By sailing so close to the Spanish frigate, Fallon had prevented the forts from firing, or thought he had, until a flurry of signals from the ramparts and the boom of cannon convinced him otherwise. The shot landed close enough that he ordered Brooks to come about, for Doncella was almost to the harbor entrance anyway. The thing was going to work or it wasn’t.
The forts’ guns continued to fire—not at Rascal, but at Doncella!
Diaz signaled furiously and kept signaling right up until the time the ship lurched to a stop and all her masts snapped forward and overboard, taking her pleading signals with them. The force of a wooden ship displacing twelve hundred tons travelling at fourteen knots meeting a three-foot diameter iron chain hanging beneath the surface of the sea cannot be exaggerated. The bow of the ship attempted to ride over the chain, but the leading edge of the keel was literally sliced off as the chain sawed its way into the ship.
As Rascal sailed away to the northeast, Fallon thought he could hear a massive grind and for a moment he thought Doncella was over, but then the frigate settled and slowly began to sink. The ship was in shambles, with rigging and masts floating about, and men clinging to the ship’s boats in desperation.
Brooks and Barclay were all smiles as Fallon ordered spirits piped up, with an extra tot for Cully’s gun crew. Barclay laid a course for Matanzas, and for a moment Fallon’s mind leapt ahead to what he would find there. But here was Aja grinning broadly and shaking his hand, pulling him back from the future to a very happy present that only a fool of a captain would ignore.
THIRTY-THREE
THE PACKET ship Ariana glided into St. George’s Harbor carrying mercantile goods, one hundred bolts of West Indies cloth, all manner of farm utensils, and a letter for Elinore Somers. Elinore was not feeling at all well that day and, indeed, had been ill for several days. Ezra Somers had no problem handling the office while his daughter recuperated, and when the letter arrived he recognized Fallon’s handwriting and immediately took it home to Elinore himself. He hoped it would lift her out of her malaise and do her some good.
Instead, it sunk both their spirits, for as Elinore read the letter aloud and the nature of Beauty’s wound was revealed they both felt powerless. Elinore knew Nico would never have written if Beauty’s situation weren’t serious, even dire. Was he secretly hoping she would come at once? Nico could be obtuse like that. And if she went to Antigua, would it be to help her good friend get well, or to bury her?
“What is it we can do, Father?” Elinore asked, holding the letter to her breast as tears formed in her eyes. “Is it just to be prayers? Surely not.” She had forgotten all about her own discomfort now, and thought only of Beauty’s struggle to live and Fallon’s burden in caring for her with his other duties and responsibilities weighing on him.
“I will get us there, Elinore,” said Somers. “But the only ship I have is Petite Bouton. I decided not to sell her into the service, but buy her myself for some light carrying trade. So, I had her careened and her bottom cleaned. New sails have been ordered but they’ll be awhile coming. What I need is a captain and a full crew to supplement the Rascals who brought her in—but leave that to me. You get yourself strong enough for sea, and I’ll get the ship ready to go.”
MOST OF BERMUDA’S men were to be found at sea, but Somers would not sail without enough men to work the guns and an experienced man to lead them. There was simply too much danger in the Caribbean. He decided to ask around at the White Horse that night and get something wet in the bargain.
In the event, Somers arrived at the White Horse in the early evening after seeing that Elinore was settled for the night—still and always a father. Elinore was improved, but anxious about Beauty. The island doctor had been around to see her, and after the examination she seemed to feel better, or rather less sick, but she hadn’t confided in Somers the source of her discomfort. A woman thing, he figured.
When he walked through the door of the White Horse, Somers saw the usual crowd, a mixed bag of Royal Navy, farmers, merchantmen, and shopkeepers. He knew or recognized many of those he saw, and the senior Fallon welcomed him warmly to a seat at the bar.
While he was waiting for his ale, a giant of a man walked in, ducking under the low doorway, and made his way to the stool next to Somers. He had the unmistakable gait of a sailor, a little sway side to side, balancing on an invisible but remembered deck. His face was scarlet and weathered, his eyes were rheumy, and his hands were gnarled and arthritic from years of pulling ropes in all weathers. He sat down heavily at the bar, ordered his wet, and turned to Somers.
