The surgeon's assistants moved in to carry the sobbing man below. Two seamen started to swab up the blood, and others hurried to obey Tolche s order to unrig the grating and replace it.

The marines trooped down either poop ladder, and Captain D'Esterre sheathed his bright sword as the company broke up and continued about its affairs.

Sparke said to Bolitho, 'We had best go over the raid again, so that we know each other's thinking.' Bolitho shrugged. 'Aye, Sir.'

Maybe Sparke's attitude was the right one. Bolitho liked Carlsson, what he knew of him. Obedient, cheerful and hardworking. But suppose it had been one of the ship's real troublemakers who had been caught sleeping on watch. Would he still have felt the same dismay?

Sparke leaned his hands on the quarterdeck rail and peered down at the two cutters which had already been manhandled away from the other boats on the tier in readiness for swaying out.

He said, 'I am not too hopeful.' He gestured at the vibrating shrouds and halliards. 'Mr Bunce is usually right, but this time – '

A seaman yelled from the maintop, 'Deck there! T'other vessel's fallin' off, sir!'

Dalyell, who was officer of the watch, snatched a glass and climbed into the weather shrouds.

He exclaimed, 'Right, by God! The schooner's falling downwind. Not much, but she'll be visible to all hands by the time they've had their spirit ration!' He laughed at Bolitho's face. 'Damme, Dick, that bugger is a saucy one!'

Bolitho shaded his eyes against the strange light and saw a brief blur across the tumbling water. Perhaps the schooner's master believed the same as Bunce and was drawing nearer so as not to lose his large quarry. Or maybe he was merely trying

to provoke the captain into doing something foolish. Bolitho pictured Pears' face as he had read from the Articles of War. There was no chance of the latter,