Troubled Waters

forced and sham-ful anyway, a stiff and un-natural show for friends, family, and children, for Navy and Society. But there had been no warmth in it, not even a hint of the old intimacy, or the trust or the forgiveness, or…

Lewrie heaved a deep, resigned, and shrugging sigh. It was over, sure as Fate. He redressed in uniform, cocked hat, and sword, trying to compose his face as neatly as he could his clothes, looking round the set of rooms as if to discover a single thing that held even a jot of warmth, of comfortable familiarity… of Lewrie-hood, either his, or hers, and found nothing, for it was as empty and impartial as the yawning, gun-less gun-deck of a hulked warship.

Nothin for it, he grimly decided, snatching up those damning letters and cramming them into a side pocket. Perhaps Twigg could do him proud. The identity of the mysterious writer would never bring his wife round, but… there was always his own vengeance to wreak. That might prove satisfying.

He'd coach to London to try to save his life and honour. She would coach to Anglesgreen, and erase him from her life, and there was likely an end to it.

'Give ye joy o' the day,' Lewrie sadly whispered as he stepped out into the hall and softly shut the door. 'For ev'ry weddin' day is a time for good cheer.'

BOOK II

It is hard to say, whether the Doctors of Law

or Divinity have made the greater Advances

in the lucrative Business of Mystery.

Edmund Burke (1729-1797),

A Vindication of Natural Society (1756)

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

When Zachariah Twigg had said 'my coach,' Lewrie had pictured a typical six- passenger equipage, drawn by four horses, the sensible sort of carriage that most people of means owned. Come dawn, however, there before the Black Spread Eagle stood the twin to the commercial 'dilly,' the diligence, or balloon coach, big enough for nigh a dozen, if they were fairly intimate dwarves, and with even more seating atop.

Twigg was there already, in top-boots, old tricorne hat, and the voluminous double-caped greatcoat that Lewrie remembered from the harum-scarum ride that Twigg had given him the year before in his 'sporting' two-horse chariot from his Hampstead retreat, Spyglass Bungalow, to London at a terrifying rate of knots, with Twigg cracking his whip and howling maniacally, with the wind blowing back into their faces with a breath-stopping force!

'You'll, ah… not be takin' the reins, will you?' Lewrie asked in trepidation as an assistant coachee took his valise and carpet bag to stow in the boot.

'Oh, I thought at least one stage,' Twigg said, eyes twinkling in evil glee and anticipation, 'once on the flat.'

'Oh, Christ,' Lewrie muttered.

'And, your father, Sir Hugo, may take a leg, as well.'

'Oh, no!' Lewrie gawped.

I'd known this, I'd've hunted out a priest for last rites! he grimly told himself, feeling like he should cross himself.

'Ah, there's me slug-a-bed.' Sir Hugo chuckled as he came round the lead pair of the six-horse team, after checking harness, admiring the quality of the beasts, as well. 'Breakfasted? Been t'the jakes?'

'Aye. But, hearing that you and Mister Twigg'll be driving, I feel a sudden, new need,' Lewrie chaffered.

'And, well-armed, too, I see. Good lad,' his father haw-hawed.

Sir Hugo looked positively piratical, sporting a pair of double-barreled pistols in his waist-sash, and the pockets of his ornate general's coat sagging with another pair of lighter single-shot 'barkers.' He'd traded his rajah's tulwar for the plainer small-sword that Lewrie recalled from earlier days.

Come to think on it, Twigg's greatcoat showed similar bulges and lumpiness, and the drag of a sword scabbard could be seen under its hem… knowing Twigg, Lewrie strongly suspected that there were even more blades in hidden places-slim poignards, krees daggers from the Far East jammed into his boots, and God knew what else.

Might have grenadoes up his rectum, Lewrie decided.

Ajit Roy and Trilochan Singh came out of the inn carrying final articles of luggage, and both of them positively clanked with weaponry, chattering away in Hindi or Urdu as gay as magpies. Compared to them, Lewrie thought his hands, Cox'n Desmond, Landsman Furfy, and Landsman Jones Nelson, looked fairly naked, outfitted with but a cutlass each, clumsy Sea Pattern single-shot pistols, and their personal knives, which served for everything from work to dining.

'Like it?' Twigg asked, gesturing towards his coach. 'Hired it on from a fellow who refurbishes 'dillys.' Usually damned comfortable when travelling with only four or so,' he went on, whether Lewrie made a good or bad opinion, or none, as was his wont. 'Time is precious… the sun will soon rise, and we must be off. Board, sirs, board if you please.'

There were two additional bodies up in the box, the driver and an assistant, wearing subdued burgundy livery under their greatcoats. Two more held open the doors and lowered the folding metal steps, wearing the same livery, and, as Lewrie got aboard, he took note that the fellow who held the door with a blank-faced servant's expression for him, but, with darting, sly eyes for everything beyond, wore the most cunning set of holsters sewn inside his greatcoat. The briefest look at the fellow's overall appearance, and his taut and wary face, before he was seated inside, convinced Lewrie that the man had been a soldier at one time, and not a timid rear-ranker, either.

The coach swayed on its leather suspension straps as Desmond and his party clambered up onto the roof seats, poor Patrick Furfy awkward and heavy, as usual; it'd be a rare day that anyone sent Furfy aloft!

There came a clatter of hooves as four mounted men, all dressed in the same greatcoats, hats, and livery, paced up from a stable down the street. The leader leaned close to Twigg's lowered window, muttering a reply to Twigg's whispered instructions, and touched the brim of his hat before touching spurs and cantering away. Lewrie got a glimpse of a brass-hiked Heavy Cavalry Pattern sabre in a scabbard mounted on the saddle, a saddle- holstered pistol forward of his right knee, and a scabbarded musketoon's wooden butt peeking above the horse's rump.

'Out-riders, just in case,' Mr. Twigg confided with a hiss, and the look of a scrapper just spoiling for a battle; the way hungry men might look forward to toast and jam. 'Four, altogether. Once it gets warm enough, they'll doff the greatcoats… just so anyone contemplating ambush will be daunted, or… eliminated,' he added, with savage relish.

'The coachees and the footmen just as well armed?' Lewrie asked.

'Oh, yes!' Twigg said, smiling broadly as the coach lurched, and began to roll forward. 'A most useful party of men, altogether. Not always so overt in their purpose, but, in this instance, not only our showy appearance, but a show of force, I thought them necessary.'

'Rode down before us,' Sir Hugo casually imparted, yawning like an hippopotamus. 'Zachariah whistled 'em up, soon as he discovered the Beaumans' arrival. Lurked 'bout the piers, the church, and the wedding breakfast, and I'll wager ye never even noticed.'

'Didn't think t'look for such at a wedding,' Lewrie said with a snort. 'Disguised as ushers and acolytes, were they?'

'Most useful men, indeed,' Twigg told them all. 'Disguises do, now and again, play a part in their line of work. Hard as it is to believe in time of war, there are some nefarious sorts who will play spy for