“Name is Stuyvesant,” he said in a gravelly voice. “Captain of the barky Drummond. And who might you be, sir?”
“I’m Ezra Somers, a trader in salt, sir. Pleased to make your acquaintance. You are new to Bermuda, I collect?”
Stuyvesant looked at Somers with liquid eyes, as if in appraisal, and nodded.
“I brought the barky in with a sprung plank. On my way to Gibraltar from Boston with dried cod, and she started leaking in a gale of wind. It took two days to blow itself out, hands at the pumps watch on watch. We was off course by then and closer to Bermuda than Boston, so here I am. Old Drummond needs her whole bottom refastened, in truth, but I want another trip out of her.”
Somers knew the tendency to push for a few more cruises before tending to ship maintenance, for he was guilty of it himself with his own ships. Stuyvesant seemed a bit on the rough side, and Somers guessed he’d worked himself up from the lower deck. A Dutchman by name, and perhaps by character, for the Dutch believed in going to sea to trade their way to prosperity. In Somers’s experience, they were also staunchly individualistic, even stubborn.
“So, you’re at the dockyard, I take it?” asked Somers.
“In line is more like it. Don’t know when Drummond will get on the ways. I could be on the beach a month or better.” Stuyvesant lifted his glass and drank half the contents in a series of long swallows. “Pumping every three hours to keep Drummond floating, we are.”
Somers stared at his own glass, the contents of which he’d barely touched, and considered Captain Stuyvesant. Perhaps, just perhaps, here was the captain he needed, but was he the captain he wanted? Stuyvesant might be interested in a cruise south, for he could sail to Antigua and back before his ship was likely to get on the ways. And he certainly looked the part of a captain, but that was very little to go on. His thoughts were interrupted by Stuyvesant ordering another ale and then turning to him with a question.
“A salt trader, you say?” asked Stuyvesant. “Would you be needing a short carry anywhere then? And maybe a captain for it?”
His question caught Somers off guard, surprised they’d both been thinking along the same lines. Somers was anxious to get to Antigua, feeling instinctively that he and Elinore were needed, given Fallon’s letter, and he abhorred being in the dark about Beauty’s condition. Maybe Stuyvesant was a gift from above just when he needed one.
“Maybe a short carry, Captain,” said Somers. “Let me think on it. Tell you what. You come ’round here tomorrow night and we can talk some more.”
With that, Somers paid for his ale and waved to the senior Fallon and left the White Horse to tell Elinore their problems getting to Antigua might be solved. Tomorrow he’d visit the dockyard and check out Stuyvesant’s story. Maybe get a look at his ship and crew while he was at it.
Maybe things were looking up.
THIRTY-FOUR
THE SPECTER of Castillo de San Severino loomed over the entrance to Matanzas, an impressive and forbidding presence. Water lapped at the stone stairs leading to the main entrance, and the quay was large and long to accommodate slave ships. The fort had been built in the 1600s but, when the British took Havana in 1762, the fort’s commander, García Solís, had attempted to blow it up rather than see it fall into British hands. Thereafter it was in a continuous state of disrepair, for the explosives had severely weakened the foundation and battlements. Still, it housed the treasury and
the slave market where calimbo, or branding, took place. The fort also served to house special prisoners; in fact, Spanish firing squads occasionally executed Cuban pro-independence patriots there.
Rascal once again entered the harbor as an American schooner to all intents, creeping in peacefully. Her sails had been shortened and the hands stood by to furl them completely when ordered. Matanzas looked just as Fallon had left it, locked in amber, sleepy and quiet. Rascal sailed up the long boot of the harbor and anchored very near where she’d anchored the first time. Only it was Brooks who ordered “Let go!” and not Beauty.
