A | B | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14A | 14B | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30A | 30B | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34
PART II
MAY, 1780
MÉLISANDE GABLES
LONDON, ENGLAND
“OH, LORD,” came a dismayed male voice from the direction of the foyer. “Mother’s here.”
“Yes, and you two are an absolute disgrace!” Dowager Countess Tavendish snapped from her wheeled chair at the top of the stairs. “Come give me kisses.”
Elliott watched from the library as his younger brother and nephew trudged up the stairs and pretended to be unhappy she was present, whilst she pretended to be unhappy with their bachelor living.
“Grandmama, I thought you weren’t coming for another fortnight,” Sandy protested. “I have ladies scheduled every one of those nights in preparation for famine.”
“Do you think to cozen me that you could find one willing woman, much less fourteen?”
Elliott and Niall burst out laughing. Sandy’s face and ears turned bright red.
“You should know better by now, Kerr,” Niall said, punching Sandy in the arm. “You cannot shock her or get the better of her. I’m here for nuncheon, not to greet you lot. Is it ready yet?”
“Niall! Sandy!”
And that was Camille’s screech, right on cue.
It was the second family reunion Elliott had been part of in six weeks and though this one involved fewer family members, it was no less boisterous.
There were women everywhere: Mother, Camille, Sophie, all their maids … and Mrs. Mocksling.
There were pug dogs everywhere: After being quelled into submission by the clutter of half-feral cats on the Penance, the dogs were now overjoyed to have been released from their imprisonment, and eager to let everyone know.
There were twice as many sailors as women and dogs: The ones who had long been pensioned off to look after Niall and Sandy had learned their new trades and were handling everyone with the aplomb of lifelong aristocrats’ servants. The newer ones who had arrived with Old Ben had been banished belowstairs until the family was settled in. Wherrymen were hauling trunks to the home and fetching and carrying. The Penance’s crew would be staying aboard it until the end of the Season, when they would all—save Elliott, Camille, and the Mockslings—return to Northumberland.
“Lynch,” Elliott muttered to his unruffled butler, who had served on the Iphigenia as Elliott’s ship’s master, “get the Mockslings and their meager belongings to Rathbone House immediately. If I have to endure them for one more moment, I will put that man’s head through the door for being so bloody spineless.”
“Aye, Cap’n.”
“Elliott!” Sophie called down the stairs. “You promised a trip to Tattersall’s as soon as we arrived!”
He cocked his head back to see his youngest sister leaning far over the rail three floors up. “And are you not a cheeky little she-devil!” He laughed when she gave him a saucy grin. “I will take you as soon as you manage to pass for a boy.”
“Oh, thank you, Elliott!” she squealed, then blushed when he winked at her before scampering off.
“Don’t encourage her,” his mother said stiffly when she, in her chair, was carried down the stairs by two footmen.
They were almost the first words she had spoken to him since their argument five days before. No more superlatives regarding his courage and cheer had been forthcoming. “Mother, I have explained this. She truly does not wish to wed and I refuse to press it upon her.”
“She is my daughter, not yours,” she snapped.
“I’m the earl.”
Her nostrils flared. “As you continue to remind me.”
“Because you continue to refuse to yield.”
She ignored that. “She will grow out of it.”
“Whether she does or not is irrelevant to me. If or when she desires a husband, she will be free to choose for herself. I acceded to your condition that she not be parcelled off until she reaches her majority, and you would be well served to give her no reason to defy you. Teach her how to keep her accounts and let her have a bit of freedom, and you may be pleasantly surprised by the choices she makes.”
“I’d rather not discuss it in the foyer whilst we are in the middle of moving house, if you please.”
“I did not initiate the conversation, Mother.”
The day continued on thusly until Elliott had had quite enough of the noise and excitement, and climbed the stairs to the earl’s apartments—the ones he had never used. Piefke was awaiting him. “Did Niall and Sandy go back to their offices?”
“Aye, Cap’n. They will be there all night, as they are involved in a file.”
Elliott grunted, went to his sideboard and poured himself a glass of whisky and shot it down his throat. “I’ll assume we’ve invitations piled three feet high?”
“Aye, but her ladyship has them all well in hand. The ladies will be staying in this evening, but said she would discuss them with you after she receives morning callers.”
“And so it begins, not twelve hours arrived. Have you secured the wardrobe I requested?”
Piefke sniffed in disdain, his lip curling slightly. “I did,” he said stiffly. “Though the wigmaker was ecstatic, the tailor thought you a madman.”
