“Bring her up, Beauty! Pass close on her larboard side!”
Rascal turned hard on the wind, gathering speed as she sailed up to windward and the floundering French ship. They were past her shattered stern and soon would pass her larboard side, for the frigate was turning away to the southward now, totally out of control.
“A broadside to her bows, Cully!” yelled Fallon, and Rascal’s starboard guns screamed their shot into Josephine’s larboard bow, obliterating her bowsprit and no doubt much of the interior heads of the ship. Now Rascal was pulling away from the defenseless frigate, which was now drifting by the stern towards the southwest and the outer banks of North Carolina, that notorious graveyard of ships.
All hands looked towards Fallon, for their fighting blood was up now and it was time to finish off the frigate while she couldn’t fight. But Fallon looked at Beauty and their eyes locked in wordless communication. The packets were now miles ahead and the coast was still dangerous and they must get back to their duty.
“Secure the guns, Beauty, and fall off towards the packets,” said Fallon. A hard decision, but the right one. “And may I just say that was as amazing a thing as I will ever see. How did I ever win a race against you?”
Beauty smiled, the worry off her face now.
“It didn’t happen often, Nico,” she said.
TWENTY
OVER THE NEXT WEEK AND MORE AJA THREW HIMSELF AND THE CREW into getting Loire to rights; in fact, his goal was to return the schooner to the best condition since her build. The crew worked enthusiastically, as he knew they would. Caleb Visser would not be left out, for being a fisherman he was quite good with splicing ropes and committed himself to re-rigging the ship. Even Little Eddy jumped in, now always at Visser’s side, and helped tar the rigging as it was sent up.
Paint pots were found below and brought up on deck and several of the crew began the tedious work of touching up the recently repaired railings and bulwarks damaged by Rascal’s shot. The gouges in the deck were smoothed out as much as possible and the ship’s boats thoroughly re-built. Holes in the hull had already been patched well enough to get Loire to Bermuda, but now the patches were gone over carefully and re-worked with fresh wood and paint until the ship was solid again and damage was close to invisible even to a careful eye.
Below decks, where the shot had come through the hull, the crew re-made furniture as they fought cockroaches and other vermin, for the cleaning and smoking would be saved for last. There was not an inch of the schooner that escaped attention, and each day saw the ship gradually come back to her old, original self. After two weeks, Loire was ready to leave Bermuda.
On their last night in St. George’s harbor Visser and Aja paused at the binnacle proudly looking the length of the ship. In all respects Loire was ready for sea. It was a contemplative moment, for who knew what the future might hold? The lapping of the wavelets against the hull and the soft, dark evening that embraced the ship seemed to draw them closer.
“It occurred to me,” said Visser to Aja, as the two of them stood together, “that of all the people I thanked for helping me bring my father home, I didn’t properly thank you. You have been more than supportive, I must say. Thank you, Aja.”
“There is no need, Caleb, sir,” said Aja humbly. “I am glad you have a father, and I hope he is ready to come home. Because we are going to find him.”
“How about your father, Aja?” said Visser. “Or, for that matter, your whole family? I’d like to hear more of you and where you came from, if you don’t mind.”
Aja grew quiet and looked at the stars, the blinking ones and the reddish ones and the bright whites, the same stars he had gazed at as a boy in Africa. He understood what they meant now, how they guided you when you were lost.
“My family were slaves before we were kidnapped into more slavery,” he said quietly. “We worked on a white family’s plantation in Senegal; I worked in the house, my mother and father worked in the fields. I learned English in the house and taught my parents to speak it a little. One night a group of men from a faraway village attacked the plantation and stole us, like you would steal cattle. I don’t know what happened to the white family, but I heard screaming. We were taken to the coast of Africa, along with many other slaves on the plantation, to an island called Goreé. My mother and sister were put with the other women and kept separated from the men. I could hear my mother crying and calling my name and I called back but I don’t know if she heard me. It was the worst pain I have ever felt. Sometimes I dream of her, and she is still calling my name, and I wake up crying.”
