The Gift
Chapter 8: Trio
Setting: Post POTC 3
Characters: Norrington/ OFC
Plot: A fluffy holiday love story. Who knew that James Norrington played the violin?
James Norrington couldn't remember a happier night in all his thirty-three years. He had played music in the company of a master Italian violinist and conversed with the most beautiful woman in the new world and now he was retiring to partake of Port Royal's finest exports, tobacco and rum, with his two most loyal friends. Certainly, he was nearing life's zenith.
"Tis' fine weed, James," Andrew concluded, a serpent of smoke exiting his lips.
Theo sucked on his pipe and asked, "From the Gravely plantation?"
"You know your tobacco," James answered, filling his own small wooden pipe.
"I do hope smoking doesn't become too popular in England. I should hate to think we'd have to export the best of it," Andrew lamented.
"The best will always go the Gravely's friends, which include Admiral James Norrington, Andrew."
Theo and Andrew lifted their pipes with a salute of, "Huzzah!"
James laughed -- the rich, weedy smoke rolling from his nostrils.
"So tobacco is the price of your friendship?"
"Yes, I'd say so, sir," Andrew answered with his usual wry, teasing tone. At that moment, a servant entered with tankards of hot rum which the men took and drank from deeply.
"Theo, not that I mind your hospitality," James said, swallowing a swig of the sweet grog. "But this evening's festivities seem a bit rich, even for a man of your high tastes. Is there anything else we should be celebrating tonight?"
Groves smiled secretly, as a log cracked and popped on the fire.
"No one can hide things from you, James," he said as he looked up, something anticipatory in his face. "I am to be a father."
"Well, Theo, you're not impotent after all!" Andrew quipped. "Congratulations!"
"I can think of no two people who deserve happiness more than you and Jane," James added thoughtfully, and Theodore answered with a quiet, heartfelt, "Thank you."
Andrew stood and put down his tankard.
"Theodore, you'll make an excellent father." Then, picking up his hat, "I only hope that Jane bears you son who I can take drinking or….a daughter I can marry," he added mirthfully as he placed his tricorn on his head.
Theodore unsteadily stood and raised a fist.
"If I wasn't in my cups, I'd beat you for that, Gillette, you French pig!"
"Oink! Oink!" Andrew laughed, bobbing his hat. "Goodnight, gentlemen, my fair lady calls."
James was laughing heartily and in no mood to leave quite yet and return to his lonely bed.
"Refill your pipe, Norrington."
Groves offered him the cedar box of dried stock.
"I believe I will," he answered contentedly and set about his work.
"For a damned Royal Naval Captain, Gillette holds fast to his French mistress."
"Is that whom he's off to see? Lizette, the baker's daughter?"
"Aye, is there another?" Theodore asked, taking a long drag on his pipe. "He should just marry the girl, make an honest woman out of her."
Norrington crossed his legs.
"But the man has his career to think of, first and foremost."
"And his happiness," Theodore added sternly, and James knew his harsh tone was a comment on his own feelings for Lucy. After a long silence, Groves added, "It seems you and Miss Gagliano were deep in conversation tonight."
"Yes," James sucked at his pipe, letting the hot smoke burn deeply in his lungs.
"She is a most spectacular woman -- beautiful, talented and refined. She will make some man a very fine wife."
James had to chuckle.
"Theo, your worse than these match-making mamas!"
"I'm far better, James," Theo sniffed. "I'm not tossing judies at you, I'm just giving you what you want."
James leaned forward in the leather chair.
"And you think I want Lucy Gagliano?"
With a broad grin, Theo answered, "I think you want her very much. The question….do you desire her as a wife or as a mistress?...Perhaps this is the same question you're asking yourself."
"Aye," Norrington replied sinking back into the chair and realizing he was slightly drunk; for it was the only time that he allowed himself to speak like a common sailor. "But would she have a keeper?" Then taking another drag, he mused to himself more than to Theo, "And am I the kind of man that who have a mistress?"
"From what Jane says of her, she's innocent….If that is dilemma that's has plagued you," Groves stated knowingly.
"Is she certain?" he replied in a low voice, face dimly lit against the flame of his pipe.
"I suppose as certain as any woman could be about another. It seems you have two options. You could ask her yourself or you could bed her."
Norrington's insides twisted. He'd never been with an innocent and had no intentions of doing so outside the bonds of the Church of England.
"If you love her, does it make any matter?" Theo asked, taking a short swig of rum from the tankard he worried in his hands. "We hold English women to a high standard, while we noble Englishmen plunder trollops like Spanish conquistadors."
Even if he had only very limited experience in the area, James had to agree.
"I suppose your right." Then standing, he announced, "It's getting late."
It was a redundant thing to say, as it had been very very late for some time now. Grove approached his Admiral and took a firm hold of his arm.
"It is for you to give the orders and only for me to give advice."
He was tired of looking into James's defeated green eyes.
"Court her, sir. Not long, but shortly and then get thee wed. You deserve happiness more than any man I have ever known."
Norrington smiled at his friend's words.
"Thank you Theo," he said, removing his tricorn from the hat rack and placing it on his head. "I think I shall take your advice to heart in this area, as you and Jane are obviously experts in such matters."
"Rightly so, sir. Rightly so." Theodore Grove concluded with private huzzah!
When Sunday church concluded, Admiral Norrington shirked his usual lunch at The White Cockade, Port Royal's only club, and instead headed towards a small alley off High Street. For when the admiral had a target in sight, it was not in his nature to hold back. He smiled and whispered, "Lucy Gagliano, prepare to be fired upon!"