“Who made you such an offer?” Grierson demanded.
“That was the word that Commander Gilpin of the Delight brig brought me, when he and Commander Ritchie and Fulmar returned to the islands from Antigua, sir,” Lewrie told him. “And, might I enquire, what has happened with Captain Forrester?”
Somethin’ dire, I hope! Lewrie wolfishly thought.
“An old friend of yours, was he?” Grierson said, simpering.
“Not particularly, no, sir,” Lewrie baldly admitted, grinning.
“His court-martial found him acquitted of the charge of endangering his vessel,” Grierson related, “even though un-bending the cables from the anchors and buckling the hawseholes was thought premature.… On the greater charge of abandoning his responsibilities he was found guilty, and has been relieved of his command, with a letter of admonishment. He will be off to England on the next packet.”
“Oh, poor fellow!” Lewrie exclaimed, his sarcasm so thick that everyone within earshot, familiar with the case, fought sniggers.
“Mersey will be in the dockyard at Antigua for months to patch her bottom, Captain Lewrie,” Captain Meadows supplied, “and will then be assigned to another officer.”
“And, most likely added to the strength of the Antigua Squadron, in place of Athenian,” Commodore Grierson announced as if it was so.
“What of the French, then, sir?” Lewrie asked. “We’ve heard but rumours of Missiessy and Villeneuve.”
“Missiessy had but a small squadron,” Grierson informed him with a smirk, “and may be on his way back to France. There’s been no word of him for weeks. As for Villeneuve and his large fleet, reports say that he made landfall at Martinique and Guadeloupe to land fresh troops for their defence. He’s sailed from there, but has made no sign that he would move upon Jamaica or Antigua, or land a force to re-take the Black rebel colony of Haiti. As far as anyone may determine, his fleet has become a Will-o’-the-wisp, a ghost.”
“So, it’s long odds he might come here?” Lewrie further pressed, wondering why the Admiral commanding at Antigua had stripped himself of ships to defend the Bahamas if he still had cause to worry that his own “patch” might still be in danger.
“Before we were despatched, an aviso cutter from Admiral Lord Nelson came in to English Harbour, announcing that he and his fleet were near the Windwards in pursuit of Villeneuve,” Grierson went on in a blasé manner, “so it may be that the French will pass near the Bahamas as they run back to European waters, but will pose no real threat. The French would fear to linger, ha ha!”
“So, you may not stay long?” Lewrie posed.
“Once the threat is well and truly over, I expect I’ll have to give up my other sixty-four, and perhaps my frigates, but the Bahamas will be my responsibility ’til Admiralty decides to replace me,” the new Commodore replied, rather archly, and nigh purring with pleasure.
Which means I’m redundant, Lewrie told himself; Will he allow me to keep my wee squadron together? Or, are they all now his?
“Well, sir, the fresh news which you’ve discovered to me is most reassuring, as is the presence of your squadron,” Lewrie told Captain Grierson, nigh-blushing to “trowel it on”, though feeling that he was eating a bowl of steaming turds. “Now that I don’t have to sink you or force you to strike, might I take my leave and rejoin my ship?”
“Hmmm … well,” Commodore Grierson paused as if considering his decision as gravely as a king contemplating a royal decree. “If we have nothing more to discuss at this moment, you may, Lewrie.”
“Thank you, sir,” Lewrie said, doffing his hat in parting.
“Mind, sir,” Grierson added, “you and I must put our heads together later, to inform me of the particulars of the islands and of the other vessels which will be under my command. Once the social niceties have been held ashore, what?”
Christ, no wonder he is dressed so well! Lewrie thought; He was lookin’ forward to a hero’s welcome and a grand ball!
“But of course, sir. Adieu,” Lewrie said, bowing himself to the gangway and the entry-port to make his departure.
Commodore Grierson doffed his bicorne briefly as Lewrie went down the battens and man-ropes to his boat, surer in his opinion of not liking him.
I could loathe him, Lewrie thought as he entered his boat.
CHAPTER FIVE
“Let fall the main course and get the ship drivin’, Mister Westcott!” Lewrie called as soon as he got upon his own quarterdeck. “Get us into port before one o’ those new-comes take our anchorage!”
