Chapter Nineteen: Navy isn’t her best colour

   The early morning had fulfilled its promise of a glorious day. The air at this altitude danced. It was still fresh, not crisp, but pleasant, especially given the heat rolling out over the distant hills that surrounded the bay. The sky was dotted here and there with great, white cumulus clouds that frothed and foamed against the pale blue sky. A sudden gust caused the ship to yaw, and the flying Man O’war cast a welcome shadow over an unfortunate sailor working high in the rigging of one of the warships in the harbour below. 

   Admiral Pierre-Charles-Jean-Baptiste-Silvestre de Villeneuve smiled as the ships below suddenly fired their cannons in salute. He was the Suprême Amiral de la Marine Impériale Française et Aero Corp after all. Thanks to his brilliant foresight that Nelson would use an unorthodox strategy at Trafalgar, and then coaxing the tiny Englishman within reach of his cannons, he out-manoeuvred and crushed the British Navy once and for all, giving Napoleon command of the seas, and the tiny Isle of England.

   The last of the cannon thunder echoed around the bay. He impatiently pressed his thin, cracked lips together and grunted as his man-servant put the finishing touches on a grey-blue wig for him, expertly tugging it down over his closely shorn scalp. ‘Merci Dominique,’ he muttered, studying himself in the glass. He had a long, pink face, with a matching nose that ended in a point. I probably should have shaved today, he thought, running a bony finger over the greying stubble on his chin. ‘Ah well,’ he sighed standing up, and holding out his arms so that Dominique could fit him into his dark blue dress jacket. He hated wearing the damn thing. On a day like today he wanted to be out on the deck, he wanted his men to forget who he was, he wanted to climb the rigging like a young tar. Ah oui, he smiled, to climb and jump up to the very top of the foremast like a reckless fool! Mon Dieu, what he would give for a day ... even an hour like that again! Instead, he scowled at his reflection, his wiry, black eyebrows momentarily joining into one, long, unkempt caterpillar that threatened to dominate his forehead.

   Dominique noisily tutted. He wasn’t much younger than the Admiral, but he looked a good deal better, with a boy’s physique, and a boy’s, undisciplined mess of dark hair that had been cut round his round head with the unmistakable precision that only a porridge bowl could have proffered. 

   Instantly, a small, ebony comb appeared in his hand, a comb whose sole purpose was to tame the caterpillar, but Admiral Villeneuve wasn’t in the mood. He swatted it away with a grunt, squared his shoulders, and turned away from his reflection in the decorative gold leaf looking glass in front of him. He loathed mirrors. If half the people in the Empire knew that a whole other world existed in there, a world of perpetual ice and snow ... a world where ghosts and monsters walked among men ... his thoughts trailed off. Villeneuve held out two fingers, and Dominique promptly placed a lit cheroot there. Villeneuve closed his eyes, inhaling, and then he suddenly yelled out loud. ‘Napoleon would have another revolution on his hands!’ Dominique, used to these unfortunate outbursts took no notice, and busied himself with sewing a button on a pair of the Admiral’s breeches. 

   ‘Oh dear, mon, Amiral, where have all the real men gone?’ A sudden gust of cool air and a sweet, inky voice caught them both off guard ... he loathed that voice.

   ‘Bonjour Mademoiselle Clotilde,’ he said, stiffly turning around. She lay, stretched out along a low, brightly coloured Spanish divan, a trophy from the Trafalgar campaign, in an iridescent gown, and she was smiling at him, he hated that smile too. Dominique quietly dragged his stool to the opposite end of the cabin, as a fine, silvery frost crept all along the cabin’s brightly, polished floor, and busied himself behind a rack of the Admiral’s shirts. 

   Clotilde stared at them, like a cat watching two plump canaries, canaries that would much rather be safely back in their cage. Villeneuve snorted, took a drag from his cheroot, and exhaled an aromatic cloud out of a nearby porthole. ‘I trust all has gone according to plan?’ He finally asked, turning his face away from a ray of sunlight that suddenly flicked gold over his eyes. He disliked having to work with this doppelgänger, more than anything, but if Napoleon Bonaparte ordered it, it must be so. He watched as she pulled her legs up between her arms, resting her chin upon her knee, flashing that smile at him. ‘All according to plan,’ she said in a deep imitation of his voice, and then laughed out loud, a silvery sound that tinkled like breaking glass. 

   Dominique shivered. He stared down his nose at the grey frost escaping from his nostrils, and then discreetly looked over the Amiral. Satisfied he wasn’t noticed, he pulled out a blue, Syrian hatta from a pile of the Admiral’s silk scarves, and, with second glance at Villeneuve, tugged it over his cold head.

