Privateer (Alexis Carew Book 5)

by J. A. Sutherland

  He went on mumbling to himself for some time, leaving Alexis to be torn between amusement and real concern that the massive man would decide he was somehow honor-bound to kill her. She’d always thought the tales of her grandmother’s feuding nature were exaggerated, but she now might have to apologize to her grandfather for doubting him.

  Finally, Malcomson looked up, eyes bright.

  “Aye, lass, we’re friends!” He shrugged. “’Til the next mails come in, o’course. Never can tell what they’ll bring.”

  “Of course,” Alexis said. “And glad I am that I’ll not have to kill you back.”

  Malcomson’s face fairly split in a wide grin. “That’s the clan spirit, lass!”

  Thirty

  Mongoose left Enclave the next day, making her way to fresh hunting grounds. Malcomson gave her a list of systems which he considered good sport, but wouldn’t have time to visit himself, and advised she make the next rendezvous of the private ships at Carina, an empty, worthless system chosen for that purpose.

  He spat as he said it, and Alexis suspected he’d not make these rendezvous himself if it weren’t the place where the most recent information from New London could be had. If a war started up again and New London added the foe to their letters of marque, none of the private ship captains would want to be late learning of it. The thought of a fat, enemy merchant getting away would surely make Malcomson’s teeth ache.

  Those systems, though, proved to be less than ideal hunting grounds.

  Mongoose sailed nearly a fortnight before spotting another ship, which proved to be only a half-decrepit luggar, carrying passengers and no cargo to speak of. A week later, the crew began muttering, and Alexis couldn’t blame them. After getting a prize so soon after their arrival, and giving up the bulk of that prize money to Enclave’s vendors as most of them had done, they were more than ready for another and more.

  She began to suspect that these worlds were not so much the fresh hunting ground Malcomson described, but rather the dregs of the Barbary where none of the other private ships wished to hunt.

  Worse than the lack of prizes, at least for Alexis, was the lack of information. Wheeley had not come through on his promised word of where ships from the warring fleets had been spotted. He’d sent only a terse, “My sources need more time. Perhaps when next you return.”

  Now they faced foul winds that seemed to have them beating to windward at every turn. Whether they’d reach the rendezvous in the allotted time was more and more in question with every chime of the bell, and the heavy work of tack after tack, all with no sign of a prize, was wearing on the crew.

  Alexis gathered Villar and her other officers around her plot table to discuss plans.

  She nodded absently as Isom set a freshly filled glass at her side. Across the table, Villar was similarly distracted by the images of darkspace charts covering the table’s surface. Parrill and Hacking looked on from either end.

  “It’s possible,” Villar said, tracing their route with his fingertip, “if the winds stay as they are and move to be in our favor only a little just here.” He tapped a spot where the charts indicated the winds couldn’t be predicted well — there appeared to be an even chance that they’d work for or against Mongoose in that bit of space.

  “And if not,” Hacking put in, “we’ll have to sail through all this empty space to get back to any sort of chance at a prize.”

  He was right in that, Carina was far from any inhabited system, which was likely why it had been chosen as a rendezvous point — little chance of the private ships’ spot being found out by others.

  “Would it not,” Hacking went on, “be a better use of our time to find a prize?”

  “In fact,” Parrill said, “as I assume we’ll want to hunt in some systems with more traffic than those we’ve just left, Carina could be well on our way to them. If the winds where Mister Villar points out are fair to us and we leave Carina after only a few days in-system to confer with the other captains, then we may leave by this route —” She traced a path on the plot, “— and find ourselves with a fine wind the whole way. Even from where we are now, it will take nearly as long to get back to any system that stands a chance of us gaining a decent prize. See here, how if we were to turn about this minute, we’d still have nearly a month’s sail to the established trade routes?”

  Hacking grunted and clenched his jaw, which caused Parrill to look up. She saw the look on his face and lowered her eyes. “I’m sorry, but you did ask,” she said.

