Hainaut groaned with weary misery at what strenuous effort that simple directive implied. Against the winds, a despatch boat couldn't fetch Pointe-a-Pitre 'til mid-afternoon next. The quickest way was by horseback, the only road a rain-gullied sand-and-shell track rutted by cart-wheels. Thirty-two of those newfangled kilometres, at least eight hours at a trot or canter, supposing a change of horses at Capesterre or Ste. Marie was available!
Hainaut would be damned if he'd do it at a gallop all the way, Guillaume Choundas's well-feared wrath notwithstanding. Was he not a warship captain in all but name, with all the duty and responsibility that that implied? Oh, he'd make a great show of leaving with the utmost despatch… but he thought a brief sit-down supper somewhere on the way could be fitted in, explained by the plea of Stern Duty to his hapless matelots, and the safeguarding of the prizes… which prizes were rare and dearly earned money in Le Hideux's purse, too, after all. Surely that earned Hainaut an extra, un-begrudged hour!
"Timmonier, I am ordered to report to Capitaine Choundas, quick as I may. You are in charge until I return!" Hainaut shouted with the proper seeming haste and clattered down the gangplank in the uniform he stood up in, bawling at the despatch rider for a fast mount.
" Vous imposteur petit" the petty officer growled to himself as soon as Lt. Hainaut was lost in the dockside throng ashore. "Go lick your ugly master's arse! Et va te faire foutre" he muttered, as he leaned over the side to hock up a hefty and derisive gob of phlegm.
"You are certain it was Proteus" Guillaume Choundas rasped in the ghoulishly unflattering light of four finger-thick candles mounted in a single stand on the side of his ornate desk. "You are certain it was that diable Lewrie?"
"There is no doubt of it, m'sieur" Jules Hainaut replied with the properly dramatic gravity, displaying grim assuredness, and a hint of residual anger. "Hand-in-glove with two americain men of war. It was Proteus in the centre, with one each in her van and rear. Against such overwhelming force, I regret there was nothing I could do with my two barely armed and undermanned prizes to aid Lieutenant Pelletier," Hainaut gravely explained, laying out the disastrous events as best he had observed them 'til he had sailed the action far aft and under the horizon.
Hainaut had been most careful to swath his clothing at the inn where he had dined (rather well in point of fact) so there would be no betraying food stains upon his person; but from the moment he had come to a dust-cloud halt from his last galloped leg of the journey (begun at the five-kilometre post outside town to look properly winded and damp with horse-sweat) Capt. Choundas had peered so closely at him that he felt as if he were under examination with a magnifying glass, so sharp, glittery, and icily dubious was Choundas's remaining good eye on him, so high-nosed and aloof did his master regard him.
"And all three ships flew their largest battle flags," Choundas pressed. Even though Hainaut had arrived shortly after midnight, and the interrogation had been going on for more than an hour, Choundas was dressed in his best gilt-laced uniform, his neck-stock done up and all his waist-coat buttons snugly buttoned. As was his master's mind as lucid and penetrating as ever.
"They did, m'sieur," Hainaut answered with an affirmative nod even if he hadn't been close enough to the action to espy such details and he strove to keep his face bland, but not too bland; with no owl-eyed staring, or too much rapid blinking to put the lie to his statement. Hainaut had seen Choundas conduct harsher interrogations before, and had even been instructed in the tell-tale frailties of men and women determined to bluff their way out.
"Ahum" was Choundas's response to that, taking time to swivel to face his detestable little clerk, de Gougne, who pointedly made an additional note of Hainaut's observation at his master's cue.
No wine, Hainaut thought in worry; dry work, but no wine in the offing. How much trouble am I in? What, kill the bearer of bad news?
In Hainaut's experience of Choundas's little "chats" with those he would expose and condemn, wine was always available to those of too much self-possession, none for the visibly nervous until they had lied their way into a corner. Wine came first for Choundas, then was given to the shaky victim with profuse apologies, as if they had survived the experience-followed by the too-casual "just a matter or two more, Citizen (or Citizenness)" to dis-arm before the verbal blow that struck below the heart. Hainaut worried (and not for the first time) exactly where he stood with Guillaume Choundas this night.
The man had aged, Hainaut noted, in the few weeks since his ship had sailed on her raiding cruise. That arc of Choundas's face he still exposed to the world was much more serely pruned than when he'd wished them all bonne chance; his flesh was more collapsed upon the bones and now of a sickly, pasty cast, as if he had turned hermit, not venturing outside his headquarters unless required, thinned by poor victuals, or the loss of interest in mere food in the face of all his cares and frustrations.
Hainaut almost exposed himself with a faint shudder of dread as he suddenly realised that the vaunted, clever, and capable ogre was not going to succeed this time. Guillaume Choundas was going to fail-, and likely drag him down with him when he went! More so than ever, Hainaut now had to be free of him.
"Your prizes safely made harbour, though, Hainaut? No damage?" Choundas demanded, too solicitous of a sudden for credence, as if they didn't matter in the slightest.
"Yes, m'sieur" Hainaut answered, feigning gruffness, as if he were immune to the temptation of prize-money, too. "Two fine schooners belonging to the same 'Amis' trading company. Both are about, uhm… thirty metres, and very fast, with promising cargoes of dyewood, coffee, cotton, rough wines and brandies, cocoa, kegs of limes and lemons, cocoanuts, sugar and molasses, and tons of cigaros or plug tobacco. In excellent condition, both of them. Lightly armed of course, but stiff and beamy enough to accept a decent battery. Six-pounders would be best, if any are available, m'sieur. Cannon of four-pounder measurement if not, to match their own armament. Pardon, but they would make excellent replacements for those we lost."
Choundas stared at him, disconcertingly unblinking for a long time, as if turned to stone by Hainaut's callow presumptions to offer "tarry-handed" nautical advice to him.
"Of course, in their present condition, they could make a fast passage back to France with their cargoes," Hainaut spoke up, wilting under that obsidian gaze, hating himself for making self-deprecating gestures, for altering his confident voice nigh to apologetic wheedling. "Whatever you decide, m'sieur."
"Indeed," Choundas intoned, with the faintest, crudest lift at the exposed corner of his ravaged mouth. "Well, then. You have ridden hard and far, Hainaut, and must be desperately hungry and thirsty, no?"
"Ready to fight a wolf for the bones, m'sieur, and so dry that I could drink a river!" Hainaut exclaimed with plausible eagerness. "My poor arse… it has been too long since I even sat a horse. Once in bed, I fear I'll sleep face-down, and need a sitting pillow for a week hence! Uhm… what should I do in the morning, m'sieur? Ride back to Basse-Terre to deal with your prizes? Sail back, preferably. There is my crew to see to…"