“How’d our Vigilances do?” Lewrie asked.
“Lost, sir, nought to one,” Greenleaf said, making a face and taking time to lift the flabby wine flask to his mouth and squirt a mouthful into his mouth. “I fear the Army’s the better wind, and ran our lads ragged, with their tongues lolling, and gasping for air.”
“Oh, pity,” Lewrie commiserated, “Anyone hurt?”
“Bruises, mostly, sir,” Greenleaf told him, “a black eye or two, a broken nose. Our Surgeon will be busy this evening, but no one was hurt bad enough to be put on light duties.”
“Well, good for that, then,” Lewrie said.
“Odd sort of war we’re having, sir,” Greenleaf breezed on after another squirt of wine. “A wee bag of excitement, then right back we come to Fiddler’s Green. Music, tasty victuals, wine and spirits, and all the doxies one could wish.”
“Aye, the doxies,” Lewrie said, those lusty images rising once again in his fervid imagination. It came out more of a grunt.
“None of them particularly refined, but refreshingly simple and eager,” Greenleaf prated on, oblivious, “not like what one would find in a larger town. Pity there’s such little privacy, except for the one brothel in Milazzo. Can’t un-button one’s flap where the ship’s people can see, after all, sir. Why, out in the olive and the fruit groves…”
“Seen it!” Lewrie snapped, hoping the fool would just stop his gob. “Commission officers must eschew such, as I trust you’ve done, Mister Greenleaf.”
“Soul of discretion, sir, I assure you,” Greenleaf swore with a leer, “though I cannot speak for the Midshipmen.”
“Then you must, sir,” Lewrie declared, turning to face him. “If not you, then the First Officer Mister Farley. We are in loco parentis to the younger lads, and must do what we can to preserve their innocence as long as possible.”
You bloody fraud, you hypocrite! he chid himself; Just listen to yourself! I’ll be hymn-singin’, next!
“Don’t know how warnings will go down with the older Mids, but we can’t allow the younger ones go home to their families, poxed to their eyebrows, Mister Greenleaf. If all else fails, explain to them about the prevention provided by cundums.”
“Cundums, sir?” Lt. Greenleaf posed, head cocked over. “That’d be beyond their wee purses, or pay.”
“We’re in Italy, sir,” Lewrie pointed out, “and it was the Italians who invented the bloody things, ages ago, after all. Some of the lads might not understand a man’s true nature, and what they have heard in Church, but … I’m sure that you and the others in the wardroom will find a way to dance along that narrow line, what? In the long run, virginal innocence is a damned dangerous thing, hey?”
“A lecture, sir,” Greenleaf replied, crestfallen to be ordered to do so right after an eye-opening adventure ashore. “I see, sir. If you will excuse me, sir, I will go off and … collect my thoughts on the matter.”
“Carry on, Mister Greenleaf,” Lewrie agreed, and turned back to the amateurish match, just as an Army bowler hurled a shambolic pitch that hit a sailor on the shin. “How is your leg there, sir?” Lewrie shouted with the other partisan spectators.
And thank God I don’t have t’give that lecture! he thought.
* * *
Later that day, back aboard Vigilance, Lewrie took himself an idle sprawl on his starboard side settee, neck-stock undone, sleeves rolled up, waist-coat hung up, and changing to a looser, comfortable pair of slop-trousers, and old shoes instead of boots. He tried to read, but Chalky was padding round and round in his lap, unable to knead a soft place to curl up. The cat finally let out a human-like hmpf! and flopped onto his side, tail slowly curling, and squirming to encourage some “pets.” Lewrie obliged him with long strokes down his side from forehead to tail tip, pausing only to turn the page of his book, or take a sip from a mug of a rather un-impressive Italian ale. It was half an hour into the First Dog Watch, late afternoon, and a wee, cool breeze flirted with the ecru sailcloth curtains over the transom windows, came through the extemporised twine-screen door to the stern gallery, whisking away the heat of the day.
Lewrie’s mind was not on his book, or the cat’s comfort, but on what Lt. Greenleaf had said of the local doxies; how they might not be as refined as the costlier girls in the better brothels in London, but were refreshingly simple and eager to please, and certainly not as coarse and hardened as street walkers or the sort who frequented the low taverns and “cock and hen” clubs for a single shilling.
