just as well... A few guns up on those headlands and you'd never get in.'

The island, roughly rectangular and lying lengthways north and south, had a great bight extending up from its southwest corner and at the head of it was the harbour and capital, St George. The Triton was steering to pass Point Saline, the south-west corner of the island—and the last sight of land for ships bound south to Trinidad and the coast of South America —before hauling her wind and beating up to St George.

Southwick commented, 'The stretch of the coast puts me in mind o' Cornwall—sheer cliffs and rocks and too much wind for trees to grow properly. Just look at those small ones— some kind of fir, are they?—all leaning over to leeward!'

But Ramage did not want to be reminded of Cornwall: already the long Tropical nights were bedevilled by memories of Gianna: lying in his cot his imagination nearly drove km mad when he thought of the long months there'd be before his fantasies gave place to reality and he'd see her again.

Looking down at the small sketch he was holding showing the harbour and lagoon of St George and then across at Point Saline, he nodded significantly at Southwick, who started bellowing orders which sent men running to the sheets, braces and bowlines, ready for the turn which would take the brig round the Point and bring St George into sight.

St George was built on several hills, with steep cliffs on the seaward side. The entrance to the harbour, little more than a slot cut in the cliffs, led straight to the quays built round three sides of a rectangle, the town ranging over the hills on the west and north sides. To the east, hidden from seaward, was a huge, almost circular lagoon, the sea-filled crater of an extinct volcano and surrounded by steep hills to form a natural amphitheatre.

But at the point where the rim of the lagoon joined the east side of the harbour a coral reef had grown, closing the channel to everything but open boats.

'A damn shame,' Southwick had grumbled. That could be one of the finest hurricane anchorages in the Windwards! Worth using a few tons of powder to blast a channel through.'

The town and harbour were well protected against attacks from seaward by Fort George, built high on the hills at the west side of the entrance and covering the whole bight.

The Fort, massively built of stone, was also the headquarters of Colonel Humphrey Wilson, the military commander of His Majesty's land forces in Grenada, and the man on whom Ramage was about to pay his first official visit.

But for a few minutes Ramage stood beside one of the eighteen-pounder guns poking its muzzle through an embrasure La the massive walls round the top of the Fort, refreshing himself in the brisk wind after the heat of the quays in the harbour below.

Facing eastwards, he had the open sea on his right—with the Triton anchored a quarter of a mile out—the lagoon facing him, and the open-ended rectangle of the harbour to his left Several small rowing boats were scattered across the lagoon, but most were close by the coral reef, each with two or three men fishing with tropical lethargy, hidden from the heat of the sun by wide-brimmed straw hats or pieces of sacking propped up with sticks to make a little shadow. Occasional movements by one of the men and glints of silver as the fish jumped dear of the water, showed there was plenty to be caught Ramage watched two of the Triton's boats laden with casks pulling for the reef: Southwick was taking the opportunity of getting fresh water from the big cistern on the far side of the lagoon.

On the shore just short of the reef two island schooners were lying over on their sides like stranded whales, hove down at the careenage by tackles to their masts so their bottoms could be cleaned. Smoke from the nearer one showed she was being cleaned by the old-fashioned method of breaming, men running flaming torches made of reeds along the planks, melting the old coating of pitch and burning off the weed and barnacles. The other one was already cleaned off, and Ramage could visualize her crew smearing on a thin layer of new pitch before coating it with a mixture of sulphur and tallow, in the age-old battle to kill the teredo and gribble worms who used the planking as both a home and a life-long meal.