have a thawed backside.
'A glass of something warming, as well, my lord?' Lewrie asked. 'Or might you take tea or coffee, first?' Count Levotchkin?'
Damn the young sprog! He had flung off his own fur hat and his coat, and was prowling through Lewrie's wine- cabinet without leave.
'I'm sure you'll find something warming in there, sir,' Lewrie said, allowing his sarcasm a looser rein for a moment. Levotchkin had tossed his hat atop the dining table, and had simply let his coat hit the deck in a furry heap for someone else to pick up later. Whitsell, the cabin boy tried to pick it up, but it was damnably heavy.
Without recognising that Lewrie had even spoken, Count Anatoli took a bottle of Kentucky whisky from the racks, unstoppered the decanter, and took first a sniff, then a short swig straight from the bottle. With a shrug that signifed that it might do, Levotchkin helped himself to a glass and poured it full, before crossing the cabins for a slouch on the starboard-side settee, with one top-booted foot atop the large brass tray-topped low table that Lewrie had fetched back from his time in India, 'tween the wars in the '80s.
'Kulturny, plyemyaneek,' Count Rybakov chid him in Russian.
Culture, Lewrie translated from his very limited stock of words and phrases, in his head; T'other's… cousin? Nephew? One of 'em, so they're related somehow. Put some manners on, he's saying.
'Kentucky Bourbon whisky, Count Levotchkin,' Lewrie told him. 'I am sorry we don't run much to vodka, nor gin, either. Rum's our stock-in-trade… that, and small beer, or wine.'
'Tea, yes, Kapitan,' Count Rybakov exclaimed, using his enthusiasm to deflect his kinsman's bad manners. 'Fyodor, ah… the glasses for tea. We Russians prefer it so hot, the tea glass must be surrounded by a metal holder.'
'I'm familiar with 'em, my lord,' Lewrie replied, though still fuming over the younger noble making so free with his spirits. 'Sorry we don't have a samovar aboard to brew tea the way you like.'
'Lots of sugar, Fyodor,' Rybakov reminded his servant, who was digging through a small chest. 'You have lemon, Kapitan?'
'For now, sir, aye. A limited supply, sad t'say. Hard to get in England, in mid-winter,' Lewrie told him. 'Tea, pipin' hot, Pettus. For you, Count Levotchkin?'
'Nyet,' the young man snapped.
'If you'll take a seat, sir,' Lewrie bade the older man, an arm swept in the direction of the settee and chairs. And, cocking a brow over the sheer amount of luggage coming in a solid stream through the forward door and piled by his sailors where the dining coach had been, across from the chart-space. 'I've taken the liberty of re-arranging the great-cabins to accommodate you on-passage, my lord,' he said once he'd sat down himself. 'I've shifted my sleeping space and my desk forrud, nearer the quarterdeck, and given you and Count Levotchkin my old space, there… aft on the starboard side, with a hanging bed-cot each. The, ah… necessary is on the larboard side, yonder, and we must share… sorry. There might be room left for your servants to sleep in hammocks, do you require them to be at hand at all hours.'
The new arrangements had looked cramped before; with all the chests and trunks and leather portmanteaus coming aboard, Lewrie began to wonder if there'd be room in which to swing a cat, did Fyodor and that huge Sasha sleep aft, along with Pettus and Whitsell.
Speaking of… Toulon and Chalky, intrigued yet frightened of all the bustle, darted with their bellies scraping the deck to their one secure place, Lewrie's lap.
'You will sleep here, with us?' Count Levotchkin asked, as if the very idea was insulting. 'With those filthy little beasts? Pah!'
'He is Kapitan of the ship, Anatoli,' Rybakov gently reminded Levotchkin. 'We are his guests. The Kapitan must sleep near the helm, and his watch officers, so he may respond to the slightest change, or emergency. It will only be a few weeks, after all,' Rybakov said with a grin. 'And cats are not as noisy as that damned parrot who shrieked the night through at our hotel last evening. Surely, the pet of some sailor… or a fiend.'
'It is not dignified,' Count Levotchkin groused, removing his nose from his glass of whisky just long enough to say.
'Would you require your servants to bunk here, my lord?' Lewrie asked again.