It was late afternoon when they arrived and, after seeing the ship settled and the hands given their duties by Brooks, Fallon and Aja were rowed to shore. Fallon did not expect to see James Wharton on the beach, for they had time to spare before he was due to show up. In the meantime, Fallon intended to learn something of Paloma Campos. Her sister’s café seemed like a good place to start.
The café was not yet full when Fallon and Aja entered; the earliest customers were just trickling in and the candles hadn’t even been lit.
In a moment, the barkeep made her appearance, and Fallon recognized her as Paloma’s sister. Instead of cheerful, she looked tired and worried, and Fallon was immediately put on guard for bad news.
“Señora, you may remember me as a businessman looking at plantations some small time ago,” he began tentatively. “I am wondering if Paloma is about, for she was very helpful to me.”
“No, Señor,” she said, tears welling in her eyes, “she left to help the rebels! It was madness to go, and this very day I learned the soldiers captured them all! The slave rebellion is crushed and the soldiers are bringing the prisoners to San Severino. They should be here tomorrow!” So distraught was she that Fallon thought she would faint at the bar. He heard Aja gasp at the news; he would of course be concerned not only for Paloma but for Young David as well.
“Good God! Señora, can you be sure of this?” asked Fallon, his mind already seeing Davies’ face upon hearing the news. “What can be done, then?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Nothing can be done. The authorities will lock them in the fort and … and they say they will shoot them all! It is what the governor decreed!” The señora was clasping and unclasping her hands, which Fallon noticed were shaking badly.
Fallon felt shocked and powerless. Paloma was even now being marched across the country to prison. The anguish on her sister’s face was more than he could bear, and he left her with a promise to think of something to help, which he knew was a lie.
THE SOLDIERS took their time, for they had what they’d come for and, besides, their prisoners were tied in a line and could move only so fast. They had been marching for almost two weeks and tomorrow would reach Matanzas at last. Colonel Munoz rode his gelding at the head of the column with practiced horsemanship, his back straight and his eyes forward. A proud soldier, he never questioned orders and served Spain obediently. Yet this hadn’t been an honorable expedition, he felt, and his sympathies lay with the scared and bedraggled band of rebels limping behind him. And the woman! How beautiful she was to be going to San Severino, which was a wretched place. No doubt the rebels were criminals, murderers even, but he could not see the woman murdering anyone. Perhaps her sympathies were simply misplaced. Well, like his own, he admitted.
Colonel Munoz kept his eyes forward, but his thoughts were behind him.
FALLON AND AJA were rowed back to the ship, each lost in his own thoughts, silent as strangers. As Fallon reached the deck he was met by Brooks with the news that the lookout had reported a brig and two sloops sailing into the harbor on the last of the sea breeze. Even now the wind brought the smell of human cargo to Fallon’s nose, and as he brought his telescope to his eye he recognized Negro Sol just making the turn toward the toe of the harbor’s boot, leading her wolf pups. Indeed, he could see the Holy One standing on the quarterdeck looking through his telescope at Rascal.
As Fallon watched the progress of Sol to the fort’s quay, he wondered what the Holy One was thinking, for he must recognize the schooner that had set a trap for his sloops. And he obviously saw it flew an American flag. Fallon could feel Brooks and Barclay and the rest of the crew waiting expectantly for orders to up anchor and attack. Or at least to run out the guns. Or something.
But it was not so easy. Fallon quickly considered his options, but as quickly as he considered attacking Sol he reconsidered, for an attack on Spanish ships in a Cuban port would likely draw the fort’s guns or, at the very least, local militia into the fray. Yet it was a standoff, for Fallon also knew the Holy One would not attack an American ship in a Cuban port for fear of incurring the wrath of Spain, and perhaps even the United States. Fallon felt powerless as he stood gaping at Negro Sol and the sloops, now landing at the quay, those evil ships that caused or abetted so much human misery.
But he fought to put the Holy One and the little wolves aside and out of his mind, for there was nothing he could do. Ezra Somers always said that a man with no options was a man with no problems and, in this case, it was true.
“There is nothing for it, Brooks,” said Fallon bitterly, not deigning to explain further. “Have the men go about their duties.”
