Dewey Lambdin - THE GUN KETCH

"Thank you, sir. And your ship is…?"

"Whippet, twenty guns. 6th Rate Sloop o' War," Rodgers answered.

Lord, yes, he was senior! Sloop was a loose catchall term for any vessel larger than a bomb, revenue cutter or armed yacht below the standardized Rates; Alacrity was technically a sloop, no matter how she was rigged aloft. But a sloop of war was a miniature frigate, smallest of the three-masted, ship-rigged vessels in the Fleet, and her captain was Post-Captain in all but name, sure to be "made post" soon.

Rodgers already wore a post-captain's "iron-bound" coat, but for three cuff buttons instead of four, and profuse with gold lace. The mark of a man rising to the top of the seniority list like a signal rocket.

"Are there many on station, sir?" Alan asked.

"Only one more, Ariel," Rodgers informed him. "You know how reduced the Fleet is, as I'm certain our lord and master told you when you reported to him this morning. Saw you being rowed ashore like Hell's Fire was licking your gig's transom, hey?"

"Aye, sir," Lewrie grinned as their coffee and pudding arrived.

"We're a sorry lot these days," Rodgers babbled on happily. "A single 4th Rate fifty-gunner, Royal Arthur, our flag. We possess but one frigate, Captain Quids' Guardian, and she's only a twenty-eight. We've half a dozen others, from revenue cutter-sized, two-masted luggers or schooners, or brig-rigged or ketch-rigged sloops, like yours. Too few, too slow, too weak, and too bloody lost from where troubles occur. Oh, pardons Mistress Lewrie, for my language."

"I have heard worse, from my husband, Commander Rodgers," Caroline informed him with a chuckle, "and that, recently."

"Mean to say you two really are married?" Rodgers marveled. "I thought… pardons again, but my experience o' Navy marriages is that most of 'em're but a convenient sham, and for a man frisk his future 'fore makin' post… ouch!"

"Pay him no mind, Ben's a conceited arse," Elizabeth Mustin said after poking her innamorato in the ribs, but with no real sign of anger. "Yes, dear… some officers do wed those they love."

"You set a hellish-bad example for all of us, Captain Lewrie," Rodgers admitted, not the slightest bit abashed. "Once the word gets out, every girl in poit'll be having your good lady over, to fathom how she got you to go for the high jump! My dear Mistress Lewrie, this is the sort o' fame you could dine out on for years, don't ya know. What say ye to a toast to the happy couple? Champagne, hey?"

"Yes!" Elizabeth enthused. "Champagne. His favorite tipple!"

"A brace o' bottles, hang the cost, and my treat, sir!"

"Most gallant, sir," Caroline said before Lewrie could answer. "We would be delighted, thank you."

"Waiter?" Rodgers hallooed. "Bloody love the stuff, dearer'n a baby craves his mother's milk. Might a'been nursed on goodvintages, far's I know, an' bawled fit t'bust t'be weaned, hey? Thank God we've peace with France just long enough to stock up for our next set-to, or pray our smugglers're bold enough to dodge the King's Customs. So, I s'pose Commodore Garvey gave you your marchin' orders already, sir?"

"Hydrographic surveying, sir," Alan replied, sketching in what Garvey's interview had been like. "God knows where, though."

"Best thing," Rodgers announced. "Outa sight, outa mind. And this Trinity House fellow Gatacre'll be just the thing. Bahamas are bad-charted, if charted at all below the populous islands."

"Caroline thought it a blessing, too, sir," Alan agreed.

"And what did you think of our lord and master, sir?" Rodgers asked, sounding offhand, but looking cutty-eyed at him.

"Ah, sir," Lewrie opined, on his guard. But he didn't believe Rodgers's ebullient personality would sit well with Garvey, either, so he could not be a favorite. "Hmm, sir!" he added, rolling his eyes.

"Did he offer drink, Captain Lewrie? And, did you accept?"

"He did, sir, but I did not. I didn't get my requested coffee."

"Then thank your lucky stars ya didn't!" Rodgers muttered as he leaned a little closer. "It all has to do with his son. Shipped out as a midshipman in Royal Arthur, and soon's they dropped the hook, he was commissioned, and a good man turned out to make room for him. He's fourth lieutenant into her now. If Garvey had a budget that'd purchase more patrol craft, he'd be on his own bottom, even as we speak! Garvey rewards his favorites, and chastises those that cross him. What he is lookin' for is any excuse to promote people up an' outa Royal Arthur, so the squadron is captained by his proteges, and young Virgil Garvey prospers. Any slip on your part'd give him an excuse for Virgil t'be third lieutenant. Oh, we all walk small about our Horace, we do!"

"God, sir," Alan chilled, "my passengers, they'll tell him I'm married, that I brought Caroline here. He's already criticized me for my shiphandling!"

"Ah, rot! Ya brought her in sweet as pie. He tried that on me, first I sailed in. Let's just say you're never t'be one o' his 'elect,' sir. As if he's Noah himself!" Rodgers sneered, warming to his screed. "Royal Arthur doesn't stir from her moorin's but once every six weeks, and that for a short run to Harbour Island or Spanish Wells over on Eleuthera and back. He's wedded t'his palacio ashore. I would be, too; 'tis a damned impressive pile. No, 'tis best you're far away for now. There's other unfortunates not among the 'saved' for him t'cull through so his sycophants can advance. More'n a few as need replacin', had I my way, sir!"

"Sounds positively Manichaean, sir," Lewrie quipped. "All of this talk of the saved, the elect."

