12th July 1809, Payday

Edward, seated at his desk, was carefully counting out the coins, putting them into envelopes with the respective names on them, and sealing them with wax.

He had been here for a month now, and it was time to pay his batman - or batmen, as it was. He was rather proud of himself for remembering this detail. He never had to bother with such small details of the household before. He had a notion that the batmen might be payed quarterly, like most servants, but he thought that a rather ill-suited scheme for their current circumstances, so he decided to ignore it - the youngsters probably would fare better with a more frequent supply of small cash then with occasional big amounts anyway.

Once he was finished, he put his writing things away, locked the small strongbox that held his valuables, tucked the two envelopes into his inner coat pocket and went in search of their intended recipients. When he spotted a soft, eagerly picking ball of yellow fluff, he set of in that direction. Whereever Peggy was, at least Pye was usually close by.

Pye was indeed fairly close to where Peggy had been pecking at the ground, though his back was presently turned away from her. His rifle was resting across his lap, and a rag was in hand, tending to the weapon diligently. Tools of that sort of trade lay on another rag to his left, smaller and bigger instruments that he could use to make sure there was not a speck of unwanted dirt in his rifle. His coat was folded on a fairly large rock, that also served, the empty part, to prop up his mug, filled with steaming tea and by that time a quarter empty.

He was humming quietly to himself, his gaiters were unbuttoned up to the four buttons at the very top and his worn down socks that had been a gift from the wife of one of his friends in the 33rd, had his toes peeking out in places, but were for the most part only carrying the colour of his shoes and any dirt that had managed to come through.

He leaned over to the cup, lifted and sipped from it then laid it back in it's spot, sighing contently.

Freddie, likewise occupied, sat companionably beside Pye, caring for his own rifle and occassionally peeking into a covered pot simmering over the fire, each time releasing a cloud of fragrant steam. When the engineer came closer, he bumped Pye with his shoulder and sprang to his feet, at the last moment recalling that saluting with a partly disassembed rifle in one hand and a flask of oil in the other was not a bright idea.

The engineer bend down to lightly flick his fingers at Peggy, then nodded to the two friends and pulled the envelopes out of his pocket. After glancing at the names and making sure they were still properly closed and each rifleman got the right one, he held them out to the boys.

"Don't let me disturb your cleaning efforts. I just came to give you your pay - Good work, men. Thank you and don't spend all the money ... well, on anything I should not officially know about. Carry on!"

With that, he turned, obviously thinking the matter and the interruption finished and ready to depart.

Cotton had likewise got to his feet, carefully setting his rifle to one side first. "Sir."

He wondered if the two younger Riflemen would ever do things slower - he himself was staid and solid in comparison, but that had a lot to do with his working life before he'd enlisted. After all, you couldn't hurry crops and farm animals.

"Oh, Cotton ... yes, of course."

The engineer fished in his pocket for some loose coins, finding two sixpence and tossing them to the older rifleman. Since Cotton had run various errants for him, generally helped him and on more than one occassion had guided Freddie in his endeavours to become a proper servant, Torrington quite saw that he rightly could expect a vail and was indeed somewhat ashamed to have forgotten it.

Thinking it not impossible now that he might have forgotten somebody else as well, he hesitated.

Startled, Cotton caught the coins and opened his hand to see what the Engineer had given him. Two sixpences - a whole shilling. That was a whole day's pay before stoppages. A slow grin appeared on his face. He wasn't quite sure why the officer had felt the need to give him a shilling, but he wasn't going to turn it down.

"Thank'ee very much, sir," he said, and noticed Torrington's hesitation. "Was there summat else, sir?"

Pye was still holding the envelope in hand, still in the outstretched position just as he had recieved it. He was looking confusedly at Torrington's back. That Freddie recieved this strange, square thing, a little bag of sorts, but smaller and leaner and made of a similar stuff as books were, was no surprise to him. He was Torrington's batman and if he needed papers delievered somewhere, who else to give them to. It was even stranger was what the captain had said. It made no sense. The envelope did weigh more than normal paper should, which had not helped him to make any more sense about it. Was he to deliver this money too. But he could not read! How could he know who it was for! He saw the scribbles on the top but did Torrington forget that he was quite incapable of making out what scribbles meant?!

He nervously cleared his throat then even more nervously began the question: "Sir.....'scuse me...but." he gulped soundly. "I can't read this... I dunno whom t' give it?" He glanced towards Cotton. The other man could read it for him of course, but perhaps Torrington could just point him in the right direction.

Torrington shook his head, startled out of his reverie.

"No, thank you. Unless ... would you mind giving this to your wife and thank her for the washing and all the other work she did."

