A King`s Commander

'Aye, Mister Mountjoy. Our Genoese?'

'Yes, sir. A most specious case, sir,' Mountjoy said fussily. 'His papers, uhm… what any court might construe as highly… colorable? Then, there is Mister Spendlove's hasty inventory, as to what she carried, as opposed to what is listed in her manifest, do you see… water, wine, flour, and biscuit, uhm… rice, dry pasta… outwardly it might seem innocent. But there is the matter of powder, flints… boots, premade cartouches and pouches… all bound in cases bearing French markings. Most conveniently not listed as cargo, sir,' his clerk concluded, preening a bit, now that his legal, and linguistic skills had been of some use at last.

'So his ship and his cargo are certain to be condemned in Prize Court, aye,' Lewrie surmised. 'Well fine, then, Mister Mountjoy. A fair morning's work, sir.'

'There is uhm… well, sir?' Mountjoy rejoined. 'As I stated, I was a scholar of languages. Our recent foe, sir, was called Fleche, Signore Capitano Guardino rather grumpily informed me.'

That worthy, at the mention of his name, drew himself up to his full height, which wasn't much worth mentioning, and tucked his voluminous coat over his greasy, straining waistcoat.

'A most interesting regional dialect, sir, the Genoese,' Thomas Mountjoy happily digressed. 'So quite unlike that Neapolitan Italian that I first heard…'

'Anything else, Mister Mountjoy?' Lewrie pressed, sensing that there was. And unwilling to waste half the rest of the day letting his clerk maunder and prose.

'Uhm, that her captain… Flйche's captain, that is… was named Michaud. Signore Guardino refers to him in rather a hostile manner, so I intuit, sir. A perfect Tartar, altogether. The signore capitano did express the wish that you blew him back to Hades, where he came from, I believe were his exact words, sir? Or at least made him as hideous as his superior, who is, in the capitano's mind, Satan himself, had he to choose betwixt the two. A cheese-parer, a miser, he called him, and a fiend, sir,.. this Brutto Faccia. Or, Le Hideux. He derogates him in Genoese, md French, with equal ease, sir.'

'Both of which mean, sir…?'

'In Italian, sir… that is to say, Ugly Face.' 'The Hideous,' is the French vernacular. Signore Guardino's ship was lying at Toulon, sir, and was, he protested, dragooned into French service. Such excuse for his participation, he believes most strongly…'

'Won't do him a damned bit of good,' Lewrie said, smirking. 'Well, sir. 'Le Hideux' is some new senior officer, just come down from Paris, so Signore Guardino related to me, sir… to command their convoys, and arrange escorts,' Mountjoy related with a confidential air. 'And to, uhm… inspire loyalty and enthusiasm in those officers and men under him. Brought his own guillotine, so 'tis said, sir,' Mountjoy concluded with a shivery, theatrical shrug.

'Then, Mister Mountjoy, do let us wish that Captain Michaud, have we not already knackered his arse,' Lewrie said with a grin over hearing the first bit of news that could possibly be considered cheery, 'his loss of this convoy will encourage his 'Hideous' superior to harvest his head! Very well, Mister Mountjoy. Well done.'

'Er… thank you, sir,' Mountjoy replied, nearly stunned to be complimented.

'Do you see Mister Knolles. He'll have work for you. And when he's done, there's a fair copy of my report to be produced for Admiral Hood.' 'Oh,' Mountjoy said, dashed at the prospect of another slew of correspondence. 'Very well, sir.'

Damme, I just hope the bastard gets the guillotine, Lewrie sighed to himself; this Michaud was just too clever by half! We'll have a much safer, and quieter, time of it, with him toasting on Satan's coals!

Commander Alan Lewrie, RN, surveyed his ship, peering forward at the truncated main and foremasts, the untidy, unbalanced jury-rigged display of low-angled forestays that bore spare canvas jibs, of masts spreading nothing cross-yarded above the tops'ls. The sailmaker, Mister Paschal, and his crew had taken half the foredeck for their work area, and were busily stitching and patching. No, Jester wouldn't dash into harbor in triumph; she'd limp, no faster than the odd clutch of prize vessels she would escort! It would be near the end of the Day Watch, the beginning of the First Dog, before she dropped anchor.

Time, and enough, to go below and visit the wounded first. See that fellow who was sure to pass over before then, if Howse was correct in his assessment… and think of something to say to him.

The report could be done later, after all. Delivered verbatim, in Hood's presence, really, with a written account to follow. Perhaps a rough draft in hand, should he dictate it to Mountjoy…?

And in the waist, along the ravaged larboard gangway, Marines in slop clothing, and sailors, toiled. Sluicing and holystoning away the bloodstains. Hammering and driving what spare lumber they carried in carpenter's and bosun's stores, to the music of the fiddler and fifer. Not the dirge he expected-they labored to the easy-paced lilts of 'The Derry Hornpipe.' Soft-joshing each other, faint smiles and some bleak chuckling, now and again. A subdued and fairly somber crew, aye, he thought; but not a broken one.

H M S Jester was still a useful instrument of war.

CHAPTER 3

'And,' Lewrie dictated to Mountjoy, who was scribbling away as fast as he could to get a rough draft, 'at no time were the three previous captured prize vessels ever actively threatened with recapture… as HMS Ariadne's captain suggests in his report. Therefore, sirs, his claims upon them are… damme, Mountjoy, what's a good legal word for horse turds?'

'I should think 'nugatory' would suit, sir,' Mountjoy allowed with a brief grin. 'Of little or no consequence.'

'Right, then,' Lewrie exulted, mopping his sweaty brow with a handkerchief, almost stifling in the great-cabin's enclosed warmth… and 'exercised' with sullen ill-humor, to boot. 'Therefore Ariadne's claim of shares in the aforesaid three vessels, taken solely by Jester long before her arrival… on the horizon, mind!… are nugatory, and totally without merit.'

'Same thing, really, Captain,' Mountjoy said dubiously.

'Wrap it in ribbons, plate it in gilt and shit… you read the law, you know the catchphrases.' Lewrie snorted impatiently. 'Hold him to the coals, and paint him the greedy fool. Trot out your really big guns and hull him, Mr. Mountjoy. The Prize Court 's bought every one of them, and their cargoes, and the settlement's been adjudged at nearly Ј30,000. And the lion's share should be ours. Ariadne didn't even get a scratch. Aye, add this… or something like it-couch it however you will- Jester fought the French national ship, and by her valiant duty reaped the higher honors, the greater glory, so…'

'To the victor belong the spoils, sir? Something like that?'

'Capital!' Lewrie rejoiced. 'I'll leave the rest to you, you know the form by now for closure in Navalese. Have it, and a copy, in hand for my signature by tomorrow morning… just into the forenoon.'

'Yes, sir,' Mountjoy assured him. 'I meant to say, 'aye aye, sir.' Sorry.'

'Very well, Mister Mountjoy, that should be all. Aspinall?'

'Aye, sir?'

'I'll have that fresh shirt and stock now, for shore.'

'Insufferable damn' pinchpenny,' Lewrie still fumed, even as he made his way uphill to his town house, sweating that fresh shirt and stock, his waistcoat and breeches, to a pearl-gray rather than white. San Fiorenzo Bay had turned into a roasting pan, the last month or so. Aboard ship, one might snatch a cooling draught of air under