Seasons of War 2-Book Bundle (55 page)

WILLIAM, DUKE OF CLARENCE: William was appointed Admiral of the Fleet by his brother the Regent in December 1811, and maintained the post until 1821 when it passed to the Earl of St. Vincent. It was more of a titular position than an active role for him, although he was known to seek permission from the Regent and Parliament to go off on various missions now and again – thus lending credence to his mounting of an expedition to find his fictional niece, Emily. When at sea, he flew his own “Duke of Clarence” flag. William became the Lord High Admiral in 1827.

While researching over the course of writing my book, I found intriguing revelations in Philip Ziegler’s biography
King William IV
. Although William was known as being hot-headed, impulsive, silly, and boorish, he also had a generous heart. It is well documented that he helped two penniless orphans – one in Newfoundland and one in Plymouth – by financing their clothing, schooling, and training as midshipmen. In time, one of these lads became a rear admiral, and William had the pleasure of signing his commission. I was delighted to discover that my fabricated storyline of Clarence’s generosity towards young Magpie is in line with the man’s true character.

SHIPS: Although there have been several ships known as HMS
Amelia,
HMS
Amethyst
, and the USS
Liberty,
the vessels and their crews in
Come Looking for Me
are fictional.

Prologue

Somehow she knew the way
. Even though the night was concealed in a graveyard gloom, and she had been forbidden to explore the lower decks of the ship, she knew where she would find him. And he … she prayed … would be waiting for her.

With a lantern in one hand, her other pressing the thin material of her nightgown against her shivering body, Emily slowly picked her way through a labyrinth of greasy hammocks, rounded with the sleeping forms of the sailors. The sea was rough this night, the wind was a choir of melancholic wails, and snarls of thunder occasionally disturbed the creaking rhythm of the ship, but no activity, no human calls or commands, resonated overhead on the weather decks. No other creature seemed awake at this late hour except for the ship — her old timbers cursing and shuddering as the relentless waves thrashed her again and again. Emily wanted to believe that the sleepers, and the wood planks beneath her bare feet, belonged to the
Isabelle
, but something knocked along the halls of her mind, some biting recollection that it could not be possible, for that great old ship, whose hull had been beaten and burned, lay rotting in the murky depths of the Atlantic.

Locating the ladder to the orlop, she descended its slippery rungs, holding the lantern before her to light her way. The reek of unwashed bodies overwhelmed the salty air, and here, in the ship’s bowels, the atmosphere was more hellish — a far cry from the peacefulness that slumbered above. Lying abandoned and forgotten between empty wine casks and barrels of weevil-infested provisions were old men: blind, emaciated, half-naked, scratching furiously at limbs that were no longer there. Their noses were in various stages of decay, their skin a mess of red blotches, and they suffered cruelly, pleading with her to bring them a drink of water. Among them lay the young lieutenant, Octavius Lindsay, crumpled and still against the damp wall, an oozing depression where the side of his head should have been, his black eyes locked on her in a death stare.

Despite the sinister scenes, Emily pushed on — her feet unsteady on the warm blood that slithered like a serpent around the deck — more determined than ever to find him. There, up ahead, beyond the mire of human misery, was the surgeon’s operating table. Hunched over it was a slim, shadowy figure, struggling, in the dim illumination of an oil lamp, to amputate the leg of a young boy who cried out most mournfully for his mother.

Leander.

Emily opened her mouth to call out to him, but could not summon her voice. Instead, a low, almost preternatural laugh erupted next to her. Spread out upon an oak bench was the corpulent form of a woman, mending a grubby shirt. When her laughter ceased she began humming a tune, as if she found strange delight in the pervasive suffering. Though Emily could not see the woman’s features, she knew it was Meg Kettle.

“Ya daft girl,” Meg hissed, jerking a fat thumb in the direction of the operating table. “’Ave ya come lookin’ fer yer precious Doctor Braden? Why, that ain’t him. I told yas before … yer doctor’s lyin’ on the ocean floor.”

Emily groped behind her for the ladder that would take her away from Meg’s rising cackle and the pain of her words, but as she mounted the first rung, the ladder — like the noses of the wretched sailors — collapsed in decay and disappeared altogether. Trapped, reeling in despair, she froze in horror as something unseen stirred in the shadows at her back. A gurgling groan followed the ominous sound of heavy, shifting chains. With a quivering hand, Emily turned and lifted the lantern, knowing all too well whose countenance would appear in the circle of light.

Trevelyan gazed at her a long while with the empty eyes of a tormented soul, and then, without warning, he lurched forward, seized her ankle with his scarred hands, and pulled her down into his dreadful darkness.

1

Wednesday, August 4, 1813

6:30 a.m.

(Morning Watch, Five Bells)

Aboard HMS
Amethyst

In the Bay of Fundy

Ten-year-old Magpie
, the little sailmaker, stood stock-still alongside the starboard rail, wishing the beats of his heart would quit banging on his eardrums. He was certain of what he had seen. Had no one else noticed it then, gliding past them silently like a gigantic alligator, studying the movements of its prey before going in for the kill?

With a darting glance around him, Magpie could see that the weather decks were mainly empty; most of the men had not yet been called from their cots, or if they had arisen before the bosun’s mate hollered,
“Up all hammocks ahoy,”
they were surely dressing below and contemplating their morning sustenance of cheese, oatmeal, buttered biscuit, and beer. The few who milled about above deck seemed — though sleepy-eyed and dragging their feet — to be completely absorbed in their chores, and the Officer of the Watch was nowhere in sight. Magpie was so shocked by the tranquillity of the
Amethyst
that he wondered if what he had seen had simply been a remnant of the frightful dream that had shaken him awake at this early hour.

