Mrs Bargus answered the door, flustered and apprehensive. "Oh, Mr Renzi! I'm s' glad you're here! It's the captain—he's in such a state! All those things he's saying, it's not right, Mr Renzi . . ."

Kydd was slumped in the same chair in his shirtsleeves, gazing fixedly into the fire, the brandy bottle nearly empty beside him. He jerked round when Renzi entered. "Ahoy there, ol' shipmate!" he called bitterly. "Bring y'r arse t' anchor an' let y'r logic tell me why—why scrovy bastards like Lockwood still strut abou' while my Rosalynd . . . while she's . . ." His face crumpled.

Renzi went to him and touched his arm. "I'm going to the apothecary, my friend. He'll have much more efficacious medicines for your pain." It was chilling to witness: never in all their years together had he seen Kydd in such a condition—save, perhaps, in the early days in the old Duke William.

"No!" Kydd's hoarse cry pierced him. "St-stay wi' me, Nicholas."

"Of course, brother." Renzi stoked the fire and drew up his chair. With a forced laugh he went on, "You should have no care for Teazer, old fellow. There's half the ship's company rollicking ashore and Kit Standish believing you gravely concerned with the stowage of the hold."

Kydd took no notice. Instead he turned to Renzi and said hollowly, "It's—it's that I can't face it, Nicholas—life wi'out her." His hands writhed. "I saw all m' days in the future wi' her, plans an' course all set fair, an' now—there's . . . no point."

Carefully, Renzi replied, "Not at all! I see a fine officer who is captain of a ship that needs him, one with the most illustrious of sea careers to come."