Pre-dawn was always the preferred choice for attacks; that, or the wee hours of the night, was there enough of a moon to prevent confusion and dread among one's own forces. Low tide for a firm beach on which to ground, or high tide, so the ships' boats had a shorter row, less time for the enemy to react, and fetch the supporting warships' guns into closer range? Which, which, which? Tides, the stage of the moon, time of sunrise, nothing seemed to concur to guarantee success.
And damn Kenyon's blood/ Lewrie found himself fuming, which was a grand distraction from his contretemps, almost a welcome one.
"A last matter, Lewrie," Commodore Ayscough had imparted, after Capt. Cheatham had departed for his own ship. "Commander Kenyon sent me report of your most recent action, and I must tell you that he is… wroth with you. He does not quite accuse, but I gather from his tone that he feels you forced him to trail his coat to draw fire from the French, which resulted in the loss of three hands killed, five men wounded, and minor damage to his vessel. I gathered he thought you'd done it from spite… to work off some long-standing grudge."
"I told him he was bait, sir," Lewrie had angrily countered, "I surely did. Was Hogue and Mischief the brig appointed to watch over the northern approaches to the Gironde, I'd have used him and his ship instead! Kenyon's instructions were to demonstrate, not make an actual landing, sir. His boats were all but in the surf before the foe opened upon us."
"But, was there some incident in your past with him, Lewrie?"
"He thought me dishonourable, once," Lewrie had weaseled. "Lured a Frog privateer close aboard by pretending to strike, then firing upon them, and setting them on fire with fire arrows. Kenyon was down with the Yellow Jack, as was half our crew, and it was our only chance. We re-hoisted colours a second before we opened, sir, burned her to her waterline, and saved our important passengers, secret despatches, and our lives. I s'pose he's resented me since, though I've quite put it out of my mind years ago. I've also made 'Post,' whilst Kenyon's still commanding below the Rates, so… is there any spite involved, sir, I suggest it is he who holds the grudge."
"Plausible," Ayscough decided, stroking his chin while they stood on the starboard gangway, waiting for Lewrie's boat to arrive. "I must confess, I've had my doubts of the man ever since he arrived on-station, Lewrie. Drinks far too much… slovenly in his personal habits. Uhm… the one time I was aboard Erato, I was struck by the, ah… strange aura about her, the mood of her crew, and the lack of uniformity in how they were accoutred, as if Kenyon plays favourites."
"Well, perhaps some of his killed or wounded were better-dressed, sir," Lewrie suggested with a bland face, "his favourites."
"Good God, you're not suggesting…!" Ayscough had blanched.
"Have no idea, sir," Lewrie had told him, hoping that Ayscough might figure it out on his own, without having to recount what he had witnessed all those years ago,… which would sound like spite. There they had left it.
Lewrie rolled his shoulders and leaned his head far back to ease the onset of a crick, before forcing his attention back to the charts and tables.
"Don't have a bloody due!" he whispered. "They'll find me out at last. 'Oh, that bloody Lewrie, what a fool he was,' they'll say." Ever since being all but "Pressed" by his own father in 1780, he'd had a mortal fear of making a monumental cock-up, sooner or later, as if he had spent all his career, not one of his choosing, playing the role of a competent Commission Sea Officer, but was at base a mere dilettante, a sham, a "cack-handed, cunny-thumbed" fraud. And now that he had the rank and seniority, the responsibility, he would be found out.
Chalky, the younger cat, half-opened his eyes and raised up his head from a tail-tucked, paw-tucked drowse on one corner of the desk, and Toulon, sprawled cross his lap, looked up hopefully, giving Lewrie a loving head swipe upon his waist-coat.
"At least you two still respect me," Lewrie muttered to them as he gave each some stroking. "Christ!" He leaned back in his chair again, running both hands over his hair, looking up at the slowly swaying lanthorns and the deck beams for inspiration. "Should've stayed a Lieutenant… a. Midshipman! Or, stayed ashore on half-pay and become a buttock-brokerin' pimp, after the Revolution!"
It was one thing for him to spin moonbeam fantasies of blood and mayhem over the wine-table, but quite another to set a plan on paper, with a dozen copies saved for later revelation, a plan that could get a lot of good men killed or wounded if it was a half-baked shambles, ending in an egregious failure. The Country's, the Navy's, and Capt. Alan Lewrie's repute could go smash like Humpty-Dumpty, and its author cashiered for hen-headed incompetence.
Think… think, ye bloody half-wit! he chid himself; what is it ye wish t'do? More t'the point, what d'ye wish the Frogs t'do? Smash those forts on the narrows, that's what, but.. . how? I need a few o'Lord Boxham's "liners," Marines, and sailors, hmmm…
He considered that, like the sketchy plan he'd formed a year or more ago to seize New Orleans, and Louisiana, from the Spanish… one now most-like mouldering in an occasionally flooded basement at Admiralty, or Horse Guards, this one might never be implemented, thankee Jesus! Lord Boxham might look at this one and reject it out of hand. But, if he liked it, and it turned out to be a farce…!
The local tides, he considered. The deep-draught ships of the line had to get within practical gun-range, close enough to the shore to frighten the French into thinking that a massive invasion force was going to be landed. Deep-draught ships would have to back up his own light ships in the Gironde, too, close ashore.
He shifted tables, books, and such on the desk, and his personal mail, still bound in twine and unopened, fell off the desk to hit the deck with a loud thud. "Ow!" he yelped as Chalky sprang off the desk, as Toulon abandoned his lap in a prodigious leap to larboard, and his claws dug in deep into his thighs for a sure launch, right through his breeches, and damned close to his "wedding tackle"!
"Say somethin', sir?" Aspinall asked, drawn from his pantry as he was getting ready to hang up his apron. "Oh, the wee poltroons got a scare on, poor darlin's."
"Ow," Lewrie sarcastically reiterated as he checked his thighs for blood. The cats landed with legs wide-spread, low to the deck with tails bottled up and whisking rapidly, looking at each other as if to ask, "What the bloody Hell was that?" before stalking on stiffened legs to sniff noses with each other, then sniff each other's arses.
"Was about t'say, sir, 'tis nigh on Two Bells," Aspinall reminded him. "Will ya be needin' anythin' more this ev'nin', sir?"
Two Bells of the Evening Watch, 9 p.m., was the time for all lights below decks to be extinguished, every lanthorn and every glim, so no accidental fire could break out, the worst danger for a wooden ship chock-full of pitch, tar, resin, gunpowder, and sailcloth. Soon, the Master-at-Arms, Mr. Neale, and his Ship's Corporals, Burton and Ragster, would start their rounds.
"No, nothing more, Aspinall. You go turn in," Lewrie told him. "Leave the coffee warming on the candle, d'ye please. I'll work a bit longer. Tell Mister Neale I'll try not t'burn us to the waterline."