The Continental Risque

by James Nelson

  The after-scuttle door flew open with a crash and John Adams emerged on deck, a pistol in each hand, a pouch over his shoulder. Biddlecomb had not even noticed that he was gone. He stepped up to the quarterdeck and handed one of the weapons to Virginia. She took the pistol with the ease of familiarity and held it sideways as she drew back the cock and pulled the trigger, nodding with approval at the resulting spark.

  ‘Vir— Miss Stanton, I must insist that you go below,’ Biddlecomb said with the tone in which he couched all of his commands. ‘I think the hold would be best, for the present.’

  Virginia smiled at the suggestion, as if she found it genuinely amusing, but before she could speak, Adams spoke for her.

  ‘Really, Biddlecomb, I’ve been talking with the girl at some length now about firearms, and I’m convinced that she has a great deal of expertise. As it seems clear we are to get into some type of fight, I should think you would want every able shot on deck.’

  ‘Well, certainly, but … she’s …’

  ‘A woman, yes, I’ve observed as much, but if she can shoot straight, we shouldn’t hold sex against her.’

  Virginia was smiling broader now, and Biddlecomb knew that his red face was as much a source of her amusement as anything, and he knew that that in turn was making him blush harder still.

  ‘Very well, you may remain on deck for the present,’ he said, then called for Rumstick to lay aft before anything more on the subject could be said.

  ‘Mr Rumstick, I’ve a mind to slow us down a bit, let them close up on us. Get some hands out on the bowsprit and lash up the fore staysail as some kind of sea anchor, then lower it away on its halyard. The foresail should hide you from view.’

  ‘Aye, sir,’ Rumstick said, and once again hurried forward, calling out the names of half a dozen of the more experienced hands to come with him.

  Not ten minutes later the fore staysail was under the bow and adding its considerable drag to the barnacles and kelp that were already slowing the brig. Biddlecomb turned to the frigate, sweeping the deck with his telescope. The spritsail, braced square, hid his view of the figurehead and the foredeck, and only glimpses of the raised quarterdeck were visible around the fore- and mainsails. He could see clusters of blue coats, the officers relegated to the leeward side. There seemed to be no excitement, no running about, no fingers pointing. That at least gave him hope that his intentions had not been divined.

  ‘You know, Biddlecomb,’ John Adams said from a foot away, his voice, loud as ever, making Isaac jump, ‘this is marvelous, marvelous. Makes a man feel alive!’

  Biddlecomb took the telescope from his eye and looked down into the shorter man’s face. Adams was smiling, grinning really, a broad and genuine grin of pure exhilaration. ‘I can quite see why you become so fond of this.’

  ‘To say I’m fond of it, Mr Adams, may be going it a bit high. I suppose if I had some kind of a prior assurance of escape, this part would be more enjoyable, but as it stands, I really can’t say that I’m having fun. Still, I’ll admit I do like the telling of the story after the outcome has been determined in my favor.’

  ‘Quite right, Biddlecomb. Bravo. But I tell you, man, you sit in that fly-infested State House and listen to those chuckleheads drone on and on about reconciliation and Petitions to the King and the invulnerability of the damned British Navy and you’ll realize just how edifying your part of this thing is. You’re doing something here, taking real action. Well, in this instance you’re running away, but you understand my drift. You can take the initiative, do something. God but I wish I could command Congress the way you can your ship.’

  ‘I see your point, though I would venture to say that anything, even something as thrilling as being chased in a sinking ship by a greatly superior force, becomes a bit of a bore with repetition.’

  ‘I should imagine. Now, what’s our plan?’

  Biddlecomb was about to assure Adams that he, Adams, would learn of the plan the moment that the British did, when he was interrupted by the Glasgow’s bow chaser. The report of the gun was loud, the frigate now less than a half a mile astern, and as if to serve as a further warning the echo of the gun came again and again from the close by shore.

  But there was no damage to the Charlemagne, and Biddlecomb doubted that the frigate’s bow chasers would even bear on them. The gun was primarily to unnerve the Americans, and judging from the uneasy glances aft and the heads craning over the bulwark and looking astern it was having just that effect. Adams, however, grinned harder and fingered the butt of the pistol he had thrust in his waistband. Like aqua vitae to a midwife, Biddlecomb thought.

