A Jester’s Fortune - Dewey Lambdin

"No, sir."

"Let's keep it that way, shall we?" Charlton suggested. "Your presence there,.. you'd come to anchor to investigate, and were gulled. Then taken prisoner, before you could inform your ship. Thought they were French, found they were Venetian, or so they claimed. And offered to render assistance… laws of the sea, that sort of thing. A silly error on your part, an even greater stupidity on Mlavic's."

"Is that the way you'll report it, sir? That I was silly?" "God, no, Lewrie!" Charlton frowned. "Admiral Jervis will know the whole truth, no matter the consequences to me. But that's for the Fleet to know… and for honest Crown subjects to not. I'll tell him you were against it from the first, and that I was a fool for ignoring your advice. That I find you clever, aggressive and enterprising, and a man of many parts. A most resourceful fellow, whose value to me and this squadron was… well, inestimable, to be blunt. Is the admiral of a mind to keep this squadron together… and me in charge"-he winced for a rueful moment-"I'd hope you and Jester are part of it. If not, then I will press most strenuously for Admiral Jervis to make use of your talents in another, more responsible capacity."

"God, uhm… thankee, sir. That's most kind of you to say," Alan flummoxed, blushing with pride. And with guilt for how he ruined Charlton's scheme-and was now being praised for it! "Most kind."

Poor honest bastard. Lewrie felt like cringing. So straight you can't imagine…!

"My warmest regards to your passengers, sir. My heartfelt condolences to Mistress Connor for her ill treatment and her bereavement. We'll do everything to speed her on her way, tell her. And extend my invitation for supper to one and all. Uhm… her son…"

" 'Bout five, sir. Breeched, but you know young lads and table-manners. Polite little git, but…" Lewrie shrugged.

Charlton shivered, regarded his good carpets and upholsteries with a certain foreboding. "Well, if we must, we must. Roll up those carpets… I've slipcovers. On your way, then, Lewrie." "Aye aye, sir."

CHAPTER 2

Lewrie watched Pylades' gig and his own launch and cutter row away. So much luggage, chests and such Lord Peter and Clotworthy had brought aboard! And those mysteriously heavy wooden crates that had had to be stored on deck, too. Lewrie wished Commander Fillebrowne joy of their contents: those allegedly "Roman bronzes" of female acrobats that Clotworthy had had cast from a sketchbook, then antiqued in an acid-bath and a few days in the salt water of Venice 's Lagoon!

"Bloody ancient what?" Clotworthy had haw-hawed. "Old-hokin! at any rate. Heard he was anglin' for the very old. Just dug up from the Morea… Turk lands, and you know what they think o' images in human likeness. Why, 'twas a wonder they didn't melt 'em down for guns!"

"Think he'll bite, Clotworthy?" Lewrie had asked. To his untrained eye, they looked authentic; he'd have bit… if they had come from anyone else!

"Pay well for th' privilege, too, I'll warrant!" Clotworthy had roared with glee. "If not him, some other fool. If not them, I've an 'early' Canova, 'long with his sketches t'prove it. Best forgeries ever. We may not see each other after supper t'night, so… a quick departure on the Lisbon packet, right after the sale, hmm? So, good-bye, me old. I spect we'll be readin' 'bout ya in th' damn Gazette, hey?"

Lewrie shook his head in bewildered merriment, glad to see the back of him, though amused as always by Chute's scandalous antics. Just as long as it was others who got fleeced!

"Frolicsome pair, sir," Lieutenant Knolles commented, "what?"

"You didn't buy anything from him, did you? Play cards…?"

"Forewarned, sir… thankee." Knolles smiled.

"I'll go below for a moment, see the Shockleys to the deck."

He marveled all over again, as he entered his great-cabins, to see the pair of Venetian red-lacquered commodes-the geniune article, not lacca povera … at least Chute had assured him. He'd have to crate them back up, store them on the orlop. They'd never last a month, when his every furnishing was rushed below every gun-drill or call to Quarters. Free, he scoffed; free, gratis… from Clotworthy?

"Make up for th' tatties an' gravy, Alan, old son," he'd sworn. "Not pinched, neither. Made such a killin' an' expect such a killin', I could afford t'be magnanimous, hey? Yer wife'll love 'em."

And there sat Sir Malcolm and Lady Lucy, sipping tea with Mrs. Connor. Rather forbiddingly, Alan thought; rather frigid. Well, Sir Malcolm was all affable… but Lucy was a bit nose-high and snippish.

"Cap'an Lewrie!" little Michael cried, leaving off his games with the cats. He ran to hug Lewrie s leg and look up adoringly, making Lewrie cringe inside anew. "Look what! Whiskers can play ball!"

