Warnings - nope. Oh, one, Australian spelling - beware!!!!
Summery - Jack gets Stephen to do him a little favour. Jack gets his just deserts, and Stephen may even get to live it down...
Comments - Book based (ie Stephen is way smaller than Jack), film influenced, bit AU time setting as I haven't read all the books, and the ones I have were out of order, blast it. The title is based on how Jack is regarding himself at the party.
Disclaimer: All characters belong to Patrick O'Brian, the wonderful writer who created them.
The Doctor's Knight.
By Fire Frog.
"God's love, why me?" Doctor Maturin asked peevishly, eying the stern faced captain and his cluster of lieutenants with dislike.
"Because you are the right size to fit the clothing, and you have the most dainty hands, sir." Answered Bonden respectfully, nodding at the doctors oft blood encrusted extremities.
They were fine hands, white and soft as a lady's, kept supple for the exacting surgeons' work that was Stephens particular gift.
"'aint dainty, sir. That is a slander. I'll admit they are somewhat less callused than a sailors..." here he trailed off as the only other candidate for female impersonator on the barky brought forth his small hands and held them steady next to the surgeons.
Babbington was the prettiest lad aboard, but next to the doctors his hands were the rough, callused gloves of a great ape. No lady would have such hands. Besides, for the rouse Jack Aubrey had in mind to work a more calm, quick thinking headpiece ought to be inside the absurdly large wig that Killick was even now primping and tweaking into readiness.
Blast.
"Damnation." The doctor cursed, and the lieutenants descended upon him like a small, many-fingered avalanche. Jack nodded and went on deck to check how the wind set, by the time he had returned the doctor had been transformed. Gone was the mumpish naturalist in his stained and tatty coat. Standing still as could be in the center of the Captains cabin stood a tiny, elegant Lady of the court. Huge billows of skirting dwarfed the tight cinched bodice of the fine dress, a filmy wrap flowing over the firmly bound upper half, hanging to the ground on either side - weighed down with silver tassels. And to top all a massive wig that contained in its powdered curls a gilded birdcage.
"My god..." Jack whispered in awe. He'd no idea the clothes stored in the Lady's chest were so magnificent. The blue looked perfectly fetching with the doctors colouring and the silver fleur-de-lis was laid on thick as could be. Killick was cursed near to vibrating with rapture as he used a small cloth to shine the silver thread to even greater lustre.
There was, however, something wrong. Jack put a finger to the side of his face as he considered his dear companion, trying to work out what it was. The lieutenants did likewise, equally aware of a fault, but unable to smoke it.
There was no make up upon the lightly tanned face as yet, this was just a trial run to see if the clothes would fit or would need adjusting, but that were not the problem.
The breasts had been simulated with waded cloth, Jack supposed, and could afford to come down a little on the doctor's torso. The dress had been picked for its modestly covered, if well bolstered, decolletage and a woman's bosom looked mighty strange trussed up in the constricting undergarments of fashion anyway. /So that 'aint it neither,/ he thought pensively.
The doctors adams apple was not intrusive and the choker that Killick had fixed there quite covered it in sparkling gems nicely.
Something - there was something... Then it hit him.
"Doctor, are you quite alright?" he asked. The man was standing perfectly still, tottering on the dainty beribboned boots his feet had been levered into, and not making a sound. Most un-natural.
At Jacks question the doctors eyes rolled upwards into his head and he toppled over, heavy as a tree felled in the forest. His shipmates rushed to catch him, but it was Jack that got there first and cradled his friend to the ground.
"Stephen!" He called sharply, looking into that dear, insensible face with mounting alarm.
"I told you not to tie the stays so tight." Bonden hissed and Killick shrank back at Jacks brief, deadly glare.
Turning Stephen over Jack plucked at the top dress, holding the doctor just so as the others pulled it up and off as swift as ever they could. The stays' fastening was too tightly knotted and had to be sheared through with a handy pocketknife. The corset loosened and Stephen took in a deep, shuddering breath. He then threw up right handily in Jacks lap.
It took him several moments more to recover, and when he had he set about Killicks head with a curling iron, brought out for use on the wig.
