By the Mast Divided (5 page)

Gherson obliged, trying to palm the purse he had into his breeches. But the villains before him were too practised to allow that, and swiftly had it off him.

‘I know that in acting as I do,’ Carruthers continued, ‘I will be saving a substantial group of men the worry that they too might find themselves in my position. To think that I took you into the bosom of my family, and that you betrayed me so…’

‘I…’

‘Do not deny it,’ Carruthers shouted, ‘do not deny that you are a damned lecher and a rogue! I gave you employment when you were strapped, got you out of Newgate gaol as an act of Christian charity, only to find out later that I am not the first to fall for the lies you spill with such ease. God only knows how many people you have dunned, how many good women you have corrupted. You have left behind you a trail of broken hearts and damaged households. You, Gherson, are a menace to every decent man in the City of London.’

Gherson was thinking that there were few enough of those, and if they devoted their lives to the acquisition of wealth, and spent their evenings at the card tables or in the company of high-priced whores, it was hardly surprising that their neglected wives looked elsewhere for comfort or entertainment. But that too was not a thing to say out loud.

‘I admit to a weakness, sir, one I have often fought to overcome.’

In just a shirt and breeches, with the cold stone of the bridge beginning to chill his shoeless feet he began to shiver, thinking it must look very like fear. Not that he wasn’t frightened – there was no way of avoiding a beating – but Gherson wondered if it might be ameliorated, so he managed to get a bit of a sob into his voice.

‘I realise that I have deeply offended you, and for that I can only curse myself.’

The tone became more woeful as Gherson berated himself for a
wretch: swore that he would never transgress again; damned the God that had made him incapable of resisting temptation. Casting his head and body around in a theatrical manner, Gherson’s eyes never ceased examining the faces before him, and he could not decide which was more alarming, the professional apathy of the alderman’s hirelings, or the hateful look of the man himself.

‘I deserve a beating, sir,’ Gherson pleaded, ‘and perhaps in your wisdom you will chastise me enough to change my nature. I swear that I shall go on my knees to God as soon as I can and beg to be relived of the burdens of my ardour.’

‘He’s a fellow,’ said one of the hard men, finally speaking. ‘He could do for a playhouse.’

‘Girlish lookin’, mind,’ added another.

Gherson threw his arms in the air, knowing that his histrionics had made no impact whatsoever. It was with a last forlorn hope that he said, with what he thought was becoming bravado, ‘Damn you all! Beat me if you must. Do your worst!’

‘You think a beating sufficient, Gherson?’ asked Carruthers, facetiously, adding himself, with a deeper timbre, the answer to his question. ‘I don’t, and I have in mind my responsibilities as a city alderman. The good citizens of London require to be protected. You speak of an ardour that requires to be cooled, and I feel that as a Christian soul it behoves me to oblige you with the means.’ The voice changed to a low growl. ‘Tip the bastard in the river, and let’s see if the Thames chills him enough.’

‘Sir,’ Gherson shouted, before adding, ‘help!’

He got no further. One of the ruffians slapped him hard to shut him up, then, with another they lifted him bodily on to the parapet of the bridge.

‘Can you swim?’ asked the man who had praised his acting, taking hold of a leg.

‘No,’ Gherson croaked, as a second ankle was grasped.

‘Why that be a damn shame.’

Both heaved together, to send him tumbling over the edge, his body spinning in the air, a scream emanating from his lips, his mind a mass of whirling thoughts, of dozens of warm beds, endless tipped petticoats and pliant female flesh, of angry spouses and wives weeping with shame. The one thing he did not think of was cold water, but that changed as soon as he hit the black, freezing Thames, disgorging icy inland waters into the sea. The shock was near to heart-stopping, the mistake of that continued
scream evident as soon as his mouth filled with liquid.

Gherson went under, into a dark void of nothingness, but his natural buoyancy brought him back to the surface, one hand raised, his flaying feet keeping him afloat long enough to let the water clear from his eyes. He could see the lights of London Bridge moving away from him; that is till he realised that it was he who was moving, being carried downstream on the riptide of creaming water that had come through the arches of the bridge.

The cry of ‘God help me’ was cut off by another mouthful of the Thames as Gherson went under once more, with his mind pursuing two opposing thoughts. One that he must stay afloat and survive, the other the certainty that it would be impossible and that he was about to die. Hands and feet lashing, he again resurfaced, feeling in an open palm a round piece of wood. He grasped it with all the desperation of a man in fear of death, pulling himself up until he got a second hand in place – which was just as well as his original grip had slipped due to the wet surface.

‘God in blessed heaven!’ cried Abraham Coyle, Master at Arms of HMS
Brilliant
, looking at the hands grasping an oar that, feathering, was only touching the water and acting as a brake.

