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old foe.
    He glanced at Allday, now rolling gently to the carriage’s motion and fast asleep. He had known all about Sir Humphrey Rivers, Knight of the Bath.
    Bolitho smiled. Allday gathered information about the comings and goings in the fleet and hoarded it as a magpie guards its treasure trove of coloured glass and beads.
    Rivers had captained a frigate named Crusader during the American Revolution at about the same time when Bolitho had been given his first command, the little sloop-of-war Sparrow.
    He had made quite a name for himself hunting French privateers and taking prizes of every shape and size. One day near the Chesapeake he had misjudged the danger in his eagerness to run down an American brig. His Crusader had ploughed into some shallows and had become a total wreck. Rivers had been taken prisoner but had returned to Britain after the war.
    He was said to have made influential friends during his captivity, and afterwards when he had been promoted to command a squadron in the West Indies. He had money in the City of London, property too in Jamaica. He did not sound like the kind of man who would fit easily into the plans of the government in Whitehall.
    Bolitho grimaced at his reflection in the dusty glass. Not even if the plan was to be offered by someone of equal rank.
    The carriage wheels dipped and shuddered through some deep ruts in the road and Bolitho winced as the pain of his wound dragged at his left thigh like a hot claw.
    Belinda had even helped to dispel his self-consciousness about that. Occasionally when the pain was re-awakened he found himself limping and he had felt humiliated because of her.
    He stirred on his seat as he recalled her touch in the night, her soft body against his, the secret words which had been lost in their passion for one another. She had kissed the wound where a musket-ball and the surgeon’s probe had left an ugly scar and had made the injury more a mark of pride than a cruel reminder.
    All this and more he was leaving behind with each turn of the wheels. Tonight it would be worse when the carriage stopped for the first change of horses in Torbay. It was better to join a ship and sail with the first possible tide and leave no room for regrets and longing.
    He looked at Allday and wondered what he really thought about quitting the land yet again with his future as uncertain as the next horizon.
    Flag at the fore. Allday was genuinely proud of it. That was something which the Admiral Sheaffes of this world could never understand.

2 “OLD K ATIE”
    C APTAIN Valentine Keen walked from beneath the poop and crossed to the larboard nettings. Around him and along the upper gun deck, and high overhead on the yards and rigging, the hands were hard at work.
    The officer of the watch touched his hat to Keen and then moved to the opposite side of the deck. Like everyone else, he was careful to appear busy but unconcerned at his captain’s presence.
    Keen glanced along his new command. He had already been pulled around Achates in his gig to study her lines and her trim as she rocked gently above her black and buff reflection.
    Ready for sea. It was every captain’s personal decision as to when that possibility was a fact. There was no room for second thoughts once the anchor was catted and the ship standing out from the land.
    It was warm and humid even for May, and the protective folds of the land were misty with haze. He hoped that some kind of wind would soon get up nonetheless. Bolitho would be impatient to get away, to cut his ties with the shore, although Keen knew his reasons were different from his own.
    He shaded his eyes and looked up at the foremast truck. Achates had never worn an admiral’s flag before. It would be interesting to see if it changed her.
    He moved into a patch of shade by the poop ladder and watched the activity along the upper deck. The ship had a good feel to her, he thought. Something permanent and hard-won over the years.