A Jester’s Fortune

'Mister Crewe?' Lewrie called. 'Give that'un a broadside! Not a warning shot, mind.'

'Aye, sir! Number one gun… as you bear… fire!' Jesters 9-pounders began to bark, lurching inboard in recoil as they lit off one by one down her larboard side, billowing great stinking clouds of spent powder. Feathers of spray leaped from the sea, so close to the xebec's hull the pillars wetted her sails as they collapsed. At a quarter-mile range, they could hear the wrenching thonks! of timbers being ravaged by solid strikes.

As the gun-smoke trailed alee and they could see once more, it was a gratifying sight they beheld. The nearest xebec or light galley had whirled away, stern-on to Jester, her lateen yards hauled in taut and almost fore-and-aft, to beat out of range towards Brae, up north. The other three had turned tail and were beating up-channel for that mutton-shoulder point, all thought of pursuit or confrontation beaten-or shot-out of them.

'Secure, Mister Crewe. And good shooting!' Lewrie congratulated. 'Mister Knolles, once the guns are bowsed up, we'll wear ship, end up running off-wind, on starboard tack. To close that merchantman.'

'Aye, sir.'

'Put th' wind up you, I'd wager!' Benjamin Rodgers wheezed with glee, once Lewrie was aboard Pylades and seated in the great-cabins, a glass of wine in his paws. 'Not often a Chase comes about and charges ye, an' there's the biter, bit… by God! Think she was a frigate for a moment there, did ye, Lewrie?'

'Damn right I did, sir,' Lewrie felt free to admit. In strictest privacy, with a good friend who wouldn't retell the story on him with a bit of spite. Well, of course, he'd retell it, Lewrie then realized. He'd dine out ¹ on it for bloody years, more-like! But at least it wouldn't be harmful to his reputation. 'Though, sir…'he felt he had to quibble, 'would you have signaled me, since you could see up that channel to what she was doing better from seaward, well…! That would o' been welcome.'

'Batavian Dutch merchantman,' Rodgers breezed on, topping up his own and Lewrie's glasses. 'Cleared from a French port, Marseilles, to fetch timber. General cargo aboard, tasty Frog exports all. Care for a dozen-dozen o' champagne f'r yer lazarette, hey? Pipe'r two o' tasty claret? Almost into port at Spalato-Split, whatever-where they'd pick up oak, pine, naval stores and compass-wood for the Frog Navy. So close and yet so far, hey? Poor bastards.'

'Damnation to Venice, I say, sir,' Lewrie offered, proposing the toast with a raised glass. 'To trade with a dangerous enemy.'

'Aye, stead o' usin' their timber t'refit their own ships,' Rodgers echoed a like sentiment. 'Can't they see, the French win in Lombardy, and the damn war comes t'them, whether they like it or no? Been sit-tin' safe an' snug too long, with th' Austrians playin' constable for 'em. You can be sure, Lewrie… th' Frogs beat Austria this summer, there'll be French ships all over th' Adriatic, an' then where are the Venetians, if they're as unprepared as you told Charlton?'

'Up shit's-creek, sir.' Lewrie shrugged. 'Old Frog expression.'

'By God, sir, but Captain Ten Bosch was glad t'see you!' Captain Rodgers hooted. 'Thought he'd be knacky, an' duck north round Brae, an' then run up th' coast inside Venice's three-mile limit. Didn't think o' runnin' foul o' pirates, haw haw!'

'Those Croatian pirates we heard of in Trieste, sir? Those… Us-cocchi?' Lewrie asked.

'No, this ain't their bailiwick,' Rodgers countered. 'Christ, though… just like the old days. Toss tuppence in the gutter, an' up pops all th' damn' pirates ya'd ever wish t'see. Serbs, Greeks, Turks workin' for some rebel Pasha… it don't signify. They've more buccaneers in these waters than a soldier's got lice, anyway. 'Least we put the fear o' God in 'em this mornin'. Whichever god they wail to, at any rate. This might work t'our advantage, Lewrie.'

