And, God knows word can pass secret 'twixt house and field slaves, and runaways, quicker than their masters could manage. No, Lewrie… 'twas only after the Beaumans managed to find witnesses who said that a darkened ship was in Portland Bight that very night that they began to suspect that the runaways might have had some help, and the ex-slave Maroons are not in possession of many boats, none larger than canoes and such, so…"

"Perhaps a French, or Spanish, privateer, that…" Lewrie tried to say, with a puzzled shrug.

"Then, there was all that folderol 'twixt your friend, Colonel Cashman of that West Indies regiment the Beaumans raised to put down the slave rebellion on Saint-Domingue, and the family," Capt. Nicely had gravelled reluctantly on, "the duel that followed the accusations slung about after that pot-mess of a battle outside Port-au-Prince, just before the withdrawal of all British forces… cowardice charges by Cashman, 'gainst the younger Beauman… Ledyard Beauman, was it?"

Lewrie could only vaguely nod; he did not trust himself to speak.

"Incompetence charges in reply, then that duel!" Nicely sniffed in gentlemanly outrage at what a shambles that had turned out to be… Ledyard Beauman too scared or drunk to obey the niceties, firing at Cashman's back before "Kit" could turn, stand, and receive; Cashman drilling the foppish bastard in the belly; Ledyard's second, a cousin, Captain Sellers from the disbanded regiment, tossing Ledyard a second pistol and drawing his own; and Lewrie, as Cashman's second, shooting him dead, too, and…

"Your friend sold up and sailed for America, right after?"

"Uhm, aye, he did, sir," Lewrie answered, sensing a reprieve if Kit Cash-man was suspected. "Good Lord, Captain Nicely, ye don't think that Christopher had a…! Well, I'm damned if…!"

"The Beaumans did, at first," Nicely had intoned, so solemnly that Lewrie felt that faint hope shrink like a deflating pig bladder.