A saga of heroes and strumpets in the days of Casanova andNapoleon, Gainsborough and Goethe, Horatio Hornblower and Amadeus Mozart, it is a rather erotic story about the famous mènage á trois consisting of England's most illustrious hero, Admiral Lord Nelson, with Britain's greatest beauty and her cuckolded husband, Lord Hamilton. These characters have fascinated readers for nearly two centuries. No season goes by without a new book, play, or movie about them. Recently it was THE VOLCANO LOVERS by a much feared literary critic. Her novel was stylish, but poor. This one is better.
        Female readers will hold Emma Hamilton blameless, and will identify with her as she moves up in society and becomes a rather cultured, intelligent woman of parts. Yet she is only a beautiful, naive country girl who is seduced, introduced to perversions, and eventually becomes an amoral, drunken wastrel before dying 'of a broken heart'.
        Nelson is presented as a tough, sharp-tongued sailor: a hero, a genius, a killer. He is comparable to the US General Patton. While Nelson and Hamilton enjoy Emma simultaneously, there is no hint that Nelson is homosexual, although Hamilton and Emma are presented as AC/DC.
        The story is set, front and back, within the frame of the hypocritical Victorian respectability that surrounded Emma's daughter, Horatia Nelson, who married a clergyman and never really knew who her parents were.
        The manuscript has several interesting and relatively unknown bits of information.

        Horatia Nelson emerged from the dry goods store on Trafalgar Square blinking in the bright sunlight. A provincial, unaccustomed to the bustling crowds of London, she stepped up onto a mounting block and peered with bright eyes over the heads of the passers-by to look for her clergyman husband.
        "The Ballad of Lady Hamilton", a raggedy urchin was shouting, hawking his broadsides of a street song. "Just off the presses. To the tune of Inveraray."
        Horatia glanced up at the Nelson statue that lorded over the square. He had loved her when she was a child. Involuntarily, Horatia's hand went to her face. Surely she had the Nelson nose, the Nelson lips. How often she had stared at Lord Nelson's portraits, trying to see a family resemblance. "Here, boy," she smiled timidly. "How much?"
        "Ha'penny, lydy," he grinned, fresh as new paint. Horatia blushed and fumbled in her reticule. "Ye won't regret it m'lydy. 'Twere a great 'ero an' a beautiful lydy."
        She took the broadside and reached out to pat the boy's tousled head, but her hand recoiled at the unwashed mass of curls.
        "Thankee, ma'am." He tugged at his foreknot just as gnarled old sailors had always done before Lord Nelson.
        The broadside was on porous rough paper, the ink smudged but fragrant.

                        "But tell me of my Lady H.,"
                         The sailor captain smiled.
                         "Tell me of my Amy Hart,
                         And tell me of my child,
                         And did the King take care of them
                         After I had died?
                         "He let her die in cold Calais,
                         Your orphan girles alone.
                         Yet tho' your friend is dead and gone,
                         Britannia rules the waves."
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

 
        The crowds eddied and surged around Horatia like the green seas at the bow of "The Victory". The world cared not for Amy Hart. Nelson was only a statue. But Horatia had known them as few had. Both were, perhaps, her flesh and blood. The thought shamed her.
        "Ah, here you are, my dear," her husband found her and took her arm with a proprietary air. "What have you there?"
        He looked so distinguished in his best black broadcloth, his wide clerical collar starched and immaculate, his China silk gaiters buckled with silver clasps. "The Ballad of Lady Hamilton," he read. "A disreputable female, my dear."
        "Mayhap...."
        He took the outside to protect her gown from splashes by the swift and careless carriages that passed, and tucked her frail arm more firmly under his.
        "Mayhap," she said. "But Milady did always treat me so gentle. She was such a sad soul after--Trafalgar." She pronounced it 'Traffle-Gar.' "And I purchased the most lovely cotton for a new gown. Flowered, a print, with a silky sheen."
        "Ah, my dear. Best you should have purchased something conservative, as fits a lady of the parish. A blue broadcloth...."
        He strode along toward their hotel. On her short legs, Horatia had to trot to keep up with him. "At the funeral," she said, " ...at her funeral all the English captains in Calais came dressed in blue and gold."
        "A last gesture to the friend of a great hero," her clergyman said self-righteously, "and a most immoral man."
        Victoria was on her throne, and all was right with the world.

