"Baltic Mission" - читать интересную книгу автора (Вудмен Ричард)

10   The Mad Enterprise

'How did you discover the connection between us?' Drinkwater asked at last, after the two men had sat in silence awhile. 'I understood my brother to be living under a nom de guerre.'

'Oh, it isn't common knowledge, Captain Drinkwater; you need have no fear that more than a few men know about it. Dungarth does, of course, and Prince Vorontzoff, your brother's employer and a man sympathetic to the alliance with Great Britain, knows him for an Englishman. But I think I am the only other man who knows his identity, excepting yourself, of course.'

'But you have not said how you knew.'

'It is quite simple. He told me once. He was sent to me from Hamburg. I introduced him to the elder Vorontzoff and, one night, shortly before I left St Petersburg, we got drunk ... a Russian custom, you see,' Mackenzie said and Drinkwater thought that Mackenzie had probably ensured Edward's loose tongue by his own liberality. 'He had reached a turning-point. A man does not put off the old life overnight and he seemed over-burdened with conscience. He made some thick allusions to drinking water. The joke was too heavy for wit and he was too drunk to jest, yet his persistence made me certain the words had some significance ... but it was only when I learned your name from Lieutenant...'

'Quilhampton.'

'Just so, that I began to recall Ostroff's drunken pun. Then, having had my professional curiosity aroused, I felt it was necessary to,' Mackenzie shrugged with an irresponsible smile, 'to invade your privacy, I think you said. And my effrontery was rewarded; you had inscribed Ostroff's Russian signature in your journal. Quod erat demonstrandum.'

'I see.' It was very strange, but Drinkwater felt an enormous weight lifted from him. Somehow he had known for years that he must atone for his own crime of aiding and abetting Edward's escape from the gallows. It was easy to excuse his actions, to disguise his motives under the cant of reasons of state. The truth was that his own rectitude made him feel guilty. Edward was a man who drifted like a straw upon the tide and who, through some strange working of natural laws, managed to float to the surface in all circumstances. To Edward, and probably Mackenzie, his own misgivings would seem utterly foolish. But he knew himself to be of a different type, a man whose life had been dogged by set-backs, wounds and hardships. Perhaps the atonement would still come but he could not deny the relief at Edward's identity no longer being quite so hermetic a secret.

He looked at Mackenzie. A few moments earlier he had been ready to consign the man to the devil. Now they sat like old friends sipping their wine, bound by the common knowledge of Ostroff's true identity. It occurred to Drinkwater that, yet again, Mackenzie had a superior hold over him; but he found the knowledge no longer made him angry.

'I knew my brother to have found employment with Prince Vorontzoff, on account of his abilities with horses, but I do not fully understand how he serves you and Lord Dungarth.'

'He is a brilliant horseman, I believe, and on account of this he formed a close friendship with Vorontzoff's son. Good horsemen are much admired in Russia and the younger Vorontzoff, being appointed to the army in the field, got some sort of commission for Ostroff. That sort of thing is not difficult in the Tsar's bureaucracy. Ostroff was at Austerlitz and attached to the Don Cossacks at Eylau, though what he has been up to lately I do not know. I was trying to make contact with him and Wilson when I was chased into Konigsberg by those French dragoons.'

'And now you want to make another attempt at reaching him through Memel?'

'Yes. And I would wish you to wait there for my return.'

'And then convey you to London with all dispatch?'

'I see, at last, that we are of one mind, Captain Drinkwater,' Mackenzie smiled.

'Then we had better drink to it,' Drinkwater said, rising and fetching the decanter.

'A capital idea,' replied Mackenzie, holding out his glass.

  Drinkwater woke sweating and staring into the darkness, trying to place the source of the wild laughter. He had been dreaming, a nightmare of terrifying reality, in which a white-clothed figure loomed over him to the sound of clanking chains. The figure had been that of Hortense Santhonax, her beauty hideously transformed. The Medusa head had laughed in his face and he had seemed to drown below her, struggling helplessly as the laughter grew and the breath was squeezed from his lungs.

In the darkness of the cabin, surrounded by the familiar creaking of Antigone, he found the laughter resolve itself into a knocking at the cabin door. He pulled himself together. 'Enter!'

'It's Frey, sir.' The midshipman's slight figure showed in the gloom. 'Mr. Quilhampton's compliments, sir, and we've raised Memel light.'

'Very well. I'll be up shortly.'

