The Continental Risque (13 page)

‘Very good, Governor,' Captain Law said, his voice betraying no opinion of the governor's decision. Brown studied Law's face; nothing was given away, but Law had not missed a bit of what had transpired. Not that it mattered. The military supplies would remain on the island, and if the rebels came, then there would still be some options available, beyond immediate surrender.

Brown felt the warm trade wind blow across the veranda, making the napkins flutter, then settle again. The same trade wind that would carry the Yankees south. And for President of His Majesty's Council John Brown, it would carry more than just rebel ships, oh, yes. It would carry opportunity as well.

‘Gentlemen,' Stanton said, raising his glass and preparing to give the same toast he had given three times already, phrased differently, to be certain, but substantially the same. The others at the table, Virginia, Rogers, Rumstick, and Biddlecomb, all raised their glasses high.

‘I give you the First American Fleet! Ten long years of blood and toil have been leading up to this moment, the moment when the United Colonies of America would put to sea their own mighty armada!'

Biddlecomb raised his glass, clicking it against the others, toasting the five vessels tied up to Willing and Morris' Wharf: two ships and three brigs, converted merchantmen all, save for the
Charlemagne
, and she much battered, which had now become a mighty armada.

He caught Virginia's eye and smiled broader still, and she smiled as well and winked. For a decade Virginia had been the only woman in Stanton House, and her father had long since given up any attempt to corral her into playing the lady; now she had her dessert and brandy with the men, and if she had lit up a pipe, Biddlecomb would have been only mildly surprised.

The conversation flowed like the Delaware River, which was now all but free of ice, drifting to subjects other than the American Navy and the upcoming fleet action. That was very much to Biddlecomb's liking; he was tired of the subject and loath to exchange this lovely city and fine company for the freezing terror of the Atlantic Ocean in the height of winter.

It was nearly midnight when the party, the farewell party, came to a close. Stanton and Rumstick and Rogers, arms linked, staggered out of the sitting room, their usual bonhomie much augmented by wine and port. They stood in the foyer, exchanging loud good-nights and congratulations.

‘Captain Biddlecomb?' Virginia said softly, her teasing smile playing across her lips. She stepped close to him, her long, delicate fingers smoothing the ruffle on his shirt. ‘I would not think it amiss if you were to come by my room, say at two bells in the middle watch, as you sailors put it. So I can say farewell.' Her seductive tone could not hide the note of timidity in her voice. Then she turned and walked, fairly glided, out of the room.

For the next hour Biddlecomb, in stocking feet, paced back and forth across the floor of his room. There was much for him to think about. In the morning he would be getting under way in command of a man-of-war in the first fleet of the American Navy, with an unknown first officer and a crew half-comprised of new recruits and jailbirds, bound away for the wintry Atlantic.

But of course he was thinking of none of that, and even when he attempted to distract himself by forcing those other considerations to the forefront of his mind, they did not stay there for long. Rather, his mind was standing fast in Virginia's bedroom, in Virginia's bed, where, he hoped, he himself would soon follow.

Through the window, which he had cracked open, it suddenly feeling very warm to him, Biddlecomb heard the sound of two bells ringing out from the men-of-war tied to the dock three blocks away. He stiffened and felt his stomach knot up, felt the telltale tingling on the bottom of his feet, the harbinger of some pending action.

He looked at himself in the mirror, adjusted his ruffled shirt, smoothed his breeches, and shook his head in disgust at this nervous and agitated state. It was not as if this would be his first time, far from it. He had been a sailor for years, and as such had experienced all of those things for which sailors were famous, including those shore-side pursuits. But that memory did nothing, absolutely nothing, to assuage his anxiety.

He walked slowly down the hall, grimacing at every squeak of the floorboards. He moved past Stanton's door, and Rumstick's, behind which he heard the loud and familiar snoring. His footsteps would never be heard over that din.

He came at last to Virginia's door, breathed deep and knocked twice, the lightest of raps. He waited, thinking that she had perhaps fallen asleep or changed her mind. He considered knocking again, or skulking back to his room, then he heard the latch lift and the door swung open.

