H. M. S. Cockerel (24 page)

Blithering away, chirpy as a magpie, she boldly confessed she'd taken up—“under the protection,” she put it—with the wealthy Sir Harry Fetherstonehaugh, and had lived at his fabulous estate, Up Park, in Sussex, for a time, grooming her stage presentations, whatever that signified. But then something cross had occurred between them, and he shipped her back to Neston. Yet soon after, she'd lived under the protection, again, of Charles Greville. Through him, she'd met Sir William Hamilton when he'd come home from Naples for a visit, had come away with
him,
had lived in his
palazzo
as his paramour for five years, and had then become his wife for the last two.

“Separate bedchambers, I take it,” Lewrie murmured, rolling to embrace her and nuzzle suggestively. Out of her rags, he found her to be a touch more fubsy than he'd thought; but it was such a welcoming and biddable fubsiness! “An old man, with his infirmities?”

“Hamilton was a soldier, a sportsman. He's climbed Vesuvius, Lord, I don't know, twenty times since he's been here. Poor dear isn't as infirm as you think, Alan. No,” she frowned, sloughing off his attentions to stretch for the Armagnac and plump up the pillows to sit against the headboard. “It's more . . . you come to our
palazzo,
you'll see. Hamilton is a collector. Roman, Etruscan, Greek antiquities . . . books and maps, rare old things. Palazzo Sessa's more museum than house, all on
loving
display,” she sneered into her snifter.

“So, are you on display, too, I take it?” he pressed, sliding up to join her and take a sip from her glass.

“Yes, in a way, I am,” she chuckled, a bit moodily. “Everyone tells him what a delightful and wondrous
adornment
I am to his house. Like his vases and kraters. As if I should be in a niche somewhere, in one of the galleries, where the light's best. One man even dared to say—in my hearin', mind!—that I was a credit to the station to which I'd been raised!”

“Yet you're not on display. You put a foot forward, bold as I ever did see,” he cooed to her, blowing her a kiss, which she turned and intercepted, leaning over him to bestow the real thing. “An ear for languages . . . on familial terms with royalty . . .”

“God, sometimes I wish to God I was a man!” she huffed, and he tried to jolly her out of her pet, in his own, inimitable fashion. But she was having none of it, at that moment.

“How far may a woman go in this world? Aye, I've sense, more'n most. An ear for languages, music . . . books and learning. Not just the frightful novels. What you described this morning, about fighting the pirates and all. I'd
love
to be able to do something meaningful . . . be a voice people heeded. Wield as much influence as you did. Hamilton . . . well, he
is
happy with me. He tolerates my . . . enthusiasms, yet . . .”

And you know which side your toast is buttered, Lewrie thought.

“His passion, though . . . I think he saves his passion for diplomacy, for antiquities . . . studying volcanoes. We're comfortable together as old shoes. Because I ornament him so well, like his marbles.” She sighed and took a deep sip of brandy. “He bought me, you know. Same as his ancient urns,” she confessed with a shrug and pout-lip sigh.

“He bloody what?”

“Charlie Greville is Sir William's nephew, Alan,” she told him, snuggling close, confidentially, her head on his shoulder. “I lived quite happily with him, but . . . he wanted to improve his estate. He'd more than enough, I thought. Though his condition was not of the
very
best, it was more than comfortable. He had a chance to make a rich marriage, and . . . I'd have been quite content to stay with him, but for that. Anyway, Hamilton came home on leave, to palaver with the Foreign Office or something, and . . . blink of an eye, I sailed away, here to Naples.”

“The cads. Both of 'em,” Lewrie groused, slipping a protective arm about her shoulders.

“Oh, no! Never say that about 'em, Alan,” she dissented, sitting up and away. “Charlie Greville was wonderful to me! He's still a dear friend. Before Charlie, I hadn't two letters in my head, and as for my cyphers . . . ! He saw I was tutored. Speech, singing, music, and cultural attainments. He brought my mother down from Neston, to be my companion. Bought both of us the best of everything, paid for . . . well, paid for what Sir Harry would not, settled . . . well. And as for Hamilton! He's such a dear, a true gentleman. Mentor, companion, loving friend to me! He's opened my eyes to so much, introduced me to so many wonderful people. Goethe? Where'd a chit from Neston
ever
have the chance to meet Goethe, sit at table with him and chat him up? Haydn . . . kings and queens?”

“I see your point. Like being royalty yourself? Ennobled?”

