Darkening Sea by Alexander Kent Read Free Book Online Page B

convenience.” Flag rank had its privileges after all.
    With Matthew the senior coachman up on the box and Allday at his side, they had drawn many stares and quite a few cheers from passers-by and farm workers as they had clattered along the cobbled streets of towns and villages, or churned up the dust of twisting lanes and the King’s highway.
    When they stopped at inns, either for the night or for some refreshment, it became common for people to crowd around them to wish them well, some timidly, others less so, as if they wanted to be part of the legend.
    As expected, Allday had been adamant about not staying in Falmouth. “Suppose you gets ordered to a new command, Sir Richard? What would they think o’ that?” Who they were he did not specify. “Vice-Admiral o’ the Red, Knight of th’ Bath no less, and yet he’s without his coxswain!”
    Bolitho had pointed out that Ozzard and Yovell would be remaining at Falmouth until the situation was more definite, and Allday had been as scornful as he dared. “A servant an’ a quill-pusher! The likes o’ them would never be missed!” But Catherine had told him that Allday needed to get away, if only to ponder on his new undertaking.
    Sometimes Catherine slept, her head on his lap as trees and churches, fields and farms rolled past. Once she clutched his arm, her eyes suddenly wide but seeing nothing, as she lived through a bad dream or worse.
    While she slept, Bolitho considered what might await him. Perhaps there would be no familiar faces this time; no ships the names of which conjured up violent memories, or friends lost now forever.
    Perhaps he might be sent to hoist his flag in the Mediterranean and so relieve Vice-Admiral Lord Collingwood, Nelson’s dearest friend and his second-in-command at Trafalgar. It was well-known that Collingwood was a sick man, some said already on the threshold of death. He had not spared himself, nor had he been spared by the Admiralty, and he had been at sea almost continuously since the battle when Nelson had fallen, to be mourned by the whole country. Collingwood had even overcome his pride enough to plead to be released from command in the Mediterranean, but Bolitho had heard nothing of their lordships’ response.
    He thought of Catherine’s suggestion concerning duty ashore and was almost surprised that he did not regret his decision to quit the sea, nor that he had shared his determination with her. The sea would always be there, and there would always be wars: the Bolitho family had shown their mettle in enough of them in the past, and there was no reason why greed and the search for power should not continue.
    He stroked her hair and her neck until she stirred slightly in her sleep, recalling the love they had shared, even on the endless journey from Cornwall. Beaming landlords, curtsying maids, waving customers: it had all blurred together now. Only the nights were real. Their need for one another, and other nights when they had merely lain close, in silence, or shared the cool of an evening at some window in a sleeping village, or a town where wheels rattled through the night and a church clock kept a count of the hours.
    Once, when he had confessed how much he was dreading leaving her, she had faced him in the darkness, her long hair loose about her bare shoulders.
    â€œI love you, Richard, more than life itself, for without you there is no life. But after what we endured in Golden Plover we can always be together. Wherever you are I shall be with you, and when you need me I will hear your voice.” She had taken his face in her hands and had said, “You are so many things to me, dearest of men. You are my hand in yours; you are one so unsure sometimes that you cannot see the love others hold for you. You are my lover as I am your mistress, or whatever they choose to call me. And you are also a friend, one I can turn to without fear of rebuff. I would not have you