She hissed again, a low, animal-like sound, ramming the derringer into the bridge of my nose between my eyes. “No! You try to trick me. I kill you now!”
My unfortunate situation permitted a close-up examination of her weapon. It was a single-shot .41-caliber Remington lady’s gun—the favorite of princesses and prostitutes. It had a maximum accurate range of maybe fifteen feet but was quite deadly at this range. I further noted the hammer was cocked back and her trembling finger was tightening on the trigger. She was going to kill me. Whether by intent or accident, the result would be the same. My move would have to be very fast.
It was.
I ducked my head to the right, Clara’s left. At the same time, I brought my right hand up and clamped down on the derringer, wedging my index finger into the notch between the hammer and the firing pin just as she pulled the trigger. She tried again, but the hammer wouldn’t strike. It couldn’t—my finger was blocking it. Our faces were only five inches apart. I saw the rage being replaced by panic as she realized her deadly gambit had failed.
My left hand groped for her other hand before she could pull another weapon on me. I found and crushed the hand in mine. Her terror was real. The type of men with whom she typically consorted wouldn’t hesitate to kill her. She tried tears and remorse. “No! Don’ shoot me! I am sorry!”
Rork was on her by then, removing the derringer and roughly pushing her back down onto the bed. I twisted her arm behind her back, ordered Law to find something to bind her with, and told Rork to search her carefully for other weapons. Law used a curtain cord to lash her hands behind her back and a towel to gag her. Rork’s impolite search yielded two sheathed stilettos, one on each thigh, and a small razor blade within the barrette in her hair.
I leaned close to her ear. “It appears you aren’t much of a lady, Clara, so all agreements are off.”
Rork’s usual relaxed outlook had disappeared. He was in his ruthless combat mode now. Clara was the enemy and quite capable of getting us killed.
“What’re your orders, sir?” He said it with the clear insinuation of what he thought should be my orders—eliminate Clara as a threat. It would take maybe five seconds, depending on the method. She caught his mood plainly and whimpered through the gag, her eyes pleading against what she knew was coming.
Once again I studied this hideous example of womanhood. She deserved no consideration. No civilized society on earth would welcome her. And yet I hesitated in deciding her fate because that very fact bothered me.
Was I getting old and sentimental? Perhaps. After a lifetime of intimate encounters with death, and my more recent escapes from it, I was tired of the lifestyle. I also knew Clara could be eliminated as a threat without requiring another death by my hand or decision. Per her own orders, the other inmates of her emporium wouldn’t try to contact her until dawn, three and a half hours away. In the meantime she could be rendered incommunicado. By the time she was discovered, we would have escaped to sea and she would have a lot to explain to a government interrogator. Those men wouldn’t hesitate to torture someone like Clara Aguila.
In the few seconds it took for me to conduct this analysis, her face morphed from terror into miserable resignation. My decision would surprise her, and I knew that soon she would gloat over my weakness. But Clara wasn’t thinking far enough ahead to see what was ultimately coming her way.
“Bind her hands, arms, legs, and feet tightly, Rork. Make sure the gag is lashed down tight also. Then leave her alive, under the bed.”
While Rork and Law were carrying out my order, I ripped off a patch of peeling wallpaper and wrote a simple note to Clara. It thanked her for helping us escape and promised even more money when she reported the details of the Spanish defenses to me. I put it in my pocket, to be placed later in an appropriate place I already had in mind.
Then I waved good-bye to the trussed form under the bed. Clara’s evil eyes glared at me. I thought of the girl she kept zombie-like on opium as her life ebbed away. What would I do to someone who did that to Useppa? Clara would find out soon, when she least expected it. As the French say, “Revenge is a dish best served cold.”
I led our way out the window, dropping down onto the landau and heading across the alley to find the carriage driver. With any luck at all, by the time the sun came up we’d be having a decent breakfast on board a U.S. warship, my message to General Shafter would have been delivered by messenger, and my Cuban nightmare would be over.
