Dewey Lambdin - The King`s Commission

• Название: The King`s Commission
• Автор: Dewey Lambdin
• Жанр: Морские приключения

1782 First officer on brig o'war . . . Fresh from duty on the frigate Desperate in her fight with the French Capricieuse off St. Kitts, Midshipman Alan Lewrie passes his examination board for Lieutenancy and finds himself commissioned first officer of the brig o'war Shrike. There's time for some dalliance with the fair sex, and then Lieutenant Lewrie must be off to patrol the North American coast and attempt to bring the Muskogees and Seminoles onto the British side against the American rebels (dalliance with an Indian maiden is just part of the mission). Then it's back to the Caribbean, to sail beside Captain Horatio Nelson in the Battle for Turks Island. . . .Naval officer and rogue, Alan Lewrie is a man of his times and a hero for all times. His equals are Hornblower, Aubrey, and Maturin--sailors beloved by readers all over the world.

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"Gad!" Alan exclaimed, getting dizzy at the thought of it. "Is that what we could start? We'd go down in history, famous as anybody!"

"It is, indeed, Lieutenant Lewrie," Cowell said so soberly that even in his ludicrous togs, he looked as impressive as any to-gaed Senator of old Rome himself. "So you see why Desmond and I were so worried that neither of you seemed very involved in it, and have altered our carefully laid arrangements."

"Had we been told, sir, it would have made a difference," Cashman replied. "Did you discuss this hope with Lieutenant Colonel Peacock? With Alan's admiral?"

"We were not able to make either of them privy to all our goals."

"Damme, Mister Cowell, we should've landed a regiment and come ashore with a band, 'stead o' this rag-tag-and-bobtail. I didn't even bring my regimentals with me. Alan left his uniform behind. From now on, would you please consider us in your plans, 'stead o' keepin' it to y'rself?"

"I give you my solemn vow that from this instant, you shall be thoroughly informed, and involved, in our deliberations, Captain," Cowell said, giving them a satisfied smile. "But do you see the implications of our embassy to the most powerful southern tribes? Not simply correcting a fiscal mistake which reduced subsidies when the war began. If we had continued financial aid, the Creeks and Seminolee would have stayed on with us instead of staying neutral, and we would have had the force to retain Florida and Georgia, come the Devil himself against us. God willing, it is still not too late to recover this region. And in the process, establish a fairer, more productive and peaceful relationship between all Indians and all Europeans throughout the Americas, one that shall put to shame near on two hundred and fifty years of the way we have dealt together. The Rebels are married to the old ways, while our new colonists to a renascent British Florida, untainted by misconceptions of the past, can adjust to the new order of things."

"And I would not worry much about making a grand show," McGilliveray chuckled. "Along the Great Lakes, the 8th Regiment wears Iroquois garb as part of its full-dress regimentals, Captain. My people have seen grand embassies before, and they all led to nothing. What we bring is more important than how well you dress for them. As I remember, I saw a painting in London just before we left. A very famous soldier portrayed in part Hindu garb, part rag-tag-and-bobtail, as you put it. He was Clive of India. Would you gentlemen like to be known to history as famous as Clive? He won England a doorway to India. You could win England the rest of North America."

Chapter 5

Alan had not known what to expect when they got to the Indian town. At best a cluster of chickees straggling along the lake shore. But what greeted him was a frontier fortress. Across nearly a mile of bottom land thickly sprigged with new corn stalks twined with vines laden with quickening bean pods, row upon raised row of plantings mixed with gourds and squash, plots of other vegetables and fiber plants he had never seen cultivated before, there was a huge town surrounded by a tall log palisade, with watch-towers every fifty yards or so, and gates cut into the walls with guard-towers alongside them.

McGilliveray informed them that this chiefdom, the White Town, held land about a mile and a half in depth into the forests from the shore of the lake, and ran for over six miles east and west.

In pride of place, McGilliveray mounted a magnificent Seminolee horse and rode at the forefront of their column, with Cowell at his side, now turned out in a bright blue silk suit as neatly as if he were taking a stroll along The Strand. Alan, Cashman, and their troops followed in two columns, somewhat uniform in their forest green shirts and breeches or slop trousers. Seminolee brought up the rear, leading the pack animals, yipping and curvetting their mounts to show off.

"Just like the Romans," Cashman said as they passed through the gate into the town proper. "A fightin' mound just behind the gate with another palisade, you see. Bends us to the left, you'll note, between another long mound. Opens up our weapons side to arrows, and puts our shield side on the left where it wouldn't do any good. It'd take a light artillery piece to force an entry here, if you could get close enough to un-limber under the fire o' those towers. Nacky bastards."

"Just as long as we get safely out," Alan replied, looking at all the Indians who had congregated to watch their arrival. "Goddamn, Kit, do you see 'em? Look at all those bouncers, will you! Not one stitch on above the waist! Oh, Jesus, I'm in love with that'n there!"

