"Lor', wot a caution ye are, yer honour, damme if ye ain't, har har!" Lewrie returned in a mock lower-deck accent, fed up with Twigg's top-lofty scorn. "Nary e'en one saucy wench, nor drap o' gin, neither, yer honour, sir? Why, wot's th' world comin' t', I axs ye? Tsk tsk."
"And yet you must make a fool of yourself," Twigg said, sighing in exasperation, his eyes and lips slit; one might have also heard him almost growl in frustration.
"Sorry, sir. My nature, I 'spose," Lewrie said, sobering.
"Well, keep a taut rein on your… nature," Twigg snapped back. "I'd keep you caged in a basement or garret, if I could, but I suppose at some point, your potential patrons will have to see you, and speak to you… more's the pity. Whilst in your lodgings, I suggest that you polish the tale you told me of how your crime occurred, and make it damned short. I'll send round a list of queries your sponsors are, to my mind, most likely to make to you, and include suggestions as to how best to explain yourself.
"And, when they see you, Lewrie… should they, that is to say," Twigg added, his acidic aspersion dripping, "I adjure you to display a proper gravitas suitable to your station, and circumstances. One might even practice righteousness in a mirror… though I doubt you're that familiar with it. Play-act a 'tarpaulin sailor,' perhaps, all blunt, and tarry-handed. Rehearse responses of wide-eyed honesty to the most probable questions they might put to you… a list of which I'll send round… damned short responses, it goes without saying. Do you give your… saucy nature free play even for a moment, such as your last, witless fillip, and I assure you that you're truly lost."
A short turn north in James Street, a tack westerly to Wigmore Street, and they were at last arrived at the corner of Duke Street, and Twigg drew them to the kerbings before a splendid converted mansion that now boasted a discreet blass plate by the entry that announced the place as the Madeira Club, Lewrie's father's "gentlemen's hotel."
"Hellish-fond of their ports," Twigg said with a sniff. "Sup in. Do not stray to your usual low haunts," he brusquely ordered as Lewrie mast-thankfully alit on solid, un-moving, ground. The doors opened and a liveried porter came down the steps to help carry his traps. "I will be in touch with you, anon. And for God's sake, Lewrie! Have yourself a good, long bathe, sponge your uniform, or purchase a new'un. You are as filthy as a Thames-side mud-lark!"
With that to cackle over, Twigg whipped up and away, leaving Capt. Alan Lewrie muttering under his breath, and slowly dribbling road-slime on the sidewalk.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Righteousness came rather easy to hand at the Madeira Club, for most of its lodgers and guests were of the very same sort of "made men" whom Twigg had disparaged over dinner at his Hampstead bungalow, newly rich or at least moderately well-to-do off steam engines, the mills and manufacturies that had sprung up due to the war's demands, expanding overseas trade despite said war, and clerks and functionaries returned from India or other colonies as "chicken nabobs," worth ?50,000 at the very least, even some "nabobs" and "gora-nabobs" with nouveau riche fortunes of ?100,000 or more, even some few who could nearly be called by the new-fangled term "millionaire." Even with his Spanish silver, Lewrie was a piker compared to most of them. After he let drop that he was a friend of Sir Malcolm Shockley, Baronet, one of the club's founders and major investors, though, once he declared that his father was Sir Hugo St. George Willoughby, the other founder, he was welcome enough there. Serving officers, in the main, holders of King's Commission, were not expected to be anything but middling-poor, so he was forgiven! And if he wasn't exactly a paid-up official member, he surely would be, soon.
God, but they were an earnest lot, though! Early to bed, early to rise, no loud noises after ten in the evening, their wagers on card games in the so-called Long Room never ventured much above a shilling or two, and every meal was preceded with a prayer. Alan Lewrie had to give his father credit, though, when it came to the victuals, and most especially to the contents of the wine cellar. If one had no valet or manservant to assist, a gentleman could trust the staff to fill a role temporarily, and with all the quiet, unobtrusive competence of the best private mansion's staff.
The maidservants, of course, were homely, old trullibubs.