  ‘Miss Stanton, I think it time you went below,’ he called out.

  ‘I’ll go below directly, Captain,’ said Virginia, heading forward toward the break of the quarterdeck.

  They rounded Throg’s Neck and turned more westerly, and Biddlecomb ordered the yards braced around. They were into the East River now, encompassed by the colony of New York. He could see the water piling up around the rocks that thrust out of the water near the shore, could see flotsam carried swiftly in the fast-moving stream.

  Stanton stood just to weather of the helmsmen, hands clasped behind his back, his feet apart, the white hair under his cocked hat whipping around in the following wind. He wore a stoic, disinterested expression, but Biddlecomb was not fooled. The old man was enjoying himself and found this every bit as exhilarating as Adams. More perhaps, for Stanton had spent his youth and early manhood at sea. His had been the life of a sailor and an adventurer, not the life of a city attorney.

  Only in his later years had he been forced to give that up to tend to a merchant fleet grown too large to manage from shipboard and to raise his daughter ashore (as a girl she had accompanied him to sea many times) after her mother’s death. Biddlecomb tried to imagine how Stanton would feel about his protégé kissing his daugher.

  Isaac glanced over at the space of deck where Virginia had been standing and was surprised to find her standing there still. ‘Miss Stanton, I thought you were going below.’

  ‘I am, just this minute, Captain.’

  ‘Well, please do so,’ he said with more irritation in his voice than had been there a moment before.

  ‘Captain,’ William Stanton said in a low voice, and Biddlecomb stepped over to him. ‘Might I suggest that you let at least two hundred feet of cable go before you make if off? With the bow weak as it is, snubbing it up short might tear it clean out, but with enough scope the weight of the rope will take up the shock immeasurably.’

  ‘Quite right, William,’ Biddlecomb said, smiling despite himself. Stanton had figured out what he was about to do.

  The Glasgow fired again, the sound louder, much louder now. She had closed to less than a quarter of a mile and was drawing perceptibly nearer every moment. Past the bow Biddlecomb could see the north and south shores of Hell Gate, Montresor and Buchannan’s Islands and Hallet’s Point, two miles away. The Charlemagne was going too slow; at that rate they would be under the Glasgow’s broadside before they even made it to the Gate, and that would be an end to things.

  ‘Mr Rumstick, send someone to cut that fore staysail away. Just cut it!’ Biddlecomb waited, ten seconds, twenty seconds, and then the Charlemagne lurched forward as the sea anchor was cut free. She felt lighter underfoot and he could sense, without measuring it against the shore, that they were moving faster.

  He stepped aft to the taffrail and peered down into their wake, afraid that the sail would hang up in the rudder and continue to slow them down. But the gray hundle of canvas emerged from beneath the counter, undulating and sinking in the river. By the time the Glasgow passed over it, it would be embedded in the muck.

  He looked up at the Glasgow, towering over them. Less than three hundred yards astern. Along her yellow sides he could see the gunports raised, the great guns run out. He had hoped they would not do that, not yet. He had hoped to avoid her broadside. But now that would be impossible.

  The land to th
e north and south was passing swiftly, more swiftly than was warranted by the mere fifteen knots of wind that was blowing over their transom. The current was carrying the Charlemagne, sweeping her down to Hell Gate, and sweeping the frigate along with her.

  ‘Make your head right for Hallet’s Point,’ Biddlecomb called forward to William Stanton.

  ‘Right for Hallet’s Point, aye,’ Stanton replied, then turning to the helmsmen called, ‘Port your helm a bit … good, steady as she goes.’

  Virginia was standing by the lee rail ramming a wad down the barrel of her pistol. ‘Miss Stanton, damn it, down below with you, please.’

  ‘Aye, aye, Captain,’ Virginia said with a smile, and a playful tone that made Biddlecomb even more angry.

  ‘Hands to braces!’ he called forward, turning to matters of more immediate concern.

  The Glasgow was coming up, coming much faster than he had realized, and he wondered if he had hung on to the sea-anchor a bit too long. If he had, there was nothing for it now. The frigate’s bow chaser roared out again, but Biddlecomb knew from hard experience that the closer the frigate came, the less likely it was that her bow chasers would bear, aimed, as they were, at an angle away from the frigate’s centerline.

