The Ironclad Alibi

by Michael Kilian

  Harry gave his thanks, moving back to get out of Jones’s way and striking his head on a metal overhang. He was already slightly dizzy from the heat and noxious, acrid fumes that were everywhere in the interior. There was noise, too—of crushing loudness.

  Proceeding on, he encountered pyramids of cannonballs set in their deck monkeys. Stepping around them, he saw what looked to be a small forge fire, then realized unhappily what it really was. The Confederates were preparing to ready hot shot. They meant to do battle in the nastiest fashion.

  The gun ports were open. Ducking down as he went along, Harry stole glances of the shore, surprised at how slowly they were moving. The Union squadron would be ready. They had been warned. But what could they do?

  He found himself in a narrow passageway, repeatedly having to flatten himself against its walls as crew came through from both directions. Finally, he grabbed hold of one young seaman and asked where Buchanan could be found. The youth pointed out the way and Harry pressed on. Inexplicably, his injured arm now began to hurt, sharply at first, then with a duller, throbbing pain.

  He lurched through the hatchway indicated, emerging into a remarkably crowded space. Buchanan, a beaky, older man, was in the midst of a crowd of uniforms, standing near the helm and complaining to an engineering officer about leaks. A river pilot was standing just to the side of him, looking steadily through an open, forward-facing hatch and calling out the course to the helmsman.

  Harry moved along the wall to gain a better view of the other officers. He finally saw Mills off to the left, conferring with another man in uniform over a map or some engineering plan.

  When Mills failed to notice Harry standing before him, Harry touched the lieutenant’s shoulder, an inconsequential act among old acquaintances but an impertinent one aboard a warship. Mills looked up, ready to snap, then froze, his mouth hanging open slightly. “Raines? You?”

  “Hello, Palmer.”

  “What in damnation are you doing on my ship? You’re supposed to be in Chimborazo. Damn all, I shot you, Raines!”

  “Not well enough, Palmer. Just tore out a little skin, though it hurts, I will say.”

  “I could have killed you—should have. If it weren’t for this fool regulation against dueling …”

  “Lieutenant Mills!”

  It was Buchanan, his hawk-like face flushed with color.

  “Sir?”

  “What is this altercation? Who is this man?”

  Mills stammered. “No altercation, sir. He’s from Richmond.”

  Harry waved his faithful letter. “From General Lee, sir.”

  Buchanan’s complexion darkened further. “I’ve not authorized you to be aboard this ship. All civilians were to go ashore. We’re under way, damn it! Remove yourself from this deck!”

  Obedient, Harry started for the exit. Mills, highly agitated, followed close behind.

  “What is it you want, Harry?” he said, when they reached the companionway beyond. “Haven’t you plagued my life enough?”

  “I need a question answered.”

  “You came all this way to ask me a question? For God’s sake, man. Arabella’s dead. Your man Caesar Augustus is dead. You and I have fought a goddamned duel. Can you not now drop this thing? Has it made you crazy?”

  “Just one question. Can you tell me of a slave child, one that Arabella was going to have sold down the river?”

  Mills furrowed his brow. “A slave child?”

  “Yes. Marked for sale.”

  “There may have been such a child,” Mills said, finally. “But I think it ran off.”

  “Was it Estelle’s child?”

  “I don’t keep close watch on the domestic lives of those people. What have you done with that woman?”

  A seaman hurried by, carrying a leather-handled metal box.

  “I took her to Belle Haven.”

  “That’s theft.”

  “No, she came on her own. Who was the father of this child?” Harry asked.

  “Damnation, Raines, with these darkies, you never know.”

  That was hardly true. Harry’s father kept track of the bloodlines of his slaves as dilligently as he did his horseflesh—to Harry’s immense disgust—for the very same reason.

  “Was it your coachman, Samuel?”

  “Could have been.”

  “How about my man Caesar Augustus?”

  “You’d know that before I.”

  Someone was calling out Mills’s name.

  “Palmer,” Harry said. “Your Samuel is dead.”

