by M. P. Shiel
XLVIII
THE SEA-FORTS
The second-reading of the Land Bill had passed by a 59 majority: and itwould now have been easy work to hurry through its remaining stages in acouple of weeks; but the Regent had awaited the nation's verdict in thereturn of the 120 to fill the Jewish seats, sure of the result.
So the 23rd was a great night--the third-reading--the majority 115 at 8P.M.; and the next day, which was marked by a very brilliant levee, theBill was before the Lords.
This stage it might easily have reached four weeks before, but had beenshelved for the election of the 120: and in those weeks the four copiesof the _Mahomet II_. had been launched.
And suddenly--bad news from Palestine: news that there, too, after allthe safeguards, the greed of a few was working to plant the oldEuropean wrong: for, the Sanhedrim being short of funds for a railway, asyndicate of five merchant-princes had offered to buy from it an estatebetween Jerusalem and the Jordan, and when the Chief Rabbi had pointedout that the offer was monstrous, in view of the terms of the Sea'sDeed of Gift, a fierce discussion had ensued, a schism; and althoughthe syndicate's offer had been rejected by 27, at the next sessionthe defeated leader, like some warlike Maccabaeus, had surged with hisfaction and a hundred Arabs into the Mosque of Omar where the Sanhedrimmet, to cast those who did not escape by flight into prison in thePasha's Palace. In the hands of his clique the Government remained.
Such was the news....
It was followed in three days by a Representation to the Regent, signedby 90,000 Jews in Palestine, the fourth name being Rebekah Frankl's,they imploring him for their sinking ship just launched, calling him"Father".
For though the Jews had been content to see that Europe which theycontemned parcelled out among a few, while the mass of men hoveredcountryless--from this had arisen their lucre--their mental quality wastoo rich in business shrewdness to tolerate in their own case any suchBedlam: yet they stood helpless before the disaster, and only in theRegent was hope.
On that night of the arrival of their Petition, the Prime Minister andthe Commander-in-Chief dined in the Palace, placid men at the momentwhen soup began, the Regent's sky quite clear, for, though a rumourwhispered that the Lords were designedly lengthening discussion of theBill, this gave no one any concern.
During entremets, however, a scribbled card was passed into the hand ofthe Commander-in-Chief, and, as he read, his eyebrows lifted. Cravingpermission, he hurried out, had some talk with his Director of MilitaryIntelligence, and returned pale.
Afterwards, as they three sat on a balcony overlooking the lake, withcigars, the Regent said: "I have thought, Sir Robert Wortley, of sendingout at once two thousand Tommies under, say, General Sir John Clough, tothe help of those poor Jews...."
Here the Commander-in-Chief cleared his throat, and in a strained voiceinterfered: "That is, my Lord King, if we ourselves have not need ofevery soldier of the line within the next week".
The Regent deposited his ash with peering eyes, puzzled.
"What does your Lordship mean?"
"Your Lordship's Majesty, I was summoned from dinner just now to talkwith Major-General Sir Maurice Coppleston, who reports movements ofarmed men, just come to his knowledge, and now going forward on aconsiderable scale, all northward. He gathers that these can onlyconsist of Territorials and Yeomanry Cavalry, of whom not less thantwelve battalions of rifles and three batteries of artillery, officersand men, are now on the way to, or massed upon, York. How widely themovement may actually extend--God knows".
Silence now: Sir Robert Wortley suddenly whitening to the lips. ThenHogarth, in a very low voice, said: "They do not know me".
"If I may crave leave to retire at once--" from the Commander-in-Chief;and Hogarth gave consent.
Queer things, omens, doubtings, weird clouds, gathered about Hogarththat night. When at eleven he gave audience to Admiral Quilter-Beckett,arrived from the _Boodah_ Quilter-Beckett said: "Strange the fineweather here: at sea it is quite rough, the _Boodah_ well under foam,and that old _Campania_ pitches so--"
"You have come, then, in the _Campania_?"--from Hogarth.
"Yes, my Lord King".
"And what about the yacht?"
"Oh, the yacht: in her I have sent the two hundred men to the_Mahomet_".
"_Which_ two hundred men, Admiral?"
Quilter-Beckett stared.
"Your Lordship's Majesty has forgotten: I had instructions that youdesired some interchanges among the garrisons, and had ordered thesending of two hundred of my men to the _Mahomet_, I to receive inreturn two hundred from her".
"And you have sent your two hundred?"
"Yes, my Lord King".
"Have you received the two hundred from the _Mahomet?_"
"They had not arrived when I left the _Boodah_".
"So that you left only one hundred men in the _Boodah_, withinstructions to receive two hundred others?"
"That is so, my Lord King".
There was silence.
