JAMES McGEE
Rapscallion

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Prologue

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

Epilogue

Historical Note

Keep Reading

About the Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

PROLOGUE

Sark stopped, sank to his knees and listened, but the only sounds he could hear were the pounding of his own heartbeat and the rasping wheeze at the back of his throat as he fought desperately to draw air into his burning lungs. He tried to delay his inhalations in an attempt to slow down his breathing, but the effect was marginal. Moisture from the soggy ground had begun to soak into his breeches, adding to his discomfort. He raised himself into a squat and took stock of his surroundings, eyes probing the darkness for a familiar landmark, but to his untutored eye one stretch of featureless marshland looked much like any other.

A hooting cry came from behind and he stiffened. Owls hunted across the levels at night. Sometimes you could hear the beat of their wings if you were quiet enough. Sark remained where he was, crouched low. It had probably been an owl, but there were other creatures abroad, Sark knew, and they were hunting too.

There was movement to his left, accompanied by a soft grunt. The short hairs rose across the back of Sark’s neck and along his forearms. He turned slowly, not daring to exhale, and found himself under close scrutiny from a large sheep. For several seconds, man and beast regarded each other in eerie silence. The animal was not alone. Sark could make out at least a dozen more, huddled behind.

The ewe was the first to break eye contact. Backing off, it ambled away and began to herd its companions towards a clump of bushes. Sark breathed a sigh of relief.

Then he heard the distant baying and the bile rose into his mouth.

They were using dogs.

Sark glanced out of the corner of his eye and saw the sheep pause in their tracks as their ears picked up the unearthly ululation. Then, as if with one mind, the animals broke into a brisk trot. Within seconds they had vanished into the deepening gloom.

Sark turned and tried to locate the direction of the sound, but the darkness, allied to the dips and folds in the ground, made it difficult to pinpoint the exact bearing.

Ahead of him, the land had begun to rise. Sark inched forward, hoping the slope would provide the advantage of height and enable him to see further than his current position. Reaching the top of the bank, he elevated himself cautiously and stared back the way he had come. The first thing he saw was the bright flickering glow of a torch flame, then another, and another beyond that. From his vantage point he could see that the torchbearers were still some way off and that they were proceeding haphazardly. He suspected they were following the creek lines, but there was no doubt they were moving towards him, drawing inexorably closer with each passing second.

There were more lights in the far distance. They were no more than pinpricks, and stationary, and he guessed these were the masthead lanterns of ships moored in the estuary. He wondered briefly if he shouldn’t have been heading towards rather than away from them, but he knew that hadn’t been an option. His pursuers were sure to have cut off that line of escape.

He looked around and found he was at the edge of a dyke. The ditch stretched away from him, merging into the moonlit wetlands like a snake into the undergrowth. The smell from the bottom of the dyke was foul; a pungent, nostril-pinching mix of peat and stagnant water. There was another strong odour, too. He could see a heaped shape lying close to the water’s edge; the remains of a dead sheep. Presumably the animal had placed its foot in a rabbit-hole or some similar burrow, stumbled down the bank and become stuck in the bog, unable to extricate itself.

Sark wondered how long it had taken the beast to die. He tried to ignore the mosquitoes whining about his ears, knowing even though he could not feel their bite that they had already begun to feast upon his blood.

Another drawn-out howl came looping out of the night. Sark felt the cold hand of fear clutch his heart and he cursed his inactivity. He shouldn’t have remained so long in one place. He got to his feet and began to run.

He had a rough idea of where he was and the direction in which he was travelling. He had the vague notion that the King’s Ferry House wasn’t much more than half a mile away. If his navigation was correct and he could reach the landing and find a boat, there was a possibility that he’d be able to cross the river and hide out on the opposite shore and thus give his pursuers the slip.

Keeping low, he continued to follow the dyke’s path, ignoring the stitch in his side, which was beginning to stab at him with all the tenacity of a red-hot rapier.

Another cry sounded; human this time, not more than a few hundred yards off. Sark was uncomfortably aware that the men on his trail knew the ground far better than he did. Despite the unevenness of the terrain and the latticework of waterways that crisscrossed the island, they were catching up fast.

His foot slipped and he swore as he started to slide down the side of the gulley. The desire to enter and wade through the murky water in a bid to confuse the hounds was tempting, but he knew it would hamper his progress. All they had to do was steer the dogs along each bank and they’d soon discover where he had left the stream, and they’d pick up his trail again in no time. It was best to keep moving and try to reach the ferry landing; as dry as possible, preferably. He slithered to his feet and scrambled back up the slope.

He could hear his pursuers calling to each other now, driven by the excitement of the chase. In his mind’s eye he saw the hounds, eyes bright, tongues slavering, straining at their leashes as they followed his scent. Sark quickened his pace.

The dyke began to widen. Sark hoped it was a sign he was close to its joining with the main channel. Pressing down on the edges of his boot heels to give himself purchase, he pushed his weary, mud-splattered body towards what he hoped was his route to salvation.

There was a shout. Glancing over his shoulder, Sark’s stomach lurched when he saw how quickly the gap had shortened. The torches were a lot closer. Beneath the fiery brands, he could make out the dark figures of men running, perhaps half a dozen in all, and the sleeker, four-legged, shapes moving swiftly across the uneven ground before them.

Another urgent cry went up and Sark knew that they had probably seen his fleeing form outlined against the sky. He ducked down, knowing it was far too late to do any good. He drew the pistol from his belt.

Then the ground gave way and he was falling.

As his feet shot from beneath him, he managed to twist his body and discovered that he had almost reached his destination. It was the edge of the river bank that had collapsed beneath his weight. He barely had time to raise the pistol above his head to avoid mud clogging the barrel, before he landed on his back in the ooze.

He struggled to his knees and pushed himself upright, and then saw the light. It was less than one hundred and fifty yards away, at the edge of the reeds. He strained his eyes. A small building began to take shape and he realized it was the ferry keeper’s cottage. His gaze shifted to the landing stage jutting out into the water; in its lee, a small rowboat resting on the mud and held fast to a thin wooden post. His spirits lifted. There was still a chance he could make it.

With the mud sucking greedily at his boots, Sark struck out for the landing stage. He had gone but a few paces when the consistency of the mud changed. It was less firm now and his boots were sinking deeper with each step. It was like wading through molasses. He looked out at the river. This was one of the narrower stretches, hence the ferry crossing, but the tide was out and there was a wide expanse of foreshore separating the jetty from the water. He would have to drag the boat a good few yards before he could float it. But he could make out the horizontal black shadow that was the opposite shore and that spurred him on. He pushed himself forward.

Behind him, the noises had diminished. There were no more cries, no howling from the dogs. The night was strangely quiet, save for the squelching of Sark’s laborious passage through the mud. Curious, Sark looked around and his blood froze.

They were ranged along the edge of the bank and they were watching him; a line of men, the shadows cast by the torches playing across their unsmiling faces. At their feet, secured by leashes, the hounds stood silently to heel.

The dogs were huge mastiffs, with broad heads and muscular bodies; each one the size of a small calf. As still as statues, they regarded the solitary figure below them with rapt attention. Their only movement was an occasional backward glance at the faces of the men who controlled them.

It was the moment that Sark knew he had nowhere to run.

But it didn’t stop him trying.

Sark estimated he still had about fifty paces to go before he reached the boat. His legs felt as heavy as lead, while the pain behind his ribs suggested his heart was about to burst from his chest. Gamely, he tried to pick up speed but while the spirit was willing, his body was telling him it had reached the point of exhaustion.

Sark did not hear the command to release the dogs, but a sixth sense told him it had been given. He turned. A close observer might have witnessed the look of weary resignation that stole across his face.

The handlers had not followed the hounds down on to the foreshore, but were holding to firmer ground, following the line of the river bank, the flames from their torches flaring like comet trails behind them. They ran in silence.

For the second time that night, Sark dropped to his knees.

The dogs were loping rather than sprinting towards him. With their agility, and their weight distributed between four legs instead of two, making them less susceptible to sinking into the mud, it was as if they knew they had all the time in the world.

All thoughts of escape stifled, Sark gripped the pistol firmly and watched the dogs approach.

He glanced to his side. He saw that the men were now parallel to him, torches raised. They were close enough for him to make out their expressions by the light from the flames. Four of them had faces as hard as rock. The other two were grinning.

Sark’s chest rose and fell. He looked back towards the dogs and raised his pistol. He aimed the barrel at the leading beast and tracked it with the gun’s muzzle.

He heard one of the men on the bank curse and saw that they had all drawn weapons of their own.

Sark could hear the dogs’ paws scampering across the mud. They were coming in very fast; close enough for him to see the light of anticipation in their eyes.

The lead hound was less than a dozen paces away when Sark thrust the barrel of the pistol under his own chin and pulled the trigger.

The back of Sark’s head blew apart. The powder smoke barely had time to dissipate before the still kneeling body was engulfed in a frenzy of snapping jaws and thrashing limbs. As the men on the bank ran towards the mêlée, the snarling of the hounds rose into the night and carried, like the devil’s chorus, down the muddy, bloodstained foreshore.

1

Outlined against the gunmetal sky, the ship’s blackened hull towered above the men in the longboat like some enormous Hebridean cliff face.

The men were silent, wrapped in their thoughts and awed by the grim sight confronting them. Only occasionally was the silence broken, by the dull clink of manacles, the splash and creak of oars and the wash of the waves against the side of the boat as it was pulled through the cold grey water.

Someone was sobbing. At the sound, several men crossed themselves. Others bowed their heads and, in whispers, began to pray.

There were fifteen men in the boat, excluding the oarsmen and the two marine guards. With few exceptions their clothes were ragged, their faces pale, unshaven and etched with fear; fear caused not only by the ship’s forbidding appearance, but also by the smell coming off her.

It had been with them even before they had embarked, carried across the river by the light easterly breeze. At first, the men had paid little mind, assuming the odour was rising from their own unwashed bodies, but then understanding had dawned. As the longboat had pushed away from the harbour wall they had become transfixed by the grim nature of the fate that was about to befall them. As if to emphasize their passengers’ rising sense of horror, the marine guards traded knowing looks and raised their neck scarves over their lower faces.

The longboat approached the rear of the ship. High above, embedded beneath the stern windows, a nameplate that once had been embossed in gold but which was now tarnished beyond repair proclaimed the vessel to be the Rapacious.

Close to, the ship looked even more intimidating. The dark-hulled vessel had all the appearance of a massive smoke-stained sarcophagus rather than a former ship of the line. There was no mizzen mast and the main mast and the foremast had been cut down to a third of their original size. Only the lower yards remained. Between them, festooned from a web of washing lines running fore and aft, was an array of what, from a distance, might have been taken for signal flags but which, on closer inspection, turned out to be a selection of tattered stockings, shirts and breeches. Age, wear and constant washing had turned every visible scrap of clothing a universal shade of grey, with the majority of the garments exhibiting more holes than material.

These were not the only refurbishments that had been inflicted upon the once proud ship. Her bowsprit had been removed, and where the poop deck had been, there now stood a clinker-built, soot-engrained shack, complete with sloping roof and chimney stack, from which grey smoke was billowing. A similar construction adorned the ship’s forecastle. It was obvious from her appearance that a great many years had passed since Rapacious last experienced the roar and thunder of battle in her search for prey. This was further confirmed by the lack of heavy ordnance; her open gun ports revealed that cannon muzzles had been replaced by immovable cast-iron grilles.

The truncation of her masts and the lack of armament had lightened the ship’s weight considerably. As a result, she was riding much higher out of the water than was normal for a vessel her size. A walkway formed from metal gratings followed the line of the orlop deck. From it a series of wooden stairs rose towards a small platform, similar to a church pulpit, affixed adjacent to the boarding gap in the ship’s handrail.

Huge chains at bow and stern secured Rapacious to the riverbed. Beyond the ship, four more vessels in a similar state of disrepair sat moored in mid-stream, line astern and a cable’s length apart, their blunted bows facing downriver.

All around, a bewildering variety of other vessels lay at anchor, from brigs to cutters and from frigates to flush-decked sloops, their yellow and black hulls gleaming, masts rising tall and straight, while pennants, not grubby pantaloons, fluttered gaily from their yardarms. They were Britain’s pride and they were ready for war.

By comparison, isolated from the rest of the fleet, Rapacious and her four sister ships looked as if they had been discarded and left to rot; victims of a terrible and terminal disease.

Seated in the waist of the longboat, one man ignored the lamentations of his companions and gazed at the ship with what could have been interpreted as interest rather than dread. Two scars were visible on the left side of his face. The first followed the curve of his cheekbone, an inch below his left eye. The second scar, less livid, ran an inch below the first. His long hair was dark save for a few streaks of grey above the temple. His jacket and breeches were severely worn and faded, though in a better state of repair than the clothes of many of the men huddled around him, some of whom were clad in little more than rags. And while the bulk of his companions were either barefooted or else wearing poorly fitting shoes, his feet were shod in what appeared to be a pair of stout but well-scuffed military boots.

“A sou for your thoughts, my friend.”

The words were spoken in French. They came from an aristocratic-looking individual dressed in a dark grey jacket and grubby white breeches, seated on the dark-haired man’s right.

Matthew Hawkwood remained silent but continued staring over the water towards the black-hulled ship.

“Heard she fought at Copenhagen,” the speaker continued in a quiet voice. “She was a seventy-four. They took the idea from us. Extended their seventies. They use them as standard now. Can’t blame the bastards. Good sailing, strong gun-power, what is there not to like?”

The speaker, whose name was Lasseur, grinned suddenly, the expression in marked contrast to the unsmiling faces about him. The neat goatee beard he wore, when added to the grin, lent his features a raffish slant.

The grin disappeared in an instant as a series of plaintive cries sounded from beyond the longboat’s prow.

Ahead, another longboat was tied up against the boarding raft in the shadow of the ship’s grime-encrusted hull. A cluster of men had already disembarked. Huddled on the walkway, under the watchful eyes of armed guards, they were preparing to ascend the stairs. Several of the men had difficulty walking. Two were crawling along the grating on their hands and knees. Their progress was painfully slow. Seeing their plight, their companions lifted them to their feet and with arms about their shoulders shepherded them along.

There were still men left on the first boat. From their posture, it was clear that none of them had the strength to make the transfer on their own. Their cries of distress floated over the water. The two marine guards on the boat were looking up towards the ship’s rail as if waiting for orders, breaking off to jab the barrels and butts of their muskets against the supine bodies around them.

Lasseur bared his teeth in a snarl.

His reaction was echoed by dark mutterings from the men seated about him.

“Silence there!” The order came from one of the marines, who stared at his charges accusingly and brandished his musket, bayonet affixed. “Or so help me, I’ll run you through!” Adding, with ill-disguised contempt, “Frog bastards!”

A face had appeared at the ship’s rail. An arm waved and an inaudible command was given. One of the marines in the boat below responded with a half-hearted salute before turning to his companion and shaking his head. At this the rowers raised their oars and they and the two guards climbed out on to the boarding raft. Turning, one of the rowers used his oar to push the boat away, while one of his fellow boatmen unfastened and began to pay out the line connecting the longboat to the ship. Caught by the current, the longboat moved slowly away from the ship’s hull. When the boat was some thirty or so yards out, the line was retied, leaving the boat’s pitiful passengers to drift at the mercy of the tide.

Angry shouts came from the line of men on the grating. Their protestations were met with a severe clubbing from the guards. Retreating, the quietened men began their slow and laboured ascent of the stairway.

Hawkwood watched grim-faced as the men made their way up the side of the ship. Lasseur followed his gaze and murmured softly, “We’d have been better off with the damned Spanish.”

“Bastards,” a voice interjected bitterly from behind them. “I’ve seen this before.”

Hawkwood and Lasseur turned. The speaker was a thin man, with sunken cheeks and watery eyes. Grey stubble covered his jaw.

“I was in Portsmouth last winter, on the Vengeance. They had a delivery of prisoners transferred from Cadiz. About thirty, all told. As thin as rakes they were; ghost white, not an ounce of flesh on their bones and not so much as a set of breeches between them. Only ten of them made it on to the Vengeance on their own. The rest were too ill to leave the longboat. The Vengeance’s surgeon refused to take them. Ordered them to be delivered to the hospital ship. Only the commander of the Pegasus refused to have them on board, not unless they were washed first. So the Vengeance’s surgeon ordered them thrown into the sea to clean them and left the Pegasus to pick up the bodies. Most of them were dead by the time the Pegasus’s boat got to them.” The man nodded towards the drifting longboat. “Looks to me, that’s what’s happening here.”

“My God,” Lasseur said and fell into a reflective silence as their own longboat, its way now clear, began to manoeuvre towards the ship’s side.

Hawkwood regarded the manacles around his ankles. If the men on the drifting boat, who presumably had also been wearing shackles, had been thrown overboard they would have been beyond help, sinking to the bottom of the river like stones.

He took a look at his fellow passengers. No one returned his gaze. They were too preoccupied, staring up at the ship, craning their necks to take in the vast wooden rampart looming above them. The sense of unease that had enveloped the boat was palpable, as if a black storm cloud had descended. Behind their masks, even the guards looked momentarily subdued.

He could still hear weeping. It was coming from the stern. Hawkwood followed the sound. The boy couldn’t have been much older than ten or eleven. Tears glistened on his cheeks. He looked up, dried his eyes with the heels of his hands and turned away, his small shoulders shaking. His clothes hung in rags about him. He’d been one of a consignment of prisoners, Hawkwood and Lasseur among them, picked up earlier that day from Maidstone Gaol. A midshipman or powder monkey, Hawkwood supposed, or whatever the French equivalent might be, and without doubt the youngest of the longboat’s passengers. It seemed unlikely that the boy had been taken alone, but there didn’t appear to be anyone with him, no shipmates to give him comfort. Hawkwood wondered where the boy had been captured and in what circumstances he might have been separated from the rest of his crew.

The order came to boat oars. A dozen heartbeats later, the longboat was secured to the raft and the transfer began.

The odour from the open gun ports was almost overwhelming. The river was bounded by marshland. On warm days with the wind sifting across the levels, the smell was beyond fœtid, but the malodorous stench issuing from the interior of Rapacious eclipsed even the smell from the shore. It was worse than a convoy of night-soil barges.

Hawkwood shouldered his knapsack. He was one of the few carrying possessions. Most had only the clothes they stood up in.

The marines set about prodding the prisoners with their musket butts. “Goddamn it, move your arses! I won’t tell you again! No wonder you’re losing the bleedin’ war! Useless buggers!”

Legs clanking, the men started to climb from the longboat on to the raft.

“Shift yourselves!” The guards continued to use their weapons to herd the men along the walkway. Movement was difficult due to the shackles, but the guards made no allowance for the restraints. “Lively now! Christ, you buggers stink!”

