"Lewrie!" Twigg snapped, turning his gaze as quickly as a famished falcon in his direction. "Have you, among your crew, any tars who'd relish a fight, does it come to it? Sailors who'd kill, if it is required? Any who might enjoy a melee… to the knife?"
"Bloody dozens, I suspect," Lewrie said with a sly smile of his own, recalling past battles, and those possessed of the hottest blood-lust during a boarding action. "My Cox'n, Liam Desmond, he's a battler… his mate Patrick Furfy. Not the sharpest thinker, but he is big, strong, and like most Irish, dearly loves a good scrap. And, there's Jones Nelson, one o' my Black, uh… volunteers. Monstrous-big, and very strong. Not so good with cutlass or pistol, but Nelson is daunting, just t'look at, and does wonders with mauls, logger-heads, and wooden rammer staffs."
"The more exotic, the better," Mr. Twigg agreed, nigh purring. "Good, we are agreed, then. Dawn, day after tomorrow, we shall, with those additions, coach to London."
"Make room for me," Burgess Chiswick offered. "I did not pack my own uniform, but I did fetch along a brace of double-barreled pistols, and, may one of you gentlemen lend me a sword…?"
"I've some spare French officers' swords aboard my ship. Pick whichever you like, Burge," Lewrie offered.
"We'll be arseholes to elbows, but…," Sir Hugo said, flexing his fingers on the hilt of his costly tulwar, as if looking forward to a violent encounter somewhere 'twixt Portsmouth and the Elephant and Castle posting-house in London. "Perhaps anyone sent to intercept us might think that Lewrie and his armed sailors are the Impress, looking for fresh muscles for the Navy, and shy off, haw haw!"
"Should I also fetch cutlasses for Singh and Ajit Roy?" Lewrie asked.
"No need," Sir Hugo told him with a grin. "A hanger sword's a part of his seven blades. In his luggage already."
"Ajit Roy and I, ah… are always… prepared," Twigg added.
Just bet ye are, Lewrie thought; daggers, swords, pistols, and a pair o' swivel-guns, t 'boot! Mounted t 'either beam o 'yer coach?
"Well then, gentlemen," Sadler said, draining the last of his brandy and setting his glass aside with a determined thump, as if the meeting was gavelled to adjournment. "I must be off in pursuit of the happy groom, to obtain his deposition and Lieutenant's journals, then join' you in London as soon as possible. It is obvious that I depart, leaving Captain Lewrie in the safest of hands."
"And I could use a lie-down, 'fore supper," Sir Hugo said with a yawn as he finished his own brandy and rose to see the others out of his rooms.
"Well, then," Lewrie said, as well, ready to head back to the George Inn. Oddly, he didn't feel that much in danger; not in Portsmouth, not in a Navy seaport, surely! He had his frigate and her crew, and a most secure place to sleep soundly, where any lurking assassin couldn't reach him. There'd be so many senior officers and their own attendants at the George that even a lone knifeman would feel daunted to enter. No, it would only be on the road that danger lay, right?
Oh, shit, Lewrie suddenly recalled; Caroline's still waitin' to tear a strip o' hide off mine arse, for some reason.
He had no decent excuse for haring back to Savage for shelter from her simmering displeasure, either. Not for long, at any rate!
This ain't goin' t'be pretty, he told himself.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
"Tea, please, Abigail," Lewrie requested, once he had shed his hat, coat, presentation sword, and snake-clasp belt. At least, he thought Caroline's new maidservant's name was Abigail; it was hard to recall, since he'd only clapped "top-lights" on her two days before… though for convenience sake, most housemaids got called "Abigail" no matter what their bloody names really were.
"Jane, sir," the stout girl with a bulldog's face meekly said.
"Jane, then, and yer pardons," Lewrie corrected himself.
They're gettin' uglier, he thought as he steeled himself to see his wife. Evidently, Caroline would not trust him to keep his fingers off any live-in household help but trolls, or the women who'd win the side of bacon at the annual village ugly-face contest without trying.
"Jane" returned with the tea, but Lewrie only had a sip or two to restore himself, and appear soberer after all that palaver with Mr. Twigg amp; Co., before Caroline emerged from her bedroom in an "at-home" dress and more comfortable slippers.
"You may go, Jane," Caroline said in a level tone. "The children are now changed, and ready for a stroll. Take them, please."
