Free A Different Sort of Perfect by Vivian Roycroft Page B

and it carried more trim; but it was a naval officer's
uniform and she'd not hesitate to wear it into any assembly room
around.
    Wake and Mayne stood below the quarterdeck, grinning.
Indescribable gratitude swelled within her.
    "I can't believe you finished so quickly. How very
clever of you! I thank you with all my heart."
    Mayne bobbed his head and stared at the deck.
    Wake turned his sennit hat in his hands. "It weren't
no problem, me lady, and there's cloth enough left for another or
two, we think. Mayne here," he jerked a thumb, but Mayne didn't
glance up, "well, he were a tailor's apprentice afore he ran away
to sea, and the rest of us have made hot-weather slops since we
were powder monkeys and ship's boys. There's—"
    But Staunton hissed. "Better cut along, Wake."
    "Aye, aye, Mr. Staunton." Still grinning, as if he
hadn't been cut off, Wake touched his forehead to Staunton, then to
her, and he and Mayne trotted off.
    To her. The old forecastleman had saluted her .
    But before she could absorb that, somewhere nearby a
drum began to thunder. Her heart leapt in response.
    "Quarters!" Staunton exclaimed, and ran off, leaving
her standing, all a-flutter.

Chapter Nine
     
    Pounding feet raced to battle stations, the jumbled
thumping emphasizing the furious drumbeat. Of course, the landmen
had to be prodded and yanked into position; best to start their
training for emergencies first thing. Fleming surreptitiously
gestured for Lady Clara to join him and she hurried over, her dark
eyes darker than ever. But her expression remained stoic, calm and
reserved, as if she disdained permitting any undignified emotion
access to her countenance.
    "Stand behind me and—" But the carpenters began
hammering below with his first word. They'd be ripping down
bulkheads, creating a clean sweep on the gun deck from stem to
stern, and while the walls vanished, Hennessy and his mates would
stow the captain's, and now the captain's clerk's, belongings into
the hold. He raised his voice. "Stand behind me and take
notes."
    She nodded, balancing the book in her arms and
scrambling for the quill. But that distracting pucker had formed
across her smooth forehead.
    "Mainly we'll be determining the rate of fire," he
added, cradling the minute repeater in his palm. "I'll give you the
start and stop times, but you must calculate the difference and
note it down. I'll also give you the fall of shot. Are my
instructions clear?"
    Her forehead cleared and she nodded again. For all
her outward calm, a ferocious excitement in her eyes mirrored the
drum's rousing roll. No modest, retiring violet, his spoiled
debutante; she responded to the drumbeat the way a keen mare
responded to the huntsman's horn, the way Topaze responded
to stu'ns'ls aloft and alow. Even more interesting.
    On the gangway, eager hands prised up the main hatch
covers, flooding misty light into the gun deck below, and beside
him she stiffened into a pikestaff, staring into the depths. The
gun crews clustered around their charges in clumps of confused
scrambling, scattered every few feet along the starboard side.
Abbot stalked behind them, his experienced eyes glancing over the
vital items, ready in hands or within reach: powder horn, rammer,
swab, water, sand, powder boys with their charges behind each gun
over on the larboard side, and the burning slow match in its tubs
sent up a sharp, enticing fighting scent. Wake cast off the ropes
confining number sixteen, Old Trusty, and the long gun's
three thousand seven hundred pounds eased backward along the
grooves engraved in the deckboards from past firing. It was the
first cannon loosed.
    Fleming leaned toward his clerk. "Note that number
sixteen is well manned and greased. It's a good choice for handling
sudden emergencies."
    Her eyes widened, dark hot mountain pools, liquid and
astonishing as well as astonished. Ah. In his absorption with the
great gun exercise, he'd forgotten his clerk was female and he'd
leaned too close. Fleming