“Exactly!” she giggled, “Why, tonight, after supper, I went up to Maria Carolina's chambers, swept in like family, and had a chat at her bedside . . . all sorts of womanly matters, frank and first-name as a sister. Think of it, Alan!
That's
why I love Naples so, it's so accepting. Here, I can be who I was truly born to be. Not like sneering London. Cold and hateful, stay in your place . . . well, when Hamilton and I go back to England, authors of a treaty that won the war and put every royal house in Europe in against France . . . and France is done to a turn. You
will
do France to a turn for me, won't you, Alan? Do just think how people will have to take to me, no matter what!” Emma boasted, brazen, yet wistful for what-was-to-be. “Heavens! Is that the
time?
”

She sprang from the bed, bouncing prettily, though without much grace, and bent for her discarded chemise.

“Hamilton and Acton said they'd be up late. Gave me a chamber, in case I wished to stay and coach home with him later. Two down, not to worry. Do me up, dear man,” she ordered, stepping into her petticoats, hoops and pads.

Lewrie went to the armoire and retrieved a silk Chinee dressing gown for himself before obeying. It was fiery red, lambent with moiré dragons in green and blue, with ivory eyes and teeth.

“Hamilton won't take much notice, but Sir John might. And Lord, Mother! She has eyes in the back of her head, I swear!”

“Your mother's still with you?” Lewrie asked, ready to hand her her gown as she carefully aligned her underdresses and hair in a tall oval-framed gilt mirror.

“Companion, advisor, cook,” she chuckled throatily. “She goes by Mistress Cadogan now. Though, you're
not
to know that, when you come . . . Great God! What a
horror!
”
She stopped primping suddenly, on espying his dressing robe in the mirror. “Wherever did you get
that?
”

“Canton, China, if you must know,” Alan said, a trifle sulkily. Nobody seemed to care for it, it seemed. It had been relegated to his sea chest—out of sight, out of mind—lest he embarrass others back home. “I rather like it,” he continued, self-mocking yet defensive. “Though my wife . . . uhm . . .”
OH, DAMME!

“Your wife,” she replied evenly, cocking a brow. After a moment she grinned ironically. “Yes, well . . . were I your wife, Alan, I would object to it, too. Let me hazard a guess. You've been wed . . . at
least
seven years?”

“Uh, as a matter of fact, just barely seven . . . and a bit,” Alan blushed.

“Dear Lord, seven years, the two of us,” she sighed, surprising him by stepping to him and hugging him close. “Each to our own fashion, mind. Dear Alan, it does seem
such
a milepost in life, don't it?”

“Amen,” he sighed with an afterglow of pleasure, kindled by her scent and the warmth of her flesh. They kissed again, soft, lingering—almost a fare-thee-well, instead of a goodnight.

“Come to Palazzo Sessa,” she ordered, taking her gown from him. “It would help if you express a keen interest in antiquities. Hamilton will be delighted to tour you round. In the afternoon, he has his ‘grampus-puff.' His nap, silly goose! A most sensible Neapolitan custom, is siesta. Especially for a gentleman his age. Do me up whilst I preen, will you? Then . . . the view from my chambers are just as good. And there
are
so many galleries, full of art . . . full of nude statuary. Quite inspiring, some of 'em,” she taunted, leaning her bottom back to his groin as he coped with getting the right hook or button in the correct slot or eye.

“Sounds delightful,” he murmured against her neck as she lifted her hair and began to pin it properly.

“Perhaps we may even dine you in,” she went on matter-offactly, a pin in her mouth. “And after supper, I will pose for you. I will do my ‘Attitudes.' Hamilton loves them. I was known for them, when I was still in the theatre. He helps me with the lights, the drapes . . .”

“A
ménage à . . .
something?” Lewrie gawped. “Mean he takes part?”

“Not like that, silly man,” she laughed, turning to view his work in the mirror. “I
do
poses.
Tableaux!
Dressed, mind.” Emma said with a fetching moue. “Classical figures, famous people, the ancient gods . . . with a tambourine and shawl, very few props.
Ecco!”

She stepped to the sideboard, picked up a silver salver, struck a pose with her profile to him. “For you. ‘Brittania, Mistress of the Seas.'” Quickly she changed, moving to another, announcing what allegory she represented. “A poor girl of the streets . . . an Amazonian warrior queen . . . Pallas Athena . . . d'ye see? Oh, pish! I've spoiled it for you! You'll know them, and they won't be a surprise!”

