Colours Aloft! Read Free

slight differences which any Frenchman would notice. The stronger bow and stiffly raked jib-boom and the gilded stern gallery which seemed almost flamboyant after earlier French ships. It was hard to see her with her decks puddled in blood, as embattled men hacked and thrust at each other to hold their ground. Many good hands died that day and on their way home to Plymouth. The dockyard had done magic with their battered charge, Bolitho thought. He had been tempted to visit his new flagship several times during her refit and repairs but had stayed away. Keen would hardly have been pleased to have his admiral come aboard in the midst of such confusion.
    Bolitho had wanted to go, needed to see and speak with people he understood. He tossed the cloak from his shoulders to reveal the gleaming epaulettes, each with its two silver stars. Vice-Admiral of the Red, apart from Nelson the youngest on the Navy list. Even that he could not get used to. Like the title which had made everyone so pleased but which left him feeling awkward, embarrassed.
    More pictures flashed through his mind as he watched the ship and gripped the old family sword between his knees.
    London, the bright liveries and bowing footmen. The hush as he knelt before His Britannic Majesty, the lightest tap of the sword on his shoulder. Sir Richard Bolitho of Falmouth. It had been a proud moment surely? Belinda had looked so radiantly happy. Adam and Allday beaming like schoolchildren. And yet—
    He saw a cluster of figures around the entry port, the blues and whites of the officers, the scarlet of the marines. His world. They would be watching his every move. Usually Allday would have been on hand to make sure he did not lose his balance or trip over his sword.
    The thought of ever being without Allday was beyond belief after what they had seen and endured together. He would be aboard before the ship weighed. He must. I need him more than ever.
    He saw the lieutenant staring at him and for a terrible moment imagined he had spoken aloud.
    But Valancey was merely anxious and stood aside as Bolitho waited for the barge to sway heavily against Argonaute ’s fat flank.
    Then he was swarming up the side and through the entry port, his ears cringing to the slap and click of bayoneted muskets presenting arms, and the fifes and drums breaking into Heart of Oak.
    There was Keen, his fair hair visible as he doffed his hat and strode to meet him, even as Bolitho’s flag broke smartly from the foremast truck.
    â€œWelcome, Sir Richard.”
    Keen smiled, not realizing that the greeting had caught Bolitho unawares. It sounded like somebody else.
    â€œI am glad to be here.” Bolitho nodded to the assembled officers and the watch on deck. If he had still expected to see some sign of the battle he was disappointed. Newly paid deck seams and blacked-down rigging. Neatly furled sails and every upper deck eighteen-pounder with all its tackles and gear perfectly in line as if on parade.
    He looked along the deck and through the criss-cross of standing and running rigging. He could see the white shoulder of the figurehead, depicting the handsome youth who had been one of Jason’s crew in the mythical Argo. Less than three years old from the day she had slid into the water at Brest. A new ship by any standard, with a full complement of six hundred and twenty souls, officers, seamen and Royal Marines, although he doubted if even the resourceful Keen had gathered anywhere near that total.
    They walked aft beneath the poop deck. By making it longer than in English third-rates, the builders had given better and more spacious accommodation to the officers. In battle, however, as in any man-of-war, the deck would be completely cleared from bow to stern so that every gun, large or small, could be worked without obstruction.
    They ducked beneath the deckhead beams and Bolitho saw a marine sentry marking the screen doors of his quarters right aft.
    â€œWhen Allday comes