“Have you seen him, Sharpe?” his lordship inquired coldly. He did not like talking to Sharpe, but condescended to ask the question.
“No, my lord.”
“I asked him to fetch a memorandum about our original agreement with Holkar. Damn him, I need it!”
“Perhaps he’s still looking for it,” Chase suggested.
“Or he’s seasick, my lord?” Sharpe added. “The wind’s freshened.”
“I’ve looked in his cabin,” Lord William complained, “and he’s not there.”
“Mister Collier!” Chase summoned the midshipman who was pacing up and down the weather deck. “We have a missing secretary. The tall gloomy fellow who dresses in black. Look below decks for him, will you? Tell him he’s wanted in my dining cabin.”
“Aye aye, sir,” Collier said and dived below to start his search.
Lady Grace, attended by her maid, strolled onto the deck and stood a studious distance from Sharpe. Lord William turned on her. “Have you seen Braithwaite?”
“Not since this morning,” Lady Grace said.
“The wretched man has disappeared.”
Lady Grace shrugged, suggesting that Braithwaite’s fate was none of her concern, then turned to watch the flying fish skim over the waves.
“I do hope the bugger hasn’t fallen overboard,” Chase said. “He’s got a long swim if he has.”
“He had no business being on deck,” Lord William said in annoyance.
“I doubt he’s drowned, my lord,” Chase said reassuringly. “If he had fallen then someone would have seen him.”
“What do you do then?” Sharpe asked.
“Stop the ship and make a rescue,” Chase said, “if we can. Did I ever tell you about Nelson in the Minerva?”
“Even if you had,” Sharpe said, “you’d tell me again.”
Chase laughed. “Back in ‘ninety-seven, Sharpe, Nelson commands the Minerva. Fine frigate! He was being pursued by two Spanish ships of the line and a frigate when some halfwit falls overboard. Tom Hardy was aboard, wonderful man, he captains the Victory now, and Hardy took a boat to rescue the fellow. See the picture, Sharpe? Minerva fleeing for her life, close pursued by three Spaniards and Hardy and his boat crew, with the wet fellow aboard, can’t row hard enough to catch up. So what does Nelson do? He backs his topsails! Can you credit it? Backs his topsails. By God, he said, I won’t lose Hardy. Now the Dons can’t make head nor tail of this. Why’s the fellow stopping? They think he must have reinforcements coming, so the silly buggers haul their own wind. Hardy catches up, gets aboard, and the Minerva takes off like a scalded cat! What a great man Nelson is.”
Lord William scowled and stared westward. Sharpe gazed up at the mainsail, trying to trace a rope from its beginning, through blocks and tackles, down to the belaying pins beside the gunwales. Hammocks were being aired over the netting racks in which they were stuffed during battle to stop musket bullets. A solitary sea bird, white and long-winged, curved close to the ship then soared away into the blue. Mister Cowper, the purser, was counting the boarding pikes racked around the mainmast’s trunk. He licked a pencil, made a note in a book, shot a scared look at Chase and waddled away. Holderby, who had the deck, ordered a bosun’s mate forrard to ring the ship’s bell. Chase, still thinking about Nelson, smiled.
“Captain! Sir! Captain!” It was Harry Collier, erupting into sight on the weather deck from beneath the quarterdeck.
“Calm down, Mister Collier,” Chase said. “The ship isn’t on fire, is it?”
“No, sir. It’s Mister Braithwaite, sir, he’s dead, sir!” Everyone on the quarterdeck stared down at the small boy.
“Go on, Mister Collier,” Chase said. “He can’t have just died! Men don’t just die. Well, the master did, but he was old. Braithwaite was young. Did he fall? Was he strangled? Did he kill himself? Enlighten me.”
164 I
“He fell in the hold, sir, looks like he broke his neck. Off the ladder, sir.”
“Careless,” Chase said, and turned away.
Lord William frowned, did not know what to say, so turned on his heel and stalked back toward the dining cabin, then thought better of it and hurried back to the railing. “Midshipman?”