                        "How did the lowly Amy Hart
                         Become Milady H.?
                         How came the smithy's lovelorn kynde
                         From out the Northern clime?"

        Amy Hart walked quickly along the towpath beside the river, taking her grandfather's luncheon in a wicker basket to his smithy in Hawarden. She was just fourteen. A large-boned girl of great natural beauty that would soon become famous, notorious, she had luxurious russet hair that fell in natural waves all down the back of her simple linen gown. The pure peaches-and-clotted-cream complexion of Flintshire was hardly touched by the summer sun, for she protected it from every exposure even as she twitched her kerchief higher on her full bosom. It would be time enough to adjust it again when she came to the village. One never knew when a young lord might pass on horseback.
        A 'friendship' with the gentry was almost the only way a young girl could get ahead in the great world--so said her mother. Only thus could a poor girl avoid the quick, cruel years of drudgery that would turn her into a hag at thirty: her hands red and gnarled, figure wracked with childbearing every year, teeth falling out.
        Amy skipped over a rotten tree trunk and pondered just what her mother meant by 'friendship'. She was proud of her budding figure, and the heated glances it drew, but she didn't understand young men or romance, much less love. It was all very mysterious.
        The blacksmith shop was smoky, hot and dark to eyes dazzled by the sunshine outside, even though the sulfurous fire of a forge that spit sparks at the dim figures within lit it. Red reflections glinted from an ornate black saddle fitted with silver that hung on a peg by the door. On its tooled red saddlebags the royal cypher gleamed in brass. Emma gasped and touched it.
        "Aaoow", she screamed. A riding crop had come down painfully on her backside.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 

        "Touchez pas, girl!" A huge man in high knee boots and tricorne hat towered over her.
        "Be done with that!" Amy's grandfather called. She could see him now, bent over with a horse's hoof trapped in his leather apron while he fitted a shoe. His sweaty brow and hairy, strong forearms were burned and scarred by flying sparks from the forge. He was so strong that he could still throw her up in the air and catch her, crushing her to his chest. "Leave her," he growled. "That be me grand-daughter."
        "No body touches the King's dispatches," the courier retorted. "Turn around, girl. La! A country beauty! And what may your name be?"
        "Emily, if you please, sir--Amy."
        "Can't make up your mind?" His silver-mounted dragoon's sword hung heavy from its wide black hanger. He smelled of horses. "How would you like to ride pillion to London with me?" Emma's eyes strained beyond him in the red gloom to see the great stallion he rode. A long white rod as big as her arm glistened and bobbed obscenely white in the heat, pendant from a huge pair of hairy testicles under the switching tail.
        "Aye, no gelding that'un," the stranger followed her fascinated stare as her cheeks colored.
        "Grandpa, your dinner," Emma put down her basket, twitched her kerchief over her breast, and ran from the shop.
        The heat of the smithy never left her as she ran home beside the cool river. Her backside hurt. She knew it would bear an ugly mark. Her face was still flushed and red, her body hot with an unaccustomed heat so that the rough linen of her shift seemed to chafe unmercifully on her delicate breasts.
        As she jumped over a fallen branch, her skirt caught and sent her sprawling in the grass. Amy burst into tears and lay there sobbing. Life was so confusing. If she laughed and danced with her cousins, the village girls pointed and whispered. If she remained aloof, the older folk accused her of putting on airs, like her mother. And always--the boys following her home, whispering wicked words in her ears, trying to put their rough hands where they didn't belong.
        Amy stopped crying and sat up slowly. The river was cool, flowing, peaceful. She stood up and looked around, rubbing her backside. A bend of the river was near, a quiet place sheltered by overhanging trees. It was one of her favorite hiding places. She listened. There was no sound but the rush of the river and the song of the birds.
        Emma went down to the water's edge and took off her clothes, folding them neatly, and slipped slowly down into the cold water. The tears washed from her cheeks. The cool came into her body.
        After a time she stood up and waded to a pool half-lit by sunlight dappled through the trees. Downstream a deer started. Amy's reflection rippled in the water. Her hair, never cut, was a rich reddish brown, and thick. She draped it over her haunches, hiding the fiery red mark. She giggled and waved to herself, posing as a queen. She made a veil of her hair over her breasts, and put a coy hand over the mysterious mound that was the center of her being. Her shimmering reflection smiled.
        The stream whispered on. Amy emerged and dried herself with her shift. She would feel better without it. Her hair dried in the sun. She was cool. She walked slowly home.
        The cottage was half-timbered, thatched. Her mother was stirring a stew in the great kettle over the fire. The dark room smelled of onions and grandma was making an apple tart.
        "An' where have you been?" her mother sniffed. "Hair all knotted! Lolling in the stream again!" Mrs. Hart put down her long wooden spoon and followed her daughter up the narrow stair to the truckle bed beneath the dormer window.
        "Won't you comb it out for me, mother? You do it so well."
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

