City of Glory

by Beverly Swerling

  By the time they’d finished the kidney, the rain had stopped. Will pulled back the canvas flap and revealed the mottled red and gold sunset sky. “Mackerel sky at night, sailor’s delight,” he said happily. “Maybe there’ll be another ship tomorrow.”

  “Not likely,” Hannah said. “This New York City is Jericho, and there’s an ambush against it and the walls are going to come down.”

  Jesse looked startled. “You said it was a fine city for work and you could—”

  “Ssh,” Will cautioned. “Don’t sass Hannah when she’s prophesying. She’s not herself then. Sometimes she don’t even remember what she says.”

  “And Joshua set the city on fire,” Hannah said softly, staring out into the scarlet sunset. “And the flames shot up as far as the sky, and you could see them for miles around. Miles and miles.”

  The rain puddled on the well-waxed wood and dripped from the oiled lines and tightly furled canvas of Canton Star. “Call this a storm, do you?” Finbar O’Toole shouted, laughing up at the lowering sky. “You must be getting tired.” His ship pitched and heaved in New York Harbor. O’Toole smiled broadly at the thought of what it must feel like below, with no fresh air to make it a bit easier to bear. Serves you right, you godrotting bastard.

  Ostensibly, he was alone with the three men left aboard now that the ship had been unladed and moved away from the wharf to a mooring in the roads, amid the moldering sloops, schooners, and merchantmen imprisoned in the harbor by the blockade. Most of the crew had been given their wages and let go. But Blakeman had offered his captain an extra quarter percent of the profits of the sale—on top of the three percent that was his payment for the voyage—if he’d remain aboard and take charge of the ship and a few hands to tend her. A month or two, Blakeman said. Fair enough; there was no place on earth Finbar O’Toole was more comfortable than on a ship. And soon as he could get done what needed doing, there really would be only himself and the tars aboard.

  O’Toole glanced toward the bow. Tammy Tompkins was on watch, huddled below a tarpaulin awning rigged in the forecastle. The other crewmen were sleeping off their dinners in hammocks on the berthing deck below. As good an opportunity as he’d have, O’Toole decided. He raised the hatch near the mizzenmast and started down the ladderway.

  A merchantman was designed to be a seagoing warehouse; everything belowdecks that wasn’t strictly necessary to keep her afloat was eliminated in favor of more room in the hold. Canton Star was a hundred feet long and pierced for twenty cannon. O’Toole had known he could barely handle three, even with his full crew of nineteen. He’d mounted half a dozen guns before they left China, three to use if he must and three in reserve—for when the bloody barrels burst in the heat o’ battle, as they always did. But thank the Blessed Virgin and all the saints, he hadn’t fired a shot. He knew when he agreed to captain Star and chance a run of the blockade that he couldn’t outfight the poxing Royal Navy. His only hope was to sneak past her. And he had. A bit o’ seamanship, yes, but mostly sheer poxing luck. Joyful had the notion he was some kind o’ miracle worker; the lad had listened to too many fanciful stories at Morgan Turner’s knee. Though from the sound of it, ’twas his cousin Andrew as told him the strangest. True enough about the treasure Captain Turner buried, but that Andrew, who’d never been aboard ship in his life, knew where it was when Morgan Turner himself had forgot—that was hard to credit.

  The captain’s cabin was in the stern, beautifully fitted in wood and brass, and spacious by shipboard standards. It was also one of the few places aboard with a lock on the inside of the door. O’Toole let himself in and shot the bolt. The light that entered through the rain-lashed single porthole was murky and gray, but enough for him to find a small lantern, strike a spark, and get it lit. He held the lantern high, looking at the section of oak-paneled wall that appeared exactly like all the rest, unless you knew exactly the place to press to reveal a small hiding place. That’s where the poxed ebony box had been the entire journey. Bad joss, that box. He’d have refused to take it, refused to captain this ship or make this journey, if it hadn’t been that doing so solved an enormous problem of his own.

  O’Toole lifted the hatch in the corner opposite the secret wall locker and descended the steps that provided the only access to the stores kept below the orlop deck. During a voyage the reserves of rum were kept in that secure region below the captain’s cabin. It was also the location of the aft powder magazine. The opening and the stairs themselves were broader than any other ladderway aboard because they had been built to allow for manhandling large kegs above decks.

