Sails on the Horizon: A Novel of the Napoleonic Wars

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Sails on the Horizon: A Novel of the Napoleonic Wars Page 11

by Jay Worrall


  As he trotted up the drive, he saw her kneeling on the ground by a flowerbed at the front of her father’s house, pruning some rose bushes with her good arm. Charles called to her and waved. She put aside her shears, rose, dusted off her dress, straightened her bonnet, and stood waiting for him quietly.

  Charles dismounted and tied Pendle to a post. “I have great news,” he said. “I’m now a landowner, a real landowner. I’ve bought the old Howell place and more. You remember, I told you about it. We’ll have to decide on a new name for the place. It has a beautiful large house. Imagine.”

  “I am happy for thee,” she said, smiling, but not smiling as much as he would have expected.

  “I want you to come and see it,” he said. Then, sensing something had changed in her, the edge of his exuberance dulled. “It’s beautiful, all hills and fields and trees…a stream…” His voice trailed off. “What’s the matter?”

  Penny rubbed the back of her hand across her forehead. Charles thought she looked unhappy. “I must discourse with thee,” she said.

  “Of course, we can talk anytime, about anything you like. But I want to show it to you,” he persisted.

  “I dare not,” she answered.

  “Oh, we can bring your mother or brother for a chaperone. That would be all right. Or I could bring Ellie.”

  “That is not the reason. We must discourse first.”

  “Discourse about what?” He felt disappointed by her lack of enthusiasm and a little put-upon. What about his grand news?

  “We must discuss thy being a soldier in the navy.” She said it with her feet planted firmly on the ground, facing him squarely, as if preparing to resist him.

  “We talked about that already,” he said, stiffening his back. “The navy is my life. I thought that was settled.”

  She shook her head. “No, that was not settled. I said that I would labor on it further with thee.”

  “What on earth does ‘labor with’ mean?”

  “It means I will discuss, persuade, argue about it with thee. I told thee, I have difficulties with thy being in the navy.”

  “All right, all right,” Charles said, raising his hands, trying to be reasonable. “What’s wrong with my being in the navy? It’s an honorable profession. I’m defending our country.”

  “It is a violent and destructive profession. When thou dost violence against other people, thou dost violence against God.”

  “No, I don’t,” Charles insisted. “I don’t attack churches or priests. I fight for England against the French and her allies at sea.”

  “But the French, the Spanish, the Dutch, all of them are God’s people,” Penny insisted. “To do violence against any person is against God’s law, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’”

  “Well, maybe the Dutch,” Charles conceded. “But the French and Spanish are both Catholic…” He stopped, sensing that continuing this line of argument would resolve nothing. Instead he said, “Do you remember what you said to me the other day about listening to God?”

  Penny nodded her head warily.

  “God tells me I should be in the navy.”

  “God told you that?” she said incredulously.

  “I didn’t hear a voice saying, ‘Charles, I want you to be in the navy.’ But I am content being a naval officer, and my conscience is clear. I feel in my heart that I am doing the right thing.”

  He saw her expression harden. “So thou wilt not leave the navy?” she said.

  “Oh, fine,” Charles snapped. “This isn’t fair. You’re asking me to choose between two things I love—my commission and you.”

  Penny’s eyes widened. “Didst thou say ‘love’?”

  “Care about,” he hastily corrected himself. “I care about you. You know that.”

  She lowered her head so that the bonnet hid her face. “I have a tenderness for thee also,” she said carefully. “That is why thy being a soldier is important. In addition to the other things, thou couldst be injured badly or killed. If thy profession is doing violence to others, it may also do violence to thy body or thy soul.”

  “If something were to happen to me, if we were…joined, you would be well cared for,” he said.

  “There are many things more important than wealth,” she answered. Then she looked up and said, “Let us talk of other things.”

  Charles welcomed the opportunity to change the subject of their conversation. “About visiting my land?” he asked.

  “No, I cannot,” she said gently. “It would be a step. I cannot take steps now.”

