H.M.S. COCKEREL

waifs eyes pleading as beguilingly as an orphaned kitten's.

'Je regrette, ma petite Phoebe…' he muttered, thinking of his few coins, and how far yet they might have to stretch. 'Je suis pauvre, aussi. Un peu de monnaie? Apres our ship… sank? Went down? I have so little money, now.'

'Je m'en fiche,' she declared, her little face solemn. 'Do not… care? You 'ave la salle chaude, ze warr-um room? Un peu de vin, et du pain? A little monnaie, c'est bien. No monnaie, c'est bien, aussi. You are ze homme seul, et moi, I am ze jeune fille, 'lone, aussi. Be kin' an' genereux to me, on'y un peu, et moi… I am generous a vous, hein? Quand, je serai votre jeune fille. Zan, I am your…'

Damme, the price sounds right, he thought; and she is a pretty little thing. Cundums! Well, my new'uns ain't Mother Green's Finest-they're Frog. But I s'pose they know what they're about when it comes to amour. The others, though, Cony and all… they'll see her go up with me, and what'U they think… and just who gives a bloody damn any longer?

He looked down into her face searchingly. Though her belly was pressed against his in promise, her gaze was so forlorn, yet hopeful, her eyes aswim with tears. For fear of his rejection, and her Fate if he did turn her away. He felt his resolves slipping. Again.

'God save me,' he whispered in surrender. 'Know what your name means, Phoebe?'

'Je ne sais pas, m'sieur,' she replied softly, putting all her kitteny fondness into her voice, sensing his agreement at last.

'It means 'sunshine' in Latin,' he chuckled, giving in to her neediness. And his own. 'Like a happy sun? Comme le soleil heureux.'

She tittered, smiled at last, and took a moment to wipe her nose and eyes on her mittens, then threw her arms around his neck. 'D'accord, m'sieur Alain? You protec' me? Nous demeurons… reside, ensemble?'

'Oui,' he nodded, with a sheepish grin. 'We demeurons, ensemble.'

'Ooh!' she cried suddenly, bouncing on her toes to hug him and giggle with relief. 'You are Fhomme tees sympathique, so good, so gentil, si magnifique! Je suis si heureuse… so 'appy! An' I mak' you so 'appy, aussi, quand… wan ve… coucherons, ensemble,' Phoebe vowed suggestively. 'Aimes-tu la coucher, Alain?'

'Oui,' he chuckled. 'Mais oui, beaucoup!'

'An' wan you leave Toulon,' she paused, inquiring of him more closely for an instant, leaning back warily to see if all particulars of their bargain were sure, like any level-headed woman of business. 'Et… ve sail way, ensemble, aussi, Alain?'

'Oui, I swear. I'll get you on a ship, when the time comes, ma petite jolie Phoebe. Swear? Promise? Uh, croyez-vous. Believe me.'

He gathered up her bags, those two items bearing all her worldly goods. He led her into the courtyard of the guardhouse, past a sentry who first gaped, then averted his eyes. Up the stairs past the few men idling and yarning in the guardroom, daring them to gawp at him. Into his room, where he shut the door on all outside distraction and curiosity.

He lit a candle as she doffed her cloak and mittens and thawed herself at the small fireplace's grate. There was a bottle of cognac on the scarred, rickety night stand by the bed. Only one glass, which he filled for her, which she accepted eagerly. He drank from the neck, listening to the rising winds as they rattled the shutters. Someone-Cony perhaps-had been thoughtful enough to obtain a warming pan for the bed, and had set out a covered dish; a quarter-loaf of bread with a hank of sausage. She devoured it ravenously, child-cheerful, as he put the warming pan back on the grate and removed coat and waist-coat.

They hung their clothing on wall pegs, suddenly sombre and shy with each other, after she was done eating. She smiled at him as she pinched out the candle, and shooed him to turn around so she could undress completely.

'M… maintenant, mon cheri,' she said at last, faint and shaky.

'Bloody…' he gasped as he turned about to look at her.

She stood nude on her knees in the middle of the bed, whore-bold. Yet as shy, as nervous and giggly as a virgin might on her first night of marriage, totally feckless and artless at that moment, without a jot of a whore's weariness, pouting boredom or experience.

