A King's Trade (61 page)
Authors: Dewey Lambdin
“Lewrie was her first, and only, captain,” Sir Andrew stated, as if trying to tweak the Earl Spencer, leaning towards him and grinning.
“The Surveyors think she will require a total refit,” Sir Evan Nepean continued. “Four to six months' work. Might you wish Captain Lewrie to sit ashore on half-pay that long, milord?”
“By God I do not!” the First Lord barked. “There's no telling
what
Deviltry the man's capable of with that much idle time available him. Andâ¦there is the, ahâ¦possibility of being tried for his theft of slaves on Jamaica. âOut of sight, out of mind' seems apt, at this moment. I will not knight a man who stands a chance of being put in the dock a few months later. Nor will I allow the papers and public time to discover what sort of man he really is. A new ship, something larger and suitable, of a certainty. Preferably, one able to sail far from England, and possible embarrassment, Sir Evan.”
Exactly what the Foreign Office appointee to the Privy Council suggested might be best for the Crown,
Nepean thought, hiding his sly grin. “Ah. In two more months or so, milord, Sir Andrew, an eighteen-pounder gunned Fifth Rate frigate will be returned from the dockyards at Portsmouth, and ready for re-commissioning. She is the HMS
Savage,
originally built in â93, just after the start of the war, and in very good structural condition, barring the usual problems with her bottom, and such. Her former captain has already been reassigned, so⦔
“Two whole months with him ashore and unemployed, though,” the First Lord mused with a suspicious frown. “Then, however long it will take him to gather a new crewâ¦.”
“There would be no delay in it, either, milord,” Nepean brightly added, “for we are in possession of a letter from both the officers and crew of
Proteusâ¦
even the Marines and cabin steward lads, expressing their wish to remain under Captain Lewrie, entire.”
“Remarkable,” Adm. Sir Andrew Hammond allowed. He was Royal Navy, man and boy, and knew what sort of officer might elicit such loyalty, even if the First Lord, a civilian, did not appreciate it. “We could pay off
Proteus
into the Portsmouth yardâ¦where she currently is anchored, I believe? Then turn over
Proteus's
people into
Savage.
Quite neat, milord. And, with little reason for Lewrie to come up to Londonâ¦into the clutches of the newspapers, hmm?”
“Oh my, yes!” the First Lord quickly, enthusiastically, agreed. “Make it so, Sir Evan. Now, as to the next matter on our agenda⦔
The exotic beasts, the jugglers and acrobats, the fire-eater and his bursts of flame from his mouth, the capering clowns and their pig bladders and antics, and the clattering waggons painted in fresh bright red and yellow drew such a crowd as any that the Marine garrison from Portsmouth Dockyards had ever drawn. The
circus's band, replenished by new musicians and outfitted in garishly-trimmed uniforms more imposing than the Army List of generals (including all retired ones), oom-pahhed, crashed, drummed, and tooted along at the head of the parade, children of the town deserting the kerbings for the cobblestones to prance and march along with them, goggle-eyed and shrieking with utter delight at such a wonder! H'elefinks, lions, dancing bears, zebras, and God knew
what-all,
and some of them, like the performers in their show costumes, had fought the filthy French, and won, for didn't all the newspapers say so, all the flyers printed by the circus, too, say it?
It wasn't just
any
tawdry old circus and theatrical troupe, it was
Wigmore's Travelling Extravaganza,
honoured with a proclamation by the Crown, with Thanks of Parliament to boot, back from deepest, darkest Africa, bigger and better than ever, and, “Oh, Mummy! We must see it! We must attend,
puh-lease?”
