by Peter Greene
Aggar now realized that the most undesirable event had now occurred: they had been seen. If the English captain could identify his ship as the Echo, he may approach, want to converse, or may try to take the ship back if he were suspecting foul play. Possibly, he might even request to come aboard for breakfast. That would never do. Though Aggar was confident in his ability to speak in an almost perfect English accent, he could never pass as an officer of His Majesty’s Navy, not up close. He had only one option. He must assume that the operative aboard the Paladin had somehow sabotaged her, making it nearly impossible to catch the Echo. Yes, he knew the Paladin was the fastest ship in these waters—probably in the world—but injured, he might just be able to slip away.
“Cherepanyanko!” yelled Aggar angrily. “Hurry! Add all sail! Kowalski! Bring us about! Starikov! Put on that uniform! And take the British men below! Guard them with your crew.”
“We need them in the tops, Captain!” argued Cherepanyanko.
“They will give us away!” countered Aggar. “Move all available Russians to the tops! And stand tall and proud, like real British sailors!”
* * * * *
As the Paladin now approached the Echo, Jonathan returned to the stern and stood next to Harrison in silence. Alexander strode up quickly and raised his telescope.
“This is odd,” said Harrison. “Gray must be daft or worse. He had, just a moment ago, reduced so much sail he was almost drifting backward! Now, as sloppily as an American whaler, he has added more sail and come about!”
“He is running?” asked Jonathan. “That is peculiar.”
“I don’t like it. Not at all,” continued Harrison.
“Could the Echo have been captured, sir?” asked Alexander. “It would explain the erratic behavior.”
“She is flying a Union Jack,” said Harrison. “However, it would not be the first time an enemy had used that trick.”
“Captain Harrison,” said Jonathan. “I thought we were at peace?”
“England has many enemies, Jonathan. Some are nations; some are privateers. And if the peace has ended, how would we know? A letter? By the time we heard about it, war could have been declared weeks ago.”
“More than likely,” added Alexander, “we would find out when an enemy ship attacked us!”
“If that is happening, let us be ready,” answered Harrison. “Jonathan? Are the men to battle stations?”
“Yes, sir,” Jonathan replied.
“I want doors open and guns rolled out now. We will show them we are prepared to fight. Mister Fawcett, keep Echo directly ahead.”
“Ahead she’ll be, sir,” said Fawcett.
Aboard the Echo, Aggar could see that now he was being pursued. His men had sloppily added sail, and the turn executed by Kowalski was too wide. He had missed the wind by overcoming it, and now they were struggling to gain it once again.
“Cherepanyanko! Add sail! Add sail!”
“She is gaining on us!” called Sublieutenant Starikov as he assisted in adding sail by hauling. He, along with Cherepanyanko and Kowalski, was a capable seaman and knew his way about a ship as much as Aggar. However, they were only three men surrounded by many who were not as seasoned. If only there were more old salts, as the British would say, they could have executed the maneuver easily and escaped.
“Find the dammed wind!” called Aggar.
Though the Russians had eventually captured some of the wind, the Paladin and her expert crew had performed their duties well, and she was now less than four hundred feet behind the Echo.
Harrison stood at the bow with Hudson at his side. They both peered ahead through their glasses.
“I see men on deck, sir,” said the marine captain. “Some are running below. I see…I see someone by the sailing master. It must be Gray. But when did he grow a beard, as light as it is?”
“That explains it,” Harrison said as he watched them. “That is not Gray.”
“Pogany!” swore Aggar in aggravation.
“What are we to do?” asked Cherepanyanko. “They are almost alongside!”
“Keep our men in the sails, have them continue working until all is let out. And keep quiet! No one speaks but me!”
Within another minute, the Paladin had caught the Echo and had taken a position less than one hundred feet off her starboard side. Still sailing with limited foremast sails due to the gun accident, Captain Harrison knew that eventually, if her sister ship could succeed in setting all sail, the Echo would pull away. However, for now, the ships seemed to be at comparable speeds.