"But suppose I tell you that I have given no such instructions: willyour heart--_leap?_"
Hogarth clapped a sudden hand of horror upon Quilter-Beckett's shoulder.
"My God--!" Quilter-Beckett started like a gun's recoil.
"Be calm, Admiral: it may be only some mistake....From whence had youthis order?"
"From--from the _Mahomet_, in the usual course--"
"Good night, Admiral; I would be alone".
At that very hour a world-tragedy was being enacted over the dark andturbulent ocean, and the immensest of Empires was sinking into the sea.
Darkly, quietly, with no mighty and multitudinous tumult of man.
That midnight the night-glass of many a mystified merchantman searchedthe murk for those coruscations with which the crescent of forts hadconstellated the Atlantic, the mariner's sea-rent waiting ready, withhis ship's-papers, in his cash box: but no galaxy of lights glanced thatnight.
To some, before this, they had appeared, but, as the ship approached,had vanished, and it was as though the swarm of the Pleiades hadbeen caught from the skies before their eyes. Long before dawn shipsseparated by three thousand miles had gained the assurance that thisor that sea-fort no longer rode the familiar spot-had been rapt to thestars, had sunk, had somehow passed from being. Before this monstrousmarvel the mariner stood dumb, and it was afterwards said that that wildnight the terminals of heaven and earth were lost, that the storm-windswere haunted, in all the air lamentation, sobbings as for swallowedorbs, and the whisper: "It is finished".
Two days previously a telegram from Admiral O'Hara had gone to all theforts in European waters, commanding an interchange of 200 of their menwith men of his own fort; and each officer in command, ignorant that thesame instructions had gone to others, had complied: so that by the nextmorning, the 29th April, 1600 men from eight forts were converging inyachts upon the _Mahomet_. As the fort garrisons, originally numbering500, had recently been reduced to 300, the others having been mostlydrafted into the 2nd Division of the British Royal Marines, compliancewith Admiral O'Hara's order left a garrison of 100 only at each of eightforts.
Toward five in the afternoon of that day, the 29th, 700 men, tothe bewilderment of her officers, were in the _Mahomet_ two of thefort-yachts having arrived upon a troubled First Lieutenant who wasin command, all attempts to see the Admiral since the morning havingfailed.
But near seven the Admiral summoned the Treasurer to his _bureau_ nearthe bottom, he being in dressing-gown and slippers, very slovenly,seeming either drunk or sick, his mouth gaping to his pantings, and anonhis languishing eye shot dyingly to heaven.
"Well, you see how I am, Mr. Treasurer", he went, "seedy. Pain in thistemple, trouble with the respiration, and a foul breath. Poor AdmiralDonald, Mr. Treasurer, poor Admiral Donald. The fashion of this worldpasseth away, sir, and the Will of God be done! Sometimes, I pledge youmy word, I almost wish that I was dead. There are things, sir, in thisworld--Ah, well, God help me; I feel very chippy. I wanted to ask you,s
ir, to let me see the books, and hand me over at once all unaudited andunsettled funds in your counting-house, though I'm not fit for affairsto-day, sir, God knows--"
"Sir!" cried the Treasurer, a hard-browed, bald-headed man with afan-beard, savouring of banks and ledgers.
"Just pass them over, sir".
"Well, this is the most singular order I ever heard of!"
"Obey me promptly, sir, or, by God, I cashier you!" roared O'Hara, hisraised lids laying nude the debauchery of those jaundiced juicy balls.
"Be it so, Admiral Donald"--the Treasurer bowed: "but on theunderstanding that I formally protest against the irregularity, andreport it to the High Chancellor".
He retired, and in half an hour returned with two clerks who bore books,himself a carpet-bag containing in cash-boxes L850,000, paper andgold, which he deposited on the Admiral's _bureau_, and, after againprotesting before the clerks, went away.
Not far off by now were some of the other six fort-yachts, convergingwith their 200 upon the _Mahomet_, and as the Admiral had no intentionof being put into irons as a lunatic in his own fort, at eight o'clockhe stole from his apartments, dressed now, not in uniform, but inpriest's robes and a voluminous cloak, bearing in one hand the bag, inthe other a key.
Those lower depths of the _Mahomet_ were an utter solitude, lit withrare rays; yet the Admiral journeyed through and up peering, skulking,pausing, hurrying, and, if by chance a light caught his face, it showeda horror of convulsive flesh, his body a mass of trembling, like jelly.
Now, the forts had been built to fight; and (since nothing isimpossible), if they fought, they might fall into an enemy's hand: toobviate which, there was in a little room on the third floor a handlewhich opened by hydraulics a door in the fort's side on the fifth floorbelow, the existence of this room being unknown save to each Admiral andto four of his lieutenants, and its key kept in a spot known to these.This key O'Hara now had in hand; and as he pushed it into the lock, hisjaw jabbered like a baboon's.
