Read Online Jack Absolute by C.C. Humphreys - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: C.C. Humphreys
Ads: Link
diet. The cook had not resisted this first chance to shine and had used the
fresh provisions brought from the shore to create rare treats: fish baked in herbs and sweet wine, beef wrapped in pastry
and flamed with brandy, a dish from India called salmagundi, which consisted of the hot spices of that land enflaming a
mélange
of minced meat, anchovies and eggs … well, sweat seeped from every man there while the two ladies – Louisa Reardon and one
Mrs Skene glowed and dabbed their perfumed handkerchiefs to their brows and breasts.
At that moment, this was distracting Jack the most. He knew he should be listening to the conversations nearest him, the discussions
between the officers on whom Burgoyne would be relying. But his attention kept being pulled to Louisa, sat on the General’s
left, the way she kept fanning the silk handkerchief across the rise and fall of her glowing décolletage, how the General
kept watching her do it as he made her laugh with tales of his London life, his twin arenas of Drury Lane and Parliament.
The old rogue had long since conceded Louisa to Jack’s attentions. ‘Miss Reardon is not mistress material,’ he’d declaimed;
unlike the wife of the commissary agent, who had already come from shore and awaited Burgoyne in another cabin below. But
Jack had drunk enough now to still feel jealous at every laugh.
Fortunately, as Louisa laughed again, that musical run of notes that came from somewhere in her depths, the laugh he wanted
reserved only for himself, his attention was demanded by a toast proposed by the man to his left, lower both in age and rank
than Jack, and a fellow Cornishman, Midshipman Edward Pellew.
Like Jack, Pellew had the black hair typical of their county. It was pulled back into the queue that most junior naval officers
sported, though the wine and the heat had pulled strands from their restraint. These were plastered to theyoung, flushed face that now thrust towards Jack, a bumper raised before it.
‘’ere, Jack. Let’s you and me pledge to an allegiance as great as we hold to England. And even older.’ He raised his glass.
‘Kernow!’
Jack smiled. He liked Pellew, beyond a countryman’s affinity. When they’d boarded the ship, and the crew had stood to attention
to greet Burgoyne on every mast and ratline, one man was at variance with his shipmates. Midshipman Pellew was standing, gloriously
alone, on the highest yardarm. On his head. Burgoyne had kept him close ever since.
‘Gwary whek yu gwary tek
!’
Jack drained his bumper of Bishop, the heated, spiced liquid firing his throat and chest, and raised the empty vessel.
The loudly expressed toast had halted conversations up and down the table. To the General’s right, Baron von Riedesel, Commander
of the German component of the Allied army, leaned into his interpreter and muttered a question. The portly General spoke
no English and the attempt for the company to respect that and speak French had degenerated on the third bumper.
The interpreter, a lean Hessian named Von Spartzehn, listened then looked at Jack. ‘Excuse me, Kapitan Absolute. I speak English,
as you see, quite excellently. But what you say, it eludes me.’
‘That’s because it is not English, Kapitan, but Cornish, the ancient tongue of Cornwall, now, alas, spoken very little even
there.’
‘And what did this mean?’
‘My esteemed young friend proposed the name of our land. Kernow is Cornwall. And I replied with an oath, sworn by two wrestlers
before they begin a contest: good play is fair play.’
‘Cornish wrastlers are the best in the world, see.’ Pellew’s Penryn brogue was becoming more pronounced the redder he got.
‘Is that what you were practising on the foredeck on the voyage across?’
It was Alexander Lindsay, Earl of Balcarras who had spoken. Tall, so pale his skin appeared untroubled by his prodigious consumption,
seemingly effete, with an accent bred at Harrow and Oxford,
fresh provisions brought from the shore to create rare treats: fish baked in herbs and sweet wine, beef wrapped in pastry
and flamed with brandy, a dish from India called salmagundi, which consisted of the hot spices of that land enflaming a
mélange
of minced meat, anchovies and eggs … well, sweat seeped from every man there while the two ladies – Louisa Reardon and one
Mrs Skene glowed and dabbed their perfumed handkerchiefs to their brows and breasts.
At that moment, this was distracting Jack the most. He knew he should be listening to the conversations nearest him, the discussions
between the officers on whom Burgoyne would be relying. But his attention kept being pulled to Louisa, sat on the General’s
left, the way she kept fanning the silk handkerchief across the rise and fall of her glowing décolletage, how the General
kept watching her do it as he made her laugh with tales of his London life, his twin arenas of Drury Lane and Parliament.
The old rogue had long since conceded Louisa to Jack’s attentions. ‘Miss Reardon is not mistress material,’ he’d declaimed;
unlike the wife of the commissary agent, who had already come from shore and awaited Burgoyne in another cabin below. But
Jack had drunk enough now to still feel jealous at every laugh.
Fortunately, as Louisa laughed again, that musical run of notes that came from somewhere in her depths, the laugh he wanted
reserved only for himself, his attention was demanded by a toast proposed by the man to his left, lower both in age and rank
than Jack, and a fellow Cornishman, Midshipman Edward Pellew.
Like Jack, Pellew had the black hair typical of their county. It was pulled back into the queue that most junior naval officers
sported, though the wine and the heat had pulled strands from their restraint. These were plastered to theyoung, flushed face that now thrust towards Jack, a bumper raised before it.
‘’ere, Jack. Let’s you and me pledge to an allegiance as great as we hold to England. And even older.’ He raised his glass.
‘Kernow!’
Jack smiled. He liked Pellew, beyond a countryman’s affinity. When they’d boarded the ship, and the crew had stood to attention
to greet Burgoyne on every mast and ratline, one man was at variance with his shipmates. Midshipman Pellew was standing, gloriously
alone, on the highest yardarm. On his head. Burgoyne had kept him close ever since.
‘Gwary whek yu gwary tek
!’
Jack drained his bumper of Bishop, the heated, spiced liquid firing his throat and chest, and raised the empty vessel.
The loudly expressed toast had halted conversations up and down the table. To the General’s right, Baron von Riedesel, Commander
of the German component of the Allied army, leaned into his interpreter and muttered a question. The portly General spoke
no English and the attempt for the company to respect that and speak French had degenerated on the third bumper.
The interpreter, a lean Hessian named Von Spartzehn, listened then looked at Jack. ‘Excuse me, Kapitan Absolute. I speak English,
as you see, quite excellently. But what you say, it eludes me.’
‘That’s because it is not English, Kapitan, but Cornish, the ancient tongue of Cornwall, now, alas, spoken very little even
there.’
‘And what did this mean?’
‘My esteemed young friend proposed the name of our land. Kernow is Cornwall. And I replied with an oath, sworn by two wrestlers
before they begin a contest: good play is fair play.’
‘Cornish wrastlers are the best in the world, see.’ Pellew’s Penryn brogue was becoming more pronounced the redder he got.
‘Is that what you were practising on the foredeck on the voyage across?’
It was Alexander Lindsay, Earl of Balcarras who had spoken. Tall, so pale his skin appeared untroubled by his prodigious consumption,
seemingly effete, with an accent bred at Harrow and Oxford,
Similar Books