Frey disappeared and he lay back in the cot, seeking a few minutes of peace. The nightmare was an old one but had not lost its potency. Usually he attached it to presentiment or times of extreme anxiety, but this morning he managed to smile at himself for a fool. It was the unburdening of the secret of Edward that had brought on the dream; a retrospective abstraction haunting his isolated imagination while he slept.

'Damn fool,' he chid himself and, flinging back the blankets, threw his legs over the edge of the cot. Five minutes later he was on deck.

'Mornin', Mr. Q.'

'Morning, sir. Memel light three leagues distant, sir.' Quilhampton pointed and Drinkwater saw the orange glow. 'It's supposed to rival the full moon at a league, sir.'

'I'm pleased to see you have been studying the rutter, Mr. Q,' said Drinkwater drily, amused at Quilhampton.

'To be fair, sir, it's Frey who has studied the rutter. I merely picked his brains.'

'Tch, tch. Most reprehensible,' Drinkwater laughed. 'Incidentally, Mr. Q, I will want you to put our guest ashore later.'

'Mr. Mackenzie, sir?' 'Yes.'

Drinkwater could almost hear Quilhampton's curiosity working. He considered the wisdom of revealing something of Mackenzie's purpose. On balance, he considered, it would not hurt. It was better to reveal a half-truth than risk stupid speculation growing wild. He had known a silly rumour started on the quarterdeck reach the fo'c's'le as a hardened fact magnified twentyfold. It had caused a deal of resentment among the hands, and even a denial by the first lieutenant had failed to extinguish it. The old saw about there being no smoke without fire was murmured by men starved of any news, whose days were governed by the whims of the weather and the denizens of the quarterdeck, and by whom any remark that intimated yet greater impositions upon them was accepted without question. In the end it was better that the people knew something of what was going on.

'I expect you are wondering exactly who, or what, Mr. Mackenzie is, eh, James?'

'Well, sir, the thought had crossed my mind.'

'And not just yours, I'll warrant.'

'No, sir.'

'He's an agent, Mr. Q, like some of those mysterious johnnies we picked up in the Channel a year or two ago. We shall put him ashore in order that he can find out what exactly the Russians are going to do after Boney beat 'em at Friedland.'

'I see, sir. Thank you.'

Drinkwater fell to pacing the quarterdeck as, in the east, the light grew and the masts, rigging and sails began to stand out blackly against the lightening sky. By the time the people went to their messes for breakfast they would know all about Mr. Mackenzie.

A few hours later the barge was swung out and lowered as, with her main-topsail against the mast, Antigone hove to. It was a bright summer morning and the port of Memel with its conspicuous lighthouse was no more than four miles away. Mackenzie came aft to make his farewells.

'I rely upon you to cruise hereabouts until my return, Captain,' he said.

'I shall maintain station, Mr. Mackenzie; you may rely upon it. I may chase a neutral or two for amusement, Drinkwater replied, ‘but my main occupation will be to ensure the ship is in a fit state for a swift passage home.'

Beyond Mackenzie, Drinkwater saw the word 'home' had been caught by a seaman coiling down a line. That, too, would not hurt. It would brighten the men's spirits to know the ship was destined for a British port.

'Do you wish me to keep a boat at Memel to await you, Mr. Mackenzie?'

'No, I think not, Captain. In view of the possible results of our ... hypothesis, I think it unwise. I can doubtless bribe a fishing boat to bring me off.' He smiled. The cupidity of fishermen was universal.

Mackenzie held out his hand and moved half a pace nearer. 'Do you have a message for Ostroff?' he asked in a low voice.

'Yes ... wish him well for me, Mackenzie ... and ask him if he is still afraid of the dark.'

Mackenzie laughed. 'He does not strike me as a man who might be afraid of the dark, Captain.'

Drinkwater grinned back. 'Perhaps not; but he was once. Good luck, Mackenzie.'

'A bientot, Captain ...'

For two days Drinkwater kept Antigone under weigh. He was merciless to the entire crew, officers and men alike. The British frigate stood on and off the land, first under easy sail and then setting every stitch of canvas she possessed. When ropes parted or jammed, he chastised the petty officers and midshipmen responsible with verbal lashings from the windward hance. It brought him a deep inner satisfaction, for junior officers were rarely blamed for the many small things that went wrong on board. They buried such failings more often than not by starting the unfortunate hands, a practice that usually assuaged the quarterdeck officers. Midshipmen had the worst name for these minor malpractices which caused such resentment among the men, and it did them good to be chased hither and thither and called to account for their failures in full view of the ship's company.

