Troubled Waters

boiled mutton, had departed Jamaica for England.

Now they'd finally discovered just who it was who stole their dozen prime field hands from one of their many plantations, the one on the shore of Portland Bight (well, sort of, kind of, recruited or received, not stolen exactly!), they were come with vengeance running hot in their spleens to see him tried, convicted, stripped of all of his wealth and property, cashiered from the Royal Navy, then most publicly and satisfyingly carted to Tyburn and hung from a gibbet, to the taunts from the Mob, and the Huzzahs of the Beaumans.

Never should've shot their damned cousin in that duel, Lewrie silently rued, grimly recalling when he'd seconded his old friend Kit Cashman, who'd drilled the youngest Beauman brother, Ledyard, right in the belly, too, who'd taken five agonising days to die after they had scandalously violated the rules of honour with a back-shot, and extra, hidden pistols. Though it was satisfyin'…

Most of the bumboats and boats for hire were scurrying about from vessel to vessel, and for the moment, only two remained tied to the landing, their shabby bundled or furled sails rustling and snapping to the breeze, and frayed rope halliards chattering against their short masts, the blocks clattering and squealing. Lewrie paused from choosing, taking a long look seaward. It was such a clear and sunny day that he could even see far up-channel into the main anchorage of Spithead, past Gilkicker Point into the little-used and shallow channel of Needles Passage round the west end of the Isle of Wight. Redcoats standing sentry-go on the ramparts of the Monckton Fort could be spotted individually. To the east, he could even make out the heights of Selsey Bill, for a rare wonder.

And there was his brand-new frigate, HMS Savage, anchored not five cables offshore, and as shiny as a new-minted penny, just fresh from the graving docks.

Her new hull paint, tar, and pitch shone in the morning light, every glitter of sunshine on the cat's-pawed harbour waters reflected down her sleek flanks like a continual shower of diamond chips. She floated light and high, less her guns and stores, which still sat ashore in warehouses and armouries at Gun Wharf, or among the goods from the Victualling Board's vast depot, and fresh copper cladding, normally below the waterline, flickered with dapples of sun like a horizontal sheet of gold or brass.

She was a Fifth Rate 18-pounder of over 950 tons burthen, the largest, longest, best-armed ship Lewrie had ever been appointed to command, and the thought of losing captaincy over her was as painful as the dread of dying. She was long, lean, and powerful-looking with such a sweet, aggressive curve to her sheerline and gunwale, with an entry and forefoot finer and leaner than the usual bluff bowed ships built in British yards. She was a leashed greyhound! A French greyhound, Lewrie had to remind himself; even so, though…

The French had built her at Brest, of stout Hamburg oak before the outbreak of the war in 1792, and commissioned in the vicious and bloody turmoil of the Terror in '93, named in honour of the crackpot ideas of the philosopher Rousseau as Le Sauvage Noble. Sent out to an ignoble sacrifice, Lewrie had learned, for with all the former aristocratic or Royalist-leaning officers of the French Navy dismissed from the service, hunted down for trial and humiliation by the revolutionaries, imprisoned for a time were they lucky… their heads chopped off by the heavy, wicked blade of the guillotine were they not… she had been captained, and her semi-hapless crew led, by former Bosun's Mates and matelots with the 'proper' revolutionary attitudes and viewpoints. When she ran afoul of a lighter-gunned British frigate off Rochefort a year later, in '94, all her grace and power had gone for nought and she had abjectly surrendered after a mere quarter- hour's pounding!

Re-named HMS Savage, taking the name of a much older Sixth Rate of 16 guns that had gone to the breakers after serving since 1761, she'd been 'bought in' and commissioned into the Royal Navy for a full three years of active service before requiring a 'truck to keel' refit, a new crew, and a new captain, and Lewrie had thought himself as fortunate to get her, but…

'Hoy there, fellow!' someone cried nearby. 'A boat, at once, I say!' Lewrie turned away from admiring his frigate to espy an officer, a Lieutenant in best-dress uniform, trotting along the quay, chivvying a much older, gap- toothed and one-eyed civilian in charge of a broken-down hand-cart piled with the officer's dunnage, the Lieutenant lending a hand on one of the shafts to speed the handcart along. Lewrie noted the typical sea-chest, much battered and scraped, with its original gay and martial paint nearly faded away; a large canvas sea-bag, and a pair of stuffed-to-bursting portmanteaus made of scrap carpet, to boot, atop the precarious and wobbly cart.

