Jane Feather - [V Series] (24 page)

“I
DON’T KNOW THAT
I
CAN LET YOU HAVE THREE FOUR
-pounders, Captain Lattimer,” the ordnance master said with lugubrious satisfaction. “The
Isolde
took six yesterday.”

Captain Hugo Lattimer, R.N., controlled his irritation with difficulty. He ran a hand through his thick chestnut-brown hair and glanced around the ordnance wharf. He’d been third in line that morning, and there were six other captains, as desperate as he to fit out their commands, waiting their turn to wheedle and cajole the ordnance master.

“If you could see your way to letting me have two, then I’ll stand in your debt,” he said, smiling with what he hoped was sufficient obsequiousness. “How’s Mrs. Huston? She was a bit under the weather last time I was in Lisbon.”

The other man’s face softened slightly. “Oh, she’s well enough, thank you, Captain. In an interesting condition.”

“Well, congratulations.” Captain Lattimer beamed as broadly as if it were his own lady about to present him with an heir. “Do give her my best regards.”

“Yes, yes indeed, I’ll do that, thank you kindly. Now, it was three four-pounders you were wanting?”

“Exactly so,” Hugo said, allowing not a flicker of triumph to show in his green eyes. “And I’ll be most grateful to you, sir.”

The ordnance master scribbled in his ledger, his face as pained as if he were losing blood, and handed over the precious requisition order. Hugo touched his gold-laced hat and left the ordnance wharf, exulting in his success.

The Lisbon morning was hot, but there was still a breath of spring in the air to soften the burning quality of a Portuguese summer that scorched even the coastal areas. The harbor seethed with life, feluccas, longboats, and fishing boats darting among the more ponderous merchant craft. Four British men-of-war lay in the outer roads, three ships of the line, and a dainty, thirty-six-gun frigate.

Captain Lattimer’s eyes rested with pride on the
Isabelle
’s elegant lines as she swung at anchor. He raised his glass, examining his command. The Blue Peter was furled against her fore-topmasthead, ready to be broken out when she sailed, and her decks were a bustle of activity. He nodded his satisfaction. Tomorrow morning they’d be under way, leaving the frustrating politics of harbor life behind.

“I beg your pardon, but do I have the honor of addressing Captain Lattimer?”

“You do, sir.” The captain turned and found himself facing a tall man of about his own age in the uniform of a cavalry colonel.

“Colonel St. Simon.” Julian extended his hand in greeting. “Admiral Moreton told me where I might find you.”

The harbor admiral was an infernal nuisance, always
interfering in his captains’ best-laid plans. “Indeed.” Hugo kept his expression impassive as he shook the colonel’s hand. “How may I be of service, Colonel?”

“By giving me passage on your ship.” Julian came straight to the point. “I understand you’re sailing for Portsmouth tomorrow.”

It was standard practice for a naval ship to carry diplomatic and army passengers. “I see no difficulty,” Hugo said, smiling with relief at this simple request.

Colonel St. Simon scratched his head a little uncomfortably and said, “Well, it’s rather more complicated than that, Captain. Do you have time to take a glass of wine with me, and I’ll explain.”

“Tell me something,” Hugo said conversationally. “Am I going to have a choice, or do you have written orders for me from Admiral Moreton?”

“The admiral agreed to accommodate the wishes of the Duke of Wellington,” Julian said delicately. Traditionally, the navy was the senior service and even the commander in chief of the army would request rather than order a senior naval officer.

“I see. In that case perhaps you had better give me a glass of wine to soften the blow,” Hugo said wryly.

“I’m …” Julian cleared his throat. “We are putting up at the Rose. The taproom’s pleasant enough.”

“By all means.” Hugo had not missed the change of pronoun.

They turned together away from the quay just as a figure came barreling toward them in the broad-striped trousers and red waistcoat of a seaman, two hooped earrings swinging, a spotted handkerchief tied over his long tarred sailor’s queue.

“Eh, Cap’n, sir. I’ve found us a brace of pigs, bonny
as you please, and three nanny goats, burstin’ with milk.” He beamed with pride.

“Good, Samuel. Listen, take this requisition and get it filled. Three four-pounders and as much round shot as you can squeeze out of ’em.”

“Aye, sir.” The sailor took the parchment, cast an incurious glance at the captain’s companion, and rolled away with his swaying seaman’s gait.