  It was not that Parrill was often wrong at all, Alexis thought, for her information and opinions had proved spot on, it was only how she presented herself that seemed to put others off.

  Alexis traced the route as well. The predicted arrival time in their destination system — Carina, the rendezvous point for New London’s privateers provided to them by Eades — and confirmed by Malcomson, though why he spat every time he mentioned it or the “commodore” she couldn’t say — was in the second half of the next possible rendezvous period. No one could predict what the winds might do to a ship’s progress, so an exact date was never possible — each rendezvous was a full week’s time in which they might expect to meet others in the privateering force at Carina.

  She frowned. “And if the winds are not in our favor, then we’ve missed it all entire until the next time. With Captain Malcomson’s talk of a commodore being involved, I’ll not want to keep him waiting, I think. It’s all well and good for a full-time privateer like the Delight’s captain to speak ill and spit at the thought, but I’ve a Naval career to think of — as do you, Hacking.”

  There was no need, strictly speaking, for Mongoose to make the rendezvous at all. She could, if Alexis wished, work entirely on her own, given their Letter of Marque, but the notion of this commodore did change what she thought prudent. She thought it might be well, also, to at least meet the other captains involved. As well, the rendezvous point allowed for any prizes to be consolidated and sent in convoy to a more established and conventional prize court than on Enclave — though with the attendant delays and lesser valuation that a formal court would give over Wheeley.

  Malcomson had been surprised at that, when she’d told him that Wheeley had bought her prize at a premium and immediately, and she thought it might have been a mistake to mention it. The man might have done it only because of his debt to Dansby, after all, and she didn’t want to impose on him by sending every privateer captain in the Barbary to his door.

  Still, Malcomson had been so understanding about the fight between their crews, and if she could curry more favor by imposing on Wheeley, she supposed there were worse ways. The man would make his own profit on the transaction, after all.

  They had no prizes to show for their efforts now, and what might the other captains — or this commodore — think of her and her crew if they showed up empty-handed?

  She took a deep breath and held it. Make for the meeting with no prizes in tow or double back farther into the Barbary and take more ships, delaying until the next rendezvous time?

  There was a chime from the cabin’s hatch and Isom came out of the pantry to answer it. A marine at the hatch to announce visitors was something Alexis hadn’t thought she’d miss, especially one as she’d last had whose every word was a puzzle of an indecipherable accent. Still, she did. It would be comforting to know who was bringing her a bit of Mongoose’s troubles before the hatch opened.

  And certainly, it would be trouble, for as Isom slid the hatch open she saw that it was the bosun, Dockett — he was a steady man, despite being caught up in the brawl on Enclave, and wouldn’t bring something trivial to her, not if it could wait until she was on the quarterdeck herself.

  “Bosun, sir,” Isom said.

  “Come through.” Alexis gestured for Dockett to sit. “A glass, Mister Dockett?”

  “Thank you, sir, I will, as you’re offering.”

  Alexis nodded and Dockett sat between Villar and Hacking, then waited for Isom to pour.
/>   “What is it that brings you, Mister Dockett?”

  Dockett sighed. “It’s the crew’s food, sir.”

  Alexis raised an eyebrow at that. The one thing she’d not thought to hear as a complaint aboard Mongoose was the food, as she’d made clear to her new purser that she wanted the crew well-fed. She knew for a certainty they’d taken aboard fresh provisions at Enclave, for Isom had brought her the bill to approve, and he’d certainly have checked that those provisions arrived, in addition to Dockett doing so.

  “What about it?”

  “The vat beef, sir,” Dockett said. “Cook brought it to me last week and I spoke to Dursley, but it’s gotten worse.”

  “Worse?” Alexis wasn’t entirely sure how the vat-grown beef that made up the bulk of the crew’s diet could, at its best, ever become worse. “In what way?”

