Troubled Waters

become a foe to Britain, or a substantial ally to other powers opposed to us, their economies so bankrupt that maintaining a navy to face ours would be impossible, effectively isolating them all in their own regions, unable to affect the expansion of the British Empire beyond the range of some yew heavy fortress guns, much less affect Europe.

'And…,' Twigg concluded with great satisfaction, 'ripe for the plucking should we ever wish such hapless, ungovernable snake pits.'

'My God, that's… Christ!' Lewrie goggled in awe, thinking of the hundreds of thousands, no… the millions doomed to die in revolts.

'Should they require arms and powder, well…' Twigg waved off.

'I don't know whether t'congratulate you, or curse you,' Lewrie finally said. 'All the Americas up in flames, blood flowin' like rivers…'

'Take your Eudoxia Durschenko, she of the long, fine limbs, and firm breasts, Lewrie,' Twigg continued.

'Huh… what? What does she have t'do with…?'

'Ever been to the Russias, Lewrie?' Twigg almost benignly asked. 'I have. Serfdom is the Achilles' heel of the Tsars, as bad an 'institution' as slavery. Once outside the grand palaces and salons of their refined, French-speaking aristocracy, Russia is as backward and appalling as a trip back to the Dark Ages, all mud, mire, and shite. A serf is a landless tenant so dependent upon the good will of his land owner that he can be flogged to death with great bull-whips… knouts, they call them… for looking at them cross. Turf a serf and his family off the land for some offence, and they become lepers, pariahs, unwelcome anywhere, and usually starve to death. The Tsar wishes to fight a war, he has to raise troops, and sends word down to the country aristocracy… 'hey ho, each estate must conscript twenty-or-so young men for the army,' and off they go, for twenty years' service… marched very far away from home ground, and barracked among strangers… so, should they be called out to read the equivalent of the Riot Act, and fire on the locals, they have no compunctions whatsoever.

'Russian peasants are a brutal lot to begin with, so demanding brutal measures from them is an easy matter,' Twigg informed him, with a shrug. 'Their pretty, unmarried girls are prey for young aristocratic 'blades,' as well, and can be treated as brusquely as one may wish.'

'You'd turn all Russia topsy-turvy, too? ' Lewrie gawped, really in need of strong drink by then. This was appalling stuff, and more proof of Twigg's coldbloodedness. 'Ye think on a grand scale, damme if ye don't, but…'

'A Russia whose serfs rise up, at long last, the veterans still young enough, the youths not yet conscripted along with them… and, supplied with arms from somewhere,' Twigg said with an evil wee smile, 'cannot field an army to save itself, much less interfere in the rest of Europe… as they dearly wish to do. You were in the West Indies, and missed our invasion of the Dutch Batavian Republic in '98. Horrid muddle, that, with the Russian Navy and Army as temporary, but prickly, allies. Sent forces from the Black Sea into the Aegean, the Adriatic, and eastern Mediterranean, and dearly wished to remain, in possession of anything they could lay their hands on, 'til the Tsar learned that he would not be given Malta, as the new Commander of the Knights of Saint John, and recalled all their forces. Impossible for us to invade, possessed of millions of military-age men, hence impossible for us to contain, should they put their minds to expanding their empire westward. A rebellion of the serfs could estop that for a long time. Ask your Mistress Eudoxia how her family, barely a cut above serfdom, suffered, should you ever run into her again.'

'But what emerges from the ruins, Mister Twigg?' Lewrie asked. 'Most likely, a weak and fractious land wracked by eternal wars 'tween various regions, and warlords,' Twigg said with relish. 'Could I snap my fingers and turn all France to dust and bones, I would do so, Lewrie. A nation which wishes to survive has no friends, only interests.' 'And the United States?' Lewrie wondered.

