Ratcatcher mh-1

by James McGee

  “Now we wait.”

  Hauling back on the oars, Jago cursed his creaking bones and reflected that he hadn’t done this much hard labour since he’d left the army. His palms were raw from the scrape of the oar handles. In the Rifles, he had always prided himself on his fitness and stamina, but he was a civilian now, damn it. He should be taking it easy, enjoying the fruits of his labours, not running around like a bloody lunatic. It was all Hawkwood’s fault, of course. Give the man an inch and he took a bloody mile. But Hawkwood, all things considered, was probably the closest thing Jago had to a friend. And if there was one thing the army taught you, it was that you stood by your friends. And Hawkwood had stood by Jago more times than the ex-sergeant could count. Now, Hawkwood was in trouble. It was time to repay his debts.

  Jago paused, twisted in his seat, wiped sweat from his brow, and looked downriver. Without the advantage of height, his view was restricted by the ever-changing flow of traffic. He could no longer see the sailboat with Sparrow at the helm, and he was beginning to wonder if he’d imagined it. He swore viciously. No, it had been Sparrow he’d seen, he was certain of it. But so what? He didn’t know for sure that Sparrow even had a connection with Lee and his undersea boat. On the other hand, Sparrow had been a mate of Spiker’s and, though the link was tenuous, it was all he had to go on. Nathaniel Jago was running on instinct. He tried not to think about the consequences if he was wrong. They were worrying enough if he was right.

  I know you’re out there, Sparrow. I can bloody smell you! So come on, you bastard, show yourself!

  Without warning, a gap suddenly widened between the vessels ahead of him, giving a clear view of the open stretch of water beyond, and it was then that he saw it. The sailboat was some five hundred yards over the port bow. The vessel didn’t appear to have made much headway since his last sighting. It was still hugging the eastern side of the river, close-hauled against the oncoming breeze. But then, even as Jago watched, the stern of the sailboat began to come around.

  An angry bellow erupted from Jago’s starboard side. A heavily laden bumboat was on a collision course. Jago dug in his oars as the vessel cut across his bow, heading for the Dog and Duck Stairs.

  “Move your bloody arse!” Jago bellowed. The bumboat wallowed past with infuriating slowness. The tiller-man raised an angry fist. The gesture was accompanied by a torrent of oaths. With his way eventually clear, Jago, echoing the tiller-man’s curse, plunged the oars back into the water and began searching urgently for his quarry.

  Where the hell was it?

  Jago blinked. The sailboat could hardly have been out of his sight for more than a couple of minutes at the most. There was no way it could have made it to shore in that time. It had to be out there somewhere. He should have purloined the spyglass, he thought, brought the damned thing with him. But Jago’s eyesight was good. He had been a rifleman, and riflemen needed the eyes of a hawk to target enemy officers. So Jago narrowed his eyes and scoured the river. Plenty of similar vessels about, but not the one he was looking for. No sailboat with a brandy keg at the stern. Shit and piss!

  Then he saw the arm, pointing.

  The arm was attached to a crewman on a dirt boat. The dirt boat was cutting across the river, probably en route to the Deptford yard with a hold full of ballast. Something had caught the crewman’s eye. Jago followed the direction of the outstretched arm, squinted hard. There was something in the water.

  A barrel, bobbing incongruously with the current, probably lost overboard by some passing lighter or merchantman; nothing to get excited about. And yet…Jago looked back at the dirt boat. The crewman had been joined by one of his mates. Both of them were pointing now. It seemed an undue amount of attention for a discarded wine cask.

  Wine cask?

  Jago stood up, stared harder, and watched as the cask sank slowly beneath the water. Not a single ripple marked its passing.

  Christ on a bloody cross!

  Showing remarkable speed for such a big man, Jago dropped down into the boat and scrambled for the oars. Nathanial Jago had walked the cold stone passage of Mandrake’s warehouse as if the Devil had been on his shoulder. Now he began to row as if the Devil was at his heels.

  “What happens if it sinks?” Hawkwood asked.

  Lee glanced up from his pocket watch and frowned. “It’s a goddamned submersible. It’s supposed to sink.”

