Hostile Shores (24 page)

No longer being pawed at by Mainwaring’s large hands, Toulon stopped fretting and snuggled down, eyes shut and his head nodding as if he would fall asleep right there in Lewrie’s arms. His breath was faint.

“Perhaps … perhaps, it would be best did we proceed, Mister Mainwaring,” Lewrie sadly, slowly agreed.

“A towel, sir,” Durbin softly suggested, getting to his feet. “Something to swaddle him during the procedure?”

“A restraining towel, yes,” Mainwaring agreed, finishing his cool tea before rising, himself. “Perhaps at your dining table, sir?”

“Dram and a half, sir?” Durbin asked his superior.

“Hmm, best make it a full two,” Mainwaring proposed. “Prepare the clyster.”

Pettus fetched a used towel and laid it on the dining table. Lewrie carried Toulon to the table and gently sat him down on it, then folded the towel round him, petting and softly cooing affection to keep the cat calm. Pettus and Jessop came close to witness, with Jessop holding Chalky in his arms to keep him from interfering.

Surgeon’s Mate Durbin produced the clyster, a metal cylinder about six inches long with a plunger at one end, and a long, narrow, and hollow metal tube, no wider than a goose quill, at the other. He withdrew the plunger and laid it aside, put a finger over the end of the tube, and presented it to Surgeon Mainwaring, who carefully measured out 120 minims, or two fluid drams, into a graduated glass tube, then poured the laudanum into the clyster. Durbin re-inserted the plunger for him, still holding a finger over the needle’s opening to prevent spillage.

“I will take it now, Durbin,” Mainwaring said, placing his own finger over the needle’s aperture, allowing a drop or two to dribble out. “Even the tiniest
bolus
of air would impede the efficacious administering of the dose, do you see, Captain.”

“Umhum,” Lewrie replied, his heart in his throat.

“If you will hold him firmly, now, Captain, I will begin,” the Surgeon said, leaning down over the end of the table.

Toulon emitted a loud, outraged
yeowl
as the needle went up his anus and its contents were injected with a push of the plunger, and it was all Lewrie could do to hold him still in the folds of the towel.

“You tell him, Toulon,” Lewrie cooed, his eyes turning hot and moist as he tried to calm his cat. “I’d be at his throat with claws out if someone did that t’me, too! Hush, now. Hush, little man, it’s done. If God’s just, there’s a Fiddler’s Green for you, too, with all the mice and birds ye wish t’chase, milk pools, and all the fish and sausages ye’d ever want. Other cats t’play with … perhaps even old Pitt. Ye might get on with him. Hush, now. Go t’sleep, and dream a happy cat’s dreams. I always loved ye, d’ye know that, Toulon?”

“’Is fav’rite people, too, sir,” Jessop said in an awed whisper, “an’ ’im be there a’waitin’ on yer when ye goes t’Heaven yerself.”

“I pray so, Jessop,” Lewrie managed to choke out, “I surely do pray so.”

Toulon did calm down, muttering a bit and going limp after a minute or so. His front paws twitched as if he was having a chase dream, and his jaws chittered silently as he did when seeing a bird.

They all waited for a full five minutes, in silence. Toulon seemed completely asleep, with no response when Lewrie folded back the towel and gently stroked and caressed his fur. Chalky was having no part of it,
mrring
and wriggling out of Jessop’s grasp to run aft and fuss and groom.

“If I may, Captain,” Mainwaring said, at last. He bent down to press an ear to Toulon, gently rolling him onto one side. He used his amplifying horn device, a stethoscope he termed it, to listen even more carefully for a full minute more before leaning back and digging into his bag for a small mirror and a lancet.

“There is no sign of respiration, Captain,” Mainwaring said as he looked at the mirror. “I can no longer discern a heart beat, nor a bit of fog on the mirror.”

Lewrie thought it rather gruesome, but Mainwaring lifted a paw to expose the sensitive pads and made a first light jab with the lancet, then a stronger second. Lastly, he pricked Toulon on his nose, with no response.

“I believe I may state in perfect conviction that he is gone, sir,” Mainwaring said with a slight nod of satisfaction. “I am sorry for your loss. He was dear to you, and a great companion.”

“Thank you, Mister Mainwaring,” Lewrie managed to say, with a curt nod. “Pettus, will you go pass word for the Master Gunner and the Bosun? I will need a nine-pounder roundshot and a baize bag.”

“Yes, sir,” Pettus muttered, wiping his eyes as he left.

