“Hmm,” Lewrie said, rising just enough to reach over to the sideboard and fetch an empty bottle that had contained the Rhenish that had accompanied the fish course. “As for water, we could issue wine bottles. Most of ’em are near a quart in volume, or thereabout. Rinse ’em out, fill ’em just before we leave the ship, and slap the corks back in, and there you are.”
“But, how would the men carry them, sir?” Lt. Westcott asked. “Army canteens have slings for wearing over one shoulder down to the opposite hip. They’d drop or break them in the first two hours!”
“Cartridge bags?” Midshipman Grainger piped up in the deep, pondering silence.
“What?” Lewrie asked.
“Well, sir, a serge cartridge bag for the quarterdeck nine-pounders is about the same diameter of your average wine bottle,” Grainger slowly explained. “Using that as a pattern, the Sailmaker and his Mate, and the Master Gunner and Yeoman of The Powder, could sew up some snug bags from spare canvas, and sew on a canvas shoulder strap. In the magazine, there is a wooden form for making new powder bags, one for each calibre of ordnance aboard, really.”
“That might be one problem solved, sir!” Lt. Westcott was quick to agree, eager to forward the plan, and get his idle arse ashore and in some sort of action.
“Where would we get nigh fifty empty bottles, though?” Merriman said with a sigh.
“That might depend on how many you can drink ’twixt now and then, Mister Merriman,” Lewrie said, laughing.
“Lord, sir!” Merriman gawped. “We consume nothing near a civilian gentleman’s usual half-dozen. Why, the wardroom’s practically abstemious! I doubt we down a half-dozen a day between all of us!”
“Drink up, then, sailors,” Lewrie merrily urged.
“Ehm … it’s the better wines that come in bottles, sir,” Lt. Simcock objected. “The poorer ones come in stone crocks, barricoes, and pipes. Our entire mess stores would have to be—”
“We need four-dozen,” Lewrie said. “Two cases from the officers’ wardroom, and two cases from my personal stock.”
Merriman and Simcock looked as if they might whimper or moan.
“Aye, Mister Westcott, that is one problem solved. Though one of many,” Lewrie declared. “Hopefully, Commodore Popham will be able to prevail upon our redcoat compatriots for at least one cart for all we’ll need to take ashore. He’s a way of getting what he wants, and getting his way, no matter.”
One bell was struck at the forecastle belfry; the first after the change of watch at 8 P.M.; it was half-past, and almost time for all glims and lights to be doused at 9 P.M.
“Heel-taps, gentlemen,” Lewrie announced, “a last glass of port before we retire … before the Master-At-Arms comes round and glares at me, hey? I apologise for the poor meal, but the company at-table this evening is always delightful. Allow me to propose a toast … to success on the morrow, and confusion to the foe!”
“Success and confusion!” they all shouted once the glasses had been poured full, then tossed their ports back to the last drop.
* * *
Once his dinner company was gone, Lewrie requested a glass of American bourbon whisky from Pettus. Yeovill gathered up the scraps and leftovers—damned few of those!—into his brass barge, and slipped a few shreds of duck to Chalky, who had hopped atop the table in eager search for more tucker, as if he hadn’t eaten his food bowl empty, and was simply famished.
Jessop helped Pettus clear the sideboard and the last plates; Pettus had paid attention during their after-supper discussions, and put the corks back into the empties, setting them aside for rinsing out later.
“Anything else, sir?” Yeovill asked, ready to depart.
“Don’t think so, Yeovill,” Lewrie told him. “You can turn in, and thank you for a toothsome meal on such short notice.”
“Evening, sir,” Yeovill replied, always happy to prepare a big spread for guests, and pleased with his handiwork.
Lewrie went to sprawl on the starboard-side settee, feet up on the low brass Hindoo tray table, and sipped on his whisky. With no more treats in the offing, Chalky jumped down from the table and ambled over to hop onto the settee, pad onto Lewrie’s lap, and nuzzle him, nose-to-nose for strokes and pets. After a few minutes of that, Chalky turned about, made a circle, and slung himself against Lewrie’s hip, making faint purring rumbles.
Now, how the Devil do we get all we need ashore? Lewrie wondered to himself; If we’re ordered ashore. Put wheels under a cutter and drag the damned thing with ropes?
No matter how daunting the whole thing seemed, though, Lewrie more than half-way hoped that Popham would get his way. It would have to be fourty-six empty wine bottles, for he would need one, himself!
BOOK THREE
Therefore, great king,
We yield our town and lives to thy soft mercy.
Enter our gates, dispose of us and ours,
For we no longer are defensible.
—WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE,
T HE L IFE OF K ING
HENRYTHEFIFTH,
ACT III, SCENE III, 47–50
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
The 7th was a let-down. Reliant’s larger-than-normal cutters and barges were assigned the task of ferrying the remaining troops of the infantry regiments, and the dis-assembled artillery pieces, their carriages, caissons, and limbers, ashore as the army slowly gathered on the beaches amid piles of stores, and the Leda frigate, along with the Encounter brig and the newly-arrived gunboat Protector, were sent near the shore to engage Dutch batteries on Blaauwberg Mountain with fire.
Other than those few Dutch guns on the heights, there was little sign of enemy resistance, so far. Some thought it odd, and ominous; others considered their absence providential. The bulk of the British field force might be onshore, but looked to be very vulnerable to any spoiling attack. The cavalry mounts and artillery team horses would be weak after weeks at sea, and getting over sea-sickness and barely getting their shore legs back, and every trooper or infantryman would be in much the same condition. With little of the artillery landed, and that portion still being re-assembled, an attack by the Dutch in force could be disastrous, with their backs to the sea already.
“Lucky bastards,” Lt. Westcott groused as the last of their cutters came alongside the larboard entry-port, and its weary crew began to clamber up to the deck, their onerous task completed at last.
“Who, the oarsmen?” Lewrie asked.
“The Leda and the others, I meant, sir,” Westcott explained. “At least they got to fire at something.”
“We earned our day’s pay, even so, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie told him. “Princely as that is, hey? And, there’s still hope for an order to form the Naval Brigade.”
“Pray God, sir,” Westcott said with little enthusiasm.
“Now our army’s all ashore, I expect General Baird will march them off inland, tomorrow morning,” Lewrie told him, rising from his sinfully idle wood-and-canvas deck chair. He went to the bulwarks to peer shorewards with a telescope. “Hmm … perhaps by noon tomorrow. Christ, what a mob they make. Several mobs, in point of fact. About as organised as a horde o’ cockroaches.”