THE POWDER MONKEY

London and the Channel Islands, 1880

I'm no hero.

But, I am the proud possessor of a large and rather good nose for news (I scribble for a wretched daily in London) that sometimes leads me to the very edges of peril. I had now the whiff of a cracking good story in my flared nostrils and was doggedly pursuing a most promising lead. Nearing my intended destination, in a freezing downpour, I had the ever-stronger sensation of an appointment with destiny.

At minimum, I believed, this latest venture might have a most happy result, namely, an influx of shillings to feed my woefully depleted coffers.

No, it was not some fleeting sniff of fame or any such nonsense that propelled me forward across that forbidding island's slippery scree. Rather, it was the fervent hope that I might soon possess sufficient funds to escape a grim warren of offices above Blackfriar's Tavern in Fleet Street. This was the joyless home to a tawdry little tabloid called the Daily Guardian.

It was there, under the mean and watchful eye of my editor, an ink addict named Mr. Symington Fife, that I pecked out my meager existence at tuppence a word. My accounts reflected my life's station, I suppose, for I currently had the princely balance of seven guineas, sixpence in the strongbox 'neath my bed. But, salvation appeared to be at hand.

As it happened, the Guardian's chief competitor, a yellow broadsheet called the Globe, had last month announced a new subscription contest in honor of the upcoming seventy-fifth anniversary of Admiral Lord Nelson's great naval victory at Trafalgar. And, by Jove, I meant to win it!

The contest rules were straightforward enough. Any person who submitted a heretofore-unreported tale pertaining to the victory was eligible. The three most surprising and entertaining stories (they had to be historically accurate, of course) would be printed. The best would win a grand prize of seventy-five quid. A king's ransom in my humble view.

All I needed was a smashing tale of the battle and some proof as to its veracity. Of course, for the price of a pint, such rousing stories were easily come by in any pub or tavern. Proving them was another matter entirely. And so it was, with a heartful of hope and my nose twitching madly, that I had set out from London to Trafalgar in search of my liberation.

As you may have suspected, I am a city dweller. I am not, by any stretch, what one might call an "outdoorsman." No, I am hardly one of those stouthearted, broad-shouldered chaps one reads about in the penny novels, off felling trees in the Wild Yukon, scaling Alps or shouting "Sail, ho!" from a pitching masthead. Rather, I'm one who likes his creature comforts and his books.

I reminded myself of this simple fact tripping over a smallish boulder I hadn't even noticed in my path. I suddenly pitched forward at a dangerous angle. Luckily, I managed to break the fall with my outstretched hands, and came away with only minor abrasions and another lashing of wounded pride.

Every passing minute on this blasted island, it seemed, was meant to test my resolve. The footing was treacherous. Needles of horizontal icy rain stung my face; nonetheless, I pressed on. I stumbled and fell again. I got up. I walked on.

You see? By my lights, a cozy armchair by the fireside is a far, far more suitable environment for adventuring than traipsing across the hostile plains of a frozen wasteland. Yet my trusty proboscis would not be denied, and so I pressed onward. The rain did ease a bit on toward evening, I must say. But, soon, the visibility dropped considerably when tendrils of fog nearly obscured the low-hanging sun. It was now merely a hazy yellow wafer sliding toward the sea.

Such dangerous terrain and weather as I encountered only served to fuel my misery and sap my confidence on that trek. Slipping and sliding across the island's rocky headland, I grew ever more tired and bone cold. Late in the day, more serious doubts about this adventure inevitably crept round the edges of my mind: one truly nasty fall and my frozen carcass wouldn't be found till next morning.

Still and all, I was determined to reach the old Greybeard Inn before nightfall, for I had arranged a meeting with the proprietor there, a Mr. Martyn Hornby, at the hour of eight o'clock.

At quarter past the hour of seven, I was still on my feet, my face a mask of ice. Uncertain of my next turning, I dug my stiff fingers inside a pocket for my map, but it was soggy and ruined and came away in pieces. My course being westerly, with only the setting sun as my guide, I still believed I might arrive before darkness fell. Time would certainly tell.

The godforsaken place to which I had recently journeyed by sail is a tiny link in an archipelago located off the coast of France. This particular island, by far the smallest of the lot, took its name from the thick, pea-soupy fogs that persistently haunted the place.

It was aptly named Greybeard Island.

The place reminded me a bit of the Skelligs, if you know those two forbidding spires. I once chased down the rare Skellig tern there, the bird flitting about those two rock cathedrals set in the royal-blue Atlantic off the southwest shores of Ireland. The Skel-ligs are remote places, potent in their discomfort. One visit is enough for most, and more than enough for your faithful armchair correspondent.

But I kept putting one boot in front of another that frigid and gloomy evening for one reason. I fervently believed Mr. Hornby could alter the pitiful circumstances of my life.

Martyn Hornby, I had recently learned from his lovely daughter, Cecily, was one of a very small number of Royal Navy veterans of the Napoleonic Wars still alive. He was, as far as I could determine, the sole living survivor of the crew of the HMS Merlin.

This small forty-eight-gun English man-o'-war had fought a courageous and-I'd come to believe-pivotal naval battle against a massive French seventy-four-gun frigate back in '05. When I say pivotal, I do not speak lightly. I mean I believed that the Merlin's victory had changed the course of history.

And no one, to my knowledge, had ever heard tell of it!

Miss Cecily Hornby, a most charming woman in my eyes, had waxed eloquent in her discourse regarding this sea battle. Here, briefly, is what I know of the matter.

Seventy-five years ago now, back in the summer of 1805, a huge French frigate, Mystere, was lurking off this very coast. The reasons for the enemy's presence here at Greybeard Island were unknown. I did know she sailed under the command of the infamous Captain William Blood, an Englishman and a traitor of the first order.

Old Bill was an infamous rogue who had betrayed Admiral Lord Nelson, not for political reasons, mind you, but for a very large sum of capital offered by the French. Captain Blood's formidable services were now at the disposal of Napoleon and his Imperial French Navy.

William Blood was Admiral Lord Nelson's nemesis in those years. And it was only the purest of luck that put that villain at last in British gun sights.

England's very fate was in HMS Merlin's hands that day. Sometime in early July, the heavily armed Mystere engaged in a vicious set-to with the much smaller British ship. As I understood the thing, had not an obscure English captain named McIver and a mysterious passenger aboard Merlin known only as Lord Hawke eked out a victory that fine summer's day, we might all be speaking French.

Surely, I thought, this dramatic encounter, long lost in the swirling mists of history, was the prizewinning tale. For now, I could only dream it were true and hope to prove it.

Subsequent to Cecily's revelations, I commenced a feverish research at the Royal Navy College down at Greenwich. And, finding no record of the engagement, I had determined that, should Martyn Hornby's tale prove credible, I, Pendleton Tolliver, lowly chronicler of church bazaars, tea parties and missing felines, might soon be a wealthy fellow. And, one rewriting the history books in the bargain.