*   *   *

The towel was sacrificed for a winding cloth, the requested baize bag, quickly sewn together out of the red baize usually used to hold a defaulter’s “cat-o’-nine-tails”, was three times normal size, as if Bosun Sprague knew its purpose beforehand, and Jessop added one of Toulon’s favourite old woven wool toys before Lewrie drew and tied the bag shut, and went out on deck to the waist, then up the ladderway to the quarterdeck. He threaded his way aft through the Afterguard and watchstanders, surprised by the presence of not only the men of the watch but most of the hands who were at that hour off watch on deck and along the sail-tending gangways. Officers, Mids, and petty officers doffed their hats as he passed. It was impossible to keep secrets from any ship’s company; they all knew of the Surgeon’s speculations and the fact that the Captain had requested his help to ease his pet’s passing.

Lewrie got to the taffrails right aft and took off his own hat, laid it down atop the flag lockers, and stood bareheaded with the bag cradled in both arms.

“I’m sorry, Toulon,” he whispered, “but it had to be done, and I meant for you t’go easy. I loved you from the first sight of you, and always will.” A captain’s stern dignity be-damned, Lewrie lifted the bag to bestow a last kiss on the baize, then extended his arms over the stern. “Goodbye, littl’un. See you in Heaven.”

He let go of the bag and watched it drop into the white trail of the frigate’s wake, where it made a small splash before sinking to the deeps.

The ship’s fiddler and the Marine flutist began “Johnny Faa”!

They
tryin’
t’break my heart?
Lewrie thought, unable to turn to face forward without showing his sudden tears. He had not heard “Johnny Faa” since he had given his old Cox’n, Matthew Andrews, a sea burial after conquering the French frigate,
L’Uranie,
ages before, and the sadness of that tune always made him brokenly mournful.

At last, Lewrie pulled a handkerchief from a coat pocket, blew his nose, and dabbed his eyes before shoving it back away and clapping his hat on his head to turn away from the taffrails and face his crew.

He got to the forward edge of the quarterdeck, and was amazed to see all hands standing with their hats off. No one had ordered it, but they had done it. Doffing his hat to them, he called out, “Thank you, lads. Thank you,” then made a slow way down to the waist and to the doors to his great-cabins, nodded to his Marine sentry, and went inside.

*   *   *

Lewrie stayed aft and below the rest of the afternoon, going to the quarterdeck for a breath of fresher and cooler air round the middle of the Second Dog Watch. Though there was no point in doing so, he did go aft to the taffrails for a while, looking far astern. Bisquit, now allowed the liberty of the quarterdeck, joined him and sat down atop the flag lockers, nuzzling for attention and pets, and Lewrie rewarded him before returning to his cabins for a silent and bleak supper. There was only one feeding bowl at the foot of the dining table for Chalky, who seemed oblivious that his long-time friend was no longer present. Once fed, the younger cat came to be petted, arching under Lewrie’s hands and rubbing his cheeks on his fingers before flopping on his side to play.

And that night, long after Lights Out when Lewrie was in bed, sleeping atop the coverlet in his underdrawers for coolness, he came awake. The hanging bed-cot was swaying gently to the roll of the ship, a motion which always calmed him and lulled him to deep sleep, but … he felt as if Chalky had leapt from the deck to the bed, and was walking and brushing up his legs and chest. Lewrie opened one eye and reached out to stroke Chalky, but there was no cat there.

He sat up on an elbow and looked round in the deep gloom of the cabins. There was Chalky, curled up at the foot of the bed with his head resting across Lewrie’s ankle! He lay back down on the pillows and was almost drifted off once more, but, there was the feeling of a cat padding up behind his back, this time, and he sat up once more in a start. Chalky woke, still draped over his ankle, yawned widely, and sat up to give out a low, challenging
Mrrr!
with tail thrashing. In the faintest light of pre-dawn, Chalky’s eerie green chatoyant eyes were fixed intently on nothing, just to the starboard side of the bed, then to the overhead, as if fearfully watching something that drifted away!

Chalky finally hopped over Lewrie’s legs and came to Lewrie’s face, nuzzling for a hand and looking over his shoulder to larboard.

“Don’t
you
go dyin’ on me, now, Chalky,” Lewrie whispered as he stroked and calmed him. “I wouldn’t know what t’do with both you
and
Toulon hauntin’ my cabins.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

It was almost Christmas Eve before
Reliant
’s little convoy finally caught sight of tops’ls and t’gallants on the Southern horizon, a wide smear of weathered tan or ecru canvas that spread from three points off the larboard bows to three points off the starboard. When the cry of “Sail Ho!” came, Lewrie was in the middle of shaving, and he dashed to the quarterdeck with a towel still round his neck and the thin foam of shaving soap still on his face.

