The Mary Celeste

by Brian Freemantle

  ‘Remind the enquiry of the cargo of the Mary Celeste,’ said the Attorney-General.

  ‘Commercial alcohol,’ said Winchester.

  ‘Surprised as you were to learn there had been found a bloodstained sword aboard, how surprised would you be to be told that there is evidence of that cargo being broached?’

  ‘Broached?’

  ‘That was my word, sir,’ said Flood.

  ‘Which in shipping circles has a rather definite meaning,’ said Winchester, refusing to be subjugated by the confident little man before him. ‘Are you telling me that there is evidence of the cargo being tampered with … pierced, in fact, for the liquid to be drawn off?’

  Winchester was proving a more difficult witness than he had imagined he would be, decided Flood. A man of surprising composure, in fact. Unless, of course, he had anticipated the awkwardness of the questioning.

  ‘To my certain knowledge, there are three barrels in the hold of that vessel lying out there …’ said the Attorney-General, gesturing towards the window and the bay beyond, ‘… completely empty of their contents.’

  ‘Were the sides pierced? Or the barrel heads removed?’ demanded Winchester.

  ‘The barrels were empty,’ reiterated Flood, uncomfortable at the man’s insistence upon a method. ‘How do you imagine that came about?’

  ‘A hypothesis again,’ said Winchester. ‘But by its very nature, alcohol is inclined towards evaporation.’

  ‘If three barrels were to evaporate, then wouldn’t the tendency be for the whole cargo to diminish?’

  ‘I’m not a scientist,’ said Winchester. ‘I don’t know the answer to that.’

  Shadows began to lengthen in the enquiry chamber and Flood became aware of Cochrane shifting at his bench. It would not be long before the judge brought the proceedings to a close, realised the Attorney-General. It was time finally to shake this complacent man.

  ‘Isn’t there a far more sinister interpretation to be drawn from the inexplicable disappearance of a sober, experienced sailor and his family from a sound vessel with its sails set than some nebulous conjecture about freak weather and alcohol evaporation?’ he demanded, allowing the aggression to show.

  Again Winchester looked from his lawyer to Cochrane and Flood felt the stirrings of satisfaction, aware of the man’s concern.

  ‘… I don’t know …’ attempted Winchester, but the Attorney-General overrode him.

  ‘… with barrels of alcohol empty and bloodstained swords lying beneath cabin bunks, isn’t a far more likely explanation for this tragedy an orgy of drunkenness on the part of the crew, who then put to a death most foul their captain, his family and perhaps even the next most senior officers?’

  Winchester made an unknowing movement with his shoulders, his bewilderment obvious.

  ‘But to what point … what motive?’ he said uncertainly.

  ‘Can’t you help us with that, Captain Winchester?’

  Flood purposely kept his voice low, wanting it to carry no farther than Cochrane and the witness, so that the uncertainty of the crewmen of the Dei Gratia still to give evidence would be heightened.

  Captain Winchester stared directly across the short distance separating him from the Attorney-General, straightening in a positive effort to recover himself. Flood thought it might have been an illusion in the failing light, but he got a fleeting impression that the man’s deeply tanned face had suddenly lightened in colour.

  ‘I want an explanation of that remark, sir,’ he said, his voice almost as quiet as Flood’s.

  ‘My function at this enquiry isn’t to provide explanations,’ said Flood, aware that his arrogance would annoy the other man. ‘It is to seek them out. Tell me, Captain Winchester, why it was felt necessary even before the commencement of this enquiry for your counsel to urge haste for the release of the Mary Celeste?’

  The man’s face had paled, decided the Attorney-General. He wondered whether the cause were anger or fear.

  ‘As Mr Comwell explained,’ said Winchester stiffly, ‘there is lying in the holds of the Mary Celeste a valuable cargo which my company is contracted to deliver upon a certain date. While my clients are prepared to make certain allowances for the circumstances surrounding the vessel, they seek discharge as soon as possible. There is also a perishable cargo awaiting shipment from Messina.’

  ‘Delivery of the alcohol for the full, agreed payment?’