Individual blossoms, whole nose-gays, were flung at the parading performers and beasts, even the hyena and the anteaters, and the red-arsed baboons in their waggon cage, the same sort of accolades given a regiment just back from a victorious campaign, and there was good old Daniel Wigmore on a fine horse, tipping his hat to one and all, a patch-eyed “foreign-looking cove” with a rifle-musket in one hand, and one of his squawling lion cubs on his saddle's pommel, a cove who could swing to face backwards, turn a flip on his horse's back, slide down to hang on the side of his mount like a wild Red American Indian, and gallop up the street like the very wind, huzzah!
And, that remarkably beautiful girl on the white horse, riding
astride,
in breeches and boots so snug you could see⦠! and children's eyes were covered, and women tittered into handkerchiefs, but my!, but she was a horsewoman, too, and with that spiky crown, that flowing mane of curly black hair, and
that bow,
my Gawd!
She
was the lovely Eudoxia, slayer of a dozen,
two-
dozen, odious Frenchmen intent upon her ravishing, or worse, and when she stood on her mount's bare back, everyone cheered, whistled, and fell in love with her daring, and her bravery.
Then, she swerved from the parade's course, right to the doors of a venerable old posting house frequented by naval officers. Right onto the sidewalk she forced her horse.
“Kapitan
Lewrie!” she gaily cried.
“Zdrasvutyeh!
Hello, again! Black fellow, Rodney, is healed up,
da?
Little shooter is well?”
“Mistress Eudoxia,” Lewrie nervously replied, doffing his hat to her, though with one eye on her father, for Arslan Durschenko had brought his horse to a
stop quite nearby, and he
did
hold a musket in his hand, and it
might
be loaded, andâ¦! “Seaman Rodney is now fine. Fit as a fiddle!” And the crowd about him began to whisper, then cry out, that that-there Navy man was “Black Alan” Lewrie, by Jingo, “The Emancipator,” and “Hero of the South Atlantic,” wot woz in all o' them tracts an' sich!
“I s'pose your circus will do well, now that⦔ Lewrie began to say, but Eudoxia got that impish look in her big, almond-shaped amber eyes, making Lewrie glance at her father, who was scowling
fiercely
by then, and starting to wheel his horse's head round, and⦠!
“Bravest man in all Navy!” Eudoxia loudly declared.
“Kapitan
is my hero!” A moment before she leaned down, took him by an epaulet, and kissed him smack on the mouth⦠with a sly bit of tongue to boot, it here must be noted, as the crowd went wild with amusement.
Oh, Christ, don't do
that,
not
now,
not
â¦
!
Lewrie frantically thought, though (it here must be noted as well) he did not find the experience
completely
disagreeable.
“Mummy, who's that lady kissing Papa?” his daughter Charlotte crossly demanded as his children, and his wife Caroline, bustled from the inn's doors. “Why's she dressed like that? Is she
foreign
orâ¦?”
“Why, I do not know, dear, but I am certain we shall discover who she is, soon!” Caroline Lewrie drawled, fixing her husband with a very jaundiced glare. Middle son Hugh guffawed, his eyes alight with instant hero-worship of the famous Eudoxia, right before his eyes in the flesh (so to speak), whilst Lewrie's eldest, Sewallis, ever a cautious lad, merely gawked and turned red.
“Is
jena?
Wife?” Eudoxia asked, turning on her sugary charm. “Mistress Lewrie, wife of bravest
kapitan
in whole world, who savink us from
Fransooski
bas ⦠bad peoples,
spasiba. Kapitan
Lewrie speak of you and
dyetiâ¦
children so
often!
Is right word, âoften'? I am honour-ed to be meetink you!” she gushed. “You comink to circus, you and children? Will be
bolshoi
show!”
“We will see,” Caroline coolly rejoined. “Honoured to meet you as well, since I've read so much about you, Mistressâ¦Eudoxia?”
“Must go, now,” Eudoxia said. “Wantink to say
bootyeh zdarovi
to Kapitan Lewrie one last time. Meanink âbless you,' yes? For all he do for us.
Dosvidanya,
Kapitan.
Paka snova!”
