22 May, First dog Watch - later in the evening

"I think it'd get us in big trouble, doin' it on the skin anywhere. 'Specially if we wasn't told to beat to Quarters." He grinned ruefully. "I don't want to get made to kiss the gunner's daughter for it, that's for sure. An' me bein' as old as I am, it might be the gratin'." He shivered at the thought of it.

"You off-watch the second dog-watch tomorrow?" he asked, thinking. If de Guarde wasn't on watch now, he would be in a moment, which would mean he'd be on duty this time tomorrow, which meant that he'd be free next watch, tomorrow. Or something like that.

"I'um a Tar.. that'd be fer me.. certainly then. I think." He didn't like the idea of it, though could they not have understood a little of joke and play?.. No probably, they wouldn't. Not if he was taking part of it, even if Oxley was a good sort.

"Think I am. If I dun' get in no trouble, that is." He grinned. It was a joke, for he did fervently hope to stay OUT of trouble, if anything. But, there was something of that that followed him around like a puppy does its master, so he felt there was no telling.

"So, would that time be a'right ter meet? Do yer know if we be leavin' port n' when?.. I dun' think it's tomorrow, but who knows! If'um it is I...well.." He knew he wanted to go, he also knew he'd be told no. He was a Tar as a punishment, but he had no doubt that the punishment extended to shoreleave as well.

"We're at anchor... we could do it when you're on watch, 'ficially, if we do it on deck. Like, if I was to teach you some of the rhythms. So long as they can find you they want you, it'd be all right, I think." He shrugged. "Don't want to get you in trouble for slackin' off, o' course, but if there ain't anythin' for you to do, that's diff'rent."

"Well'um then.. we've got ourselves a fine deal , 'ere." He smiled and held his hand out to Oxley's almost as if to seal it with a shake. " Yer not gettin' me in trouble if they dun 'zactly need me. N' anyways.. I'um o' less use ter 'em than a proper big, burly Tar would be." He grinned and indicated one such at the far end.

"now that'un .. needin' ter shift things with him a'right!"

Oxley grinned and shook his hand. "I'll come an' find you later, then, when I've got a moment. If it looks like I might get you in trouble, I'll scarper. Elsewise I'll be there. Don't want Mister Leat havin' another go at you, do we?" he said. He wondered how Mister Cartwright would react to finding out a Tar wanted to learn to be a Marine drummer boy.

"No!" The boy shook his head giving Mr. Leat one thought and he was a thought too many. He remembered vividly how he was sent to clean this filth and that, and felt utterly humiliated when he had no choice but to do as he was told. There was certainly a thing he wished not to have to do again. Not unless he wished to loose his lunch or the last bits of pride.

"If'um an officer starts comin'.. I'um goin' ter be quick ter do as if I've worked all along and you, well you'd best do as if you just happened to chance past there or summat." He shook his head. "There's no way I be givin' that lieutenant any chance ter be like he was with me then!...No cleanin' of t' Heads.. wos humiliatin' enough." He looked at Oxley and smiled, embarrassed. "..is.. I.. really hated that, you know. wos' terribly humiliating!"

"I know," the drummer said, soberly. "I... Was bad enough for me gettin' told I was goin' to be looked after by Mikey - didn't know him then, y'see - when Mister Cartwright wasn't around to do it himself. Had to try not to think 'about cleanin' the heads meself, 'cause I thought he'd change his mind an' make me do that, instead. I'm sorry you got all the horrible things to do... Don't think that officer likes you much, somehow."

He grinned. "Well, you doin' summat like this might help change their minds... show you can be one of us, see. A Terpsy, I mean. Though I dunno that we want any officer to see, really."

"You was helpin' with those shirts n' I wos' watchin' you.. Ain't a telling how much I did hate yer at t' time, n' my officer." His voice was hushed in the barest of whispers. He did not want to get accused of speaking mutiny by sounding his displeasure.

"..Mr. Leat?.. no. Think he's... maybe he's upset 'bout Chase still. " He remembered being told to change his mind, to not have the jack tar flogged. But he didn't and in this defied the lieutenant and possibly secured himself a much harder means of promotion just back to his middie self.

"Why don't yer.. want them officers to see?" He asked surprised and turned to look at Oxley.

