The King's Coat Read online

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  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  By Dewey Lambdin

  More praise for The King’s Coat

  Copyright

  To my mother, who always thought I could do it, but most especially to my father;

  Lt. Cmdr. Dewey Lambdin (USN)

  • ‘Boot’ Seaman in 1930

  • ‘Mustanged’ in 1941

  • Died in line of duty, 1954

  “So hush, for the wind’s his Lorelei

  And he wants to hear her calling,

  where the wave-tops flash

  with the light of God,

  in sparkling, salt-teared Mercy

  for those who commit themselves

  to The Deeps.”

  “We are precarious, uncertain, wild, enduring mortals, and may we so endowed continue, the wonder and balance of the universe.”

  —JOHN BYNG

  Prologue

  In retrospect, perhaps, getting into his half sister’s mutton was not the brightest idea that Alan Lewrie had ever had. Not, he told himself later, that it had been his idea at all; Belinda had been the initiator and he merely the recipient of her favors, which were ample. That she had been the object of desire for half the blades in London, both old and young, made it imperative that he try her at least once, just for the sake of comparison, much like a book critic would sample some Gothick fright and flummery so he could say he had read it. That half those blades had already preceded him really didn’t bother Alan.

  After all, Belinda never dallied with anyone less than aristocratic (unless one counted the odd stable boy, ostler, shopclerk, tinker or tradesman who happened to be in the immediate vicinity when her blood was up), and since Lewrie knew half of them anyway, he could be fairly sure she wasn’t poxed.

  Admittedly, he had suffered some pangs of concern that they were related, but since he was a Willoughby by blood if not by name, they had submerged wherever guilt pangs go when faced directly against Willoughby nature. Run shrieking for the nearest window, he surmised to himself, if they have any sense at all.

  Belinda was a fetching girl right enough, an auburn beauty with creamy skin, breasts that threatened to spill over her bodice, and bold eyes for any man of comely proportions. And, being a Willoughby, hot as a pagan Hindoo with the morals of a monkey.

  Alan was seventeen, two years younger than she, but already sure of his abilities to please at what he thought was the Prime Sport of Kings, a well-knit young man of middling height who could turn heads at a ball or on the Strand even without his “Macaroni” clothing. With the Christmas season over, and the City Season pace dying down, he had little to look forward to until spring and invitations to country houses, and had wearied of maids and mop-squeezers. It was looking to be a damned dull year, 1780, until the last explosion of parties in spring, so what could be more delightful than a dalliance at home, where one did not have to brave the elements, the Mob, mud, dead cats and streets full of garbage, or a shower of night soil from some window? This will cut down on my gambling debts, and my clothing bills, so everyone should be grateful.

  He had been surprised that Belinda would show interest in him at all, since he was the younger adopted but natural son born out of wedlock, usually referred to as “that filthy little bastard” by everyone, including his father, and Belinda herself. But suddenly, instead of irritable toleration, there had been a week or two of sultry looks, some covert fondling, seductive conversation and deep breathing that led up to this night when all the servants were out of the way. Gerald was off chasing fellow sodomites so he could scratch his particular form of Willoughby itch; Sir Hugo and his manservant Morton were both away, most likely drinking and wenching themselves into the gout again, and no one to interfere. Alan had pinched a silk condom from Sir Hugo’s travelling kit (half sister or not, he was only fairly sure of her latest amours) and had finally succumbed eagerly.

  They were gloriously engaged, and Belinda was trying to emulate the sound of a pack of hounds after the fox had gone to earth, when he thought he heard a scuffling noise in the hall, which he thought damned odd, odd enough to put him off stride, which didn’t seem to affect Belinda’s squirmings and View Halloo much. He knew servants never came upstairs after dinner, not if they knew what was good for them, and everyone else would be away ’til dawn at the earliest.

  Then he heard the door latch snap open.

  “Suffering Christ,” he breathed, his passion cooling precipitously. “Belinda, leave off, quick!”