“Drive it will be, sir,” Lt. Westcott agreed. “Bosun, set all to the royals! Topmen aloft! Trice up and lay out to make sail! Sheet home the main course and shake out all reefs!”
“Not that it will do much good, sir,” Mr. Caldwell the Sailing Master laconically said. “Our hull is as weeded as the New Forest.”
“What is Commodore McNaughton like, sir?” Westcott asked, once the crew was at their tasks and sail was spreading.
“Dead as mutton, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie said with a wry moue. “His replacement is Captain Henry Grierson.” A twitch of a corner of his mouth spoke volumes to his First Lieutenant. “Does anyone know of him?”
“The Griersons, sir?” Midshipman The Honourable Entwhistle spoke up. “I know something of the family.”
“Do tell then, Mister Entwhistle,” Lewrie bade him.
Entwhistle’s father was a Baron, so all of his brothers and sisters (’til the girls married, of course) were entitled to be called “Honourable” except for the eldest brother, who would inherit all and become the umpteenth Baron Entwhistle. Of course he and his family would know a bit about almost everybody. Entwhistle had entered HMS Reliant in April of 1803 a rangy eighteen-year-old, but was now a man grown, and an experienced senior Mid looking forward to standing for the oral examinations before a board of Post-Captains to gain promotion to Lieutenant.
“They are related to Sir Henry Dundas, sir, now Lord Melville,” Entwhistle told him, “and I do believe that the Admiral commanding at Antigua is some sort of in-law to the Griersons.”
“Damn! Dundas! That murderous fool!” Lewrie groaned.
When the war with France broke out in February of 1793, Sir Henry Dundas had been Prime Minister William Pitt’s Secretary of State at War, and Dundas had been brim-full of schemes to fight the French, most of which involving invasions and expeditions to the East Indies to expel France from her last slim grip in India and in the China Trade. In the West Indies, the scheme was to conquer all French colonies that rivalled Great Britain in the lucrative exports from the Sugar Islands, monopolising sugar, molasses, and rum. Both of the Indies were deadly for Europeans, who had to endure Malaria or Yellow Fever during the hot seasons, along with Cholera and Dysentery and God only knew what else the rest of the year. All those hopeful expeditions had resulted in the deaths of over sixty thousand soldiers and sailors who had perished of disease, not battle or glorious conquests.
Dundas had become Henry, Viscount Melville, and had been named First Lord of the Admiralty in 1804, replacing stalwart and honest-to-his-bones Admiral John, Earl Saint Vincent, “Old Jarvy”, who had waged a gallant but failed attempt to clean out the greed, venality, corruption, and speculating of Navy suppliers, contractors, the dockyards themselves, and even the Navy Board. Viscount Melville, though, who had been Treasurer of the Navy twice in his political career, knew where the side-profits were, and had come to be sneered at as “Lord Business As Usual” almost from the moment he took office.
Now, even though Viscount Melville’s peculations and profits on the sly, and his turning of the blind eye to his fellow plunderers, had finally drawn official notice, resulting in his impeachment and replacement by Admiral Charles, Lord Barham, in this past May, there were too many who continued to hold high offices to sever Melville’s influence. Indeed, there were many who wished that the promised trial in the House of Lords might result in an acquittal, and his glorious return!
“P
lace, patronage, and ‘petti-coat’ interest,” Lewrie commented with a weary, jaded shake of his head. “All damned fine, so long as you’re the recipient, of course. Even with Melville impeached, not a thing’s changed. Investigators will be reportin’ corruption and writin’ reform policies ’til the turn of the next century!”
“Your pardons, sir,” Midshipman Entwhistle said with an adult’s firm grasp of reality, “but Old Jarvy’s mistake was thinking that refined and educated gentlemen who hold high office are as honest as he is. As if corruption is a high tide that only goes up so far.”
“Well said, Mister Entwhistle, damned well said,” Lewrie agreed. Turning aft, he called to Midshipman Munsell. “D’ye still have your copy of Steele’s, young sir?”
“Aye, sir, though it is at least two months out of date,” the lad piped up. “Shall I look someone up for you, sir?”
“Aye.”
A moment later, Munsell was reading an entry aloud. “‘Captain Henry Grierson … made Post in June of 1795, Captain of the Oxford, seventy-four, May of 1803’.”
