“All my Lieutenants are very healthy, sorry, Mister Thatcher,” Lewrie had to tell him, with genuine sympathy.
“Ah, well then,” Thatcher said with a sigh. “Do you still wish to see one of the horse transports?”
“Aye, I do, if it’s no imposition,” Lewrie said.
* * *
True to his promise, Lewrie was back aboard Reliant before Noon, just as “Clear Decks And Up Spirits” was being piped and the rum keg was being carried to the forecastle. The welcome ritual was halted for a moment to salute Lewrie back aboard. He lifted his sodden hat from his streaming-wet hair, and made a quick way down the ladderway to the waist, and the door to his great-cabins, shooing off the ship’s dog, Bisquit, whose fur was just as wet, and shaking showers of rain from his hair every now and then.
“Good luck with those,” Lewrie told Pettus as his cabin-steward took his hat and cloak. “You could get a bowl o’ wash water from ’em, do ye let ’em drip long enough. So long as ye don’t mind blue water.”
“I expect they have bled as much dye as they ever will, sir,” Pettus speculated as he hung them up on pegs. “Might you relish a cup of hot tea, sir? I’ve some on the warming stand.”
“Aye, with milk, sugar, and a dollop o’ rum,” Lewrie decided. “A large dollop.”
“Coming right up, sir,” Pettus said, pausing to fetch Lewrie a dry towel for his hair and face.
His cats, Toulon and Chalky, had been napping at either end of the starboard-side settee, but came dashing with their tails vertical to greet him. They found his boots intriguing, and sniffed about them, posing their mouths open to savour the aromas like little lions.
“I hate t’ask it of ye, Pettus, but I seem t’ve trod in horse droppings. Got the most of it off, but…,” Lewrie said with a hapless shrug.
“I’ll see to them, sir. Jessop? The Captain’s boots need a cleaning,” Pettus promised, then shared a secret smile with Lewrie as he passed that onus to the cabin boy.
After changing to an older pair of buckled shoes, Lewrie sat at his desk and scribbled out a set of orders for Lt. Thatcher and the masters of the transports, outlining the signal flags he would be hoisting during the day, and the blue-fire rockets he would launch at night when it was necessary to alert them, or keep them in close order. He tried to keep it simple, given his last chaotic experience of escorting a huge “sugar trade” convoy from the West Indies in 1804. Even if Admiralty was paying them to sail together and trust their escort, merchant masters were indeed an un-cooperative and tetchy lot.
It was hard going, for Toulon and Chalky always found delight in interfering with people that ignored them when at a chore. First it was his oldest cat, Toulon, who would hop into his lap then atop the desk, there to sniff, swat at the steel-nib pen, and squat on the paper. Just after he was shooed off, it was Chalky’s turn to leap up and flop onto one side, then wriggle with his paws in the air for his belly to be tickled.
“Oh, for God’s sake, why’d I ever think that cats make good companions,” Lewrie growled. “There. Satisfied?” he asked as he rubbed Chalky’s belly for a second or two. No, he was not, for he flipped on his side once more and began to snatch at the pen with both paws. Then it was time for Toulon to return and flop and wave for “wubbies”. The requested tea showed up, and that required inspection and more sniffs.
“First Off’cer, SAH!” the Marine sentry announced.
“Enter!” Lewrie bawled back, beyond frustrated, by then.
Lt. Geoffrey Westcott came in and approached the desk, a touch warily, taking a cue from Lewrie’s tone.
“Rescue me, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie demanded. “Take a cat. I can only deal with one at a time.”
“Here, Chalky,” Westcott said, grinning. “Come nip a finger.”
He sat down in a chair before the desk and lifted the younger cat into his lap, which made Chalky flatten his ears, leap down, and run off to the dining coach to sit and furiously groom, insulted beyond all measure.
“How are our brethren in the Army, sir?” Westcott asked.
“Eager t’win their spurs, and gallop through the entire Dutch army,” Lewrie said sarcastically. “Cavalry, by God! I met some of the officers, and I swear they’re as dense as roundshot. Yoicks, tally-ho. The Thirty-fourth was raised round Shaftesbury—”
“I’ve friends from Shaftesbury,” Westcott said with a knowing nod, and a brief, feral grin, “though none of them are dull enough for cavalry.”
“Their Colonel, Laird, raised and paid for them himself,” Lewrie went on, “designed their uniforms, armed them with old-style straight Heavy Dragoon swords and Paget carbines, like Viscount Percy did his regiment. But, I doubt there’s a professional soldier among ’em, from the horse-coper to the top. Must’ve made some of his money back from sellin’ officers’ commissions.”
“Well, all we have to do is get them there, and after that, it will be up to whichever General appointed,” Westcott said.
“I was in the middle of tryin’ t’write orders to the transports’ masters, but for the cats,” Lewrie told his First Officer. “We will up-anchor in the morning, at the start of the Forenoon, and fall down to Saint Helen’s Patch. If there’s a good wind, we’ll stand on, but if there’s not, we’ll come to anchor and wait for one. Warn the others to arrange their last-minute necessities from shore, and make sure the Purser knows.”
“Mister Cadbury believes he has everything in hand, but for one or two bullocks for fresh meat, the first few days at sea, sir,” Westcott replied with a shrug. “And the wardroom’s needs are met.”
“Before I have Faulkes make fair copies, I wonder if you would aid me in draughting the orders … see if there’s anything I might miss,” Lewrie asked, shoving the papers towards Westcott, and brushing Toulon to one side of the desk with his arm. Toulon flopped on top of his arm to weigh him down and began to rumble.
“Happy to oblige, sir,” Westcott agreed.
“Tea, with some rum, sir?” Pettus offered.
“Sounds delightful, thank you, Pettus,” Westcott perked up.
“And a second cup for me,” Lewrie added.
“Hmm,” Westcott mused after going over the first two sheets of paper. “I do wonder, sir, if we have to signal changes of course, subject to the weather. It’s not as if they’ll just plod along astern of us and follow our every move.…”
* * *
The orders were thrashed out by half-past Noon, and Westcott departed. Faulkes got to copying, and Lewrie’s mid-day meal arrived, a hearty chicken and rice soup, a middling-sized grilled beef steak with hashed potatoes and some of the black-eyed peas purchased in Savannah in the Spring, brought to spicy life with Yeovill’s stash of sauces, accompanied by brown bread and butter, and a decent claret.
The cats got their own shredded beef, spare rice, and hashed potatoes gravied with dollops of chicken soup in their bowls at the foot of the table, after making a great, adoring fuss over Yeovill when he entered and served out their shares. They came to nuzzle and rub on Lewrie once Pettus cleared his plate, then made for the settee for a long afternoon nap.
Faulkes brought the copies for Lewrie to look over, then folded them and sealed them for one of the Midshipmen to deliver. Whichever one it was, he would be getting wet, for the rain continued, heavier and steadier, and looked as if it would continue all through the afternoon and night.
Lewrie poured himself a fresh cup of tea, minus rum, from the sideboard, and went back to his desk. At last, he could look over his personal mail and respond to some of it. There were some bills from a London shop or two, for which he wrote out notes-of-hand to be redeemed at his solicitor’s, Mr. Matthew Mountjoy. There was one from Peter Rushton, an old school friend from his brief stint at Harrow before being expelled for arson … not only expelled but banned from the grounds forevermore, upon risk of arrest! That’un would be newsy and chatty!