Captain Caution (12 page)

The Frenchman stared at it, scratching his nose. "No," he said at length, "that name means nothing in Roscoff."

Slade motioned to the fat woman for another tumbler, filled it for the Frenchman; then sighed and pondered, his lids downcast in vague regret. "Too badI" he said. "Too badl My friend Captain Chater told me Henry Potter worked regularly between Roscoff and Plymouth, and would set me across."

"You know Chater?" the Frenchman asked. He swallowed half his tumbler of brandy, shivered violently, and stared hard at Slade out of watery eyes.

"I knew him," Slade said. "He had the fever in Fernando Po. The damned fool wouldn't close his ports at night."

The Frenchman grunted. "Fernando Pol" he growled. "That is another thing, then! Strange Englishmen are not welcome in this town, but men from Fernando Po - "

Slade drew papers from his pocket, and as he waited for the Frenchman to examine them, he heard the humming and buzzing of the room mount again to its former violence.

The Frenchman pushed back the papers. "Yes, I will tell you. You know about Dunkirk?"

Slade shook his head.

"The Emperor Napoleon, he has turned over a section of the city

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to the English free traders, so that our poor country may take a few millions from the rich Goddams. All the time there are in that port five hundred sailors from across the ditch" he jerked his head toward the Channel "and if you go there, I think you find Pottaire." He finished his brandy, shivered again and pulled pensively at an earring.

"It's too far," Slade said. "Anyway, those that run out of Dunkirk wouldn't be going so far west as Devon; they'd be for Kent and Sussex. It's Plymouth I'm for."

Seemingly lost in thought, the Frenchman sniffed at the brandy bottle and pushed it toward the fat woman in black. "This Cousin Jacky is for export to England," he growled. "Spill none of it on your dress, lest it eat a hole. Give us a measure from the keg of '97."

Grumbling, the mustached woman produced a second bottle, from which the Frenchman poured two half tumblers.

"And," Slade reminded him, "I want to come back the same way in four days. I thought I'd pay in advance on this side, and leave the return money with madame here, to be paid when I come in again paid with a hundred-franc bonus."

The Frenchman put an arm around Slade's shoulders and breathed heavily on his neckcloth. "Ah, but this is something we arrange at once. I am arrive here this morning, and I do not go back for four days, because every Englishman in the world either carries lace and Cousin Jacky, or wishes to buy it! There is the English of it for youl They make a law; then all of them work day and night to break ill Now there are so many of us that unless we take our turn, we bump into each other in mid-Channel! It is a hard thing for poor France that so many English should take the bread out of our mouths, no?" He patted Slade's shoulder and seemed to weep a little.

"It's tonight I want to go to Plymouth," Slade said.

"Yes, yesl But not Plymouthl Polperro, Yealm, Dartmouth, Cawsand, Looe yes; every night there are tuggers to those places, but not to Plymouth. Plymouth, it is too full of war vessels. Listen now to me. Here is what we do: Tonight four loggers go to Whitesand Bay, between Looe and Plymouth two English and two French. I send you with an Englishman Captain Vincent, cutter Lottery; he is very intelligent man. If there is something to be found out" he raised his eyebrows suggestively "by those fools in the army who are forever studying and daily growing stupider, Captain Vincent, he will deliver even a general anywhere in England in two days, entirely safe. You go with him to Whitesand Bay tonight and be nicely in Plymouth for breakfast; then in four days you come with a

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friend of Captain Vincent to Whitesand Bay once more, and we return here like two larks."

The cutter Lottery, laden with one hundred ankersof cognac, five hundred pounds of tea, seven thousand yards of lace and thirty bales of silk, ran due north from Roscoff on the night tide; and Captain Vincent, nursing the tiller of his swift vessel as easily with one hand as though he navigated a ship's dinghy in a canal, held Slade's gold pieces to the dim light of the binnacle; then stuffed them into the pocket of his breeches and cast a quick glance under the mainsail

"You came to the wrong place for a Plymouth vessel," he told Slade, staring at him innocently out of clear blue eyes, "and if you wasn't a stranger, you'd 'a' knowed it. It takes money to shut up the Excise and Preventive officers in a port that size, and pay off a dozen revenue-cruiser captains to boot; and us little fellers, we ain't got it. It's only the big Scotch and French and Dutch and English companies that can pay that high for protection; and if we nose in on their preserves, it's a knife in the ribs or a bullet in the back, like as not, for those of us as does."

