The Invasion Year (34 page)

“Alan, my old!” Peter yelped, tipping his chair back onto four legs and rising to greet him. “Sir Alan, Knight and Baronet, can you feature it, haw!
Read
of it, and congratulations, indeed! Comin’ up in the world like one of those infernal French hot-air balloons!”

“Peter! How the Devil d’ye keep?” Lewrie cried, pumping his hand.

“Main-well, Alan, main-well, I will allow,” Rushton said with a smug and satisfied smirk. “In town long, are you?”

“A day or two more, perhaps, then back to Sheerness. I hear there’s a war on, and the French are bein’ a bother,” Lewrie replied. Hell, that jape pleased once! “How are things in Lords? Met someone you should know … one of yours, Percy Viscount Stangbourne?”

“Hell of a fellow!” was Peter’s opinion. “Simply mad-keen to have a go at the Frogs with that regiment he raised, and the grandest sportsman going. Has bottom at the gaming tables, let me tell you! Got a head on his shoulders, too … quite unlike half the twits that sit in Lords. He actually stays awake, pays attention, and damme if he don’t make plain sense when he speaks up. Quite unlike
me,
Lord knows, haw haw! Here, let’s take a table and have a glass or two.”

“How’s Clotworthy?” Lewrie asked, once two glasses of brandy appeared. “Still up to his old tricks?”

“Prosperin’ quite nicely,” Peter told him, with a wink and a nod over Clotworthy Chute’s chosen profession, that of a charming “Captain Sharp” who specialised at separating new-come heirs and aspiring “chaw-bacons” from some of their money by playing the knowing guide to every pleasure and absolute necessity of life in London, sharing a very pretty penny with all the tailors, hatmakers, renting agents, and furniture and art dealers to whom he steered the gullible. “Of late, the lad’s gone
honest
 … sort of. Artworks, statuary, furnishings, and the sort of classical tripe people used to bring back from their Grand Tours of the Continent.” That stunning news was delivered with another wink and a nod. “Have you the time, you should see his new shop.”

“Bronze Greek or Roman statues made a thousand years old in one week in a salt-water bath, hey? I saw him pull that off in Venice! He has a genuine talent, and a damned fine eye for the real article, I’ll give him that,” Lewrie said with a laugh. “If I don’t see him before I leave, give him my very best regards.”

“Oh, I shall. So. If you haven’t been dined out on your newest baubles,” Rushton said, pointing at the star on Lewrie’s coat, “yet, I mean t’say … we should dine together, tonight. My treat.”

“That’d be grand, Peter, but I’m promised,” Lewrie had to tell him.

“Not with your father,” Rushton said with a shiver.

“With a lady,” Lewrie corrected him, hoping to leave it at that.

“Oh ho! Anyone I know? Or, would care to know?” Peter leered.

“She
may
be known to you,” Lewrie hinted, off-handedly.

“Well, it can’t be that Rooski wench, Eudoxia Durschenko. Her circus and all’s on tour for the Summer,” Rushton said, puzzled. “Off somewhere far north and nasty, where the locals offer sheep dung for admission, haw! And, I hear Percy Stangbourne’s mad for her, anyway. Who else do we both know you could hunt up on short notice, hmm … my word, that’s a poser.”

“And it ain’t Tess … or a parlour guessing game,” Lewrie rejoined with another laugh. “How is Tess, by the way?”

“Still utterly
delightful,
old son!” Peter boasted. “Found her a very good place, convenient to Parliament … it can be
days
between real business … and I must confess I’ve become rather fond of her. I thank you for introducing us, and feel forever in your debt for it … even if the wife won’t.”

“Spoilin’ her proper?” Lewrie teased. “And, you’re welcome.”

“Oddest thing … she seems pleased and content with the simplest things. Doesn’t pout for gew-gaws, and all that, as your run-of-the-mill courtesan or mistress will. Simple, conservative tastes, and … comes of bein’ bog-Irish poor so long, I s’pose,” Peter said with a shake of his head in wonder. “Should I give
her
your regards?”

