The Continental Risque (8 page)

‘The best thing is that the
Charlemagne
is man-of-war built, she's not a converted merchantman, and that gives her the chance to be the best ship in this fledgling navy. She's a good vessel for you to serve aboard.'

‘Excellent. This is marvelous, as much as I dared hope for. First officer! In fact, it puts me in mind—'

‘It's the least you deserve, I should think,' Hewes cut him off again. ‘In all fairness you've sailed as first mate for three years now, and if this war had not come about, you'd be a ship's master soon. Not to mention the fact that you've recruited a good number of seamen, which the
Charlemagne
desperately needs.'

‘They're good men, good Southern boys, and they're ready to fight. Perhaps you know my agent, Jedadiah Huck?'

‘I do not.'

‘Jedadiah Huck of the Wilmington Hucks? He's a good man, fanatical about the cause for independency. He's recruiting the best seamen he can find. The last of them should be here by next week, latest. You know, in my experience the southern man always makes the best sailor because—'

‘There's talk of expanding the navy. We spent most of tonight discussing a plan to build a fleet of frigates. They'll be fine ships, fast and powerful, and command will go to those who distinguish themselves. I hope that such an opportunity will present itself to you.'

‘As do I, Joseph. But in my experience one can make luck, if you see what I mean. I don't intend to sit on my haunches and hope that such opportunity will come my way.'

‘As well you should not. Good. I'm pleased with your attitude. But … there's one other thing …'

‘Yes?'

Hewes paused, staring down at the filthy tabletop, searching, as was his habit, for the right words. ‘There is some concern,' he began in a hesitating voice, ‘some concern among the Southern colonies that this navy is increasingly becoming a New England navy. I thought at first there was a note of excessive suspicion in that, but now I'm not so certain. The only captain not from New England is Nicholas Biddle, and he's from Pennsylvania, which is hardly the South. There are no Southerners …'

‘If there is something I can do …' Tottenhill began, his voice sounding unsure.

‘I don't know. The best that you can do is serve with distinction, then we'll get you a command. But … keep your eyes open, you understand? I should like to know what's really going on. We need a representative from the South to break this New England cabal. Do you understand me?' Hewes knew he was not expressing himself well.

‘Oh, I certainly do, Joseph, I certainly do.' Tottenhill smiled and took a long pull of his drink. The light from the lantern mounted on the wall danced across the wet sheen on his eyes as he looked off into the clouds of smoke that gathered around the low ceiling beams.

Hewes cleared his throat and stared into his mug. Tottenhill was an eager young man, always agreeable, which made Hewes uneasy. He hoped that the lieutenant understood, truly understood, what he had been trying to say.

The small merchantman, around two hundred tons burthen, worked her way past Cape Fear and into the Cape Fear River, homeward bound for Wilmington in the Colony of North Carolina. The wind was over her quarter and the tide was with her; the first bit of luck, her master mused, since they had pulled their anchor from that very river two months before.

Under topsails, jib, and fore topmast staysail, she worked her way past the marshy fields covered with brown winter grass to larboard and starboard. She was not handled well – those few of the crew who were not sick or injured were sullen and uncooperative, going about their duties grudgingly, not acknowledging orders, not acknowledging their shipmates. The master drummed his fingers on the quarterdeck rail. He was desperately anxious to be home.

At last the final, gentle bend in the river straightened out into the long stretch of water that led like a road to the docks and anchorages of Wilmington, that lovely town.

Ten minutes later the ship rounded up and the anchor plunged into the river. The vessel eased back into the current until her hawser was taut. Her topsails hung in great disorderly folds of canvas, her hatches needed breaking open, there was the customs inspector to meet, a thousand details to attend to. But the master had one concern that took precedence over all of that.

‘Mr Luther,' he called to the first mate, ‘pray get the boat over the side and fetch the sheriff out here, as quick as you can.'

Amos Hackett lay in the dark hold of the merchantman, his hands and feet bound in iron shackles made fast to chains that were in turn fastened to the deck with big iron staples. He felt the rage come over him, possess him, blind him, a more profound blindness than even the blackness of the hold.