  “How can that be?” Mills stared at him. “You kill him?”

  “Estelle did.”

  “Estelle?”

  “He was coming at me with an axe, and she shot him.”

  Mills grabbed Harry by the shoulders and thrust him back against the bulkhead.

  “What more you goin’ to cost me, Raines?” He shoved him again with even more vehemence. “What else? Am I goin’ to lose my commission now, ’cause you took a mind to follow me onto this ship?”

  A sailor was at Mills’s elbow. “Captain Buchanan wants to see you right away, sir.”

  Harry shook himself loose from Mills’s grip, then reached into his pocket, removing the two carved African figures he’d retrieved.

  “A moment more, Palmer,” he said, extending them in his hand. “Have you ever seen these things before?”

  Puzzled, Mills took one, holding it up to whatever light was in the corridor. He returned it, shaking his head.

  “No. Damned slave nonsense.” He took a step, then halted. “I’m going to have you put ashore at the first convenience, Raines. Then I don’t want you to come near me—ever again! I swear, you come back to Richmond, you’re dead!”

  He stalked off, the sailor following. Not a minute later, two marines appeared, each taking Harry by an arm.

  “This way,” said one.

  They took him a deck below, to a small officer’s cabin containing a table, chair, closet, and bunk.

  “You’re to wait here,” the marine said. “Lieutenant Mills’s orders.”

  “What is this?”

  “His cabin.”

  There was a small, hanging lantern, but it was not lit. When they closed the door, he was left in darkness. Harry heard the click of a lock.

  He struck a match, and retrieved the lantern. Striking another, he touched it to the lantern wick.

  One of Mills’s uniforms hung on the back of the door. It would be folly to put it on. There weren’t but a dozen officers on the ship, and they’d all be well known. His next stop would be the brig, if this peculiar vessel possessed one. After that, the gallows.

  Leaving the uniform unmolested, he set about a search of the tiny cabin. The most interesting thing he found was a bound packet of letters, which he quickly perused. They were florid and dramatic, in places quite passionate, and quoting Shakespeare’s sonnets. All were unsigned—though he knew the hand to be Louise’s.

  Inside a drawer, he discovered a photographic carte de visite portrait of Louise, along with a framed, formally posed daguerreotype of Arabella and a little girl, along with another photographic plate of Bella when she was younger, possibly about the time she and Harry were trothed.

  He pondered it sadly, then returned it to the drawer. The one of Louise, however, he pocketed.

  For a while, he lay back on Mills’s bunk, listening to the noisy throb of the Virginia’s gigantic steam engine and the wash of water just the other side of the hull. They were not traveling very fast. Whatever her virtues as a warship, they did not seem to include speed, and her deep draught could be dangerous in bodies of water as full of shoals as Chesapeake Bay and Hampton Roads.

  If only he had some means of informing the Union forces across the water of these facts.

  Harry took out the two figurines. He hadn’t examined them very carefully, assuming them to be nothing more than little totems from Caesar Augustus’s interest in the dreadful Voudon that had been more his mother’s religion t
han slave camp Christianity. Harry remembered that Caesar Augustus had kept one of them on his person. Now two.

  He took off his spectacles and held one of the objects close. As he had not realized before, it was highly detailed—a miniature work of advanced craftsmanship. The head was much like the African masks he had seen his father’s slaves sometimes making, and was clearly male. Placing it now gently down on the mattress, he raised the other to his eye.

  Just as clearly, it was of a woman.

  Harry sat up, rubbing his chin. Then he stood up. Taking out a now very soiled handkerchief, he wrapped the two figures with great care and placed them deep in a pants pocket. He put his wallet and his pocket pistol in the other.

  He had to get off this boat.

  Chapter 23

  From time to time, Harry heard running footsteps in the companionway outside, and once, voices just outside his door. But no one disturbed him. He doubted he’d been forgotten. More likely, he’d been put out of mind until Buchanan’s more pressing concerns were dealt with. If there was to be a battle, he’d be left here. The cabin was below the waterline, and presumably safe.

