In the Wardroom--Signing In

The men at the table shifted on their benches. They did not take well to Perry's boldness.

Chase looked at Perry evenly and said, "That's no worry of ours, we doesn't like the look of you. There's plenty of deck for sittin' on. This table's full. Now shove off."

Perry did not care if they liked the look of him of not. He did not care what they thought at all, but before he could say so, a cat jumped onto the table and upset the ink pot, spattering its contents across the surrounding seamen. Perry swore as he rescued his precious sheets of paper.

"Hey there!" Williams burst out, as he and the others scrambled away from the ink-spill. The cause of the overturned ink-pot was Miss Emily, which precluded any true expressions of anger, at least toward her.

"Lookit what you done," Dyer snarled, eyeing Perry angrily. It had been his fault that the ink-pot had been on the table in the first place.

Chase carefully picked up the purring cat, heedless of the inky pawprints she left on his shirt. "Poor lass," he muttered.

"It ain't my fault!" Perry snapped. "If you'd a let me sit down...! Now look at it!" He held up the ink-spattered sheets of paper. "Just shove over and give me a seat already." One of the seamen fetched a rag to swab at the spill, and Perry took the place where he had been sitting on a sea chest.

There was a collective growl from the seamen when Perry took Dyer's place at the table. It was bad manners to take a man's chosen seat if he got up for a moment.

"Fine," Chase said curtly. "Siddown, an' enjoy the whole bleedin' table." He turned his back on Perry and moved away across the deck, a confused Miss Emily partially draped over his shoulder. The others followed his lead, filtering off to sit with other messes around the deck.

Fair enough. Perry smirked after them as he made himself comfortable, spreading out his sheets of paper and the ink pot to write his letter.

Miss Emily sneezed and leapt down from Chase's shoulder, apparently deciding that she didn't really want to be on the gundeck after all. Chase shook his head in grim amusement as he watched the ink-stained cat go trotting aft. She was going to back to her cabin, which meant she was going to get Mister Leat's things daubed with ink.

"Gotta seat, lads?" Chase asked the men of the Number Ten mess, who nodded and made room for him.

One of the men finding a seat behind him shoved Perry's elbow, causing him to further mar the paper and break the tip of his quill. "Right, that's it, that's bloody it!" he cried, rising and turning to face the offender.

"That's bloody what?" Robbins demanded, rising to his feet. He and Seward stared at Perry with open hostility. "Gonna try summat, Yank?"

From the Number Ten mess, Chase watched the confrontation unfolding without expression. It would serve Perry right for thinking he could strut around like that.

Perry was angry but he was not entirely stupid. There was no sense in fighting when he was so vastly outnumbered. They would beat him to a bloody pulp. Fuming, he glared back at Robbins. "Just leave me be."

Robbins scoffed. "Gerroff our gundeck, then."

"I'd get off your ship if I could, mate," he sneered. "They didn't give me much choice."

There was a brief silence at that and the seamen looked around at each other. Robbins smirked.

"That so?"

Several other men were smirking and exchanging knowing glances now.

Things were turning... well, not ugly, yet, but it wouldn't take much to puh things that way.

Thompson sighed. "Lads, not here an' not now, please," he said, conscious that he was the only one in a red coat in this part of the messdeck. "Give a lad a chance, can't you. As for you," he continued, giving Perry a quick jab with his finger, "don't go gettin' 'em all riled up. You'm the one what'll come off worst, an' you don't want that, trust me."

Perry glared sullenly at them all, but turned and slowly sat again.

The other seamen subsided, gradually returning to their separate pursuits. Robbins and Seward reluctantly sat back down and across the deck, Chase shook his head.

"Whole bloody ship's goin' mad," he muttered.

Perry stared down at the quill for a moment, fuming until his anger could subsisde. He clenched his teeth and finally turned to the others. "I got two sheets of paper here. If anyone can lend a knife to cut this pen, I can write a letter for him."

No one answered.

"Or," he said, reaching into his pocket, "I got a bar of best Carolina tobacco I'm willing to share, if someone lends a knife to cut it."

The mention of tobacco drew suspiciously curious glances from men in the adjacent mess. It was a tempting offer.

Jimmy Squeak broke the silence first. "How good's Carolina 'bacca?"

The American stared at him. "Only the best in the world, mate!" he cried. "Now, I only got a bit with me, but my wife's on shore, yeah? I can write to her, and tell her to send me more, along with my clothes and things - and wine, Porto ruby wine. But I can't write to her with a broken pen, and I can't cut you a bite without a knife." He gave Squeak a grin. "What do you say?"

"Lesseeit." Jimmy Squeak eyed Perry warily. "I'll cutyer quill an' 'bacca, jes' pass 'em both over."

Perry frowned. "Do you know how to cut a quill?"

He rolled his eyes. "I oughta. Worked two years fer a bookseller, din't I?"

"Oh." Perry looked at him again, surprised. "Well how about I give you the quill first, you give me the knife, I cut you a chew, and then you cut me the quill."

Jimmy shook his head. "Notta chance! Can't cutyer quill wi' no knife. 'Sides, what sorta seaman're yew, not havin' a knife fer yer own self?"

"I ain't got nothin' for me own self, do I? Since they grabbed me! Course I have a knife, but it's on my boat!" He forced his frowning face to relax into a smile once more. "Along with barrels of wine, barrels and barrels of finest Porto wine, for I'm a wine merchant, ya see. And I can get you some."