Perhaps it was Mister Quill’s nature, having been a long-term student and librarian at college before his recruitment into Secret Branch, but he was like a “pack-rat,” and never threw anything away that caught his fancy, or he thought might be useful in future. He turned up in a light two-wheeled cart the day after Col. Tarrant’s request, accompanied by his boy message runner, Fiorello, with a chest crammed full of papers, maps, old letters, and writing materials.
Once ensconced in Col. Tarrant’s quarters, and the chest opened, the Colonel’s dining table, the sideboard, and the chairs were soon piled high with loose, untidy, and perilously balanced stacks of the stuff, and it didn’t help that Dante the hound found it all so intriguingly scented that he had to be shooed out and the doors closed after several collapses and avalanches.
“Fiorello, play with the dog!” Mr. Quill ordered, exasperated, tugging his shirt cuffs and waist-coat back into order. “Sorry about this. My lodgings are just by a sausage shop, and the fish market is not fifty yards off. I expect my papers have taken on aromas simply too tempting. Melito di Porto Salvo, ah … it’s here, somewhere,” Quill said as he roamed from one stack to another, lifting a part of a pile to thumb through.
“We’re thinking more about Monasterace Marina, or the villages east of there,” Col. Tarrant prompted, while trying to be helpful bent over to scoop up fallen pages and such.
“Don’t like the looks of Melito,” Lewrie told Quill. “Too tough a nut. The convoys along the roads…”
“Ah, the detours, you mean,” Quill said, breaking out a smile. “Yes, I’ve had a letter from Silvestri, which tells of the supplies now going over the mountain roads from Filadelfia to Monasterace and Siderno, then back along the main coast road. The partisans have been watching closely, but haven’t been able to do anything about them, so far … lack of arms, and numbers. About the arms shipment…”
“We want to ambush the supply convoys along the coast road once they cross the mountains,” Col. Tarrant reminded Quill, though in a cooing voice; he looked as if he’d save loud shouts for later if the fellow didn’t stay on point.
“Hmm, ambushes, well,” Mr. Quill mused aloud, standing up and scratching at his chin. “If you can pull that off, more power to you. Don’t quite know why you’d wish to traipse about the countryside and play Red Indians, when the seaport towns are still there. Bova Marina, Brancaleone Marina, Locri, Siderno, and on east to Monasterace, they may not have warehouses any longer, but the supply convoys are only stopping for the night, then moving on in the morning.”
“How do you know that, sir?” Lewrie asked.
“What, I didn’t tell you?” Quill replied, then unfortunately for them breaking out into one of his bray-wheeze-gasping-drowning-man laughs. “Silvestri’s band of partisans is in contact with other bands all throughout Western Calabria, and when he asked that fellow ‘Spada’ or whoever he is about the convoys, he got an ear-ful. Well, there’s still stockpiles in each village, oats, grains, and hay for the mule and ox teams. That’s what the first convoys carried, d’ye see, so a convoy of waggons could feed their draught animals overnight.”
“Quick raids on the towns, then,” Col. Tarrant realised, “where we already have information … burn the fodder, and whichever convoy happens to be in town at the moment, if luck’s with us. Hmm, I say!”
“I would suppose,” Quill breezily said, “and if the fodder is lost, hmm … the French would have to waste waggons and animals restocking it.”
“Delaying the carriage of food and supplies to their troops!” Lewrie exclaimed as if the battle was all but won. “And, if we burn waggons and slaughter the waggon teams, that makes things even more difficult for the French. I doubt the supply of horses, mules, and oxen in Calabria is in-exhaustible. Or decent waggons, either.”
“And all for the destruction of a single bridge, haw!” Tarrant crowed. “Which would you prefer first, Sir Alan? Pick a village.”
“Bova Marina, I suppose,” Lewrie said, pushing stacks aside to bare the sea chart beneath them. “It’s close to Melito di Porto Salvo, but the land is flatter, the beaches are broader, its harbour is more open, and it’s only a long day’s march even for ox team waggons from Melito. Almost the end of a long, gruelling trek for the French with the convoy, teamsters and escorts, if any. They might be feelin’ a bit too cocky, by then. Garrison, though, and artillery,” he cautioned.
