The French Admiral

other.

'Not on his own decks, sir,' Alan answered a bit more sharply than he would with a naval officer, but Chiswick took no offense at his tone, merely shrugged and turned back to lead the horse up the road once more.

'If you are going to carry a musket, let it rest on your saddle and not hang useless on your back, Mister… Lewrie, did he say?

'Aye, sir, Lewrie,' he said softly, slipping the musket to a more quickly usable perch across his lap, pointing to the left side of the road.

They proceeded in silence for some time, with the more experienced Chiswick listening intently to the sounds of the woods, which so far seemed benign in the extreme, for all the foreboding that was hinted in their lush and wild dark jumble.

'Do all your men have Fergusons, sir?' Alan asked almost in whisper. The road opened up on either side in rough clearings, and he could espy some of Chiswick's men in the woods ahead by their red coats and white breeches.

'Mostly,' Chiswick said, peering into the woods still. 'When our company was raised, my father helped outfit them and thought Major Ferguson was onto a good thing. Some of the other companies had to make do with the Brown Bess or their own guns from home. Do you like it?'

'Aye, sir,' Alan said. 'I'd like to try my hand with one someday.'

'Pity poor Patrick Ferguson could not convince the army to adopt it,' Chiswick commented, looking up at Alan for a moment. 'Now he's dead and his rifle will most likely die with him.'

'It would be perfect for use at sea, though,' Alan observed. 'To fire at long range with aimed fire would play merry hell with officers on a quarterdeck.'

'As long as the enemy did not play merry hell with you,' Chiswick grunted. 'I cannot imagine just standing there out in the open like you do in sea fighting.'

'Mostly you are behind a bulwark or a barricade made of rolled-up hammocks, sir,' Alan said. 'For my part, I cannot imagine standing out in the open like regular infantry does, trading broadsides or volleys or whatever at a hundred paces.'

'Let the line troops do that,' Chiswick sneered. 'We're riflemen, by God—out on the flanks where we can do the most good, screening the advance or covering a retreat.'

'So your brother informed me, sir.'

'Well, there are some pines for you.' Chiswick pointed to the low ridge ahead with his rifle barrel. 'Do you believe they would suit?'

'It is not for me to judge, sir, but I will fetch the carpenter and the bosun,' Alan said, looking at the trees growing up the hill to the right and left of the road. 'They look tall and thick enough.'

'I'll halt my skirmishers at the top of the hill 'til you've made your decision, then,' Chiswick offered.

'Aye, sir,' Alan said, and wheeled his horse about to canter back.

It seemed that those trees would suit admirably, being both tall enough, straight enough, and thick enough to serve as new masts and spars once they were trimmed of limbs and stripped down. The limbs were not so low on them that the best parts of the trees would have too many knots or knurls once they were cut to the right lengths.

'Ya chose well, sor,' the carpenter allowed to Chiswick.

'We used to mill timber and float it down to Wilmington on the river,' Chiswick told them. 'They looked suitable to me.'

'Let's get to work, then,' Railsford said, all of a bustle to get something accomplished so they could get out of those woods before dark. 'Lewrie, have the hands stack arms and start felling those trees the bosun and the carpenter indicate.'

'Aye, sir,' Alan said, dismounting. 'Perhaps we shall finish in time to get a little hunting done, sir.'

'What do you say to that, Lieutenant Chiswick?' Railsford said.

'I'd not stray too far if you do,' he cautioned, 'the fewe: men the better, and the less shots, as well. We don't know who's out here, and don't want to draw attention to ourselves.'

'Yes, I suppose so.' Railsford frowned. 'Still, some fresh meat'd be welcome.'

'With a rifle instead of a musket, I could bag something, Sir,' Alan said, hoping to get out of standing around supervising the working party. 'I would not fire until I was sure of my target.'

'Yes,' Railsford said, 'and you're about as useful at this as tits on a man. Bosun, have we a good woodsman to accompany the midshipman?'

'Cony, sir, 'twas caught poachin' afore he joined.'

'I would have to send some of my men, regardless,' Chiswick said. 'Poacher or not, this is not some squire's private preserve.'

'I could take Mollow, sir,' Burgess Chiswick volunteered. 'And we could use the horses to carry anything we bag.'

'Right,' Chiswick said after a moment's thought. 'But do not go too far or stray too far from the road. If you meet up with any trouble, strike for the river to the north and get into the open. No wild firing, or I'll have your hide, see?'

'When did I need more than one shot, dear brother?' Burgess chided.

'True enough,' the elder Chiswick had to admit, albeit grudgingly. 'Mollow, do you see the sergeant for the trumpet. Give us a blast on it if you run into any enemy troops.'

'That I will, 'pon my honor,' the private said, slouching over the barrel of his rifle as no English regular would ever be allowed.

'You wished to try a Ferguson,' Chiswick said to Lewrie as his private dashed off on his errand. 'Here, use mine.'

He offered the rifle and a cartouche pouch, taking Lewrie's in exchange. 'If you think twenty rounds will be enough?'

'If not, maybe I can pester a deer to death, sir,' Alan replied, matching Chiswick's sardonic, teasing expression.

'Everyone ready?' Burgess asked once Mollow had joined them along with Cony, the wiry young ordinary seaman. 'Here, leave your sword behind. You'll only trip on it in the woods. Got pistols just in case?' Every man carried at least one, with the army man armed with a pair of long-barreled, amd probably more accurate, dragoon pistols. Chiswick took off his own sword and tossed it to his orderly, retaining a bayonet.

'Along the creek, or over the hills?' Alan asked the ensign.

'Too late in the morning for game along the creek,' the younger Chiswick decided. 'They'd come down to drink at dawn and then go back up into the woods. Best cross the hill and see what's on the other side. We'll lead the horses.'

Chapter 6

After the first hour they had covered only a mile, creeping like slugs through the woods to the south of the road. Mollow and Cony were out ahead on the flanks, almost out of sight, while Lewrie and the ensign formed the central pair, within a long musket shot of each other. Alan was enjoying himself hugely as he picked a way through the underbrush wide and high enough for the led mare to follow. He had not been this far away from uniforms and naval discipline in months, even though he had to admit to himself that he did not know what the hell he was doing. He was not a trained hunter, not like Mollow, Cony, or Chiswick, who had been at it almost since birth. He was indeed a city man, only exposed to hunting in the summers on his father's not-so-large estate, more at home with bird shooting or riding behind a pack of hounds over open fields.

This silent crouching and stalking, listening for the sounds of game and trying to limit one's own clumsy crashings and slitherings was foreign to him, but he was getting into the spirit of it although it was damned dry work. The ground was too dry to see much in the way of a sign, or to recognize it as old or new if he had. Face it, I am not a Red Indian he thought. Still, it was so close to play instead of work that he could easily lose himself in the process, not being dependent on what he shot to be fed that night or not.

The woods began to open up before him, and he could see signs that the trees had been thinned at one time; some stumps were still sticking up. He could stand up fully, and he halted to survey things. There was less