His high spirits are a bit dampened, though, when he sees Royal Duke and the crew! A more inexperienced, motley gang of landlubbers Hoare has never seen. His orders are to look into the murder of two Navy captains, brothers, whose bodies, or parts of them, were found in the forest. The Navy believes that a traitor in the pay of France had arranged the murders, and Hoare is charged with finding the culprit. But how is he to do this with the ragtag crew manning his little tub?

Gradually, however, Hoare discovers that the unprepossessing people under him, from a less-than-five-foot-tall lieutenant to the female master's mate, a cryptographer, a geometer, and the sailor that keeps a flock of carrier pigeons, have just the unusual skills to bring this urgent assignment to a successful conclusion. And since they are anything if not willing to perform, on all counts, they might be able to be whipped into acceptable enough shape so that Hoare can challenge his arrogant rival to a race without disgracing his ship, his crew, and himself.