  “Hard to describe, sir, but the crew’s bound for dinner soon and Cook called me in to look …” He shrugged. “Cook’s not keen on serving it.”

  Alexis shared a look with Villar, whose eyes were wide. Shipboard cooks, save those serving the officers, were not known for their discretion in what they put before the crew — especially in the way of the vat-beef. There wasn’t much that could be done with that at its best, and it was often the better choice to simply ensure each member of the crew got their fair measure of a half kilo per day, leaving it to the men to have something to pour over it in an effort to make it palatable. In a storm, the berthing deck fairly rattled with the sound of ill-wrapped condiment bottles in the spacers’ chests.

  “Isom,” Alexis said, “go and see Cook and have him fix me a plate of what he’ll be serving the crew, will you?”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “Mister Dockett, my compliments to Mister Dursley, and I’d admire it did he attend me here at his convenience.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  Villar waited for the hatch to slide closed behind Dockett before speaking.

  “How could the stuff ever be worse?” he asked, echoing Alexis’ thoughts.

  Alexis shook her head. “I can’t fathom it, myself. Nor can I imagine Dursley running some game that would be so obvious — I did tell him quite clearly that I’d share the crew’s meals at times and hold him accountable. If he’s tried to shave a few pence on the men I’ll put him in-atmosphere at the next port.”

  That threat was far more serious aboard Mongoose than a navy ship. Royal Navy pursers purchased their warrant from Admiralty and only Admiralty could dismiss them — a captain’s recourse was far greater. Her authority — sole master after God, as it went — might not go so far toward the lash as a naval captain’s might, but she could put any man she chose in-atmosphere. With every man aboard, including the purser, after profit from this voyage, that threat was serious indeed.

  Isom quickly returned and set a plate before Alexis. “Cook says it’s not his fault.”

  “What’s the matter with it?” Alexis studied the plate. The “beef” was much as it always was — more than a bit grey, more than a bit slimy-looking, no matter how it was cooked, and with more than a bit of the odd, not-quite-off odor of the vats wafting up to her.

  Villar leaned over the table, peering. “Is it green?”

  “More orangeish, if you ask me,” Isom said.

  “Nonsense,” Hacking said, “it’s clearly black now.”

  Parrill cocked her head. “How interesting.”

  “What are you all on about?” Alexis looked down and closer. “It’s the normal sort of grey …” She paused. Were their flashes of color as she moved her head? “Well, perhaps, it’s a bit …” She edged to the side, rounding the table to where Isom was standing. “I suppose I do see some orange, must be a trick of the light.”

  “Now it’s green,” Isom said. He’d circled the table to Villar’s side in response to Alexis’ move.

  “Blue,” Villar said, from the far side of the table.

  “What could cause this?” Hacking murmured.

  Parrill crouched down and eyed the slab of beef from table-level. “Light refracting from the cut edges at different angles through the varied layers of oil on the surface.” She glanced up at Hacking’s grunt of disgust. “I’m sorry, but you did ask.”

  “Not you,” Hacking said, for once. “I turned my head a bit and the bloody rainbow’s made me dizzy.”

  Alexis snorted and circled to where Villar had started, Isom and the rest circling as well.

  “Oh, that is disturbing,” she said.

  “Quite.”

  “Put a man right off,” Hacking agreed.

  “Do you suppose it’s really just the light hitting the …” Alexis trailed off, not sure of what to call the bit of a sheen that sometimes covered vat-grown beef.

  “Does it put the taste off, do you think?” Villar asked.

  “I should think the larger question would be if it’s at all safe,” Alexis said. “Taste’s never in it to begin with.”

  “Well, if it wasn’t safe the vat controls would tell us, wouldn’t they?” Hacking leaned closer, sniffing. “I mean, it smells all ri … it smells as it should, at least.”