The insults rained down thick and fast, and while it was doubtful many of the men shuffling along the grating could understand the harsh words, the tone of voice and the poking and prodding made it clear what was required of them.

Slowly, in single file, the men clinked their way up the ship’s side.

“Keep moving, damn your eyes!”

Hawkwood stepped from the stairs on to the pulpit, Lasseur at his shoulder. A jam had formed in the enclosed space. Both men stared down into the belly of the ship. Lasseur recoiled. Then the Frenchman leaned forward so that his mouth was close to Hawkwood’s ear. His face was set in a grimace.

“Welcome to Hell,” he said.

2

I should have bloody known, Hawkwood thought.

Ezra Twigg’s face should have given the game away. Hawkwood wondered why he hadn’t picked up the signals. The little clerk’s head had been cast down when Hawkwood entered the ante-room in reply to the Chief Magistrate’s summons. Normally, Twigg would have looked up from his scribbling and passed some pithy comment about the marks on the floor left by Hawkwood’s boot heels, but this time Twigg had barely acknowledged the Runner’s arrival. All he’d done was look up quickly, murmur, “They’re waiting for you,” and return to his paperwork. The omens hadn’t been good. Hawkwood chided himself for not being more observant. Though he had absorbed the warning that the Chief Magistrate had company.

As Hawkwood entered the office, James Read stepped away from the tall window. It was mid-morning and sunlight pierced the room. Hawkwood wondered why the Chief Magistrate, a man who made no secret of his dislike for cold weather, looked so pensive. Given his usual disconsolate manner when confronted with inclement skies, he should, by rights, have been dancing across the carpet.

The second man looked around. He was heavy-set, with short, sandy hair, a broad face and a web of red veins radiating across his cheeks. He was dressed in the uniform of a naval officer and clearly suffered from the habitual stoop, characteristic of so many seamen, which, Hawkwood had come to realize, was more a testimony to the lack of headroom in a man-of-war than any lingering defect of birth.

The officer looked Hawkwood up and down, taking in the scarred face, the unfashionably long hair tied at the nape of the neck and the dark, well-cut attire. The Chief Magistrate walked to his desk. His movements, as ever, were measured and precise. He sat down. “Officer Hawkwood, this gentleman is Captain Elias Ludd. As his uniform implies, Captain Ludd is from the Admiralty.”

Hawkwood and the captain exchanged cautious nods.

“The Transport Board, to be exact,” James Read said.

Hawkwood said nothing. The Transport Board had been created initially to provide ships, troops and supplies during the American War of Independence. But the wars against Bonaparte had seen the Board expand its range of activities far beyond the original borders of the Atlantic. Now, due to Britain’s vast military and naval commitments, the Board was responsible for the movement of supply ships to the four corners of the globe.

“The Admiralty requires our assistance.” Read nodded towards his visitor. “Captain, you have the floor.”

“Thank you, sir.” Ludd looked down at the carpet and then raised his head. “I’ve an officer who’s gone missing; name of Sark. Lieutenant Andrew Sark.”

There was a short silence.

Hawkwood looked towards the Chief Magistrate for guidance, then back to the officer. “And what, you want us to find him? Isn’t that the navy’s job?”

Ludd looked taken aback by Hawkwood’s less than sympathetic response. James Read said, “There are other factors to consider. As you know, the Transport Board’s jurisdiction extends beyond what might be viewed as its traditional bailiwick.”

What the hell did that mean? Hawkwood wondered.

“The Board also administers foreign prisoners of war,” James Read said. “You recall it took over the duty from the Sick and Hurt Board.”

Hawkwood wondered if the Chief Magistrate was expecting a vocal acknowledgement. He decided it was probably best to remain silent. Better to keep your mouth shut and be thought an idiot than to speak and remove all doubt. He decided a noncommittal nod would probably suffice.

“My apologies, Captain,” Read said. “Please continue.”

Ludd cleared his throat. “Over the past several weeks, there’s been a sudden increase in the number of prisoners who’ve escaped from detention. We sent Lieutenant Sark to investigate whether these were random events or part of some orchestrated effort.”

“And he’s failed to report back?” Hawkwood said.

Ludd nodded, his face solemn.

“When did you last hear from him?”

Ludd stuck out his chin. “That’s just it – we haven’t heard from him at all. It’s been six days.”

“Not long,” Hawkwood said.

“In the general scheme of things, I’d not disagree with you.” Ludd gnawed the inside of his lip.

“Captain?” Hawkwood prompted.

Ludd ceased chewing. “He was not the first,” he said heavily.

Hawkwood sensed James Read shift in his seat. Ludd continued to look uncomfortable. “The first officer we sent, a Lieutenant Masterson, died.”

“Died? How?”

“Drowned, it’s presumed. His body was discovered two weeks ago on a mud bank near Fowley Island.”

“Which is where?” Hawkwood asked.

“The Swale River.”

“Kent.”

Ludd nodded. “At the time there was nothing to indicate he’d been the victim of foul play. We mourned him, we buried him, and then Lieutenant Sark was dispatched to continue the investigation.”

“But now that Sark’s failed to report back, you’re thinking that perhaps the drowning wasn’t an accident.”

“There is that possibility, yes.”

“Forgive me, Captain, but I still don’t see what this has to do with Bow Street,” Hawkwood said. “This remains a navy matter, surely?”

Before Ludd could respond, James Read interjected: “Captain Ludd is here at the behest of Magistrate Aaron Graham. Magistrate Graham is the government inspector responsible for the administration of all prisoners of war. He reports directly to the Home Secretary. It was Home Secretary Ryder’s recommendation that the Board avail itself of our services.”

Hawkwood had met Home Secretary Richard Ryder and hadn’t been overly impressed, but then Hawkwood had a low opinion of politicians, irrespective of rank. In short, he didn’t trust them. He had found Ryder to be a supercilious man, too full of his own importance. He wondered if Ryder had been in contact with James Read directly. There was nothing in the Chief Magistrate’s manner to indicate he was talking to Ludd under sufferance, but then Read was a master of the neutral expression. It didn’t mean his mind wasn’t whirring like clockwork underneath the impassive mask.

Read got to his feet. He walked to the fireplace and adopted his customary pose in front of the hearth. The fire was unlit, but Read stood as if warming himself. Hawkwood suspected that the magistrate assumed the stance as a means to help him think, whether a fire was blazing away or not. Oddly, it did seem to imbue an air of gravity to whatever pronouncement he came up with. Hawkwood wondered if that wasn’t the magistrate’s real intention.

Read pursed his lips. “It’s no secret that the Board has come in for a degree of criticism over the past twelve months. It has been the subject of two Select Committees. Their findings were that the Board has not performed as efficiently as expected. Further adverse reports would be most … unhelpful. So far, these escapes have been kept out of the public domain. There’s concern that, should word of its inability to keep captured enemy combatants in check emerge, the government’s credibility could suffer a severe blow. With all due deference to Captain Ludd, while the loss of one officer sent to investigate these escapes might be construed as unfortunate, the loss of two officers could be regarded as carelessness. It is all grist to the mill, and with the nation at war any lack of confidence in the administration could have dire consequences.”

Hawkwood stole a glance at the captain and felt an immediate sympathy. He knew what it was like to lose men in battle; he himself had lost more men than he cared to remember, and it was a painful burden to bear.

“What services?” Hawkwood asked.

Read frowned.

“You said the Home Secretary wants the Board to avail itself of our services. What services?”

James Read looked towards Ludd, who gave a rueful smile. “My superiors are unwilling to commit further resources to the investigation.”

“By resources, you mean men,” Hawkwood said.

Ludd flushed. “As Magistrate Read stated, two officers have apparently fallen prey to the investigation already. I am not anxious to dispatch a third man to investigate the death and disappearance of the first two.”

Everything became clear. Hawkwood stared at James Read. “You want Bow Street to take over the investigation?”

“That is the Home Secretary’s wish, yes.”

“What makes him think we can succeed where the navy has failed?”

Read placed his hands behind his back. “The Home Secretary feels that, while the Admiralty is perfectly capable of assigning officers to the field, there are certain advantages in utilizing non-naval personnel, particularly in what one might consider to be investigations of a clandestine nature.”

“Clandestine?”

“There are avenues open to this office that are not available to other – how shall I put it? – more conventional, less flexible departments of government. Would you not agree, Captain Ludd?”

“I’m sure you’d know more about that, sir,” Ludd said tactfully.

“Indeed.” The Chief Magistrate fixed Hawkwood with a speculative eye.

An itch began to develop along the back of Hawkwood’s neck. It wasn’t a pleasant sensation.

“I refer to the art of subterfuge, Hawkwood; the ability to blend into the background – most useful when dealing with the criminal classes, as you have so ably demonstrated on a number of occasions.”

Hawkwood waited for the axe to fall.

“Captain Ludd and I have discussed the matter. Based on our discussion, I believe you’re the officer best suited to the task.”

“And what task would that be, sir … exactly?”

James Read smiled grimly. “We’re sending you to the hulks.”

The Chief Magistrate’s expression was stern. “We’ve got prisoners of war spread right around the country, from Somerset to Edinburgh. Fortunately for us, the new prison in Maidstone is ideally situated for our purposes. It’s been used as a holding pen for prisoners prior to their transfer to the Medway and Thames hulks. You’ll begin your sentence there. From Maidstone you’ll be transported to the prison ship Rapacious. She’s lying off Sheerness. Better you arrive on the hulk within a consignment of prisoners rather than alone. There’s no reason to suppose anyone will question your credentials, but it should give you an opportunity to form liaisons with some of your fellow internees before embarkation.”

It was interesting, Hawkwood mused, that the Chief Magistrate had used the word sentence rather than assignment. Perhaps it had been a slip of the tongue. Then again, he thought, maybe not.

“Your mission is several fold,” Read said. “Firstly, you are to investigate how these escapes have been achieved –”

“You mean you don’t know?” Hawkwood cut in, staring at Ludd.

Ludd shifted uncomfortably. “We know Rapacious has lost four prisoners in the past six weeks. The trouble is, we don’t know the exact time the losses took place. We can assume the other prisoners concealed the escapes from the ship’s crew, possibly by manipulating the roll count. Without knowing the precise times of the escapes we haven’t been able to pin down how they were achieved, whether it was a spur-of-the-moment thing based on a lapse in our procedures or if the escapes were planned and executed over a period of time. All we know is that Rapacious is missing four men. What makes it more interesting is that there have been similar losses from some of the other Medway-based ships. We’re also missing a couple who broke their paroles.”

“How many in total?” Hawkwood asked.

“Ten unaccounted for.”

“Over how long a period?”

“Two months,” Ludd said.

“As I was saying …” James Read spoke into the pregnant silence which followed Ludd’s admission. “You are also to determine whether the escapers have received outside assistance. Captain Ludd is of the opinion that they have.”

“Based on what?” Hawkwood said.

“Based on the fact that we haven’t managed to track any of the buggers down,” Ludd said.

“Explain.”

Ludd sighed. “Escapes are nothing new. Some are spontaneous; the sudden recognition of an opportunity presenting itself: a door left unlocked, a careless guard looking the other way during a working party, that sort of thing. They generally involve a prisoner acting on his own. Nine times out of ten, he’s rounded up quickly, usually because he’s cold and wet and he can’t find food or clothing, he’s no idea where he is and he daren’t ask directions because he can’t speak the language. They don’t last long. Many end up turning themselves in voluntarily – and not just to the military. They’ve even surrendered to people in the street. But when it’s more than one, when two or three at a time have made a run for it, that suggests they’ve devised a plan, hoarded food and spare clothing, maybe bribed a guard to sell them a map so they know how far it is to the coast, and where they can steal a boat. Even so, not many make it. All it takes is one careless word; someone overhears them speaking Frog or talking English with an accent and the game’s up. But these recent escapes, they’ve been different.”

“How so?”

“As I said, we weren’t able to pick up their trail.”

“Which means what?”

“In my book, it means someone’s definitely helping them.”

“Like who?”

“That’s what we sent Masterson and Sark to find out.”

“What do you think?”

“My own theory? Free traders, most likely.”

“Smugglers?”

“My guess is that they’re passing the escapers down the line to the coast. They’ve got the routes all set up, they’ve got the men and the boats.”

“That, Hawkwood, is the third part of your assignment,” Read said. “If there is an organized escape route, I want it disrupted, preferably disbanded.”

“It might explain why your Lieutenant Masterson was found in the Swale,” Hawkwood said. “Could be he was thrown from a vessel.”

“Could be,” Ludd agreed. “I’d deem it a personal favour if, along the way, you could find out what happened to my men. If they were done away with, I’d prefer to be told.”

“If free traders are involved, it won’t be easy,” Hawkwood pointed out. “They’re a law unto themselves. Anyone going in and asking questions is sure to make their ears prick up. It’s more than likely they’ll see me coming a mile away.”

Ludd and Read exchanged glances.

“Quite so,” James Read said quietly. “But in this case they’re going to be looking in the wrong direction.”

“Hindsight’s a wonderful thing,” Ludd said. “Our mistake was sending Masterson and Sark through the front door. They were competent men, but they were naval officers first and landsmen second. In this situation they were out of their depth, no pun intended. We might just as well have dispatched a marching band to accompany them. Masterson’s brief was to try and infiltrate the smuggling organizations. We thought the best way for him to do that was to have him pose as a former seaman looking for work and to make it clear he wasn’t too bothered whether the work was legal or not. Trouble is, the smuggling fraternity’s too closely knit. My feeling is he ended up asking the wrong people the wrong questions – and that Sark made the same mistake.”

“You can take the man out of the navy but you can’t take the navy out of the man,” Hawkwood said.

“Something like that,” Ludd agreed unhappily.

“You, on the other hand, will not be quite so obvious,” James Read said. “We hope.”

“You mean I’ll be using the tradesman’s entrance,” Hawkwood said.

The corner of Read’s mouth twitched. “Providing we can manufacture a suitable history for you.” The Chief Magistrate paused. “My initial thought was that you should pass yourself off as a French officer, but I’m not sure that’s entirely practical. While I appreciate that your knowledge of the language is considerable, could you maintain the deception for any length of time? Captain Ludd and I have discussed the matter and we believe the current crisis with the United States has provided us with the perfect solution. You will pass yourself off as an American volunteer.”

“An American?”

“As you know all too well, from your recent encounter with William Lee, our American cousins are less than enamoured with us of late. Even before the recent declaration of war, a substantial number of American citizens have been drawn to Bonaparte’s flag; a legacy of American and French liaison during the Revolutionary War. With that in mind, we thought you could assume the mantle of an American officer attached to one of Bonaparte’s regiments who has been captured in the field. The fact that you are conversant in French gives us a distinct advantage.

“All that remains is your identity. Something credible that will pass scrutiny, preferably based on your own expertise and, ideally, involving an engagement of which you have personal knowledge. The only problem with that, however, would be the question of your whereabouts over the past three years. The most logical choice would therefore seem to be something more recent, from which all the facts have yet to be sifted. Captain Ludd and I have perused dispatches and determined that the victory at Ciudad Rodrigo will best fit the bill. Reports of the battle are still being disseminated. Are you familiar with any of the details?”

“Only from what I’ve read in the news sheets,” Hawkwood said.

The Times had carried general reports of the battle, as had the Chronicle and the Gazette. Ciudad Rodrigo was a picturesque Spanish town overlooking the Agueda River. Only a few miles from the border, it guarded the main northern route between Spain and Portugal. Wellington had laid siege to the town at the beginning of January. The attack had been a ferocious affair. Casualties had been heavy, but Wellington had emerged victorious. Many prisoners had been taken.

Read nodded. “Very good; a volunteer captain attached to the 34th Régiment d’Infanterie Légère will be the most fitting for our purposes, I venture. The regiment was created last year, drawing men from other units, so there is every possibility they could have utilized foreign experts in the field. I’ll leave you to manufacture an appropriate biography for yourself.”

The Chief Magistrate reached across his desk and picked up a small canvas pouch. “These are some of the reports pertaining to the siege. Make use of them. They contain details that are not public knowledge; for obvious reasons, as you’ll discover. Our own soldiers may well have emerged victorious, but they did not cover themselves in glory. Such knowledge could assist in fending off awkward questions. Use it to your advantage if you find yourself pressed. Attack is the best form of defence. Denigrating your former comrades in arms will help deflect attention from your alias. Read the dispatches. You’ll see what I mean.”

Read handed over the pouch. “As an officer, you’ll be permitted to carry a few personal belongings. Mr Twigg will provide you with funds. French and British currency is used on the hulks. I would urge you to be circumspect in your expenditure, however. The coffers of the Public Office are not a bottomless pit.

“The wounds you received in the Hyde case will stand you in good stead. They’re recent enough to have been sustained around the supposed date of your defeat and capture. They will add to your credibility.”

The scars from his encounter with the escaped Bedlamite, Titus Hyde, had healed well. But that wasn’t to say he didn’t sometimes wake in the small hours wondering what might have become of him had the blade of Hyde’s sword been an inch longer. The razor-thin weal along the rim of his left cheek was a visible reminder that the line between life and death can be measured by the breadth of a single hair or the span of a heartbeat.

“Who else will know I’m a peace officer?”

Read hesitated before replying. “No one. Aside from myself, Captain Ludd and Mr Twigg, no one else will be privy to your true identity.”

“Not the hulk’s commanding officer?”

“No one,” Read repeated.

“So, how do I send word if I discover something?”

“That’s why you’ll be listed as an officer in the ship’s register. It entitles you to apply for parole. Captain Ludd recommends we make it appear as though your application is pending authorization. You will thus be required to appear before a board of assessment. Your first interview will be scheduled to take place one week after your arrival. Captain Ludd will be the officer in charge. You will provide him with details of any progress you may have made.”

Hawkwood stared at the dispatch pouch and then looked up. “In that case, I hope you all remain in good health. I’d hate to find I’m stranded on the bloody ship because you’ve all been struck dead in your beds.”

3

“Name?”

The question was emitted in a thin, reedy voice by a narrow-shouldered, sour-faced man seated behind a large trestle table that had been set up in the forward section of the weather-deck. The clerk did not look up but waited, lips compressed, pen poised, for Hawkwood to reply. A large ledger lay open in front of him. The seated man to his right, a supercilious-looking individual with reddish-blond hair, slim sideburns and nails bitten down to the quick, wore a lieutenant’s uniform. The one standing by his left shoulder was younger, slightly built, dark haired, and dressed in a yellow canvas jacket and matching trousers. Stamped on the sleeves of the jacket and upon each trouser leg were a broad black arrow and the letters T.O., the initials of the Transport Office. His eyes roved back and forth along the line of waiting men.

