THE GUN KETCH

Alacrity would be sailing soon, and Lewrie needed to replenish his personal stores for his pantry and wine cabinet. Leaving Caroline after breakfast, he borrowed a horse and cantered to town. And, out of prurient curiosity, he wandered into Finney's.

There was an entire row of shops for clothing, for shoes, for ladies' fashions and fabrics, with the latest miniature gowns on the porcelain dolls sent from Paris and London depicting the height of that season's styles and colors. There were cheese shops, spirits stores awash in wines, brandies, harsh whiskeys, gins, and liqueurs of a dozen nations. Finney had furniture for sale, wallpapers and chintz for drapes or recovering; kitchen wares from America and home, fine china and silver services, glassware from utilitarian to finest crystal pieces. One entire block of Bay Street on the southern side, and around the corner of Market Street for half of another block was his so-called mart, his commercial fiefdom.

Though he rued giving Finney any of his trade, or any of his money, he did find good prices on quality merchandise, and ended up purchasing stationery and ink, various cheeses and meat sauces, and several interesting books to fill his solitary hours, some with the pages already cut by a previous owner, though offered as new.

Alan opened one of the books and found it dog-eared on several pages. It was a recent English translation of a French novel he had heard about, Les Liaisons Dangereuses by some Frog scribbler named de Laclos. The dog-eared pages contained scenes of a most pleasing and salacious nature, which made Alan smile, even as he winced at the chalked-on price of six shillings. Thumbing further through it, he discovered an inscription in the frontispiece.

'From Daniel,

To his scamp of a brother Nathan. May this inspire you aboard Matilda on your next Voyage! May her New 1st Mate have similar Joy of the swarthy Bahamian ladies!'

Wonder if he did, Alan thought with amusement. And did he have to sell it to pay for the Mercury Cure to rid himself of the pox those Bahamian 'ladies' gave him?

He decided to buy it, and added it to the pile on the counter.

'That should be all here,' Alan said to the young clerk who was following him about, keeping a running total from store to store.

'Might have a peek at this before you leave, Captain sir,' the young man suggested. 'The very latest scientific device to predict the tropic storm. Hang this on your bulkhead below-decks, and you'll have all the warning a sailing man would ever need.'

'How does it work?' Alan asked, looking at a bulbous glass flask with a tall, narrow, sealed neck. Inside the flask was a blue liquid of some kind. It was brass-bound to a wooden plaque.

'The better the weather, the more of the liquid will gather at the bulb-end on the bottom, sir,' the clerk told him. 'But when there is a storm brewing, why 'twill soar up the neck. The worse the storm to-be, the higher will it go, sir. 'Tis said, sir,' he confided with an air of secrecy, 'that the Admiralty will be requiring every one of their ships to be equipped with one soon. We've shown one on display over t'the ships' chandlery all this past year, and 'tis been a wonder to all who've seen it for how accurately it reflected the weather, it has. And only twenty guineas, sir!'

'Should the Admiralty require it, then let them buy it for me,' Alan scoffed. 'Let's go select some wines.'

'Very good, Captain sir.'

The spirits shop was set up much like a coffeehouse, or an inn's public room, with tables and chairs. The walls were lined with barrels and wooden cases of bottles, with a combination counter and bar at the rear.

'Well, damme!' Alan was forced to exclaim as he espied an oil painting over the counter. It was his harem scene that Caroline had traded off, to the life! There were the same buxom darlings on the same draped couches, with a slender lass featured in the foreground standing to be toweled after her bath, the one who so- muchresembled his first whore in Covent Garden, the infamously handsome ' 'Change Court Betty' in all her bare splendor.

'Inspiring, ain't it, sir?' the clerk simpered. 'Here, Davie, the captain would like to sample some wines this day.'

'Aye, sir,' the vendor smiled, wiping his hands on his apron as he came from behind his counter. 'Pray, have a seat, sir, and take yer ease. Tell us yer wants, sir, an' we'll trot 'em out for yer to select those as best suits yer palate.'

Lewrie took a seat and removed his cocked hat. 'Let's begin on port. I'll need one case.'

