Dewey Lambdin - Sea of Grey

In the last few days, administering the Last Rites had become a daily chore, supplanting all the other cares a captain should have for his ship, and the mellifluous prose of the Book of Common Prayer cloying and banal, the litany so familiar that he could almost recite from memory, as if declaiming passages from Caesar's Gallic Wars at school.

Lewrie looked over at Midshipman Grace, feeling pangs of sympathy as the lad stumbled about the gun-deck as if in a trance, red-faced but dry-eyed after their last trip ashore in the cutter… to bury his grandfather, the canny Nore fisherman they'd known simply as the Older Grace. Now Mr. Grace's father, too, lay insensible beneath an awning stretched over the boat-tier beams up forrad by the foc'sle belfry, by turns shivering and teeth-chattering under three blankets, or sweating buckets and thrashing for relief from malaria. Arthur "The Middle" Grace might recover, Mr. Shirley believed; it was malaria, not the Yellow Jack, and chichona bark extract was lengthening the calm periods 'twixt bouts, though he was still as weak as a wet dish-clout. Young Grace stumbled forward and knelt by his father's pallet, taking his hand and clinging and patting it.

"How's he doing?" Lewrie asked Durant in a soft mutter. "It comes and goes, sir," Durant said, heaving another of those Gallic shrugs of his. "Improving, I venture to say." "Mister Shirley?"

"He is resting, Capitaine. Ze strain 'as been 'orrible. It is a wonder, so enervated he 'as become, zat he 'as not succumbed himself. So far, it is ze old and weak, ze very young who fall ill and die." "Any more cases?" Lewrie asked, crossing his fingers. "Two, Capitaine … Seaman Ordinaire Harper and Landsman Drew," Durant mournfully went on. "Both, 'owever, display no sign of Yellow Jack. Only ze malaria. And zey are strong." "But only one death today," Lewrie insisted.

"Ze poor Lieutenant Wyman, oui .. . but zere are two more 'ands who 'ave the Yellow Jack, and near ze last stages of ze malady, sir. I cannot imagine zey will see tomorrow's dawn."

"Damn, damn, damn!" Lewrie spat, weakly thumping a fist atop the cap-rail of the starboard gangway bulwarks. "I'm tired o' this, Mister Durant. There must be something more we can do."

"We do all zat medicine knows, sir," Durant objected. "Chichona extract at the first sign of sickness, salt water clysters and all the fresh water zey can drink, to ease ze constipation, and lack of… my English… pissing in zose wiz Yellow Jack. Better air on deck, shade and coolness? Mister Hodson smokes ze ship below wiz faggots of tobacco, we scour wiz vinegar and salt water, we root out ze rats and cockroaches, no one 'as lice or fleas. But it is all so confusing zat we 'ave both malaria and Yellow Jack at once together, Capitaine. Is ze chichona bark good for zose wiz the Yellow Jack, or harmful? Is fruit juice helpful, or does it produce more bile, zat, I zink is a symptom of Yellow Jack, and contributes to the vomito negro? Ze liver and ze kidneys of men who die of Yellow Jack, when examined after death, are ruined. It explains ze lack of piss, ze constipation, but ze why, or ze how…?"

"And we've pumped the bilges so often, you could eat down there. There's no ordure, the pump-water comes out bright and clean," Lewrie wondered aloud. "We've burned loose gunpowder, buckets of tar, not a damned preventative that's supposed to work, works!"

"Water casks emptied, scoured wiz vinegar and sea water as well," Durant sadly agreed. "It was most odd, though, sir… ze water casks we filled once we reach Jamaica? When we open zem wiz Mister Coote an' his mate, I find ze top of ze water thick wiz little nits. Set aside in a glass I cover wiz gauze, I find zat mosquitoes hatch out. I read of zis, regarding slave ships calling at Dahomey… zat zey found nits in fresh water taken from running streams, as well as still pools. Wiz ze gauze, I filter ze water, skim ze tops, before we stow clean casks bellow, zis time. And ashore, Capitaine, pardon ze expense, but we found a shop zat sells extract of citron, and candles made wiz citron."

"They smell good, aye… better than the mess-decks do now, at any rate," Lewrie agreed, with a firm nod of his head. "How expensive?"

"Cheaper zan ze assafoetida herbs, Capitaine," Durant said right quickly, to justify what was surely an unauthorised outlay. "Besides, ze assafoetida is very 'ard to find, at present. Mais non, ze merchant assures me zat, if citron candles, or if a mix of hot tar and citron oil, is lit and let smoulder and fume, ze house where they burn does not suffer malaria or Yellow Jack."

"Damme, a cure?" Lewrie exclaimed with great relief.

"For, uhm… women of ze house, it seem, Capitaine, " Durant said, with a weasely look. "Men, who are about business outside ze home, are just as vulnerable but, sir, zose inside are protected! Ze citron, I believe, exudes a sweet miasma, countering ze bad miasmas zat cause malaria and Yellow Jack! Regard, Capitaine," Durant said, becoming agitated and cheerful, waving off Lewrie's just-as-sudden scowling. "You go into ze forest, you find ze poisonous plant or weed. But every time, growing close by, is ze antidote! Nature will 'ave her balance, n'est-ce pas? Every grand-mиre, your grannies, know of zis! Sickness follows contact wiz ze shore, but after a week or two at sea ze number of ze stricken diminishes… until ze next contact wiz shore. Citron candle and citron tar smoke-pots burning below, by the hatchways, perhaps hung all about ze upper deck after dark, blocks ze insinuation of tropical miasmas, sir!"