"Yes'm."
Lewrie studiously applied himself to sugaring and creaming his tea, slurping down one cup as the children thundered from their rooms, and tromped noisily belowstairs for the outside world… and God help Jane, and Portsmouth… and got a second cup ready for consumption before Caroline swept to a settee and sat… arms crossed, her brow furrowed, and her gaze piercing.
"And what was of such import that required the better part of two hours,
husband?" Caroline coolly enquired.
"Savin' my bloody neck from the noose," Lewrie told her. "That the Beau-mans are in London, and what my attorney plans t'do about 'em. How we're t'go, and when…"
"You're just dashing off again?" his wife scoffed. "When?" "T'morrow, very early," Lewrie told her. She wasn't yet so hot she was throwing things, so he dared to amble over to a wing-back chair by the fireplace with his cup and saucer, and sit himself down. Not in easy reach, it went without saying!
"I see," Caroline muttered with a nod of her head, then heaved one of her exasperated sighs. "I suppose I should expect no better of you, after all these years. Absence, and indifference."
"I could stay with you here, dearest, but the next time ye saw me'd be swingin' in the wind at Newgate," Lewrie posed. "Rather see me hang?" he tried to jape, with a lop-sided grin.
"Hmm" was her answer to that.
"Oh, for God's sake, Caroline!" Lewrie griped, crossing his legs and shifting uneasily on his chair. "We were makin' some progress on a reconciliation. Now, you… you've been in a pet ever since you came down from home. What's the matter? The weddin's over, and it came off damn' near perfect. I'd've thought ye'd feel relieved, 'stead o'…"
"It did," Caroline said, with no joy of arranging a successful ceremony, breakfast, and beginning on good terms with the new in-laws. "Now I'm shot of her, and God help the Langlies. The coy… jade is now their worry," she spat, and Lewrie could read "bitch" or "whore" in place of the term she chose.
"Caroline… there never was a single thing 'twixt Sophie and me," Lewrie assured her, as he had dozens of times before. "I made a solemn oath to a dyin' man… a friend, no matter he was French… and I honoured that pledge. We honoured, rather, for 'twas you, most of the time, who saw to her raisin'. Did she ever dally with anyone? You ever suspect Sophie's morals, ever hear or see anything with your own senses that led you to believe she played either of us false?
"Or… do ye place complete trust in those damned letters?" he pointedly asked. He didn't relish a fight with her, and knew that he had set one off, after months of tippy-toeing, but he was simply tired of being treated like a leper.
Her fierce frown, and the way one slippered foot and shin jiggled, was all the answer she made, and was all he needed to know.
"What, you've gotten another 'un?" he tried to tease. "Darlin', they're all lyin' packets!"
"Oh. Was your Corsican whore, Phoebe Aretino, a made-up fantasy, Alan?" was Caroline's vexed reply. "Or was she real? In Genoa, there was a Claudia something-or-other… was she spun from thin air? That slutty mort who bore your bastard child, Theoni Kavares Connor… I read of you and her long before seeing them both in Hyde Park! Just fever dreams, were they, you… bastard}"
"Now, now…" Lewrie tried to shush her, setting aside his tea and pushing hands towards her. They'd never lodge at the George Inn again, if she went on like that, and as loudly!
"Whore-monger … Corinthian… rakehell!" Caroline skreeched. "Just like your bloody father… like ail your line, most-like! The other letters proved true, so why not the ones about your precious and sord
id Sophie, hah? Like the one about that vulgar circus bitch!"
"What?" Lewrie gawped, rowed beyond genteel temperance and volume himself. "Eudoxia Durschenko? You must be joking! Or, somebody must. I told you, Caroline, she set her cap for me, but I never laid a fing-"
"Vain and prideful bastard!"
"You got a fresh letter, is that it?" Lewrie demanded. "Let me see it!"
"So you can destroy it, then call me 'tetched'?" she accused.
"I've never seen one of 'em," Lewrie explained, getting to his feet. "I've told you and told you, 'tis someone who despises me… thinks I done him wrong somehow, and is gettin' his own back, through you My father described one t'me, just after the Nore Mutiny. Fine bond paper, Spencerian copper-plate hand, all that? I'd hoped Mister Twigg could've found out more. I told him of 'em last year, and-"
"Another of your circle of whore-mongers?" Caroline scoffed. "Why, does he wish to read them, late at night, Alan? Or, is he ready to swear on a Bible and lie for you… convince me that they're all false… then laugh with you, at me, behind my back?"
