Sterett swung over the rail and descended the netting. “Mr. Putnam, come with me; you may be wanted.”
“Aye, sir.”
As he climbed up the polacca’s netting and over the rail, Bliven’s first thought was of the blood; he had no idea there could be so much. Each starboard roll brought a thickening of the course of blood that spilled over from half a dozen places; he had always read of blood running from the scuppers, and now he had seen it. The corsair’s deck was thick and slick with it. On the farm he had helped his father with slaughtering pigs when cold weather came, so he had seen pools of gore before. But this, men were wounded not with a bullet but with a shower of grape, or a cloud of splinters as a ball crushed in a section of the hull. Men were not wounded, they were rent in pieces.
That was his first thought. His second was of Lieutenant Sterett. He knew he must show no horror, no thought that tended toward pity. Swinging over the rail, his feet met the deck squarely as the ship topped a swell. It would not do to slip and fall in the blood; Sterett would mark him most favorably if he strode through it, confidently, taking no notice that twenty men had bled out their lives in it.
Bliven’s duty was at Sterett’s side, and the lieutenant commandant and two marines as soon as their feet touched the deck rushed toward the stern, swords drawn, to where a man in a black tunic heavily corded with gold reclined against the stump of the mizzenmast. He had black hair and a trimmed white beard.
“Who are you?” demanded Sterett.
“I am Reis Mahomet Rous,” he answered, “admiral in the service of His Highness, the bashaw of Tripoli.”
Sterett was silent for a tense second before he fairly spluttered, “You are another damned Scotchman!”
“The captain was badly wounded,” continued the admiral, “and has been taken below. It is I who surrender the ship to you, Lieutenant—” He paused for a name.
“Sterett! You are another damned bloody Scot. Explain that to me!”
“I can’t bloody well help where I was born!” the admiral roared in pain. “Can you?”
“Well, you are a man of no honor, sir! You surrendered and resumed the fight!”
“And you drew us out under false colors, Mr. Sterett. Do you think you have the right to make accusations about honor?”
“We raised our own flag before we commenced firing!”
“So did we, both times.”
“You surrendered!”
“No, we drew you in.”
“Don’t bandy words with me, I could hang you this minute and be within my rights.”
The admiral gave a single, sighing laugh. “Proceed, then, if you will. It will be more merciful than to return home vanquished.”
Sterett had spent the worst of his fury and looked about the carnage on deck. “What are your casualties?”
Admiral Rous collected a breath. “Twenty dead, including the surgeon. Thirty wounded, including the captain. I do not include myself, I am not that dangerously hurt. Twenty are unharmed. Can you send your surgeon aboard to care for my wounded?”
“Mr. Porter?” Sterett looked to his side.
“Sir?”
“Can you report on our casualties?”
“None, sir.” Sterett looked at him, confounded. “Not one,” he repeated. “Not a scratch.”
Sterett shook his head in wonder. “Very well. Admiral, we have a chaplain aboard. Do you desire spiritual comfort?”
“No. All my men are Moslems, they would not take it kindly.”
“I was thinking of you, you damned turncoat.”
Even seated against the remains of the mizzenmast, Rous drew himself up. “All that I have done, I did to stay alive. I will not become a hypocrite now.”
Sterett pursed his lips. “As you wish. Mr. Putnam?”
Bliven snapped to, alert at being wanted. “Yes, sir?”
“Take the boat back to the Enterprise. Return with the doctor and tell him to bring his kit. There are thirty wounded for him to sort and care for best as he can. And bring the carpenter, and as many men as he can get in the boat.”
“Very good, sir.” He turned to obey almost before he was done saluting, and was over the side.
Sterett observed his boarding crew disarm the remaining twenty pirates who were not wounded, binding them and sitting them back to back about the mainmast, where they could be easily watched. A second detail gathered the thirty wounded in the main berthing area below, tying those still capable of moving about, and making up a platform for the surgeon’s mate to work on them when he came over. They searched thoroughly for weapons, which they deposited near Sterett on the quarterdeck, a growing pile of dirks and cutlasses and scimitars, old muskets and blunderbusses, and four large daggers of a curious manufacture, with polished handles, elaborately worked scabbards, and wicked, curving blades nearly a foot long and half as wide.
“The ship is ours, sir,” reported the marine lieutenant at last. “The wounded are gathered and awaiting the surgeon.”
“Very well,” responded Sterett. “Rest your men, give them a ration of grog while we wait.” He looked impatiently back to the Enterprise and saw Putnam, the surgeon’s mate, and the carpenter, with four others, more than halfway returned; in a moment they were up the netting and on deck.
“Begging your pardon, sir,” said the marine. “There is no grog below. No rum, or whiskey, or wine or anything.”
“We do not consume alcohol,” growled the admiral. “Our religion forbids it.”
“Well,” huffed Sterett, “it is a queer religion that allows piracy and murder and pillage, but no drinking.” He sheathed his sword. “What ship is this, again?”
“The Tripoli,” said the admiral. “Fourteen guns, one hundred eighty tons.” Then he added disdainfully, “A nice prize for a young lieutenant.”