“I can’t imagine,” said Visser tenderly.
“I was put on a ship with my father,” continued Aja stoically, “and we were put with many men below decks. It was dark and I was very scared and men were crying and moaning. Some men seemed to die they were so scared. Every day the ship’s crew came through the holds and took the dead men to throw overboard. There was no light, so I don’t know how many days we sailed but it must have been many days and nights later that the ship was attacked by pirates who wanted to steal us. There were many men and women who tried to help the crew fight the pirates but they were all slaughtered. I hid behind some barrels and I could hear the pirates searching the ship but I made myself very small. When I couldn’t hear anything else I came out from hiding and searched for anyone else alive but there was nobody. I couldn’t find my father, so the pirates must have taken him.”
“My God, Aja,” said Visser. “How did you ever survive?”
“I ate some of the ship’s biscuit and there was water in the casks,” answered Aja. “Then two days later Captain Fallon found the ship and Cully found me hiding. I was taken aboard their ship, Sea Dog, but I was very afraid they were going to kill me or sell me again. But they didn’t; they saved my life and became my friends.”
“That is an amazing story, Aja,” said Visser. “A miracle, really. And now look at you. Second mate in Rascal! But you have seen much, too much, of the baser side of man’s nature, I’m afraid.”
Aja was quiet then, his eyes looking forward towards Loire’s bows, watching the men end the day talking amongst themselves.
“Yes,” he said, knowing he could still be surprised.
Little Eddy walked home from the ship that night very tired and very dirty, with paint smudges on his face and hands but a jingle in his pocket thanks to Caleb Visser. He was nine years old, but somewhat small for his age, and most people in St. George Town put him at eight or younger.
When his father left for sea, Little Eddy’s mother took in laundry and cleaned houses to make ends meet, but quickly tired of it. She was always good with advice to the women of the houses she cleaned, though, and became fascinated with tarot cards. The islanders knew of her and often dropped by to have their fortunes told, but no one really took what she said seriously. Well, until she read the cards for Nicholas Fallon’s mother one night and turned into a legend on Bermuda.
For, unfortunately, Fallon’s mother received the Death card, and a great depression came over her. She had spent a good deal of her life not feeling well and believing she was going to die, and she actually did pass on in three weeks after the card was revealed to her. Maybe it was a coincidence, maybe not, but soon after there was an influx of Bermudians wanting their fortunes read. Men were going to sea, a baby was to be born, a marriage proposal was about to be made—the usual stuff of worry. In very little time Madame Pauline’s Fortunes opened in the English basement of a dry good’s store in St. George Town.
Business was perhaps predictably good, for Madame Pauline had no real competitors on Bermuda for giving advice and telling fortunes. But her relationship with Little Eddy, never particularly close, suffered from loss of contact. He dodged school, scrounged the beaches during the day, and she worked at night. He was growing up mostly on his own.
Sometimes he snuck close by as his mother counseled various islanders on their life. He learned to understand the cards as his mother explained what
they meant.
So he knew what he was doing later that night as he snuck out of his bedroom window, leaving what money he had along with the 8 of Cups on his pillow.
The figure on the face of the card was walking away. It meant he was leaving Bermuda.
TWENTY-ONE
AS RASCAL PASSED WASHINGTON THE WIND GREW AND CAME FROM THE west, with warmth in it now. The ship bounded along energetically, pushed several knots faster by the remarkable stream of warm water under her hull. The crew chattered excitedly with every mile made good towards Boston, and their mood was contagious. Barclay was on deck occasionally, strapped into a chair, still pale and thinner than before surgery, trying to get used to having a missing limb. He complained, of course, and had every right to.
Even the packets made good speed, as if they were horses running for the barn and, indeed, in several days’ time it could be imagined that the journey would be almost over. The only sails sighted now were American merchants and the odd American naval vessel patrolling the coast, for the quasi-war with the French had emboldened French privateers to all but enter U.S. harbors in search of prizes.
