CHAPTER TEN
Oh m'sieur, you are back so early!" Sophie de Maubeuge said in surprise as he practically burst through the front door. She might have been the belle of yesterday's Militia parade and drills, but Caroline-sprung from more frugal, practical Colonial stock-had engrained real work into her. Sophie was dressed in one of her oldest sack gowns, and a maid's apron and mob-cap. With a cloth-wrapped broom, she had been sweeping for cobwebs in the entry hall. Not very energetically, Lewrie suspected; she had been raised as a French aristocrat since birth.
"The tavern was not amusant?" Sophie enquired, obviously eager for an excuse to leave off servants' work and twinkling with wit.
"Informative, but not amusing, no, Sophie," Lewrie answered, in a rush still. "Where is Caroline?"
"In 'er boudoir, up…"
"Excuse me then," he said, bounding for the staircase.
"Ze post 'ave arriv-ed? You wish zat I, uhm… classer, non… sort it for vous, m'sieurr she offered, stepping forward and eyeing that loose bundle with what Lewrie could only feel was… alarm.
"Thank you, no, Sophie, it's only bloody bills!" Lewrie shouted down from the landing on his way up the second pair-of-stairs. "I'll sort 'em later. Caroline?"
Helpful little chuck, he thought, but no wonder if she wishes a way out with Harry-or anyone-to avoid Caroline's housewifery work!
"Why, what is it, Alan?" his wife asked, with an amused chuckle in her throat as he stepped into their bedroom. She had been sorting out bed-linens, stowing away home-sewn winter quilts and blankets.
Slaying the triumphant smile he had worn since first breaking the seal on his Admiralty letter, he held it up in mute statement, now unfolded to the full, with its official seals of office in view.
Caroline wrapped one arm about a bedpost to support herself, while her other hand flew to cover her stricken mouth with trembling fingers. "Oh, no… oh, God, no!" she quavered. "You're barely home two weeks; they promised you it could be weeks more before…!"
"I'm to have a frigate, dearest," he told her, "that means I'll be made 'post'! With this mutiny still on, they simply must get ships to sea, untainted ships, otherwise…"
She positively glowered at him, despite her shock and grief!
Damme, wrong tack, Alan thought, got things out of order!
"Caroline, I truly am sorry; I thought we'd have more time too… peaceful weeks with you and the children, but…" he attempted saying to cosset her, tossing the bundle of unopened letters and bills to the foot of the bed so that he could go and embrace her. "But as long as this war lasts-'growl ye may, but go ye must.' I can't…"
"I know, Alan!" she gravelled back, arms crossed over her bosom; tears and betrayal-glints in her eyes. "Dear Lord, how well I know by now. I wish you'd never even seen a warship all your born days!"
"Well…" he stammered, surprised and spurned by her vehemence, "there've been times I'd wish the same, my love, believe me. Cockerel. My first ship, Ariadne… loony Treghues's Desperate.. ."
"But you're a Navy man," she jeered back, refusing his offered embraces, back-pedaling towards her cedar chests, "off like a flash at their first… their every beck and call. Eager to dash away for your glory and honour… while those who love you must remain, abandoned… worrying and fretting, a-and…!"
"Caroline," he whispered, taking a tentative step forward, but she would have none of it, retreating towards the windows with a swish of her skirts. "Dear?" he lamely begged to her turned back.
"How little time we've really had, Alan," she accused. "Those three years in the Bahamas… a mere four more here, in our own home. Making a life so sweet and filled with every delight a man could imagine. Heirs, and land, friends and community, family, and…!"
"And then a war came, which threatens them all," Lewrie reminded her, more sternly than he meant to. "You know I had to respond to our country's call, dear. I don't know what else I could've…"
"You could have stayed, Alan!" she accused, whirling to face him again, that vertical furrow in her brows. "If I, if we, meant anything at all to you…"
They'd had arguments before, but Lewrie felt that this one would be memorable. So surprised was he, so betrayed by his usually supportive and admiring wife, he felt that he could only blush with shame; for she was right on the nail-head with her accusations!
"Four years on the land, you could have at least made an effort to learn the farm's ways… to uphold and aid me," she fumed, now looking bleak and haggard in her quiet rage. She stomped past him to shut the door so the servants or children couldn't hear. "But you didn't. You played at it! And as soon as Admiralty sounds their bosun's pipes, why off you scuttle to wear King's Coat, again, so you can stalk about your quarterdeck, relishing it!"
He would have told her that they were rightly termed the bosun's "calls," but thought better of it immediately.
"It's what I am, Caroline," Lewrie said with a sigh. "It's who you married, mind… a Sea Officer of the King and…"
"Yes, you are," she sighed in turn, leaning on the door as if exhausted past all contemplation of future improvement. "And a glad one… you know you are. Glad to sail away to who knows where; glad to be free of your familial responsibilities. Glad to wallow in gore and shot, expose yourself to danger, 'til it catches up with you some day… so long as you can chase after… glory! Gone so long, so far, thinking a letter every rare now and then, a pack of 'pretties' from a foreign port, atones for your absence!" she hissed.
"Dearest…"
"No thought for the ones you leave behind," she continued, hands to her face to daub her tears. "Now your war isn't the short one you thought when last you left us… is it, Alan?" Caroline jeered. "God knows, another year or two perhaps. God save us, another five, ten? Another three-year commission, before we see you for a bare month, or less, before the next one, and the next one… and…! Damn you, and damn the Royal Navy, just…!"
Her anger broke in a flood of weeping, wrenching sobs that shook her frame, made her shoulders shudder. She lifted her apron's hem to swab her inflamed face, and Lewrie at last could step forward to scoop her into his arms, offer mute comfort and sympathy. He rocked her, as if dancing from one foot to the other, laid her head on his shoulder, and stroked her long, lean back-afraid to say a word more for now.
At last she made a sniffle, drew a deep breath, and sighed in resignation. "How soon then?" she asked, in a wee girlish voice into his shirt collar.
"My reply off by afternoon post," Lewrie speculated-gently. "Depart by first light tomorrow, I fear. I really am sorry, dear'un. You don't know how sorry. Our joys together… us and the children… you're not the only one who misses peace and normalcy. Tranquility."
"Do they say where you're to go?" she asked, clenching back at him, her face cooler against his at last.
"I rather doubt Portsmouth or Plymouth are in any mood for new ships to commission at the moment," he dared to scoff. "First, up to London… then perhaps the Nore or Great Yarmouth. Some port close to home, I'd suspect, with the French and Dutch fleets threatening us. I doubt it's to be a foreign station, not for a year or better most-like," he told her, leaning back a bit, emboldened by her resignation to meet her eyes once more.
"So… not too far, or long, a separation?" Caroline softened, leaning back herself, for a tiny crumb of promise.