King`s Captain l-9

by Dewey Lambdin

The children, no matter how delightful or loving, had grown to be irksome, and he wished for a respite from them and their ados. His lovely, : accomplished wife, so graceful and gracious, so loving, sensible, and affectionate-a woman most men would kill for as a mate!-was becoming an intrusion into his thoughts, his fretting over manoeuvring Proteus seaward, of stocking her, manning her, readying her…! 'Twas her needs her desires took precedence; and her faults and lacks-and her foreboding-reputation!-which rilled his waking thoughts and made him squirm with desperation to be off and free!

  It didn't help that Caroline sensed this, as she did so many of his moods by then, and could feel the stand-offish apartness of a driven man beneath his cheerful exterior sham. He was becoming that feckless, uncaring, and ungrateful boor she'd wept about back in Anglesgreen, the one who'd throw off every tie to land and family to dash off at the slightest whiff of tar and salt!

  And it really didn't help his feelings of inhuman boorishness that she was so very bloody… good about it! Not so much accepting their separation, or his eagerness for it, really, as she was "bearing up"-like a Christian martyr whose immolation depended on the timely arrival of a waggon-load of kindling. Saintly! She was long suffering, sweet-natured, temperate, and patient to the very end, and not letting her true feelings show even for an instant-for the children's sake, for his sake, and his career's. Though she could put more import into a faint sigh than most people could cram down the muzzle of a 42-pounder fortress gun…!

  Her silent patience irked him by then about as much as the antics of the children. "Go on," she as much as said to him, "be a heartless monster. I'll grin and bear it, no matter how sore you hurt me… us. But don't you feel the slightest pangs of guilt?"

  Aye, he did, which only made him wish that he could fly away-even sooner or quicker!

  Marriages, Lewrie thought, most melancholic, as he waved shoreward at them as they stood forlorn but brave atop the King's Stairs to watch his departure. Christ, who thought them up? Had to've been some hermit in a hair shirt… his little joke on the rest o' mankind/ Or God's more a cynic than we think Him!

  The night before, they'd said their goodbyes in a final hour of privacy in his quarters. He'd hugged them all, cajoled them all, and dried more than one set of tears. Now, once Proteus was well on her way downriver, Caroline would take them all back to London for a last round of sights, shows, and shopping before returning to Anglesgreen, their adventures over. His, however, were just beginning. And in a most perilous way too.

  The high tide had just begun to ebb, and turn from slackwater. Even though it was an ungodly hour to be up and stirring, he had to make the most of that tide. It was nippy and cool, and the faint hint of sunrise promised a bleak, overcast day, with a whiff of rain on the light breezes, breezes which, unfortunately, stood from out of the Nor'east. The hands stood at sail-handling posts or about the capstan head, their few ship's boys and boy servants ready with the nippers to serve the messenger cable to the thigh-thick mooring hawser. A Medway river pilot stood by the quartermasters on the wheel, clapping his hands for warmth and chatting quite gaily with Mr. Winwood. With impatience, Lewrie could imagine, as he listened to those mittened paws slapping together now and again.

  Proteus tried to stream downriver with the turning tidal flow, her stern pointing something near to Nor'east; the direction the Medway ran from Chatham until it got to Gillingham Reach and the sharp bend to the Sou'east. The wind, however, had just enough force to it to shove her down, even under bare poles, so that her bows pointed about due West. Directly against the tide, that wind. It promised to be an eventful morning!

  Dear Lord in Heaven, Lewrie thought, deciding that prayers might not go too far amiss; let me get her down to Sheerness… safe. Lady, do you have a soul, remember I ain 't yer enemy? You 're a ship, born and bred, and yer proper place is the sea… so let's get down there. Be perverse as ya wish once there, but… it's me or ya get a real bastard for a captain next time! Christ, I'm daft…

  "Very well, sirs," he announced in a voice he thought much too chipper and loud, as he turned away from the bulwarks and the sight of his family and wished Royal Navy captains could cross their fingers for luck in public. "Let us be going, even if it is a windward tide."

  They stiffened, ceased their whispered morning chatters, and the tin mugs of coffee were stashed away so they could be about the demanding business. Everyone looked so bloody keen and earnest, masking the fears they felt. Lewrie could almost (but not quite) sympathise.

  "Would you recommend we tack or wear off the mooring, sir?" he asked of the river pilot. "Bows to windward or alee?"

