Troubled Waters l-14

by Dewey Lambdin

  "Welcome aboard, sir," Chatham 's First Lieutenant said, hiding his smirk damned well, as did the other officers gathered on the gangway; but it was only the stone-faced sailors of the side-party and the Marines presenting arms in full kit who didn't look highly amused.

  "Lewrie… HMS Savage, come to join the squadron, sir," Lewrie gruffly replied, doffing his hat to the national flag and the Admiral's broad pendant, then the deck officers. "I've despatches and mail with me, some of which I assume will be welcome. If you'll drop a line…"

  "Indeed, Captain Lewrie," the First Officer brightened, snapping fingers to summon one of the flagship's eighteen Midshipmen to see to it. "My pardons, Captain Lewrie, but… though we have not met, your name is familiar to me."

  "L 'Uranie," another officer prompted from the side of his mouth.

  "But, of course, sir! A gallant action!" the First Officer said with a grin; though it did appear as if he might have made another connexion, had his junior not steered him away.

  "Quite an arrival, sir! Most unconventional!" came a loud, and "plummy," upper-class voice, and a stout older man in the full dress uniform of a Rear-Admiral came plodding up, all smiles. With him was an older Post-Captain, most-like Chatham's, and a young Flag-Lieutenant. "Lewrie, are you? Saw your appointment into Savage listed in the Marine Chronicle. Good God, sir!

  That one of those Cuffies of yours?" he said, pointing overside at Jones Nelson. "I can see why you, ah… obtained him. Strong as an ox, is he? Decorative addition to your boat crew, as well, I should think. Weren't you to stand trial, or be sued, or something? Last news from the London papers were simply full of it, haw haw!"

  'Oh, that Lewrie!' was the expression on many nearby faces.

  "King's Bench found the Jamaica trial colourable, milord, and put off the proceedings 'til all evidence is reviewed," Lewrie had to say with a straight face, though fuming at such abrupt treatment from a senior officer. He should have been used to such, after his years serving under an host of insulting fools, and a fair number of people who might have had good cause to abuse him now and again, but by God it still irked!

  Eat his shite, an' think it plum duff, aye! he grimly thought.

  "The particulars are most-like featured in the latest papers I brought from England, milord," Lewrie said with a seemingly uncaring, and unaffected, shrug and smile. "Perhaps by Hilary, or Easter, Term."

  "Walk with me, Captain Lewrie," the Rear-Admiral said, turning more business-like. "A glass of something?"

  "Nothing for me, milord."

  Lewrie's orders from Admiral Lord Bridport, commander of Channel Fleet, had told him to report himself and his frigate to Rear-Admiral Arthur Iredell, Baron Boxham, so he knew with whom he was strolling; even if that august worthy had yet to name himself, which was insulting enough, but to be walked up and down the quarterdeck instead of being welcomed into the great-cabins under the poop deck was even worse!

  "We shall soon be coming about, so I will not keep you long," Lord Boxham explained. "Yonder to our lee lies France, at present not six leagues off, sir. My brief, for this particular squadron, is from fourty-six degrees latitude, or the north tip of the lie d'Oleron, all the way down to the latitude of Arcachon, to blockade a coastline that runs roughly one hundred and twenty sea-miles, and 'tis rare that all the liners of this squadron are together in one place, as you find us today.

  "Not quite as bad an area to cover as the squadron buried deep in the sack near Bayonne, where Spain and France meet, should a storm roll in from the West, as they usually do, hereabouts," Lord Boxham said with a visible wince. "Navigation is also tricky, I warn you now. From Rochefort Suth'rd to Biarritz and the Spanish border, this coast is very shoal, the land quite flat, with few notable headlands by which to estimate position. Should fog arise, one may cast ashore before one knows what has happened."

  "Aye, sir," Lewrie said as they reached the aft end of the deck by the poop cabins, and turned to pace back towards the hammock netting overlooking Chatham % waist; that reply was usually safest. "Though I have the latest London chartmakers' works, perhaps your Flag-Captain is in possession of more current soundings, and such, which I might obtain or copy, milord?" he went on, trying to sound energetic and thoughtful.

  "Your senior in the Inshore Squadron will have better, no doubt, Captain Lewrie," Lord Boxham said, rather dismissively, as if he resented having his lecture interrupted. "Savage, so I note, is of the Fifth Rate, which means that she has a draught of seventeen or eighteen feet, Lewrie? Good. That will serve nicely.