To Porter’s ears, the pirate admiral had said a yearned-for word. “Yes. Mr. Sterett, sir. Will you be naming a prize crew?” he asked. As first lieutenant, he knew it would have been pointless to conceal the hope that he would assume command of her.
“No,” said Sterett curtly.
“Sir?” Porter was incredulous.
Sterett could not mask his own disgust with what he had to say. “Our orders are to protect our commerce and wage defensive battle only. They do not provide for the taking of prizes.”
“What!”
Sterett held up his hands. “Don’t complain to me about it, take it up with Congress. We cannot act offensively until there is a declaration of war, and they don’t know yet that war exists. Admiral”—he turned his attention again to Rous—“my further orders are specific. I am to leave you the means to reach a port, and there you see Malta. I recommend you make for there. Mr. Putnam?”
“Sir?”
“Take these four you brought, roll their guns and carriages overboard. Then go below, carry up their shot and powder, and throw it into the sea as well.”
“Aye, sir. Come on, boys, let’s start with this one.”
“Mr. Lanford?”
“Aye, sir,” answered the carpenter.
“Saw off his mainmast at a height of six feet. Rig him one sail, enough to make for that island.”
“Aye, sir.”
It took more than an hour for the surgeon’s mate to bind the wounded and lay out the dead and the parts of the dead, then the cutter returned him and the carpenter and his men to the Enterprise. When it returned, he, Porter, and Bliven gathered in the polacca’s waist to follow. In an unseen moment as the marines were casting the entire assemblage of pirate weaponry overboard, Bliven leaned down and plucked up one of the enormous curving daggers with the carved handles that he had marked earlier. He did not remove it from its worked leather scabbard, but slipped it under his shirt. One of the marines found and lowered a boarding ladder, which he meant to make their descent easier, but it missed its pu
rpose, for the blood on their shoes made them more likely to slip on its steps than they would have in simply climbing down the netting.
Once back on his own deck, Bliven was aware for the first time that his knees had begun to shake.
“Mr. Putnam.” It was Sterett’s voice.
“Yes, sir.”
Sterett looked him down and up. “Well done, by God.”
Bliven laughed just once, a single, almost hysterical “Ha!”
“And Mr. Putnam.”
“Sir?”
“Regulations be damned, you have earned your first rum. Now get you below.”
“Aye, sir.”
“And what now, sir?” asked Porter.
“On to Malta,” said Sterett, “and pick up water for the squadron. They will be getting thirsty.”
• • •
OUTSIDE THE HARBOR OF TRIPOLI, Dale, James Barron, and the President encountered the Tripoli, limping home to port, before the Enterprise reached them. When Barron hailed the battered polacca, Rous told him he had been beaten by a twenty-four-gun Frenchman. Not allowed to take prizes, Barron allowed him into Tripoli harbor. It was not until he encountered Sterett and the Enterprise the following day, riding low from the thirty tons of water in her hold, that he learned of the battle.
“By God,” Dale kept saying as he read Sterett’s report, “by God,” and he handed the pages as he finished them to Barron. “This is signal. This is—you expect gallantry from Sterett, but these boys, this, Bandy, sticking fast at the wheel as a pirate tries to cut him to pieces, and Putnam, kills one himself and then shoots the one hacking at Bandy. I tell you this is the stuff of which navy traditions are made. I want to meet those midshipmen.”
Sterett sent them on board the President, where they were taken down the ladder to the gun deck, where they were dumbstruck by the neat, curving line of deadly long twenty-fours, their lanyards coiled, their swabs and rams hung overhead. They saw the next ladder down to the berth deck, but were led aft to the commodore’s cabin. In their wildest imagination they could not have conjured such a spacious ship.
Dale and Barron spoke to them alone for more than half an hour before sending them out to the wardroom and ordering the best dinner the ship could provide. “Young men such as you are the pride of the navy, the future of the navy,” said Dale. “You have begun great careers on this voyage. We shall follow you with the keenest interest.” Dale said this outside the door of his cabin, and within the hearing of several lieutenants, both naval and marine.
Thus it was a great shock when, forty minutes later, Barron answered a frantic knock at his door and discovered the cook in a terrible state of agitation. “Beg pardon, sir, but you better come quick. There is a big fight down on the berth deck.”
Barron grabbed his sword and clattered down the ladder. On gaining the berth deck he saw a gathering of young officers forward, and he heard the unmistakable pinging of saber blades.
“Tell other men that I am a coward?” It was a boy’s voice that reached Barron as he approached; it was shrill, almost hysterical. “I’ll show you for a coward!”
“Sam, stop this! I never—ha!”
Barron heard a staccato of metallic blade strikes, and the first voice repeated, “Damn you! Damn you!”
“All right, then, damn you!” the second voice shouted, and Barron could tell from the flurry that he had assumed a furious offense. He discerned from the accusations and protests that it was not a duel, really, for in duels there was little or no talking; that had already come and gone. This must be a very amateurish brawl indeed.
“Belay that!” Captain Barron’s voice rolled, booming, down the gun deck even as they heard the hard soles of his shoes closer and louder. “Hold there, by God!” They heard the slink of his sword from its scabbard.