Virginia looked out through the partially open door, looked into his eyes and smiled. She was dressed in her nightgown, a loose-fitting silk affair, low-cut in the front and clinging to her here and there, giving a suggestion of the slim body beneath. Her head was uncovered and her long brown hair hung down her back and forward over her shoulders.

Behind her the single candle standing in a tin sconce shaped like a fleur-de-lis on the wall cast a warm circle of light, giving the gauzy fabric that draped down around the big four-poster bed an ethereal quality while the rest of the room was lost in shadow.

Virginia opened the door wider and stepped aside and Biddlecomb stepped in. ‘Captain Biddlecomb,' Virginia said with a hint of her teasing voice, then shut the door. ‘Isaac,' she said, this time with an odd note of vulnerability as they stood looking at each other.

‘You look wonderful,' Biddlecomb said, and inside he grimaced and cursed himself for being such a stupid, awkward calf. Such an idiotic thing to say! But Virginia smiled, a shy, girlish smile, not at all what he was used to, and she looked at his face and then down at the floor.

The light from the candle lit the one side of her face and played off the shimmering surface of her nightgown. Biddlecomb was overcome with desire, a hunger that would be sated before all else. He reached out and put his hands on her little waist, and she looked up and threw her arms around his neck and they kissed, pressing hard against each other. He ran his hands over the smooth silk, feeling her body under the cloth, ran his hands over her back and shoulders and she pulled him toward her, kissing him with a reckless need.

He reached his arm down and scooped her up, their lips never coming apart, and carried her over to the bed, her weight far less than he would have imagined. He pushed the curtains aside and laid her down and laid down with her.

‘Isaac,' Virginia breathed the word. His lips ran over her face and her eyelids and her neck, he kissed the beautiful, smooth expanse of skin above her breasts. He felt his desire increasing, ready to break over him like a squall.

His hand ran down the length of her body, over her hips and her waist and her hard stomach. He felt her hands running through his hair, her breath coming faster, and he moved his hand up along her side and cupped her breast, warm and firm. She let out a little moan and moved under him, and he felt her hand on his, pressing his hand harder against her breast. He ran his lips over her face, and then she pulled his hand away, saying, ‘Isaac, no. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.'

Biddlecomb rolled back, propping himself up on his elbow, stroking her face with his hand. She looked like a trapped bird, confused and afraid. ‘I … I am sorry, Isaac, I love you so much.' It was not the Virginia Stanton he knew, not the unflappable Virginia Stanton. Now she was vulnerable and frightened, for the first time in his memory, and despite the frustration, the inordinate frustration that he felt, he loved her far more then than he ever had before.

‘I'm sorry,' she said again. ‘It's not you, it's me.' Biddlecomb wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close to him, and she pressed her face against his chest, her hands clasped across her chest. He could feel her tears on his skin.

‘It's all right, it's all right,' he said. ‘I love you so very much.' They lay like that for a long time. Biddlecomb ran his fingers through her thick hair. ‘Fair's fair,' he whispered at length. ‘I did write you a note once, alluding to our upcoming marriage.'

Virginia pulled away from him and looked up at his face. Her eyes were rimmed with red, but she was smiling. ‘You did too. And will you keep your word? Will you marry me?'

‘Of course I will, of course I will.' What in the hell was he saying? Had he at last agreed to something to which his courage would not admit?

An hour later Virginia's breathing became rhythmic and pronounced as she fell asleep in his arms, and Biddlecomb knew that if he did not leave then, then he might fall asleep as well, and morning would find them in that compromised position. He rolled her gently on her back, and wisps of her hair fell across her face and her silk nightgown pulled taut, revealing the sensual curves of her body. He felt the desire flare up again, like a fire one had thought extinguished, and he fought down the urge to run his hand over her.

‘Are you going?' she asked in a sleepy voice, and her eyes slowly opened.

‘Yes, my love.' He leaned over and kissed her, and she kissed him back.

‘Are you angry with me?'

‘No,' he said, not knowing if it was the truth. Yes, it was the truth. He loved her, he was not angry with her.

‘And you'll marry me?'

‘Yes, I'll marry you.'