  "Either'd suit just as well, Captain Lewrie," the pilot replied, with a long, lazy yawn, as if it were no matter to him. "Bows alee'd save a spot o' labour when we get to the bend. But there's bags of sea room alee, sir. Bows a'weather, you'd have to tack at the bend… and do you end up 'in-stays,' well…"

  There was that, Lewrie thought; trying to tack in the narrow confines ofthe river bend, most-like with a dozen contrary vessels coming upriver and vying for sea room. Should they not get her bow 'round, she'd drift on the tidal current, right onto the far shore's mudflats! He'd been reading accounts of how to weather the Medway, had tried to recall his one-and-only downriver passage from so long before. That had been with a helpful beam wind from the West-Nor'west. He'd lain awake and schemed, played a tiny paper boat model down the river chart (when Toulon wasn't swatting it halfway to France or Peterborough!) in all imaginable weather conditions. This one, though, was the one he'd feared worst, almost as bad as a leeward tide, with wind and current flowing the same direction, which would have had them dragging anchors astern at the "trip" to keep from being hared along quite out of all control and at a prodigious rate of knots! No, this crew's not well-drilled enough for a proper tack. Alan sighed, feeling his innards shriveling. We 'd muck it, sure Fate! It was bows alee for them, and all the sail-handling and helm commands he would give- arse backwards!

  "Back and fill, then… bows alee," Lewrie decided aloud.

  "Nought t'fear, sir." The pilot yawned again.

  Easy for him t'say. Lewrie glowered. Think I'm fearful, do … ?

  "Larboard bower's a'cock-bill by the ring-painter, sir," Ludlow supplied, sounding much more agreeable and cooperative this day, now he had something nautical and challenging to do. Or delighting in goading his new captain into folly, Lewrie could also conjure! Taking joy from his dithering and delay. "Shank-painter's free, and we've a stream-anchor prepared astern, as you ordered, sir. Just in case."

  "Very well, Mister Ludlow," Lewrie snapped, steeling himself, and for a dread, blank moment trying to recall what commands to issue and in what order. He cast a glance aloft at the commissioning pendant to see how strong the wind was and whether it was steady or not. It was firmly out of the Nor'east, dead foul of the tide and river.

  "Weil sheer her 'round first, gentlemen," he pronounced with a nip to his voice. "Helm hard-over to larboard… hard alee, Quartermasters."

  Streaming back from her mooring buoy by a single cable, Proteus already had steerageway, with that tide sluicing past her rudder and down her sides. With the helm hard-over to leeward, the tide forced her to turn, still tethered, bringing her stern up into the wind and her bows down towards the lee shores to the South.

  She was held to the permanent mooring buoy by a single hawser up forrud, doubled from the starboard hawse hole to the metal ring atop the buoy and back to a belay, at fairly middling-stays. He'd placed Mr. Midshipman Adair, his best and brightest so far, all the way forrud in charge of letting slip.

  "Mister Peacham," Lewrie barked, wheeling to face his eldest of the middies, who stood with the afterguard in charge of the mizzenmast. "Stand by to hoist spanker to get her stern 'round. Mister Ludlow… stand ready with the tops'ls and inner jib."

  Up her stern came, Proteus angling more across the tideway with her stern almost directly into the wind. Any further and she'd snub on that mooring cable, Lewrie kn
ew, fail to wheel far enough Sutherly to set sail, yet… for good or ill… they had to let go, to trust in the wind and tide to take her and let her get a touch of way on so they could sail her off and not trip over the buoy-or drift helplessly to strand her on the south bank!

  Soon… wait, she'll snub… now! Lewrie thought, drawing in a preparatory breath. "Mister Adair… let slip!" he almost screamed. The wind… had it come almost due aft yet? A touch of veering on his left cheek? "Man the captsan! Haul in! Smartly, now!"

  She was free, untethered. Horny bare feet pounded the deck as the hands on the capstan thundered about in a circle, breasting to the bars, the pawls ratcheting as fast as a trotting horse's hooves, winding the messenger cable inboard about its drum, with the heavier hawser "nippered" to it. That heavy cable groaned and grated through the eye of the hawse hole.

  With no sails aloft, Proteus was taken by the out-flowing tide, adrift slowly astern, still so slowly turning with her helm hard-over, and her 740 tons of deadweight too much for the wind on her tall sides, her masts, and the maze of her rigging. There, the wind, a tiny touch on her larboard quarters!

  "Hoist away aft, Mister Peacham! Sheet the spanker hard a'starboard! Mister Ludlow… let's begin with the foretops'l."