Their blood up, neither Bliven nor Samuel trusted to lower his saber, even at the captain’s order. They stood frozen, their blades crossed, hearing his voice but neither taking his eyes from the other’s. They heard the staccato of footsteps draw nearer along the planks but did not look away, seeing only Barron’s blade slash between them, knocking their sabers down to the deck.
“What!” demanded Barron. “By God, how dare you? What do you mean by this?” From the corner of his eye the captain detected the ill-suppressed smirks among the lieutenants and assessed the true case, that the boys had been goaded to the confrontation. God only knew what malevolent whisper had set the violence in motion. “So! So!” He was a ball of fury seeking a place to strike, and a couple of the junior officers stepped almost imperceptibly toward the rear of the clot.
Sam Bandy spoke up as manly as he could. “It was a matter of my honor, sir.”
“Your honor, sir?” roared Barron. “You are fourteen years old!” He started to add that questions of honor should come only after being old enough to shave, but he stifled it, because even in this moment he knew that might not really be the case. In this navy that sent boys to sea with the prospect of fighting and dying like men, that might not be altogether true at all. “You two,” he growled. “Go to my cabin, this instant.” Sam and Bliven turned to go, but then Barron nodded down at their swords. “Give me those, both of you.”
They retreated meekly toward the ladder and then up, as Barron’s gaze flashed among the junior officers. “Well amused, are you?” They knew better than to speak. “Well. Let us hope that your entertainment was worth the cost of what will come.” They knew he was noting down who was there and who was not.
Barron regained his cabin, joined by Commodore Dale, who had heard the disturbance from the head of the ladder but had not descended. Sam and Bliven were still flushed, but calming down enough to be afraid of what they had done.
“I am shocked,” sputtered Barron; Dale stood to one side, silent. “What in God’s name was this about?”
Both boys looked at the floor.
“Speak!”
“Sir,” said Sam haltingly, “I heard one of the lieutenants say that Mr. Putnam, well, asserted that I played little part in taking the Tripoli, and that my part was not as gallant as his, that the pirate he killed was about to kill me and take the wheel.”
“I never did,” Bliven protested.
“Be quiet,” ordered Barron. “From whom did you overhear this?”
Sam started to say that he did not know their names, he was not acquainted with them, but then realized that speaking against a lieutenant, even an anonymous one, could land him in such grief as he had never known.
“Speak up, boy. Who said it?”
“The responsibility is mine, sir, no one else’s.”
“And did some other of the lieutenants impart to you that you must challenge and fight him or lose the respect of all the officers?”
Bliven and Sam looked at each other.
“Well?”
“Whatever I say, I’m doomed,” muttered Sam.
“How do you mean?” Dale stepped in.
“Sir, we’ve been at sea long enough to know how it works. We’ve seen it. One lieutenant will order a sailor to do this, then a second will come along and order him to do something else, and then he will be whipped for whichever order he neglects. Then they laugh about it.”
Barron folded his arms.
“Sir, the sailors do not deserve that,” said Bliven. “And forgive me, sir, neither do the midshipmen. Forgive me, sir, but is it not well known in the service that the lieutenants abuse all their inferiors most terribly?”
Barron’s voice softened. “I know the conditions at sea. Young men, full of fight, and the fight might be months away. And then not everyone gets to fight. You two fought the enemy and you both behaved superlatively. But now can you imagine the jealousy of the junior officers stuck here on blockade? I don’t defend them, but I understand them. I know that midshipmen are caught under the thumb of the lieutenants.” He gestured at Da
le. “We all know they abuse you, but it is the naval tradition; it binds you to the service.”
“Yes, sir,” they muttered almost together, although neither one saw any connection between the abuse and loyalty to the service.
“So, will you agree to hold each other blameless?”
Sam and Bliven glared at each other intently until Sam finally swelled back up. “Sir, I don’t know what he said.”
“By God,” said Barron, “I’ll tell you what you are going to do. You are going to shake hands.” Sam and Bliven eyed each other.
“Shake hands this instant!”
At least there was no issue of who would extend his hand first. They went out simultaneously and they clasped hands for about two seconds, Bliven looking over Sam’s shoulder and Sam looking at the floor.
“No, by God,” growled Barron, “you’ll not get away with that. Take hands again and keep them there.”
The midshipmen obeyed, embarrassed.
“Now repeat after me: I swear.”
They knew better than to provoke him further. “I swear,” they said.
“That I will never fight you again,” said Barron.
“That I will never fight you again,” they answered.
“For any pretext or provocation whatsoever.”
“For any pretext or provocation whatsoever.”
“I will defend you in battle.”
“I will defend you in battle.”
“And I will be as watchful for your honor.”
“And I will be as watchful for your honor.”
“As I am for my own.”
“As I am for my own.”
“So help me God.”
Both boys swallowed. “So help me God.”
“All right.”
They released hands and took a step apart, shaken. Barron thought they must be religious enough to appreciate the gravity of an oath before God.
“I take it, then, that I no longer have to worry about you two flying at each other like a couple of hotheads?”
“Yes, sir,” they answered together.
Barron pointed to his desk. “Take up your swords.”
The Shores of Tripoli Page 7