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Making up his mind he slapped his hand on the table. ‘Yes, I have it, it will do very nicely. Be so good as to ask Mr Jex to step this way.’
    Jex arrived and was asked to sit. His air of confidence had sagged a little and was replaced by pugnacity. The purser’s arms were crossed over his belly and he peered at his commander through narrowed eyes.
    â€˜I have come to a decision regarding you and your future.’ Drinkwater spoke clearly, aware of the silence from the adjoining cabin. Mrs Jex would hear with ease through the thin bulkhead.
    â€˜Your influence with the dockyard does you credit, Mr Jex. I would be foolish not to take advantage of your skill and interest in that direction . . .’ Drinkwater noted with satisfaction that Jex was relaxing. ‘I require that you do not sleep out of the ship until you have completed victualling for eighty souls for three months. Your wife may live on board with you. You will be allowed the customary eighth on your stores, but a personal profit exceeding twelve and one half per cent will not be tolerated. You will put up the usual bond with the Navy Board and receive seven pounds per month whilst on the ship’s books. Until the ship is fully manned you may claim a man’s pay for your wife but she shall keep the cabin clean until my servant arrives. You will ensure that the stores from the Victualling Yard are good, not old, nor in split casks. You may at your own expense purchase tobacco and slopsfor the men. You will, as part of this charge, purchase one hundred new greygoes, one hundred pairs of mittens, a quantity of woollen stockings and woollen caps, together with some cured sheepskins from any source known to you. You will in short, supply the ship with warm clothes for her entire company. Do you understand?’
    Jex’s jaw hung. In the preceeding minutes his expression had undergone several dramatic changes but the post of purser in even the meanest of His Britannic Majesty’s ships was sought after as a source of steady wealth and steadier opportunity. Drinkwater had not yet finished with the unfortunate man.
    â€˜We have not, of course mentioned the fee customarily paid to the captain of a warship for your post. Shall we say one hundred? Come now, what do you say to my terms?’
    â€˜Ninety.’
    â€˜Guineas, my last offer, Mr Jex.’
    Drinkwater watched the purser’s face twist slowly as he calculated. He knew he could never stop the corruption in the dockyards, nor in the matter of the purser’s eighth, but he might put the system to some advantage. There was a kind of rough justice in Drinkwater’s plan. Mrs Jex’s wealth came from the brief sexual excesses of a multitude of unfortunate seamen. It was time a little was returned in kind.
    Virago
presented something of a more ordered state a day or two later. Both Matchett and Mason, despite their unprepossessing introduction a few days earlier, turned out to be diligent workers. With a third of Jex’s ninety guineas Drinkwater was able to ‘acquire’ a supply of paint, tar, turpentine, oakum, rosin and pitch to put the hull in good shape. He also acquired some gilt paint and had Rogers rig staging over the stern to revive the cracked acanthus leaves that roved over the transom.
    While Drinkwater sat in his cloak in the cabin, the table littered with lists, orders, requisitions and indents, driving his pen and dispatching Mason daily to the dockyard or post-office on ship’s business, Rogers stormed about the upper deck or terrorised the dockyard foremen with torrents of foul-mouthed invective that forced reaction from even their stone-walling tactics. Storemen and clerks who complained about his bullying abuse usually obliged Drinkwater to make apologies for him. So he developed an ingratiating politeness that disguised his contempt for thesejobbers. With a little greasing of palms he could often reverse the offended