Dewey Lambdin - A Jester’s Fortune

Couldn't be Spendlove, he thought weakly.

He lolled his head right, to try and focus on Mrs. Connor, who sat by his right shoulder, supporting him, felt a cool, soft hand on his brow, stroking so gently…

The hulking form was back, pawing him and prodding vigourously. There came the thud of a wooden box, the tinkle of gleaming, silvery things. More fire in his calf as something wet and stinging was laved over it, and he caught the sweet-and-sulfur tang of West Indies rum on the air. Then came a single blazing-red star from somewhere not that far away, wavering and sputtering, nearing…

"… see this, ma'am. Cover his ears, perhaps?" someone said. It was the hulking thing, shuffling on its knees upward to peer into his face. Surgeon Mister Howse!

"Bite on this," he said, offering a folded leather strop, all foetid, dried and mangled as old shoes, and bitten by the teeth of an hundred prior sufferers. "Think of something pleasant."

Then the pain went indescribable, and his leg was burning, all active flames, smoke and sizzle, and charring black, he could imagine; like he'd taken a tentative dip into a red-hot stream of lava!

"Oh, you bloody bastard!" Lewrie gritted through the gag, quivering tense as a sword-blade. "Enjoy that, do yyaaa? Shit!"

Over the child's redoubled wailings, he could hear Mrs. Connor shusshing and making crooning noises, holding his head in her hands to stop the sounds and sights, rocking the boy on her lap. Rocking him.

"Best way to stop the bleeding, sir," Mr. Howse said, looming up in his face again. "Tourniquet, then a cautering iron. Rum for a fuel, as it were, to encourage the searing. Did he not nick a major vein, you may recover. Sir," Howse lowed, sounding disappointed he might be successful. "I'll dress it now, sir."

"Marines, level! By volley.. . fire!" And the crash of another avalanche of musketry, quite near the camp, at last. "At 'em, Jesters! Sword and steel!" he heard Lieutenant Knolles cry, followed by a roaring of pagan joy. And still the clash and clang of blades. "Bayonets! At th' double-quick… cold steel, an' skin the bastards!"

"Help me up," Lewrie ordered. He was now wide awake, in too much pain to swoon, too angry (it must be admitted), and looked out to see his seamen and Marines sweeping into the camp, battering what bit of fight the pirates had left from them. And there were Mlavic and Leut-nant Conrad Kolodzcy, still going at it, hammer-and-tongs. Kolodzcy had acquired a swept-hilt dagger for his off-hand, and was two-handing it in the elegant old Spanish rapier-and-poignard style. His balance was exquisite, his every move liquid and graceful, the minimum of effort to parry, defend… then burst into furious motion, all threatening swiftness, like a horde of aroused bees. A pirate came to save Mlavic, dashing in from Kolodzcy's left, and Kolodzcy lunged at the pirate chieftain to take room, pivoted on one heel, and that pirate was stumbling past, his sword gone and his bowels spilling over his hands as he pitched onward to trip and die with a hideous screech.

"Damme, he's good!" Lewrie breathed in awe.

Driving Mlavic back to the middle of the camp, both too intent on murder to think of safety, of retreat. Lewrie heard a yelp from Kolodzcy as some seamen neared: "Nein, he ist mine!"

Back across the blood-soaked earth, Mlavic stumbling back over his tortures, his dead and dying victims; teeth still bared in a ferocious snarl of defiance, Mlavic fought to the death, knowing he'd be killed right after, should he win, but so fired, so forged by hate…!

Tripped! Seized on the ankle by the groveling Albanian woman who'd been savaged nigh to death, who lashed out grief-blinded, hatred-blinded! Mlavic lost his balance, tried to recover, to shake loose of her as she clawed at him.

"Unt, ja!" Kolodzcy cried thin and high, slipping inside guard and driving his dagger into Mlavic's right forearm, to turn it, wring it, and force his nerveless fingers to let go his scimitar. Slip his small-sword's narrow blade into Mlavic's throat in the same movement, then let go the hilt and lever the plunging, thrashing knife-hand off until his opponent began to weaken. "Sterbe, schweinhund! Ich bin nicht der madchen-haft-mann! Ich bin dein tod!"

Mlavic gargled and coughed, drowning, lowering his knife-hand.

"Die, pig-dog… die!" Kolodzcy screamed, ramming his dagger hilt-deep under Mlavic's heart.

And Dragan Mlavic complied, his knees buckling as Kolodzcy gave a great heave and flung him back, right to the edge of the central fire, where his head and shoulders draped over the shimmering-hot stones, and his hair and his beard and his goat-hair weskit caught fire. Where, a moment later, the broken and bleeding Albanian woman crawled, to pound him weakly with a short bit of kindling, screaming and weeping all the while as that brutes face blazed and sizzled like pork-cracklings. Kolodzcy turned, grinned his weary delight and raised the hilt of his sword to his face in a formal salute to Lewrie-with a double-click of his heels and a short head-bow, for good measure. Alan lifted his own hanger and sketched what salute he could in reply. "And thank God for him," he breathed.

"Sir, you hurt?" Lieutenant Knolles was asking, kneeling down by his side. "Sorry, sir, but I wasn't to know, 'til-"

"You did damn fine, Mister Knolles," Lewrie assured him, with a pat on his shoulder. "Know or not, your timin' was splendid. You've done yourself proud. They break?"

"Run off into the woods, sir, t'other side of the island." "See to the stockade, then, Mister Knolles," Lewrie said as he heaved himself up to a sitting position, no matter the pain. "There's sure to be some they didn't bring down to torture 'fore… get every civilian or Venetian sailor off the island, back aboard their ship. I think we'd best leave our pirates in the woods 'til dawn tomorrow, or we'd lose some of our men to 'em, floundering about in the dark. And I doubt they'll be much of a threat, now we have their ship and their boats. Call everyone back near the beach and we'll fort up. Clean up this slaughterhouse in the morning, too."