"Ah, that's marvelous, Michael," Lewrie enthused, kneeling to his level. "Did you teach him all by yourself? He's a clever kitten, isn't he? And you're a clever lad. Or did Toulon show him how?"

The first night aboard, shivering with fright, weeping and wailing most miserable from all he'd been forced to see and hear so young, little Michael had been inconsolable. 'Til Toulon had slunk up close and pressed against him, climbed in his lap and rubbed, bestowing cat-kisses and purring. Slept with him, too, in a hammock slung low in the chart-space, and never left his side. 'Til they'd come back from shore at Venice, of course, with Michael's present, a grey-and-black-striped tabby kitten of his very own-best of the thousands.

"No, I did!" Michael insisted loudly. "Come see!"

"I will, I promise. After supper tonight, we'll all have us a rare old romp, hey? But there's ship's business right now. Can't be a slack-hand captain, remember?"

"I 'member." Michael nodded, solemnly but impishly.

"Sir Malcolm… Lady Lucy, the boats from Lionheart are near, and your trunks and such are slung, ready to load," Lewrie told them.

"Ah, then we must be going. Come, my dear," Sir Malcolm said, finishing his tea and getting to his feet. "You'll join us on deck, Mistress Connor?"

"Your pardons, sir, but," Theoni replied, standing up and dipping him a short curtsey, "this close… I mean no discourtesy to you, but I have no wish to even have a glimpse of that island again, nor ever hear it mentioned. I hope you understand."

"I understand completely, ma'am, truly," Sir Malcolm said with sympathy. "Good-bye, then. And may I express to you my fondest wishes you may have a safe and tranquil journey to England. And find every contentment and joy once there, for both you and your fine little man. Come, Michael! A parting kiss! You're such a splendid young fellow. We'll miss you desperately, that's the boy!" And Michael complied.

"Good-bye, Lady Shockley," Theoni said, dipping her a departing curtsey as well. "A safe journey for you."

"Good-bye, my dear. Though we will see each other at supper?" Lucy answered, gushing so honey-sweet Lewrie almost winced.

"I'll see you out on deck, sir… ma'am?" he offered. "Want to come, Michael? Just you, not your kitten. He's not an old salt yet, not like Toulon."

"I'll mind him, Michael, you go on and watch the sailors and all," Theoni assured him.

"Why, d'ye know," Sir Malcolm suddenly announced, "we could all end on the same packet from Gibraltar. Certainly the same packet from Lisbon. See Commander Lewrie's things through customs, and make sure you arrive safe, Mistress Connor! Couldn't we, Lucy?"

"Why… yes!" Lucy replied, nonplussed for a moment at such an egregious notion, but recovering quickly. "How delightful a prospect!"

She shot Lewrie a glare; who took a squint to see what Theoni had made of that; receiving in turn a subtle arch of a perfect, artfully arched (and lovely, he thought!) brow, and a faintly amused cast to a forced-to-be-pleasant smile. The passage to Venice had become heaven. Passage from Venice had been all elbows and knees, grumblings and cattiness. No privacy, of course, not a jot; no chance to…

"Be back soon," Lewrie promised Theoni Connor. "I'll have Andrews or Cony keep a weather-eye on him, never fear."

"Then he will be in good hands," Theoni answered, a real smile playing at the corners of her lips; so full of hidden meaning and promise, he hoped. "None better," she added as she gathered up the kitten.

The second night of passage, Lewrie had been too fitful from his wound to sleep, despite Mr. Howse's infusion of laudanum in wine- enough, he'd assured Lewrie; to ease pain but leave him his wits should he be called on deck. Wakeful and tossing in a hammock in the dining-coach, too many years away from his midshipman days to be comfortable in it, he'd risen and stolen to his wine-cabinet, limping and wincing as the ship rolled and heaved her way north. He'd accidentally wakened Theoni, and she'd come to help him as he'd groped and stumbled to the settee. She'd fetched his wine and taken a measure for herself.

Their wine was in those heavy, ornate chalices that no one still living had claimed, once their property had been sorted out and returned to them. Those silver chalices that Clotworthy Chute had gasped over at first sight; he couldn't exactly swear, mind, but he thought them to be Cellini's work, or just as old and valuable, cast in his style. "What I say is, Alan, m'dear… were a fellow like you t'own 'em, he'd never leave someone th' likes o' me alone with 'em!"