  The rum was finished, doled out in fair and proper rations over the nine weeks of the journey. As for the powder kegs, he’d taken aboard fewer than the magazine held, and far fewer than three cannon would have needed in an all-out battle, much less six. God alone knew what might have happened if that had been discovered. Crew would have hung him from the yardarm. But the only way they’d have known was if there was a battle, and in that case they’d all be dead or captured anyway, and the risk had to be taken. He’d needed space in the after magazine for his own special cargo.

  There was a sour smell of fresh vomit. Despite all the dangers, the poxed buzzard was still alive. “Nei ho ma, how are you, you sodding Chinese bastard? As bad as you smell, I warrant.” O’Toole used his foot to shove aside the false wall behind the empty powder kegs. “C’mon, you tset-ha tset-ha. Come out o’there. It’s safe enough now.”

  Time was, when the Cantonese known as Thumbless Wu would have gone for a knife if anyone called him an ugly male stalk. Today he could barely pull himself out of the three-by-four-foot hole where he’d spent the entire crossing, released only in the dead of night when O’Toole thought it safe to let him stretch his cramped legs for an agonizing few minutes. In the first days Wu had spewed forth endless questions each time he saw the Irishman. After a week he’d been too ill to speak. Earlier, when they tied up at the wharf, he began to feel better, but now the storm had made it worse again. He could barely lift his head. Never mind. He was in America; his joss had held. Wu got shakily to his knees and loosed a steady stream of Cantonese curses. Just to prove to himself he was still alive. “Diu lay lo mo hail! Leng gwai!”

  “Fuck your mother’s hole as well, you poxed misery. Sweet Christ but you stink. Here, clean yourself up some.” O’Toole pulled a damp rag from his pocket and watched Wu gratefully bury his face in it. The lantern created a shimmer of red-gold light—the hold was lined with copper to prevent a stray spark from setting off the gunpowder—and O’Toole held it higher to get a better look at the man who’d caused him so much grief and extracted a payment he’d bitterly hated making. Wu’s sam, a long cotton gown, was encrusted with the sweat and filth of the journey. His fu, the long, loose pants worn beneath the sam, were equally disgusting. Sweet Christ Jesus, what with his clothes, his long braided queue, and there probably being not another Chinese in New York City, what would happen to the bugger? Not his worry. Finbar O’Toole made a bargain and kept it, and that was him finished. “I’m taking you ashore. To dei. Land. New York City. Nei ming baak ma? You understand?”

  Wu let loose another stream of Cantonese. Mostly curses, but threats as well. O’Toole leaned down so the man could see into his eyes. “Now you listen to me, you yellow bastard. And don’t pretend you don’t understand English because I know damned well that you do. I kept my word and I brought you here—though Almighty God alone knows why you wanted to come. But you’re here and you’re alive, which is the greatest amount of joss even a ho choi lucky bastard like you could have hoped for. And that’s us finished. Seung dang! We’re square. Paid off my ten thousand and I don’t owe you one farthing more. Now keep your mouth shut and come with me, or you’ll have to swim or drown.”

  The small, light boat known as the captain’s gig was suspended aft, below the taffrail. O’Toole released it from the davits and quickly and quietly lowered the boat to the water. He glanced around. Tompkins was still in the bow, the t
wo others yet asleep below. Best of all, the rain had stopped and the sky was streaked red with a fine sunset. He signaled and the stowaway crept forward, muttering fierce discontent when he saw he had to descend a rope ladder and get into another boat. O’Toole would have liked nothing better than to have been rid of him earlier when they were moored at the dock, but there were too many people around to chance it then. This was the best way. He helped Wu get a leg over the taffrail and begin his descent. Thumbless Wu—he used to run the wealthiest and most luxurious gambling house in Canton, but O’Toole had never known him by any other name—used his first two fingers to grip the lines of the rope ladder. He’d always thought the bastard was amazing, even when he owed him most and hated him most. Wu used his forefingers as if they were the thumbs it was said he’d lost at the age of eight, as a result of a gambling debt with a Hakka pirate.