"Aye, sir." Knolles nodded, taking time to look about, bewildered. "God, what'd they do, sir? How could they-"

"Speak of it, tomorrow, sir," Lewrie cut him short, not caring to dwell on it much, either.

"You're not too sore hurt, are you, sir?"

"Spot o' wine, and I'll be dancing, most-like." Alan chuckled, hoping that was true, that he wasn't slowly puddling blood inside that seared-shut gash. "Oh… where're my manners? Mistress Connor? Mistress Theoni Connor, allow me to name to you my First Officer, Mr. Ralph Knolles. Mister Knolles, Mrs. Patrick Connor. Her husband was late of' Bristol, byway of Zante. Her son… and what's your name, sprout?" "He's Michael," the lady supplied, cosseting the little lad a bit more, rocking him as he sat on her lap. Rocking her hip on Alan's side, too. The lad had calmed down, was no longer crying hysterically, but he didn't look far from a fresh bout. "And I am honoured to know you, sir… Lieutenant Knolles. Another of my saviours." She smiled at him, wilting young Knolles to an aspic; but with a significant eye for Lewrie, too, openly adoring.

"Should I get you something, Captain Lewrie?" she offered, in a maternal sort of way. "A brandy, to restore you?"

"Had my fill o' plum brandy, thankee," Lewrie said with a grimace. "Some wine, sir. I'll fetch it," Spendlove volunteered. And there was one of those silver chalices again, brimming with restorative red wine. Lewrie took a deep draught, and felt much better. "Something I have to do," he decided, after several more. "I won't be a minute. If you'd help, Mister Spendlove? You've a young back, and there's something I have to see to."

He got to his feet, wincing. But with Spendlove under his left arm for support, so he'd not put weight on his leg, he hobbled slowly to the centre of the camp, near the fire, to gaze down on Mlavic. The Marines had dragged him out to lessen the reek of roasting man, built up the fire to illuminate the forest where foes still hid. But the Marines stood gagging at the sights they beheld, the incredible amount of blood that had flowed, the rivened victims' corpses. Pragmatically though, they half knelt to pluck those gold coins Mlavic had strewn in boast. The Marines froze, turned away, pretending they weren't looting as Lewrie and Spendlove hove up.

"No matter, lads," Lewrie told them. "No head-money in this for us… just justice. So take what you may find. Corporal Summerall? Could you find five guineas for me? Just five guineas."

"Aye, sir. No problem, sir!" he replied, relieved that Lewrie would look the other way. He brought them after a quick search, rubbing off the drying blood with his musket cleaning rag. He laid them on Lewrie s palm. Lewrie peered down at them, glittering and clean again. Then folded his hand and shoved them deep into a pocket of his breeches.

"Now get me back aboard Jester, if you'd be so good, Spendlove," Lewrie sighed. "Away from this…"

And limped away… with his four guineas recovered for the wine- and the last to pay for all.

Quod sin ea Mavors abnegat,

et solis nostris sudoribus obstat,

ibimus indecores frustratque

tot aequora vectae?

But if Mars refuses,

and alone resists our efforts;

shall we depart disgraced

after traversing so many seas in vain?

Argonautica, Book V, 667-669

Gaius Valerius Flaccus

"This, sir, is for you," Lewrie announced, handing over a canvas binder that contained documents for Captain Charlton, as soon as he'd been admitted aft in Lionheart's great-cabins, "I fear they may be bad news, after getting ashore at Venice. Our consul told me."

"And what led you as far afield as Venice, sir?" Charlton asked, with a dubious brow up. "And off-station more than a week?"

"My written report, sir, will discover all to you," Lewrie said, presenting him with a second folded-over sheaf of papers. "One from Leut-nant Kolodzcy is included, as well."

Charlton looked puzzled, but he broke the wax seal on the orders first, waving Lewrie to a chair and a decanter of wine while he took a seat behind his desk and began to read.

"Oh, bloody…" Charlton nearly moaned, dropping the orders to his lap and staring off into the aether, looking aghast. "It's true?"

"Aye sir, sorry," Lewrie confirmed. "Bonaparte's repulsed the Austri-ans again, round Bassano… taken Trent, up in the passes in the Alps and sent 'em running. French troops landed at Bastia, and we had to evacuate, so Corsica and San Fiorenzo Bay are gone. We still garrison Capraia and Elba, but… And the Spanish, sir. Consul told me-"

" Spain 's declared war on Great Britain, aye," Charlton sighed, with an uncomprehending shake of his head. "Thrown in with France, and the Coalition's broken. We're on our own, with half of Europe against us. Dear Lord…!" He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose in weariness. "That's it for us, too, it seems. Admiral Jervis has been ordered by London to evacuate the Mediterranean… retire upon Gibraltar. Therefore, he writes, we're to leave the Adriatic, and are to make 'the best of our way' there for further orders. At once."

"Our consul suspected, sir, but couldn't confirm that." Lewrie coughed into his fist. "He did suggest all British subjects get out of the way of the fighting, return home, so I surmised it would be coming. Leave Venice, too, he thought, and get to Denmark or a neutral Baltic port as best they're able… or take passage west on neutral ships. I beg your pardon for the delay, sir, but I took the liberty of informing Lord Rushton and Sir Malcolm Shockley. Whilst tidying up the… matter which forced me to Venice. Wouldn't do for the Frogs to capture members of our peerage, or one of our greatest manufacturers. Lord, and a