"Never let it be said you let a solemn moment cramp your style," Cashman drawled.

"You conquer what you want, and I'll conquer what I want."

"I doubt the Royal Academy would hang that sort of heroic portrait of you in Ranelagh Gardens. Besides, if you keep ogling all the girls, your men will get out of hand. Set an example," Cashman ordered. "For now, at least."

"Eyes to your front!" Alan barked over his shoulder.

The street they paraded was wide as any in London, wider than some in Paris, lined with what seemed to be a definite pattern of buildings. There was a fence of sorts surrounding each plot, an insubstantial thing of dried vines and cane. Behind each fence was a two-story wood house much like a chickee, with plaited mats hung from under the eaves, some open and some closed. A more substantial house of thickly woven cane walls daubed with mud sat in each plot, along with one, two or three smaller out-buildings, and each plot featured a home garden of some kind.

But, grand as it looked, the place was rough on the nose. They might bathe every morning, Alan thought, but something stinks to high heaven. It smells worse than London, that's for sure.

The plots were laid out in a rectangular pattern, so many of the plots to each… he was forced to call them town blocks, with narrower lanes leading off at right angles from the main thoroughfare. Up ahead was an open area, and what looked like a gigantic plaza raised several feet above the town's mean elevation, upon which sat a large wattle and daub structure, and beyond it a collection of open-sided sheds. Beyond that, there seemed to be a war going on.

Several hundred Creek warriors were whooping and storming from one end of the plaza to the other, all waving some kind of war club, and flowing like waves on a beach, swirling left and right in pursuit of something. It had to be some ritual war, Alan decided, by the way the clubs were raised on high and brought down on the odd head. Now and then, the shrieks and cries surged to a positive tumult as the mob congregated around a tall central pole. The mayhem was so fierce he expected to see bodies flying in the air.

One thing that amazed their party were the many people who looked almost white compared to the run-of-the-mill savage. Not just white men and women who might have gone native while on a trading venture, but a great many scarified tribespeople who sported blue or green eyes, blonde hair, or other signs of European origin. There were also lots of people much darker than average who appeared to have been sired by Blacks, or a few men and women who could be nothing but Black.

Once they stacked their goods by the winter town house and had a chance to look around, Cowell asked McGilliveray about this phenomenon.

"Runaway slaves, sir," McGilliveray said with a smile. "And men from the Colonies who found our way of life more agreeable than slaving for a harsh master. Or the Army."

"Or deserters run from a King's ship?" Alan asked.

"Possibly, Mr. Lewrie." McGilliveray laughed, at ease among his favorite kind. "Captives taken by war parties, too. Our life is hard, make no mistake of that, but it is much less hard than white man's ways. There are many captives who eventually prefer to stay when given the chance to escape. Talk to them, find out for yourself. Every child wants to play Indian, but no Indian child wants to play white man, or go willingly to live among your people. The ball game will go on for hours yet. I shall go find my mother's people, and tell her we are here. You rest here in the shade. Do not raise your hand to any man, or give any offense, I warn you now. Keep your goods safe in the center of your group, and don't wander too far. You are safe, so there is no call to brandish weapons, I swear it. One thing, though," he warned as he left, "don't show any liquor until you are safely housed."

There was nothing for it but to gather their boxes and chests together and use them for furniture. They sat in the welcome shade and fanned flies. Some of the men might have been tired enough from their marches to sleep, but the swarming activity of a whole town full of savages kept them awake and near their weapons.

The Creeks walked by without a care in the world, laughing and pointing to the white party now and then, calling out what seemed to be friendly greetings. Some scowled at them and made threatening gestures from a distance, but the White Town was supposedly, according to McGilliveray, a place of sanctuary and peace, where grudges could not be acted out.

"We should have waited outside the town walls until tomorrow," Cashman finally mumbled, almost asleep.

"Why is that, sir?" Cowell asked.

"We're bein' made to wait, sir," Cashman said. "Coolin' our heels in the ante-room. Best they got their damned game over and been ready to receive us at once, with no excuses. We lose authority by being kept waitin' like this. Devilish shabby way to treat an embassy."

"Desmond knows best, surely," Cowell complained.

"Oh, perhaps he does, sir," Cashman grunted, too sleepy to argue about it. He pulled a pipe out of his pack and started cramming tobacco into it.

"Hullo," an Indian boy said, coming up close to them while Cashman got out his flint, steel and tinder for a light. The child was only about five or so, as English in appearance as any urchin on a London street.

"Hello, yourself." Cashman grinned. "And where'd you spring from?"

"Here."

"Before," Alan prompted, not too terribly fond of children, but willing to be friendly, as long as he had to be.

"Before when?"

"Before you came here?"

"Tallipoosa town," the boy said, pointing north.

"Before you were a Creek," Alan asked.

