Hostile Shores (21 page)

While waiting for the promised wine, Gilbao told Lewrie of how his family had settled in the Azores in the 1600s, and of how charming and delightful the climate was. Yes, the house was old, but they had the wealth to keep it up. Several generations lived in it, along with his own wife and growing family, and Lewrie had to compliment him on its grandeur, noting how Greco-Roman or Mediterranean it was.

Concepcion entered the offices, at last, with a silver tray and icing bucket, in which stood the bottle, and two crystal glasses. She set it down between them on the low table and poured.

“Iced!” Lewrie exclaimed in pleasure.

“Sweden is good for something,
Senhor
Lewrie,” Gilbao laughed, “though I cannot imagine
living
in such Arctic dullity. Allow me to propose a toast,
senhor
. To the recent epic victory your Navy won off the coast of Spain!”

“Ehm …
what
victory?” Lewrie had to ask, his glass held a few inches below his mouth.

“Why, Admiral Nelson’s victory over the combined French and Spanish fleets,
senhor
! You do not know of it?” Gilbao exclaimed. He all but slapped his forehead. “But of course, you must have left England before the news could arrive, and have been at sea, out of touch with anyone. My pardons for presuming.”

“Tell me of it … once we sample this wine,” Lewrie urged.

“To victory!” Gilbao responded, allowing them to drink deeply. It was a heavenly white wine, light, flower-scented, and with hints of the slightest sweetness, much like a German Riesling.

“That
is
good,” Lewrie agreed, almost smacking his lips.

“The newspapers from Lisbon and Oporto arrived only three days ago,” Gilbao informed him, “both in Portuguese, and the mercantile papers printed in English for the many expatriates. I have a copy of the mercantile paper, if you would like to read it. Or, take it with you to your ship.”

“You are most gracious,
Senhor
Gilbao, thank you,” Lewrie told him with a smile and a seated bow as Gilbao finished his wine, then rose to cross to his desk to shuffle through a neat pile of correspondence to fetch the newspaper.

“I must warn you that not all the news is good,
senhor,
” Gilbao said as he returned and handed the paper to Lewrie. “The French and Spanish lost at least twenty ships, but … the gallant Admiral Nelson sadly perished.”

“Nelson?
Dead?
” Lewrie exclaimed, dropping his hand and the newspaper to his lap in shock.

“Shot down by a French Marine in the fighting tops and taken below to the surgeons, who could do nothing for him,” Gilbao said with a sombre tone, shaking his head in sorrow as he sat back down to pour them top-ups.

“The little minikin,” Lewrie muttered, shaking his own head. “He always did say, ‘Death or Glory’ … ‘Victory or Westminster Abbey’. At Cape Saint Vincent, he ordered me to join him in facing the entire Spanish van, just his sixty-four and my sloop of war. ‘Follow me, Lewrie,’ he yelled. ‘We’re bound for glory!’ I suppose he’s got his spot in Westminster Abbey, at last.”

“You
knew
him,
senhor
?” Gilbao marvelled. “You must tell me all of what you know of such a hero.”

“I did not know him well, sir,” Lewrie said in preface, cautioning Gilbao that he could not relate all that much—quite unlike the supper ball at Nassau—and heaving a small shrug. “We ran across each other several times, but he was always senior to me, and I doubt if I mattered to him. I was not in his intimate circle.”

And, I’ll not mention Emma Hamilton unless he asks, I won’t say a word about how vainglorious he was, or how pettish he could be, either,
Lewrie chid himself.

*   *   *

Later that morning, wandering the small town’s streets to shop for his personal needs, and have a look-see, Lewrie felt a rare and odd out-of-sorts malaise take him, almost a light-headed separate-ness he could not blame on three glasses of Gilbao’s excellent light wine. He stopped in the shade of a row of trees, facing the waterfront to watch bum-boats and barges plying between the shore and the transports with loads of bagged grain and bales of hay, kegs of water, and beer.

There was an iron bench with wooden slats, and he sat himself down. The English-language Portuguese newspaper crinkled as he did so, and he pulled it from his coat side-pocket to re-read the account of the battle. It was a sketchy article, since no news writer had been on the scene, and was likely based on third- or fourth-party word of mouth. If a Royal Navy ship had put into Lisbon or Oporto, one which
had
participated in the battle and was in need of firewood and water, or light repairs, that might explain how twenty enemy ships had been reportedly taken, not some vague number like “dozens” or “many”. Not all had been kept, for the winds and seas had gotten up after the hard fight was over, and several prizes had been wrecked on the shore about Cádiz, and some re-taken by their own crews.

