Seasons of War 2-Book Bundle (85 page)

“Did you lose another finger?”

Bridlington brought his hands to his face. “Noooo.”

“Then you can pick yourself up, brush yourself off, and make yourself useful.”

In no mood to deal with Bridlington’s indignation, Fly turned away to rally volunteers. “See to these men! Easy now! Fetch the stretchers if need be! Run ahead and tell Mr. Brockley he’ll soon have four more patients.” Sighting Morgan’s distinctive woolly thrum cap in the crowd, he pulled the carpenter aside. “Could you provide some assistance in the hospital? I fear Mr. Brockley is in way over his head. If he carries on as he has been, we’ll all be devoted to laudanum when we reach England.”

Morgan’s fist touched his cap accordingly, and he was about to head off when he discovered Magpie at his side. Having scuttled down the mizzen the minute the ship stopped rocking, the little sailmaker had overhead Mr. Austen’s request. “If ya want, sir, I’ll help too. I knows somethin’ o’ bandages, and sand on the floor, and the like.”

“I’m grateful to you, Magpie. Perhaps you could sprinkle vinegar on the floor? I believe a good disinfecting is long overdue.”

Magpie nodded, recognizing the importance of his new role.

Morgan caught Fly’s attention, his lips moving silently. “What about Mrs. Kettle?”

“Trundled out,” he mouthed in reply.

Having cleared the accident scene, Fly rushed back to the taffrail to raise his spyglass once again. Was it his imagination? Had the ships gained on them? He gazed up at the
Amethyst
’s sails; not all of them were set. Where was the sailing master? It was imperative they stay ahead of them, at least until nightfall. He was about to call for the ship’s speed, and to the captain of the tops to see to the unfurling of the gallants, when, as if in answer to their misfiring gun, there came an answer back.

A single gun boomed over the water, sending a chill through Fly. Around him, the Amethysts stopped in their tracks. Still clutching boxes and pikes and muskets and cannonballs, their eyes flew to the stern. At so far a distance, what did it mean? Was it a signal from a friend, or a signal to war?

At sea

Leander lifted his head
up, and as he listened, he nudged Biscuit, who lay slumped against him.

“Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?” grumbled Biscuit, rubbing his sleepy eyes. “I hear nothin’ but me belly. I swear I swallowed two crabby old women that’re scratchin’ at one another’s faces.”

“Shhh! Listen!” whispered Leander. “Guns firing!”

“I figured it would come to this. Yer hallucinatin’, Doc.” Biscuit looked over at their companions, who were asleep in the skiff’s stern, their mouths open as if hoping to catch a flying fish, one still grasping onto the ropes that governed their single sail. “Apparently, our mates heard nothin’.”

“Wake them up! We must steer toward the guns,” insisted Leander.

“Oh, nice! Folly it is then. Did ya wanna sail below their batteries, and get shot to pieces?”

“Perhaps Providence will smile on us, and we’ll discover they’re the guns of our countrymen.”

“And what if they ain’t?”

“At this point, I no longer care.”

They exchanged a meaningful glance.

“Right then,” whispered Biscuit. Moving nothing more than the muscles of his mouth, he barked, “You there, Helmsman!” It took a considerable amount of Biscuit’s waning energy, and more than one bark to rouse the comatose sailors, as well as a few minutes of waiting before the one holding the sailing ropes looked up in anticipation. “We’re settin’ a new course! Tell ’im where to, Doc.”

Leander felt a flutter in his belly, and a tingling in his weakening limbs. Pressing his clasped hands to his lips, he finally called out, “Due south.”

24

Wednesday, August 25

2:00 p.m.

Winchester

Gus could hardly believe
his ears. What was it old Dr. Braden had just said to his Aunt Sophia? He pinched himself. Was he dreaming? Hoping to hear the suggestion repeated, he fixed his shining eyes on the doctor, who sat across from him at the small oak table in the kitchen at Butterfield Farm. Begrudgingly, his aunt had prepared tea, but in doing so had mortified Gus by refusing to take out her porcelain teapot and saucers from the sideboard, using the excuse that “a country doctor such as yerself deserves, I suppose, nothing more than a clay mug and a basin of bread and butter.”

Old Dr. Braden did not seem in the least bit put off by Aunt Sophia’s scarcity of charm and hospitality, and, thankfully, his surprising suggestion — nay, his invitation — had served to dampen Gus’s embarrassing recollection of the unfavourable beginning to his unexpected call.

