“Ah. Chatfield. Report, please.”
“We have clear seas, Captain, save for three fishermen to northward. And, sir? We have thrown over the log-line and Mr. Crabtree desires me to report a speed of nine knots. Current course: northeast by north, a half north. The wind has veered a point, and remains steady.”
“Thank you, Chatfield,” Richard said. He was leaning over a chart laid out on the cabin table and held in place by small stone blocks at the corners. “Your watch is relieved at four bells, correct?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Very well. Report to me again at that time.”
“Aye, Captain.”
Richard returned to his chart of the western Mediterranean. Bracing his legs to counteract the sharp heel of the schooner, he gripped a parallel rule firmly in hand and walked it from the compass rose to their last position of dead reckoning an hour ago. Agreen was sailing Falcon as close to the wind as she could lie, so the wind veering a point had brought them a point southward. He picked up his dividers and measured nine sea miles on the latitude scale at the side of the chart. Using the dividers to measure that distance along the edge of the rule, he penciled a light line on the chart from their last position and indicated their new position with a tiny bold circle, carefully noting beside it the time and reported compass heading. By his reckoning they were now roughly twenty miles from the Spanish port of Cartagena, on an approximate line of latitude of 38 degrees north, with the Balearic Islands dead ahead over the horizon. By sunset, he calculated, they could make their southerly jog through the wind and proceed close-hauled direct to Algiers, assuming the wind remained as is.
The chart indicated that Algiers lay four hundred miles almost due east of Gibraltar, a fifth of the way along the two-thousand-mile Barbary coastline stretching from Salé, Morocco, eastward to the city of Derna in Tripoli. Falcon could not sail due east—strong headwinds from the Levant prevented it—but due east was not Richard’s preferred course. When he learned that he would be sailing without a Royal Navy escort, he had plotted an indirect route along the Iberian Peninsula, keeping just beyond sight of land and sailing with topsails furled to render Falcon less conspicuous to another vessel. His chosen course increased the distance on this leg of the voyage by one-half, but that did not trouble him. It was a safer route. The British flag fluttering on his ensign halyard, coupled with the laissez-passer Jeremy had given him, afforded some comfort. But he was in no position to tempt Fate.
Since leaving Gibraltar two days earlier, he had ordered the men to sleep by the guns on their regular starboard and larboard watch rotation. Keeping the men on deck and maintaining a high level of readiness was essential for the safety of the schooner as well as the mindset of the crew. It was a tiring regimen, but they would soon drop anchor off the coast of Algiers. As for himself, the knowledge that a large part of his family’s fortune resided directly below him in the hold—and that he alone was responsible for its safekeeping and delivery—was enough to keep him on his toes. And so it would continue, he realized, until he and Eagle’s crew were well clear of North Africa.
Wearily he sat down at his desk and reviewed, once again, the numbers as he understood them. He had with him seven chests of hard specie worth $68,000 in U.S. currency, $9,000 more than bin Osman had demanded two years earlier from American envoy John Lamb for the release of Eagle’s crew. Nine thousand dollars seemed a good and necessary hedge, and Richard again gave silent thanks to Henry Hardcastle for his unexpected generosity—something he had done more conspicuously in a letter he had written his father-in-law from Gibraltar.
Still, certain questions remained unanswered. There was no way for Richard to know who else might be imprisoned in Algiers. His primary mission was clear—to secure the release of Eagle’s crew—but could he negotiate the release of other American sailors in the event he found any? Certainly, as an envoy of his government he had to try. He did know that the crews of Dauphin and Maria had originally been taken to Algiers in 1785. But the French Foreign Ministry had reported that most if not all of them had been sold into slavery elsewhere along the Barbary Coast. If that be true, though, why had the dey allowed the crew of Eagle to remain intact in Algiers? Precise figures were hard to come by because nations rarely publicized the price they paid to ransom their citizens. But it was rumored that both Russia and Sweden had recently paid $1,500 per able-bodied seaman, and $2,500 for an officer. If that be true, why were the ransoms being demanded for American sailors so high—almost twice as much?
