The little flags wagged again.

Though the gunboats were over two hundred yards off by then, Lewrie could distinctly hear Lt. Harcourt swearing a blue streak as some of those braking oars snapped like twigs. To make matters even worse, two boats in Lt. Elmes’s group had their tillers put hard over in the wrong direction, causing all four of his boats to collide. The helmsmen in that group out-shouted Lt. Harcourt, each blaming the other for the accidents. Lewrie could make out “Tom-noddy!” and “Hen-headed lubber!” and “Cack-handed idjit, ye geed when ye shoulda hawed!” Even more oars were damaged as they’d scraped down each other’s sides.

“Lord, sir!” Lt. Westcott said, astonished.

“Show ’em the Recall hoist, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie ordered in sad amusement, shaking his head and slowly collapsing the tubes of his telescope, “before the Spanish spot ’em and laugh themselves t’death. This looks like it’s goin’ t’be a damned long day.”

*   *   *

Fully armed and manned, the boats were just too heavy for the normal oars used in ships’ boats to get them going from a dead stop, to back-water and shift their aim quickly, or bring them to a quick stop; they’d snap every time, leap out of the thole pins that held them, and slam oarsmen hard in their chests.

“Send ashore to the dockyards, Mister Westcott, and my compliments to Captain Middleton,” Lewrie decided, “but, what we need on the boats are cut-down sweeps. Bigger oar blades, with thicker, stronger shafts, and perhaps even thicker and stronger sets of thole pins. If he can pad the loom ends so they don’t cripple my sailors every time they brake or back-water, we’d all very much appreciate that, too.”

The sailors in question, now back aboard for a more detailed explanation of their duties, had a good, appreciative laugh, but the First Officer had to scowl, and a scowl on Lt. Westcott’s harsh face was formidable. “Sweeps, sir? I can’t recall the last time I’ve seen even the smallest warship fitted with sweeps, and row-ports. He might not have a one on hand.”

“Exactly, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie replied with a sly, cherubic grin. “And until he does whip some up, our gunboats are useless.”

“Oh, I see, sir!” Westcott grinned back, tumbling to it. “I shall go over to the yards myself, sir, with your permission.”

“I couldn’t deprive you of the experience, sir,” Lewrie told him with a wink and a nod. “Now, lads,” he said louder, turning to his sailors, “let’s gather round the base of the main mast and we’ll go over what should have happened this morning, hey?”

He put a bold and confident face on for their benefit, even as he thought that the whole endeavour was thankless, pointless, useless, hopeless.… Christ, you can coin a whole slew o’ new words to describe this shitten mess! Somebody, anybody, get me back out to sea!

CHAPTER TWO

Lieutenant Westcott had come back aboard an hour or two later that day with the cheering news that Captain Middleton didn’t have any sweeps in store to be cut down. Equally cheering was Westcott’s description of Middleton’s reaction, how he had all but slapped his forehead, stomped round the wood yard in anger at himself for over-estimating the strength of the usual ash oars and under-estimating how the added weight made his fancy new gunboats so slow and unwieldy. It had been a joy to watch, Lewrie was assured!

Less cheering was the information that, once Captain Middleton had gotten over his “How could I have been so stupid?” and his groans and gargles of Mea Culpa, he had assured Westcott that the Gibraltar dockyard had a goodly lot of ash planks in stock, and that he could have enough sweeps fashioned to try out on at least half of the gunboats by the end of the week, and that his artificers would have the rowlocks strengthened on all the existing boats, and strengthen them on the four more under construction, as well!

“Don’t s’pose we could sneak over and set a huge fire in the yards,” Lewrie had glumly suggested at that news.

“That might not go down well, sir,” Westcott had cautioned him. “Sabotage, treason … all sorts of court-martial charges.”

“Unless we could blame it on the Spanish,” Lewrie pointed out. “The authorities ashore have foreign agents on their brains, and Spanish or French spies under every bed. General Dalrymple’s sure that a mutiny plot has been in the works for most of this year. Ah well … we probably would be caught in the act.”

Long ago, Lewrie and two schoolboy chums had been caught in the act after setting fire to the governor’s coachhouse at Harrow, and sent down, expelled, and denied the grounds forever.

*   *   *

“You’ll be dining ashore tonight, sir?” Lewrie’s cabin steward, Pettus, asked as Lewrie primped himself at his wash-hand stand. He asked with a straight face and a non-committal tone, since everyone knew by now where Lewrie might be, and with whom when ashore.

“Thought I might, Pettus,” Lewrie said, striving for “casual” himself as he dried and put away his razor after a touch-up on his morning shave. “Pass word to Yeovill that he’s to prepare something for you, Jessop, and my clerk, Mister Faulkes, but not for me, but I will be back aboard for breakfast.”

“Aye, sir,” Pettus replied, casting a quick grin at the teen-aged cabin servant, Jessop, who, out of Lewrie’s sight, also grinned impishly and made a hole of his left hand, poking a right finger into it.

Lewrie wetted his toothbrush in a cup of fresh water, ran it over a tin of flavoured pumice toothpowder, and began to scrub at his teeth. Once done, he put a hand to his mouth to catch his breath to sample its freshness. He would be dining with his “kept woman,” the lovely and intriguing Portuguese, Maddalena Covilhā, and wanted very much to please. In a side pocket of his uniform coat he had a tin of London-made cinnamon pastilles for both of them, before and after supper.

In the other side pocket there were three freshly-cleaned sheep-gut cundums, also London-made. Though he did not plan to make the evening an “All Night In” at the lodgings he’d taken for her, it was always best to be prepared for surprises.

Surprises, well; here came one of the furry kind, for his cat, Chalky, sprang to the top of the wash-hand stand and found a precarious perch on one corner, then ambled along the narrow front lip with the skill of a circus rope walker, brushing his mostly white fur on Lewrie’s recently sponged waist-coat, butting and stroking his head and his cheeks in affection, or in mischief; with Chalky it was hard to tell.

“Aye, and I love you, too, puss,” Lewrie said, giving Chalky a few long strokes from nose to tail as the cat turned about and pressed himself to Lewrie the other way, marking his master as his property. He also stuck his nose in the cup of water and had a swipe at the toothbrush.

“Just keep my coat out of his reach ’til I’m ready to put it on, my lad,” Lewrie told Pettus.

“Never a fear of that, sir,” Pettus promised, “we always hang it from an overhead beam hook … though, there is so much stray hair in the air, you’re sure to catch a few.”

“As I well know, by now, aye!” Lewrie happily replied, taking a last brush of his hair. “Well, shove me in it, and I’ll be off.”

*   *   *

Oh, Christ … him! Lewrie thought with a groan as he espied Mr. Thomas Mountjoy at the top of the landing stage of the Old Mole as his boat ghosted up to it; What the Devil’s he doin’ here, and what sort of shit is he lookin’ for me t’do for him, now? We weren’t to see each other ’til the end of the week!

Thomas Mountjoy was really a nice younger gentleman, a clever and diligent fellow who ostensibly ran a minor firm’s office at Gibraltar, the Falmouth Import & Export Company, Ltd. He was the epitome of a second or third son of some Squirearchy family, sent abroad and into Trade, with a hope that he might make something of himself. Mountjoy was brown-haired and brown-eyed, and nothing remarkable at first impression, sobrely dressed, no flash at all.