Hawkwood gazed down at the clerk and said nothing. He was still feeling the chill from the dousing he had received.

The guards had removed the shackles and made all the new arrivals strip naked on deck before handing them a block of brown soap and ordering them into large water-filled barrels. The water was freezing and by the time each man had rubbed himself raw, clambered out, passed the soap on to the next man and dried himself with the rag towel, the water surface in every tub was covered by a thin oily residue.

Orange jackets, trousers and shirts had then been distributed. There seemed to be only one size, small, which left the recipients struggling woefully to fasten the jacket buttons. With most, the trousers reached only as far as mid calf. The only person to emerge from the handout with any modicum of dignity was the boy from the longboat. The jacket was too long at both hem and sleeve, but the trousers were close to being a good fit, albeit only after they had been secured around the boy’s thin waist by a length of twine.

Not everyone received a uniform. A number of men, Hawkwood and Lasseur among them, were allowed to keep their own clothes, supposedly because they were officers, though Hawkwood suspected it had more to do with a scarcity of jackets and trousers rather than an acknowledgement of their rank. Certainly, it appeared that prison uniform had been passed, in the main, to those whose own apparel was beyond salvage. All soiled articles were tossed on to a growing pile on the deck. To be taken off the ship, Hawkwood assumed, and burned.

Next, canvas slippers were distributed. Neither Hawkwood nor Lasseur were deemed impoverished enough to warrant the gift of the shoes. Hawkwood noticed that both his and Lasseur’s footwear were attracting surreptitious attention from some of the less fortunate prisoners and he made a silent vow not to let his boots out of his sight.

A look of irritation moved across the registration clerk’s pinched face at Hawkwood’s lack of response. The lieutenant maintained his impression of boredom. The clerk flicked his finger imperiously and the man standing at his shoulder in the yellow uniform repeated the question in French.

“Hooper,” Hawkwood said. “Matthew.”

As Hawkwood gave his name, the clerk stiffened and frowned, while next to him the lieutenant’s head snapped round. His eyes darkened.

The clerk recovered his composure and turned his eyes to the grainy sheet of paper at his elbow. He ran the nib of his pen down the page and gave a small click of his tongue as he found the entry he was looking for. Hawkwood assumed it was the list of prisoners transferred from Maidstone and that the clerk was confirming his name.

The lieutenant peered over the clerk’s shoulder.

The clerk sneered. “Our first American. Not so independent now, are you?” He sniggered at his own wit.

The lieutenant viewed Hawkwood with undisguised hostility as the clerk began to transfer the details into the ledger, repeating the information under his breath as he did so. “Rank: captain; date of capture: 20th January; action in which taken: Ciudad Rodrigo; date of arrival: 27th May; application for parole under consideration; physical description …” The clerk raised his eyes again and murmured, “Height: approximately six feet; scarring on left side of face … surly-looking brute. Assigned to the gun deck. Next!”

After listening silently to the description and the comment, the lieutenant favoured Hawkwood with a final grimace of distaste before he turned away.

“Damned renegade,” Hawkwood heard him mutter under his breath.

The interpreter jerked his head for Hawkwood to move along. Behind him, he heard Lasseur give his name and the clerk’s litany began again.

At the next table the prisoners were presented with a rolled hammock, a threadbare blanket and a thin, wool-stuffed mattress.

Hawkwood studied the armed guards ringing the deck. Their escort had been composed of marines, seconded to the shore establishment, but neither the army nor the navy liked to assign regulars to the prison ships. True fighting men were needed abroad. This lot would be members of a local militia, specially recruited, Ludd had told him. He’d seen two of the guards exchange knowing grins as they stared at the boy’s milk-white buttocks during the enforced bathing. One of them had nudged the other and sniggered. “Wait till His Majesty gets a look at that!”

Hawkwood wondered what that meant.

The processing stretched over two hours. There were not that many new arrivals – three boatloads in all, perhaps forty men in total – but the ill-tempered admissions clerk seemed intent on proving how pedantic he could be. Slowly, however, the line of men began to shorten. Hawkwood was intrigued as to why they’d been herded into one half of the quarterdeck rather than escorted below. His question was answered as the last prisoner was handed his bedding.

A figure appeared at the rail of the deck above them. He was tall and raw-boned. His face was gaunt and pale. The white piping on his lapels proclaimed him to be another lieutenant, though he looked old to be holding the rank. Hands clasped behind his back, he gazed dispassionately at the crowd of men gathered beneath him. His eyes were very dark. Gradually, as the prisoners became aware that they were being observed, an uneasy silence descended upon the deck. Beneath his hat, the lieutenant’s eyes moved unblinkingly over the upturned faces. The clerk and the lieutenant at the table rose to their feet.

The gaunt lieutenant remained by the rail, his body incredibly still, as he continued to stare down. Not a word was uttered. Only the sound of the gulls wheeling high above the ship broke the stillness. Then, abruptly, after what seemed like minutes but could only have been twenty or thirty seconds, the lieutenant stepped back from the rail, turned abruptly, and, still not having spoken, returned from whence he came.

“Our brave commander,” Lasseur whispered. “Rumour has it he once captained a frigate, had a run-in with one of our eighties off Finisterre, and surrendered his ship. After they exchanged him, he was court-martialled.” Lasseur sucked in his cheeks. “Took to drink, I’m told.”

Hawkwood wondered where Lasseur had got his information. Some people had an uncanny knack of picking up all kinds of rumours. Though, in fact, Lasseur was only half right. The commander of the hulk, if that’s who the lieutenant had been, was named Hellard and he had indeed been demoted from captain. But it had been Funchal not Finisterre where the lieutenant’s fate had been sealed, and he had taken refuge in the bottle before the engagement, not following it. Hawkwood had been told the correct version by Ludd during his briefing; though it didn’t alter the fact that Hellard had been assigned to Rapacious as punishment. Furthermore Ludd had told Hawkwood that Hellard’s background was modest, which meant he’d been unable to call on a patron to rescue him from exile and set him back on the promotion ladder. Commanding this floating tomb was as high as Lieutenant Mortimer Hellard was ever going to get. And he knew it. It accounted for the stony countenance, Hawkwood thought. This was a man resigned to his fate, resenting it, and suffering because of it.

“Take them below, Sergeant Hook.” The order came from the lieutenant with the bitten fingernails. “And do something about those. They’re making the place look untidy.”

The lieutenant scowled at a pair of prisoners whose legs had given way. Hawkwood assumed they were the two who had been helped up the stairs by their fellow detainees. He wondered what had become of the men who’d been left in the longboat, and whether anyone had bothered to retrieve them. No one in authority on Rapacious seemed interested in taking a look. It was more than likely the boat was still drifting at the end of the line.

“Aye, sir.” The sergeant of the guard saluted lazily and turned to the prisoners. He nodded towards the stairway. “Right, you buggers, let’s be having you. Simmons, use your bayonet! Give that one at the back there a poke. Get the bastards moving! We ain’t got all bleedin’ day! Allez!”

Lasseur caught Hawkwood’s eye. The Frenchman’s smile had slipped from his face. It was as if the reality of the situation had finally sunk in. Hawkwood shouldered his bedding, remembering Lasseur’s earlier whispered comment. As he descended the stairs to the well deck it didn’t take him long to see that Lasseur had been mistaken. Hell would have been an improvement.

Hawkwood was no stranger to deprivation. It was all around him on London’s cramped and filthy streets. In the rookeries, like those of St Giles and Field Lane, poverty was a way of life. It could be seen in the way people dressed, in the looks on their faces and by the way they carried themselves. Hawkwood had also seen it in the eyes of soldiers, most notably in the aftermath of a defeat, and he was seeing the same despair and desperation now, carved into the faces of the men gathered on the deck of the prison hulk. It was the grey, lifeless expression of men who had lost all hope.

They ranged in age from calloused veterans to callow-eyed adolescents and they looked, with few exceptions Hawkwood thought, like the ranks of the walking dead. Most wore the yellow uniform, or what was left of it, for in many cases the prison garb looked to be as ragged as the clothing that had been stripped from the backs of the new arrivals. Many of the older men had the weathered look of seamen, though without the ruddy complexion. Instead, their faces were pallid, almost drained of colour.

Some prisoners huddled in small groups, others stood alone, if such a feat was possible given the number of wasted bodies that seemed to cover every available inch of space. Some of the men were stretched out on the deck, but whether they were sleeping or suffering from some malady, it was impossible to tell. The ones that remained upright gazed dully at the new arrivals being directed towards the hatch and the stairs leading into the bowels of the ship. Some of the men looked as though they hadn’t eaten for days.

“My God,” Lasseur gagged. “The smell.”

“Wait till you get below.”

The voice came from behind them. Hawkwood looked back over his shoulder and found himself eye to eye with the dark-haired interpreter from the weather-deck.

“Don’t worry; in a couple of days, you won’t notice. In a week, you’ll start to smell the same. The name’s Murat, by the way. And we call this area the Park. It’s our little joke.” The interpreter nodded towards the open hatch and the top of the ladder leading down. “You’d best get a move on. Squeeze through, find yourselves a space.”

“Murat?” Lasseur looked intrigued. “Any relation?”

The interpreter shrugged and gave a self-deprecatory grin. “A distant cousin on my mother’s side. I regret our closest association is in having once enjoyed the services of the same tailor. I –”

“How much do you want for your boots?”

Hawkwood felt a tug at his sleeve. One of the yellow-uniformed prisoners had taken hold of his arm. Hawkwood recoiled from the man’s rancid odour. “They’re not for sale.”

There were ragged holes in the elbows of the prisoner’s jacket and the knees of his trousers shone as if they had been newly waxed. His feet were stuffed into a pair of canvas slippers, though they were obviously too small for him as his heels overlapped the soles by at least an inch. Several boils had erupted across the back of his neck. His shirt collar was the colour of dried mud.

“Ten francs.” The grip on Hawkwood’s arm tightened.

Hawkwood looked down at the man’s fingers. “Let go or you’ll lose the arm.”

“Twenty.”

“Leave him be, Chavasse! He told you they’re not for sale.” Murat raised his hand. “In any case, they’re worth ten times that. Go and pester someone else.”

Hawkwood pulled his arm free. The prisoner backed away.

The interpreter turned to Hawkwood. “Keep hold of your belongings until you know your way around, otherwise you might not see them again. Come on, I’ll show you where to go.”

Murat pushed his way ahead of them and started down the almost vertical stairway. Hawkwood and Lasseur followed him. It was like descending into a poorly lit mineshaft. Three-quarters of the way down Hawkwood found he had to lean backwards to avoid cracking his skull on the overhead beam. He felt his spine groan as he did so. He heard Lasseur chuckle. The sound seemed ludicrously out of place.

“You’ll get used to that, too,” Murat said drily.

Hawkwood couldn’t see a thing. The sudden shift from daylight to near Stygian darkness was abrupt and alarming. If Murat hadn’t been wearing his yellow jacket, it would have been almost impossible to follow him in the dark. It was as if the sun had been snuffed out. Hawkwood paused and waited for his eyes to adjust.

“Keep moving!” The order came from behind.

“That way,” Murat said, and pointed. “And watch your head.”

The warning was unnecessary. Hawkwood’s neck was already cricked. The height from the deck to the underside of the main beams couldn’t have been much more than five and a half feet.

Murat said, “It’s easy to tell you’re a soldier not a seaman, Captain. You don’t have the gait, but, like I said, you’ll get used to it.”

Ahead of him, Hawkwood could see vague, hump-backed shapes moving. They looked more troglodyte than human. And the smell was far worse down below; a mixture of sweat and piss. Hawkwood tried breathing through his mouth but discovered it didn’t make a great deal of difference. He moved forward cautiously. Gradually, the ill-defined creatures began to take on form. He could pick out squares of light on either side, too, and recognized it as daylight filtering in through the grilles in the open ports.

“This is it,” Murat said. “The gun deck.”

God in heaven, Hawkwood thought.

He could tell by the grey, watery light the deck was about forty feet in width. As to the length, he could only hazard a guess, for he could barely make out the ends. Both fore and aft, they simply disappeared into the blackness. It was more like being in a cellar than a ship’s hull. The area in which they were standing was too far from the grilles for the sunlight to penetrate fully but he could just see that benches ran down the middle as well as along the sides. All of them looked to be occupied. Most of the floor was taken up by bodies as well. Despite the lack of illumination, several of the men were engaged in labour. Some were knitting, others were fashioning hats out of what looked like lengths of straw. A number were carving shanks of bone into small figurines that Hawkwood guessed were probably chess pieces. He wondered how anyone could see what they were doing. The sense of claustrophobia was almost overpowering.

He saw there were lanterns strung on hooks along the bulkhead, but they were unlit.

“We try and conserve the candles,” Murat explained. “Besides, they don’t burn too well down here; too many bodies, not enough air.”

For a moment, Hawkwood thought the interpreter was joking, but then he saw that Murat was serious.

There was just sufficient light for Hawkwood to locate the hooks and cleats in the beams from which to hang the hammocks. Many of the hooks had objects suspended from them; not hammocks but sacks, and items of clothing. They looked like huge seedpods hanging down.

Murat followed his gaze. “The long-termers get used to a particular spot. They mark their territory. You can take any hook that’s free. Hammocks are slung above and below, so there’ll be room for both of you. Best thing is for you to put yours up now. The rest are on the foredeck; they’re taken up there every morning and stowed. When they’re brought back down you won’t be able to move. You’ve got about six feet each. Come night time there are more than four hundred of us crammed in here. You’re new so you don’t get to pick. When you’ve been here a while you might get a permanent place by the grilles.”

“How long have you been here?” Hawkwood asked.

“Two years.”

“And how close are you to the grilles?”

Murat smiled.

“What if we want a place by the grilles now?” Lasseur said. His meaning was clear.

Four hundred? Hawkwood thought.

“It’ll cost you,” Murat said, without a pause. He read Hawkwood’s mind. “Think yourself lucky. You could have been assigned the orlop. There are four hundred and fifty of them down there, and it isn’t half as roomy as this.”

“How much?” Lasseur asked.

“For two louis, I can get you space by the gun ports. For ten, I can get you a bunk in the commander’s cabin.”

“Just the gun port,” Lasseur said. “Maybe I’ll talk to the commander later.”

Murat squinted at Hawkwood. “What about you?”

“How much in English money?”

“Cost you two pounds.” The interpreter eyed them both. “Cash, not credit.”

Hawkwood nodded.

“Wait here,” Murat said, and he was gone.

Lasseur stared around him. “I boarded a slaver once, off Mauritius. It turned my stomach. This might be worse.”

Hawkwood was quite prepared to believe him.

Lasseur was the captain of a privateer. The French had used privateers for centuries. Financed by private enterprise, they’d been one of the few ways Bonaparte had been able to counteract the restrictions placed upon him by the British blockade. But their numbers had declined considerably over the past few years due to Britain’s increased dominance of the waves in the aftermath of Trafalgar.

Getting close to Lasseur had been Ludd’s idea, though the initial strategy had been Hawkwood’s.

“I need an edge,” he’d told James Read and Ludd. “I go in there asking awkward questions from the start and I’m going to end up like your man Masterson. The way to avoid that is to hide in someone else’s shadow. I need to make an alliance with a genuine prisoner, someone who’ll do the running for me so that I can slip in on his coat-tails. You said you’re sending me to Maidstone. Find me someone there I can use.”

Ludd had met with Hawkwood the day prior to his arrival at the gaol.

“I think I have your man,” Ludd told him. “Name of Lasseur. He was taken following a skirmish with a British patrol off the Cap Gris-Nez. The impudent bugger tried to jump ship twice following his capture; even had the temerity to make a dash for freedom during his transfer from Ramsgate. If anyone’s going to be looking for an escape route, it’ll be Lasseur; you can count on it. He’s made a boast that no English prison will be able to hold him. Get close to him and my guess is you’re halfway home already.”

The introduction had been manufactured in the prison yard.

Lasseur had been by himself, back against the wall, enjoying the morning sun, an unlit cheroot clamped between his teeth, when the two guards made their move. The plan would never have been awarded marks for subtlety. One guard snatched the cheroot from between Lasseur’s lips. When the Frenchman protested, the second guard slammed his baton into Lasseur’s belly and a knee into his groin. As Lasseur dropped to the ground, covering his head, the guards waded in with their boots.

A cry of anger went up from the other prisoners, but it was Hawkwood who got there first. He pulled the first guard off Lasseur by his belt and the scruff of his neck. As his companion was hauled back, the second guard turned, baton raised, and Hawkwood slammed the heel of his boot against the guard’s exposed knee. He pulled his kick at the moment of contact, but the strike was still hard enough to make the guard reel away with a howl of pain.

By this time, the first guard had recovered his balance. With a snarl, he swung his baton towards Hawkwood’s head. But the guard had forgotten Lasseur. The privateer was back on his feet. As the baton looped through the air, Lasseur caught the guard’s wrist, twisted the baton out of his grip, and slammed an elbow into the guard’s belly.

Shouts rang out as other guards, wrongfooted by the swiftness of Hawkwood’s intervention, came running. It had taken four of them to subdue Hawkwood and Lasseur and march them off into a cell.

The clang of the door and the rasp of the key turning in the lock had seemed as final as a coffin lid closing.

Lasseur’s first action as soon as the door shut was to take another cheroot from his jacket, put it between his lips and ask Hawkwood if he had a means by which to light it. Hawkwood had been unable to assist. Whereupon Lasseur had shrugged philosophically, placed the cheroot back in his jacket, extended his hand and said, “Captain Paul Lasseur, at your service.” Then he’d grinned and touched his ribs tentatively. “I suppose it was one way of getting a cell to ourselves.”

Hawkwood hadn’t thought it would be that easy.

Lasseur had managed to maintain the devil-may-care façade up to the moment he’d seen the men in the longboat being cast adrift from the hulk’s side.

Around them, the other fresh arrivals assigned to the gun deck were also looking for places to bed down. The invasion of their living quarters had caused most of the established prisoners to pause in their tasks to take stock of the new blood. The mood, however, seemed strangely subdued. Hawkwood wondered if the original prisoners resented this further reduction of what was already a barely adequate living space.

Among the new batch was the boy. He was standing alone, weighed down by his hammock, mattress and blanket, utterly bewildered by the activity going on around him; though he was one of the lucky ones in as much as he did not have to amend his posture in order to move about inside the hull. He looked like a small boat tossed by waves as he was turned this way and that by the men brushing past him, mindless of his size.

The boy turned. One of the other prisoners, a slight, weak-chinned, effete-looking man with a widow’s peak of thinning hair – a long-standing resident of the hulk if the decrepit state of his yellow uniform was any indication – was crouched down with his right hand on the boy’s shoulder.