Readjusting his new green eye-patch, Magpie again squinted into the fog bank that swirled around the hull and masts of the
Amethyst
like the wispy gauze of a woman’s evening gown, his little sweaty hands instinctively fingering the blades of the magnificent dirks — the ones the privateersman, Prosper Burgo, had given him — which he had hooked upon the length of rope tied at his waist to hold up his trousers. He gave them a reassuring pat. Should the
Amethyst
be so ill-fated as to be attacked by ruffian boarders this morning, he’d be ready. In the meantime, it was imperative … he had to alert someone. Leaving the rail, he forthwith ran into Mr. Austen, the former commander of HMS
Isabelle
.

“Magpie! Whatever are you doing up so early? Surely you’re not mending sails at this hour?”

“Oh, sir,” said Magpie breathlessly, “I couldn’t sleep. I had one o’ them bad dreams. Trevelyan had come sailin’ back in his
Serendipity
, and he was aimin’ to kill all o’ us.”

Fly Austen looked down at him with an expression in his eyes that Magpie longed to believe was affection. “And tell me, in this dream of yours, did you save me again, as you once did, by plunging your dirks into Trevelyan’s thighs?”

Magpie peeked up shyly at the man for whom he harboured such great respect. “I woke up first afore Trevelyan started the killin’,” he said. “But ya gotta know, sir, if need be … I would do it agin fer ya.”

Mr. Austen gave Magpie a warm smile. “But if it was only a dream, why is your breathing still laboured, and why are you trembling as if Trevelyan himself were standing behind you with a pistol directed at your head?”

“Oh! Sir! I think we need to clear the deck and beat to quarters.”

“I beg your pardon?”

Magpie pointed into the gloomy fog. “Just now, somethin’ … somethin’ went glidin’ past us.”

Mr. Austen swung around toward the rail, a note of alarm creeping into his voice. “Are you quite certain?”

“Aye, sir … it came so close.”

“What exactly, Magpie?”

“A ship, sir.”

“Could it have been a fishing vessel? We
are
sailing in popular fishing waters.”

“I seen its hull, and its gunports.”

“Gunports?”

Magpie nodded his curly head.

“One deck of them or two?”

“Could only see one, sir, on account of this low-lyin’ fog.”

“And were the gunports opened or closed?”

“Closed … I think … sir.”

“Were you able to determine its nationality?”

“Nay, sir, I didn’t see no masts nor shrouds. I didn’t see no distinguishin’ colours or pennants.”

Hastily Mr. Austen removed his bicorne hat, closed his eyes, and angled his head over the railing, as if he were listening to the sough of the fresh winds that ruffled his dark, wavy hair.

“What are ya hearin’, sir?”

Fly called out to the men working on the weather decks for silence, and then he put his finger to his lips and looked down at Magpie. “I’m wondering if it’s possible to hear the beating of their sails.”

Pleased to have an excuse to lay down their brooms, barrels, and ropes, the sailors abandoned their posts and prowled to the rail alongside Mr. Austen. Among them, Magpie spied Morgan Evans. Once the carpenter’s mate on the
Isabelle
, he had recently been given a promotion, and was presently the
Amethyst
’s head carpenter. A woolly thrum cap had replaced the knitted sock he once wore upon his head of shaggy hair, so that the men could easily spot him in the crowd. Morgan stood before Mr. Austen, bouncing from one foot to the other as he always did when his nerves had got the better of him. “Shall I fetch Captain Prickett, sir?”

“Aye, Mr. Evans. And perhaps you could also ask the bosun to awaken the men, and Biscuit to douse his breakfast fires, though he’ll grumble like the devil.”

Mr. Austen’s quietly spoken requests confirmed Magpie’s worst suspicions. His legs suddenly lost their strength, as if someone had thumped his knees with a mallet, and he had to lean against the ship’s side for support. The Amethysts had not seen action for a month, not since the day they had confronted Trevelyan and his ship, the USS
Serendipity
, off the coast of South Carolina. Since then, there had been several sightings of enemy flotillas and American warships, but always the chase had ended in a lucky escape.

In no time at all, the bosun had raised the dead with his cry, the drummer had beat the men to quarters, and soon the decks were swarming with officers and marines and ordinary sailors, all questioning — as they assumed their stations — what it was that had been sighted in the fog. Captain Prickett emerged from his great cabin and stomped about the quarterdeck, buttoning his waistcoat — with great difficulty — over his abundant belly, and barking orders at his dazed men:

“Reduce to fighting sail. Double reef the topsails. Where the hell is the cursed bosun? The canvas is
his
responsibility! And where is the master to tell me where the devil we are? Mr. Piper! Clean up this mess at once, and clear for action. Jim Beef … if that’s a can of grog I see in your hand, I suggest you dispense with it right away. Nay, man, not in your mouth. Over the side, if you please. I’ll not have you falling down drunk at your post.”

Close on Prickett’s heavy heels was First Lieutenant Lord Bridlington, his white hands clasped as if in prayer, shuffling his feet and continually biting his lower lip. “Mr. Austen, can you be quite certain it’s an enemy warship? The boy, Magpie, cannot be trusted. He only has one eye!”

“We cannot take
any
chances, Mr. Bridlington.”

“Mr. Austen’s right, Bridlington, we must prepare for the worst,” said Prickett, throwing back his shoulders, which only resulted in his belly becoming more conspicuous.

“But these mists! We cannot see a thing. What will we be shooting at?”

“We won’t take the first shot, Mr. Bridlington,” said Mr. Austen, restoring his bicorne hat to his head, “in the event they prove to be a friend, not a foe. We’ll wait to see from what direction their fire comes … if it comes at all.”

Lord Bridlington withered away with a cry, and tried to hide himself behind Captain Prickett, as if he hoped that — were shots to be fired — his corpulent superior would take the hits for him.