24th May, Morning - Deck

"But I could run..n' if they followed.. then you'd have less of them men fightin' you." He pointed out with a small smile. "Then it would be easier fer you again n'... I could run fast." Though he knew little of the place so he might well have gotten himself into a tight spot. It needn't be said though and he was unwilling to admit it.

"N'.. I'um small.. they'd have a harder time catchin' me you know." He tried to reason. "N'...if it helped...then it wos' worth it." He bit his lip and looked up at the marine. " Well... all but t' smell.. I could've done without that!"

"That's mebbe true. An' the smell'd keep anyone from wantin' to get too close to you." He grinned at the lad. "You sure you washed it all out? I ain't goin' anywhere near your mess if you ain't washed it out proper, like. As f'r small... mebbe it helps, mebbe it don't. You can hide in smaller spaces, that's for sure. I 'member doin' that when I was your age, after all."

"Well would'a been a blessin' n' a curse. Nobody might want ter get too close, but those who would would smell me a mile away,..so's hidin' could get a bit tricky ter do!" He tugged on the musket when his mind was to cross his hands over his chest, and stopped then with a pout clear on his face.

"Oy! Ain't our mess that ever smells. We's quite a clean sort of creature, you know!" His expression softened and all he did then was to shift his hand on the musket again and have it held as the marine needed it. ".. n' I've got them..French shirt now.. fer one. You know I wouldn't be let into the boat if I didn't!" He paused. "You hid lots at me age? Wot for? For whom...'em.. couse of whom, generally?"

"I sometimes felt I spent most me life hidin' when I was your age. Lived in Chatham, see, an' that's got one of the big Royal Dockyards, an' a Captain in the Impress Service, so there's allus sailors goin' round lookin' men to press. They's only s'posed to take folks older'n eighteen an' younger then fifty-five, what use the sea and don't carry a Protection. That's a bit of paper with their name an' description on it that says they can't be pressed 'cause they's needed to do their job. Most of the men workin' in the Dockyard have 'em. Anyway, I might only have bin your age an' a little half-starved urchin with it, but they'd still have pressed me if they could. An' me never bein' any closer to the sea than what the riverside is at Chatham."

He grinned and moved the musket along a bit to get to the next one of the pipes. "I 'venchally gave up on tryin' to keep away from 'em an' wandered just a bit along the Dock Road to the Marine barracks an' listed. That was the year of the Great Mutiny, that."

"They'd take those with protection too? n'.. n' couldn't yer fake yours? " He flushed at the suggestion he made. Not like a midshipman should, even a former one! No cheating, because that was wrong and yet he'd just gone and said that! He shook his head and tried to pretend he'd been quiet.

"..I never needed to hide, me. Not from a press gang or summat. Though they wouldn't really venture to a gennle'man's home like they'd do round t' streets, I guess. Though...at t' same time, t' friend of me family's. T' captain. He was a sort of a pressgang too!.. Afterall, he came , n' after that I wos' drafted into ter navy!"

He smiled and shifted his grip to accomodate Thompson's. "Um, great mutiny?.. you was hearin' of it? Or there? Or.... wos' it hard ter go n' join in? Wot' did they do, when yer came up, all..well skinny as a twig?"

"No, a Protection means you can't be pressed, not unless there's an order from Admiralty or Government or someone high up like that, to press from Protections. Can't be faked, neither, 'cause it's got your name on and a great long description that only fits you, an' I can't write an' I couldn't fake one of them if I tried. They could press gennelmen, but it ain't worth all the bother an' anyway, the officers are gennelmen. They'd rather get folks who are used to usin' their hands though, I'm sure of that."

"You ain't heard of the year of the Great Mutiny? The fleet mutinied at Spithead in the year 1797, see. They wanted all sorts of things, like better pay, better food an' stuff like that. An' when that was over, the folks in the fleet at the Nore - off Sheerness - heard about it and wanted the same, so they mutinied too. Only it was worse at the Nore 'cause they was threatenin' to blockade London, or some nonsense like that, an' all the ringleaders got hanged."