That girl, that coquette, Lewrie mused, picturing her most vividly all over again, imagining her offered charms almost as virginal as a young lover just introduced to lovemaking, and as eager as a new bride, eager and giggling, savouring as much pleasure and passion as she might give. What would a romp be like with one such as her, and might she be at the camp the next sporting contests? Where could he and she find privacy, how many cundums should he carry with him, and might she spend an entire afternoon with him?
“More ale, sir?” Deavers asked as he puttered round the cabins.
“Ah, no, Deavers, thankee,” Lewrie replied, irritated to be back in reality; it came out more an harumpfh.
“The Eye-talians make some nice wines, sir,” Deavers dithered on, “but they need some lessons when it comes to beer and ales.”
“Aye, they do,” Lewrie grudgingly agreed. To further distract himself from idle lust-dreams, he added, “There’s a tale about German monks who posed a question to the Pope about beer, Deavers. They wondered if it was sinful to drink it, or drink so much of it. The Vatican didn’t know what they were talking about, so they sent the Pope a barrel of their best, and all the Italian Cardinals, and the Pope sampled it. They wrote the monks and said they could drink it, and it wasn’t sinful. It was so different from their wines that they declared it a penance! To drink it, like bein’ told to recite several dozen Hail Marys!”
“So, if an Englishman drinks himself half a gallon, he’s earnin’ forgiveness, sir?” Deavers slyly asked.
“No, just a good drunk, and a hard head in the mornin’,” Lewrie japed back.
“Midshipman Chenery t’see the Cap’um, SAH!” the Marine sentry announced in a loud voice, and a stamp of his boots.
“Enter,” Lewrie said back, laying the book aside, but staying seated; sprawled, rather.
“Ah, thank you for seeing me, sir,” Charles Chenery began with his hat held at his waist, turning its brim round and round. “Ehm … it’s nothing to do with duty, sir. Something personal, rather, and ehm … perhaps brother-in-law to brother-in-law, sir?”
“You know I do not play favourites, even for you, young sir,” Lewrie sternly cautioned him. “In some trouble, are you?”
“Not in trouble, no sir!” Chenery nervously exclaimed. “It’s ah, d’ye see, ehm … it’s about girls, sir.”
Oh, shit! Mine arse on a band-box! Lewrie thought; I’m givin’ that lecture, after all!
“They’re delightfully different from us, for starters,” he told Chenery in jest. “What about them?”
“Ashore today, sir,” Chenery said, taking a tentative step nearer, and glancing over his shoulder at Deavers, Dasher, and Turnbow who were puttering round the great-cabins. “There was this girl, a local girl. Well, I couldn’t make heads or tails of what she was saying, of course, but … she was awfully friendly, and pretty and … fetching, I suppose I could call her. She most-like couldn’t make heads or tails of what I was saying, either, but we seemed to hit it off, so easily, and I bought us some wine, and … but that’s not the point, sir! She put her arm in mine, and stood so close it made my head reel, and … she kissed me, just playful at first, and then…!”
“Was it your first kiss?” Lewrie asked, almost feeling sorry for his much younger, and in-experienced brother-in-law.
“Ehm…” was all Chenery could say.
“Your first that wasn’t a peck on the cheek?” Lewrie went on. “Full on the lips, lips slightly parted, lasting for long seconds?” Lewrie prom
pted, and Chenery nodded his head, reddening. “Did your tongue and hers meet?”
Am I bein’ cruel? Lewrie wondered; It is sort of fun!
“Aye, it was, sir, and aye, we did,” Chenery whispered. “And I got the strangest feeling that I never…!”
“Oh, do stop fidgeting and sit you down,” Lewrie offered, pointing to one of the collapsible chairs, into which Chenery sank with so much force that the chair squeaked. “It was nice, and exciting, and tempting, was it not?” Lewrie asked. “And you were tempted to do more than just kiss and fondle.”
“I was, I was indeed, sir!” Chenery confessed.
