Down to the Sea (41 page)

“Look at this weather, Cromwell. Do you think your planes will be flying in it?”

“I did.”

“Well, you might be a more gifted pilot, sir. I think it’s a fair bet, though, that we are in for a bit of a blow. Not a cyclone, as they call them here, but a fair blow nevertheless. I doubt if your airships will be doing anything for the next couple of days.”

He turned and looked back at his staff.

“Ten knots they’re making, according to Mr. Cromwell. That means they’ve closed over a hundred miles since he saw them this morning. Another hundred by dawn, which could put them near the Minoans at dusk tomorrow. We’ll meet them there.

“It should be blowing, visibility will be down, and as you heard in Mr. Cromwell’s report, their guns are big but useless beyond three thousand yards. In a good storm with high seas it will be even less. We race in, slash, try to get this red flagship. Sink that and their precious emperor goes to the bottom, and we break them. I just wish to hell we had some of those self-propelled mines that the Design Board decided to waste on their aerosteamer scheme instead.”

He turned and looked back at Richard. “Any problems with that, Commander?”

Richard looked at the chart, then at the admiral. He could see in the man’s eyes that the plan was formed and nothing would change it.

“Better than waiting for a nice warm sunny day and a good flat sea for your aerosteamer carriers and air corps. Meanwhile, they blast my ships apart, then come and blow this town apart and take it.”

Richard had to concede the point. There was a certain audacity to the venture, an audacity which the veterans of the last war were noted for, the betting everything on a single shake of the dice.

“Good luck to you then, sir. Any orders for the air groups and carriers?”

One of Bullfinch’s staff chuckled. “Come out and bomb the wreckage when we’re done with them. The
Gettysburg
might have been caught by surprise, but by damn we won’t be.”

Bullfinch turned, and his withering gaze silenced the officer. He motioned for Cromwell to follow, and the two walked off a few dozen paces.

“Look, Cromwell, I must admit I do not like you.” Richard stiffened, but Bullfinch’s tone was different, almost apologetic.

“I understand, sir,” Richard finally replied.

“No, I’m not sure you do. Yes, in part it was your father, but even I will admit that in his own way, before we came here and everything got unhinged, he was a good sailor and taught me a lot that I never learned at Annapolis.

“It’s just that you suddenly come landing in my lap with this wild tale about the
Gettysburg
being lost, the Kazan, an emperor that sounds like a fool, and a religious fanatic with a race of god-like men and Horde warriors.”

Richard could not help but smile. He nodded in agreement. “I can see that now, sir.”

“And then there was Pat O’Donald’s boy. No one likes to hear that a beloved friend’s son is a traitor.”

“I never said he was a traitor, sir.”

“Well, it sure as hell sounded like it to me,” Bullfinch snapped. Then he sighed. “Look, son. Your coming back with this tale, it caught me—it caught all of us—off guard. In a way it made some of us look like fools for going along with this treaty as long as we did. Also, your tale that they could blow us out of the water, well, that is basically saying that old Admiral Bullfinch can be blown out of the water.”

“I never said anything like that, sir.”

“You’re obviously not someone who hangs around Congress,” Bullfinch replied sadly, “but believe me, that’s what will be said.”

“Sir, I was with the president and he has nothing but admiration for you. I think that’s what counts.”

“Be that as it may, you are, to many of us, a snotty lieutenant bearing a wild tale, who gets jumped in promotion, then comes back here as a special messenger from the president to tell me what to do. Do you get my drift, young man?”

Cromwell reddened. He was suddenly aware as well of just how exhausted he was. What little food he’d eaten before the twenty-hour flight had long since gone out the window. His stomach was in aching knots, the few sips of vodka had gone to his head, and all he wanted was some sleep. Everything else at the moment seemed to be drifting away. But he focused his attention, seeing the look in Bullfinch’s eye.

“Yes, sir,” he sighed, “I can well understand.”

Bullfinch hesitated and noisily cleared his throat. “And for that I apologize.”

Startled, Richard shook his head. “You’re an admiral, sir. I don’t think you need to apologize to me.”

Bullfinch laughed softly. “Well said, and from anyone else I would think that you were trying to kiss an admiral’s royal rump.”