Even so, Nelson’s victory was a death-blow to French hopes for their long-expected invasion of the British Isles. Without their fleet to cover the crossing of the Channel by their thousands of small craft, or a fleet-in-being and at sea to draw off warships from Channel Fleet, to reduce English resistance, there was no way for Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte to risk the loss of his massive army which he had planned to cram into those small boats. People in England could draw deep breaths and sleep soundly in their beds, after years of dread.

Bonaparte had sent Missiessy and Villeneuve to the West Indies and back to lure the Royal Navy away from the defence of the Channel, and the ruse had failed, thank God. Bonaparte had been too clever for his own good, and he had thrown a significant part of his navy away for nothing.

Thank God Boney’s a soldier,
Lewrie thought with a snort of derision;
They’re not the sharpest wits, and know nothing of the sea.

Nelson, though … dead and gone.

Nelson’s gone.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

News of the grand victory off Cape Trafalgar was heartily welcome aboard
Reliant,
though tempered by a sense of grief that Nelson had been slain. The victory was given three cheers aboard the transports, too, and perhaps some soldiers of the 34th might have felt some sadness over the Admiral’s loss, but while Nelson had been a national hero, he had not been an
Army
hero, so it did not affect them as sorely. Now, if they had heard that Jim Belcher, Tom Cribb, or Daniel Mendoza, their favourite champion boxers, had died, they would have mourned.

What really made the Army officers unhappy was Lewrie’s estimate that their passage South would be much longer than the first leg from Portsmouth. Once round the same latitude of Cape Verde, they would lose the steady Nor’east Trade winds, and would face winds from the Sou’east, requiring all ships to make many tacks, going “close-hauled to weather”, to make ground. They found it hard to fathom that beating to weather would take one hundred and eighty or two hundred and ten miles veering back and forth to make sixty or seventy miles South each day. Making their passage even longer were the currents; there was an Equatorial Current that would be favourable all the way round the Western coast of Africa ’til the Ivory Coast, but then they would meet both the South Equatorial Current, which would smack them square on their bows, and the counter currents which could swirl them into the Gulf of Guinea, and be foul against them whenever their course had to be seaward, or waft them shoreward and onto the shoals. The quickest course, he told them, would lie closest to shore, emulating the ancient explorers such as Vasco da Gama. Further out to sea lay the Doldrums, the Horse Latitudes, where there were confusing, swirling currents, and no wind for weeks at a time; so named for the complete loss of horses carried by earlier expeditions, when the food and water ran out.

*   *   *

“I wonder what the soldiers will do when we cross the Equator, sir,” Lt. Westcott mused as the peaks of Madeira shrank and shortened astern. Westcott looked in merry takings, quite chipper in point of fact. A brief half-day ashore at Funchal, and a visit to that highly recommended brothel, had done him wonders.

“Have a group, ceremonial vomit, I’d imagine,” Lewrie chirped back, rocking on the soles of his boots with his hands clapped in the small of his back, and relishing the fresh breezes and the easy motion of their frigate. “Why change routine just because they’ll be crossing the line?”

“I was just wondering how they would welcome King Neptune and his Court aboard, sir,” Westcott said with a laugh.

“I doubt they’d do anything,” Lewrie mused, tickled by an image of riot. “Who’d enforce the rites? The transports are manned at the rate of five sailors and one ship’s boy per every hundred tons, plus the master, two mates, and perhaps five or six more petty officers. If
they
tried to initiate the soldiers, I expect they’d end with their throats cut. Speaking of, Mister Westcott … you
have
made plain to our ‘shellbacks’ that they’d best make
their
revels harmless, with no insults against any superiors?”

“I have, sir,” Westcott replied with a stern nod.

“Having been ‘anointed’ once, myself, and a ‘shellback’ several times over, I intend to stand and watch and enjoy the ceremony. But, Mister Westcott?” Lewrie teased with a leer. “You have not yet said if
you
have ever crossed the Equator. Have you, sir?”

“Ehm … I fear that my naval career has taken me no further South than Trinidad, sir,” Westcott hesitantly confessed.

