Troubled Waters Page 5

  "Aha, Captain Lewrie, do you come in, sir!" his barrister gayly exclaimed, broadly gesturing him to a wing-back chair before his desk, which was piled high with stacks of legal octavos and folders of that pudding-crust "law calf" leather. "Your servant, sir, and I am Andrew MacDougall. Will you take coffee or tea, Captain Lewrie? Take a pew, sir, and be comfortable whilst we begin about it, ha ha!"

  And'he's the one t'save mine arse?Lewrie gawped to himself as he took in Mr. Andrew MacDougall, Esquire, for MacDougall looked more like a puckish public school boy than what Lewrie expected an attorney to be. MacDougall looked no older than his middle-twenties, his face round, with dimpled cheeks and chin, under a head of curly dark blond hair that spilled over his forehead in an unkempt mop—one that he swiped back at least twice before Lewrie could seat himself—and was so curly that Lewrie could conjure that he really wore a peruke-styled court wig of unconventional colour, were it not for the fact that his lawyer's formal black court robe and peruke already rested on a stand in one corner, a stand formed much like a mast with one crossed yardarm. Lewrie found it oddly disconcerting, that mute display; more of a legal scare-crow with "arms" spread wide to net the unfortunate, and the peruke with its three tight side-curls, short queue bound with a black ribbon resting on a pad atop the stand, a faceless intimation of future horror. It was so ghoulish that Lewrie felt a tiny shiver.

  Scare-crow, or the Grim Reaper? Lewrie thought with a gulp.

  "Well now, isn't this delightful?" MacDougall most happily said as Sadler hovered over Lewrie's right shoulder. "Coffee or tea, sir?"

  "Umm . . . coffee'd suit," Lewrie decided. "Delightful, sir?"

  "Why, to meet one of Britain's heroic sea-dogs, Captain Lewrie!" MacDougall exclaimed again, making Lewrie even uneasier with the dread that his new attorney did rather a lot of exclaiming, and had less of the requisite gravitas than God had promised a March Hare!

  "A sea-dog now under a sentence of death, sir," Lewrie replied with a squirm of impatience to get past the politenesses to the meat of the matter.

  "Oh, that!" MacDougall said with a wave of his hand as he took hold of a matching wing-back chair and dragged it round the desk quite near Lewrie's, plumped himself down in it, and crossed his legs "club-man" fashion, with one ankle resting on a knee. "Stuff and nonsense!"

  "Stuff, and non—?" Lewrie gawped . . . aloud, this time.

  "Slavery was outlawed in the British Isles nigh fifty years ago, Captain Lewrie, and the condition of slavery is no longer recognised under Common Law," MacDougall was quick to assure him, leaning over to tap Lewrie on the knee, and bestowing on him a very wide grin. "Also, there is the fact that the Committee of Privy Council for the Colonies . . . , disbanded long ago, by the by . . . , allowed Jamaica, and certain other colonies and plantations, use of their own local Grant Law, but, such law has no standing in English jurisprudence, d'ye see, Captain Lewrie! Oh, for cases concerning commerce, those presented in Courts of Common Pleas, or Chancery Court should such Grant Law cases concern inheritances and disputed wills, jury decisions or local justices' rulings might stand if appealed in England, but certainly not anent your case, which would go to King's Bench for confirmation, most usually. Ah, the coffee! Capital! Thankee, Sadler."

  "So . . . no one's to snatch me up and march me off to Tyburn?" Lewrie asked, suddenly feeling a lot better.

  "Newgate, sir," MacDougall corrected him, with another swipe at his unruly locks, and yet another of his disarming smiles. "Tyburn's out, and Newgate Prison, near the Old Bailey, is London's new site of executions. Closer and more convenient to everyone needful of instruction in the sureness, and majesty, of the law, ha ha! There's nothing finer than a series of hangings to keep our criminal class daunted, ha ha! Well, sometimes in Horsemonger Lane . . ."

  "Beats the theatre all hollow, too, does it?" Lewrie shied away, wondering just what sort of a tom-fool his supporters had engaged.

  "Entertainment for some, surely, Captain Lewrie . . . grim warning to others," MacDougall chummily agreed as he shovelled four spoonfuls of sugar into his coffee and stirred it up. "Ah, just right. Brazilian, and thank God the Portuguese are still neutral in this war."