Elliott grinned. “That is the purpose of it, is it not?”
“He would also have preferred to take his own measurements, as he does not trust mine, and requests to attend you personally for the final fitting.”
“Of course. Tell him he is to present himself later this evening. I need it as quickly as possible.”
“I hope you will dress more circumspectly for the Lords.”
“Piefke,” Elliott drawled.
“In the absence of your fine-fitting uniform, that is, Cap’n.”
“Miss that, do you?”
The man turned away slowly. “Aye, I do a bit, Sir.”
Elliott watched him for a moment, then said, “Speak your mind, Matey.”
The valet-cum-bo’sun’s mate-cum-valet began to refold Elliott’s stack of already immaculately folded cravats. “I am happy to serve as your valet to my pensioning off, Cap’n, and though I was taken by a pressgang, nevertheless I miss the feel of the sea under my feet. I am … adrift.” He paused. “Many of us are.”
“You would go back to sea?”
“’Tis just the thing, Sir. I don’t know.”
Elliott sighed. “I am equally adrift, Piefke.”
Piefke looked over his shoulder in surprise. “You are?”
“What think you? I am near nine and thirty, and have only now met the most magnificent woman I could hope to claim as my own—and I cannot have her. I have been accustomed to being the sole authority of my own and five, six, seven other ships, but here I am little more than an occasionally useful nuisance. And you—my crew, now my staff—see that.”
The valet’s eyes narrowed. “We do not cotton to your family’s cavalier attitude, Sir, nor do we take their opinions to heart. You are not only a clever and merciful captain, but you have saved our lives many times over.”
Elliott blinked. “Merciful?”
His man’s face tightened further. “We have all served with either Kitteridge or Skirrow, do you remember, Sir.”
Ah, so they had. Which raised another question— “And so Fury’s mutiny—?”
Piefke inclined his head solemnly. “We did not believe she had beheaded him, but her crew was insistent and unanimous on the event.”
“Really!” Elliott eased back into one of his soft chairs. “Did they describe it in detail?”
“They did.”
“Tell me!”
The beginning of the tale of Fury’s brutal rampage, whilst astonishing and arousing, only served to make him more melancholy and resentful than he already was. He held up a hand halfway through it. “Stop. I cannot bear to hear this when she is forever unavailable to me.”
Piefke once again nodded his understanding, and Elliott sighed. “Thank you, Piefke. Please inform the tailor he and his assistants are to prepare for a full night’s work. In the meantime, have my supper sent up, and I do not want to be disturbed until the tailor has arrived.”
“Aye, Sir.”
“Because right now,” Elliott muttered to himself once he was left alone and moved himself to a seat at the desk in his private library, “I am going to write a list of tasks I need to accomplish.”
He found what he needed, sharpened his pen, and began to write.
“Number one: find her.”
If you don’t want to wait 2 years to get to the end, you can buy it here.
Pirates!
Hey Moj!
Has anyone told you you kick serious butt recently?
Oh, thank you, Threedoor! Not sure what I’ve done lately, but thank you all the same!
Consistency.
Levity.
It’s really this ‘place’ though, like a little internet abode. You all put in a bunch of effort. I’m just a freeloader.
It wouldn’t take much of that social scene to drive me to sea, under any terms.
Elliott finds a way to amuse himself as he figures out what he can do for the rest of his life that won’t drive him insane.
Thank you for these.
Reading this in serial form, this one was mighty challenging. Many things to remember.
Yeah, I don’t like reading serially, but I threw myself on the Friday night grenade.
Sadly (mentioned before) I lost touch during a month’s hospital stay in April.
I’m a bit behind.
But I (think?) I have the Kindle version so I will revisit some day.
@Mo: Understood and appreciated. I was thinking about that before you said it.
Takin’ one for the team is oft unheralded, sadly.
Did you tell us about this hospital stay at the time? “Tales from the respirator”?
Well… it started as a generous residential stay in NYC for a week or so but then I caught a shitload of bugs from the nice ladies who were required to watch over me 24/7 – not at all unexpected in my case – which led to a couple weeks in the hospital before another week or so at the residence.
Anywho… I had to tap out of yours and Animal’s serials. 🙁
@Rhy: *Fist bump*
Rough shit. Well, you are better now than you were. Onward, upward. Always.
Maybe? I hate treacly stuff like “I appreciate every day more now” but… yeah.
*Dammit. Read that as “That’s some rough shit.”
Not close to “Tough shit.”