His thoughts were interrupted, briefly, by a report from Phineas Pratt. Conditions were unchanged, Pratt announced, though Dr. Brooke had come topside, clearly feeling the effects of a rolling sea.
Richard nodded, with sympathy. The good doctor was no sailor and had suffered bouts with seasickness throughout the voyage. Yet overall he seemed quite content. On occasion he had joined the three ship’s officers at supper and had regaled them with stories about his experiences in the Continental Navy, stories that became ever more fanciful as more rations of rum found their way into his glass. That was before Gibraltar. Once Falcon had departed the British fortress, Richard had suspended rum rations for everyone, himself included.
Thirty minutes later there came another knock on the door.
“Reporting as ordered,” Peter Chatfield said as he respectfully entered the small cabin. “Sea conditions and course remain the same, Captain. We have sighted what looks to be a Spanish felucca, but that is all.”
“Thank you, Chatfield. Please be at your ease.”
Richard gazed up fondly at the ruddy-faced, tow-haired youth. The two were well acquainted. Chatfield lived three houses down from him on South Street, and his parents were close friends of Richard’s own parents. At nineteen, he was Falcon’s youngest crew member. Nonetheless, he could hand, reef, and steer as ably as any man aboard, and he performed every task asked of him without complaint. He could also play a tune on the fiddle to lift the soul of even the most salt-encrusted tar. Plus he had another God-given talent—the reason Richard had summoned him today.
“Chatfield,” Richard said, “you are a fine sailor, and you have helped keep morale high aboard ship since our first day out of Boston with your music. I am glad that you are with us. If you continue in our service, a brilliant future awaits you.”
Chatfield blinked, caught off guard by the unexpected praise from his captain and employer. “Thank you, sir,” he said somewhat sheepishly.
“However,” Richard went on, “in Algiers I shall have need of another of your skills. You are a gifted artist, Chatfield. I have seen many of your drawings and sketches. Your attention to detail is quite extraordinary, especially when it comes to landscapes.”
“Why, thank you very much, sir,” Chatfield replied, more boldly this time, the pride of the artist showing through.
“As you know, from Algiers we are sailing north to the naval base at Toulon. The French government has granted us entry for a limited time to allow Eagle’s crew to receive medical attention as necessary and to recuperate before we head for home. From Toulon, Mr. Crabtree and I will be traveling to Paris to meet with Captain Jones. I am commissioned by our government to pass along such intelligence about Algiers as I am able to gather. He and his delegation will use that information in their mission to the Barbary States, which we can assume will take place soon after our new government is installed. Captain Jones will be negotiating peace treaties there, as well as the release of all remaining Americans held prisoner in North Africa.”
“I understand, sir,” Chatfield said. That information was common knowledge aboard Falcon. Richard had explained it to the crew soon after they had departed Boston.
“Here’s where you come in, Chatfield. As soon as we reach Algiers, I want to put your artistic skills to work. Specifically, I want you to draw whatever you see—the city, the harbor, the islands, the fortifications, everything—in as intricate detail as possible. I don’t know how much of this sort of thing Captain Jones
may require, but I do know he can’t have too much information. Since we won’t be in Algiers a long time, you will have to work quickly and diligently. When I go ashore, you will accompany me as my aide-de-camp. Take mental notes of what you see, write down what you can, and sketch everything when you get back aboard. This will be your sole responsibility from the moment we arrive in Algiers to the moment we leave. I have made Mr. Lamont aware of this. Do you have any questions?”
“No, Captain,” Chatfield said.
“Good lad. And Chatfield,” Richard added offhandedly, “there’s a reason you’ll want your artwork to be at its best. Captain Jones himself will be reviewing your drawings—as, I suspect, will General Washington.”
“General Washington, sir?” Chatfield gulped.
“Quite possibly,” Richard assured him. “And others of his cabinet as well.”
THE CITY OF ALGIERS faced eastward on the western slope of a wide, horseshoe-shaped bay sculpted into the dry hills of North Africa, so later that afternoon Richard ordered Falcon through the wind, on a new course south by east. If the wind held, they should sight El Marsa at the bay’s northeastern tip by the evening watch of the next day, their fourth day out of Gibraltar.