“It would appear that there are at least seventy ships, sir,” Lt. Spendlove, the officer of the Forenoon Watch, eagerly reported. “I
believe
I can make out their fores’ls … fore topmast stays’ls … lying to the right, so they must be making the long board Sou’-Sou’west, the same as us, sir!”

“Hmm, that’ll make for a long stern-chase, then,” Lewrie speculated aloud. “As we close with them, we’ll fall into their wind shadow and be blanketed. They’re hull-down under the horizon, so we’re about twelve or more miles alee of ’em, but it may be dusk before we come to hailing distance. Mast-head!” he shouted aloft. “Any signals yet?”

“Just now, sir!” Midshipman Munsell cried down. “It is ‘Query’!”

“Very well. Mister Spendlove, have our number hoisted, and in this month’s private signals book, add ‘Come To Join’.”

“Aye aye, sir,” Spendlove said, turning aft to relay the order to Midshipman Rossyngton at the taffrails, flag lockers, and signals halliards.

“Caught them up at last, sir?” Lt. Westcott asked as he mounted to the quarterdeck, with Lt. Merriman right behind him, and both of them as hastily half-dressed as Lewrie.

“It appears so, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie told him with a grin.

“Do we know which ships Commodore Popham commands, sir?” Lt. Merriman asked, with his own telescope glued to one eye.

“I think I recall that he has the
Diadem,
sixty-four,” Lewrie said, off-handedly stroking a raspy cheek in thought and finding that his fingers came away soapy. “He’s the
Raisonnable
and
Belliqueux
as well, also sixty-fours. There’s sure t’be frigates and such, but at the moment the names escape me. Oh, there’s the
Diomede,
one of the old two-decker fifty-gunners.
Diadem, Diomede?
Easy to get them confused.”

“As a trooper, sir?” Lt. Merriman further asked.

“As far as I know,
Diomede
’s still rated as a warship,” Lewrie said with a shrug. Fifty-gunned two-deckers had been a failed experiment, much cheaper to build, crew, and maintain than 64s or 74s, but unable to match weight of metal with larger ships even in their brief hey-day. There weren’t more than a dozen 50s left, and most of them had been converted to troop transports, and the few remaining in the Navy as ships of war were found only in the farthest corners and backwaters of the world, where the stoutest opposition they might meet would be frigates, sloops of war, or brigs and light privateer vessels.

“Pity the poor fellow who has charge of
her
!” Lt. Merriman said with a snicker of derision.

“Oh, I don’t know,” Lewrie, laughed. “One could be worse off. One could be appointed an Agent Afloat with the Transport Board!” After the others had had a slight laugh, Lewrie ordered, “Carry on, Mister Spendlove. I will be below, finishing my shave.”

“A close, Sunday Divisions shave, sir,” Westcott teased. “You will be reporting aboard Commodore Popham’s flagship by supper time.”

“And, after this long on-passage, sir,” Lt. Merriman, their wag, posed, “you might have to fetch them rabbits and quail for the
entrée,
else the Commodore serves you salt-meat junk!”

“Like a housewarming supper?” Lewrie laughed. “Signal my host t’see if I can bring anything before I boat over? Hah! Carry on, gentlemen.”

*   *   *

By five of the afternoon, in the middle of the First Dog Watch,
Reliant
gladly shedded her three charges, and
Ascot, Marigold,
and the
Sweet Susan
swanned off into the larger convoy’s gaggle in search of the ships bearing the rest of the 34th Light Dragoons. Lewrie had the frigate steered over to join the rest of the escorting warships, and hoisted the very welcome signal “Have Mail”, which elicited an invitation from HMS
Diadem
to send a boat at once, followed shortly after by a second invitation for
Reliant
’s captain to dine aboard Commodore Popham’s flagship at half-past 6
P.M.

Lewrie found that almost bearable. For many long weeks, he had dressed any-old-how in his oldest, plainest coat, loosely tied neck-stock, and roomy slop trousers. Now, he would have to dress in snug breeches, silk shirt and ironed stock, snow-white waist-coat, and his finest uniform coat with the sash and star of the Order of The Bath. At least the supper would be held after sundown, so the present latitude’s oppressive heat would not be as bad as a mid-day dinner, and on the long board on larboard tack which the fleet held, the humidity of the African coast was far away, and there was a fresh-enough breeze off the sea.