Make Her Wish Come True Collection. Ann Lethbridge

      ‘Surely you never expected to stay at Walthan Manor, Master Muir?’

      What a self-righteous prig Midshipman Tommy Walthan is, Sailing Master Benneit Muir said to himself. He’s a pipsqueak, a lump of lard and an earl’s son. God spare me.

      ‘Oh? I assumed that since you commissioned me to drill you in navigation methods, that I would be more useful close by.’ That was the right touch. Ben didn’t hold out much hope that any amount of tutoring would improve the wretched youth’s chances of passing his lieutenancy exams next year in 1811, but it was nearly Christmas and the sailing master had no plans.

      There wasn’t time to go home to Scotland, or much reason. The girls Ben had yearned for years ago were all married and mothers many times over. His mother was gone, his father too old to travel and his brothers in Canada.

      Walthan gave that stupid, octave-defying titter of his that felt like fingernails on slate. It had driven other midshipmen nearly to distraction, Ben knew, but at least it was one of the irritants that spurred others to pass their exams and exit the HMS Albemarle as quickly as possible. Even the captain, an amazingly patient man, had remarked that nothing short of the loss of his ship would ever rid them of Tom Walthan. No other captain wanted him, no matter how well connected his family.

      ‘Stay at Walthan? Lord, no, Master Muir! I can’t imagine what my mama would say, if you stepped from this post-chaise with your duffel. Better find a place in the village, sir.’ The midshipman coughed delicately into his sleeve. ‘You know, amongst people more of your own inclination.’

      Ben decided that the village would be far enough away from Walthan’s laugh, but he didn’t intend to sink without a struggle.

      ‘You’ll shout my room and board?’ Ben gave the midshipman the full force of the gallows glare he usually reserved for the quarterdeck. It wasn’t that he couldn’t afford to pay his own whack, but he was tired of being cooped up in the post-chaise all the way from Plymouth with Tom Walthan, the midshipman from Hades.

      ‘If I must,’ Walthan said, after a lengthy sigh, that made Ben feel sorry for the lad’s nanny, gone now. He had no doubt that Walthan’s mother had long since given up on him.

      ‘I fear you must pay,’ Ben said. ‘Do you know of lodgings in Venable?’

      ‘How would I?’ Walthan waved his hand vaguely at the cliff edges and sea glimpses that formed the Devon coast. ‘Venable has a posting house. Try that.’

      Ben gave an inward sigh, nothing nearly as dramatic as Tom Walthan’s massive exhalation of breath, because he was not a show pony. He had hoped to find a quiet place to finally slit the pages on The Science of Nautical Mathematics and settle down to a cosy read. Posting houses were not known as repositories of silence.

      ‘Besides, I still must explain why I have asked you here to help me study for my exams,’ Walthan said. ‘The last time I wrote Mama, I was pretty sure I would pass.’ Another delicate cough. ‘And so I informed her.’

      ‘That attempt in Malta?’ Ben asked. He remembered the barge carrying four hopeful midshipmen into the harbour where an examination board of four captains sat. Three had returned excited and making plans, Walthan not among them. The laggard’s disappointment was felt by everyone in the Albemarle’s wardroom, who wanted him gone.

      ‘Those were trick questions,’ Walthan said, with all the hurt dignity he could muster.

      Ben swallowed his smile. ‘Oh? You don’t see the need of knowing how to plot a course from the Bight of Australia to Batavia?’

      ‘I, sir, would have a sailing master do that for me,’ Walthan said. ‘You, fr’instance. It’s your job to know the winds and tides, and chart the courses.’

      Hmm. Get the idiot out of his lowly place on the Albemarle and he becomes almost rude, Ben thought. ‘And if I dropped dead, where would you be?’ The little nuisance was fun to bait, but the matter was hardly dignified, Ben decided. ‘Enough of this. I will do my best to tutor some mathematics into you. Stop here. I’ll see you tomorrow at four bells in the forenoon watch at Walthan Manor.’ Ben shook his head mentally over the blank look on the midshipman’s face. ‘Ten o’clock, you nincompoop,’ he said as he left the post-chaise and shouldered his duffel.

      Now where? Ben stood in front of the public house and mail-coach stop, if the muddy vehicle visible in the ostler’s yard was any proof of that. He peered through the open door to see riders standing shoulder to shoulder, hopeful of something to eat before two blasts on a yard of tin reminded the riders to bolt their food or remain behind. Surely Venable had more to offer.

      As he stared north and then south, Ben noticed a small sign in the distance. He walked in that direction until he could make out the words, Mandy’s Rose. Some village artist had drawn a rose in bud. Underneath he read, ‘Tea and good victuals.’

      ‘Victuals,’ he said out loud. ‘Victuals.’ It was a funny word and he liked the sound of it. He saw the word often enough on bills of lading requiring his signature, as food in kegs was lowered into the hold, another of his duties. Oh, hang it all—he ran the ship. Victuals. On land, the word sounded quaint.

      ‘Good victuals, it is,’ he said out loud as he got a better grip on his duffel. He tried to walk in a straight line without the hip roll that was part of frigate life. Well balanced aboard ship, he felt an eighteen-year awkwardness on land that never entirely went away, thanks to Napoleon and his dreams of world domination.

      A bell tinkled when he opened the door to Mandy’s Rose. He hesitated, ready to rethink the matter. This was a far more genteel crowd than jostled and scowled in the public house. He doubted the ale was any good at Mandy’s Rose, but the fragrance of victuals overcame any shyness he felt, even though well-dressed ladies and gentlemen gazed back at him in surprise. Obviously posting-house habitués rarely came this far.

      His embarrassment increased as his duffel seemed to grow from its familiar dimensions into a bag larger than the width of the door. That was nonsense; he had the wherewithal to claim a place at any table in a public domain. He leaned his duffel in the corner, suddenly wishing that the shabby thing would crawl away.

      The diners had returned to their meals and there he stood, a good-enough-looking specimen of the male sex, if he could believe soft whisperings from the sloe-eyed, dark-skinned women who hung about exotic wharves. He put his hand on the doorknob, ready to stage a retreat. He would have, if the swinging door to what must be the kitchen hadn’t opened then to disclose a smallish