Hawkwood watched as a look of doubt crept over the boy’s face. The boy shook his head. The man spoke again, his expression solicitous. The boy tried to squirm away from the man’s touch, but the latter took hold of his jacket sleeve. The hand on the boy’s shoulder slid down and began to make gentle circular movements in the small of the boy’s back. The boy looked petrified. Hawkwood took a step forward.

“No,” Lasseur said softly, “I’ll deal with it.”

Hawkwood watched as Lasseur ducked beneath the beams and the hanging sacks. He saw the privateer place his hand on the man’s shoulder, lean in close and speak softly into his ear. The man said something back. Lasseur spoke again and the man’s smile slipped. Then he was holding his hands up and backing away. Lasseur did not touch the boy but squatted down and spoke to him.

A voice in Hawkwood’s ear said, “Right, it’s all arranged; a room with a view for both of you.” Murat looked around. “Where’s your friend?”

“Here,” Lasseur said. He was standing behind them. The boy stood at his side, clutching his bedding. “This is Lucien. Lucien, say hello to Captain Hooper and our interpreter, Lieutenant … my apologies, I didn’t catch your given name.”

“Auguste,” Murat said.

“Lieutenant Auguste Murat,” Lasseur finished. He fixed Murat with an uncompromising eye. “I want space for the boy as well.”

Murat’s eyebrows rose. He shook his head. “I regret that’s not possible.”

“Make it possible,” Lasseur said.

“There’s no room, Captain,” Murat protested.

“There’s always room,” Lasseur said.

Murat looked momentarily taken aback by Lasseur’s abrasive tone. He stared down at the boy, took in the small, pale features and then threw Lasseur a calculating look. “It could be expensive.”

“You do surprise me,” Lasseur said.

Murat’s brow wrinkled, unsure how to respond to Lasseur’s barb, before it occurred to him it was probably best to tell them to wait once more and that he would return.

Hawkwood and Lasseur watched him go.

“I have a son,” Lasseur said. He did not elaborate but looked down. “How old are you, boy?”

The boy gripped his bedding. In a wavering voice, he said, “Ten, sir.”

“Are you now? Well, stick with us and you might just make it to eleven.”

Murat reappeared and, unsmiling, crooked a finger. “Come with me.”

Stepping around and over bodies, heads bent, the two men and the boy followed the interpreter towards the starboard side of the deck.

“You’re in luck –” Murat spoke over his shoulder “– another place has become vacant. The former owner doesn’t need it any more.”

“That’s fortunate,” Lasseur said. He caught Hawkwood’s eye and winked. “And why’s that?”

“He died.”

Lasseur halted in his tracks.

Murat held up his hands. “Natural causes, Captain, on my mother’s life.”

Lasseur looked sceptical.

“From the fever. They say it’s due to the air coming off the marshes.” Murat jabbed a thumb towards the open grilles. “It’s the same both sides of the river. It’s what most men die of, that and consumption. That’s the way it happens on the hulks. You rot from the inside out.”

Hawkwood noticed that the prisoners near the gun ports were making use of the light to read or write, using the bench along the side of the hull as a makeshift table. Some were conversing with their companions while they wrote. As he passed, Hawkwood realized they were conducting classes. He looked over a hunched shoulder and guessed by the illustrations and indecipherable script that the subject was probably mathematics.

“It’s best to try and keep busy,” Murat said, interrupting Hawkwood’s observations. “You’ll lose your mind, otherwise. Many men have.” The lieutenant pointed. “Here you are, gentlemen. Welcome to your new home.”

Compared to where they’d just come from, it was the height of luxury. Hawkwood wondered how Murat had persuaded the previous incumbents to relinquish such a valuable location. It didn’t seem possible that anyone would want to do so voluntarily. Maybe they were dead, too.

They weren’t, Murat assured them. “It’s just that they prefer food to a view. You’d feel that way, too, if you hadn’t had a square meal for a week,” Murat added, pocketing his fee. “You’ll learn that soon enough. If I were you, I’d guard my purse. Don’t indulge in fripperies. The price you’ve just paid for your sleeping spot will buy three weeks’ rations. Not that they give us anything worth eating, mind you. There are some who’d say death from the fever would be a merciful release. If you want to make a bit of money, by the way, you can rent out your part of the bench.”

“I knew I could count on you,” Lasseur said. “I had this feeling in my bones.”

The interpreter permitted himself a small smile. His teeth were surprisingly even, though in the gloom they were the colour of damp parchment. “Thank you, Captain. And might I say it’s been a pleasure doing business with you.”

Murat turned. “And the same goes for you, Captain Hooper. It’s a pleasure to meet an American. I’ve long been an admirer of your country. Now, if there’s anything else you require, don’t hesitate to ask. You’ll find I’m the man to do business with. You want to buy, come to Murat. You have something to sell, come to Murat. My terms are very favourable, as you’ll see.”

“You’re a credit to free enterprise, Lieutenant,” Lasseur said.

Murat volunteered a full-blown conspiratorial grin. “You’re going to fit right in here, Captain.” The interpreter gave a mock salute. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, gentlemen.” And with that, he turned on his heel, and walked off. To hand the money on, Hawkwood assumed, minus his commission, of course.

“I do believe we’ve just been robbed,” Lasseur said cheerfully, and then shrugged. “But it was neatly done. I can see we’re going to have to keep our eyes on Lieutenant Murat. Did you ever have any dealings with his cousin?”

Hawkwood shook his head and said wryly, “Can’t say I’m likely to, either, considering I’m an American and he’s the King of Naples.”

“I keep forgetting: your French is very good. Murat’s cousin served in Spain, though.”

“I know,” Hawkwood said. “And your army has been trying to clean up his damned mess ever since.”

Lasseur looked taken aback by Hawkwood’s rejoinder. Then he nodded in understanding. “Ah, yes, the uprising.”

It had been back in ’08. In response to Bonaparte’s kidnapping of the Spanish royal family in an attempt to make Spain a French satellite, the Spanish had attacked the French garrison in Madrid. Retaliation, by troops under the command of the flamboyant Joachim Murat, had been swift and brutal and had led to a nationwide insurrection against the invaders, which had continued, with the assistance of the British, ever since.

Lasseur gave a sigh. “Kings and generals have much to answer for.”

“Presidents and emperors, too,” Hawkwood said.

Lasseur chuckled.

The boy moved to the port and stared through the grille.

Hawkwood did the same. Over the boy’s shoulder he could see ships floating at anchor and beyond them the flat, featureless shoreline and, further off, some anonymous buildings with blue-grey rooftops. He heard the steady tread of boot heel on metal. He’d forgotten the walkway. It was just outside the scuttles. He waited until the guard’s shadow had passed then gripped the grille and tried to shake it. There was no movement. The crossbars were two inches thick and rock solid.

“Well, I doubt we’ll be able to cut our way out,” Lasseur said, running an exploratory hand over the metal.

“Planning on making a run for it?” Hawkwood asked.

“Why do you think I would never ask for parole?” Lasseur said. “You wouldn’t want me to break my word, would you?” The Frenchman grinned and, for a moment, there was a flash of the man who had arrived in the gaol cell at Maidstone looking for a means to light his cheroot. He regarded Hawkwood speculatively.

“I’m still considering my options,” Hawkwood said.

Lasseur smiled.

The irony was that Lasseur wouldn’t have been entitled to parole anyway, even if he hadn’t already proved he was a potential escape risk by virtue of his earlier breaks for freedom.

There were stringent rules governing the granting of parole, which entitled an officer to live outside the prison to which he’d been assigned. It meant securing accommodation in a designated parole town, sometimes taking a room with a local family or, if possessed of sufficient funds, within a lodging house or inn. In return, the officer gave his word he would not break his curfew but would remain within the town limits and make no attempt to escape. The penalty for transgressing, if apprehended, was a swift return to a prison cell.

The rules were stricter for men like Lasseur. A privateer officer’s eligibility for parole status depended upon the size of the vessel in which he’d been taken. If the ship was less than 80 tons and mounting less than fourteen carriage guns of at least four-pound calibre, he would not be accorded parole status. Lasseur’s command, at 125 tons and mounted with six-pound cannon, qualified, but unfortunately for the privateer he had not been captured on his own vessel.

Lasseur’s ship, Scorpion, was a ten-gun schooner and his eyes lit up whenever he spoke of her.

“She may not be the biggest vessel afloat, but she’s as fast as the wind and her sting is deadly, and she’s all mine.” Lasseur had given a rueful smile. “And if I’d had her beneath my feet, we’d not be having this conversation.”

Scorpion had been laid up in Dunkerque for repairs following a difference of opinion with a British fifth-rate on blockade patrol. On that occasion Scorpion had not been fast enough to avoid the British gun crew’s aim, but with the aid of a convenient fog bank she had managed to give her pursuer the slip and make a successful run for home. While awaiting repairs, Lasseur had been talked into delivering dispatches between ports along the North French coast. His transport had been a two-masted caique or – as Lasseur had described it – a floating piece of excrement, and no match for the British sloop that had appeared out of nowhere and which, with a twelve-pounder carronade, had blown the caique’s main mast and rudder into matchwood and taken her crew and temporary captain captive. Lasseur had told Hawkwood that he didn’t know which would prove the most embarrassing experience, his capture or the ribbing he’d receive when he was reunited with Scorpion’s crew: “They will make my life intolerable.”

When Hawkwood hinted that any reunion was liable to be some way off, Lasseur had fixed him with a steadfast gaze. “They know I’m a prisoner. When I escape, I will send word and they will come for me.”

Recalling Lasseur’s words and watching him test the strength of the bars, it was hard not to admire the man’s faith, though Hawkwood still couldn’t help but feel that the privateer captain was being a tad over-optimistic. He wondered whether Lasseur, confronted with the reality of his incarceration, was secretly harbouring the same thought. If he was, the man gave no sign.

Hawkwood’s musings were interrupted by a sudden warning shout, followed immediately by the clatter of boots on the stairs. The prisoners seated around the gun ports scrambled to put away their paper and pens. Standing up, they moved towards the centre of the hull. Not knowing why, Hawkwood, Lasseur and the boy followed suit and watched as a dozen guards wielding lanterns and iron bars, led by a bovine corporal, thrust their way on to the deck.

4

“Here they come,” a man next to Hawkwood muttered. “Sons of bitches!”

“What’s happening?” Hawkwood asked.

The prisoner turned. His uniform hung off his bony frame. His hair was grey. A neat beard concealed his jaw. The state of his attire and the colour of his hair suggested he was not a young man, yet there was a brightness in his eyes that seemed out of kilter with the rest of his drawn appearance. He could have been any age from forty to seventy. He was clutching several books and sheets of paper.

“Inspection.” The prisoner looked Hawkwood up and down. “Just arrived?”

Hawkwood nodded.

“Thought so. I could tell by your clothes. The name’s Fouchet.” The prisoner juggled with his books and held out a hand. “Sébastien Fouchet.”

“Hooper,” Hawkwood said. He wondered how much pressure to apply to the handshake, but then found he was surprised by the strength in the returned grip.

Fouchet nodded sagely. “Ah, yes, the American. I heard we had one on board. You speak French very well, Captain.”

Jesus, Hawkwood thought. He didn’t recall seeing Fouchet in the vicinity of the weather-deck when his name had been registered. Word had got round fast.

“How often does this happen?” Hawkwood asked.

“Every day. Six o’clock in the summer, three o’clock in the winter.”

The guards proceeded to spread about the deck. There was no provision made for anyone seated on the floor, nor for the items upon which they might have been working. Hawkwood watched as boot heels crunched down on to ungathered chess pieces, toys and model ships. Ignoring the protestations of those prisoners who were still trying to retrieve their belongings, the guards proceeded to tap the bulkheads and floor with the iron clubs. When they got to the gun ports they paid close attention to the grilles. The deck resounded to the sound of metal striking metal. Hawkwood wondered how much of the guards’ loutish behaviour was for effect rather than a comprehensive search for damage or evidence of an escape attempt. Not that the strategy was particularly innovative. It was a tried-and-tested means of imposing authority and cowing an opponent into submission.

Satisfied no obvious breaches had been made in the hulk’s defences, the guards retraced their steps. Peace returned to the gun deck and conversation resumed.

“Bastards,” Fouchet swore softly. He nodded towards Lasseur and then squinted at the boy. “And who do we have here?”

Hawkwood made the introductions.

“There are other boys on board,” Fouchet said. “You should meet them. We’ve created quite an academy for ourselves below decks. We cover a wide range of subjects. I give lessons in geography and geometry.” Fouchet indicated the books he was holding. “If you’d like to attend my classes I will introduce you. It is not good for a child to while away his day in idle pursuits. Young minds should be cultivated at every opportunity. What do you say?” Fouchet gave the boy no chance to reply but continued: “Excellent, then it’s agreed. Lessons will commence tomorrow morning, at nine o’clock sharp, by the third gun port on the starboard side. Adults are welcome to attend too. For them, the charge is a sou a lesson.” He pointed down the hull and turned to go.

Lasseur placed a restraining hand on the teacher’s arm. “Did you see what happened to the men in the boat?”

The teacher frowned. “Which boat?”

“The one before ours; the one left to drift. The men were too weak to board.”

“Ah, yes.” The teacher’s face softened. “I hear they were taken on board the Sussex.”

“Sussex?”

“The hospital ship. She’s the one at the head of the line.” Fouchet pointed in the direction of the bow.

Lasseur let go of the teacher’s arm. “Thank you, my friend.”

“My pleasure. There’ll be another inspection in an hour, by the way, to count heads, so it wouldn’t do to get too comfortable. I’ll look out for you at supper. I can show you the ropes. In return, you can tell me the news from outside. It will help deflect our minds from the quality of the repast. What’s today, Friday? That means cod. I warn you it will be inedible. Not that it makes any difference what day it is; the food’s always inedible.” The teacher smiled and gave a short, almost formal bow. “Gentlemen.”

Hawkwood and Lasseur watched Fouchet depart. His gait was slow and awkward, and there was a pronounced stiffness in his right leg.

“Cod,” Lasseur repeated miserably, closing his eyes. “Mother of Christ!”

The next contingent of guards did not use iron bars. Instead, they used muskets and fixed bayonets to corral the prisoners on to the upper deck. From there they were made to return to the lower deck and counted on their way down. The lieutenant who had overseen the registration was in charge. His name, Hawkwood discovered, was Thynne.

The count was a protracted affair. By the time it was completed to the lieutenant’s satisfaction, shadows were lengthening and spreading across the deck like a black tide. In the dim light, the prisoners made their way to the forecastle to queue for their supper rations.

The food was as unappetizing as Fouchet had predicted. The prisoners were divided into messes, six prisoners to a mess. Their rations were distributed from the wooden, smoke-stained shack on the forecastle. Sentries stood guard as a representative from each mess collected bread, uncooked potatoes and fish from an orderly in the shack. The food was then taken to cauldrons to be boiled by those prisoners who’d been nominated for kitchen duty. Each mess then received its allocation. Fouchet was the representative for Hawkwood’s mess.

Lasseur stared down at the contents of his mess tin. “Even Frenchmen can’t make anything of this swill.” He nudged a lump of potato with his wooden spoon. “I shall die of starvation.”

“I doubt you’ll die alone,” Hawkwood said.

“It could be worse,” Fouchet said morosely. “It could be a Wednesday.”

“What happens on Wednesdays?” Lasseur asked, hesitantly and instantly suspicious.

“Tell him, Millet.” Fouchet nudged the man seated next to him, a sad-eyed, sunken-chested seaman whose liver-spotted forearms were adorned with tattooed sea serpents.

The seaman scooped up a portion of cod and eyed the morsel with suspicion. “We get salted herring.” Millet shovelled the piece of fish into his mouth and chewed noisily. He didn’t have many teeth left, Hawkwood saw. The few that remained were little more than grey stumps. Hawkwood suspected he was looking at a man suffering from advancing scurvy. Hardly surprising, given the diet the men were describing.

Lasseur regarded the man with horror.

“We usually sell them back to the contractor.” The speaker was seated next to Millet at the end of the table. He was a cadaverous individual with deep-set brown eyes, a hooked nose, and a lot of pale flesh showing through the holes in his prison clothes. “He gives us two sous. The following week, he returns the herring to us so that we can sell them back to him again. Most of us use the money to buy extra rations like cheese or butter. It helps take the taste of the bread away.”

Lasseur picked up a piece of dry crust. “Call this bread? This stuff would make good round shot. If we’d had this at Trafalgar, things would have been different.”

“What do you think the British were using?” Fouchet said. He lifted his piece of bread and rapped it on the table top. It sounded like someone striking a block of wood with a hammer. He winked at the boy, who up to that moment had been trying, without success, to carve a potato with the edge of his spoon. “Give it here,” Fouchet said, and solved the problem by mashing the offending vegetable under his own utensil. He handed the bowl back and the boy smiled nervously and resumed eating. He was the only one at the table not to have passed comment on the food.

“Do they ever give us meat?” Hawkwood asked.

“Every day except Wednesdays and Fridays,” Millet said, with a marked lack of enthusiasm. “Don’t ask what sort of meat it is, though. The contractors keep telling us it’s beef, but who knows? Could be anything from pork to porcupine.”

Fouchet shook his head. “It’s not porcupine. Had that once; it was quite tasty.”

Lasseur chuckled. “How long have you been here, my friend?”

Fouchet wrinkled his brow. “What year is it?”

Lasseur’s jaw fell open.

“I’m joking,” Fouchet said. He stroked his beard and added, “Three years here. Before this I was on the Suffolk off Portsmouth.” He jabbed a finger at the tall, hook-nosed prisoner. “Charbonneau’s been held the longest. How long has it been, Philippe?”

Charbonneau pursed his lips. “Seven years come September.”

Seven years, Hawkwood thought. The table fell quiet as the men considered the length of Charbonneau’s internment and all that it implied.

“Anyone ever get away?” Hawkwood asked nonchalantly. He exchanged a glance with Lasseur as he said it.

“Escape?” Fouchet appeared to ponder the question, as if no one had asked it before. Finally, he shrugged. “A few. Most don’t get very far. They’re brought back and punished.”

“Punished how?” Hawkwood pressed.

“They get put in the hole,” Millet said, removing a fish bone from between his teeth and flicking it over his shoulder.

Hawkwood scraped his lump of cod to the side of his mess tin. “Hole?”

“The black hole.” Millet’s tone implied that he could only have meant the one hole and Hawkwood should have known that.

Fouchet laid down his spoon. “It’s a special punishment cell; makes the gun deck look like the gardens at Versailles.”

Across the table, Lasseur considered the description. He stared hard at Fouchet and said, “What about the ones who got away, how did they do it?”

Fouchet shrugged. “You’d have to find them and ask them.”

“You don’t know?” Lasseur said.