The rage did not make him want to lash out, did not make him want to strike anything, the way stupider men did when thus overcome. He rarely felt the urge to hit someone. His was a more subtle violence, and he was proud of that. Chaos, anarchy, was his balm, manipulation was his release. Nothing made him feel as genuinely calm as watching men around him fall apart, victims of his guile.

It had been good for a while, on that voyage. He had really stirred things up. But it had not lasted, and the old man had shown a surprising degree of determination in locking him down. And so for the past five days he had been shut up alone, with only his thoughts. Amos Hackett now knew what his own private hell would be.

He felt the ship heel to starboard and knew they were rounding up into the wind. He was enough of a seaman to understand the nuanced motion of a ship. His career had begun twenty-five years ago, at the age of nine, when his father, a common laborer and a violent drunk, sent him to sea as an apprentice, after receiving, Hackett was certain, some payment for him. Even an idiot would learn something of ships in that time, and Hackett was no idiot.

Suddenly the hold, which had been silent save for the slap of water on the hull, was filled with the rumble and shudder of the hawse paying out from the cable tier and running out of the hawsehole one deck above. They were anchoring. Now there would be the devil to pay and no pitch hot. Hackett felt the rage overwhelming him again and he cursed softly and violently, spewing out a string of obscenities that grew increasingly filthy and vituperative. It made him feel better, but only a little. He needed a drink. He needed to see someone hurt.

He heard the ship's boat lowered away, and sometime later – he had no notion of how long – he heard it bump against the side of the ship, returning from the town. A minute later came the sound of shoes on the ladders, voices, and the dim, swaying light of a lantern coming closer as some party made its way down to the hold.

‘Amos Hackett, hello again.' Hackett glanced sideways up at the group of men standing over him. The chains did not allow him anything more than a kneeling position, and that further inflamed him. The light, dim as it was, hurt his eyes.

‘Sheriff, is that you? God damn me, but I'm glad to see you. Tell them to get these chains off me. It ain't legal.'

The sheriff was smiling. ‘But of course, Amos. You there' – he turned to two armed seamen and the ship's carpenter standing behind him – ‘pray let Mr Hackett, Esquire, out of them chains.'

The group stood silent as the chains were removed from Hackett's raw wrists. ‘You can't get up to the gallows if you're chained up down here, now can you?' was all the sheriff said before leading the small band back to the deck. Hackett was manacled and flanked by the two armed seamen, who took every opportunity that presented itself to shove him along and curse him for stumbling.

They stepped through the after scuttle and into the bright autumn afternoon. The sunlight brought tears to Hackett's eyes, and he felt them well up and roll down his cheeks. His clothes were torn and filthy, and in the fresh air on deck he was aware of how badly he stank. He felt his rage come to a boil again. He had to let it out. He had to talk.

‘Sheriff, Captain Barry here chained me up, chained me like a dog for no reason. It ain't legal and I want him arrested. I'm going to bring charges against him.' This was a lame attempt; no thought had gone into it. He was just talking, but it made him feel better, as if he had some control. ‘I suggest you get these irons off my wrists.'

‘Ain't legal, you say?' the sheriff asked. ‘Well, now, Captain Barry, who, I should point out, is a gentleman and a citizen of long standing in this town, not the son of a drunken cur, says you was undermining his authority and leading a mutiny. And this ain't the first time we've heard the like about you. Now, who do you reckon I should believe?'

‘Mutiny? It's mutiny, is it? A man can't have a genuine grievance without being arrested for mutiny, and the cook laying out food what ain't fit for a dog? And the men asking me would I please go to the captain and beg him do something to make our lot better, and me going, humble as you please—'

‘That's quite enough, Hackett. Captain Barry …' The sheriff held up his hand to restrain the master, who was making a move as if to strike Hackett. Hackett was in turn cowering as if his life was being threatened.

‘There, Sheriff, you see now how it is!' Hackett yelled, pointing with cuffed hands an accusatory finger at the master.