God, how much can I tell him without it gettin’ back to his father, or Jessica? Lewrie wondered, crossing his legs and turfing Chalky off his lap with a petulant Mrr! of complaint; How much has he been told about sex by his Reverend father? Most-like, not much.
He felt a serious bout of hypocrisy coming on!
“Hmm, you obviously know about the ways of men and women,” Lewrie said. “You’ve been aboard when the ship was put Out of Discipline.”
“Oh, aye sir,” Chenery said with a firm nod, “and it was nothing like father told me! That, and well … when I and my classmates went to the booksellers after school, we always snuck looks at the caricatures, if we could get away with it. Pooled our pennies and bought a few from street vendors, especially the nude ones, and hid them from our parents…”
So he’s not been kept under glass, or a pile of cabbage leaves! Lewrie thought, feeling hopeful that young Charles Chenery knew a lot more than most lads.
“What did your father tell you?” Lewrie asked.
It was the usual pious rot, but what could the lad expect from a father in the ministry, surrounded by older brothers in Holy Orders, his sisters wed to other ministers; keep oneself pure ’til he wed an equally pure bride from a good family; treat all women from the better sort as virginal, innocent, and fragile as Meissen china or crystal stemware; and girls of the lower orders, and looser morals, were to be avoided like the Plague, for vaguely un-specified reasons, and for him to pray often to ask for Heavenly strength to shun temptations if they arose. And, lastly, do not weaken oneself by self-pleasuring and spending one’s vital seed and vigour outside of conjugal union.
“Well, all that’s good, in the main,” Lewrie said, leaning his head back after Chenery had finished stammering through what little he’d been told, “but Life’s not quite like that, as you’ve seen when the temporary ‘wives’ are allowed aboard,” he went on, looking the lad in the eyes. “As you’ve most-like heard late at night in your mess, when the older Mids … spill their seed. The same thing happens belowdecks among the crew, too, when they’ve been too long without women, and none of them are sapped of their vital strength. So, I’d not make a meal of that, but … now. This girl you met. Were there brothers, a father, or an old crone escorting her?”
“Ehm, no sir,” Chenery told him. “She was by herself. Well, with two other girls, at first, but they went their own way once she ah … cozied up to me.”
The poor lad blushes faster than rose buds! Lewrie thought.
“It was good odds that she might have been a girl of the ‘commercial persuasion,’ lad,” Lewrie told him.
“A … a whore d’ye mean, sir?” Chenery all but gasped. “But, I thought that most doxies are as plump and haggard as the ones who came aboard Sapphire. Ugly brutes!”
“Aye, street walkers and dockside whores are rather off-putting, but they didn’t all start that way,” Lewrie said. “It’s the life they lead that coarsens ’em. Even girls who look like young goddesses can be prostitutes. Did she try to steer you somewhere private?”
“I did get the sense that she would, sir,” Chenery replied.
“In point of fact, I was approached by a very fetching, tempting young woman myself today,” Lewrie felt confident enough to admit. “The Army camp draws them like flies to honey. It’s a good thing I don’t speak Italian, hey? Rather embarrassing, really.”
“Aye, it was, sir!” Chenery chimed in, perking up. “Mean t’say, more flustering than anything else. Tempted to, but not daring to … have my way with a…? First time and all…?”
“She could have been a ‘fireship,’ lad,” Lewrie told him, turning stern. “Poxed to her eyebrows? You do not want to catch the Pox. The Surgeon would charge you fifteen shillings that you don’t have to give you the Mercury Cure, your teeth’d turn t’grey chalk and fall out, and no one’s really sure that it’s a genuine cure. I’ve seen it happen to fellows I’ve served with, and there’s no guarantee that they’d not pass it on to anyone they married. Hah, try livin’ with that on your conscience! And, what’d your family say?”
“Oh, I didn’t think of that, sir!” Chenery said with a gulp, “though, at the moment I wasn’t sure I was thinking at all,” he added with a nervous laugh.
“Your ‘little’ head was in charge, I expect,” Lewrie said with his own amusement. “Besides, did the girl think you had a lot of coin in your purse, she might’ve had a bully-buck partner, ready to cosh you on the head and rob you blind, right down to your stockings. It’s a risky thing, associating with the whores, no matter how desirable they look, or how sweet they talk.”
