At least she called me by my Christian name, he bemoaned.

“I will take a breath of air, and a stroll whilst we are here,” Lydia said to her maid. To Lewrie, with the beginnings of a smile at long last, she said, “If you will be so good as to hand me down, sir?”

Lewrie sprang from the coach to do the footman’s job of folding down the metal steps, then offered her a steady arm to support her as she descended. With her left arm atop his right, they began to stroll toward his hired coach. With fewer witnesses, Lydia leaned close to him, pressing her cheek to his shoulder for a second.

“It is so good to see you, too, Alan,” Lydia said with evident fondness in her voice, and looking into his face with a grin so wide that her nose did its usual, endearing, crinkle. “I, too, have most anxiously tried to spy you on the road, after I sent a note out to your ship, and your First Officer, Westcott, sent me a reply that you had gone up to London. I dearly wish that I could accept your invitation of dinner, or a pot of tea, but … I fear you must be back in Portsmouth by dark yourself, must you not?”

“True, I must,” Lewrie told her, explaining the sad condition of his ship’s bottom, and the urgency of her cleaning before joining Popham’s expedition. “The earlier it’s started, the earlier it’s ended, and we’ll be off.”

“To the South Atlantic?” Lydia gasped. “So soon?”

“I am so sorry, Lydia,” Lewrie said with a long sigh. “Barely back to England, and whish!—then God only knows how long we’ll be before Reliant is de-commissioned and paid off at home, again. Who’d be a sailor, hey? Or … someone who waits for one?” he asked as he gently slid his arm round her waist and drew her to face him.

“This is so cruel!” Lydia whispered, her eyes going moist. “God, how I’ve longed for you to return, and not knowing when that would be. I thought you were still on the other side of the ocean, then your note arrived saying that you were in Portsmouth, with no hint that you were returning!…”

“I’d have gotten back before any letter would have arrived, we left so quickly,” Lewrie explained. “The mail packet’d still be mid-ocean. Sorry about that.”

“How blissfully happy I was to know that you were back safely, and wanted me to come to you,” Lydia said, almost in a whimper. “And to dash off like a bloody … fool!… to find you gone, without one thought for me. No lodging arranged, not even an explanation left for me ’til I had to beg one from your Westcott. Damn you, Lewrie!”

Uh-oh! I’m in the “quag” up t’my neck! Lewrie cringed.

“I didn’t know you’d be coming down, so how could I…,” Lewrie tried to wriggle out, but stopped and peered into her eyes. “I’ve made you angry, haven’t I? Lydia, I am so sorry. Believe me, I wanted to see you just as desperately. If I’d been aboard to get word that you were coming, I’d have strewn the road with rose petals. I did not mean to seem like I ignored you. Don’t be cross with me, Lydia. If we have only a few minutes together here—”

“Yes, you have made me angry, Alan,” Lydia snapped with an impatient toss of her head. “Angry with you, and angry with myself for being such a bloody idiot! Angry for laying myself open to such disappointment. I am angry with you for having to spend a night being gawked at, goggled, and snickered over like a high-priced whore at that horrid lodging house. God knows, I should be accustomed to snickers, scorn, and snubs by now, but I find that I am not, and I did not care to be reminded of how scandalous people think me!”

Christ, I’ve opened Pandora’s Box! Lewrie quailed; She’s ventin’ hot as Vesuvius!

“Lydia, I didn’t mean for that t’happen, I could never—,” he tried to say to mollify her, but she was on a righteous tear, by then.

“Now, just because you ran across me on the road, you’d wish me to lodge with you in some ratty country inn, so you can use me for a convenient vessel for your pent-up lust?” she spat.

Thought of it, Lewrie qualified to himself; but I’ll not admit that to her, by God!

“That’s not what I intended, Lydia,” he lied, trying to assure her. “Just an hour or so of your company over tea, or— Oof!”

Lydia Stangbourne, daughter of a Viscount, punched him in the stomach with a dainty kid-gloved fist! Lewrie had forgotten that she was stronger than most women, the result of strenuous outdoorsy activities in the country. She hunted and shot and fished, managed horses as good as any groom, and even took secret lessons from a swordmaster.

He stepped back to rub his belly. “Will you strike me, again, m’dear, or should I borrow one of the coachmen’s whips?” he asked.

The rant was over, though. Lydia put her hands to her face and lowered her head. When she looked up a moment later, she was weeping, with her face screwed up in misery.

“Oh, Alan!” she cried, and flung her arms round his neck.

“I am so sorry, Lydia,” he muttered into her sweet-smelling hair. “We could call it a comedy of errors, ’cept it ain’t all that funny. I’m sorry we ended up at cross purposes, missin’ each other coming and going, and might not be able t’see each other again for weeks more, if the Navy has their say in it. All I meant was to sit and talk, have a laugh or two, not … Hush now, dear girl,” he comforted her by swaying her slowly. “Don’t cry, Lydia. Don’t cry.”

She gave out a loud sniff against his shoulder.

“Have you a pocket handkerchief, Alan?” she softly asked. “I must look a fright, and what any passersby must think of me … like a jilted … trull!”

“A trull, you?” Lewrie tried to cajole. “A fright? No. You’re as handsome and fetchin’ as ever, Lydia. Remember what I told you the time we all coached down to Sheerness … that no one could ever take you for a doxy, or a trull. They’d think you a captain’s lady.”

She stepped a bit apart to dab at her eyes with the requested handkerchief, blew her nose, then broke out in a shy and embarrassed smile. She handed the handkerchief back, which act made her laugh as she did so. “Sorry about that, now it’s so damp.”

“Cherish it forever!” Lewrie quipped. “Have it framed—”

Her arms went round his neck again as she silenced him with a long and passionate kiss. Lewrie wrapped his arms round her to lift her off her tiptoes and drape her against him, and coachmen and servants be-damned. Their kisses were urgent, her breath hot and turning musky, and Lewrie felt a rigid awakening in the fork of his trousers.

Lewrie half-heard the clopping of a horse on the road.

“There’s rooms to let down the road in Liphook, don’t ye know!”

Lewrie broke off their kiss to scowl, discovering an older gentleman in corduroy, tweeds, top-boots, and a curl-brimmed thimble hat as their taunter, obviously a prosperous local landowner, who was in high humour, and sporting a wide leer.

“Sod off!” Lewrie called back, which made the older fellow snap his head about and almost rein in.

“Yes, just … sod off!” Lydia added, laughing out loud, then leaning close to Lewrie to whisper, “You must tell me later what ‘sod off’ means, Alan!” with impish delight.

“Happy to,” Lewrie assured her. “You may find it serves usefully in London, when anyone dares snub you.”

Both of them had stepped back, though still holding each other’s hands. Lydia looked up at him contemplatively. “This bottom-cleaning you speak of. It will occupy you fully? For how long?”

“Assumin’ there’s a free dock available, better than a week or two,” Lewrie told her, explaining how his frigate must be emptied of all her guns, stores, and munitions, her upper masts taken down “to a gantline” so she could be heaved over onto her side and stranded high and dry at low tide on one of the hards, or propped up in one of the graving docks. “If there’s no dock or stretch of beach available, we might sit and swing at anchor ’til they can get round to us.”