  She grappled him even tighter to her, yelping aloud now, her transports of joy turning into full-fledged yells which he took for dumb lust. “Not now, you silly mort, someone’s here.”

  “Merciful Father in Heaven,” a voice quavered as the bed curtains parted with a jerk, spilling candlelight on the scene.

  Alan gulped at the sight of their parish vicar. Now what’s the “amen-curler” doing here? God, is he up next with her?

  Belinda pitched into a screaming frenzy as Alan disengaged and crawled away from the scene of the crime. Then, he saw the others; his brother Gerald, grinning wickedly; his father’s catch-fart Morton, who had a pistol in his fist; his father, even redder in the face than his usual brandy-induced hue, exercising his thick fingers on a walking stick; God help him, even their family solicitor Pilchard was there, bringing up the rear and trying to peek over their shoulders for a better view of Belinda’s charms as she screeched her way up a full octave.

  “Your own sister!” The vicar appropriately shuddered. “You godless … animal!”

  “Half sister,” Alan corrected as coolly as he could, clad only in a silk sheath condom and kneeling about as close to flagrante delicto as one could.

  “He raped me! Help!” Belinda screamed.

  “I’ll see you hang for this,” Sir Hugo said, advancing with the walking stick swishing the air.

  “Rape, hell,” Alan shouted in defense, thinking it a poor one even as he said it. “The jade was the one invited me!”

  “Lying hound!” Sir Hugo took a swing at Alan’s head that barely missed the vicar, and, if Alan had not gone flat on his back, would have half beheaded him. “I’ll kill you for this, you little bastard.”

  Alan did the sensible thing at that point; he ran. He leaped from the bed and made for his clothes. Morton came for him, but he was a well-fed slowcoach, and Alan had retrieved his breeches and was well on his way to freedom past Morton’s outstretched arms when Sir Hugo’s cane came down like a thunderbolt from on high and struck him on the shoulder, which caused him to draw his length on the parquet.

  “There, there, girl.” The vicar pawed Belinda’s bare arms and back and reluctantly allowed her to draw a sheet up over her magnificent young breasts. “You’re safe from him now!”

  Sir Hugo got the toe of his shoe in, spinning Alan about on the bare boards like a top before he fetched up against a table which came down with a crash, but allowed him space to rise. Belinda w
ent into another paroxysm of wailing as the vicar slobbered over her.

  “Vicar, I swear before God this was not totally my doing,” Alan shouted, dodging about the room from Morton and his father. Gerald and Pilchard huddled in the doorway, unwilling to get too involved, but ready to form a blocking force. “I don’t know you well, and I doubt if you know this family well, either, but if you did…”

  “Take him, Morton,” his father said. “Take him now!”

  The one safe road was not another lap of the room. Alan vaulted a table and dove back into the bed, rolling to his feet by the vicar.

  “If you would only listen to me, sir…” he begged.

  Belinda’s feet flew into action, pummeling him around the groin and up against the quavering old churchman. “You … you … Absalom!” the vicar finally managed to say, just before hitting him inexpertly in the chin with a lean and birdlike fist. It was enough, however, to put stars in his vision and brought with it the odd urge to sneeze. As the others rounded the bed to lay hands on him, he sank to the floor once more, feeling the thump of the vicar’s foot slamming his ribs.

  “Here, that’s not quite … cricket,” he protested.

  As he was jerked to his feet and hustled out of the room, he got a chance to lay eyes on Belinda once more, and she was staring at him with a curious smile on her lips and a crinkle to her eyes, the sort of smile he had seen her deliver to a particularly tasty stuffed goose at remove, after she had had her fill and was quite satisfied.

  Damme, what’s this all about, Alan wondered groggily, still smarting from the kick in the ribs from the otherwise saintly seeming reverend. With his arms full of clothing, he was hustled upstairs in Morton’s steely grasp.