They'd talked in low mutters, fearful they'd waken Michael, who had that night slept as if drugged, himself-his first real, refreshing night of rest after his satanic ordeal. They'd laughed a bit, softly, as the hours fled by with no call from above to summon him. Shared the parts of their pasts they'd cared to reveal. And, by the light of the single guttering candle, he'd been mesmerised by her tantalising, exotic beauty. Sitting so close together, a lonely…

Admit it, a randy man, too long without, he'd chid himself.

And a lonely, frightened widow, rescued from the very brink, the knife-edge of rape and murder, the butchering of her only child. Some gratitude she'd felt, perhaps; or hero-worship? After playing stoic and brave for so long, she'd broken down and wept on his shoulder, so quietly still, stifling her rasping, heaving, nigh-screaming terrors to spare Michael, burying her face in his neck and moaning into his shirt all she'd tried to suppress; including her widowhood, he'd imagined.

She'd cried it all out, round Two Bells of the Middle Watch… then turned her face up to his without a word. Kissed him with fierce need, fingers and hands, arms and mouth strong and beseeching hungrily. Breeches, shirt, bed-gown and chemise torn and flung aside. Then, into the hanging, swaying double bed-cot, making love to him so grasping and engulfing, so desperately exuberant, as if lovemaking could purge all the shrieks, the blood and terror away-banish fear and mortality, or the uncertainty of her future in a cold, alien new land; the grief of leaving her old one.

Fierce and strong, urgent and passionate, clasping him viselike to her, and Alan had responded with a fury of his own, to forget for a time just how close to murder he'd been, too. It had felt… holy!

Silent, she'd been, though, stifling the cries she might've made, moaning, whimpering and panting into his neck. Even when her bliss had come, she'd merely stiffened, shuddered, spasmed, with a long hitch of her exhausted breath before relaxing. Later, they'd dared to coo and to chuckle, deep in their throats, barely above whispers near each other's ears. Nestling spent, languidly stroking lovers, 'til her need came to her again, then his… then hers a joyful fourth and last.

They hadn't dared touch since, not with the others aboard to see or hear, not with Lucy peering at them so deuced sharp, as if she had divined all; nor with Peter and Clotworthy garrulous and yarning, still keeping their bachelor hours and sipping far into the night. A glance, two hands brushed as they passed, a demure smile of eternal mystery she bestowed upon him when no one was looking-that was all they managed. It had been so soul-shattering, Lewrie could almost put it down to some laudanum-induced fever-dream, and feared Theoni had used him for cleansing, for a personal Epiphany; one memorable night was all she'd needed, and should he approach her, she'd spurn him and blame it on weakness, a mistake never to be repeated.

'Til now, of course. That fondness in her voice, that smile, so secret and promising…! Perhaps this very evening, after Charlton and his supper. Or in the few days of privacy on-passage to Gibraltar?

Damn fool, damn fool! he sighed to himself, feeling the fork of his breeches go taut in spite of himself; here I nigh swore off, an' look what a mockery I made o' that! He recalled most happily, though, a sight of her slim, womanly form, her chestnut hair flowing down low to her waist, the scent of rosemary and thyme in that hair. So perfectly made, gliding on cat-feet in that candle s dim glow, four or five inches less than his height, and so enfoldable, so well-fit to him!

He came back to reality, and rocked on the balls of his feet on his quarterdeck, gazing out towards the island. A shrill cry, followed by the patter of feet came, as little Michael and one of the ship's boy-servants scampered about in the waist; Tag, it looked like, with Bosun Cony watching their every move, grinning a long-absent fathers grin at their antics, and thinking of his own little Will back in Anglesgreen.

Blocks creaked as the first net of luggage was slung over-side. Lewrie turned to see Sir Malcolm Shockley overseeing its transfer, with his manservant and Midshipman Hyde. And Lucy approaching; smirking!

"My word, Alan," she said, standing by the bulwarks, a tad too close for his liking. "Such a gay dog you've grown to be, sir. I see you're a doting father, the way you cosset that poor lad. But not much of a husband, in truth… do I read the signs aright?" she simpered as she tapped him with her fan and spread it artfully. "What horrid folk we've turned out. A Greek woman, my dear! Taking advantage of her in a fragile moment… though I must own she has a certain attractiveness, a… c'est-a-dire… an animal magnetism, n'est-ce pas? Why, I have a good mind to write your lady-wife to let her know what a lecherous Corinthian she really has for a husband!" She tittered quite gaily.

"You wouldn't dare!" Lewrie growled, though shivering; aye, she'd be the sort t'do it, too! All for bloody-minded spite!

She laughed at his discomfort, matching the pace he took to get a sociably acceptable distance away from her.

"Mean t say…" he amended. "What signs could you possibly read? Or find t'read? There's nought between…" Should've taken that tack first! he told himself.