  The Irishman turned and saw no one but the man on watch. “Ahoy, Tompkins!” he hailed. “I’m going ashore.”

  Tompkins turned and started for him. “Give you a hand, Captain?”

  “Don’t need it. Get back to your post.”

  This wasn’t the navy and O’Toole had never enforced military rules, though he knew Tammy Tompkins had been a navy man before he fetched up in Canton. An insolent bastard nonetheless. He’d pushed too far a time or two and O’Toole had to give him extra watches, even dock his pay on occasion. Probably shouldn’t have picked Tompkins as one of his remaining crew, but when it came to handling the lines, the man was as skilled as any tar aboard. When you were going to tend a ship this size with a crew of three, they had to be the best available. Besides, he liked the tar’s whistling.

  Tompkins raised a hand in compliance, turned around, and went back to his place in the bow, whistling “Old Zip Coon.”

  O’Toole climbed down to the gig. Thumbless Wu was already huddled in the stern, looking, if it were possible, still more miserable. “Do us a favor,” O’Toole said as he picked up the oars. “If you’re going to puke, do it over the side.”

  Chapter Six

  New York City,

  Wall Street, 7 P.M.

  THE PINEAPPLE FINIALS had been set atop posts either side of the gate in front of Bastard Devrey’s residence in 1706 when it was built. The cobbled path that led to the graceful three-story red-brick house dated from the same period. Very little around the house was the same.

  Will Devrey, Bastard’s great-grandfather and the founder of Devrey Shipping, was a man of his time. He’d built his house a few steps from the East River docks and the Wall Street slave market that were the foundation of his fortune, installed his wife and children on the upper two floors, and conducted business at ground level. In those days the building across the road was the City Hall, later to be the seat of the American government and the place where George Washington was inaugurated the nation’s first president. That venerable edifice had gone to ruin when Congress decamped first for Philadelphia, then for its present home on the drained swamp they called the Federal District. The city tore down the old Federal Building two years past, and the lot housed two brand-new countinghouses now. New Yorkers were short on sentiment when it came to property.

  The old Court District for instance, on lower Broadway near Bowling Green. Once it had been the most fashionable part of the city. It was still a charming place to live, but it was surrounded by the clogged lanes and snaking streets of the narrow southern tip of the island. These days the great merchant princes had built themselves palaces in the far north of the town. Jacob Astor’s mansion set the standard. It stood in rural splendor on Broadway between Barclay and Vesey streets, and his gardens backed up on Hudson’s River. His countinghouse on Little Dock Street, on the other hand, was in the thick of the downtown pandemonium.

  New Yorkers with a claim to elegance and social standing no longer lived on Wall Street. And these days only mechanics—craftsmen and shopkeepers and the like—lived above their businesses. Bastard no longer had his countinghouse on the ground floor, but the whole town knew that didn’t satisfy his wife. The last time Bastard raised cash by selling scrip in Devrey Shipping, the purpose had been to build a Broadway mansion up near Astor’s. Celinda Devrey had been a Clinton. She’d married a man presumed to be able to support her in style, but the war and Bastard’s bad judgment conspired to deny her expectations. The Broadway house stood half built and empty, and likely to remain so given the morning’s events.

  Joyful had been planning this encounter for some time, and he knew he’d never have a better opportunity. Celinda must have given her husband a fair serving of grief with his Wall Street dinner this day. Bastard was as ripe as he’d ever be, a fruit ready to drop into Joyful’s hand. All the same, he couldn’t simply present himself at the door and wait for a servant to announce him. His cousin was unlikely to be receiving visitors this evening.

  It was almost nine o’clock and the rain had stopped. Joyful turned left on the mossy cobbled path that circled the house and approached the set of long windows that spilled light into the shadowy garden. An oil lamp had been lit but the curtains left open. He could see a high-backed chair and a footstool, and a man’s legs. Joyful reached for the handle of the casement. It turned easily and opened toward him. “Good evening, cousin.”

  Bastard did not turn around. “Who the hell are you?” His voice was thick with drink.

  “Joyful Patrick Turner, your second cousin, I believe, once removed. At least that’s as near as I can work it out.”

