Wilder Perkins: Hoare and the missing Mids

Hoare returned the conversation to the matter of "larks." He was disappointed, though not surprised, to find that these were the ordinary sort of merry prank common on shipboard-greasing the soles of Harcourt's ("Lovey's") shoes so that on donning them the first thing he did was slip and fall on his arse; the time, when Steptoe had newly reported aboard, when he was sent hither and yon in search of the key to the keelson; other tricks old as Neptune but forever new. Not so much as a hint of a cabal to raise illicit money from the mids' elders. In desperation Hoare asked the question direct, only to see his victim first look shocked, then burst into a fit of the giggles.

"That would have been a lark!" Steptoe said when he had regained control of himself.

"Keep the idea to yourself, lad," Hoare said upon dismissing him to his duties. Himself, he had nothing more to do aboard Hebe just now, so he paid his respects to the quarterdeck and boarded Devastation for the short, hard beat in the teeth of the breeze into the Inner Camber where he kept her.

Immediately upon landing and securing his yacht, he returned to Admiralty House. Here he ran hard aground, into pandemonium.

Not only Delancey but Patterson as well, the admiral's private clerk, awaited him. Patterson was literally wringing his hands; Hoare was certain that, had not Delancey's pride precluded it, his hands too would have been wringing.

"There you are, Hoare!" Delancey's cry of accusation carried more than a hint of relief. "Where the hell have you been?"

"Right where you told me the admiral wanted me to go," Hoare whispered. "Aboard Hebe. Now, pray excuse me."

He left the others to wring their hands into rags if they so chose and dodged past them and up the stairs to the admiral's sanctum. It was here that he found the real pandemonium.

Sir George's marine sentry stood impassive, his bayoneted musket at the charge, his face flat and eyes to the front, under siege by several important-looking civilians. All were clad in the latest Bond Street fashion, all were shouting at the imperturbable lobster. Two of the noisy gentlemen were flourishing pieces of paper in the sentry's unblinking face. These personages, Hoare guessed immediately, were the missing mids' anxious friends and relations, come to demand their scions' immediate rescue.

Hoare eeled his way through the crowd, which after all numbered only three or four, and slipped into his admiral's private quarters.

"There you are, Hoare!"

Sir George's outcry was identical with the one his subordinate had uttered below. "Where the hell have you been?"

"Aboard Hebe, sir," Hoare whispered, glad for once that he could give only the soft answer that turneth away wrath. "I brought the ransom note back with me."

"Like hell you did, sir. The ransom notes are right here-and there are at least three of them, sir, I'll have you know, not just one. They're outside this very office being waved in the face of my poor marine. I'll tell you this, sir: if this hullabaloo isn't brought to a stop forthwith, I'll summon the guard detachment and have the whole bunch of 'em thrown into irons, Members of Parliament, peers of the realm, and all."

Under his thick shock of white, Brutus-cut hair, Sir George's face was as red as his lobster's coat. Rear Admiral Sir George Hardcastle had the reputation of being a hard and a merciless man, and he gloried in it. But now was not the time for rough behavior toward his visitors if they were as exalted as they seemed to be and if the admiral wished to avoid being thrown aback himself.

Hoare must calm the waters, he saw.

"Not yet, sir, I beg," he whispered. "First let me see what I can do."

He returned to the doorway, set the sentry gently to one side, and surveyed the noisy little mob. Seeing that Patterson and Delancey had returned and were hovering on the outskirts, he signaled them and instructed Delancey in his usual whisper to take himself to The Three Suns inn, where he was to have accommodation set aside that would be suitable to members of the ton. Patterson was to follow, escorting the friends and relations. When Delancey began to protest his ignominious assignment, Hoare faced him down.

"Now, sir! Go!"

Delancey went.

Thereupon Hoare put fingers to his mouth and produced a piercingly shrill whistle. It was the first really loud noise he had learned to emit, soon after being made mute, and invariably everyone within earshot of it froze in astonishment. So it was now. The hubbub ceased.

Hoare knew that the silence would be brief. Important persons like these would not be cowed by a mere noise-even a really loud one — for more than a few startled seconds. He used the time to pass his explanatory cards to the assemblage.

These were two middle-aged bucks dressed to the nines, whom he took to be the relatives of Harcourt and Buchanan and who appeared as interested in each other's attire as they were in the business that had brought them here; a purple man, portly as a pudding, who could only be the nabob Lord Many-mead; some family Mend; and a firm-looking man with the air of a former naval person, who was surely Dacres, brother of Captain Dacres, RN, of Guerriere.

Hoare cleared his throat-almost the only natural sound that the marksman in Eole had left to him.

"Ha-h'm. If I may have your attention, gentlemen: I understand that you are all come to Portsmouth in connection with the disappearance of Hebe's three midshipmen. I am the officer charged with obtaining their return, as safe and unharmed as circumstances permit."

The hubbub renewed itself. Hoare grasped only snatches of the visitors' remarks. They were all in the sharp-voiced tones of persons who were used to instant compliance with their slightest whims.

"… Outrageous… unconscionable negligence… Parliament

…"

"Mr. Patterson here will escort you all to The Three Sims, where most of you have undoubtedly put up. There are rooms there that are more suitable for our meeting than this one, and they offer a very fine port. Or brandy if you prefer spirits. I shall join you in a few minutes' time.

"Meanwhile, I take it that each of you received the same message. If you, sir, would be so kind as to leave your copy in my hands, I would be greatly obliged."

He looked pointedly at the man he presumed to be Dacres, since as a likely former naval person he would at least have obeyed orders from time to time in the past. Prom their looks, the others had probably never even heard an order since they were three, let alone obeyed one.

Dacres, if it were he, complied.

"It is like the others?" Hoare inquired.

"Identical, sir," was the answer.

"If you will permit me to lead the way, gentlemen," Patterson said, and started down the stairs, looking over his shoulder at them as he went. The move was almost fatal, for he saved himself from falling down the flight only by catching the upper newel post. He recovered his balance and his equanimity instantly, however, and the troop followed him like a brood of gorgeously feathered ducklings.

Left to himself, Hoare hastened to peruse the new ransom note.

He remembered quite vividly the note Captain Davison had received. This one was totally different. In the first place, it was written in a literate, even clerkly hand, almost a copperplate. Second, it employed a style that Dean Swift of Gulliver fame would have found difficult to equal.

The letter bore neither date nor — as was only natural under the circumstances-place of origin.

Sir (Hoare read):

The organization I have the honor to represent has taken your son, and two other young gentlemen of like lineage, into protective custody.

We are as aware as you must be yourself of the legislation which is about to be brought up in Parliament, namely a Home Rule Bill under the terms of which the oppressed people of Ireland will be granted home rule. To wit: self-government under the Crown; full independence, that is, with respect to all matters of faith and law, excepting only issues of foreign relations.