Fallon and Beauty studied the chart for the approaches to Boston harbor carefully; it wouldn’t do to have come so far and run aground on the rocks at the entrance to their destination. Fallon noticed that Barclay was paying attention to their course and straining to overhear his conversation with Beauty, which he took as a good sign that the sailing master was gradually becoming more involved in the running of the ship. He could not use a sextant with one hand, of course, but Beauty took the sights and they conferred on their position and heading. Even that involvement was a milestone in his return to something like normal.
Boston harbor was chock-a-block with all manner of ships when Rascal came through the channel, and Fallon felt momentarily overwhelmed at the sight. Luggers and wherries and barges and hoys by the tens were crossing back and forth, and brigs, snows, and barques were anchored about. This was the business of a major port, the commerce of nations as goods and cargoes were loaded and unloaded by the ton, ships were re-supplied with water and provisions, livestock hoisted aboard cackling and lowing and bleating in fear and confusion and the inevitable bum-boats of small-time merchants selling tobacco and liquor and baubles right off the decks of their small craft.
Several hours after they’d gained the entrance to the harbor, a harbor pilot directed the packets to a wharf and Rascal dropped her anchor close by. If the crew was disappointed in not sinking the French frigate they didn’t show it, for all knew the ship might well have ended up on the notorious shoals to the west, sunk and dismasted. One could always hope. And, besides, none of the crew had ever been to the United States, much less Boston, and all the hands were agape identifying ships from so many countries going to and fro or swinging to their anchors.
Fallon was a bit agape himself. He was about to call for his gig to take him to the wharf where the packets were off-loading when he saw a small boat coming within hailing distance. Indeed, there was someone rather official looking standing in the sternsheets about to speak.
“Ahoy, Rascal!” called the young officer whom Fallon could now see wore an unfamiliar uniform, one that was different from Micah Wood-son’s anyway. “Harbor patrol, sir! May I come aboard?”
In very little time the young officer was on Rascal’s deck, informing Fallon that he was indeed with the harbor patrol, checking papers and manifests of all incoming ships. It was evident the United States was taking every precaution against her enemies, French or Spanish, as the case might be.
“And how long will you be staying in Boston, if I may ask, sir?” said the harbor patrol officer, handing Rascal’s papers back to Fallon. “You are, of course, welcome to stay as long as you like.”
Fallon had been considering the same question; his mission to escort the salt packets was effectively over the moment they tied off to the wharf. He could linger, of course, and see the famous American town where a protest over a tea tax effectively presaged the American Revolution. Or he could go home.
“I think we will load provisions and wood and water over the next two days and then be away,” he said to the young officer. “Much as I would like to stay longer. But first I will call on our American agent if you will direct me to his office.”
In the event, Fallon was soon away in his gig towards the quay where Pence and Ashworthy were offloading their salt, for the Somers’ office was nearby. The docks were full of activity, and the gig had trouble locating an opening at the dock. At last, Fallon was ashore and in little time found the Somers agent in his office.
His name was John Dingle, an Irish-American, rotund man with bushy side whiskers and a shrewd look about his eyes, no doubt befitting a customs man. After introducing himself, Fallon got to the point.
“I have recently made the acquaintance of Caleb Visser, a fisherman who sails out of Boston. Do you know of him?” Fallon looked closely at Dingle, whose shrewdness seemed to vanish at the mention of Visser’s name.
“Why, yes I know Visser,” said Dingle. “And his brother Alwin and his father, Wilhelm, of course. Cod fishermen they are. Or were. Wilhelm Visser got himself captured by the damned Barbary pirates, I heard, and I have great fear he will never come back to Boston. Caleb and his brother Alwin have left to try to ransom him, but I can’t imagine how that can happen. They are true bastards over there.”
“Have you had other ships taken then?” asked Fallon.