‘What have we got here?’

‘Man in the water,’ cried Kemp, in a voice that had Pearce trying to sit up to see what was happening, only to find his movement constrained by his being lashed to another, so that his view was cut off by the top strakes of the boat’s planking.

‘In the name of Christ get a hand on him,’ Coyle cried.

That was easier said than done; having just shot through the central arch of London Bridge they were still caught in the disturbed and
fast-flowing
scud created by that narrowing of the waterway. Indeed, if Gherson had not been caught in the same current he would have been lost, but the tumbling cataract was carrying him downstream at almost the same pace as the boat. Dragged inboard, Gherson felt a hand grasp his wrist just as his grip was going for the second time. Then a rope was round his other hand and he was being hauled roughly over a rowlock, before he tumbled in a soaking heap amongst a pile of other bodies.

‘Find out where he came from,’ demanded Coyle, passing back the lantern. The question was put to Gherson by the sailor who had dragged him inboard, with Kemp holding the light close so that Coyle could see his face, an act which revealed his own rodent like features, and highlighted a drop of mucus that glistened on the end of his nose.

‘The bridge,’ gasped Gherson, ‘London Bridge.’

Pearce had a view of him now, dripping water from a sodden shirt, slicked down, soaked hair and a youthful face that, even in the grip of a deep and justifiable fear, had a sweet and innocent quality – full lips, a slightly Levantine nose and pale unblemished skin. It was also instructive to look at the others who had taken an interest in this providential gift to the press-gang, Walker and Rufus among them. There was no sympathy for one who now shared their plight, more a look of abhorrence, as though this soaking specimen had somehow compounded the nature of their own situation.

‘What will old Ralph Barclay say, young Martin,’ Coyle hooted to the boy marine, ‘when we tell him that hands are dropping out of the sky?’

Kemp lifted Gherson’s head, none too gently by the hair, to glare into eyes that looked to be in the grip of the terror of death. ‘Might be worth an extra tot of rum, Coyle, but with that sod it might also get you disrated.’

‘Best rope the bugger.’

‘No need,’ replied Kemp, dropping Gherson’s head. ‘The only place this cove can go is back in the river, and looking at him, I don’t reckon that is a way he would choose.’

Captain Ralph Barclay, ahead of Coyle in the pinnace, felt he could be content with his night’s work, though he could not help but consider that his world had come to a sorry pass when a full Post Captain of twelve years seniority had personally to take to the task of recruiting. Nor was this night’s effort likely to gift him many sailors, all he could hope for was a clutch of untrained landsmen, albeit ones who would find it hard to complain. But a body was a body: anyone would do to a desperate commander, as long as he had two legs and two arms. In twenty years at sea, Ralph Barclay had learnt that a bit of decent discipline could turn even the most dim-witted clod into a useful crew member. Given that he could be ordered to weigh at a moment’s notice, he had no time to wait for those in authority to solve for him the problem of a lack of hands.

But underlying his muted satisfaction was a residue of worry. He knew well that he was not allowed to take a press-gang into the Liberties of the Savoy. Would there be a hue and cry? The majority of the people in the Pelican had escaped and they would have filled the streets with their noise. But in a city accustomed to riot, and it being late at night, he hoped that most of the inhabitants would keep their shutters and doors bolted. Nor could the majority of the customers, a bunch of debtors and felons, readily involve the law, which was available only outside the confines of where they themselves were safe. But it was a thought that nagged at him, given that the expense of redress, should he be arraigned for the offence, would be very high indeed. He ran over the faces he had looked into, mostly of creatures in distress. But there had also been one showing a defiance that called for a knotted rope’s end, delivered hard and twice. That was a fellow, a mouthy sod, who might require further constraint. So be it, if it was necessary, then the captain of HMS
Brilliant
would provide it.

Try as he might to concentrate on such matters, thoughts of penury soon resurfaced to dominate Ralph Barclay’s thoughts – it was eloquent testimony to the present state of his finances that he was leaving London, not even in a public coach, let alone a private one, but in a boat. With his frigate berthed at Sheerness, a visit to the capital should have been made overland. It would not have been comfortable, or speedy, but it would
have been a damn sight more so than the pinnace in which he had set off in the cold predawn of that morning. He had lugged up the Thames Estuary on a biting wind with his longboat and cutter in company, masts stepped in favour of oars as soon as the river narrowed, because the amount of waterborne traffic precluded tacking and wearing under sail with any degree of safety.

