Dewey Lambdin - The King`s Coat

Morton took him by the arms again, and began to hustle him into the tender custody of the Navy. "Give my regards to Belinda, too," Alan called out. "Have you not tried her already, you'll find her a right short-heeled wench, and a most obliging sort of girl." Alan saw a look cross his father's face and had to laugh in spite of the circumstances. "By God. I believe you already have. ’

‘Shameless. Come on, you," Captain Bevan ordered. ’I'll pay you all back, you know," Alan threatened as the coxswain took charge of him at the door with huge hard hands. ’You, and Belinda, and Gerald, and that pettifogger Pilchard, and your brainless helpmeet Morton.’

Gerald was waiting at the base of the stairs, pleased with the world. "Do us all proud at sea, won't you, Alan dear? Don't bother to write, though.’

’My brother, Captain Bevan," Alan said by way of a hasty introduction. "Sews his own dresses and, what's the naval term… he goes in for the windward passage? God rot you too, Gerald. I hope to see you in the stocks for buggery one day, you poxy sodomite.’

There was no servant present in the front hall, just a valise and his cloak and hat awaiting him, a much too smaIl tricorne trimmed in white lace and adorned with a long feather. It was jammed onto his head, but without his usual tall, oversize wig it came off once they were in the street. ’Have you no shame?" Bevan demanded. "Comport yourself quietly into the coach, for your own sake, if not for your poor family's.’

’Then have your trained bear let go of me.’

He shrugged himself into his coat and cloak, picked up his fallen hat and entered the coach. The coxswain got in and sat across from him. ’My name's BeII," the man announced in a deep rumble. "Do you really believe I give a damn what your name is?’

‘Give me an excuse ta cut yer nutmegs awrf, boy. Ya sing small wi' me an' sit quiet er ya won't live ta sign aboard a ship. ‘

‘Take your choice, young 'un," Captain Bevan said, seating himself next to his coxswain and sweeping back his cloak to reveal a pair of small pistols in his waistcoat. "Go a gentleman, or suffer the consequences.’

’I shall keep that in mind, thank you, Captain Bevan," Alan replied archly, wrapping his cloak closer about him. Even a windy and wet January morning could not explain the sudden coldness he felt as their coach rattled off to rendezvous with the "Dilly" for Portsmouth.

A sullen, icy wind blew across the King's Stairs in the city of Portsmouth as Midshipman Alan Lewrie waited for the boat to fetch him out to his ship, the sixty-four-gun 3rd Rate Ariadne. Many naval vessels tossed and gyrated on the heaving grey green harbor waters, and Alan swallowed hard, and became a touch ill just watching them. He was also still in a mild form of shock over his fall from grace, and his sudden banishment. From one moment of being a buck of the first head and caterwauling with his friends allover London, chasing women, eating and drinking his fill, gambling and playing, and with little thought for the morrow, to this seaborne exile was just too hellish a wrench.

The trip down had been rough; bad roads and bad company, with both Bell and Bevan eyeing him like hawks. Even a bath and a shave at the inn had not revived his spirits. There had been no chance to escape. To listen to Bevan, it wasn't that bad a fate to go to sea, and over the past few days, the terror of it had slipped away. He would be a midshipman, not a common sailor, a junior petty officer with authority, carried on the ship's books as a gentleman, berthed with others of his kind, with servants and stewards to care for his clothing and his table.

Bevan had told him about prize money, and how some ships' crews had become rich beyond measure, and how midshipmen took a larger share; of how fellows much like himself had gone on to fame and fortune and had set themselves up as great men once they came home.

And during the process of buying his kit, Alan had reveled in a form of revenge on Sir Hugo. Bevan had a letter of credit from his father-he did not strike Alan as the sort one would trust with a full purse-and since it wasn't Bevan's money, they ended as confederates in spending it properly. Six full uniforms, three of them the best the town could boast, more silk and linen shirts than anyone could need, silk and cotton stockings, breeches and working rig slop trousers, personal stores of extra fine biscuit, jam, tea, paper, and the proper set of books, such as the latest edition of Falconer's Marine Dictionary.