'I'm late, I'm late!' the younger officer could be heard to say. 'Christ, a quarter past Eight Bells! I'm fucked, so bloody fucked… oh' he exclaimed as he took note of Lewrie and his pair of epaulets. He visibly blanched, almost slammed to a stop in chagrin to use blasphemy and Billingsate in the presence of a Post-Captain.

'Joining a ship, are you?' Lewrie enquired, putting a 'stern' expression on his phyz. 'Cuttin' it rather fine, ain't you?'

'Aye, sir,' the Lieutenant replied, doffing his cocked hat in salute, to which Lewrie replied with two fingers touching the brim of his own. 'Got the last coach, skin o' me teeth, that, and arrived at a late hour last night, sir. Some old friends at the Blue Posts…'

'Indeed,' Lewrie primly drawled, quite enjoying himself, for a rare once lately. Damme, this is fun! he thought. 'And they simply had to 'wet you down' to your new posting, hmm?'

'Aye, sir,' the Lieutenant shamefacedly replied.

'A damned bad beginning, sir,' Lewrie admonished. To punctuate his shammed disdain for such, he drew out his pocket-watch and peered at its face, then turned and waved at the last remaining hired boat at the foot of the landing, for, during their brief conversation, another Lieutenant and two Midshipmen had engaged the other, better boat.

'I, ah…,' the Lieutenant began to say, realising that he was going to be even later reporting aboard his new ship, for he was out-ranked and would have to wait for the return of anything that floated.

'I s'pose I could offer you a ride, Mister, ah…?' Lewrie idly offered.

'Urquhart, sir. Ed'ard Urquhart,' the other told him, looking desperately into the middle distance to see if anything resembling a hired boat was coming back to the foot of the King's Stairs empty. 'Edward, mean t'say…,' he babbled on. 'Might I enquire as to where your ship is anchored, sir? Mine own is quite near at hand… that frigate just yonder, sir… Savage.'

Aha! Lewrie exultantly thought; they've finally got round to sendin' me a First Officer, at last! One had turned up, weeks before, but that'un had pleaded off sick after the first week, and had departed looking like Death's Head On A Mop-Stick, hacking, wheezing, coughing, and hoicking up phlegm by the bucket. He's mine, damn his eyes!

'What? Captain Alan Lewrie's ship?' Lewrie pretended to scoff.

'Aye, sir.'

'Under that scoundrel, that rogue?' Lewrie mock-sneered. 'That rakehell Corinthian? Hah! God have mercy on your soul, then, sir!'

Lt. Edward (or Ed'ard) Urquhart blushed and gulped, timorously replying, 'I was given to understand, though, sir, that Captain Lewrie is a most distinguished and capable captain. A renowned …'

'Any fool can be brave and dashin', don't ye know, sir,' Lewrie pooh-poohed. 'Well, then, Mister Urquhart. I will, this once, mind, take mercy 'pon ye, and allow you to board that shiny wee barge, before attending to mine own urgent return to my ship. Bargee! Two passengers… and all this… jetsam.'

The boatman and his assistant helped place the heavy sea-chest amidships of their scruffy little launch, while Lt. Urquhart saw to his own sea-bag and carpet bags, an act that secretly pleased Lewrie, for most young men of the squirearchy, who made up the bulk of the Navy's officers, would have stood aloof on their dignity and depended on the lesser sorts to hew and haul.

Lt. Urquhart stepped down into the rustling boat, following the time-honoured tradition that senior officers would be 'Last In, First Out' when transferring from a ship or shore.

'W'ich ship, Cap'm?' the bargee at the tiller asked, once they were settled upon their respective thwarts.

'We'll go to Savage first,' Lewrie stated. 'A short sail for you. The 'gant-lined'