Nor could he lay any claim to having had, of his three other appointments, a good day. His first port of call had been to the people he wished to appoint as his prize agents. The firm of Ommanney and Druce had impressive offices in the Strand: high-ceilinged rooms with elaborate cornices, heavy crystal chandeliers, excellent furniture, attentive and obsequious clerks and servants who never stinted on the Madeira. The partners themselves were rich men and the atmosphere of calm wealth that pervaded their premises, besides raising a degree of jealousy in their visitor’s breast, stood as ample testimony to the many successful naval officers for whom they had acted. Portraits of some of those lined the walls, admirals, commodores and captains who had earned fortunes fighting England’s enemies, including one by Joshua Reynolds of Ralph Barclay’s late patron, Admiral Lord Rodney.

The partners had welcomed him as an old if not valued customer. Having commanded a frigate during the last stage of the American war, though without much in the way of distinction, he had put a modicum of money their way. Five years on the beach had frayed things and as men who knew to within an inch the value of a captain’s reputation, as well as the nature of his present commission, they had judged Ralph Barclay to be worth ten minutes of their time. It was ten minutes of unstinting flattery because it was an axiom of the trade that you never knew who was going to be Midas – the most unlikely naval officer could capture a treasure ship and move from poverty to wealth in a blink, lining the pocket of his prize agent along the way.

Within those ten minutes it had been made plain that the firm of Ommanney and Druce was unwilling to advance him funds upon the expectation of future profit. Had he lined their pockets deep in the past, as had some of his fellow West Indian officers, it would have been seen as a credible risk, but he had not. He could exude as much confidence as he liked and claim that, with orders that would take him to the Mediterranean, the opportunity existed in a war so newly declared to snap up prizes in the Bay of Biscay. Both partners would know that he was short on his complement, they might even know that in the article of hands he had too high a ratio of landsmen to proper seamen, because
such men saw it as their job to know everything. And they would know that Captain Ralph Barclay was neither famous enough, rich enough, aristocratic enough nor popular enough to man his ship with volunteers. He depended on the Impress Service and his own efforts, and that was no basis on which to advance large sums of money that might flounder due to the actions of a limited and inexperienced crew.

He was not a risk they were prepared to support. Let him go to a moneylender and pay his rates. If he had success he would be able to afford them, if he did not, he might end up being chucked into the Marshalsea, had up for debt, but that was no concern of theirs. They had seen him to the door that opened out on to the bustling Strand, an act of courtesy that cost them nothing, but one that should suffice to stop this rather undistinguished officer from taking his business elsewhere.

The day had not improved. He had to deal with a moneylender who was just as well informed as his prize agents, who knew the value of a year’s sea pay for the captain of a sixth rate at eight shillings a day and that would only be settled by the Admiralty twelve months hence – taking no account of sums that might be wanting from the way Barclay ran his ship, or debts incurred by any number of extraneous factors. He was also a man who could calculate a risk to the point of obscurity, and Ralph Barclay left that office, grim-faced and irascible, with a purse much too light for his needs, and a debt to pay that should he fail to take a prize, would cripple him for years to come. His only comfort was that the queue of captains and lieutenants who filled the waiting room was testimony to the fact that he was not alone in being strapped.

If there was a naval officer who went to sea without the need to raise a loan he had never met him and he doubted he existed. Even admirals who had garnered riches in their careers could rarely raise the cash to fund the service they undertook in defence of their nation; they would, like him, pledge their plate and their credit then wait years, sometimes a decade, for the sums to be fully reimbursed by the penny-pinchers at the Admiralty and the Navy Board. As Barclay made his way to the Admiralty through the deep stench, streets full of horse dung and runnels of human waste, and the teeming crowds of London, he had reflected that if the whole Great Wen reeked of corruption, he was on his way to an establishment that in every respect outdid the city.

‘Lord Hood will see you now, Captain Barclay.’

That request had broken Ralph Barclay’s somnolent train of thought, the umpteenth rehearsal in his head of what he was going to say to the
man who ran King George’s Navy, a way to convey the parlous nature of his situation without in any way forfeiting the dignity that went with his rank. In his imaginings sweet words had flowed, convincing statements to sway even the most jaundiced soul – Hood would see his case as one requiring succour, and lift from his shoulders what he knew to be his major concern. But the sliver of confidence his reverie had engendered had been checked somewhat by the looks he had received from the other officers crowding the waiting room, one or two of envy, several of blatant fury that he was being favoured over them.

Hungry, it being well past his three o’clock dinnertime, Ralph Barclay had stood and nodded to the group, some of whom had been there when he arrived an hour and a half before. He had left behind numerous lieutenants and a pair of grey-haired captains desperate for a ship, a party for whom the fleet could not expand fast enough. Each would have, like he had in the past, bombarded Lord Hood with letters, backed up by pleas from anyone of influence they could muster: a senior officer with whom they had served who remembered them with warmth enough to put pen to paper, their sitting MP if they shared his politics, relatives and connections however distant and however light they stood in the counsels of government. Now they were on their last throw; the hope that a personal plea would gain them employment. They would sit here all day if necessary, and the following day as well, some fated never to gain entry.