“Oh, yes,” answered Dingle. “So many that no one is sending ships there anymore. Well, no one but Silas McDonald, who is stubborn to the point of obstinacy. He is planning to sail Mary of Dundee for Malta any day and I don’t expect we will see him back either. This war with the Barbary pirates is ruining the trade and ruining lives, sir. And the Vissers aren’t the half of it, though I pray for them, I do.”
Later, in the privacy of his cabin, Fallon settled on the stern cushions with a glass of wine and thought about what Dingle had said. He wondered what Caleb Visser would do without his gold, without his ship, without much of anything now. He genuinely liked the man, and he certainly understood his quest, quixotic as it was, to bring his father home. It seemed impossible now. Perhaps it had always been at least improbable.
Fallon was still musing when there was a knock at the door and Beauty entered.
“We should have stores aboard tomorrow, Nico,” she reported. “Very cooperative, they are, here in Boston. Since we will be leaving so soon I decided not to allow the crew to have a run ashore. They’ll be disappointed, but it might take a week to round them all up in Boston. Do you agree?”
“Yes, I want to be away for home as soon as possible. I have a wedding to plan, remember?”
“I do,” said Beauty, fingering the sea dog around her neck. “I’m surprised you remembered it.”
TWENTY-TWO
ZABANA BALANCED EASILY ON SERPENT, A LARGE XEBEC WITH TWENTY-four 12-pounders that served as his flagship. The ship had three masts with lateen sails and a bank of oars on each side for slaves. But the most distinguishing feature was the long bowsprit, around which was wrapped a carved wooden snake, its evil head at the tip. Glowing within the head were painted red eyes meant to terrify enemy ships.
The janissaries, however, were the corsair’s secret weapon. These were the elite soldiers of the Ottoman Empire, swaggering and utterly fearless and seemingly immune from pain. Almost two hundred of them sat about Serpent’s deck polishing their scimitars and cleaning their muskets. They were commanded by their agha, or chief, and some number of them sailed on all of Zabana’s corsairs.
The janissaries wore tall red caps, with long, sashed robes and tight canvass breeches and iron-heeled, red slippers. Sometimes they talked with one another, sometimes not. Mostly they tended to their weapons or gambled, smoking and looking out at the passing sea with hooded eyes above drooping black mustaches.
Serpent’s sailing complement was normally close to three hundred, but Zabana had rationed
some of the crew to other ships. It was a constant management process to shuffle crews and recruit more, for he had over 60 corsairs at sea at any given time.
Zabana had contemplated the dey’s orders, what was actually said and what was said between the lines. Though Zabana was powerful and wicked, the dey was more powerful and more wicked, and Zabana knew that, should his corsairs fail to bring in prizes, he might well be made to disappear. Though xebecs were not really suitable for open ocean, he decided to send his little navy far away, up the coast of Europe to Holland and Denmark and perhaps Sweden to raid villages where the women were fair and beautiful, and also west through the Strait to prowl off the coast of North Africa with orders to take ships at sea. If those ships were American, or even British, and could be taken quickly and easily, who would know? Things happened at sea. The ships could be sunk and the prisoners hidden below decks and brought secretly back into Algiers.
Taking the dey’s hint, he’d decided to go to sea himself. Serpent had provisioned over the next several days and then weighed before first light, Zabana being anxious to be away from port, away from his garden, as the dey had said. In truth, it felt good to be at sea again. He had his beheading cart, and it pleased him to see the fear that it caused in the crew’s eyes.
Zabana was neither short nor tall, with black hair and beard and the dark looks of a gypsy. His eyes were hooded, making him seem as if he was almost asleep. But, in fact, he was always alert, his mind constantly weighing options and risks and consequences, seeing life in three dimensions. He had a notoriously short temper and turned violent quickly, and yet he spoke in a barely audible voice, perhaps to conceal his lisp.
He said as little as necessary to command the ship; and those who did not strictly obey his orders were punished with the loss of a finger. A worse offense meant castration. And there was always beheading as the final punishment.
Barbarians on an Ancient Sea Page 9