“I swear I'll show all gape-jawed wonder, Emma,” he promised.

“I must go. But we're not done yet, Alan. We cannot be!” She sighed, bitter at their parting, clinging to him and kissing him, dewy and full of promise of delights to come. “Dear as my life's become, I sometimes have to dare, to feel alive again. Swear you'll dare all as well. God save me, but I cannot thrive on esteem and companionship, I
must
have passion. Rare as it is in this world . . . rare as it's been in my life. But, when the right man appears and I feel so half-seas-over, like a girl again . . . then
hang
the risk!”

“Uhmhmm,” Alan commented (sort of), nodding against her hair, and wondering just what half-cocked idiocy he'd gotten himself into
this
time. And what sort of swoony lunatick he was dealing with.

She broke free of his embrace at last, strode to the balcony doors, and turned . . . to
pose,
one hand high on the door sill. “For all the time you remain in Naples, dear Alan. All the time we have, be my bold captain. Fortune
favours
the bold.
Buona notte, caro mio.
Until tomorrow, and tomorrow . . . and tomorrow!”

And then she swept away dramatically, making a grand exit, back for her secret passage to her borrowed chamber. Back to an air of respectability.

“Whew!” he exclaimed at her departure. Speaking softly to himself, in case she had lingered to count the house. “
Buona notte,
me dear.
Grazie,
o' course.
Damn' grazie!
Lord, though . . . wonder what Italian is for ‘daft as bats'!”

C H A P T E R 7

A
ye,
sir, their mountebank was here,” Mr. Pruden told Lewrie on the quarterdeck. He didn't sound impressed by a high-flown Italian physician. “Same nostrums as I had aboard, Jesuit's Bark and such, in a tea. He went from cold to hot, 'bout the end of the second dog last evening. Sweated it out, I should think. Mercury and laudanum, that raises a sweat.”

“I have to see him,” Lewrie commanded.

“His ‘top-lights' are still out, sir. Dead to the world.”

“Still, Mister Pruden, as first officer . . .”

“Very well, sir.”

Captain Braxton was still unconscious, and the fever hadn't done his appearance much good. He lolled on the pillows, face slack as some dead man, his mean little mouth canted to leeward, his skin as sickly a buff yellow as old parchment, his shortish hair tousled and glued to his scalp by perspiration. Mister Pruden lifted the captain's wrist to feel for a pulse.

“Thumpin' away like a band, still, Mister Lewrie,” Pruden smiled. “No more shivering ague, no more hot flushes and sweats. Feels cooler, too. I think this bout's over.”

“How much longer will he be unable to command, sir?” Lewrie asked.

“Mmm, Lord . . . no tellin', Mister Lewrie, sir.” Pruden shrugged in puzzlement. “Man his age, fit as he is . . . well as he
appeared
before the fever took him? It may be several days before he regains strength enough to hobble about. Then again, it may be a week or better.”

“Should he be sent ashore to convalesce, sir?” Lewrie hoped aloud.

“No need for that, sir, not since the fever burned itself out. A spell of bed rest, of a certainty. Depending on how the fever debilitated him,” Pruden countered, a bit sadly. “God has a wicked sense of humour, Mister Lewrie. Here He strikes our tyrant down, raising our hopes. And then restores him to health, just when we believe we're liberated.”

“Well, at least we're spared his rod, long as he's horizontal,” Alan sighed, shaking his head. “Had he informed you of his infirmity before, sir? Any cause for wariness over his health?”

“None, sir. Though I
did
make it my duty to inquire, to assemble a roster of past injuries and illnesses among the crew. You recall, I asked of the wardroom as well, so, should some condition, my ignorance of which might do harm—”

“You asked the captain directly, sir?” Lewrie pressed, getting a germ of an idea which restored his hopes.

“I did, sir, in the pursuit of my bounden duties as ship's surgeon.” Pruden nodded somberly, as sober as if testifying at a court.

“And his reply, sir?”

“To, uhm . . . ‘bugger off,' sir, and not to meddle,” Pruden smirked.

“So you think he intended to hide the possibility of a recurrence from you, sir? In your opinion, as a qualified and warranted surgeon?”

“I thought he was being his usual ‘tetchy' self, Mister Lewrie. But, aye . . . there's a possibility. Of course, it may be that malaria had not recurred on him in several years. He may have put it ‘out of sight, out of mind,' sir. Like a bad tooth which really should come out, but a man'll ignore 'til it festers his gums, Mister Lewrie.”

