The French Admiral (44 page)

Alan's prophecy about using his cabin so seldom had come true on the way down from New York. If he was not on the orlop deck supervising the proper stowage of provisions and munitions, then he was standing night watches, fully in command of
Desperate
as her real officers slept. He kept log entries, saw that the glass was turned on the half hour and the bells were struck; that the course was steered as laid down and that the quartermasters on the wheel stayed awake. He toured below decks when he could to see that all lights were out and the hands were behaving, that the lookouts were attentive, that the night signal book was close at hand, and signal fusees ready for emergencies. He saw that the fire buckets were full, that the bosun of the watch and his hands were trimming the sails for best efficiency, that there was no navigational hazard in their path and no ship on a course for an imminent collision, that the knot log was cast to determine their speed at regular intervals and that in soundings along the coast the leadsmen regularly plumbed the ocean depths.

He also had to keep a weather eye out for privateers or some part of the French fleet, which had not been reported leaving the American coast yet and could still be somewhere nearby.

It was such a quantum leap in duties and responsibility that he almost (but not quite) swore off strong drink, and there was no rest, not for a moment on deck. At first he was too embarrassed to have to summon Railsford, Monk, or the captain at the slightest hint of doubt, and got cobbed for waiting too late. On the other hand, when he summoned them too often, he got cobbed for that, too, and developed a slightly haunted look after one week of his new duties.

There was some reward, even so; to stand on deck when everything was running smoothly, hands behind his back and rocking on the balls of his feet, feeling
Desperate
surge along with a tremble and hum of wind and sea on her rigging and hull, totally under his control. Four hundred and fifty tons of warship, worth more than twelve thousand pounds; aboard were twenty pieces of artillery, over one hundred fifty lives, and it was, for intervals, all his to command.

Another joy was to simply finish the middle watch, see the first hint of dawn, pipe up hands from below, sign the log, and turn things over to Railsford without incident. There might be a single grunt of satisfaction that he had done what was required without killing anyone, or sinking the ship in the process, or tearing the masts right out of her. Usually, there would be a quick conference aft as the hands knelt to scrub decks forward, and Railsford or Treghues would give him a critique on the night's work—what he had done right and what he had done wrong. And so far, there had been enough right things to counterbalance the few wrong.

Another change was in the way he was remonstrated; no more being bent over a gun for a dozen strokes of a stiffened rope starter, no more tongue lashings. The cobbings were short, to the point and were couched as admonitions from a senior officer to a junior officer, done out of hearing from the hands so his authority with the crew would not suffer.

When he began, he thought he had been prepared for standing watch by his stint in the schooner
Parrot,
but he realized that that period had been all play and schoolwork. Lieutenant Kenyon,
Parrot
's master and commmander, had assigned Lewrie and the late Thad Purnell together to do the work of a single adult, with senior bosun's mates or quartermasters to act as a safety net should they run into trouble, someone to prompt them into the right answer, keep them out of real difficulty, and keep their playfulness in check.

Desperate
was not schoolwork, and there was no one to turn to as tutor in the night watches; he was the lone man with no one to backstop him. If he failed at this, he would never get another chance, so he took a round turn and two half hitches, as one said in naval parlance, and tried to begin to act like the sea-officer they expected him to be, and the sea-officer he aspired to be.

They sweated blood to make it in past Cape Fear (it was not named Fear for nought, after all) and into the river between the true coast and the long peninsula. If anything, it looked even more desolate than most stretches of the southern American coast, low barrier islands with only sea oats and dune grass, low forests of wind-sculpted pines on the banks, and the salt-grass marshes stretching off to either hand, with only swamp behind.
Desperate
could, by staying to the middle of the channel, just barely make it upriver, and that took real skill. With a tide running in, they could ride the flood, but would have no control over the helm. They had reefed tops'ls, jibs and spanker set, with a light wind off the great curve of Onslow Bay that gave them just enough forward momentum to give the rudder a bite, but not so much speed that they could run into trouble before dropping a kedge-anchor from the stern if they took the ground on the mud and sand shoals.

“Point ta starboard, quartermaster, put your helm ta loo'ard, handsomely, now,” Monk cautioned.

“Five fathom, five fathom to starboard!” the bosun's mate in the foremast chains chanted.

“Sonofa . . .” Monk growled, wanting to stand on, but worried about shoaling. Off to larboard, there was an eddy that swirled as though the tidal flood was caressing something substantial, which he had just altered course to avoid.

“That's a back eddy, Mister Monk,” Alan said, remembering how the current would spin about in the Cape Fear River from his earlier voyages in
Parrot.
“Lieutenant Kenyon said there was no harm in it, and we stood in quite close to it.”

“Aye, but what'd ya draw in yer schooner?” Monk asked, working on a quid of tobacco so vigorously it made Alan's jaws ache to watch him.

“A foot over one fathom, sir. But the main channel was far off to the larboard, ran right up alongside Eagle Island.”

“Aye, if yer a coaster,” Monk said. “The Thoroughfare, they calls it, but it's too shallow fer the likes o' us.”

“And a half four.”

“Helm aweather half a point,” Monk said compromising.

“Six fathom, six fathom on this line,” the larboard man called.

“Aye,” Monk went on, puffing with relief to find deep water. “I s'pose ya know the main channel's on the west side, 'least 'til ya get ta Old Town Creek an' the Dram Tree?”

He pointed out a huge bearded cypress on the right bank farther upriver. “Bad shoal at Old Town Creek. Mosta the big ships don't go no further than Campbell Island an' the Dram Tree. Sailors take a dram afore hoistin' sail fer a long voyage from the Cape Fear. What's Campbell Island bear now?”

