<div class="floatleft">(https://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/2/24/Token_1.png)</div><strong>Name:</strong>Penny (https://elliquiy.com/forums/index.php?topic=300519.msg14693656#msg14693656)<br/><strong>Location:</strong>Gun Deck<br/><strong>Time &amp; Date</strong>: Day 1 | Morning<br/><strong>Tagging:</strong>Lawton | Open<br/><strong>Content:</strong>Ratting<br/><hr/>Lawton was playful but his words, no matter if the intent was to joke or to be believed, found fertile soil in Penny's ears.  As soon as they landed in them tendrils of belief and wonder sprouted then dug greedily towards Penny's mind to root themselves as firmly as any ancient oak that would one day form the back bone of a mighty ship's keel.  There simply was no way she wouldn't believe what he'd said as the God's own truth and her eyes were wide from more than the gloom on the gun deck as she listened.<br/><br/>"Cor..." she whispered and had her faith in Lawton's words reinforced by the loving way he stroked Matilda.  It was a lover's touch, a man's touch, possessive and wondrous of the curved beauty beneath his palms but also firm and demanding that she dance to his tune.  He might court her but when the wooing was done it's be Matilda who lay back and spread her skirts 'n limbs to receive Lawton's ramrod.  Once charged with his potent seed she'd birth a proper gunner's bastard, a son-of-a-gun, and hurl him out to shatter the bones of any ship that looked upon her man with malice or avarice.<br/><br/>Dropping what she believed a curtsy looked like, hands spread out to the side of her pantaloons, the young girl dipped and bent her knees towards the gun that Lawton spoke about.  "Beggin' your pardon, me lady," Penny said seriously.  "Din't mean nuttin' by it.  Can't help I've got no manners, right?"  When Penny looked back at Lawton it was clear that she'd gobbled down every word he'd spoken like a school of pompano around the pier ready to gobble up a lad's hooked bit of crab.<br/><br/>"Aye, sir," she said and held out her hand, too late remembering it held the belaying pin.  Penny juggled it to her other hand, almost dropping it on her bare toes, then put her much smaller hand, grimy nails and all, into Lawton's mitt like one.  "I'll be right nice to Lady Matilda and, and," like many illiterates Penny's memory was better than someone who had the lazy luxury of written lists but she hadn't been paying any particular attention to Lawton's names for his guns, being more concerned about giggling over how he was talking.  Still she remembered a few, like Anne and Mary.  That was fitting she thought, the names both belonging to great ladies even though she most often heard them applied to drabs and whores.  "And Lady Anne and Lady Mary," she offered.  "Which'n are they?  Is it her?" she pointed with the belaying pin to another cannon.  "Or her?"