curious about shipboard life, so he came along as well, and they had a pleasant ride back to the town and the docks.
'Boat ahoy!'
'Aye, aye!' the bowman shouted, holding up one finger to indicate a very low rank to the deck watch of the frigate and the need for only the smallest side party. Under the circumstances, the bosun's mate did double duty of piping them aboard and representing the ship as watch officer. There were few enough people on deck, at any rate.
'Permission to come aboard, Mister Weems,' Alan said doffing his hat and nudging Burgess to emulate him.
'Aye, Mister Lewrie,' Weems said. 'How're things ashore?'
'Only half misery, considering, Mister Weems. This is Ensign Chiswick of the North Carolina Volunteers. I suppose that is much like a warrant rank, possibly an acting lieutenant.'
'Yer servant, sir,' Weems said, knuckling his brow.
'And yours, sir,' Burgess replied.
They went below to the midshipmen's mess, where only little Carey resided at present. He was glad to see Alan, and was full of questions directed at both of them, seeming in full, childish awe of the soldier.
Alan rapped on the light, temporary partition between his mess and the officer's wardroom, and was bade enter. He led Burgess in to meet Mr. Dorne, Cheatham, Lieutenant Peck of the marines, and the sailing master, Mister Monk.
'Had enough of soldiering, have you, Lewrie?' Peck drawled, taking his ease on the transom settee with a clay pipe fuming by the window.
'And learned sweet damn-all, sir,' Alan agreed. 'I would not presume to enter the wardroom, but I believe my chest is stored here, and I need fresh linen and things.'
'Aye, so it is.' Monk nodded. 'Mister Chiswick, sir, take a seat an' have a drop with us while ya wait.'
'Thankee kindly, Mister Monk,' Burgess said, shying his hat at a peg and drawing up to the scarred mess table.
'Ya bring yer laundry, too?'
'No, sir. Just my thirst,' Burgess said easily. 'And a curiosity about your ship.'
Alan dumped his jute bag of soiled linen, hoping a hammock man could eventually tend to it, and dug down into his chest for clean shirts and stockings, a more presentable neckcloth, and a second pair of shoes that he could rotate with the only pair he had been wearing in all the muck over the last few days of rain and sogginess. He was intensely relieved to see that nothing had been disturbed in his absence and that a very torn and stained shirt in the bottom was still in the same position and gave off a muted, heavy clinking sound as he shifted it. He packed himself a fresh pair of breeches and a pair of working rig slop trousers as well and relocked his chest.
'Sit down as well, Mister Lewrie, don't stand on ceremony,' Monk ordered. 'They's grog, there, an' some decent red as well. Top up an' share a glass with us.'
'Thank you for the wardroom privilege, sir.'
'Big doings ashore, then, Mister Lewrie?' Mr. Dorne asked as he straightened his eternal tiewig and peered over his tiny spectacles.
'Nothing much yet, sir. No sign of the enemy to the west of us.'
'Well, they are up on the Gloucester side,' Peck said. 'Lafayette and some Frogs. Lauzun's Legion, I'm told. Lancers, dragoons, and foot, along with some unit called the Virginia Militia. Some of 'em marched in, some boated in from the French camp on the James.'
'And we could not stop them, sir?' Alan asked, filling a glass with the red wine. Rum he could get ashore, and it was getting tiresome.
'The French're absolute masters o' the navigation now. Not one British craft c'n swim but by their leave,' Monk said.
'Well, there's the spy boats,' Peck stuck in.
'Sneakin' in and out at night with letters to an' from Clinton an' Graves in New York ain't challengin' the French, sir,' Monk retorted.
'Any word on when we may expect relief, sir?' Burgess asked.
'None yet, lad.'
'It is not like Cornwallis to sit so idly, I assure you, sirs,' Burgess said out of pride. 'In the Carolinas, we marched like… like foot cavalry, active as fleas. There is still a chance to march inland to Williamsburg and cross over into better country. And with enough of these small transports I saw here in harbor, we could cross to the Gloucester side. Tarleton is a Tartar—he could cut a way through for us.'
'There's to be an attempt to cross the bay to the eastern shore soon, I have heard,' Cheatham volunteered. 'A solid enough rumor of it, in faith. Heard it from the supply quartermaster ashore. Send fireships downriver to frighten the French away and cross before they can respond.'
'I wish they would tell us,' Alan ventured, thinking that he was too far from the harbor to reembark on that experiment, and fearful of being left behind as a forlorn hope or rearguard. 'It would take some time to get our guns back aboard for the attempt.'
'Yea, well.' Monk coughed in embarrassment and looked away to busy himself with a large swallow of grog.
That's exactly what would happen, Alan realized with a cold shudder under his heart. Some regulars would get off, but the Volunteers and my people would be sacrificed. Goddamn and blast the bastards!
They shifted to cheerier topics; the good state of health of Lieutenants Railsford and Forrester over on Gloucester, what Avery was doing with the heavy guns closer around the town, but it was a gloomy mess.
Wardroom privileges did not extend to supper, so Alan and Burgess excused themselves as the mess cloth was spread, and no one made any noises of invitation to dine with them. Mr. Dorne was good enough to see them out on deck, taking the need of air as an excuse. But once on deck, they met the gloomy presence of Commander Treghues, who swooped up like a wraith in the dark.
'Mister Lewrie, is it?' he said.
'Aye, sir. Come aboard for fresh linen, sir. May I present Ensign Burgess Chiswick of the North Carolina Volunteers, sir.'
'Mister Chiswick, give you joy, sir. I hope Mister Lewrie has not let the reputation of the Navy down?'
'Indeed not, sir,' Burgess replied. 'He has been a most resourceful fellow and a good companion. His battery is attached to our redoubt just on t'other side of the creek. Good artilleryman, he is, sir.'
'Yes, he likes the sound of guns. Good work, Mister Lewrie,' Treghues said with a small chuckle, which was so out of character from the harsh and bitter man Alan had come to know that he strongly suspected the captain had totally lost his wits, even if it was a startling improvement.
'Who would have thought it?' Alan whispered after Treghues had quit the deck for his cabins and his own supper. 'Mister Dorne, sir?'
'You'd not notice in the dark, Mister Lewrie, but I performed a slight trephination upon him after you left the ship,' Dorne said softly enough so that even Burgess could not hear. 'There was pressure upon the cranium from the occluded blood resulting from the blow he received, which I relieved, and he is remarkably restored to his former self thereof. He has little memory, however, of the last few weeks.'
Dorne slipped him the wink to let Alan know that he had forgotten even his grudge against his least-favorite miscreant rogue.
'Thank bloody Christ!' Alan breathed.
'There is, however, a slight problem,' Dorne continued. 'He was dosed with a tincture of hemp, a decoction from the South American plant cannabin, more correctly
'God, yes,' Alan agreed. 'I'm off like a hare.'
'More like a fox, if I know you well at all,' Dorne said. 'And good luck to you in our shared misfortune.'
'Aye, Mr. Dorne, and good fortune to you as well.'
Once ashore and on horseback once more, Burgess was most complimentary in his opinion of Commander