OT *snort*
I just received a solicitation for monies from my small city’s “police benevolent association”.
In light of the fact that this is a one-Party ACAB town, it’s amusing to see them convey something of a sense of humor on their way to collecting maybe ten bucks from this campaign.
Applebee’s has awesome chicken tenders.
——————nothing follows——————-
Fuck you and fuck Applebee’s.
You are what’s wrong with this country.
I generally go for bone-in chicken. Tenders are for kids, but for whatever reason, I like Cheddars chicken tenders.
If I wanted to waste my money on 🍗, I’d at least go to BWW.
Sorry more OT lulz.
This is just too amazing not to share, even at the risk of doxxing myself. I live across the street from this entirely predictable disaster. It was under construction when I moved here, and in less than one year the residents have managed to destroy a brand-new building – and the brain-dead reporter is willing to share in the blame-game of everything and everyone other than the junkie drug dealers who form a significant percentage of the residents.
Maybe it’s true that the developer preys on gullible leftist towns who preach discredited “housing first” flapdoodle, who knows. But that doesn’t absolve the city who granted them millions of dollars of tax breaks that they surely knew was just throwing money out the window. Perhaps most amusingly, this building is located directly next door to f’in City Hall so it is impossible for the r’tards that run this place to ignore.
Anyway, thank goodness I can’t smell the excrement-covered stairwells from here. The problem last summer with all of them bringing their junkyard dogs across the street to shit in my back yard seems to have been miraculously mitigated, at least.
Unexpectedly.
“most of the issues stem from people who are … invited in by other residents”
That’s totally the developers fault.
Shocking the US version of a UK “council estate” is a shithole.
Sorry, Rhy. Next door was a semi crackhouse for years and it just sucks having that constant, low level criminality and chaos going on
Yeah that exact line lit up my bullshit-detector.
Deflect, deflect, deflect. So tiresomely predictable.
I do feel sorry for the innocent actually-working poors who got sucked into this shitty situation for no reason other than that the left treats them the same contempt that they treat everyone else.
Though to be fair, there is clearly a sort of delivery-service operating between the Jungle (the urban campers that have live behind the WalMart for years) and this new building. You can actually watch it in operation.
And speaking of dystopia, I just started playing Cyberpunk 2077 yesterday and I was kind of surprised at some research today that seems to indicate that the romantic sideshows are limited to boy/girl and lesbian stuff.
Do better, Poland developers.
lol I made my guy such a uniquely hott trad-fuck with no piercings or tatts that all the freaks around me should by all rights find me irresistible but somehow I doubt the game engine will oblige.
And of course it can only be the landlord’s fault.
I don’t care about South Park mocking Trumpland. It does sort of beg the question of where they were the four years of Biden’s term or why they used kid gloves if they even touched that pompous prick Obama. They have always tried to present themselves as more “libertarian.” We don’t lack for a shortage of people willing to attack Trump in this country. It’s not stunning and brave.
They did have connections to Hunter Biden who otherwise would be ripe for mockery.
I saw UCS this morning note who the fuck is Charlie Kirk. I doubt even a third of South Park’s audience is or was familiar with him prior to them attacking him.
He’s a weird target. You need to be extremely online to have any idea of who he is.
I couldn’t pick him out of a lineup.
Yeah it’s pretty obvious now that they lean left.
This. It’s tired and lame. It reeks of the exact same path Howard Stern took.
The show got really shitty during and after the Obama years so I stopped watching before that asshole made some appearances so I can’t say if they treated him with kid gloves or not.
I remember they were all over Trump during his first term and completely silent about Scranton Joe.
They know which side their gluten-free bread is organic free range grass-fed buttered on.
I gotta sleep and wake up soon, so wanna post for later folk. Two very interesting events at my Walmart, occurring at the same time, in Noblesville, IN. (Both very affluent and deep, dark True Blue.)
1. Confederate flag seen on man’s shirt. It was a store or club’s shirt, with acronym letters that I never fully saw. He was with his gal, young 20s, both quite tatted, pushing along their child, maybe 2yo. White. (!) Normal shopping time for such a family. I saw no reactions from anyone. Odd, me thunky. I couldn’t just follow ’em and get the acronym and logo in full, which I’m upset about. *shrug* I was doing other shit. Odd spycraft on my end to follow them as much as I did.
Best I got: Red shirt and black letters. Black cross and letters on either side, certainly with DI and then an E and an N or an H, or I don’t know.
