‘What?’ roared Kite, ‘you have taken all this while to tell me she is already here?’
‘Hold hard, Kite, I have asked Jones to come up to the house the moment he has completed his clearances, so you will have to wait an hour or so longer. Sit down for pity’s sake and possess your benighted soul in patience.’ He turned to his wife. ‘Is there perhaps another cup of tea for a thirsty and abused messenger, my dear?’ Wentworth grinned at Kite, then leaned towards Sarah. ‘Do, I beg you, Mrs Kite, soothe the ingrate,’ he implored mockingly.
Wentworth’s reference to Kite as an ingrate marked the strain in the relationship between the two men. Kite had known for some weeks that the delay in Spitfire’s arrival had been caused by Wentworth having sent Jones out on the last of several slaving voyages. Kite had promised Puella he would never again personally profit from such an enterprise and he was exceedingly angry that Wentworth had done so on his behalf. Untroubled by moral considerations of this delicate nature, and bowing only to the imperatives of the market-place, Wentworth had waved aside Kite’s objection, justifying his act on the grounds that Kite had ‘distracted himself on the American coast with no very clear indication of his intentions relative to the Spitfire’. This, Wentworth had claimed, left himself free to employ the vessel in the manner he deemed most profitable to the Spitfire’s owner. Since the voyage had proved highly profitable, Wentworth was unable to comprehend how Kite felt he had the slightest grounds for complaint. He, Wentworth, had no idea that Kite would suddenly want his vessel back ‘on a whim’. Kite did not argue; it was enough that she was safe and would be at his disposal. Indeed his principal preoccupation was what he would do with Captain Jones, now that the man had regained his self-confidence along with the habit of command. In the event, this problem never arose. Jones had made sufficient money to take a small house into which he installed a handsome quadroon and with whom he declared he wished to ‘relax, at least until the coming hurricane season was past, and perhaps for longer.’
‘’Tis the langour of his tropical blood,’ Wentworth had explained with a singular lack of insight and a good deal of prejudice. Kite was not disposed to argue the point. Instead in a burst of released energy he hastily removed every trace of the Spitfire’s slaving voyage, constantly aware that in the mahogany-built Wentworth, Rathburne and the Rhode Islanders had, as they might themselves say, ‘gotten themselves a tarnation fine little man-o’-war at a real Yankee bargain price’. Refitting and rearming Spitfire, he made of her not merely a private ship of war, but a privateer bent on a most private mission.
He received assistance from an unexpected source, Nathan Johnstone, who volunteered to join the ship.
‘A privateering voyage,’ Kite explained, ‘is in the nature of a speculation. I cannot afford to pay you.’
Johnstone waved these considerations aside. ‘I shall, if you will permit me, venture a little capital and ask that you take me as a gentleman volunteer. I have no desire to remain longer among the islands and to serve with you for a few months will take me north to,’ Johnstone shrugged, ‘who knows what?’
‘Very well,’ Kite had said, agreeing. ‘I shall make you gunner. You may take charge of the arms chest, the powder and the shot, along with the guns.’
Johnstone nodded with satisfaction. ‘That seems a very sufficient inventory for a clerk,’ he said smiling as the two men shook hands.
‘Now I suppose I must show you the principle of a magazine.’
‘It might be of use, certainly.’
In the last few days of refitting the schooner, Kite felt a mild sensation of panic as the news arrived from Massachusetts. The investment of Boston by rebellious Americans was, it was claimed, of such a provocative and forward nature that General Gage must soon evacuate the town or utterly defeat the rebels. British fortunes in New England now hung, like the Damoclean sword, by a single thread. It was enough for Kite. Shipping a quantity of powder and shot and placing it in Johnstone’s prepared lazarette, he loaded Spitfire with rum and a consignment of imported flour, and on Wednesday 17 May 1775 the schooner sailed from St John’s, heading for New England.
‘I cannot pretend that I am not glad to see them go, my dear,’ Kitty Wentworth said pointedly, slipping her arm inside that of her portly husband and falling into step with him as he took a turn on their terrazzo as the sun set. ‘We can enjoy our own and the island’s society again now.’ She paused, threw him a quizzical look and observed, ‘your friend Kite is much changed, and not for the better, I am afraid.’
