Ramage's Trial Read Online Free

on marble headstones in the cemetery (the wording was carefully copied out and sent home to relatives).
    â€œBoat leaving the flagship with a lieutenant on board, sir,” Paolo Orsini reported. “Heading our way.”
    â€œThe admiral smells his share of prize money,” Southwick muttered as Ramage went below to his cabin to change his uniform and put on his sword. A brief but comprehensive “Report of Proceedings” waited on his desk: it lacked only the name of the admiral, which he had yet to discover.
    Ten minutes later a young lieutenant arrived on board and was brought down to the cabin, where he introduced himself as Lieutenant Newick. He told Ramage that the admiral wished him to make his report as soon as possible. “The two prizes,” he said hesitantly. “We had no idea that there were two such French frigates in the area, although we guessed we might see you.”
    â€œOh – why was that?” asked a puzzled Ramage. What could have brought him to the commander-in-chief’s notice?
    The lieutenant looked embarrassed. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have mentioned it, sir. There’s a letter from the Admiralty waiting for you, and the admiral had one at the same time. Came out in the last Post Office packet that arrived a week ago.”
    â€œLet’s go,” Ramage said. He could think of no reason why Their Lordships should be writing to him, but despite the heat of the tropical sun coming down through the Calypso ’s deck, he felt a sudden chill. The unexpected was usually unwelcome: so far he had learned that much about life.

 
Chapter Two
    Rear-Admiral Edwin Tewtin greeted Ramage at the entryport of his flagship the Queen with what Ramage later described to Southwick as well controlled amiability lightly cloaked with a curiosity which was clearly as painful to ignore as a nagging toothache.
    After all the formalities of a little-known rear-admiral (commanding one of the Royal Navy’s smallest stations) finding himself greeting one of the most famous of the Navy’s young frigate captains had been completed – with a pardonable amount of wariness on either side – Tewtin led the way down to his cabin and waved Ramage to the comfortable chair, sitting down opposite him while Lieutenant Newick perched nervously to one side in a straight-backed seat.
    Ramage saw at once that Tewtin had probably not (so far, anyway) done well from prize money: the furniture in the great cabin verged on being spartan; the curtains bunched on either side of the sternlights would have been appropriate in one of the public rooms of a small but busy coaching inn; the rows of wine glasses nesting in a rack on the bulkhead above the sideboard could have come from the bar parlour, and the buckles on the admiral’s shoes were made of pinchbeck, not gold.
    None of which, Ramage told himself, necessarily made Rear-Admiral Tewtin any less efficient as a flag officer, and might indeed indicate heavy expenses at home – many a man had been ruined through inheriting a large estate without the money to run it, or acquiring a wife whose style outranged his purse.
    Although Ramage waited a minute or two, expecting Tewtin to hand over the Admiralty letter, the man made no move, and his desk was bare. He looked up at Ramage and asked: “You have a written report of your proceedings?”
    Ramage bent down to open the canvas pouch he had leaned against the side of the chair, but Tewtin said: “I’ll read that later. Just tell me what brings you here with two French frigates as prizes.”
    And now, Ramage thought to himself, choose your words carefully. He had written orders from the commander-in-chief of the Channel Fleet, Admiral Clinton, for the operation he had just carried out, and these concluded that the Calypso should then return to England and report direct to the Admiralty (leaving Admiral Clinton happily distant in the event of failure). There