Dewey Lambdin - A Jester’s Fortune

"I possess neither, at present. Send to shore for spumante, I s'pose?" Charlton shrugged, almost in a good mood by then. "As for a Frog wine, no harm in drinking it, d'ye think?"

"Ask of Captain Rodgers, do you go aboard his ship, sir. He's sure to have some. His very favourite in the whole world. Politics or war aside, he's bound to have a case squirreled away for special occasions. And a chance for action is just that, sir."

"Aye, I'll enquire of him, Lewrie."

Good God, Charlton thought, once more betwixt being reconciled to Lewrie and Rodgers. He was being put on warning that they were a proper pair of blackguards. Does Rodgers tipple a lot of wine? More than is good for a man beyond a gentlemanly brace of bottles a day?

The door that led to the gun-deck, at the forward end of the great-cabins, had been left covertly ajar, Lewrie noted. Some quick-witted sod with an ear to the ground, he thought. As he walked with Charlton to see him off, he caught a flash of scarlet and white; a Marine in proper kit, at last. There was a subtle thud of a musket butt on the deck beyond. Knolles had most-like cleared the rigging of laundry, sent the Marines below for tunics, hats, belts and gaiters and had Jester and her full complement ready to give their new senior officer the right sort of sendoff.

"Oh, bloody… 'ware that…!" Lewrie burst out, as Charlton clapped his large cocked hat on his head.

Captain Thomas Charlton walked on a pace or two, though his hat didn't. It remained, plastered to the still-wet varnish of one of the overhead deck-beams by its "dog's vane" and riband bow, tied beneath the gold-laced loop and gilt button of rank on the left-hand side. He reached up for it… back for it.

"Uhmm, yer hat, sir?" Lewrie blushed scarlet.

"Uhmm, yayhss," Charlton fumed, just as red-faced. "Quite."

"Lewrie, you gay old dog!" Captain Benjamin Rodgers boomed in glee as he pumped Alan's hand vigourously. "Yer a sight for sore eyes, damme 'f ya ain't. How do ya keep, sir?"

"Main-well, sir," Lewrie replied, just as gladly. "You've come up in the world, I see. And well deserved, too."

He noted, though, that Ben Rodgers only wore a single bullion epaulet on his right shoulder; a Post-Captain of less than three years' seniority. Back in the Bahamas, he'd been an eyelash away from gaining his due promotion, been jumped into a "post ship" as soon as his old sloop of war, Whippet, had paid off in England, perhaps by late '88! It seemed that the same spiteful patrons and well-connected allies of their venal former commodore on that station, who'd blighted Lewrie's career from '89 'til the start of the war, had vented their spite on Rodgers s as well. It was said, Lewrie remembered, that "you can't keep a good man down." But there was a lot that the haughty, and criminal, could do to hide a friends crimes, and make a good man's rise extremely slow. Lewrie feared that Rodgers might bear him a grudge, but his exuberant greeting put paid to that worry. If he'd suffered, he showed no sign of grief over it. He would let "the dirty" slide off his back like water off a duck's.

"When, uhm… did you make post?" Lewrie had to ask, though.

"In '93." Rodgers shrugged, but with a triumphant gleam. "On half-pay 'til the Nootka Sound troubles in '91. Even sailed as far as Cape Town for the Pacific 'fore I broke passage and the mail packet caught up with me to call us off. Barely back home, wasn't I, when the Frogs went and made life int'restin' again, hah! And you, sir? On yer own bottom, wearin' an 'ironbound' coat? When? Still married, are you? Caroline s well? D'ye have an even larger brood?"

Thank God Rodgers was still the same brisk and stout fellow Lewrie had known long before, as windy as a Cape Horn passage. His hair and complexion were Welsh-dark. He'd been eating well, but hadn't turned all tripes-and-trullibubs; he'd always been stocky and square. His face was more lined with a captain's cares, his hair beginning to thin. A fuller face made him strangely more youthful-seeming. And, in spirit, he was the very image of his old slyly puckish, boisterous self.

"Three gits, my God, sir!" Rodgers roared, shying away in mock fear when Lewrie had answered most of his quick questions. "Oh, good! The bubbly. Aye, I'll take a refill. Damme, I know farm livin's boresome as the Devil, Lewrie, but… mean t'say!" He bellowed in mirth, as that properly spiked champagne punch made the rounds anew.

"And yourself, sir?" Lewrie japed in return. "Still a bachelor, 1 trust? Any new Betty Mustins? No by-blows round your ankles?"

"None I know of, mind." Rodgers laughed, touching the side of his nose. "Nor wife, either, I'm that proud to admit. Wondrous fine as yer Caroline is, sir, fetchin' as some of the doxies've crossed my hawse, the very idea of wedded bliss is enough to put me off me feed! Can't see how you've stood it all these years, bless me if I can!"

"Pretty much like the press-gang, sir," Lewrie rejoined with mirth of… his own. "God made women kind the bosun's mates of our world. They slip you the King's Shilling 'fore you've noticed, and you're in, with no way out. Once aboard, they train you, same as we turn lubbers into sailors. Lay into you often enough with their tongues, stead of starters. Only problem being, they're the only ones who know the lore,,and only tell you what you need know, when they think you need to know it. Damn-all more to learn, of course, but they're not telling 'til-"

"Speakin' o' rope-end starters," Rodgers muttered, almost nudging Lewrie off his feet, "remind me t'tell you 'bout the one I met in London 'fore we sailed. Touch o' the oF hairbrush t'her, and you'd think she was entered in the Derby!"