As the studdingsails rose and set for the eighth or ninth time, as the topgallant masts were struck and the yards sent down, the men worked with a will, seeing how at every misfortune it was a midshipman, a master's mate or a petty officer that was identified as being the culprit. The hands were in high glee for, with the captain on deck throughout the manoeuvres, there was little revengeful starting carried out by the bosun's mates who well knew Drinkwater's aversion to the practice. It was one thing to start men aloft in an emergency or when faced with the enemy, when the need to manoeuvre was paramount; but quite another to do it when the ship was being put through her paces.

Even the officers bore their share of Drinkwater's strange behaviour, Rogers, as first lieutenant, in particular. But he bore it well, submitting to it as though to a test of his recovery. At the end of the second day, as the men secured the guns from a final practice drill, Drinkwater pronounced himself satisfied, ordered a double ration of three-water grog served out to all hands and brought the ship to anchor a league from Memel light.

'Well, Mr. Rogers, I think the ship will make a fast passage when she is called upon to do so, don't you?'

'Yes, sir. But a passage where, sir?' asked Rogers, puzzled.

'Well, if we get the right slant of wind, we shall make for London River!'

Rogers's smile was unalloyed. 'Hell's teeth, that's good news. May I ask when that might be?'

'When Mr. Mackenzie returns, Sam, when Mr. Mackenzie returns. '

Mr. Mackenzie returned shortly before noon three days later, hailing them from the deck of a fishing boat and obviously in a state of high excitement. Drinkwater was on deck to meet him and found Mackenzie had lost his air of cool self-possession. His dust-stained clothes flapping about him, he strode across the deck, his face lined with dirt which gave its expression a compulsive ferocity.

'Captain, your cabin at once.' He seemed breathless, for all that he must have been inactive during the boat's passage.

'Prepare to get under weigh, Mr. Rogers,' Drinkwater ordered, turning towards Mackenzie, but the agent shook his head.

'No ... not yet. There is something we must attend to first. Come, Captain, every second counts!'

Drinkwater shrugged at the first lieutenant. 'Belay that, Mr. Rogers. Come then, Mr. Mackenzie.' He led the way below and Mackenzie collapsed into a chair. Pouring two glasses of blackstrap Drinkwater handed one to the exhausted agent. 'Here, drink this and then tell me what has happened.'

Mackenzie tossed off the glass, wiped a hand across his mouth and stared at Drinkwater with eyes that glittered from red-rimmed sockets.

'Captain,' began Mackenzie, 'I need you to come with me. I have returned to persuade you. It is imperative. It is a mad enterprise, but one on which everything hangs.'

'Everything?' Drinkwater frowned uncertainly.

'Yes, everything,' Mackenzie insisted, 'perhaps the history of Europe. You are the one man who can help!'

'But I am a sea-officer, not a spy!'

Drinkwater's protest roused Mackenzie. 'It is precisely because you are a sea-officer that we need you ... Ostroff and I. You see, Captain Drinkwater, my hypothesis has proved correct. Napoleon and Alexander are to meet in conditions of the greatest secrecy, and to gain access we need a seaman's skills.'

The British spy made out a desperate case for Drinkwater's help and he had to concede the justice of the argument. What Mackenzie demanded was incontrovertibly within the latitude of Dungarth's special instructions. Whatever the bureaucrats at the Admiralty might think of him leaving his ship, he felt he was covered by Lord Dungarth's cryptic order: You should afford any assistance required by persons operating on the instructions of this Department. Now he knew why the old, recurring dream had woken him a few mornings before; he had felt a presentiment and he knew the moment for full atonement had come.

'Damn these metaphysics,' he growled, and turned his mind to more practical matters.

Mackenzie had suggested they took a third person, someone with a competent knowledge of horses, for they had far to travel, yet one who would play up to the fiction of Mackenzie mas­querading as a merchant and Drinkwater as the master of an English trading vessel lying in Memel. For this there was only one candidate, Midshipman Lord Walmsley, the only one of Antigone's people who was familiar with horses, and who spoke French into the bargain. His lordship showed a gratifying willingness to volunteer for a 'secret mission' and was ordered to remove the white patches from his coat collar and to dress plainly. His preparations in the cockpit spread a sensational rumour throughout the ship.