“I’ve nothing new since the raids in the Spring,” Quill apologised, “but, all that information is in here, somewhere … copies of all I sent Admiral Charlton so his ships could prepare for it. Might we have some tea? It may take awhile.”
Lewrie heaved a sigh and took off his coat and waist-coat, and hung them on a chair back. He looked round and realised that every chair was taken with stacks of material, so there would be no sitting as they searched for the hidden keys that opened Bova Marina to a new raid. He began to page through the nearest stack on the dining table, wishing that Quill had suggested wine instead of tea, for it looked to be a long morning and afternoon.
* * *
Two hours later, and they were still at it. They had found the sketches that Don Julio’s henchmen had made of Bova Marina; the town’s layout, the depths of water off the likely beaches, and a view from sea level. The warehouses were no longer there, of course, pounded to ruin by some frigate’s guns, along with half the waterfront dwellings, so that sketch was no longer to be trusted completely. But, so far, they could not find comments on Bova Marina’s garrison; how many of them, from which regiment, where they’d been lodged, their nationality, or whether the French had thought to emplace artillery in such a poor place.
“It’s close enough to Melito di Porto Salvo,” Lewrie hesitantly speculated. “It wasn’t a storehouse for an invasion of Sicily like Locri or Siderno were, so … perhaps it had no garrison of its own, and that regiment of Germans at Melito just tramped through now and then.”
“As I recall from our briefings, there were coastal trading ships and large fishing boats in the harbour, though,” Col. Tarrant said, leaning back in a chair that he’d finally cleared and now sat upon, rubbing his eyes with the heels of his hands. “Perhaps only one company would be necessary to guard them ’til Marshal Murat up in Naples marched his invasion force down to take ship. And, it most-like would have come from the nearest regiment, which would have been the Germans at Melito.”
“Nothing left to guard, now,” Mr. Quill commented, pinching the bridge of his nose, “and that plan scotched, so there might not be a permanent garrison, as you say, sir.”
“I’m fair starving,” Col. Tarrant announced. “Let us break for dinner, before my eyes glaze over.”
“Amen to that,” Lewrie seconded with enthusiasm.
“Just so long as it ain’t fish,” Quill dared to say. “The fish market at Messina? My poor stipend? Ah, me. Why, I may be growing gills by now, hah hah!”
Don’t … do not … laugh! Lewrie implored, dreading another bout of Quill’s donkey-like hee-haws as they made their way out to the front gallery, sunlight, and fresh air. Lewrie had been on his feet for the better part of an hour before he’d cleared a chair for himself, bent over the dining table, and he had a faint crick in his lower back, which he bent and twisted to relieve.
“I wonder, though, sirs,” Quill began once they were all seated in much more comfortable collapsible campaign chairs round a locally obtained farm table, and sipping on fresh glasses of fruity white wine, “Are you gentlemen a bit daunted by the presence of German allied troops at Melito?”
“The terrain, the narrow beaches, the prevailing surf,” Lewrie ticked off on the fingers of one hand, “and the six twelve-pounders that cover the beaches. One’d think Don Julio’d realise that it’s indeed too daunting, at present, even if he isn’t a soldier.”
“That, and the fact that, so far, we’ve spent far too long in camp…” Tarrant added.
“Swingin’ round our anchors,” Lewrie stuck in.
“Waiting, idling,” Tarrant went on, with a slight bow to Lewrie, “and totally dependent upon news of places that Don Julio wishes us to strike. He’s picked all our targets, save the big raids on Locri and Siderno, where these vast supply depots were, and I’d much prefer choosing for myself. You must feel the same dependence, sir.”
“Oh, indeed, Colonel Tarrant, I have!” Mr. Quill answered him with almost world-weary resignation. “He, and the services he offered, literally fell into my lap, within a month of my arrival at Messina. Quite dear services, mind. Fifty guineas here, an hundred guineas there, ‘Such a risk will cost you, signore.’ I need more boats, more guns, more time, more everything! Now the arms I requested ages ago have finally arrived, their delivery to the partisans over there in Calabria will cost me even more! If I can find him.”
“What, he’s disappeared?” Lewrie gawped.