“Have a grand tour of Britain, Mistress Durschenko,” Lewrie bade her in turn, doffing his hat and making a leg to keep it formal, and
innocent.
Eudoxia kneed her horse and made him perform a kneeling bow to Lewrie, to the further
amazement of the crowd, as she swept something like a formal Eastern
salaam
while seated on his back, too.
“And
that
meansâ¦?” Caroline warily enquired.
” âGoodbye,' and âsee you'⦠I think, in Russian, my dear,” he told her, thanking God that Caroline's only foreign tongue was a little French, for
“Paka snova”
â”See you,
again!”
âhad been delivered with such a light in Eudoxia's eyes, laden with so much impish
promise.
“And,
shall
we attend the circus, Alan?” Caroline icily posed.
“Wellâ¦I'm certain the
children
would enjoy it, dear,” Lewrie replied with as much off-handed blitheness as he could muster, actually managing to look his wife in her eyes, âstead of blinking too much.
“Oh, Mummy, could we?” Charlotte squealed, about to bounce out of her shoes, and her face as squinted as when she needed to pee; and Hugh and Sewallis clamoured for it, too. “We've never
seen
a circus!”
“We shall see, children,” Caroline told them. “I'm sure that it would be
educational.
Though, perhaps it might prove too exciting for
some
of us,” she added, a brow cocked in her husband's direction. “I believe your father has seen it several times, already, and, what with all that is needful to commission his new ship, might have no time to spare for
further
attendance.”
“Well ⦔ Lewrie glibly rejoined, shrugging again, higher.
And I never laid a
finger
on the mort!
he thought;
Well, maybe a hand, a lip or two, but⦠damned if I did, damned if I didn't, and Caroline'll think the worst o' me, either way. Gawd, but this is going t'be a
long
reconciliation! Ain't I a bloody hero? Ain't that worth something, in my own house?
“Come along, children,” Caroline serenely instructed, gathering her brood, her regal air parting the press of the crowd before them as sure as Moses parted the Red Sea. “Come, Alan!” she bade her husband with a trifle
less
patience as he lagged behind a little, wondering for a second or two whether she meant him to be in their company, after all. “We're going to the chandlers' shops for your needsâ¦dearest. Or so I thought,” she said for the benefit of the close-pressed spectators.
“Oh, o' course, my dear,” Lewrie replied, joining them at last. He linked arms with her, and plastered as much of an untroubled expression on his phyz as Caroline wore on hers.
“But, what about the
circus,
Mummy?” Little Charlotte whined.
“Oh, we shall attend, dears,” Caroline vowed, turning to smile at her children. “Of course, we shall. Your father will take usâ¦for are we not a family, after all?”
Thank bloody Christ!
Lewrie thought with glad relief;
There
is
a thaw⦠maybe.
Then, began to contemplate how un-interested, aloof, and semi-bored he must act at the performance that night, and make his wife actually believe it!
At one time in the far-distant past, I rather naively assumed that I had Alan Lewrie's career in the Royal Navy plotted out with an appearance in a series of major events from his entry into the Fleet in 1780, all the way through to 1815.
Wrong, wrong, wrong! The more I associate with the rogue, the further afield I end up departing from that early stab at a
curriculum vitae.
It's as if my rubber bracelet, which bears the initials W.W.L.D.âWhat Would Lewrie Doâwas ensorcelled by a cut-rate wizard down on Lower Broad here in Nashville, quite near Tootsie's Orchid Lounge and the Old Ryman Theatre, so that Lewrie's perverse streak of “Oh no, let's go
there!”
sometimes takes over. It could be worse; I could have been possessed by the ghost of Hank Williams, and drunk myself to an early death, years ago!