  “I don’t mean on purpose,” Hawkwood said. “I mean if something happens. How do you get out?”

  Lee appeared unperturbed by the likelihood. “You detach the keel, and float up.”

  “And if that doesn’t happen?”

  “Then you hold your breath, and pray.”

  Hawkwood stared at him.

  Lee sighed. “If you can’t detach the weight of the keel, the only way out is through the hatch. But you can’t simply open it and swim out. The incoming water pressure would be too great. The only way would be to open the valves and allow the hull to flood. Once the hull’s flooded, there’s equal pressure inside and out. Only then could you open the hatch and swim to the surface.” Lee chuckled darkly. “I commend you, Officer Hawkwood. Your desire for self-preservation is quite admirable. Futile, but admirable.”

  Lee snapped his watch shut. “But enough. The tide’s reached its height. Time we were making a move, Mr Sparrow. Stand by to take her up.”

  Lee relayed crisp instructions and the submersible began to rise. Lee pressed his eye to the forward window. “Hold!”

  Hawkwood sensed that the top of the submersible’s tower had breached the surface. He watched Lee. The American was concentrating on the river and studying his watch and compass, taking bearings.

  Sparrow took the opportunity to remove his shirt. Clothed, Sparrow’s physique had seemed insubstantial. Now, Hawkwood could see the man was wiry rather than thin. As a deckhand, Sparrow would have been no stranger to ropes and rigging and manual graft, and the muscles in his upper body and his flat stomach hinted at both strength and stamina. Sweat glazed his chest and forearms. Hawkwood found himself staring at the seaman’s back. Sparrow’s flesh was a mosaic of crisscrossing scar tissue. The scars were old, Hawkwood saw, but there was no disguising what they were: the legacy of a severe flogging, possibly more than one. It probably explained why, like Scully, he was working for the American. Another abused, disaffected seaman-in all likelihood a former mutineer-looking for vengeance.

  Eye pressed against the tiny window, Lee’s hands moved to the rudder controls. “Now, Mr Sparrow. Steady as she goes.”

  Sparrow began to turn the crank. His effort was accompanied by the sound of cogs meshing, as if a clock was being tightly wound. The Narwhale vibrated. Hawkwood felt the vessel shift on its axis. Slowly, the submersible began to come about. At first, the movement was uneven, but as Sparrow eased into his rhythm, progress through the water became smoother. Only the hypnotic click of the gearing mechanism and Sparrow’s breathing as he turned the propeller crank gave any indication that the vessel was in motion.

  Lee’s eye was glued to the tiny window. Occasionally his gaze would shift to the compass dial and his hands would alter the angle of the rudder to maintain the vessel’s course. He knew this would be the last time they could raise the Narwhale without attracting attention. After this it would be too risky exposing the tower so close to unfriendly eyes on ship and shore.

  Lee did not have a lot of room to play with. Even at the height of a spring tide, the river bottomed out at a little over three fathoms, which didn’t leave a great deal of leeway either above or beneath the hull. And over the years, the river had been gradually silting up. There’d probably come a time, not too far distant, when the dockyard would no longer be able to handle ships of large tonnage. As it was, Deptford was too far upriver, with insufficient depth of water, to allow ships to sail down to the mouth fully armed and victualled. Current practice, once a ship had been launched, was to rig a jury mast and float her down to Woolwich, where she would be docked, coppered and rigged in prepar
ation for sea trials.

  And HMS Thetis was about to make that first auspicious journey.

  The warship looked mightily impressive, Lee conceded, as he peered through the glass. As bright as a new pin in the morning sunshine. He could see that the jury mast had been raised. Cut from a single Norfolk Island pine, it rose tall and slender, as straight as an arrow from her midsection, A temporary boom had also been attached. Bunting and flags fluttered gaily from every rail. It was going to be a grand occasion.

  He could see movement at her bow and stern as the crew made final preparations for departure. A tremor of excitement moved through him.

  Hawkwood looked over his bound wrists, saw the American stiffen and sensed they were close and that Lee probably had the target in his sights. Which meant that he was fast running out of time. Lee was about to commence his attack and there wasn’t a thing he could do to stop him.