“Only if you think it best,” Lewrie told him.

“Really, now … who
is
the lady in question?” Rushton said more animatedly, leaning forward on his elbows and leering. “You leave me most perplexed.”

“A gentleman never tells, Peter,” Lewrie gently chid him.

“The
Devil
they don’t!” Rushton hooted with glee. “If one can’t boast, then what’s the point o’ chasin’ quim?”

“My lips are sealed,” Lewrie said, shaking his head “no.”

“Well, if you won’t you won’t,” Rushton said with a sigh as he leaned back and took a sip of his brandy. “I s’pose you’ll be back at sea in a week, anyway, with no time for sport, so whoever she is, take what joy you can before. Keep the French in line, on
their
side of the Channel, there’s a good fellow.”

“Crossin’ the Channel ain’t like puntin’ down the Avon,” Lewrie dismissively said. “I haven’t spent all
that
much time in it, but it’s a nasty piece of work, one day out o’ three, and a right bastard on the fourth. Hellish-strong tides sweep up and down it, and a contrary wind can whistle up when you’re halfway across. It’s hard to feature just
how
the Frogs intend t’manage it, at all.”

“You’ve not been following the papers, old son,” Rushton objected, shifting impatiently in his chair and leaning forward again. “Where the Devil have you
been,
you haven’t kept up?”

“West Indies,” Lewrie told him with a grin.

“Soon as the war began again, last May, Bonaparte started shifting nigh an hundred thousand troops to the coast, and began building an armada of boats … might’ve launched it all
before
May. There’s umpteen
thousands
of boats of all descriptions, barges, gunboats, sailing craft, rowing craft as big as Cleopatra’s that might be able to carry whole batteries of artillery, limbers, caissons, forge waggons,
and
the horses!” Rushton hurried to explain. “They tell us in Parliament that they’re massin’ ’em round Boulogne, Dunkirk, and Calais, mostly, for the shortest trip cross the Dover Straits, but they’re buildin’ ’em in any port or river, from Brest to Amsterdam. I tell you, old son, Bonaparte means to try it on, sometime this Summer we’re told to expect, and if ‘Boney’ does, then all our Sea Fencibles, Yeoman militias, and our pathetically small army won’t be able to handle ’em!” Peter gravely insisted, jabbing a forefinger on the table top. “We can build all the Martello towers we wish, but the French will just sweep round those and head for London, laughing all the way.”

“What the Hell’s a Martello tower?” Lewrie asked, frowning.

“Looks like a big, tall drum, with lots of guns, but they’re too far apart from each other to deny the ground between ’em, and the garrisons’re just large enough to defend themselves, penned up inside.”

Lewrie would have asked Rushton what a Sea Fencible was, too, but that might have been confessing a tad too much ignorance. He supposed someone could inform him, sooner or later.

“Can’t exceed the
budget,
after all,” Rushton sneered, tossing back a dollop of brandy. “The nation’s survival mustn’t reduce the subsidies to our
good
allies, the Austrians!

“Now, when he was still First Lord of the Admiralty, Earl Saint Vincent assured us the Navy could handle things … told us, ‘I do not say the French cannot come, my lords, what I say is that the French will not come
by sea
’! Reassurin’, ’til that dodderin’ Pitt reclaimed office and turfed him out for Lord Melville, who most-like don’t know what an
oar
looks like. God, for all we know, Alan, the French
might
float over in really
big
hot-air balloons and land soldiers right in Whitehall. We’ve heard they’d experimented with the bloody things … s’truth!” Rushton barked, in response to Lewrie’s stunned look. “The bloody snail-eatin’ bastards might have
two
hundred thousand men in arms round Boulogne,” he said on, leaning on his elbows again, looking wearied and depressed. “We all just hope that you and the rest of the Navy
can
handle ’em when they come. I
like
bein’ a philandering rake-hell, with lashings o’ ’tin’ and a lovely mistress t’spend it on, Alan. A
free
English gentleman, who’d prefer t’die in my bed, and not get beheaded by a French guillotine. All that stands between us right now are our stout ‘wooden walls.’ And salty sods like you!”