This all started quite innocently when I ran across a mention in a reference book about a British circus and theatrical troupe that had sailed to America in 1797, and had had a wildly successful year's tour down the coast of the United States, from New England to Savannah, and Lewrie, and I, both said, “Hmmm,” about the same time. Him first, me first, I'm still not quite sure, but the thought of actresses, agile acrobats, bareback riders (which had a very sexual connotation in the eighteenth centuryâfigure it out for yourself!), skimpily clad aerialists, breathy little “theatrical”
ingénues,
and actresses! Did I mention actresses? The only drawback was the clowns and mimes⦠along with the “Zoo-Doo” left by a menagerie of exotic beasts.
As for those slavesâ¦the Rev. William Wilberforce and other people
whom Lewrie met in London before his little Odyssey were actual people who were in the relentlessly grim process of reforming every wee bit of English Societyâ¦the word “Respectable” didn't even come into common usage âtil the late 1790s, after Wilberforce and Hannah More got their talons into things. Sarah Trimmer really wrote dismayingly “cute” children's books, damning all the old blood-and-guts and scare-them-to-sleep folk tales as too traumatic for such shrinking violets as British children. The first roots of the Politically Correct movement put out their first runners deep under the soil at that moment.
So successful were the Reformers, the Clapham Sect, the Evangelical Society, and the Society for the Abolition of Slavery that Britons became a
very
tight-assed people, just in time for the Victorian Age. To this day, you put up a sign demanding that Brits line up for something, and you'll get a queue the likes not seen outside ticket offices for Super Bowl seats. As Hannah More gleefully said, “Slowly we shall take away all the bad old influences, âtil the only thing they have to look upon is ourselves.” Or something very much like that, but you may get the gist. They were social engineers so successful that they made Lenin weep with envy.
Slavery in the British Isles disappeared in the 1750s, though rich business interests fought tooth and nail to keep the sugar, teas, and coffee crops coming in from the Caribbean. It was not âtil 1807 that the slave trade was officially abolished throughout the British Empire, a ban honoured more with lip-service âtil 1815, when the Napoleonic Wars ended, and the government could pay attention to enforcing its laws. A peacetime Royal Navy became active in policing the African coasts with anti-slavery patrols to stop the continued export of slaves by other countries. Slavery itself was not abolished in all British colonies until 1833.
While Lewrie is not much of a real musician with his wee penny-whistle, and I have had my bad moments with bagpipe lessons and badly-done banjo playing, both he and I like music. In the last few books, readers will have run across the
titles
of eighteenth-century tunes, and for those who haven't been to the Smithville Old Time Fiddlers Jamboree, Uncle Dave Macon Days down in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, been to the Ryman and the Grand Ole Opry, or been fortunate enough to be my downstairs neighbours at one in the
A.M.
who just
adore
my CDs, let me cite a couple of them to put you in a “Lewrie state of mind.” Drink, low companions, seedy dives, and “women no better than they ought to be” are up to you, though.
“Smash the Windows” is by a group called The Virginia Company, a collection of pre-Revolutionary tavern music on authentic instruments. Write The Virginia Company, Box 1853, Williamsburg, VA 23187, or call (757) 229-3677.
Another is “Nottingham AleâTavern Music from Colonial Williamsburg,” recorded at the Raleigh Tavern. Contact the Williamsburg Foundation, Box 1776, Williamsburg, VA 23187-1776.
So, here's Lewrie, a national hero, and actually sorta-kinda reconciled with his
wife?
But, will it all end up aboard Tom Turdman's barge at Dung Wharf, as things involving Lewrie usually do? And, what is Zachariah Twigg
really
up to, and has Alan been set up as a ready-made martyr for the anti-slavery crowd, as Lewrie suspects? When
will
the Beaumans and their lawyers (boo, hiss!) arrive, and may Lewrie get his new frigate out to sea before they do? And, finally, just what
did
Eudoxia Durschenko have in mind when she bade him that enigmatic
“paka snova”
â”See you⦠again!”
“No, Lewrie, you can't go to the circus, again, damn yer eyes!”
Orâ¦maybe he might.
W.W.L.D., y'all.