“You see, I have occasion to visit a cousin in London who’s long been ailing, and, I thought, as I should only be away a few days, why not take Mr. Walby with me?” He turned to smile at Gus. “Besides, I believe he has a special someone there whom he’s most anxious to see again.”

It took a moment for Aunt Sophia, who was bouncing her homely, ill-tempered baby on her lap, to snap shut her suspended mouth. She seemed as dumbfounded with the invitation as was Gus. “Ya mean that haughty princess what didn’t have the decency to make me acquaintance on the day that fat Duke what’s-his-name left Gus here?”

“She’s not haughty at all, Auntie,” insisted Gus.

Aunt Sophia frowned at her nephew. “Is she the one ya dashed that letter off to yesterday?”

Gus nodded with excitement.

“Well, she won’t have got it yet. She won’t know yer coming.”

“There’s nothing more pleasing than a surprise,” Old Dr. Braden serenely remarked.

“And why should she stoop to receive ya at all? Yer nothing but a midshipmite, and a broken one at that.”

“Because, Auntie, because … because we’re friends,” stammered Gus, wounded by her slight.

“I’m very much hopeful she’ll agree to receive us both, even if she has to call off her guards and archers,” said the doctor, lifting his mug to his lips and taking a generous sip, despite the fact that the tea was of poor quality and tasted quite as if Aunt Sophia had boiled it in laundry water. But he seemed content, and continued in his pleasant manner. “Mr. Walby has delighted me with stories of her warmth and compassion, and her keen sense of adventure.”

“Well, I dunno,” said Aunt Sophia with a toss of her head. “I never heard of a princess what had compassion fer nobody.”

Old Dr. Braden winked at Gus. “I must confess that I’m most anxious to make her acquaintance.”

Aunt Sophia’s eyes suddenly narrowed. “Gus ain’t got no money fer travelling, and no proper clothes fer visiting with a princess, even if she ain’t a haughty one. And I ain’t giving ya nothing fer his expenses.”

“With your permission, good madam,
I
shall take care of his expenses,” said the doctor, sampling his slice of buttered bread.

For a moment Aunt Sophia fell quiet, and then she began hemming and hawing, and soon she was squawking something fierce about having to take on Gus’s chores, for she had no husband — the one she once had having abandoned her months ago for a
tawdry
harlot
in a travelling theatre — and with so many babes underfoot, she simply could not manage more chores; and how if she were to ask the field labourers to take them on she would have to pay them extra, and this would cause her undue grief, for she had very little at her disposal, having seen no money from Gus’s uncle, her seafaring, ne’er-do-well of a brother, in a crow’s age.

Her tedious quibbling left Gus holding his breath. Oh, what if she refused to let him go? He was near to abandoning hope when old Dr. Braden calmly set a five-pound note upon the table, and slid it toward Aunt Sophia. The sudden change in her countenance and deportment was quite remarkable.

“Well, ya appear to be a decent sort, Doctor, so ya can take him. He’s more hindrance than help ’round here anyways.” She wagged a finger at him. “But I ain’t putting ya up fer the night.”

Old Dr. Braden bestowed a generous smile upon her. “As there are many hours of daylight remaining, the minute Mr. Walby has gathered his belongings we shall be on our way, and out of yours.” He lightly tapped the palms of his hands upon the table and looked toward Gus, who sat there in a happy trance, hardly daring to believe his good luck. “Well, young sir, get a move on. Go pack your things.”

Spurred to action, Gus grabbed his crutch and hobbled across the kitchen’s stone floor to the narrow passage of stairs that led to his garret room.

“Now, Doctor, if ya kin bear his sour company and that bent leg o’ his,” said Aunt Sophia, determined to have the last word, “yer welcome to keep him … fer good.”

2:30 p.m.