“Ahoy, Echo! What news?” Harrison called across the waves as he and his officers approached the port rail. This was somewhat a breach of protocol as he should have waited for Jenkins, or in the very least a lieutenant to call for him. Harrison hadn’t the time for that sort of propriety.
Shortly, the officer on the Echo waved in return.
“Ahoy, Paladin! Commander Andrews, newly assigned!”
“You were running, Commander. Did you not see our colors?”
“Ah! That is funny,” said Andrews. “No, we just did not realize you were an English ship! The light was not assisting us from our angle.”
“We noticed that you were slowing,” called Harrison, “then adding sail. It was hard to discern your intentions.”
Sergeant Hudson remained nearby, a concerned look on his face as he realized there was something missing from the Echo.
“We wonder about Captain Gray,” called Harrison. “Is he not commander of the Echo?”
Aggar paused for a moment. Damn these English dogs! he thought. Do they know their entire corps of officers by name and ship?
“Gray?” called Aggar. “He was replaced. I am now in command. Are you readying to fire, Commander?”
“We are ready but would rather not,” explained Harrison. “Standard procedure, as you know.”
“Is it?” asked Aggar. “I didn’t think so. I have not prepared my crews, Commander.”
Just then, Quinn appeared, tucking in his shirt as he approached.
“Sorry, sir,” he said. “I was undressed.”
“I don’t remember ever seeing an Andrews on any list. Have you, Alexander?” asked Harrison softly.
“No, sir. I have no knowledge of him,” replied Alexander.
“I do, sir,” said Quinn. “Andrews and I served together in the East India Station aboard the Xerxes. He is quirky but a good egg. Inexperienced, yet well connected. May I, sir?”
“Please,” said Harrison.
“Ahoy, Andrews! Quinn here! I haven’t seen you since Ceylon!”
“Ah! Quinn. A pleasure once again!” came the greeting from the Echo.
Harrison stared across the water to his sister ship. There were less than thirty men in the tops, now setting sail on the foremast; however, that was enough. Soon, the Echo would pull away.
“A new lieutenant, as inexperienced as this, assigned to the Echo?” asked Harrison quietly.
“He is friends with Captain Spears, sir,” added Quinn. “That would explain some of this. His family has friends in high places.”
Following a head motion from Harrison, Fawcett brought the Paladin a few yards closer to the Echo, causing Aggar to hide his face whenever he could, using the rigging, the wheel, and even his hand. If he could only get a bit more sail set, he could get away. Noticing the damaged foremast of the Paladin, he smiled within. His operative had succeeded. He needed only a few more moments.
Harrison caught a longer glimpse of Andrews. My, he thought, he looks considerably old for a lieutenant. He must be in his forties!
“We must take our leave of you, Commander Harrison,” Aggar said as his ship finally set his last sail and began to move ahead. “Our mission is on a tight schedule!”
“If so,” called Harrison, “why did you pursue us, now only to turn away?”
“Our orders have us searching for a specific ship,” called Aggar. “Unfortunately, you are not the one. That is all I can say.”
“Edwards,” called Aggar. “So sorry! I must be going! Good fortune to you, my friends!”
With that the Echo had caught the wind sufficiently, and was off and away.
“That was…strange,” commented Hudson.
“I agree, Sergeant,” said Harrison as they all watched the Echo disappear quickly ahead. “I believe he is lying.”
“Lying, sir?” asked Jonathan.
“He said he couldn’t tell if we were a friendly?” commented Alexander. “That is unbelievable.”
“Beggin’ your pardon, Captain,” interrupted Sergeant Hudson.
“Hudson?”
“Yes, sir. I noticed that, well, he was a tad short on marines. He should have had a half dozen at least.”
“How many did he have?” asked Alexander.
“None.”
They all paused, deep in thought.
“It could be as I said, sir,” said Quinn. “He is inexperienced. The light was slightly—”
“He is lying, and I know it,” stated Alexander.
“And how do you know it?” asked Harrison as he smiled broadly.
