The King`s Commission

Chapter 3

The next morning, with Sand Cay, the last speck of land of the Turk's and Caicos Islands just under the horizon, Albemarle signaled Shrike to close her, and once close alongside, ordered her to back her tops'ls and heave to. As they wondered what the matter was, a boat set out from the flagship's side, bearing little Captain Nelson. He scrambled up the side and took the salute from the side-party, then advanced to where Lewrie and Caldwell were standing.

"Good morning, sir," Alan said. "What is the matter?"

"I have come to see your gallant captain Lilycrop, Mister Lewrie," Nelson told him. "I trust he is well enough to see visitors?"

"Aye, sir, he is," Alan replied. "If you will allow me to lead you to his quarters? Mister Caldwell, would you take the deck?"

"Admiral Barrington took the highest number of casualties," Nelson said as they walked aft. "It is my intention to go there later, to see to their needs. Your captain is recovering?"

"Still in much pain, sir, as I'm sure you'll understand," Alan replied, mystified that Nelson was making the effort. Was he salving a guilty conscience that people had been hurt at his orders in a doomed adventure? "I saw him this morning, and he was awake, mostly."

"Your surgeon holds hopes for his recovery, then, sir?" Nelson pressed.

"Aye, sir. He's very strong for his advanced age. Spent a lifetime at sea, you know," Alan told him, feeling the urge to put the needle in at Nelson's expense. "This was his first command. And now he'll likely lose it."

"I see." Nelson frowned, pulling at his long nose.

Lieutenant Lilycrop swung in his hanging bed-box to the gentle motion of his ship. His usually dark-tanned face was pale, and he sweated a good deal, but the surgeon had said that it was good for him, to sweat out the poisons from the wound. The offending limb was propped up on a pile of pillows, wrapped in bast and gauze, looking no more harmful than a peer suffering a bout of the gout. There was a mug of rum near at hand, and every cat he had ever owned had gathered in some silent sense of commiseration, near the bed-box, or curled up in his lap or on the pillows.

The captain had his eyes closed, and they could hear him make soft groaning noises, wincing a bit as a wave of pain intruded on his senses. But he opened his eyes brightly when they were announced.

"Captain Nelson has come to pay his respects, sir," Alan said, and did the duty of introducing them.

"Are you in much pain, sir?" Nelson asked, taking a seat that Gooch offered him.

"Well, sir, you get your foot shot damn near off, then let a drunken Welsh sheep-coper saw the damn thing off, an' see how it makes you feel," Lilycrop said uncharitably.

"I am sorry, Captain Lilycrop," Nelson replied in a soft voice, totally abashed, and evidently wishing he were anywhere else in the wide world at that moment. "Since you suffer on my behalf, I was wondering if there was anything I could do for you, to make you more comfortable."

"Ah, don't mind me, Captain Nelson," Lilycrop said, laying his head back on the pillows. "Gooch, come prop me up a bit. That's it. I went for the fun of it. Can't let Lewrie have all the glory, and he's half laid up himself with a nasty leg wound. No one to blame but meself, see. One takes one's chances. Thankee for comin', though. 'Tis more'n I'd expect from most." Samson jumped up onto the bed, ruler of the cabins, and sniffed around for a place to lay close to his master, making a couple of more fearful others jump down. "Ah, we smell all medicinal, don't we, sweetlin'? Like some rum, Captain?"

"Thank you, no, Captain Lilycrop. I've never been much on rum, or spirits," Nelson answered.

Oh, God, please don't let Lilycrop call him a hedge-priest! Alan thought.

"If you're sure there is nothing I could do for you, sir?" Nelson said, beginning to rise.

"Oh, sit ye down, sir. We tried to do somethin' right, an' if I didn't get hit when I did, it'd a been later, tryin' to take the battery. Had a funny feelin' about the place, soon's I stepped ashore. Not your fault. No sense lookin' like a hanged spaniel on my account. I've had fifty years in the Fleet, man an' boy. Had to happen sometime. In the last war, with Pocock, thought I was a goner half a dozen times."

"In the East Indies?" Nelson brightened. "Where were you?"

There was a knock on the door, and midshipman Edgar relayed a message from Mr. Caldwell. "Excuse me, sir, I'm wanted on deck," Alan said and excused himself.

By the time he had discovered the reason for his summons, had tended to the matter of discipline, and placed a seaman on report for fighting, he fully expected Nelson to come out of the cabins, too, but Nelson did not. A full half-hour passed before he emerged.

"A gallant man, sir," Nelson said, his eyes a little moist as he came up to Lewrie. "He has served long and honorably, with little recognition or reward. And now this."