“A neat trade,” Lewrie groused. “Give up a seventy-four-gunned ship of the line for a lesser ship, but a broad pendant!”
He’s, what, no older than his mid or late thirties? Lewrie wondered: That’s awfully young t’get a two-decker, ’less he’s had a lot o’ help up the ladder. Without makin’ a name for himself that any of us ever heard of? Hmmm. There’s another reason for me t’dislike him!
“Ehm, Athenian is making a hoist, sir,” Midshipman Munsell said as he put the old copy of Steele’s back in the flag locker and took notice out-board. “It is … ‘General’ to all ships, and ‘Make More Sail’,” he deduced after a squint with a telescope and a quick referral to the signals book.
“It appears it’ll be a race, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie said.
“One we may lose, sir, given the foul condition of our ‘quick-work’,” Lt. Westcott told him. “Do you wish the stuns’ls rigged?”
Sailing off the wind as Reliant was, studding booms could be extended from the course and tops’l yardarms to bare more sail to the following wind, which might gain them a knot or more over the warships of Grierson’s squadron, but …
“It’s not that far to Hog Island and the main channel, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie decided, shaking his head No. “We’d barely get ’em rigged and spread before we’d have t’take ’em in for entering port. I’d admire did you remove the larboard hawse buckler and bend a cable to the best bower, instead. Mister Caldwell? How close may we shave inshore of Hog Island?” he asked puckishly. “Closer to the entrance channel than those bastards?”
“Oh, I see what you wish, sir,” Caldwell replied, spreading a grin on his usually stern face. “Do we alter course a point to larboard now, we should have more than sufficient depth.”
Lewrie glanced at the chart which Caldwell showed him, then got his telescope from the binnacle cabinet rack and peered forward. He could see Firefly, Lt. Lovett’s little 8-gunned sloop, abeam of the wind as she stood in to the entrance channel. Over the trees of Hog Island, he could make out the peaks of Thorn’s and Lizard’s masts, for they were already in port and rounding up into the wind to ghost to a stop, drop anchors, and pay off sufficient scope as their crews handed the last scraps of sail.
He did not need the glass to look over towards Grierson’s leading frigates; they were a cable apart in line-ahead, all driving hard with white mustachios under their forefeet and cutwaters, and creamy wakes curling down their sides. But, the leading frigate was abaft of abeam to Reliant, and the second and third were off her starboard quarer. Most importantly, they were now at least two cables or better to seaward of his frigate!
Lewrie went to the starboard bulwarks and leaned far out for a look overside. He had to shake his head over the thickness and length of the weed strands that fouled Reliant’s bottom and waterline. Some broke off as he watched and swirled astern into the wide bridal train of wake, where sea birds by the hundreds swirled and mewed and dove to snag themselves a bite, or scoop up some of the green slime that flaked off in tasty wee morsels.
“Mister Westcott, when we’re near the entrance channel, I wish the ship scandalised … Spanish reefs and Irish pendants … to take the speed off her. Topmen aloft as we do, to take in courses, royals and t’gallants. Prepare a cable to the kedge anchor, as well. We’ll stand in somewhere near our old anchorage, bear up into the wind, then let her fall off Northerly before droppin’ the kedge, then ghost on ’til the kedge bites. We’ll let go the best bower then, and be abeam to the prevailin’ breezes, and won’t swing to impede Commodore Grierson’s squadron when they enter port.”
“And if his lead frigates out-foot us, sir?” Westcott asked with a smirk on his face.
“Then they’ll put on a pretty show for the good folk o’ Nassau,” Lewrie told him. “The main thing about racin’ the other fellow is to know when to slow down! We’ll have the centre of the channel and will be the vessel with the right of way.”
“Very well, sir,” Lt. Westcott agreed, chuckling in anticipation. “All will be ready when you order us to alter course.”
Reliant stood on under full sail, slowly losing the race to the entrance channel to the lead frigate of Grierson’s long column of warships. She was two cables abeam of Lewrie’s frigate as Hog Island receded and the channel began to spread out alee, revealing the town of Nassau. Almost dead-level and still showed no sign that she would reduce sail! Lewrie could see her captain looking aloft, at the channel as it neared, then astern to the flagship, which had yet to signal any change.
