Read Online Admiral by Dudley Pope - Free Book Online Page B

worked well together, and almost a miracle that together they were an extraordinarily powerful combination. Aurelia had once said that one of them was the pistol while the other was the powder and ball; that together they were lethal but apart they were comparatively useless. A shrewd assessment, Diana realized.
    Now Leclerc was looking at Ned with raised eyebrows. “Has M’sieur Yorke…?”
    Ned stood up and looked round at the four buccaneers. “I have a question to ask, before finally deciding.”
    “Then ask it,” Coles said bluntly.
    “We don’t beat around the bush, y’know.”
    Ned nodded, as if to make clear he was not implying any evasiveness. “You mentioned yesterday that if I became your leader, you had plans for an expedition against the Spanish ‘the like of which the West Indies had never seen before’.”
    “That is correct,” Leclerc said. “We have.”
    “Will you tell me what it is?”
    “If you are going to be our admiral, yes; if not, no,” Leclerc said without hesitation or a glance at his fellow buccaneers. “It is not that we do not trust you,” he added quickly, “but if you knew and then fell into Spanish hands, they have means of making you reveal secrets…”
    Ned nodded and glanced across at Aurelia who, dressed in white cotton, her hair hanging in spiral ringlets, looked more like an aristocrat’s demure bride than the young woman who had stood on the Griffin ’s deck as she sailed into Santiago.
    “You see,” Ned said, “I am expected to be their leader and at once lead them on such an expedition…”
    If he was expecting sympathy from Aurelia he was unlucky. “They’d be mad to tell you if you then decide not to lead them,” she said. “Why should they? Why do you want to know?”
    “I would like some idea of the first job that I’m expected to undertake.” Ned said mildly.
    “This next expedition might be one ‘the like of which the West Indies has never seen before’,” Aurelia said, equally mildly, though Diana was not deceived, “but with respect to Captain Leclerc, I trust the one after that will be bigger, and the third greater than that. Otherwise, if each successive expedition is smaller, then eventually the buccaneers will starve.”
    “She’s right, yer naw,” Coles said in his deep North Country accent. “Bigger’n better, that’s what we want. A thinking man is what we need – beggin’ yer pardon ma’am, it’s as clear as fresh brewed ale that you’re a thinking lady.”
    Gottlieb slapped his knee in agreement. “Coles and Mrs Wilson are right. Planning, that’s the secret; we don’t need someone to cheer us on and wave a sword as he leads us through the breach in a castle wall; we want someone who plots : who says: ‘No, we do not raid this place because it will alert the Spanish and spoil our chances for a much more important expedition against that place’.”
    There was a sudden silence and everyone’s eyes were on Ned. Diana realized that his whole decision, on which depended their future as well as that of all the buccaneers, was at that moment balanced on a knife edge. The wrong word, the wrong gesture, would make him refuse.
    “Come on, Ned,” Thomas said gruffly, “we need you.”
    And then suddenly Ned was nodding his head, and saying: “Yes, all right then,” and the buccaneers were crowding round him to shake his hand and Aurelia had stood up and moved towards him.
    The men stood back the moment they realized she was there. Leclerc bowed to her. “Kiss him,” he said, “because we cannot, and then we kiss the hand of the admiral’s wife.”
    Finally, with the congratulations completed, Ned turned to Leclerc, “So far, four of you have elected me the admiral. What about the rest of the Brethren?”
    “It will be unanimous,” Leclerc said. “You will see. Our old admiral died some weeks before we left Tortuga, and we all knew there was no one else suitable.”
    “What about this great expedition,