For the better part of two hours the black brig and sloops unloaded their trembling cargoes and the slaves huddled in naked groups while prospective buyers prodded and poked them to assess their value. One by one or in small groups the buyers led them away to be branded after presumably paying a small fortune for them, though the transactions could not be seen from Rascal’s deck.
Fallon’s frustration was compounded by ironical thoughts that he could not shake: Young David rampaged through Cuba freeing slaves, which no doubt created a slave shortage on plantations around Matanzas, which drove up demand and, presumably, prices for slaves in the market, which attracted slavers and pirates all the more to the trade. And the irony of ironies: Fallon had sunk Doncella Española, a frigate sent by Spain to hunt the little wolves and their ilk! So, Fallon’s mind reached a twisted but inescapable conclusion: He was at least partially responsible for the Holy One counting his money right now.
The thought sunk his spirits, and he savaged himself for a fool.
His mood did not lighten when, in the early evening, Negro Sol and the sloops eased away from the quay. Fallon watched dejectedly as the Holy One ascended his quarterdeck and raised his arms to heaven, as if in prayerful thanksgiving for his good fortune in selling his slaves. Oddly, the Holy One seemed to have lost all interest in Rascal and may have even had his eyes closed as his ship disappeared into the night. A further testament to how lightly he regarded his adversary across the harbor.
LATER THAT EVENING the stars made a full showing over Cuba. Every constellation that could be seen in that early winter sky was showing brightly. Fallon stood at Rascal’s stern deep in thought, for his mind fought to forget the humiliation of the day, to put it in the past, and to think of something to do to help Paloma. And Young David, come to that. But, whether due to his black mood or the capriciousness of fate, for once an idea didn’t come, a daring plan didn’t form, and the longer he stared at the lover’s sky the more forlorn he felt. He had failed today, and he would fail tomorrow. The enormity of the problem pressed on him, like the enormity of the sky, and even conjuring lovely thoughts of Elinore failed to bring up his spirits. He imagined Davies this very night, looking at this very sky, wishing to the stars that Fallon would return with good news about Paloma. Finally, he went to his cabin, not to sleep, but to lie awake until dawn.
THIRTY-FIVE
THE NEXT MORNING found Rascal moving about her anchor in a small, indecisive breeze and Fallon on deck with his black coffee, a darkness on his face. He looked up to the Stars and Stripes flying rather proudly and would have smiled to himself at the deception had his spirits allowed. His gaze came down to the shoreline, deserted at this time of morning except for a beggar who’d apparently slept on the beach. Fallon reached for
his telescope. He swept the town and looked up the road leading from the east. He was looking for dust from the approaching soldiers, but saw nothing. Finally, returning his focus to the beach and then onto the beggar, who was awake by then, he saw James Wharton smiling at him.
In very little time, Aja left in the gig to retrieve Wharton, who was soon aboard and shedding his disguise, the ragged coat and hat and walking stick cast aside. He seemed as fit as the day he’d been set ashore.
“Come, sir, join me for breakfast below while I hear of your derring-do,” said Fallon, trying to escape his low spirits. “And I might have a few things you may find of interest as well.”
Leaving instructions with Brooks to be alerted if the Spanish soldiers approached, Fallon led Wharton below to his cabin. Wharton bade Fallon speak first, curious about what he would report and whether it would corroborate what he had learned in the last month.
Fallon began by telling Wharton of Young David, his escape from slavery thanks to Aja, and of his apparent success in burning sugarcane from Matanzas to Santa Clara, setting slaves free along the way. Wharton nodded in appreciation, and nodded more vigorously when told that white Cubans had aided and abetted Young David and that some, like Paloma Campos, had even joined him.
“That’s what we’re looking for!” exclaimed Wharton. “Pray continue.”
“It has all gone bad, I’m afraid,” said Fallon. “The governor sent Spanish soldiers to capture Young David and the rebels and soon, today perhaps, the soldiers will bring them to the fort. I fear they will all be executed.”
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