  Lewrie took a sip of his and found it not quite as scalding-hot as he preferred, but it was close, so he dashed two spoonfuls of sugar into his own, stirred it up, and sipped again.

  "So . . . ," Lewrie reiterated, "could someone take me up?"

  "Oh, there is a remote possibility," MacDougall allowed with a shrug, "very remote, mind. Any fool may lay an 'information' with one of our new-fangled Police Magistrates, but that sort of arrest usually involves petty crimes . . . or revenge 'twixt thieves who've fallen out. Even were you to be denounced, and the Bow Street Runners come snatch you, you'd be back on the streets, in a trice . . . or, as my good old granther always said . . . 'in twa shakes o' th' wee sheep's tail, an' th' feerst ain a'ready been shook,' ha ha!"

  "Uhm . . . why?" Lewrie had to ask, not reassured a whit.

  "Fear, sir! Fear!" MacDougall told him with a great chortling laugh. "Now, 'tis a crime the Runners are already pursuing, yes, they would hold you 'til trial. . . one of those King's Bench 'justice mills' that prosecutes twenty or thirty cases a day. But, you, sir! Ha! We do not treat our well-born, or our heroes, in such a fashion. Most of the criminal class, the lower classes, well . . . their crimes are evident, as usually is their guilt, God help them. But for a gentleman, a member of the landed gentry and the well-to-do, most of the magistrates start to tremble in their boots! Deference to the 'better sorts,' and members of the nobility, would result in a quick remand to higher authorities, and, with the presence of legal counsel at your side upon such remand, would have you free in an eye-blink.

  "Unless you had committed a heinous crime here in England, sir," MacDougall cautioned in a (rare) sober moment, then not a second later guffawed and slapped his knee. "And, of course we both know that you didn't, and any Police Magistrate would drop you like red-hot shot and not care a fig what transpired on Jamaica, unless told to do so."

  "I may safely walk the streets of London, then?" Lewrie asked.

  "No one walks London streets in perfect safety, given how many criminals we have abouts, Captain Lewrie," MacDougall said, finding a new cause for amusement, "but, in your case, such a taking-up, as I've already said, would be a very remote possibility."

  "Well, that's something, then," Lewrie said with a relieved sigh.

  "There is also the commonly held fear of the old 'Star Chamber' tyranny and official oppression, Captain Lewrie," MacDougall told him as he rose to liven the fire in the grate with a poker, then sat back down. "You are aware that there are no government prosecutors under Common Law? Every person put on trial, whether in King's Bench for criminal cases, in Common Pleas or Chancery Court, is prosecuted by an objective attorney engaged by the aggrieved party. And every person brought to court is supposed to be represented by yet another objective attorney engaged by the accused, his family and supporters, or, in some cases by a barrister, sarjeant, or advocate appointed by the Lord Justices should the accused be indigent."

  "As I supposedly was back in Kingston?" Lewrie charily asked.

  "The conduct of your trial in absentia on Jamaica, I tell you, sir, was the very epitome of the worst abuses of Star Chamber proceedings!" MacDougall intoned in a sudden pique. "From what I was able to gather from friends and allies of yours in the West Indies, your legal counsel, a locally schooled 'Johnny New-Come' to the Jamaican bar, was whistled up from a tavern cross the street from the courthouses, given but half an hour to familiarise himself with little more than your name and background, and presented no witnesses on your behalf, not even any witnesses who might attest to your character or qualities, before your trial began. Oh, there's a whole host of irregularities which I have gleaned from the transcript of your trial, sir . . . rather a short one, given the fact that the entire proceedings did not last much more than three hours, from 'Oyez' to verdict, to sentencing, and the justic
e's 'God have mercy on his soul, wheresoever he may be at this moment'!"

  "Three . . . hours?" Lewrie blanched, that wonderful coffee curdling in his stomach. "Three bloody hours?"

  "Not as odd as you'd think, sir," MacDougall replied, laughing again. "Why, the first complex criminal case in King's Bench, with a slew of witnesses on both sides, that actually lasted more than a lone day, did not occur 'til 1794! Sat in on it, whilst I was 'eating my terms' at Grey's Inn, and what a show it was, ha ha! Fascinating!"

  "Oh, Christ," Lewrie weakly croaked.

  "Nought to fear, Captain Lewrie," MacDougall soothingly said. " 'Eating my terms' was not all I did before being called to the bar."