Alan was sure that even a royal bastard could not make a finer showing, and secretly, he thought he looked especially handsome in the uniform, even if it was on the plain side. There had been a saucy dark-haired chambermaid at the inn that had thought so, too, his last evening ashore. After a dinner that had filled him to bursting, two bottles of claret and several brandies, he had gone to his room to discover her ready to turn his bed down for the evening and fetch a warming pan. When he suggested she warm it instead, she was out of her sack and stays in a heartbeat. Thankfully, Bell relented and stood guard on the door, and not in the room with him, showing some mercy to him on his last free night. He had no civilian clothing anymore, so he could not have run away. Like a condemned man, he had eaten a hearty meal, and had bulled her allover the room until the sky was grey.

Both Bell and Bevan had been tactfully silent after he had washed up and joined them for breakfast, much like executioners who had the good grace not to crack jokes at the wrong time. The girl's send-off, all the drink, and little sleep had damned near killed him, and a cold breakfast had almost finished the job… and still gave notice of trying. ’I am in no shape to do this," he said to Bell, who took no notice. And there was the boat from his ship, approaching fast. "Here, you," Bell said behind him to a waiting bargee. ’Help the gemmun with his chest.’

The sense of shock was gone, also the hope of escape, and Alan's passing interest in prize money and uniforms and little revenge faded as reality approached. Here was the end of one life and the beginning of another that felt much like penal servitude. Had he not heard or read somewhere that the Navy was like a prison, in which one had the chance to drown? " Bell, I have money," he said, turning to the coxswain. "Tuppence'll do for the bargee, sir.’

’No, I mean…" Lewrie hinted, tipping a wink. "Best do it like a man."

Bell scowled. "Sir.’

Alan shrugged and tramped down to the boat at the foot of the stairs. One man held it to shore with a boat hook while eight more sat with their oars held aloft like lances. There was a boy by the tiller, a midshipman of perhaps fifteen. ’Hurry it up, will you?" he called. "Our first lieutenant's watching. Well, get in the goddamned boat. We won't bite you… yet.’

Alan stumbled across the gunwale and sat in the boat at the stem by the boy who had addressed him, while two of the oarsmen took hold of his chest and placed it in the bottom of the boat with a loud thump. Alan flipped a coin to the waiting bargee. ’Shove off, bowman," the boy at the tiller said. "Out oars. Backwater, larboard… give us some way, starboard.’

Alan looked up at Bell, who spat in the water as he waved him a sardonic farewell. Alan sighed and turned to look at the men in the boat with him. The nearest oarsmen were both tanned a dark brown, with skin as wrinkled as a discarded pair of gloves. They also sported impressive scars which stood out like chalk marks on their arms and faces. ’Give way all," the boy called. "Stroke, damn yer eyes, or I'll see someone's back laid open for shirking." That could cheer me up, Alan told himself; not like a hanging but possibly entertaining. He turned to look at the tiller man of his version of Charon's Ferry and marked him down for a brutal little git of a type he was familiar with from Harrow (and sundry other schools from which he had been expelled), a right bastard made even worse with power over fags and new boys. At least once he was aboard ship, he would have the same power, as if he had been made prefect over a whole shipload of fags. But the men in the boat didn't look like the pink-cheeked little victims he had bullied in the past. Neither did they look like the popular illustrations of Jolly Jacks and True Blue Hearts of Oak. In fact, they resembled more last session's dock at the Assizes, surly, uncouth and dangerous brutes, the gutter sweepings from the worst parts of the city, cutthroats and cutpurses he normally wouldn't give way for, unless they were the pimps he knew. These men looked like the sort who would do him in for a little light entertainment. And that brought him full-circle to the dicey situation in his belly. ’God, it can't be sick already," the tiller boy crowed. ’Oh, hold your tongue," Alan snapped, making sure to keep his own mouth as tightly sealed as possible. "So that's the way you'll be, milord." the boy said with a cruel laugh. "Well, you'll sing a different tune when we're at sea, that I promise you. I said row, you damned sluggards." Within minutes, they were close to Ariadne and steering for its starboard side. It seemed immense to Alan's eyes, much like a country house on a large estate. Unfortunately, a country house that seemed to bob and roll with a life of its own. The bowman grappled them to the side with his boat hook by the mainmast chains. ’Up you go, my booby," the boy said. ’Up there? How?" Lewrie gawped. ’Jump onto the battens, grab hold of the man-ropes, and climb to the entry port.’