40
Carlito
Santiago de Cuba, Cuba
Sunday, 3 a.m., 3 July 1898
WHEN WE WOKE HIM in his straw bed in the barn, Clara’s driver was far more obliging than his mistress. Once I assured him she had fully approved of our enterprise, he was on board with the idea. I neglected to mention the price, and he unwittingly offered us a discount—the ride would be only twenty Mexican gold pesos.
Carlito was a boy of maybe fourteen, with the same worldly eyes as the girl who’d answered the brothel’s door but far more vigor. As he got the horse and rig ready, we learned more about him. He’d been working for the brothel for three months, a step up from his previous life as a street urchin, earning the job by stabbing a man he saw hurting one of the girls on the street. He now ran errands for the girls and their clients, tended the brothel’s horse and landau, and was the personal servant and self-proclaimed “guardian” of Señora Clara.
He stated the last with a puffed-up chest and lowered voice while fingering the homemade dagger tucked in his rope belt. His work at the brothel had obviously inculcated a strong sense of discretion, for the youngster expressed no surprise at either our nationality or our plan. He wasn’t a laggard, either, pocketing the five-peso deposit without a moment’s delay. I decided to keep young Carlito in mind for future purposes. One never knows …
We got under way at twenty-five minutes past three a.m., with Carlito on the open driver’s seat up front and the three of us squeezed inside the small landau. We quickly closed the curtains all around, with one exception. Rork sat right behind Carlito, making sure the kid saw the uncovered spike of Rork’s false left hand poking out between the front curtains, just inches from his spine.
The city was quiet as the swaybacked nag lethargically dragged us down the street to the south and the bay. Evidently, the search for us had been called off. We only encountered one group of three constables sauntering along on patrol. They recognized the landau and waved to Carlito. He explained he was taking some drunken officers back to the naval dock.
The policemen laughed, saying the officers would be in big trouble, for the fleet’s officers had gotten strict orders to be back on their ships by midnight. That little tidbit caught my ear and started my mind working. The Spanish fleet hasn’t moved in weeks. Are they getting ready to come out and fight the Americans at dawn? What would that do to my plan?
We rounded the curve of Calle del San Basilio and saw the naval station headquarters building ahead, the same one we’d hurtled past a few hours earlier. It was tranquil now, with only a few sentries, but I saw lights in several windows. Some staff officers were working very late on a Saturday night, which I thought odd. Then I smelled a familiar acrid smoke: funnel gas, a combination of coal smoke and embers. There was a haze of it in the air, coming from the lower bay where the Spanish warships were anchored.
Rork noticed it too. “Spaniardos’ve fired up the boilers, sir. Just started, by the smell’uv it. Somethin’s afoot with their fleet, I’m thinkin’.”
“I’m thinking you’re right, Rork. Today might be the day they make their move. We need to get out to sea and warn our ships.”
Our conversation was ended when the landau drove up to the naval headquarters’ sentry post. Following his orders from me, Carlito casually reported he had three drunken officers from Clara’s place in the back, and they needed a boat from the officers’ landing to their ship. The boy did it so casually I realized he’d probably said the same thing many times before, a routine occurren
ce of no importance. The sentry wasn’t as casual, though. He nervously asked for the officers’ identities so he could report them to his officer of the watch inside the building.
The three of us inside the landau got our weapons ready, but Carlito never missed a beat, spontaneously creating three names for the sentry, adding that the men were heading out to the flagship. It was an inspired addendum, for no one would hinder officers going to the flagship. My respect for the kid went up a notch. Clearly, he would become a famous politician or criminal mastermind someday.
“Get ready to drive out of here fast, Carlito, if they demand to talk with us,” I said in muted Spanish through the forward curtain.
The sentry returned moments later and said we could pass onward to the wharf, whence the officers would ride out to the flagship with the captain of the port, who was about to depart in his personal launch. He would meet us at the landing in a few minutes. Then, unknowingly, the sentry dropped a bombshell into my plan when he gave the name of the captain of the port. Boreau.
