Working Ashore

Johnson made a noise of disgust but didn't bother making an actual response to that. It wasn't like any of the broken furniture could be repaired enough to serve as tables and chairs again.

Instead, he turned his back on the midshipman and the provosts and said to the working party, "Preddie. Tug out another of those shanties of yours. Bit too quiet in here."

Preddie grinned. He thought a moment, then launched into "Homeward Bound", carrying on swabbing as he sang.

Thompson joined in the chorus with a will, despite being a Marine who'd never been a sailor on a merchant vessel, where they sang shanties as a matter of course.

This whole thing was a joke, it really was. He just hoped the Captain - or one of the other officers - would get here quick, and straighten the whole mess out.

The officer turned as he and the midshipman spoke quietly. Mister Hollow gave a curt nod. He had though this ordeal would have been quickly concluded and so came. Since it seemed that the other Tar would not be back a while he could wait no longer. The conversation lasted longer than that, and was quietly concluded. Mister Hollow gave a curt nod to the oficer provost and then turned about on his heel and walked out the door.

The men sang, but the provosts seemed to care less about it now, than they did earlier. They just watched the room be cleaned of vomit, of blood, of excrement even and in the most part of broken wood, of tables and chairs that barely resembled it. There has been a good deal of vomit somewhere to the centre of the room, and another such puddle to the side, by the wall. "..Make sure it don't stink no more once you're done." Some of the floorboards would demand a thorough scrubbing. Especially those which had served the men failing to go out to relieve themselves.

The place stank - at least one man had failed to get out of the door to go and find a privy to relieve himself in. The smell wasn't helped, in Thompson's candid opinion, by the provosts hanging around... and was probably even worse what with the midshipman from Defiance. He should've been thrown out of the Navy years ago - to have a grown man of his age still a midshipmite was beyond stupid. Disrate him and maybe you'd get some decent work out of him.

He grinned as their unofficial shantyman began Round the Corner Sally. "Oh, were you ever round Cape Horn, Round the corner Sally! Where your arse is never warm, Round the corner Sally!"

He joined in the chorus with gusto. There were the days he hated, with their mind-numbing duties and drills... and then there were days like this, when he couldn't imagine belonging to any other ship in the King's service.

A vaguely familiar face looked in at the door. "This place open? God bless Portugal!" Deverel strode in and headed toward the bar before realizing that the men in the tavern were not customers. Judging by their pigtails they were British seamen, and they were cleaning. He gave the scene a perplexed frown. "What are you men doing?"

They are cleaning, sir." One of the provosts seemed to have decided to state the obvious, but did so in a respectable manner reserved for the men who mattered, men of rank. He withdrew then and glanced to the door where the midshipman had gone. Was this officer in any relation to the first? He seemed much more jovial, certainly more ready to have fun and.. had the other Tar not gone to fetch an officer really, though this one hardly seemed to know what the whole ordeal was about. He'd thought to drink possibly.

"..Could you be of assistance, sir." The young provost of some rank approached him and gave him a small motion of greeting before continuing. "These men refuse to keep silent." All too obvious, when the room shook with the loud voices, some possibly off tune, others of brute strength rather than anything and some a fairly good sort. "They are indeed disobeying us in not wishing to return the mops to us." He added with a slight frown. "When they ought to have no claim on it." If these men had been soldiers they'd have been flogged now, they'd have been strung up, each and every one of them and be given a proper lashing, after the officers were consulted and agreed on of course. But no, be cursed that they had to be navy men and with this, in portion exempt of a directer authority over them.

"What?" Deverel looked at the seamen, the provosts, and the marine with curiosity now. Why would seamen be cleaning a tavern? And why with a group of provosts watching? "Oh give them back their mops, men. It ain't the deck of a man 'o war and there's no holystoning here. Find something else to clean if they want to do the swabbing." He looked at the marine, trying to remember if he had seen him before. "What ship, corporal? Are these your men?"

"They are cleaning because they are being punished for their poor behavour during the night. During which they have behaved in the worst possible manner." The provost explained, thinking he liked the lieutenant. He seemed very easy to talk with and likable.

He paused and looked at Deverel. "They are of a boat Terpsychore."

At last, Dyer reappeared--with the captain right behind him. Bolitho had not been pleased to learn that the provosts were causing trouble yet again. He was irritated to have had to leave the ship to deal with this new disruption, but he was not going to have those blasted provosts giving his men even more grief than they deserved. They were being punished, and the provosts had gotten their "justice." Now they were having qualms about the way the men were working? What more pointless complaints could they have in mind?

As he entered the tavern, he took in the scene before him. The men were all working--seemingly quite diligently--and singing as they did so. Bolitho saw nothing wrong with that. But clearly the provosts did. Then he saw Lieutenant Deverel talking with one of the provosts, and now he really began to wonder what on earth was going on.

"I was told my presence was required here," he said, glaring at the provosts, "Whatever is the matter?"

