Chapter Two – One arm and one eye

As the dark fell over England, Edmund Blackadder was finally done tidying up after the Prince Regent, and he had decided to pay Ms. Miggins' coffee-shop a visit.

He opened the door into the shop, and immediately he heard the high, girly voice greet him: "Good evening, Mr. Blackadder!" He rolled his eyes and forced a smile. "Good evening, Ms. Miggins. A pot of the black powder of yours," he said without even insulting her brew, because it could hardly be called coffee.

Miggins chuckled and turned around, "Coming up, Mr. Blackadder. By the way, my good Mr. Blackadder, I have heard something very strange from that kitchen lad of yours," she told as she filled a yellow, quite flowery pot with coffee powder.

Blackadder looked up. "You are telling me you paid attention to what Baldrick said?" He now began to doubt whether Ms. Miggins actually had a brain or if she accidentally had forgotten it in his last pot of coffee.

She nodded, and almost danced over to his table with his tray with the coffee pot and his usual shepherd's pie. Whilst she poured the brew up in an elderly-looking flowery cup of yellow porcelain, she continued her lively chitchat: "Oh yes, Mr. Blackadder, your Baldrick is a very intelligent lad indeed." Blackadder looked at her as if she had just told him she was expecting his baby without having been his mistress, but he did not comment it. He could not find the right words.

"He told me this very morning, that he has seen a boat in Portsmouth Harbour!" she said, and she sounded excited. Blackadder rolled his eyes, and picked up his shepherd's pie. The usual bad quality, but as a man of honour, he did not mention the matter. Instead, he referred to Miggins' mentioning of Baldrick's journey to Portsmouth: "Now you are starting too?" he mumbled. Miggins admired her pies in an almost motherly way before she turned to Edmund again. "Well, I will say that you will be surprised, Mr. Blackadder!" she said and tried to show the teeth, that were not in their place. Blackadder grimaced gently, and looked at her with ill-hidden disgust.

"Ms. Miggins, there is nothing unusual about a vessel in Portsmouth Harbour! We are a seafaring nation with the world's finest Navy!" he tried to convince her, but she seemed as ignorant to the facts as Baldrick tended to be. He continued to put some sense into her miniature head: "We have Nelson!" Now she started to giggle, and Blackadder thought that he had said some easily-misunderstood joke, until she winked at him. "Baldrick told me it was the Victory!"

Blackadder was purely astonished. He dropped his pie down and his mouth fell down on his chest. It was not the fact that Nelson had returned; it was the fact that Baldrick knew which "vote" that belonged to Lord Nelson and what name it had. He had never thought that possible! Miggins clearly misunderstood it, and she patted him cheerfully on the left shoulder, saying: "Now, cheer up, Blackadder! He will probably be coming to visit the Prince so you can get a good look at 'im."

Edmund looked at Ms. Miggins, as though she had missed the point in it all. "What interest can I have in a man who has an ugly wife, a filled purse, an enormous boat with a ridiculous name and bitter crewmembers, and then the fact that he is missing an eye and an arm?"

When finished with his pie, Blackadder had taken his leave and walked home to the castle. He had wondered about the fact that Baldrick had known that it was HMS Victory and not HMS Rowena, two almost similar boats from the same shipyard. Maybe it had been mere luck… But fate did usually not smile on Baldrick, or Blackadder. Else he would probably be a squire instead of butler…

He had walked deep in his thoughts, and as he stopped outside the castle doors, he heard a noise coming from the green bush beside the doors. He looked at the bush, as if it had been yelling in the middle of a very important scene in a play, and it stopped saying it for some seconds. Then it started again. Blackadder, who was not a man believing in either supernatural powers or magical creatures merely walked over to the bush and raised his cane, whipping the bush to make it silent.

He should have reflected on if it was really a good idea to whip bushes in the middle of the night; but he was secretly furious and he needed to release his temper on something. And a bush seemed a rather good choice. He turned about, mighty satisfied with himself, before he heard something: "Oy, backstay sails!" He turned about. "What?!" he yelled. The bush replied: "What in the name of my commission do you think you are doing, laddy?!" the bush replied furiously.

Blackadder, feeling that this was getting too ridiculous, started to see some sense. "Come forward, Sir, and stop hiding in the bush." The bush mumbled an oath, and then stepped out in the light from the lantern.

It was a low gentleman, holding around a lady. The lady was incredibly beautiful, Blackadder remarked, and bowed in respect. "Your servant, m'lady." He said, but the man got a furious look. "You have some bloody nerves offering your services to my Emma, Sir!" he said and released the woman. She looked at him, but then took his arm. Or, the only arm he had, Blackadder saw. "Horatio, do not make such hullabaloo about it," she gently whispered, and Blackadder knew one thing for sure; he had completely lost his heart to this "Emma".

But at the same time he did only know of one Horatio in England, and that was his Lord, the good Lord Horatio Nelson of the Nile. And he too knew of Nelson's reputation, he had been married and then crossed every law that were set down and declared that Emma Hamilton, the attractive young woman, was his mistress.

"I am sorry, Sir, I did not notice that it was you, hiding in the bush." Blackadder said and bowed. Nelson, a very proud man, though neither incredibly handsome nor tall, looked down at the bowing man and then looked at his mistress with the one eye he had. The other one were made of glass, had Blackadder noticed. "You are forgiven, Sir. I might as well ask you not to mention this matter to anyone due to the good lady's reputation." He had quite a commanding voice, Blackadder noticed. Woe be the man crossing him…

"But what were you doing in the bush, my good Sir?" Blackadder curiously asked, and Nelson got a sudden glimpse in his eyes, before he laughed. "I will bet you my other arm and Emma along that you can guess it," Blackadder, well knowing, admitted defeat. "In that case, I will leave you to it. Good night, Sir."

And this would only be the first of many hilarious meetings Blackadder would have with the ill-tempered, low and ugly Horatio Nelson; and, of course, with the shiningly beautiful Emma Hamilton…