'Aye aye, sir,' Aspinall meekly replied, and sped out of the cabins, for he had never heard his usually genial captain in such a rage directed at anyone, other than England's enemies.
'Yer supper'll be ready in half an hour, sir,' Aspinall told him after Erato's boat had come and gone, and Kenyon had been seen over the side in a Bosun's sling, and into the cutter where his 'pretty' sailors had received him with what might be called 'fond and loyal' care.
Whatever Hell Lewrie had boasted he might deal the French, there was a lingering dread in him that, when the time came, he could not rely on Kenyon or Erato. Kenyon's jealousy, that long-ago detestation that he'd shown when down with Yellow Jack, and it had fallen to Lewrie as a Midshipman, the only 'officer' aboard the Parrot schooner about to be taken by a French privateer. To Kenyon's lights, he had done a most dishonourable thing… pretend to strike colours 'til the French were close-aboard, then fire every weapon weak HMS Parrot possessed, employing dards de feu-fire arrows-to set the privateer's sails afire, and make their escape as the privateer burned to the waterline. There had been no French survivors, well… with half his own crew down with fever, and quickly succumbing himself, Lewrie hadn't bothered much with plucking enemies from the sea. There had been their important passengers, Lord and Lady Cantner, to consider, and keep from any more risk.
Kenyon had gone all huffy about it, once he'd recovered to the point that he could listen to the tale, and had gone all prim and outraged at such a breach of gentlemanly conduct, even to their foes. He had bought Lewrie his first hanger, icily writing that he would surely need it the next time Lewrie was faced with an ethical dilemma, which dilemma he would fail, and be called to account on the field of honour!
Spite aside, jealousy aside, Kenyon had had a miserable career, might have spent years on miserly half-pay, and too proud to stoop to just any employment, while still a so-called prestigious Sea Officer of the King. Only a new war had put him back in the uniform he loved.
He said he did time in merchant service, Lewrie recalled; and that might not've paid that well, either. Proud, priggish… punctilious over his precious honour, so… where did it all go, I wonder? How 'd he reconcile all that with his secret life o' buggery?
Lewrie considered a note to Ayscough questioning Kenyon's fitness, a request that Erato be transferred, but, at the moment, Lewrie had no real evidence against him… other than he was as drunk as a fiddler's bitch in mid-afternoon, and the sight of Kenyon and one of his long-ago friends kissing passionately a long, long time before.
No. Leery as he was concerning Kenyon, he would have to accept the notion that, for now, he'd put him in his place, and on warning to straighten up and serve… soberly, competently, and chearly.
Lewrie crossed his fingers over that hope as Lt. Urquhart got Savage under way, and out to sea for the night.
Damme, though, Lewrie also thought; if blessing him out wasn 't hellish-great fun!
Over the next few weeks, Lewrie could almost agree with Kenyon that blockade duty was boresome, indeed. If there were merchant ships attempting to enter the Gironde, they were caught further out to sea by the larger frigates that served with the line-of-battle ships. And if any vessel was prepared to depart Bordeaux, then the sight of Royal Navy ships, hull-up and prowling the river's mouth, put the wind up its master.
Given the tides, Savage could only spend a few hours deep in the estuary, and then only on fair-weather days, for the continual Westerly winds off the Bay of Biscay could gust up to half a gale without warning, pinning Savage on a lee shore, and, able to 'beat' only sixty-six degrees off the eye of the wind, she could end up wrecked on either the north or south shores.
Such a 'sack' limited the usefulness of the two brig-sloops of his small squadron, too, for, square-rigged as they were, they suffered the same limitations on how close they could go 'full and by' should a blow arise. If the weather got really bad, they had two bad choices; attempt to work their way further out to sea, abandoning the blockade, or try to anchor in the estuary and ride it out, with both bowers down and dragging through the unfirm, sandy sea-bed.
It was the fore-and-aft rigged cutters-Lt. Umphries's eight-gunned Argosy, Lt. Bartoe's Penguin, and Lt. Shalcross's slightly larger ten-gunned Banshee-that could dare operate inside the invisible dividing line 'twixt Pointe de la Coubre and Soulac sur Mer on a regular basis.
After meeting and dining-in those three worthies, Lewrie could at least feel secure in his mind that his cutters were in good hands. Lt. Umphries was only twenty-two, and some Admiral's favourite, a lad with lots of 'interest,' and secure enough in his prospects to show a lot of sauce and high spirits. Lt. Bartoe, on the other hand, was in his mid-thirties, had little official favour, and Penguin was his very first independent command. He was, therefore, more hard-bitten and taciturn, but just as eager to get at the foe and prove himself, at last. Lt. Shalcross might as well have been a swash-buckling pirate from the first decades of the eighteenth century, from the days of Blackbeard, Stede Bonnet, and Captain Kidd; a very clever and aspiring fellow, with the most engaging and exuberant personality.
All three were growing tired of stopping the same fishing boats each day, of snooping within gun-range of the middling-sized fort near St. Georges de Di-donne to draw fire, and nimbly tack about to frustrate the Frogs… or of taking a few pot-shots at the battery being built near Pointe de Grave to panic the local workers and slow progress.
Lt. Bartoe was eldest, the more senior by date of commission, so Lewrie gave him charge of all three cutters' daily operations, hinting that he would be highly pleased did the cutters make even more nuisances of themselves.
As for HMS Mischief and HMS Erato, Lewrie assigned them to work only slightly across the 'dividing line,' with Erato to stand sentry-go from Pointe de! la Coubre to St. Palais sur Mer, and sometimes taunt the St. Georges fort, and for Hogue in Mischief to pace back and forth from the barren beach point below Soulac sur Mer to Pointe de Grave, and, if the wind allowed, get close enough to take the battery under fire along with the cutters, every now and then.
For himself and Savage, though, he could not risk her across the 'line' he had drawn except for the rarest circumstance. Lewrie began to feel Commodore Ayscough's frustration with blockade duty, of commanding from a distance, no matter how short; of being there to protect all his smaller and weaker vessels should the French get so tired of them that they sortied to try to drive them off.
He 'poached' a little instead, venturing north into Charlton's bailiwick, as far as the northern end of the Cote Sauvage peninsula, to the southern tip of lie d'Oleron and the Pertuis de Maumusson, the channel that led into the sheltered bay that lay behind the isle, and the maze of waterways near the towns of Marennes and La Tremblade.
To the south, Savage might cruise into Capt. Lockyear's territory as far as the north end of the Etang d'Hourtin-Carcans, a shallow 'lake' back of the barren beaches 'twixt Hourtin and Maubuisson, just to keep the French honest. And to relieve the boredom of tacking at the stroke of every second watch bell from one bank of the estuary to the other, as predictably as a pendulum clock.
And, to make things even more boresome, Medoc and Aquitaine were unremarkable, with very flat land, no significant hills or headlands by which to navigate or take bearings. The pine forests were immense and dark, and from Soulac sur Mer south to Cap Ferret by Arcachon and its large basin, the dunes and beach were unbroken. When scouting outside his proper area, and going alongside Capt. Lockyear's 20-gun Arundeliox a relatively merry 'get to know each other' dinner, Lewrie learned that the coast Lockyear watched was much the same sameness, all the way to Biarritz and Bayonne in the Golfe de Gascogne. In yawning point of