Rork cursed under his breath. I exhaled slowly, willing myself to remain calm and think logically. Of all the officers in the Spanish navy, the last one I wanted to see was Captain Julio Boreau. As Carlito drove the carriage through the naval depot toward the officers’ landing, Law asked Rork why we reacted to the name Boreau.
“’Cause that sonofabitch knows us by sight. An’ a truly nasty piece o’ work he is. Boreau’s father was a lieutenant in the Spanish secret police who tried to kill the good captain an’ me a couple o’ times over the years. The bastard even came to our home in Florida tryin’ to kill our entire family, if you can fathom that.”
Law asked, “What happened?”
“Ooh, he got his final comeuppance when Captain Wake gave him the permanent deep six in New York Harbor. That was back in ’86, an’ ever since then, his son Julio’s been after us both. Julio’s as bloody crazy as his father, an’ damned if the little bugger didn’t nearly have us a couple o’ times.”
“I lost track of him after ’95,” I added. “He was on a staff assignment at Cádiz, back in Spain. And now he’s here in Santiago as captain of the port? This billet’s a hell of a demotion for a career navy officer. With his political connections he should have made admiral by now.”
Rork huffed, “Nay, even the Spaniardos can spot a bloody lunatic, sir. ’Tis a wonder his own lads haven’t shot ’im by now. Bet they want to.”
The landau stopped alongside the water’s edge. I peeked out the curtain at a steam launch, her little stack puffing away with full pressure as she sat at the landing. The tide was high, and the gunwale was level with the dock, making it easier for us to board in a hurry. The three-man boat crew was standing by. I heard them conversing quietly about the landau’s possible passengers.
I whispered up front to Carlito in Spanish, “Do you see a senior naval officer anywhere?”
“No, sir,” he whispered back. “It is only us and the sailors by the boat. They are waiting for him but looking at us now. I will tell them there are drunken officers inside the carriage.”
My original plan had been to board the launch by pretending we were prisoners under freedom of parole, on our way to breakfast with the Spanish admiral on board his flagship. Once the launch was in the darkness at the middle of the bay, we would commandeer it and go to Norden. There, we’d buy off Bendel and steam out of the bay to our fleet offshore.
That was before the unforeseen complications of the Spanish fleet preparing to get under way and Boreau joining us on the launch. As with most of my plans of late, events forced me to cancel this one. We’d have to take action right away at the landing and seize the launch before Boreau appeared.
“The sailors are pointing toward an officer walking this way from the building,” murmured Carlito. “I think he is the Captain Boreau the sentry spoke about.”
I looked out the side curtain, covertly examining the boat crew. To my mates I said, “We’ll have to take the boat now. When I give the word, we rush the crew, knock them out or push them in the water, and get her under way. I’ll take the bow man, Rork gets the engine man amidships, and Mr. Law gets the coxswain aft. The coxswain is the only one armed—a holstered pistol in his belt. Remember, no shooting if we can help it. We don’t want to alert the sentries and raise the alarm, or we’ll never get away from the landing. Quickly and quietly, gentlemen.”
They both got ready. I placed the wallpaper note about Clara on the floor of the compartment as if it had inadvertently fallen there. Leaning forward through the curtain, I handed Carlito the rest of my remaining Mexican gold ten-peso coins.
In deliberately slow Spanish, I told him, “Your days of working for Clara are over, Carlito. When we jump out, I want you to drive fast out of here. Get away from the naval depot. Leave the landau somewhere on the other side of the city and immediately get far away from it. Try to get out of the city and to the Cuban army. Do you understand?”
“Thank you, sir. Yes, I understand!”
“Good luck, Carlito. Live a good life. I hope we meet again.”
Closing the curtain, I noted my pocket watch said 3:35 a.m. I gave the order, “Now!”
The three of us leaped out of the landau. We were on the boat in an instant, knocking the stunned sailors overboard with blows to their heads. Behind us, young Carlito wasn’t tardy in seizing his new opportunity. Smacking his horse’s rump, he got the old beast into a run toward the entry gate, yelling to the sentries that his horse was out of control—yet another excellent extemporaneous cover story that both allowed him to exit and diverted their attention from what we were doing at the boat.