"In belly." The child grinned widely. "What is Creek?"

"Muskogee," Cashman said.

"Me Muskogee!" the boy crowed proudly.

A youngish white man in breech-clout and head band came over to them, and spoke to the boy in Muskogean. "He botherin' you, sirs?"

"Not at all, sir." Cashman smiled, now puffing on his pipe. "I was askin' him what he was before he was Muskogee."

"He's always been," the man replied, squatting down in their circle cross-legged, fetching out a pipe of his own, this one part of a tomahawk he had in his waist thong. Cashman shared his pouch of tobacco with him. "Ah, 'tis grand, this is, sir, the genuine Virginia article. Beats kinnick-kinnick, it does, thankee kindly. Now what would be bringin' a English officer into these parts?"

"An embassy to your mikkos," Cashman allowed grudgingly, and Cowell woke up enough to huff a warning to keep their business close to their chests.

"Not seen English about since Fort St. George went under down to Pensacola in '81," the man said, having trouble with his English from long dis-use.

"And how did you know he's an officer, fellow?" Alan asked.

"Same way I knows you are, sir." The man beamed with good humor. "I was a soldier meself, back five-six year ago, at Mobile. I run off. Not much you gonna do about that, is there, sir?"

"Enjoy your honorable retirement, sir," Cashman said laughing lazily. "Good life among the Muskogee, is it?"

"Better'n fair, sir. I was once called Tom. Now I'm part of the Muskrat Clan, me name's Red Coat. Got me a Muskogee wife, and the boy, o'course."

"So what's the life like, Red Coat?" Cashman drawled.

"Oh, Injun men work, sir, don't let nobody tell ya differn't," Tom/Red Coat allowed with a shrug. "Got to hunt, fish, build things now an' agin. Keep a roof over yer heads, food in yer belly. Help with the harvests, though the wimmen tends the fields. Fight when t'other tribes stirs up a fuss. Say, you wouldn't be havin' no rum ner whiskey, would ya, sir?"

"Clean out of it, I'm afraid, Tom." Cashman frowned.

"You bringin' guns an' powder, looks like," Tom observed keenly. "Want the Muskogee to do some fightin' fer ya's? With Galvez over to New Orleans with nigh on four thousand men? Garrisons at Mobile and Pensacola, and patrols all over these parts? 'Tis a wonder ya got this far, and that's a fack. They brung five thousand outa Havana when they took Pensacola, and that's not two days' march from here."

"We're devilish fellows, Tom," Cashman grunted. "What's odds we get put up in this long house here?"

"Wouldn't hold me breath on that. Too many mikkos in from the tall timber, Seminolee, too. Who brung ya this far? Had to be a Injun guided ya?"

"White Turtle," Cashman said finally, after playing with his pipe to exchange glances with Cowell.

"White Turtle, hey? He's pretty well connected. Must be somethin' powerful important, then," Tom speculated. "Might get put up with the Wind Clan, and Green-Eyed Cat. Hey, sure ya don't have no whiskey? I could come 'round later on the sly, like, so's the bucks don't get a nose of it. I palaver Muskogean powerful good, sir. Ya might find me a useful man, so's ya don't make anybody mad if yer gonna stay a spell. Be yer interpreter an' such."

"That might be worth talking about." Cashman nodded slowly. "I can't promise anything, mind."

"Wink's as good as the nod, sir, I get yer meanin'. I go." He knocked the dottle out of his pipe, crushed it between his fingers hot, and stuffed it into a small beaded pouch, and stood up. "Oh, by the way, sir. Tell yer friend in the pretty suit not ta sit on his knees like a woman. They been laughin' at him, they has. Sit cross-legged like a man'r he'll not be welcome at the council."

"Thank you, Tom. G'day to you, then."

"Insufferable person," Cowell sniffed, shifting his seating position with a groan. "An admitted deserter, you heard him say it, with a smile on his face."

"Still, he might be useful, Mister Cowell." Cashman shrugged.

"We have Desmond, what need do we have for him?"

"Desmond can't be with us all the time, sir," Cashman said. "And we'll not always be together as a party, not if we're to bathe and do all the things he suggested to ingratiate ourselves. From what I've seen so far, there may be more of his type about this town, willing to give us a bit of advice or translation, for a sip of rum or two. Remember what Lewrie said, about our men and the native women. It's bound to happen, and Desmond doesn't seem willin' to help in that regard."

"Neither do I, sir," Cowell sniffed. "It is not our place to be topping their women. You and Lewrie should issue strict orders that we are to concentrate on the task at hand and eschew their favors."

"One thing I've learned in the Army, Mister Cowell, is never be stupid enough to issue an order I've no hope of enforcin'. What should we do, raise the cross-bars and have one of Lewrie's men fashion a cat o' nine tails? That'll make the Indians eager to join hands in our endeavor, won't it, if we have to flog our men to keep 'em chaste?"