‘Shut your gob, Hackett,' the sheriff said and then to the armed seamen added, ‘Get him in the boat.'

Hackett slumped in the stern sheets of the boat as they drew nearer the town of Wilmington and its all too familiar jail. He had not intended to lead a mutiny, that was the thing of it. He had just been amusing himself, just letting the rage pay out.

It was the first time he had sailed with Barry. Indeed, it was the first time with most masters with whom he sailed, as it was rare that any captain would ship him twice. Had Barry not been desperate for able-bodied men, the stock of seamen being much depleted by the privateers, Hackett doubted that he would have found that berth. His reputation was spreading. He should really have left Wilmington as he had planned. But he had not.

He had been aboard Barry's ship only two days when he first saw the rift. The cook was an old-timer, adept at wielding the kind of authority that cooks can have, if they play the game well, and that one did. Half of the crew liked the man, or at least pretended to. The other half did not, but they kept that opinion enough to themselves that it caused no real friction. Until Hackett came aboard.

The first move had been the most enjoyable, and surprisingly effective. He had caught a rat, deep in the hold, and with his sheath knife had deprived the animal of its tail and four feet. It had been amusing enough to watch the filthy thing squirming around in the light of the lantern, trying to flee on bloody stumps. But that was nothing compared to the reaction of the men – none of them friends of the cook – who found the rat's body parts in their food.

That alone had started a near riot. First accusations, then plates, then fists, had flown around the forecastle. Blood might have been shed if Hackett had not stepped in as peacemaker, pleading with both sides to be reasonable.

The captain had thanked him for that, the stupid bastard. They were only three days out at that point. It had promised to be one of the most enjoyable voyages yet.

The boat thumped against the wooden dock and Hackett was lifted, none too gently, from the stern sheets while the sheriff, preserving as much dignity as he could, clambered out after him. ‘Come on, then, Hackett, off to the jail. You know the way, been going there since you were weaned. Recall how you used to visit your father, even before the first time you was thrown in there?'

They started up the narrow street, sloping uphill away from the river. The sheriff would not let up. ‘Most decent families, you know, Hackett, have their own pew in church. Yours got its own cell in the prison. Hey? Your own cell in the prison? The Hackett cell?'

People were stopping to watch the procession go by. Hackett could see the heads shaking, the children's eyes averted by their parents. The better sort. He loathed them. All his life they had looked at him like that, shaking their heads. He envisioned doing to their children what he had done to that rat.

After the initial riot things had gone well. In his role of peacemaker and new man in the forecastle, he had no former loyalties, and thus the ears of both factions, which made it that much easier to stoke everyone's suspicions and anger. He had never seen a crew so divided, so angry and unhappy. Oh, it was great fun, for a time.

They came at last to the jail. ‘In you go, Hackett. Into the Hackett cell.' The sheriff found this concept throughly amusing and would not stop. Hackett remained silent, staring at the stone floor. Raising any objection would only make the idiot sheriff go on at greater length. He knew the sheriff. They had known each other for many years now.

What was so utterly maddening to Hackett was that the whole thing, the whole wonderful frolic, had fallen apart through his own stupidity. He was not content to just enjoy what he had wrought. He never was, and he was ashamed of that weakness. In such instances he felt the need to share his triumph, to gloat, to explain to those more stupid than he, and that was pretty much everyone, just how clever he had been.

Always, on any crew, some sycophant was ready to lap up his words, and on this voyage Tom Elphinstone was that man. He followeed Hackett around, agreed with everything he said, waited for more. On a night watch, 3
A.M.
, Hackett found himself alone with Elphinstone on the quarterdeck, taking their trick at the helm, the mate having gone forward to stop a fight from breaking out. It was a rare thing on shipboard, to find yourself alone. Hackett could hold it in no longer.

‘I done this, you know.'

‘What?' asked Elphinstone.

‘This whole thing, about the cook? I started the whole damned thing. I brought the crew down, tore the ship apart, because I wanted to. And I could do it because I'm smarter than any of these sons of bitches, including you.'