  "Aye, aye, sir," Ludlow piped back, all enthusiasm, yet sounding dubious in spite of it. "Hoy, there! Let fall the foretops'l! Brace starboard! Clews… halliards… jears, an' haul away!"

  Up the yard went from its rest upon the foretop, with topmen out on the foot-ropes freeing the brails, the clews singing in the blocks to haul the lower corners down to bare them to the wind, the canvas rustling and shivering as it began to belly in fits and starts, loose-footed.

  Proteus was now swinging, not quite under control yet, drifting and driven by the tideway, the spanker forcing her stern down and her bows up, so she lay Sou'easterly, almost abeam the river, and angling more and more windward.

  "Mister Adair! Bare the inner jib, larboard tack!"

  Just enough pressure on her bows to keep her from swinging up too far into the wind, and getting her foretops'l laid aback on the mast! And that muddy, dangerous lee shore about as far away as Lewrie could spit, it seemed!

  "Main tops'l, Mister Ludlow, hoist away!" Lewrie pressed for more sail and more control. "Mizzen tops'l too… but brace her all aback!"

  Christ, he gloomed, just about ready to drop the larboard bower and surrender, admit he was a fraud, give up this nonsense, and slink off! She was now athwart the tideway, beam-onto the wind, hauled off by that shred of the inner jib's tack for the moment, but still making way mostly East, which would drift her onto the shore any second, did the tops'ls not fill and…!

  Come on, lady, you can do it! he groaned to himself; God knows I'm not sure if I can, but you…!

  Hmm, though…

  The tops'ls were now fully alive, almost thundering as they were set wind-full. Slackly wind-full, but bellied out and drawing, braced 'round to be brushed by the wind, to shape it and cup it for an instant before it soughed past at an acute angle.

  And Proteus began to steady, broadside to the wind, sailing into the wind, and making an awkward course to the Nor'east, still a bit too near that lee shore than Lewrie cared for, but…! She was going downriver with the tide, her fore and main tops'ls giving her lift, and the mizzen tops'l all aback to act as a brake as if she was cocked up to windward, fetched to! Turning a bit too much to windward, so…

  "Mister Peacham, brail up the spanker to the gaff for a bit," Lewrie called, after a long moment of thought. "Mister Adair, douse the inner jib… for a bit!" he shouted forrud.

  And without the wind's pressure on the spanker to act directly opposite of the usual effect, which would normally have swung her bow off, she steadied once more, a bit more broadside to the wind and the river. Got I it now, I think! he told himself; bows get too high, Ire-hoist the inner jib up forrud and that'll push her bows back down. Does she trend too far off the wind, Ire-hoist the spanker aft, makin' her stern-heavy. Rudder… well, hmm. What rudder? We're sailin' as fast as the tide, so we've no rudder control at all 'til we reach the river bend and try to haul our wind and sail Large to the Sou 'east…

  And if it all goes to shit, he assured himself, though still a bit more than a tad shuddery; we just douse sail and drop anchors. Do we meet a string o' barges, or get goin' too fast, we brace the tops 'Is aback to slow down. Balance wind 'gainst tide… just sit in one spot for a bit…? As long as the wind complied and continued out of the Nor'east, it was-quite illogically and most disconcertingly-what was known as "smooth sailing"!

  "Neatly done, sir," the river pilot drawled, with a beamish eye. "Incredible, ain't it… what you can do with a ship, do you set your mind to it? Short handed you may be, Captain Lewrie, but you've a talented batch of officers and mates. Includin' yerself, sir. Goes without sayin'."

  "Ah… hmm, well," Lewrie cautiously allowed, wondering if he was being twitted. There was still plenty of river left in which he could come a spectacular cropper. Don't know what the blaies I'm about, he chid himself. Never done this in me life; don't know… damn fraud!

  "This'll be the worst stretch, sir," the pilot went on, rocking on the balls of his feet, looking as if he'd be inclined to sing or hum in another minute. "No traffic this early it seems. Once to the bend Sou'east into Gillingham Reach, we'll be off the wind on larboard tack. Inner, outer jibs, an' foretopmast stays'l to get her bows down, then we'll fly for a spell. Tricky bit there, sir, oh mercy!" the pilot enthused. "Tricky as anything."