   Villeneuve paced the length of the spacious cabin, stopping before a large bay window that looked out the stern of this soaring Man O’war. The turquoise water in the bay bristled with whitecaps that skipped and frothed as a breeze blew inland. His warships in the sea below rocked in the summer sun, accompanied by small, bobbing fishing boats, selling their catch to his hungry sailors. 

   ‘Where is she?’ He finally asked. Clotilde, her chin still resting on her knees, turned her eyes in his direction, a slow smile spreading across her face. ‘She?’ She asked, her dark eyes sparkling. ‘Am I not good enough for you? Are we not exactly alike?’ Villeneuve sighed and turned his gaze back toward her. She was small. Dark curls fell across her face and shoulders. She was almost beautiful. ‘Mademoiselle Clotilde,’ he spoke quietly, turning his attention back outside, as a passing cloud caught his eye. ‘I think ... we think,’ he suddenly noticed the absence of Dominique, and spied his legs sticking out from behind his collection of shirts. ‘No matter,’ he said more to himself. ‘Clotilde ...’ She continued to eye him with that sneery smile. ‘Where is the girl?’

   ‘Oh, well ...’ She swung her legs round, and lightly sprang off the divan, landing in front of a tall, gold, Baroque mirror, and pressed a tiny finger against the uneven glass. It rippled like a pebble that had been dropped into a pond at midnight. Villeneuve was unimpressed, he knew the mirror for what it was, a door, a gateway to the last unconquered realm. ‘She’s ... in there?’ He raised a bushy eyebrow at her. Clotilde slowly turned on her heel, her dress quietly swishing around her ankles, and faced him. ‘Non, mon Amiral, she is -’ She stamped her foot on the bright, wood floor. ‘Here on the ship.’ 

                                                          ***           

   ‘What?!’ Villeneuve barked at her. ‘Where is she daemon?! Speak plainly, for I’ll not be taken for a scrub. You say she is on my ship? Then tell me where, where is your twin?!’ Clotilde glared at the Admiral, she glared without blinking, her eyelids disappearing into their sockets. Villeneuve thought her eyeballs must dry out for the lack of blinking. ‘I hung her from the bowsprit!’ She suddenly spat, and then she abruptly turned her back on him, and stepped closer to the mirror, her nose almost touching the dark, rippling surface. She stopped, and her eyes narrowed. Her reflection was gone.

   Her head whipped round, silently, accusingly, staring at Villeneuve. She opened her mouth to say something, but then closed it again. ‘How could this idiot have anything to do with it?’ She mumbled to herself, turning her gaze back toward the mirror. In the glass, the cabin shone back at her, she could see the desk covered in books, she could see the silver and gold instruments on the wall glistening in the sunshine ... she could even see the Admiral and his servant ... but she could not see herself!

   Growling, she raised a hand, and pressed a pale finger against the glass, and then hissed, yanking it away. 

                                                    It burnt her. 

   The glass burnt her! But how can this be?! She thought. What is happening? She spun on her heel and glared around the room. Pointing her red fingertip at Villeneuve. ‘Bring me Francesca!’ She ordered. This time Villeneuve flinched, and this time he did not contradict the daemon. Even before he realised what his feet were doing, he found he was quickly marching toward the exit of his cabin. He had never seen her like this before. Dominique was already there, pulling the heavy, oak door inward, spilling sunlight into the room. ‘Admiral on deck!’ He yelled in a spectacularly, uncharacteristic deep voice. 

   Villeneuve took three steps across the gleaming deck, and stopped at the brightly painted rail, happy to be away from Clotilde. A booming sound he knew well reverberated through the air. He shielded his eyes with a large hand and inspected the bright, blue balloons that held his ship up in the air. They flexed, stretching and bobbing in the summer breeze like overexcited jellyfish cresting an angry, turquoise wave in the Mediterranean. 

   ‘Steady on, Monsieur Gorin!’ He shouted up to a blonde youth that was busy tightening some netting across two of the smaller, blue balloons. ‘We don’t want to burst our bladders, eh?!’ He suddenly chuckled, surprised at his relief. Surprised at how nervous Clotilde had made him feel. He looked back over at young Gorin. ‘The silly boy, he’s turned three shades of red.’ Villeneuve turned his gaze back down over the deck, not seeing the silly boy grinning in spite of himself, as all the sailors did when the Admiral was within earshot. The old man had one of those particularly Parisian accents that sounded as if his tongue had been stung by a dozen wasps, but still, they respected him, even with his Parisian pronunciation.

