The boy was touchingly proud of his ship while Sharpe was awed by it. It was a vast thing, much bigger than the Calliope, and young Harry Collier rattled off its statistics as he took Sharpe through the lavish dining cabin where another eighteen-pounder squatted. “She’s 178 feet long, sir, not counting her bowsprit, of course, and 48 in the beam, sir, and 175 feet to the main truck which is the very top of the mainmast, sir, and mind your head, sir. She was French-built out of two thousand oak trees and she weighs close to two thousand tons, sir—mind your head—and she’s got seventy-four guns, sir, not counting the carronades, of course, and we’ve six of them, all thirty-two-pounders, and there’s six hundred and seventeen men aboard, sir, not counting the marines.”

“How many of those?”

“Sixty-six, sir. This way, sir. Mind your head, sir.”

Collier led Sharpe onto the quarterdeck where eight long guns lay behind their closed ports. “Eighteen-pounders, sir,” Collier squeaked, “the babies on the ship. Just six a side, sir, including the four in the stern quarters.” He slithered down a perilously steep companionway to the main deck. “This is the weather deck, sir. Thirty-two guns, sir, all twenty-four-pounders.” The center of the main deck, or weather deck, was open to the sky, but the forward and aft sections of the deck were planked over where the forecastle and quarterdeck were built. Collier led Sharpe forward, weaving nimbly between the huge guns and the mess tables rigged between them, ducking under hammocks where men of the off-duty watch slept, then swerving around the anchor capstan and down another ladder into the stygian darkness of the lower deck, which held the ship’s biggest guns, each throwing a ball of thirty-two pounds. “Thirty of these big guns, sir,” he said proudly, “mind your head, sir, fifteen a side, and we’re lucky to have so many. There’s a shortage of these big guns, they tell us, and some ships are even driven to put eighteen-pounders on their lower deck, but not Captain Chase, he wouldn’t abide that. I told you to mind your head, sir.”

Sharpe rubbed the bruise on his forehead and tried to work out the weight of shot that the Pucelle could fire, but Collier was ahead of him. “We can throw 972 pounds of metal with each broadside, sir, and we’ve got two sides,” he added helpfully, “as you may have noticed. And we’ve got the six carronades, sir, and they can throw thirty-two pounds apiece plus a cask of musket balls as well, which will make a Frenchman weep, sir. Or so I’m told, sir. Mind your head, sir.” Which meant, Sharpe thought, that this one ship could throw more round shot in a single broadside than all the combined batteries of the army’s artillery at the battle of Assaye. It was a floating bastion, a crushing killer of the high seas, and this was not even the largest warship afloat. Some ships, Sharpe knew, carried over a hundred guns, and again Collier had the answers, trained in them because, like all midshipmen, he was preparing for his lieutenant’s examination. “The navy’s got eight first rates, sir, that’s ships with a hundred or more guns—watch that low beam, sir—fourteen second rates, which carry about ninety or more cannon, and a hundred and thirty of these third rates.”

“You call this a third rate?” Sharpe asked, astonished.

“Down here, sir, watch your head, sir.” Collier vanished into another companionway, sliding down the ladder’s uprights, and Sharpe followed more slowly, using the rungs, to find himself in a dark, dank, low-ceilinged deck that stank foully and was dimly lit by a scatter of glass-shielded lanterns. “This is the orlop deck, sir. Mind your head. It’s called the cockpit as well, sir. Watch that beam, sir. We’re just about under water here, sir, and the surgeon has his rooms down there, beyond the magazines, and we all prays, sir, we never end under his knife. This way, sir. Mind your head.” He showed Sharpe the cable tiers where the anchor ropes were flaked down, the two leather-curtained magazines that were guarded by red-coated marines, the spirit store, the surgeon’s lair where the walls were painted red so that the blood did not show, the dispensary, and the midshipmen’s cabins that were scarce bigger than dog kennels, then he took Sharpe down a final ladder into the massive hold where the ship’s stores were piled in vast heaps of casks. Only the bilge lay beneath and a mournful sucking, interrupted by a clatter, told Sharpe that men were even now pumping it dry. “We hardly ever stop the six pumps,” the midshipman said, “because as tight as you build ‘em, sir, the sea do get in.” He kicked at a rat, missed, then scrambled back up the ladder. He showed Sharpe the galley beneath the forecastle, introduced him to master-at-arms, cooks, bosuns, gunner’s mates, the carpenter, then offered to take Sharpe up the mainmast.

“I’ll not bother today,” Sharpe said.

Collier took him to the wardroom where he was named to a half-dozen officers, then back to the quarterdeck and aft, past the great double wheel, to a door that led directly into Captain Chase’s sleeping cabin. It was, as the captain had said, a small room, but it was paneled with varnished wood, had a canvas carpet on the floor and a scuttle to let in the daylight. Sharpe’s sea chest took up one wall, and Collier now helped him rig the hanging cot. “If you’re killed, sir,” the boy said earnestly, “then this will be your coffin.”

“Better than the one the army would give me,” Sharpe said, throwing his blankets into the cot. “Where’s the first lieutenant’s cabin?” he asked.

“Forrard of this one, sir.” Collier indicated the forward bulkhead. “Just beyond there, sir.”

“And the second lieutenant’s?” Sharpe asked, knowing that was where Lady Grace would be sleeping.

“Weather deck, sir. Aft. By the wardroom,” Collier said. “There’s a hook for your lantern there, sir, and you’ll find the captain’s quarter gallery is aft through that door, sir, and on the starboard side.”

“Quarter gallery?” Sharpe asked.

“Latrine, sir. Drops direct into the sea, sir. Very hygienic. Captain Chase says you’re to share it, sir, and his steward will look after you, you being his guest.”

“You like Chase?” Sharpe asked, struck by the warmth in the midshipman’s voice.

“Everyone likes the captain, sir, everyone,” Collier said. “This is a happy ship, sir, which is more than I can say for many, and permit me to remind you that captain’s supper is at the end of the first dogwatch. That’s four bells, sir, seeing as how the dogwatches are only two hours apiece.”

“What is it now?”

“Just past two bells, sir.”

“So how long till four bells?”

Collier’s small face showed astonishment that anyone should need to ask such a question. “An hour, sir, of course.”

“Of course,” Sharpe said.

Chase had invited six other guests to join him for supper. He could hardly avoid asking Lord William Hale and his wife, but he confided in Sharpe that Haskell, the first lieutenant, was a terrible snob who had flattered Lord William all the way from Calcutta to Bombay. “So he can damn well do it again now,” Chase said, glancing at his first lieutenant, a tall, good-looking man, who was bending close to Lord William and evidently drinking in every word. “And this is Llewellyn Llewellyn,” Chase said, drawing Sharpe toward a red-faced man in a scarlet uniform coat. “A man who does nothing by halves and is the captain of our marines, which means that if the Frogs board us I’m relying on Llewellyn Llewellyn and his rogues to throw them overboard. Is your name really Llewellyn Llewellyn?”

“We are descended from the lineage of ancient kings,” Captain Llewellyn said proudly, “unlike the Chase family, which, unless I am very much mistaken, were mere servants of the hunt.”

“We hunted the bloody Welsh out,” Chase said, smiling. It was plain that the two were old friends who took a delight in mutual insult. “This is my particular friend, Llewellyn, Richard Sharpe.”