He pulled out another sixpence - better safe than sorry - and fortunately he could afford this policy. A moment ago he had contemplated giving the money to her himself, since he did not like much the notion of giving her money to her husband without Maggie at least seeing it, but even he realized that to ask a man where his wife was and then giving her money might give a somewhat wrong impression.

At Pye's question, he looked equally confused for a moment, then explained slowly:

"This is for you! See, here: Z-A-C-H-A-R-Y P-Y-E."

He followed the letters with his finger while he slowly pronounced the name.

"It's your pay for the last month for serving me."

Freddie meanwhile was starring at the envelope with highest concentration and his tongue firmly between his teeth, deciphering the inscription letter by letter.

"For Maggie? Yes, sir." Cotton took the third sixpence and put it with the others in his pocket. She might be able to use it to lay in some more stock or something; she had a good head for that sort of thing after all.

He hid a grin as the Captain spelled out Pye's name on the packet the lad was holding. It hadn't been so very long ago that Cotton himself had been unable to read his own name.

"But, sir,..my name is Zachary Pye, not Za CH arie Peeaye!" He protested. After a moment he felt quite embarrassed too. The captain has only pronounced it differently because it was slow and this was how his name was written. The shorter few squiggles were his last, and the first his first name.

His eyes widened and he blinked at captain Torrington. Wait a moment. This was HIS?! This was for him? For what? He had only helped Freddie around with the things which allowed him to hang around his friend anyway. Was he supposed to give that to Freddie actually? He looked at his friend then the captain again. He would certainly share it with him! "Thank you, sir!" He said loud and greatful like, perhaps as grateful as a puppy who had been given a slice of ham. Mind, had he been given a slice or even a bit more of that ham he would perhaps have managed a few hops in the air as well.

"Thank you. If... if you'm sure that 'tis fer me." He said and clutched the envelope to his chest. He was being paid! Not by the army, but by the captain and for doing things that he'd actually quite enjoyed doing and did not even consider as chores. He felt a little guilty at taking the money and looked at his friend for some guidance. If it was ok, he would keep it. If Freddie said no, he would thank the captain again and give it back.

Now Torrington looked even more confused - wasn't it custom that soldier servants were paid some extra money?

"Yes, I'm quite sure it's for you!"

He looked at Cotton, quite helpless to understand what was going wrong here.

(At this point proceedings were slightly interrupted by Freddie, who had finally figured out that the writing on the envelope was "Friedrich Rottländer", grinned all over his face because he had successfully managed that feat, then suddenly realised that it was his own name and started to do a little dance, shouting: "Oh, it's for me! It's for me!" - It seemed that it was rather unimportant what was inside. The simple fact that Freddie had successfully gotten a letter was enough to send the young German into raptures.)

Cotton couldn't help grinning at Rottländer's ecstasies, but sobered a little at the confused look on Captain Torrington's face. "They bin servantin' for you, sir, but I don't think they understood they'd get paid for it," he said with a half-shrug. He himself hadn't expected to receive a vail for the things he'd done for the Engineer, but it was nice to be appreciated - and it wasn't as though he'd been a servant for anyone else before Captain Vickery took him on, so receiving vails was quite out of his experience anyway, though he'd occasionally received a penny or two for opening gates or holding horses for gentlemen before he'd enlisted.

"Oh!"

The engineer frowned.

"Well, as long as they serve me, they will get paid. Did they really think they had to do all this additional work for free?"

Which had been quite a lot - and he was used to London standarts, where good servants usually were hard to come by and demanded an appropriate wage before lifting a finger.

"Well, in this case, you probably better should keep an eye on them for a bit - I would hate if they were to invest their unexpected earnings in alcohol and wake up with a head bad enough to make Captain Vickery rethink their position."

Cotton's grin widened again. "I don't reckon you ought to worry about that, sir. They'm sober enough sorts, I think. Not like some redcoat types I could mention." He bent to take the lid off the kettle; there was plenty of water in it. Good. He hung it over the fire again.

"D'you want a cup of tea or anythin', sir?" he added, straightening up again.

Torrington had to admit that he was kind of curious to see the reaction of Freddie and Pye once they got actually around to opening their envelopes. Since he wasn't perfectly sure what soldier servants were supposed to get, he had decided to pay Freddie as an underbutler and Pye as a footman, hoping that their army wages would make up for the bed and board he would usually provide for his domestic servants.

So he gladly accepted the invitation.

"If you should happen to have one, gladly."

"There'll be one directly minute, when the kettle's boiled, then, sir," Cotton informed the Engineer, glancing across to the boys. "Hey - you two. You goin' to open them packets, then?" he said, wondering just how flummoxed they were going to be when they saw the contents, whatever they were.