        Mrs. Hart sat down by her and ran the great tortoise-shell comb through her daughter's hair in long strokes. She never ceased to marvel at
the beautiful girl she had brought forth. Tall she was, like her grandfather,
and strong, but of an astounding beauty from head to toe. And she was aware of it, as her snapping black eyes could hint.
        "The sun is already behind the copse," Mrs. Hart complained. "What could take so long?"
        "There was a man... " Amy muttered. "A man going to London."
        "Was he fair? Was he rich?"
        "Oh, mother! How should I know?"
        Mrs. Hart wheedled the story from her, and then waxed wroth. "You are a goose!" she stammered. "A King's courier is no mean person. Did you not even get his name? D'ye want to live your life out in Flintshire, scrubbing greasy linen in the stream 'till your hands turn red with lye and black with ashes?"
        Amy tried to escape, but her mother pursued her. "D'ye want this life?" she shrilled, flushed under her mobcap. "You have the beauty for a royal palace, a prince's apartment. Will ye settle for a cottage an' a gang of brats?" And then she went into her familiar tirade about the great ladies' houses in which she had served as maid or housekeeper. "All satin and laces, they wear," she went on, as always.
        "What shall ous do, mother?"
        "We'll go up to London, child. Ye're wasted in Flintshire."
        She could never understand what it was that her mother wanted of her. Amy was not foolish. She could even read and cipher a bit. She had taken to her lessons, so sparingly bought at so many pence per week, better than the other village children. And Amy could sew and make her own gowns, and embroider, and wash the nappies of the village doctor's children. Amy was no dullard, but she could not imagine what it was that drew her mother to the great city.
        That night as they sat over their stew, Mrs. Hart tried to explain to her parents why she was taking her daughter, their beautiful grandchild, away from them.
        "She'll never have a chance here, Da, never. D'ye want for her to grow up and marry off with some cottage weaver and have a passel of brats an'... " Mrs. Hart looked guiltily at her mother--worn, worn down to silence and to the submission to drudgery, but still as strong as the gnarled trees of her native Scotland. "I want my Emily to have a chance in life. She's young; she's beautiful. I'll take her down to London just as I went when I was her age and...."
        "Aye, an' look at you. What good 'as it done for ye?" The old blacksmith sighed with resignation, for he knew he could never prevail against this house full of women.
        "Ye'll take her away, as you went away, and what will 'come of ous? Ye'll leave us alone, forgotten...."
        "Never, Da. We will always coom back. You be our strength and refuge from the storm."
        Amy didn't know what to make of it. She was excited at the thought of getting away from her nursemaid job at Dr. Thomases, of seeing new places, new things; but the village of her childhood, her wonderful and fearsome grandfather, her sweet grandmother, always so silent.... Amy squirmed in her rush chair. Her bottom hurt.

        The next four days were exciting as they prepared for the great voyage to London. Few villagers had ever been out of the county, and only Mrs. Hart had ever been further than Deal. The people talked strange down in the south, so they said. They gabbled and swallowed their words.
        Mrs. Hart counted her hoarded coins again and again, and spoke of her great days as housekeeper to 'Milady 'Orston. She even went with Amy to
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

say goodbye to Doctor Thomas' family and to make sure the girl received a good character.
        For Amy it was a time for looking at her several gowns, nagging her mother into sewing the new ribbon that matched her bonnet strings onto the
front of her dimity gown, and picking the best of her homespun dresses.
        And then at last it was the night before they were to leave. As they sat together before the fire, Amy's grandparents were quiet, already lonely.
        Her grandmother was thinking of the great luncheon she would pack for them to eat during their long trip the next day, and her grandfather had given up the golden guineas he had put aside. Mrs. Hart was almost sad. Amy was excited.

