Carrie Bebris - The Deception At Lyme

“I am here at the invitation of the Philpot sisters—have you met them?”

“I have not had the pleasure.”

“Lovely ladies, all three—prodigious fossil-hunters. Their collection is considered one of the best, and includes several discoveries that are the first of their kind. Lord Chatfield introduced me to Miss Elizabeth Philpot at one of his dinner parties. We had a most enjoyable conversation about paleontology and archaeology—how they are really quite similar, both sciences in which their practitioners sift through earth searching for evidence of those—be they creatures or men—who lived before us.” He paused. “But you —how are you and Mr. Darcy? And your little one? I regret that I have not yet had an opportunity to meet her.”

“We are all well, thank you. Lily-Anne is here in Lyme with us. Perhaps you would like to come to dinner one evening?”

“I should enjoy that above all things. I am engaged this evening—the Philpots have invited some promising local young people for a scientific salon—but I am otherwise at your disposal.”

“Tomorrow evening, then, at six?” Lyme, she had found, did not keep London hours.

“I look forward to it already.”

Darcy’s pace slowed as he reached the end of the Walk and neared the harborside pub. He was yet uncertain of what he hoped to learn from this meeting with Lieutenant St. Clair, a meeting arranged at Darcy’s initiative. He was therefore even more uncertain how to direct their conversation. It is difficult, after all, to set a course without knowing one’s destination. And Lieutenant St. Clair struck Darcy as a shrewd enough sea officer to detect any sign of foundering.

What Darcy did know, was that since reading Gerard’s diary, he remained troubled by the unfinished business his cousin had left behind. What had happened to the idols Gerard found? Had St. Clair ever determined their ownership? Had he even attempted to?

And now, years later, did it matter?

The tavern sat in a narrow street in Cobb Hamlet. Darcy passed the Harvilles’ cottage and continued a few more doors to the Sheet Anchor. Though the meeting had been Darcy’s suggestion, the venue had been St. Clair’s.

Sailors and dockmen crowded its tables, some eating dinner; fish dominated the menu, from the look of their plates. Others merely enjoyed the local brew; a few of them appeared to have been enjoying it all day. Peace was not an altogether good thing for men susceptible to idleness.

Darcy spied St. Clair in the back of the tavern, where the lieutenant sat with another gentleman at a table abutting one wall. The two were engaged in close conversation, necessitated by the volume of the ballad being sung two tables away by half a dozen seamen deep in their cups. Fortunately (for Darcy, if not the song’s hero), the betrayed cabin boy was cast overboard and the Golden Vanity sailed off upon the lowland sea just as Darcy reached St. Clair.

“Mr. Darcy! I did not hear you approach.” He gestured toward his companion, a weathered, gouty man who could have been any age from forty to sixty. He had a round face, a rounder gut, and a nose that pointed toward intemperance, but his well-made clothes indicated that he had not abandoned all consciousness of his appearance. “Allow me to introduce Captain Tourner, under whom your cousin and I served aboard the Magna Carta. ” St. Clair turned to the captain. “Mr. Darcy’s cousin was Lieutenant Fitzwilliam.”

“Fitzwilliam?”

“Gerard Fitzwilliam.”

“Of course—the Dangereuse, ” he said. “Do you think I could forget that day?” Darcy could not tell whether his disdain was directed toward St. Clair for his implied suggestion that Tourner had forgotten his fallen lieutenant, or toward the French ship that had been the cause of his death. The captain glanced up at Darcy. “Lieutenant Fitzwilliam was a promising young man. His death was a loss for the navy as well as his family.”

“We appreciated the letter you wrote at the time,” Darcy replied. In truth, the earl had criticized Captain Tourner’s letter as being too brief, the minimum that duty required, with very few particulars. “We are also grateful to Lieutenant St. Clair for having recently returned my cousin’s sea chest to us.”

Captain Tourner regarded St. Clair critically. “You returned Lieutenant Fitzwilliam’s sea chest only recently? Where has it been all this while? I ordered you to arrange for his effects to be transported home with all reasonable expedience, as with any other fallen officer.”

St. Clair shifted in his chair and signaled the serving maid. “The rest of his belongings were delivered in a timely fashion; the chest remained in my custody at the request of Lieutenant Fitzwilliam himself. Would you care for another tot of rum, Captain?”

Tourner’s heavy face flushed. “Why would Fitzwilliam have wanted his chest floating around the world with you rather than sent home? And when did he make this alleged request? You were not with him when he was shot.”

“Some weeks before. I hoped I would never have to make good on the promise.”

The serving maid brought rum for three. St. Clair moved his chair closer to the wall and surveyed the room for an unoccupied chair that could be commandeered for Darcy, but Captain Tourner stood.

“You are welcome to my seat, Mr. Darcy. I have business to attend.” Apparently, however, the captain had no intention of also relinquishing his rum. Tourner drained his glass and set it beside three empty ones on his side of the table, then picked up his hat and departed.

Darcy sat down, leaning back as the girl cleared away the empty glasses. He noticed that St. Clair had only one glass on his side, and wondered how long he and the captain had been in conference. “Forgive me if my arrival curtailed your meeting with Captain Tourner.”

“Not at all,” he said. “We were merely reminiscing about past days. Idle talk.”

“I am glad for the opportunity to have made his acquaintance. Had you mentioned when we spoke the other evening that he was in Lyme, I would have sought an introduction. Is the Magna Carta in port here with him? I should like to lay eyes upon the ship, even if only from shore.”

“When last I heard, she was in Bristol. Lyme’s harbor is too small to comfortably accommodate many ships of that size. Regardless, the Magna Carta is no longer Tourner’s ship. He now captains the Swansea, an old sixth-rate docked in Plymouth at present. However, there is talk of the Admiralty breaking up the ship now that the war has ended.”

“What will Captain Tourner do then?”

“Go on half-pay, I suppose, while he waits for the Admiralty to offer him another ship. It will be a long wait, though, as there are many captains with more seniority and more distinguished service records in similar straits. Alternatively, he could take up an appointment on a private vessel or in another branch of the service—transport, packet ships, or the like. Such duty, however, is hardly glamorous, and would be felt as a demotion.”

“Perhaps the Preventives?” Since arriving in Lyme, Darcy had seen numerous ships patrolling the coast to deter smugglers.

“Captain Tourner, command a revenue cutter?” St. Clair chuckled, lifted his rum, and drank.

“He would not find such duty attractive?”