  "Now as I was saying," the Rear-Admiral went on, and yes, he had felt interrupted, and was irked by such from a mere frigate captain. "There is another squadron keeping an eye on Rochefort, the small ports of the Vendee region, Saint Nazaire, and the mouth of the Loire up North, whilst my duties principally encompass the river Gironde, and what the French possess in the way of warships built or building, fitting out, or readying for sea from the port of Bordeaux, up-river."

  "I see, milord," Lewrie replied with his best stern phyz on.

  "Once on-station, a perusal of the charts will shew you, Lewrie, that the Gironde, below the last of the aits, is actually a very wide ria, thirty miles or so long, and over six miles wide as it approaches its mouth. Rather a lot of places for French warships to find a safe mooring."

  "And, for French merchantmen as well, I should expect, milord."

  "You demm'd frigate captains!" Rear-Admiral Iredell, Lord Boxham, barked in disgust. "All prize-money and loot, with not a thought for anything else!"

  "Your pardons, milord," Lewrie countered, "but starvin' our foes o' food and naval stores, both, keeps 'em tied up alongside the piers, and eases our duties, I should think."

  " 'Thout the proper battle that stops their demm'd business for good an' all?" Lord Boxham said with an outraged snort. "God forbid! Well, you'll be in good company, Captain Lewrie. All I may spare for the close blockade are light frigates, some over-aged sloops of war, some newer brig-sloops, and eight-gun cutters under mere Lieutenants… all of whom dream of money" he gravelled, in a huff.

  "Very well, sir," Lewrie flatly replied.

  "You're to seek out and report to Commodore Ayscough, in HMS Chesterfield…," Lord Boxham said.

  "The one with the bagpipers, milord?" Lewrie could not help but blurt out, for then-Captain Ayscough had been his superior in the Far East 'tween the wars, in Telesto.

  "Yess, him!" Lord Boxham barked, as if rowed beyond all temperance to be interrupted a third time, or that the sound of bagpipes set him howling mad.

  "Delightful, milord!" Lewrie happily said, sure of a better welcome.

  "Deserve each other, more-like," the Admiral spat. "Well, off with you, Captain Lewrie. Now your mail and despatches are aboard, I shall not keep you. Ayscough should lie to the Sou'east of the river mouth today."

  "Thank you for receiving me, milord. Adieu," Lewrie said with a doff of his hat, and a sketchy bow in conge.

  "Try not to drown yourself, sir!"

  "Can't afford to, milord," Lewrie rejoined. "I've not yet been to France!"

  Rias? Lewrie fumed on his way back down the battens to his boat; rias and aits? A ria 's a narrow estuary, and the Gironde's as broad as the Straits of Dover. And what's wrong with river islands, not aits/ Good old Ayscough a Commodore, though! Even if he still has his damned bagpipers!

  Lewrie sat himself down on a thwart near the launch's tiller to contemplate whether Commodore Ayscough would go so far with his fondness for all things Scottish as to dine him aboard on a haggis, cock-a-leekie soup, and turnips! And, on a happier note, Lewrie also considered whether he should send Midshipman Carrington aloft to spend the night perched on the cross-trees, or hang him from the main-mast truck with a line round his balls!

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  HMS Chesterfield was an older two-decker 64, bluff and beamy, but, with a more pronounced tumblehome from waterline to her gangways and bulwarks, was much easier for Lewrie to board-this time with Midsh
ipman Grace in charge of his launch. Savage had run across her in late afternoon, in company with one of the few large 44-gun Fifth Rate frigates, HMS Lyme. As soon as numbers and private signals had been exchanged, Chesterfield had made two more short hoists; "First Dog," followed by "Captain(s) Repair Onboard," as sure an invitation to supper as a hand-delivered note, or a butler's china bell. Still in full dress, Lewrie gladly paced 'til near Seven Bells of the Day Watch, then called his boat and crew away once more. Just at the last strokes of Chesterfield 's bell chiming Eight Bells, he was at the foot of her boarding battens, and scrambling up. As the dog's vane atop his cocked hat crested the lip of the entry-port, a drum rolled, Bosuns' calls began to shrill; Marine boots on oak decks, Marine palms on polished muskets stamped or slapped, and… God, there was the dreadful preliminary drone of single bagpipe, before the piper launched himself into a lively rendition of "Campbell's Farewell to Red Castle," one of Ayscough's very favourites, as Lewrie could attest after three long years serving under him; hearing it, and being told its title, every bloody day!