“I’m told there are brothels, though, sir,” Chenery continued, sounding rather wistful, “where it’s safe, and there are physicians to, ah, inspect for the Pox.”
“Oh, there are!” Lewrie admitted. “And if one must, and has the funds for it, they are generally safe for young gentlemen.”
“And I’ve heard of protective devices, sir?” Chenery asked.
“Cundums,” Lewrie told him, growing wary of his words from that point on. It would not do at all to admit that he had some, or that he had used them in the past. “Sheep gut leather, very thin sheathes one binds on one’s member. They prevent infection from the Pox, and it’s said that, should a married couple not wish, or cannot afford, more children, they’re useful at preventing un-wanted pregnancies.
“They’re very dear, though, and not always effective,” Lewrie cautioned. “Were I you, Charles,” he said, using the lad’s first name since they were almost in private, “I’d not risk your health, or your future prospects, without ’em. I fear you’ll have to deal with your temptations the best you can ’til you’ve taken all precautions against future shame. Then, if you simply must…” Lewrie concluded, flinging up his hands for a moment in a helpless “if.”
“It’s so very frustrating, though, sir,” Chenery said, sighing.
“A lot of Life is, young sir,” Lewrie imparted, going for his best “sage” sounds, though thinking himself such a fraud.
“Well, I shall go, sir, and thank you for taking time to speak with me about … that sort of thing,” Chenery said, getting to his feet and tugging at the set of his uniform jacket, which prompted Lewrie to rise as well to see him out. “It’s better advice than any I’ve gotten from the fellows in my mess. Some of the older lads have told the youngest that women have teeth ah, down there,” he imparted with a knowing laugh.
“What, that old tale?” Lewrie guffawed. “What rot!”
“I’ll take my leave sir,” Chenery declared.
“Very well, carry on, Mister Chenery,” Lewrie said in reply back to the proper formal relationship. “No need to mention our wee talk with your father, and certainly not your sweet sister. There are things best left un-said with the fairer sex.”
“Oh, of course, sir!” Chenery exclaimed, performing a short bow, and headed for the door, clapping his hat on as he did so.
Hah! Cheated death, again! Lewrie exulted to himself; I damned well hope, anyway!
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Damme, but I used t’be so fond of idleness! Lewrie told himself as he paced the poop deck of HMS Vigilance one morning before Clear Decks And Up Spirits was piped. He held his everyday hanger in his hand, swiping it back and forth as if reaping a field of wildflowers, after an hour or more of swordplay with the younger Midshipme
n. He paused to look round the anchorage as Six Bells of the Forenoon Watch were struck, hearing the echoing chimes of his three transports mixing with those of his own ship, wondering when they would sail again.
He knew himself, his penchant for boredom if grand doings were not in the offing, but in the past he could at least be bored near tears out on the open sea! Swinging at anchor for nigh a week with nothing to plan for, nothing to do, was as close as he expected that he could get to being part of the Standing Officers who safeguarded a de-commissioned ship, and it was chasing him sore. Try as he might, he found himself impatient with others, becoming testy if an evolution did not go well, and in some cases growing downright surly. His skin crawled, his innards seemed to itch with the desire for action, to the point that he could not sit still, or even nap, and found himself forced to prowl the ship, or pace, unable to lose himself in one of his novels, or sleep soundly of a night without more than a few tots of his rapidly dwindling supply of American corn whisky.
Oh, there was Chalky and his antics, though his cat was now of an age, and napped more than he played. And, there were old letters to re-read, and new ones to write when something novel struck him in one of the old ones that he’d glossed over the first time, but Lord!
Greenleaf’s right, it is an odd sort o’ war we’re having, he thought, finally sheathing his sword in frustration, looking at it as if he’d never seen it before, and wondering if he would ever draw it, or clap it on his hip except for formal occasions, again.
“Aarrh!” Lewrie shouted to no one, his good old, piratical yell, and clattered down the larboard ladderway to the quarterdeck, where he could dash into his cabins and really vent his frustrations.
“Cool tea, sir?” Deavers offered, “Or lemonade? We’ve just got two dozen fresh’uns off one of the bum-boats.”
An Onshore Storm Page 12