Falcon’s American-style schooner rig did not go unnoticed as the ship crossed the Mediterranean. On three occasions the lookout reported glints of sail to the south or east that appeared to be on a course of interception. As before, Richard took no chances, assuming every vessel of consequence they encountered was a pirate. He ordered evasive action, relying on the schooner’s speed to outrun any would-be predator.
The third vessel, spotted rising to windward during mid-afternoon, proved more difficult to shake off than the first two. She was a three-masted barque, the largest vessel they had encountered since leaving Gibraltar. The schooner’s inherent advantage over a square-rigger—her ability to lie two points closer to the wind—was no advantage now. Falcon was already close-hauled, sailing by the wind; the barque was upwind with the wind at her back, presumably her fastest point of sail. Richard had two choices: he could either try to outrun her as the schooner currently bore, with North Africa somewhere over the horizon and with the barque closing on an oblique angle of interception; or he could do what he did: wear his ship around, order the two topsails shaken out, and flee back toward Spain with the wind on the starboard quarter, Falcon’s fastest point of sail. When Falcon showed her heels, the barque at once adjusted her sails in pursuit, keeping pace and even seeming to narrow the gap between them until the black cloak of a moonless night settled over the Mediterranean, ending the chase. When Agreen ordered the crew to bring her back around and shorten canvas for night sailing, Richard resolved to keep the two fore-and-aft sails reefed throughout the next day and to approach Algiers under cover of darkness.
RICHARD SET HIS course toward the mammoth Bay of Algiers and the lighthouse that the chart indicated was on Penon Island, the largest of numerous islands scattered about the approaches to the city of Algiers. Their vast number and varying sizes reminded Richard of the islands of Casco Bay at the approaches to Portland, Maine. Jeremy had informed him that there was also a fort on Penon, an island connected to the mainland by a man-made mole, and he had described other seaward batteries apart from the city to the north and south. Fort Barbarossa to the south, named after the red-bearded Turkish grand admiral whose galley fleets finally drove the infidels from Algiers in 1529 and ended more than two centuries of Spanish occupation, was the crown jewel of Algeria’s defenses.
Richard decided to delay his final approach into Algiers until dawn, lest an unknown vessel without proper identification signals attempting to breach the harbor defenses by night set off an alarm. He was expected here, and he would sail in under American colors. His understanding of diplomacy was that so long as he remained within the bay, in sight of Algiers, his diplomatic credentials protected him and his crew from harm or capture—unless, of course, he somehow offended the dey.
Its connection to the mainland gave Penon Island the shape of a sideways L running west to east out into the Bay of Algiers. The lighthouse was on the island’s northern tip. On its southern end, the fort guarded the entrance to the inner harbor, accessed through a sizable gap in a breakwater running a half-mile southwestward on a straight line toward Fort Barbarossa. As Richard took in that smooth-faced, well-maintained breakwater, the thought sprang to mind that here, no doubt, was where American slave laborers, his brother among them, had endured many tortured hours.
As Falcon approached Penon in the relative cool of early morning, Richard stood by Agreen at the tiller. He held his breath, forcing himself to concentrate on the schooner’s course and to act as if the fort’s massive cannons, about to come to bear at point-blank range, were of minor consequence. Falcon’s crew took their cue from the officers, though no one, including Richard, could resist a glance at the two-tiered alabaster fortress looming off to starboard. Above it, at the pinnacle of a towering, slender, unadorned turret, an enormous green flag bearing a long white crescent stirred lazily to life in the awakening breeze. Below, on the parapets, turbaned soldiers in white with a red sash slanted across their chests kept vigil among rows of massive black cannon, the bore of each barrel as wide and menacing as the largest guns on a Royal Navy First Rate.
“We’re through,” Agreen said casually once they had sailed beyond the threat of instant annihilation. “Where to, Captain?”