Richard found that whatever hard feelings he’d felt had just burned out. He lowered his head. “I’m sorry as well, sir.”

“Fine, then. I want you to stay here ashore for a couple of reasons. I want you to get some rest and in the morning make a report, with drawings of the ships. Then have a courier take an express up to Suzdal. I’ll be gone by then, and dispatches also will be waiting to go, detailing my plan of operations.

“I’ve got a pretty good weather nose, Cromwell, and that young lackey of mine in the fancy uniform over there is right. There’ll be a bit of a blow tomorrow, maybe the day after as well. With luck we’ll get a punch in, maybe a couple of solid punches, and get back out under darkness and foul weather.

“Cromwell, I can’t simply stay here and do nothing, and for the next couple of days I don’t think any of you boys will be flying.”

Richard nodded, finding that he was in agreement.

“If the weather clears, you know where we’ll be. Bring in everything you have.”

“Yes, sir, but what about the aerosteamer carriers?”

“With luck, they can follow up on what is left.”

He stopped and looked off for a moment, then turned back.

“Actually, I think they might be the future, Cromwell, if we can ever figure out how to make the engines more powerful and get the speed up so your attacking a ship isn’t all but a guaranteed suicide. So for the moment I think they’re ahead of themselves, but what the hell, on this world, we’ve always been ahead of ourselves.”

Bullfinch extended his hand and Cromwell took it.

“I’ve included a personal note to the president in my dispatch. Hang on to it, and if something should happen— you know what I mean—see that he gets it.”

“I don’t plan on sending it, sir.”

Bullfinch withdrew his hand and smiled. “Son, we both know my chances. I’m sailing with my fleet. Just see that he gets it.”

Bullfinch did not even bother to wait for a reply. He walked away, shouting obscenities at his staff as he urged them to mount up and get to work.

Richard saluted him anyhow as he disappeared into the dusk.

Dawn broke wet and soggy across the broad expanse of the lower Mississippi. Theodor, with Captain Rosovich by his side, watched as the dispatch boat, which had come out from the small riverboat town, cast off from the
Shiloh
. Its lone occupant hoisted a small sail, which bellied out, and the boat heeled over as it started to tack back in toward shore.

Smoke belched from the leaky stack, whiffs of coal gas coming up from below deck where the joints where leaking, and the
Shiloh
started up again. A sailor came up the ladder that had been lowered over the side. Running past the two, he ducked through a hatchway into the bridge, pausing to pass a bundle of Gates’s
Daily
to a first mate. Men were already queuing up, handing over ten cents for the five cent paper. Theodor tossed him a coin and opened the sheet up.

The headline splashed across the top was the largest Adam had ever seen, taking up nearly a third of the paper. The banner was but a single word:

WAR?

“What the hell is Gates doing?” Theodor growled. “Of course it’s war. Look at this.”

He pointed at the left column below the headline:

F
IGHTING ON
B
ANTAG
F
RONTIER

Adam leaned over and grabbed the paper. “President’s son reported missing,” he read aloud.

He closed his eyes and lowered his head.

“It happens a lot,” Theodor said hurriedly. “A couple of days later they turn up. Believe me, I know. I was reported dead several times.”

“Still, it doesn’t look good. The Bantag moving to the south, that’s clear enough indication that something is up.”

“Mr. Rosovich?”

Adam saw an ensign standing in the hatchway to the bridge.
¹

“The admiral wants you, sir.”

Adam looked over at Theodor, who quickly folded up the paper, stuffed it in his back pocket, and followed Adam through the hatch and up the ladder to the bridge.

It was a roughly made affair of wood, nothing more than an enclosed wooden platform made of three layers of railroad ties to at least give the illusion of protection. There was a chair for the captain, a wheel, compass, barometer, and speaker tubes lined up against the starboard side. All of it was a far cry from the original plans for the
Shiloh
, with a proper steel cupola and a proper captain’s quarters.

Rear Admiral Petronius was gazing balefully at a telegram, as the two came onto the bridge. “I did not ask for you, Theodor Theodorovich.”

“I invited myself anyhow,” he replied with a smile. Adam remained silent, know that Petronius held Theodor personally responsible for what had been done to the
Shiloh
and the other two ships of what was supposed to be his flotilla.