"Well, not at first, I don't. And I don't think Mister Bush'd like the joke... he ain't the sort who would, if you know what I mean. Though I think Mister Cartwright would. He's nice, he is."

Oxley wondered how a lieutenant could still be upset over a flogging, when the sailor who'd actually gone to the grating seemed to have got over it. "Couldn't you go an' 'pologise, if it's that?" he asked, though not really expecting a positive answer.

".. Oh you mean t' prank?" Of course it was better the officers didn't figure or see it at first, or did the marine think something different than that. He looked at the boy to try and figure it out.

"..Talk ter t' lieutenant?" His eyes did grow wider at that. "...but he's got.. ten other reasons he'll have thrown in m' face if I try.. n' he'll tell me i've no right at all ter talk to a lieutenant being a Tar, even if he'll go off to chat with one, jus' after he tells me off.. .or maybe because of that."

"Maybe," Oxley said. "I dunno. Don't reckon I'll ever understand them officers, not if I reach a hundred. You stick with us, an' we'll show you right." He tried to imagine de Guarde doing the duty of a Marine drummer, in the uniform and all, and grinned. It would be fun to see the men's faces when they realised it wasn't him or either of the Shepherds standing there.

"You know, I might.. with all luck become one some day." Which was a big if, if Mr. Leat would keep his dislike for him, or if none of the officers might decide to consider evaluating him positively. Even less was it a chance, should the captain not find either time or interest to see if the boy had improved.

He frowned at that thought. "Well... i should hope I would, but it doesn't seem too promisin'." He sighed.

"Shouldn't allus look for the worst in things, y'know. You'll get old afore you know it, doin' that." He grinned. "It was a good joke, that. Think it got Sam wonderin' what sorta ship he'd stumbled inta, which ain't all bad. Only watch out he don't go an' pull a joke on you or summat."

He tapped his sticks gently against his his thigh. "I dunno. We'll have more drummers than a first-rate afore we know it," he said quietly, grinning.

"He wouldn't pull a joke on me! He might be an Oxley but I don't see you havin' fooled me either." He grinned and crossed his hands over his chest, leaning a bit to the side. His left hand tapped against his right, and then smoothed his sleeve a little.

"No hard feelings, mind." He added hastly and looked at the lad with whom he had once fought and who now, seemed like a chap that he would be willing to go skylarking with. "..Hmm, just' so long as the admirality don't get wind of it and starts bein' all greedy n' tries to take all them finest drummers from this ship." He whispered. "..You would teach me enough to be .. good, would ye?" He added.

"You don't know him like I do," the drummer returned equitably, folding his arms and leaning against the mainmast. He glanced around. "'Course I will... here," he said, making his mind up and straightening. "I'll show you summat now, if you like. If you come up to the gun deck, I reckon we can get out o' the way. Gundeck... though the fo'c'sle'd prob'ly be better." He grinned at the younger lad.

"Goin' where you say I should.., Ain't till we're called up, that I need to be anywhere's.. n' till I do.. there'd be plenty enough of us to skip a few moments more.. before t' line is set." He smiled at the marine lad and straightened a bit." So, bes' you go n' lead the way, or jus' tell me which turn to take, if you mean for us to meet there too embarrassed to have yourself be seen with a mere Tar 'bout." Though considering the past events...

"We can sit out the way, by one of the fo'c'sle carronades. C'mon, I'll show you summat. An' you'll already be on deck when your watch gets mustered, so you won't miss 'em, if you's worried 'bout that." He probably wasn't but Oxley offered the reassurance anyway. He reached for a piece of rag from the rag-bag - there was an old dittybag with rags in, hanging from a hook on the mainmast, to hand when a Marine needed a rag to wipe his musket or bright-work down with.

"C'mon, then," he said, and led the way up the aft companionway to the gundeck before heading for'rard to go up the steps to the fo'c'sle.

De Guarde followed with a beat to his walk. He smiled as they passed a few men. He was forgetting his worries again and not getting drunk. Perhaps friends could well take the place that drink had for so long. It used to comfort him, though he feared drinking as much now as he wanted it. Getting caught while not quite sober could have terrible consequences and it had already earned him something of a task he did not want to do. And probably, he wouldn't. He knew it was a game played with fire, but the stronger his trust in friends had grown, the surer he was he could not betray them. How strange the feeling too, that he would stand up for someone not out of his benefit, but out of loyalty, out of their own benefit even.