"That's what being genteel is all about." Killick said reverently, later in the day to his messmates. "Your common whore would have bailed me up with the wine bottle standing by, but the Doctor chose something more lady like by half." His listeners nodded in silent agreement.
...
Stephen swam hazily out of a fulsome sleep to find that someone was holding his hand. Rolling his head on the pillow he looked out at his cabin and promptly gave such a start that he fell from the hanging cot with a curse.
"Oh, now sir, prey hold your hands still and away, or we've to do it all again." Young Bonden cried, the bottle of enamel paint in his hand waving about while the paintbrush in the other stayed rock steady.
Stephen had quite a few words to say about this turn of events too, but the others, Bonden and Pullings (with Killick hovering in the background,) looked so beseechingly at him, insisted they would have talked things through directly if the doctor had not looked so destroyed and in need of every bit of his sleep that they hadn't the heart to wake him, that he had no choice but to forgive them the embarrassment.
"Tis the thing, you know." Bonden spoke earnestly. "All the ladies have designs upon their nailbeds, and we thought we'd do it now, so the paint would dry in time and you'd not have to fear smudging it."
"Very thoughtful indeed." Stephen said, reaching out to take up a cup of water, but the others made harsh tisking noises and Killick snatched the cup away.
"You're not to be touching things." The waspish sailor declared. "Here, I'll hold it and you may sip, steady and steady, just so."
...
"We only have the one opportunity, for the mail ship will pull in soon and then our chance is ended. Once those documents reach their destination all will be ruined, and I needn't tell you how important this is to me." Jack told the doctor as between them Pullings, Bonden and Babbington together layered paint and rouge upon his face.
"I'll not disappoint." Stephen murmured, trying to move away from Bonden who was endeavouring to prick out his eye with a stick of kohl.
"I know you wont, my dear. Should anything go amiss it's your steady shinning parts I'm relying on to get us through. It's a tricky pretence you must make, and I thank you for the deception. As plans go this was the most direct I could come at. We will assail them directly from within, like the cat in lambs clothing."
Stephen laughed aloud at this, his friend was no land animal and his words proved it.
Jack frowned, reaching over to take up a silk fan from the items Stephen would carry with him and placed it open in his friend's hand.
"Here, perhaps you should keep your face covered as much as you can behind this." And he indicated that Stephen should use the fan as a shield.
"Oh," cried Stephen, much hurt. "I see. It's an ugly man I am, and an uglier woman. I need no second cautions." And he lifted the fan up until only his eyes, bright with accusation, showed above it.
"No, Stephen, that was not what I meant at all!" Jack cried, aghast. "Its just that you laugh so freely, with hardly a modest look to be found at all, and court ladies are said to be damnably modest in all their dealings, from what I've heard."
"You have heard wrong, then, brother." Stephen said, not quite recovered from the perceived blow. "Ladies of the court can be bluff and spirited as ever can be. But I take your meaning and shall remain shielded from improper curiosity."
Jack could tell from the slight coldness in his friends voice that Stephen was still hurt, but he could not think how to rectify the matter, what with his lieutenants and that dolt Killick standing there. He stood uncertainly a moment then turned to straighten the lay of his silk necktie one last time. He felt quite the overbearing booby.
...
The doctor was altogether inured to the affront of having his person lifted up and moved bodily by now, as the sailors often employed this tact to keep him from being underfoot, trampled, or swept overboard. So his hands swathed in white mittens he hung meekly as the crew passed him along the gangplank and onto shore. They did not trust to his teetering progress in the tight highhealed beribboned boots, nor to his luck in resisting the damp sea (he had fallen in so many times now that any new occurrence went almost unremarked upon).
Once ashore the hands went scampering out into the nearby headlands, each holding a little net. They soon came back and the biggest of the singing crickets they had caught was placed carefully into the gilded cage within the doctor's wig. The rest of the insects were stored away for the doctor's collection, a miserable little gift to help smooth the unhappy set of his jib.
"Now, Stephen - Stephanie, sorry, d'you remember the plan?" Jack asked.
The doctor held out his hands and the white mittens were removed, to reveal the excellent enamelled artwork Bonden had performed upon them, unsmudged and perfect as could be. Stephen took up the little chalkboard he had suggested the mute Lady Stephanie would employ to correspond with her underlings and wrote something quite rude upon it in Latin. Jack blushed a little and ground one heel into the dirt of the sidewalk.
