Reefs and Shoals

Lewrie went back forward from the mizen stays, steeled himself, and waited for the hull to roll upwards before making a dash for the hammock nettings and stanchions at the break of the quarterdeck. Then it was a slow ascent, clinging to the nettings, to the weather side, where a captain was supposed to be. He hooked an arm to the shrouds of the main mast to stay upright as Reliant heeled far over to starboard with the next roll, and stood there, scowling at the fury of the sea, and wishing for a cup of something boiling hot; coffee, tea, or cocoa, it made no difference. Even hot water would suit, but with the ship pitching, heaving, and rolling so violently, everyone was on cold rations, for the galley fires could not be lit in such weather. Lewrie let out a long, deprived sigh.

Eight Bells chimed in four double-dings from the foc’s’le belfry up forward; it was 4 P.M., and the end of the Day Watch and the beginning of the First Dog. There were happy and relieved smiles upon every hand’s face, for they could go below for two hours. Far glummer were the faces of the men of the fresh watch, some of them the spare hands who had just gotten below for a few minutes, and would face two more hours of misery before the Second Dog Watch.

Lieutenant Spendlove was mounting to the quarterdeck to replace Merriman, so Lewrie timed a (fairly) level- deck dash down to the helm, and the binnacle cabinet as those worthies exchanged salutes.

“I relieve you, sir,” Spendlove was intoning.

“I stand relieved, sir,” Merriman answered. “Course, full and by to West-Nor’west. The last cast of the log showed five knots.”

“Gentlemen,” Lewrie intruded.

“Sir,” they chorused.

“I’ll go below with you, Mister Merriman, and leave the watch to you, Mister Spendlove,” Lewrie told them. “Should the wind shift a touch more Sutherly, alter course as near as you’re able. If the wind veers ahead, summon me at once. Nicely done, by the way, Mister Merriman.”

“Thank you, sir,” Lt. Merriman said, grinning.

“Aye aye, sir,” from Spendlove.

* * *

Once below and aft, in the relative warmth of his great-cabins, Lewrie peeled off his hat and canvas coat, both stiff and soaked with half-frozen spray, and wound off the useless scarf. He hugged himself and shivered, blowing on his chilled fingers as he slid into the chart space to plot the last few hours’ progress, and the change of course.

“Might you care for something warming, sir?” Pettus asked. “I could heat up some of your cold tea over the candle warmer.”

“God, yes, Pettus, and thank yer kind soul!” Lewrie boomed out with a quick laugh. “How’s Jessop doin’?”

“Crop-sick as a hound, sir,” Pettus said with a shrug.

Lewrie looked aft, and found Jessop in pretty-much the same position he’d been in when he’d left to go on deck, hours before.

“Aye, some warmed-up tea, Pettus, with lots of milk and sugar.”

Lewrie returned to peering at the chart, speculating with brass dividers and parallel ruler that if they could maintain at least five knots over the ground for so many hours going West-Nor’west, the ship would have made… Pah! He tossed the tools aside in frustration, for that course would carry them further North into even colder seas, and gained them nothing to the West.

As much as he detested the idea, they would have to wear about once more, right at the time that the second rum issue of the day was doled out, in the midst of preparations for what meagre cold rations would be served. Before sunset would be best, but… it was better than standing on ’til they struck Iceland!

Lewrie managed to make his way aft to his hanging bed-cot, to check on the cats. “How ye copin’, lads?” he gently asked them.

He was answered by low moans and the flicks of bottled tails. They had not moved far from where he’d last seen them, either.

“Tea’s almost ready, sir,” Pettus informed him. “A few minutes more, and it’ll be nigh scalding.”

Thud! came the Marine sentry’s musket butt on the deck without, and the cry of “Midshipman Munsell, SAH!”

“Enter!” Lewrie called out, the fingers of his right hand most firmly crossed against more bad news.

“Mister Spendlove’s duty, sir, and he says that the winds are veering ahead, West-Nor’west, to Half-North in gusts,” Munsell said, his teeth chattering.

“Steadying on West-Nor’west, or more Northerly, young sir?” Lewrie asked.

“Ehm, it seems to be shifting more and more Nor’westerly, sir,” Munsell speculated.

“Very well,” Lewrie said with a sigh. “I will come up. Give my compliments to Mister Spendlove, and inform him he’s to summon all hands and be ready to wear about.”

“Aye, sir.”

“The tarpaulins, Pettus,” Lewrie said, looking for his sodden scarf. Once dressed again, he took time to duck into the chart-space and stepped off six points of sail from their present course, then suddenly smiled. Six points off the relative wind would be Due West, did they continue sailing “full and by”, but… did they fall off to a “leading wind”, two more points, to West-Sou’west, he could ease the ship its tortuous twisting and pounding, and not only make bags of Westing, but much more progress to the South, as well, where surely the weather might be a touch more moderate!

It might be a tad warmner, too, by God! Lewrie thought; And we might not be blown ashore on Cape Finisterre, either!

Feeling more hopeful of their immediate prospects, he headed for the door, with but one longing look at the mug of tea on the warmer, which was beginning to steam most nicely.

Damn, and bloody damn! he mourned.

CHAPTER NINE

The harsh Nor’westerly gales continued to blow fiercely for all that night after wearing, and all through the next day, allowing the frigate to trundle along “two points free” headed West-Sou’west, and making a goodly Westing, as Lewrie desired. The force of the gales was too great to bear more canvas than they already had spread aloft, and the great rolling of the troubled sea’s wavecrests still robbed wind each time that Reliant sagged down into the deep troughs, so it was still hard to exceed a snail-like five knots, but it was still progress.

It couldn’t last, of course. The Nor’westerly blew itself out, the storm driving it spending its wrath on the French and Spanish coasts as Reliant reeled onwards. To replace it came a fresh gale, this one from the West-Nor’west at first, requiring the tautening of sheets and braces a bit at a time ’til they were back on a beat to weather steering West-Sou’west, then ceding one point, then another, to Sou’west by South. If there was a moderation of the fierceness of wind and sea, it was only a matter of degrees, with only a slight rise in barometric pressure, and a fresh chalk mark on the neck of the liquid barometer perhaps a quarter-inch below the others. There had still been no sun sights, but the communal agreement on their Dead Reckoning had them near the 43rd line of latitude, and a safe one hundred miles West of Cape Finisterre.

By that point, the temperature had warmed a bit, so that the spray droplets that got flung like bird-shot stayed liquid, and the seas shipped over the bows were no longer icy. What sloshed or dripped below was no longer frigid misery, but cool, damp, soggy misery.

* * *

“Nine days… about nine hundred miles made good, sir,” Lt. Westcott commented as Lewrie came to the quarterdeck for the second time at Four Bells of the Morning Watch at 6 A.M. Lewrie grunted his acknowledgement