  “She’s a beautiful sight, my friend.” Lee grinned. “But you’ll have to take my word for that.” Lee turned. “Pity she’s going to end the day as kindling. Steady, Mr Sparrow. We don’t want any mishaps this close to home.”

  The submersible moved ahead cautiously and Lee pressed his eye to the glass once more. He was looking for defences, festoons of netting, fenders, a ring of decoys-anything that would indicate that they were anticipating an attack. But, astonishingly, the ship appeared to be unprotected. Lee recalled Hawkwood’s attempted bluff, when the Runner had told him he had men outside the warehouse. There had been no men, no support, no reinforcements. Hawkwood had been on his own. Which indicated that Hawkwood’s assertion that the authorities knew about the attack on Thetis had also been an exaggeration. They undoubtedly thought the attack was going to take place further downriver, in the estuary, not in the middle of London. Lee grinned to himself. Damned fools! He was about to deliver a blow that would shake the British out of their complacency.

  Lee gave the order to submerge. As silently as a ghost, the Narwhale sank beneath the waters of the Thames. Less than two hundred yards separated the submarine from its unsuspecting prey.

  19

  “You’ve got a choice, Corporal,” Jago growled. “Either you find Chief Magistrate Read and bring ’im here, or else you take me to ’im. Either way, you’d better be quick, or else I’m going to tear your bleedin’ head off, piss down your neck, an’ go and look for ’im myself. What’s it to be?”

  The marine gripped his musket and swallowed nervously. An angry Jago was an awesome sight, and the corporal who had stopped Jago at the top of the dockyard jetty stairs was beginning to regret his dedication to duty. Not that he’d had much say in the matter; his orders had been clear. Halt and prevent all unauthorized personnel from entering the dockyard area. The directive had been handed down by Sergeant of Marines Burnside, and where Corporal Elias Watkins was concerned, Sergeant Burnside’s word was law. So the corporal stood his ground.

  “Can’t do that. You ain’t got authorization.” The corporal stumbled over the last word.

  Jago reached under his jacket. “This here’s all the authorization I need, laddie.” He held out Hawkwood’s baton. “So, why don’t you stick your neck back in, and you and me can take a little walk. What about it?”

  The corporal looked Jago up and down.

  “Right now would be a good time,” Jago hinted ominously.

  The corporal regarded the baton, its royal crest, and the fearsome expression on Jago’s face, then took a cautious look over his shoulder. Indecision furrowed his brow. Finally, after what seemed like an age, he shouldered his musket.

  “You’d best come with me.”

  The big warship lay at anchor, paintwork gleaming. Her two-decked hull was mustard yellow, her upper wales and gunports jet black. She dwarfed the flotilla of smaller dockyard support vessels that hustled and bustled feverishly around her high chequered sides like worker ants around a queen.

  Cutters, buoy boats, hoys, pinnaces, skiffs and lighters scurried between ship and shore, loaded to the gunwales with equipment and victuals, while yachts, yawls and gigs transported officers and men with all the dexterity of waterborne sedan chairs.

  Her name was inscribed boldly for all to see on the counter of her stern: Thetis.

  The dockyard rang with the sounds of industry. Enclosed within the yard’s stout protective walls were all the workshops and raw materials vital to maintaining the British Navy’s command of the high seas. From launching and building slips, wet and dry docks, mast houses, boat ponds, saw pits and timber berths to tar and oakum stores, sail lofts, rigging-houses, rope-walks, smithies and copper mills, and accommodation for a score of other trades besides.

  Adjacent to the dockyard lay the huge victualling yard. Had the capital, by some cruel circumstance, found itself in the grip of a deadly epidemic, the chairman and commissioners in charge of the navy’s Victualling Board could rest easy, secure in the knowledge that the Royal dockyard and its workforce would emerge from the plague unscathed. All they’d have to do was bar the gates. The yard was as self-sufficient as a small town. Aside from dry-storage facilities, the Deptford yard boasted its own bakery, brewery, cooperage and slaughterhouse. This was evidenced not only in the sounds that carried across the water but also in the smells that accompanied them. Some pleasant, like the warm aroma of freshly baked bread and biscuits and fermenting hops, some not so agreeable: the pungent odour of boiling tar and the sweet, sickly whiff of cow shit, untreated hide, fresh blood, and offal.