  The Charlemagne flew past the gaping entrance of Flushing Bay to the south, past the Two Brothers to the north. Buchannan’s Island was broad on the starboard bow, on the larboard was the wooded area known as the Pinfolds, and beyond the bowsprit, less than half a mile away, was the entrance to Hell Gate. From where he stood it did not even look like a channel, appearing more like a narrow inlet, but that was only because the far end of the passage was hidden by the dogleg. It was time to issue orders.

  Biddlecomb stepped up to the break of the quarterdeck. ‘Listen up, you men!’ he shouted, and all heads turned aft. ‘Sail trimmers, stand by sheets and halyards. On my order I want you to let ’em fly, just cast them off, you hear? Gun crews man the starboard battery, get ready to fire on my command. Mr Sprout, please lay aft. Carry on.’

  A buzz of speculation ran fore and aft, but the men moved to their stations and Biddlecomb was satisfied that they understood and would carry out their duties. With a quick word to the bosun he explained what he wanted and sent him forward to attend to it. Biddlecomb then stepped over and said, ‘I’ll take the conn now, William.’ He could not help smiling, a smile that was equal parts conspiratorial and filial.

  ‘Aye,’ Stanton said, smiling as well, then in a loud voice announced, ‘Captain has the conn!’

  ‘Now … Virginia, will you get the hell below?’ Biddlecomb shouted, noticing that she had moved to the break of the quarterdeck and stopped. ‘William, will you see her below?’

  ‘Aye,’ Stanton said with a look of resignation on his face, ‘I’ll try.’

  Biddlecomb stood by the helmsmen, feet at shoulder width, hands clasped behind his back, and watched the mouth of the Harlem River opening up to starboard and the entrance to Hell Gate gaping before them. Even from there he could see the confused, swirling chop of that treacherous spot of water near the tip of Hallet’s Point known as the Pott.

  He looked aft. The Glasgow was no more than one hundred yards astern, charging down like an enraged bull, overwhelming, great guns thrust from her side. Maltby, if it was Maltby still in command, intended no doubt to hang on the Charlemagne’s heels through Hell Gate and then beat them to flotsam in the wider part of the East River beyond, destroy them under the eyes of the citizens of New York. And that was fine; he could intend whatever he pleased.

  Biddlecomb swiveled around. The shoreline was close by, to north and south, and under his keel all of the water of Long Island Sound was funneling through the narrow hose of the East River and screaming into the nozzle of Hell Gate. This was the moment.

  ‘Helm hard a-port! Put your helm hard a-port!’ he shouted at the helmsmen, though they were less than five feet away. The two men at the tiller could not have been more surprised by the command, but they were experienced seamen, and though their eyes went wide, they pushed the long tiller over.

  The Charlemagne heeled hard as she slewed round, turning broadside to the wind, broadside to the frigate tearing down on them. ‘Sail trimmers, let fly! Let it all go! Larboard battery, fire as you bear!’

  Overhead, topgallants and topsails came flogging down, the perfect symmetry and power of the sails collapsing in a loud, banging confusion. The Charlemagne continued to turn, and now the frigate was right on their beam, fifty yards away. The American brig swung up into the wind until her bow was facing the bow of the oncoming frigate.

  ‘Midships!’ Biddlecomb shouted, and the helmsmen pulled the tiller in and the Charlemagne came to stop, her bowsprit pointing upriver, the Glasgow’s jibboom just overlapping her own as the frigate passed down their side. ‘Mr Sprout, let go!’ Biddlecomb shouted and the bosun let fly the ring stopper and the anchor plunged into the East River. The heavy cable paid out through the hawse pipe as the brig gathered sternway.

  The forwardmost gun on the larboard side banged out as the Glasgow hurtled down on them, passing less than twenty yards away on their larboard side. The calm of the frigate’s quarterdeck was gone; now men, officers and seamen, were rushing around in pandemonium. The captain alone seemed undisturbed, standing by the starboard rail of the quarterdeck, a covey of midshipmen off to one side. He did not look like Maltby, but a man taller and thinner.