Wentworth stopped and turned to his wife. ‘I fear the same must be said of his friend Johnstone. Come my dear, tell me if you love you husband. Do you?’
‘Of course I do,’ she replied coyly.
‘Come then…’ he took her hand and led her hurriedly into the house, shutting the chamber of their bed-room door and swinging round on her. ‘Come madam, I have an urgent need of you!’ he said, taking off his coat and kicking off his shoes.
‘My dear, you are all haste, surely a little tenderness…’
‘Devil take it, you have been hot for him for weeks! Ever since you quenched Johnstone.’ Wentworth advanced on his wife who backed towards the bed, half alarmed and half acquiescent. ‘Now let me show you what manner of man I can be when my wife is aroused…’
‘Oh, sir!’ she exclaimed laughing, seeing his engorged state spring from the confinement of his breeches as she fell back upon the bed and lifted her skirts. ‘It has been some time…!’
‘Aye, madam, and we shall be glad of their visit if only for this moment… of…rapture…at…their…departure…’
Kite and his wife found Boston a very different place from what it had been but three months earlier. It was now a town under formal siege, with rebel positions straddling the narrow isthmus of the Neck and cutting off communications with the rest of New England. The harbour, overlooked by Dorchester Heights in the south and Bunker and Breed’s Hill in the north, was full of shipping. A handful of Royal Naval cruisers, a number of military transports and numerous merchant vessels, both American and British owned, all lay at anchor below the commanding heights.
If Boston had seemed to be full of soldiers before, it was now stuffed to over-flowing, British troop reinforcements having arrived during Kite’s absence. The contrast was marked by more than a mere increase in numbers, for where before the troops had tended to distance themselves from the hostile townsfolk, now this augmentation seemed to empower the troops, so that they were less self-effacing and conducted themselves with a certain swagger. Kite marvelled at this, particularly among the young subalterns, seeing that since the colonists had so effectively chivvied the British infantry back into Boston after their sally towards Lexington and Concord in April, and had since then prevented them from repeating the exercise. The besieging of Boston by a hay-seed army of militia seemed to Kite to be a humiliation to which the gay young officers seemed indifferent. Moreover, Kite soon realised that Boston was short of every necessity and was filled with more than the hungry mouths of several thousand extra soldiers. In fact Boston’s political colour had been changed dramatically, for men and women too terrified of the Patriot party to remain in the surrounding countryside had come to seek refuge under the bayonets of the King’s soldiers and this wretched population now awaited the exertions of General Gage and his army to restore them to their homes.
Making his way to the Commander-in-Chief’s headquarters after attending to the usual inward formalities at the Custom House, Kite reflected upon the increasingly desperate situation. At the Custom House Collector’s clerk had brought the newly arrived ship-master up to date with the situation and then assured him of a profitable sale of his cargo, particularly if he permitted his own brother to act as agent in order to avoid the painful consequences of government requisition.
‘I do assure you, Captain Kite, that between ourselves there is an eager market with payment in ready money for flour, but you must not delay. Once your inwards clearance is pro
cessed you may well have to surrender the lot for a pittance.’
‘Tell me,’ Kite had countered, ‘have letters of marque and reprisal been issued against the rebels?’
The clerk had looked astonished. ‘No sir.’ he had then dropped his voice to a confidential tone. ‘There is a marked reluctance on the part of General Gage to admit that a state of open rebellion exists, let alone war!’
‘Good God, sir! You mean to tell me that these hostile preparations don’t signify?’
‘No sir, they don’t. Only two days ago, on the 12th, the General issued a proclamation offering a free pardon to every person in the province with the exception of John Hancock and Samuel Adams…’
‘Which fell on deaf ears, no doubt,’ Kite had commented dryly.
‘Indeed it did, Captain. But if you wish to dispose of your cargo…’
‘Yes, yes…’ Kite had frowned, thinking for a moment and then asked for directions to General Gage’s headquarters and with an assurance to the Custom House clerk that he would let him know directly about the disposal of his cargo, Kite hurried out into the street.