He spat over the side. "Of course, them that has to make port in all weathers, maybe they need protection; but Whitesand Bay is all I need; no questions asked and labor plenty. You'll see 'em turn out tonight, with four vessels unloading! We pay 'em well; and every farmer and shopkeeper and blacksmith in the town, they'll be out to help; yes, and the women and children and the parson. And why shouldn't they, when it comes to that? What right's a government got to say a poor man sha'n't have his tot of Cousin Jacky, if so be he needs itI"

"It's all the same to me where I land," Slade said, "so long as nobody throws me into jail for being American. Going on an errand of mercy, the way I am, I wouldn't want to be branded as an enemy and all that." He laughed. "I'm no more an enemy of England than you're an enemy of France, but we'd both be hard put to it if it came to explaining!"

Captain Vincent nodded, gazing round-eyed at Slade. "Aye," he said, "I was thinking the same. It's likely you'd have no trouble, with your head cocked up on account of your eye, and so looking important and mean, like an English gentleman. It's likely you wouldn't; only there's no telling there's no telling." He brooded for a time. Then: "You said it was Bristol you were making for?" he asked.

"To carry poor Chater's watch and seals to his mother," Slade said.

Captain Vincent nodded. "If I was you, I'd make sure. Better be

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safe than sorry, 'specially if you can enjoy yourself doing it. It'll cost some money, but you'll find it'll be worth it, more ways than one that is, unless you got objections to traveling around with a young female."

"It depends some on the female!" Slade tilted back his head to look at Vincent, and his teeth, as he laughed, were tight together, so that his laughter had more the sound of soft and eager breathing than of mirth.

"Well, I tell you," Vincent said, "this female's all right. She's young and she's sensible looking. Nothing flash about her, see; nothing to set people watching her all the time; nothing that'd oblige you to be fighting some young buck every few minutes to keep him from trying to cut her out; but she's sharp as a whip, and buffs better'n any female ever I see! Now, if you should get this female and take her around as your wife, she'd do all the talking, and nobody'd suspect you of not being an Englishman. Most Englishmen act tongue-tied when they're with their wives, anyway."

Slade cleared his throat. "I've had the same idea in mind for some time," he said frankly, "but I thought of visiting a house of entertainment where I could make a selection. I'm a little particular about my women."

"I'll tell you how it is," Vincent continued quickly. "There's plenty of females in Plymouth and Portsmouth and every other port nowadays, what with the men of the deet to take care of, and the regular run of trade, and prisoners coming in to be looked after; but I tell you right now, you have to watch out for yourself There's plenty in Portsmouth that'll stay with a prisoner fresh aboard a receiving hulk right out of the cable tier of a frigate, two shillings for a full night's work; but you know what happens if you take up with one like thatl"

Slade laughed, a hoarse and racking laugh.

"Yes," Vincent went on, "but this female, she's nothing like thatl There's admirals that've enjoyed associating themselves with this female, and haven't hardly been able to wait to get back off their stations so they could get hold of her society again. Admiralsl"

The two of them chuckled.

"How's it sound to you?" Vincent asked.

"Not badl" Slade said. "Not bad, provided she doesn't get to thinking I'm made of money. How much would I have to pay her?"

"I'll tell you how it is," Vincent said. "There was a few of us fitted up two houses in Plymouth not the regular run, but high-class houses of entertainment. Some of the females we brought over from France for entertaining purposes, just the same as the Duchess of

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Portsmouth was brought" they chuckled again "and some we found closer home; but they're all of 'em ladies, fit to be presented at Court, or to spend a week visiting in Buckingham Palace. Now, if this female goes stepping off with you, it hurts the profits, as you might say; so you'd better pay me enough to cover that end of it, and then you can fix up with her. Maybe she'd come too high for you. Whenever she puts in considerable time entertaining a gentle- man, she has to have two new dresses, one for day and one for night, and five guineas a day. Too much, ain't it?"