  James Read stood by the side of the launching slip and surveyed the activity before him. His right hand toyed idly with the handle of his cane.

  “You think she’ll pass muster?” The voice came from the man at his side.

  Commissioner Ezekiel Dryden was tall and loose-limbed. His heavy-lidded eyes and languid exterior gave the impression of a lifetime spent in idle pursuits. Dryden, however, was a former naval captain, as were the majority of dockyard commissioners. He had commanded ships in action. Now he was in charge of both the Deptford and Woolwich dockyards. He had full authority over all dockyard personnel, both military and civilian, and movement of all vessels therein. He reported directly to the Navy Board.

  James Read looked pensive. “She’ll have to. I fear time’s against us.”

  A movement on the dockside diverted the Chief Magistrate’s attention. Two men were approaching, a marine and a civilian. Read’s heart quickened.

  The marine drew to a halt and saluted. “Beggin’ your pardon, your honour…” But he was given no chance to expand as James Read held up a hand.

  “Thank you, Corporal. You may go.”

  The corporal blinked at the curt dismissal. He looked towards Dryden, as if seeking some kind of moral support. When none was forthcoming, he glanced at Jago with renewed respect and not a little confusion.

  “Don’t let us detain you, Corporal.” Commissioner Dryden’s dry voice broke into the marine’s thoughts.

  “Yes, sir. Very good, sir.” Discipline finally overcoming curiosity, the corporal gave a flustered salute, shouldered his musket, and turned on his heel, no wiser than he had been before the big man had arrived.

  Read wasted no time. “You have news, Sergeant?”

  Jago nodded. “Aye, an’ none of it’s good.”

  “Explain.”

  Read and Dryden listened in silence as Jago described his own entry and investigation of the Mandrake warehouse. Read’s expression grew even more severe as Jago described his discovery of the clockmaker’s corpse.

  “God in heaven!” Dryden, though a seasoned officer, experienced in the harsh reality of war at sea, was plainly shaken by the cold-blooded murder of Josiah Woodburn.

  “And Officer Hawkwood?” the magistrate prompted. “You say there was no sign of him?”

  Jago shook his head. “It’s my guess they took ’im.”

  Read frowned. “Took him where?”

  “On board with ’em.”

  The magistrate looked taken aback. “On board? You mean the s
ubmersible?”

  “I reckon.”

  “God almighty!” Dryden said. The commissioner turned and stared balefully out at the river.

  From the other side of the wall, separating the dockyard from the victualling yard, there came a sudden mournful lowing followed by a succession of ear-piercing grunts and squeals; the cacophony heralding a fresh intake of stock, newly arrived from Smithfield. Somewhere nearby, a hammer clanged against an anvil. The reverberation was followed by a wail of invective. While in a distant corner another, more strident voice, could be heard berating some hapless unfortunate for botched workmanship. Life in the yard went on.

  “And you definitely saw the craft submerge?” Read pressed.

  Jago hesitated. “You’re askin’ if I’m positive I saw the bloody thing. Can’t say as I am. All I can tell you is that the boat was there one minute and gone the next, Sparrow along with it. Could’ve been the top of a bloody barrel that I saw go under, could be the two shit-shovellers were lookin’ at something else, but if it was this submersible you told us about, then it’s still out there-” Jago nodded towards the water. “Somewhere.”

  All three men gazed out at the river. The water looked suddenly deeper and darker and infinitely more menacing than it had a few moments before.

  “So what do we do now?” Jago asked.

  The Chief Magistrate remained silent. Dryden looked down at his shoes. Jago didn’t like the way they were avoiding his eye. “We’ve got to stop the bloody thing! What about the captain? What are we goin’ to do about him?”

  James Read continued to gaze at the river. “Officer Hawkwood, I fear, is on his own. If he is on board the submersible, then we must pray that he finds a way to disable the vessel and gain the upper hand. If not, then there’s nothing any of us can do to assist him.”

  Jago swore under his breath. They were not the words he had wanted to hear, even though he knew the magistrate was right, “But what about the ship? You’ve got nets out, right? And patrol boats?”