“It just seemed obvious, my lord,” Sharpe said lamely.

“The workings of your mind are a constant mystery to me, Sharpe,” Lord William said, writing as he spoke. “I shall, of course, moderate your opinions by talking to more senior men when I reach London, but your jejune thoughts will make a first draft possible. Perhaps I shall talk to my wife’s distant cousin, Sir Arthur.” The pen scratched steadily. “Do you know where my wife is this afternoon, Mister Sharpe?”

“No, my lord,” Sharpe said, and was about to ask how he could be expected to know, but bit his tongue in case he heard the wrong answer.

“She has a habit of vanishing,” Lord William said, his gray eyes now steady on Sharpe.

Sharpe said nothing. He felt like a mouse under a cat’s gaze.

Lord William turned to look at the bulkhead which divided the dining cabin from Sharpe’s cabin. He could have been gazing at the picture of Chase’s old frigate, the Spritely, which hung there. “Thank you, Sharpe,” he said, looking back at last. “Close the door firmly, will you? The latch is imperfectly aligned with its socket.”

Sharpe left. He was sweating. Did Lord William know? Had Braithwaite really written a letter? Jesus, he thought, Jesus. Playing with fire. “Well?” Captain Chase had come to stand beside him, an amused expression on his face.

“He wanted to know about the Mahrattas, sir.”

“Don’t we all?” Chase inquired sweetly. He looked up at the sails, leaned to see the compass, smiled. “The ship’s orchestra is giving a concert tonight on the forecastle,” he said, “and we’re all invited to attend after supper. Do you sing, Sharpe?”

“Not really, sir.”

“Lieutenant Peel sings. It’s a pleasure to hear him. Captain Llewellyn should sing, being Welsh, but doesn’t, and the lower deck larboard gun crews make a splendid choir, though I shall have to order them not to sing the ditty about the admiral’s wife for fear of offending Lady Grace, yet even so it should be a wonderful evening.”

Grace had left his cabin. Sharpe closed the door, shut his eyes and felt the sweat trickle beneath his shirt. Playing with fire.

Two mornings later there was an island visible far off to the south and west. The Revenant must have passed quite close to the island in the night, but at dawn she was well to its north. Cloud hung above the small scrap of gray which was all Sharpe could see of the island’s summit through his telescope. “It’s called St. Helena,” Chase told him, “and belongs to the East India Company. If we weren’t otherwise engaged, Sharpe, we’d make a stop there for water and vegetables.”

Sharpe gazed at the ragged scrap of land isolated in an immensity of ocean. “Who lives there?”

“Some miserable Company officials, a handful of morose families, and a few wretched black slaves. Clouter was a slave there. You should ask him about it.”

“You freed him?”

“He freed himself. Swam out to us one night, climbed the anchor cable and hid away till we were at sea. I’ve no doubt the East India Company would like him back, but they can whistle in the wind for him. He’s far too good a seaman.”

There were a score of black seamen like Clouter aboard, another score of lascars, and a scattering of Americans, Dutchmen, Swedes, Danes and even two Frenchmen. “Why would a man be called Clouter?” Sharpe asked.

“Because he clouted someone so hard that the man didn’t wake up for a week,” Chase said, amused, then took the speaking trumpet from the rail and hailed Clouter who was among the men lounging on the forecastle. “Would you like me to put in to St. Helena, Clouter? You can visit your old friends.”

Clouter mimed cutting his throat and Chase laughed. It was small gestures like that, Sharpe reckoned, that made the Pucelle a happy ship. Chase was easy in command and that ease did not diminish his authority, but simply made the men work harder. They were proud of their ship, proud of their captain and Sharpe did not doubt they would fight for him like fiends, but Capitaine Louis Montmorin had the same reputation and when the two ships met it would doubtless prove a grim and bloody business. Sharpe watched Chase for he reckoned he had still a lot to learn about the subtle business of leading men. He saw that the captain did not secure his authority by recourse to punishment, but rather by expecting high standards and rewarding them. He also hid his doubts. Chase could not be certain that Pohlmann’s servant really was Michel Vaillard, and he did not know for sure that he could catch the Revenant even if the Frenchman was aboard, and if he failed then the lords of the Admiralty would take a dim view of his initiative in taking the Pucelle so far from her proper station. Sharpe knew Chase worried about those things, yet the crew never received a hint of their captain’s doubts. To them he was certain, decisive and confident, and so they trusted him. Sharpe noted it and resolved to imitate it, and then he wondered whether he really would stay in the army. Perhaps Lord William would die? Perhaps Lord William would have a sleepless night and stroll the poop deck in the dark?

And then, Sharpe wondered, what? A library with a fireplace? Grace happy with books, and he with what? And, as he asked himself those questions, he would sheer away from their answers, for they involved a murder that Sharpe feared. A man could kill a secretary and pass it off as a fall from a ladder, but a peer of England was not so easily destroyed. Nor had Sharpe any right to kill Lord William. He probably would, he thought, if the chance came, but he knew it would be wrong and he dimly apprehended that such a wrong would leave a scar on his future. He often surprised himself by realizing he had a conscience. Sharpe knew plenty of men, dozens, who would kill for the price of a pot of ale, yet he was not among them. There had to be a reason, and selfishness was not enough. Even love was not enough.

Provoke Lord William to a duel? He thought about that, but he suspected Lord William would never stoop to fight a mere ensign. Lord William’s weapons were more subtle; memoranda to the Horse Guards, letters to senior officers, quiet words in the right ears and at their end Sharpe would be nothing. So forget it, Sharpe told himself, let the dream go, and he tried to lose himself in the work of the ship. He and Llewellyn were holding a competition among the marines to see who could fire the most musket shots in three minutes and the men were improving, though none could yet match Sharpe. He practiced them, encouraged them, swore at them, and morning after morning they filled the ship’s forecastle deck with powder smoke until Sharpe reckoned the marines were as good as any redcoat company. He practiced with the cutlass, fighting Llewellyn up and down the weather deck, slashing and hacking, parrying and slicing until the sweat ran down his face and chest. Some of the marines practiced with boarding pikes which were eight-foot ash staffs tipped with slender steel spikes that Llewellyn claimed were marvelously effective for clearing narrow passageways on enemy ships. The Welshman also encouraged the use of boarding axes which had vicious blades on short handles. “They’re clumsy,” Llewellyn admitted, “but, by God, they put the fear of Christ into the Froggies. A man don’t fight long with one of those buried in his skull, Sharpe, I can tell you. It cools his ardor, it does.”

They crossed the equator and, because everyone aboard had crossed it before, there was no need to put them through the ordeal of being dressed in women’s clothes, shaved with a cutlass and dipped in sea water. Nevertheless one of the seamen dressed himself as Neptune and went around the ship with a makeshift trident and demanded tribute from men and officers alike. Chase ordered a double rum ration, hung out a larger studdingsail that the sailmaker had stitched, and watched the Revenant on the northwestern horizon.