Well, what do we have here...

"Well, what do we have here..." smirked Captain Downy, the lines of wicked joy spreading across his face.

Captain had the desire that all captain's in the Royal Navy had...promotion. Born Elijah Daniel Downy, the third of three sons to the lesser earle of Williamshire, Captain Downy had little promise for prominence in the King's Court, unless he distinguished himself at sea.

His first assignment had been the captain of a little cutter that had been patroling the West Indies trades routes, when disaster struck.

For a time, Captain Downy had won the favor of the West Indian Fleet Admiral's confidence in halting pirating on his trade routes. If Captain Downy was excellent in ambition, he was pathetic in diligence. As often happens in hurricane season, a great squall blew in. Captain Downy was never one to ride a storm out and, therefore, carelessly he ran his cutter full-sail before the storm. He blamed his helmsman, he blamed his cutter, he blamed the a civilian envoy assigned to his ship, but the fault for crashing the King's cutter into the rocks of Point Yellow Feather, was placed as emphatically as the ephithets on his shoulders on Captain Elijah Daniel Downy.

Now, for the past 13 years he was the butt of many behind-the-back jokes among the fleet captains. It took five years of wrangling for his father to get his captaincy reinstated and another four years to find him a post. Finallly, after two years patroling the whaling lanes of the North Sea, miserable from constant cold and lack of sun-light, sweet revenge was within his grasp.