remaining noirs seemed as if they knew those letters by heart. Cleaning, laundry, and yardwork was now done in lacklustre fashion; dishes and glassware appeared at meals spotted and stained, and had to be sent back over and over 'til he was satisfied. The cuisine, already upsetting, was now slovenly over-done or under-done, some days too spicy to be stood, and on others so bland as to be nearly tasteless, and the new male cook and his assistant had a rare knack for finding the toughest, oldest, and scrawniest victuals, whether fish, fowl, or meat. Lank, wilted, half-shriveled vegetables, half-washed salad greens almost brown or black on the leaf edges…!
And their mute, dog-eyed, blank-faced portrayals of dumb innocence, their shambling-slow, head-scratching shows of utter ignorance! They behaved much as that Lt. Recamier had cautioned. Spoons and utensils went missing, saucers and cups inexplicably got broken or chipped, costly bed-linens brought from France got torn, permanently stained, or so poorly repaired that the caterpillar-sized seams made them useless for sleeping.
Despite constant warnings about open windows and doors, birds, lizards, and shoals of cafards, the huge evil-smelling cockroaches endemic to the tropics invaded, infested the house (and their bedding!) every night and each dawn, resulting in a stampede of noirs who went tittering and yelping to chase them down and expel them-resulting in something fragile and valuable being broken each time.
Merde alors, every bottle of wine that was opened tasted as if it had been watered, no matter that he inspected the corks and leaden seals closely, no matter that his clerk Etienne practically stood guard over his cellar, with all the crates placed in de Gougne's cramped office and bed-chamber; with a Marine Infantry sentry in the foyer right outside the doors!
And not a blessed one of them would fan him!
Screeching tirades made no more impression than if Choundas had howled at the tide like King Canute ordering it to go out, not in. And he could not beat them, whip them, kick them, or slap them, as one could casually do Hindoos, Chinese, or Filipinos, and it was galling to him. One letter had suggested spending more of his pay to purchase a better cuisine for all, including servants, of garbing them in better clothing, of supplying shoes and stockings, but he would be damned if he would. The cost of that notwithstanding, there was no way Choundas would stoop to 'bribing' noirs to treat him better, or be mocked for a 'soft' touch. It would be a token of total surrender, and even if he dismissed them all and started with a fresh crew of servants word of his ineffectiveness-his de-fanging!-would be all over the island by the next sunset, making him the laughingstock of noirs, Creoles, and French-born alike.
He fanned himself some more, and swabbed his face and neck with a small towel that had once been coldly moist, but now reeked of sweat, mildew, and arm-pits. He painfully drew his chair up to his massive, and elegant, desk to study his manning problems.
Lt. Houdon could command the brig, the larger prize vessel now being armed and converted for a commerce raider; Lt. Mercier would be his second officer; and Capt. Griot would have to surrender one of his junior lieutenants to make the necessary third, bien.
Capitaine MacPherson, for all his drawbacks, was a masterful seaman, able to command La Resolue without his first officer; and his first lieutenant would be seasoned and made of the same mould as he by now. That officer would get the large schooner's command, aussi bien. Junior lieutenants would move up in seniority, aspirants would become acting-lieutenants aboard the corvettes…
No, the schooner needed two more officers, and the brig needed a fourth, perhaps, to serve as prize-master when she took a suitably big or valuable merchantman… the schooner, too? Damn this heat!
Choundas found it hard to think. He took a deep breath of hot, still, and musty air, squirmed about so his sweat-sodden shirt became cooler by exposure, and pored over the names in the copied musters. He ticked off a few names, chose a couple, then leaned back in frustration against the damp leather chairback, chewing absently on the end of his expensive pen's rosewood stylus. It was one of the new steel-nibbed pens, just coming into vogue and common use, instead of goose quills, and (he proudly thought for a moment) another example of his nation's inventiveness, like the lead-core pencil.
Recamier? No. Jules Hainaut? Hmmm. What was he to do with young Jules? he wondered.
The lad had shown well, the day that Le Bouclier had… died. Hainaut was tarry-handed, when he put his mind to it, and was overdue for reward for his services to him, as well as his recent pluckiness, but yet… what that idiotic Dutch captain Haljewin had said stuck in Choundas's suspicious mind, and kept resurfacing.
Someone who had known the Dutch ship's cargo and day of her departure, someone who knew his plans must have betrayed her, had betrayed poor Capt. Desplan and Le Bouclier to the British!
How else to explain how Lewrie and his frigate had arrived just at the perfect moment? Lewrie was a swaggering dumb beast, a weapon to be wielded by his betters, nothing more, Choundas disparagingly sneered.
In the Far East, Lewrie had been under the thumb of a much slyer man, that murderous cut-throat, the spare and hatchet-faced anglais spy Zachariah Twigg. Together, they had ruined his plans a second time in the Mediterranean, in '94, despite being forewarned by Citizen Pouzin, his enigmatic civilian counterpart sent down from Paris. Posing as a mere banking clerk, a Juif from Coutts' Bank named Simon Silberberg of Lewrie's acquaintance, Twigg had. Hah!
Old, Twigg would be now, but Choundas did not think he could go far wrong to suspect that he still spun his webs this far from London, using a younger protege who would find that beastly ignoramus, Lewrie, once again a useful cat's-paw. A younger spy who had already obtained his secret navy signals books!
And… had not old Twigg or Silberberg, or whatever he called himself-and Lewrie!-taken one of his coasting vessels full of arms to encourage the Piedmontese and Savoyards into French service?
Another delicate mission most effectively stopped, and Jules… Hainaut had been aboard her, had he not? Taken prisoner, and held for a mere six weeks before being exchanged for a British midshipman, then returned to his side. He'd thought, then, that it had been a suspiciously short imprisonment, but…
Had Twigg 'turned' Hainaut back on him as a secret informer, as Lewrie had somehow 'turned' that Claudia Mastandrea slut who had been sent to milk him dry of information, then poison him, as he and Citizen Pouzin had arranged? All his schemes had turned to dust, after Hainaut had come back to him… hadn't they?
How did les anglais know of his coming to Guadeloupe, learn of Haljewin's sailing day, know his decision to shift Le Bouclier over to Basse-Terre, and when? From a nest of traitors and spies already here °n the island… or from one he had unwittingly brought with him?
Choundas had always known that Jules Hainaut's eager deference was cynical play-acting. The lad was out for his pleasures, promotion a fat purse, and his prick. He had taken him on anyway, knowing what good use he could make of a shrewd and pragmatic rogue. The Revolution badly needed men who would not flinch from ruthlessness and Jules had proved that he could ignore false sentiments and perform what he was ordered to do. Choundas had worked round his sham and had even found the lad amusing at times. He had groomed him tutored him, to improve his effectiveness in the future. He didn't wish to think the worst of the lad. There could be a spy placed, or bought off, long ago; there could be someone whom he had yet to suspect. And it would be galling for Choundas to admit he had nurtured a viper in his breast all this time.
He would give Hainaut the benefit of the doubt… for now. At sea, he would no longer be privy to the plans he would improvise, now that Choundas knew that his old ones might be compromised. If Jules was the spy, he would have no way to communicate with the British.
Did Lewrie and the British continue to plague him with more inexplicable coincidences, Choundas would know that Hainaut was innocent.
But, did the fortunes of his small squadron and his new raiders improve beyond all hopes, and the deep investigation he would begin the very next morning fail to turn up another suspected traitor…!
It would be sad, but for the lack of another explanation Choundas would have no other choice but to denounce