'How so, sir?' Alan enquired dubiously. He'd had more than his fill of pirates in the Far East and the Bahamas.

'All our worries 'bout pursuit 'mong these islands.' Rodgers winked. 'Or goin' too close inshore. Did we see a Venetian warship, today, I ask you, sir? And I'll lay you any odds you want, we'll not see theirs, nor anyone else's, all th' way south t'th' Ionians, nor th' Straits of Otranto. We've a free rein, in th' first instance. And, were I a merchantman, I'd be more afraid of gettin' took by pirates'n I'd ever be o' bein' took by us. We don't cut their damn throats!'

'So they'd be afraid of getting close enough in to get taken,' Lewrie realised, 'that they'd be fair game for us, sir?'

'Exactly, Lewrie.' Rodgers smirked. 'Like that fellow Ten Bosch said this mornin'… we're the fryin' pan, the pirates're the fire. You stick your bowsprit inside the islands, go within spitting distance o' th' coastline, and you're sure t'get took. An' butchered like a steer 'cause yer th' wrong damn' religion, wrong damn' eye colour… by God, Lewrie! We're rescuin' angels in comparison!'

CHAPTER 2

For a backwater of the war, the Adriatic teemed with shipping. Farther on south, Pylades and Jester encountered another enemy merchantman, just west of Ragusa, and seaward of Pylades, in deep water. A fine two-masted brig became their prize, a prize that temporarily put up the French Tricolour flag before striking at the sight of Pylades and her open gun-ports.

By dusk of the same day, they'd met another, this one inshore of them, and beating hard to flee into the protection of Ragusas fortress guns. Jester had begun the chase badly out of position, a bit too far Sou'west of her to cut the angle, this time, and had been forced to go right for her stern, only weathering her the slightest bit. It was the longest sort of chase, and they'd lost the race in the end. Once more, a French merchant ship had hoisted their blue-white-red Tricolour flag.

This time, however, it was in derision, as they sailed almost into spitting distance of Ragusas well-armed fortifications before making the larboard dogleg turn that would take them into the harbour proper.

And, as Lewrie continued to close the coast to within a mile of the fortifications, with his gun-ports closed, all thoughts of fruitful pursuit gone… the French crew hoisted their bare arses over the rails and jeered their failure!

Dawn found Jester well south of Ragusan territory, and south of the tiny Venetian enclave of Cattaro, loafing along under all plain sail to a slight Easterly wind off the shore, a Levanter. Though a Levanter was usually a sign of bad weather-in this part of the world, nothing good ever came from the un-Christian East!-it seemed rather a benign beginning for a new day. And it was not as chilly as that Bora which had dominated on the previous day, from the North or Nor'west.

'Bar, sir,' the Sailing Master intoned.

'Where away?' Lewrie frowned in sudden dread. Could those damn Venetian charts be trusted, or not?

'No, sir.' Mr. Buchanon chuckled. 'Bar, meanin' th' name o' th' town, sir. Off our larb'd beam, now, Captain.'

'Ah.' Lewrie reddened, irked that he'd taken fright of running his Jester onto an uncharted bar. 'Just so. Now, Mister Buchanon… would that be a Montenegran Bar? Or is that the Albanian Bar? I mind the border's somewhere over yonder.' He japed his way out of embarrassment.

'Think it's still Montenegran, sir,' Lieutenant Knolles supplied, full of good cheer that morning. 'Had a peek at the charts, just 'fore the change of watch. That rebel Pasha of Scutari the Austrians told us of? He's inland, somewhere just abaft of abeam. And the port of Dulcigno, sir? Where the Corsairs lurk? Allies, I'd suspect. Somewhere yonder, at any rate. Ah, coffee! Capital!'

Aspinall came up from the great-cabins with a set of mugs upon a hank of twine and a pot of coffee for them all. With him, unfortunately, came Lewrie's new clerk, Padgett, with a selection of ledgers under his arm. And up from the waist came the Purser Mr. Giles, grinning in a dangerous fashion, with his own new clerk, his 'Jack in the