“Enough depth for us to alter course, Mister Caldwell?” Lewrie asked.
“Another minute more would suit, sir,” Caldwell told him, busy with his sextant to measure the height of Fort Fincastle and some other prominent sea-marks to judge the distance. “There is nearly the end of Hog Island to larboard, and the channel ’twixt Arawak Cay and Long Cay … ah! I would round up now, sir!”
“Mister Westcott, alter course to larboard!” Lewrie snapped.
Round Reliant went, her jib-boom and bowsprit sweeping cross the cays and the town in a thunder of canvas as her courses, main and mizen tops’ls, and t’gallants and royals were reduced of a sudden, drawn up in their centres to leave the outer parts bagged and unable to draw the wind in untidy bat wings, leaving the fore tops’l, jibs, spanker, and stays’ls, the fore-and-aft sails, still standing to keep a way on her as she came about, rapidly shedding speed.
The channel led East-Sou’east, close to the prevailing winds before trending Sutherly into the main harbour inside the shelter of the various cays.
“Sheet home the mizen t’gallant once more, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie ordered. “Let’s keep steerage way on her.” The Quartermaster’s Mates on the helm were making large swings of the wheel to keep her on course. After the mizen t’gallant gained them a bit more wind, he looked at them again. “Better now, Cottle, Malin?”
“Aye, sir, ’at helped,” Cottle replied.
“Lord, he’ll miss the channel!” Midshipman Munsell crowed from right aft. Lewrie turned to watch, gloating to see the lead frigate match his tactic of scandalising his ship, but the second and third in line astern of her were forced to alter course to seawards to avoid a collision! They would miss the entrance channel altogether, and have to tack about under reduced sail to regain the entrance! Over the top of the low-lying spur of Hog Island, Lewrie could see Athenian and her consort, the other two-decker 64, altering course Northerly in succession to avoid being stacked up atop the three frigates!
“I think you might have just made yourself an enemy, sir,” Lt. Westcott took a brief moment from his harrying duties to mutter.
“I have the feeling that I had, no matter what I did, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie told him, chuckling. “Even did I yield him the entrance first, there’s some people there’s no living with.”
* * *
Reliant was anchored by bow and stern, her squares’ls harbour-gask
eted and all fore-and-aft canvas handed and stowed, and the Bosun Mr. Sprague and his Mate, Mr. Wheeler, had rowed round the ship to see the yards squared to mathematical perfection before Athenian groped a slow way into port behind her frigates.
The Reliant’s musicians were playing “The Bowld Soldier Boy” as the gilt-trimmed red rum cask was fetched on deck for a delayed issue. The hands waiting for their grog raised a cheer as the two 64s rounded up to drop anchor. On the quarterdeck, Lewrie was sprawled in his collapsible wood and canvas deck chair, with both of his cats in his lap, and the ship’s mascot, Bisquit, dancing on his hind legs and barking a welcome of his own.
Lewrie tipped Athenian his cocked hat in salute.
It’s the least I can do, Lewrie thought; and the least is what I intend t’do! Along with gettin’ my report on Grierson’s wee “joke” to Admiralty, first!
CHAPTER SIX
Lewrie had to wait two days before Commodore Grierson thought to summon him for that promised face-to-face meeting to brief the new-come upon the Bahamas, and the vessels and captains Grierson would inherit. The hoist of Reliant’s number and “Captain Repair On Board” caught Lewrie in casual clothing, again, in slop-trousers and buckled shoes, a plain coat, and his shirtsleeves as he, the Bosun, the Carpenter, and other petty officers made an inspection of the ship belowdecks. The summons also came after the islands’ Governor-General’s invitation to a welcoming ball ashore. Grierson had said that they would meet “once the social niceties had been held”, so he was obviously wishing to get an onerous chore over with before shining at a grand supper dance, at which he hoped to be regaled.
* * *
“Welcome aboard, sir,” Athenian’s First Officer, Lt. Hayes, said at the entry-port, once the salutes had been rendered.
“Good morning Lieutenant … ah?” Lewrie responded cheerily; he would not take out his sour mood over meeting with Grierson to extend to others. “I did not get your name, last time I was aboard.”
Hostile Shores Page 4
