Just how much loot did the old fart fetch back from India? he was forced to wonder; And where did he develop such good taste? And then he just had t’name it so lamely!

“Done Roaming”, which was the real meaning upon which the pun of Dun Roman was based, was more fitting on a weekender tradesman’s cottage in Islington, for God’s sake! Oh, it had been grand when Lewrie had first seen it, ages ago, and once inside, it had gotten made over over the years into a marvel. Spacious entry foyer, first salon to the right, library-office-study to the left; formal dining room aft of that, smaller en famille breakfasting room off that, then the entertaining hall astern of all those, big enough for a game of tennis, and the rare ball. There were two wings, with four bed-chambers in each, with his father’s the largest. One could use a guide to find one’s way about, making Lewrie feel as if he was but temporarily residing at a sumptuous hotel!

The house staff was new to him, too, as much as he and his entourage was to them, so everyone felt wary and on guard, from the cool and dignified butler, Mayo, his wife the housekeeper, the footmen and maids, maids of all work, the stout old cook, Mrs. Furlough, who looked on Yeovill as a threat to her job security, right down to the coachman and grooms and the wee young scullery maid!

Lewrie had a set of rooms dedicated as his, with some of his old settee furniture, writing desk, and books and bookcases from the time that he and his late wife, Caroline, had rented a farm and had run up a pleasant house when they’d come back to Anglesgreen from the Bahamas in 1789 … painfully, Sir Hugo had hung Caroline’s portrait in there, the one done in ’86 when she’d been a new and happy bride.

At least he had Pettus as someone familiar to do for him, and Jessop, when he wasn’t hanging round the barns and stables, gawking and full of a thousand questions, since he’d never been on a working farm before, having been dredged up on the streets of Portsmouth. As for Desmond and Furfy, they’d been to Anglesgreen before, and after a few days of loafing, had pitched in with the farm work, what little there was with winter coming on, assisting the estate manager and the grooms, exercising the saddle horses and teaching Jessop to ride.

Chalky, Lewrie’s mostly-white cat, and Bisquit, the former ship’s dog, had a myriad of rooms, wardrobes, cabinets, and corners to explore in the house, though the youngest footman had to be assigned to keep an eye on the dog so the polished wood floors and expensive carpets didn’t get soiled.

Poor Bisquit. As Reliant was de-commissioned, draughts of sailors were paid off and re-assigned to other ships, leaving Bisquit without his long-time playmates and those who would sneak him treats. No one could think what to do with him. The Midshipmens’ mess which had snuck him aboard as their pet in the beginning certainly could not take him to their new ships, and neither could the Commission Officers; any new captain of theirs might have Bisquit thrown ashore to fend for himself! Even the Standing Officers who remained with the ship ’til she was at last scrapped could not keep him; their wives and children would be living aboard with them ’til Reliant was out of the yards and re-commissioned and would eventually have to place the dog’s fate in the hands of the frigate’s new captain. At least Lewrie had a farm, or, technically, he had access to his father’s estate, where Bisquit could thrive, and, should Lewrie ever gain a new ship and an active commission, the dog might remain, so he had decided to fetch Bisquit along, with a stout leather leash tied to his collar should Bisquit get too distracted and lope off on the journey to get hopelessly lost.

Except for the Old Ploughman, Anglesgreen wasn’t all that welcoming, either. His late wife’s family had never been all that high on Lewrie from the beginning. His brother in-law Governour Chiswick, once a panther-lean young man, was now pretty much the model for that caricature character John Bull, sure of his opinions, quick to speak them, loud, and as stout and round as an overfed steer. Their uncle, Phineas Chiswick, who had grudgingly taken them in as refugees after the American Revolution, penniless refugees at that, was now in his dotage, a whinnying, drooling, wheelchair-bound wreck with no surviving male heir, so it would be Governour who would inherit everything, and Governour had been managing in his place for so long that he’d become ever more sure that his way was best for everyone, and looked on Lewrie as an un-wanted interloper.

Lewrie might have found an ally in his other brother in-law, Burgess Chiswick, but Burgess was now a Major in a regiment of Foot, and only rarely down to Anglesgreen, and his own estate and house, which just happened to be the one that Lewrie and Caroline had rented and built, the farm and house that Uncle Phineas had sold right out from under him after Caroline had died. Burgess had married, and his new father-in-law, Mr. Robert Trencher, had purchased it for a wedding present, making Uncle Phineas Chiswick a pile of “tin”!

Perhaps the most distressing of all was the reception that Lewrie got from his own daugther, Charlotte. Ever her mother’s child, she had once been the dearest little angel, sweet and adorable—even if he’d never gotten the hang of raising a girl; boys were much easier for Lewrie to understand—who’d adored her father. Once!

That had changed once Caroline began to get scurrilous letters intimating that Lewrie was an unfaithful cad, naming names, citing salacious intimate details, and turning Caroline into a suspicious, bitter harridan, even suspecting and raging at their completely innocent ward, Sophie de Maubeuge.

Sophie? Never. The rest, unfortunately, was too damned true, revealed in spite by a former lover, Theoni Kavares Connor, with whom Lewrie had fathered a child, which fact had taken him some time to discover. Charlotte had been the only child at home to soak up her mother’s anger. Already turned against him, Caroline’s murder as they had fled France was the final straw, Lewrie’s fault alone, and damn Harry Embleton and Governour Chiswick for convincing Charlotte that that was true!

A day or two of retiring early and sleeping late to catch up on years of missed rest, hours in the library with books new to him, and tentative walks outdoors, checking up on his favourite saddle horse, Anson, but unsure if he was ready to try riding, yet, Lewrie had to call upon her at Governour’s house, where Charlotte had lodged since he had been called back to service in the Spring of 1803. He clambered, painfully, into a one-horse carriage and let the unfamiliar coachman, Waddey, bear him over.

*   *   *

Governour’s sweet but meek wife, Millicent, came dashing from the parlour as their butler announced his arrival, and rushed to give him a hug, crying, “You poor man! We are so relieved to see you alive. When we got your letter saying that your ship would be paying off and you would be coming home, so cruelly wounded, I’ve been half beside myself with worry! So many earnest prayers have we lifted to Heaven for your healing.”

“For which I thankee kindly, Millicent,” Lewrie replied, giving her a warm hug back. “The healing’s coming, slowly. Perhaps a spell in the country’ll do for the rest. Is Governour in?”

“He’s been called away to speak with Sir Romney and some others at the Red Swan,” Millicent told him with a toss of her head. “Local politics, to prepare for the next by-election to keep Harry in office.”

That was a slap in the face; Lewrie had sent a note round that set the date and time of his coming.

“And Charlotte?” he further asked.

“She’s in the parlour,” Millicent said. “Come in and see her.”

Lewrie stumped his way to the wide double doors and stepped through. For a second, his heart jumped as if he’d seen the ghost of his late wife, for Charlotte, now fifteen, was eerily the very image of Caroline as she had been at eighteen when first he had met her in her family’s poor lodgings in Wilmington, North Carolina, just before the evacuation of Loyalists had begun.