"M' sorry my dear," he murmured, looking up the street for the coach they had sent word for to come and collect them. Two of his men were to play footmen in attendance and were dressed accordingly, in their best formal trousers and straw hats set just so with a blue ribbon sewn round each one. The carriage arrived presently and Jack carefully handed Lady Stephanie into the dark interior, his men alighting behind in their proper places.
/This was all that fool Moorehollows fault,/ Jack thought savagely as he watched Stephen rub at one already well pinched heal. Curse the man for taking the wrong set of documents with him off the barky and sending them on by courier to the pompous Governor Rialto's house. It was only a matter of time before they were passed on even further, back to London.
With good winds he had landed before the next mail ship could arrive to carry them off, but Rialto had not offered up the mail packet to him for transport, as was the custom. Instead he had insisted on waiting for the next scheduled vessel. He had cited Jack's tendency to find himself in open battle and the disastrous affects this had on delivery time as the reason.
Blast him. However; the Governor had asked after the Captains passenger, rumoured to be a Lady of some standing in the Grecian court, on her way to Bath for health reasons. Would she consider coming to a small social affair?
There was no Lady on board, in fact Lady Stephanie's presence was a concoction, a red herring, a rouse enacted to pull unfriendly eye's from the real fugitive as she made an urgent escape from incarceration in Greece. She had in fact left them at the initial port dressed as a whore and ridden off into the night accompanied by an itinerant monk.
Her clothes, however, and several of her more precious belongings had remained aboard, to keep the illusion of her leaving with the ship active. How handy this now proved to be!
Jack had smiled widely as he accepted the invitation on behalf of his 'guest', informing Rialto that the Lady was mute from a childhood disease of the throat, but happily could still hear and think with full accretion. Indeed, she was a gem of a woman, if shy, and he doubted not that the Governor's daughters would benefit from the meeting.
An engagement was set, Maturin's reluctant help acquired, and now they rode towards the Governors house in splendid array, Stephen in his sumptuous blue and silver, Jack in his formal navy coat trimmed with gold braid.
What a handsome couple they made as they entered the ballroom, the Lady leaning genteelly upon the Captains arm as he lead her at a leisurely pace across the floor. How the women longed to have such poise, such demure effacement, such marvellous, fashionable clothes! And a fighting Captain of the fleet to escort her as well, how wonderful!
How the men gazed with envy at Jacks marks of office, his brightly polished sabre, honourable battle scars and magnificent leonine carriage. To be a Captain upon the sea, with men eager to follow your command and elegant ladies of the court hanging upon your every word. Marvellous! Enviable!
And oh, how Jack was glad of his thick blue coat, for he knew without a single doubt that had Stephens hand rested upon his naked arm he would have drawn blood by now. The grip the creature had upon him was terrible strong!
Stephen would very much liked to have drawn blood about right now. Preferably Killick's, but Jack's would do as nicely. He could hardly breath in the tight bodice, despite having made specific adjustments to the fastenings himself (he suspected Killick and a night time attack with a needle and thread had been involved) and his feet were already blistered from the walk up the long hall and staircase.
He clung to Jack as much to keep himself from falling as for the proper look of an escort, and he marked the coming of their walk to its end destination with a fervent inward prayer of thanks.
Jack presented the Lady Stephanie to Governor Rialto, his wife and children, several guests and sundry other local dignitaries with a tiny beadle of worry running up his spine. Stephen looked very pale under his mask of paint, Jack hoped his friend could last the engagement.
Light headed, it was with immense relief that Stephen realised he was being gently pressed into a chair, from whence he was told he should 'hold court'. This took at least some of the pressure off his ribs, lungs and toes and he blinked dumbly a moment before reaching into his drawstring bag for the fan and spreading it with a mild snap.
The other ladies took this as a signal and their own fan's came out, some of them quite large and preposterous things with mighty wads of crystal beaded tassels tied to the handles. Jack stood to Stephens left hand side and answered general questions, sometimes reading from Stephen's board when the doctor chose to add a comment or observation.