  MacDougall then proceeded to lay out the usual cursus lex that most aspiring attorneys were required to pursue . . . which did nothing much to reassure Lewrie that any lawyer was worth a pinch of pig shit.

  A first or second son, usually from a well-to-do family, might attend university for a decent grounding in a gentlemanly education in rhetoric, Latin, and Greek. Whether graduate or not, anyone wishing to become a proper lawyer would approach one of the great Inns of Court—Lincoln's Inn, Grey's Inn, Middle Temple, or Inner Temple—whichever suited his tastes, and where the members seemed more of a like mind to his than any of the others, then ingratiate himself by merely hanging about, reading precedent from past proceedings on his own time with no real schedule of instruction, and dine-in often enough for the elder members—those called "Benchers" who had already earned their honourifics of "King's Counsel"—to "vet" them and decide, usually after a period of three years of social dining "in hall" with other members, whether they should be "called to the bar" or not! Oh, some more aspiring might spend their time as "special pleaders," the ones who wrote up presentations to be submitted to court for their elders, but it wasn't really all that necessary, after all. There were many well-born aspirants who avoided the drudgery of such menial work, but became lawyers on the strength of their supper conversation, and their ability to look sober after those communal dinners!

  Andrew MacDougall, though, was the son of a Scottish magistrate who had actually bothered to read the law, and for a time apprenticed himself to a real, successful attorney before inheriting the estate and becoming a respected local magistrate. The father's respect for the law, and his incessant talk of what had occurred in his local court, his explaining the intricacies of the differences between English Common Law and Scottish—and long evenings in his study spent wrangling what current law was, and what a fair-minded man felt it should be—had enflamed young Andrew MacDougall to be a barrister. He had spent time at a good public school (or what passed for one in Scotland), then had done two terms at university in Edinburgh before coaching down to Oxford to complete his studies, then had approached Grey's Inn. And while "eating his terms," he had deeply immersed himself in studying, in attending Court sessions, in long and earnest discussions with the "Benchers" and writers of his lodge, eagerly offering to take on the drab finger-pinching work of a special pleader for more than a year before being called to the bar, and, MacDougall was quick to inform Lewrie, had been successful in most of his cases, since!

  "My gown's yonder, sir," MacDougall concluded with a hint of pride as he pointed to that spooky black robe with outstretched arms on the stand in the corner, "though I am still required to wear one of 'stuff,' not silk, and have yet to earn the title of King's Counsel, yet I do assure you that I will do my absolute best to represent your cause, Captain Lewrie, and my absolute best is, dare I say it, rather a cut above what you may encounter from some other of my colleagues, whether I held strong personal views on the justice of your actions in recruiting those slaves and making free men of them, or not. . . which act I not only approve, but applaud, by the by, ha ha!"

  "Though . . . whether you approve or not, Mister MacDougall, you sound to me more than capable," Lewrie told him. "Thank God for it!"

  "Thankee kindly for your words, Captain Lewrie, and I trust you will be of the same mind once your time before the bench is over," Mr. MacDougall said. "Now. We may need send Sadler for a second pot, or a third, as we get to the meat of the matter. For I must glean all I may from you concerning the theft. . . well, shall we say, rather, the 'obtaining' of those dozen former slaves, ha ha! How, and when, was the idea concocted, and with whom . . . every last particular that happened on the night you, ah . . . closed the coast, what evidence still in your possession I might present as testimony, that sort of thing? I know you are fitting out a new ship of war, and your time is short, so today, perhaps tomorrow as well but no longer, it is vital that we make the most of your presence here in London."

  "Let's be at it, then," Lewrie was quick to agree.

  Chapter Six

  Surviving witnesses; there were plenty of them, for Lewrie's old crew and wardroom had mostly turned-over entire from Proteus to Savage. MacDougall was delighted to hear that all Lieutenants and Midshipmen were required to keep daily journals noting wind, weather, sea states, and what happened during their times on watch, or out-of-the-ordinary events that their ship met. While Lt. Catterall was dead and gone and his journals were unavailable, Adair and Grace could testify, and Lt. Langlie, no longer on the ship but still fitting out his own new warship, could send his old journals to MacDougall, if he was quick to ask for them. "Hell's Bells," Lewrie spat, "I'll be seeing Langlie before that. . . he's to wed my ward, Sophie de Maubeuge, this weekend in Portsmouth!"