  Unless, of course, the Virginia sank.

  Crouching by the keyhole, he got out his penknife—thankful that they’d not bothered to search him for weapons—and worked Boston Leahy’s magic on the lock. Opening the door just enough to steal quick peeks both ways down the corridor, he listened. He could hear a noisy mingle of sounds, including men shouting, but nothing near. Overall was the rhythmic thump of the engine. He closed the door, then extinguished the lantern. He’d wait.

  A very long time passed—easily an hour, possibly more. The ship’s passage was so regular Harry found himself lulled almost to sleep. Then came the sudden sound of a cannon shot. It was loud, and apparently near, but not from this ship.

  Reopening the door, then closing it as several sailors trotted by, he stood back against the wall, just as the cannon, wherever it was, fired again.

  Harry could stay in this confinement no longer, but he knew he’d be spotted the moment he went outside. If Mills’s officer’s coat was too dangerous and useless a disguise, there were at least a hundred and maybe two hundred crew aboard. Being taken for one of them would be much easier.

  After thinking a moment in the dark, he removed his coat, waistcoat, and shirt and made a bundle of the garments, which he set carefully by the cabin door. Off came his boots and socks next, placed beside the bundle. The ship’s interior was hot. If there weren’t sailors dressed in this informal fashion yet, there would be once the engagement truly got under way. Harry doubted he’d have to wait for very long.

  The cannon fired again, sounding a bit closer. Harry heard a concussive whang against the hull, and then the splash of water. It was time.

  Putting his spectacles carefully in place, he stepped out into the corridor. The shouting, apparently coming from the Virginia’s gun deck, was vociferous now—generated more by excitement than command.

  There were several wooden buckets under the stairs leading to the main deck. Harry took one and started up the steps. There was dirt and oil aplenty. He stopped to smear some over his face and shoulders, then, head down, made for the guns, trotting quickly along the raised gangway that ran between the twin lines of cannon.

  No one stopped him. He didn’t halt until he had reached the far end, where a Parrot rifled cannon pointed through the forward gun port over the bow. Crouching by a support beam, he was able to see forward, though his view was only of open, empty water, with a thin line of land at the horizon. Moving to the other side, he found a better vantage point. He could see the source of the cannon fire, a Union steam tug apparently armed with a Parrot rifled gun of its own. It fired two more shots, then turned, heading toward what appeared to be Newport News.

  “You, sailor!”

  He’d been discovered. He rose, turning toward the voice, hoping it wasn’t an officer.

  It was, but he had found no fault with Harry greater than malingering.

  “Why are you larking about there, you lazy son of a bitch?”

  “Sir?”

  “Get down to the magazine. We’re going to need more powder. Forward.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  Harry was uncertain just where the magazine might be, but guessed amidships, not far from the wide main staircase. That proved near enough. He told an enlisted man he encountered he’d been sent for powder but had gone to the wrong place. The man gave him a curious look, but then provided directions. It occurred to Harry the fellow was in fact malingering himself, having perhaps a reluctance to be on the gun deck as the Virginia chuffed on toward battle.

  The crew stationed in the powder hold were happy to oblige him with enough to be toted but much heavier than Harry had expected. Shouldering it, he started to trudge away, when he was halted by a sailor’s voice.

  “Where’s your station?” the man asked.

  “Forward gun,” Harry said.

  “You’re supposed to tell me that.”

  “Aye, aye.”

  He managed to get his load to the gun without stumbling, whereupon the officer commanded, “More!”

  Other crewmembers were performing the same chore. Harry got in line with them. Every time he returned to the forward Parrot, he stole a look through the ports.

  There were now two high-masted frigates in view, the tug heading for the one at the left. The alarm had been given in the Union fleet and black smoke was pouring from the funnels of smaller vessels anchored nearby as they got steam up.