Out back of the building Reliah Smith and Bonden waited at the kitchen door. Reliah was a landsman given into the services in exchange for a pardon from his thieving ways. When Bonden felt the time was right he signalled his man and Reliah scooted up the side of the building like a monkey. He arrived at the Governors stateroom, as Jack had directed him, found the bag the Captain had spied in a corner and proceeded to ease the documents they needed free from the rest of the mail.
As he left Reliah helped himself to one of the Governors cigars and the stub of a candle from his sidelight, then slid down the outer wall to rejoin Bonden for a piece of crumbled pie with the house servants.
The real last orders of Lord Brighton would never now see the light of day, bringing shame on what was a noble and kindly family name.
...
A grey haze floated over Stephens eyesight and the booming sound of his own heartbeat had begun troubling the doctor before the hour arrived and they were finally free to go.
"Time and tide wait for none." Jack told their guests apologetically as he scooped his swooning doctor up and all but carried him to the carriage. Once there he slid a well practiced hand up the back of the volumouse dress and worked loose the knot that held the corset stays at bay.
The doctor took a deep breath and winced, the movement being quite painful for him. He drooped sideways onto his friends arm and Jack rubbed worriedly at his back.
"Are you well, dear Stephen?" he asked solicitously.
"As well as a man thrust bodily into a sausage skin for the last few hours can be." Stephen said, straitening up and adjusting his skirts around his feet. "At least the damnable dress was not done up as tight as the first time. But I tell you, that Killick changed it after I had set it up just so and I'll not let the creature get away with such a cruel act!"
They rode in silence for the rest of the short trip, and when they came to the wharf Jack made the driver proceed as far onto the planks as he could make the horses go. Stepping out briskly he then plucked the slight doctor from the carriage steps and carried him whole onto the ship to avoid him having to walk a step further in the tight boots.
The ships Captain was a rake, the carriage drivers reported later to the eager townsfolk, he had ravaged the Lady on the way back to the ship and then carried her swooning self back aboard, there to perform even more debauchery, no doubt of it! How fantastic, huzzah!
As soon as he was sufficiently recovered Stephen Maturin chased Preserved Killick all over the ship with a toasting fork, giving him a nasty wound to the backside and an earful of such language that any talk of a 'genteel lady' was put down forever.
Finis.
Summery - Jack gets Stephen to do him a little favour. Jack gets his just deserts, and Stephen may even get to live it down...
Comments - Book based (ie Stephen is way smaller than Jack), film influenced, bit AU time setting as I haven't read all the books, and the ones I have were out of order, blast it. The title is based on how Jack is regarding himself at the party.
Disclaimer: All characters belong to Patrick O'Brian, the wonderful writer who created them.
The Doctor's Knight.
By Fire Frog.
"God's love, why me?" Doctor Maturin asked peevishly, eying the stern faced captain and his cluster of lieutenants with dislike.
"Because you are the right size to fit the clothing, and you have the most dainty hands, sir." Answered Bonden respectfully, nodding at the doctors oft blood encrusted extremities.
They were fine hands, white and soft as a lady's, kept supple for the exacting surgeons' work that was Stephens particular gift.
"'aint dainty, sir. That is a slander. I'll admit they are somewhat less callused than a sailors..." here he trailed off as the only other candidate for female impersonator on the barky brought forth his small hands and held them steady next to the surgeons.
Babbington was the prettiest lad aboard, but next to the doctors his hands were the rough, callused gloves of a great ape. No lady would have such hands. Besides, for the rouse Jack Aubrey had in mind to work a more calm, quick thinking headpiece ought to be inside the absurdly large wig that Killick was even now primping and tweaking into readiness.
Blast.
"Damnation." The doctor cursed, and the lieutenants descended upon him like a small, many-fingered avalanche. Jack nodded and went on deck to check how the wind set, by the time he had returned the doctor had been transformed. Gone was the mumpish naturalist in his stained and tatty coat. Standing still as could be in the center of the Captains cabin stood a tiny, elegant Lady of the court. Huge billows of skirting dwarfed the tight cinched bodice of the fine dress, a filmy wrap flowing over the firmly bound upper half, hanging to the ground on either side - weighed down with silver tassels. And to top all a massive wig that contained in its powdered curls a gilded birdcage.
