King, Ship, and Sword

'My eyes, the town's gone… industrious! All that's the local squire's land, or it was… Sir Romney Emberton's. He'd not abide that. Did he pass over, and his son Harry set them up?'

'They good people, sor, the Embletons?' Desmond asked, peering out the windows himself.

'Sir Romney is,' Lewrie commented, not sure whether he liked the changes round Anglesgreen; it was a bucolic, boresome place, full of predictable and sometimes tiresome folk, but he'd hoped to find it as reassuring as an old shoe… just long enough to get tired of it before Napoleon Bonaparte, and Admiralty, snatched him back to active sea service. 'Harry delights in killin' horses at fox-huntin', and at steeplechasin', they're no matter t'him. Last I was home, he was the Leftenant-Colonel of the local Yeoman Cavalry. Ye can't miss him… He's the chin of an otter, talks louder'n an angry Bosun, and laughs like a daft donkey.'

'Faith, sor, but one'd think ye had a down on him!' his Cox'n wryly commented.

'Of long standing, hah!' Lewrie told him with a barking laugh. He took the risk to his hat and hair and stuck his head out the coach window once more, looking back at the brick-works and tannery, grimacing with displeasure to see the steam and stinks rising from them like a pall of spent gunpowder from a two-decker's broadside, hazing off to a flat-topped cloud that slowly drifted eastward.

God help us, does the wind change, he thought, just as a glob of muddy slush plopped against his cheek from the front wheel, eliciting a snarl that had more to do with the new-come industries. He swabbed the muck off with his wool scarf and sat back as he noted several new brick cottages on the left of the road that hadn't been there before, where once there had been a common-shared pasture before the Enclosure Acts that had taken away poor cottagers' grazing and vegetable plot rights, and turned so many from hand-to- mouth self-sufficient to common day labourers on others' farms, or driven them to the cities, where the new manufacturies might employ them. At least the dozen or so cottages were on decent plots of land, picket-fenced, with wee truck gardens and decorative flower beds. They were substantial-looking, well- painted, with flower boxes at each window sill, and in the Spring might appear quite pleasant, he decided.

To the right, at last, and there was mossy old St. George's parish church, as stout and impressive as a feudal manor or Norman conqueror's keep, with its low stone walls marking the bounds, now topped by new iron fencing. The expansive graveyard was further bound with iron fencing, too, though the oldest headstones were still lime- green with moss, and tilted any-which-way, as if braced 'a-cock-bill' in eternal mourning.

St. George's had marked the eastern boundary of the village the last time Lewrie had been home- Christ, my last time here was back in '97? Lewrie realised with a start-but it seemed that that had changed, too, for, hard by the church's fenced boundary there was a lane running north, then a row of two- and three-storey brick and slate-roofed, bow-windowed shops that hadn't been there before, either.

'Milliner's… a tailor's… a tea shop?' Lewrie muttered half under his breath. 'And what's this?' There had been four row-houses just east of the Olde Ploughman public house, but someone had re-done the fronts, closing off half the entrances, and turned two of them to double doors, all to allow entry to a dry goods! 'A dry goods?'

Before, anyone wishing to do serious shopping would have had to coach, ride, or hike to Petersfield, the closest substantial town, or go all-in and stay over at Southampton, Portsmouth, or Guildford, but now…! Why, in the dry goods store's windows Lewrie could espy ready-made clothing, china sets, and-

'This th' public house ye told us of, sor?' Desmond asked as the coach drew level with the Olde Ploughman. It had been touched up with whitewash recently, sported a new, swaying signboard over the entrance, and new shutters.

'Aye, Desmond,' Lewrie told him. 'The side yard's a grand place in warm weather, tables outside and… coachee! Draw up here, I say!' Lewrie cried, thumping his walking-stick on the coach roof. 'As long as we're here, we'll try their ale, the coachee and waggoner, too.'

At that welcome news, Liam Desmond sprang from the front bench seat and opened the door, jumping down to lower the folding metal steps for Lewrie, who was out not two seconds behind him, and walking round the head of the coach's team of four to take it all in, bare-headed.

'Ale, Pat!' Desmond cried. 'The coachee and yer friend, too!'