Richard slowly let out his breath as he surveyed the inner harbor with a spyglass. It was a fine anchorage, the many islands at its approach and its two breakwaters providing shelter against foul weather coming from any direction. What vessels he could see lay quietly at their moorings, and they made for an eclectic collection. Anchored within the shadow of the fort was a flotilla of narrow-beamed xebecs, most with three lateen-rigged masts, the two largest carrying a square sail on the foremast. Nearby were three other vessels of distinctive pedigree: an old-fashioned Portuguese caravel with a high poop deck; three highprowed galleys equipped with oars and a single mast that appeared to be built along the lines of an ancient Viking raider; and an odd-looking three-masted polacca, a local merchant vessel, with lateen rigs on her foremast and mizzen framing a square rig on her mainmast. He searched about, to no avail, for the barque that had pursued them two days before. Nor did he find Eagle, although that came as no surprise. She had either been sold off, he speculated, or presented as a gift to bin Osman’s overlord in Constantinople.
Richard pointed toward a stone jetty jutting out into the harbor from shore. “Might as well go all the way in,” he said. “There’s deep water in there, and I see no advantage in anchoring out here. There’s no easy escape from this place, should it come to that.”
“Can’t argue with you there,” Agreen replied. In a louder, more authoritative voice: “Stations to drop anchor! Trim the sheets there! Stand by to douse the jib!”
As the schooner glided in toward the jetty, Richard walked forward with his spyglass. He focused the lens as he swept the glass up and down, right and left, taking in a city set slightly back from the harbor and encased within a ten-foot-high wall that followed the contours of the outermost structures in remarkably straight lines. The two outer walls, to the north and south, ran up a gentle slope of hills and slanted inward toward each other without actually meeting at an apex to form a triangle. Instead, the top of the triangle appeared to be lopped off, with the two sides connected north to south by a much shorter wall. Algiers thus appeared as a giant trapezoid facing eastward. Within those walls, Jeremy had informed him, lived more than fifty thousand people.
At first glance the city seemed remarkably clean, almost blindingly white, the stark stone of its multistoried, flat-roofed buildings reflecting the rays of the early morning sunlight so fiercely that he had to shield his eyes from the glare. Since the walled city lay upon the slope of the hill, it was easy to pick out individual buildings. Certainly he had no trouble identifying the most imposing structure of all, situa
ted a quarter of the way up the trapezoid. Built centuries ago as a fortress for the ages, it rose a majestic one hundred feet into the air amid a complex of stately buildings and a grand mosque surmounted by an enormous white cupola. Towering over the mosque, and attached to the side of its Moorish-arched entryway, was a single, thin minaret with what looked like a whaling ship’s crow’s nest attached to it three-quarters of the way up. Richard collapsed the spyglass, thinking that Jeremy had not exaggerated when he described the magnificence of the royal palace known locally as the Qasbah.
“You have your work cut out for you,” he said crisply to Chatfield, who was standing by the fife rail at the foremast, absent-mindedly flaking out a topmast sheet as he took in the sights. “I suggest you get to it.”
Chatfield looped the coiled rope over a belaying pin. “Aye, Captain,” he said.
Richard walked aft. “Mr. Lamont,” he directed the mate, “you may call the men to breakfast. Please ask Whiton to send up a pot of coffee for Mr. Crabtree and me.”
“Right away, sir,” Lamont said.
Richard joined Agreen at the taffrail, as caught up as his crew by the strange and exotic landscape that stretched out before them. Together they watched the palm-rimmed city stirring to life within its walls, and even more so outside them, amid a sea of white tents so numerous that they seemed to be laying siege to Algiers. Caravans, Richard speculated, preparing to set off into the great sandy wilderness of the Sahara Desert. Here and there they saw camels loping lazily among thickets of date palms and fruit orchards, and they were close enough to hear the distant Arabic of men engaged in morning routines. Richard’s eyes swung back to the base of the city, to the wall directly ahead at the end of the man-made mole where a huge rectangular entryway with a triangular roof gave access into the city. Camel drivers were leading in a troop of the single-humped beasts; on either side of the gate, attached to the outer rampart high up near an esplanade on top of the seaward-facing city wall, were five structures that looked like giant black meat hooks. Richard dared not speculate on what those evil-looking monstrosities might be used for.
For Love of Country Page 13