   With the Admiral’s arrival above, the long expanse of the ship’s bright, wood deck became alive with the movement of hands at work. There was the rolling of barrels, the lifting of boxes, tending sailcloth, scrubbing clothes in buckets, and shining the long, brass cannons that lined the rails. Other men were singing while they worked, their voices raised in bawdy chansons that would make the faces of even the hardiest of the English sailors burn brightly, while others joked, smoked and laughed beneath the sails that billowed between the sea and the blue sky. These men were his men. Hand-picked veterans from his days on the oceans, seas, rivers and lakes. Older men, men with scars, men missing limbs, ears and eyes. These men were the best the French Navy had, and now he had them all together on this flying Man O’ War.

   He grabbed the rail of the ladder leading down to the main deck, and, with the  practiced manoeuvre of routine, spun round, sliding to the bustle below. The men nearest, all raised their fists, knuckles to foreheads in salute, and others shouted cheery ‘Good mornings’ at the sight of him. He smiled as he wound his way around the heavy masts, ducking as the breeze blew a grey sail round in his direction. The love of his men was not too be taken lightly - not ever. He stepped to the edge of the rail, and sneezed as the warm sun tickled his nose. The ships below seemed so small from up here, like toys in a washbasin. He could almost reach out and hold an entire seventy-four in the palm of his hand, but he wasn’t here to muse. He turned, tugging at the bottom of his jacket, and strode down to the forecastle.

                                                           ***

   Francesca didn’t remember how she got here, not exactly anyway. She was, actually, unafraid, and unsurprised at her predicament. Why not? She thought. Why shouldn’t I be trussed like a Christmas goose to the front of a flying ship? Isn’t that what all the fashionable young girls are wishing for these days? She twisted her torso, and tried to rub her back against the bowsprit. God, what an itch! She sighed. It was just no use, there wasn’t enough slack in the cord that held her. ‘You know?’ She said out loud, looking left and right at the distant clouds that raced through the sky along side her. ‘This is the closest I’ll probably ever get to flying like a bird.’ 

   ‘Ah, Mademoiselle,’ said Villeneuve, his deep voice interrupting her reverie. ‘And you know what? If I untie ...’ he bent over pressing a wrinkled finger against the rough, hemp rope. ‘Just one, teeny-tiny knot, you will know exactly what it is like to fly like a bird.’

   Francesca whipped her head round, and only succeeded in smacking her temple against the hard bowsprit. ‘Ow, ow, OW!’ She angrily yelped, and followed that with an irritated ‘Pardon me, monsieur, but you have me at a most distinct disadvantage!’ She coughed out a strand of hair that, caught in a cross breeze, suddenly blew in-between her open lips. She spat the hair out. ‘Who may I have the -’ She hesitated again, and then smiled into the air. ‘The pleasure of addressing?’ 

   ‘It certainly is a long way down,’ said Villeneuve, ignoring the question. ‘Can you see the dolphins swimming beneath you Francesca?’ He paused, waiting for an answer, and not hearing one, he said, ‘May I call you by your Christian name, Francesca? But of course I may,’ he continued. ‘Down there, just to your left?’ He pointed. ‘Ah, but excusez moi, you cannot turn your head far enough.’ He pulled his hand back, and nibbled at a fingernail, looking out over the glistening bay. ‘Down there,’ he gestured, this time with his nose, he no longer cared if she could see him. ‘Is a little ship ...’ he paused again, looking back at Francesca. ‘A ship, that -’ He watched the back of her head carefully. ‘ ... Some of your friends arrived in last night.’ 

   ‘Ow!’ Francesca banged her head again. Her head was going to be covered in lumps. ‘My friends?!’ She whispered ... here?’ Villeneuve stepped up atop the narrow bowsprit, and raised his arms out, smiling when he discovered he still had his sense of balance. ‘Yes, Francesca, your friends thought they might rescue you ... foolish, non?’ Just then, she looked very much the twin of the daemon, he thought ... only more ... what? Alive? Naive? Less of a saloppe? He lit a cheroot, and bit at the end of it, inhaling. Alive, he decided, blinking upward, as two of the ship’s enormous balloons suddenly jumped, scattering the sunbeams across the deck as they bounced against each other in the breeze.

   Bizarre, he thought out loud, and then, suddenly remembering where he stood, and who he stood above, he bent down, and carefully crawled out along the long, thin bowsprit until he lay on his back, head to head with Francesca. ‘Et alors Francesca?’ He quietly whispered. ‘What shall we do with you, mademoiselle? I expected an Italian like yourself to be more forthcoming, more, how do say? Chatty.’ He exhaled a cloud of tobacco as a large, furry, black and gold bumblebee zigzagged over his head, and then, caught in a cross-wind, disappeared beneath the bow of the ship. 