Jonathan also wondered how Harrison and Alexander were so sure. Yes, Andrews seemed like a clumsy oaf, and his ship was handled so poorly, it was simply an embarrassment to the Royal Navy. But they had all seen well-commanded ships and also others that were not so tightly run.
“I saw that you laid a trap for him, Captain Harrison,” said Alexander.
“Continue,” said Harrison.
“You asked him who gave him his orders—gave him a choice actually. Both wrong, of course. Orders do not come from Admiral Monteith nor Admiral Edwards. All come from Captain Spears through Admiral Barnett.”
All now knew that Andrews was lying. But why?
“Is he just a grobian?” asked Alexander. “A clumsy oaf with a pitiful crew?”
“A fool, but a harmless one, I believe,” offered Quinn.
“Possibly,” said Harrison. “Fawcett! Resume our course toward Gibraltar.”
Later that evening, as Jonathan tossed in his sleep, he decided to give up the fruitless effort and wake. The mission was not going as smoothly as he or anyone desired. They had left port late, had received strange orders, and after his mistake at the gun, had now lost precious time. And Spears and Wilder making their requests for him to ensure the mission’s success at the bequest of the king—it was enough to send his mind spinning. No wonder he couldn’t sleep.
Of course, sleeping like a log on the hammock next to him was Sean. He had a smile on his face, and now and again, Stewie, purring softly as he lay on the boy’s chest, would stretch and yawn, look at Jonathan through half-slit eyes, then drift back to sleep. At least some are confident and able to rest, Jonathan thought.
He stared at the beam above his head for a few more moments and, resigned to the fact that he was unable to sleep, rose and lit a candle. Sitting next to his locker, he opened it and searched inside to locate paper and pen. There he saw the small box that had contained the silver compass star Delain had given him. Fingering the trinket now about his neck, he smiled and decided to write two letters—one to his father and Miss Thompson and the other to Miss Delain Dowdeswell. The Paladin would be in Gibraltar by morning, and the letters could be delivered home on the next ship bound for London.
HMS Paladin moored in the port of Gibraltar late in the morning of April the eighth. Immediately, Harrison had sent Streen, the carpenter, and Lieutenant Alexander to the port master to inquire about needed lumber for the foremast. Quinn was dispatched to deliver mail and report to Admiral Crampton, the ranking officer of Gibraltar Station. None of the crew, however, were allowed to go ashore, and to add insult to injury, they enjoyed only the hardtack that was served for breakfast.
Upon their arrival, a light rain began to fall, and after securing the crew and ship, Harrison called Jonathan, Jenkins, Hudson, and Sean into his cabin. Berkeley had prepared a light snack of soft-tack and cheese, strong coffee, which he seemed to regard as his specialty, and after a quick jaunt to a local market, some cheesed eggs and sliced ham.
“Not bad, Berkeley,” said Harrison smiling. “You will soon be preparing spotted dick and pigs’ pettitoes along with all the other favorites.”
“Thank ya sir,” said Berkeley. “I aim to please.”
“Speaking of aiming,” said Harrison as he turned to Sean, “How goes the musket practice? Are you showing any improvement?”
“Yes, sir,” said Sean as he secured a forkful of eggs from his plate.
“He no longer falls over after each firing,” said Hudson.
“And I have yet to kill anyone accidently,” noted Sean with some sense of pride.
“Well,” said Jonathan as he sipped his coffee, “let us hope you never have to fire that gun in battle!”
“Hear, hear!” came the chorus from all those present, including Sean. Though he was progressing marginally, Sergeant Hudson and Hicks were worried that, if needed, Sean might prove ineffective in using the gun, and this had them holding target practice daily for the youngster, dropping various pieces of used lumber and other debris over the stern and having Sean fire upon them as they bobbed up and down in the waves and as the ship pitched and rolled. It was difficult, to say the least, but they encouraged him nonetheless and even commented that in such conditions, even appearing to send a round close, within a few yards, was cause for celebration.
“We have plans to discuss, gentlemen,” said Harrison, bringing the subject back in hand. “I fear that the foremast will need complete replacing.”