"My god..." Jack whispered in awe. He'd no idea the clothes stored in the Lady's chest were so magnificent. The blue looked perfectly fetching with the doctors colouring and the silver fleur-de-lis was laid on thick as could be. Killick was cursed near to vibrating with rapture as he used a small cloth to shine the silver thread to even greater lustre.
There was, however, something wrong. Jack put a finger to the side of his face as he considered his dear companion, trying to work out what it was. The lieutenants did likewise, equally aware of a fault, but unable to smoke it.
There was no make up upon the lightly tanned face as yet, this was just a trial run to see if the clothes would fit or would need adjusting, but that were not the problem.
The breasts had been simulated with waded cloth, Jack supposed, and could afford to come down a little on the doctor's torso. The dress had been picked for its modestly covered, if well bolstered, decolletage and a woman's bosom looked mighty strange trussed up in the constricting undergarments of fashion anyway. /So that 'aint it neither,/ he thought pensively.
The doctors adams apple was not intrusive and the choker that Killick had fixed there quite covered it in sparkling gems nicely.
Something - there was something... Then it hit him.
"Doctor, are you quite alright?" he asked. The man was standing perfectly still, tottering on the dainty beribboned boots his feet had been levered into, and not making a sound. Most un-natural.
At Jacks question the doctors eyes rolled upwards into his head and he toppled over, heavy as a tree felled in the forest. His shipmates rushed to catch him, but it was Jack that got there first and cradled his friend to the ground.
"Stephen!" He called sharply, looking into that dear, insensible face with mounting alarm.
"I told you not to tie the stays so tight." Bonden hissed and Killick shrank back at Jacks brief, deadly glare.
Turning Stephen over Jack plucked at the top dress, holding the doctor just so as the others pulled it up and off as swift as ever they could. The stays' fastening was too tightly knotted and had to be sheared through with a handy pocketknife. The corset loosened and Stephen took in a deep, shuddering breath. He then threw up right handily in Jacks lap.
It took him several moments more to recover, and when he had he set about Killicks head with a curling iron, brought out for use on the wig.
"That's what being genteel is all about." Killick said reverently, later in the day to his messmates. "Your common whore would have bailed me up with the wine bottle standing by, but the Doctor chose something more lady like by half." His listeners nodded in silent agreement.
...
Stephen swam hazily out of a fulsome sleep to find that someone was holding his hand. Rolling his head on the pillow he looked out at his cabin and promptly gave such a start that he fell from the hanging cot with a curse.
"Oh, now sir, prey hold your hands still and away, or we've to do it all again." Young Bonden cried, the bottle of enamel paint in his hand waving about while the paintbrush in the other stayed rock steady.
Stephen had quite a few words to say about this turn of events too, but the others, Bonden and Pullings (with Killick hovering in the background,) looked so beseechingly at him, insisted they would have talked things through directly if the doctor had not looked so destroyed and in need of every bit of his sleep that they hadn't the heart to wake him, that he had no choice but to forgive them the embarrassment.
"Tis the thing, you know." Bonden spoke earnestly. "All the ladies have designs upon their nailbeds, and we thought we'd do it now, so the paint would dry in time and you'd not have to fear smudging it."
"Very thoughtful indeed." Stephen said, reaching out to take up a cup of water, but the others made harsh tisking noises and Killick snatched the cup away.
"You're not to be touching things." The waspish sailor declared. "Here, I'll hold it and you may sip, steady and steady, just so."
...
"We only have the one opportunity, for the mail ship will pull in soon and then our chance is ended. Once those documents reach their destination all will be ruined, and I needn't tell you how important this is to me." Jack told the doctor as between them Pullings, Bonden and Babbington together layered paint and rouge upon his face.
"I'll not disappoint." Stephen murmured, trying to move away from Bonden who was endeavouring to prick out his eye with a stick of kohl.
"I know you wont, my dear. Should anything go amiss it's your steady shinning parts I'm relying on to get us through. It's a tricky pretence you must make, and I thank you for the deception. As plans go this was the most direct I could come at. We will assail them directly from within, like the cat in lambs clothing."
Stephen laughed aloud at this, his friend was no land animal and his words proved it.
Jack frowned, reaching over to take up a silk fan from the items Stephen would carry with him and placed it open in his friend's hand.