  “If we can sit on that bench, I’ll tell you about Ellie and Winchester,” he said hopefully. They walked to a long wooden bench at the front of the house and sat, side by side, a little apart. Charles told her of his talk with Winchester and of Winchester’s declared aspirations to marry his sister. Penny described almost word for word Ellie’s visit and her own advices on appropriate female deportment with respect to ardent men, some of which they laughed about together.

  “I don’t think it’s a bad match, thy sister and Stephen Winchester,” Penny said at length. “I wish Ellie were a little older and that they could have had more time to get to know each other in a normal way. But she admires him greatly, and I think he would be a good and loving husband to her.”

  Charles carefully took her good hand and held it in his own. “Something similar might be said about you and me,” he said softly.

  Penny removed her hand from his and brushed it against his cheek. “I know,” she said, her voice almost a whisper, “but it’s not the same for thee and me. Thou art being true to thy beliefs about fighting and war, and I must be true to mine. Thou wouldn’t want me otherwise, and I couldn’t live with myself if I weren’t.”

  “You can’t mean that,” he said, even though he was pretty sure now that she did.

  “I mean,” she said hesitantly, “that I don’t see how we can…continue, with this between us.”

  Charles kicked at the dirt in the path and felt a heavy weight settle in his chest. It was bitterly ironic that two of the things that attracted him to her the most, her directness and independence, would keep them apart. He didn’t trust himself to speak.

  “I know it’s not easy for thee,” she said.

  “Is that all?” he managed. “Is that the end? Because of my…” He left the thought unfinished.

  She turned and faced him with tears on her cheeks. “Oh, Charles,” she said, “I’m so sorry for thee. I understand thou had great plans. I don’t know what to do. I don’t think it can be.” She was silent for a moment, then said, “I think we shouldn’t see each other for a time. I want to be fair to thee. I don’t want to keep thee hanging on false hopes.”

  “I see,” Charles said, not really seeing at all. The sun had already set, he noticed, and it would be dark before he reached home. “I’d best be going,” he said, not wanting to leave.

  Penny nodded.

  “Wilt thou ask Ellie to continue to visit me?” she said, wiping at her cheeks with her hand.

  “I’ll tell her,” Charles said. There seemed to be nothing more to say, so he rose from the bench and started toward his horse. Penny followed close behind. Before he could put his foot in the stirrup, she took hold of his arm and turned him toward her.

  “I want to thank thee,” she said evenly. “Thou hast been a good friend to me. I want thee to know that I care deeply for thee and always will, no matter what happens between us.”

  “Thank you,” Charles said, a feeling of loss enveloping him. He took her hand and kissed it lightly. “I’m sorry if I caused you any discomfort.” With that he heaved himself onto Pendle’s back. They exchanged terse good-byes and he trotted down the lane in the failing light. On the way home he decided that, if he left first thing in the morning, he could probably reach Liverpool in time to take command of the little brig before it was given to someone else.

  FIVE

  “WHICH SHIP, SIR?” THE STROKE OARSMAN ASKED AS Charles and Attwater settled uncomfortabl
y in the riverboat’s sternsheets, their sea chests wedged between the thwarts in front of their knees. A driving rain pelted the river’s surface, with the wind blowing a small chop and driving the wet into every crevice and opening of Charles’s boat cloak no matter how tightly he drew it around him. “The brig Lomond,” he replied.

  “All right Bob, together now,” the wherryman said to his companion on the opposite oar. “Remember what I said. Together means we both pull at the same time.”

  Bob, a thick-necked, dark-haired man who looked to be in his early thirties, nodded slowly, his eyes watching his companion’s oar like a hawk, even though it was still shipped.

  “The Lomond, she’s upriver off Whitby,” the stroke said, turning to Charles. “You’ll have to give Bob here some leeway. Got hit on the head by a falling spar when we wuz messmates on the ol’ London. Ain’t been the same since. He wuz my best mate, though. I kind of looks after him.”

