Lieutenant de Vaisseau Jules Hainaut relished pacing his small quarterdeck as the sun threatened to rise in the East. Like a proper and salted sea officer his hands were clasped in the small of his back in imitation of the aristo captains and lieutenants he'd served when he'd been a humble seaman. As was the custom in all navies, he could pace, or strut, alone up to windward facing the Trades and the soon-to-be-risen sun, savouring the shivery damp coolness that was so welcome before the harsh warmth of the usual tropic day.
He rocked on the balls of his feet, enjoying the creak of those bright-buffed boots on his legs, and fiddled with the hilt of his precious smallsword. The name Hainaut was sure that he had made for himself was going to be the talk of the entire colony, figuring prominently in the despatches back to Paris and the Ministry of Marine, too… no matter how derisive his more-experienced fellow officers aboard La Vigilante had been towards him. Her new capitaine, Lt. Pelletier from Capitaine MacPherson's corvette, had been highly dubious of his appointment into La Vigilante as his Second Officer, almost openly sneering at him for being a dilettante more suited to odious shore duties, as well as the catch-fart to such a bloody- handed ogre as Choundas. Even the midshipman, now Acting-Lieutenant Digne, the Third Officer, had seemed to mock and disdain him; jealous of not
being named second-in-command to his friend Pelletier, Hainaut had thought.
Well, he had shown them what he was made of with an unaccustomed show of diligence and nautical skill, with saucy courage in the taking of their four prizes, and his willingness to come aboard this captured schooner, Mohican, as a prize-master when they had begun to scrape the bottom of the barrel for enough people to man them all with a sham of energy and even unselfish generosity, and he had mostly won them over.
This schooner Mohican, and her near-twin that sailed not a mile alongside her, the Chippewa, were fine vessels-fast, handy, and sea-kindly for all their outlandish rigging and their steeply raked masts. Their valuable cargoes notwithstanding, Hainaut was sure that Mohican and her sister would make magnificent commerce raiders, if bought in and converted to men o' war under Choundas's control, not as privateers under Hugues. Not so large that either demanded a senior officer in command, too.
Lt. Hainaut had, as soon as he'd moved his sea-chest and traps aboard Mohican, determined that he would be her captain. He had at last nagged, hinted and cajoled himself away from Choundas, the damned crippled monster! and by fetching in such booty, this Mohican would be his permanent escape, his route to the fame, glory, and profit he wished-he would!-win in future. A year or two and any odium from having been Choundas's 'creature' would be forgotten, and…
'Dawn, m'sieur,' the older petty officer who now stood watches as a temporary quarterdeck officer announced as the sun finally burst above the eastern horizon. Lt. Hainaut crossed to the helm to take a peek at the marvellous book he'd found in Mohicans great-cabins, that tabulated true sunrise and sunset to longitude. He juggled the book and the sea-chart, grunting in satisfaction as he noted that they'd made a decent distance to weather during the night, just that tiny bit farther East, and a safe haven in Basse-Terre or Pointe-a-Pitre. The casts of the knot log added up to an impressive sum of Northing, too. Hainaut set the book and the slate aside and stepped off their probable course with a pivoting brass divider and a ruler. Unless they ran into foul weather or roaming enemy warships, their entire 'convoy' of prizes and raiders would make a triumphant landfall at Guadeloupe in three more days. The two corvettes, Le Gascon and La Resolue, with their much greater hold capacities, and the stores with which to keep the seas for months, still prowled down South nearer the Spanish Main, Trinidad and Tobago, to 'show the flag' to their dubious allies the Spanish and Dutch and put iron back into their sagging spines as well as to take prizes. They would not return for weeks more, perhaps. For now, it would be this prize, these ships and their successful captors, that would arrive first to win the cheers from Guadeloupe… and earn the most in the Prize Court with all the valuable and tasty goods they bore.
'Very well,' Hainaut said at last. 'Time to send the lookouts aloft, Timmonier. And tell the cook he may start breakfast.'
'Oui, m'sieur Lieutenant,' the temporary second-in- command said in reply. Hainaut was irked that he had yet to address him the way he wished, as capitaine. Some, it seemed, needed more convincing than others. Hainaut turned away and strode aft to the taff-rails, to stand atop the transom lockers and grip the starboard lanthorn for a better view astern, taking a moment to enjoy how straight and true was Mohicans wake and how narrow the creamy-white road she cut over the sea was. Fine in her entry, slim in her moulded breadth, yet wide enough to carry cargo and be 'stiff,' even beating to windward. Whatever the Americans had done when forming her body below her waterline let her slice through instead of bully the waves.
She must be mine! Hainaut fervently thought again. He felt he would die, did he not keep her as his own, this rapier-quick and epee-slim marvel.
'Glass,' he demanded over his shoulder, his right hand out to take the telescope when it was fetched to him, without looking to see if he was being obeyed. But of course he was, instantly.
There was La Vigilante, well hull-down and perhaps eight or ten kilometres back, shackled to their slowest and dowdiest pair of prize trading brigs. Lt. Houdon's big brig, La Celtique-another of his odious master's conceits to honour his damnable 'blood'-and three prizes were perhaps a mile or more astern of La Vigilante, but, being a much less 'weatherly' pack of square-riggers, were rather far down alee. Mohican and Chippewa, even under all plain sail, had out-raced them all since sundown.
Hainaut's stomach rumbled with hunger as he lowered his glass, and hopped down from atop the transom lockers. Mohican was positively crammed with good things to eat on her long passage back to her miserably cold home port. Her manger held dozens of chickens, six pigs, and four sheep, and the hens laid enough eggs for a four-egg omelette for his breakfast. There were still loaves and loaves of fresh bread aft, with strong, piquant South American coffee beans by the gigantic sack. He'd have fresh, unwormed cheese, a whole pot of coffee, and a chicken breast with his eggs, brightened with fresh-ground Spanish pepper, with first-pressing turbinado sugar, with over-sweet goat's milk to whip into the eggs, to make his coffee elegantly au lait, with luscious jams and pearly-dewed fresh butter to smear on light-toasted bread…!
'Allo.!' a lookout precariously perched on the main-mast tops'l yard shouted down. 'Attention! Three… strange… sail… alee! Two points off the larboard quarter, and approaching quickly! Allo?'
'We see them!' Hainaut screeched back, even before he mounted the transom lockers once more and swung his telescope in the indicated direction.
Oui, there were three of them; two full-rigged ships and a brig! They were bounding along under every stitch of sail, 'all to the royals' fore-and-aft stays'ls flying, and steering almost across the Trades, to the East-Sou'east… thundering up from the dark leeward horizon as if to pass ahead of La Celtique'?, group of prizes… ahead of his own ship, La Vigilante, and her group, too!
'Allo!' the mainmast lookout cried once more. 'I see… flags! They are warships! Two frigates, and a brig o' war! One is anglais, and two are… americaine the lookout yelped in consternation.
'Together?' Hainaut cried, just as disconcerted as the lookout. 'Americans and the British, together? Mon Dieu, merde alors, have the Amis declared war on France?'
There came a faint, muffled cheer from belowdecks, from their prisoners who had once owned and sailed Mohican, as the lookout's cry worked its way down to the fore-hold where nonplussed