  There was no complacency now about Captain Winchester. He looked warily across the enquiry room, forehead lined in an attempt to follow the Attorney-General’s questioning.

  ‘Of course,’ he said finally.

  ‘Nearly $37,000?’

  ‘Slightly less than that.’

  ‘If we add to that value the value of the ship, some $14,000, we have an aggregate of about $51,000?’

  There was a sudden movement to the Attorney-General’s left and the lawyer Cornwell rose.

  ‘For some time,’ he said to the judge, ‘I have been anticipating some intervention on your behalf at the worrying direction of my learned friend’s questions. As this has not been forthcoming, I seek an assurance from the Attorney-General, through you, that there is some point or purpose to this somewhat bizarre interrogation, reminding the court at the same time that these are civil proceedings into a claim for salvage, nothing more.’

  Cochrane jerked up at the impudence of the interruption. ‘Are you questioning my conduct of this enquiry, sir?’ he demanded.

  ‘Under no circumstances,’ said Cornwell instantly, less abashed than he had been during his earlier clash with the man. ‘It is Mr Flood’s conduct I am calling into doubt.’

  With an obvious effort, Cochrane controlled his anger. His voice almost unnaturally level, he said, ‘I made it quite clear at the commencement of this enquiry, Mr Cornwell, that I intended to allow as much investigation as I deemed necessary to get to the heart of this matter. In my opinion, there has been nothing about the Attorney-General’s behaviour to earn the reminder from me of the nature of this hearing, any more than I need such remonstrances from you …’ He paused, turning to Flood. ‘And I leave it to the Attorney-General to provide what assurances he feels necessary about the point or purpose of his questioning.’

  Rejected again, Cornwell sat down and Flood turned to him, happy at the further confusion the man’s interruption had created.

  ‘I am delighted to assure my learned friend that every question I have posed today and will pose during future days has a very real and definite purpose … the purpose of finding the correct solution to this affair …’

  He turned back to where Captain Winchester was shifting at his place. The man was greatly disconcerted, decided Flood.

  ‘You are familiar with salvage claims?’ he asked.

  ‘No,’ said the owner. ‘Fortunately they have been rare occurrences in my experience.’

  ‘I’m sure the court is delighted to learn of your admirable record,’ said Flood. ‘But you will be aware, of course, of the nature of awards … the percentages normally allocated by courts?’

  ‘I understand they vary.’

  ‘Indeed they do, depending upon the circumstances and the enquiry’s acceptance of the evidence produced before it. But tell me, Captain Winchester, what would you expect a court to award in this case if it were satisfied that the claim from the crew of the Dei Gratia were completely justified?’

  Winchester took a long time to reply, twice looking to his counsel as if he expected a fresh challenge.

  At last he said, ‘From loosely established precedents, I would assume them to be looking towards something around 50 per cent of the total of cargo and ship value.’

  ‘Which we have already agreed is around $50,000. So we are talking of a sum around $25,000?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘A fair sum of money?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Particularly when, with the exception of a few barrels, the cargo remains intact and ready to be unloaded at Genoa whene
ver the Mary Celeste is released. For full and complete settlement of some further $37,000 on top of any salvage award?’

  Again Winchester looked to his counsel, but when the man remained seated he came back to the Attorney-General and said, ‘I am at a loss to understand the point of this discussion.’

  ‘Are you, Captain Winchester?’

  ‘What inference are you making, sir!’ demanded the owner.

  ‘Raising questions again,’ said Flood easily. ‘Questions to which I shall return during the course of this enquiry until we get what I consider are satisfactory answers …’

  He turned from the witness, towards Cochrane, estimating this to be the precise moment he should stop, to cause the maximum effect.

  ‘That concludes my questioning for today,’ he said. ‘But I would seek to lodge in the court’s record the request to recall this witness during the course of the hearing if it is considered necessary.’

  ‘The court notes your request,’ said Cochrane, rising gratefully. ‘The court will be adjourned until tomorrow.’

  The moment the judge left the chamber, Winchester hurried towards his counsel, gesturing as he did so for the American Consul to accompany him.