“Samuel could find a filled scuttlebutt in a desert,” Hugo Lattimer commented as they turned into the cool dimness of the Rose. “Invaluable man.”

“I know the type,” Julian said, indicating a table in the window, instructing the waiter, “Lad, bring a bottle of port.”

The captain sat down, sweeping aside the skirts of his blue coat to free his sword. A dusty bottle and two glasses appeared; the wine was poured. The captain downed his first glass almost without tasting it.

“First one fast, second one slow,” he said without apparent humor, refilling his glass. “So let’s hear the worst, Colonel.”

“Four passengers, three horses, and a mountain of baggage,” Colonel St. Simon stated bluntly.

“Dear God!” Captain Lattimer stared at him. “How am I to find room in a frigate? The
Isabelle
is not a ship of the line, sir.”

Julian moved his hands in a gesture combining both comprehension and powerlessness. “The admiral seemed to think …”

“The admiral is an interfering old busybody who doesn’t understand the first bloody thing about commanding a man-of-war. He’s sailed a desk throughout his entire career,” Hugo said furiously. He refilled his
glass and tossed the contents down his throat with a flick of his wrist.

Julian was accustomed to men who drank deeply, and refilled the captain’s glass without giving it a second thought.

“Oh, there you are, I’ve been looking all over for you. You’ll be pleased to know that we’ll be two chests lighter.… Oh, I beg your pardon?” Tamsyn stopped in midspeech and looked inquiringly at the gentleman in his white-lapeled blue coat with its deep white cuffs and gold-buttoned sleeves.

“This is Captain Lattimer. And a taproom is no place for a lady.” Julian made no attempt to conceal his annoyance. He’d hoped to have everything settled with the captain before exposing him to the full effects of Tamsyn’s presence.

“Well, I’m no lady, as you never tire of telling me,” Tamsyn said cheerfully, putting one booted foot on a spare chair, resting her arm on her knee. “Good morning, Captain. Are we to voyage in your ship?”

Hugo blinked at the diminutive figure with her vibrant violet eyes and the short shining cap of silvery hair. She was wearing a riding habit, the skirt hiked up by her inelegant stance to reveal leather britches.
Not if I can avoid it, lass
. It was a silent declaration as he thought of the havoc such an astonishingly unconventional creature could cause among the crew.

“In the name of grace, take your foot off there,” Julian said, sharply pulling the chair out from under her foot. “Sit down, if you must.”

Tamsyn put her bottom where her foot had been and smiled warmly at the captain. “Don’t mind the colonel. He’s as cross as two sticks this morning. I expect it’s the
heat. My name’s Tamsyn.” She held out her hand in a friendly manner.

Bemused, Hugo took it.
Tamsyn what? Doesn’t she have a surname?
“Delighted, Miss Tamsyn,” he murmured.

“I promise we won’t be in the least a nuisance on your ship,” Tamsyn continued blithely. “Josefa and I can share a sleeping space. We’re perfectly accustomed to discomfort and cramped spaces, you should know. And you’ll find Gabriel a very useful person to have around … won’t he, Colonel?”

“Quite possibly,” Julian snapped, still recovering from the implication that he was suffering from heat stroke. “Where is he?”

“Concluding the deals we made with the merchants,” she said. “I told you we’ll be two chests lighter for the rest of the journey. We’ve sold all the bolts of cloth and the smaller casket of jewels. That leaves just the gold and the two bigger caskets. You’ll have room to store such things, Captain?”

“Hell and the devil,” Hugo muttered, developing the unshakable conviction that he was as firmly caught as a fish on a hook. “You’d better show me what you’ve got.”

“Come upstairs, then.” Tamsyn pushed back her chair, getting energetically to her feet. “You can meet Josefa at the same time. She’s standing guard at the moment.”

Hugo sent a glance of despairing incomprehension toward the colonel, who was looking grimmer than ever. “I had hoped to ease you into this more gently,” he said. “But there’s no such thing as gentle, with Violette around. She has about as much finesse as a stampeding herd of elephants.”

“Violette?” Captain Lattimer’s bemusement was running amok. “I understood the lass to say her name was Tamsyn.”

“Yes,” Julian said. “I’ll explain the situation to you in full.” He turned to Tamsyn. “Would you make yourself scarce for half an hour … if it isn’t too much to ask? When Gabriel returns, ask him to join us here.”