“Sometimes it pays not to ask too many questions.”

“You’ve never considered it?”

The teacher shook his head. “It’s a young man’s game. I don’t have the energy. Besides, the war won’t last for ever.”

“The Lord loves an optimist,” Charbonneau muttered, scratching the inside of his groin energetically.

Lasseur pushed his tin to one side. “I have to ask, Sébastien: how, in the name of the blessed Virgin, did someone like you end up in a place like this?”

Fouchet smiled, almost sadly. “Ah, if you only knew how many times I’ve asked myself that very same question.”

“You going to eat that?” Millet sniffed, indicating the remains of Lasseur’s fish.

Lasseur gave him a look as if to say, What do you think? He then watched, fascinated, as the seaman reached over and, with grubby fingers, helped himself from the tin.

“I committed an indiscretion,” Fouchet said. “I was a professor of mathematics at the university in Toulouse and I had a liaison with the wife of one of my colleagues. He did not take kindly to the title of cuckold and insisted on calling me out. Unfortunately for him, I proved the better shot. His friends took it rather personally. They had influence, I did not. I lost my position, along with what little that remained of my reputation. When I applied for alternative teaching posts, I found doors were shut in my face. I sought solace in the grape; a panacea not exactly conducive to the furtherance of one’s career. That would have been the end of it, had it not been for a miracle.”

“What happened?”

A rueful smile split Fouchet’s creased face. “I was conscripted.”

The grins began to circulate around the table until Millet, who started to laugh, forgot he was still trying to digest Lasseur’s discarded cod. He was turning red when Charbonneau slapped a palm between his shoulder blades, bringing him back to the vertical and the rest of the table to their senses and reality.

Hawkwood guessed Fouchet’s situation wasn’t unique. The latter’s reference to the hulk’s self-founded academy and the standard of workmanship he’d observed looking over prisoners’ shoulders as he’d traversed the gun deck was proof of that. It was one of the notable differences between the British and French forces. Whereas Britain swelled the ranks with volunteers – which in many cases meant felons and homeless men looking for a roof and a meal – Bonaparte’s troops contained a large portion of conscripted men from all walks of life. In all likelihood, there were probably as many skilled craftsmen and teachers among the mass of prisoners on board Rapacious as there were in any of the small towns lining the shores of the surrounding estuary.

“I see you favour your right leg,” Lasseur said. “You were wounded?”

Fouchet smiled. “Musket ball; just below my knee.” He tapped the joint. “It’s the devil in cold weather; doesn’t work too well in the damp either.”

The teacher turned to Hawkwood. “So, Captain Hooper; what’s your story? How did you come to be captured?”

“There were more of them than there was of me,” Hawkwood said.

Fouchet smiled. “I believe I overheard Murat say it was at Ciudad Rodrigo?”

Hawkwood nodded.

“That’s a long way from home. What was an American doing there?”

The question Hawkwood had been expecting and of which he was most wary.

“Shooting British soldiers; officers mostly.”

“Why?”

“Your Emperor was paying me.”

Fouchet smiled. “I meant why you?”

“I’m a sharpshooter: First Regiment of United States Riflemen. I thought you might need my help.”

“Cheeky bastard,” Charbonneau said. “What makes you think France needs your help?”

Millet rolled his eyes. “Look around, idiot.”

Construct a biography based on your own expertise, James Read had told him. An officer from the Regiment of Riflemen had been the obvious choice. The American equivalent of Hawkwood’s former regiment, the Rifle Corps, used the same methods as its British counterpart, combining the tactics of the Light Infantry and, in the case of the Americans, native Indians, to harass and disrupt enemy movements. The first into the field and the last to leave.

“Heard that was a fearsome fight,” Millet said.

Fouchet frowned. “The siege took two weeks, I think I read.”

“Twelve days,” Hawkwood said. “Might as well have tried to stop the tide. How do you mean, read?”

“It was in the newspapers. They’re forbidden, but we manage to smuggle them in. Costs us a fortune. A few of us understand some English, but it’s usually Murat who translates. Not that we believe everything that’s in them, of course. You were wounded?” The teacher indicated Hawkwood’s facial scars.

“One of their riflemen took a stab at me with his bayonet.”

“You were lucky. You could have lost the eye.”

“He was upset.” Hawkwood shrugged. “We’d killed a lot of his comrades. Our cannon blew them to pieces. It didn’t stop them coming at us, though.”

“What happened to the rifleman?” Charbonneau asked.

“I killed him,” Hawkwood said. “He died, I lived. We surrendered. The British won.”

Hawkwood’s manufactured account wasn’t too far from truth. He’d read the dispatches. The Rifles had been in the thick of the action, providing covering fire for the Forlorn Hope, the forward troops leading the assault on the walls. The breach had been nearly a hundred feet wide, a huge target for the French gunners who’d launched a hail of grapeshot on to the attackers. It was only after the cannons had been destroyed and a French magazine had blown up that the British had managed to finally take the town. That much had been covered in the newspapers, but only the dispatches covered the aftermath, with accounts of how British soldiers, incensed by the slaughter of so many of their comrades, had gone on a drunken rampage. To prevent a massacre, officers had been forced to draw their swords on their own men. To add to his woes, Wellington had lost two of his best generals: Mackinnon of the 3rd Division and the Light Brigade’s Black Bob Crauford, under whom Hawkwood had served on a number of engagements.

“Bastards,” Millet muttered. “Goddamned bastards!”

The occupants of the table fell into a sombre silence.

Charbonneau broke the spell. “What about you?” he asked Lasseur.

Lasseur launched into a humorous account of his capture and imprisonment. It wasn’t long before his audience was smiling again, by which time supper was almost over. The messes began to break apart as the prisoners retrieved their hammocks from the foredeck and took them down to their allotted spaces below.

The boy had fallen asleep at the table, head across his folded arms.

“What’s his story?” Fouchet asked, as Millet and Charbonneau left to reclaim their aired bedding.

Lasseur shook his head. “He hasn’t said much. My guess is he got separated from the rest of his crew. So far, all he’s given me is his name.”

Fouchet nodded his understanding. “I suspect he’ll be all right once he’s with someone his own age. I’ll have a word with the other boys. Perhaps he’ll talk to them. In the meantime, it would be in his best interest if you kept a watch on him.”

The quiet note of warning in the teacher’s voice caused Lasseur to pause as he got up from the table. “That sounds ominous. Something you’re not telling us?”

“The boy’s young, small for his age, an innocent from what you’ve told me and from what I’ve observed. He’s also far from home and therefore doubly vulnerable. It should come as no surprise to you that there are those on board who would be likely to take advantage of his situation.”

Lasseur sat back down. “How likely?”

Fouchet smiled sadly. “My friend, there are over nine hundred men on this ship. More than eight hundred of them are imprisoned as much by inactivity as they are by these wooden walls. I suspect you already know the answer to your question.” The teacher picked up his tin and utensils and rose stiffly from his seat.

From the look on Lasseur’s face Hawkwood knew the privateer captain was remembering his exchange with the balding man on the gun deck. Lasseur stared down at the sleeping boy. His face was as hard as stone. “I’ll bear that in mind,” he said.

It wasn’t the first time Hawkwood had experienced the restraints of a hammock. There was a definite art to clambering into the sling, but it was a case of once mastered, never forgotten. As a soldier, he’d grown used to bivouacking in uncomfortable surroundings, be it barn, bush or battlefield. On the march, you took advantage of sleep and sustenance when and where you could, because you never knew when the opportunity would arise again. A hammock was the epitome of comfort compared to some of the places he’d had to rest his weary head.

He lay back and listened to the emanations of the four hundred souls hemmed in around him. The sounds varied widely in content and tone, from the drawn-out cries of the distressed and the wheezing of the consumptives to the groans of the dysentery sufferers and the weeping of the lonely and dispossessed. When added to the chorus of swearing, hawking, spitting, farting, coughing and general expectorations common to the male species, they formed a discordant backdrop to the physical deprivations endured by men held in mass confinement and against their will.

The human sounds began to fade as the hulk’s inhabitants fell under the spell of night. In the darkness, however, the ship continued to express her own displeasure. A continuous cacophony of groans and creaks from the vessel’s ancient timbers filled the inside of the hull. It was as if Rapacious was venting her irritation at the presence of those trapped aboard her. The pull of the tide and the sound of the wash against her sides seemed magnified a thousand-fold, as did the hypnotic slap of rope and line against her cut-down masts and yards.

Mercifully, her gun ports remained propped open, for these were the only means of ventilation. Even so, it was unbearably warm. The squeak of hammock ring against hook and cleat was a grating accompaniment to the noisy tossing and turning of the gun deck’s restless residents as they sought relief from their sweltering discomfort.

Even if there had been silence within the hull, the rhythmic step of the sentries along the metal gantry outside and their monotonous half-hourly announcements that all was well was a salutary reminder that the will of every man on board, be he prisoner or guard, was no longer his own to command.

A sniffle sounded close by. It was the boy. He was lying on his back, blanket pushed down over his lower legs. His right arm rested across his face as if to ward off a blow. As Hawkwood watched, the boy turned his head, the movement revealing his right eye and lower jaw.

At that moment, a scream rose out of the darkness. It seemed to hang in the air for two or three seconds before ceasing abruptly. Hawkwood knew it had originated not on the gun deck but somewhere below, deep within the bowels of the ship. There was little or no reaction from either the sentries outside or the occupants of the surrounding hammocks, save for one: the boy. Moonlight from the open gun port highlighted a pale segment of cheek, skin tight over the bone. The boy’s eye was a white orb in the darkness. He stared wildly at Hawkwood for several seconds, terror written on his face, then his throat convulsed and he turned away, pulled the blanket over himself, and the contact was lost.

The scream was not repeated. A small, rounded shadow appeared at the grille. A rat was squatting on the sill, preening. As if suddenly aware that it was being observed, it paused in its ablutions and lifted its head. Then, with a flash of pelt and a flick of tail, it was gone.

Hawkwood closed his eyes. It was interesting, he thought, that the rat, when startled, had chosen to exit the hull rather than seek sanctuary within it.

Perhaps it was another omen.

5

Hawkwood stood at the rail of the forecastle and gazed down at his new world. The view was less than impressive.

Aside from the two accommodation decks, the only other areas on the ship where prisoners were permitted to gather were the forecastle and the well deck, the space referred to euphemistically by the interpreter Murat as “the Park”. Lasseur had taken it upon himself to pace out the Park’s circumference. The survey did not take long. It was a little over fifty feet long by forty feet in width. It didn’t need many prisoners to be taking the air to make the deck seem overcrowded. It explained why so many men chose to remain below decks. With space at a premium, they didn’t have much choice.

Bulkheads at the forward and aft ends of the ship separated the prisoners’ quarters from those of the ship’s personnel. The militia guards occupied the bow. The hulk’s commander and the rest of the crew were accommodated in the stern. At first sight, the bulkheads appeared to be made of solid iron. On closer inspection, Hawkwood discovered they were constructed from thick planking studded with thousands of large-headed nails. Loopholes had been cut into the metal-shod walls at regular intervals to allow the guards on the other side of the partition to fire into the enclosed deck in the event of misbehaviour or riot. They resembled the arrow-slitted walls of a medieval keep. With the gun deck reminiscent of a long dungeon, it wasn’t hard to imagine the hulk as some kind of bleak, impregnable fortress.

At six o’clock the guards had removed the hatch covers, allowing the prisoners to carry their bedding topside to be aired. Hawkwood had welcomed the first light of dawn, still conscious of the collective reek coming off his fellow inmates. Lieutenant Murat had given his assurance that it would take only a few days to become acclimatized. As far as Hawkwood was concerned, the moment couldn’t come soon enough. The gun-port location may have provided access to the elements and a sea view, but it didn’t mean the smell was in any way reduced. The foul odours within the hulk had built up over so many years that they’d become engrained in the ship’s structure, like a host of maggots in a rotting corpse.

Breakfast had been a mug of water and a hunk of dry bread left over from the previous evening’s supper. The fist-sized block of stale dough had been made marginally more digestible when dunked into the water. It remained small consolation for what had been, despite Hawkwood’s ability to negotiate the hammock, a fitful night’s sleep. Though it was a soldier’s lot to bed down when and wherever he could, it did not always follow that slumber came easily. The night had seemed endless. Lasseur looked equally unrested as he peered out across the choppy brown water.

Perched at the extreme north-west corner of the Isle of Sheppey, Sheerness dockyard lay across the starboard quarter; an uneven line of warehouses, barracks and workshops. Rising above these was the fortress; its squat, square outline surmounted by a grey-roofed tower. Guarding the entrance to the Medway River, the fort dominated its surroundings, a stone defender awaiting an unwise invader.

To the south, at the edge of the yard, lay Blue Town. The settlement provided accommodation for the local workforce and owed its name to the colour of the buildings, all of which had been daubed in the same shade of naval paint. Made almost entirely from wood chips left over from the dockyard work, the small houses weren’t much more than crude shacks, clumped together in an untidy rat-run of narrow lanes. Even so, they were several steps up from the previous riverside accommodation. Originally, dock workers had been housed in hulks, not dissimilar to Rapacious, moored to break the flow of the river and reduce the loss of shingle from the foreshore. A couple of them still remained, stranded on the mud like beached whales after a storm.

Across the river, a mile away to port, the Isle of Grain was a dark green smudge in the early-morning light, while beyond the stern rail, less than two miles to the south, lay the western mouth of the Swale Channel, separating Sheppey from the mainland.

The weather had improved considerably. Despite the sunshine, however, there was a stiff breeze and it brought with it the smell of the sea and the cloying, fœtid odour of the surrounding marshes, which stretched away on both sides of the water.

A cry of warning sounded from the quarterdeck where Lieutenant Thynne was supervising the delivery of provisions from a small flotilla of bumboats drawn up alongside the hulk. Fresh water casks were being hoisted on board to replace the empty ones lifted from the hold, and one of the casks had come adrift from its sling. It was the second delivery of the day. The bread ration had arrived less than an hour before and had already been delivered to the galley.

Lasseur eyed the activity with interest. “What do you think?” he said.

Hawkwood followed his gaze to where the wayward cask was being secured. “It’d be a tight fit.”

Lasseur grinned.

Hawkwood looked sceptical. “How do you know they don’t check inside as soon as they get them ashore?”

“How do you know they do?”

“I would,” Hawkwood said. “It’d be the first place I’d look.”

“You’re probably right,” Lasseur murmured. “Worth considering, though.” He reached into his coat, drew out a cheroot, and gazed at it wistfully.

“I’d make that last,” Hawkwood said. “They tell me tobacco’s hard to come by. Expensive, too.”

Lasseur stuck the unlit cheroot between his lips and closed his eyes. He remained that way for several seconds, after which he placed the cheroot back in his coat and sighed. “The sooner I get off this damned ship, the better.”

Latching on to Lasseur appeared to have been a sound investment. From the moment they’d been thrust into the Maidstone cell together, the privateer captain had made it clear he was looking to make his escape. Gaining the man’s confidence had been the first step. James Read had been correct in his surmise that Hawkwood’s background story and the scars on his face would stand him in good stead. Lasseur and the others had accepted him as one of their own. Hawkwood’s task now was to find some way of exploiting that acceptance. Where Lasseur went, Hawkwood intended to follow.

Hawkwood allowed himself a smile. It was strange, he thought, given the short time he’d known him, how much he’d come to like Lasseur. It had been an unexpected turn of events, for the privateer was, after all, the enemy. But wasn’t that what happened when men, irrespective of their backgrounds, were thrown together in unfamiliar surroundings? It reminded him of his early days in the Rifle Corps.

When Colonels Coote Manningham and Stewart had put forward their plan for a different type of unit, one which would fight fire with fire and carry the war to the French, the men who were to form the new corps had been drafted in from other regiments. Suddenly the past didn’t matter; whether they were draftees or volunteers, was irrelevant. The men’s loyalty was to the new regiment, and the glue that bound them together was their willingness to fight for their country and against the French.

On Rapacious, it was a similar situation. It didn’t matter whether you had been a sailor or a soldier, privateer, teacher or tradesman. The important thing was that you shared a common enemy. And in the case of the men confined aboard the hulk – Hawkwood included – it was the officers and men of His Britannic Majesty’s prison ship Rapacious who were the foe.

According to Ludd, Rapacious hadn’t been her only name. During her years as a man-of-war, as a mark of affection her crew had bestowed a nickname upon her: Rapscallion, a tribute to her role in causing mischief to the French.

It was doubtful, Hawkwood reflected, looking around him, if any of the seamen who’d raised her sails, scaled her rigging and run out her guns would have recognized her now. Any beauty or sense of pride she might have possessed as a mighty ship of war was long gone. Even with the morning sun slanting across her quarterdeck, with her once graceful profile buried beneath a ramshackle collection of weather-beaten clapboard sheds, she was as ugly as a London slum.

Another cry sounded from the work party. The full water casks had all been taken aboard and the last bumboat was pulling away with its cargo of empty barrels. Several of the full casks remained on deck. The contents were needed for the day’s midday soup and to replenish the drinking water tanks. The hoist was repositioned in preparation for the next round of deliveries.

Lasseur turned from the rail. “Walk with me, my friend. I’m in need of some exercise.”

The number of prisoners strewn around the deck made it more of an obstacle course than a walk.

“How many soldiers are there on board, do you think?” Lasseur asked. He kept his voice low as they picked their way through the press of bodies.

“Hard to tell,” Hawkwood said. “Not less than forty would be my guess.” He looked aft, where two members of the militia were patrolling back and forth across the width of the raised quarterdeck, muskets slung over their shoulders. Other militia were spread evenly around the hulk, including one on the forecastle from where they had just descended. Hawkwood had counted three on the gantry and one on the boarding raft, and there was one at each companionway. He suspected several others were standing by, poised to deploy at the first sign of trouble.

The two men left the forecastle and made their way below.

“I did a count last night,” Lasseur said as they descended the stairs. “Six on the grating, one manning the raft, and I could hear others on the companionways.”

“You didn’t waste any time,” Hawkwood said.

Lasseur shrugged. “It was hot, I couldn’t sleep. What else was I going to do? Besides, I’ve seen the way you’ve been looking around.”

“There’s the crew as well,” Hawkwood said.

“I’d not forgotten. How many, would you say?”

Hawkwood shook his head. “On a ship this size? You’d know better than me. Thirty?”

Lasseur thought about it, pursed his lips. “Not so many. Twenty, maybe.”

“They’ll have access to arms,” Hawkwood said.

Lasseur nodded. “Undoubtedly. There’ll be an armoury chest: pistols and muskets; cutlasses too, probably.” The privateer captain fell silent.