For himself Drinkwater begged a plain blue coat from Hill, leaving behind his sword with the lion-headed pommel that betrayed his commissioned status. Instead he packed pistols, powder and ball in a valise together with his shaving tackle and a change of small clothes.

'You will not need to worry about being conspicuous,' Mackenzie had yawned, 'the countryside is alive with travellers all going wide-eyed to see their Little Father the Tsar meet the hideous monster Napoleon.'

The hours of the afternoon rushed by. He had left instructions with Quilhampton to execute his will should he fail to return, and had attempted to write to Elizabeth but gave the matter up, for his heart was too full to trust to paper. Instead he went to the orlop to see Tregembo who was recovering well, and passed on a brief message to be given in the event of his disappearance. It was inadequate and ambiguous, but it was all he could do.

'I wish I could come with 'ee, zur,' the old man had said, half rising from the grubby palliasse upon which he lay. Drinkwater had patted his unhurt shoulder.

'You be a good fellow and get better.'

'And you look after yourself, boy,' Tregembo had said with a fierce and possessive familiarity that brought a sudden smile to Drinkwater's preoccupied face.

Finally, he had written his orders to Rogers, placing him in temporary command. Should he fail to return within ten days, Rogers was to open a second envelope which informed their Lordships of the state of affairs Mackenzie had so far discovered and his own reasons for leaving his ship. As the dog-watches changed, Mackenzie woke, and half an hour later they left the ship.

Lieutenant Quilhampton commanded the boat, making his second trip to Memel to land agents and scarcely imagining why the captain found it necessary to desert them like this. The mood in the boat was one of silent introspection as each man contemplated the future. Drinkwater and Mackenzie considered the problems ahead of them while James Quilhampton and the oarsmen gazed outboard and wondered what it would be like to be under the orders of Samuel Rogers. The only light heart among them was Lord Walmsley who had a thirst for an adventurous lark.

The long northern twilight offered them no concealment as they pulled into the river, past the lighthouse tower and its fire. The quays of Memel were still busy with fishing boats unloading their catches. Drinkwater tried to assume the character of Young, master of the Jenny Marsden, as typifying the kind of man he was trying to ape. He tried to recall the jargon of the merchant mariners, mentally repeating their strange terms in time with the oars as they knocked against the thole-pins: loss and demurrage; barratry and bottomry; pratique and protest; lagan and lien, jetsam and jerque notes, flotsam and indemnity. It was a bewildering vocabulary of which he had an imperfect knowledge, but in the event there were no Custom House officers to test him and with a feeling of anticlimax Drinkwater followed Mackenzie up a flight of slippery stone steps onto the quay, with Walmsley bringing up the rear.

There were no farewells. Quilhampton shoved the tiller over and the bowman bore off. Ten minutes after approaching the quay the barge was slipping seawards in the gathering darkness. Quilhampton did not look back. He felt an overwhelming sense of desolation: Drinkwater had deserted them and they were now to be subject to the arbitrary rule of Samuel Rogers.

Lieutenant Samuel Rogers sat alone at the captain's desk. His eyes looked down at the table-top. It was clear of papers, clear of Mount's long-borrowed Military Atlas, clear of everything except a key. It was a large, steel key, such as operated a lock with four tumblers. A wooden tag was attached to it and bore the legend: SPIRIT ROOM.

Rogers stared at the key for a long time. He was filled with a sense of power quite unattached to the fact that he was now in effective command of the Antigone. This was something else, something strange stirring in a brain already damaged by alcohol and the horrible experience of being lashed in a strait-jacket. Rogers was quite unable to blame himself for his addiction. He blamed fate and bad luck and, in a way, that obligation to Drinkwater which had become a form of jealousy. And Lallo's justification for his treatment had rested on Drinkwater's own instructions. He had been 'confined quietly' ... the meaning was obvious. That it had been done for his own good, Rogers did not dispute. Disagreeable things were frequently done for one's own good and a streak of childishness surfaced in him. Perhaps it was a weakness of his character, perhaps a by-product of his recent chronic alcoholism, but it was to darken his mind in the following days, worsened by the isolation. Drinkwater's absence had placed him in and the position of trust that he now occupied. That, too, was attributable to Drinkwater, and it was this sense of being in his place and having to act in his stead that suffused Rogers with an extraordinary sense of power. In this peculiar and unbalanced consummation of a long aggrieved and corrosive jealousy, Rogers found the will to reject his demon.

With a sweep of his hand he sent the spirit-room key clattering into a dark corner of the cabin.