"Aye, sir," Alan agreed.

"If only we had been successful, I would not feel so badly at his loss," Nelson went on. "Though he would be losing the ship soon, in any event when the war ends. But there would have been a chance for further employment."

"The ship lacks a year till the end of her original commission, sir," Alan pointed out. "She's a prize, bought in out here."

"He has a family?" Nelson asked.

"None that I'm aware of, sir. Never married, either, to my knowledge. I get the impression that there was a lady once, but it didn't work out."

"There is always a young lady with whom things did not work out," Nelson said with such a wistfulness that Alan peered at him more closely. He didn't look like the sort of swaggering young buck to take love and pleasure wherever he would find it, and Alan got the idea that Nelson had been spurned rather recently, and still suffered.

"His only family is his cats, sir," Alan went on. "They're a great comfort to him."

"Yes. There are rather a lot of them, aren't there?"

"Would you like one, sir?" Alan grinned.

"Um, actually, no, thank you." Nelson essayed a shy grin of his own. "Well, I must be getting on to Admiral Barrington to see their wounded. Did you have any others hurt?"

"No, sir," Alan answered. "Um, one thing, sir, if I may be so bold as to ask. Is there any way you could do something for the captain? I'd heard sometimes that senior post-captains are promoted to rear admiral upon their retirement. And I was wondering if there was anything like that could be done for him, to promote a lieutenant to post-captain, even if it means the retired list."

"They call them admirals of the 'yellow squadron,' Mister Lewrie," Nelson said with another grin. "Usually because they're too stupid to trust with a command, and have too much 'interest' to just cashier, to make way for a more promising officer. He means a great deal to you, does he not, Mister Lewrie?"

"Yes, sir, he does. I had no business being made first officer of this ship, but he was patient with me, and taught me everything I know," Alan confessed. "Fifty years, from powder monkey to captain of his own ship, God knows how long a passed midshipman. He deserves a better retirement than a lieutenant's half-pay, or a cripple's pension."

"God bless you, sir, that was well said, and kindly meant," Nelson said, almost fierce with passion, and taking his hand to shake it firmly. "We do seem to treat our sailors in the shabbiest manner, and then depend on them to save the country when anyone with good sense would run for the hills and tell us to get someone else to do the dirty work!"

"If you could make any sort of recommendation in his behalf, sir, I'd be forever in your debt," Alan offered.

"And I shall, sir," Nelson promised. "I shall speak for him to Admiral Hood once we rejoin the squadron. He has treated me with great kindness in past, though," Nelson added with a wry expression, "I do not know why he should continue to do so after this debacle."

"We didn't know how strong they were, sir."

"Still," Nelson said, leading him to the entry port where his boat waited, almost seeming to grow in size and importance as he began to enthuse, "I was always most pleasantly amazed over in Nicaragua how a smaller force could prevail over a greater one, if one went right at them. Conceive a bold plan, carry it out with audacity, bring all one's strength to bear upon one point, like Rodney did against de Grasse, and you give them pause. They seem to step back, to draw breath at your daring, and once checked, they are beatable!"

"I see, sir." Alan nodded, amazed at how energetic the slight little fellow could become.

"To pause, to question your own chances, is to surrender the initiative to the foe. Fire that challenge to loo'rd, and then go at them!" Nelson insisted. "Lay your ship yard-arm to yard-arm with the enemy, which is all that anyone can ask of a captain, and trust to the pluck of English seamen to win you a victory! Given decent odds, I'll put my money on our men every time, and then it's victory, or a place in Westminster Abbey! Either way, you've upheld your honor, or found glory."

Without a break, Nelson shook Lewrie's hand once more, and went to the entry port, doffed his hat to the crew in reply to the salute due him, and Alan was amazed that the hands were cheering, perhaps in recognition of his solicitousness in coming to see their captain as most officers would not bother to do. It was either heartfelt on Nelson's part, or it was the vainest piece of theatrics Alan had seen away from a stage. Yet there was something about the man, he had to admit.

"Uncanny sort, ain't he, sir?" Caldwell asked once they had the ship under way again. "That one'll go places, you mark my words. Wish he'd come aboard and got the hands fired up before we tried to take Turk's Island. With a little of his enthusiasm, we'd have had the bloody place."

"He is inspiriting, I'll grant you that, Mister Caldwell," Alan replied. But, he kept to himself, with an attitude like that, the little minnikin's going to get himself killed for certain if he keeps all that death-or-glory stuff up. And if Turk's Island is any example of his skills at war, I'd not want to be anywhere near him next time he feels inspired.