  “That’s kind of you,” Charles replied. “I’m sure he appreciates it.” It had crossed his mind more than once that it was a harsh world for crippled or otherwise disabled seamen. They were a common sight in all the port towns, often missing limbs, or disfigured by scars or the pox, or wasted by some other disease. When no longer useful, they were simply discharged as unfit for service and left to be a burden on others or to fend for themselves. A few were reluctantly accepted onto parish poor rolls, some looked after by their families, if they could afford it. The rest died early, or became beggars or thieves. Bob was one of the lucky ones. The navy, for whom they had given their health, accepted no responsibility. For many, Charles thought, it would have been better if they’d been killed instead of injured.

  “It’s no trouble,” the stroke said. “He pulls real good once you get him started.” With that he unshipped his oar and shoved it against the jetty. As the boat fell off he said, “Now, Bob,” and both men dipped their oars into the water. “Mind if’n I ask yer business on the Lomond, sir? If’n you don’t mind my ask’n, that is.” The boat moved into the current, well out of the crowded shipping channel. Although it was only early afternoon, the other ships anchored in the harbor were mere outlines in the downpour, the riverbanks and buildings beyond almost totally obscured.

  “I’m her temporary commander,” Charles answered, the wet and the cold wind off the water making him distinctly uncomfortable.

  “Oooh,” Bob intoned. It was the first sound Charles had heard him make and sounded deep and meaningful.

  “I told you so,” the stroke said to his mate a moment later, nodding significantly. “Didn’t I tell you so?”

  Charles and Attwater had left Edgemont Hall at first light the morning after Charles’s conversation with Penny. They had driven in the carriage to the Liverpool port admiral’s office, which they reached before noon. He had decided that taking up the command was the most sensible thing he could do. It would be his first real command, not counting his few days in charge of the battered Argonaut, and he thought that working with some other officer’s trained and disciplined crew would be good practice before taking control of his own ship. He also hoped that a busy month at sea would keep him from brooding on the very painful subject of Penny Brown. She had cut him firmly adrift and it was time he found a new course. Only one thing worried him about leaving home—Stephen Winchester had declined to join him. Charles had requested, almost to the point of begging, that Winchester come along as a volunteer, but the lieutenant had steadfastly refused. In the end all he could do was to remind his lieutenant what he had said about priests and to instruct John to keep a very close eye on him and Ellie at all times. “Left to their own devices, they’d be like rabbits” were his exact words.

  Although the port admiral was temporarily away from Liverpool, it was quickly arranged with the admiral’s representative, one Captain Alphonse Dawson, that Charles should take command of the Lomond immediately. Dawson expressed surprise that Charles had arrived so soon; he hadn’t been expected for a week or longer. The courier who had been sent to inquire as to his availability, and to whom Charles had refused the day before, had in fact not yet returned. As soon as the necessary orders were drawn up and signed, Charles and Attwater set off to find a riverboat to take them to his new ship.

  “What do you mean, ‘I told you so’?” Charles asked the stroke oarsman.

  “Oh, sir, we shouldn’t be talk’n about it. We’d be out of line, we would be,” the waterman answered. Then, to his mate, “Bear a little to larboard. No, here, just ease yer oar a bit.” Without a blush he said to Charles, “The Lomond’s capt’n, he’s a sot. I know it for a fact. We rowed ’im to shore a week or two back. Shak’n like a loose jib too close to the wind, he was, and see’n things. Fit to be tied, he was.” Nodding his head forward, he added, “That’s her over there.”

  Charles peered through the falling rain, using his hand to shield his eyes, and made out the hull of a smallish brig anchored at the bow and stern about a cable and a half’s length from shore. Her masts were indistinct against the backdrop of the land. From this distance she looked normal enough, but as they neared he began to notice details. Just under her taffrail the name LOMOND was carved in large block letters that had once been painted a brilliant gold. Now chipped and peeling, the lettering seemed to read ION NI. Both her masts were rigged but the yards were badly askew, hung at various angles fore and aft and tilted haphazardly to port or starboard. Several bumboats that normally ferried out local merchants selling all manner of goods, from clothing and tobacco to spirits and women, seemed to be more or less permanently tied up alongside.