On the gun deck, Hawkwood was surprised by the number of pedlars foraging for business among their fellow prisoners. In their search for both buyers and sellers, they were as persistent as any he’d encountered under the arches of Covent Garden or the Haymarket. The number of men willing to trade away their belongings appeared to be substantial, though from their pitiful appearance, it wasn’t hard to see why. Watching the transactions, Hawkwood didn’t know which depressed him most: the fact that these men had been reduced to such penury, or the pathetically grateful expressions on their faces when a bargain was struck. Several of the prisoners who’d arrived the previous day were handing over items of clothing in exchange for coinage. They did it furtively, as if shamed by their actions. Hawkwood assumed the money would be used to purchase extra food, a commodity that had become a currency in its own right.

Lasseur read his thoughts. “I was talking with our friend Sébastien earlier. He told me that when he was at Portsmouth one of the men on the Vengeance set up his own restaurant and became rich selling slop by the bowl. Wherever there’s a shortage of something, there’s money to be made.”

“Lieutenant Murat would probably agree with you,” Hawkwood said.

“Ah, yes, our intrepid interpreter. Now there’s a man worth cultivating.”

“You trust him?”

“About as far as I can spit.”

“That far?” Hawkwood said.

Lasseur laughed.

Hawkwood’s attention was diverted by one of the small groups occupying sections of bench over by the starboard gun ports. It was the teacher, Fouchet, and his morning class. His pupils – half a dozen in total – were seated on the floor at his feet. The boy Lucien was with them. He looked to be the youngest. The eldest was about fourteen. Fouchet caught Hawkwood’s eye and smiled a greeting. His pupils did not look up.

There were some two score boys on Rapacious, Fouchet had told him, ranging in age from ten to sixteen. The practice was not exceptional. Fouchet’s previous ship, the Suffolk, had held over fifty boys, some as young as nine. Hawkwood had wondered briefly about the Transport Board’s wisdom in confining children with the men. But then, the Royal Navy employed boys not much older than the ones attending Fouchet’s class as midshipmen and runners for their gun crews, and so presumably saw nothing unusual in sending innocents like Lucien Ballard to face the horrors of life on board a prison hulk. Hawkwood had a vague notion that Nelson had been around the same age as Lucien when he’d gone to sea. He was reminded of some of the street children he employed as informers. Age had never been a consideration there. The only criteria he’d set during their recruitment were that they were fleet of foot, knew the streets, and kept their eyes and ears open.

“My son is twelve,” Lasseur said quietly. The privateer captain was also looking towards the group by the gun port.

“Where is he?” Hawkwood asked.

Lasseur continued to watch the class. “With his grandparents in Gévezé. It’s near Rennes. They have a farm.”

“Your mother and father?”

Lasseur paused. “I’m an orphan. They’re my wife’s parents. She died.”

Hawkwood kept silent.

“She fell from her horse. She loved to ride, especially in the early morning.” The Frenchman swallowed and for a second time the mask slipped. “I’ve not seen my son for three months. They send me letters. They tell me he attends school and is good at his lessons and that he likes animals.” A small smile flitted across the Frenchman’s face. “His name is François.” Lasseur turned. “You have a wife, children?”

“No,” Hawkwood said.

“A woman? Someone waiting for you?”

Hawkwood thought about Maddie Teague and wondered if she’d ever viewed herself in that role; lonely and pining for her man. He didn’t think so, somehow. Maddie was too independent for that. He had a sudden vision of her lying beside him, auburn hair spread across the pillow, emerald-green eyes flashing, a mischievous smile playing across her lips.

“Ah!” Lasseur smiled perceptively. “The look on your face tells me. She is beautiful?”

“Yes,” Hawkwood said. “Yes, she is.”

Lasseur looked suddenly serious. “Then I’d say we both have a reason to escape this place, wouldn’t you?”

“As long as it’s not inside a bloody water barrel.”

“There’ll be other ways,” Lasseur said firmly. “All we have to do is find them. Fouchet said there’ve been a few who’ve done it. Maybe we should ask him how they did it.”

“Maybe we should ask somebody who’s a bit more devious,” Hawkwood said.

Lasseur grinned. “You mean Lieutenant Murat?”

“The very man,” Hawkwood said.

The interpreter frowned. “Forgive me, Captain Hooper, but you may recall I was there at your registration. I understood you were waiting for your parole application to be approved. Why would you still harbour thoughts of escape?”

“The captain’s weighing his options.” Lasseur kept his face straight. “No law against that, is there?”

The interpreter’s brow remained furrowed. “Indeed not, but you’ve only been here a day.”

“So?” Hawkwood said. “What the hell does that have to do with anything?”

“Perhaps you should be a little more patient.”

“Patient?” Lasseur said.

“I’ve been patient.” Hawkwood resisted the urge to wipe the condescending smile from the interpreter’s face. “My patience is starting to wear thin.”

“And you’ve certainly been biding your time, Lieutenant,” Lasseur said icily. “How long have you been here? Two years, is it?” The privateer turned down his mouth. “Perhaps this wasn’t such a good idea.”

Hawkwood gazed at Murat and gave a slow shake of his head. “We thought you’d be the man to advise us. It looks as if we were wrong.” He cast a glance towards Lasseur and shrugged. “Pity.”

“You want to know what I think?” Lasseur murmured. “I think the lieutenant’s grown a little too complacent, a little too comfortable. I’m guessing he’s never even thought of making a run for it himself. He’s making too good a living here.” Lasseur threw the interpreter a challenging glare. “That’s it, isn’t it? In fact, I’d wager you’re earning a damned sight more through barter and your interpreter’s pay than you were as a naval officer. Got yourself a nice little business here, haven’t you? You don’t want to leave. Am I right?”

A nerve pulsed along the interpreter’s cheek. “All I’m saying is that it’s my understanding these things can take time – weeks, months sometimes.”

“What if we don’t want to wait that long?” Hawkwood said.

“We couldn’t help noticing the water delivery earlier,” Lasseur said. “We thought that had potential.”

There was a pause. Then the interpreter gave a brief shake of his head. “You can forget the water casks. It did work, but not any more. Nowadays they’re the first things they check.”

“Really?” Lasseur said. He threw Hawkwood a look. “So much for that idea.”

“I told you it looked too damned easy,” Hawkwood said. “All right, so what about the other deliveries?”

Lasseur had played the interpreter beautifully. Like a fish caught on a hook, Murat hadn’t been able to resist the tug at his vanity. Now, wanting to be considered the font of all knowledge, he shook his head. “That’s been tried, too. I told you; the bastards check everything. You’ll never get off that way.”

Murat’s gaze drifted sideways, distracted by the activity around them. The three men were seated next to one of the portside grilles. Hawkwood assumed it was where Murat slung his hammock, for the interpreter had welcomed his and Lasseur’s arrival as if granting them entry into his personal fiefdom. Elsewhere, dotted about the deck, the more industrious inhabitants were engaged in a variety of pursuits. Basket makers, letter writers and knitters squatted alongside bone modellers and barbers. Some worked in silence. Others chatted to their neighbours. The scratch of nib, the snip of scissors and the scrape of blade on bone filled the lulls in conversation. Hawkwood wondered if there’d ever been a time when the hulk had fallen entirely silent. He doubted it.

“We could use the cover of night,” Lasseur said. “Steal a boat.”

Murat shook his head again. “They hoist the boats up alongside. They’re at least ten feet above the water. One’s kept afloat, but it’s secured by a chain from the boarding raft and that’s always under guard.”

“Damn.” Lasseur bit his lip.

Hawkwood addressed Murat. “How did the others get off?”

“Others?” Warily.

“There have been others, haven’t there?” Lasseur pressed.

There was a noticeable hesitation. An artful look stole over the interpreter’s face. “As I said, Captain, you’ve only been here a short time. You wouldn’t expect all our little secrets to be revealed to you quite so soon.”

So, you do have secrets, Hawkwood thought.

Lasseur’s eyebrows rose. “Why, Lieutenant, anyone would think you didn’t trust us.”

The interpreter spread his hands. “For a start, there’s the matter of the pot. You haven’t put anything in yet.”

“Pot?” Lasseur looked to Hawkwood for enlightenment. “What pot? What the devil’s he talking about now?”

“Your friend Fouchet didn’t tell you?” Murat said, a half smile forming on his lips.

“Tell us what?” Hawkwood sat back.

“There’s a contribution taken from our food rations. It’s kept back for prisoners on punishment. If anyone disobeys the rules or does damage to the hulk, they’re reduced to two-thirds quota. The food we put by is used to help them out.”

“Very generous,” Lasseur said. “And maybe a little something’s put aside for escapers as well? Is that it?”

Murat hesitated again.

“Why, Lieutenant, you sly boots!” Lasseur grinned.

The interpreter coloured.

“All right,” Hawkwood said. “Let’s not piss around here. What’s it going to cost?”

Murat blinked. “What do you mean?”

“Don’t take us for fools, Lieutenant.”

“Think of your commission.” Lasseur arched an eyebrow suggestively.

“And how generous we might be,” Hawkwood added.

A light flickered behind the interpreter’s eyes.

“Well?” Hawkwood prompted, recognizing the bright glint of greed.

Murat stared at them for a long time. Finally he sighed. “If such a thing could be arranged – and I’m not saying it could – it would not be cheap. There are expenses, you understand.”

Lasseur patted the interpreter’s knee. “That’s my boy.” The privateer turned to Hawkwood and winked. “Didn’t I tell you Lieutenant Murat was the man to see?”

Murat seemed to flinch from the touch, but he recovered quickly.

Hawkwood leaned forward. “All right, how much?”

The interpreter hesitated again. Hawkwood suspected he was doing it for effect.

“Just for the sake of argument,” Hawkwood said.

“For the sake of argument?”

“The three of us having a little chat, nothing more.”

Murat looked around. Then, in a low voice, he said, “I’m assuming you would not be expecting passage all the way back to America?”

“You get me as far as French soil and let me worry about the rest.”

Murat sat back. “Very well; four thousand francs, or two hundred English pounds, if you prefer.”

Hawkwood sucked in his breath.

“Each,” Murat finished.

“God’s teeth!” Hawkwood sat back. “We don’t want to buy the bloody ship. We just want to get off it. The highest offer I had for my boots was only twenty francs. We’ll both be dead from old age or the flux before we’d earned enough. Are you mad?”

“The price would include all transport, accommodation and safe passage to France.”

“For that sort of money,” Hawkwood said, “I’d expect the Emperor to collect me in a golden barge and carry me up the bloody beach when we got there!”

Lasseur chuckled. Then his face grew serious.

“How the hell do you expect us to find that sort of money?” Hawkwood demanded.

The interpreter shook his head. “An agent makes contact with your families. It’s they who arrange payment. Once the full fee’s been paid, preparations for your departure would begin.”

“How do we get off the ship?”

Murat smiled. “Come now, gentlemen; I’m sure you understand the need for discretion. The less you know at this stage, the safer it will be for all of us. I would also urge you to keep this conversation to yourselves.”

“You’re telling us the walls have ears?” Lasseur asked.

Murat grimaced. “It’s not unknown for the British to plant spies among us, but no, sadly, there have been occasions when betrayal has come from closer to home.”

Hawkwood felt his insides contract.

“Traitors?” Lasseur said.

“Not necessarily. You forget, we’re not the only nationality on board these hulks. Captain Hooper is proof of that. We’ve got Danes, Italians, Swedes, Norwegians … take your pick. France has many allies. There’ll be some who’d look to alleviate their misery by claiming a reward for informing on their fellow prisoners.”

Hawkwood prayed that nothing was showing on his face. At least he’d discovered one thing: if there was an organized escape route, it was only available to the rich. He wondered how deep Bow Street’s coffers were and what James Read’s reaction would be when Ludd relayed details of the amount involved: four years’ salary for a Runner.

Hawkwood felt Lasseur’s hand on his arm.

He realized the privateer had misinterpreted his silence for doubt when Lasseur said, “You’re wondering how you would raise the fee?”

“It’s not the money,” Hawkwood said, recovering. “It’s making the payment.”

That could prove an interesting exercise, Hawkwood thought, unless Ludd came up with a practical idea during their meeting.

Lasseur patted Hawkwood’s shoulder reassuringly and, to Hawkwood’s surprise, said, “No need to fret, my friend.” The privateer turned to Murat. “I will cover the fee for Captain Hooper.”

Murat looked momentarily nonplussed, then shrugged, almost dismissively. “Very well.”

“How long will it be before we hear anything?” Lasseur asked.

“I cannot say. I’ll require the name of the person you wish the agent to contact and a note to prove the agent is acting on your behalf. You’ll be notified as soon as we receive word that agreement has been reached and payment made.” Murat looked at them. “Are the terms acceptable?”

Lasseur and Hawkwood exchanged looks.

“For the sake of argument?” Lasseur said. “Perfectly.”

“Well?” Lasseur asked. “What do you think?”

“I think Lieutenant Murat’s a duplicitous bastard,” Hawkwood said.

They were back on the forecastle. The stifling atmosphere below had been too much to bear. They had emerged topsides to find that the breeze, although still persistent, had dropped considerably.

“I believe we’d already established that,” Lasseur said drily, and then frowned. “You’re still worrying about the fee, aren’t you? As I said, do not concern yourself. You can repay me when we’re home.”

“You hardly know me,” Hawkwood said.

“That’s true,” Lasseur agreed. “But I’m an excellent judge of character. You’ll honour the bargain. I know it.” The privateer grinned disarmingly. “And if you prove me wrong, I shall cut out your heart and feed it to the pigs.”

“Your wife’s parents can find that amount?” Hawkwood asked. He had no idea, but he didn’t think a French farmer’s income was that high.

“No.” Lasseur shook his head, and then said firmly, “But my men can. The name I gave to the lieutenant was one of my agents.”

“You have agents in England?” Hawkwood said.

“But of course.” Lasseur looked surprised that Hawkwood had even thought to ask. “I have a number in my employ. They keep me advised of British naval movements.”

Hawkwood sensed his preoccupation with the means of payment must still have shown on his face, for Lasseur paused and then said, “What? Don’t tell me you were thinking of waiting in case your parole is granted? Forgive me, but I do not see you as a man content to bide his time in an English coffee house waiting for the war to end. You said I don’t know you. Well, I do know you’re a soldier, and you know both our countries need men like us to continue the fight. That’s why we’re going to escape from this place. I shall return to my son and my ship. You will return to your woman and your Regiment of Riflemen, and between us we will defeat the British. You will do it for your new country and your President Madison and I will do it for my Emperor and the glory of France. One can never put a fee on patriotism, my friend, and four thousand francs is a small price to pay for victory. What say you?”

Confronted by Lasseur’s earnest expression, Hawkwood forced another grin. “I say when do we leave?”

Lasseur slapped him on the back.

It had turned into a fine summer’s day. The sunlight and the sharp cries from the gulls circling and diving above them, although plaintive in tone, were a welcome relief after the gloom of the gun deck. Shirts and breeches flapped from the lines strung between the yards. Faint sounds of industry carried from the dockyard: the ringing clang of a hammer, the rattle of a chain, the rasp of timber being sawn. Out on the river, a pair of frigates, sails billowing like grey clouds, raced each other towards the mouth of the estuary.

It was only when the eye returned to the deck of the hulk and on across the sterns of the other prison ships visible over her bow that the view was marred. The hulks squatted in the water as if carved from blocks of coal. Plumes of black smoke pumping from their chimney stacks spiralled into the azure sky, proving that darkness could be visited even upon the very brightest of days.

And as if to emphasize the fact, the calm was shattered by a blood-curdling howl and up on to the already crowded well deck erupted a seething tide of horror.

From his vantage point on the forecastle Hawkwood saw the throng of prisoners break apart. Sharp cries of panic rang out. He heard Lasseur draw in his breath. He wasn’t sure what he was seeing at first. It was like watching beetles swarm over the carcass of a dead animal, except the creatures that were spewing out of the hatches and trampling over the Park were not beetles, they were human, and many of them were naked. Their hair was long and matted; their bodies were daubed with filth. The ones that were not naked might as well have been, for the rags they were wearing were little more than strips of tattered cloth. Some of them, Hawkwood realized, were wearing blankets, which they’d wrapped around themselves like togas. Hissing and screeching, fangs bared, they surged around the other prisoners like a marauding pack of baboons, leaping and prancing and in some cases laying about them with fists and feet. Others were beating mess tins. The noise was ferocious.

Yells of alarm echoed around the quarterdeck. As the militia gathered their startled wits and hurried to unsling their muskets, a uniformed officer materialized behind them, tall and thin. The dark, cocked hat accentuated his height. It was the commander of the hulk, Lieutenant Hellard. Flanked by the guards, the lieutenant strode quickly to the rail and stared down at the fracas below. His face contorted. Without moving, he rapped out a command. Half a dozen more guards, led by a corporal, appeared at a clattering run from the lean-to on the stern. Their fellow militia, already at the rails and secure in the knowledge that reinforcements had come to support them, drew back the hammers on their muskets. Within seconds, a battery of gun muzzles was aligned along the width of the quarterdeck.

With the ruction on the Park in full spate, the lieutenant raised his arm. The corporal barked an order and the militia took aim.

God’s teeth! Hawkwood thought. He’s going to do it!

But the lieutenant did not give the order. Instead he continued to watch the drama playing out on the deck. The militia guards’ fingers played nervously with the triggers of their guns.

For two or three minutes the uproar continued. Then, suddenly, as if a signal had been given, the situation changed. The naked and toga-clad creatures began to pull back. The other prisoners started to regroup. Several, emboldened by the sight of the retreating horde, waded into their former tormentors, beating them towards the open hatchways. Some were wielding sticks. Arms rose and fell. Cries of pain and anger told where the blows landed. Driven back, the invaders were disappearing down the stairways from which they had so recently emerged, like cockroaches scuttling from the light.

Within seconds, or so it seemed, the attackers had all dispersed. Immediately, several hands were thrust aloft, palms open; a signal that the prisoners left on deck had the situation under control. The lieutenant, however, did not move, nor did he give any indication that he’d even seen the raised hands. Remaining motionless, he watched the deck. The prisoners stared back at him, chests heaving. Some were bloody and bruised. A tense silence fell over the Park. A gull shrieked high above. No one moved. It took another ten seconds before the lieutenant finally let his arm relax and stepped back. Immediately, the tension on the well deck evaporated. The militia uncocked and shouldered their muskets. The reinforcements turned about. The deck guards resumed their posts. The atmosphere on the well deck settled back into its habitual torpor. The hurt prisoners retired to lick their wounds.

Hawkwood discovered he was holding his breath. He let it out slowly.

“What happened there?” Lasseur breathed. “Who in God’s name were they?”

“Romans,” a voice said behind them. “Bastards!”

Hawkwood and Lasseur turned. It was Charbonneau.