  * * *

  “I must beg your forgiveness for striking him, Sir Hugo,” the vicar said, gratefully accepting a brandy in the first-floor study. “I’ve not raised a fist in anger since I was twelve, but the utter audacity and cock-a-whoop gall of him quite overcame me.”

  “I understand totally,” Sir Hugo said without humor. “Perhaps if I had allowed my temper to break on him more often when he was young, we would not be engaged as we are tonight.”

  “You did not strap him as a child?” the vicar asked.

  “Very rarely. He’s a thoroughly spoiled young man,” Sir Hugo said, pouring himself a glass. “You are new to the parish, so I must explain. In my youth, before I settled down from serving the King as a soldier, I was more forward than most with the young ladies. His mother was beautiful, my first love, a proper girl from a good family.”

  The vicar made agreeable cooing noises, which Sir Hugo ignored.

  “Before I went overseas, she and I consummated our love for each other, and then I lost touch with her, my letters returned or never answered. I was heartbroken,” Sir Hugo muttered, looking only stern, but not in the least heartbroken. “By the time I had returned, and married someone else, I discovered that she had borne me a son. She had been turned out by her own family, and had died, little better than a prostitute, and that boy a pitiful parish waif. I could not refuse to own up to my sin, could I, Father?”

  “Well…”

  “To atone for all, I took him in, you see.”

  “A heavy burden brought about by the lust of the flesh, sir,” the vicar said, now on familiar ground. “But a common one, I am sad to say. In these evil times in which we suffer before our admission to the higher reward…”

  “Yes,” Sir Hugo said. “As I was saying, I took him in, fed him, clothed him, sent him to the best schools, and never could find the sternness in my heart necessary for his proper upbringing, because of my guilt and shame of abandoning her, even though she was too proud to tell me. My second wife died, leaving me the sole parent of three poor babes. Even then, I could not raise a hand to him, not after ruining his poor mother, for being the one who caused her untimely death.”

  “Er, which mother are we talking of?” the vicar dithered.

  “His mother … Father!” Sir Hugo snapped. “Alan was the very image of her when he was a boy. How could I strike him? How could I deny him anything his heart desired?” He sank his face into his hands.

  “You poor fellow,” the vicar said, patting him on the back.

  “God most assuredly is aware you tried, Sir Hugo,” the vicar went on. “For we have all sinned not only by commission but by omission as well, and come short of the glory of God. Any small act of contrition and amends is—”

  “He is a rakehell,” Sir Hugo said, shooting to his feet and going for the brandy decanter, away from the vicar’s petting.

  “Indeed.”

  “A gambler, a Corinthian, a brothel dandy and the bane of any pretty maid in London,” Sir Hugo went on with some heat. “He fought a duel, so please you, for his alleged honor, brought comment on this family by his shocking conduct, wasted my money to clothe him in that ridiculous Macaroni fashion … he was expelled from Harrow, sir.”

  “Merciful God,” the vicar gasped at this last revelation.

  “Something about emulating the Gunpowder Plot and the Governor’s privy. I do not see him mending his way in future, either.”

  “God forgives all, Sir Hugo. Even the most practiced sinner,” the vicar reminded him with a beatific smile, and a brandy glass that was dry as dust on the bottom.

  “Even the attempted rape of his own sister? The rest I could live down, but this! Belinda will be ruined! What good man would have her, even with her dowry and prospects? How shall I face the world as the father of a boy doomed to be hanged like one of the filthy Mob?” Sir Hugo filled the vicar’s glass and then threw himself into a face-down sulk behind his desk. He waited for an answer but heard only the sound of sloshing and a moan of contentment from the vicar. “I mean to say, how may I retain the good name of Willoughby?” he prompted.

  “Ah, yes, the poor young lady,” the vicar finally said, not without a gleam coming to his watery eyes.

  “Yes?” Sir Hugo prompted, trying not to seem impatient.

  “Transport him. Or send him to the country,” the vicar decided.