“A ‘Pollywog’ are ye, sir?” Lewrie purred, leaning a tad closer to grin. “Oh, how jolly this will
be
!” Then, to Lt. Westcott’s consternation, Lewrie strolled off to the weather rails, his step jaunty, and humming a gay air. Now there was something to look forward to!

*   *   *

The first few days out of Funchal, they still had the Nor’east Trade winds, so the going was good as they sailed past the Spanish Canary Islands with the isles only fifty or sixty miles East of them.

The next few days were also passable as Lewrie led the convoy almost Due South across the Tropic of Cancer, the 20th Latitude, then down the wide strait between the Portuguese Cape Verde Islands and Cape Vert on the shoulder of Africa, where the Equatorial Counter Current, the swirling eddies off that, and the Sou’east Trades began to greet them.

Round the 10th North Latitude, though, the perverse Sou’east Trades forced them to stand Sou’-Sou’west, close-hauled towards eventual shoaling waters, which were badly or sketchily charted, and then all four ships would have to make a heart-breaking turn to the East-Nor’east and sail back towards Africa, losing ground ’til the shore could be seen from the cross-trees, and they would tack and bear off Sou’-Sou’west once more, and safely out to seaward. To make matters worse, it was growing hotter, even though they were well into early December, and the sun, so friendly round Madeira, began to feel brutal, and Surgeon Mr. Mainwaring had little in the way of balms to ease unwary sailors’ burns when they worked shirtless.

A little South of the 5th North Latitude, on a shoreward tack, they raised Cape Palmas, the Southwestern limit of the Western bulge of the African continent, and stood away Sou’-Sou’west once more.

At least the next time they had to tack shoreward, there would be hundreds of miles of sea-room before they fetched the coast again, deep into the Gulf of Guinea.

A day or two more and they would cross the Equator, where the Bosun, Mr. Sprague, and his mates and some of the other older, saltier hands would hold court. They were already cackling among themselves and rubbing their hoary palms in glee.

It was then that Pettus, over breakfast, pointed out to Lewrie that Toulon was not acting his normal self.

“Toulon? What’s wrong with him?” Lewrie asked. His older cat had been all laps and affection the last week. He looked to the foot of his dining table, where Toulon and Chalky sat by their food bowls.

“He doesn’t seem to have much of an appetite, sir. At first, I took no notice, but now?” Pettus said, pointing down-table.

Yeovill had whipped up the last of the eggs purchased at Funchal in an omelet, a third of it laced with dried sausage bits and shreds of bacon just for the cats. Chalky was nibbling away at his bowl, but Toulon was just hunkered down over his, paying no heed to the welcoming aromas, and just staring off into the middle distance, eyes half-slit as if he was napping. And, when Chalky had polished off his own bowl and nudged Toulon aside to wolf down his as well, Toulon paid no heed. He had never been the assertive cat, but allowing himself to be robbed?

Lewrie left his plate, and his chair, to go to the other end of the table and stroke Toulon. “What’s wrong, littl’un? What’s put you off your victuals? Are ye feelin’ ill?”

Toulon looked up at him, made a meek little
Mrr,
and licked at Lewrie’s hand. Lewrie pulled out the chair at that end of the table and sat down to gather Toulon into his arms, where the cat went willingly, starting to purr.

“My Lord, he’s light as a feather!” Lewrie exclaimed. “Ye can feel his ribs, and his backbone. Here, Toulon, have a wee bite or two. Come on, now.” Lewrie dug into the food bowl for a tiny morsel of sausage and put it under Toulon’s nose, but he would have none of it.

Jessop had come to the end of the table to watch.

“’E’s been pissin’ a lot, too, sir,” Jessop informed him, “an’ ’ardly ever in their sand box. Seems all ’e warnts t’do is sleep, an’ drink water. Won’t play like ’e usedta.”

“Whenever you’re on deck, sir, he’s most likely to be found in the starboard quarter gallery,” Pettus contributed, “napping atop the crates and chests, so he’s level, with the windows. I thought that he was just watching sea birds.”

Lewrie cradled Toulon, stroking his cheeks and chops with one finger, and Toulon tilted his head to look up and meet Lewrie eye-to-eye, slowly and solemnly blinking. He might be softly purring, but his tail tip did not move.