Anson stood on the quarterdeck of the Centurion, staring across the vast, watery expanse off the southeastern coast of China. It was April 1743, and it had been two years since he had lost sight of the Wager. He still did not know what had happened to the ship, only that she was gone. As for the Pearl and the Severn, he knew their officers had turned their scurvy-ridden, storm-beaten vessels back around Cape Horn—a decision that had caused the Pearl’s captain to see himself in “no other light than a disgrace.”