Jonathan’s heart sank again. He stopped eating and sat as still as stone.
“Streen believes we will need to replace the mast completely; however, due to our timetable, that will not be possible to effect here in Gibraltar. I have sent Streen and Alexander to see what lumber they can find to assist in supporting the mast.”
“If I may,” asked Jenkins, “No matter what magic Streen conjures, we will not be able to set all sail on that mast. We will lose speed.”
“Are we able to make eight knots?” asked Harrison, knowing the answer.
“Hard to say, sir,” responded Jenkins. “We ’ave to wait until Streen is done.”
“Our only other option is to turn back to London and then to Scotland for repair,” said Harrison.
“The mission will be a failure, sir,” said Jonathan.
“Let us see what Streen can do with whatever lumber he can afford,” said Harrison. “My desire is to continue on without delay.”
Within the hour, Streen and Alexander returned to the Paladin. Fortunately, they acquired a good bit of lumber, iron bands, and bolts to more or less repair the lower foremast, and though it was not anywhere near perfect or even acceptable, Jenkins and Fawcett believed they might make eight or nine knots—maybe ten, depending on winds. No matter what, the mast would require constant attention.
“Commander,” said Alexander, joining the officers at the stern, “I received some interesting news pertaining to the Echo. The yard commander, Admiral Crampton, asked specifically if we had seen her.”
“Oh?” asked Harrison.
“I told him we had, and that she was under a new commander. He told me that Echo was due in Gibraltar on the sixth of March. However, she never reported.”
“She’s a month late, and we’ve seen her lollygagging about,” said Hudson.
“I mentioned that to Crampton. I suggested that their orders may have been changed,” added Alexander.
“Not entirely uncommon, is it?” asked Quinn.
“No,” said Commander Harrison, “though still suspicious that word has not reached Gibraltar Station and Crampton, isn’t it?”
Streen had worked through the night with his crew, and by the beginning of the first watch, they had patched the f
oremast with various wooden braces and brackets designed and created from their knowledge and years of experience. Certainly not repaired by any sense of the word, the mast looked almost as if it were surrounded by a cage, made with several large planks of heavy oak, straps of iron, and wooden braces that secured the mast to the deck and rails. Streen had finally declared that they were ready for sail.
Once underway, experimentation was necessary to test the strength of the repairs, and Harrison ordered more and less sail, adjusted rigging, and discussed outcomes with Fawcett and Alexander. They each looked intently at the mast, checking its bracing and listening for stress-cracking or other unexplainable noises.
Satisfied with adding all but the fore topgallant, the uppermost sail on the foremast, they were soon away from Gibraltar, heading straight east at nine knots to Telašćica. Due by the sixteenth of April, Harrison and Fawcett had calculated that, if sailing on calm seas with mostly favorable winds, they could still make the rendezvous by that time, if luck would serve.
Meanwhile, alone in his thoughts, Jonathan continued his lessons with Fawcett when he could, enjoying the fact that he was finally getting the feel of piloting the great ship. He also appreciated the opportunity to concentrate on something other than his problems.
12
The Bridge at Wapping
As early afternoon fell on the busy city of London, April the tenth, Marine Captain Gorman, not dressed as such, stood in front of The Monument near Pudding Lane. The Doric column had been erected as a tribute to the damage and loss due to the Great Fire of 1666. He observed the copper-sculpted urn of flames atop the two-hundred-foot memorial and then turned his attention to each of its sides, seemingly inspecting the structure for cracks and imperfections. He murmured to himself, circling the monument, back and forth, around and about. This odd dance of course was a signal to his most effective spy.
After physically receiving a bump on his side as he was leaving the Admiralty earlier that morning, Gorman looked in his pocket to find a coded message that had been placed there. It simply read “Bordeaux on the plaza.” What this meant to Gorman was startling. Bordeaux, of course, was the code name for Marine Lieutenant Scotty Slater, Gorman’s finest and most experienced operative, who was stationed in southern France, Spain, and points east. The phrase “on the plaza” meant that Slater had news for Gorman, and they were to meet at The Monument.