The Invasion Year

“Good taste in cabin furnishings, Lewrie,” Captain Speaks said after Faulkes dashed out. “Quite… comfortable, I’d imagine.”

That sounded like a back-handed condemnation, another way to say that Lewrie’s great-cabins were a touch too fine, not the Spartan bare-bones indifference to personal comfort expected by the Navy.

“Thankee, sir,” Lewrie said, watching Speaks rise and go aft towards the transom settee.

“You carry your wife aboard, sir?” Speaks asked, espying that wide-enough-for-two hanging bed-cot.

“I am a widower, sir… two years ago,” Lewrie told him, with a slight dis-approving edge to his voice.

“Good God, are those cats?” Speaks further growled, spotting Toulon and Chalky, curled up together on the coverlet. “Mousers, I’d hope?”

“Passing-fair at it, sir, but mostly company,” Lewrie replied. “You’ve your parrot, I’ve my cats. They’re nigh mute, but amusing.”

“I despise cats,” Speaks huffed. “Can’t abide them. Give me a good dog, now… that’s another matter.”

What else’ll he find fault with? Lewrie sourly wondered.

“Your ship, sir!” Captain Speaks said, turning to face Lewrie. “When I came aboard she looked ‘ship-shape and Bristol Fashion.’ ”

“We try t’keep her all ‘tiddly,’ sir,” Lewrie blandly said. “I find that the French make that difficult, now and then.”

“So much like my old Thermopylae,” Captain Speaks said, seeming to mellow at the mention of his last command. “Of the same Rate, and weight of metal. You were at Copenhagen.”

It sounded like a petulant accusation.

“Aye, sir.”

“Got a chance to fight her,” Speaks said with a grunt.

“We did, sir. And went up the Baltic to scout the state of the ice and enemy harbours on our own,” Lewrie answered. “We rejoined the fleet the night before.”

“Lost good Mister Ballard,” Speaks sadly mused, pacing about the cabins as if they were his own. “Arthur was an excellent First Officer to me. Would have made a fine Captain, had he lived. I liked him very much. Though you didn’t know him as long as I-”

“He was my First Officer in the Alacrity for three years, sir, in the Bahamas, ’tween the wars,” Lewrie interrupted.

He goin’ t’blame me for that, too? Lewrie angrily thought.

“I did not know,” Speaks gruffly said. “Well, sir! Be sure to be aboard Penarth by Four Bells, and Lieutenant Clough and I will show you what we’re to work with, and familiarise your people with the procedures.”

“Very well, sir. I’ll see you to the deck,” Lewrie offered as he went for his hat, which he’d left on the dining table.

“No need, sir,” Captain Speaks quickly said. “I might take one or two minutes to savour being aboard a frigate, again.”

“You’d wish a brief tour, sir?” Lewrie asked.

“No, no, don’t wish to bother your people,” Speaks insisted.

“No bother at all, sir, and since I’m goin’ on deck, too…,” Lewrie said, but Speaks was already halfway to the doors to the weather deck. He had to trot after him, then pass him as Speaks idled on the outer deck between the guns. Lewrie was at the top of the gangway by the break of the quarterdeck by the time Speaks made a slower way up the ladderway. “Side-party for departure honours, Mister Houghton,” Lewrie ordered his senior Midshipman from the corner of his mouth.

Captain Speaks paused at the top of the ladderway, hands in the small of his back and gazing forward to the forecastle, taking in all the bustle of Reliant’s hands, the mathematical exactitude of all the yards and maze of rigging. Speaks heaved a deep sigh, which came out as a throat-clearing grunt, then became all business-like as he doffed his hat in departure. The bosun’s calls tweedled, muskets and swords were presented to see him over the side, right to the last moment when the dog’s vane of his hat dropped below the lip of the entry-port.

Poor old shit’s jealous, by God! Lewrie told himself; I have a command, and he don’t… not a real’un.

Captain Joseph Speaks would have recovered from his pneumonia by April of 1801, but Admiralty had not offered him another warship, and then the Peace of Amiens had kept him ashore on half- pay. Mid-May of last year had seen at least an hundred ships put back in commission, but… none of them were his, and when finally recalled to active service, what had he gotten? Not a frigate or warship commensurate with his seniority, but a project!

No wonder he’s turned sour as crab-apples! Lewrie realised.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

Before boarding one of Reliant’s cutters for the long row out to Penarth, Lewrie had time enough for a private moment with Lieutenant Westcott.

“Should Captain Speaks make mention of it, some of your family are down to Portsmouth to see you, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie muttered to him. “Which took you ashore. He might have a ‘down’ on ye, else.”

“Thank you for covering for me, sir,” Westcott said with a wide grin, not one of his usual quick flashes.

“And was a good time had by all?” Lewrie japed, with a leer.

“ ‘All’ did, sir,” Lt. Westcott cheerfully confessed, “and we’d have had a better, had Faulkes not found me. The lady’s most obliging and fetching, a recent widow of an apothecary. Sold up the business to another, but didn’t manage to gain all that much security. Thank God she can still afford to send the son off to a schoolmaster… with his dinner pail. Hours and hours on her hands, alone, most days?”

And yours on her, Lewrie told himself, chuckling at the image.

“Whatever shall I do with you, Mister Westcott?” Lewrie teased.

“Swear I’m an abstinent and celibate Christian, should bully-bucks come and ask for me, sir!” Westcott rejoined. “And that I’m not here!”

* * *

Penarth was a two-masted brig, fitted with shorter mast stubs to serve as crane supports, one aft of her foremast, the other forward of her main-mast, from which jib-arms could swing. She had much more freeboard than Fusee, the result of a much deeper hold for the coasting coal trade, and slab-sided, with none of the tumblehome designed into warships to reduce top-weight; her boarding battens were vertical, and a hard climb right over her bulwarks to an in-board set of steps, with no proper entry-port.

“Welcome aboard, sirs,” her “captain” said. Lt. Douglas Clough was indeed a Scot, but without a Highland “sawney” accent. He was red-haired and pale-complexioned, though, his hair, when he doffed his hat, frizzy and tightly curly-wavy. Clough was an odd-looking bird, for his forehead receded at a pronounced slant from a heavily beetled ridge of brow, his large, stubby nose almost matching the angle of his head so that it appeared that they were one precipitous slope.

“Captain Speaks has spoken… has explained the nature of the catamaran torpedo to you, sirs?” he asked.

“Only that they are a form of torpedo, sir,” Lewrie said for all.

“Let’s show them, Clough,” Captain Speaks grunted.

“This way, sirs. We keep them in the hold, out of sight. Nice and dry ’til deployed. If you will all follow me?”