“This dispatch went up to Suzdal this morning. Fortunately, the station master back there heard it on the wires”— he pointed at the town that was drifting astern—“and seeing us approach saw fit to at least make sure we heard about it as well.”

Petronius held the telegram at arm’s length in order to read.

“Kazan fleet sighted dawn yesterday, five hundred fifty miles southeast Constantine, steaming northwest ten knots. Shall sortie with entire fleet to engage. God Save the Republic. Bullfinch.”

“They went without us?” Theodor asked.

“Obviously, or am I making this dispatch up?” As he spoke he waved the sheet of paper.

“Petronius, I didn’t mean that. It’s just that if he had waited another day and a half we’d be there to support him.”

“In this weather?” Petronius snapped, indicating the line of rain squalls sweeping across the river. “If it’s this way here, it must really be cutting loose on the coast.”

“Still, it’ll pass. He should have waited.”

“Are you a sailor?” Petronius replied. “Well, if not, then don’t dare to pass a judgment on the weather.”

“I’m a flyer,” Theodor announced, his voice edged with anger. “It’ll pass. He should have waited for everything, throw everything at them at once.”

“Well, he won’t, and I wouldn’t either. Any comment, Mr. Rosovich?”

Adam swallowed and shook his head. “If Admiral Bullfinch sailed, he must have had good reason to do so, sir.” Theodor looked over at Rosovich as if he had just sold out.

“I’m tempted to tell the chief engineer down below to bring us down to half speed. The engines are barely broken in, and we’re banging them to pieces steaming at this rate. We’ll miss the fight and that’s that.”

Theodor shifted uncomfortably and looked over at Adam.

“Sir,” Adam said quietly, “our orders were to make best possible speed to Constantine to report.”

“Report to who? The local madam? The fleet’s sailed, sonny, and we missed it.”

“Still, sir, the orders said the best possible speed.” Petronius crumbled up the telegram and tossed it on the deck.

“Wrong place at the wrong time, damn it,” he growled. Neither of the pair spoke.

“Best possible speed then, Mr. Rosovich. And that thing you were going to build up forward, what about that?”

“The steam catapults,” Theodor replied. “I’ve decided not to.”

“Pray why?”

“It would mean tearing up fifty feet of deck. We have the parts, and they would have been installed for the two scout planes, but I don’t want to risk having a deck torn apart and going into action with the job half done. It will have to wait.”

“This speed that Mr. Rosovich keeps hollering about and the wind. Suppose there isn’t enough wind.”

“You just said there’d be a blow, Petronius.”

The admiral glared at him. The rest of the bridge crew went rigid, staring straight ahead.

“Then see to that damn leaking smokestack. You came along for some purpose or other, make yourself useful.” Both of them, taking his comment as a dismissal, backed out of the bridge and went down the ladder.

“If I wasn’t interested in seeing what the hell happened to you, Rosovich, I’d get off this boat at the next town,” Theodor announced, shaking his head.

“He’s just shaken up, that’s all.”

“Shaken up?”

“He just found out all his old friends are going down to death or glory, and he isn’t with them.”

“Death or glory? You think that’s what war is?” With a sigh Theodor walked away.

The attack came the hour before sunset, catching Abe by surprise. The first wave swarmed up out of the ravine where they had snatched the water a day and a half ago, a position that the Bantag had occupied heavily the following night. Six men had ventured down there last night, but their heads had been found at dawn, carefully placed in front of the redoubt on the west slope.

In spite of the outrage the sight had triggered, Togo was impressed by the gesture. Usually the Bantag ate the brains of fallen cattle in order to kill their spirits. The return of the heads was meant as a sign of respect to a courageous foe.

The mounted charge came forward at a gallop. Abe had posted himself by the unit’s best marksman along the north edge of the butte, trying to spot a shot for him. Earlier in the day they had seen the standard of a leader of a thousand in a ravine to the north. Twice the sniper had taken a shot at him and missed. He was just lining it for the third time, a long gamble at six hundred yards, when the cry went up that an attack was under way.

Abe, crouching low, ran to the west side of the butte and looked down. The charge was already halfway across the six hundred yards of open ground. In a remarkable display of horsemanship, the riders were hanging over the sides of their saddles, keeping the body of their mount between them and any incoming rounds.