And why do I think I know her? Lewrie silently shuddered. An old "bareback ride"? My half-sister, Belinda? Sounds familiar…

"Gentlemen," Captain Charlton announced at last, playing the genial host, "I am informed supper is ready. Captain Rodgers, do you sit yonder, to my starboard side. And Commander Lewrie, here to larboard? Apologies, Charles…" he said to his First Officer, one Lieutenant Nicholson, a grave and studious-looking young man with dirty-blond hair. "Fear you must take seat below the salt, and perform the role of Vice. Toasts and all."

"With pleasure, of course, sir," Nicholson assured him.

It was, surprisingly, very much unlike a typical English supper. Oh, the conversation was strictly limited, of course; nothing which amounted to shop talk was allowed. Religion, Politics and Women were right-out for subject matter, as well.

It was all books, plays, music and such, amusing trivia gleaned from the latest London papers; hunting, harvests, Fashion, all about which Captain Charlton was very well informed, displaying an impressive range of interests and a fair amount of knowledge.

But the soup course was a tangy, creamed-shrimp bisque instead of the mundane, and expected, oxtail, turtle, or pea soup. The fish that followed was a local snapper, but dredged in flour and crumbled biscuit and served crunchingly hot, aswim in lemon juice and clarified butter. Corsican doves appeared, breasts grilled separately, wrapped in fatty bacon; a mid-meal salad to cleanse the palate, but still piquant with a vinegar and mustard dressing. There was, at last, a roast. Not the hearty (and leather-tough) local beef, but a brown sugar-cured Italian shoulder of pork, sauced with a subtle mix of Worcestershire and currant jam. The removes had been baby carrots, tiny pigeon peas and small stewed onions, along with potatoes. Each, though, had come with its own enhancing spicing-the potatoes especially, surely the last shriveled, desiccated survivors from Lionheart's orlop deck, from home. But they were diced small, then pan-fried with minced onion, some melted Cheddar, a dab of treacle and a Jamaican pepper sauce.

Books, well, Lewrie could converse on some, at least. Gossip, plays, and music? He was near hopeless. But, food, now! He and their host were at it like magpies, comparing Cantonese, Bengali, Bahamian, Mediterranean and Carolina Low Country cooking, all but bawling "you must give me that receipt!" to each other.

"Books, dear Lord, sir!" Rodgers dismissed airily, somewhere in red-faced mid-feed. "I'll admit t'only readin' the one. And that a damn thin'un. 'Twas a book set us on the right trail in the Bahamas, though, wasn't it, Lewrie? To hunt a pirate chief?"

The wines were rather good, too, though Charlton apologised for each as they appeared with each course; they'd only come from Vigo, he said with a shrug, where Lionheart had broken her passage the past spring. There's more to this'un than most people'd suspect, Alan told himself, after a grand couple of hours at table with Charlton. He's not yer typical English sea-dog. There's a brain abaft that phyz o' his. And Lewrie cautioned himself to wait awhile longer before forming too quick a judgement of his new superior. And took a care to not imbibe too deep in his wines, either. It was a cruel ruse, but a useful one, to observe one's junior officers when they were deep in their cups, in vino veritas. Fortunately, even Rodgers, ever fond of spirits, knew that one, too, and while hearty, stayed upright.

The tablecloth was finally whisked away, the water glasses removed and the port, nuts, cheese and sweet biscuits were placed within easy reach. Lieutenant Nicholson, once they'd charged their glasses, did a midshipman's duty from the foot of the table as Vice, proposing the King's Toast, and they drank to their sovereign. Even if King George III had been talking to trees in Hyde Park lately, thinking them to be Frederick the Great of Prussia, as rumour had it.

"Sweethearts and wives, sirs," Charlton offered next, with a cocked eyebrow, giving them a searching, amused glance before finishing the traditional Saturday mess toast. "May they never meet!"

And why'd he look so long at me for? Lewrie wondered as he was forced to echo that platitude. Has the bastard heard something?

"Now, sirs," Charlton said more seriously, "I would suppose you've received your formal orders from the flag by now? Good. That makes you mine, officially. I also trust you've seen to victualling, and stores, 'pon the receipt of a transfer to a new command? Again, good. Nothing to delay a dawn departure but thick heads, should the winds suit. I can tell you now, we're off to the Adriatic. What was known as the 'Mare,' or the Gulf of Venice."

Charlton took pains to outline the political situation, using many of the same terms as Admiral Jervis had that morning: the strengths, or lack of them, of the maritime nations that fronted that sea, and just how much help, or friendship, they might expect to find.

"Damn' shoal, I've heard, sir." Rodgers grimaced. "Pylades draws 'bout two-fathom-four, proper laden. Your Lionheart must draw nigh three. Be like glidin' 'cross the Bahama Banks on tippy-toes, anywhere close inshore. Like Lewrie and I did once, sir."

"Well, like I did, sir," Alan began to rejoin. "You went north-about the Banks, while Alacrity did the-"

"I would hope that we could avoid, sirs, the rockier eastern shore on the Ottoman Turk and Austrian side," Charlton interrupted, knowing the sound of a long-winded heroic reverie when he heard one. "Let those sleeping dogs lie, hey? I believe our greatest concern will be in the Straits of Otranto, the mouth of the Adriatic, and the nearby Ionian Sea. Those Venetian Ionian Islands, to the east'rd, have deep-water harbours for watering and victualing. By the by, you are aware of a new diplomatic nicety? Since the largest 42-pounder coastal artillery piece may throw solid shot three miles, many nations are now claiming sovereign jurisdiction up to three miles off their coasts, guns or no. A safe enough offing, even for Lionheart and Pylades, Captain Rodgers, d'ye see. And she does draw nigh seventeen feet aft, as you surmised."