King`s Captain

'concerned friend' knew her address there too. Looked her up on my way back to Anglesgreen, your dear wife bade me.'

'You what?' Alan said with a wince, sure the game was up after all this time. At Caroline's urging? 'She did?' And did his father try to put his leg over? 'How was she? How did she…? Is he really?' 'He has your eyes,' Sir Hugo cooed.

It was true, then; after all these years, he'd sired a bastard… one he knew of, at any rate. One he had to own up to… well, there'd been Soft Rabbit up the Appalachicola, but he'd scampered long before she'd borne his git… on King's business!

'Fetchin' wee lad,' Sir Hugo said, holding up the bottle to see if they'd need a replacement soon. 'And I'll give ya points, me son, for taste. A dev'lish-handsome woman is Mistress Theoni Connor. Those big amber eyes, almond-slanted and all, her chestnut hair? And still trim as a spinster lass, despite bearin' two 'gits.' '

'So… what did you tell Caroline?' Lewrie enquired, crossing his fingers for luck; feeling the urge to cross his legs too!

'Partways, the truth,' Sir Hugo replied, taping his noggin and looking especially sly.

Lewrie felt like putting his head on the desk and blubbing.

'Partways, lad.' Sir Hugo chuckled. 'Whorin' runs in the fam'ly blood… so does artful lyin'. Told her, yes, she's a newborn and she did name him after you… but for savin' her and her son, Michael, from rape and butchery… for helpin' her t'Venice to cash in, thence t'Lisbon and the packet ship for Bristol. Out of gratitude! But I also said I didn't see a bit of resemblance.'

'Thank bloody Christ for that!' Lewrie whooshed in relief. 'I mean… thank you, Father!' That was hard-wrung from him; Lewrie could not recall too many benefits he'd ever gotten from the man to thank him for!

'Lied main-well, if I do say so m'self,' Sir Hugo told him, as he smiled. 'Your ward, Sophie, did too.'

'Sophie? Hey? She never knew Theoni, so… Oh! Phoebe!'

'Aye, that'xm' Sir Hugo chuckled. 'Poor chit got flustered… when home, remember, does Sophie begin t'babble more Frog than English, she's up t'somethin'. But Sophie assured Caroline this Phoebe chit was just a seamstress and maid from Toulon… came aboard your ship as a refugee with hundreds of others, and served Sophie 'til she got off at Gibraltar. Your cabin was arseholes and elbows with emigres. No privacy anyway.'

'So what did Caroline make of all that?' Lewrie dreaded to ask.

'That there's a damn' sight too many women so 'grateful' to ya t'suit her. Allowed that it all might sound innocent… you bein' so manly and fetchin', or so she said. But there's a bit too much of it. Said maybe the damn' letter was from some termagant mort you'd spurned…!'

'Oh, good!'

'Should there actually be one in that category… hmmm?'

'Forehead creased?' Lewrie asked, crossing his fingers again.

'Nigh a yard deep,' Sir Hugo related. 'Muttered somethin' like 'where there's smoke, there's fire.' More fool you, me lad, marryin' a shrewd woman. I'd o' cautioned ye t'stick with 'stupid' if I knew you felt the marriage itch. Slack-wit women may fluff up 'jealous'… never for th' right reasons, thank God, so ye can get away with more. Now, Alice, Lord… I could've had her maid in the soup tureen, and she would've said the tang was off, was all.'

'So Caroline's mollified? Completely?'

'Well, let's say she almost was.. .'til your solicitor wrote to her,' Sir Hugo said, beginning to smirk and chuckle under-his breath as he topped their glasses with the last of the bottle. 'Beg pardon?'

'Needed seed money, day-labourer's wages. Feller said that she couldn't get as much as she'd requested since ye'd promised one-hundred-sixty pounds to some Sheerness women for, ah… 'services rendered.' ''

'But that was for helpin' me… they weren't… I never!' 'Stap me, didn't I caution ye. Quality beats Quantity all hollow, me lad?' Sir Hugo had the cruelty to hoot in high humour.

'Thirty-two of 'em, surely the number told her it was preposterous…' Lewrie spluttered some more, growing numb.

'I'll not get in the middle o' that 'un,' Sir Hugo vowed.

Aye, it'd look that way, wouldn't id Lewrie sighed to himself; / am so well and truly … ruined! Do I go home, I'll most-like be shot on sight.¹ Her brother, Governour, always was toppin '-fair with pistols!

'We need another bottle,' his father pointed out.

'Gad, yes… I expect we do,' Lewrie replied, stumbling over to the wine-cabinet and fetching one himself, stripping the lead foil off and fiddling with the cork.

'Oh, give it here, cunny-thumbs. I know my way 'round a cork,' Sir Hugo crankily told him. 'There… d'ye see? Slap, twist… pop!' 'Think it's safe to go home?' Lewrie enquired, once re-enforced.

'Not if you care for breathin', no… not for a while. Gathered from the keyhole like… things'll be more'n a tad frosty, for quite a spell. 'Time heals all wounds,' they say though. She'll still write… though she suggested separate letters to yer children so ye and she can thrash things out in private missives. I also gathered she's of a mind that your Navy can have ye…'twas best you're at sea and absent. At least a year in foreign climes, she said t'me direct. I did fetch a letter along. Sorry, lad. Tried me damnedest, but…'

He slid a rather slim letter across the desk, making Lewrie lean far back from the edge, half expecting it to burst into flames!

'And whilst I was passin' through London on the way here, Alan… I also stopped off t'see your mistress. She bade me bear a letter to ye as well.'

'She's not my mistress!' Lewrie felt need to growl. 'I've not seen her since Lisbon, not heard a word…'

'Oh, is she not?' his father drawled, amusedly. 'May have little need o' yer loot… Hindi word for plunder, by-the-by… but I've ears, me lad. I know th' sound o' fondness when a lady speaks of a feller… how she asked after ye an' all?' he added, softer, more kindly.

He slid the second over; this one was thicker-much thicker.

And which'll I end up readin' first? he asked himself, fearing to touch either, yet unwilling to shuffle them into a drawer together.

'That damned 'concerned friend' letter,' he said instead, 'is there a single clue as to where it came from, who wrote it?'

'No return address o' course,' his father said, with a shrug of his shoulders, making his epaulets dance and glitter. 'As I said, it was a good hand, quite cultured, in fact. Costly paper, but no identifying seal in the wax. Who might've known about your Mediterranean doin's?'

'Lucy Beauman… old amour from the Caribbean,' Lewrie confessed, 'Lady Lucy Shockley now… she was there in Venice. I turned down her advances.'

'Well, there's a wonder!' His father hooted once more.

'Married woman, throwin' herself at me, and havin' it off with another Navy officer, Commander Fillebrowne, at the same time!' Lewrie spat, railing at Lucy's morals.

'Oh, such shameful doin's.' Sir Hugo mocked.

'Well, I quite liked her husband.'

'Could she be your anonymous correspondent, then?'

'Doubt it.' Lewrie frowned in thought, all but chewing a thumb nail. 'A bold, florid penmanship, as I recall… rich as Croesus even when single, but… sheep could spell better than she could! Well…'

'Hmmm?' his father prompted, with a purr.

'Fillebrowne. Clotworthy Chute diddled him with some expensive 'instant' antique Roman bronzes. You recall Clotworthy from Harrow?'