  The Charlemagne fired, again and again down the line, and the gun crews flung themselves to reloading, hoping to get off a second shot in the few seconds that the two ships would be broadside to broadside.

  And then the Glasgow fired, one gun after another as she passed the now anchored Charlemagne, the whistling, screeching shot from her long nine-pounders tearing up the shrouds and ripping chunks from the masts and bulwarks. They were firing chain shot, chain over round shot, and it was ripping standing and running rigging alike. At least one of the Charlemagnes lay dead, his blood pooling on the deck. But the brig’s anchor was holding fast, and the current had the frigate and was sweeping her past, sweeping her into Hell Gate, and they could do nothing to stop it.

  Gun for gun the Charlemagne and the Glasgow pounded away at each other as the British man-of-war flew past. Biddlecomb could see chunks of wood flying through the smoke, and he knew that the Charlemagnes were having some effect. But it was the current that would save them, if they were to be saved. He could see a gang of men on the frigate’s bow struggling with the best bower, and he smiled to himself. It was too late. They would not get that anchor down in time to stop themselves.

  He heard a pistol shot close by, then another and another. William Stanton and Virginia and John Adams were at the quarterdeck rail, searching out targets through the smoke. An officer hung dead in the Glasgow’s shrouds, his arm and leg tangled in the ratlines. ‘Virginia, goddamn it, get below!’ Biddlecomb screamed, wondering if Virginia had killed the man. Her face was as expressionless as her father’s as she spit a ball down the barrel, cocked the lock, searched out a target, aimed, and fired again. Only Adams still wore his idiotic grin.

  ‘Virginia, son of a—’ Biddlecomb shouted, but she was ignoring him and he did not have time to dedicate to this problem.

  And then the Glasgow was past, her quarter galley sweeping by at Biddlecomb’s eye level, swinging away from him. She was turning, coming up into the wind, her captain trying to check her forward motion before she was pulled into the grip of Hell Gate. Biddlecomb could not believe his luck, or the poor judgment of the Glasgow’s captain. It was the most foolish thing that he could do.

  The Glasgow heeled hard over, turning up into the wind, just as the Charlemagne had. She was careening sideways into the narrow part of the river, her sails coming full aback, studdingsails collapsing and flogging in a tangled and unholy mess. The frigate swept sideways into Hell Gate with greater and greater force as the current and the backed sails increased her sternway. She was completely beyond human control, completely at the mercy of win
d and tide.

  Thirty seconds later she went aground on Hallet’s Point. She stopped, not the sudden, jarring stop of a ship hitting a rock, but a more gentle cessation of movement as she sank, rudder first, in the mud. The tall rig shuddered and swayed as the frigate came to rest, pinned against the bank by the tons of water that flooded through the Gate. It would likely be days before she would float again.

  The Charlemagne was quiet, unnaturally quiet, though Biddlecomb realized that a part of that at least was the result of the broadsides impairing his hearing.

  And then the entire brig exploded in cheers. Men leapt up and down and waved their hats over their heads and clapped each other on the back. Biddlecomb felt strong arms around him, Stanton pounding his shoulders, Adams clasping his hand and shaking it.

  ‘Marvelous, Biddlecomb, marvelous! Bravo, I say!’ Adams was saying, and to Biddlecomb’s dulled hearing his voice seemed a normal volume. ‘Now I should think we can get a landing party together and attack the frigate over land, maybe one thrust by land, do you see, and one from a boat. Shall we tell off the men? I’ll be happy to take command of the shore party.’

  ‘A fine idea, Mr Adams,’ Biddlecomb said, ‘but in the interest of republicanism I think we shall go to Philadelphia first, and there you can take up your plan with the full committee.’ And before Adams could reply, he called for hands away aloft to set the sails to rights, and for Mr Sprout to rig the capstan.

  CHAPTER 3

  The Naval Committee

  Stephen Hopkins made his way toward the Philadelphia waterfront, leaning into the bitter autumn wind, assaulted by the leaves and the sand that swirled around the sidewalk bordering Chestnut Street. Windows set into the tall blocks of homes that lined the street cast their light on the walkway, revealing the patchwork of bricks amid the shadows.