  Flood smiled, well satisfied with his first day. He took time collecting his scattered documents and then walked from the room, aware that they would have seen his expression and found it as unsettling as they had his cross-examination. He had just disrobed when Baumgartner appeared at the door.

  ‘Sir James would like to see you,’ he said.

  ‘Went well today,’ said the registrar, as they walked towards the judge’s chambers. It was more of a question than an observation.

  ‘It will get better as the days progress,’ predicted Flood confidently.

  Cochrane was at the window, as he had been during their encounter before the enquiry had begun, when the Attorney-General entered.

  ‘Thank you for your support,’ he said immediately, to Cochrane.

  ‘Gave you the undertaking before the proceedings began,’ the other man replied. ‘You raised a lot of questions in there today.’

  ‘And I intend getting the answers,’ said Flood.

  ‘You think Winchester is involved in whatever happened?’

  ‘He was too composed … unworried. Should have been far more outraged by the obvious inferences I was making.’

  ‘He could just be a dour man,’ pointed out the judge.

  ‘More likely a guilty one.’

  ‘I’ll need more than innuendo and suspicion.’

  ‘You’ll have your evidence,’ said Flood. ‘I’m determined you’ll have your evidence.’

  He glanced at the carriage clock upon the mantelpiece of the judge’s chambers. By now, he decided, Dr Patron would be well into his analyses. Of all the evidence, that which Dr Patron was going to produce would be the most damning.

  Because it was the nearest place available, they went to the house of the American Consul, Horatio Sprague. Cornwell sat at the desk, jotting pad before him, with Pisani opposite, but Captain Winchester, engulfed by anger, was unable to sit. Instead he strode about the room, jerking his arms out for emphasis, a vein pumping in his forehead. Sprague lapsed into his customary role of listener.

  ‘Railroaded,’ protested Winchester. ‘The damned man has got a conviction about murder and is determined to railroad me into some position of guilt, the instigator of a crime with God knows who.’

  ‘I’ve rarely been present at judicial proceedings like it,’ said Cornwell, more controlled.

  ‘I’m not for a moment suggesting that you are in any way involved,’ Sprague said to the ship-owner, ‘but broached cargo and bloodstained swords sound very suspicious.’

  ‘He never said how the cargo had been broached,’ said Winchester. ‘I still say I’m right about evaporation.’

  ‘The Attorney-General didn’t say a great many things,’ said Pisani reflectively. ‘In fact, he was far more damaging in what he left unsaid.’

  ‘What can we do?’ demanded Winchester.

  ‘About what?’ asked Cornwell and the owner realised that both the lawyers and the consul were regarding him curiously.

  ‘In the name of God, surely you don’t believe I’m in any way involved in the disappearance of the captain and crew of one of my own vessels!’

  ‘Sorry,’ apologised Cornwell. ‘It was the phrasing of the question.’

  ‘I meant,’ said Winchester, the clarity of his pronunciation and explanation indicating his annoyance at the other’s doubts, ‘what can be done to prevent this from turning into a kangaroo court?’

  Cornwell looked enquiringly at Sprague, who moved his shoulders in a gesture of helplessness.

  ‘Very little,’ admitted the Consul. ‘Frederick Solly Flood is a man of some established standing in this colony and is the duly appointed Attorney-General. By many he’s regarded as a worthy advocate. Personally I regard him as a man with far too vivid an imagination, but Sir James Cochrane seems intent on giving him his head. And he’s the duly appointed judge.’

  ‘So I have to sit there, day after day, while the damned man fabricates evidence to suit his convictions.’

  ‘Come now,’ protested Cornwell. ‘It can’t get quite as desperate as that.’

  ‘Can’t it!’ said the owner. ‘I don’t recall your attempts to set things right being favourably received today.’

  ‘No,’ conceded the lawyer. ‘The court feeling is certainly against us.’

  ‘What about this bloodstained sword?’ said Winchester.

  ‘I knew of the existence of the sword, from the inventory prepared by the court marshal,’ said Cornwell. ‘The suggestions of bloodstains came as a complete surprise to me.’