"Well, stap me!" Rodgers hooted in surprise. "What the devil are you doin', wearin' our good King's Coat, an' makin' noises like a man's read a real book! Don't ya know English tarpaulins're supposed t' sound so simple-minded, even the others notice, sir? Stump about the quarter-deck yellin' 'Luff!' and cursin' 'damn my eyes,'ha ha!"

"Damn… my… eyes," Lewrie pronounced tongue in cheek, slowly as if trying it on for the first time. "And is that best uttered with one hand on the hip, sir? Perhaps… gazing aloft and wondering why the devil all that laundry's drying up there, sir?"

"Goddamme, but you'll do, Captain Lewrie! You're a jolly young dog, and blessed with the second-handsomest lady in the islands. I do avow you'll do right well for me! My irreverent sort of fellow."

"I will endeavor to please, sir," Lewrie smiled back, lifting a glass of champagne to his lips. This Rodgers was a merry wag himself, the sort Lewrie would feel most comfortable and sportive with, and found himself liking Commander Benjamin Rodgers a great deal, wishing he was the commander of the Bahamas Squadron instead of Garvey.

"And do you lodge in town, Miss Mustin?" he heard Caroline ask, conducting their own conversation apart from Navy gossip.

"God, no! Nassau's fearsome noisy and rowdy, Caroline. May I call you Caroline? And you must call me Elizabeth. If only to escape the stenches, I have a small house east of town, out towards Fort Montagu. One gets first shot at the Trade Winds out there, blowing all manner of nastiness alee, as Benjamin puts it. A Loyalist family of my acquaintance bought a plantation there, but the soil is awfully thin… played out… so they're running up houses."

"Thank God for the Loyalists, or Nassau'd still be dull as a dead dog," Rodgers commented. "They've braced this colony up good as a soldier's wind and got it moving. God help the American Republic, after running the best of 'em out. And God be thanked they lit here."

"Caroline is of a Loyalist family," Alan bragged.

"Never you mean it!" Elizabeth gushed. "Truly? Why, so am I, my dear! New York."North Carolina!" Caroline rejoined, and they both fell into a swoon of comradeship at once. "God, how wonderful, I can't…!"

"We've a funny society here in the Bahamas, Lewrie," Rodgers told him as he topped up the champagne glasses. "Ain't this grand stuff, though? There's us on top. Government, military and naval officials from home. Right under us are the old-time families from Nassau, Eleuthera, Long Island or the Exumas, the rich traders and planters who've been here for years. Third-best, but greater in numbers are the emigre' Loyalists. Under them you have the poor whites, the artisans and tinkers and such. Ex-pirates, deserters, freebooters and buccaneers, who small-hold or fish, ply their poor trades or loaf about. Then come the Cuffys, and it's the same story chapter and verse as it is for the whites."

"How so, sir?"

"Free blacks first, o'course, then slaves at the bottom. But they have a caste system bad as any I've read of among the Hindoos. Octoroons, quadroons, mulattoes, brown to coal black'uns. So a free black but a blueskin is rated lower man a free black who's almost white, d'you see. Straight or woolly hair, pale or dark skin. Now the blueskin may be a home owner and educated, with a shop of his own, makin' enough money to bloody vote in England, but his fellow with the straight hair and talk of Portuguese sailors in the family tree is the better man, even were he dirt-poor, illiterate and ignorant as so many sheep. Damned funny world, ain't it?"

"I've heard that said, sir," Lewrie japed, raising his glass in a mock toast. "Though I've never heard much laughter about it."

"Hah, you're a sharp 'un, sir! A glass with you, my lad."

"Uhm, about losing my ship, sir…?" Alan inquired urgently as they lowered their glasses to refill.

"Who are your patrons?" Rodgers asked unashamedly. In the Navy, family connections, petticoat influence, and favors given and gotten mattered almost as much as merit and seniority, or competence and wits. Young officers aspired to a circle of "sea daddies" who looked after their careers; senior officers culled their wardrooms and lower decks looking for proteges with connections, too, or talents and abilities. A man was judged by the quality of his prote'ge's, by his wisdom in the choices he sponsored so the nation and fleet were better served, and success by a junior shone just as brightly on his "sea daddy."

"Retired Admiral Sir Onsley Matthews, sir," Alan stated. "And I received this commission from Admiral Sir Samuel Hood."

"Ah, didn't we all, though," Rodgers grunted, since Hood had sat in charge of the Admiralty's professional side for several years.

"From his hands personally, sir," Alan boasted. "First in '83 off Cape Francois, then this February along with Admiral Howe, at the Admiralty. Face to face, as it were, sir."

"Don't come any better than that!" Rodgers said with brows up in appreciation. "I know for certain neither o' those worthies suffer fools gladly. Damme, what wicked fun! I do believe I'll have a chat with our lord and master Commodore Garvey tomorrow. Put a word or two in his ear about your… dare I say… august connections to shiver his tops'Is! Make him wonder what you're doin' here in his command. If you're here to keep an eye on him."

"Even more reason for me to sail as far off as possible," Alan sighed. "And stay there until I rot, sir."

"Aye, but with a rovin' commission, an independent ship, free of all his guff," Rodgers chuckled. "Can't ask for better duty, nor better chances for mischief, I'm thinkin'. No, once I drop the word on Garvey, your command'll be safe as houses. He'll fear to displace you so his son may prosper."

"That is a relief, sir."

"Damme, I may have to start bein' sickeningly patronizin' to you m'self, Lewrie," Rodgers laughed. "If I mean to aspire."

"If you do not fear Captain Garvey, sir," Lewrie responded, tongue in cheek, "perhaps I should begin to patronize you!"