The chariot ride did require Lewrie to purchase a complete new uniform at his old Fleet Street tailor's; whilst there, he also got a rather drab and sober civilian suit, imagining that if the city's bailiffs were on the lookout for a Capt. Lewrie, RN, they might not look twice at a natty fellow in mufti, as the East India Company officers put it. And, if he appeared to be sober, grave, and righteous before his potential patrons in unremarkable (but well-cut) clothes, it might go a long way towards furthering his cause. Lewrie didn't imagine that prim Clapham Sect and Evangelical Society sorts would care very much for "flash" on their own backs… or on their penitents, either. With his fellow lodgers' attires to go by, Lewrie thought he'd made a wise move.
"That's the question, d'ye see, Captain Lewrie," one member told him as they sat side-by-side in matching leather chairs before a cheery fire one night in the Common Rooms. After a hearty supper, and two bottles of smuggled French cabernet sloshed down, Mr. Giles, who'd made his fortune in the leather-goods trade, had turned nigh-gloomily voluble in his maunderings, to which Lewrie, in his new "sober" guise, was forced to listen, nod, and make the appropriate "ah hums" and "I sees."
"What t'do with sudden wealth, sir," Mr. Giles said with a sigh, as if ?250,000 was an intolerably sinful burden. "To spend and get and waste it on mere pleasures and fripperies, as most do, when presented with a windfall, an un-looked-for inheritance? Why did God intend for me to prosper, and not others? Thankee for the port, sir… aahh! If one ponders it a bit, one sees that wealth hidden under the proverbial bushel basket, greedily squirreled away, benefits no one. The Lord may mean for us to make ourselves comfortable, but not showy, then use His rewards for our hard work and diligence to the benefit of others, d'ye see. To be useful, of avail to improve others' lots…"
Mr. Giles was a Methodist, and a Utilitarian.
"Treat the sick," Lewrie surmised, "feed the poor, all that."
"New hospitals, yes sir," Mr. Giles replied. "Work-houses, and parish poor-houses to relieve the unfortunate, the orphans, the widows. Good works among 'em, too. Not outright charity, though. Schools for the lower classes, so that they learn honest trades, thrift, sobriety, and obedience to the laws of the realm-"
"Chastity…" Lewrie stuck in, feigning an agreeable air.
"Oh my, yes, Captain Lewrie!" Giles heartily agreed. "As well as cleanliness in their persons and habitations, and the way they live their lives. Now, Mister Putney, yonder…" Giles said, indicating a sallow stick of a fellow who looked as if an entire host of tropical diseases had had fun playing with him, "was the Collector of, uhm… some Indian city or province… Sweaty-Pore, or some such like that. Came home with an hundred thousand pounds, and what's the very first thing he did with it?"
Found a better physician, was Lewrie's best guess.
"Donated two thousand to tract societies, to spread word of new morality throughout London and Portsmouth, ha!" Giles boasted, clapping a palm on the wide arm of his leather chair-which act resulted in a waiter fetching them both a fresh bottle of the house's trademark Madeira, which wasn't exactly what Mr. Giles had in mind, but was welcome nonetheless.
"And the poor academies and Sunday schools, I trust, teach them to actually read those tracts?" Lewrie asked, smiling congenially, but bored about to tears and wide yawns. "All improving, and… useful."
"Exactly, sir, exactly," Giles chummily agreed. "Now, our Major Baird is also a 'graduate' of our Indian possessions," he said, indicating another well-tanned man in his thirties in a "ditto" suit of such starkly unrelieved black that Lewrie had taken him for a "dominee." "I heard he only came off, of late, with thirty thousand, mostly in looted pagan baubles, tsk tsk." Lewrie wasn't sure whether Mr. Giles was sad that Maj. Baird hadn't piled up loot by the keg, or had had a bad run of luck at plundering
the poorer rajahs. "Invalided out of East India Company's army, sad t'say for him, poor fellow, but before he departed, I'm told he donated enough to hire a C. of E. chaplain to minister to the needs of the native soldiers in his regiment. He and his Colonel held Sunday Church Parade, rain or shine, and succeeded in converting a fair number of heathens to the Lord, before coming Home. In the market for a wife is Major Baird, at present, and I'm certain that the Good Lord will reward his efforts a thousand-fold, by steering his steps to a most suitable and companionable match, of a like mind."
Giles leaned closer to whisper, "Baird's dead-set against novels, don't ye know, any wastrel reading matter that does not uplift or serve the greatest good. Thinking of forming a society of his own, I believe, to which I do believe I may donate an hundred guineas, ha!"