“Romans?” Hawkwood said, thinking he must have misheard.

“Scum,” Charbonneau said, his eyes blazing. “They live on the orlop. We don’t see them very often. They prefer the dark. Some of them have been here longer than I have. We call them Romans from the way they wear their blankets, like togas. They have other names, but they’re still animals. They used to be held in prisons ashore. Got sent to the hulks as punishment, I was told. Now it’s the rest of us who’re suffering – twice over.”

“Some of them were naked!” Lasseur said, unnecessarily.

Charbonneau nodded. “They’re the lowest of the lot. They’ll be the ones who’ve gambled all their belongings away. It’s how they exist. They have a mania for it. Cards and dice dominate their lives. Most start with money. When that’s gone, they wager their clothes and their bedding, even their rations. Sometimes they starve themselves, hoarding their rations to sell them off and then start over again. When they run out of belongings or food they steal from others or roam the decks looking for peelings or fish heads. Even the rats aren’t safe. Now and again they send out raiding parties, like the one you just saw.”

“Rafalés,” Hawkwood murmured.

“Some call them that,” Charbonneau said, eyes narrowing. “You’ve heard of them?”

Hawkwood nodded.

“Why don’t the guards punish them?” Lasseur asked.

Charbonneau gave a dry laugh. “How? Look around. You think this place isn’t punishment enough? In any case, the commander’s hands are tied. They can’t be flogged. No prisoner can. Direct physical punishment’s forbidden, unless a British soldier or crew member is harmed.”

“So he wouldn’t have given the order to fire?” Lasseur said.

“Not unless there’d been a full-scale riot which threatened the safety of his men. As far as our commander’s concerned, any disagreement between prisoners is dealt with by prisoners’ tribunal.” Charbonneau sniffed dismissively. “What goes on below deck stays below deck. It’s got so that the guards hardly ever enter the orlop now. They leave them to get on with it. The rest of us don’t go down there either. It’s not safe. You saw what they were like.”

Hawkwood remembered the scream he’d heard on his first night and the lack of reaction it had provoked. He looked across the Park towards the quarterdeck and watched as the hulk’s commander removed his hat, turned his face to the sun and closed his eyes. The lieutenant stood still, letting the warmth soak into his skin. His hair was dark and streaked with grey.

After what must have been half a minute at least, the lieutenant opened his eyes and dropped his chin. Running a hand through his hair, he placed the hat back on his head and turned to go. Abruptly, he paused, as if aware that his unguarded moment had been observed. He looked over his shoulder. Hawkwood made no attempt to glance away as the lieutenant’s brooding eyes roved slowly along the line of prisoners. As Hellard’s gaze passed over his own, it seemed for a second as though the hulk commander’s attention lingered, but then, as the lieutenant’s stare moved on, the moment was gone. Hawkwood decided it had been his imagination, which was probably just as well. Clad in civilian clothes rather than the ubiquitous yellow jacket and trousers, Hawkwood knew he’d risked drawing attention to himself by making eye contact with the lieutenant. It had been an unwise move.

“Unless I’m mistaken,” Lasseur commented softly as the lieutenant made his way from the deck, “there’s a man who spends a lot of time in his own company.”

The world began to revolve once more. Charbonneau drifted away. Beneath Hawkwood’s and Lasseur’s vantage point, a fencing class was being conducted. In the absence of edged weapons, the students were reduced to wielding the thin sticks that had been used to quell the recent invasion – still a risky venture given the confines of the classroom – and the Park echoed to the click-clack of wooden foils.

“Can’t say I care much for their instructor,” Lasseur said dismissively, looking down at the scene. “The man’s style is abominable. Do you fence?”

“When the mood takes me,” Hawkwood said.

Lasseur grunted at the noncommittal answer and then said, “A splendid exercise; the pursuit of gentlemen. Perhaps we should give lessons, too? Earn ourselves some extra rations.”

The dry tone in the privateer’s voice hinted that Lasseur was being sarcastic, so Hawkwood didn’t bother to reply. He looked out across the water. Lasseur did the same. The two frigates were nearing the mouth of the river. Close hauled, yards braced, their nearness to one another suggested a friendly rivalry between the crews, with each ship determined to steal the wind from her opponent, knowing the loser would be left floundering, sheets and sails flapping, her embarrassment plain for all to see.

From Lasseur’s distant gaze and by the way his hands were holding on to the rail, knuckles white, Hawkwood sensed the Frenchman was thinking about his own ship. Hawkwood tried to imagine what might be going through the privateer’s mind, but suspected the task was beyond him. His world was so far removed from Lasseur’s that any attempt to decipher the faraway look was probably futile.

While there were inherent dangers attached to both their professions, it was there the similarity ended. Hawkwood’s world was one of ill-lit streets, thieves’ kitchens, flash houses, fences, rogues and rookeries. Lasseur’s, in total contrast, was the open deck of a sailing ship, running before the wind. It seemed to Hawkwood that, whereas his world was an enclosed one, almost as dark and degrading as the hulk’s gun deck, Lasseur’s was one of freedom, of the open main and endless skies. For Lasseur, being cooped up on the prison ship would be like a bird whose wings had been clipped. Small wonder his desire to escape was so strong.

“How long will it take, do you think?” Lasseur asked. He did not look around but continued to follow the frigates’ progress towards the open water.

“Murat?”

Lasseur nodded.

“He has the advantage,” Hawkwood said. “He’ll probably be content to keep us waiting, even if it’s just to teach us who’s pulling the strings. It could be a while.”

Lasseur turned. There was a bleak look in his eyes. “Any longer in this place and I swear I’ll go mad.”

“One day at a time,” Hawkwood said. “That’s how we have to look at it. I hate to admit it, but the bastard was right about one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“We should be patient.”

Lasseur grimaced. “Not one of my better virtues.”

“Mine neither,” Hawkwood admitted, “except, we don’t have a choice. Right now, I don’t think there’s much else we can do.”

Lasseur nodded wearily. “You’re right, of course. It does not mean I have to like it, though, does it?”

Hawkwood didn’t answer. In his mind’s eye he saw again the mob of prisoners rising out of the hatches and the mayhem they had created. Lasseur had referred to the hulk as a version of Hell. From what Hawkwood had witnessed so far, the privateer’s description had been horribly accurate. In his time as a Runner, Hawkwood had visited a good number of London’s gaols: Newgate, Bridewell, and the Fleet among them. They were, without exception, terrible places. But this black, heartless hulk was something different. There was true horror at work here, Hawkwood sensed. He wasn’t sure what form it took or if he would be confronted by it, but he knew instinctively that it would be like nothing he’d encountered before.

6

The interpreter had been wrong about the smell. After four days, Hawkwood still hadn’t grown used to it. Grim smells were nothing new, living in London had seen to that, but in the enclosed world of the gun deck, four hundred bodies generated their own particular odour and, despite the open ports and hatches, the warm weather meant there was no way of drawing cooler and fresher air into the ship. The sea breezes afforded no respite. They brought only the damp, faecal aroma of the marshes, which hung across the polluted river like a moisture-laden blanket.

That said, Hawkwood decided Murat might have got it wrong when he’d nominated fever and consumption as the most prominent causes of death aboard the ship. From what Hawkwood had seen, it was more than likely one of the main culprits was unremitting boredom.

While a proportion of the hulk’s inmates did engage in productive pursuits such as arts and crafts, giving or receiving lessons, or setting themselves up as shoemakers or tradesmen in tobacco or other goods, it seemed to Hawkwood that they were in the minority. A vast number of the ship’s population opted to pass their days in idleness. Even on the gun deck, men gambled. It wasn’t difficult to recognize the ones who’d fallen under the spell. The quiet desperation in their eyes as they laid down their cards or took their time lifting the cup from the little cubes of bone, knowing their inevitable descent to the deck below had already begun, was evidence enough. Others engaged in more dubious dealings: the manipulation of weaker inmates through theft, intimidation and sexual gratification, followed by threats of reprisal if their authority was questioned. Some sought sanctuary by curling up and sleeping wherever there was room – and there wasn’t much room. The remainder seemed content merely to wait and to die.

In an attempt to evade the stink, Hawkwood kept to the forecastle as much as possible, sometimes with Lasseur for company. To avoid remaining sedentary, he’d lent his labour to the hulk’s work parties. This had drawn comment from some of his fellow prisoners. Most officers regarded such labour as beneath their dignity and preferred to pay a substitute to carry out any manual tasks assigned to them. The going rate was one sou or ten ounces of bread from the day’s rations.

Hawkwood had no such qualms, having served in the Rifles, where every man was expected to pitch in. And even before that, as a captain, it had always been Hawkwood’s contention that he would never assign a task to one of his soldiers that he wasn’t prepared to do himself. It had been a good way to garner loyalty and in the heat of battle it had served him and the men he’d led very well. So Hawkwood had willingly lent his back to hoisting supplies on board and swilling down the foredeck and the Park after supper. Better the smell of honest sweat in his nostrils than the all-pervading stench of the hulk’s lower deck.

Lasseur, too, had done his share of manual graft, working alongside Hawkwood at the hoist and in the ship’s hold. The temperature within the ship was such that jackets and shirts were soon discarded. The prisoners’ backs ran wet with sweat and it was easy to tell whether an inmate was new on board or a regular member of a work party: the irregulars were the ones whose flesh was as pale as paper.

Lasseur’s hide carried the healthy sheen of a seaman whose voyages had taken him to warmer, far-flung climes. His torso was well formed without being muscular, and evenly tanned – in contrast to some of the men, whose forearms and faces were the only areas of their bodies that showed the effects of exposure to the sun. The rest of their skin, normally covered by a shirt, looked bleached white in comparison.

What also set Lasseur apart were the marks of the lash across his spine. Hawkwood had passed no comment on the scars. He’d enough of his own, including the ring of bruising around his throat, which had drawn a few curious looks both when he’d taken the bath prior to his registration and when he removed his shirt during the work details.

Lasseur had noticed Hawkwood’s passing glance at his back and had made only one comment: “I wasn’t always a captain.”

“Me neither,” Hawkwood had told him, and that had been enough. The rest of the men, whose quizzical looks might have indicated a desire for explanation, they ignored.

When he wasn’t labouring in a work party or talking with Hawkwood or Fouchet, or sometimes with the boy, Lasseur spent most of his time pacing the deck and gazing restlessly across the estuary, locked within his own thoughts. With so many bodies crammed in one place, physical solitude was but a dream. Hawkwood knew there wasn’t a man on board who wouldn’t try and seek solace in the privacy of his own mind. He sought it himself when he could, and took advantage of the opportunities it offered to observe shipboard routine at close quarters. And in the course of his observations Hawkwood had seen enough to know that making a successful escape from the hulk looked well nigh impossible. Moored a stone’s throw from the middle of a busy estuary; surrounded by inhospitable marshland; heavily guarded by its contingent of militia and a commander who was fully prepared to use deadly force against the slightest infraction, the ship was too well sealed.

According to Ludd’s reckoning, four men had made it off the hulk in recent weeks. In the short time he’d been on board, Hawkwood had yet to uncover a single clue as to how they might have done it. He’d tried to pin Fouchet and the others down, but to his frustration they had been of no more help than Lieutenant Murat.

With the exception of those who’d retreated into their own little world and the denizens of the orlop deck, most of the prisoners seemed content to co-exist in small social groups centred round their messes. Many would probably have no idea there’d been an escape, let alone have any knowledge of how it had been accomplished; their first inkling that something untoward had taken place would come with the increased activity of the hulk’s commander and his crew, and the heavy-handed actions of the guards as they inspected and emptied the deck to take an unexpected body count. Someone as well informed as Fouchet would know more, but the teacher was too cautious to discuss such matters with a new arrival, particularly in the light of Murat’s reference to informers. Hawkwood had operated clandestinely before and, though patience did not come easily to him, he’d learned that a subtle approach would achieve better results than barging around asking too many pertinent questions.

Ludd’s suspicion that there was organization behind the escapes had been confirmed by Murat. Yet Hawkwood was still no wiser as to who was behind it. He wondered how long it would be before the translator got back to them. A week? Two? Or would it be a month? Or longer? The thought made his blood run cold. His rendezvous with Ludd was in three days. Would he have anything positive to report? It didn’t seem likely. Unless a man could change himself into something the size of a rat and slip between the grilles like Hawkwood’s scaly-tailed friend the other night, the only way off the hulk seemed to be as a corpse wrapped inside a burial cloth. Even then you wouldn’t get very far.

There had been seven deaths in the time Hawkwood had been aboard. The cause was marsh fever. During the summer months the fever claimed many victims among the weak and undernourished. Age was an inevitable contributing factor, though in the close-knit squalor of a prison ship, fever, typhus, pox and depression showed no favouritism. Two of the dead men had been in their twenties.

There had been no ceremony in the removal of the deceased. Wrapped in filthy sacks of hastily sewn sailcloth, the corpses had been lowered into a waiting boat using a winch and net. Then, accompanied by a burial detail of prisoners and a quartet of militia, the sorry cargo had been rowed to a bank of shingle half a mile off the hulk’s stern. Hawkwood and Lasseur had watched in sombre silence as the bodies had been carried up the foreshore and thrown into a pit dug at the back of the beach. From what they’d been able to see, no words were spoken over the burial before the boat made its return journey.

What had been noticeable to Hawkwood was that, aside from himself, Lasseur and a few of the newer prisoners, no one had taken any interest in the proceedings. On Rapacious, death and burial were commonplace.

Mid-afternoon of his fifth day on the hulk, Hawkwood was leaning on the forecastle rail, taking a rest after three hours spent hauling barrels of dried herring and sacks of onions on board. The work had been hard, but there had been a sense of purpose to the task, and, more importantly, it had made the time pass quicker. Now the sun was warm on his back and the estuary was calm. If he closed his eyes and nostrils, a man could, for a moment or two, imagine he was a thousand miles away.

Lasseur was standing next to him. The privateer captain had pulled the cheroot out of his jacket for what must have been the hundredth time and was staring at it with all the concentration of a drunkard eyeing a bottle of grog.

Hawkwood sensed a presence at his shoulder.

It was the teacher, Fouchet, his face frozen in an expression that struck Hawkwood with a sense of impending dread.

“Sébastien?” Lasseur enquired cautiously.

Fouchet stared at them, as if he didn’t know where to begin. Sorrow exuded from every pore.

“Sébastien?” Lasseur said again.

The teacher’s face crumpled. “They’ve taken the boy.”

Hawkwood frowned. “Who have? The guards?”

Fouchet shook his head. “The Romans.”

Lasseur gasped in shock, his cheroot forgotten. “What? How?”

“I sent him to the galley after his lessons to help Samuel prepare for supper. He didn’t arrive. I only found that out when I went to sort out the rations for the mess.” The teacher began to wring his hands. “I should have gone with him. It’s my fault.”

At Lasseur’s request, Fouchet had secured the boy a job as assistant to one of the galley cooks.

“How do you know the Romans have him?” Hawkwood said. “He could be with one of the other boys.”

The dwellers from the orlop had kept a low profile since their lightning raid on the Park – collectively, at any rate. Individually, they still made forays on to the forecastle in search of galley scrapings or the chance to barter, though they were usually given short shrift by the non-Roman captives. En masse, however, their presence on board, only a deck below, continued to cast a dark shadow in the minds of all the other prisoners. They reminded Hawkwood of the untouchables he’d seen in India: hated and feared, but impossible to ignore.

Fouchet shook his head. “I spoke with Millet and Charbonneau. They asked around. Lucien was seen with Juvert.”

“Who’s Juvert?” Hawkwood asked.

“I know him,” Lasseur said quickly. “Damned pederast! I caught him talking to Lucien on the first day. I warned him to leave the boy alone.”

Hawkwood’s mind went back to the prisoner he’d seen crouched beside the boy, slender fingers caressing Lucien’s back. “He’s a Roman?”

“He’s one of Matisse’s acolytes,” Fouchet said.

“Matisse?”

“A vile creature; calls himself king of the Romans. He rules the lower levels. A Corsican, too, if you can believe that,” the teacher added sourly.

“There’s a leader?” Lasseur couldn’t hide his disbelief.

“What about the guards?” Hawkwood asked, wondering why Matisse had adopted the title of king. The Romans of old had been ruled by an emperor, hadn’t they? Though on second thoughts, one Corsican emperor at a time was probably enough. His mind went back to the comment he’d overheard between the two militia men when he’d arrived on board:

Wait till His Majesty gets a look at that!

A sick feeling began to worm its way into Hawkwood’s stomach.

Fouchet shook his head. “They’ll do nothing. No crime has been committed. In any case, they won’t dare to venture that far below deck.”

Hawkwood stared hard at the teacher. “It’s a British ship! You’re telling me the British Navy has no rights on one of its own vessels?”

Fouchet spread his hands. “It has the right. It’s the will that’s lacking, especially where the Romans are concerned. If you want the truth, I think the commander and his men are more wary of Matisse and his courtiers than we are.”

“But the British are armed. They have guns!” Lasseur protested.

“True, but you saw for yourselves the other day: they’ll not use them unless one of their own is threatened.”

Lasseur gazed at the teacher in horror. Fouchet wilted under the scrutiny.

“This is what you meant, wasn’t it?” Lasseur said finally. “This is why you told me to watch him. Matisse has done this before. He’s taken other boys. My God, what sort of place is this?”

“If I told you the half of it,” Fouchet replied softly, “you’d say I was mad.”

“What about the tribunal? Doesn’t that have influence?”

Fouchet shook his head. “Not over Matisse, it doesn’t. Besides, tribunal is just another word for committee. When was the last time a committee did anything constructive? And by the time the tribunal’s convened it would be too late. We have to do something now!”

Dear God! Hawkwood thought wildly. “All right, Charbonneau told us anything that happens below deck stays below deck. We’ll take care of it ourselves.”

“How?” Fouchet’s head jerked up. “Wait, you’re going down there?”

“Unless you can think of another way,” Hawkwood said. He waited for an answer.

Fouchet looked at them helplessly.

“This Matisse, can you take us to him?” Lasseur asked.

Fouchet paled. He took a step back, nearly overbalancing in the process.

Anger flared briefly in Lasseur’s eyes and his expression hardened. But as he stared at Fouchet, he saw the fear in the teacher’s face.

“We’re wasting time,” Hawkwood said.

“I’m so sorry,” Fouchet whispered. His face sagged. He looked suddenly very old and very frail.

Lasseur gave the teacher a reassuring smile. “We’ll get him back, Sébastien, I give you my word.” He turned to Hawkwood. “Perhaps we should be armed?”

Hawkwood looked at Fouchet. “Will they have weapons down there?”

Fouchet gave an unhappy nod. “It’s possible.”

“Wonderful,” Lasseur said. “What should we do about that?”

