By the time Lewrie was satisfied with his crew’s gunnery, even Bisquit the dog had taken to running below on his own whenever the Marine drummer and fifer started the Long Roll, with no one to lead him by the collar, and Chalky learned that his wicker travelling cage was a safe and snug place to run to!
* * *
Off the Southern tip of Madagascar, near the mouth of the Mozambique Channel, Lewrie decided to return to Cape Town. After he had breakfasted on oatmeal and coffee, he went to the quarterdeck to give that order. Bisquit was playing fetch with some of the ship’s boys, but broke off and began to slink towards the hatchway, wary of his presence which might presage another morning of dread thunders, but Lewrie took time to whistle him up and give him some petting before mounting the ladderway.
“Good morning, sir,” Lt. Westcott, who had the watch, said.
“Good morning to you, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie said back with a grin. “Put the ship about, if you please, and shape course back to Cape Town.”
“Very good, sir!” Westcott replied, perking up and baring his signature brief smile. “Bosun, pipe all hands! Stations to wear!”
Once about and steady on a course of Sou’west by West, Lewrie summoned Westcott to join him at the windward rails.
“Aye, sir?” Westcott asked.
“I’ve been ponderin’ something, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie said. “The complete absence of any Dutch warships in the area.”
“Well, one would think the Dutch are too busy protecting their East Indies colonies, sir … Java and such,” Westcott said after a moment of musing. “Or, they’re preying on our India and China trades, alongside their allies, the French. What they now call Holland, the Batavian Republic, is occupied by, and subordinate to, the French. If any Dutch warships are around, one’d most-like find them at the isles of Réunion and Mauritius … under overall French command.”
“It still makes no sense to me that they just abandoned and set fire to that sixty-eight gunner anchored in False Bay,” Lewrie told him.
“The Bato, sir,” Westcott supplied.
“Aye. We were so busy landing troops, we didn’t have a rowing boat t’spare,” Lewrie continued. “They could’ve sailed her out to sea and run to Réunion and we wouldn’t have known a thing about it. And, if the Cape Colony was so important to the Dutch, and the French, why was she the only one there? We’ve seen one of our East India Company trades, a couple of Swedish ships, an American whaler or two, but not hide nor hair of the Dutch or the French. I don’t like it. I have a … fey feeling that once they get word that we’ve taken Cape Town, the French and the Dutch together could put together a decent-sized squadron t’take it all back.”
“Well, a squadron of ships, perhaps, sir, but with five thousand of our soldiers ashore and in control of the forts, they wouldn’t stand much of a chance at counter-invasion,” Westcott dismissed with a shake of his head.
“There is that, granted, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie allowed as he turned to gaze aft as if searching for a hostile sail on the horizon … any hostile sail. “We beat the stuffings out of the Dutch Navy at Camperdown, but they’d have a long time since t’rebuild it, even if Napoleon’s used their yards t’build all those thousands of invasion craft so he could land in England. They could send at least one two-decker sixty-eight to defend Cape Town, so … why not more, t’protect their East Indies colonies? Or, d’ye think I’m jumpin’ at shadows?” he asked, turning back to his First Officer to pull a face in self-deprecation.
“More … planning against the worst, sir,” Westcott replied with a hint of a grin. In his three years’ service under Lewrie, he had yet to see him take himself seriously, or become pompous. “Fore-warned is fore-armed, what? But, it may be, sir, that it’s half what you might wish, more than what the Dutch have, or might do. God, we have been so busy and active for so long that this idling in harbour, and so-far fruitless cruising, is … nettlesome. Making us sit up late at night, waiting for the shoe to drop, and listening for the odd creaking.”
“We?” Lewrie scoffed. “Me, ye mean. Frankly, it’d be better did all our ships spend more time at sea, ’stead of holdin’ victory suppers, and pattin’ ourselves on the back. Roam farther afield than Cape Agulhas and Lamberts Bay to the North o’ Cape Town. Bring every crew beyond ‘river discipline’ competence again.”
“You’re thinking more like a Commdore, again, sir, not just another subordinate Captain,” Westcott dared to comment, “serving at another man’s whims.”
“Well, I will allow that my brief time in that position was … habit-forming,” Lewrie said with a self-mocking shrug. “All that vast power and authority was intoxicatin’!”
Westcott laughed along with him.
“How to suggest such to Commodore Popham, though, sir,” Westcott said in a lower voice, “and express your suspicions of a Dutch and French combined riposte, hmm?”
“That is the rub, aye,” Lewrie replied, scowling, “without him thinkin’ me an old lady, or unwilling t’hear anything from anyone that goes against his set thinkin’. Or, takin’ any suggestion from the likes of me, at all! I think he’s a ‘down’ on me, ever since we went off on our own with the Army. Oh, well.”
“Commodore Popham is a very active sort, though, sir, just full of schemes and ideas,” Westcott noted. “With the Navy’s part in the conquest done, and the Cape Colony in General Baird’s total control, might he be looking for other fish to fry, by now? Who knows, sir. The tiniest flea planted in his ear, and we could all be out to sea and having a go at raiding Fort-de-France!”
“Hmm, now that sounds … interesting,” Lewrie mused. “Just bung-full o’ prospects for fresh laurels. Once back at Table Bay, we will see.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Even before the Reliant frigate could complete her gun salute to the Commodore, put down her bower anchors, or take in all sail, a signal appeared on HMS Diadem’s halliards: Reliant’s number and “Captain Repair On Board”.
“Well, damme,” Lewrie muttered. “Impatient about something … ain’t he?”
“Away, the Captain’s boat crew!” Lt. Westcott took time to yell, amid all the other necessary commands which would bring their ship to safe and secure anchorage. Table Bay was not the snuggest harbour in the world, and when the winds came Westerly, they blew directly onto shore and raised choppy surges that put all anchored ships on a lee shore. “Afterguard! Haul the first cutter up from towing and lay it abeam the starboard entry-port!”
“Look presentable, do I, Mister Spendlove?” Lewrie asked their Second Officer in jest, tugging at his shirt cuffs and his neck-stock. He was in slop-trousers, scuffed boots, and his oldest and shabbiest uniform coat and hat.
“Oh, fit for the King, sir,” Spendlove replied with un-characteristic puckish humour.
“We will see to making the ship all tiddly, sir,” Westcott promised. “No worries. And, no need to keep the Commodore waiting.”
“Very well, sirs,” Lewrie said, bound for the entry-port for his rushed departure.
“Once aboard the flagship, sir,” Lt. Spendlove called after him, “might you ask where yonder French frigate came from?”
“Indeed, I shall,” Lewrie told him, for he was as curious as the rest as to the why and the how that a large French frigate sat at anchor with a large Union Jack flying over the enemy Tricolour from her stern staff.