'Going back t'sea, are we, sir?' the vendor clucked. 'Got a fine 'Rain-Water' Madeira just in. Got a lovely nose, ain't it, sir? Try a sip of that, now.'

A door in the back that led to the storerooms opened, and Alan paused with a sample glass to his lips as John Finney emerged, intent on a loose sheaf of papers. He looked up, spotted Lewrie, and smiled hesitantly, then put a bold face on it and stepped forward.

'Captain Lewrie, the top o' the mornin' t'ya, sir,' he lilted in an Irish brogue. ' Tis delighted I am t'see you again, sir, and in my… establishment, at that,' Finney stumbled, seeming to be trying to recall a lesson in elocution, to sound more English, though with a hard emphasis on those 'break-teeth' words not common to his everyday speech.

'Mister Finney, good morning,' Lewrie nodded, willing to sound at least affable in reply. He even threw in a small grin.

'I trust me… my clerk David is satisfactory, sir?' Finney continued, laying his papers down on the counter.

'Most satisfactory, sir, thankee,' Lewrie rejoined.

God, but he's an imposin' bastard, Lewrie thought as he sipped the Madeira! Finney stood a full six feet tall, broad of shoulder and deep-chested as a yearling steer. He was sailor-dark in complexion, with a full head of bright blond hair drawn back into a queue as low as his shoulder blades. His face was angular and square, and in his chin there was a pronounced cleft. For someone who'd come up from a stew, he had remarkably good white teeth. And penetrating, sometimes mocking blue eyes. With that heft, he could have looked day-labourer common, but he was flat-stomached, lean in the hips and thighs, and showed a very shapely calf in his silk stockings. His hands and his feet betrayed his origins, though; huge, clumping-long feet and hands square and thick as a bricklayer's, roughened by a lifetime of hard work, no matter the heavy and expensive rings he now sported.

'That'd… that is the 'Rain-Water' Madeira, David?' Finney inquired, coming to the table to pick up the bottle. 'A pleasing and tasty selection, Captain Lewrie. Not as dry as some. Like it?'

'Quite good, yes,' Lewrie agreed. 'Though a guinea the bottle is a trifle steep, Mister Finney.'

'We could arrange split-cases, sir,' Finney assured him, pulling out a seat. 'Allow me, sir? Thank you. Say, four bottles or so of the Rain-Water, and the rest made up from a lesser vintage, for guests who can't 'predate the best, ay? Why deprive y'self o' fine port just 'cause ya dine alone aft most o' the time. And is it sailin' soon y'll be, Captain Lewrie?' he asked, lapsing into brogue.

There was a craftiness to the set of Finney's eyes, at least to Alan's suspicious imagination. And yet, there was almost a pathetic eagerness, too. The eagerness of a seller, he wondered? The pandering of the outsider towards a better, Lewrie took a moment to sneer? Or that of a basically lonely man risen out of his element and trying to fit in? To make contact with newcomers who didn't spurn him?

'I have no orders at present, but…' Lewrie shrugged, giving Finney the same smile he'd bestow upon any acquaintance. 'We've been so long at anchor, it's bound to be soon.'

'Davie…' Finney said, whirling on his chair, 'David, bring out last year's Oporto for Captain Lewrie to try. Four shilling the bottle, I'm that sorry t'say, but nigh as tasty, and a grand bargain. Now wot ya say t'that, sir?'

'Mmm, rather nice,' Lewrie had to agree. 'Let us say eight of this Oporto, and only four of the better Madeira. And I'll simply have to treat myself less often.'

'Done!' Finney exulted, slapping the table top as if he had won a trick at ecarte. 'Now, wot else will ya be desiring?'

Lewrie spent almost an hour in the wine shop with Finney as bis eager-to-please host. Away from formal affairs, the salons and dance-floors where he most likely felt strangled and out of place, he proved a likable enough fellow, Alan had to admit, as they compared voyages, ports of call, and past storms, as sailors ever will.

'An' wuz ya niver t'India, now!' Finney had exclaimed with joy. 'An' Canton, too? Gawd, 'twas a time, a grand time, I had 'mongst the heathens meself! Topman, I wuz, then… main topmast captain.'