Her light olive skin was dark against the pale sheets, caressed by flickers of firelight, her hair a long, curling, dark brown cascade down her back to her waist, over her shoulders, half-concealing breasts small but well formed, almost perky. So slim and neat, so girlish and tiny she looked, almost thin…

'J'ai froid, mon cheri,' she shuddered in a wee voice as she hugged herself for a moment, her eyes huge with want 'Viens a moi… come to me? Depeches, vite?' she implored, stretching out her arms for him.

He rushed to the bed to embrace her, to kneel close to her, run his hands hungrily over her velvety firm young flesh, feeling her goosepimple at his touch. 'Si belle, tu es si belle, si petite, si…!' he praised. 'Such a beautiful little pretty!'

'You mak' me warr-um, Alain?' she shivered, somewhere between a nervous laugh and a helpless plea. 'You keep me safe an' warr-um, mon gentilhomme fantastique?' She leaned back from his kisses to take his face in her little hands to regard him, to force him to regard her, for a serious instant. 'Alors, a toi, je donne tout, mon coeur. Zen my all… I give to you? Mon corps… mon coeur, moi-meme!' she whispered in touching tears that scalded as they splashed on his cheeks as they kissed again.

They fell into the warmed bed, hurling the covers up to their chins, burrowing eagerly into the welcome warmth of press-hot sheets, grasping to clasp their warming flesh together, beginning to chuckle and sigh, to simper and giggle like goose-girl and stableboy.

When did she learn my given name, he idly wondered, too busy for much real thought as they rolled and interlaced, limbs twining as sinuous as snakes, mouths pressed together, stroking and exploring… Scott? Must have told her. She was always friendly enough… amusing and anxious to please. To fit in. Hang everything, he decided. Just all of it-hands, the war, the siege, all of it! Just a few nights, for the love of Heaven.

'Ma belle,' he sighed in her ear, lost once more, humours ablaze as he nuzzled and savoured, afire for her and nothing else but a few precious moments of sweet, tumbling oblivion. 'Ma petite. Oui, I'll keep you warm. Je fais tu chaud… and safe.'

'Oh, mon cheri,' she swore, going breathless. 'Mon coeur… mon amour! Aimes-moi!'

To seal her bargain, to coax him or cajole him, to winnow her way into his sympathy and affection to hold him to it, she repaid him in the only coin she had left, or perhaps understood. But with passion so intense, so open and eager, so far beyond a coquette's artful practice, that he could not believe her giving of herself so completely was totally feigned, towards the end especially. Panting on his shoulder, tears in her eyes, kisses deep and searing, softly lingering and full of gentleness and seeming affection. As if, for a time at least, the girl could shut the door on her own very real fears for her future. Phoebe had as much need as anyone to abandon herself, deny the terrifying world outside, and sink mindlessly and carefree into a sweet oblivion of her own, surrender time and time again to pleasures so imperative that rife beyond her body's sensations had no terrors which could even compare.

And sleep, at last, draped half over him, her head resting on his chest, clinging in her sleep as doggedly as he had to his raft, so light and sweet, so soft and toasty warm, with her hair spilled like a quilt over them. Sleeping peacefully, purring gentle and slow, twined about him. Completely spent yet happy.

Dreaming perhaps? he wondered as he drowsed alongside, his arms cocooning her. What did whores dream about, anyway? Her world was so narrow, so limited, and she such a willow branch to any wind that blew… did she dream of safety, new gowns, a little place to call her own? Of surviving long enough to continue her same narrow life?

He glanced at his new watch on the night stand by the firelight. Another cheap piece o' work. Just gone eleven, he yawned, completely, utterly spent himself. Yet happy as well, in his own way.

Whatever it'd been-a young whore's practiced arts to earn her passage, or a frightened girl's exquisite gratitude, some small measure of true affection and desire at last awakened-who knew, he asked the ceiling. It had been bestial, magnificent… tender. And grand.

He slept himself, then. As the skies opened and a cold sullen rain began to fall, slashing at the besieged port, driven by a half-gale of wind. Pattering and rattling on the shutters, drumming on the roof slates, making him glad he wasn't at sea on such a fearsome night.