Night was now come; the sea rough; Spain lost to sight; the two emptiedyachts on the way back to their forts; yonder the lights of the _MahometII_. lying-to; two officers in oilskins walking arm in arm, to and fro,on the roof; and said one: "Look at those waves there all of a sudden:they rather seem to be breaking on the wrong side of us".
Then they resumed their talk; and to and fro they walked, arm in arm.
Till now one with sudden hiss: "But-good Christ-just look-why, theroof's _leaning_--!"
At that moment an outcry and runners from below, shouts, a trumpet-call,were borne on the winds to them: for the Admiral had rushed up to themanned parts of the fort, all hell alight in his eyeballs, bawling out,"The boats! The _Mahomet_ is sinking!"
In spite of which many perished, the survivors afterwards declaringthat the tragedy mesmerized their nerves with a certain awe not to becompared with the terrors felt on sinking ships, the _Mahomet_ affectingthem like a being of life, like behemoth slowly dying, or some doomedmoon. She gave them, indeed, plenty of time, though when the steelportals on two of her sides were opened, the sea washed up the steps,making the launching very delicate feats, and near the last the leaningwas so marked, that there was difficulty in standing; and still inpatient distress she waited while the waves like multitudinous wolves,trooped to prey upon her.
As the Admiral ran to the outer Collector's Office to embark, he wasfaced by the Treasurer, revolver in hand, and "Hand me over that bag,Admiral", he said pretty coolly, "or I blow out your brains".
O'Hara's mouth worked: he could not speak.
"Will you?" said the Treasurer: "no doubt you mean to hand it over tothe proper authorities, but I prefer to do that myself. Be quick, youold dog!"
Whereat O'Hara, having no weapon, dropped the bag, and trotted wide-eyedforward to the thronged scene of the launchings.
There were more than enough boats, and though on the lowest side of thefort nothing could long be done, all had gone off, when the fort, havingsettled very low, looking for some time like a brawling cauldron andarea of breaking waves coloured by her hundred lights, went down, andwas not.
Whereupon the yacht, over a hundred yards away, was caught in thetraction of her strong enthralment, and, like a planet, started intorunning round a region of sea which wheeled; while seven of the boats,rowing for life, were grasped, and dragged back, with a hundred andnine, into the deep.
"Toll for the brave...."
As to the other boats, they arrived at Tarifa the following evening,with 583; but the Admiral ordered the _Mahomet II_. to Cadiz, where soonafter midnight he landed, and, by negotiation with a "_Jefe_", in anhour had a train for Madrid. As he was about to step in, the Treasurertouched his shoulder.
"What, Admiral, off by land?"
"Yes, sir, as you know", said O'Hara, "for you have been spying mymovements for the last hour. How childish to imagine that I haveanything to fear, or want to escape! Why, I am bound for England--myonly object in the land journey being quickness. I even invite you tocome with me."
"All right, Admiral, I will....If you be tempted to murder me _enroute_, remember these"--a pair of pistols; and they set out at aboutthe hour when the whole crescent of tragedies was over.
At six that evening a yacht, a copy of the _Mahomet II_., had come tothe Cattegat sea-fort to land 200 men who wore the Empire's blue-jacket,the name "Mahomet" on their caps--nothing to show that they were notgenuine Mahomet men, though some looked rather sea-sick; but inreality they were young lords, stock-brokers, Territorial Officers,men-about-town, park-keepers, undergraduates, secretly armed with knifeand revolver, and knowing, too, where the armoury of the sea-fort lay.
Meantime, three other yachts, all named _Mahomet II_., were a-ply in theAtlantic, two containing 400 men each, one 600, each of the first twoto land 200 at a fort at six, and her remaining 200 at the next fort byeight-thirty, serving four forts, the last to land 200 at each ofthree forts: so that by 10.30 P.M. each of eight forts, including theCattegat, contained 200 enemies disguised as fort-men.
And punctually at eleven, in each, began perhaps the darkest massacre ofhistory--no quarter given--and when the alarm went forth, whichever ofthe unarmed fort-men rushed to the dark armoury found the door fastenedagainst him. Of two men in bed, talking together through an open door,one arose at the stroke of a clock and killed the other; some perishedin sleep--all very quietly accomplished: a few shots, a few lost echoesin the vast castles, a few daubs of blood. And in no case did a singleone, either massacred or assassin, escape alive: for, in everycase, some one or other of the fort-officers--Admiral, Lieutenant,Commander--to prevent capture, opened the inlet to the flood in the verythick of the doom, went down with his muteness and his bubbling, and thesea, a secret in its bosom, rolled over the Sea.