He shook his head. "I served on Sandwich for a bit - the Nore guardship, a few years after. It's where they hanged the ringleaders, after it was all over." He chuckled. "Oh, they took a bit of persuadin'. The sentry on the gate thought I was jokin', but a corp'ral came out and said if that's what I wanted to, he didn't see why I couldn't. An' the food I get here's better - well, there's more of it, than what I got at home."

"You saw them hang?" He was in awe of the story. He'd been far too young to remember or follow any such events taking place. A whole fleet mutinying at Spithead, he could hardly imagine that, let alone the threat that London would've been blocked. How many men would raise t heir hands against their 'masters' and demand something. They demanded better food, better pay? And for that they would be hanged.

"..How'd they figure out who was t' leader?" He asked in whisper. They were talking about a mutiny, and though it wasn't one being planned his instinctive reaction was to drop his voice.

"n' others? What happened to them? Did they 'ang 'em like they always do?" He tilted his head to look at the musket and smiled at it, for it was looking - if it did not before - even finer now.

"You chose right. There's.. you've seen lots of adventure goin', n' yer havin' avoided bein' pressed, ye have food n' in a way yer' equal n' a bit above us too. Couse, if summat goes wrong, you guard us, or ye defend t' officers from.. them." He relaxed. "N'..if you hadn't, you wouldn't be here talkin' ter me." He grinned. " I know is selfish.. ter say that, but I'um glad yer made that decision so long 'go. Do yer.. miss them lasses though?"

"They knew who was the delegates, see, an' they got hanged. Though they couldn't hang everyone in the whole Fleet, so they to let 'em off. An' they knew that if the French caught wind of it an' tried anythin', the Fleet would go an' fight 'em. They wasn't against the King, see, or even really against their officers. They just wanted things to be better - only they asked for more than the Spithead lot did, an' it was that bit worse. I don't think any of the Spithead men got hanged for it. So it's a damn shame the Nore folks did."

He shrugged. "I didn't see 'em. Heard 'bout it, o' course. But the Nore's summat like ten mile downstream of Chatham, out right by the sea jus' off Sheerness - that's on the Isle of Sheppey, case you don't know it. I was on Sandwich for a bit durin' the Peace, afore I went into Calypso, see. That was five years after the Mutiny, in '02."

He put the rag down to look at the musket. "I get to go with a lass most times I'm ashore. It can be a bit... hard, like, bein' at sea for months on end, but it's all right."

"Don't ever want ter be part of a mutiny.. could get someone who's never done something wrong.. and they'd accuse him of it.. and I don't want ter be wrongly accused.. couse,.. couse I wouldn't mutiny no. Never. Like I know you wouldn't. I mean...I've had a captain, m'self.. and when I did... ..he was a ..very strict sort, but.. even then.." He studied the marine thoughtfully. "What I mean to say is....I think that.. though they've just wanted summat for themselves.. mutiny only was wrong as it always is."

He turned quiet since he had used the word too often and thought he could've called unwanted attention and secondly because he thought he made little sense anyway with his babble.

Instead he considered the last answer and blushed a bit as his eyes were on the musket. He adjusted his grip and slipped his other hand to take the rag. "So... you's not worried you'd grow sick from it? ...you's really.. uh.. needin' it for.. for months?" He was asking of things that no gentleman would and he looked awkward and embarrassed about it as well as feeling uncomfortable. ".Will we all?"

"I dunno all what happened - 'member, i was only your age - but I heard that they'd tried to ask prop'ly, in petitions, y'know, which most folks'd take notice of. Only they was ignored - an' I mean they'd been askin' for some time. Like about pay - sailors was still gettin' the same money sailors was paid a hundred years ago or more. So, they'd tried to do it right, an' bin ignored. So they did... well, what they did. Mind, I ain't sayin' they was right to do it. I'm only sayin' as how I heard it."

He grinned and surrendered the cloth. "Well, when you'm as old as me, an' you've bin at sea for months on end without a sight of a pretty girl, you get to thinkin' an' thinkin' about it, an' you can't hardly wait till you get to land some'rs there's pretty girls," he said, smiling. He stretched his legs out. "Well, some folks can't, anyhow. An' most sailors don't even get a run ashore like us Marines do, so it's even worse for them, poor devils."