There was an appearance of military activity outside Gage’s headquarters as Kite approached Province House. The open doorway was guarded by two sentries, both wearing the tall caps of men from a grenadier company, while two orderlies held the nervous heads of five officers’ chargers. Just as Kite approached, one of these men grabbed the reins of a sixth horse as it galloped up and its rider slid to the ground and threw them to the orderly. The young scarlet-clad officer fumbled in his saddle-bags as the brilliant June sunshine twinkled off the silver crescent of the gorget at his throat. Having drawn out of his saddlebag the bundle of papers he had brought to headquarters, the young man strode up the steps two at a time. Kite made to follow but one of the sentinels barred his way with his musket.
‘I have dispatches for General Gage,’ he lied, adding with more truth, ‘I am Captain Kite, master of the schooner Spitfire.’
The soldier looked at him and the brief-case that contained his inwards clearance papers. ‘Where are these despatches from then, Captain?’ he asked with a truculent and suspicious air as his fellow sentry came over, but a voice behind them interrupted.
‘Good God! Is that you Uncle William?’
Both sentries snapped to attention as the officer who had preceded Kite into the dark interior of the requisitioned house retraced his steps. Kite looked from the unco-operative visage of his interlocutor into the good-looking and sun-burnt face of Harry Makepeace.
‘Good God, Harry! What the devil are you doing here? I though you had taken a seat in Parliament.’
‘Long story but come in, come in.’ Makepeace waved the sentries away and led Kite through the hallway and into a withdrawing room given over to acting as the ante-room to the adjutant-general’s office. ‘I heard the names “Kite” and “Spitfire” and well, here you are… Do you have despatches for the General?’
Kite shook his head. ‘No, not exactly, but I’d like to see a senior military officer if you can arrange it. I daresay your own mission warrants a quick entry…’
Makepeace laughed. ‘These?’ he held up the papers from his saddle-bag. ‘These, dear uncle, are the daily returns from my regiment. They represent the extent to which military duty is entrusted to a mere captain of infantry in Boston these days,’ he said ironically.
‘I did not know you possessed any great military knowledge capable of more fitting employment, Harry,’ Kite responded with equal irony and a smile.
Makepeace assumed a serious face and like the Custom House clerk an hour earlier dropped his voice. ‘Even a young fool just out from England with reinforcements for his regiment and a purchased captaincy knows it is utter folly to allow those damned rebels to dig themselves in and surround Boston. Why they’ll be up on Dorchester Heights and Bunker Hill before Gage…’
‘Captain Makepeace!’
‘Sir?’ Makepeace turned. An officer had opened the door of an inner room. He wore the lace of a major and his outstretched right hand was ink-stained.
‘I am waiting for your battalion’s daily muster again!’
‘Major Hayward,’ Makepeace said with plausible aplomb and turning to indicate Kite, ‘this is Captain Kite of the schooner Spitfire, he has urgent business with the adjutant-general…’
‘Not as urgent as yours will be if you don’t hand over your papers.’
‘Come Hayward,’ said Makepeace, winking at Kite as he handed the papers over, ‘there is no need to be unpleasant just because you owe me twenty guineas…’
‘I shall whip your arse at the cart’s tail if you are insolent, Makepeace. This is an army headquarters not a gaming house…’
‘More’s the pity, but what about Captain Kite here…’
‘What about Captain Kite?’ asked Hayward, looking down and studying the muster lists Makepeace had given him.
‘I want a letter of marque and reprisal for my schooner, sir, from the Commander-in-Chief in his capacity as Governor of Massachusetts,’ put in Kite boldly.
‘You have twenty-six men sick in the 59th, Makepeace…’ Hayward looked up at Makepeace, ignoring Kite’s interjection.
‘Some sort of flux, sir. Nothing serious the surgeon says.’
‘Fat lot he’ll know about it,’ Hayward said, looking at Kite for the first time and frowning. ‘What did you say?’
Kite repeated his request adding, ‘I’ve a cargo of excellent flour that I shall be pleased to trade for such a commission.’