‘Should I make you do it tomorrow, before you sail? You might change your mind, given time to think.'

‘Well, I suppose …' he said, equivocating, trying to guess if she was joking, if he was ready to keep his promise immediately. The thought, in truth, was far more intimidating than the thought of taking his battered brig into the North Atlantic.

‘I'm joking,' Virginia said, closing her eyes and rolling half over, throwing her arm over his legs. ‘You can wait 'till you return. I don't want you to rush headlong into anything.' The old Virginia was waking up.

‘I'll marry you when the fleet returns. Now you go to sleep, and I'll see you in the morning. I have to go back to the ship quite early. But you will come see me off, won't you?'

‘Of course, my love, my sweet Isaac.' She kissed him again.

Biddlecomb did not wait until the morning to return to the
Charlemagne
. No sooner had he made his way back to his room than he realized that sleep was no longer a possibility, plagued as he was by his frustrated desires and his apprehension for the future, his unwillingness to leave Virginia and Philadelphia, his concern over his promise of marriage, and his anxiety over the myriad things that plagued commanders of ships the world over.

He pulled his blue coat on, and his heavy wool coat over that, pushed his cocked hat down on his head, and made his way down the cold and silent streets to his ship, his beloved
Charlemagne
, tied to the wharf.

He crunched through the snow, inches deep, and struggled to the foot of the brow, walking carefully over the icy surface. He stepped gingerly onto the wooden plank; in the dark it was hard to tell wood from ice, and he was halfway up when a voice from the deck called, ‘Halt! Who goes there?'

Biddlecomb stopped and looked up, unsure if he should laugh at the histrionic challenge. He did not recognize the man at the gangway, one of Faircloth's marines, only about half of whom he had met.

‘Who goes there?' the marine asked again.

‘
Charlemagne
,' Biddlecomb replied, the standard means of indicating the captain of a vessel.

‘Yes, this is the
Charlemagne
, and who are you?'

Biddlecomb might have laughed if he had not been in so foul a mood, and he might have given the man a dressing-down, but the marine was only following orders, and doing so conscientiously, and a captain could not lambast a man for that. He even managed, ten minutes later, to give the marine a ‘Well done,' after he had been held at bayonet point on the brow while Lieutenant Faircloth was summoned.

‘God, I am sorry for this, sir,' said Faircloth, dressed in his bottle-green coat, boots, and wool undergarments. He thrashed his arms across his chest as he followed Biddlecomb across the deck.

‘No need to apologize, Lieutenant.' Biddlecomb stepped below with Faircloth hurrying beside him to usher him past the other marine posted at the great cabin door. ‘We shall all have ample time to get to know one another, and to pick up the finer points, such as who is the captain of the vessel. Good night, sir.' No sooner had he shut the great cabin door than he regretted taking his irritation out on Faircloth, but it was too late to rectify that.

Thunderheads of excitement about the sailing of the fleet had been building over Philadelphia, and the next morning they broke. With the first clear light at dawn one could see that the ice was thinner than it had been in weeks, with large pieces breaking away from the solid sheets along the banks and swirling away downstream. By the afternoon watch the river would be clear enough for the fleet to sail, and sail they would.

The crowds began to gather along the quay just as the last of the supplies were struck down and hatches battened securely for sea. Commodore Esek Hopkins, younger brother of Congressman Stephen Hopkins, his face creased by a lifetime at sea and looking every one of his fifty-seven years, paraded the wharf, a lieutenant and three midshipmen trailing behind like bridesmaids.

‘Hopkins is on a rhumb line for our brow, Captain,' Rumstick mentioned, nodding to the entourage just stepping off the
Cabot
. ‘Reckon he'll expect a side party and all.'

‘I reckon you're right. Do we … ah … do we have a side party? Has that detail been told off?'

Rumstick smiled. ‘I got it well in hand, Captain.'

And, as usual, he did. The ship's boys turned out with white gloves, and Faircloth's marines, dressed in identical bottlegreen uniforms, much to Biddlecomb's surprise, stood ready to present arms. Their drills were ragged, but not overly so, considering that the very Marine Corps itself was not above two months old.