“Very well,” Lewrie sighed, putting his hands in the small of his back and pacing, ducking the overhead beams. His eyes fell on the thick logbook on the desk in the day cabin. There was still a way!

“Mister Pruden, you keep a journal of treatment, do you not?”

“Aye, sir.”

“I will require a notice from you, in the ship's log, that Captain Braxton fell ill of fever, and that in his stead I had to assume command temporarily. To explain why I was forced to,” Lewrie demanded.

“I would be most happy to comply, sir,” Pruden beamed, getting his drift. “And should anyone care to take notice, I will write up an entry in my own journal, including what nostrums I prescribed, and their cost, of course.”

“How fortunate we were, to be in port at the time,” Alan hinted. “And to obtain the services of our ambassador's physician. For free?”

“Certainly, sir,” Pruden agreed, jiggling with wry good humour. “I'll go and do it now, whilst my memory's fresh, shall I, sir?”

“I would be deeply obliged if you would, Mister Pruden,” Lewrie said with a grateful bow. After the surgeon had departed, he sat down behind the captain's desk, opened the logbook and thumbed through to the last entry in Braxton's own hand. There had been no entry for the day before their arrival in port, Lewrie noted, most happily. Captain Braxton was more than likely already ailing and unable to write.

“Sentry!” Lewrie bawled, sure that a thunderclap under his cot could not rouse the captain in the sleeping cabin.

“Sah!” the Marine bawled back, stamping into his presence.

“Send down to the wardroom, Private Cargill. I need my lieutenant's journal. My compliments to them, and I'll want the sailing master's . . . and Lieutenant Braxton's, as well.”

All Commission Sea Officers were required to keep a daily journal; practice for log entries later in their careers. From their observations and inscriptions, battles were sometimes reconstructed, careers made or broken, discipline meted out after-the-fact at courts-martial, or meritorious deeds recalled and rewarded, sea conditions agreed upon.

Somewhere in the leaky, waterlogged basements of Admiralty, on high chairs when the Thames backed up on them, a host of mole-like writers gleaned those journals for any new information, any pattern to be deduced in wind and sea conditions for given areas of the world, for a change in headlands, a new seamark erected since the last time a Royal Navy ship had chanced there. Depths especially, dangers, new entries in sailing instructions or coastal pilots . . . to those myopic scribblers nothing was inconsequential, and once stored, nothing was ever tossed.

From his lieutenant's journal, and from Braxton's, Lewrie reconstructed the observations proper to a ship's log, stating that the log had not been kept up . . . and most importantly, why.

11 July 1793, by Alan Lewrie, First Officer, HM Frigate Cockerel; log entries for the preceding day, 9 July, our Captain indisposed on 9, 10, and 11 July, and unable. Dawn, 9 July: winds SSW, 1/2 S, and blowing a quarter-gale. Sea state mildly disturbed, cat's paws and horses, visibility clear, 10 Miles. Straits of Bonifacio astern 10 leagues, Isle of Caprera stbd quarter. By sextant, distance 10 Sea Miles . . . Course ESE, 1/2 S, spd 7 1/4 knots. Exercised the . . .

It took an hour to transcribe everything, to recreate the voyage, from the straits to fetching Naples at first light on the 10th; anchoring, discovering the captain's illness, meeting the ambassador and delivering the secret papers . . . being presented to the king, and being forced to dine and sleep out of the ship. Pruden's note came to him, and he transcribed that, then took the fateful step of declaring in writing that he had assumed temporary command, until such time as the surgeon deemed Captain Braxton hale enough to resume his duties.

Then Alan entered the damning statement that the second lieutenant had not informed him of the captain's condition, though he noted in his journal that he'd been dined-in on the 8th and 9th, and had made no mention of the captain being sick after being at table with that worthy.

“Sentry!” he called again, after he'd sanded his last words.

“Sah!”

“Send for the second officer, Mister Braxton. Present to him my compliments, and I require Mister Braxton to kindly attend me, in Captain Braxton's quarters,” Lewrie related, with an expectant smile.

• • •

“You sent for me, sir?” Clement Braxton asked, a little fearful. Whether he dreaded what was coming, now that Lewrie was temporary Lord and Master, or whether he more feared dire news of his father's condition, it would be hard to decide. Lieutenant Braxton glanced hangdog toward the door to his father's sleeping coach, and at the novel sight of Lewrie at ease behind his father's desk, with equal trepidation.