   ‘What have you done with my friends? Where are they?’ Francesca asked suddenly. She closed her eyes. ‘I, I miss them.’ Villeneuve nodded, distracted by a curling, white cloud in the distance. ‘Certainly you do, my dear.’ He answered. ‘Certainly you do.’ He reached out, and lightly patted at the front of his tunic, tugging another thin cheroot from within a pocket. ‘It is only natural to do so, of course.’ He placed the cheroot between his lips and sucked on it distractedly for a moment, before pulling out his box of matches. He shook it, and frowned - it was empty. ‘I don’t supposed you have a match?’ He asked out of the corner of his mouth. 

   Quick as lightening, a match appeared before the Admiral’s cheroot. ‘Eh?!’ He said, startled. ‘A match Sir.’ It was Dominique. Raising a hand, Villeneuve shielded his eyes against the morning sun, and saw his manservant leaning dangerously out over him with a lit match expertly cupped in his hand. Villeneuve smiled. ‘Thank you Dominique,’ he puffed, laying his head back down, and then, noticing Dominique hadn’t moved, he looked back up. ‘Was there something else?’ Dominique grabbed hold of a nearby rope, and pulled himself back up. ‘Yes Amiral, ... the, uh ...’ He glanced down at Francesca. ‘The other young lady is waiting.’ Villeneuve’s eyes widened suddenly. ‘Indeed, indeed!’ He exclaimed. 

   Villeneuve thought for a moment, inhaling another lungful of smoke, when his stomach suddenly rumbled angrily. An idea! He smiled. ‘What do you say to some breakfast Francesca? I’m sure we can find you some good, Italian pancetta ...’ Francesca snorted, cutting him off. Not likely, she thought. ‘And anyway, I don’t eat pancetta,’ she said instead. Villeneuve blinked. ‘What? But you are Italian, are you not? What kind of Italian doesn’t eat pancetta?!’ Francesca shifted, and squirmed in the ropes. ‘The kind,’ she said irritatedly, as a strand of cord rolled up over her nose, threatening to pin itself to her forehead. ‘The kind that thinks before she eats!’ ‘I see ...’ Said Villeneuve. He didn’t, of course.

   ‘What about?’ He tried again, pressing his lips around the cheroot, and then blowing perfect little O’s of smoke into the air. ‘What about a nice café latte?’ ‘A café laaaatte?’ She dribbled the words. The thought of a café, the deep, dark, oozy, creamy, steamy, rich ... ‘You have café?’ She quietly asked. ‘I do,’ he smiled. ‘Dominique?’ He raised a bushy, black eyebrow at the boy. ‘Oui, bien sûr Amiral. Today we have Turkish coffee. ‘Turkish coffee!’ Francesca and Villeneuve exclaimed at the same time, and then again, a little quieter. Turkish coffee.  

  Villeneuve looked up at Dominique from the length of the bowsprit. ‘Have we a cezve?’ Dominique raised his own eyebrow at the Amiral. ‘We have a brass cezve.’ And then before he could help himself he added ‘naturally.’

   Villeneuve exhaled a warning cloud of smoke, but then decided to let that bit of impertinence pass. He fixed his watery eyes on Dominique’s, and instead asked, ‘hot’?

   ‘Oui.’

   ‘Cardamom?’

   ‘Natur -’ Dominique bit his tongue, stopping himself. 

   ‘Oui.’

   ‘Sugar?’

   Francesca coughed, and both men looked at her.

   ‘I actually don’t like sugar in my coffee ....’

   Villeneuve looked back at Dominique, ‘No sugar,’ he said.

   He nodded. 

   ‘Very good.’

   A cezvz is the pot with which Turkish coffee is prepared. It is traditionally a small, brass pot, that very much resembles a miniature beer stein with a long handle that projects up from its lip at a 45° angle. The coffee, water, and sugar (if desired) are brought to a frothy boil over an open flame, and then, quickly boiled once more, before being poured into demitasse cups and served. Cardamom is added at the end for extra flavour.

   It is exquisite. 

  ‘Well ... oooop!’ Villeneuve happily hopped up, ... and then? Then he promptly slipped  and fell sideways from the bowsprit.

                                                        ***

   A shriek. A shriek so shrill, so sharp, so piercing that it momentarily stunned the entire compliment of sailors aboard the great, grand, soaring Man O’ War. A shriek that slid, and carried, and slipped across the smooth surface of the ship, and then stabbed down, down, down into the very heart of the blue bay below.

