Regency Christmas Wishes. Carla Kelly

the empty chair opposite him. The other two partners, good whist players, were already seated.

      ‘Captain Grey, would you partner me?’ the luff asked.

      Jem considered their chances of taking sufficient tricks from the proficient pair looking at him with similar calculation. He knew the state of Chardon’s purse—his parents dead now, and Auguste Chardon living from hand to mouth, thanks to the Treaty of Amiens. Jem knew they could defeat their opponents, who were post captains like himself, with ample prize money to see them through the irritation of peacetime. Chardon needed a big win to support his habit of eating and sleeping under a roof.

      ‘I’d be delighted,’ Jem said, and sat down.

      ‘Our Yankee captain,’ one of the opposing captains said, and not with any real friendship.

      Jem shrugged it off as he always did. There were worse things to be called. Hadn’t his older friend Captain Benjamin Hallowell, also a Massachusetts Yankee, managed to become one of Sir Horatio Nelson’s storied Band of Brothers after the Battle of the Nile?

      ‘Aye, sir,’ he said, broadening his relatively unnoticeable American accent.

      Jem motioned for Lieutenant Chardon to shuffle the deck.Ninety minutes later, he had the satisfaction of watching the captains fork over a substantial sum to Chardon. A note to Mrs Fillion had brought sandwiches and beer to their table. Jem wasn’t hungry, but he suspected Chardon was. How nice to see him eat and play at the same time.

      After the captains left, grumbling, Chardon tried to divide the money. Jem shook his head. When the lieutenant started to protest, Jem put up his hand.

      ‘I have been where you are now,’ he said simply. ‘This discussion is over, Lieutenant Chardon.’

      And it was; that was the beauty of outranking a lieutenant. He invited Chardon to join him down the street at a fearsome pit of a café serving amazing sausages swaddled in thick bread. He ate one to Chardon’s three, bid him goodnight and returned to the Drake, before the lieutenant, not so poor now, could go in anonymity and without embarrassment to his meagre lodgings. In due time if Chardon survived, once war resumed, he would have his own prize money earning further income in Carter and Brustein’s counting house.

      ‘You may prefer me not to say this, Captain Grey,’ Chardon told him as they parted company. ‘You are a man of honour.’

      Jem Grey returned the little bow and made his way back to warm and comfortable quarters at the Drake. He could unbutton his trousers, kick off his shoes, lie down on a bed that did not sway with the current, and contemplate his next step, now that he knew Theodora Winnings had loved him eleven years ago.

       Chapter Two

      After a beastly night worrying how long Teddy Winnings had waited for him to reply to her letter, James scraped away at the whiskers on his face, slouched downstairs to the dining room, and settled for a coffee and a roll, which didn’t please Mrs Fillion.

      ‘I really hope you’re not still troubled over that unfortunate letter,’ she said as she poured him a cup. ‘I worried enough for both of us.’

      ‘No, no,’ he lied, then repented because he knew Mrs Fillion was intelligent. ‘Aye, I did worry some.’

      ‘What are you going to do about it?’

      He looked around the dining room, wishing there were someone seated who had more courage dealing with Mrs Fillion. He saw none, and he knew most of the room’s occupants. Men could be such cowards.

      ‘I don’t know,’ he said frankly.

      Honesty appeared to be the best policy with Mrs Fillion. She declined further comment, to his relief passed on to her next customer, coffee pot in hand.

      He had a headful of things to do, but lying awake nearly all night had pushed one agenda directly to the top of his mind’s disorderly heap. His jaw ached. A man feeling as low as he did could only take the next step, which he did. He drew his boat cloak tight around him and walked to Stonehouse Naval Hospital.

      Unwilling to face the nosy clerks in Admin, Jem walked directly to Building Two, where an orderly met him at the door.

      ‘Where away, captain?’ the man asked, in proper navy fashion.

      ‘Surgeon Owen Brackett,’ he said. ‘Tell him James Grey would like a word, if it’s convenient.’

      The orderly touched his forehead and gestured to a sitting room. It must not have been convenient for Owen, because Jem sat there for at least thirty minutes. Still in a dark mood, he read through the obituaries in the Naval Chronicle, remembering the time he was listed there when his frigate had been declared missing after a typhoon in the Pacific. When the Nautilus finally made port in Plymouth a year later, there had been surprised looks from the harbourmaster. He smiled at the memory.

      ‘Jem, what brings you here?’ he heard from the doorway.

      If Jem had thought he looked tired when he stared into his shaving mirror this morning, he was a bright ray of sunshine compared to Owen Brackett.

      ‘I thought this damned peace treaty would turn you into a man of leisure,’ he said to Owen as they shook hands.

      ‘Hardly. Why is it you deep-water sailors have so many ear infections?’ Owen asked.

      ‘Too many watches on deck in storms,’ Jem replied promptly. ‘If you don’t have time...’

      ‘I do. What’s the matter?’

      Everything, Jem thought. A proposal of marriage I tendered was accepted eleven years ago but I never saw it. ‘My jaw aches,’ he said instead.

      Owen gestured for him to come down the hall to his office. ‘Have a seat and tip your head back,’ the surgeon said. With skilled fingers, he probed, asked a few questions with his hand still in Jem’s mouth, and nodded at Jem’s strangled replies.

      ‘Tense jaw is all. You’ve been gritting your teeth for years,’ he pronounced. ‘It’s a common complaint in the navy.’

      ‘Surely not,’ Jem said. ‘I don’t grit my teeth.’

      ‘Probably every time you sail into battle,’ Owen countered.

      Jem opened his mouth for more denial, then closed it. The surgeon was probably right. ‘What’s the cure?’

      ‘Peace. Maybe a wife,’ Owen replied with a smile. He consulted his timepiece. ‘There is a shepherd’s pie cooling below deck in the galley. Join me for luncheon? The ale is surprisingly good here.’

      They walked downstairs together, the surgeon talking about gonorrhoea with an orderly who stopped him on the stairs with a question. It was more information than Jem wanted or needed, but he couldn’t interrupt a friend with no spare time, peace or war. Good thing Owen already had a patient wife.

      Owen was right about the shepherd’s pie, which had the odd facility of both filling his stomach and loosening his tongue, although that could have been the fault of the ale. A fast eater from years of necessity, he decided to ask Owen’s advice about the letter, while the surgeon served himself another helping.

      ‘Here I am, the proud possessor of a letter in which a young woman I love, or at least loved, accepted my proposal,’ he concluded. ‘I’m curious to know how she has fared through the years.’

      ‘You say she is pretty.’

      ‘Quite, but that’s not the half of it. She was so kind to me.’

      Even now Jem clearly remembered the loveliness of Teddy Winnings’ creamy complexion, and the deep pools of compassion in her eyes at first, followed a few weeks later by lively interest when he was coherent and—he hoped—charming. Young he may have been, but he was a gentleman. He had known he was enjoying the company of a young lady properly raised, and behaved himself.