The Captain`s Vengeance

Another day, another guided tour, Lewrie thought.

They'd not found Lanxade or Balfa; indeed, they'd been rumoured to have departed New Orleans for parts unknown. Even with Toby Jugg, the only witness they'd dared bring along on the expedition, wandering the port on his own for days on end, they'd not turned up one familiar face from the pirate ship's crew-or recognised a single one of the elegant young sprogs on the buccaneer schooner's deck the morning that Lewrie's prize-ship crew had been marooned.

So this morning involved 'that other nonsense' that Lewrie and Pollock were charged to perform, and frankly, though Lewrie thought it a bootless endeavour, he had to admit that it was pleasureable work.

The morning was slightly overcast, but balmy. There was a faint breeze that felt refreshing, and it was not mosquito season, though a goodly tribe of flies were present round their horses.

He'd been shown the Cabildo and the cathedral their first days on foot, strolled the streets and pretended to shop… round the fort guarding the town centre and the levees, out Rue de l'Arsenal to the garrison barracks and the storehouses to count Spanish noses one day; rode to Lake Pontchartrain's shore through the reclaimed marshes that were now greengrocer produce plots to sniff round decrepit Fort Saint John, and the reeky Bayou St. John that threaded right into the city.

This morning Pollock suggested a brisk canter out to the east, along the Chef Menteur road towards Lake Borgne, across the Plain of Gentilly, near Bayou Bienvenu, with a promised alfresco dinner at the end of it. Lewrie was a good horseman, but it had been a while since he'd spent that much time astride. In point of fact, his thighs were chafing, and his bottom was stiff and sore!

'Damme, Mister Pollock, I didn't think you meant to emulate Alexander's march into Persia!' he griped at last, trying to rub his ass.

'Almost there, no worries,' Pollock gaily replied.

'Almost where, the middle of another swamp?' Lewrie carped, as Pollock checked his horse to a slow walk from a canter in the shade of a tall cypress grove.

'What do you make of the country hereabouts, sir?' Pollock asked.

'Well, it's green, frankly,' Lewrie said with a scowl as he cast his gaze about. 'Hellish lot o' trees, and such. All these fields… the usual marshy sponges, I s'pose, 'neath the prairie grass?'

'Quaking prairie, such as we've seen before? No. Not quite,' his guide told him, sounding a tad pleased with himself. 'Take note of the variety of the grasses, the sandier nature of the soil. Oh, rainy season will turn the sand and clay into a perfect quagmire, but in the winter, or a warm and dry springtime, it's… passable. Grazeable.'

Lewrie took note that their horses' hooves left fairly shallow prints and didn't throw up much mud, except for the lower places… but they'd crossed a fair number of rivulets and seeps.

'Not much quicksand out here, either, sir,' Pollock mused.

'Nor much market for it, either, I'd expect,' Lewrie quipped. 'Bad for egg timers and watch-glasses, hey?'

'The bulk of the grasses here, Mister Willoughby,' Mr. Pollock irritatedly explained, 'are not marsh grasses, like those round rills and along the bayou channel. They're dry-land grasses. If the soil along Lake Pontchartrain won't support troops, artillery, or waggons, do you not think that this terrain might be more practicable? Please leave off your japing and take a good look, I conjure you!'

'Well, aye, I s'pose the land here is higher and dryer,' Lewrie allowed, dismounting and squatting to dig up a handful to crumble in his hands, wondering again why anyone in his right mind would send a sailor on a chore like this, instead of a soldier… or a farmer! He was, at best, a 'gentleman-farmer' on his rented acres in Surrey, one who might 'raise his hat' but little else. That was his wife's bailiwick, what her experience and knowledge from an agricultural childhood in North Carolina had taught her; what their hired estate manager and day labourers tended to without Lewrie having to do much beyond shout encouragement, heartily agree like the Vicar of Bray, then toddle down to the Olde Ploughman tavern for an ale.

'Firm enough to support… things, perhaps?' Pollock hinted.