Hayward started, grasping the import of Kite’s words. ‘You want a commission for your schooner to act as a privateer in exchange for your cargo, is that correct?’
‘You have it, sir. She was very successful as a private man-o’-war during the last war.’
‘I can vouch for that,’ put in Makepeace helpfully.
‘I wouldn’t, if you wish to render Captain…’
‘Kite, Major Hayward.’
‘If you wish to render Captain Kite any kind of service.’ Hayward sniffed and looked at Kite. ‘I can simply requisition your cargo, Captain. It would be a lot easier.’
‘I can be of considerable use to the Government, Major Hayward, and I would not advise you to requisition my cargo.’
‘Why not, pray?’
‘I could weigh anchor and go and sell it, along with the gunpowder and shot I have laid-by, to the rebels.’
‘That would be a treasonable act.’
‘But your taking my cargo without recompense would be another action to discredit His Majesty’s name in Massachusetts and I have already lost a ship and my wife has lost an entire business, all of which was taken by the rebels without any compensation from either themselves or His Majesty’s Government.’
Hayward turned away. ‘I cannot enter into any discussions about your personal misfortunes,’ he said over his shoulder as he retired to the inner room.
‘Major Hayward,’ Kite called after him, ‘you may have a hundred tons of flour for a letter of marque and fifty guineas to clear the pestilence of debt from your shoulders.’
Hayward spun in the doorway, his face colouring. ‘You would try to bribe me sir?’
‘’Tis the way business may be done, sir,’ Makepeace interjected quickly. ‘Captain Kite is a man of capital good sense, Major, and means you no affront. Allow me to wipe out your debt sir, for a letter of marque.’
Hayward hesitated. ‘I shall see what can be done.’
‘Today, sir,’ pressed Kite.
‘Before I see you at the tables…’ Makepeace added.
Hayward looked from one to another of them and then, drawing himself up said coolly, ‘damn the pair of you. You may discharge your cargo, Captain, and Makepeace, you can pass word to the QMG.’
‘My pleasure Major Hayward,’ grinned Makepeace, saluting the closing door.
‘Well, Uncle,’ Makepeace said as they strode out into the sunshine and he shook his head at the orderly, ‘let us take a glass of wine
before I return to my battalion. I am intrigued, you said “my wife”, was that all a fabrication?’
‘No Harry, I remarried. A lady from Newport, Rhode Island, named Sarah Tyrell.’
‘I was sorry to learn about Puella. And young Willie.’ Makepeace paused and eyed his uncle. ‘I gather it was you bereavement that decided you to quit Liverpool and dissolve your business association with us.’
‘Yes. That and the fact that Frith was not a man I had any sympathy with.’
Makepeace turned and ducked into a tavern where he called for a bottle and sat himself down.
‘I am sorry to hear that. I have always found him congenial enough.’
‘I am sure you have, Harry, and I am sure he went to some trouble to be so to you. I found him otherwise.’
Makepeace poured the wine and left Kite to pay for it. He took the opportunity to drop twenty guineas onto the table.
‘I thought the sum was fifty,’ Makepeace said, picking the gold coins up.
‘I do not have that sum with me and in any case I only mentioned fifty to Hayward. You expressed satisfaction with the repayment of his debt.’
‘You have lost none of your shrewdness, Uncle.’ Makepeace’s tone was dry.
‘Thank you,’ Kite replied. ‘I was sorry to hear you are still gambling.’
‘Oh, don’t be censorious. To be truthful there is so little else to do. We sit here day after day waiting for God knows what. The enemy seem to possess at least as much military competence as we do, which isn’t saying much. There was some muttering about the seizure of the southern heights at headquarters yesterday.’ Makepeace sat back and stretched out his legs. ‘Alongside such incompetence, a night’s gambling seems a small enough sin.’
‘What are my chances of getting Hayward to comply with my request?’
‘If I remember a letter of marque is a complicated document, ain’t it?’
Makepeace nodded. ‘But it legitimises my actions and I have my own accounts to settle. If the rebels won’t do business our way, I shall do it theirs.’
The Privateersman Page 18