Sea of Grey

'Atrip… heave and awash!' The best bower anchor broke free of the sandy bottom and swayed above the surface.

HMS Proteus sidled a bit, swinging free of the ground, taken by the Nor'Nor'east winds, a quickly hoisted outer flying jib backed cross-deck up forrud to force her to fall off to larboard tack, taking the wind on the left-hand side of her bows, her square sails on her yards swinging about and luffing end-on, blocks clattering, canvas snapping and rustling.

Free!

Langlie was an able deck officer; Lewrie left it to him and his juniors to get way on her, as Proteus's bows swung more Easterly, still not under control. He stepped over to the double-wheel and the compass binnacle, to stand by the quartermasters on the helm.

'Full and by on larboard tack, Mister Motte,' Lewrie ordered as he looked out to weather. 'Nothing to loo'rd. Make her head Due East… or as close as you may manage.'

'Aye, sir… Due East, an' nothin' t'loo'rd,' Motte echoed as he tentatively spun the wheel to find a 'bite' to the rudder.

The forecourse and main course were now drawing, being braced in to cup the wind. Inner, outer, and flying jib were bellied alee, as were the middle stays'l and main topmast stays'l; the mizen tops'l and the main and fore tops'ls were stiffening with the wind's press, and their frigate began to heel a bit, beginning to make her sweet way, churning salt water to a slight froth close-aboard, chuckling and muttering back to the sea as she got a way on, and hardening up on the wind's eye, on larboard tack.

There! A first lift of the bows as the scend off the North Sea found her as she gained the Queen's Channel, the first burst of spray under her jib-boom!

Free! Lewrie exulted, taking a deep, cleansing breath of iodine tang; Caroline, Theoni, rage, bills… shore-shite!

He paced over to the windward railing, up the deck which was now slightly canted as more sail sprouted to gather free, willful winds. A faint chorus sang in the rigging, a faint applause rose from her wake as she laid the start of a wide bridal train astern, fought to make the 'mustachio' of foam before her bows.

He felt like singing, at that moment!

'Do you wish more sail at the moment, sir?' Lt. Langlie asked, once the t'gallants were set and drawing.

'No, Mister Langlie, that'll do quite nicely,' Lewrie said as he turned to face him, smiling, at ease at last. 'Stand on as we are, 'til we make a long offing.'

'Aye, sir.'

'And I'll have a tune, Mister Langlie,' Lewrie added. 'Summon the fiddlers. Spanish Ladies, I should think.'

'Er… aye aye, sir.'

The hands were piped down from aloft, the last tug of a brace was tugged. Sheets and halliards were gathered on pin-rails and fife-rails, the hawsers were hosed down and stowed below in the cable tiers, the hawse bucklers fitted to block spray and sluices from high waves. Excess ropes were flemished down in neat piles. Proteus was ship-shape.

Farewell and adieu, to you Spanish ladies,

farewell and adieu, you ladies of Spain!

For we've received orders t'sail from old England,

and we hope in a short time t 'see you again.

We'll rant and we'll roll, like true British sailors,

We'll rant and we'll roll, all across the salt seas!

Until we strike soundings, in the channel of old England,

from Ushant to Scilly is thirty-five leagues!'

Fiddles, tin-whistles, the youngish Marine drummer, and Desmond on his uillean lap-pipes, made it sweetly longing.

' 'So let ev'ry man, raise up his full bumper,' ' Lewrie joined in, bellowing (as was his wont when singing) the words out, ' 'let ev'ry man drink up his full glass… for we'll laugh and be jolly, a-and chase melancholy… with a well-given toast to each true-hearted lass!' '

A few lances of sunshine broke through the dawn clouds, spearing HMS Proteus, making her glisten as bright as a new-minted coin, as she proudly made her way to sea, all bustle and swash, gleaming fresh canvas and giltwork flashing… out where she properly belonged.

No matter where those sealed orders took them.

CHAPTER NINE

Is he reading them?' Lieutenant Catterall, the sly and waggish rogue who had risen from senior Midshipman to Third Officer, asked.

'Aye, just now,' Lieutenant Langlie answered as he paced along the windward side of the quarterdeck, stepping over the ring-bolts and tackles of the light 6-pounders and 24-pounder carronades.

'Opened 'em, sir?' Bosun Mr. Pendarves enquired.

'I do believe, Mister Pendarves,' Lt. Lewis Wyman replied with an abrupt nod, as he stood at the top of the larboard gangway ladder.

'So we'll soon know our orders, won't we, Mister Pendarves?' Mr. Midshipman Sevier (the shy one) opined near the ladder's foot.

'Or, not,' Mr. Midshipman Adair, a clever Scots lad, jeered at him. 'He has no duty to tell us anything, if it's secret doings.'

'Gracious!' little Midshipman Elwes gasped. 'Secret work?'

'Work o' some sort's in order, young sirs,' Bosun Pendarves told them, noting that all six 'mids' were hanging about, ears cocked for a bit of gossip and doing nothing, which was sinful in boys, either nautical or civilian. 'Go on, now… back t'yer duties, lads.'

'Bloody Christ, this is lunacy,' Lewrie muttered aloud once he had broken the seals on his canvas-bound supplemental 'advisories.'

'Sir?' Aspinall idly asked from his wee pantry.

'Someday I'd love t'meet a one-armed Admiralty clerk, Aspinall. Someone who can never say 'but on the other hand',' Lewrie griped. At least Aspinall was amused.

The Royal Navy was infamous for over-vaunting orders. Sending a small brig o' war to patrol off Leith was too easy, too simple. No, additional tasks were always larded on, like sketching the headlands, taking new soundings when not chasing smugglers, amassing a new dictionary of Scots' slang, trawling for a 1588 wreck rumoured to contain Spanish Armada gold and silver, or fetching back some pregnant female sturgeons for the royal table!

His advisories did not require any new tasks of a secret or more perilous nature than usual, but…

On the other hand! Lewrie most snidely thought, snickering.

They were secret, nonetheless. Lewrie suspected that they had been so labeled because no one responsible for their issuance was willing to let himself be known as a complete lack-wit!

Lewrie got to his feet, shaking his head in wonder as he paced aft to the transom settee, to gaze out upon the ship's wake. It was a grey and blustery day, the horizon a bare two miles of visibility even from the mastheads, when Proteus was rolled and scended upwards atop a salty hillock. The ocean was a'heave, grey-green and spumed by white caps and white horses. Proteus groaned and creaked, then roared as she soared aloft on a wide, rising wave, her sails and masts, her standing rigging strained wind-full. Moments later, the sluicing roar was even louder as she coasted and surfed down into an equally wide, but deep, trough, where her courses were robbed of wind and slatted, whilst her tops'ls and t'gallants remained taut, and her stout bows thundered as they met a low hedge of water that ran a shudder through her timbers from stem to stern.

He unconsciously shifted his weight from foot to foot, as if he were riding a short seesaw atop a drum, as