'Aye, I think it might be,' Lewrie dumbly agreed.

'Mount up, then, and we'll ride on to the end of the road and have our meal,' Pollock suggested, pleased with Lewrie's opinion.

'Bring any liniment?' Lewrie asked with a grin, taking time to massage his buttocks, with the reins in his hands.

'Sorry, no… Said you were a horseman.' Pollock snickered.

They dismounted and spread a groundcloth at the end of the Chef Menteur road, on a sandy, beach-dune hillock on the western shore of Lake Borgne. A vast expanse of open water-seawater-stretched out before them to the south and southeast, the lake's horizon mostly limitless, except for due east, where, cross a fairly narrow channel or river, the swamps began again and made a vast, reedy, and marshy island that blocked the view; here and speckled with a few straggling groves of scrub trees.

Once the horses had been hobbled and let to graze, once they'd been led to fresh water to drink, Pollock did provide a decent spread, Lewrie had to allow. There were crusty, fresh baguettes, mustard and butter in small stone jars, and pickles in another. A choice of roast beef or ham was wrapped in one cloth, and several pieces of crispily breaded and fried chicken were wrapped in another. A glass apothecary jar contained cold, cooked beans in oil and vinegar, and there were two bottles of imported hock. Pewter plates and utensils, spare chequered napkins, and proper wineglasses… Pollock had seen to everything.

Another thing Lewrie had to admit to himself as he concocted a thick, meaty sandwich (or was it, as his cabin- servant, Aspinall, had cheekily termed it, a 'Shrewsbury,' for the real lord who'd first built one at an all-night gaming table?) and took a bite: risky though this expedition might be, he was actually beginning to enjoy it!

A night or two in a comfy shore bed, with fine coffee or hot chocolate delivered to his bedside by one of his pension's servants; of sleeping lubberly, civilian 'All-Night-Ins' with no emergencies to summon him on deck; and a myriad of coffeehouses, cabarets, wine bars, or eating places from which to choose had seduced him utterly. And the victuals, the viands, the delicious variety, all but a few low dives preparing piquant, unforgettable dishes, ah!

And Charite Bonsecours and her enthusiastic amour to savour… to contemplate another bout after the first and second, well! He was, but for a troop of nubile and nude nymphs feeding him ambrosia… or grapes… in the fabled Lotus Eater's Paradise!

'Out to the Nor'east, yonder, is Cat Island,' Mr. Pollock intruded, rattling out the folds of his inevitable chart to lay between them as they dined. 'Between Cat Island and the mainland is the inlet they call Pass Maria, ah… here, ahem.' Pollock indicated with a forefinger, which left a dab of mustard on Lake Borgne. 'There is deep water on the seaward side, you see. Near to Ship Island, as well. This swampy island before us, t'other side of this channel, has a fort at the north end, Fort Coquilles, to control the pass into Lake Pontchartrain, but… there's nothing to guard against ships entering Lake Borgne… coming right to the shore on which we sit, Willoughby! In your valued opinion, could Fort Coquilles prevent a landing here?'

'What calibre are their guns?' Lewrie asked, measuring distance 'twixt thumb and forefinger, and laying them on the chart's scale. It was a full five miles from the fort to the channel mouth.

'I've heard boasts that they're twenty-four-pounders,' Pollock supplied. 'Ships' guns, on naval carriages.'

'They'd not have a hope in Hell,' Lewrie told him, sure enough of artillery, one of his chiefest delights since his first experience of a broadside on the old Ariadne. 'No mortars? No big'uns?'

'Only light Coehorn mortars on the landward walls, I have discovered, over the years,' Pollock guardedly declared. 'Our Spaniards are a boastful lot when shopping. Do you use my telescope, you can almost make out the fort to the north and east of us. It's placed on firm ground, so I'm told, at this island's tip. The Pass, the lakes, are too shallow for deep-draught ships, so I suppose the fort was set in place to counter small vessels and gunboats from getting past it.'