King, Ship, and Sword

'I'd thought to take a look at the place, for old time's sake, but Imogene wished to get on to Paris, so I didn't,' Plumb lamented. 'Neither of us is quite as eager to forego our comforts as we did in our headier days, d'ye see. Yet who could have expected a visit to be necessary?' he added, to excuse himself.

'Well, you couldn't have known,' Lewrie said, sighing heavily to the reality and taking another deep gulp of calvados. You'll get us killed, for the lack of it, though, you hen-headed… ! he thought.

'Once we've donned our last disguises and gotten a new form of transport in Saint Orner, I must leave the three of you somewhere safe and make a reconnaissance on my own, before committing us to its use,' Sir Pulteney decided aloud, waving a hand for the bottle, as if in need of 'Dutch courage' himself. 'In a very humble costume, haw haw!'

Hope it ain't clowns or mimes! Lewrie gloomed.

'So close to the sea, what better way to blend in than to play the part of

common sailors?' Plumb said with a clever little hee-haw. 'I trust our ladies will not be scandalised to become sailors' doxies!'

Sailors and doxies, is it? Lewrie thought; no sailor is authentic without a good knife, no doxy without a wee pistol up her skirts! We get to Saint-Omer safe, the last o' my money's goin' for weapons!

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Plumb drove alone to St. Omer to dispose of the cabriolet and their last, now-empty trunk and leather valises, getting what he could for them. He came back, on foot this time, with a canvas sea-bag partially filled with something, and changed his clothes and appearance to match their own. Caroline and Lady Imogene had changed, in the meantime, to voluminous peasant skirts, with hems high enough to show a bit of ankles, clunky buckled shoes, and a froth of lace. They wore rough ecru blouses with be-ribboned and embroidered peasant vests over them, topped with tawdry shawls and hats. Caroline kept her coppery-red wig, whilst Lady Imogene went for frizzy, dishwater blond. Sir Pulteney and Lewrie wore tattered and dingy old-style slop-trousers, the legs so loose and baggy, and ending just below the knees, plain cotton stockings to hide gentlemanly legs that had not been bronzed by the sun, their feet crammed into buckle shoes, as well. Sailors of any nation were proud to be well-shod when ashore. Itchy fishing smocks atop striped pullover singletons completed their disguises, as did the tasseled red Jacobin Liberty caps proper to good French revolutionaries. The fact that they hadn't shaved in few days helped with versimilitude, though Lewrie thought Sir Pulteney's eye-patch was a bit much.

They walked into St. Omer on 'shank's ponies' to do the last shopping and to purchase a rickety, two-wheel cart and a lone older nag to pull it. The Plumbs took the front bench together, whilst the Lewries lolled in the rear, using sea-bags for bolsters, and, to make their disguises even more believable, all made an open show of wine or brandy bottles, tobacco in the form of cigarros or blunt pipes, and an air of merriment. On their slow way north out of St.-Omer, the Plumbs quickly taught them some semi-drunken songs to sing should the need arise when confronted by a patrol.

It was disconcerting, though to see how many cavalry patrols there were on the road that morning. Almost every hour, a file of ten or more troopers would come cantering south from the sea, or another file would go past towards Calais, but only now and then stopping the rare coachand-four or the larger public conveyances.

The cavalrymen might look them over as their cart slowly plodded up the road, mostly to ogle Lady Imogene or Caroline and make lewd, suggestive japes to them, but Lewrie had to hand it to Lady Imogene, for she could hurl insults and gutter-French right back at them, insulting their manhoods in a way that made the troopers guffaw, not get angry, then canter on. Each time, Lewrie's stomach did back flips and a handstand, his mouth turned dry (which only another tipsy swallow of wine could assuage), and his 'nutmegs' did their shrinking act, even as he swayed and scowled at the cavalrymen, striving for pie-eyed innocence.

The slightly soberer and more fluent Sir Pulteney always told them that he and his mate were bound for Calais to find a ship, since they'd spent the last of their previous voyage's pay, and, amazingly, every patrol, no matter how suspicious, had taken that as Gospel and ridden on!

And so it went, hour by slow hour, mile by plodding mile, each fetching them that much closer to the coast, the sea, and to the fisherman's hut, the inlet and beach, and freedom.

'Love what ye've done with yer face,' Lewrie told Caroline as the afternoon wore on, and they finished off the last of the chicken, ham, and bread. Lady Imogene had 'tarted' them both up with the sort of heavy makeup no respectable lady of worth would employ; red lips, kohl-outlined eyes, pale-powdered faces, and too much rouge. 'And yer stockings!' Lewrie added. Caroline had her skirts up halfway to her knees, displaying blue-and-black horizontally banded hose. She flicked her skirt down quickly. 'Arr, does yer warnt a l'il tumble roight 'ere in th' cart, missie?' he teased in imitation of a British tar. 'Give a shillin', I will, fer a bit o' sport, har har!'

She tossed a chicken bone at him, grinning as she plucked some meat from a breast and chewed, looking impish, for a rare moment. She held out a strip for him to chew.

He took it, though chicken breasts were not as moist and tasty as dark meat. Playing a drunken sailor, and the many nips at a bottle to make that plausible, had made him hungry.

'More coming, from behind, Sir Pul… Henri,' Caroline warned recalling Plumb's new alias. 'A lot of them!'

The Plumbs went into their drunken singing, swaying, and bottle-waving in time to their tune.

'Christ, shit on a biscuit!' Lewrie yelped as he looked astern at the party that was rapidly gaining on them. 'Mine arse on a band-box! Grope me, Caroline! Lay down and paw me… for our lives!

'It's that de Guilleri bitch and that Chasseur Major we met at Bonaparte's levee. They'll know us, sure as Fate, if-'

Caroline fell on her back and pulled him half over her, arms round his neck to hide his face, one thigh lifted to stroke down his thigh. It was a lazy kiss, a sleepy one 'twixt two people too foxed to couple. Lewrie shut his eyes tight, with the inane thought that if he couldn't see Charitй de Guilleri, she couldn't see him!

Rapid clops of hooves, coming closer! The chink of bit chains and metal scabbards, the squeak of saddle leather! A lot of horses, then the hiss and creak of a carriage's wheels and suspension, to boot! And they were slowing down, reining back to look them over!

'Hй! Des Matelots ivres et leur putains,' someone said dismissively, so close that Lewrie could imagine that he had leaned over close enough to smell the fellow's garlicky breath. Drunk sailors and their whores… damned right we are, so sod the fuck off! Lewrie thought in panic.

'Hй, Capitaine Choundas,' another mocked. 'Are these some of your heroic Celtic or Breton seafarers, hein?'

Choundas? Gawd! Lewrie thought, ready to squeak in stark terror; him, too? Where'd they find him, floatin' face-down in the Seine?

There was a slow palaver 'twixt Sir Pulteney-Henri-and the leader of the mounted party; intent questions from one and drunken mumbles from the other. Whatever was said, what little Lewrie could glean from their French, he hadn't a clue. He fully expected a rough hand on his shoulder, tearing him away to face them, then…!

Caroline turned her face to his, tucking under his shoulder to hide her own identity while he pretended to lamely nuzzle her neck, his own face hidden in her red wig, wondering if his own black one'd stay in place, and trying manful not to sneeze!

'Merde,' said the leader 'Adieu. Allons vite, mes amis.'

The clop of hooves picked up the pace from a slow walk to a canter, the carriage rattled past, and the Plumbs