“This is for you, sir. I was told to give it to no one else.”
He watched the captain slit open the envelope, his expression suddenly guarded. What was he thinking? He wished he had torn it up without even reading it himself.
He saw the captain’s sun-browned hand tighten suddenly on the letter, so that it shivered in the reflected light. Anger, disapproval, emotion? He no longer knew what to expect. He thought of his mother, only minutes before she had died, thrusting a crumpled paper into his hands. How long ago? Weeks, months? It was like yesterday. An address in Falmouth, some twenty miles from Penzance where they had lived. He had walked all the way, his mother’s note his only strength, his guide.
He heard the captain fold the letter and put it in his pocket. Again, the searching look, but there was no hostility. If anything, there was sadness.
“Your father, boy. What do you know of him?”
The midshipman faltered, off guard, but when he answered he sensed the change. “He was a King’s officer, sir. He was killed by a runaway horse in America.” He could see his mother in those final moments, holding out her arms to embrace him and then to push him away, before either of them broke down. He continued in the same quiet tone, “My mother often described him to me. When she was dying she told me to make my way to Falmouth and seek your family, sir. I-I know my mother never married him, sir. I have always known, but…”
He broke off, unable to continue but very aware that the captain was on his feet, one hand on his arm, his face suddenly close, the face of the man, perhaps as few others ever saw him.
Captain Richard Bolitho said gently, “As you must know, your father was my brother.”
It was becoming blurred. The tap at the door. Someone with a message for the captain.
Adam Bolitho awoke, his body tensed like a spring as he felt the uncertain grip on his arm. It came to him with the stark clarity of a pistol shot. The ship’s motion was more unsteady, the sea noises intruding while his practised ear assessed each in turn.