'No,' said Rybakov. 'Da,' said Levotchkin. 'Nyet,' Rybakov insisted, glaring the sulky young man to surrender the point. 'They are not necessary after we retire, Kapitan Lewrie,' he stated, settling the matter. 'And we both understand the constraints placed upon us and our usual comforts when travelling by ship… by a warship, not one built for their passengers' pleasures… do we not, Anatoli.' It was not a question, but a pointed warning, to which the young man had to nod agreement… though his face and ears went a bit redder as he swallowed his bile.
Mr. Mountjoy entered the great-cabins, sidling past two sailors lugging yet another bloody-great leather round- topped trunk, and made his bows to the nobles, before leaning down to Lewrie.
'It would seem that Lieutenant Ricks will not be available, sir.'
'Why not, Mister Mountjoy?' Lewrie said with a frown.
'He, ah… was taken up for debts the morning our party left London, sir,' Mountjoy mournfully said, 'and is now most-like held in the Fleet prison 'til he's repaid his creditors.'
'Well, damme,' Lewrie groused. 'Can't Admiralty pay 'em for him, so he's available?'
'They are his personal debts, sir,' Mountjoy explained, 'and not any sums he might have run up in active British commission. Recall, he was on half-pay to Admiralty, the last three years, and was in Russian service 'til late last Autumn, so…'
'And, I s'pose there's no one else available?' Lewrie asked, and answered his own question. 'No, of course there isn't… not in time t'do us any good. Might take a week t'whistle up another'un, and he'll take the best part of the next week t'come join us here in Yarmouth.'
'Well, sir, with the Russian Baltic fleet iced up in harbour,' Mountjoy pointed out, looking for the best face on things, 'there may not be all that great a need for immediate expertise on their navy.'
'We must delay our sailing?' Count Rybakov asked, a tad agitated upon hearing of it.
'I think not, my lord,' Lewrie told him, puffing out his cheeks and lips in frustration, though putting the best face on it himself. 'Mister Mountjoy is correct… does the ice keep your Baltic fleet in port a month or so longer, it's slim odds we'll run into any of them at sea, before we land you at the nearest ice-free port to Saint Petersburg, so Lieutenant Rick's presence would make no difference to us. I expect, soon as the wind's come Westerly, to set sail. Perhaps as soon as tomorrow, dawn.'
'I am gratified to hear it, Kapitan Lewrie,' Count Rybakov said with relief. 'Our diplomatic mission, and the hope of a reconciliation between our two great nations, before a war can be set in motion, from which no one can prosper but the odious French tyrant, Bonaparte, must not be hindered.'
No wonder everybody likes him, Lewrie thought.
'Most gratifying to the Foreign Office, as well,' Mountjoy said with an open, relieved grin.
'By dawn, we could be on our way, Anatoli,' Rybakov cheerfully said. 'Does that not sound pleasing?'
'Da… yes, it does,' Count Anatoli agreed, sitting up a little straighter, showing his first sign of any emotion other than bored-to-tears. 'Urr-rah!' he cried, right after tossing his drink down in one gulp. It did not help his welcome aboard, though, that right after he had drunk, he threw the glass at the pierced metal grate door of the stove, where it shattered.
And no wonder everyone despises you! Lewrie thought, wincing at the mess, and the loss of one of his better glasses; He keeps that up, he'll be drinkin' from cupped hands… we all will. I'd wager he has hosts o' people lined up, waitin' t'slap him silly.
Count Levotchkin smirked at their reactions to his action, and tossed off a small shrug that was all they would get by way of apology. He rose to go to the wine-cabinet for a fresh glass, perhaps a taste of something else more pleasing, while his kinsman, Count Rybakov, looked at Lewrie and rolled his eyes as if to say 'what may one do with these youngsters?' while nodding and blinking a silent apology for him. Whitsell, Lewrie's runty cabin boy, went for a broom and dust-pan.
'One of our customs, Kapitan Lewrie,' Rybakov said. 'Whenever an oath is pledged, or a toast of significance to us, we break the glasses in the hearth, or on the floor, to seal its importance… so that no one may re-use those glasses, and renege, later. That is how urgent our… peace mission is to us… to Anatoli, you must understand.'
Lewrie looked over his shoulder to the young man in question to see him opening another decanter and sniffing