Your eye certainly saw “DIE,” connecting the dots. I guessed it was some sort of pawn store logo, or a DIY group or in that ballpark. All oddness combined. (The young gal, if gussed up, would. )
DIE NH? Free State Project for or against-ers?
2. The Biggie, IMO. Amish /Mennonite man was ‘shopping’ alone. He was ~20, no beard. He was walking around with no real purpose. No cart or basket, so not like others I’ve seen, shopping normally. I asked him if he needed help finding something, and he oddly responded. He obviously did not want to, for some reason.
“No, I’m just..” and he kinda just wandered off. I kept working and wandering, and I kept seeing him. Never carrying anything, and last I saw, he was wandering around the sporting, hunting, fishing department.
Hypothesis: Thinking on it as it happened, was he on his Rumspringa, seeing what all the English have. I don’t think this is a bad theory for his behavior – He was walking around, not confused, but not what ‘we’ would do, and he was just walking and looking.
I don’t know how his ‘shopping’ adventure concluded.
I’ll greatly enjoy introducing Leonard from Lawn & Garden to you in a couple weeks.
In my town I would have immediately thought “junkie”. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
We have lots of Amish around here but other than the farmer’s market you really don’t see them in the city.
I’m fairly sure I ran into Amish girls on rumspringa in KY, not sure on the guys. The girls usually gaggle up and stay in their Amish clothing while the guys tend to ‘go English.’
These Padres unis are horrific.
Like so:
https://www.eastvillagetimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/musgrove-scaled.jpg
My eyes are too blinded by the surroundings to judge the actual uniform.
Petco is one of the few parks I’ve been to outside of Fenway and Yankee Stadium. It’s a great ballpark. I regret just scampering back to the OC after the game vs hanging out down there. Not sure what we were thinking with that plan…
Why?
Holy fuck!
Has anyone posted this? Its verrrry funny
https://x.com/DudespostingWs/status/1953886677312909684?t=vVWeeg53v-IIGccxWcy5XQ&s=19
I took a heavenly ride through our silence.
Eugene Vodolazkin: The Aviator:
Anastasia lied. She went to the secret police and tried to convince them she had contracted a hit on Zaretsky. She didn’t, of course. She couldn’t. How’d she possibly pay for such a thing? But she lied to try to save Innokenty. She lied so desperately that even on her deathbed she couldn’t help but cling to it.
I’m convinced that’s the case.
Time to clock in, Glibbies. I reckon there will be talent in the aisles today.
Rock on.
So apparently I fell asleep after work yesterday. And slept through my dinnertime, and overnight, and my alarm, and just woke up to realize I’d also slept with the lights on.
Why am I still tired?
😥
I’ve opted to withdraw from the pistol match, because I’m pretty sure it’d be a bad idea in my current state.
I’m going to eat something and get more sleep.
Sleep apnea?
No
Come on … you’re a big tubby, aren’t you?
Such a condition would not be a one-time thing.
Heave ho and give no quarter, me mateys!
🏴☠️🤨⚔️
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUc_jXBD9DU
🎶🎶
suh’ fam
whats goody yo
Good morning, homey, Sean, U, ChipP, EfE, and Grumble!
Morning.
Turns out tiredness is not my only symptom, so I’m calling it a sick day.
Oh no! I’m so sorry! I hope you feel better ASAP! 😟
🤒👍
☕️😄
https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a65636648/why-california-ev-drivers-lose-carpool-lane-priveleges/
Fuck em! 🖕
Not that I’m advocating for this, but why couldn’t California start their own decal program instead of whining that the Feds are ending theirs?
For the record, autocorrect changed “decal program” to “fecal program”, which California already has.
I suspect federal highway funding is somehow involved.
There was a Dunham’s department store in Wellsboro.
https://www.facebook.com/dunhamswellsboro
https://www.nj.com/hunterdon/2025/08/3-neighbors-called-911-about-gunshots-and-screams-the-night-a-nj-trooper-killed-his-ex-her-boyfriend.html
Ban NJSP!
https://www.nj.com/hunterdon/2025/08/top-cops-suspended-over-serious-concerns-after-2-killed-by-stalker-ex-boyfriend.html
It’s a start, I suppose.
Fire them all!
I played https://squaredle.com/xp 08/09:
*25/25 words (+10 bonus words)
📖 In the top 8% by bonus words
I played https://squaredle.com 08/09:
*31/31 words (+10 bonus words)
📖 In the top 4% by bonus words
🔥 Solve streak: 766