She sprang from the settee and began to pace the room, and the proper "languid" graces bedamned. She was all but stomping.
"Caroline… Zachariah Twigg is most certainly no friend of mine" Lewrie tried to explain, almost finding some faint amusement in the very idea. "His place at the Foreign Office is that of a spy, a meddler and intriguer overseas. Toppled rajahs and foreign princes who stood in England 's way… a cut-throat, an assassin, and probably still is, despite his official retirement. One of the most dangerous men ever I met, but… not a real friend to anyone, or me. He knows forgeries, hand-writing, or knows people who do. I thought that he'd be able to 'smoak out' the identity of your anonymous scribbler."
That stopped her in her tracks, wide-eyed in surprise.
"I've been his gun-dog since '84, in the Far East," he went on, sensing an opening. "Dancin' t'Twigg's music in the Med, and the West Indies, too. And, every time Twigg, or one of his agents, shows up with a scheme, I feel rabbits runnin' over my grave. He finds me a… useful asset, Caroline," Lewrie spat. "Still does, else I'd never have gained support from the Abolitionists t'defend me, nor gained such a good attorney. God help whoever it is writin' those letters to you, my girl, if Twigg discovers 'em. He can make an enemy just disappear, on the quiet. All the pain they've caused you… wouldn't you desire t'know who's plagued you, and have something done about it?"
"I… never knew," Caroline softly replied, looking puzzled; not any less bitter, but it was a slight improvement.
"I was never at leave t'tell you, or anyone," Lewrie said. "Now, show me this latest letter. As Twigg and I coach to London together, I can show it to him, and let him have a go at it. Please, Caroline?"
She took a long pause to think that over, her arms snugly tucked under her breasts, hands gripping both elbows, and looking at the floor, before making up her mind, and going to the bedroom to fetch it.
Damme, I think /know this hand! Lewrie told himself as he read the first, for Caroline had fetched not one, but two of those letters, both much crumpled in her past rages. From where, though, or when, I wonder? Still could be a man's hand… or a woman's.
The oldest was about Sophie, full of scurrilous "observations" of her behaviour in London society, perhaps just after the time that she fled Anglesgreen and went for shelter with his father. Sophie was portrayed as frivolous, flighty, and "flibberty-gibbet," openly flirting with the many beaus who sniffed about her, sporting, and playing balum-rancum on the sly with impressive bachelors and rich married men who kept her "under their protection" like a mistress or a courtesan, then creeping home to Sir Hugo St. George Willoughby, into his bed where they whored together, and regaled each other with minute recollections of their latest conquests!
The anonymous writer included an allegedly overhead conversation 'twixt Sophie and some other infamous young belle, about how she filled her days, and nights, but could not wait 'til her "hero," long out at sea, could return, so they could pick up where they'd left off, and continue their long affair… right under her Paladin's roof!
"Caroline, this is utter, bloody… tripe!" Lewrie gravelled. "All the years Sophie lived with us, sweet and virginal, how can you believe she'd act so, or sound so, carnal? What girl, not a penniless waif, but damned-well supported and reared, would say such things to anyone if she had any hopes of makin' a good match!
"This supposed overheard conversation… Sophie might've been heard talkin' 'bout Anthony Langlie… comparin' dance partners, and tellin' some other girl why she was so indiff'rent to 'em, that's all. Someone's twisted it all round, and salted it with smut," he told her.
Caroline had moved to the tea table, and had poured herself a cup. She sipped standing up, and looked over the cup's rim at him in faint, mute agreement that his supposition might be correct.
The second about Eudoxia Durschenko was even more scandalous, more lurid. She was portrayed as an amoral Roosian foreigner, a jade who didn't own the morals that God promised a stoat, a circus person who performed nigh unclothed, and thought nothing of it, an actress!-which was a bare cut above a street prostitute, if the sum was right.
According to the scribbler, Lewrie and Eudoxia had rogered in his great-cabins, on long country rides, naked as earthworms right out in the open, in her private dressing room before and after performing.
Well, he'd fantasised such, but nothing like that ever happened… more's the pity. Can't be anyone from the convoys, aboard Proteus, who wrote this trash, he grimly thought; this is all made up, a fever-dream for certain. Worse 'n a novel 'bout a sultan's seraglio!