  "Lewrie, you young scamp, sir!" Commodore Ayscough bellowed with glee as he came up to doff hats with him, then seize his paw and shake vigourously. "Look at the laddie, will ye all… a Post-Captain on his own bottom, just clanking with medals for bravery, ha ha!"

  " 'Tis good to see you again, too, sir," Lewrie rejoined. "And, you a Commodore. Had Admiralty a parcel o' wit, you should've hoisted a broad pendant years ago."

  "Aye, and if more cripples and wheezers meet their Maker, I'll make Rear-Admiral as they fall off Navy List," Ayscough whooped. "You are delivering orders, or are you to join my motley crowd, Lewrie?"

  "To join, sir, and see if we may have a merry time with the foe over yonder," Lewrie told him, vaguely pointing off to the East, where the French Biscay coast could almost be made out in the quickly dying sunset. "As we did in the Far East."

  "Toppin news!" Ayscough exclaimed. "The Frog shore is crawlin' with smugglers, spy boats, and all sorts of shippin', and too many of them still manage to get past us, thin as we are in these waters. How many guns is your Savage, and what's your weight of metal?"

  When told that she mounted twenty-six 18-pounders, with a pair of 12-pounders for chase guns, and mounted eight 9-pounders and eight 32-pounder carronades, Ayscough was delighted.

  " Chesterfield is a stout old barge, Lewrie, but a slow-coach," Ayscough grumbled as the music died, the side-party and Marines were dismissed, and they paced the length of the gangway. "Good for commanding a squadron, but not for helping at close inshore work, either. Rather have me a frigate like yours… keep me hand in, partake of a hot action now and then, but…," he said with a resigned sigh. "Now Lyme, there, is fine for the open sea, too, but a fourty-four-gun frigate can't pursue runners close enough ashore any more than can I. Her captain is already come aboard… solid fellow, is Captain Charlton."

  "Captain Thomas Charlton, sir?" Lewrie gawped in surprise, and further pleasure. "I served under him in the Adriatic, sir, when he had Lionheart, back in '96! This really is an 'old boys' reunion."

  " 'Deed it is," Ayscough chearly agreed. "Recall young Hogue, do you? Made Commander last year, and I made sure to request him when I got sailing orders. He's here into a brig-sloop, the Mischief. And a damned good choice o' name, too, for he's energetic and full of it… mischief, that is, ha ha!"

  "I'd be delighted to see him again, too, sir," Lewrie declared. "I read of his posting, but haven't seen him since Telesto paid off in '84."

  "See him soon enough," Ayscough promised, "soon as I despatch you and your fine frigate closer to the coast. Know how the Royal Navy works, Lewrie," Commodore Ayscough said with a wry scowl. "Decades of swallowin' ninny's shite, and only findin' a few truly good'uns here and there, so… when one finally has the seniority, and the active commission, one seeks out as many good'uns as one can get away with. What place and influence is worth, that… employ the best one discovered, and make fond daddies happy, to boot! Ah, here's Captain Charlton. I think you know our third guest, Charlton?"

  "Good God above," Captain Charlton said, almost gasping in surprise as he strode up from aft and below to the gangway. "The last that I heard, Lewrie weren't you to be hung?"

  "Decided t'steal away with a frigate and turn pirate out here, sir," Lewrie japed as they performed the same ritual; first a doff of their hats in formal salute then a hearty handshake.

  "He'd have made a good one, as I recall from the Adriatic, sir," Charlton told Ayscough. "You must reveal all to me, to us, Lewrie. As we dine upon Commodore Ayscough's generosity."

  "Speaking of, let us repair below, shall we, gentlemen? I promise you an excellent supper," Ayscough, as host, bade them.

  And a most excellent supper it was, for Commodore Ayscough had always set a fine table, and was partial to his "tucker"; though how Ayscough could provide crisply fresh leafy greens for the salad course, and crisp-crusted, piping-hot bread-not maggoty and hard biscuit-after so long on-blockade, Lewrie could not fathom. Nothing fresh could survive the long voyage from England, even stowed aboard the swiftest packet.

  There was a mincemeat pie, the inevitable "reconstituted" soup, of course, but the main course, instead of salt beef, salt pork, or a chicken from the forecastle manger, was lobster, served up surrounded by boiled shrimp, and even the clarified butter was fresh, not rancid from the tub on the orlop, and each diner got a small dish of a horseradish sauce vaguely reminiscent of the French-style d la mayonnaise, or a remouladel And the wines…! The bottles set out on the side-board all bore distinguished French vineyards' names and varieties not seen in England since the war had begun in 1793, but for a few cases brought in by Channel coast smugglers every now and then, and priced so dear that even the wealthy might take pause before purchasing some.