“Are you going to tell the captain everything? Because if so, I’m sure I ought to be here.” Tamsyn’s brows drew together in a somewhat aggrieved frown. “It is my plan, after all, and I could surely explain better how—”

“No,” Julian said flatly. “I will apprise Captain Lattimer of the facts in my own words. He and I speak a language that you do not. Now, be off.”

Tamsyn, very put out, nibbled her lip. This was her enterprise; surely she should be present at strategy discussions. Then it occurred to her that while the cross-country journey had been conducted according to her wishes, from now on she would be a guest of His Majesty’s navy, under the escort of the army. She didn’t know anything about such travel, and she certainly didn’t have the right to make decisions or even offer an opinion. And Colonel, Lord Julian St. Simon wasn’t going to lose the opportunity to let her know it, however public the arena.

It was a galling thought. Without saying anything else, she turned and trailed forlornly from the taproom.

Julian watched her crestfallen departure. It was surprising that such a fiery individual could be cast down by a sharp snub. Well, she’d better get used to it. He turned back to his visibly confused companion. “Let me fill you in, Lattimer.”

•   •   •

Tamsyn lay listening to the rhythmic scrape of a holystone on the quarterdeck a few inches above her face. Judging by the heavy rasping, they were also using one of the massive lumps of granite studded with nails that they called bears. It was close to dawn, a faint graying light seeping through the small window in the captain’s sleeping quarters.

She stretched and turned onto her side, the hanging box bed swinging with her movements. It was like being in a permanently rocking cradle, very soothing combined with the gentle motion of the frigate on the presently smooth Atlantic waters. Josefa, in her own box across the small space, muttered as she came out of sleep.

Then the peace of early morning was shattered by a loud shrilling of whistles as the bosuns woke the watch presently sleeping belowdecks. Feet pounded on the decks, voices bellowed down the companionways, “Tumble up … tumble up!” And the racing feet sounded like roll after roll of thunder as the men scrambled on deck with their rolled hammocks to stow them in the nets along the frigate’s sides.

After three days at sea Tamsyn had become accustomed to the noise of this morning ritual. Josefa, however, continued to grumble at being awoken with such violence. Now she sat up, grabbing the wooden sides of her cradle as it swung wildly with her movements.

“Ay de mí,”
she sighed as she did every morning, contemplating maneuvering her ample frame out of the cot and onto the shifting timbers of the cabin floor.

“
Buenos días
, Josefa.” Tamsyn sat up, her own slight body barely creating a stir in the supporting ropes.

There was a loud bang at the door, and the man Samuel’s voice came through the oak. “Hot water, missus.”

“Gracias, señor.”
Josefa shuffled to the door, drawing her shawls modestly around her. She opened it a crack, met Samuel’s grinning face, seized the copper jug, and dragged it inside. Josefa didn’t hold with sea travel, and she didn’t trust sailors.

Tamsyn was sitting up, hugging her knees, a slight frown drawing her delicate arched eyebrows together. “It’s Monday, isn’t it, Josefa?”

“So I believe,” Josefa said, pouring water into a bowl.

“The last Monday in April.” A little sinking feeling settled in her belly. Cornichet’s ambush had been on March 28. Her monthly bleeding had almost ended; she remembered how she’d sat huddled in his cabin with the rope around her neck ironically thanking heaven for small mercies.

But in that case it should have started again five days ago. She touched her breasts, feeling for telltale soreness. Nothing. It had been a risk, those three glorious encounters. The first occasion there’d been no time in the swirling conflagration of ecstasy to think of consequences. The other times she hadn’t wanted to spoil the rhythm and spontaneity to consider practicalities. She’d never had that problem before, but Lord St. Simon was no ordinary lover.

She’d persuaded herself that the time in her cycle was relatively safe. The village women held to the lore that pregnancy tended to coincide with coupling in the middle of the woman’s cycle. It sounded a haphazard lore to Tamsyn, but she’d chosen to believe it.

“Damnation!” she muttered under her breath.

Grimly, she swung herself out of the box and disappeared into the quarter-gallery opening off the sleeping
cabin, in the faint hope that a visit to the privy would reveal what she knew hadn’t happened.

It was a forlorn hope, as she’d known it would be, and she returned to the cabin, pulling her nightgown over her head. Maybe it would start today. She wasn’t always reliably regular, and five days wasn’t that late. She sponged her body vigorously, as if she could bully it into behaving properly, then dressed in the britches and riding habit that allowed her some freedom of movement without breaking the colonel’s sartorial rules.