The sputtering coxswain recovered quickest. Pistol in hand, he reached up for the gunwale to reboard the boat. Rork ended that notion with a roundhouse whack of an oar to the fellow’s forehead.
Law cast off aft and took the helm as I cast off forward. Rork engaged the gear, and the launch lurched ahead, gathering speed. Law put the tiller hard over and steered out into the bay. Soon we were moving at five knots.
So far, the commotion of the runaway horse had captured the notice of everyone at the station. Even Captain Boreau—I confirmed it was him when he walked under a streetlamp—headed toward the gate at first. Then the Spanish sailors we left in the water began yelling louder to alert their compatriots.
We were a hundred yards away when the first shot rang out.
41
My New Command
Santiago Bay
Sunday, 4 a.m., 3 July 1898
LUCKILY, THE FIRST Spanish shots were wide. That soon changed. A discordant series of whistles blared forth. Bellowed commands echoed across the water, and a ragged volley of rifle shots came down the bay. The riflemen were firing systematically around the arc of the bay. It was blind firing but effective. The next volley proved far more accurate, forcing us to duck below the gunwales. The one after that struck the water to our left in a near miss.
I had the helm by this point. Law was helping Rork feed coal into the boiler fire, but the fire was already at its peak. The boat refused to go faster than about five knots. I did some quick calculations. It was almost two miles to Norden, three and a half miles to the Spanish fleet anchorage, and eight to the nearest American ship offshore—a long way to go in a small launch capable of only five knots. With forts and emplacements on both sides of the bay near the mouth, the enemy fire would turn into a hailstorm when we reached that part of the journey. Topping everything else, the eastern sky would begin to lighten in about an hour and a half—right about the time we got in front of El Morro. Colonel Melgar would enjoy that.
The timing would be very close. Still, I thought we had a chance at making it most of the way to the fleet offshore, if we could remain obscured in the darkness of the bay as we headed south. Fortunately, we were burning coal instead of wood, which would’ve shown a shower of sparks. Even so, I warned Rork to watch for any telltale embers escaping from our tiny stack and to reduce the boiler fire if he saw them
. Other than these efforts there was nothing else to do. We were steaming south as well hidden as we could be.
My hope of concealment ended seconds later.
A white shaft of light beamed out from atop the naval station’s headquarters building and slowly swung south along the bay’s western shore. We were half a mile away from the dock when it stopped and settled on us. We were lit up as if by the sun. I expected a barrage of artillery fire, but none came.
“No forts on the shoreline this far up the bay,” opined Rork. “An’ we’re out’uv effective range o’ their rifles finally. The bastards can see us but not hit us with rifles out here.”
Law tapped me on the shoulder and pointed behind us. “Ah, Captain, there’s a boat back there close to the naval station, and she’s heading this way.”
Rork peered back and pounded his right hand down on the thwart. “Oh, hell, Mr. Law’s right, sir. An’ she’s a Ligera-class gunboat, like those buggers we fought at Isabela.”
Law looked questioningly at Rork, who explained, “Forty-two-millimeter rapid-fire gun on her bow, an’ a nasty piece o’ work. That was what nailed Captain Wake in the face. They’ve got a Maxim machine gun on the stern, as well. Her speed’ll be maybe nine or ten knots, if she’s been maintained well, which I’d wager your pay for a month she probably hasn’t.”
“She’ll be on us in ten minutes at the most,” I said, glancing aft and then to the shoreline on the port bow. “Look, I think that’s the iron company’s railroad pier over there. It’s just beyond the main defense line outside the city. They’ll probably have some small work dinghies. We’ll head there, go alongside a dinghy, transfer to it, and set this launch on a course to the west, across the bay. Hopefully, the searchlight and gunboat will follow the launch while we go down the shoreline in the dinghy. Get ready to jump in a dinghy, men.”
Honoring the Enemy Page 25
