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Authors: Dewey Lambdin
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but thatâs nine hours at eight knotsâsay another seventy or so to the good. And only half a point to looârd of the best course I can hope to make. If the wind didnât get up, and make us reef in. If we donât get headed! Comes westerly again tomorrow, weâll either fall afoul of Ushant down south, or Landâs End or the Scillies up north!
He decided to do his further pondering over charts in his great-cabins, where he could worry and smolder in private.
âGood evening to you, Mister Buchanon,â Alan said, touching the brim of his hat in salute. âI wish you joy of the evening, sir.â
âAnd a peace . . . ahem! And a good night to you, too, sir.â
Lewrie nodded firmly at Buchanonâs sensible reticence, and his rephrasing, then took himself to the larboard ladder to the gun deck.
Dispatches aboard, too valuable to lose, he mused; Frogs out in fleet strength . . . wind most like to die away to nothinâ, head us again . . . or come up by the bloody barge load, and . . .
Damn that boy!
C H A P T E R 4
S urprisingly, the winds did no such thing, the third day upon passage. There was mist, to be sure, light sunrise winds that slatted sails for a while, but most cooperatively backing to the southwest or south-southwest again. Clouds stayed low and cream-jug pale for most of the day. At the end of the Middle Watch, when the crew was summoned to scrub and sluice, then stand Dawn Quarters, there was a lot of dew, the mists riming everything with damp. Sunrise wasnât ominously red. The fog and mist dispersed, but never quite disappeared, limiting visibility to a scant four miles around Jester, even from the crosstrees. Noon sights were educated guesses of how high that diffuse, cloud-covered sun ball was, but the consensus of results on the quarterdeck, except for Mister Spendloveâs, which placed them somewhere on the same latitude as Iceland, showed them weathering the Scillies and Landâs End. And dead reckoning, and the record of the knot log, suggested a position beyond the Scilliesâ almost one hundred nautical miles west of the Lizard since yesterday noon.
And, with the wind backing southerly, Jester could come back to due west again, though only at seven or so knots on a light, tantalizing wind, and stand even farther out into the Atlantic.
And the sea. It was almost calm, mashed flat by a humid, and rather pleasant warmth, glittering and rolling, folding and curling not over three to four feet, more mirrorlike, more oily and without ripples; though the long Atlantic rollers made themselves felt. The ship rose and fell slowly and grandly, lifted, her entire length, by the long period of the scend, instead of hobbyhorsing. When pitch she did, or roll, it was a slow, creaky procedure, quite predictable and almost pleasant for all but the landsmen and new-come Marines, who âcast their accounts to Neptuneâ over the leeward rails. Faint wake astern, barely a bustle of disturbance down her flanks as water churned sudsy close aboard, and her forefoot cut clean and sure into the round-topped rollers, to part them with hardly any fuss at all.
Uncanny, Lewrie thought warily. Retributionâs coming, sure as Fate. Theyâre toyinâ with us. Soon, itâll be roarinâ. When we least expect it. Damme, I hate surprises!
Dawn of the fourth day was coolish and bracing, with a bit more life to the sea, the rollers now shorter-spaced and surging higher, in four- to five-foot swells. The wind backing even more, now all but out of the south! Toying with them, backing, then gusting up a touch, as it veered ahead a point or two. Yet still easily manageable winds.
Jester would luff up through the gentle gusts, driving close-hauled, and was able to maintain a base course of west-souâwest, and a half-hourly cast of the log showed a steady seven and a half knots.
By noon sights, Alan was just about ready to start chewing his nails in
He decided to do his further pondering over charts in his great-cabins, where he could worry and smolder in private.
âGood evening to you, Mister Buchanon,â Alan said, touching the brim of his hat in salute. âI wish you joy of the evening, sir.â
âAnd a peace . . . ahem! And a good night to you, too, sir.â
Lewrie nodded firmly at Buchanonâs sensible reticence, and his rephrasing, then took himself to the larboard ladder to the gun deck.
Dispatches aboard, too valuable to lose, he mused; Frogs out in fleet strength . . . wind most like to die away to nothinâ, head us again . . . or come up by the bloody barge load, and . . .
Damn that boy!
C H A P T E R 4
S urprisingly, the winds did no such thing, the third day upon passage. There was mist, to be sure, light sunrise winds that slatted sails for a while, but most cooperatively backing to the southwest or south-southwest again. Clouds stayed low and cream-jug pale for most of the day. At the end of the Middle Watch, when the crew was summoned to scrub and sluice, then stand Dawn Quarters, there was a lot of dew, the mists riming everything with damp. Sunrise wasnât ominously red. The fog and mist dispersed, but never quite disappeared, limiting visibility to a scant four miles around Jester, even from the crosstrees. Noon sights were educated guesses of how high that diffuse, cloud-covered sun ball was, but the consensus of results on the quarterdeck, except for Mister Spendloveâs, which placed them somewhere on the same latitude as Iceland, showed them weathering the Scillies and Landâs End. And dead reckoning, and the record of the knot log, suggested a position beyond the Scilliesâ almost one hundred nautical miles west of the Lizard since yesterday noon.
And, with the wind backing southerly, Jester could come back to due west again, though only at seven or so knots on a light, tantalizing wind, and stand even farther out into the Atlantic.
And the sea. It was almost calm, mashed flat by a humid, and rather pleasant warmth, glittering and rolling, folding and curling not over three to four feet, more mirrorlike, more oily and without ripples; though the long Atlantic rollers made themselves felt. The ship rose and fell slowly and grandly, lifted, her entire length, by the long period of the scend, instead of hobbyhorsing. When pitch she did, or roll, it was a slow, creaky procedure, quite predictable and almost pleasant for all but the landsmen and new-come Marines, who âcast their accounts to Neptuneâ over the leeward rails. Faint wake astern, barely a bustle of disturbance down her flanks as water churned sudsy close aboard, and her forefoot cut clean and sure into the round-topped rollers, to part them with hardly any fuss at all.
Uncanny, Lewrie thought warily. Retributionâs coming, sure as Fate. Theyâre toyinâ with us. Soon, itâll be roarinâ. When we least expect it. Damme, I hate surprises!
Dawn of the fourth day was coolish and bracing, with a bit more life to the sea, the rollers now shorter-spaced and surging higher, in four- to five-foot swells. The wind backing even more, now all but out of the south! Toying with them, backing, then gusting up a touch, as it veered ahead a point or two. Yet still easily manageable winds.
Jester would luff up through the gentle gusts, driving close-hauled, and was able to maintain a base course of west-souâwest, and a half-hourly cast of the log showed a steady seven and a half knots.
By noon sights, Alan was just about ready to start chewing his nails in
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