"I'um getting shoreleave today!.. Though I am not going for them ladies.. no. No, I'm going for...because I can and.. because the captain allows me. So better to go before he changes his mind. Can't go drinking much though. He said I have to behave, else I will not be allowed ter go again, and possibly I won't be a midshipman not even if I change ship or the ship changes captain.." He had decided that the mutiny was not something he ever wanted to experience and that indeed, even if the cause was just, he did not want to think of it, or now talk of it.

"..any'ow...You aren't coming today?...What do other folk who don't .. who ain't needing or feeling like they can hardly wait? Why don't they feel like that?"

"Well, good for you. I've already been, me, so I won't be goin' ashore again soon, I don't suppose." He gave the lad a smile and a half-shrug. "You'll be all right without me there, though, won't you? So long as you keep out of trouble. Which ain't to say you can't drink, just don't drink so much you end up lookin' at things all cross-eyed."

He shrugged. "Other folks... well, they find ways. I dunno quite what they do, but they find ways of copin'. Have to, don't they?"

I won't be able ter drink much no. Will keep myself sober I think. See if I can find any more writing paper, perhaps something I could.. send home some time." Though he doubted he would. "...Oh! Speaking of which, look wot'... I got from when we was fighting the other...uh day."

He looked quite proud as he slid his hand under his shirt to tug on the string that now lay attached to the handle of a small knife. He pulled it out free and tugged the leather of it's sharp blade. "This."

He shifted in his place and released the string so that the knife lay over his shirt taking the hold of Thompson's rag again and rubbing it, rather not expertly, over the musket. "How... how do ye cope then?" Another bold question, but the quest for knowledge of the boy, the thirst for it had been stronger.

"Ain't that got a sheath done so's you can wear it on your belt, like the other sailors do?" Thompson asked. "It looks a real good knife that. Proper useful. "Here, just the brass with that. Little circles, like you done when you did me crossbelt plate, 'member?"

He sat back, steadying the musket. "I... cope. Jerk off sometimes when I'm feelin' the need, like. Mostly I try not to think 'bout it too much."

"Does.. but I like it here better. It's where I can't 'zactly loose it, right close at hand too and a bit out of the way, though it makes it feel itself rather uncomfortable sometime, I must admit. " He adjusted the motion of his hand so that it was circling only in small little rounds, touching the brass that he thought would need some scrubbing.

"So.. I see." He leaned over the musket. "So's you'd call it mean if I reminded you all... in detail of, dunno.. the lass we've seen yesterday?" He asked and looked as innocent as an angel, who seemed to have forgotten his halo and wings.

"Yes, I would," Thompson said. "I'd've thought better of you, Mathew de Guarde, gennelman to the lower decks. Ain't you s'posed to be teachin' us how to be all nice an' p'lite like the young gennelmen is?" He grinned, adjusting the musket a little so de Guarde could see it better. "I'd've thought that havin' a knife on your belt'd be more comfier an' make it easier to get at. Shows what I know. I'm only a Marine, after all, an' us lobsters don't know hardly anythin' 'bout sailorin'."

"..Would I be considered a gentleman with the way that I speak? All muddled up with hardly a word that I may not distort in a way." He purposely spoke in the near perfect an accent and allowed each word be formed fully. "I've never considered it my duty that I should teach anyone the ways of a gentleman, or that I ought to behave as one, while below decks and before the mast." He gazed at Thompson, his eyes twinkling with mischief and delight.

"Would I not then describe the curve of a lass's body, the softness of her bosom, the particular arch that her waist may take on as she leans to serve you a well deserved drink? The shadow that might be but so subtle yet endearing, of her rising chest as she breaths you a suggestion of the not quite a wine of quality?" He grinned and looked all innocent then.

"Oh, if I was to climb, the knife might catch on a rope, I think, or slip from me belt or such. That is, it could be done and one would be always best to have with you, but where to carry it... it all depends of what you need to do." He continued as if earlier he had not been quite poetic about what he had seen the other evening.

