CHAPTER THREE
Kingston-and Old Port Royal, or what was left of it, after the infamous earthquake many years before-was an ideal anchorage, protected from hurricane winds and winter gales by the Blue Mountains, but Lord, it could be a career-ender to approach if one were ignorant of its dangers! Lime Cay, Rackam's Cay and Gun Cay, Drunken Man's Cay, Christ, you could see those, could spot three miles of rocks and shoal-water reefs that stretched Sou'west to Nor'east, beginning four miles South of Fort Charles at the tip of the Palisades. The reefs, though, like Great and Little Portuguese and Salt Pond Reef on the Western approaches-it took an experienced master or a knacky harbour pilot who knew the sea bottom as well as he knew his wife's, and this time they had drawn the short straw and gotten a pilot with whom they had never worked, one so blithely casual and dismissive of impending danger, he had actually made that grave and sober Christian, Mr. Winwood, the Sailing Master, throw parallel rules and brass dividers and curse! He had come aboard with the dissembling gravitas of your practiced toper and had only started to slur, titter, and reveal himself as "three sheets to the wind" after they were committed, halfway into the maze inshore of the Great Portuguese!
And it hadn't helped the deck officers, the captain included, that mere seconds after they had made their number to Fort Charles and had begun the required gun-salute to the flag, that a signal had come in reply for her "Captain To Repair On Board"-which in this case meant for Lewrie to depart the ship {instanter if not earlier) and get his arse over to the fort, Giddy House, or Admiralty House, in haste.
"Well done, sir," Lewrie said, doffing his hat to Catterall and Langlie as he readied to disembark, "given the circumstances, and the pilot's state. Had I known, I'd have not asked it of you, yet… my congratulations for coping so well, Mister Catterall."
"Erm… thankee, sir!" Catterall responded, greatly pleased at the unlooked-for compliment, though still wheezing and swabbing perspiration.
"My permission to hoist a full bumper," Lewrie continued, with a sly wink. "You more than earned it, God knows. Gentlemen?"
With his reports, and bearing his log just in case it might be required, Lewrie took the salute of the crew and side-party, and went down into his gig, which had been towed astern in fear that his rapid reporting would be demanded.
The transition from sunlight to dim coolness almost made Lewrie sneeze as he stopped by the hall porter's station to ply a damp, cool towel on his face and neck before confronting Authority. The weather actually was quite mild, the daytime temperatures averaging in the low to mid-eighties, but no matter the season, the Caribbean sun was still a farrier's hammer. Combine that with Lewrie's trepidation of rencontre with "the Wine Keg," Capt. Sir Edward Charles, whose animus he'd roused through no fault of his own, after nearly half a year of swanning about as free of Navy control as so many larks, and it was no wonder that he could feel moisture under his clothes, in his nether regions.
Once dried, Lewrie put the best face on it and nearly marched down the long, gloomy hallway, the hard leather heels of his gilt-tasseled Hessian boots ringing off the plank floor and the hard plaster and shiny paint of the walls. He attained those fearsome double doors, so heavy and intricately panelled, so glossy with linseed oil or beeswax polish. Hell was said to be alluring, Lewrie considered as he took a deep breath and heaved a sigh; from the outside, at least, before one got past its portals. He tugged his waist-coat, shirt cuffs, his sword baldric and neck-stock into pristine order, even gave the short ribbon-bound queue atop his collar a nervous tug before knocking.
The double doors resounded with a sound not unlike Doom… Doom!
"Go the bloody hell away!" someone inside shouted.
"Gladly," Lewrie replied without a thought, feeling as if he was back in public school (one of many he had attended at one time or another) and had come for a well-deserved caning, only to discover that the headmaster or proctor was sick! "May I take my frigate with me when I do?" he could not resist quipping.
There came a muttered something, mighty like a suppressed curse, then an aggrieved growl of "Enter!"
Lewrie pulled on the ornate brass handles and swung the doors back, revealing that dread office, that heaped desk awash under working papers, the bookshelves spilling over with loose stacks of it, and several wineglasses, all used since sunrise… Wait a bit!
"Mine arse on a band-box!" Lewrie expostulated.
The shelves were neatly stacked, all correspondence bound up in various coloured ribbons; the desktop could actually be seen; the books and ledgers were arranged in what Lewrie could only take for a proper order, and the only potables in sight was the coin-silver coffee set and tray on a sideboard 'neath the large North-facing windows, a set of porcelain cups, three candles burning under a more plebeian black-iron pot.
"So you finally turned up, have you?" scoffed the Post-Captain, standing behind the desk, minus his uniform coat.
"Captain Nicely?" Lewrie gawped in utter surprise.
"Unfortunately," that worthy said, waving a weary hand over the neat-but-daunting stacks of paperwork. "Come in, come in, Captain, and pray do pour yourself a cup, do you enjoy coffee. Take a pew, sir."
"Er, thankee, sir," Lewrie said, feeling much more at ease. He did pour a cup of coffee, stirred in some local sugar, and sniffed at the cream, then poured in a dollop of that, as well, taking an appreciative sip before seating himself, with his canvas-bound packet on the other chair. "Hmmm," he added, smacking his lips.
"Hope you don't mind goat's milk," Nicely said, "but it's fresher than cow's… just out back, d'ye see, drawn off the teat this dawn, so it has no time to go over. Does the sugar run low at sea, there's nothing like a dollop of sweet goat's milk."
"Up 'til now, I'd always thought it too sweet, sir, but…"
"Leave off the sugar, use a level teaspoon's worth, not a heaping," Nicely suggested, seating himself behind the desk and perking up brisker. "And what have you brought me, Lewrie… more paperwork to read, initial, pass on, and file? My, ain't you the fine gift-giver!"
In their brief acquaintance, Lewrie had quite liked Nicely; he was so aptly named! He was a squarely built older fellow, one of those gentlemen who simply oozed confidence, competence, and reliability. Nicely was a bluff older sea dog, but one with a wry and infectious sense of humour-or irony-to go with his merry blue eyes. Brisk, efficient, yet droll, he was a most congenial sort. Nicely had done Lewrie several kindnesses at Port-au-Prince before the evacuation of the Army from Saint-Domingue, when Nicely aboard HMS Obdurate had held temporary command of that harbour. And, after all, Lewrie had come in with complaints from Capt. George Blaylock of HMS Halifax . Nicely and Blaylock had been nigh mortal enemies since their midshipman days, and, since "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" applied to Royal Navy politics, Lewrie and Nicely had turned out to be "cater-cousinly."
"Sorry, sir, but I fear I must," Lewrie said, setting aside his coffee to hand over his bundled packet. "We've been under 'independent orders,' at the behest of some people from the Foreign Office, so…"
"Heard all about that," Nicely breezed off, "so I fear that you wasted a deal of ink and paper documenting your doings. Sub rosa they were, so they'll remain."
"I take it that Mister Pelham and Mister Peel returned to Jamaica before we did, then, sir," Lewrie surmised. "Well, damme!"