  “But the courts involved…”

  “Ah, yes, well…” The vicar shrugged and made free with the decanter on his own.

  “I shall, of course, disinherit him,” Sir Hugo announced. “I’ll not have him spend another moment under this roof as one of mine. Then it shall be up to him to succeed or fail under his own name.”

  “He is not known by Willoughby?”

  “Lewrie, his mother’s maiden name, sir.”

  “Let me see … some form of punishment, or banishment, that will not reflect on your own kith and kin, remove him from the scene and make a man of him,” the vicar said. “I have it!”

  “Yes?”

  “I know a captain in the Royal Navy, Sir Hugo. With this dreadful little rebellion going on in the American colonies, one more young volunteer for service would not be looked on amiss.” The vicar fairly beamed.

  “And ship him out as a seaman?” Sir Hugo grinned in return.

  “Heavens, Sir Hugo, be merciful at the last, I beg you. To be a midshipman is punishment enough, but to be pent with the common rabble, an educated young man raised as a gentleman … besides, there would be unfavorable comment if he stood out from his surroundings too well.”

  “I suppose so,” Sir Hugo said unhappily. “So I shall have to buy him his kit. And his commission as well, I suppose.”

  “Not at all, Sir Hugo,” the vicar assured him. “Well, he must have his kit, but a commission in even a poor regiment is four times the cost of a willing captain. I am sure my friend Captain Bevan can find your son a commander desperately in need of hands and midshipmen. Like much else in our times, the zeal of the populace for naval service is akin to the lack of zeal for the true sense of Christ’s teachings.”

  “Desperate enough to take even young Alan?”

  “Fifty pounds in the right pocket in Portsmouth could put him on any ship of the line.”

  “Preferably one
going to foreign climes, the farther the better. And your friend can do this?”

  “Most assuredly, Sir Hugo. Why, I recall in my last parish there was a young widow with a son who was—” the vicar reddened at the memory that Sir Hugo thought touched a bit too close to home “—at any rate, the Fleet is full of young lads who are not exactly welcome at home.”

  “Shameful,” Sir Hugo said. “Well, please be so good as to have your nautical friend … Bevan, did you say? … attend me as soon as he can. And, just to clear this up as a legal matter, I wonder if I could prevail upon you to attest to what you witnessed this evening with my solicitor, Mister Pilchard? He is gathering statements in case we have to call the watch and have Alan imprisoned, should he prove to be intractable.”

  “Mosht happy to oblige you, Shir Hugo,” the vicar said, barely able to bring glass to lip any longer. “I shall not keep you longer, Shir Hugo. I believe we have all shuf … suffered enough tonight.”

  “Indeed we have, sir.” Sir Hugo nodded somberly.

  Sir Hugo rose and bowed a courteous goodnight to the stumbling sermonizer as Morton held the door for him and took him in charge to the parlor, where Pilchard waited. Sir Hugo sat down and mused happily over his brandy. It seemed an age before the wizened solicitor stuck his head around the door, waving a sheet of vellum to dry the ink, much like a flag of surrender to his master’s temper.

  “Is that sodden hedge-priest gone?”

  “Just this minute, Sir Hugo. I saw him to the door myself.” Pilchard grinned, entering the room fully as Sir Hugo waved him forward. He laid the document before his employer like a great trophy. “Here it is, Sir Hugo. And considering his vulnerable state and the witnesses against him, I anticipate no problem there…”

  “Excellent, Pilchard, excellent! Everything is in order, then.”

  “All but young Alan’s signature, Sir Hugo.”

  “I wish you to make an addition to this, Pilchard.”

  “Sir?”

  “Have a brandy and sit down, for God’s sake,” Sir Hugo ordered, irritated at the outré deference his solicitor always showed him but secretly still pleased that he could engender that sort of deference. Pilchard obeyed the instructions and took a seat on a settee, perched on the edge of the cushion with knees close together.