"You'm a young terror, that's what you are," Thompson said, hastily shifting his legs to get a bit more comfortable. That was hardly fair. "You just wait till you'm stuck out at sea with only tough old salts to look at an' keep you comp'ny, an' see if'n you don't start thinkin' 'bout... 'bout heavin' bosoms an' pretty ankles an' the like."

"Oh pretty ankles , George? Wot' would that look like?" He asked just as innocently as he had spoken before and then reverted to a proper speech. He was mightily entertained. "The lass we've seen yesterday. She had indeed her hair just slightly swirled, cascading down from where they were tucked behind her petite ears, across her lean, tall neck to rest about her shoulders only barely uncovered so that you could see the soft glow of her pale skin." Or had it been darker? It did not matter for as long as he could make the marine look as though he was going to up and run for a dark corner at any time.

"She had..a touch of red on her lips, like the first bud of a rose early in spring, her cheeks with a gentle warmth and softness that only good food may bring." Well, he hadn't meant it to rhyme but if it did, why complain?

"The rest concealed under a layer and layer of cloth, some tightened to hold her form, but the skirt to flow about her feet and.. concealed ankles, so freely." He painted the picture with each word adding to it, and still worked on the musket as innocently. "Won't have such a problem as you!" Though the thought of 'old salts' compared to the girl had been rather unappealing.

"You were born to hang," Thompson declared, adjusting himself as much as he could with one hand. "I'd like to see you cope with that picher, when you'm as old as me." He shifted again. "I dunno why I put up with you, I really don't. Ain't I bin nice to you, an' listened an' talked with you, an' all?"

His smile faded with Thompson's remark and he shifted uncomfortably himself, though not quite for the reason his friend did. He rubbed small circles against the brass, and was quiet as the marine went on to voice his hopes as well as his complaints. "..that's what they said... couse I didn't drown. "He murmured so quietly he didn't expect the marine to register.

"..You was nice...aye." He added more loudly, as an awfter thought. "Been nice, talked n' listened." He glanced at Thompson's slops then dropped his gaze back to the musket. "..wos' jus' tellin ye.. how that lass looked like.. I remembered more than I thought.. drank less than I usually'd like."

Thompson adjusted his trousers carefully. "Well, you must be takin' some sort of interest in them girls, if you 'membered all that much," he said. "Still can't b'lieve you'd rather talk with a lobster than a member of your own mess, though. Not that I don't like it," he added hastily, in case De Guarde should get the wrong idea. He reached up to ruffle his hair a little. "You'm all right, lad, you are," he said. "You stay sober like that an' work hard an' the folk's'll learn to like you an' respect you."

"Not a certain thing.. that." He answered and reached up to press his hair back into submission. "...I dun though! I only remember them girls because I've seen one.. I wasn't .. wasn't being n' acting like you, even then! N' m' cheeks were only warm couse it was cool outside and hot inside... that is, in t' tavern. So's why I was red!" He mumbled.

"...I like to... to talk to you couse...you's my friend. I'd have talked to you the same if you was a Tar." He adjusted the grip on his rag. "... n' I do talk ter some of me mess. Do that with Chase. .fer one. "

"Y'know, if folks see you like polishin' brasswork, they'll get you to cleanin' all the bits of brightwork on the ship." He smiled and adjusted the musket so de Guarde could get to it a bit easier. "It's nice havin' friends you can talk to, ain' it?" he said. "Humour an old Marine an' tell me who else you'm friends with an' what you like about 'em."

"Well .. if they don't mean to be payin' me... or if I don't want to, they can be askin' for it all day and I won't do it." He said simply and continued to work on the bits of the musket he considered still in need to be shined and rubbed.

"..Oxley. He's my friend." He murmured after a long few moments of thought, which he organised perhaps in a better order or atleast made a decision whom he could mention first and whom he could mention or call a friend at all. "..Tom' Oxley.. t' marine drummer lad. Well.. wot' I like 'bout him? He's helpful, and he's friendly.. n' he actually.. well he even had his coat for me when I needed it. I didn' like that we fought but he apologized. Though there's still summat he ..owes me a bit. What he did with me clothes!"