'Ale, arrah!' Furfy chortled.

The Olde Ploughman fronted on the large village green that ran along the stream that bisected Anglesgreen, spanned just a bit west of the public house by a stout stone-arch bridge. Across the stream sat a second street, fairly new from the 1780s, once mostly earthen, mud and now and then gravelled. Now the street was cobbled, several row-houses had been turned into even more shops, and there were even more streets south of them, lined with even more of those handsome cottages, situated on spacious acre lots, with room enough for coach-houses and stables, chicken coops and runs, truck gardens, and walled-off lawns. Lewrie gawped in awe, slowly turning to look upstream towards the Red Swan Inn (where the squirearchy and landed gentry did their swilling, and Lewrie was most unwelcome) and found that the village had grown in that direction, too, though the smaller green of the Red Swan was yet untouched, and the groves of giant oaks still stood.

'Neat li'l place, an't it, Pat?' Desmond asked his mate.

'Fair-clean'un, too, Liam,' Furfy replied, spreading his arms and expanding his chest to inhale deeply. 'Nothin' like th' reeks o' London. Smells… farm-y… '

'A bit like our auld Maynooth, hey?' Desmond said with a grin.

'Smells ale-y,' Furfy decided.

'Ale, aye,' Lewrie announced. 'Ale for all, 'fore we go on to the house.'

Spiteful as Caroline's most-like t'be, I might as well go home foxed, Lewrie decided; it mayn't matter, one way'r t'other.

The Ole Ploughman was ancient, a public house since the days of the Norman Conquest, some speculated. Its interior walls were whitewashed over rough plaster, the few windows Tudorish diamond paned, and the ceiling was low, the overhead beams black with kitchen, fireplace, candle, oil-lanthorn, or pipe smoke.

Or so it had been. During his long absence, old Mr. Beakman and his spinster daughter had added fair approximations of Jacobean Fold wood wainscot panelling. The walls were now painted a cheery red, and the beams, and the barman's counter, looked to be sanded down to fresh, raw wood, then linseeded and polished to a warm honey-brown. Beakman had gone with the times and had set aside a dining area round the fireplace on the right-hand half of the vast room, with new tables covered by pale tan cloths, whilst the left-hand half had been re-arranged to accommodate drinkers and smokers round the other fireplace, with double doors leading out to the trellised and pergolaed side garden, which was no longer a scraggly attempt at lawn, but brick-paved and railed in by low picket fences.

There were brass spitoons for those who chewed their quids, and even more brass candleholders along the walls, and brass lanthorns hung from the overhead beams, making the public house much brighter, warmer, and more welcoming a place than ever it had been before.

'My stars,' Lewrie breathed as he shrugged out of his cloak and hat, noting the framed pictures hung on the walls, too; old pastorals and race horses, prize bulls and boars, and hunting scenes featuring packs of dogs gathered round mounted riders. 'Who did all this?'

'Will ye look at 'im! Cap'm Lewrie t'th' life!' a woman cried from behind the long bar counter, past the customers bellied up to it. 'Will, come see who's come home!'

'Maggie Cony?' Lewrie exclaimed, recognising the round-faced local lass who'd married his old Bosun, Will Cony. She'd thickened and gone 'apple dumpling cheeked' but she was still the good-hearted and hardworking woman he remembered when both she and Cony had been in his employ 'tween the wars. 'You work here now?'

'Tosh, Cap'm Lewrie, we own the place now!' Maggie said, wiping her red-raw hands on a bar towel and coming round to greet him.

'Old Beakman sold up?' Lewrie asked, puzzled, as he made her a showy 'leg' and bow. Maggie dropped him a curtsy.

'La, 'e wuz gettin' on in years, an' not but 'is daughter t'inherit, an' 'er still a spinster, so, once Will paid off from 'is last ship, with all 'is pay an' prize-money, we made an offer an'-'

'Cap'm Lewrie, sir! Welcome 'ome, by yer leave, sir, why I've not clapped glims on ya in ages an' amen!' Will Cony said with glee as he emerged from the back kitchens. The tow-headed, thatch-haired lad he'd been had thickened considerably, too, and his forehead had grown higher, his top-hair thinned considerably, though still