  “Got your hand blown off in this miserable war, didn’t you? Not a hellish lot to be joyful about, is there? Go away. Devreys have no truck with Turners. It’s tradition. And speaking personally, I care even less for heroes.”

  “Much as I expected. But I’m not going away just yet. Mind if I pour myself a drink?”

  Bastard still had not turned around, but he waved a languid arm in compliance. “Help yourself. The Madeira’s excellent but the sack isn’t much better than piss. Cellar’s gone to ruin in this war, along with everything else.”

  The simple furniture of New York cabinetmaker Duncan Phyfe was the fashion now. This room’s style had the feeling of an earlier time; heavy, rococo pieces in the style of Chippendale. An elaborately carved mahogany table against one wall held a number of decanters. Joyful removed the glass stoppers and sniffed each in turn. When he’d identified the Madeira, he poured himself a generous tot. “Can I get you a refill, cousin?”

  “Cheeky sort, aren’t you, offering a man his own tipple in his own house.”

  “Not for long.”

  “What does that mean? Are you planning to be less cheeky sometime soon?”

  “No. It means the house won’t be yours for much longer. It will go on the block with all your other assets once Gornt Blakeman squeezes the last drop of life out of Devrey Shipping. As, I trust, you are well aware.”

  Silence for a few seconds, then, “Come over here, Joyful Patrick. So I can get a good look at you.”

  He did as he was asked, and took a good look in his turn. Bastard was sweating profusely, his face was bright scarlet, and his eyes were puffy with drink, maybe tears. He squinted up at Joyful, then leaned forward and squinted some more. “Truth, isn’t it?”

  “What?”

  “That we’re all redheads descended from Red Bess.”

  “My mother was also a redhead.”

  “The beautiful Roisin. Yes, so I heard. I remember now, you’re a bastard as well. Christ, what a history.”

  Joyful shrugged. “My parents married soon after I was born, but it doesn’t make any difference. We’re not responsible for the past, Cousin. Only the present. And maybe the future.”

  “My future, as you so generously pointed out, is a bucket of steaming manure. The whole town has the stench in its nostrils. So why should I go on talking to you, Joyful Patrick? This house is still mine, whatever may happen next week or next month.” He flailed an arm in the air. “Get the bloody hell out or I’ll whip you out.”

  There w
as a horse whip hanging on the wall beside the fireplace. Joyful had no idea what it was doing there, and not much fear of Bastard carrying out his threat. “You’re in no condition to do any such thing, and I’m not leaving quite yet. No, don’t protest. Hear me out. It’s in your best interest.

  “What you want is to salvage as much as you can from this disaster. But you don’t know how, so you’re sitting here on what may well have been the worst day of your life drinking yourself into oblivion. And since I warrant tomorrow has worse in store, you’ll likely be doing the same for some days to come. And sooner rather than later the sheriff will come to read you into bankruptcy. Then it will be too late.”

  “Too late for what?”

  In spite of himself, Bastard was sobering up, Joyful noted. Give a man a genuine life-or-death choice, and even the fog of alcohol could lift. “Too late for me to help you wriggle out of the mess you’re in.”

  “And how might you do that? Presuming I act before it’s too late.”

  Joyful stretched out his foot and hooked another of the heavy mahogany armchairs closer to Bastard’s. He sat down. “It’s simple. First you give me a ship; a fast sloop such as the Lisbetta will serve very well. Then you make over to me a large part of Devrey Shipping.”

  A few seconds of silence, then Bastard made a sound between a snort and a chortle. “Well, no reason this family shouldn’t finally produce a madman to go along with everything else. No, wait! The crazy old Jew Solomon DaSilva, he was your grandfather. A whoremaster turned gunrunner who nearly burned the city. That explains it. Now get out.”

  “Solomon set alight my father’s privateer, the Fanciful Maiden, while she was lying in harbor. But the old reprobate had made a huge fortune for himself before the Huron captured him and tortured him into insanity. And yes, he was Morgan Turner’s father and my grandfather. And my grandmother was Squaw DaSilva, who took over her husband’s affairs and increased his wealth fourfold. They were a pair of business people as clever as this city’s ever seen. My forebears are reasons for you to listen to me, Cousin, not send me away.”