She led him to the door which opened onto the back of the quarterdeck and they stepped out, risking the eyes of the helmsman and the duty officer, but if they were seen no one remarked it. They climbed to the poop deck and Lady Grace gestured at the skylight above the cuddy cabin from which, in contravention of Captain Cromwell’s orders, a faint light gleamed.
Creeping softly as children who have stayed up long after their bedtime, Sharpe and Lady Grace went close to the skylight. Four of its ten panes were propped open and Sharpe could hear the murmur of men’s voices. Lady Grace peeped over the edge, then drew back. “They’re there,” she mouthed in his ear.
Sharpe looked through one of the dirty panes and saw three men’s heads bent over the long table. One was Cromwell, the second Pohlmann and Sharpe did not recognize the third. They seemed to be examining a chart, then Pohlmann straightened up and Sharpe ducked back. The smell of cigar smoke came through the open panes.
“Morgen friih,” said a voice, only it was not Pohlmann who spoke in German, but another man. Sharpe risked leaning forward again and saw it was Pohlmann’s servant, the man who spoke French and claimed to be Swiss.
“Morgen friih,” Pohlmann repeated.
“These things ain’t certain, Baron,” Cromwell said.
“You have done well this far, my friend, so I am sure all will go well tomorrow,” Pohlmann answered and Sharpe heard the clink of glasses, then he and Grace shrank back because a hand came into sight to close the open panes. The dim light was extinguished and a moment later Sharpe heard Cromwell’s growling voice talking to the helmsman on the quarterdeck.
“We can’t go down now,” Grace whispered in his ear.
They went to the dark corner between the signal cannon and the taffrail and there, crouched in the shadows, they kissed, and only then did Sharpe ask if she had heard the German words.
“They mean ‘tomorrow morning,’ “ Grace said.
“And the man who said them first,” Sharpe said, “is supposed to be Pohlmann’s servant. What’s a servant doing drinking with his master? I’ve heard him speak French, too, but he claims to be Swiss.”
“The Swiss, dearest,” Lady Grace said, “speak German and French.”
“They do?” Sharpe asked. “I thought they talked Swiss.” She laughed. Sharpe was sitting with his back against the gunwale and she was straddling his lap, her knees either side of his chest. “I don’t know,” he went on, “maybe they were just saying that we turn west tomorrow? We’ve been sailing south for days, we have to go west soon.”
“Not too soon,” she said. “I would like this voyage to last forever.” She leaned forward and kissed his nose. “I thought you were going to be appallingly rude to William at dinner.”
“I held my tongue, didn’t I?” he asked. “But only because my shin’s black and blue.” He touched a finger to her face, marveling at the delicacy of her looks. “I know he’s your husband, my love, but he’s stuffed to his muzzle with rubbish. Wanting officers to speak Latin! What use is Latin?”
Lady Grace shrugged. “If the enemy is coming to kill you, Richard, who do you want defending you? A properly educated gentleman who can construe Ovid, or some barbarian cutthroat with a back like a washboard?”
Sharpe pretended to think. “If you put it like that, of course, then I’ll take the Ovid fellow.” She laughed, and it seemed to Sharpe that this was a woman born to happiness, not misery. “I missed you,” he said.
“I missed you,” she answered.
He put his hands under the big black cloak to find that she was naked under her nightgown and then they forgot the next morning, forgot Cromwell, forgot Pohlmann and forgot the mysterious servant, for the Calliope was shrouded in the night, sailing beneath a slivered moon as it carried its star-crossed lovers to nowhere.
Captain Peculiar Cromwell was on the quarterdeck all next morning, pacing from larboard to starboard, glowering at the binnacle, pacing again, and his restlessness infected the ship so that the passengers became nervous and constantly glanced at the captain as if expecting him to lose his temper. Speculation flew around the main deck until it was finally agreed that Cromwell was expecting a storm, but the captain made no preparations. No sail was shortened or lashings inspected.