Julian Stockwin - Tyger

“Then-”

“Yes. I’m captain of the good barky Eskdale Hall and, like all captains, I have my duties and my paperwork and, as I must, I’m to concern myself with my stout crew and their liberties.”

They toasted their respective commands with all due ceremony.

Then Kydd asked, “And can it be said you’re restored after your … travels, Nicholas?”

Cecilia flashed Renzi a warning glance. “If you’d leave the brandy, Purvis …”

The footmen quietly retired as well.

“It was-” Renzi began, but Cecilia interrupted him, leaning forward, “Nicholas suffered dreadfully. Thomas, he told me everything-but now he’s home and we’re together again.”

She reached across to squeeze her husband’s hand, her piercing look both pleading and of the utmost love.

An unexpected wash of envy at the intimacy between them took Kydd off-guard. “Ahem. So you’ve no plans for another …”

“Dear fellow, allow that I’ve earned a measure of repose, which I fully intend shall be spent in my library,” Renzi said firmly.

Cecilia brightened. “Oh, I nearly forgot! Thomas, it’s the county ball next week-we’re host this year. Please say you’ll attend, dear brother?”

“Why, of course, Cec.”

“You’ll be the toast of the evening-a true hero who graces us with his presence on our little occasion.”

“You shall want me in uniform, then?”

“With star and sash both! And I have in mind just the lady you’ll squire,” she added. “The Honourable Arabella Fortescue, an accomplished beauty and most delightful woman …”

IT HAD BEEN TOUCHING to see Renzi and Cecilia together, but Kydd had still not quite grown used to seeing his friend at such an elevation.

Renzi had changed. He was wearing the honour and noble bearing as though born to it, which of course he was, but now he carried himself differently: serious, listening more, saying less. Kydd suspected he’d gone through some private hell in Constantinople in his clandestine efforts to stop it falling into the hands of the French, but was not letting the world see how it had affected him. The healing was a task for Cecilia alone.

For himself it was different. He’d lost L’Aurore -but in her place had been given a plum prize: a brand-new heavy frigate of the latest design, the envy of every red-blooded captain in the navy. The price? Months of patience in idleness.

Since his first command, dispatch had been the watchword, and sloth a vice. Now he was being asked to kick his heels, with nothing to do other than graciously accept the reputation and eminence that was now his.

After making his farewells to Renzi and Cecilia, it was off to London-with leisure time and freedom to make foray into the entertainments on offer in the world’s capital.

Kydd settled into his accustomed chair at the White Hart Inn while Tysoe dealt with the baggage. He realised he needed someone who could provide a fashionable steer, give him an entree , and thought of Edmund Bazely, the jolly commander he had first met among the Channel Gropers in those feverish times of Bonaparte’s threatened invasion.

He’d heard that the man had just returned from a particularly fortunate cruise in the Caribbean. A determined bachelor, he was above all a knowing man about town in London.

Impatient to taste the delights of the capital, Kydd soon found himself outside Albany in Piccadilly.

The doorman took his card and before long a tubby man stood before him, not fully dressed but beaming with pleasure.

“Why, damme if it ain’t Kydd the Frog-slayer! Or is it t’ be Sir T at all?” he added, with a teasing grin. “Do come in, cuffin. M’ cabin is all ahoo but ye’re welcome, very welcome!”

The rooms, or “set” as they were termed in Albany, were modest in size but well appointed and quite the thing for their chief function, bachelor quarters for the comfortably off.

“A snort o’ something?” Bazely called to his guest, from the bedroom, as he completed his attire. “Jus’ touch the bell.”

Kydd nonetheless politely waited until he emerged. “You’ve done well at prize-money then, dear fellow.”

Bazely grinned. “Pewterising is the solemn duty of any in a blue coat, m’ friend.” He looked at Kydd shrewdly. “Last I saw ye, you’d run afoul o’ Admiral Lockwood, somethin’ about his daughter, wasn’t it? Now I sees before me a cove who’s made post, got his name in The Times , shipped a star, an’ who everyone says is today’s hero. I honour ye for it, Kydd. And thank ’ee for noticing an old frien’ like this.”

“Damn your eyes, Bazely-I came of a purpose, man.”

“Oh?”

“I’m to get a frigate-but not yet. She hasn’t completed, I have to wait it out. Months. And I’ve a yen to make the most of it, take m’ fill of what London can offer a weary mariner, if you see my meaning.”

“Ha! Jack Tar on the ran-tan in the Great Smoke?”

“Just so.”

“ Fenella ’s in for small repair, I think I c’n see m’ way clear to a mort o’ frolicking. Cards? High table? Theatre? Ladies-or all four on ’em?”

After an agreeable discussion on which to do first, Bazely reflected lazily, “Weren’t ye in that Buenos Aires moil at all?”

“Yes, I was. Why do you ask?”

“As it might put a crimp in your little spree-the court-martial. I take it y’r not bein’ charged?”

“No, but I’m to witness.”

It had been a relief to hear that only one man was to face the court: the instigator of the failed expedition, Commodore Popham. Kydd had received the formal notification only very recently that he was being summoned as witness, with the instruction to hold himself in readiness for the date of convening, to be announced.

“Should be interestin’, I’m persuaded.” Bazely chuckled.

“Maybe, but I think it a miserable thing, and to be honest with you, m’ friend, I don’t particularly want to dig it up again.”

“No? Then you’ve been out o’ Town too long-every codshead scribbler tryin’ either to roast the man or cry up the hero. Here y’ have the Admiralty, righteous an’ frowning, saying as how he left his station to go a-venturing without leave. An’ over there you’ve got Johnny Public-he adores a scrapper who sees th’ enemy an’ goes for him.

“And it’s gone political. Popham was a Pitt’s man, an’ when he was gone, he lost his friends. He’s a cunning old fox, but where can y’ stand with a closet Whig like Portland? Not t’ say the Tories at each other’s throats and ready to see their allies go hang. It’s a right shambles an’ the whole world has an opinion. I’d say ye’d better have your story tight an’ pretty, Kydd. You’re in the centre o’ the storm.”

It cast a pall, but not for long.

Bazely beamed. “So we’re for the tiles. Now, m’ knightly friend, if I’m to introduce ye to ladies o’ my acquaintance then I’m not t’ be shamed in the article o’ dress. Here in Town we has t’ be taut-rigged an’ in fashion or we don’t stand a chance against y’r strut-noddies prancing about as calls ’emselves the ton . I know a tailor t’ be trusted in Old Bond Street. Shall we …?”

Kydd had been overseas for so long that he hadn’t appreciated just how much things had changed. Gone were the colourful and ornamented waistcoats and breeches of the eighteenth century and in their place was a mode laid down by the upcoming society dictator Beau Brummell, avidly followed by the Prince of Wales-a plain, studied elegance that owed everything to cut and quality.

“Sir has a fine figure,” the tailor declared, holding Kydd at arm’s length. “We can make much of this. Buckskin pantaloons, perhaps?”