“I can’t see Hellard giving us the key to the armoury,” Hawkwood said drily. “And we don’t have time to go searching. We’ll just have to improvise.” He turned to Fouchet. “Where’s Juvert? Have you seen him since the boy went missing?”

A spark of hope brightened the teacher’s eyes. He nodded and pointed.

Claude Juvert was savouring the moment. He was on the beak deck, in the forward heads, enjoying a piss. There was a splendid view of the river from the pissdales, if you kept your eyes front and ignored the unsightly sterns of the prison ships moored over the bow. There was the gross stench, of course, but it was impossible to avoid that, even with the deck exposed to the elements. There were only six seats of ease on the hulk and with over eight hundred prisoners on board it was rare not to find most of them occupied at any one time. Four prisoners were seated behind Juvert, trousers bunched around their ankles, contemplating their future. Conversation was desultory.

Had Rapacious been at sea and under sail, the smell would have been barely noticeable. The constant deluge of salt and spray cascading over the forward netting would have ensured that the deck received a regular sluicing. The shit and piss stains that accumulated around the holes in the gratings would have been washed away without any bother. With the ship moored in the middle of a river in almost flat calm water with only an occasional choppiness to break the monotony, the sanitary arrangements weren’t anywhere near as effective. It was decidedly moist and treacherous underfoot.

Juvert shook himself dry, buttoned his trousers and wiped his hands on his jacket. Emitting a small sigh of satisfaction, he turned to go.

The blow from Lasseur’s boot took Juvert in the small of the back, propelling him head first against the netting stanchion. There was a dull crunch as Juvert’s thin nose took the brunt of the impact. He let out a yelp. Blood spurted. Lasseur stepped in, took Juvert by the throat and squeezed. Blood from Juvert’s broken nose dripped over the privateer’s wrist.

“Remember me?” Lasseur said. His eyes burned with rage.

Juvert’s eyes opened wide, first with shock and then in fear. He moaned and tried to jerk free, but Lasseur’s grip held him fast.

Hawkwood took Juvert’s left arm. Lasseur took the right. They hauled him to his feet.

“Any trouble,” Lasseur hissed, “and it won’t be just your nose – I’ll break your neck.”

Hawkwood smiled grimly at the row of squatting, slack-jawed prisoners who didn’t know whether to remain where they were or try to make a strategic and ungainly withdrawal. “As you were, gentlemen. We’re just leaving.”

They left the heads, escorting the whimpering Juvert between them. Their emergence drew curious looks. A few frowned at the froth of blood on Juvert’s face as he was bundled unceremoniously along the deck, but one look at Lasseur’s steely grimace was enough to warn them it would be a mistake to interfere.

Lasseur placed his lips close to Juvert’s ear. “Did I or did I not warn you to stay away from the boy?”

“W-what boy?” Juvert spluttered. The collision with the post had split his lip and loosened what remained of his yellowing front teeth.

It was the wrong answer. Lasseur spun Juvert round and slammed him against the curved bulkhead. Then he slapped Juvert sharply across the face. “Don’t play games with me! I’m not in the mood.”

“What have I done?” The words emerged weakly from between Juvert’s bloodied lips.

Lasseur hit him again, harder and very fast.

Juvert let go another high-pitched squawk. Blood dripped from his nose and down his chin.

“You took the boy, Lucien, didn’t you?” Lasseur pressed.

Hand over his nose, Juvert mumbled something unintelligible. Tears of pain misted his eyes.

“What?” Lasseur cupped a palm to his ear. “Speak up. We can’t hear you.”

Juvert, anticipating another blow, threw up his hands. “I had to do it.” The words bubbled from his broken nose and split lip.

“Had to?” Hawkwood said.

Juvert spat out a thick gobbet of blood. “It was Matisse! He made me. I was in debt after losing a w-wager. He said if I delivered the boy to him, he’d consider the debt paid.”

“You gutless piece of shit,” Lasseur snarled. He drew back his balled fist.

Juvert cringed and shut his eyes. “Please –”

“Please? You dare to beg? Did Lucien Ballard beg? Did any of the boys beg when you delivered them to him?”

Juvert shrank back.

Concerned that Lasseur would do Juvert permanent damage before they’d achieved their objective, Hawkwood put out a restraining hand.

“You’re taking us to Matisse,” Hawkwood said. “And then Captain Lasseur and I are going to point out to His Majesty the error of his ways.”

“You can’t,” Juvert pleaded, trying to pull away. His frightened gaze moved first to Hawkwood then to Lasseur and then back again. “You don’t know him. Matisse will kill me.”

Hawkwood nodded towards Lasseur. “He’ll kill you if you don’t. And if he doesn’t, I will. So move yourself.”

There should have been an inscription carved into the overhead beam, Hawkwood thought, as he looked down the darkened stairwell: Abandon hope, all ye who enter. He’d heard the phrase somewhere, but he couldn’t recall when or where.

Lasseur had purloined one of the lanterns from the gun deck. He held it over the hatchway. The opening was small compared to most of the others on board. The stairs leading down looked narrower and a lot steeper, too. Poised on the rim, Hawkwood could just make out the bottom step. It lay in shadow, barely visible. There were no signs of life, though he thought he could hear vague sounds rising from deep within the well; faint whisperings, like tiny wings fluttering. There were muted rustlings too, and growls of laughter, and a rattling noise, as if tiny claws were skittering across a table top.

Juvert looked like a man about to be thrust into a pit full of vipers. Blood from his broken nose had congealed along the crease of his upper lip and both cheeks carried thin vertical scars where the sweat and tears had forged tracks through the dirt on his face.

“Move,” Hawkwood said brusquely.

Pushing the reluctant Juvert ahead of them, Hawkwood and Lasseur stepped down through the hatch.

It was like plunging into an oven. Hawkwood felt as if the air was being drawn from his lungs with each step he took. He recalled Murat’s description of the orlop and its lack of headroom compared to the gun deck. Even so, when he reached the bottom of the stairway, he was unprepared for just how low the deckhead was; at least another six inches lower than that of the gun deck. His ears picked up a dull thump. The lantern light wavered and he heard Lasseur curse; proof that even an experienced seaman could be caught unawares.

Hawkwood suspected the word had been passed the moment Juvert’s heel hit the top step. The whispering he thought he’d heard earlier had intensified as news of their descent spread through the deck. It sounded like leaves soughing in the wind.

Had the ship still been seaworthy, the orlop would have been below the waterline, with no access to natural light or ventilation. But, as Hawkwood had seen from the longboat, scuttles had been cut into the hull along the line of the deck. Smaller than the gun-deck ports, square cut, and blocked by metal bars, they were nevertheless of sufficient size to allow daylight in, much to Hawkwood’s relief. He hadn’t relished negotiating the dark with the lantern as their only source of illumination.

If the gun deck resembled a cellar, the orlop was more like a catacomb. He heard Lasseur mutter another oath under his breath and remembered the privateer’s comment about boarding a blackbirder off the African coast. It sounded as if Lasseur was reliving the experience. The heat would have been enough to trigger memory. It was stifling; more so than on the gun deck, and the humidity was intense. Hawkwood’s shirt was damp with sweat. His skin prickled uncomfortably.

According to Charbonneau, the Romans craved the darkness. The statement wasn’t strictly true: the open scuttles proved that and Hawkwood could also see the flicker of lantern light. It made him wonder if it wasn’t the Romans and the Rafalés’ fear of outsiders that governed their near nocturnal existence rather than their supposed predilection for perpetual twilight.

Peering into the orlop’s murky interior, he could make out crude benches and rows of sleeping racks. Many of the men on the racks were naked. Huddled together like spoons, their skins as grey as cadavers. Others, clad in what remained of their uniforms, resembled scarecrows, while the ones dressed only in their blanket togas looked more like moths as they melted in and out of the shadows or hovered around the guttering candles, gripping their cards with spindle-thin fingers.

Hawkwood, shirt moulded to his flesh, was beginning to envy the men who were without clothes. It was becoming harder to draw breath. The cause of the faint rattling noise that he’d detected earlier was now clear and he chided himself for not recognizing it as dice being rolled across table tops. Even naked and starving, the Rafalés were prepared to gamble their lives away. The darkness couldn’t conceal the wild expressions on the faces of the wretches hunched around even the dimmest candle flame. Each tumble of the die was accompanied by cries of excitement or gales of manic laughter. It was like walking through the corridors of Bedlam.

Heads turned towards the intruders. Some faces showed open hostility. Others reflected fear at seeing their sanctuary violated. Some of the men on the sleeping racks, who in the midst of all the wretchedness had still managed to retain a small sliver of dignity, hunkered down in a desperate bid to conceal themselves beneath their meagre scraps of blanket. The remainder turned their faces away and tried to merge into the shadows.

Charbonneau had referred to the orlop-dwellers as animals. Even allowing for prejudice, the description had seemed harsh, but looking around it wasn’t hard to see the truth in it. As he made his way along the deck, Hawkwood’s stomach heaved at the sight and stench of prisoners lying in their own filth.

“I would not keep dogs in a place like this,” Lasseur whispered, horrified.

It seemed impossible to believe that men could allow themselves to be subjected to such degradation. It made Hawkwood wonder about British prisoners held in French gaols. He didn’t know if the French used hulks. There were prison fortresses, he knew that; many of them in the north, at Verdun, Quimper and Arras. Were the conditions there as bad as this? It was more than likely any French prisoner who did manage to escape would waste no time in reporting the brutal manner in which they’d been kept. It wasn’t inconceivable that, in retaliation, the French authorities would make it their duty to display the same lack of compassion as their British counterparts.

Like many soldiers, Hawkwood had always viewed a quick death in battle as infinitely preferable to being cut and probed by the regimental surgeon and slowly dying, crippled and in agony. Now, bent almost double and surrounded by such abject misery, it was only too clear there were fates far worse than the surgeon’s knife. Being captured and held in a place like this – that was death of a kind; a slow, lingering death. And no man, no matter in which army he served, deserved that.

As Hawkwood crabbed his way beneath the beams, trying to avoid the stares, several dark objects tacked to the support struts caught his eye. He paused, curious. Lasseur held up the lantern. Hawkwood found he was looking at a row of rat pelts, with the ears and tails still attached. What had Charbonneau told them? Even the rats aren’t safe. Hawkwood wondered what rat meat tasted like. He turned away, sickened.

They were almost at the bow. Ahead of them, the base of the foremast rose solidly out of the deck. The press of bodies wasn’t so bad here, Hawkwood noticed, which was curious. It was as though the mast was some sort of totem, beyond which the mass of the Rafalés were not prepared to venture.

Hawkwood was acutely aware of the ache at the base of his spine; the effect of being bent double. He tried to ease the discomfort by straightening, suspecting it would be a futile exercise, but discovered to his relief that the height of the deckhead between the crossbeams had become a little more generous. He still wasn’t able to stand upright, but there was a definite improvement over the miserly headroom at the bottom of the hatchway.

Juvert paused. He looked suddenly apprehensive. Hawkwood peered ahead cautiously. He could hear voices, but forward of the mast the bow section of the orlop lay in near impenetrable darkness and he couldn’t see a thing. Then he heard a bray of harsh laughter and he looked again. It took a second for him to see there was in fact a thick layer of blankets in the form of a curtain suspended from the overhead beam, effectively sealing off the main part of the orlop from the fore platform. From the darkness beyond the heavy veil came the hollow rattle of dice and the murmur of conversation.

Lasseur raised the lantern. He nodded. Hawkwood took Juvert’s arm and drew back the edge of the curtain.

During his time in the army Hawkwood had endured a good many sea voyages. The majority of them, almost without exception, had been miserable. But he still held memories of the transport ships and had a vague idea of their layout below deck. In the hulk’s previous life, the fore platform had probably housed the boatswain’s and carpenter’s quarters and workshop, along with the gunner’s storeroom, and the area would have been separated from the main orlop by a concave bulkhead. On Rapacious the bulkhead had been removed. The cabins and storerooms had been transformed into gloomy, lantern-lit alcoves, some of which were partially concealed behind hanging blankets. Hawkwood saw that scraps of cloth had also been hung over the scuttles, reducing the daylight coming in through the grilles.

There were perhaps ten or twelve men present, seated at the tables or sprawled on sleeping racks; most were clad in the drab yellow prison garb. Some, however, were wearing blanket togas. A couple were engaged in a dice game. At another table a foursome was playing cards – drogue, from the looks of one pair, who had wooden pegs clipped over their nostrils while they awaited the outcome of the next hand.

Hawkwood was struck by the strong resemblance to a rookery drinking den. The only difference between this section of the orlop and a rookery were the half-dozen hammocks suspended from the beams.

At Hawkwood’s and Lasseur’s entrance, conversation ceased abruptly. At the card table, the losing pair sat up straight and surreptitiously removed their nose pegs.

Hawkwood broke the silence. “We’re looking for Matisse.”

No one answered. Several men exchanged wary looks.

“Cat got your tongues?” Hawkwood gripped Juvert’s elbow. “Point him out.”

Juvert winced. His mouth formed an O. He looked petrified, but before he could reply, several men stood up. They weren’t empty-handed. Each was armed with what looked like a heavy metal blade, about eighteen inches in length.

Well, Fouchet did warn us, Hawkwood thought. But swords? He heard Lasseur mutter an obscenity.

Benches slid back noisily. Dice and cards lay forgotten.

One of the armed men shuffled forward. He was heavy set with bowed legs and a low brow. “What’s your business here?”

Lantern light played across the speaker’s face. A large, pear-shaped birthmark, as dark as a gravy stain, covered his right cheek and jaw. His nose had been broken at some time in the past.

Hawkwood took a surreptitious glance at the blade in the man’s hand. It looked like an iron barrel hoop that had been hammered flat. The edge was a long way from honed, but it looked as if it could still do considerable damage.

“You’re Matisse?”

The man looked anything but regal.

“I’m Dupin.”

“Then you’re only the monkey. It’s the organ grinder we want.”

Close to, Hawkwood noticed there was something different about Dupin’s uniform. As well as the arrows and the letters on the sleeves and thighs, the yellow jacket and trousers were covered in an uneven pattern of small black dots. Some of the dots were moving. Dupin’s clothes were alive with lice. Hawkwood’s skin crawled. He resisted the urge to scratch and bit down on the sour taste that had risen unbidden into the back of his throat.

Lasseur had seen the infestation, too. The lantern illuminated his disgust. He shuddered.

Hawkwood said, “Tell His Majesty that Captains Hooper and Lasseur are here. He’ll know what it’s concerning.”

“Best do it quickly,” Lasseur said. “Otherwise stand aside.”

Dupin stared hard at the marks on Juvert’s face. Then he turned. He jerked his head at the men over his shoulder and as they moved apart another table came into view at the back of the compartment. Five people were seated around it. There was no throne, as far as Hawkwood could see; only benches. No crown or robes of state, either. Bottles and jugs sat on the table alongside platters of half-consumed bread and cheese.

The figure at the centre of the table leaned forward, revealing a closely shaven, oval-shaped head and a face empty of hue.

Lasseur gasped. The privateer’s reaction had come not from seeing the man’s bald pate but from his eyes. They had no discernible pupils. The centre of each eye was not dark but shell pink, as if a thimbleful of blood had been emptied into a saucer of milk. Even odder was the way the head appeared to be disembodied, for the rest of the seated figure, from the neck down, looked to be swathed entirely in black, save for one pale, slender arm which rested languorously over the shoulders of the small, blond boy seated beside him.

“Matisse.” Lasseur made the name sound like a whispered obscenity. He went to take a step forward only to find his path blocked.

The thin, bloodless lips split in two.

“It’s all right, Dupin. You can let them by. We’ve been expecting them.”

7

Hawkwood stared at the pink eyes and the shaven scalp and wondered about the colour of Matisse’s hair. There was a name given to people whose hair was so blond it was almost white and whose red-rimmed eyes looked as if they were leaching blood. Whiteface, some called it, though that wasn’t its only name. Spain was where Hawkwood had come across the phenomenon, for the first and only other time, in the person of a small boy in an orphanage run by priests outside Astariz. The boy had been abandoned in the confessional as a baby, wrapped in a blanket, his only possession a small silver crucifix strung on a bootlace around his neck. The child had been seven years old when Hawkwood had met him and something of a miracle, for no one had expected him to live beyond his fourth birthday. The boy’s eyes had been sensitive to light, Hawkwood recalled, forcing him to spend most of his waking hours in a darkened room. It was one of the brothers who’d told Hawkwood that the word used to describe the boy’s condition had been borrowed from Portuguese traders. It was the name they gave to the white Negroes they’d encountered on the coast of Africa. They called them albinos.

The colour of Matisse’s eyes suggested he might be a victim of the same abnormality. Maybe that was how the Romans’ alleged preference for the dark had got started. Maybe the stories were based purely on a distorted understanding of the Roman leader’s affliction.

Hawkwood’s thoughts were interrupted.

“Captain Lasseur! This is an honour! It’s not often we get to meet one of the republic’s naval heroes. Why, I was regaling my friends here only yesterday with tales of your exploits. Very impressed they were, too; especially with your taking of the British brig. Justice. Where was it now? Off the coast at Oran? I heard you were severely outgunned. That must have taken some courage. We admire a man with backbone, don’t we, boys?”

There was a curious rough yet sibilant quality to the voice. The mocking words were heavily accented and didn’t so much emerge as slither from the tip of the man’s tongue. Hawkwood presumed that was due to the speaker’s Corsican heritage. There was no response from the other men lounging at the table, who looked as dissolute as their leader and decidedly unenthused by the prospect of receiving visitors, irrespective of their reputation.

“And you’ll be our gallant American ally, Captain Hooper! I regret to say, due to an oversight no doubt, Captain Hooper’s reputation has failed to precede him. My commiserations, nevertheless, on your capture, sir. The Emperor needs all the help he can get. My spies tell me you’re newly arrived from Spain; a bloody battleground, by all accounts. The newspapers here say that Wellington’s giving us a roasting. Is that true? Or are they pamphleteering, I wonder?”

Hawkwood ignored the question. He stuck out his boot and shoved Juvert forward. “I’m told this belongs to you.”

Surprise and gravity did the rest. The trip sent Juvert flying. Forced to put out his hands to save himself, he let out an undignified splutter as he slewed across the deck, forcing several of the onlookers to scramble back from his line of trajectory. The boy jumped nervously, his eyes wide. Shaken out of their insouciance, the men on either side of him sat up. Shock lanced across their faces.

The shaven-headed man’s pose did not change. It was hard to read the expression in his eyes as he stared down at Juvert’s prostrate body. Only the contraction of his jaw muscles indicated the essence of his thoughts. He looked up, his arm still draped across the boy’s shoulders.

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