  "How do you do it, sir?" Lewrie marvelled between bites, and a deep, appreciative sniff of his fresh-poured wine. "One'd think that, by the time you arrived on-station, such victuals'd have long ago run out."

  "Get the bulk of it from the Frogs, Captain Lewrie," Ayscough gleefully told him. "S'truth! God, the look on your face!"

  "French fishermen put out every morning to earn their livings," Capt. Charlton was glad to expound. "Does one of our cutters or brigs close them, these days, they've learned that their boats are too tiny for us to take as prize, so they no longer run in fear of us. British silver… a little British silver… goes a long way."

  "For wine, fresh food, some of their catch, or… information," Commodore Ayscough cryptically said. "Give the Frogs this much… They still manage to mint solid coin after seven years of war, whilst we've had to resort to paper bank notes. Not great value to their coinage by this time, of course, what with all the… what do they call it, Captain Charlton?"

  "Inflation, sir," Charlton supplied with a grin.

  "And what a pot-mess their coinage is," Ayscough derisively grumbled.

  "God knows what a denier is made of. Soft iron? But, three of them make a Hard, or twelve deniers make one sol, but you're still in the range o' ha'pence. Four Hards make one sou, twenty sous make one livre, six livres make one ecu, and you begin to talk of something in silver… four ecus makes what once was called a louis d'or, before they chopped poor King Louis's head off, that is, and you finally get to gold… 'bout the same as our guinea. All a jumble left over from the royal days, along with local-minted tripe, and how the Devil even the French keep track of values is a mystery to me! More bread, sirs?"

  Ayscough's cabin servant made a quick tour round the table with the bread barge, and Lewrie took another thick slab. Now that he knew what he was dealing with, he could put a name to it; a boule loaf.

  "Would the French fishermen run from a frigate, sir?" he asked.

  "Not any longer," Charlton informed him. "No dread of us taking them for spare hands, nor of seizing their boats. Fetch-to within two miles of the shore, and they will most-like swarm you like bumboats in a British harbour. Mind the spirit smuggling, though. Our sailors
are not that fond of wine, when they can get rum for free, and most French beers are simply ghastly, but the fishermen will have small flasks of brandy or arrack aboard. Not good brandy, mind," Capt. Charlton said with a wry expression.

  "Pearls before swine," Ayscough snickered.

  "Though the arrack, a rather fiery equivalent to rum, is desirable," Charlton continued. "Probably stolen from French naval stores."

  "No American whisky, I s'pose," Lewrie said with a downcast expression of his own. "Grew rather fond of it in the West Indies, the Kentucky sort, which is aged several years in oak barrels. Bourbon, I think they're beginning t'call it."

  "Dear Lord!" Charlton softly exclaimed, rather in awe of anyone who would prefer such a strong drink.

  "I do have two five-gallon barricoes aboard, but God only knows how long we'll be on-station here," Lewrie said. "You've never tried it, sirs? Might I decant a gallon each for you to sample?" he teased.

  "A quart, perhaps, for me, Lewrie," Ayscough replied, grinning impishly. "For I doubt a Yankee Doodle bourbon can measure up to my Highland Scottish whisky. Usquebaugh, by God…, the 'water of life'!"

  "I am set down amid fur-coated barbarians." Charlton pretended to shiver. "Vikings with the palates of Philistines!"

  Oh, it was grand to be in company with such fine men, officers he had long before learned to trust and rely upon, Lewrie deemed during their supper. Ayscough, that burly fellow with salt-and-pepper hair, clubbed back into an old-fashioned sailor's long queue, his cheerful weathered face, and piercing grey eyes! Charlton, still the tall, lean, and wiry epitome of the genial and articulate, soft-spoken English gentleman-off his quarterdeck, of course-and possessed of a droll and dry wit. Charlton's mild brown eyes and regular, unremarkable features had many times crinkled in amusement in their private moments. And both of them were sailors' sailors, as experienced and canny as any rough "tarpaulin" man, right down to their toenails.

  Away went the last plates and the white wine, and out came their dessert and its accompanying drink; ripe Anjou pears amid crumbled sweet biscuit, drenched in a sweetened brandy, with large blobs of stiffened and whipped cream atop! And with it, a rich, dark Madeira port. "Magnificent!" Lewrie pronounced it.