A beautiful ship. Working with the local squadron, he had felt the power of her. The fastest he had known. Soon the anonymous faces would become people, individuals, the strength and the weakness of any ship. But not too close. Not again. As if someone had whispered a warning.

He sighed and looked at the cases of wine. How would Catherine manage, what would she do without the man who had become her life?

He heard three bells chime faintly from the forecastle.

It was going to be hard, even harder than he had imagined. People watching him, as they had watched his beloved uncle, with love, hatred, admiration and envy, none of them ever far away.

He knew Galbraith’s background, and what had smashed his chance of promotion to the coveted post rank. It could happen to anybody. To me. He thought of Zenoria again, and of what he had done, but he felt no shame, only a deep sense of loss.

He was about to walk beneath the open skylight when he heard Galbraith’s voice.

“When the Pendennis battery fires one gun, you will dip the flag and ensign, Mr Massie, and all hands will face aft and uncover.”

Adam waited. It was like an intrusion, but he felt unable to move. Massie was the second lieutenant, a serious young man who held the appointment because his father was a vice-admiral. He was, as yet, an unknown quantity.

Massie said, “I wonder if Sir Richard’s lady will be there.”

He heard their feet move away. An innocent remark? And who did he mean? Catherine, or Belinda, Lady Bolitho?

And there would be spite to bring out the worst. Shortly after Unrivalled had commissioned, the news of Emma Hamilton’s death had been released. Nelson’s lover and inspiration and the nation’s darling, but she had been allowed to die alone in Calais, in poverty, abandoned by so-called friends and those who had been entrusted with her care.

The ship moved slightly to her cable and he saw his reflection in the thick glass.