Peggie watched the excitement of the young Freddie, then the happy smile on Pye's face, the boy finally aware that this was really his envelope. This man seemed to be giving out things in white squares. She scampered up to Torrington and chirped expectantly. Well, Pye got something, the big man Cotton got something, and the fast running boy Freddie got something, she was next. Right? She chirped again and fluffed up to try and make herself bigger and more noticable.

Pye was too distracted with his envelope to see what Peggie was doing and had by now sat down, curled over it, and very delicately began to tear it open. He tugged at the paper's ends, careful not to destroy the writting of his name. When he needed someone to write his name next, he could just hold it out and it would help if he really, really, really needed his name put on paper somewhere. Just follow the strokes and squiggles. it should work. He would even practice it!

Finally he opened the envelope and stared at it, stunned. He looked up at Torrington then back into the envelope, then up again and then finally back to its contents. He may not have excelled in many things, but he did know when there were shillings in his envelope and he did know he had seen quite a few in there! His shillings, all of them. Had Torrington miscounted?! There were so many things he could buy with it, starting with... could he buy himself sugar, and cake, and honey and sausages and bread, and more sausages and some things he could have Freddie make soup from? With every thought, his gaze became more happy and more dreamy. Oh, this was brilliant! He would serve Torrington day and night and inbetween that, and even at times which don't cover the above mentioned, if possible. He did say serving him would get him paid!

Freddie opened his envelope with the same wonderment in his eyes as a child opening christmas presents. When he saw the shining shillings, his eyes got as big as coachwheels and he slowly and referentially counted them out, afraid that perhaps the shining metal might turn to dust like fairy gold. This was more money than he had ever held in his hand in his whole life!

After a few moments of silent wonderment (in itself enough of a miracle) a slow, broad grin spread over his face and he looked at Pye and Cotton and declared earnestly:

"Now I can buy a new pot!"

Torrington had to hide his laughter behind a cough and turned away, thinking that this particular misunderstanding was better handled by Cotton. As he did, he became aware of a rather insistent chirping from a tiny, but decidedly noticable ball of fluff. Somewhat startled, he looked down at the bossy little chick with a raised eyebrow.

"Well, I don't think you have done much for me to deserve it, Miss Peggy, haven't you? I rather should expect rent for sleeping in my boots!"

But while talking to the animal, he was already searching in his pockets whether there was some stray bisquit there. Unfortunately Freddie made very sure that there never was anything in the pockets the engineer hadn't consciously placed there, and crumps certainly didn't fall into that category. So with a courtly bow towards the chicken, the engineer excused himself for a moment to dip into his tent, coming back not only with his sketchbook and pencil, but also with the bisquit tin.

Cotton had to disguise a chuckle as a cough, lest Rottlaender get the wrong idea.

"Um, it's your money, to spend on you," he said, once he'd managed to get himself under control. "Ah - would you get a cup so I can pour the Captain's tea?"

"You mean buy a new ... oh, you mean now!"

Freddie darted away thrusting the money into Cotton's hand to hold until he was back with the mug.

Peggie the little chick, scampered after Torrington, chirping excitedly for he seemed to go fetch something and if he did not, she could still chirp unhappily at him there and he might take pitty on her. He should pay her for she did keep his boots warm and sometimes his coat. She was doing her duty perfectly and one day she might even give him an egg. Feeding her was an investment into his own future!

Pye blinked as suddenly two men had gone missing, Torrington on one side, with a little ball of fluff chasing after him, and Freddie in the other direction, hurrying to get a mug. Cotton was still there, minding the kettle filled with water. "..we's can buy ourselves cake?" He asked softly. He had not tasted them perhaps, but he had remembered seeing those sweeter things the Portuguese had made and also the Spanish. He was tempted to try them now or even some of the other food, finer one.. perhaps not too fine, his coins could not buy him Spain yet!

Peggie came running back after she realised that her Pye was not following her and that she had walked quite a distance - in chick perspective - away from him. She came chirping accusingly as if to ask why he had not come as well, that while she would get fed by the officer, she still needed him, just if it so happened that a cat would be lurking somewhere and thought to eat it.

She may have also just come to see, while Torrington searched for bits for her, whether any of the others may have had some food as well. After all, the flap had closed before she was able to run in and that meant that she would have had to wait standing infront of it.

With a few hops she was seated on Pye's shoe looking up at him almost as if it was he, who was hers and not the other way around. Though, for an egg, he was a bit too big to warm up nesting.

"Cake?" Cotton said, realising he'd been addressed. "It's your money, you can do what you like with it. Though if you go buyin' cake, it ain't goin' to last as long as that."

He looked down at the packet Rottlaender had shoved into his hand, and then back up in the direction he'd taken. "Is anythin' goin' to slow him down, ever?" he wondered aloud.