to engage the interest of these young scrubs, eh? “
He scrutinized my nephews' faces, well aware that nothing more was required to command their full attention than the spectacle of the seventy-four.
The great third-rate towered above our heads, her keel a massive construction of elm to which great ribs of oak were fixed. She was nearly complete, the decks having been laid and the hull partitioned into bulkheads, powder magazines, storerooms, and cabins, with ladders running up and down. The Itchen yard is ideally suited for such a ship, for the river water flows in through a lock, and the finished vessel may float down to Southampton Water in time.
“Jupiter!” Edward exclaimed. “Isn't she a beauty, though! How long have you been a-building?”
The shipwright gazed at his work with ill-concealed affection. “Nearly three years she's been under our hands, and you shall not find a sweeter ship in all the Kingdom. No rot in her timbers, no crank in her design; and we shan't hear of this lady falling to pieces in a storm!”
“Are such things so common?” I murmured to Mr. Hawkins.
The Bosun's Mate glowered. “Have ye not heard of the Forty Thieves, ma'am? All ships o' the line, built in rotten yards? Floating coffins, they were—though I served in no less than five of 'em.”
“Good Lord.”
“When is she to sail, Mr. Dixon?” George enquired.
“We expect to launch her at Spithead in the spring. Perhaps your naval uncle will have the command of her! Should you like to look in?”
“Should we!” the boy replied. “Above all things!”
“Jeremiah!” Dixon called. “Yo, there—Jeremiah! Now, where is that Lascar?”
A dark-skinned, lanky fellow with jet-black hair ran up and salaamed, in the manner of the East Indies. A Lascar! The boys, I am certain, had never encountered a true exotic of the naval world—one of the renowned sailors of the Seven Seas. I smiled to see Edward's expression of interest, and George's of apprehension.
“Jeremiah at your service,” he said, with another low bow. “You wish to see the boat, yes?”
Mr. Dixon slapped my nephews on the back so firmly George winced. “Get along with ye, now. The Lascar won't bite. Refuses even to touch good English beef, if you'll credit it; but he's a dab hand with a plane and a saw.”
Nearly an hour later we bid Mr. Dixon goodbye, and Mr. Hawkins turned his skiff towards home. Yesterday's water party proved so delightful, however—so exactly suited to my nephews' temperaments and interests— that on this morning, their last day of liberty, I was determined to get them once more out-of-doors.
THE ABBEY RUINS, AND THE SCATTERED HABITATION that surrounds them, lie southeast of Southampton proper, just beyond the River Itchen. In fine weather, of a summer's afternoon, one might walk the three miles without fatigue; but with two boys on my hands, and the weather uncertain, I had thought it wiser to make a naval expedition of our scheme. As the diminutive craft bobbed and swayed under the boys' restless weight, I feared I had chosen with better hope than wisdom.
“Sit ye down, young master, and have a care, or ye'll pitch us all over t'a gunnels!” Mr. Hawkins growled at George. Mr. Hawkins is not unkind, but exacting in matters nautical. I grasped the seat of George's pantaloons firmly; they were his second-best, a dark grey intended for school in Winchester, and not the fresh black set of mourning he had received of our seamstress.
The Bosun's Mate maneuvered the skiff into a small channel that knifed through the strand, and sent the vessel skimming towards shore. Above us rose Netley Cliff, and the path that climbed towards the abbey.
“That'll be Netley Lodge.” Hawkins thrust a gnarled thumb over his shoulder as he rowed, in the direction of a well-tended, comfortable affair of stone that hugged the cliff's edge. “Grand place in the old days, so they say, but nobody's lived there for years.”
“And yet,” I countered as the boat came to rest on the shingle, “there is a thread of smoke from two of the four chimneys.”
The Bosun's Mate whistled under his breath. “Right you are, Miss! Somebody has opened up the great house—but who? ”
“Perhaps a wandering ruffian has taken up residence,” George suggested hopefully.
Mr. Hawkins shipped his oars. “Beyond is the village of Hound—nobbut a few cottages thrown up, and scarce of folk at that, what with the war. They'll know in Hound who've lit the fires at t'a Lodge.”
A freshening wind lifted Edward's hat from his head, and tossed