Dewey Lambdin - The French Admiral

Two hours later the tide began to ebb from slack water. The crew were summoned from below, where they had been napping, and began to let out on the bower cable to drift down on the kedge off the stern. Once at short stays, the kedge was tripped and brought in, the still night air having no chance to carry off the muddy tidal effluvia that the cable brought up as the damp thigh-thick cable was led below to the tiers to dry. They hauled back up to the bower and drew her in to short stays as well.

"Hove short, sir," came the call from the blackness up forward.

"Touch of land breeze, Mister Monk?" Treghues asked by the wheel, once more seemingly sane and rational, the very picture of an Officer of the King.

"Aye, sir, a light 'un, but it's there," Monk said.

"Hands aloft, then, Mister Monk. Hoist tops'ls, jibs, spanker, and forecourse."

"Aye, aye, sir."

The first freed canvas began to fill from the softly soughing land breeze, heated during the day and now warmer than the sea breeze which had cooled to stillness. As that gentle wind found her, Desperate began to make a slight way, beginning to stir dark waters.

"Weigh anchor, Mister Railsford."

The hands spit on their fists, breasted to the capstan bars and put a strain on them. The pawls began to clank as they marched about in a circle, and the anchor cable came in rapidly.

"Up an' down!" a bowman shouted. If the bower did not break free of the mud, if it was snagged on an old wreck or sucked deep into silt, a moment more could have the Desperate sailing over her own cable, bringing her to an inglorious halt, swinging her broadside and tearing the sticks right out of her.

"Anchor's free!" a bosun's mate called as the capstan pawls clanked rapidly, like a drummer's tattoo. In the feeble candles by the fo'c's'le belfry, one could see the puddened ring and upper stock of the bower and hands already over the side to cat it down. Raving, certifiable and leaping mad Treghues could sometimes appear, but no one could ever find a fault with his ship-handling. It was certainly a pity that their departure had taken place so near midnight that the town could not have turned out to gawk and marvel.

Steering carefully for the light, with the church spire squarely dead astern, they crossed the bar as the ebb began to gather strength but still had enough depth to carry them over in perfect safety. Once Railsford, the bosun and his mates, and the ship's master-at-arms and corporal had made their rounds, the hands were allowed to go below to their hammocks, and Desperate became once again merely one more ship on a dark sea, lit up at taffrail, binnacle, and belfry, but otherwise as black as a boot.

Alan and David were given the middle watch to stand together, from midnight to four, when the ship's usual day would begin, so they would get no rest until after the hands had scrubbed down the decks, stood dawn quarters, had brought up their hammocks, and been released to breakfast. Across the bar, the sea was as restless as Alan's nerves. The quick phosphorous flash of cat's-paws broke all about them, though the air was still as steady as a night wind could be and showed no evidence of kicking up. A visit to the master's chart cuddy showed that their barometer indicated peaceful weather. There was a slice of moon ghosting through scattered clouds thin as tobacco smoke, and far out beyond them the trough glinted silver-blue when the clouds did not partially occlude that distant orb. If there was chop enough for cat's-paws, it held no malevolence, for the horizon was ruler-straight instead of jagged by clashing rollers. The wind sighed in the miles of rigging, the sails and masts quivered to the hinted power of the breeze, vibrated down through the chain-wales, and set the hull to a soft quiver, as though an engine of some kind were operating below decks, an engine of the most benign aspect. Alan sometimes thought that the ship was breathing and purring like a contented cat by a warm hearth, rising and falling and slightly rolling with a deep and somnolent breath.

By God, that bastard hedge-priest can't take this away from me, Alan told himself, peeling off his short midshipman's coat and waistcoat. The day had been hot, and the area below decks before sailing had been stifling. He spread his arms to let the cool night wind explore every inch of his body that he could expose and still preserve modesty. He undid his neck-stock, unlaced his shirt and held it away from his skin for a moment. He felt a bit of breeze where one normally did not feel breezes and inspected his breeches.

My God, I came back aboard with my prick damn near hanging out, he groaned. After those men attacked us, I never did up all my buttons. No wonder Treghues was thundering at me like he was.

Bad as the captain's opinion of him was at that moment, bad as it could get in the future (and Alan wondered if such a thing were possible), he could not restrain a peal of laughter at the picture he must have made.

"If you have discovered a reason for glee, by God I'd appreciate you letting me share it," David said from the darkness of the quarterdeck, almost invisible except for the whiteness of his breeches, shirt, and coat facings.

"Did you notice that I was a bit out of uniform when we were aft?"

"No."

"Had my breeches up with one bloody button, that's what!"

David broke into a hearty laugh as well. "You mean to tell me you went in there looking like something out of The Rake's Progress and you didn't know?"

"Me and my crotch exposed, you and your head bandaged—we must have seemed like the worst Jack Nasty-Faces Treghues had ever laid eyes on!"

They went forward to inspect the lookouts and to get away from their captain's open skylight, in case he was still awake and now busily inscribing their names in his book of the eternally damned.

"God, I am laughing so hard my ribs ache," Alan said, stumbling about the deck over ring-bolts and gun tackle and damned near howling, which upset the watch since they weren't in on the joke.

"I have tears in my eyes, I swear I do," David chimed in, pulling his bloody handkerchief out of his pocket and applying it to his face.

"Ah!" Alan heaved a great breath to calm down. He stopped laughing. "I would suppose we had better savor this. It's the last laugh we shall have for a long time."

"Worth it though, stap we if it wasn't. Here now, Lewrie, next leave is on me, my treat."

"Good. And I shall let you go first in the morning. In the beginning, the…"

"No, no, you'd be so much better at the Bible than me," David said, calming himself. "You've probably already violated half of it. Besides, why get us into more trouble by a report of blaspheming?"

"You're right," Alan agreed, leading them back aft.

"Um, Alan, what did the captain mean about you forcing yourself on your own blood back there?" David asked.

"Just raving, I expect. Think nothing on it."

"Did that have anything to do with the way he turned against you so quickly after Commodore Sinclair took over the squadron?" David asked. "I mean you've never been really all that forthcoming about your past before the Navy. As your friend, it would make no difference to me, but…"

"Sir George knows my father, and like me thinks about as much of him as cowshit on his best shoes. And there's Forrester sneaking behind our backs to his uncle Sir George," Alan said quickly. "Put those two together and you get Treghues trimming his sails to suit Sir George."

"My father caught me with the cook's daughter," David confessed in a soft voice. "She was fourteen, I was eleven. I already knew I was down for the sea, but I thought I had another year before they sent me."

"You precocious young bastard!" Alan laughed. "Well, did you get into her mutton?"