  ‘And not just on the sword. On the decking as well,’ Sprague reminded them. He’d been so sure of finding some logical reason for his friends’ disappearance; even hoped a ship would arrive somewhere with them aboard and then the whole episode could have been explained. Now he was unsure.

  ‘Do you know Captain Morehouse?’ Cornwell asked his client.

  ‘One encounter,’ said the ship-owner. ‘His reputation is that of being an excellent captain. Why?’

  ‘So you’ve no reason to doubt his affidavit of how he came upon the vessel and took her into charge?’

  The room was completely quiet as Sprague and Winchester considered the implications of the lawyer’s question.

  ‘Preposterous!’ said Winchester, at last. ‘You surely can’t propose that a respected captain and crew would slaughter fellow countrymen … and a baby as well … in the doubtful expectation of getting $25,000 salvage?’

  ‘They wouldn’t have known the value of the cargo,’ argued Cornwell. ‘They could have imagined it would be something far more valuable and that an award might be higher.’

  Captain Winchester smiled for the first time, shaking his head in anticipation of being able to destroy a conjecture.

  ‘But they would have known,’ he said. ‘At the last meeting I had with Captain Briggs before he sailed, he told me he was dining that evening with Captain Morehouse. The men were friends.’

  Studying his friend, Captain Morehouse pushed his chair back from the tiny cabin table, to enable the steward to clear the meal more easily. Benjamin Briggs was a square-bodied, compact man of whom the initial impression was one of prudent neatness. Although worn comparatively long, as if to compensate for his high forehead, the man’s hair was freshly bartered and the moustache and goatee were trimmed shorter than the usual fashion. The suiting was conservatively cut from durable cloth, chosen more for its length of wear than its comfort, and his nails, short-dipped, were still chipped and his hands hardened with the evidence that he worked his ship as readily as any crew he commanded.

  He was a man without mannerisms or need for unnecessary conversation or movement. Captain Morehouse knew there were some who would have regarded Briggs’s company as dull, but that was not the reaction the man drew from him.

&nb
sp; What then? Morehouse concentrated, seeking a word for his feelings and becoming unhappy with the only one which came to mind. Reassurance seemed illogical. Yet that was how he thought of the other man. Benjamin Briggs was a man in whose presence one felt reassurance, whether on the pitching deck of a ship or in the quiet surroundings of a social evening.

  Briggs had minutes before raised his head from the prayer of thanks at the end of the meal. There had been similar gratitude before it began and Morehouse thought that in many people, particularly seamen, the piety would have appeared peculiar or an affectation, maybe even something at which to smirk. But with Briggs it had appeared completely natural. He continued the reflection. Many other people, even of sincere conviction, would have passed up the custom at another’s table, to avoid embarrassment or perhaps ridicule. But that would never have occurred to Briggs. He was as uncompromising in his attitude to religion as he was in everything else. Morehouse found him an easy man to admire and like.

  He lit his pipe, not bothering to offer the pouch to Briggs, who did not take a pipe.

  Morehouse got it properly kindled, then said, ‘So tomorrow you’re off, the owner-captain.’

  ‘Part-owner captain,’ qualified Briggs.

  ‘It was a big step, using your capital and borrowing more.’

  ‘I discussed it thoroughly with Sarah. She encouraged it.’

  ‘You like Captain Winchester?’

  Briggs considered the question. ‘No reason to think otherwise,’ he said. ‘One of the fairest men along the waterfront, from his conduct so far.’

  ‘That’s my feeling, too,’ said the second man. ‘I’ll admit an envy for what you’ve managed.’

  ‘I was only talking of it to Sarah today,’ said Briggs distantly. ‘It might so easily not have come about.’

  ‘How so?’

  ‘There was a time when I thought of the church … family influence, I suppose. And childhood impressions. I lived in a pastor’s house for four years.’

  ‘What stopped you?’

  ‘The common sense of my father.’

  ‘He talked you out of it?’

  Briggs smiled. ‘He was far too wise for that. He just let the infatuation run its course. I served as altar boy and general helper in my grandfather’s church and then realised like everyone else what my feelings really were. I don’t think I would have had the courage to become a priest.’