“It’s much the same the rest of the year, with long spells of leave for shooting, fishing, or chasing young ladies,” Hughes groused, “and once the drill for the day, the inspections once a week, is done, most young officers stroll back to the mess for drinks, leaving their men to the sergeants, and only know their troops by names in a muster book, and without their books, they wouldn’t have a clue who they are. They do not lead, they simply pose in the proper place, by God!”

“Can’t do that in the Navy,” Lewrie told him, “livin’ cheek by jowl with ’em for months on end, and knowin’ ’em by the odour of their farts.”

“This lot, Lord,” Hughes bemoaned, more than happy for Pettus to top up his glass. “Oh, I can understand that this wasn’t what they expected. They thought they’d be in the chummy comfort of the mess, with the bands playing, the colours flying, the bugle calls, and the excitement of battle on a field of honour … not rolling about in a ship, getting wet from the knees down, separated for who knows how long from their regiment, and asked to do the total unknown things.

“Home, hearth, and family is the regiment,” Hughes mused with a note of fondness in his voice. “Recruited from the same county they grew up in, for the most part, many of the rankers childhood friends. A grand system is the way we build our Army, quite unlike the French levee en masse, which rounds up unwilling conscripts and shoves hordes of strangers together.”

Lewrie would have mentioned that the Royal Navy pressed hordes of strangers together, but didn’t think it was a good idea, even if it resulted in tightly-bound ships’ companies in the end.

“I expect you will lead our young fellows to the water, as it were, and make them drink, whether they like it or not,” Lewrie said in jest.

“Damned right I shall, sir!” Hughes exclaimed. “By the time I am done, they’ll know their stuff and swear that they volunteered for the privilege!”

“I have no doubt you will, sir,” Lewrie stated.

“What we’re to do, you know, Captain Lewrie,” Hughes said after a swig of wine, “is revolutionary, a method of attack never before attempted. Why, with a few more transports and some escorting warships, I can easily envision the landing of a whole battalion of specially-trained troops at once, overwhelming any objective, defended or not. What was it you called it in your proposal which you sent to Sir Hew … an amphibious operation? God, a fully-established Amphibious Regiment on Army List, perhaps someday an entire Amphibious Brigade! And the officers in at the beginning leading and training the additional troops to glory, honour, and promotion, hah!”

“Well, only if we make a success of it, mind,” Lewrie told him.

“We shall, we shall, by God!” Hughes boasted.

And you’ll be Colonel of the regiment, or be made Brigadier, or be knighted for it? Lewrie thought; Damn, but he dreams ambitious!

“Well, sir, I must take my leave,” Hughes said after tossing back the last of his wine, and rising. “It’s Mess Night at the headquarters, and we’ve a fresh bullock from Tetuán. Moroccan cattle don’t make the best roast beef, but they’ll do in a pinch, hah hah!”

“See you aboard the transport in the morning, then,” Lewrie said, “though I would’ve thought that your last night ashore for some time would be better spent with your mysterious dining companion.”

“Time enough for her, after a good supper,” Hughes said with a wink as he clapped on his grandly feathered bicorne.

“I’ll see you to the entry-port, sir,” Lewrie offered, thinking that if he were in Hughes’s shoes, he’d have given the roast beef supper a wide miss.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

“Mine arse on a band-box, the…!” followed a moment later by “the cretinous, cack-handed, cunny-thumbed bloody … lubbers!”

Lewrie’s oldest and worst cocked hat was flung to the deck for the third time, and it wasn’t even eleven in the morning, yet, but the latest attempt to dis-embark the soldiers of the 77th from Harmony to the boats was no better than the first three over the last five days, and Lewrie was sure that it was disappointing enough to make the Archbishop of Canterbury start kicking children!

“It might look better in the dark, sir,” Lt. Westcott quipped.

“If we ever get that far, we’ll drown the whole crippled lot, and start fresh!” Lewrie roared. “These people couldn’t climb down off a bloody foot-stool!”

It ain’t even that rough a morning, Lewrie bemoaned, watching the Redcoats swaying and clinging for dear life to the scrambling nets, and the easy pitch of the waiting boats alongside the transport. The sea was mild-enough, though there was moderate, foaming surf at the foot of the Rock, sweeping in to wet every inch of the narrow beach, and spew round the rocks. What he had estimated to only take ten to fifteen minutes had turned out to be closer to half an hour just to get them all aboard and settled, much yet to get the boats ashore.

Off Sapphire’s bows, his own four boats were already filled with his Marines, loafing in a rough line-abreast about a cable off, waiting for the Army to sort themselves out.

“My thanks, again, Mister Westcott,” Lewrie said to his First Officer in a brief, calm moment. “The boat, ye know. How and where ye got it…”

“Best not enquire, sir,” Westcott said, with a taut grin. “The less you know, the better.”

The smallest of their boats, the 18-footer jolly boat, had disappeared, miraculously replaced one dark night by a spanking-new 25-foot cutter to match the one they had, and when the sun rose, there it was, painted white with sapphire-blue gunn’ls just like their others. Admittedly, the paint had still been wet, but…! The jolly boat had been too small to be useful except for carrying a very few passengers ashore and back, or rowing the Bosun round right after anchoring to see that the yards were level and squared with each other. He was the only one who missed it.

“Harmony’s starboard-side boats are shoving off, sir,” Lieutenant Harcourt pointed out. “They’re clearing the ship, just afore her bows.”

“Twenty-five bloody minutes, Christ!” Lewrie spat.

“Faster than before, sir,” Westcott said. “That’d be Captain Kimbrough’s, I believe.”

Young Captain Bowden’s company was only halfway loaded into the boats on the transport’s larboard side. Lewrie put his telescope to one eye and could make out Bowden by Harmony’s mainmast stays, mouth open in rage, disgust, or impatience; at that distance it was hard to tell. Major Hughes was aft by the mizen stays, arms wind-milling in the air to urge the last few soldiers to go down the nets. He looked red in the face as the last man went over the bulwarks at last, then wind-milled his way forward to bellow at Captain Bowden.

“One boat’s coming off, sir,” Harcourt reported.

“Coming?” Lewrie yelped. “So is bloody Christmas!”

At very long last, all the boats were full and stroking shoreward in line-abreast. At least Sapphire’s sailors were professionals at rowing and conning the boats. They all grounded on what passed for a beach roughly about the same time, and their passengers scrambled out over the bows much more quickly, as if glad to find even a patch of solid ground on which to stand, relieved and delighted to escape boats and ships for even a few minutes.

They looked comical, even to Lewrie’s frustrated eyes, huddled almost shoulder-to-shoulder at the foot of the nigh-vertical, barren cliffs, wetted to their shins as the surf rolled in, with some soldiers balancing themselves on the boulders and scree rocks that had accumulated at the cliff’s base over the centuries.

“Mister Harcourt, the six-pounder, if you please,” Lewrie said. “Signal the return. Then pray … earnestly.”