Hood had not looked up as Ralph Barclay entered, which had done nothing for his mood, already unsettled from hunger and impatience. Instead he had riffled through a stack of letters, reading swiftly and briskly dictating to a secretary, each letter being added to a second pile as a decision was arrived at. With lamps lit due to the fading outside light, he had examined the admiral’s face and demeanour. Having met Samuel Hood on quite a few occasions the reddish-cratered skin, the heavy brows over direct and intolerant eyes and the voice, full of sibilants from his ill-fitting teeth were familiar, though the bulbous nose was somewhat bigger than Ralph Barclay remembered. Hood had been dressed in a blue coat edged with gold braid, with a puffy lace ruff at the neck, which had seemed a touch dandified for a man of his age and appearance.

‘Regrets that I cannot oblige Captain Stoddart at present, but I am in anticipation that the expansion of the fleet will see his obvious merit rewarded, though a ship-of-the-line may be beyond my power to grant. This one to the Duke of Grafton. Your Grace has been practised upon. I fear the officer who sought your intervention has shown great economy in
providing you with details of his career, which as a measure of character leaves much to be desired. I hope that I will not be brought to write to you again on this, but I assure you that should any officer of merit seek your assistance, I would be happy to have you plead in the future on his behalf.’

Hood had then looked up and said, ‘Captain Barclay.’

‘Milord,’ Ralph Barclay replied, ready to continue, only to be rudely checked as Hood went back to another letter.

‘This one to Mr Dundas. It has been my intention to provide for Lieutenant Macksay as soon as a suitable place can be found. I abjure you to be patient as I know him to be an excellent and competent officer worthy of your recommendation.’

Hood’s tone was at odds with the words, but then Henry Dundas was a powerful man, head of a clutch of Scottish MPs and close to the Prime Minister, William Pitt; someone too puissant for a request that a man he favoured be denied. Lieutenant Macksay might be a donkey with two left feet, half blind, incompetent and a danger to any vessel in which he sailed. With a sponsor as powerful as Henry Dundas he would certainly get a place.

Ralph Barclay had then experienced a slight sinking feeling, for that thought had brought home to him his own paucity in that area. In the world in which he lived influence was everything, and that was a commodity of which he was very short. It galled him because he had realised that he must, in this room and in his situation, plead for help, and that was an act for which he was, by nature, unsuited. Nevertheless it must be so, and Barclay steeled himself to the task.

Samuel, Lord Hood, had sat back suddenly, waving away the secretary, in what Ralph Barclay had suspected to be a deliberate act of dramatisation – the message: I am seeing you because I feel I must, not because I would choose to do so.

‘I am plagued by correspondence, Barclay. I swear most of my day is taken by it.’

‘The burdens of rank, sir.’ Ralph Barclay had meant that as a sympathetic remark, a platitude to soften Hood up, but his empty stomach had worked upon his natural irascibility to make his voice sound grating and unsympathetic.

‘As you will find should you ever get your flag,’ Hood had growled, before adding, ‘but now that you have seen how occupied I am, perhaps you would do me the honour of coming to the point of why you have called, given that, unlike all the officers in this pile of correspondence,
and that throng of ne’r do wells crowding my waiting room, you already have a ship.’

Ralph Barclay had fought to compose his features into something approaching empathy, difficult given that it went so much against the grain. He didn’t like Samuel Hood and the man knew it, and it was a sentiment he suspected was heartily reciprocated. Barclay had been a client officer of Hood’s one time superior George Rodney, and he was very partisan in support of the man Hood hated, and held to be the singly most corrupt officer he had ever had the misfortune to serve with. To Barclay Rodney had been a genius – if he was flawed, inclined to play ducks and drakes with official funds and a touch prone to promote undeserving officers – that was part of the estimable whole. Hood was a plodder, with none of the gifts of leadership that Rodney had displayed – the ability to inspire seamen to a superior order of courage in battle, to smell out his enemies and bring them to a fight.

With the sudden feeling that such thoughts might be reflected on his face, Barclay had blurted out, ‘Hands, milord.’

‘Hands, Barclay?’ Hood had responded, voice grave and eyes enquiring under heavy grey eyebrows.

Ralph Barclay had finally found the tone he was seeking – of camaraderie – that of one serving naval officer sharing a worry with another. ‘I am likely to be ordered to sea shortly, milord, to escort a convoy to Gibraltar.’

Those words, delivered with a wry smile, had done nothing to dent Hood’s testiness; he had replied with an air of studied impatience that Barclay found infuriating. ‘I have a vague recollection of your orders, Barclay, since it was I who signed them.’