"Here, perhaps you should keep your face covered as much as you can behind this." And he indicated that Stephen should use the fan as a shield.
"Oh," cried Stephen, much hurt. "I see. It's an ugly man I am, and an uglier woman. I need no second cautions." And he lifted the fan up until only his eyes, bright with accusation, showed above it.
"No, Stephen, that was not what I meant at all!" Jack cried, aghast. "Its just that you laugh so freely, with hardly a modest look to be found at all, and court ladies are said to be damnably modest in all their dealings, from what I've heard."
"You have heard wrong, then, brother." Stephen said, not quite recovered from the perceived blow. "Ladies of the court can be bluff and spirited as ever can be. But I take your meaning and shall remain shielded from improper curiosity."
Jack could tell from the slight coldness in his friends voice that Stephen was still hurt, but he could not think how to rectify the matter, what with his lieutenants and that dolt Killick standing there. He stood uncertainly a moment then turned to straighten the lay of his silk necktie one last time. He felt quite the overbearing booby.
...
The doctor was altogether inured to the affront of having his person lifted up and moved bodily by now, as the sailors often employed this tact to keep him from being underfoot, trampled, or swept overboard. So his hands swathed in white mittens he hung meekly as the crew passed him along the gangplank and onto shore. They did not trust to his teetering progress in the tight highhealed beribboned boots, nor to his luck in resisting the damp sea (he had fallen in so many times now that any new occurrence went almost unremarked upon).
Once ashore the hands went scampering out into the nearby headlands, each holding a little net. They soon came back and the biggest of the singing crickets they had caught was placed carefully into the gilded cage within the doctor's wig. The rest of the insects were stored away for the doctor's collection, a miserable little gift to help smooth the unhappy set of his jib.
"Now, Stephen - Stephanie, sorry, d'you remember the plan?" Jack asked.
The doctor held out his hands and the white mittens were removed, to reveal the excellent enamelled artwork Bonden had performed upon them, unsmudged and perfect as could be. Stephen took up the little chalkboard he had suggested the mute Lady Stephanie would employ to correspond with her underlings and wrote something quite rude upon it in Latin. Jack blushed a little and ground one heel into the dirt of the sidewalk.
"M' sorry my dear," he murmured, looking up the street for the coach they had sent word for to come and collect them. Two of his men were to play footmen in attendance and were dressed accordingly, in their best formal trousers and straw hats set just so with a blue ribbon sewn round each one. The carriage arrived presently and Jack carefully handed Lady Stephanie into the dark interior, his men alighting behind in their proper places.
/This was all that fool Moorehollows fault,/ Jack thought savagely as he watched Stephen rub at one already well pinched heal. Curse the man for taking the wrong set of documents with him off the barky and sending them on by courier to the pompous Governor Rialto's house. It was only a matter of time before they were passed on even further, back to London.
With good winds he had landed before the next mail ship could arrive to carry them off, but Rialto had not offered up the mail packet to him for transport, as was the custom. Instead he had insisted on waiting for the next scheduled vessel. He had cited Jack's tendency to find himself in open battle and the disastrous affects this had on delivery time as the reason.
Blast him. However; the Governor had asked after the Captains passenger, rumoured to be a Lady of some standing in the Grecian court, on her way to Bath for health reasons. Would she consider coming to a small social affair?
There was no Lady on board, in fact Lady Stephanie's presence was a concoction, a red herring, a rouse enacted to pull unfriendly eye's from the real fugitive as she made an urgent escape from incarceration in Greece. She had in fact left them at the initial port dressed as a whore and ridden off into the night accompanied by an itinerant monk.
Her clothes, however, and several of her more precious belongings had remained aboard, to keep the illusion of her leaving with the ship active. How handy this now proved to be!
Jack had smiled widely as he accepted the invitation on behalf of his 'guest', informing Rialto that the Lady was mute from a childhood disease of the throat, but happily could still hear and think with full accretion. Indeed, she was a gem of a woman, if shy, and he doubted not that the Governor's daughters would benefit from the meeting.
An engagement was set, Maturin's reluctant help acquired, and now they rode towards the Governors house in splendid array, Stephen in his sumptuous blue and silver, Jack in his formal navy coat trimmed with gold braid.