  "And did you keep journals of your own, sir? Did you write down what your purposes were that evening?" MacDougall pointedly enquired.

  "Not reallyl" Lewrie explained, squirming. "Once a commission is done, logs and journals are sent to Admiralty for perusal and storage, so . . ."

  "No, it wouldn't do, would it, to write down 'May first at Eight P.M., turned slave-monger,' hey?" MacDougall said with a moue, followed by a schoolboy's

  "I noted the course steered from Kingston, closing the coast at night, dousing all lanthorns . . . how far offshore it was when we came-to, sending boats ashore under Mister Langlie, and, ah . . . being received of a round dozen . . . volunteers," he concluded, blushing a bit.

  "What? Doused all lanthorns?" MacDougall suddenly enthused as he scribbled that down on a sheet of foolscap, so madly that he slung ink droplets. "Now that's extremely interesting!"

  "It is?" Lewrie asked, at a loss.

  "And," MacDougall eagerly pressed, "did you, or any of your surviving witnesses, see any lights ashore, sir?"

  "Well, there were some porch lamps and such, a half-mile or so back from the beach," Lewrie recalled. "Where, I assumed, the overseer had his lodgings, perhaps one or two round the main house's porch gallery, where the Beaumans would reside, if they'd been there. It wasn't their only plantation, d'ye see, but the one nearest to my friend Christopher Cashman's plantation. I'd not have tried it on, else, for he'd sent word to them that, if they wished to run and join the Navy, they'd get the Joining Bounty as volunteers, and get the same treatment as any White volunteer. Could've taken twenty or more, the whole lot of 'em, if Admiralty wouldn't notice sooner or later that I was paying twice the number of hands that Proteus was rated."

  "But. . . other than those few lamps, did you see any other light ashore?" MacDougall squirmed like a puppy as he insisted on an answer.

  "Nary a one, sir," Lewrie could firmly aver, for he had spent the hours from sunset to dawn in a funk-sweat to be discovered, and it had been a huge relief at the time for Proteus to have stolen in, then stolen out, without waking a cricket.

  "Saw no hand-carried lanthorns or torches, no hue and cry?" Mr. MacDougall repeated, as if a life hung on the answer. "Hounds barking, gunshots, anything like that?"

  "God, no! 'Twas quiet as the grave," Lewrie told him.

  "Ah ha!" MacDougall sharply cried, slapping his palm on his desk and guffawing as he swiped his hair out of his eyes once more.

  "Well, there were seals on the beach, they barked a bit, but no dogs," Lewrie further informed him
.

  "Never saw a living soul coming to that beach, other than your volunteers, Captain Lewrie?" MacDougall demanded, suddenly not sounding so young and schoolboy-ish. "What other lights were there? A moon?"

  "Starlight," Lewrie related, pouring himself another coffee as he did so, even if the pot had gone tepid. " 'Twas a new moon at that time. It was, ah . . . taken into account for the success of the enterprise," Lewrie admitted, a trifle shame-faced, and talking chin-down to his shirt collar.

  "And your own ship's lights were all extinguished, ah ha! Yes?"

  "Yes, of course," Lewrie assured him, one brow up.

  "Would it surprise you very much, Captain Lewrie, to learn that the Beauman family's overseer on that plantation, and his son, claimed in their testimony at your sham trial that they were awakened by sounds of the slave population, ah . . . celebrating? That they testified that they quickly roused themselves, took up arms, a hand-lanthorn, and lit a rag torch? That they rushed down to the beach, but arrived too late to re-capture their runaways?"

  "What? That's utter shite!" Lewrie spat. "We didn't. . . !"

  "Fired off a pair of shots at the boats, they swore," MacDougall rushed on to relate. "And, though they hit nothing, your ship was so close ashore, they knew her for a frigate, a British frigate, at once. More damaging to you, they swore they could mark your appearance . . . by the light of your ship's taffrail lanthorns, because you were standing right by one of them, fully illumined."

  "Mine arse on a band-box if they could!" Lewrie erupted. "Now, sir . . . another matter," MacDougall demanded, picking up a not-so-thick octavo and flipping through the pages to the section he wanted quickly. He rose and paced, tossing hair out of his eyes, and looking like a cherubic, rotund Puck, for he was a young man of substantial girth and heft. "In what position, relative to the coast, did your frigate lie? Sideways to the beach? How close?"