Dewey Lambdin - The King`s Coat

‘Aye, sir," Alan shouted back, thinking it was a summons for him, as usual. ’ Both of you," Kenyon added.

Lieutenant Swift and the captain were there on the gangway by the time they had ascended to that level by the forecastle ladders and gone aft to join the officers. "Silly cack-handed, cunny-thumbed whip-jack of a sailor you are, sir," Swift howled, spitting saliva into the wind in his fury. "A canting-crew imitation tar would know better than that. There's a jolly-boat stove in and the barge damaged as well because of you.’

’Sony, sir," Alan said along with Rolston. ’Oh, not you, Lewrie, at least not this once; it's Rolston I'm talking to." Swift's face was turning red as a turkey cock's wattles. "Get back to wode, Mister Lewrie.’

’Oh, aye aye, sir," said a surprised Alan, not on the carpet for the first time since he had joined Ariadne. ’ If it wasn't for Lewrie you'd be pressed flat as a flounder, and good riddance to bad rubbish…" Swift was going on as Alan scrambled back across the boat-tiers to leeward, out of earshot.

I should have let him get mashed, damme if I shouldn't have, Alan thought. But now I've done something right for a change, and somebody else is getting grief.

An hour later, they finished lashing down the boats and by then the watch had changed. Alan went down to the lower gun deck and sniffed at the odors of sickness and bodies. Even as bad as the weather was topside, he almost contemplated going back on deck rather than stand the atmosphere down here, but he peeled off the sodden tarpaulin and began to work his way through the swinging hammocks toward the after-ladders to the orlop. He passed the junior midshipmen's mess, where there was a single glim burning. The master gunner Mr. Tencher had a stone bottle by his elbow on the table, secured by fiddles, and was humming to himself. ’Lewrie," he whispered, not wanting to wake up his sleeping berth mates. "Want a wet?’

‘God, yes, Mister Tencher, sir," Alan croaked in gratitude. He seated himself on a chest and locked his elbows into place on the table so he wouldn't slide about. The gummy wetness of his clothing that had been soaked in salt-water for hours almost glued him to the dry wood. ’Cider-And, boy," Tencher promised, pouring him a battered tin mug full of something alcoholic-smelling. "And what, Mister Tencher?" Alan asked, sniffing at it as it was handed over to him. ’Good Blue Ruin, Holland gin." Tencher laughed softly, his leathery face crinkling. In the fitful light of the glim he looked as if he had tar and gunpowder pennanently ground into his wrinkles. "God in Heaven," Alan choked after a sip. He had ordered Cider-And in country inns and had usually gotten rum or mulled wine as the additive. Plus, he was never partial to gin, but he took another sip, grateful for the hot flush in his innards. ’Hear ya done somethin' right tonight, Mister Lewrie.’

’It was nice not to be caned or shouted at for a change, Mister Tencher," Alan said, tears coming to his eyes from the fumes of the gin. ’No gunner's daughter fer you, eh?’

‘Until tomorrow." Alan gave Tencher the ghost of a smile.

The man had run him ragged, trying to pound the art of handling artillery into him, and had had him caned more than once when he didn't have the right answer. He could not feel exactly comfortable with Tencher but he meant to be civil if the man was going to trot out free drink. ’Rolston should owe you a tot fer saving his life, ya know," Tencher said. filling his own mug again and taking a deep quaff. ’Well, we shall see," Alan said, forcing himself to choke down the rest of the mug. He knew that if he made it to his hammock without passing out he was going to be a lot luckier than he had any right to be. "Thankee kindly, Mister Tencher, that was potent stuff. I shall sleep like a stone if they don't call all hands again.’

’Don't mention it." Tencher winked. "Earned it.’

Alan made his way out of the mess, clinging to the top of the half partitions toward the double ladders. Someone took him by the arm in the dark and spun him to a stop. ’ Lewrie. ‘

‘ Rolston?" he asked. thinking he recognized the voice. "Think you're a clever cock, do you?" It was Rolston, alright. ’I'll not let you make me look ridiculous like that again-’

‘You don't need any help from me to be ridiculous." Alan tried to judge just where Rolston's head might be so that when he hit him, as he felt he soon must. he could get in a good shot. "I'll settle you." Rolston's voice was shaking.

Alan could barely make out a face, but he knew the fellow must be almost weeping with rage by then. "I'll square your yards for you for good and all-’

‘No, you won't," Alan said, prying the hand from his arm and pressing it back away from him against Rolston's best effort with an ease he would not have had weeks before. "And if you lay hands on me once more I'll kick your skinny arse up between your ears, right where it belongs.’

’Watch and see ifI don't get you, Lewrie.’

’Watch out for yourself." Alan chuckled. "I might not save your miserable life next time.. .farmer.’

Alan took a few cautious steps toward the coaming of the hatch, wary of a sudden shove from Rolston that could send him crashing to the hard deck below, ready to dive flat and let Rolston go arse-over-tit instead. But Mister Tencher came out of the mess area with his glim and a handful of scrap paper for a trip to the warrant officer's heads in the roundhouse before the focs'l, and Rolston had to turn on his heel and go forward to his own berth space. Alan, relieved, went below to his own, where he slid out of his wet dripping clothes and sat on a chest to towel himself down in the dark.

His skin was burning with saltwater rash and he could feel the chafe in crotch and limbs, where boils were erupting from the constant immersion and the sandpaper effect of wet wool. He rolled into his hammock nude, wearing a blanket wrapped about him like a cocoon. He tried to inventory what he had dry to wear but was so sleepy, exhausted, battered and drunk that he soon fell into a swoonlike sleep, dreaming once more of getting everyone who had been in any way responsible for his current predicament in the Navy all together in one place, and roasting them over slow fires.

Two days later, once the weather had moderated, they only found twenty ships of their convoy at first light. Perhaps fifteen more came straggling back into sight over the next few days. It was likely that the five missing merchantmen would never be seen by anyone again. At first Alan was a bit irked that no one said anything about his saving Rolston. then realized that it was just one of those things that was, after all, expected from a midshipman or a sailor, with no thanks needed or expected.

What a shitten outlook they have in this Navy, he sighed.

Dawn was a rosy hint rising over the humps of the sea astern, lost in the grey gloom of another spring morning in the windswept North Atlantic. The taffrail lanterns and the candles in the wheel binnacle lost their strength, and one could begin to recognize people on watch by their faces instead of their voices. Like wraiths the ships in convoy began to loom as dark shadows ahead of them to leeward on either side of their bows now that another long voyage was almost over.

Alan clung to the starboard shrouds halfway up to the main top, shivering with chill and trying to steady a heavy telescope to count ships. Lieutenant Kenyon was below him at the quarterdeck ladder, his eyes flying from one vantage to the next, judging the strength of the wind, the set of the sails, Ariadne's position to the rest of the convoy, a first reassuring sight of Dauntless out to leeward and far ahead of the convoy, eyeing his watch to see they were awake and alert. Lewrie wondered if he was making nautical plans for all eventualities… or merely sniffing the aromas that occasionally swirled back from the smoking galley funnel. Today was a meat-issue day following a Wednesday "Banyan Day" on which the crew was served beer, cheese, gruel, soup and biscuit.