Ah. Just as their hopes were high that Deverel could be the solution to the mop and shirt problem, the man appeared. They recognised him easily.The coat they've seen as of rank, and the face was familiar from the earlier escapade in seeing the captain. The younger provost inched back, the other few looked stonefaced as they looked at Bolitho and the officer stepped forward, glaring at Dyer, but speaking in a civil tongue.

"The men disobeyed our orders.." he was curt and simple, but whether he would press the matter was yet to be seen.

"Sir," Johnson said, glad for the interruption. "Seems there's some disagreement over the lads ought to be working."

Which was putting it mildly. At least with Bolitho, Johnson could be confident of a rational solution. The same obviously was not to be expected from this lieutenant.

Thompson straightened to attention at the first glimpse of Bolitho's blue coat and gold lace... though he'd thought at first that it was Mister Bush. The actual truth wasn't much better, though he did outrank the strange Lieutenant.

At least the Captain would bring some sort of sense to this whole mess. It wasn't even as though they'd done anything wrong, not really. It was a complete joke, the whole thing. And why shouldn't they sing, if they wanted to? It wasn't as though they were aboard Terpsy, where they belonged.

"Indeed?" Bolitho looked around at the men again. They were all still working. What had the provosts ordered them to do that they were not currently doing? Then he turned back to Johnson. "Thank you for informing me, corporal."

To the provost, he asked, "And what orders did you give them, praytell?"

"Since the mops are hardly adequate for their work.. ..fabric indeed needed for this.. but little of it present.. we had told them to use their shirts.. in the cleaning of the floors. Which we did mean to enable them to wash afterwards.. regretfully they have decided it would be best to defy us, ..and to sing so that they do not hear.. what we are to tell them." The man answered coldly, aware that the corporal had put his answer as a one, very diplomatic one.

"..it was a simple order..which would've enabled this room to be cleaned as best it can..."

"Sir," Johnson said, and pointedly fell silent. The provosts needed no help from him in making themselves look and sound stupid.

The whole thing was just stupid... and there was no way Thompson was going to use his shirt to scrub anything. Not at the price Foxley, the purser, would charge for a replacement - or cloth to make a replacement.

Bolitho raised an eyebrow. So the provosts had hoped to further humiliate the men by ordering them to use their shirts to wash the floor? What nonsense. And they had not wanted the men to sing either? That was even more nonsensical.

"I see no need for them to use their shirts. They do not need to use their shirts to swab the deck of the ship, so why should they need them to clean this tavern? And as to their singing, they are simply accustomed to doing that aboard ship. If it offends you so terribly, I can order them to cease their singing. But I shall not order them to use their shirts for that is unnecessary."

The officer looked annoyed, though he chose not to comment on it. He looked at the men instead bidding himself some time before he was to respond. It was hardly a victory to have them keep silent. It was the other which would've thrilled him, not this. They could shout and sing for all he cared if they were humiliated doing something else. But the other way around, it wasn't much of a humiliation at all."

..but sir... they have thrown excrement at us, when first we encountered them, and they have made all sorts of filth here.. you stand witness to it yourself. Ought they not pay in equal.. to what crime they've committed. I do not wish to have my men degrade themselves in throwing ..the said stuffs.. but the shirts would've been equally... enforcing of a lesson learned. " He concluded and looked at Bolitho. "It is only...so that others do not learn to think such..actions to be right."

"I do see all sorts of filth here but surely there were other sailors and soldiers here as well. My men were not the only ones who created this mess." Bolitho's frown deepened. "To my mind they are already paying for the 'crime' they have committed. I see no need for further humiliation."

He said this last rather pointedly, making it clear that he knew exactly why the provosts were demanding that the men use their shirts.

"That may be, sir....but they have been the only to assault my men." The officer said , pressing the matter further. "The only to assault them in such manner as is hardly...." He did not finish, but he was certain that the captain knew what he meant to say. "And thus for that part of the crime... are they?"

Bolitho continued to glare. Clearly the provost was going to try to keep pushing him until he gave in.

"If they assaulted your men, then the punishment of having them use their shirts to clean the floor does not seem to fit that crime," he said flatly.

Assaulted...? Thompson didn't remember a single one of the Provosts getting thumped, punched or otherwise set upon, and if they had, he certainly wasn't anywhere near it when it had happened.

He scowled. Cleaning this place up was one thing, but there was no way he was going to take the fall for anyone who'd been stupid enough to do that.

Chase and Taylor had slowed their work, listening with obvious interest to the officers' conversation. A glare from Johnson set that to rights. It was bad enough they'd had to send for their captain. For any of them to get caught out for slacking would be unforgivable.

"..What then do you suppose such a crime should be payed with?" THe officer asked, masking the irritation of the other man's lack of want to agree to his supposition. Chase and Taylor were noted, but too late to act on their slowing of work. Corporal Johnson had set them to rights just in time and too soon for the provosts. Just too soon.

This was the last thing Deverel had wanted when he had seen an open tavern and heard singing within. The captain had not addressed him at all, and so he felt it safe to exit quietly without making excuses or farewells. He did not think Bolitho was a bad sort, but they had been mutually glad to say their goodbyes when the admiral had summoned him back to Defiance.