“Off somewhere on his own criminal enterprise,” Quill groused, “out of touch for the present. I’ve spoken with some of his men … all those damned ‘’Tonios,’ and none can say where he’s gone, or when the scouts come back from Melito di Porto Salvo, either. Did I hear from Mister Silvestri through Don Julio’s men? No, sirs. The partisans sent a little fishing smack cross the Straits to Messina and delivered his letter themselves. They even named a beach where they can accept the arms, the dark of the moon coming up, but … without Don Julio’s boats, I can’t make the delivery.”
“Ehm, how many?” Lewrie idly asked.
“Two hundred stands of arms,” Quill lamented, “Is that how you describe them? Two hundred refurbished French Saint Etienne arsenal muskets, French cartridge boxes and belts, and twenty thousand rounds of pre-made paper cartridges.”
“Well, Sir Alan has boats aplenty,” Col. Tarrant tossed off. “He could deliver them, surely.”
“Eet weel cost you multi gold, signore,” Lewrie japed, though he secretly thought it high-handed of Col. Tarrant to volunteer his services so blithely.
“You could, Sir Alan?” Mr. Quill gushed. “That would be just capital!” They’re stored at the Castello in Messina for the nonce, all crated up, ten to a box, One, perhaps two, of your rowing barges could carry them nicely!”
“And Mister Silvestri and the partisans could begin to curtail supply convoys in the mountains!” Col. Tarrant enthused.
“Ahem,” Tarrant’s orderly announced, “dinner is served, sirs.”
“Topping!” Tarrant cried. “What are we having?”
“Sardines and mussels in wine sauce, sir, with rice and beans, and a loaf of that nice, crusty ciabatta bread with seasoned olive oil dipping sauce, along with a crisp lettuce salad.”
Lewrie looked to Quill, who at that moment was heaving a sigh that it would be fish, after all, and hid his smile of glee that the man was to be dis-appointed once again.
* * *
“I was quite impressed with the mien of the partisans that I met the night we took the bridge,” Col. Tarrant said as his orderly fetched out grapes, apricots, and sweet bisquits for “afters,” and a fresh bottle of that white wine. “Quite fearless. Swashbuckling, even. Now you’re in contact with them, Mister Quill, grand things may be afoot.”
“As I have dearly wished, sir,” Quill replied, savouring his wine, “though the Italians seem as spirited as any, I cannot in good conscience put too much trust in their resistance.”
“Oh? Whyever not, sir?” Col. Tarrant asked, sounding let down.
“Well, consider their history, sir,” Quill began, looking skyward to gather his thoughts for a moment. “The history of Iberia, rather, in the first instance. The Spanish and the Portuguese were for hundreds of years at war with their Moorish invaders, the Gothic Vandals before them, and with each other, at times. The various kingdoms were able to unite, though, and co-operate against the Moors in the Reconquista. El Cid? All that martial glory, in the name of God? Then, when they packed the last Moors off in Fourteen Ninety-Two, and Ferdinand and Isabella united all the kingdoms under one banner, there was relative peace within their own borders, under one monarch, with a sense of themselves as Spanish or Portuguese, so … when the French marched in and their gutless Francophile ministers sold them out, they were livid!
“The Italians, though…” Quill went on, leaning back in his chair, toying with a knife and an apricot, “once Rome fell, and the Empire in the West fell into chaos, the Italians have known nothing but war, invasions, one new tyrant after another, city-states like Florence, Padua, Naples, and others invading other city-states nigh as often as one changes shirts. Occupation, rape, robbery, murder, pillaging, starvation? Vikings, Normans, Moors, Vandals, Spanish conquerors, Ottoman Turks, and now the French, and it’s all of one piece to the Italians.”
“Better to sit back and hope they’re left alone ’til the next conqueror comes marching in, d’ye mean?” Lewrie asked him.
“Occupation by the French, Sir Alan, is nothing to get offended by. They’re just another plague of locusts to be borne ’til they go away, and someone else takes their place, yes. Why take up arms, why resist, after so many centuries of supine complacency? They see their dukes and counts and leaders collaborating, so … why bother? I fear, sirs, that the Italians can be excitable, but only over a horse race, or a festival. There will be some who rise up, but … don’t count on the same scale of resistance as we’ve seen in Spain.”
