The following day was little different from the preceding ones. Overnight the wind had backed slightly but had lost much of its strength, so that the great, dripping sails filled and sagged in noisy confusion and added in some way to the general air of tension.

Towards noon, with the drizzle as heavy as ever and the sea an expanse of dirty grey, the pipe echoed around the ship, 'Hands lay aft to witness punishment!' It was common enough, and under normal conditions might have excited little comment. In a King's ship discipline was hard and quickly executed, and the punishment given by members of the company to one of their own caught stealing from a shipmate's meagre possessions was far worse.

But today should have been different. After all the weeks and months of frustration and waiting, of being cooped up in harbour with little more comfort than a prison hulk, or beating up and down the coastline on some fruitless mission or other, it had been hoped that this would bring a change.

The weather did nothing to help. As Bolitho stood with the other lieutenants, while the marines clattered up and across the poop in two scarlet lines, the ship's company hurried aft. They had to squint against the blown spray and rain, and the biting wind which stirred the dripping canvas with long, uneven gusts. A sullen, unhappy start, Bolitho thought.

The man to be punished came to the larboard gangway, flanked by Paget, the swarthy master-at-arms, and Mr Tolcher, the boatswain. Paget was a tight-lipped, bitter man, and set against him and the squat boatswain the prisoner looked by far the most innocent.

Bolitho watched him, a young Swede named Carlsson. He had a clean-cut face with long flaxen hair, and was staring around as if he had never laid eyes on the ship before. He was typical of the Trojan's mixture, Bolitho thought. You never knew what sort of man you would confront from day to day. Many tongues and races had been gathered up into Trojan's hull in two years, and yet somehow they all seemed to settle in a very short while of coming aboard.