The village was full of seamen armed with bludgeons and cutlasses, running up and down the narrow alleys in small parties, kicking the doors in and searching the houses.
The fisherwomen hung out of their windows and flung jeers and slops at them.
“Press gang,” Teresa was informed. They had landed from a frigate anchored just round the corner in Gwavas Lake and had so far caught one sound man, one epileptic and the village idiot, who was vastly pleased at having some one take notice of him at last.
A boy line fishing off Tavis Vov had seen the gang rowing in, given the alarm, and by the time the sailors arrived all the men were a quarter of a mile inland. Very amusing, eh? Teresa agreed that it was indeed most humorous, and added her shrewd taunts to those of the fishwives.
Then an idea sprang to her head. She went into the tavern and drank a pot of ale while thinking it over. When the smallest detail was complete she set out to find the officer in command.
She found him without difficulty—an elderly and dejected midshipman leaning over the slip rails, spitting into the murky waters of the harbor, and invited him very civilly to take a nip of brandy with her.
The officer accepted without question. A nip of brandy was a nip of brandy, and his stomach was out of order, consequent on his having supped off rancid pork the night before. Teresa led him to a private room in the tavern, ordered the drinks and, when they arrived, locked the door.
“Look ’e, captain,” said she, “do ’e want to make a couple of guineas?”
The midshipman’s dull glance leapt to meet hers, agleam with sudden interest, as Teresa surmised it would. She knew the type—forty years old, without influence or hope of promotion, disillusioned, shabby, hanging body and soul together on thirty shillings a month; there was little this creature would not do for two pounds down.
“What is it?” he snapped.