“Then why do you wish to give them arms, Mister Quill?” Lewrie demanded.
“Upon the belief that, perhaps, this time they will, and that with our arms and encouragement, this time the spark will take light and kindle real rebellion,” Quill sadly told him.
“Good God,” Col. Tarrant commented, “I do not envy you your mission, Mister Quill.”
“I might have better luck separating Spanish colonies from the home country, indeed, sir,” Quill answered. “But, I must try, and hope, that my efforts will be rewarded.”
“Ah, well,” Tarrant said with a sigh. “Back to the mining of your papers, I fear. Shall we, gentlemen?”
* * *
By four that afternoon, they had found what they had searched for, and yes, it had been one company of a German regiment that had garrisoned Bova Marina when it had been an invasion port for the taking of Sicily, there to guard the many boats, but there had never been any artillery emplaced there, and most-likely would not be any, now that the small, sleepy seaport contained nothing in need of protection.
To Col. Tarrant’s chagrin, Lewrie decided that they would not sail directly down the Strait of Messina to make the raid, in full view of enemy watchers ashore on the mainland, but would go North, then West-about Sicily, to strike from the open sea. By now, his ship and the transports were known to the French, and the sight of them would alert the whole Calabrian coast.
To atone for that, Lewrie invited them to dine aboard Vigilance that evening, promising them that his cook, Yeovill, would provide a succulent repast. He assured Mr. Quill that it would most certainly not be fish!
* * *
Once back aboard in his great-cabins, Lewrie sat at his desk, and slowly sipped on a mug of ginger beer, mulling over whom he would send with the arms shipment. His junior officers, Rutland, Greenleaf, and Grace had participated in all of the troop landings and fighting, so far, earning his praise in reports to Admiralty, which the papers in London had re-printed, most especially The Gazette. Advancement to higher rank or more-responsible postings depended on a man’s reputation with Admiralty, and the general public. In his own younger days, Lewrie and his fellow Mids, his fellow Lieutenants, had almost come to blows over which of them would be granted the opportunity to shine and make names for themselves. Bravery, skill, and “neck-or-nothing” daring gained a fellow honour, and glory.
Aye, I relish seein’ my name in the papers, too, Lewrie admitted to himself; And I wish I could go with the muskets myself.
He recalled how delighted Brigadier Caruthers had been during the battle with the French regiment at Siderno, back in the Spring, when he had crowed that he had had a horse, a captured French horse, shot out from under him, as if it was the grandest thing.
Of course it was; it would look brave in the London papers!
Sadly, though, Lewrie realised that he was too old, too senior, now, to risk life and limb chasing more fame, or satisfying his lust for action; no, that would be his junior officers’ place these days.
Farley, he thought; He’s not had his chance, yet.
As Vigilance’s First Officer, Lieutenant Farley held an elevated position, but an onerous one. His job was to act as second-in-command and present Lewrie with a ship ready to go to sea at a moment’s notice, a somewhat happy, well-drilled, and superbly organised ship, with her crewmen assigned to the tasks to which they were most suited. Under his eagle eyes fell the proper material condition of just about everything, a thankless, unending chore, but one which groomed him for promotion to his own command, someday.
Lewrie recalled his impressions of Lt. Farley from their brief time together in the Thermopylae frigate, in the Winter of 1801, in the Baltic, and the Battle of Copenhagen. Farley and his old shipmate from their Midshipmen days, Lt. Fox had been quite a waggish pair, but nigh “tarpaulin men” and good leaders on duty, and Farley had distinguished himself during that cruise, especially after the frigate’s First Officer, Lt. Ballard had been killed in battle.
Farley it is, Lewrie thought, making up his mind; And if I know him well enough by now, he’ll leap at the chance.
“Dasher?” Lewrie said.
“Aye, sir?” Dasher asked, looking up from feeding his bunny a lettuce leaf.
“Go pass word for the First Officer, would you? I have need of him,” Lewrie told him.
Aye, he’ll leap, Lewrie thought as Dasher left the cabins; And God help his hopeful arse.