*   *   *

That rant had been a tad too depressing for the both of them, so Lewrie had not stayed at Lloyd’s much longer after that one brandy was drunk. He walked back to the Madeira Club, hoping for a long nap to restore his flagging energies, but … it wasn’t Lydia’s promised note that the day-servant who manned the desk and cloak room held out to him. It was a letter from the First Secretary to Admiralty, William Marsden, requiring him to report at his earliest convenience upon the morrow to be briefed upon “certain confidential matters pertaining to the threat of possible invasion.”

“Good Christ, I guess it’s serious!” he muttered.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

“Oh Dear Lord above,” Lydia Stangbourne muttered, setting down her tea cup and sighing resignedly. “The bloody papers, the bloody scribblers!”

She was back in the gossip columns again, as was Captain Sir Alan Lewrie, Bart. Though no names could be mentioned, anyone in London who followed the news could figure out who was involved.

Last evening, a dashing Naval Person, recently made Knight and Baronet, was seen in the company of a Lady best-known to our readers for obtaining a Bill of Divorcement, which was an infamous marvel in our pages two years running. Perhaps the Lady in question may teach the heroic “Sea-Dog” some new parlour Tricks, or, has our Jason obtained a fresh sheet-anchor for his good ship
Argo?

If it had been the
Times
or the
Gazette,
the jape might have been printed in Latin or Greek, though both papers were not immune to such smirks in English, these days, she realised, laying the newspaper aside. She shook her head and let out another sigh, thankful that the damnable “observer” had only seen them together at supper, not later as they entered Willis’s Rooms for the night.

“Hallo, sister, and aren’t you a picture?” her brother, Percy, commented as he came breezing into the small, informal dining room, as chipper as ever.

“Good morning, Percy,” Lydia said, forcing a smile on her face … and folding the paper so that that item would not show. “Cook will be delighted that you came to breakfast on time, for a change. Have a good night, did you?”

“Smashing night!” Percy crowed, sweeping his coat-tails as he sat down. There was a pot of coffee for him on the side-board, and a servant poured a cup for him at once. “Good ho! Bacon
and
kippers! I’m famished. Thank you, James,” he said as his plate was delivered. After creaming and sugaring to his taste, and a first sip, he went on. “Yes, the cards were with me … at Almack’s, not the Cocoa Tree. The change was good for me. Oh, I was down about five thousand for a bit, but finally broke even, and then a couple of side wagers put me a thousand to the good. What did you do with
your
evening, and was it enjoyable?”

“Most enjoyable,” Lydia said, colouring a little at the memory. “I went to supper with Captain Lewrie. He knew of this perfectly
fine
chop-house in Savoy Street, and you simply
must
go there, Percy! They have … it’s like an ‘all-nations’ dram shop in a way.
Emigré
French
chefs,
a Neapolitan who specialises in fish dishes, even a
Hungarian
who prepares the most
marvellous
medallions of veal or lamb, something called a
ragoût,
one they call a
goulash,
and there was an appetiser of smoked oysters in a sweet, hot sauce that was heavenly!”

“With Captain Lewrie?” Percy said, his fork paused halfway to his mouth, took his bite, chewed, then got a sly, teasing look. “Damn my eyes, Lydia. Has the gallant Sir Alan caught your interest?”

“He is most charming and amusing to me … without the unctuous smarm of most of the men I know,” Lydia replied, going arch, bland, and imperious. “He’s a most admirable fellow. Soon to leave us, more’s the pity. Admiralty’s ordering him back to Sheerness on the morrow … a confidential matter, was all he could tell me of it. He should be at the Admiralty this minute, being told what it may be.”