  “The vats will signal if something’s gone dangerous, of course, but their sense of that is quite liberal. And they can be adjusted, so if the purser’s determined to keep a vat going and the ship’s willing to accept a probability of no more than ten-percent of the crew needing the heads in a given watch, then it’s allowed. Most people, you see, have a bacteria in their guts which can handle a certain amount of …” Parrill paused and glanced around the table. “Well, and ten-percent do not, you see, so …” She sighed and stood up, eyes downcast. “You did ask.”

  “Yes, clearly, I’m at fault,” Hacking sneered at her, “and not your —”

  “Mister Hacking,” Villar said quickly.

  Hacking stiffened and glared at Parrill, whose shoulders hunched even further.

  Alexis had a feeling this must be what life in the wardroom was like, and felt a flash of sympathy for Villar, having to ride herd on the others so much. Then for Hacking and Parrill, both, for they were clearly ill-suited to live in close proximity for so long and it appeared to be wearing on them. She might have to speak to Villar about it and decide if one or the other of them should be let go, though where she’d find another qualified officer in the Barbary, she couldn’t think of. Perhaps one of the other private ships would have a likely fellow she might trade him for.

  Or, she thought suddenly, perhaps this commodore will have a lieutenant chafing a bit under a flag officer and wish a man like Hacking in his place.

  That was a possibility she might bring up with the commodore when they arrived at Carina — for now, though, there was the matter of the beef.

  Alexis started circling the table again, Villar and the others following suit. She paused, and moved back a bit, then forward again. The change from green to blue was really quite something. “I’ve never seen the like before.”

  “It is worrisome,” Villar said. “I can understand the crew’s concern.”

  “Yes,” Alexis frowned. “I wish there was some way other than just the vat sensors to reassure the crew that it’s only a, well, visual disturbance.”

  There was a soft chittering from underneath the table and Alexis leaned down to look. She reached under and came up with the lithe, flowing armful of fur that always seemed to be underfoot.

  “Exactly what I was looking for,” she said, setting the mongoose on the table near the plate.

  “Sir!” Isom said. “Not Boots, no!”

  “Now, look, we’ve just said the sensors say it’s perfectly all right, yes?” Alexis pushed at the creature’s backside to edge it closer to the plate. “So it can’t do it any harm. And —” she stressed, cutting Isom off as he started to speak again. “— with the crew so enamored of the creature they’ll surely eat their share on its say-so, won’t they?”

  “I’m not sure that’s the best way,” Villar said. “I mean, they do like him, but ‘Go on, eat this
green bit, as the captain’s pet says it’s quite all right,’ might not be the most convincing take.”

  “Go on, little creature,” Alexis muttered, ignoring Villar. “Try a bit.” She edged the plate closer to him. “Good stuff, fresh from the vat.”

  Boots turned and bared his teeth at her before leaping from the table and dashing into her sleeping cabin.

  “Little bugger,” she muttered.

  The hatch chimed and Isom went to answer it, but not before giving her a disapproving look.

  “It’s not my fault, sir!” Dursley, the purser, exclaimed as he was ushered through.

  Alexis pointed at the plate. “Well, whose is it, then?”

  “I topped up our stores at Enclave,” Dursley said, “as we do in every port, and now —” He jabbed his finger at the plate. “It’s gone all rainbowish on me! Every vat, the same!”

  “But it is safe to eat?” Villar asked.

  Dursley started to speak, stopped, then looked from Villar to Alexis and back again.

  “All of the vat sensors say it’s the finest,” he said finally.

  “So it is safe to eat?”

  Dursley shook his head. “It will not harm a soul.”

  Alexis frowned. “That’s not quite the same thing, is it?”

  Hacking looked skeptical as well. “Is it just the color that’s off?”

  Dursley licked his lips. “It weren’t so bad before, sir, really. Started with the color, then the color got brighter, see? And the brighter the colors, well, the worse — I’ve spoken to Cook and we’ve seen that it’s perfectly all right when it’s sliced off the vat and after it’s cooked. So long as it’s not further disturbed, the only difference is the color. So, yes, right?”