Dewey Lambdin - The French Admiral

He felt something strong for her, but not knowing what love felt like as an emotion, he continually questioned it. He knew himself fairly well as a rake and a rogue, but this feeling for her was much greater than anything he had felt for a graceful neck, a well-turned ankle, or a firm bosom. Yet damned if he could put a label on it. He puffed up with it when he wrote to her in short bursts between duty and sleep, and her rare letters filled him with pleasure and the passion of jealousy if she even mentioned another male. Frankly, her letters were only part delight, were misspelled so badly he could barely credit them—and damned if he could discover what was so fascinating about what she had worn to church or how her hair was fixed for a carriage ride, or how difficult it was to find a maid who could iron properly. Her latest screed had been a damnation of the French Navy, who seemed intent on denying her the right shade of blue ribbons, and a fervent wish that Alan would skewer all the bothersome pests as soon as dammit and let her get on with sartorial splendor.

So what if she's feeble? he asked himself. Most women are, when you get right down to it. That's not what they were created for. If I want someone to talk to about something that matters, I'll toddle off to a coffee house or a club. He remembered the night in London, just before a descent into the Covent Garden district for a run at the whores, when two educated men had almost come to blows at Ozinda's over whether women could be educated at all!

If one got a fortune and a termagant mort came with it, then one could always keep a mistress. In the better circles, which Alan fervently hoped he could soon rejoin, it was a matter of course that the wife was for breeding children, and the mistress for pleasure. The thought of domestic drudgery, of having to stay in and listen to the empty pratings of a woman night after night made Alan and most of his past friends shiver with dread.

God help the poor who have no outlets, he thought. And God help me should I turn out to be one of them.

No matter what happened, he had his reserve money—over two thousand pounds in gold coins lifted from their last prize, the Ephegenie . It was part of a much larger trove that had been hidden in a large chest in that ship's late captain's necessary closet. That gold was now deep within his sea-chest, wrapped up in a discarded shirt so worn, mended, stained, and daubed with tar that no one with any taste whatsoever would even look at it, much less borrow it or disturb it.

Ironically, he could not make much use of it, since to dig down to it would reveal its presence, and a midshipman's chest—even a locked one—was no safe place for anything. There were times that Alan regretted taking the money, and not settling for the roughly 125 pounds he would have received as a share out of the prize-money once the main mass of coins—nearly 80,000 pounds—had been discovered. Admittedly those regrets were rare, but the thought had crossed his mind. Instead, he had to depend on the 100 guineas his father sent, and how long that arrangement would last, he had no idea, or any great hopes for in future.

His reveries were interrupted by seven bells chiming from the fo'c's'le belfry; eleven thirty in the forenoon watch. Almost immediately the bosun's pipes sang and the order was bellowed to "clear decks and up spirits." The hands lashed down their labors and queued up for their rum ration. Soon they would be allowed to go below to their dinner, while Alan would have to wait, his stomach already in full cry for sustenance. There was fresh food coming offshore, but he would not share in it. There would be small beer and the last of the rum to savor for even the meanest hand, but he would not taste that fiery anodyne to the misery of a seagoing life.

"Lucky Forrester," Avery said, standing by the rum cask with the purser's assistant as the rum was doled out.

"He wouldn't know what to do with time ashore," Alan said.

"Might take two guineas to find a girl that'd let him put the leg over her."

"And she'd have to be beef to the heel, at that," Alan added.

"This is grievous to me," Avery said, looking at the rum.

"No grog fer ye today, sir?" the purser's assistant asked, waving a measure about toward them, knowing full well the captain's instructions and delighting in having power over the midshipmen in this regard.

"No, thank you," Avery said stiffly. "Carry on."

He and Alan made their way aft to the quarterdeck, unable to bear the sight of the hands smacking and savoring their liquor.

"Lots of activity," Alan said, indicating the fleet about them. "Damme, look there. Is that a load of lumber going into Terrible ?"

"Lots of spare rope, too," Avery said, picking up an unused brass telescope. "I swear her masts look sprung. See what you think."

Alan took the glass and aimed it at Terrible . The third-rate 74 did indeed appear badly worn, her masts slanted from the more usual slight forward rake. Except for closing with Barfleur a couple of times or sailing close to another, larger frigate, Desperate had been far out to windward from the fleet for the most part of their passage, unable to see much as to the condition of their fleet.

"Come to think on it, David, half of them appear they've just come through a major storm. There's not a ship present that looks well set up."

"Then I sincerely pray the French look just as bad," David said, taking the glass back. "We seem more due a refit than a battle."

"We're more at sea than the French, usually—their big ships at least." Alan was repeating common knowledge. "But what's this delay in aid of? I should have expected this Admiral Graves to come boiling without the bar at once and get us on our way. God knows what the French are up to while we stew here. Any idea who he is anyway?"

"Lord North's cousin, I am told," David said sourly.

"Is he, God save us!" Alan shuddered.

"Who knows, he may actually be good," David said, placing the telescope back in the rack by the binnacle. "You know how people feel back home. They wouldn't do a damned thing for the Hanover Crown or the government unless they're damned near bribed by promises of graft and jobbery. I expect they considered themselves lucky to get anyone at all, the way all the so-called fighting admirals have retired to their estates to sit this war out. It's not popular in the first place, even if the government was, which it's not."

"This factionalism will do for us one of these days," Alan remarked.

"We were lucky to get Hood and Rodney together with one fleet for a while. I'd feel better with Rodney back out here, but…"

"Once he clears all his creditors, perhaps he shall come."

"How many ships did Mister Railsford say de Barras had up in Newport?" David asked suddenly.

"Eight sail of the line, I think," Alan answered. "Why?"

"What if he and de Grasse combine in the Chesapeake?"

"Then we smash both of them together," Alan said firmly.

"Perhaps Graves cannot leave New York uncovered. We might have wasted our time coming to him for assistance. God, I wish we were both post-captains right now," David said, with some heat. "This not knowing anything is driving me to distraction."

"Don't believe that the post-captains know much more than we do now," Alan cautioned. "All we have to do is fight. They'll point us at the foe like a gun, and all we have to do is discharge at the right time. We shall either do something glorious, or look like a complete pack of fools—so what is there to worry about?"

"God, you are an unaware bastard," David said, grinning and shaking his head in wonder at his friend's attitude.

"I dare say," someone drawled, and they spun about to see if the captain had caught them at their speculations. David pointed to the open skylight over the captain's quarters.