And, how had the nameless writer discovered all this? "… 'introduced to her following a performance of Wigmore's New Peripatetic Extravaganza,'" Lewrie read aloud, his scorn and sarcasm positively dripping on the threadbare carpets, "cross the Thames in Southwark, and, after complimenting her upon the heroism she and the circus performers had shown when assailed by a French frigate in the same South Atlantic battle in which her paramour won his latest fame, she thanked me prettily, but then began to regale me with tales of how she had emulated her Navy lover. Then, to my astonishment, told me of their lovemaking, as if it was the most natural thing in the world, or so it might be to such a trull, who may not even be strictly allowed to be considered a Christian!'
"Damme, Caroline," Lewrie spluttered, "she and her father were Roosian Orthodox! Arslan Artimovich slept with one eye open to keep her a virgin, with a dagger in one hand, and his bullwhip in t'other, and there wasn't a man in their troupe who'd dare even let his glance linger! For someone t'know details… all of 'em false, mind!… he had t'be close t'me this last year past, and…," he paused to compare the handwriting of both letters, "and these letters are both done in the same hand. The one time… once, I tell ye, that Dan Wigmore invited me back-stage after the show in Recife, none of the performers had a dressin' room t'roger in. Rickety foldin' mirror tables, with a thin curtain t'dress behind, that was all! Eudoxia was never guested aboard Proteus, and you go aboard Savage tomorrow morning, you ask of anybody, from wardroom to gun-deck, they'll tell you that Can't you see that someone is spinnin' tales 'bout Sophie, and Eudoxia, out of thin air? That this is all spite?"
"Though she behaved so fond of you, when I met her during the circus parade, right here in Portsmouth, Alan," Caroline coolly said, seemingly intent on her tea as she slowly paced the rooms, slowly and more gracefully. "Rode right up onto the sidewalk, bent down to kiss you, in a most intimate fashion from horseback, did she not?"
"I was in all the papers after we anchored and paid off, she was famous, and saw a way to increase the audience by a public show," he countered, managing to sound relatively reasonable about it. "And I introduced you and the children to her, did I not? Would a guilty man do that?"
"The slyest ones would, yes," Caroline said, "and could. She flung herself upon you, you said, Alan. How much did she fling, hah?"
"We met aboard the circus ship,
the time the dancin' bear tried t'eat my hat and shins," Lewrie replied, "I told you o' that, and she found me amusin'… what happened t'me, amusin'. Didn't see her at all 'til we anchored at Recife, and I went to the circus, and Wigmore invited me back-stage. I talked to a lot of circus people. He wanted me t'use what influence he thought I had with Captain Treghues to let-Navy sailors have shore liberty, so they could attend his shows, makin' him even more 'tin.' Faint chance o' that, you remember Treghues. We sailed for Saint Helena, they put on the circus, and the comedies and dramas there, and I sat in the front row one night, and after the curtain call, she hopped off the stage and plopped herself in my lap, just as I told you… for a jape on her father, for the audience, 'cause it was funny!"
"Ha… ha," Caroline mocked.
"At Cape Town, I barely saw her," Lewrie pressed on, going over old news of his innocence. "She stayed in Cape Town when others from the circus went inland t'hunt new beasts for their menagerie, and we were down at Simon's Town, salvagin' a new rudder. She rode out the mornin' we set off, for target practice with her bow and her guns, and met us on the road… in front of a dozen sailors, and a dozen more drovers… and we talked for a bit as we rode along… Pennsylvania rifles and Fergusons, the Red Indian moccasin boots she got in Savannah, Georgia… a shootin' contest, perhaps, then she galloped off to exercise that white trick stallion o' hers, and that was all, dear." "Uhm-hm." One brow was up, high, and her eyes were squinted. "Your own brother met her," Lewrie stanchly soldiered on with his protestation of innocence. "The mornin' we were loadin' the new rudder into a barge, she came down to the docks t'sight-see, Burgess came ashore off one o' the home-bound Indiamen, and I had t'introduce her, or give her the 'cut-direct.' And, when I named him as my brother-in-law, she called me a slew o' names, like I'd led her on false… tarakan… sikkim siyn… peesa… cockroach, son of a bitch, and well, ah… prick, if ye must know… pardons."
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