'Hmmpf! As I recall from the reports sent me by you and Jemmy Peel, that loose federation of sovereign states is already at logger-heads. The southern states distrust the cold natures of the people of New England, the northern states mock the culture, manners, accents, and cuisine of the southern. As early as 1783, northern writers show scorn for southerners, and their institution of slavery, which is dying out in New England… even if it is the New Englanders who own, and make their money from, slave ships and Negro importation. If there is more anti-slavery sentiment in the North, we shall capitalise on that. If the southern states feel oppressed, we shall find some way to provide diplomatic and military aid, therefore widening the break in the unity of the 'United' States. That nation is far too young to have a nation-wide ethos, as of yet. Men's loyalites lie within their particular state's borders much more than the federal entity, which is far-distant and as distrusted by most as Englishmen distrust a large army.'

'And this is Crown policy? Your ultimate ploy?' Lewrie asked. 'But what of our own economy, the sugar and all from the West Indies?'

'We ban slavery throughout the British Empire, Lewrie, giving us the moral and ethical 'guinea stamp,' ' Twigg schemed, 'which will be as valuable as any amount of lost trade. Besides… the southern United States are almost completely agricultural. May we, by diplomatic and moral force, make slavery so shameful an institution in America that the federal government bans it… at least bans the further importation of Africans, they are crippled, in need of imported goods, finance, and… 'friends,' d'ye see? Our shipping interests, sugar interests, will go where the products are, will make just as much money as they did before, and will be just as happy. The Navigation Acts will not be violated, for British exports, in British bottoms, will sail to ports in the South, and return with all the timber, tobacco, naval stores, rum, and molasses as before, in addition to the burgeoning sources of flax and hemp for linen and rope, and the newer southern crops, such as sugar cane and cotton.

'If the Liverpool slavers in the 'Triangle Trade' are harmed, if the few sugar grandees in the West Indies go out of business, then it is a small price to pay,' Twigg happily concluded.

'First, though, we have to abolish slavery in all British possessions,' Lewrie rejoined. 'And that involves me. Did I just stumble into this, or…?'

'You were, Lewrie, once I became aware of your plight, the perfect example with which to deepen the average Englishman's detestation of slavery, to make more people aware of the issue, and, in supporting a successful naval hero guilty of stealing Blacks… an act of liberation, if you will… so Britain will be seen by the entire civilised world doing something about it, leading the way, setting a high-minded example for the rest of the world to emulate. Wilber-force, Priestly, Hannah More, and Clarkson et al., perhaps even the Wesley brothers and their too-exuberant 'Leaping Methodism' which has so taken hold of the common folk, even Bentham and his rot, are reforming Britain from the ground up, fostering a stronger religiosity, and the concurrent moral climate which accompanies such, so that our 'Christian Duty' will be, in future, to right the perceived wrongs of a sinful world, ha ha!'

'Even if that means I must hang in the process? Shit!' Lewrie spat, getting to his feet in search of Twigg's study for something wet and spiritous. He found a large-ish cruet sort of bottle, but its contents stank bad as hyena piss, so he restoppered it. 'Wait a bit…! Did you merely take advantage of me… or, did you see to it that my case had to go forward, get splashed all over the papers? Could I have been swept under a rug, your powers used t'get me off?'

'To your previous question, Lewrie… you stumbled into it, as you usually do,' Twigg said with what most people might deem a sympathic smile. 'You, alone, leaped into a dung-hill of your own volition, and the Beaumans followed their typically rapacious wont in pursuing you, though Lord Balcarres, Vice-Admiral Sir Hyde Parker, and your Captain Nicely did try to sweep you under the rug, as you say. Once the matter became public, about the same time that I became aware of it, I decided to get involved… to get you acquitted, firstly and force the issue onto the public conscience. And that is the bald truth.

'Oh, for God's sake, Lewrie!' Twigg snapped, mercurially changing tone. 'You wish a drink, there's a bottle of brandy sitting right beside my day-lilies… the bloody flowers, yonder! And, I seriously doubt you will hang.'

'How can you be so sure?' Lewrie asked, after a goodly slug and a smaller second, right from the bottle, as he sat back down.

'Your barrister, Mister Andrew MacDougall, sent me a note this evening, in reply to mine,' Twigg related, sucking meditatively on the mouthpiece of his hookah. 'Though many Lord Justices are