Carter The King's Commission

Wounded at the forward rail of the Phoenix, Jeremiah Carter is left behind to heal in Nassau while his ship sails for England. Salt water, sun, and a young lieutenant named Corbin get him fit and ready for the board. He crosses the Atlantic in the dispatch brig Childers, surviving a running fight with an American privateer and a hard gale on short rations. He reaches Portsmouth just as the Phoenix finishes her refit. Before a board of four captains, including the bitter Captain Burrell, he wins a true lieutenant's commission. Thorne releases Hale to follow him, and the two join the frigate Hesper under the cold, exacting Captain Strand.

Sent to carry stores to Port Mahon, the Hesper is ordered to look into Cadiz along the way. From the masthead, Jeremiah counts twenty-two Spanish ships of the line ready for sea. Spain declares war, and Gibraltar falls under siege. The Hesper races home with urgent dispatches, fighting off a xebec, slipping the Spanish blockade under the Rock's guns, and sighting the vast combined fleet of France and Spain off Ushant.

At Spithead the beacons burn and England braces for invasion. Sent to find Admiral Hardy, the Hesper watches the Ardent taken off Plymouth. She escapes in an easterly gale and at last finds the Channel fleet west of the Scillies. Jeremiah's count helps Hardy decide to fall back to Spithead, and the sickly enemy fleet turns for home. In Massachusetts, Abigail receives his letter in the autumn frost. On the Hesper's deck that same night, Jeremiah stands under the same North Star, still carrying her worn square of cloth.