"Well," Slade said, clearing his throat, "if she's as shrewd as you claim, she might be worth it. How much would cover the profitsP"

"Oh, call it five guineas," Vincent said carelessly.

Again Vincent examined gold pieces in the light of the binnacle; and after that, in the lurching and swaying cockpit, he whispered busily in Slade's ear until, dead ahead, a score of blinking, wavering lights marked the tumbled rocks and the sheltered crescent beach of Whitesand Bay.

NIII

THE office of Admiral Sir John Duckworth, high above the dockyard at Devonport, looked out over the bewildering marine activities of the Hamoaze to the lofty wooded slopes of Mount Edgcumbe, beyond which lay Whitesand Bay; and Admiral Duckworth himself, stocky and formal in his high-collared uniform coat and spotless nankeen breeches, stared from the window at the swarming waters below, in which shore boats, bumboats, ships' boats, and lighters of every description scurried like beetles among the frigates, line-ofbattle ships, hulks, ships repairing, ships fitting and ships under sail. Behind him, the hoarse voice of Captain Slade filled the room with a ceaseless and not displeasing hum.

Admiral Duckworth turned from the window suddenly. "As I understand it," he interrupted, "you want one-half of the sum realized from the condemnation sale, if, as and when this barque is cut out from some port unknown. I tell you at once, my good fellow, it won't do! It's too muchl"

Slade shrugged his shoulders. "That's as you see fit, Admiral." He coughed. "I've heard there are ways in which vessels are ships when they enter your prize courts and sloops when they come out though, of course, that's none of my affair. And I know your prize money is often divided oddly. Why, I know a case, and so do you, too, sir, where a British admiral received four thousand pounds prize money from a single vessel, while the seamen on his ship were given two pounds apiece. Of course, that's none of my affair either, but it's been done, and done often, where your admirals were concerned; and what's been done can be done again."

Admiral Duckworth stared at him coldly, but Slade only laughed.

"It seems to me," the slaver continued, "that the circumstances should make some slight difference, too. Here's a vessel that will be fitted out as a privateer against you, under a Yankee captain that meaning no offence can sail circles around your fastest frigates and sloops-of-war. It seems to me it should be a privilege for you to nip this little enterprise in the bud, no matter how much it costs you a privilege and a patriotic duty."

"Dear mel" the admiral said in a light voice. "Lessons in patriotism

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to a British admiral delivered by a Yankee merchant captain whose position is let us say equivocalPInterestingl"

Slade tilted back his head and smiled up into the red face above him. "Don't take me wrong, Admirall Don't take me wrongl It only seemed to me I ought to mention the saving to your country, seeing that you've objected to my reasonable price for the information. Why, here, Admiral; this barque and her cargo will sell for thirty thousand pounds. That's fifteen for government and fifteen for me; and if you send a schooner to cut her out, her officers and crew would consider themselves made men if they divided five thousand among 'em. There's ten thousand left for government. Or call it five thousand, and make a fast sloop-of-war out of the barque. All profit, Admirall But if you don't get her, what thenP Suppose she slips out and takes four or five of your merchantmen, as she with As she willl"

Slade clicked his teeth together and laughed his soft laugh that sounded like quick strokes of a brush against stone. "You'll have the shipowners buzzing around the Admiralty's ears, crying for their lost money and cursing the navy for a kettle of old goats and younger sons, and that's all you will travel"

Duckworth walked up and down the room, glancing angrily at Slade. "It's beyond met" he said at length. "I've done some fighting against your people in my time, and it was generally the other way around. Usually it was our people that went running over to yours, because of all your wild talk of freedom; but here you are, wanting to sell your own shipmates!"

Slade seemed hurt. "No, nol You've got it hindside foremost, Admirall The barque belongs to a poor, helpless girl with no mind for business. She's fallen into the hands of two unscrupulous rascals, Admiral. If they have their way, it'll be no time at all before the girl's stripped clean and deserted in a foreign port. They'll take her barque for a privateer, and they'll take her money from her on the plea of refitting. It's that, Admiral, that's set me off on this. I do hate to see an innocent maid so fooled and misled."

The admiral looked at him and laughed.