"A creditable endeavour, sir," Lewrie said, fighting a stricken expression from showing; in his rooms he had four new novels he'd found in the Strand, all of a lubricious or lascivious nature. Lewrie thought of hiding them away, before one of the ugly chambermaids found them and denounced him to Maj. Baird, fearing that the Evangelical Society might just drag him about the city in chains, for an example of how "rogues were ground honest"! At the Madeira Club, reading about sex was about as close to the genuine article as one could get! In strict privacy.
"One may try to be a good, Christian Englishman," Giles stated, all but wringing his hands, "one may attend Divine Services, hold deep and abiding faith, and strive to shun the lures of the world, Captain Lewrie, but, without Good Works, one is not a complete Christian, and is but a drone in Society. One must strive to be and do, not just to seem, hey what?"
"Now, where have I heard that before?" Lewrie asked, his tongue firmly in his cheek by then. "Did Doctor Priestley say it, or…?"
"Bless me, but I can't recall," the wine-fuddled Mr. Giles said with a vague shake of his goodly head. "So, what is it that you do to make your mark on a sinful world, Captain Lewrie? Where do your interests lie when it comes to improving and uplifting?"
"I exterminate godless Frogs and heathen Dons, thus making our world safe for moral Englishmen, sir," Lewrie declared, pretending as if it was his true calling, though ready to snicker aloud.
"Ha ha! Capital, capital, ha ha!" Giles exclaimed, bellowing his delight and slapping the chair arm, again. "A glass with ye, sir, a brimming bumper!"
"Well… if you insist, Mister Giles," Lewrie replied, fraudulently trying to demur. "Though 'wine's a mocker,' and I've not much of a head for deep drinking. Not my nature, d'ye see, and… I really did intend to read at least another chapter of the Good Book tonight, before retiring… clear-headed, but… hang it. A glass it is!"
Soon after that convivial "slosh," he made his excuses, further pretending to yawn in a prodigious, jaw-locking manner, and made his goodnights to one and all.
Once out of the Common Rooms, though, he headed for the bar for a pint flask of decanted (also smuggled) French brandy, which he hid in his breast pocket. He almost made it to the stairs, but for the noble Maj. Baird, who managed to impede his progress long enough to hold a whispered conversation, enquiring just where an "inquisitive" fellow could "covertly witness and gather damning evidence upon" the immoral doings of the city, the cock hen clubs, the dissolute dens of iniquity where wagers were laid, and where "women of the town" plied their trade… "to document in eye-opening tracts," of course.
"Ask the barman for a copy of the New Atlantis," Lewrie winked back, "that guide's your boy to all the dissolute. Slip him sixpence. Failing that, just wander down Charing Cross, this very night."
He left the upright Maj. Baird to sort Sin out for himself.
"Well, you look presentable," Mr. Twigg said as Lewrie entered his hired coach, thank God a closed one, and not another damn' chariot, this time. "You're well-practiced in your responses?"
"As well as may be," Lewrie told him in a fretful tone as he sat across from him on the cold and damp-feeling leather bench facing Twigg. Twigg had decreed that Lewrie's new uniform would be best, complete with his sword and both the Cape St. Vincent and Camperdown medals hung low on Lewrie's mid-chest from their coloured ribbons.
"Sir Malcolm Shockley and some others have put in good words for you," Twigg informed him, sounding almost breezily unconcerned. "Your old school chum, Peter Rushton in Lords, sent a letter, as well. With his reputation for vice, God knows what use it'll be… though I must declare it was well-written. Clerk gave it a polishing, I expect."
Lewrie gave that a short, jerking nod of agreement; at Harrow (in the short time in attendance before his expulsion) trying to read a sniggery, surreptitious note from Peter Rushton had been all but indecypherable, like getting a scouting report on the defences of Biblical Canaan from one of Moses's spies, and hastily scribbled in Aramaic at that! "Meet us behind the coach-house and share a bottle of brandy" in Peter's idea of a "copper-plate" hand could have very well meant "We've hid five dead mouse and they're randy," which of course had earned them both a caning, even if the instructor or proctor couldn't make heads or tails of it, either.
