H.M.S. COCKEREL

The king calmed at last, sat back down, and shouted instructions to the kitchen. Out came aproned flunkies, beamish young boys with olive complexions and dark hair, excited and trembling. Would they be at some regimental recruiting office by next sunrise, Alan wondered? They seemed bloody cheerful about the prospect!

Out came a thatch-covered bottle, a red wine fruity and dusky, so dry it made him pucker. Lacrima Christi, he was told it was; the Tears of Christ, which he thought fitting. There was a heaping platter of a stringy glop… pasta, he was also told: spaghetti al dente, shimmering with olive oil, flecked with oregano, sun-dried tomato bits and garlic, with a thin sera of tomato sauce. Also arriving was a selection of hot fish. Fried shrimp-gamberetti-done to a tawny crispness, but pink and succulent inside. More shrimp, filleted and skewered and grilled.

'Eat, eat, tenente!' Sir John insisted, once the uproar had at last died down. Something momentous seemed to have been settled, but Lewrie wasn't sure exactly what, since it wasn't formal yet, and no one was going out of their way to explain such diplomatic intricacies to a lowly such as he. 'His Majesty operates the cook shop himself, and he is delighted to see a man with a hearty appetite. He catches many of these fish himself, off Fusaro and Posillipo, he bids me tell you. He is a great fisherman, as well as hunter. He sails his own boat, too.'

'As far as the Isle of Capri? I've heard how beautiful… how bellissimo…!' Lewrie said between heavenly mouthfuls.

That set the king off on another paroxysm of rapture, over Capri 's magnificent coves and beaches, its vistas, its ancient structures.

'I would delight to see it, do we stay long enough in Naples,' Alan said to the prime minister. 'Just as I adore tasting new foods, I delight in seeing new and exciting places.'

'You like common Neapolitan foods, His Majesty wonders?'

'Ambrosia of Heaven, Your Excellency. I may never lay knife to English foods again,' Lewrie declared, not anywhere near toadying.

'His Majesty demands you stay ashore this evening. Dine with us at the reggia, the royal palace. All common Neapolitan menu, he promises. He will stuff you, His Majesty assures me. And give you a good night of rest in a real bed, not a seaman's cot, for once.'

'Should I, Sir William?' he asked. 'What if I… slip up, or…'

'We shall be with you, Leftenant. Never fear.'

'Please, Your Excellency, convey to His Majesty my undying and heart-felt gratitude for his most generous invitation. One to which I look forward with unbounded gustatory anticipation!'

He looked at Emma Hamilton, who was fanning herself, still rapt upon him, after his brusque description of his East Indies service.

And that's not all I'm looking forward to, he thought, giving her a grin and a brief nod.

Chapter 6

Had a hole in me, I think; hollow leg, or something. But, Lord! It was all so bloody good! So grand!

Minestrone, the plebeian vegetable and pasta soup-even that was head and shoulders above Navy fare. Meat-stuffed pastas, layered with a tomato sauce, dripping with melted cheeses! Veal marinara, game fowl jugged in a wine sauce, domestic chicken breasts done in a cream sauce with wide egg noodles. More fried fish, more grilled goodies. God knew how they'd done it, but there'd been ices with the fruit for a last course, tart and sweet sorbets, and creamy-what'd they call 'ems?-gelatil And for the levee preceding the actual promised stuffing-antipasti. Lovely cheeses, thin-shaved prosciutto; and, of course, the sybaritic pleasures of fresh-baked bread, piping hot, crusty and white milled flour, with dollops of churned butter!

Wines, too. Sweet Marsalas and sweetish, sparkling spumantes. Then butter-smooth, aged reds that rivalled the best Cabernets France could boast. Thank God for the food, he thought; I've taken a barrel aboard, feels like. I'm well and truly foxed!

A minor kingdom, in the greater scheme of things, Naples might be, but King Ferdinand's palazzo was a bejeweled, begilt faeryland of high, ornate baroque ceilings, well-figured marble walls awash with statuary and gigantic tapestries, over-scale paintings (dead relations, mostly-or hunting scenes), shiny with Chinese wallpapers, glittering with crystal sconces, chandeliers, glowing amber with a shipload worth of real bee's-wax candles, festooned with silver and gold, niello or cloisonne, strewn with furniture too precious to sit upon. It was so grand, so showy, after half a year of those wooden walls of his, so different from his bleak daily vistas of rolling sea. And the music!

A chamber orchestra still sawed away in an upper gallery, just as they had through the levee and the supper. Light, airy, delightful stuff-sonatas by Giovanni Gabrieli, Giovanni Bat-tista Fontana and Marco Buccolina. Or so he'd been informed.

If Naples was not indeed Heaven, it was very close to it, Alan determined. With a traitorous snifter of French Armagnac in his hand, he let go a more than gentle burp of contentment.

The supper was over, the ecarte and music was winding down, and it was too late for the last guests to stay and dance. Sir William and the prime minister were gone somewhere. King Ferdinand had spoken some brief last words to him and had plodded off, too.

Have their three heads together over the treaty, I expect, Alan thought; thankee, my boy, but we'll take it from here. Oh, well.

'Scusi, signore tenente Lor… L… Liri,' a white-wigged footman announced by his side. He was holding a six- armed candelabra.

'Lewrie,' he muttered, barely glancing at him, searching for Emma Hamilton, who had also scampered off somewhere.

'Si, signore tenente Liri,' the servitor persisted, 'you ple-seah toa follah me, signore tenente? I lighta you… up… toa bed, signore.'

Well, shit, he sighed to himself. Right, then… I should have known better.

His chambers were magnificent. The night was warm and fragrant; the two pairs of doors which led to a wide, fret-stoned balcony were open. The suite was as large as an admiral's great-cabins. There were side tables bearing cloisonne, gilt and silver gewgaws, a writing desk of tortoise-shell mottled wood, heavily inlaid with ivory, urns filled with fresh-cut flowers everywhere he looked, an expansive wine cabinet big as a duke's sideboard, an intricately carved armoire big enough to hold a corporal's guard, and a bedstead as wide as a quarterdeck, with silk sheets and satin coverlet already turned down, the two pair of pillows plumped up invitingly.

'Willa they bea anythin' elsea youa wan', signore tenente?' the footman intoned, sounding both hesitant and grim. Lewrie glanced at him and noted his lips moving after his statement; probably in rote rehearsal of his little English over the most probable statement he might next make.

'Anything else?' Lewrie grinned.

'Si, signore tenente Liri,' the man answered, then repeated with effort: 'Willa-they-bea-anythin'-elsea-youa- wan', signore?'

'Dancing girls,' Lewrie bade, tongue in cheek, just to see how the poor fellow might handle the unexpected. 'A string quartet. Some courtesans. And magic. I insist on magic.'

'Uh, scusi, signore tenente…' Sweat popped on his upper lip as he flummoxed. 'Willa-they-bea-anythin'-elsea, signore tenente?' he reiterated, sounding a bit desperate.

'No, nothing else,' Lewrie relented. 'Thank you. Goodnight. Or how you say…? Uhm. No, grazie. Buona notte.'

'Ah, si, tenente!' the man bobbed with relief, bowing himself out quickly. 'Si, grazie. Buona notte, signore. Buona notte!'

'Call me at first light,' Lewrie insisted. ' Sunrise. Giorgno? First sparrow fart? Bloody…' He pointed at an ormolu clock, struck his hands in his armpits, and crowed like a rooster. The footman came back, pointed to the Roman numeral V and shrugged quizzically. Alan pointed to the VI, mimed shaving and washing.

'Ah, si, signore. Awakea you… 'ota wat'r. Buona notte!'