The Balloonatics: A Tale of the Great War

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“Lieutenant Naseby you are a complete and utter fool! A hopeless, helpless tit, in fact! You were reported to be highly competent as a seaman and as a divisional officer, which is why you were appointed to a crack ship, why I accepted you. Your three months on board in our hurried wartime commissioning have shown you to be the most useful of officers. And after so promising a start, you show incompetent the moment we leave the wharf by proceeding to run down the Admiral’s barge! When manoeuvring in harbour, Naseby, one is expected to observe and give way to small craft, not to collide with them!”

Commander Savage, captain of HMS Calliope, the newest of light cruisers, seemed in no mood to listen to reason. Peter Naseby tried to offer a defence, suspecting he was wasting his time. The Old Man had not shown himself the most rational of figures in his three months in command, was far more inclined to shout abuse and blame than to consider the cause of any problem that arose. He was, considered from a rational, dispassionate viewpoint, an underbred lout, an oik, an officer who should have been locked away in a back office in the Admiralty where no gentleman would have to cross his path. Peter wondered just what his parentage was – there were a few strange sorts in the Navy these days. He was inclined to blame it on King Edward Albert, Dirty Bertie, who had encouraged the louche and the outré in Society. Edward was dead but his influence still lingered, resulting in a few very peculiar senior officers, appointed and rapidly promoted and a definite embarrassment to Society.

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