  "Indeed!" Lewrie snapped, feeling more reason for misery. "Traffic, for certain, in Gillingham Reach, sir," the man went on, most blithe. "Upriver boats huggin' the weather shore, and us to cross the Reach and hug it too… beam-reachin' the wind for the main channel. Nasty shoals t'loo'rd, I can tell ye, so ye won't wish to be forced down on 'em. Where the channel narrows, 'fore it opens up once more? Sutherly pass below the shoals is possible, but 'tis fearsome narrow, and this tide'll be ebbin' too quick to trust to it by the time we get there. Short, sharp, beat t'weather into the northern channel where there's more room, I'd suggest, Captain Lewrie. Barring the odd lighters and ignorant barge captains, hey? Or some brute of a iiner' comin' upriver for a refit, ha, ha? No worry though, sir. We'll be right as rain. Right… as… rain, ha, ha!"

  If I didn't need him so damn' much, Lewrie grimly told himself, I think I could most cheerfully kill him!

  "Uhm… Mister Ludlow. Sheet home the spanker," he instructed instead, bleakly taking in their progress, taking notice of what lay outboard, again. "We're stern-high." "Aye, aye, sir!"

  He looked aft. Amazingly, Chathman and Rochester 's spires were already far astern, the King's Stairs unable to be seen. He'd sailed his family "under the horizon" and hadn't had the time to give them a final backward glance, even a last wave of his hat. Proteus, according to the small-scale chart tacked to the traverse board by the binnacle cabinet, was already nearly two miles downriver, within a mile of the bend into Gillingham Reach and making a goodly way on the strengthening tide. He'd been too busy to notice, would still be busy… about as busy as a one-armed tavejn wench, 'til they got into the estuary by Queenborough, within sight of Sheerness and the wider mouth of the rivers in the Nore anchorage, where they could drop anchor at last between the Isle of Sheppey and the Isle of Grain.

  He felt a surge of remorse, which rose to dominate his worries of handling this strange new ship, for ignoring his family so completely. Yet beneath his qualms from imagining the disaster which still could happen… he felt a sense of relief. Loved and cherished as they were, he was free of them, freed from their concerns, their domestic

  God, yer such a callous bastard, he sighed to himself!

  Across the lowlands, marshes, and mudflats, the Nor'east winds brought a faint hint of deeper waters, of ocean beyond. He was free, almost asea once more, in a spanking-new frigate. With a bit more luck to this short passage, he'd be at the edge of the sea, almost ready for anything…

>   Whack! Quickly followed by an outraged yelp.

  Lewrie turned to see one of the new-comes in the afterguard on his knees by the weather braces for that backed mizzen tops'l. Mr. Peacham stood over him, with a petty officer close by, whacking at his palm with a rope "starter."

  "Gittup, ya stewpid git!" the petty officer snarled. "You'll learn t'keep yer hands off that brace 'til I tells ya t'tail on!"

  "Worn't gonna free it," the lubber carped, getting back to his feet, " 'twoz just seein' 'ow ya tie h'it proper… ow!"

  Midshipman Peacham cuffed the volunteer on the side of his head, sending him sprawling again. "None of your civilian sauce, damn you! No back talking to your betters!" He held out a hand to demand of the petty officer his starter, as if he planned to lash the unfortunate to the deck until he learned. The other new-comes stood aghast, and even the few experienced men of the afterguard looked cutty-eyed over it.

  "Mister Peacham, sir!" Lewrie barked. "A word with you. Sir."

  Peacham put on a bland expression and came to his side, dutiful and obedient.

  "Mister Peacham," Lewrie muttered, leaning close so others could not hear. "We're short-handed and barely a herd, much less a crew yet. I will allow the Bosun and his mates to 'touch up' crewmen when necessary, but damme if my midshipmen will lay hands on our people. You will not indulge in such again, sir. Do I make my meaning clear to you?"

  "Uh, aye, sir. Perfectly clear, sir," Peacham managed to choke out, still striving for blandness, though seeming appalled by the idea that physical force would be denied him.

  "Officers are not allowed such," Lewrie expanded with a growl of displeasure. "You, sir, are an officer in training. You must learn to enforce discipline and obedience without resorting to violence on your own part. That's what the senior hands are for."

  "Aye, aye, Captain." Peacham nodded.

  "And you will caution your petty officer to save his starter, and his fists, for worse reasons than a new-come's curiosity," Lewrie concluded. "Storm, battle, imminent shipwreck, a real cause for haste, sir! Not to preface a warning about accidentally slacking the mizzen weather brace. Can he not instruct and lead without his starter, then I'll find myself a likely lad who can. You will put him on notice on that head, Mister Peacham. Firmly and forcefully. Lead… not drive!"