"We're to speak to William Wilberforce, himself, Lewrie," Twigg informed him. "You followed my directives? Had a last bathe, a good night's sleep… alone… and you're not 'headed' by spirits?" "Sober as a hangman," Lewrie answered.
"How apt," Twigg said with a sniff. "Here's the line you're to take… 'twas your old compatriot, Colonel Cashman, late of the King's Service in a West Indies regiment, and local planter-"
"And un-findable for corroboration in the United States," Lewrie stuck in. "-whose utter revulsion over the institution of slavery, even was he a participant and slave-owner for a time," Twigg drilled onwards, "that led you to despise slavery, yourself. Very John Newton-ish, you see. It will strike a chord with Wilberforce and what possible entourage of the like-minded who might be present, for it slightly coincides with Newton's own experience of being a slaver, then shipwrecked, and enslaved by the very people he sought to capture and sell. That poem of his, describing his enlightenment and salvation…"
" 'Amazing Grace,' aye," Lewrie said with a grunt and a new nod.
"You actually know of it," Twigg nigh-gasped with surprise that Lewrie, of all people, had been exposed to it. "Well, damme. Wonders never cease! No matter… when asked, you will clew to this point as if your life depended on it… which it does, by the by," Twigg said, with another sniff of faint amusement, "that it was Cashman who thought it all up."
"Damme, sir!" Lewrie said, recoiling. "Even if it's half-true, he's a good friend, and it's not… quite honourable to shift the-"
"He did think it up, you said so, yourself!" Twigg archly objected. "As a cruel jape on the Beaumans. In my version, however, the former Colonel Cash-man, disgusted with slavery and his own part in it, manumitted all his own chattel, then, grieved by the unremitting, and inhuman, beastly cruelty with which the Beaumans kept their slaves, he schemed to free as many of them as he could… encouraging them to go into the mountains and join the free Maroons, the young men and boys to 'steal themselves' and join your crew as free men."
"But…" Lewrie tried to say, loath to put the onus on "Kit" Cashman, no matter that he was far out of reach of British justice.
"They… stole… themselves, Lewrie!" Twigg insisted. "You did not steal them, d'ye understand the significance of that? It's a lawyerly niggle, but, under current statutes, you only aided and abetted, but did not instigate, or commit, hah! And, you did it in a fine cause. Think of yourself as the noble hero from a free land, England!, where slavery has already been banished. Suddenly exposed in the Caribbean Sugar Isles to the utter barbarity of slavery's realities. And it sore-grieved you. Consider also your experiences on Saint-Domingue, where you witnessed the, ah… desperate courage of self-freed Blacks trading their lives by the thousands, so their children could be free. I still have friends at Admiralty… I've read your reports of intercepting those sailboats full of ex-slave soldiers, who almost blew you out of the water with suicidal gallantry…
the survivor who slit the throat of one of your sailors as his last act of defiance, and you were touched… to your very soul," Twigg spun out, and Lewrie could see it was all a cynical sham that Twigg was creating, merely an interpretation of what really happened. Ordinary Seaman Inman's throat had been slit out of savage hatred of any White man, not gallantry, but… it was much of a piece with what a barrister would argue at his trial, and if such an interpretation of evidence and happenstance took place at an informal hearing, not a formal trial (which would preclude a trial for a hanging offence should it succeed in gaining him sponsors, protectors), well… so be it. And he hoped Christopher Cashman would forgive him, should he ever even hear of it.
"I'll do most of the exposition, Lewrie," Twigg ordered, leaning back against his facing coach bench. "You just sit there and be stoic, stern, and honourable. Refuse wine, but accept tea or coffee. The sun isn't 'below the yardarm'… all that. Try not to fidget or squirm on your chair. Sound resolute. Boast only when describing what fine tars your dozen Black hands are. You might allude to any religious instruction they've gotten since signing articles. It'd go down well, hmm?"
Like a boxer getting last-moment cautions on his opponent, there was not time enough for Mr. Twigg to impart all of his last suggestions. Before Lewrie knew it, their coach pulled to a stop before an imposing row house's stoop (where, exactly, a preoccupied and benumbed Lewrie in later years couldn't say, and couldn't find with both hands and a whole battalion of flaming link-boys) and their coachman's son, serving as a footman, was folding down the metal steps and opening the door.
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