What a handsome couple they made as they entered the ballroom, the Lady leaning genteelly upon the Captains arm as he lead her at a leisurely pace across the floor. How the women longed to have such poise, such demure effacement, such marvellous, fashionable clothes! And a fighting Captain of the fleet to escort her as well, how wonderful!
How the men gazed with envy at Jacks marks of office, his brightly polished sabre, honourable battle scars and magnificent leonine carriage. To be a Captain upon the sea, with men eager to follow your command and elegant ladies of the court hanging upon your every word. Marvellous! Enviable!
And oh, how Jack was glad of his thick blue coat, for he knew without a single doubt that had Stephens hand rested upon his naked arm he would have drawn blood by now. The grip the creature had upon him was terrible strong!
Stephen would very much liked to have drawn blood about right now. Preferably Killick's, but Jack's would do as nicely. He could hardly breath in the tight bodice, despite having made specific adjustments to the fastenings himself (he suspected Killick and a night time attack with a needle and thread had been involved) and his feet were already blistered from the walk up the long hall and staircase.
He clung to Jack as much to keep himself from falling as for the proper look of an escort, and he marked the coming of their walk to its end destination with a fervent inward prayer of thanks.
Jack presented the Lady Stephanie to Governor Rialto, his wife and children, several guests and sundry other local dignitaries with a tiny beadle of worry running up his spine. Stephen looked very pale under his mask of paint, Jack hoped his friend could last the engagement.
Light headed, it was with immense relief that Stephen realised he was being gently pressed into a chair, from whence he was told he should 'hold court'. This took at least some of the pressure off his ribs, lungs and toes and he blinked dumbly a moment before reaching into his drawstring bag for the fan and spreading it with a mild snap.
The other ladies took this as a signal and their own fan's came out, some of them quite large and preposterous things with mighty wads of crystal beaded tassels tied to the handles. Jack stood to Stephens left hand side and answered general questions, sometimes reading from Stephen's board when the doctor chose to add a comment or observation.
Out back of the building Reliah Smith and Bonden waited at the kitchen door. Reliah was a landsman given into the services in exchange for a pardon from his thieving ways. When Bonden felt the time was right he signalled his man and Reliah scooted up the side of the building like a monkey. He arrived at the Governors stateroom, as Jack had directed him, found the bag the Captain had spied in a corner and proceeded to ease the documents they needed free from the rest of the mail.
As he left Reliah helped himself to one of the Governors cigars and the stub of a candle from his sidelight, then slid down the outer wall to rejoin Bonden for a piece of crumbled pie with the house servants.
The real last orders of Lord Brighton would never now see the light of day, bringing shame on what was a noble and kindly family name.
...
A grey haze floated over Stephens eyesight and the booming sound of his own heartbeat had begun troubling the doctor before the hour arrived and they were finally free to go.
"Time and tide wait for none." Jack told their guests apologetically as he scooped his swooning doctor up and all but carried him to the carriage. Once there he slid a well practiced hand up the back of the volumouse dress and worked loose the knot that held the corset stays at bay.
The doctor took a deep breath and winced, the movement being quite painful for him. He drooped sideways onto his friends arm and Jack rubbed worriedly at his back.
"Are you well, dear Stephen?" he asked solicitously.
"As well as a man thrust bodily into a sausage skin for the last few hours can be." Stephen said, straitening up and adjusting his skirts around his feet. "At least the damnable dress was not done up as tight as the first time. But I tell you, that Killick changed it after I had set it up just so and I'll not let the creature get away with such a cruel act!"
They rode in silence for the rest of the short trip, and when they came to the wharf Jack made the driver proceed as far onto the planks as he could make the horses go. Stepping out briskly he then plucked the slight doctor from the carriage steps and carried him whole onto the ship to avoid him having to walk a step further in the tight boots.
The ships Captain was a rake, the carriage drivers reported later to the eager townsfolk, he had ravaged the Lady on the way back to the ship and then carried her swooning self back aboard, there to perform even more debauchery, no doubt of it! How fantastic, huzzah!
As soon as he was sufficiently recovered Stephen Maturin chased Preserved Killick all over the ship with a toasting fork, giving him a nasty wound to the backside and an earful of such language that any talk of a 'genteel lady' was put down forever.
Finis.