“Two points to larboard, sir.”

“Captain, my respects, an' once past Campbell Island, I suggest we do anchor.”

“Very well, Mister Monk,” Treghues said lazily. “We'll round up into the wind, let go the best bower and back the mizzen tops'l to let the wind and tide end her up bows down-river. Mister Coke?”

“Aye, sir?” the bosun said.

“I'll not let her fall back too far from the bower, mind. Hang the kedge in the cutter and row her out to drop. Veer out half a cable aft and a half cable forrard. Take Mister Avery with one of your mates.”

“Aye, sir.”

Lewrie cast a glance at David Avery standing by the quarterdeck nettings overlooking the waist. Much like the change in attitude when Keith Ashburn had been made an acting lieutenant into
Glatton,
the squadron flagship when Alan's first ship
Ariadne
was condemned, it seemed as if a friendship was being tested once more. In the past, it had been Keith Ashburn who had placed the distance between them to protect the authority of his new commission. Here, it was Avery who was distancing himself from Lewrie, finding it difficult to say “Alan” instead of “Mr. Lewrie” or “sir,” even in the mess. There did not seem to be any animosity, even though Avery had been in the Navy over four years and was still a midshipman, while Alan had risen like a comet to an acting mate in a little less than two. He was still friendly, but no longer close, and Alan regretted it. And there was little he could do about it without stepping out of role and playing favorites. Railsford had warned him of that one night when he had come on deck to catch a breeze. Best do it now, he had said, before new midshipmen come aboard, and you have no bad habits to break.

When they did receive new midshipmen, Alan and the new master's mate who would be appointed into
Desperate
would have to rule the mess, supervise the newlies, and keep order without playing favorites. It was sad, all the same, just another slice of naval life Alan detested.

“Mister Railsford, round her up into the wind, if you would be so kind, and bring her to,” Treghues finally ordered.
Desperate
swung about in a tight turn, her helm hard over until her bows were pointed for the sea she had left. At a sharp arm gesture, the bower dropped into the water with a great splash and she began to pay off upriver, driven by tide and sea breeze on her backed mizzen tops'l, while everything else was handed or taken in by the topmen and fo'c's'le-men. They spent half an hour rowing out the kedge-anchor from the stern, letting her go and winching the ship forward onto her bower; they lashed the heavy cable to the mooring bitts and hauled in on the kedge-cable until they had her firmly moored in the river fore and aft. The shallow coasters they had escorted in had to take what moorings they could, since
Desperate,
as leading ship up channel, had taken the best mooring for herself, and devil take the hindmost.

“Mister Railsford, now we've the cutter free, my compliments to you, and would you depute for me ashore with Major Craig concerning his plans for evacuation. There are orders from General Leslie in Charleston to convey, as well,” Treghues drawled.

“I should be delighted, sir.”

“Um, excuse me, sir,” Alan said.

“Aye, Mister Lewrie?” Treghues asked, turning to face him.

“If you would not mind, sir, I should like to go ashore with the first lieutenant,” Alan said.

“Not ten days into your new rating, and you think you have earned a right to caterwaul through the streets of this unfortunate town?” The captain frowned. “You disappoint me, Mister Lewrie. I had thought you had learned your lesson about debauchery.”

“Not debauchery, sir.” Alan gaped in a fair approximation of shock, or what he hoped would pass for it. “It is the Chiswick family, sir. You mind them, the officers that came off Jenkins Neck with me? Their family is here in Wilmington at last report, and I have tidings and money from their sons to help their passage. I promised Lieutenant Chiswick I would look them up, if possible, sir.”

“Hmm,” Treghues murmured, cradling his jaw to study him. “On your sacred honor, this is true, sir?”

“'Pon my sacred honor, sir,” Alan swore. “I gave them my word, sir.”

“Very well, then, but if you come back aboard the worse for wear, as you did in Charleston, I will not merely disrate you from master's mate, I'll put you forward as an ordinary seaman.”

“I understand, sir,” Alan said. And God, please don't let me run across anything tempting this time! he pleaded silently.

They landed at the foot of Market and Third Street, just below St. James church and the white house that Cornwallis had used as his headquarters. The church was in terrible shape compared to the last time Alan had seen it, but it was his destination, operating on the theory that Loyalists would be Church of England if they had any pretensions at all to gentility, and the parish vicar would know where the Chiswicks resided, if they were members.

He knocked on the door to the manse, and a wizened fellow came to open it, more a hedge-priest than anything else, dressed in black breeches and waistcoat gone rusty with age and abuse, and his linen and ample neck-stock a bit rusty as well, as though he had to wash and iron himself.

“Yes, what do you want, sir?” the man asked him, wiping his hands on a blue apron, and Alan wondered if the man was a curate or a publican doing double duty if the parish was not living enough.

“I am seeking information about a family named Chiswick, sir,” he said. “I thought perhaps they might be temporary members of your parish. Is the vicar in?”

“The
rector
is out, sir.” The man sniffed, eyeing the King's uniform up and down as though it were a distasteful sight to him. “And I know no one by the name of Chiswick, not in our regular parish.”

“They came down from around Campbelltown,” Alan prompted. “New arrivals to Wilmington.”

“Oh.” The man frowned. “And their reason for leaving that country?”

“I believe they were burned out,” Alan said, getting a little put out with the man's effrontery.

“Loyalists, then.” The man nodded, stiffening up and glowering.

“Here, this is Church of England still, is it not?”

“It is not, sir.” The man huffed up his small frame as though insulted. “More to the point, Episcopal, but not Church of
England.
Had we been else, Tarleton and his troopers would not have used our nave for a stable, sir!”