“Mister Braxton, you've been a
very
bad boy,” Lewrie sneered. “Sir, I—”

“Your father, it seems . . . our captain, is going to recover.”

“So Mister Pruden and the civilian doctor were kind enough to inform me, sir, aye,” Clement gulped, bobbing with that good news. He assayed a sheepish grin—more a rictus than anything else. Alan was having none of it, however.

“You almost
killed
him, you damn' fool!” Lewrie barked suddenly, crashing a fist on the ornate desk. “You and Boutwell
knew
he was sick as a dog, since we cleared the Straits of Bonifacio. You
knew
he needed the surgeon, but you hid that! Kept him from medication!”

“Dear God, sir, I . . .” Braxton swayed, like to faint.

Lewrie shot to his feet, temper aboil.

Thank God for all my lessons, he thought; I've been browbeat or tongue-lashed by the
best!
All those officers who'd shouted at me, superlative howling sessions . . . and now it's
my
turn!

“By God, sir, you saw fit to hide his illness from
me,
not only endangering your father, but the
ship,
Mister Braxton!” Lewrie shouted. “You take filial loyalty too far, sir; too far by half! You are either a Sea Officer, charged upon your sacred honour to put the needs of the ship first, last, and always . . . or you're a bloody fraud! Derelict in your duties . . . who'd put personal, family concerns
above
duty!”

Clement Braxton blanched, reeled backwards half a step as he saw how deep was the pit he was about to be shoved into.

Damme,
I'm good at this, Lewrie exulted, inward! Though all his talk of honour and duty did make him cringe a little at his own hypocrisy. It sounded like the worst sort of cant, coming from
his
sort!

“Sir, there was no intent to be derelict . . .” Braxton babbled.

“Sir, I tell you that you were. By omission. Your journal. Two nights you dined with the captain, alone. Seeing how ill he'd become. Yet, there is no mention of it. You did not tell Mister Pruden about a recurrence of malaria. You did not tell me, to prepare me, should I have to take over. The
ship's
log, sir . . . no entries past dawn of the 9th,” Lewrie pointed out, hefting the bedraggled, salt-stained journal like God's book of the Saved at Heaven's gates. “Good God, are you so witless, you couldn't have cobbled
something
together from your daily journal? Or were you so afraid of him being dismissed the Sea Service that you thought to hide the truth from there as well, Mister Braxton?” Lewrie thundered. “False log entries . . .
no
log entries, is an offence against the Admiralty, sir! Under Article the Thirty-Third, sir. Fraudulent Behaviour!”

“I could not, sir, not in the log, I . . .” Braxton moaned, twisting slowly in the wind. “He urged me, but I could not! He ordered me direct, sir . . . but that
would
have been lying, sir. I could not.”

“Ordered you direct to hide the truth from me, sir?” Lewrie said derisively. “Ordered you to falsify the log? Which?”

“Both, sir,” Braxton sighed, red-faced. “He hasn't suffered any fever since '91, sir. Thought, back in cooler climes, he wouldn't. A tropical thing, left behind, we prayed.”

“And you thought he could hide out until he'd dealt with it and gotten better, did you?” Lewrie snapped.

“The last few times, sir . . . more like a bad cold, sir, nothing worse. Fa . . . the captain hasn't had a
really
bad spell since '89, so we thought . . .
he
thought, that is . . .” Lieutenant Braxton snuffled.

“Well, it wasn't. He almost died of it, and he's going to be flat on his back for some time. That leaves me in charge. It makes
you
first officer. But I tell you, sir, I will dismiss you from all duties if you even
think
of deceiving me, or hiding something from me again.”

“I give you my solemn oath, sir, I will not!” Braxton cringed.

“Come here, Mister Braxton,” Lewrie commanded. “Do you look at the log. Note I've made it current, from our journals. Look it over, and determine if there's anything omitted or amiss.” Lewrie paced the day cabin, hands behind his back again. “You will also note, sir, that I have made a formal statement of your father's illness, and my taking temporary command whilst our ship operates independent of the fleet.”

“I see it, sir,” Braxton flinched after a quick peek, as if sight of the log was like espying Medusa and her head full of snakes, which would turn him to stone at the very sight.

“Is there anything untrue in my account, sir? Any matter which you dispute? Including your failure to inform me?” Lewrie growled.