                                                        ***

   The sailors in the harbour below that had been laughing, complaining, and sweating in the heat of the morning sun stopped as one. The officers froze in their tracks, the livestock stopped braying, and baaing at one another, fishermen stopped fishing, swimmers stopped swimming, and the ships and boats that bobbed above the tide, they stopped their bobbing. Everyone and everything with ears and eyes that could look up, looked up.

   The shrieking only grew louder.

   Villeneuve thrashed, dangling from his fingertips. He swung, wildly twisting, his nose just inches from the copper front of the ship, his boots scraping against the glistening hull as he frantically scrabbled for something, anything to save him from falling.

   Francesca screamed louder still.

                                          ‘LET GO OF MY HAIR!’

   Panicked, Dominique practically fell over his own feet, as he rushed to save his beloved Admiral. He quickly launched himself headfirst over the rail, throwing his hands around the bowsprit, and without so much as a ‘how do you do’ to the shrieking Francesca he briskly wrapped an arm around it (and her stomach) and stretched out a hand to the dangling Villeneuve. ‘‘Amiral! Amiral!’ He tried to make himself heard over Francesca’s incessant screams. ‘Amiral ... s'il vous plaît!!!’

   ‘Dominique! Bon homme!’ Yelled Villeneuve as he swung from Francesca’s tangled tresses, waving a frantic hand out toward his manservant. Villeneuve missed, and swung backward, twisting in the wind. He held tighter to Francesca’s hair, grabbing handfuls of her locks and kicked out, completely ignoring Francesca’s shrill protests, trying again to reach up to Dominique’s hand.

   Dominique cursed, he just couldn’t reach him. Behind him the sailors nearest the forecastle had already crowded at the rail, pushing and yelling at each other for ladders and ropes to help up their Admiral. The swiftest, and lightest scampered out, kneeling atop the bowsprit, a hand clasped round each of Dominique’s ankles, urging him to lean out further. None of the ship’s compliment, however, were paying any attention to Francesca, not to her screams, nor to the ropes that bound her - ropes that were quickly unravelling beneath the weight of the screaming girl and the swinging Admiral.

   ‘Essayez Amiral, my hand, try to take my hand!’ Dominique was half on, and half off the bowsprit now. The quick thinking sailors formed a human chain, the largest of the men had the thick, corded hemp of the ship’s shroud twined round his massive forearms, anchoring their rescue party with the others clinging to him for support. If Dominique got hold of the Admiral, they knew that their combined weight would be significant (an unfortunate result of the Admiral’s love for lemon chicken.) 

   And so, they made this chain, arm in arm, hand in hand. Until, finally, two of the strongest and agile mainmast climbers were out, directly atop Francesca, and directly behind Dominique. They stretched, swiftly lowering the manservant down to their Admiral. ‘Sir!’ They hollered. ‘Amiral!’ Dominique called. ‘GET OFF! LET GO!’ Francesca screeched. Dominique’s fingertips reached out, brushing Villeneuve’s hand. Success! He thought. ‘Sir!’ He curled his fingertips downward. ‘Look up!’ Give me your -’ 

                              The rope holding Francesca finally unwound. 

   The cord slipped its knots, then, one braid after another, the rope suddenly began to thrash, and whip round the bowsprit as it uncoiled. A suddenly silent Francesca lurched forward, and Dominique found himself tumbling with her, and then the rope completely fell away. He stared in dismay as it dropped, twisting through the air into the bay below. 

   Horrified, Dominique did a sort of somersault, desperately grabbing out, and catching hold of the Admiral’s arms, shoulders, and collar ... and in quick succession, shirt, belt, legs, boots, and, finally, stockings. Dominique’s cheeks turned pink, but realising he was still attached to the Admiral, and, by extension, the ship, he proudly huffed. ‘Amiral!’ He kicked out at the air below.  ‘I have you!’

   His triumph, was, however, short lived. Francesca spun, and quickly fell, crashing into him. Oh the pain. The sudden, piercing pain of having your head smacked into by another, equally hard skull, is unparalleled in the annals of pain-dom. Dominique swore ‘S-! C-! B-!’ He bit his tongue. He was upside down, and face to face with Francesca, who had tumbled out over Villeneuve, cracking him in the face, perhaps on purpose, as she had smiled a great, big smile. Her dark, curly locks were finally free of the admiral’s fingers, and she didn’t care whose head she had cracked into. 

                    ‘Ciao.’ She smirked, at Dominique. ‘My name is Francesca.’