  As Harry thunked down the sixth package of explosive, the wound on his left arm hurting badly, the officer told him to leave off his fetching and stand by.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Harry retreated to the nearest beam, crouching down again to look through the gun port. The Virginia was turning, but with dismaying slowness—another flaw in the supposedly invulnerable Monster. This was indeed to be a sea trial—of the most hazardous kind imaginable.

  Rising slightly, Harry squinted for a view of the Virginia’s bow. There was no wind at all now, and nothing at all in the way of waves, yet water was coming over the foredeck.

  Of a sudden came the sound of more explosions. They’d drawn nearer the point of land and Harry could see puffs of smoke rising from the Union batteries. One of the high-masted frigates then unleashed a rolling broadside. All the shots fell short.

  The steam tug had taken the other frigate, on the left, under tow, bringing it around so that all of its guns would bear. As soon as it had done so, the ship’s beam side flamed with cannon fire. Harry heard splashes and then more accurate thumps and bangs of a rain from hell, as cannonballs and shells struck the Virginia’s forward deck and casement. Struck and bounced. Harry was some forty feet from that iron plating and, except for the hideous noise, could discern no effect.

  Buchanan was holding his fire. The ironclad continued its lethargic turn, an inexorable, malevolent force ignoring the defense fire as a mastadon might flies. This sangfroid was perhaps too bold. When the range closed more, the enemy shot might prove the master.

  The “enemy?” Harry had been in the Confederacy too long. He belonged on one of those Yankee ships lying off the bow—or, more preferably, on the land beyond.

  The Virginia’s guns were now all loaded and primed, the gun crews standing by in taut anticipation. Both the Union frigates had the range now and were whipping the ironclad with solid shot and explosive shell.

  Again no effect, though a few sparks and metal fragments spattered through the forward gun port when a shell exploded just below it.

  The Virginia still made no reply. The officer was shouting at him, but Harry couldn’t hear any of the words. Not knowing what the man wanted, he ran again for more powder, wondering when the Virginia would fire its first shot.

  When he returned, the officer had gone. He set down the powder package and sat on it.

  Whang!!! Solid shot hit the Virginia’s upper plating just a few feet from Harry’
s head, showering him with a sooty dust. He moved behind the support beam. It was difficult to discern much out the gun port now, as the Union guns had laid so much smoke.

  Mills and another officer entered the area, examining the walls and ceiling for damage. He stood for a moment just inches from Harry, looking up at the beam, then he moved on, as though Harry was not there.

  More fusilades. More crashes and banging. More sooty dust. Here at least was open ventilation, though sweat continued to run down Harry’s back. He wondered how hard this must be on the men below the waterline.

  A gunner officer barked an order loudly enough for Harry to hear—a command to spread sand on the decking around the guns. Harry knew enough about naval matters to understand the point of that. The sand would soak up blood.

  The Virginia had completed its turn and now was heading straight for the high-masted frigate on the left. As the Federal fire continued to strike, cannons bellowed on either side of the Virginia. She had picked up escorts Harry hadn’t noticed before, and they were announcing their presence and intent.

  An officer descended from the upper deck and rushed to the lieutenant in command of the gun deck. It was difficult to make out everything he said, but Harry picked up “captain” and “signal for close action.” Then came, “Run out your guns!”

  The well-trained crews leapt to the task. Harry’s view forward was obstructed by some of their efforts, but he could see they were steaming steadily toward the left frigate, the progress grudging, but inexorable. All the while came the maddening thuds of the cannonball rain, interspersed with exploding shells.

  One member of the Parrot crew was proving too enthusiastic for his own good, in his haste knocking loose several heavy round shot from their stack, one of them rolling over his foot. Hopping on one leg, howling from pain, he brought operations to a halt until the gunnery officer intervened.

  “Get yourself to the surgeon,” he hollered. Looking about, he took happy note of Harry. “You, take this man’s place.”

  “Never worked a gun crew before, sir.”

  “What? What’s your duty station?”

  Harry tried to think. “Haven’t been assigned one yet, sir. I came on as a last minute replacement.”