He shook his head. If Terpsy was poisoning his mind, it was with all the good things, as some would say. He didn't think the officers would see it, but atleast he had good company even if they didn't. And thus musing away, he nearly ran smack into a beam or something of such sort. He blinked, took a step to the side and then hurried after Oxley.

"Ey. So.." He began. "I won't get any homework after you show me, right?"

"Any... what? If that's summat to do with schoolin', don't fergit I never went to school or nothin'," Oxley said, turning to see where the younger lad was. "How's about here? Reckon that's out of the way 'nough for things?" He indicated the space between two of the short stubby carronades. They weren't as long as Terpsy's main armament, her 12-pounder cannon on the gundeck below them, but they were both young and didn't take up that much space, so he thought they'd be pretty much out of sight there.

He dropped easily to the deck to sit cross-legged on the wooden planking. "C'mon, drag up a plank and siddown, all right?" he said, looking up with a grin.

"It does. Homework... basically means something you'd have to do after you've had the lessons. Additional practice, the work you'd do when your teacher was not around but he gave you to do. Like... when you'll teach me something, you might want me to practice till next time we do another teachin' lesson...and that'd be.. the work I'd have to do." Well, nobody ever said he could give the best explanation about it. Dropping beside Oxley, he stretches his legs out from under him. At the time he was wearing the cleaner pair of slops, which he tugged a little to set them right.

"There, I'm as ready as can be, Mr. Teacher." He teased his friend, though he pretended to be all serious about it.

Oxley managed to refrain from hitting de Guarde round the head, as he would any of the other boys if they'd called him that. De Guarde was likely to still be touchy about that sort of thing, and not realise it was meant in a friendly way.

"'S easy 'nough," he said, pulling his drumsticks out. "And don't you go makin' off with these here, neither, you," he said. "Half the trick o' being able to do it prop'ly is holdin' the sticks right. Like this," he said, then frowned. "Here, it'll be easier if I sit next t'you." He shuffled round till he was sitting by de Guarde's side. "Don't forget you got the drum to your right, see," he said by way of explanation. "If you was to watch me from the front, you'd learn it all on the wrong side."

"Not ter go off with them? Darn'..got me." The youth smiled and then looked at what Oxley was showing him. Drum to his right.

He nodded thoughtfully but then added :" ..Why to my right?..why not straig' up in front or left?" He asked thinking that there might've been some great reason for it, if there wasn't then it was one silly question to give, although one certainly coming from his uneducated guess.

"Dunno, 'zackly. But I seen the army drummers an' they do it the same. Makes it easier to march with it, I think - though I ain't really done much of that. An' it's where the crossbelt sits. So when you got your drum clipped on prop'ly, it's goin' to be on the right, ain't it?" He shrugged and shook the rag out. It was a decent-sized one, for once, and he passed the sticks over before folding the cloth and laying it on the decking a little to de Guarde's right. "Don't want to go doin' it right on the deck, see. And it'll give you summat to pretend's the drum-skin, too."

Taking the pair of sticks carefully he waited for the drummer to place the cloth to his right. At first he didn't understand whether he meant to set the 'table' or what, but with the following explanation he nodded. It would muffle most of the sound, the colour was pretty close to how it should look. A good trick anyway, and imagining there was a drum there, easier when there was a 'mark' to imagine by.

"Suppose' to hold them like this?" He had observed the marine before and thought to position his sticks in his palms the way Oxley had done. At least the way he thought he had. "Do they damage easily if yer use them on summat they are not meant t' be used on?"

Oxley considered the question. "Don' think so. I mean, if you was to hit the carronade-slide here," he patted the carriage of the carronade behind them, "as hard as you could with one, I reckon you'd break it. That Shriver broke one of 'em, once. Jus' snapped it like... like you'd break a dry twig. He's awful strong like, an' was in a ragin' temper. Snatched it out me hand, knocked me inta the mainmast, like, an' jus' up and broke it. Mean ol' sod, him."

He shrugged before reaching to adjust de Guarde's grip fractionally. "Not so hard, see. An' I find it easiest with that finger there, like that. You don't want 'em in a fist, 'cause that jus' makes it harder to... to feel it."