"How much?" Lewrie asked again, arms crossed in leeriness.

"Twenty pound, ten shillings, five pence, Capitaine. Five pound of my own, some from Mister Hodson-zough he does not believe, he will grasp at ze straw, n'est-ce pas? Some from Mister Shirley, because he is desperate, and ze rest, uhm… from ship's funds, sir."

"For… perfume," Lewrie scoffed; for that was the only use he knew of for citron… other than colouring or zesting desserts.

"Please, I beg you, let me try it, Capitaine. Ze merchant says it is well recommended on ze Spanish Main, by ze Portugese in Brazil!"

"Oh, for God's sake, Mister Durant, he sold you a bill o' goods!"

"If nozzing else, M'sieur Capitaine, ze citron seems to drive ze pesky mosquito away," Durant insisted, playing his final card.

"Aye, then…" Lewrie finally relented. "If for nothing else but a good night's sleep, without all that buzzin' and swattin'. I'll let you try it. S'pose we could write it off as an experiment."

"God bless you, Capitaine Lewrie! Merci, merci beaucoup! You will see… I 'ave made up ze hot tar and citron oil already…"

"Thankee for asking first… sir," Lewrie scowled, turning away to go below to his cabins. "Mind you, this turns out to be a cure for malaria and Yellow Jack, put me down for a large share of the profit."

"But of course, M'sieur Capitaine … guaranteed!" Durant said with a gush, grandly doffing his plain hat and sweeping it down to the deck as he bowed his gratitude before scrambling down the ladder for the main companionway hatch, and his medical stores below.

The transom sash windows were open wide, the glazed panels in the coach-top overhead were propped open, and a canvas wind-scoop ventilator caught what little air stirred in the millpond-still harbour, but his great-cabins were still stifling. Lewrie stripped off his formal funeral finery and changed into a worn pair of white slop trousers, trading his fancy Hessian boots for a dowdy pair of calfskin slippers. He sat at his desk with a "top-silver" palmetto fan, clawing his neck-stock off and opening his shirt.

Aspinall brought him a glass of sugared lemon water, silently padding about as if fearful of catching Lewrie's eye. He'd been that deferential and insubstantial ever since the first deaths. Lewrie had a sip, and pondered which onerous task he'd undertake first. Sighing, he plopped his feet atop his desk and slouched down in his chair, feet aspraddle and crotch aired; it was too warm and humid to cross ankles.

There was the matter of letters to write to the dead mens' kin, but at the moment he felt too enervated, and too steeped in death, to tackle that chore. Besides, he had exhausted all the stock platitudes he knew for grief, and it wouldn't feel quite right to pen an identical letter to all, like an Admiralty form for indentures or broken spars.

With so many dead, dying, or bedridden for weeks as they healed, there was the Watch-And-Quarter Bill to be amended, but Lewrie thought that would best be done in concert with Lt. Langlie and the midshipmen, who worked more closely with the hands than he. Perhaps have them all in for a "working" breakfast? There was a cook to be discovered among the crew, since poor old lamed Curcy had been one of the first to pass over, and the food issued since had been positively vile. Foster, the Yeoman of The Powder, would move up to Gunner's Mate to replace poor Mr. Bess, whom they'd buried the last morning; he'd find another man handy with canvas and needles to replace the Sailmaker's Mate, young Hickey. If things went on as badly as they had so far, fully half of those thirty sick men presently laid out fiat would die before the week was out, he realised, and the survivors wouldn't be worth tuppenny shit for two or three weeks more. Only two Ordinary and two Able Seamen were lost so far, but a fair number of the sick were the spryest topmen, the young and experienced hands a ship could not do without. And their replacements were half a world away, due on the next hired supply ship and not expected to arrive before the end of hurricane season, 'round October or November when the bulk of the "liners" returned from Halifax.

And always had first choice, damn them, their captains, and the seniority and favouritism that dictated the new mens' dispersement!

Not wishing to think about Watch-And-Quarter Bills, Lewrie had another sip of sweet lemon water and scowled, one eye asquint, at his desk… at his mail from England. After the first rushed reading, he wasn't so sure that he wanted to revisit those, either!

"Damme, pile it on, why don't You?" he muttered to God or Fate. "And thankee that trouble usually comes in threes!"

Plague, uselessness, and his personal life; each one a horror!

The letters from his father Sir Hugo had been the easiest stood, and had contained more pertinent information. What little he'd gotten from Caroline had been pure vitriol!

For it seemed that another of those damned, anonymous "My dear friend, you simply must know…" epistles had turned up on Caroline's doorstep, and this time whoever the Devil wrote them had known all and had told all regarding his visit to Theoni Connor's London town house, the day after Caroline had stormed off for Anglesgreen in high dudgeon; how Theoni had coached down to Sheerness and had cohabited as man and wife with him for an entire week before Proteus had sailed! The anonymous writer had even named the inn and the placement of their set of rooms, How early their candles were snuffed…!

So much for 'time heals all wounds, ' Lewrie glumly thought, once he'd read Caroline's lone, accusatory missive; and you can chuck 'least said and soonest mended' and 'absence makes the heart grow fonder' over the side, too!