        It was a long voyage, and everything was new to a country girl. Through Shropshire, Warwick, and Middlesex the huge stagecoach bounced and bowled along in warm sunshine. From her high seat above and behind the driver, Amy marveled at the rolling hills. In bright daylight, there was little to fear from highwaymen.
        And then the ultimate--"Look, look!" Amy clutched her mother's hand. "Over there!"
        "Aye, St. Paul's it is." London, rising out of the mists, Amy Hart's first big city.
        The coach let them down in front of a noisome inn. "Nay, this be not for us, child," her mother said. "Hi, boy! Fetch a barrow for our baggage and follow along. Quick, now."
        They walked through the busy lanes, the young boy following. Amy's wide eyes thrilled at the crowds of people, bound on their own errands, all strangers. She gasped at the carriages on the busy streets. Her auburn hair and clear gaze excited the stares of passersby. Amy threw back her shoulders and twitched down her kerchief with her free hand. Mrs. Hart clutched the other hand and grumbled as she led the way around puddles and dodged the hurrying crowds, for Amy had eyes only for the myriad strange sights.
        "There be a doctor's sign," said she.
        "Aye. Chatham this is. Mayhap you can find another nursemaid position."
        "Cutler, cutler; sharpen your knives!" a grindstone man cried.
        "A farthing... a farthing; a farthing for the blind." The beggar sat on a curbstone holding out a wooden cup. There were no beggars in Flintshire.
        "Here, boy," Mrs. Hart said, pausing in front of a pothouse. "Wait for me. Emily, you stay and don't let him run with our goods." She went inside. Amy smiled down at the boy. He blushed, averting his eyes from her kerchief.
        "Oh, look!" She pointed to a varnished carriage clipping by on the high street at the end of the lane.
        "Bishop of Derry. Them's his arms. He be a Earl, too. We see him all days."
        The sights of London engulfed her. A tall hook-nosed man with ringlets of long black hair brushed by her, staring shamelessly. Amy looked away, but not before she had taken in his grey velvet suit trimmed with silver and gold lace, and his jewelled sword hilt.
        Through the open windows of the wineshop she could see her mother gesticulating as she talked with an untidy young man in a leathern apron. They pointed at her through the casement window and Emily blushed. Finally her mother returned.
        "Come, girl. Boy, carry the boxes up. Third floor to the rear." The single room overlooked a tiny yard with two wizened trees. It took but a moment to hang up their few shifts and gowns. Mrs. Hart dug deep in her purse to pay the barrow boy. "Thank you," Amy said to him, smiling.
        "He couldn't refuse me, your brother," Mrs. Hart mumbled.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

        "My brother?"
        "Nay, um... All good folk are brothers."
        Amy was suddenly filled with curiosity, but she knew she dared not ask too much about her mother's shadowed past. Mrs. Hart did have a temper.
        "Tomorrow we'll go out, my dear, bright and early. You'll find a nursemaid's place, just like with Dr. Thomas. And with my references, I'm
sure I will find a place as housekeeper for the gentry. You will see, the great world is just waiting for us."
        They had kidney pot pie at the long table in the wineshop that evening, and they walked the moonlit lanes hand in hand. Both mother and daughter
were almost too excited to go to bed. For Mrs. Hart, it was a new start, a new youth to be lived again, yet she anticipated it with a fear of failure, a mistrust of her own strength. For Amy there were no doubts. She was fourteen. She was beautiful. There was only the fear of the unknown. The thrill of life that ran through her as she lay in the lumpy bed next to her mother's inert form was such that she wanted to get up, to run to the window, to let her gown sway in the exciting new winds that blew in from the Thames. This was London. This was her life.

---

COMING SOON!!
Summer 2001

Milady Hamilton ... soon to be released by Crossroads Pub

 

Traditional Values      Cafe Society     Boy on a Pony
Hopalong Cosadice  A Fine Romance    Dope
Wind nor Rain        Swastika