Portsmouth Harbour

The prisoners due for
transportation were ordered on deck — the frail ones coaxed along with the aid of the guards’ musket butts — where they were to deliver up their mean hammocks and bed-sacks before being herded into rows, according to their ultimate destination. Standing before them, his boots planted in a wide stance upon a raised dais in the bow of the
Illustrious
, was the smug, slovenly lieutenant-in-command, who, in a savage voice, shouted out the place names one-at-a-time: “Dartmoor Prison in the county of Devon; Newgate Prison, London; Woolwich on the Thames, Portchester Castle, Portchester; His Britannic Majesty’s Prison Ship
Brunswick
in the Medway River; His Britannic Majesty’s Prison Ships
Hector
and
La Brave
, Plymouth …”

Trevelyan was among the herded prisoners. Assessing the scenes around him, he could not help but feel encouraged; over half the ship’s company of shuffling skeletons was being moved to make room for a fresh crop of incoming prisoners, newly acquired from various American prizes taken on the Atlantic. With the addition of surly English officers from shore, and their armed soldiers brought along to keep the prisoners orderly — the guards of the prison hulk evidently incapable of instilling them with confidence based on the number of recently attempted escapes — the deck was terribly overcrowded, and every so often one of the frail prisoners would collapse in the crush, crying out in painful despair. Wherever Trevelyan looked, there were sweating, stinking bodies and confusion, and the smoky air around the
Illustrious
quivered with pitiful bleats and raucous commands.

Perhaps this would be easier than he had imagined.

It was essential he stay as close as possible to Twitch, who was now able to stand thanks to a few additional loaves of bread, though the two men were careful not to speak to one another. Their last words had been communicated late in the night, when the others were asleep.

“When they find out, do ya think they’ll hang me?” Twitch had whispered in fearful gulps.

“Nay, it’s me they want, not you,” Trevelyan had assured him, as he handed over his clothes and the final bribe of bread.

Now, as the two waited in their respective lines under the hot afternoon sun, Trevelyan gave Twitch a furtive glance. The American’s countenance was a shade of sickly pale, but he was smartly outfitted in a once-fine muslin shirt, knee breeches, and wooden clogs, his convulsing infrequent and barely noticeable, looking decidedly more regal than his counterparts in their coarse yellow jackets and trousers, stamped with the initials TO for Transport Office, and those pathetic souls who wore nothing at all.

Trevelyan was clad only in his linen drawers, but in a canvas bag he carried a tricorne and a velvet coat — valuable souvenirs of his brief stay on the
Illustrious
. Initially, he had thought it wise to wear them, and then changed his mind, deciding he’d be more conspicuous
in
them than out. They would come in handy, if not now then somewhere down the road. Having overheard chatter that this would be the day for the prisoners’ removal from the hulk, he had smudged his face with tar and hacked off his hair — grown long in his weeks of captivity — with the aid of scissors filched from the careless master, and zealously guarded by the prisoner who had done the filching. His oily, straw-coloured hair now stood straight up on his head, in an untamed style reminiscent of Twitch.

The lieutenant-in-command was in a foul mood. His voice was hoarse from reprimanding his guards for their bumbling organization of the prisoners; his face damp and crimson with fury at discovering, while counting, that some men had either been trampled upon somewhere on the deck, or forgotten in their Black Holes. “As you’re all good-for-nothing,” he yelled in exasperation, “you shall help dole out the rations of fish and bread, and then get yourselves to the aft sheds and out of my way.
I
shall do the counting myself.” He crossed his arms, and set his foot to tap upon the dais while the guards, still brandishing their muskets, scurried about with the hulk’s boys, handing the prisoners their pittance of food for the long journey to their next hell. When it finally came time for the lieutenant to count out the eleven prisoners bound for Newgate, and the sixty-two bound for Woolwich on the Thames, all of whom would be transported together, Trevelyan held his breath until the man was satisfied and had turned away his grumbling, red-faced attention to count the next group. Then, slowly, so as not to excite notice, he traded places with Twitch.

He kept his head down, waiting for a heavy hand to seize his arm, or a bayonet to be thrust into his buttocks. But when nothing happened, when the deck didn’t erupt in pandemonium over his trickery, he dared to glance up. Two English officers and a complement of soldiers were leading the Newgate-Woolwich line of misery toward the set of wooden steps that would take them down to the floating gallery at the water’s edge, and to the waiting launches that would, in turn, take them to shore.

Trevelyan felt some relief, but he could not control the trembling of his hands. He now stood in the line headed for Dartmoor Prison, which had already been checked and counted. But stories of such cruel treatment and suffering had come to those on the
Illustrious
in missives from fellow Americans holed up in that fearsome prison on its black moor that he would have no part of it. He would have to change lines again. But how, when there was no one to change with him this time?