"Shot him?" Lt. Urquhart.marvelled, a tad wall-eyed, by then. "In the centre of his chest, and he lived} Surely, sir, you're not saying that his… what'd ye call it?… his geas for good fortune made him bullet-proof?"
"All she did was knock him flat, and make a bruise as big as a mush-melon," the Surgeon, Mr. Durant, said with a wry chuckle.
"Fortunately for the Captain, the butt-flask of compressed air which provides the motive force was nearly spent," Lt. Devereux related, with a chuckle of his own. "I put it down to extreme good fortune, no more, Mister Urquhart, for, had Mademoiselle de Guilleri had a spare flask, we'd have lost him, certain."
"You should have been there to see the pirates' captured Spanish treasure ship explode, sir!" Lt. Adair told Urquhart. "She took light somehow, as she drifted off, and when her powder magazine went up, she was blown to kindling. And God knows how many new-minted silver coins went flying sky-high… bright as a royal fireworks, and plopping in the bay in a circle a mile across, and lost forever!"
"After that, 'twas a rather, dull year, though." Gamble frowned. "Off to Halifax last summer with despatches…"
He was interrupted by the lone chime of One Bell in the Evening Watch- half past eight, leaving them another half hour before a call for Lights Out at nine, observed in harbour or at sea.
"… a partial refit, and a full re-coppering, there," Gamble went on. "To Portsmouth, then orders to join the escort of an East India Company trade."
"We might have gone as far as Bombay, Calcutta, or Canton, but for getting our rudder shot clean off by a French frigate one night off Cape Town," Adair supplied with a pouty look. "Though we did touch at Recife and Saint Helena on the way, and that was enjoyable."
"And there was the circus," Lt. Gamble said with a twinkle.
"Circus?" Urquhart, by then rather bleary, enquired, at a loss once more.
"Why, Mister Daniel Wigmore's Travelling Extravaganza, sir!" Lt. Adair replied. "Surely, you've heard of it, the most famous circus in all the British Isles!"
"Circus, menagerie of exotic beasts, and theatrical troupe, in one," Lt. Gamble happily mused. "Comedies, dramas, aerial acts, knife throwers, dancing bears, and lion taming… clowns, mimes, and bareback riders. Some barer than others, hmm?" He leered.
"Oh, 'Princess' Eudoxia!" Adair gaily joined in. "Bow and arrows, and never missed, standing bareback, from under the belly of her huge white stallion, facing aft like a Parthian, what a wonder she was!"
"Billed as Scythian, Circassian royalty, but really a Roosian Cossack," Gamble stated with equal enthusiasm. "An absolutely stunning, dark-haired beauty, slim and tall, with the most cunning long legs, in skin-tight breeches, knee-high moccasin boots, a corsety thing, and see-through gauze… what-ye-may-call-it long shirt. And wasn't she hot after the Captain! Threw herself at him…'til she learned he was married, o' course."
"He did pick up a smattering of Roosian, though." Adair leered suggestively. "Curse-words, mostly, from that vicious old lion tamer father of hers."
"Their slow old tub, the Festival, was bound for Cape Town to capture new beasts, and attached itself to our convoy on our way for Recife," Lt. Devereux explained. "She sailed with our home-bound trade, too, once we'd replaced our rudder and set the ship to rights, and was there the night we fought and made prize of the L 'Uranie frigate. The second Frenchman went after the slowest ship in the convoy… the Festival… but, when they tried to board her, they ran into a hornet's nest of trained, bears, baboons, and a loosed lion. Knife throwers, sharpshooters, and Mistress Eudoxia's bow and arrows, too. The Frogs were so terrified, they tumbled back aboard their ship and sheered off, just as the other escort, the old Jamaica sixty-four, got about and closed with them, and I doubt they fired more than a single broadside for honour's sake before they struck, as well.
"Why, Wigmore's Circus received Thanks of the Crown, Thanks of Parliament and 'John Company,' and even did a command performance for King George," Devereux said with a laugh, "and now Wigmore's future is made forever. I must own surprise, Mister Urquhart, that you haven't heard of them."
"I was at sea aboard Albion , and out of reach of the papers," Urquhart had to admit. "Though I did read the official account about Proteus's defence of the convoy. Well, gentlemen…," he said, with a glance upwards to the stubs of the candles in the overhead lamps, instead of drawing out his pocket-watch. 1 "This had been a most enlightening evening, one which assures me that as Savage's First Lieutenant I run no risk of lacking excitement, hey? And I look forward eagerly to whatever new adventures our gallant Captain Lewrie may lead us in future."
"We will follow him anywhere," Lt. Gamble said with a taut grin, and his tongue firmly in cheek, "if only to see what he'll get into, next, ha ha!" Which jest raised a general round of laughter from all the men at-table, but for the dour Mr. Winwood.
"I, ah…," Urquhart flummoxed, his now-fuzzy thoughts put off pace by Lt. Gamble's smirky comment. "A toast, may I be so bold… a last one, for the Captain assured me that tomorrow will be a strenuous day… to the gallant Captain Alan Lewrie, and to further Glory and Fame for HMS Savage!"
He raised his glass on high, as did the others, but…
"And to 'Mother' Green's best, sirs!" Lt. Devereux amended. "Andom Captain's favourites!"
Urquhart gawped once more, mouth agape for a moment, for Mother Green (God rest her patriotic soul!) had made and sold the finest and safest sheep-gut cundums from the Green Lantern in Half Moon Street in London for years, had come out of retirement at the urging of her old clients when the American Revolution had erupted in 1776 to make "protections" for their officer sons, so they could "rantipole" Yankee Doodle wenches in perfect assurance of safety, too.
Urquhart also blushed, for did he not have a round dozen from that selfsame source, now manufactured by Mother Green's heirs, down in the bottom of his sea-chest, 'cause one never knew when the chance might arise… not with women of the better sort, certainly, but…?
"The Captain… Savage… and Mother Green!" he proposed.
"Boat ahoy!" came a muffled cry from the unfortunate Midshipman who stood Harbour Watch in the officers' stead. The reply could not be made out as they tossed back their last glass-fuls to "heel-taps," but moments later came the faint thud of a boat coming alongside the entry-port, and at such a late hour, too.
CHAPTER FOUR
Alan Lewrie was ready for bed, after a rather succulent supper taken alone in his great-cabins. A whole jointed chicken, dredged in flour and crumbled biscuit, then pan-fried the way his wife from North Carolina had cooked it, a method happily re-discovered when he'd been dined aboard ships of the fledgling United States Navy in the Indies, among officers from South Carolina or Georgia. Fresh garden peas and young spring carrots, intermixed, had accompanied it, supported by a baked potato smeared with mustard, and a basket of dainty shore rolls.
His Cox'n, Liam Desmond, had talked their "Free Black" volunteer cook, so aptly re-named Cooke, into baking a few apple tarts, as well; all sluiced down with one of the bottles of Cape Town white wines that Lewrie had purchased just before sailing back to England, and a couple of brandies, after, when catching up on the last of the day's unending flow of official paperwork from the warehouses ashore, a chapter or two of a new novel, and a game of chase with a champagne cork on a string with Toulon and Chalky 'til they'd tired of it, had rolled their eyes at him, and had flopped down on the canvas deck chequer, exhausted.