  By this time, rain or no rain, Charles and his boat were close enough that they should have been hailed by the watch on deck. No one seemed to be on deck and he heard no challenge. Charles began to suspect that all was not going to go as smoothly as he had hoped.

  “She ain’t exactly a smart ship, is she?” the stroke offered.

  “Row around her. I want a closer look.”

  “It’ll cost ye extra, sir,” the stroke said, nudging Bob to lift his oar so he could swing the skiff to starboard. “Sixpence extra.”

  “All right.”

  “Each,” he added.

  “Fine,” Charles muttered at the boatman.

  As the small boat started along the side of the Lomond, Charles’s dismay increased. The brig’s sails were carelessly furled so that the huge folds bellied toward the deck as they filled with rainwater. The sail halyards and clew lines hung sloppily, poorly fastened or flapping in the wind, and some actually trailed overboard in the water alongside. As they passed under the bow, he could see that she had been a trim ship once, with fine lines, a little scrollwork on her bow, and a sharp cutwater. Now she had gone seedy from lack of paint and attention. On the port-side hammock netting clothing was hung out haphazardly, perhaps to dry before the rains had started.

  It was at this point that a squeaky cry came from the ship, “Ahoy, what boat?” The high-pitched breaking voice reminded Charles of Billy Bowles from the old Argonaut.

  “Lomond!” the stroke oar yelled back.

  There was a silence before the someone on the deck said, “Just a moment.” Charles thought it a strange reply to an announcement that the brig’s commanding officer was about to come on board.

  “Lay alongside. I’ll climb up by the mizzen chains,” Charles ordered.

  “No, t’other way,” the waterman said to Bob, and in a minute the wherry bumped against the Lomond’s side. Charles stood in the rocking craft and grabbed the heavy chains attached to a narrow platform on the ship’s side and heaved himself up, then over the railing and onto the deck. He had discarded his boat cloak for the climb and the rain already began to soak through his new uniform coat. Almost immediately, a ship’s boy, possibly twelve or thirteen, padded toward him. He was barefoot, clad in sodden oversized clothing, and incongruously carried a telescope almost as tall as he was on a strap over his shoulder.

  “I told you to wait,” the boy said indignantly.


  “You call me ‘sir,’” Charles answered. “You say, ‘I told you to wait, sir,’ and if you talk back to me again I’ll have your behind striped. Now go below and fetch the lieutenant. Leave the glass by the binnacle.” Charles waited, looking around him as the boy darted off, fuming at the sloppiness and disorder around him.

  A disheveled and unshaven man in most of what might have been a British naval lieutenant’s uniform appeared moments later, still tucking his shirt in as he came. Charles noted that they were about the same age and build, with the same short dark hair. He took an instant dislike to the unkempt lieutenant who could allow his ship to fall into such a state.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” the lieutenant said as he stopped in front of Charles. “Didn’t expect you for another week at best. Be more presentable if we’d known.”

  “I should hope so,” Charles answered, looking pointedly at the mess around him. In addition to the tangles of rope, the decks were filthy, there were overturned buckets, items of clothing, including women’s clothing, and other equipment lying here and there. Christ, Algerian slave galleys must be cleaner than this. He looked at the officer more closely. His eyes were bleary and he swayed slightly but noticeably on his feet.

  “Who are you?” Charles demanded.

  “Tillman, sir. I’m the first lieutenant. I’m in charge while Commander Freemont is away.”

  “I’m in charge now,” Charles snapped, his dismay turning to disgust. “My steward and sea chests are in a boat alongside. Have them brought aboard immediately. Pay the boatmen the going rate and two shillings extra.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Then have the women cleared off the ship and the spirits put under guard.”

 

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